All About Comps By Jennie Godfrey

This blogpost is for anyone in the position of querying agents/pitching their book who struggles with identifying comp titles. I know that for some writers, providing comps is like writing a synopsis; a necessary task, but one to be hated and feared.

Why use comp titles at all? Why are they useful?

I have a different perspective, one that comes from being a bookseller as well as a writer, in that I really enjoy identifying comp titles, for my work and other peoples. The reason is simple, it’s the quickest and most efficient way to describe and recommend a book to someone.

Customers don’t usually have endless amounts of time for you to describe a book and all it’s themes/why they should buy it. Providing a recognisable comp title or two allows them to make a decision quickly about whether it sounds like something they might like to read or not.

It’s similar with agents. While they will get a sense of your book from your letter and synopsis, providing comps is an easy way to cut through the noise and encapsulate the feel of a book. So here is my guide to identifying and using comp titles in pitching your book.

NB: please bear in mind that this is MY perspective, take what’s useful and discard the rest.

What is meant by a ‘comp title’?

I really get the negativity around providing comp titles. Who wants to reduce their work to being just like someone else’s? Isn’t the whole point to be original? Well, yes, but remember that there is nothing new under the sun and providing a comp title doesn’t mean that you are saying ‘this book is exactly like my book.’

What a comp should do instead is give an agent a shortcut to the feel of your book in the most accurate and positive way possible. It’s a way to shine the best light on your work and I hate to go all Gen Z on you, but a comp is more about ‘vibes’ than it is about direct comparisons, and those ‘vibes’ can be about any aspect of the book, with some ideas/examples below.

1)    The premise – does your book have a similar start point/hook as another one? For example, my debut has two young girls trying to solve a mystery (therefore one of my comp titles is The Trouble with Goats and Sheep)

2)    The writing/prose – is your writing pared-back/lyrical/poetic? Which other writers could be described that way? For example, one of my writer friends is Chloe Timms (who wrote the Seawomen) and her prose is lyrical in the way that I think Sophie MacIntosh’s work is.

3)    Plot/structure –regardless of the characters, is there any similarity in how the books works/is structured? E.g., feminist retellings of Greek myths.

4)    Protagonist – does your main character share traits with another? Are they of a similar type? A tortured artist? A stand-up comedian? A reclusive young woman?

5)    Setting – e.g. If your book is set in the Australian outback, is it possible it might bear some similarities to other outback noir books?

Often a book is best described as a combination of two (and sometimes three) titles in what Jonny Geller (CEO of Curtis Brown Group) calls ‘bridging’ (you can watch his You Tube here https://youtu.be/mD-uP2BsVy4). This is where you use more than one title to demonstrate the new place the book takes the reader. It doesn’t matter if it’s a ‘weird’ mix if it accurately represents your book in the best possible light.

Again, I will use my own book as an example here – when it came to querying The List of Suspicious Things, I already had The Trouble with Goats and Sheep as a comp (see above) but because it’s set in West Yorkshire, is dark (!), and uses dialect in the dialogue, I combined it with A Kestrel for a Knave (or the film Kes) to give a more accurate flavour of the book.

I can already hear someone saying ‘but I’ve heard the rules are that it has to be published within five years’ which leads us nicely onto:

What are ‘The Rules?’

This is an interesting one. As far as I know there aren’t any. But there are some agent preferences, guidelines, and some common sense, which often morph into ‘rules’ when they appear on social media enough times (see also how many social media followers’ writers need to have).

My rule of thumb is; if you find yourself getting lost in the made-up rules/what so-and-so says on Twitter (including people like me!) then just keep reminding yourself to choose whatever comp represents your book most effectively. That’s all that really matters.

Having said that, there are some common-sense things to think about:

1) Using recent & well-known titles (broadly 5 years) – there is more likelihood that the agent will have read or at least heard of them that way. Also shows a level of commercial currency to your own work

2) Not using the biggest selling book of the year/decade as your only comp – it paints you into a corner and there’s a fine line between confidence and arrogance, tread it carefully.

3) Think about film and television too – it’s all writing – and who wouldn’t want to read Succession in book form (for example). My current WIP has a Happy Valley vibe to it, and I’m very happy with that.

And if your best comp title doesn’t fit into the guidelines (e.g., A Kestrel for a Knave would be too old) use your judgement. I decided that the agents I was querying would definitely have heard of, if not read A Kestrel for a Knave and that in combination with The Trouble with Goats and Sheep it was the most accurate and best way to represent my work.

Here are some tips to help you to identify yours:

Think about your book as a whole and consider the aspects identified earlier in this blogpost. Some useful prompts to think about are:

1)    Who might my book sit on the same shelf as?

2)    Who might my book be for fans of?

3)    Who would you put me on a panel with at a festival?

4)    What ‘family’ is my book in (even if it’s a second cousin twice removed!)

And if you really struggle with this, I would start by thinking about the last book you read, or any book you’re not attached to emotionally, and come up with comp titles for it using the prompts in this blogpost. You can even use the classics for this - and have fun with it. There is no right or wrong.

For example, here are two recent books I loved, and the comps I use in the shop to recommend them:

Lady MacBethad by Isabel Schuler – Shakespeare, but make it Taylor Jenkins Read

Are you Happy Now by Hanna Jameson – Leave the World Behind meets Modern Love          

I recognise that it helps if you read a lot, which I do, but if you don’t then ask someone who does – you can ask your beta readers for their thoughts, or any bookseller friends, or Google (using keywords to describe your book). Apparently, you can also use some form of AI for suggestions (my technical knowledge doesn’t stretch that far) but that definitely is not necessary.

The trick with comp titles (which could also apply to life) is to think about what’s really important and let go of the noise. Find a way of describing your work in the most accurate and positive way possible – that’s what matters.

Good Luck!

Jennie Godfrey – May 2023

Author of The List of Suspicious Things: Published by Hutchinson Heinemann February 2024