In other words, they can only share what they want to
see in a query letter — their individual preferences and pet peeves.
# 1 thing
I see in query letters and book proposals: «I'm going to start a blog, get a FB page, start tweeting.»
Four young literary agents meet for an evening of food, drink, and conversation about how they find new authors, what they need to
see in a query letter, and the common mistakes writers should avoid.
There are many mistakes that I've
seen in query letters, but I will name just a few that would absolutely deter me from requesting the manuscript from an author.
Even if the manuscript comes in and it's rambling and long, if it has that spark that
I saw in the query letter, then I don't care if it's rambling, because I can fix that.
Not exact matches
You'll
see that we request all the salient elements typically found
in a
query letter: the title, premise, and length of the manuscript, your writing background, and your long - term writing plans.
It's amazing how you're able to «
see all the money»
in a book, then squeeze all that juice out of it and put it into a one - page
query letter.
Now that you're
seen my favorite sample
query letter read the next article in this free 15 - part series with my thoughts on Query Letter vs Syno
query letter read the next article in this free 15 - part series with my thoughts on Query Letter vs Syn
letter read the next article
in this free 15 - part series with my thoughts on
Query Letter vs Syno
Query Letter vs Syn
Letter vs Synopsis.
As you can
see in my previous post regarding
query letters, I kind of don't have any.
One of the tricks to a good
query letter is to write each one specifically to the needs of a particular agent, after you've done
in - depth research to
see what she's looking for.
You won't necessarily send this with your
query letter (this depends on each agent's submission policy); but even if you just send a
query letter first, you'll need to have the following material pre-prepared
in case the agent is interested and wants to
see more.
I have
seen publishers send a rejection without bothering with looking at the manuscript because the editing
in the
query letter was poor.
Click here now to read the next article
in this 17 - part series and
see the ultimate
Query Letter Sample Structure.
I
see Too - Late Thirty
in a lot of
query letters and book proposals when they discuss promotion plans, and it sends chills up my spine — and not
in a good way.
You should pay attention to the specific agent / agency's submission guidelines anyway, as they will all differ a little bit, but generally speaking,
in the US agents just want to
see a
query letter plus synopsis, and they will decide whether they want to read a sample of the actual book based on that.
View the
query letters of other writers (if the author makes it public) and sort them on a per - agent basis so you can
see just what that agent likes or dislikes
in a
query.
AbsoluteWrite — absolutewrite.com Book Country — www.bookcountry.com Critters Writer's Workshop — www.critters.org How to Write a
Query Letter — accrispin.blogspot.com/2010/08/how-to-write-query-letter.html Miss Snark (read the archives)-- misssnark.blogspot.com / AgentQuery — www.agentquery.com SlushPile Hell (how NOT to write a cover letter)-- slushpilehell.tumblr.com Preditors & Editors — pred-ed.com Writer Beware — www.sfwa.org/beware/ Duotrope's Digest — www.duotrope.com Ralan's SpecFic and Humor Extravaganza — ralan.com Strange Horizon's «Stories We've Seen Too Often» — www.strangehorizons.com/guidelines/fiction-common.shtml William Shunn's Manuscript Format Guide — www.shunn.net/format/story.html Writer's Digest — www.writersdigest.com Science fiction & Fantasy Writers of America — www.sfwa.org Horror Writer's Association — www.horror.org Romance Writers of America — www.rwa.org International Association of Tie - In Writers — www.iamtw
Letter — accrispin.blogspot.com/2010/08/how-to-write-
query-
letter.html Miss Snark (read the archives)-- misssnark.blogspot.com / AgentQuery — www.agentquery.com SlushPile Hell (how NOT to write a cover letter)-- slushpilehell.tumblr.com Preditors & Editors — pred-ed.com Writer Beware — www.sfwa.org/beware/ Duotrope's Digest — www.duotrope.com Ralan's SpecFic and Humor Extravaganza — ralan.com Strange Horizon's «Stories We've Seen Too Often» — www.strangehorizons.com/guidelines/fiction-common.shtml William Shunn's Manuscript Format Guide — www.shunn.net/format/story.html Writer's Digest — www.writersdigest.com Science fiction & Fantasy Writers of America — www.sfwa.org Horror Writer's Association — www.horror.org Romance Writers of America — www.rwa.org International Association of Tie - In Writers — www.iamtw
letter.html Miss Snark (read the archives)-- misssnark.blogspot.com / AgentQuery — www.agentquery.com SlushPile Hell (how NOT to write a cover
letter)-- slushpilehell.tumblr.com Preditors & Editors — pred-ed.com Writer Beware — www.sfwa.org/beware/ Duotrope's Digest — www.duotrope.com Ralan's SpecFic and Humor Extravaganza — ralan.com Strange Horizon's «Stories We've Seen Too Often» — www.strangehorizons.com/guidelines/fiction-common.shtml William Shunn's Manuscript Format Guide — www.shunn.net/format/story.html Writer's Digest — www.writersdigest.com Science fiction & Fantasy Writers of America — www.sfwa.org Horror Writer's Association — www.horror.org Romance Writers of America — www.rwa.org International Association of Tie - In Writers — www.iamtw
letter)-- slushpilehell.tumblr.com Preditors & Editors — pred-ed.com Writer Beware — www.sfwa.org/beware/ Duotrope's Digest — www.duotrope.com Ralan's SpecFic and Humor Extravaganza — ralan.com Strange Horizon's «Stories We've
Seen Too Often» — www.strangehorizons.com/guidelines/fiction-common.shtml William Shunn's Manuscript Format Guide — www.shunn.net/format/story.html Writer's Digest — www.writersdigest.com Science fiction & Fantasy Writers of America — www.sfwa.org Horror Writer's Association — www.horror.org Romance Writers of America — www.rwa.org International Association of Tie -
In Writers — www.iamtw.org /
Consideration from a literary agent or publisher almost always involves a
query letter, and
in many cases they'll want to
see a synopsis and sample pages before requesting a full manuscript.
In a profession with so many hurdles (completing a novel, crafting
query letters, self publishing books, seeking agents, finding a traditional publisher, marketing the novel, dealing with frequent rejection, persevering...) we must remember that our words and our stories help readers feel
seen and heard.
In this case it was
seen by the one e-publisher, but I will certainly add this information to future
query letters.
You
see, while I was working my butt off to shrink my
query letter and synopsis, it only occurred to me
in passing that the process was way harder than it should be.
I find that there are so many things an author can do wrong
in querying an agent with a submission
letter, while there are very few things an author can do right
in querying an agent with a submission
letter, so it's really hard to say every single thing an author should avoid
in a
query letter... Though if I could throw just five glaring problems I tend to
see:
I can
see how writing the
query letter first would force asking yourself the key questions you mention
in advance of writing the story.
A writer I know says that I should never send anything to a magazine without writing a
query letter first to
see if the editor is interested
in my idea.
Unfortunately I
see query letters that shoot themselves
in the foot, from authors who reveal themselves to be clueless about what an agent's looking for and the business realities of publishing.
The purpose of
query letters for writers is to find out whether an editor would be interested
in finding out more about
seeing a piece of work.
Click here to
see the perfect
query letter sample structure
in my Get a Book Agent Guide.
Click here to
see this stellar literary agent
query letter example
in my Get a Book Agent Guide.
But one of the agents
in my very first
query group, Harvey Klinger, asked to
see the first few chapters three hours after I sent my
query letter.
That's a good litmus test for you, to
see if your pitch is ready to be sent out
in the form of a
query letter and / or to be a verbal pitch
in a conference setting where many agents and editors turn up these days to meet new writers, which they truly want to do at all times.
For publishing houses, you'll want to write a
query letter to
see if there's any interest
in your topic or send them a completed manuscript.