No Greater Hope

A few friends have asked me what this whole query thing is. I’ve been aware of this process since college and have been trying it on and off for years, so I forget that most people have no idea what I’m talking about when I say I’m querying. So, for all of you, here it is:

Once you’ve written a book, you can’t just take it to a publisher and get it published. Well, actually, I suppose you CAN take it to a publisher, but chances are they won’t publish it and, for a myriad of other reasons, you really just DON’T want to go to them directly. What you need is a liaison between you and the publisher. Publishing a book is complicated. I don’t know all the details because it hasn’t happened for me (YET!), but I know that even if it were an option to go liaison-less, I wouldn’t. This leads to the whole literary agent and query thing. The literary agent is the liaison between you and the publisher. The query is how you get the literary agent.

So what’s a query? A very short letter in which you tell the literary agent:

the name, genre, length, and basic gist of your book

why the literary agent might want your book (It’s like THESE OTHER AWESOME BOOKS!)

a little bit about yourself (including publishing experience, if you have it, which I don’t)

Now, since I’ve had minimal success with this whole query thing, if you’re someone with experience and you know what’s wrong with my little list, please send me a comment! If you don’t want to comment here, please visit me on Twitter (@tracygoeke) or send me an email (tracy.goeke@gmail.com).

After you’ve written your query, you research literary agents. You find literary agents who want what you’ve got. And you send your query, send your query, send your query. Some literary agents also ask for a synopsis or the first few pages of the book. They read your query, they read your materials, and IF they like what they’ve read, they ask for more. You send them your MS (manuscript, writing, book, you get the idea). If they like it after they’ve read the whole thing, then they ask to represent you and your book. You say HELL YES! or, more politely, yes please.

After you sign with an agent, they then send out their version of a query for your book to publishers. Once a publisher decides to buy your book, then—before it appears on shelves in bookstores and libraries and internet sites—there are edits and…well, I can’t finish that sentence properly. I haven’t been there yet. But I’ll get there. I WILL GET THERE.

Of course, literary agents can also send you a polite rejection that usually begins with a dreaded Dear Author. This happens WAY more than the acceptance. Many agents don’t respond at all unless they’re interested in your work. Numbers vary from agent to agent, but they get A LOT of queries. A LOT. They may only ask for more material from 1/100 queries. Of those requests…well, here again I can’t finish the sentence. I don’t know how many MS they read and accept. All I know is, so far, none of them have asked for my full book.

It’s gonna happen, though. I can feel it. Or, I can hope it. There’s no greater hope than that moment I send an email to an agent. Every time, I think this might be the agent who wants what I’ve got. I’ll let you know when that happens.