Diary of a Writer #12 - Thursday 16 July

Submit, submit, submit. The last week has been devoted to researching agents and sending them query letters/pitch proposals. 

Why so many? Because according to the agents' own websites I can expect to wait between 4 and 16 weeks for a reply (other than the usual email auto-acknowledgement of receipt) although some warn that not all rejected pitches may even receive a refusal slip – so if I waited for each one to respond before sending off another query letter, years could elapse.

Here's another thing... although I have some good agents listings data, you cannot rely upon it being up-to-date. Agents depart, agents are not yet back in the saddle post coronavirus lockdown, and some agents are so busy they are not taking on any new work.

And there's more... There's no such thing as a one-size-fits-all query – even among agents working within the same agency.

Some take email submissions, others use the Query Manager system. I even found one New York City agency that only takes postal submissions – I swerved them.

Some accept attachments to emails, others want to the content pasted into the body of the email. Those that take attachments may accept Word files, some also accept PDFs but many have long lists of file formats they do not accept. I even found one that specified DOCX files only.

Some want a query letter plus sample chapters. Some want a query letter plus synopsis plus sample chapters. Some want a query letter plus synopsis but no sample chapters. I also encountered one that required a query letter plus synopsis plus sample chapters AND a blurb. And a good blurb is really hard to compose.

Then there is the amount of biographical information "about you" they require or don't require.

And as for sample chapter requirements, this can vary from first chapter, to first three chapters, to first five chapter, to first 50 pages.

As I said, there is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all query.