What Do I Do if I Get a Request to Read More From a Literary Agent

Query letters - how to write a query letter that gets manuscript requests

This post is regularly updated with new data. If you'd like ane-on-one assist with your query, check out Jane'south query alphabetic character master class.

The query letter has 1 purpose, and ane purpose but: to seduce the agent or editor into reading or requesting your work. The query letter is so much of a sales piece that it's quite possible to write one without having written a word of the manuscript. All it requires is a business firm grasp of your story premise.

For some writers, the query will correspond a completely different way of thinking well-nigh their book—considering information technology means thinking about 1's piece of work as a product to exist sold. Information technology helps to take some distance from your work to encounter its salable qualities.

This postal service focuses on query messages for novels, although the same advice applies to memoirists, because both novelists and memoirists are selling a story. Nonfiction volume queries are addressed here.

Before y'all query

Novelists and virtually memoirists should have a finished and polished manuscript before they begin querying. However, some may be tempted to begin early considering it can take and then long to receive responses from agents and publishers. The thinking goes: Well, the amanuensis probably won't respond any earlier than a month anyway, and I'll be done by and then, so why not go a jump on it?

But what if the agent responds correct away?

Or what if yous're not done in a month? What if you realize your manuscript needs a lot more work?

You'll wish y'all hadn't started querying. You may end upwards rushing your writing or editing process (undesirable to say the least), or admitting to the amanuensis/editor that it will have y'all X weeks or months to follow up, by which point, their enthusiasm may accept waned.

To avoid creating a high-force per unit area or awkward situation, I recommend yous wait until you feel the manuscript is totally washed—the best y'all can go far. That doesn't hateful you have to hire freelance editors or copyeditors or proofreaders, but it does mean fixing or revising annihilation you know needs attention.

4 elements of every query letter

I recommend your query include these elements, in no particular order (except the closing):

The housekeeping: your book'southward genre/category, word count, title/subtitle
The hook: the description of your story and the well-nigh critical query element; 150-300 words is sufficient for most narrative works
Bio note: something about yourself, usually fifty-100 words
Thank y'all & closing: about a sentence

I consider personalization or customization of the query optional. More than on that later.

Some agents and publishers require that you mention comparable or competitive titles. You lot tin learn how to inquiry your comps in this postal service.

In its entirety, the query shouldn't run more than than ane folio, single spaced, if printed, or somewhere around 200 to 450 words. I recommend brevity, specially if you lack confidence. Brevity gets you in less trouble. The more than you effort to explain, the more you'll clasp the life out of your story. So: Get in, go out.

Opening your query alphabetic character

Put your best foot forrard, or lead with your strongest selling bespeak. Hither are the most common ways to begin a query:

Possibly you've been vouched for or referred past an existing customer or author; mention the referral right abroad.
If you met the agent/editor at a conference or pitch event, and your material was requested, then put that upfront.
Starting with your story is a classic opening—and my preferred opening—when you don't necessarily take a expert custom or personalized opening for the person you're querying.
Some queries start in an informational manner, which is besides fine: "[Title] is an 80,000-word supernatural romance…"
Published or credentialed writers might beginning with their successes, especially if they've won awards or received an MFA from a well-known schoolhouse. However, few fiction writers begin their query by talking about themselves because well-nigh are unpublished. (This isn't a problem, though.)

Many writers don't accept referrals or conference meetings to fall back on, and so the story becomes the lead for the query letter.

Personalizing the query letter: yeah or no?

Your query is a sales tool, and good salespeople try to develop a rapport with their target. Information technology can be helpful to testify you lot've done your homework and that you're not blasting indiscriminately. Information technology can also fix you lot apart from the large majority of writers querying—if it'south washed meaningfully.

Hither's an instance of a meaningful personalization: "The acknowledgments of The Ideal American mention yous with praise, and F. Scott's masterful work partly inspired my own novel.

If you personalize the query by saying, "I found you in Writer's Market place," or "I see from your website that you lot're seeking mystery," and you add together nix else, that's not terribly meaningful. Try to say something that tin't be repeated by another writer or used in another query. Hither I comment further on whether to personalize your query.

Identifying what you're selling

Your volume'southward title, discussion count, and genre can be stated upfront, although often it's better to look until the terminate of the query to offer this housekeeping information.

Title. Everyone knows your book title is tentative, so you lot don't have to explicitly state the championship is tentative.
Give-and-take count.If your novel's word count goes beyond 120,000 words, you lot have a challenge ahead of you. Eighty thou words is the manufacture standard for a debut novel. See this post for a definitive list of advisable word counts by genre. If you lot have an off-putting word count, some agents recommend withholding this fact until the end of the alphabetic character, in one case you lot've potentially hooked them. Minimum word count for about novels is 50,000 words.
Genre.If you're unsure of your genre, yous can get out out any mention of it. Even so, if you do, be sure to describe a comparison between your volume and another recent title published within the last five years. You tin say that your book is written in the same fashion or style as some other volume or author, or that it has a similar tone or theme. Two comparisons are sufficient; the more thoughtful the comparing, the meliorate. Comparison yourself to a current New York Times bestselling author tin come across as big-headed or as well easy. Instead, demonstrate a nuanced understanding of where your book falls in the literary landscape. Agents and editors volition pay closer attention if it appears you are well read, because that increases the chances your volume is well written. (Over again, you can learn most comp titles hither.)

Describing your story (the hook)

For near queries, the hook does all of the work in convincing the agent or editor to asking your manuscript. Here are a couple formulas that can help y'all get started.

Who is your primary grapheme (protagonist)?
What problem do they face up?
What are the choices they must make? What tension drives the story forward?

What does your grapheme desire?
Why do they desire it?
What keeps them from getting it?

Hither's an example of a brief hook for The DaVinci Code:

Robert Langdon is an American academic and an expert in the symbols of the aboriginal world. While on concern in Paris, he's summoned to the scene of a grisly murder in the Louvre where he's the main suspect. He must race beyond Europe, one step ahead of the law chasing him, to solve the murder and testify his innocence. In the process, he uncovers arcane letters hidden in the globe'southward best-known artworks, solves ancient puzzles, and ultimately discovers secrets well-nigh Jesus that could bring downwards the Catholic Church building.

As part of this claw, you may need to establish the setting or time period right abroad; this is especially true for authors of historical fiction or science fiction and fantasy. For example: "My novel, SCI-FI Ballsy, is set in the distant future where humans have abandoned earth and now live on the rings of Saturn."

A skillful hook balances grapheme and plot. By the end of the query, the reader should accept an thought of why we care most the main character(s) but also the story problem or tension that keeps united states turning pages.

While the hook formula looks elementary—and it is—your story may sound rather boring when it's boiled downward to these elements.

When a hook is well written but boring, it offers the same former formula without stardom. The protagonist feels 1-dimensional (or like every other protagonist), the story angle is something nosotros've seen as well many times.

The best hooks take some kind of twist or an element that helps your work stand out, that makes it uniquely yours. That is: the idea doesn't experience derivative of existing bestsellers. For example: Every fourth dimension an amanuensis comes across a query featuring a YA protagonist with special powers acquired on his birthday, and he must figure out how to control these powers at an unfamiliar school, at that place's a expert chance the agent is going to pass unless there's a dramatic twist.

How do you know if your idea is tired—by an agent's standards? Well, this is why anybody tells writers to read and read and read. Information technology builds your knowledge and feel of what'southward been done before in your genre, equally well as the conventions.

In Laurie Scheer'sThe Writer'due south Advantage, she well demonstrates the difference between a tiresome story hook and an heady ane:

I accept heard an eternity of pitches featuring women every bit victims, survivors, single mothers, etc. If someone pitches me a story nigh a 43-year-old unmarried woman who has had a successful career in advertising or police or pharmaceuticals or whatever, and decides at the concluding minute that her biological clock's ticking and she wants to have a child … I will wait for the writer to tell me the rest of the story.

And there is no remainder of the story, because in their mind, that is their story.

To which I say, "Who cares?" Seriously, who volition care about that storyline? No one. We have seen numerous stories almost women wanting to have children afterward in life. I could produce a listing at least two pages long consisting of books and movies with this plot line.

However, if one of the main characters is a 43-year-sometime unmarried businesswoman having her first kid and, at the aforementioned time, her 22-year-old niece is also having her first child—considering the niece does not see the do good of having a career and just wants to exist supported by a rich husband—I suddenly see some conflict here.

Whenever I teach a class where we critique hooks, just virtually everyone can point out the hook'southward problems and talk about how to improve them. Why? Because when yous're non the writer, you take distance from the work. When you do come beyond a great novel claw, it feels then natural and like shooting fish in a barrel—like it was effortless to write.

Examples of brief story hooks

Every day, PublishersMarketplace lists book deals that were recently signed at major New York houses. It identifies the title, the author, the publisher/editor who bought the projection, and the agent who sold it. It also offers a one-sentence description of the volume. These sentences are inevitably well-crafted, and can help you ameliorate understand what is currently exciting to agents and publishers.

There are trends and fashions in publishing, and if you were to read the 1-sentence description of every novel that sold in your genre in the final vi months, you would meet definite themes emerge.

While your query hook would get into more detail than the following 2 examples, these hooks help illustrate how much you lot can accomplish in merely a line or two.

Bridget Boland's DOULA, an emotionally controversial novel about a doula with a sixth sense [protagonist] who, while following her calling, has to confront a night and uncertain futurity when standing trial for the death of her best friend'southward baby [protagonist's trouble] [a doula with a 6th sense? cool.]

John Hornor Jacobs's SOUTHERN GODS, in which a Memphis DJ [protagonist] hires a contempo Earth War 2 veteran to find a mysterious bluesman whose music [protagonist's trouble] — broadcast at ever-shifting frequencies past a phantom radio station — is said to make living men insane and dead men rise [twist]

Check for red flags in your claw

How to tell if your hook could exist improved:

Does your claw run longer than 300 words? Yous may be going into besides much detail.
Does your claw reveal the ending of your book? Only the synopsis should practise that. However, erstwhile agent and editor Mary Kole says yous might demand to reveal the ending in your query. It'due south not my preference, but I've worked on projects where it becomes necessary, for reasons that Kole explains.
Does your hook mention more iii characters? Usually y'all only need to mention the protagonist(south), a romantic interest or sidekick, and the antagonist.
Does your hook go into minor plot points that don't touch the choices the protagonist makes? Practise you lot really need to mention them?
Does your hook talknigh the story, rather than telling the story? Don't get bogged down in how you wrote the book or what its themes are. Focus on what happens instead.

Writing the bio in your query letter

For novelists, particularly unpublished ones, I think it'southward OK to leave out the bio if you can't think of anything worth sharing. Only information technology'due south nice to put in something.

The central to every particular in your bio is: Volition information technology be meaningful—or perchance mannerly—to the agent/editor? If y'all tin't confidently respond yes, exit information technology out. In order of importance, these are the categories of pertinent info.

Publication credits. Be specific most your credits for this to be meaningful. Don't say you've been published "in a diverseness of journals." You might too exist unpublished if you don't want to name them. If you have no fiction writing credits, you don't demand to state that y'all're unpublished. That betoken will be made clear by fact of omission. If y'all have a long publishing history, just listing the ones you're nigh proud of or the ones about relevant to what yous're pitching. I don't recommend including academic or trade journals, since they don't convey storytelling power.
Self-published books. Lots of people have cocky-published, and a self-publishing history doesn't hurt your chances with a new, fresh projection. Yet, if you're trying to become an amanuensis or publisher for a book or seriesthat's already been self-published, my advice is to not bother trying. (If you must, hither's how to pitch an agent with a self-published volume.) Do non make the mistake of thinking your self-publishing credits make you somehow more desirable as an writer, unless yous have incredible sales success, in which example, mention the sales figures of your books and the boilerplate star rating.
Your profession.If your career lends you lot credibility to write a better story, by all means mention it. Only don't go into lengthy particular. Teachers of Grand-12 who are writing children'due south/YA often mention their pedagogy feel as a credential for writing children's/YA, simply it'southward not, so don't care for it like one in the bio. (Perhaps information technology goes without saying, simply parents should not treat their parent status as a credential to write for children either.)
Writing cred.Mention any writing-related degrees you lot accept, whatever major professional writing organizations you belong to (e.g., RWA, MWA, SCBWI), and possibly whatever major events/retreats/workshops you've attended to assistance you develop your career as a writer.
Special research. If your book is the product of some intriguing or unusual inquiry (you spent a year in the Congo), mention it. These unique details can catch the attention of an editor or agent.
Major awards/competitions.Virtually writers should not mention awards or competitions they've won because they are besides pocket-size to affair. If the award isn't widely recognizable to the majority of publishing professionals, and then the only way to convey the significance of an honor is to talk about how many people you lot vanquish out. Usually the entry number needs to be in the thousands to impress an agent/editor.

If you have no meaningful publication credits, don't effort to invent whatsoever. If you have no professional credentials, no research to mention, no awards to your proper noun—goose egg notable at all to share—don't apologize for it. Mayhap say something brief well-nigh yourself—where yous live, your educational activity, your day job, hobbies. Remember: Even if you're unpublished, you're still completely respectable. Y'all're mainly getting judged on the story premise, non your bio.

On the other finish of the spectrum: Don't talk most starting to write when you were in second grade. Don't talk virtually how much you've improved your writing in the last few years. Don't talk nearly how much y'all enjoy returning to writing in your retirement. Just mention a few highlights that prove your seriousness and devotion to the craft of writing. If unsure, go out information technology out.

If your bio tin reveal something of your vocalism or personality, all the better. While the query isn't the place to digress or mention irrelevant info, there'due south something to be said for expressing something near yourself that gives insight into the kind of author y'all are—that ineffable you. Amuse helps.

Novel queries don't have to address market concerns

Don't exist tempted to elaborate on the audience or market for your novel. This is often misunderstood since nonfiction writers do have to talk about marketplace concerns. Even so, when it comes to selling fiction, you don't talk about the trends in the marketplace, or most the target audience. Yous sell the story. I often encourage memoirists to follow the same principle and leave out readership information—salvage it for the book proposal if information technology's requested.

Likewise, novelists don't need to talk over their marketing plan or platform. Sometimes you lot might mention your website or blog, especially if you feel confident nigh its presentation. The truth is the amanuensis/editor is going to Google you lot anyway, and notice your website/blog whether you mention it or not (unless you're writing nether a dissimilar proper name).

While having an online presence helps show you'll likely be a practiced marketer and promoter of your work—especially if y'all take a sizable readership already—it doesn't say anything most your ability to write a great story. That said, if you have 100,000+ fans/readers on Wattpad or at your blog, that should exist in your query letter of the alphabet.

Close your letter professionally

You don't read much advice virtually how to shut a query alphabetic character, perhaps because there's not much to it, right? You say thank you and sign your name. Merely here's how to leave a good concluding impression.

You don't have to land that you are simultaneously querying unless the guidelines need it. Everyone assumes your query is being sent to multiple parties and not to a unmarried person at a fourth dimension. I do not recommend sectional queries.
If your manuscript is nether consideration at another agency, and so mention it if/when the next amanuensis requests to run into your manuscript.
If y'all take a serial in mind, this is a expert time to mention it. Merely don't belabor the point; it should accept a judgement, eastward.g., "This is the kickoff in a planned series."
Resist the temptation to editorialize. This is where you lot proclaim how much the agent will dear the work, or how exciting it is, or how it's going to exist a bestseller if only someone would give it a hazard, or how much your kids enjoy it, or how much the earth needs this work. Basically, avoid directly commenting on the quality of your work (whether that's to flatter or criticize yourself). Your query should show what a practiced author you are, rather than you telling or emphasizing what a expert writer y'all are.
Thank the agent, but don't carry on unnecessarily, or be incredibly subservient—or beg. ("I know you're very decorated and I would be forever indebted and grateful if you would merely look at a few pages.")
There's no demand to go into great particular almost when and how you're bachelor. At the bottom of your letter of the alphabet, include your electronic mail address, possibly a telephone number.
Do non introduce the idea of an in-person meeting. Exercise not say you lot'll be visiting their city soon, and inquire if they'd like to meet for coffee. The only possible exception to this is if yous know y'all'll hear them speak at an upcoming conference—but don't inquire for a meeting. Merely say you look frontwards to hearing them speak. Utilize the conference'due south official channels to set up an appointment if available.

The following stuff doesn't belong in the query

Your many years of effort and dedication
How much your family and friends love your work
How many times yous've been rejected or close accepts
How much coin you've invested in editors or editing
Quotes of praise from anyone, or mentioning how such-and-such well-known person has read your work and/or offered advice on it. Peradventure it's boosted your ego or conviction that some VIP has read your work or offered a critique. Simply agents/editors volition make upwards their ain mind, and if your VIP really believed in your work, why aren't they offering you a referral to their agent or editor?

The submissions strategy I recommend

If you'd like to take a conservative arroyo, divide your agents into buckets: A listing, B list, and everyone-else list. Try submitting in rounds of v-10 at a fourth dimension (depending on the size of your list), including ane-2 of each agent type. If your A list people immediately and favorably reply, then I'd send out another round right away, a mix of As and Bs, to encounter if you can gin up competing involvement. If responses trickle in with no particular pattern or order, send another round within 2-4 weeks or and so. At least every month, ship another round until your list is exhausted.

If y'all immediately come across a pattern in the response that indicates something'due south amiss, yous can adjust your approach for the adjacent round of queries. The reason I recommend this bourgeois arroyo is it tends to be easier to manage psychologically. But there's nothing wrong with sending out your materials to everyone on your list at once or sending in college volume. It just means that you don't get that "next chance" or opportunity to adjust your pitch afterwards. (One time a rejection, always a rejection—or that should be your supposition.)

Query letter of the alphabet instance for a novel

Dearest —:

Information technology'southward the yr 1200. Since succeeding to the papacy two years agone, Pope Innocent Iii has been agitating for a new cause, 1 that volition finally conquer Muslim-controlled Jerusalem. Simply European monarchs ignore his telephone call, as well involved in squabbling amongst themselves.

So the Pope turns to two of his trusted men with a mission: to seek out the powerful Presbyter John, an unknown king in the Far Due east, who has promised to put his vast armies in service to the Pope's Crusade. Simply information technology requires traveling through the treacherous political, religious and mercantile terrain of medieval Europe.

1 of the emissaries is Mauro, an older monk who uses logic and reason to deepen his faith. The other homo is Nicolo, a young Genoese merchant striving to improve his family's fortune and his own place in the globe. Nicolo is supposed to lead and guide the mission, but the beau carries secret orders from a decadent Cardinal.

THE EMISSARIES (96,000 words) is an adventure tale solidly grounded in historical fact about the search for Presbyter John. The book will appeal to readers of historical fiction in the style of Ken Follett (Pillars of the Earth) and Noah Gordon (The Physician), and also to readers seeking the accessible social critique of Amitav Ghosh (Sea of Poppies, the Ibis Trilogy).

I did research for The Emissaries in nigh of the locations mentioned in the volume. I have lived and worked in over 50 countries and received numerous international awards for my work in social and trade justice. My nonfiction book, Javatrekker: Dispatches from the Earth of Off-white Trade Coffee (Chelsea Green, 2008) received a Publishers Weekly Starred Review and the Gold Medal every bit Best Travel Essay Book from the Independent Publishers Association. I have been the on-air host of two recent PBS specials ("Java: The Drinkable That Changed America" and "Traveling in the 1970s"), and speak regularly at universities and conferences on bug of social justice, international trade and the environment.

Thanks for your consideration.

Special communication on email queries

Email queries and queries submitted through online forms tend to go read and rejected more quickly than snail mail queries (which are rarely accepted these days, in fact). Depending on your situation, you may cease up creating 2 divide versions of your query letter of the alphabet, 1 for electronic mail and another for press/mailing.

Hither'due south the formatting process I recommend for email queries specifically:

Write your query in Discussion or TextEdit. Strip out all formatting. (Usually there is an option under "Salve As" that will permit y'all to save every bit elementary text.)
Transport the query without whatsoever formatting and without whatever indents (block style).
Don't use accost, date headers, or contact information at the beginning of the e-mail; put all of that stuff at the bottom, underneath your proper noun.
The first line should read: "Dear [Agent Name]:"

E-mail queries benefit from shorter paragraphs and/or more paragraph breaks—unless the agent insists everything be contained within three large, outsized paragraphs. That is a very astern requirement that only makes things harder for everyone, but follow such guidelines if you must.

If you have an email address for an editor/agent who doesn't take email queries, y'all can endeavor sending your query on a hope and a prayer, but you probably won't receive a response.In fact, I've heard many writers complain that they never receive a response from email queries. (Sometimes silence is the new rejection.) This is a phenomenon that must be regrettably accepted. Send i follow-up to inquire, simply don't keep sending emails to effigy out if your query was received.

Y'all've sent your query—now what?

If you don't hear back, follow upwardly afterwards the stated response fourth dimension using the same method as the original query. If no response time is given, look nigh i month. If querying via snail post, include another copy of the query. If you still don't hear back subsequently one follow-upwards attempt, presume it's a rejection, and move on. Do non telephone or visit.

If an agent asks for an sectional read on your manuscript, that means no one else can read the manuscript while they're because it. I don't recommend granting an exclusive unless information technology's for a very short period (mayhap 2 weeks).

In non-exclusive situations (which should be virtually situations): If you accept a 2nd request for the manuscript before you hear back from the get-go agent, so equally a courtesy, let the second agent know it'southward also under consideration elsewhere (though y'all needn't say with whom). If the second amanuensis offers yous representation first, go back to the starting time agent and let her know yous've been fabricated an offering, and requite her a chance to respond.

Additional resources on query letters

QueryShark: run past an agent who critiques queries (dormant, but still helpful)
QueryTracker: dig for examples of successful queries (look nether "success story interviews")

Looking for more?

Start Here: How to Get Your Book Published
Outset Here: How to Write a Book Proposal
Dorsum to Basics: Writing a Novel Synopsis

Want to ane-on-one help?

Effort my former colleague, Jessica Strawser, the quondam editor of Writer's Assimilate.
I offer a query alphabetic character primary class.

Jane Friedman (@JaneFriedman) has twenty years of experience in the publishing industry, with expertise in digital media strategy for authors and publishers. She is the publisher of The Hot Sheet, the essential newsletter on the publishing industry for authors, and was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World in 2019.

In addition to beingness a columnist forPublishers Weekly, Jane is a professor with The Neat Courses, which released her 24-lecture series, How to Publish Your Book. Her book for artistic writers, The Business concern of Beingness a Writer (University of Chicago Press), received a starred review from Library Periodical.

Jane speaks regularly at conferences and industry events such as BookExpo America, Digital Book World, and the AWP Conference, and has served on panels with the National Endowment for the Arts and the Artistic Work Fund. Find out more.

stokesdomess.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.janefriedman.com/query-letters/