What Publishers Want

...is very important if you want to sell your work.

I was just reading literary agent Kristin's blog post No Vampires Please, in which an editor at Random House expresses a desire for sf/f novels that DON'T have vampires in them, and in which the heroine is not a soulless killing machine.

That's not to say that another editor isn't still in love with the genre. But if you were submitting to this editor, you shouldn't send her your Anita Blake lookalike.

Getting the right story to the right editor is very important. That's what a literary agent is for - knowing what the different editors want and like and are likely to leap on like rabid dogs. Putting the right story in the right place at the right time is the best way to get it published.