#AgentQuery

[authortoberecognized]

WRITER'S FORUM: AGENTQUERY

                                       WRITER’S FORUM                                            AGENT QUERY AgentQuery provides a wealth of information about agents and publishers. Information is provided as to where to find agents, organize and track queries and look at agents’ data. Publishers’ info is also available. If you do find an agent or publisher that fits your needs; do some…

[not-poignant]

Hi Pia

Feel free to ignore if this is unwelcome, but have you ever thought about publishing traditionally to sublimate your income and draw in new readers? I know you've self published two books already and that you didn't feel like they did very well, but maybe the experience would be different if someone else was in charge of marketing and all the other business stuff?

Obviously everyone's experience is different but as an author myself who's published both trad and self, traditional publishing has been a completely different experience and has allowed me to focus more on writing because I'm not the one responsible for advertising/marketing/financing anymore.

There are a ton of literary agents nowadays that want to represent diverse and lgbtqia+ fiction, some of them even in Australia.

Websites like Reedsy, AgentQuery and Jerichowriters have extensive directories to find literary agents.

(This is lengthy folks so I'm putting the other two parts (and my response) under a read more! Also putting it under a read more so the anon can skip my response since it's very 'here's all the reasons I can't do this' and they just might not want to read that, lmao)

(continued -> )

Trad publishing houses have better resources for marketing and helping authors get more attention than any self publishing website could.

Obviously most authors, unless they're really prolific, don't get a huge advance (the average is between $1000 - $5000) but getting your foot in the door or on the traditional publishing "ladder' so to speak can have a huge benefit for your serials. Because it gives you more exposure. Plus it's in the agent's best interest to find a publishing house that accepts stories that contain darker themes and negotiate the best deal for you.

For some reason places like Amazon and the like accept and keep up more "dark" books that are traditionally published than they do with self pub ones. Maybe because they have more respect or leniency for publishing houses? I have no idea. But you could use this to your advantage. I think I remember you mentioning that writing novels felt quite isolating to you? But you already have 2 completed novels (3 if you count the fae one) that you could potentially revisit or rewrite to your liking and get them represented by agents.

You already have a loyal readership and that's very attractive to trad pub houses and agents.

As well as trad publishing, you could also make s simple website that doesn't require much maintenance. It could be just a landing page that says something about you and then has links to your tumblr and patreon where you're more active. That way you increase the chances of getting your serials found by additional readers and also come across looking more "professional". Not that you're not professional now. You are and I admire you greatly, but the unfortunate reality is a lot of people still judge by appearances and some will be more drawn to an author's website than a tumblr page, at least at first. So I think having a simple landing page would open up another door for you to benefit from.

Trad publishing is work but definitely not as much as self publishing, and you can continue on with your serials. Getting an agent can be time consuming but I personally believe the pros outweigh the cons and I also believe that your stories would be a huge treasure to the growing lgbtqia+ market. Seriously there needs to be more!

These are just suggestions and thoughts and like I said before, feel free to ignore. But I know you've mentioned wanting to grow your career in the past and I genuinely believe you can do so with some of these pathways.

~

Okay, my response. Posting this because firstly I think the suggestions could work very well for other authors reading this! And I hope they take the advice to note, and secondly because I haven't talked about this for a hot minute so let's talk about it again.

So the TL;DR is yes I have considered traditional publishing. I have actually been traditionally published in short stories, poetry, and also had my art published on covers and re: interior illustrations. But my Fae Tales works got soundly rejected when I sent them to publishing houses that were doing open calls for that sort of material. I've never heard back from an agent and I never expect to, heh.

~

Now for a bit more detail

I have been traditionally published before (it's how I got my writing out there long before I ever wrote serials), and yes, I have approached publishers with my writing since then. In fact Tradewinds was written for the traditional publishing market, and it got soundly rejected, and then shelved. The reasons it was rejected ran the gamut from 'I don't like that these fae eat humans no one is going to relate to these people' (while the editor then went on to publish vampire books idk) to 'There's too much worldbuilding you can't expect readers to keep up with this' to 'Your stories are too long, no one wants to read characters talking all the time.'

Meanwhile in my online serials I was getting feedback like 'my favourite chapters are the ones where the characters just sit in a room and talk' lol.

The traditional publishing world is also not quite as utopian for most authors as you make it seem. I'm friends with a lot of authors who are traditionally published because that's the world I came from, and unless they're solely in KU and doing generic rapid release formula romances, none of them are making that much money. Certainly not enough to live off. It may have been that you were very fortunate, anon, but I know hundreds more traditionally published authors that left trad pub to make money, and I know about 5 in trad pub personally who are making enough to live off of.

Only one of those is really writing what she truly loves to write, and even then, publishing houses have refused to commit to her entire fantasy series (and she's regularly in 'Top 10/20 Women Fantasy Authors in the World' lists) and forced her to finish the series prematurely. Something I never ever have to worry about in self pub.

The reality is that in trad pub these days, you're still in charge of most of your marketing unless you're one of the big earners for the publishing house. In fact I'd be expected to keep even more of a social media and marketing presence than I do now. I don't do almost any of the things you're supposed to do as an author in marketing to be appealing. I don't have a Facebook author account. I don't have an Instagram author account. I don't maintain or regularly send out newsletters (which automatically puts me in the like 0.05% of authors who make money doing this lmao).

I don't know if you ever have looked that closely into what m/m publishing houses expect from most of their authors, but the newsletter swaps, cover releases, review circuits, interview circuits and more are fucking grueling. We're expected to be responsible for our advertising and our marketing to a fairly massive degree. Some traditionally published in m/m still have to pay for their release blitzes out of pocket. These publishing houses, by and large, do not offer advances. You say most authors don't get large advances. I don't think most authors in this arena get offered advances at all unless they're somehow miraculously acquired by a Big 4.

We're expected to have an already established social media presence because of that (that's why it's so appealing to publishers that we have social media presences already, anon, so we can market, they can save money, and we still see only a minimal cut from the royalties).

And you still have to focus on your finances, because publishing houses like Dreamspinner straight up didn't pay a whole bunch of authors for so long they destroyed careers. They still haven't paid some of their authors. And they're still running a business and people still buy their books.

Trad publishing houses have better resources for marketing and helping authors get more attention than any self publishing website could.

This is true if a) they're a big publishing house and not an indie publisher of which most LGBTQIA+ publishing houses are and b) they're willing to use them on you.

The authors that make the most money get the most resources. If they believe you're going to earn back your advance and move thousands or tens of thousands of units per book, then yes, you will get those resources.

I have been told so many times now - even from friends who run publishing houses, including one who works at HarperCollins - that my work will never be mainstream enough to have broad appeal. They literally told me not to keep trying re: trad pub, because that was my dream for a long time. These folks have given me rock solid advice in the past, it's one of the reasons I'm doing so well now via Patreon + Ream. But they were like (paraphrasing) 'you don't write 60-80k romances and you don't want to and that's not your strength anyway, you're multi-genre which makes you hard to market, you write psychological and literary trauma recovery which is hard to market, you write character studies which are hard to market, publishing houses often don't commit to series anymore if the first two don't move units and if they pulled the plug you'd be contractually obliged to never finish that series until your contract was up.' I could go on, but it was like yeah...actually. Fair.

For some reason places like Amazon and the like accept and keep up more "dark" books that are traditionally published than they do with self pub ones. Maybe because they have more respect or leniency for publishing houses?

They do, but most publishing houses want very formulaic dark romance which is not what I write.

I have a 300k omegaverse slowburn that still hasn't had any penetrative sex in it, anon. Publishing houses don't want that. They don't expect anyone will wait 4 full length novels to get to literally a single penetrative sex scene.

But you already have 2 completed novels (3 if you count the fae one) that you could potentially revisit or rewrite to your liking and get them represented by agents.

If I rewrote them to my liking, trad pub wouldn't want them. They'd be too long! I think agents etc. take one look at me and go 'oh god, no thank you!' I'm not an easy sell, by any means.

Plus I'm very e.e about all of that with the knowledge that they then give me only about 10-15% of the royalties on the sales, vs. self-pub where I get around 70%, or subscription where I around 80% of it. When someone subscribes to me, they don't have to worry about 85-90% of their subscription fee going to a publishing house. I don't have to think about how many thousands and thousands of books I'd have to sell to make the same amount that I do now via subscription.

As well as trad publishing, you could also make s simple website that doesn't require much maintenance.

If it was that simple, I'd be doing it. I don't mean this in a facetious way, I mean it in a: I've made a lot of websites, in fact I run one at the moment not connected to my writing (I've been running it for so long it's now in its 20s and can probably has a driver's license). I find it so tedious that I barely remember to check in on it. But forgetting about it means there's always maintenance to keep up with when I get back to it.

Running websites is simpler than it used to be, but it's still not simple. There's hosting and hosting costs, there's server changes, there's back-end maintenance etc. I'm considering it for down the track, but there's a reason I decided to go the route of Patreon over my own site. There are authors (like Christopher Hopper) who actually do subscription through their own domain, but it's a lot of work.

Even placeholder sites are still work. They need updating, details change, story titles changing etc. Maintaining my Patreon + Ream About pages is enough, they're always both a little out of date, lol.

Not that you're not professional now.

Oh no, I mean from a 'traditional publisher looking at me to see what kind of candidate I am' I'm really not though. Like I said, I don't have the newsletter (100 subscribers who get one newsletter a year is not really a newsletter), I don't have the Facebook/Tiktok/Insta/Twitter/Bluesky/Threads accounts, etc. I write multi-genre across multiple steam levels, and I'm allergic to writing serials shorter than 150k. One of my best performing original serials was an 800k contemporary story with no sex in it but a lot of BDSM. It can't be marketed as clean or sweet, it's not high steam, an entire chapter is 'boy saves snail from rain.' Also he was cruel to animals, so not exactly what I'd call a sympathetic main.

And yet that story did so well for me via Patreon + Ream, because people want the kinds of stories that publishing houses generally don't want and I happen to be writing them.

Trad publishing is work but definitely not as much as self publishing, and you can continue on with your serials. Getting an agent can be time consuming but I personally believe the pros outweigh the cons and I also believe that your stories would be a huge treasure to the growing lgbtqia+ market. Seriously there needs to be more!

Anon I just literally do not believe an agent would want to represent me. I have 0% belief in that. Not from a self-deprecating angle but from a 'I am not a good bet for the trad market' perspective. From a 'I have so many friends who are trad pubbed authors who stare at me like I'm insane for writing serials as long as I do' perspective. From a 'professionals in the industry have told me it's amazing I'm doing so well in serials because there's no way they'd take a risk on what I'm doing' perspective. From a 'just because it's queer and diverse doesn't mean it hits literally any other thing a trad pub is looking for' perspective. I've been doing this for 10 years. There are agents who represent work similar to mine who know what I'm doing and wouldn't touch me with a ten foot pole. They're not missing out on a trick, they know I'm not broad appeal, and they're right.

Also the only way I'd have the energy to manage trad pub is by quitting serials. And honestly, I never found trad pub all that much fun while I was doing it for non-novel stuff. It was fine, and it is nice to have my stuff out there, but it was a ton of admin and a lot of going back and forth between people who really only care about marketing a product, and that's great and what they excel at! But I'm too disabled to turn this job into something crushing just to potentially make more money, I'd rather just quit and go back onto a full Disability Pension. I can't see any way I still get to write the stories I want to write, in the way that I write them, and be remotely appealing to a single reputable trad pub or agent.

Also *gestures to everything in this article*

[what-even-is-thiss]

Check out this website. It’s got a big listing of literary agents as well as pages that explain different parts of the process of querying them. Make sure you check out the agents company website and what sorts of other authors they get published before you contact them. The agents I’ve talked to have told me they get pissed at authors who don’t do even the tiniest bit of research about them before submitting.

Poets and writers also has a database but it’s slightly less comprehensive. Poets and writers is a great resource in general though for finding writing competitions, journal submission periods, mfa programs, indie publishers, etc. It’s a magazine/website meant to be useful to professional and aspiring to be professional writers basically and I reference it all the time.

Interacting with published authors gives you absolutely no comfort when you ask questions about publishing.

They’ll be like yeah the process of finding an agent and getting your book published and dealing with publishers is like being forced to chew your own arm off slowly over the course of several weeks while getting skinned alive by a toddler with a butter knife. You should still try to do it though.

[authormabridge]

As I restart my #BookAgent #querying, I need to #remember that #persistence is key. J.K. Rowling was rejected 13 times, My #birthday buddy Dr. Seuss’s first #book was rejected 27 times. Hard work is just half the battle. But believing in my work and fighting for it is the other half. • • • • #AgentQuery #LiteraryAgent #bookstagram #books #upcomingbook #upcomingseries #hiddentruths #HiddenTruthsSilentWitness #author #upandcoming #upandcomingauthor (at Arizona) https://www.instagram.com/p/CNZAlcqrpfu/?igshid=cp25lus4b8li

[cyallowitz]

Literary Agent Resources #agentqueries #queryingforrepresentation

Hi, SEers! Mae here. Last month I shared tips on how to write a query letter for agent representation. You can find that post HERE. Today, I’d like …Literary Agent Resources #agentqueries #queryingforrepresentation

[authoralliance]

What’s the Dill, Pickle?

TODAY’S AUTHOR TOMORROW (“Gone-by-the-Way, Sad Truth” History) 

Authors all had the childhood dream of growing up happy, healthy, and wealthy with a successful career writing passionately of all our “whats and whens.” The demise of traditional publishing has been painful for all of us, and deadly to many. Much like newspaper, magazine, radio, and countless other industries, book publishing has taken the proverbial digital-wave dive for the past two decades. Self-publishing has soaked enough in the brine from novelty to normal; and finding a publishing house to brave the way for a new author, write an advance check, or cover all the publishing tasks and marketing cost is… well… no longer realistic. 

Perhaps you already have considerable notoriety, or are an ex-President, then okay; otherwise, an unknown author cannot expect to get a book offer, no matter how many query letters he writes. It’s just a brutal fact of life. The 21st-century market is new and unrefined. Change is often not hilarious and rarely fun. 

Today’s authors are now cramming to become salespeople. Book publishers have gorged themselves into sprawling print-on-demand farms, graphics and other author services profiteers. Many things have come and gone over the past 20 years. To underscore the point, just look at how many online author associate entities have recently just disappeared from the internet without warning. 

This year, the top “10 Best Online Writing Communities for Aspiring Authors” reduced to eight. 

Number 1: Absolute Write Water Cooler and number 2: AgentQuery Connect have simply gone. 

The upside of all of this drama is that the global community is learning a lot about what works and what just wastes a great deal of time and money in the current climate. We’ve taken a long look at a future where reading books is perhaps passé, even archaic; and the two-minute video blurb on social media even seems a bit too long. 

You can’t possibly blame the Covid pandemic for any of literature’s dreadful fate, either. (In fact, some book genres have sold better during the coronavirus lockdown than before it began.) The book industry has to shoulder much of the responsibility for the state-of-the art. Authors are dreamers and believers… publishers are in a business of dollars and sense. So, the industry has been slow to react to life in the new digital, fast-paced world of self-publishing. Like it or not, self-publishing is here to stay as we can see. 

AM/FM Radio became more conglomerate-network-oriented and less locally focused. Magazines and newspapers went online or went out for recycling. The book business has faced the wrath of industry digital change from bookstores and book signings to online Amazon sales and eBooks but is yet to undergo the harshness of public ‘lack-of-appetite’ for an excellent book. People invest in more types of media than ever before in humanity. Books require a skilled unpacking of detail equating to a considerable investment in time to satisfy both the storyteller and the reader. Time is of the essence. What the future holds for authors and book professionals is just a matter of time. 

Tomorrow’s Trend King and next week’s Public Spending Demand are on the line. Self-publishing survivors must conjure up the next set of recipes to manage a new-world pickle mandate… We grow cucumbers! We must create a demand for cucumbers! Whether you like sour, dill, or like me, bread and butter, the pickle barrel rolls on because the whole idea is so simple… Just sell pickles. Connoisseurs argue, “no one needs a pickle you eat quicker.” 

As professionals, we should continue to roll with the flow; and be diligently selective about who we choose to partner with. So now, for some good news. 

It’s time, try the world’s fastest-growing author network — 

http://INSONA.com

#author #self-publish #marketing #myAuthorServices #blogThis

[batmansymbol]

Hi! I loooved Seven Ways We Lie--it was so super good!! Can I ask what your representation and publication process was like? How did you get your baby to the world? Thanks, and I hope your day is swell!!

hello, dear anon! thank you for your kind words. :)

Seven Ways We Lie came to life through various slush piles. publishing has a reputation for being a nepotistic industry. maybe this is true for people who are within its immediate orbit, but i, a mere rube from north carolina with absolutely zero prior connections, nudged my way in, and the majority of the authors i know have absolutely no prior connection either, so evidently the nepotism claim is not entirely true.

I sent query letters–pitch letters, basically–out to literary agents for several different novels before 7wwl. 4 novels, I think, of which three were–alas–fucking awful (this was during high school). I pity the agents who were subjected to them, but there we go. I queried my phenomenal agent, Caryn Wiseman, in my freshman year of college with an early version of Seven Ways, which was at the time called In Sin and was quite a bit darker. It was a cold query–I’d found her through the AgentQuery database and thought she sounded like a good fit, given her interests and the specs of the manuscript. she requested to read, and that summer offered representation. when I got the email requesting The Call, I had a mild fit of hyperventilation outside a movie theater.

since college takes up a lot of time, and since caryn is a highly editorial agent (i love this–generally i don’t trust people if they tell me they love a piece without some sort of caveat), we went through nearly two years of revisions. halfway through junior year, after four (!) editorial passes, she took the manuscript out on submission to publishing houses, and my editor–anne heltzel from abrams, also an absolute gem of a human being–expressed interest. we talked through revisions on the phone, her vision sounded like it gelled perfectly with what I wanted the manuscript to be, and the sale was finalized that winter and I cried excessively.

edits took place mostly during the second semester of my junior year, which was rough because my mental health was mired in a bog of pure bullshit at the time. but! things turned out ok, we’d finished copyedits by the time I started senior year, and publication was the following march. and that is the entire road, dear anon!

if you’re also trying to get your novel baby into the world, I recommend to the highest degree the aforementioned AgentQuery database, as well as the QueryTracker database, which can help you keep track of which agents you’ve contacted and their current submissions status. equally vital for me were the query letter critique forums on both AbsoluteWrite and AgentQueryConnect. for actual babies, unfortunately, I have less advice. perhaps a doula?

xoRiley

[gaiabamman]

What's the best way to get an agent?

Getting a literary agent

In order to get a publisher, you need to find an agent. A few publishers will consider writers with no agents, but the typical submission route sees an agent pitching your work to publishers.

Who are agents?

Agents are experts in the book business. They consider hundreds of books a day, choose a few promising clients a year and try to pitch their work to publishers. If you did get an agent he/she is your best bookish friend! Agents are experts who believe in your book. Treat them fairly and don’t expect them to be you biatch. Their job is pitching to publishers, not advertise your book (nor edit or listen to you whine). Know what to expect.

What do agents do?

They select authors as clients and try to get them good deals with publishers. They are paid when the writer is paid. Never give money to anyone to read your work! A serious agent would never ask for money.What don’t agents do? They don’t advertise your book, they don’t edit, they don’t cook for you, nor look after your children.

How do I get an agent?

To get an agent you have to write a query letter. In fact, on average, you have to write about 100 queries to find an agent, and that is only if your book is prime stuff. An alternative is to take part in “pitching competitions” like PitMad on twitter or attending a writers’ pitch conference.

How do I select which agent is right for me?

Don’t flood all the literary agents of the world at once. Choose two or three who published books you liked and are similar to yours. If you can’t think of any, you should probably be spending more time reading before you consider publishing.  Check AgentQuery to find agents open to submissions in your genre. Do some research on them, make sure they are a good fit and be ready for rejection.

How do I deal with rejection?

Dismiss it. It’s part of the job and it’s good for big egos. Finding an agent is like finding a soulmate, all you need is one. BUT, if after ten queries nobody asked for a partial of your manuscript, you might want to question if there is something wrong with your query or if you’re pitching for the wrong genres. Alternatively, it could be that your project is “high risk” or not “mainstream” enough, in which case most agents will not take a chance. I personally think that high risk projects are awesome: go indie and publish yourself!

So, how do I write a query?

This is a quick guide on what is a query letter and how to write one to successfully pitch your novel to a literary agent or, less commonly, to a publisher.

Before I say anything about query letters let me disclaim that most of what I learnt comes from the infinite wisdom of Her Holiness the Query Shark, a successful agent dedicated to help hapless, unexperienced writers. Study her website and see plenty examples of failure and success, rejoicing at her snarky sense of humor.

What is a query letter?

A query letter is a short missive (typically an e-mail) that pitches your book in 200-300 words. Don’t go over 400 words, it should fit in one page. A query letter will be likely the hardest thing you will ever write.

What elements should be in a query letter?

A query should answer the following questions:

1-Why did you select this agent?

Successful agents receive about 100 queries a day. Never write “Dear Agent” (guaranteed click-delete response). Agents want to know why you think they are a good fit for you. If you are thinking this is not your job but theirs, you’re better off indie publishing. Ask yourself how many agents are banging on your door right now and how many writers are banging at any one agent’s door. Got the picture? Good. Now do research on your agent. Good lines would be: “you represent this other book (pertinent book similar in style or genre to yours) so I thought…” or “You are seeking books in this genre so…” To find information about your agent of choice, start with AgentQuery, then check the specific agent’s website and any interviews online. Sometimes you might want to go as far as to check their twitter feed or search for videos. Yes, it is a lot of work and a time drain.

2- What is your book about?

You are a writer. SHOW, DON’T TELL! Never say “this is a great story” or “this is the best book you will ever read”, “this is the next bestseller” etc… SHOW THEM!  Start with the conflict. Don’t tell them everything, just enough for them to want to read more, possibly getting a feel for your voice.

3- Why are YOU qualified to tell this story?

Are you writing a book about the Vietnam war and you’re a fifteen-year-old Italian? Well, good luck pitching that. You will have to explain why you think you are qualified, and why you are in a unique, privileged position to tell that story.

In general: You only have 200-300 words, choose them well.

1. Avoid clichés; you are a word crafter. Still, don’t overdo it! Verbose queries are not good. Use your style.

2. No typos, you hear me? None.

3. Be professional. It’s really difficult to get the tone of an e-mail or letter sometimes. Avoid jokes and confusing double meanings.

4. Be respectful. Start with Dear Miss Amman (just an example, by golly, I’m not an agent!) Most agents don’t care if you call them by their first names, but some really hate it. They are professionals and they don’t know you. Play it safe.

5. Don’t beg. If you don’t think your book is awesome, nobody will. (Avoid things like “I have been sick” “I have fifteen children” “I barely sleep” “Forgive the typos”).

6. Don’t boast. Be confident, but professional. If you have some facts that can help you list them clearly.

7. Don’t state the obvious. “I would be glad to provide a full manuscript upon request.” Of course you would be. Finish with “Thank you for your time” or similar.Essential info to include: the title of your manuscript ALL CAPITALS, the word count (approximate to the closest 5,000), the genre, your signature with your full REAL name, address and phone number.

BEWARE!

-Check for specific guidelines on each agent’s webpage! Some will go as far as to tell you what type to use. All will specify if they want a partial with the query (typically the first three chapters pasted in the body of the e-mail).

-Send no attachments unless specifically asked. It’s the fastest way to the garbage bin. They fear viruses and will never open an e-mail with unsolicited attachments (signatures, files, anything).-Separate your paragraphs, so that your e-mail is not a scary block of text. Happy querying :D

GBA

PSI compiled this and more advice on a free writer guide you can get from my blog. Click here to check it out. No, it’s not a scam. Yes, I’m a real published author.

[month9books]

On today’s #writingwednesday, we’ll hear advice from Justin Joschko, author of Yellow Locust and Iron Circle, about getting a literary agent.

Represent! – The Art of Landing a Literary Agent

 For some authors, the first step on the road to publishing their novel (aside from writing the darn thing) isn’t submitting to a publishing house, but instead  in acquiring that strangest and most elusive of beasts: a literary agent. I stress the “some authors” part, as it’s certainly possible to publish a highly successful book without any representation. Indeed, with the rise of digital submissions and easy online self-publishing, it might be easier now than it ever was. For those with a bit of insider knowledge and marketing savvy, going it alone is a viable approach.

I had neither of things, however, so for me getting an agent was essential.

Which is not to say that it was easy. The process can be confusing, tedious, and occasionally heartbreaking, but also highly rewarding. Below, I offer a few tips gleaned from my own experience.

1. Writing a query letter is an art: learn it. The query letter is your shop window, your message in a bottle, your signal flare. In a couple of hundred words, it has to convince the agent to invest more time in your work, either by requesting pages or reading those you’ve already submitted. That might only take a few minutes, but minutes are precious. Describing the anatomy of a query letter is a post (or ten) in itself, but the key is to keep it brief and professional. Sample letters are easy to find online, and for those with the means, plenty of published authors will edit your letter for a fee.

2. Choose your target wisely. If an agent’s clients all write hard science fiction or military history, don’t send them a query for your paranormal romance. If their bio says they don’t do political thrillers, don’t send them a political thriller. Doing so wastes your time and theirs. Nearly every agent has some sort of online presence these days. Take a few minutes to see what they’re looking for and who they represent. If they use Twitter, read through their feed.

3. Make it personal. Agents hate form letters, and while they’re not naïve enough to assume you wrote the entire query just for them, they appreciate feeling that they’ve been contacted for a reason, and not just as part of an email blast to the first fifty names that showed up on AgentQuery. Take a look at what authors they’ve worked with in the past, and explain why your work would be a good fit for them. It doesn’t have to be much: “I’m a fan of your client’s series, Vampire Dentist, and given your interest in monsters and medicine, I thought my book Werewolf Obstetrician may appeal to you.”* And for the love of Pete, don’t address the email to “Dear Agent.” These people have names. Learn them and use them (and spell them correctly).

4. Proofread your submission. Then proofread it again. Do you think you’ve proofread enough? You haven’t. Do it again. A single typo doesn’t make a bad book or a bad author, but agents are busy people, and they spend their days sifting through thousands of queries in search of one that stands out. Spotting a typo gives them an easy reason to reject your submission.

5. Submit in batches. Simultaneous submissions are not a sin in the publishing world, but resist the temptation to fire off your query to a hundred agents at once. Each new submission is an experiment of sorts, and you need to give yourself time to collect and review the data. Batches of 6-10 are a good size, though tastes vary. Take any feedback you get on board, but even form rejections tell you something. If you send out 10 queries and get 2 requests for partials or fulls, your letter is doing its job, even if the samples don’t lead to a contract. Ten form rejections, on the other hand, tell you that your letter might not be resonating, and that it may be worth tweaking it. You only get one shot per agent for your query to land (at least until you write a new book), and if the letter needs work, it’s much better to learn as much after the 10th submission than the 100th.

6. Don’t take it personally. If an agent rejects your submission, they’re not saying you’re a bad writer. They’re not even saying your book is bad. They may have loved it, but simply thought they didn’t have the contacts they’d need to sell it. Or they may have a similar book on their roster already, and feel that juggling both wouldn’t be in the best interest of either. Rejection stinks, and it’s okay to feel sad, but do what you need to get over it rather than declaring your literary career to be over or blaming the agent for failing to recognize your genius.

7. Know when to end the conversation. Thank yous are nice in person, but they can clog up inboxes pretty fast. Agents won’t be offended if you don’t thank them for a form rejection. If they gave you detailed personal feedback, you can write back a brief note to show your appreciation, but otherwise no response is expected. Avoid asking if you can resubmit a revised version unless the agent mentioned this possibility themselves. And above all, don’t get nasty. It serves no purpose, and word could get out that you’re more trouble than you’re worth.

8. Be persistent. Some writers get lucky and land an agent after only a few queries, but for most of us, the journey is far longer. Learn from your rejections, but don’t dwell on them. Just remember that the number of Nos you hear doesn’t matter. It’s the Yeses that count, in the end. And you only need one.

 *If you’ve written a book about a vampire dentist or a werewolf obstetrician, please contact me. I want to read it.

Justin Joschko used these techniques to land his own his agent, Alec Shane of Writers House, and publish Yellow Locust and Iron Circle.

[char27martin]

Switching from Querying Agents to Querying Publishers

After completing a final polish on Is That The Shirt You’re Wearing? my collection of humorous essays, I diligently researched and targeted literary agents, and sent personalized query letters. And I eagerly waited for their replies.

Then I waited some more . . . and waited some more after that. I even sent myself test emails to make sure my email program was working—the writer equivalent of a stand-up comedian asking, “Is this thing on?”

This guest post is by Kristen Hansen Brakeman. Brakeman’s comedic essays have appeared in the New York Times Motherlode, The Huffington Post, The Washington Post, Working Mother Magazine, Scary Mommy, and Erma Bombeck Writer’s Workshop, where she is currently the Humor Writer of the Month. She has appeared on Huff Post Live to endlessly debate the use of the word “Ma’am,” and is a reviewer for the New York Journal of Books. Real humans have compared her writing style to both Erma Bombeck and Nora Ephron, but possibly they were intoxicated at the time. Brakeman works behind-the-scenes on television variety shows and lives in the suburbs of Los Angeles with her husband, and three daughters. Her first book, a collection of humorous essays titled IS THAT THE SHIRT YOU’RE WEARING?, was published by Tidal Press in May 2017.

Undeterred, I continued submitting about ten queries at a time every few months or so, for three years. Though each rejection left me in the doldrums, I was encouraged to continue because of the many compliments I received about my writing, helpful advice on how to strengthen my platform, and the suggestion from one agent that my manuscript was a tad on the short side.

With the false hope that it was the quantity of my words to blame, I re-wrote and restructured, and then submitted again, this time with my slightly longer, yet apparently still unsellable book. As the months passed and my number of queries topped the 150 mark, I was, as the queen of humorous essays would say, “at wits’ end.”

Finally, in my last batch of rejections, came frank words from two different agents saying the same thing: Essay collections are simply too tough of a sell, even for well-known writers or comedians. One offered that if I were to become super famous, like say, Tina Fey, to contact her again. Become super famous? Why didn’t I think of that in the first place?

Yet I still believed strongly in my manuscript, and felt that readers would enjoy not just the humor, but also relate to my real-life struggles and appreciate the positive tone. And the fact that so many beta readers and literary agents said they loved it, made me not want to give up.

[New Agent Alerts: Click here to find agents who are currently seeking writers]

Lots of friends suggested that I self-publish, but I didn’t want to do that either. It’s probably a great option for prescriptive nonfiction authors who write weight loss guides or get-rich quick tips, but let’s face it, people aren’t Googling “humor essays” for help with their troubled lives.

Also, according to Publishers Weekly, the average nonfiction book sells only about 250 copies a year, and 2,000 over a lifetime. My profit margin would be higher if I self-published, but either way the amount I’d earn would still be minimal. So I decided to keep trying to to have my book published traditionally, if for no other reason, than to serve as a legitimate credit when peddling book two.

If big publishing houses weren’t interested in essay collections, maybe medium and small publishing houses were worth a try. I found listings for independent presses on Writers’ Digest, Poets & Writers, and AgentQuery, with descriptions of the type of books each publisher was interested in and their submission policies.

Whereas most agents asked for only a query letter and a writing sample, I discovered that publishers universally required a book proposal, replete with a market analysis, marketing plan, and a description of the target audience (in my case … um … humans who like to read and laugh?). With the help of online guides, I somehow faked my way through completing a proposal.

As I searched for places to submit, it dawned on me that my book was in a bit of a literary no-man’s land. I was too unknown to land a contract at a large trade, but my writing seemed too mainstream for the majority of these independent presses, who clearly preferred “literary” writing—serious novels or short story collection, poetry collections, or chapbooks. Frankly, I didn’t even know what a chapbook was, so I was fairly confident I had not written one.

Whenever I’d find an independent press that actually wanted essay collections I’d get excited, but most were after essayists of a different sort: deep thinkers who pondered man’s place in the universe, not someone ranting about the horrors of collagen lip plumping. And I bet not one of their essayists spoke in the voice of their dog … or cat.

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Conventional wisdom says not to judge a book by its cover, but I had to do just that to guess at which independent presses might want me. If the book covers on their website looked particularly heady or dour, I moved on. If a publisher expressed interest in humor, yet their nonfiction humor book covers had old-fashioned comic drawings, I clicked away, knowing we wouldn’t be a good match.

After a few months of submitting, I heard back from one of the medium-sized publishers from my first round of queries. The acquisitions editor requested my manuscript, and then later wrote back to say that she loved it. She asked for a few changes to my proposal, including securing advanced blurbs and adding links to my published columns, in hopes that her company’s marketing department would agree with her desire to buy the book.

A month later, and after numerous emails back and forth, unfortunately she wrote that they would have to pass. My platform was deemed to be, “Not dazzling enough to make a dent in the crowded marketplace.”

I was devastated. I felt like I was so close, only to have the rug pulled out from under me. My husband had to work hard to talk me off the ledge, emphasizing that if this editor wanted to publish my book then surely someone else would too.

As much as it pains me to admit it, it turned out that my husband was right. Over the next few months I actually had three more independent publishers express varying levels of interest.

I had submitted to one of them, Tidal Press, because on their website it said they were interested in books that “explore the life of the underdog, the outsider … and that make you feel less alone … and sometimes they’re funny.”

[How to Resurrect a Forgotten Manuscript]

The outsider—too much of a “nobody” for the big trades, but not “literary” enough for the smalls—that sounded like me! So when the publisher wrote back to say that she liked my voice and thought that I nailed the void in publishing that she wanted to fill, it was music to my ears.

Within a few months I had a signed contract in my hand and the knowledge that my book was actually going to be published. What’s more, the publisher wisely decided to market it as a memoir—a more popular genre than humor.

My only experience in publishing has been with an independent press, but I’m guessing that one of the biggest benefits is that the writer gets to talk directly to the publisher. Likewise, probably the biggest drawback for a small publisher is that they have to talk directly to the writer. Because first-time writers have questions … so many questions, and because they’re so gosh darn excited about their first book being published!

While being published traditionally meant I didn’t have to worry about the nuts and bolts that I would have had to deal with had I self-published, I will be doing the lion’s share of the marketing. So once again I’ve turned to online advice to help me navigate my campaign, which has included asking (okay, begging) for reviews, offering interviews to book bloggers, and endless requests for blurbs in everything from alumni newsletters to local book clubs.

We’ve all read the amazing stories of writers who found an agent on the first try or landed a fabulous publishing contract within a couple months, but for the majority of us, our books are only published because of our own perseverance.

Five and a half years, more than 150 agent queries, and a few dozen small press submissions later, my goal of having my book published will finally be realized. Of course I’m aware of the sales stats for books like mine, but I won’t let that discourage me. After all, I’ve come this far!

  The biggest literary agent database anywhere is the Guide to Literary Agents. Pick up the most recent updated edition online at a discount.

If you’re an agent looking to update your information or an author interested in contributing to the GLA blog or the next edition of the book, contact Writer’s Digest Books Managing Editor Cris Freese at cris.freese@fwmedia.com.

        The post Switching from Querying Agents to Querying Publishers appeared first on WritersDigest.com.

from Writing Editor Blogs – WritersDigest.com http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/guide-to-literary-agents/switching-querying-agents-querying-publishers

[greater-than-the-sword]

Thanks.

I technically know a lot about writing queries. I even had a full manuscript request once (on a different book). I know about Agentquery. I’m just worried because.... well, agents almost never tell you the reasons why they’ve sent a rejection, and there are so many unwritten rules and subjective things. I’m not afraid of being rejected, I’m afraid of making the same mistake multiple times in a row and not being able to figure out what the mistake is.

Just in a Mood where I’m worrying a Lot about whether my novel will ever be good enough for an agent…

[cyallowitz]

Writing a Query Letter #agentqueries #literaryqueries

Hi, SEers. Mae here today to discuss a topic that usually makes authors cringe. There are two things I despise writing—a book synopsis, and a query …Writing a Query Letter #agentqueries #literaryqueries

[liaarskiss]

agentquery started following you

{he rubs fingers together, eyes set on a moving world he has little interest in. there are footsteps approaching him, one with purpose belonging to one he hasn't yet met, but it takes him out of his realm of empty thoughts. artemis doesn't turn his head in acknowledgement, but he manages to raise his voice for conversation.}

Haven't seen you around before.And here I thought I've met everyone worth any effort at all. {plays with his rings, eyes still focused on the scenery.} Name?