Oh what a beautiful mo(u)rning?

My question is about what formatting to use when querying from outside of the U.S.

Some of us folk writing on the other side of the world feel that o's are very lonely without their u's, and that z's need to stop being so rough around the edges. As a result, we end up with words like colour and analyse. And don't even get me started on the use of single quotation marks over double quotations.

So my question is: If you are afflicted with this fear of lonely o's, quotations loitering in pairs, and the 26th letter of the alphabet, what do you do when querying a U.S. agent? (So that's where those u's and s's went!)

Do you and your cool-blooded brethren ignore this in understanding (I'm thinking this is a no), or should the writer adapt the formatting to fit the style of which the agent is used to?

Holy zedonkulas!
or should I say Holy Zedounkulas?

Most agents are quite comfy with reading novels written in Brit.
Most of us have spent some time reading books with extra u's, and rounded zeds. Agatha Christie. Jane Austen. The Brit editions of Lee Child (which are available a good month before the US edition, just FYI.)

We even know that when you're standing in the garden, you're not actually standing on plants and barkdust. And we know that the bonnet of your auto doesn't have a hatpin.  We're still a little embarrassed about what you think a fannypack is, but we'll just never mention that word again, ok?

If your book is set in the UK and the characters are UK speakers, you'd be nutso to make them all sound like Americans even to American readers. And one way to convey character is word choice, and in this instance word spelling.

Now, if you plan to write a novel about Americans and set it here, you'd be wise to strip out all the UKisms.

In other words, let the language and spelling you use reflect the book you're writing. We'll get it.

As to your query, it's better to just write with your normal spellings. We aren't going to be flummoxed by your insistence on using u to prop up that slacker o. 

OuK?

"include the first 3-5 pages with your query"

1) The main character of my WIP does not appear on the pages until the second chapter. Should I:

a. include the actual first 5-10 pages? Because those first pages are just a sample of my writing style and ability to hook the reader anyway.

b. include the first five pages of the second chapter? Because this action includes the MC and will make more sense to an agent who just read my query.

c. do something else? I don't think I should rewrite the query to include the subplot introduced in the first chapter. Nor do I want to rearrange the WIP so the protagonist starts the action. But I am open to those options if you have a different opinion.

2) The first few pages of my WIP have footnotes that are translations of French phrases in the text. I think they're understandable without the footnotes, but beta readers requested them. Since I will put sample pages in the body of my email below the query, should I try to incorporate the footnotes (maybe with asterisks or something)?

1. The correct answer is d:  include the first 5-10 pages (or whatever the agent asked for) and at the bottom of your query write "the main character is introduced on page X" so the agent knows not to expect Felix Buttonweezer even though the query is about him.


2. You can't have footnotes in an email. The format will make me you insane. Most of us understand the rudiments of French (merde! merci! bien sur!) and if we can intuit the meaning from context you'll be fine.

To support this opinion, go take a look at any episode of the late, lamented tv show Firefly in which the characters curse in Chinese. You don't need to know what they're saying to know what they mean.

Am I still a debut?

I know that it's easier to get signed as a debut novelist than after having published a book, especially if the book didn't sell very well. (Your exact words were, "It's easier to launch a career than to revitalize one.") So my question is, what if the first book wasn't a novel?

I'm one of three writers at a niche blog, and we'd like to create a nonfiction advice book. The blog is currently hosted by a small publishing company, which is a nice connection, though of course there are no guarantees! Because we have a narrow audience, it's unlikely that we'd sell an impressive number of copies.

But I'm a woodland creature! My question is, how will this affect my future chances of publishing a novel? Publishing credits are good, but then I wouldn't be a debut author, even though it would be my first novel.

But you will be a debut novelist, and that's what counts.

Non-fiction has very little crossover to fiction in terms of sales. Just ask Bill O'Reilly who has had several "non"-fiction books (at least that's how they are marketed--historians are too busy laughing to explain why it's hilarious) on the top of the best-seller lists, but his novel has tanked not once but twice.

Think of it this way: your non-fiction advice book about How To Dry Clean Your Dragon isn't going to appeal to the same audience that wants to read your novel about ballerinas in space.

People read advice books to learn things.
People read novels to be entertained.

You'll be just fine.

How to reference #MSWL in a query

Thanks to #MSWL, more and more agents are tweeting their preferences.

I know the rule about starting your query with the pitch--you've said it, repeated it, maybe even sent out a smoke signal that didn't make it all the way to my country. But if Fabulous agent mentions on #MSWL s/he wants a novel with drunk koalas, and I have it, would it be okay to start with that?

Something like: "Through Twitter and #MSWL, I saw you were looking for submissions with drunk koalas. My novel, MAKING MY OWN BREWSKI: THE EUCALYPTUS LEAVES ERA, might be a good fit for your list."

Some sites say it's great, some say it's pointless, and I don't know who to believe (except for Your Sharkiness, of course).

The key to this is in the first sentence: tweeting their preferences. The only thing new here is the medium. Agents have always stated preferences. Preferences are listed in QueryTracker, on the agent's website guidelines, in Writers' Guide to Literary Agents, pretty much anywhere there's a list of agents.


It's always drives me slightly bonkers to have someone start out "you say on your website that you're looking for thrillers." Well, yes. I know that. I not only know that, I WROTE IT. You don't need to tell me.

What you do need to tell me is that you wrote a thriller.

And it is to be devoutly hoped I'll actually know that without you saying so, because your query will SHOW me a thriller, either by plot, or character or (dare to dream, Janet) both.

In the case of the #MSWL, you don't need to tell the agent what s/he's looking for. You say instead that you have a project that fits something on her #MSWL.

To use your example:

"Through Twitter and #MSWL, I saw you were looking for submissions with drunk koalas. My novel, MAKING MY OWN BREWSKI: THE EUCALYPTUS LEAVES ERA, might be a good fit for your list." what you mentioned on #MSWL.

Obviously you'd polish that up a bit; this is just the initial effort.

This is housekeeping so it goes at the end, BUT in the case of #MSWL, you can also put it
in the subject line.

Subj: Query for TITLE (#MSWL)

Do this so the agent knows right away this is something s/he's specifically looking for.

Do NOT overload the subject line with word count, category, publishing status, etc.

So, who were you again?

Recently I received a late night email from a writer I've been in touch with for about seven months. He'd queried me and I'd sent back his requested full with some chipper notes and a flinty-eyed demand for revised pages. In other words, we're as close to pals as anyone can be with a shark.

He's also a regular commenter here and might have won a flash fiction contest.

In other words, we're pals AND I know his name.

Too bad my spam filter didn't.

Priscilla is a petulant thing. She is stupid as only a literal-minded thing can be (not quite on the level of sheep in that she's not quite suicidal but close.)

When I tell her in no uncertain terms that AuthorPalOMine@SharkForBrains.com is a pal, and his emails should be color coded green and speedily sent to my inbox with a trumpet flourish, she will do that.

But she'll ONLY do that if the email is AuthorPalOMine@SharkForBrains.com.
If it's AuthorPalOMine@AuthorPalOMine.com, Priscilla balks.

And by balking I mean she does not color code it green, does not speedily deliver it to my inbox and all trumpets have fallen silent.

Given we all have multiple email addresses (I have six, three of which you'll see associated with my agenting gig) it's really important to remember that Priscilla and her ilk require consistency.

Always query from the same email address. Always follow up from that address if you're doing revisions or anything else.

If you're pals with a shark, and you know you're going to change email addresses, let me know. That way I can make sure Priscilla's instructions are updated.

Here's the reason you want to do that: If you send something with an attachment, it's likely to get sorted into spam if your address isn't in my address book. Once you're in spam, my response time drops like a rock cause I do forget to check it sometimes.  Oh, I'll find you eventually sure, but neither of us really want a delay like that.


I do pay attention to the people I know, but the way I make sure of that is by color coding your email address. Change your email address and you've stymied me. I'm pretty sure this is NOT what you want to do.

Is it?

Is it insensitive to use my non-white sounding name, when I am white?

I share a name with a published author. Thus I use a variation of my name to post comments on your blog. I know that I will have to correspond with industry professionals by my given name. Should I also make it clear publicly that the blog name is my pen name?

Thanks to the white guy who used a Chinese pen name to publish a poem, I am a little worried that any obfuscation of my very white ethnicity is going to cause problems. The name I have chosen could lead people to assume that I’m not white. Should I be concerned?

No.
What people assume about you is their problem.

There's a hilarious episode of Seinfeld about this exact situation.

When you query, you'll mention your pen name...or not.  There's a blog post on how to do both.

I find it hilarious that people are upset that someone adopted a "Chinese sounding name" to get published, when any survey of published works will tell you that the best way to get published, hands down, is to be a middle-aged white male.

That said, when anthologies or calls for submissions specifically say "we're looking for diverse voices" you can err on the side of good manners by telling them while you, yourself, are not colorful, your writing is.

The true problem with diversity is that not enough non-white, non-males are sending in work.

When you ask a newspaper's op ed page editor why so few women are published, they'll tell you it's cause 85% of the submissions they get are from men.

We need to do better on the ground floor: getting young writers of all colors and genders to send out work.

If anyone is interested in supporting that there are some great places to do so.

Girls Write Now is one

Afghan Women's Writing Project is another.

I'm sure there are more and the commenters will provide us with info.

But the best way to support diversity in publishing is to buy and read writers who are non-white, and/or non-male. It's not enough to say "I read regardless of color and gender." You have to actively seek out new voices. Your librarian can help you. There are some amazing writers out there you haven't heard of yet. And just wait till you see what I've got coming up the pipeline!

So, my life is about to implode, should I mention that?

For reasons I won't get into, my personal life is going to be an unholy mess soon. I've been sending out queries and the responses are pretty good. How upfront should I be with a prospective agent about the soon-to-be shambles of my life?

Be upfront but NOT in the query. This is information I'll need to hear in our conversation after I've read your manuscript.

If you've got a problem, it's better to know ahead of time so we can plan effectively.  If you don't tell me, and my emails start to disappear into the ether, my first thought is that you're a flake not that your life is having its way with you.

Shambles can cover a lot of things: illness, divorce, impending arrival of a child (for both mother and father!) moving, taking a new job. Even expected events can arrive in unexpected ways (like my dear friend's first baby who arrived 90 days early and introduced us all to the miracle of neo-natal intensive care.)

What you're really wondering is whether, upon hearing this, an agent will run screaming for the exit. That's a realistic concern, and certainly some might.

And I hope that us sharkly types will realize that letting a mermaid hold our fin while her tail is being mended is a very good use for fins.

That's not photoshop, dear reader!

Query on, be up front, and plan for success.

May 2016 be a terrific year for you.

Novel set in the US but I live elsewhere

I have read (almost) all of your posts on Query Shark, so thank you. This is my question (with a short backstory, sorry):

I am an author based outside the United States, writing in English. My novel is set in the U.S. and touches on topics of race, illegal immigration and even a little on religious extremism. If I was to set it in my home country I'd run the risk of it never being published or, if published, having it confiscated by the police and my sorry self ending up needing a lawyer because I've stoked "racial/political/religious sensitivities".

It is a contemporary romance novel, by the way.

Do I need to disclose that I am submitting from outside the U.S. when I query? (1) I can imagine the questions a prospective agent would be asking themselves (ie. why this setting for this story by this writer?) before they proceed with my query.

Or should I just mention that my MC and I are both women of color and leave it at that? (2)

That's two questions, sorry (I'm Asian, we apologize a lot).

Thank you in advance for considering this question. If you tell me that all I need to worry about is the quality of my writing it will be an early Christmas present.(3)

(1) No
(2) Yes
(3) Merry Christmas, now what did you get me?


The only thing you need to focus on right now is the writing. Many of us have clients who live and work outside the United States.  I don't care about anything except the quality of the work first, and whether I want to work with you, and you want to work with me second.


Perhaps we should all sing this new Christmas theme song:

Crazy pants!

Crazy pants!

Crazy's here to stay

oh what fun obsessing is,

as we type away!

Just make sure you have a native English speaker take a look at your manuscript before you start querying. Although it's clear you have command of the language there are some things that can trip you up if it's not your first language.

Tricky little phrases like "get your goat" which is not the same thing as "get your ram" and if you have some scalawag driver trying to ram a car, you really don't want to translate that as goat a car. And goat cars aren't go carts although one would rather hope to see that someday.

And you might make sure you have a beta reader who lives in the US now. Nothing irks me more than geography mistakes. If you've got Felix Buttonweezer running south on Central Park East, in hot pursuit of his mistress who has just stolen his kale supply, well, you've got a problem larger than hot kale.

Writing Effective Queries

I've spent ten years talking about writing effective queries.

The number of INeffective queries that arrive in my mailbox, DAILY, is perplexingly high.

When you think about a query, it's pretty simple really.
A good query is like the answer to the question: Have you read any good books lately?


When someone asks you that, what do you say?


Agent: So, read any good books lately?
Author 1:YES! It was 75,408 words long, and it's historical fiction, and it's set in Boring, Oregon!

Agent: So, read any good books lately?
Author 2: YES! I'm an unpublished writer with no writing credits, but I've loved to write since I was little.

Agent: So, read any good books lately?
Author 3: YES! It starts with Jack Reacher being arrested for a crime he could not have committed, and when he's cleared of that, the guy who framed him turns up dead, and Reacher has to decide whether to stay and figure out what happened or just get the hell out of this crazy pants town.

A good query is a handsome beast!

I did a round of query replies this morning and at least 30% of them didn't get to "what's the story" until the third paragraph.


Look at your query. Look at the first line. If I ask you "So, read any good books lately?" are you going to tell me what you've written in that first line?


The most compelling thing you're going to tell me in your query is the plot.
Start with that.

Query Question: I've drawn from my own experiences; should I say so?

Can I write in a query that some of my book is based on personal experience?

My main character is a single mother with severe social anxiety, who moves to a new city with her autistic daughter who doesn't talk and their live-in nanny. The daughter is a younger version of my daughter, who is autistic and communicates through baby signs, memorized phrases/song lyrics, and sometimes remembers she has picture cards.

The mother and her struggles with social anxiety is based on me and what I've been through (although when my baby-sitter said she was going to grad school in a different state, I resigned myself to never leaving the house again rather than moving ... I'm only half-kidding. I still have to leave the house to mow the backyard).

I don't want to say semiautobiographical, in part because I'm not 100% sure what that entails exactly, but also because the plot is fiction. There are a few scenes in the book that mirror things that have happened to me and my daughter, but the over-arching plot, the subplots, all the other characters, and the rest of those two characters' personalities - for better or worse, those are all from my head.

Is it a good idea mention in my query that those two characters are based on real people? I thought that would lend an authenticity to my novel, but I'm also concerned I'd be taking up valuable real estate in a query with information that'd be better suited to an "about me" blurb. And also maybe scaring away agents by telling them I have social anxiety.

I always hate to read "this is based on a true story" or "on real people" or worst of all "this is based on my life" in a query.  

I hate it because most people do not live lives that make good stories. Not even really well-known people. Story has a narrative arc, it has antagonists, it has a plot. My life has people who annoy the snot outta me, a to-do list that really needs to get over itself, and a lot of blog readers who make me laugh.  It's a great life, but it's sure not a novel.

And most writers (particularly at the early stage of their career) are not brutal enough to create villains out of the very real people in their lives.  "Based on real people" isn't the selling point you think it is.

Your book can certainly be informed by the experiences you've had. But your book must be able to bring that world alive without a reader knowing anything about you.

If you really want to mention this in a query here's how you do it:

Paragraph One is the same set up we always have: Who the main character is, and what does she want. What's keeping her from getting it? What's at stake if she doesn't? What will she have to give up or lose
to achieve her goal (ie what's her skin in the game?)

Paragraph Two is any writing credits you may have.

Paragraph Three is your bio. You'll say "this story is informed by my experiences with social anxiety and raising a daughter who is on the autism spectrum.

"Thank you for your time and consideration,
"Felix Buttonweezer"


And I'm not sure what semi-autobiographical is either. It sort of feels like hedging. Either it's a novel and you make it all up or it's an autobiography/memoir, and you don't make up any of it.  Very different kettles of fish.





 

Query Question: I don't want you to think poorly of me

I am developing an idea for a book that is (shall we say) dark and that I believe may have a market. Listening to people talk, I have discovered that most people have very dark fantasies that I consider really appalling.

They don’t act out on them (usually) so you don’t see their faces on the evening news. But they are everywhere. 

They are on the subway before sunrise when you go to work in the dark. They are on the sidewalk as you strut nervously to your office. They drive the cabs you take because you are afraid to walk the streets of Manhattan. One of them may live in your apartment building, sharpening the kitchen knives and thinking of paying you a midnight visit, uninvited and very soon.

BUT I AM NOT ONE OF THEM. It is fun to write for them (and maybe make an agent and publisher rich and earn me their deathless gratitude - I hope – whether I get any money out of it or not.)

But I don’t want anyone to think I am a lunatic just because I am writing about one and for multitudes of them. The question is, is it OK to query using a pseudonym. If an agent turns the idea down, I don’t want that to sour a future project titled LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE SAILS MERRILY ON THE GOOD SHIP LOLLYPOP or some such thing as that. I do NOT have a reputation to protect and don’t want one to live down.

Is it OK to query as a marked man?

Please do.
And not in the first person voice of your main character.

Query question: more on noms de plume

You've addressed the issue of using a pseudonym a few times both on your agent blog and on Query Shark; this is a very specific question about using a pseudonym for different genres.

I publish articles, personal essays, and longform creative nonfiction on a variety of subjects, many of them related to political or social issues and all of them under my real name. As I was preparing a query letter for a mystery novel I've written, I was thinking that publishing it under a pseudonym might be a good idea.

I'd like my fiction to entertain readers, including those who might avoid it if they disagree with real-name-me's public stance on various issues. I've also found that, as a reader, if I'm really engaged in the essays of an outspoken nonfiction writer, I am, for no reason I understand, disinclined to read their fiction. I think it's a feeling of being happily sated by their mind and words through their creative nonfiction. (I'd be very curious to know what your regular blog commenters think about this, if they experience it.)

Do you have an opinion on this? If so, how would you suggest addressing it in a query? Is any explanation needed or just my name followed by "(writing as Carkoon Carrie)"? Or is this a question an author and her agent would figure out together?

I think it's entirely reasonable to separate your fiction from your non-fiction.

I originally intended to say I didn't share your disinclination to read fiction by writers who also have a strong non-fiction presence.

Then I realized I did.

Some of it comes from wanting the people who write non-fiction to be expert in their field. Why else read them if not to find out about things from a reliable knowledgeable source? I don't feel that way about fiction writers at all. I just want to be entertained. 

Loretta Ross doesn't have to be an auctioneer for me to love her debut novel DEATH AND THE REDHEADED WOMAN (Midnight Ink: 2015)

On the other hand if Miss Ross is writing non-fiction about the auction world, I do want her to know what she's talking about, and not, as when she's writing fiction, making it all up.

But I also have a client who writes both fiction and non-fiction with the same name for both, and it seems to be working out just fine.

There's not a right way/wrong way here; you should do what you think is right for you. If writing your fiction with a different name feels right, do it.

As to how to do it:

If you're going to inform the agent that you will be using a pen name you can follow this format:

Thank you for your time and consideration,
Beatrice Buttonweezer (writing as Charlotte Mountbatten-Windsor)


If you're NOT going to inform the agent that you're using a pen name at the query stage, you follow this format:

Thank you for your time and consideration,
Charlotte Mountbatten-Windsor

Query question: travails with character names

I am querying a novel, and use your blog as one of my main resources on querying etiquette.
I love the idea of starting the query with the character's name, but I'm having trouble figuring out how. My main character starts out as a number, and eventually earns her name (toward the end of my ms). I'm not sure if I should start the query out with "Agent 61825...", or if I should start out with her earned name, and go back to fill in the fact that she comes from a society where humans are given numbers, and not names.

I can almost hear the movie trailer voice over right now "In a world when humans have to earn their names...."

Starting a query with the character's name is my druthers not because the name is important. It's to prompt the writer to focus on writing a sentence that begins with what's important. In other words, to pry them out of backstory.

Example:
Sebastian Dieter set sail for the New World with his wife, three small children, everything he owned in the world, and a fierce and fervent hope for a better life.

(That's the start of a book I sold recently about the first non-English immigrant wave to the New World. It's a captivating and compelling story.)

That captures our interest much more quickly than: the first wave of German speaking immigrants began arriving in the New World in the 1730's. This is the story of one voyage that began in Rotterdam and ended in flames off the shore of Rhode Island.

What to call your name your name changing character at the start of the query is going to be discover by trial and error. Try something. If you like it, let it sit for a day, then look again. If you don't like it, try something else.
There is no right or wrong here despite my strangled yelps of outrage over at QueryShark. There is only effective and ineffective.

Your goal in a query is to do one thing: entice me to read on.

Query Question: an editor has my ms; how do I list that in the query

 I have a procedural query question. If my MS is currently out with an editor, following a pitch conference, I understand it is appropriate to note that in my query. Is that information to include in the first paragraph, last paragraph, or even the subject line?

It's a housekeeping measure and you put it in the last paragraph.


And lest you think this is a selling point for your work, let me pour a bucket of cold water on you by telling you it's not.

The reason it's not is that once an editor has read your manuscript, an agent can't go back to him/her with the polished up version you'll have after some developmental work. Your agent in fact can't go to anyone at that imprint again.


There's a reason we BEG you to query agents first and it's exactly for this reason. The editor you meet at the conference may not be the right editor at that publisher for your book. You can't know. We do.


I know it's unbelievably tempting to think of yourself as The Exception to that, but you're not. No one is. 


Don't pitch editors at conferences. Talk to them about what they like to read, or what they're specially looking for but if you can hold back on pitching your agent will thank you.

Query Question: I love you, can I tell you?

Thank you for being awesome. I imagine you get that a lot. People are thankful for your help, and it can be hard not to gush.

A chronic gusher myself, I often wonder how my appreciation is being perceived by its  recipients.

And so, if I may, I'd love to know your thoughts.

See, there's this publisher. I've been following him for about two years. I love his passion and personality. He has incredible ethics and works hard for his authors. We've been in contact multiple times for various reasons, and there is no doubt in my mind that he is the one I want to publish my work.

I want to tell him how strongly I feel, yet I'm afraid of coming across as creepy or phony.

How much praise is too much? Does sincere flattery get old for your kind of wonderful?

Normally I delete all the nice things people say to me in emails before I publish their questions here. That's not to say I don't appreciate their compliments, I DO. I delete it because I think it would make everyone feel they had to start their question with some sort of praise, and that would remove any shred of sincerity from it.

The more specific you can be about what someone has done that helped you, the easier it is for us to feel it's sincere and not just idle flattery.

"I love his passion and personality" is more adulation than anything else
"He works hard for for his authors" is much more specific.

If you were to say "I want you to publish my work because you work hard for your authors" that's something that feels genuine.

"I want you to publish my book because I love your passion and personality" ....that feels like sucking up.

Sincere thanks never gets old.

So, tell the publisher what he does that makes you want to query him, and leave the gushing for fan letters to Tiger Beat.

Incorrect query format

Someone out there is telling writers to start their queries with this:

Title: Title
Genre: Literary fiction
Page count (single-spaced): (number)
Word Count: (number)
Status: Ready for publication

I don't know who it is, or where the info is listed but it's WRONG.

The only other thing explanations is that someone read a screenplay book, and thought it applied to book publishing.  It does NOT.

DO NOT START YOUR QUERY LIKE THIS.

For starters, your pages are double spaced (please god, I hope you know THAT) and I don't care about page count. I care about WORD count.

Second, you're using up your first look with things that are housekeeping.

The first line of your email query is:

Dear Janet (or dear Snookums or whatever you're calling me)

The next line is the name of  your character and what has just happened that is going to change his life.

Absent specific directions to the contrary from a specific agency about their specific needs, this is absolute ironclad industry standard.

As more agents are reading on their phones, the last thing you want to do is make it harder to get to what matters: the story.

I've gotten a bunch of poorly formatted queries lately, thus this blog post.

After almost ten years and 250+ examples at QueryShark, this kind of thing makes me snarl with frustration. 

query question: should I include a link to a key moment in the book in the query?

I have an upmarket women's fiction 84,000 word polished manuscript. I had my book read by a retired senior writer for Rolling Stones who lives here in the bay area. He said the book is a go. Freshman Melanie is romantically fixated on her straight best friend.  The crisis moment of this book  was published in (Title) magazine in the fall of 2012. Here is my question: Is it TERRIBLE QUERY ETIQUETTE to include the link to this story?

Don't include a link to anything you think I should read in a query. The chances that I'll click on a link in a query are slim to none.


If you link to anything in your query, it's your website, and that is underneath your signature, at the bottom of your query, before your pages.


I will go to a website sometimes, particularly if you've been coy about who published your last books (too often such coyness means you've self-published.)




In addition, the crisis moment isn't something you'll even mention in a query. A query is intended to entice the reader to read the pages, and those pages to make the reader want more pages. It's NOT a synopsis of the book. 

If you have any doubts about what to include, there are 250+ examples now at QueryShark

And I'm really not sure why you'd trust the opinion of a writer for Rolling Stone (not Stones, that's the rock band) about an upmarket women's fiction novel, unless that's what she writes when she's not doing long form non-fiction for Rolling Stone.

Follow up on a blog post about query guidelines entice or reveal

I sent the question about some agents wanting a two paragragh "intriguing" query and some wanting a full on synopsis, and what to do when you don't know what they want.  I've encountered many submission guidelines like Wendy Sherman's unfortunately, I didn't write them down and can't remember who the heck they were. 

Here are the guidelines from Wendy Sherman Associates.



DO:

• Write a gripping query letter
• Tell us why your project would be a good fit for our agency
• Tell us why this book has an audience, and why you’re the one to write it (particularly for non-fiction)
• Include information about your credentials to write this book, publications and prizes, awards, and conferences
• Compare your book to other titles that are similar
• Tell us which well-known writer’s work yours resembles
• Limit your query to one page
• Include a double-spaced table of contents and overview (non-fiction)
• Include a double spaced 1st chapter (fiction)
• Provide us with your email, phone number, and address
• Tell us what happens in your book. It’s not a book jacket or a movie trailer–don’t tease us, we need to know!
• Read the books on how to find an agent – there are several. There is much valuable information that will help you throughout this process

Only when I actually read these guidelines did I understand how query guidelines can be disconcerting for the sophisticated querier.

The sophisticated querier is someone who has spent a lot of time and care researching guidelines, publishing terms, looking for what an agent wants.

The vast amounts of information now available to queriers means that more of you are sophisticated, and savvy about the process than ever before.

Look at that list again. There are 12 bullet points.  Tally up how many of them you already knew. My guess is between 10 and 12, right?

Here's where the trouble starts. "Tell us what happens in your book" means something different to you than it does to the casual querier.  I have only to look at my incoming queries to understand that "tell me what your book is about" is NOT a given.

However, if you've spent any time at all in the query trenches, you KNOW to write two enticing paragraphs. When someone says "it's not a book jacket or a movie trailer" you think...oh! I should be writing something that isn't the standard two paragraph enticement.

In fact, this bullet point is asking for EXACTLY what I've been hammering you on over at Query Shark. It's asking for the main character, the choices s/he faces and what's at stake.

If you're reading various agency guidelines, and all the bullet points seem pretty obvious to you, don't over think the one that isn't.  It's probably exactly what you thought it was the first time you saw it. Don't over think. Don't over analyze.

Query Question: questions in a query

is it okay to ask a question in a query?
I've just read this brief on the movie American Psycho
"Patrick Bateman is young, white, beautiful, ivy leagued, and indistinguishable from his Wall Street colleagues. Shielded by conformity, privilege, and wealth, Bateman is also the ultimate serial killer, roaming freely and fearlessly. His murderous impulses are fueled by zealous materialism and piercing envy when he discovers someone else has acquired more than he has. After a colleague presents a business card superior in ink and paper to his, Bateman's blood thirst sharpens, and he steps up his homicidal activities to a frenzied pitch. Hatchets fly, butcher knives chop, chainsaws rip, and surgical instruments mutilate-how far will Bateman go? How much can he get away with?


I began to ponder if someone could write something like this as a query, with those two questions at the end?

It's ok to ask questions in a query if it works. This works, which is not surprising since it's a pitch for a movie and people spend a lot of time and money making sure those pitches entice movie viewers.

What you want to avoid in a query are rhetorical questions:  what would you do if? Have you always wanted to do X?

Things that assume a mind-set of the reader are dangerous because agents on the whole are a caustic, jaded lot and we would simply prefer you tell us about the book, and leave the other stuff on the cutting room floor.

More on how to figure out what agents represent

I have finished Signal (loved it), but am left puzzled by one thing. How is it you think you don’t rep speculative fiction? Oh, I know Patrick Lee and Jeff Somers write a fast-paced story that you could nudge over to thriller/suspense, but seriously. People are going to start putting two and two together, you know. If you sell it they will come – the queriers, I mean. Heck, I might even lead the charge.

Well, I don't represent speculative fiction cause I'm not really sure what it is.  I signed Patrick Lee for a book that I think of as a thriller. I pitched it as a thriller. It got published by an imprint of Harper that does science fiction. We sold enough copies that I know it sold to people who don't read science fiction.  Same with Runner. I pitched that as a thriller. It was marketed as a thriller.  If you think it's speculative fiction, I'm ok with that as long as you buy many many copies of the book.

And Jeff Somers was signed for a book called CHUM that isn't speculative fiction (whatever that is) and when I sold Electric Church I thought it was science fiction, or a dystopian thriller.

I make jokes about this by saying I sold dystopian by mistake, I thought it was something else.

Which is of course really funny until you're a writer trying to figure out what the hell I want to read.

Well, here's a suggestion: ignore category. Just send everything. I don't particularly care. I'll read pages from enticing queries no matter what category you place it in because I've learned that what I call it can be much different than what the editor calls it, or where it gets shelved after the marketing people take a whack at it.

This is why you do NOT start a query with "here's my speculative fiction novel." You start with the name of the protagonist and what's at stake. You reel the reader into the story FIRST, then close with what you think is the category (and half the time you're wrong, but I don't care about that either.)

The reason most people who write what you might call speculative fiction won't find a place on my list though is cause I've already got Patrick Lee and Jeff Somers, and those guys keep me pretty damn busy. Fortunately Brooks Sherman likes that kind of writing too, and he's got more room on his list than I do.