by Steve Laube

It is a good exercise to reflect on the past year. Count the blessings, reflect on the hard lessons, and remember the good times.

The highlight was bringing both Tamela Hancock Murray and Karen Ball into the agency in late May. I was and continue to be very excited about the talent and work these two are doing on behalf of our clients.

That hard work had visible results as we secured sixty-four (64) new book contracts that will cover 113 new books. That works out to a new contract every four business days.

There were some challenges with three authors having their contracts cancelled for a variety of reasons. This is never easy, but it can happen.

Keeping track of the blistering changes in the industry would give any sane person whiplash. Amazon’s surge and Border’s demise gave many of us pause. I read over 150 pages of industry related material each week in an attempt to keep up. I like to joke that an agent’s job is to keep track 24/7 because the industry can change on Tuesday. This was proven last month when two major personnel changes were announced on the same day at two different firms…and that day was Tuesday.

The biggest publishing news event was the sale of Thomas Nelson to HarperCollins. (click here for my thoughts on that event.)

Our client list grew exponentially with the addition of Tamela and Karen. We now represent over 150 authors. It is an honor and a privilege to serve such a talented group.

We redesigned the web site early in the year which created the infrastructure to ramp up our blogging efforts. Having three agents allows us to share the blogging load so each person takes one day while I also collect weekly news articles and find something lighthearted to share each Friday. The number of regular readers has tripled since mid-year.

I spoke at seven different writer’s events around the country and also attended my 30th consecutive ICRS convention in July.

On a personal note my wife and I celebrated our 30th Anniversary and we took an Alaskan cruise along with my brothers and their wives. What made it even greater was being able to watch our daughter perform 14 times in 10 days since she was one of the dancers on board the Sea Princess. We topped off our trip by visiting my parents to celebrate my father’s 90th birthday. Then later in the year we celebrated the 100th birthday of my wife’s grandmother.

Here is wishing you all a happy new year!