18/10/2024 0 Comments a beginner's guide to queryingYou finish your draft novel, edit it as best as you can, get some people to read it (if you can bully them into it), listen to their feedback, tweak your novel, edit it again, make it as good as you can, then get ready to release it into the world… But how? In the olden days, before the likes of Amazon came onto the scene, your only option was to print out your query package, lovingly bundle it into big brown envelopes, drop it in a post box and hope for the best. This is exactly what I did with my very first novel that I wrote in 2010. How things have changed. Now you can self-publish too; what does that involve? self-publishingIf you self-publish, everything it up to you. After you’ve got your novel as good as you can, you will probably need to pay an editor for a line and copy edit (this is the editing you do to really make your novel shine), you can do this yourself, but unless you’re an editing ninja, I don’t recommend it. After it's edited and proof read, you have to format it so you can print it, you have to create an ebook, you have to design the cover or pay someone to do it for you, and you have to market it. You can do all this for virtually nothing, if you’re really good at editing and designing and doing massive publicity stunts that make the world interested in you and your novel, or you can get a publisher to do all that for you and they will take a big chunk of your profits for the privilege… traditional publishingIf you’re broke or fresh out of ideas for publicity stunts, then I guess the good old traditional publishing route still very much has it’s appeal. You get your novel ready for a line/copy edit, then a publisher tweaks it and polishes it (with your input of course), makes a shiny cover and gets it on the shelves of bookshops. They will also give you an advance before all this starts! (Usually, not always). You’ve probably heard of some of the big publishers, like Penguin/Random House, Hachette and Harper Collins, but there’s loads of other publishers too, all of various sizes, ranging from the afore mentioned ‘big boys’ down to one-man-bands. Some of them let you query direct, some of them insist on you getting a literary agent first. Most of the bigger publishers only accept submissions via agents. So how do you get one of these publishers to take a gamble on your book? queryingIf you don’t fancy self-publishing, then you’re going to have to do some querying.
So what is querying? It’s basically where you go to a publisher or literary agent and tell them a bit about you and your book, usually with a synopsis and the first three chapters, and hope that they like what the see enough to ask to see more. So you get your query package ready, then you do some research to find a load of agents and/or publishers you think will like your novel, and you start sending out your stuff. Then you wait. And wait. And then you’ll start to get some rejections. At this stage you might tweak your submission package and send out some more queries. Then wait some more. Until eventually, you either get a request for a full manuscript, or you lose the will to live. Ok, I might be exaggerating slightly with the losing the will to live bit, but you can certainly get to the point where you start to lose all faith in your novel. You start asking yourself stuff, like: “Is my concept too edgy?” “Is my inciting incident exciting enough?” “Are my descriptions too long / too short / too boring?” “Are my characters engaging?” “Do I have a strong voice?” What the bloody hell does “VOICE” mean anyway? I’ve read so may agent pitches saying they are looking for a strong voice. Sorry, I didn’t study creative writing at uni, why can’t they just talk to this sciences graduate in English? (Sorry for my little rant, explanations about what “voice” means are welcome in the comments section of this blog post.) So you keep sending queries until you either get a full request or you give up. But even if you get a full request, that’s by no means the end of the road. A full request just means that whoever you’ve queried wants to see a bit more of your manuscript. After which, they may or may not want to offer you representation (if they’re a literary agent) or a publishing deal (if they’re a publisher). If they’re the former, even once they’ve decided to represent you, they then have to try and sell your manuscript to a publisher, and there’s plenty of repped authors out there whose agents never sell their manuscript. So why even bother to query? Good question. I’ve tried querying with four different novels over the years. I’ve given up on three of them. The first, in fairness, was a pretty rubbish book. The second was rubbish too, when I first started querying it. The third was ok, but could be better. I’m currently querying the forth. Today I got another rejection. I got a couple more rejections yesterday, and also sent out a couple more queries, too. Despite the odds that no one will ever publish my books, I’m still doing it! Am I nuts? Probably, but that has little to do with my querying. You see, I’m querying, but I’m also self-publishing. I have written eight novels in total over the years. The first was awful. Let’s pretend that one doesn’t exist. The second has a good concept, but its execution was terrible. It’s been re-written three times since the first draft, and I reckon it’s now half decent. The second and third books I queried were part of a six-book series. Those are the badgers I’m self-publishing. The eighth is the one I’m querying right now. Why? Why not? Also, because my six-book series is my baby. It’s my collection of stories I’ve been crafting for the last three years and I need to get these out into the world. I can’t guarantee that if I rely on the traditional route. They are also science-fantasy, so don’t sit in a neat little box that publishers tend to like, which will make a traditional deal more tricky. I’m going to self-publish these, but I’m going to keep trying to get a deal for my eighth novel. Why? Enough with the questions! OK, fine, I’ll explain. My eighth novel is the first in a brand new series. It’s pure fantasy, so sits in a nice little box. When I say in my query letter, “this is a stand alone with series potential” I’m not bull-shitting like I was with some of the other books I queried (they were definitely part of a series). I actually wrote the thing with one eye on the market, with the intent to try to get a traditional deal. This sounds soulless, sad, depressing even. But it’s the reality. You might be lucky and write stuff with a lot of commercial appeal. You might be super talented and write an awesome book first time. You might query the right agent, at the right time, and get an offer early on. Chances are, none of those things apply to you. Chances are you’ll be like me, stuck in the query trenches doomed to never leave them. But if this is you and you’re starting to lose the will to live, try to remember this quote that is often credited to golfer Gary Player in reference to his luck in getting the ball into the hole. “The more I practice, the luckier I get.” I’ve been practicing writing and querying for three years now (plus for maybe 6 months, 14 years ago), and I’ve not been lucky yet. But if I keep practicing writing and making my query package perfect, maybe, one day, I’ll find the luck I seek.
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AuthorCharlotte Goodwin is the author of the Gallantrian Legacy series. A set of six books (and counting) set in a universe where magic is real, there's just not much of it on Earth. Archives
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