In Remembrance: Nancy Love 1928 - 2010

Nancy and I were friends for 30 years. She was a loyal and generous friend who was always up for a trip, an outing, an adventure. She was passionate about her work and about seeing the world. We traveled to Turkey and Cuba together, sharing digs that were crummy, odd (in a cave) and grand. Her Sag Harbor country house became almost a second summer home to me, and it's very hard for me to believe that I will not be picking her up at 65th Street and Lexington Avenue on our way out to the country, chatting about politics, movies, the book business, and mutual friends.

Nancy was dedicated to ASJA, which is why friends who would like to honor her memory should donate to the Writers Emergency Assistance Fund.

Nancy was a role model to many of us. She lived a full, independent life as a single woman, reinventing herself from writer to editor to literary agent, along the way. She showed us how to age gracefully—never complaining, always entertaining, and bringing people together. Two weeks before she died, I had her to my apartment for dinner and she was telling me about her plans to launch a website! She was a life force, elegant and energetic to the end.

—Eleanor Foa Dienstag, ASJA past president

When I decided 14 years ago, after many years as a journalist and author, to become a literary agent, I was told by the last book editor I worked with that I shouldn't do it. He warned me that agents as a breed were sneaky, creepy, not to be trusted, and generally despicable.

Obviously, he had never met Nancy Love.

If I was going to be a literary agent, I wanted to be the kind of agent Nancy was: smart, self-deprecating, hard working, and no-nonsense, with a real love of books and authors. When I started out in the book business, I didn't know much about how to be a literary agent, and to help me learn, I organized a monthly agents' lunch group, comprised of established agents who were helpful, generous, and kind. So naturally, that group included Nancy.

I learned so much from Nancy—as did all of us in our lunch bunch. Not just about contract clauses to pay attention to and editors to avoid, about not getting ruffled when authors acted crazy, and dealing with downturns in the book publishing business—but, most of all, just enjoying how lucky we were to have careers we loved. Sure, we all complained about something or other that had happened to us during the previous month, but we also knew full well that we were the envy of many. By the end of each get-together, and certainly after each holiday lunch—celebrated at Christmastime at wonderful places like the Plaza Hotel's Palm Court or the Russian Tea Room and always toasted with champagne—Nancy helped remind us that we could work hard, see some wonderful books we shepherded get published, be real allies to our clients (and to one another), and truly enjoy our lives. Nancy knew that the life of a literary agent was a great one, and how lucky we were.

Nancy was clearly the elder stateswoman of our group of seven, but with her unflagging energy and her slim, sturdy body and her countless exotic trips—to Mongolia, to Vietnam, to Cuba, to Cambodia—we never knew her age, nor questioned it. Which is why when she suddenly announced she probably could not attend our lunches anymore, we were all surprised. We expected Nancy would always be there at Danal every second Wednesday, or announce yet another far-flung vacation, or a weekend trip home to Sag Harbor—certainly not get sick.

Our merry band of seven agents is now down to six. How did that happen? We still don't believe that we won't be seeing our smiling Nancy—in the summer months wearing her big-brimmed straw hat, in the winter months in her puffy white down coat—heading back to her home office after one of our gripe-and-laugh-filled lunches, to make a deal, to lend support to her clients, to put her personal stamp on her books.

And what of that editor who told me long ago that literary agents were awful? What did he know? What a shame he never met the one agent who more than lived up to her name: Love. Nancy Love.

—Linda Konner, ASJA, literary agent

Nancy is survived by her children, Judy Love and Steve Love, four grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren. Rather than flowers, it was suggested that tax deductible contributions be made to Writers Emergency Assistance Fund, payable to "ASJA Charitable Trust," 1501 Broadway, Suite 403, New York, NY 10036. A memorial service was held on Sunday, July 18, 2010, Temple Adas Israel, Sag Harbor.