You can find the full article with the annotations as to why these questions are important here.

Jim starts out by saying the following:

He suggests asking the following questions:

(be sure to read the full article for all his reason's WHY you should ask these questions)

• What about my book did you respond to?

• Do you have editorial feedback?

• What’s your editorial style?

• How long have you been with your agency?

• How many clients do you have?

• What is your typical response time to email/phone calls?

• How do you like to communicate (email vs. phone)? And how often do you communicate during a submission?

• What happens if you don’t sell this book?

• How many editors do you go to before giving up?

• What percentage of projects that you sign do you sell?

• How long is your average client relationship?

• Who do you work with to sell foreign/film rights? What is the agency’s support staff? Do you handle contracts? Rights? If not, who does?

• What does your agency agreement look like?

• Can I speak to one or two of your clients about their experiences working with you?

• [Specific to any author who wants to work in more than one genre]: Are you open to authors who work in multiple genres? And are there genres/age groups/etc. that you don’t represent? If I write something in one of those, what then happens?

And lastly, he shares a very brief what NOT to ask:

• How much can you sell my book for? How long will it take to sell my book?