[shannon-polson Posts: 4 Status: Offline I love kids' books!]

Hi, I have a picture book I was hoping to start to shop around to agents, but as I started to look into it, several noted they were only accepting submissions from authors who also illustrated their own books, and there were mentions of the tricky PB market right now. Does anyone have any advice or ideas? Thanks!

[Debbie Vilardi Posts: 7,004 Status: Offline Language is so cool! WWW]

Keep looking. Keep checking back on agents you've looked at. Follow some on Twitter. Attend programs (if you can afford to), like some conferences and workshops, that may help you bypass the usual submission guidelines. 12 x 12 is a good one.

Also note that agents prefer an author to have three books ready to submit. This shows them you won't be a one-hit wonder. You can also look into small presses tht don't require an agent for submission. Good luck.

[Hopeful Posts: 227 Status: Offline I love kid books!]

There are also a few publishers, like Chronicle Books, that accept unagented submissions.  You can submit your manuscript directly to them.

[dkshumaker Posts: 1,448 Status: Offline WWW]

Agree with Debbie. Keep looking. There are certainly agents who take on PB authors who aren't also illustrators. The pbpitch website (www.pbpitch.com) has a list of picture book agents - actually, it's probably a bit outdated, I need to do some updates, but it's a good place to start. In addition, google "Monster list of picture book agents" or something like that. That list might be more up-to-date than the PBPitch one. The MSWL website (manuscript wish list) and corresponding Twitter hash tag might be helpful as well.

PBPitch is coming up on 6/9 if you are on Twitter. Agents and editors (of mostly small houses) stop by and heart pitches. They are selective, but we do get success stories every time. :-)

Best of luck!