Yesterday I received the contract for the next three Booktown mysteries. Now to sign on the (un)dotted line and mail the copies back to my agent.
Contract negotiation time is when you really, REALLY love your agent. No doubt about it, lawyers write contracts so that a non-lawyer can't understand them, and often head for the closest wall to bang his/her head against.
I read through the entire 14 pages of the contract and by the time I finished, my pupils looked like pinwheels. The most interesting thing(s) to me were the things my agent found unacceptable. The contract still retains the original wording, and now there's a line through the unacceptable wordage, and the new wordage is in boldface. Wordage that benefits me instead of the publisher.
I can't get into what she had them change -- it's just too complicated. Suffice to say it's good. And let me say it again. I really, REALLY appreciate my agent!
And best of all -- I have a month longer to finish the book than I thought I had.
Ahhhh...life is good.
