Selling My Soul (In a Good Way) is a weekly journal about
my efforts to get a debut novel published.
The first literary agent to represent me and my writing came by way of the lowly semicolon.
You know, this little and infrequently used punctuation: ;
One of Merriam-Webster’s explanations is:
A semicolon separates related independent clauses that are joined without a coordinating conjunction, such as and:
-
- Mabel the Cat had made a big pot of goulash; it was simmering on the stove.
- Goulash was Harry the Dog’s favorite; the scent drew him to the kitchen.
I think of the semicolon as a momentary pause, like taking a breath or delaying a second or so to deliver a punchline.
But what does that modest smidgen of punctuation have to do with my first agent? Many decades ago, long, long ago in the last century, I attended a writers conference. One of the events included an agents’ panel. Each agent gave a brief presentation, followed by a Q&A time. The use of the semicolon came up when the agents were asked about their dreaded “red flags”—like too many misspelled words or improper formatting—in query letters or manuscripts that could lead to rejection. One particular agent said semicolons were a red flag for her. In the Q & A, she and I had a brief, friendly back-and-forth about using or not using them.
That led her to remember me later in the conference. When I “pitched” my novel to her, she asked to read the whole book. Soon enough, I was her client.
Long (and frustrating) story short, she apparently became ill, never communicated with me, never did anything with my novel, and less than a year after our punctuation tête-à-tête, we parted ways.
My adventure with the agent and the semicolon has given me the experience to know that working with a literary agent doesn’t guarantee your work will find a publishing home. While my cautionary tale is probably modest compared to other writers, it’s a lesson I try to remember.
Do I need an agent if I want to get traditionally published? Well, the odds against me are stacked from here to the International Space Station without an agent. They are the gatekeepers. I need an agent; and yet an agent is no guarantee.
Since last week’s Selling My Soul, I’ve sent out three more query letters: Agents #36, #37 and #38. No rejections as of this writing.
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“You can always edit a bad page. You can’t edit a blank page.” – Jodi Picoult