Pitch Letter example

Back in May I sold Kennedy Foster's debut novel Standfast to Abby Zidle at Pocket Books.

At the time I sold it there were several editors looking at the book. The first cover letter copied below is to one of them. The cover letter to Abby is below that one. There are three differences (not spelling errors or punctuation but actual specific changes). Can you spot them?

Dear Editrixilated:

Thanks for your phone call today and your interest in STANDFAST!

STANDFAST is a ranch in the Palouse country of eastern Washington; it’s also Alice Andison’s approach to life. Alice has worked the ranch alone in the years since her father’s death.

One winter day the ranch collies bark the arrival of an unknown horse: riderless, saddled, desperately thirsty. Alice knows she must at least attempt to find the missing rider despite thigh high snow and the dropping temperature.

Domingo Rolodan, who has spent sixteen years north of the Line working cattle and horses, avoided the latest INS raid by sheer luck. He and his prized mare made a heart stopping escape across a railroad bridge, far above the Snake River, crosstie to crosstie, praying desperately the Empire Builder from Montana wasn’t due. It is his mare who finds her way to STANDFAST that cold winter morning.

The cold and snow mean the rider is probably dead, but Alice knows she must go look. “Cowboy up Alice” she tells herself as she heads out with her top collie and saddle horse. She can be out in the unforgiving open for only two hours; it will be mere chance if she can find the missing rider in that time. Her collie sees him first: a hunched body in a snow bank, clearly past life. “Dreading to look” Alice then “realized the rag of white vapor that passed at intervals across the front of the hood came not from the collie, but from the corpse.”

STANDFAST is the story of how Alice and Domingo come to love each other, through cultural misunderstandings, the looming presence of a lien holder on the ranch, and the problems of family. Immigration issues give the book a modern feel without making it so contemporary it will be dated in another year.

I love the lean elegant prose of STANDFAST, and I love the characters. I love how (Ms) Kennedy Foster shows us new and unexpected sides of characters we thought were old hat: Mexican workers, ranchers, cowgirls, even lawyers.

I hope you will love this as much as I do. There’s another novel, probably YA, with the same characters, told from the point of view of a middle school girl. I have no idea how it would fit into a marketing plan for STANDFAST but figured you should know.

Thanks for taking a look at this.


Here's the one to Abby:

Yeehaw, Cowgirl!

Thanks for your interest in STANDFAST!

STANDFAST is a ranch in the Palouse country of eastern Washington; it’s also Alice Andison’s approach to life. Alice has worked the ranch alone in the years since her father’s death.

One winter day the ranch collies bark the arrival of an unknown horse: riderless, saddled, desperately thirsty. Alice knows she must at least attempt to find the missing rider despite thigh high snow and the dropping temperature.

Domingo Rolodan, who has spent sixteen years north of the Line working cattle and horses, avoided the latest INS raid by sheer luck. He and his prized mare made a heart stopping escape across a railroad bridge, far above the Snake River, crosstie to crosstie, praying desperately the Empire Builder from Montana wasn’t due. It is his mare who finds her way to STANDFAST that cold winter morning.

The cold and snow mean the rider is probably dead, but Alice knows she must go look. “Cowboy up Alice” she tells herself as she heads out with her top collie and saddle horse. She can be out in the unforgiving open for only two hours; it will be mere chance if she can find the missing rider in that time. Her collie sees him first: a hunched body in a snow bank, clearly past life. “Dreading to look” Alice then “realized the rag of white vapor that passed at intervals across the front of the hood came not from the collie, but from the corpse.”

STANDFAST is the story of how Alice and Domingo come to love each other, through cultural misunderstandings, the threat of deportation, the looming presence of a lien holder on the ranch, and the problems of family.

I love the lean elegant prose of STANDFAST, and I love the characters. I love how Kennedy Foster shows us new and unexpected sides of characters we thought were old hat: Mexican workers, ranchers, cowgirls, even lawyers.

I hope you will love this as much as I do. There’s another novel, probably YA, with the same characters, told from the point of view of a middle school girl. I have no idea how it would fit into a marketing plan for STANDFAST but figured you should know.

Thanks for taking a look at this.