Selling My Soul (In a Good Way) is a weekly journal
about my efforts to get a debut novel published.
Sometimes, in this “adventure” of querying, I feel like I’m back in school and facing mid-terms or finals week tests for all of my classes.
Every literary agent wants different information and materials.
They want the first . . .
- 10 pages
- Opening chapter
- 10,000 words
- 50 pages
The want everything in one email, with these embedded in the email . . .
- Query letter, opening 10 pages
- Only a query
- A query that is only 250 words
- The query, opening five pages, and a synopsis
They want all information submitted through Query Tracker (QT), which is an online form that may include . . .
- The query
- Your bio
- Comparable titles to your manuscript
- Word count, title, genre
- Opening 5 or 10 or 20 or 50 pages
Whether it’s an email or at QT, the formatting that a writer has (hopefully) carefully done for the finished/polished manuscript is often tossed out the window. Where once the novel you are submitting had proper paragraph indenting and line spacing, those thousands of words and sentences transform into something . . . not so proper. Maybe just randomly weird, but readable. Or even into a potential mishmash of barely readable content, with inconsistent spacing and words scrunched together. I worry: did I just send an agent an alphabet slop of nonsensical words?
I’ve additionally complicated my querying efforts by preparing another manuscript (a trio of novellas entitled WHEN YOU REMEMBER ME) to send to some small, independent publishers. I won’t go into details other than to say that every publisher I’ve found that might be open to my novellas wants different information and materials.
And I can’t not mention that with all of the differing requirements for submission, I want to be as perfect as possible. No misspelled words. Getting the agent’s or publisher’s name correct. Checking again and again to make sure I’ve provided exactly what has been requested.
Whew . . .
- I’m exhausted
- I’m determined
- I’m wondering why I’m doing this
- I’m a writer
Since last week, I’ve received one rejection (from Agent #35) and sent one more query letter (to Agent #50.
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“The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter. ’tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.”- Mark Twain
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