Agent to the Stars by John Scalzi (read me like a book .TXT) 📕

Legal Notes: This work is copyrighted by John Scalzi. The novel is freely given and may be freely distributed on a non-commercial basis, in whatever electronic format you please, as long as the work remains intact and unaltered and is attributed to me, John Scalzi. All other rights are reserved by me, specifically commercial and derivative rights. If you are interested in commercial and/or derivative rights, contact me.

If you enjoy this novel, a signed, limited edition hardcover is available from Subterranean Press. Read the details here. Order from Subterranean Press. 10% of every purchase from the Subterranean Press site benefits the Child’s Play charity. Also available on Amazon and BN.com, and other online booksellers. This edition is limited to just 1,500 signed copies. Get them while they last.

Also on sale: Check out my critically-acclaimed debut novel Old Man’s War.

Hi there.

In the summer of 1997, I was 28 years old, and I decided that after years of thinking about writing a novel, I was simply going to go ahead and write one. There were two motivations for doing so. First, I was simply curious if I could; I’d had up to that time a reasonably successful life as a writer, but I’d never written anything longer than ten pages in my life outside of a classroom setting. Two, my ten-year high school reunion was coming up, and I wanted to be able to say I’d finished a novel just in case anyone asked (they didn’t, the bastards).

In sitting down to write the novel, I decided to make it easy on myself. I decided first that I wasn’t going to try to write something near and dear to my heart, just a fun story. That way, if I screwed it up (which was a real possibility), it wasn’t like I was screwing up the One Story That Mattered To Me. I decided also that the goal of writing the novel was the actual writing of it — not the selling of it, which is usually the goal of a novelist. I didn’t want to worry about whether it was good enough to sell; I just wanted to have the experience of writing a story over the length of a novel, and see what I thought about it. Not every writer is a novelist; I wanted to see if I was.

Making these two decisions freed me from a lot of the usual angst and pain that comes from writing a first novel. This was in all respects a “practice” novel — a setting for me to play with the form to see what worked, and what didn’t, and what I’d need to do to make the next novel worth selling.

It worked. I picked a fun, humorous story — aliens from another world decide to get an agent — and I just let it take me where it wanted to go. I banged out the chapters on the weekends, using the weekdays to let my mind figure out what to do next. The writing was fun, and for the most part it was easy, and in three months, the whole thing was done (and just in time for my high-school reunion).

Once the novel was finished, I decided, what the heck, I might as well try to sell it. This was not particularly successful. The agents I shopped it to liked the writing, but said humorous SF was hard place; the publishers liked the writing but said humorous SF was hard to sell. I wasn’t terribly put out about this; this was a practice novel, after all. But on the other hand I thought it was good enough to let other people see it.

So in early 1999, I decided to put it online as a “shareware novel.” The premise was simple: People could read it, and if they liked it, they could send me a dollar, or whatever sum they liked (even if that sum was zero). If they didn’t like it, well, clearly, they wouldn’t have to send me anything. It was a no-risk proposition for the reader. I didn’t expect to see a dime from it, but as it turns out, over five years I made about $4,000 (well, I think it was about that much. I stopped counting after a while. I know I made enough to buy a laptop and lots of pizzas. More than enough).

Fast forward to today. My second novel, Old Man’s War, did indeed sell to a publisher, thanks in no small part to the experience earned writing this novel. And between the writing of this novel and the publication of that one, five other books slipped out of my brain, due in some measure to my confidence that I could write book-length works, be they fiction or non-fiction. In a sense, this novel is the midwife to every book since. For this reason alone, it holds a special place in my heart. It doesn’t hurt that it’s a fun story, too.

And now here it is for you to read. I’m no longer soliciting a dollar if you enjoy the novel; the story has long since proved its worth in that respect. I offer it freely to give new readers a sample of my writing (perchance to tempt them to pick up one of the other books), and to say “thanks” to those who picked up another of my books and were curious enough about the author to find their way here. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, and have enjoyed all the writing since.

John Scalzi

December 8, 2004