Somebody Loves Me!

Three positive responses in one day!

From Barbara Collins Rosenberg (on a lovely, cream-colored paper):
“I have received you query letter and would like to know more about your book…”

From Jeff Herman (of the famed Jeff Herman’s Guide):
“We apologize if this is a late response and understand that your work may no longer be available. But if it is we would be very happy to review it.”

From Miriam Altshuler (who I had queried two years ago about my memoir, which she requested to review but ultimately declined. It has yet to be published.):
“Thank you for your letter and it is nice to hear from you again. I would be pleased to read the first 50-100 pages of your book.” (she remembered me somehow!)

It feels so good to finally get some positive responses. After mailing out over a hundred queries, I am inevitably getting quite a sea of rejections back. It’s easy to start feeling down, but these invitations for a proposal are making me feel a bit more buoyant. Hope springs eternal.

The Frugal Rejection: Apologetic Agents

Now, a sampling of the “we’re sorry we couldn’t be more personal” phrases from the more self-conscious agents in my ample rejection pile:

From Dunham Literary:
“Moreover, we apologize that we cannot respond in a more personal manner.”

From Nancy Love Literary Agency:
“We apologize that, due to the high volume of submissions we receive, we could not include a personal note.”

From Ellen Geiger:
“I’m sorry that sheer volume prevents me from responding personally to your submission.”

It seems that most of the agents who apologize have printed their form letters on plain white paper and cut several small rejection letters out of one 8 x 11 sheet (as opposed to many agents, who have fancy, stiff, off-white paper and their own letterhead). In other words, these rejection letters look something like a note you would post on a message-board advertising that you are looking for a roommate—and not a formal letter from a fancy schmancy literary agency. By the same token, I do wonder why an agency would waste expensive paper on aspiring authors who don’t pass muster. I would probably use the thin white scrap-of-a-letter.

Blue Ink Rejections

More blue-ink scrawled “we don’t represent your genre” messages…

From Scott Treimel Agency:
Ms. Write—
We represent authors of children’s books exclusively.
Best of luck,
Mary Leigh Krasnieuicz

(Oops. Don’t know how that one slipped through the cracks. Oh well, it happens.)

From Linda Konner:
Dear Ms. Write,
Thanks for getting in touch, but I handle only how-to books. Best of luck.
L. Konner

(I’m pretty sure that wasn’t clear from her entry. It would have saved us both the effort had she clarified what sort of books she represents.)

From Joan Raines (this writing is really sloppy):
Sorry, not for me.
J.

When I get hand-written notes, it makes me wonder if these agents aren’t getting as much mail as the other ones. If I received dozens of useless queries each week, I would almost certainly use a form letter. On the other hand, the blue ink method does save paper…

Rejection #2: Memoir, Anyone?

From John A. Ware (Agent for John Krakauer, and also for Eric Brende, author of Better Off, a book about a year living in a Mennonite community with no “modern conveniences.”)

Scrawled in blue ink on top of my query letter:

“Sorry, no memoirs, categorically. Good luck with it.”

Well, my book is not exactly a memoir. In fact, I had chosen to query Mr. Ware because I felt that my book was very similar in genre to Eric Brende’s book, which was represented by Mr. Ware. Oh well, at least I was treated to a hand-written, thick-inked denial instead of the standard type-written form rejection. Still, agents, it’s not nice to lie. John Ware, you clearly don’t categorically deny memoirs.

Rejection #1: Not Joining Barbara Kingsolver

My first rejections are beginning to file in, so I thought I'd share a few of them on the blog. Here's one from Ellen Geiger, of the Frances Goldin Literary Agency (which represents Barbara Kingsolver! Damn!):

Dear Author:

Thank you so much for sending your project to me for possible representation. I’m sorry that sheer volume prevents me from responding personally to your submission.

I am so busy these days that I take on very few new clients. In this case, I just didn’t feel your work was right for my list at this time. In this highly competitive environment, you need an agent who can represent you with 100% enthusiasm.

I wish you every success in placing the book.

Sincerely,
Ellen Geiger


All in all, a pretty nice rejection: well-written, straightforward, apologetic but not overly so. Thanks, Ellen.

Finding Agents to Query

Here are some useful websites for agent listings:

http://www.agentquery.com/
http://everyonewhosanyone.com/agus1.html
http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/browse.htmlhttp://www.mediabistro.com/content/archives/pitchinganagent.asp

Remember, if you’re on a budget, the 2006 Writers Market (or Jeff Herman) can work just as well as the 2007 version. There might be a few new agents each year, but:

a) you can generally find them online,
b) unless you get Writer’s Market right when it’s published, those new agents (with a special symbol alongside their entry, announcing that they’re new) are going to be deluged with query letters,
c) most of the (good, well-established, well-connected) agents are the same from year-to-year,
d) you’re supporting used bookstores (which are almost always independent),
e) and besides, if you’re sending out 100 queries, chances are you’re going to get some bites anyway, even if you miss a couple of newbies. (Save your money for stamps!)

I do recommend buying a book, and not just relying on online entries. A book is a good, quick way to get your list started.
Most websites have very simple listings of agents – just name and address. Books often have more information about the individual agencies, and they save you some time trying to track down additional information about submissions guidelines and preferred genres. (Writers Market and Jeff Herman both include how to query specific agents and what sorts of books those agents represent.)

Mail Merge How-To:

If you’re going to query a big batch of agents, you’ll want to get comfortable with the “mail-merge” function in Microsoft word/excel (it allows you to use a spreadsheet of names and addresses to produce hundreds of letters without having to type in each bit of information). Here's how:

Make an excel sheet of all the agents you are planning to query. This will become an extremely useful tool – not only will it enable you to rapid-fire generate and print out 100 query letters to different agents with the touch of a button, but it will also help you keep track of what agents have requested your proposal, and when. (The latter capability is highly necessary with the Blitzkrieg approach.)

If there are a few agents you’re particularly ecstatic about, BY ALL MEANS personalize a few of those letters. (Kiss ass all you want – mention a few of their other clients, whether you attended a conference they did, whatever. It might help catch an agent’s eye – but in my humble opinion and experience, not having kiss-ass in all those other letters is not going to make or break your chances of a positive response.)

A technical note about personalization: the MS Word mail merge function generates a new document with ALL of the letters, so once that document has been generated (and SAVED! Save often!) you can meddle with individual letters to your heart’s desire.

Back to the tech hints:

EXCEL SHEET

I know Excel can be a scary program, but what you’ll be doing is extremely simple, I promise.
Make 11 columns, titled:
Status, How Sent, Agency Name, Agent’s Name, Name with Title, Wants, Notes, Address L1, Address L2, Address L3, Additional Contact Info.

Columns 1, 2, 6, 7, and 11 are for your information.
Columns 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, and 10 are for the mail merge.

An example entry would be (each line break denotes a new column):

Requested proposal!
Snail mailed
Miriam Altshuler Literary Agency
Miriam Altshuler
Ms. Altshuler
Query and now proposal!
Likes Creative Non-Fiction with strong platform
53 Old Post Road North
Red Hook, NY
12571
845.758.9408 (no email given)


MAIL MERGE:

Draft your letter, leaving space wherever you want something that’s agent specific. I have put asides in [ brackets ] – but you’d just leave blank space there if you were actually drafting a letter for a mail merge.

E.g.,
--------------------
Miss Writes
10001 CyberSpace Drive
New York, NY
10001

[ agent’s name will go here]
[ agent’s address will go here]
[ address continued ]
[ address continued ]

Dear [ agent’s name will go here ],

I am writing to query you about my 500,000 word neo-blogospheric-narrative, Miss Writes.

[Etc.]

Warm regards,
[don’t forget to leave space and SIGN here!!]
Miss Writes
misswrites@misswrites.com (email preferred)
(911) 911-9111
-----------------

Once you have that letter drafted, go into the “Tools” drop-down menu. Select “Data Manager.” A new window should pop up: select your excel spreadsheet as your “data source.”
You can then drag your “merge fields” (which should come up as the titles of your excel spreadsheet columns – e.g., AgentName) into your document in the appropriate space you left.

Then MERGE, baby! (As new document.) Voila. You now have whole ream of beautiful letters, ready to be printed, stuffed, and sent off to agents.


PRINTING:

To print individual letters you must type “S1, S3,” for pages 1 and 3 since Word generates all of the different letters as individual sections (hence, S1).

(This took me about a half hour to figure out. Thanks, Bill Gates.)

The Case of the Unsigned Queries

Crap! A couple days after sending out my initial batch of query letters, I have realized that I forgot to sign all the letters. Oh no! Oh no! They’ll think I’m so rude, and unprofessional. They’ll never want to be my agent. They’ll see the blank space where my signature is supposed to be and just toss the letter right out the window of their posh, tenth-floor suites. I’m history!

I rushed to the post-office to see if I could salvage the second batch of letters, which I had just shoved into the mail slot an hour before. Nope, the stodgy postal worker says. They’ve all been thrown together with thousands of other letters. You’d never find ‘em.

My boyfriend tries to console me by explaining that I did have my name typed out on the letter, so it’s not like there was a complete lack of signature. (Sure, not a complete lack, but definitely a big fat blank space above my typed-out name.) And besides, if they like the material, why should they care if there’s no signature inked in? he asks.

Still, I say I’m history. My life is over.

The Query Strategy: Blitzkrieg

I have opted for a no-holds-barred offensive approach to querying agents for my new book. The last time I queried a book—my memoir, which has yet to be published—I sent letters to maybe forty agents. At the time, it seemed like a million. A couple tips I learned from this first effort: first, get comfortable with the “mail-merge” function in Microsoft word/excel (it allows you to use a spreadsheet of names and addresses to produce hundreds of letters without having to type in each bit of information); second, buy the type of envelopes that come with a sticky strip (you don’t want to lick that many envelopes with that icky sticky nasty chemical taste on them). Anyway, I ended up with four or five agents requesting the manuscript. I sent it, and they all “passed.”

Which left me feeling more than a little unloved.

So this brings me back to my new approach: the Query Blitzkrieg. I am sending letters to over 100 agents. Yes, you heard me right—more that 100. This process of contacting so many agents is made slightly simpler because some accept or even prefer email queries. In the guide books and writer websites, I have read the gamut of advice on how many agents to query. Some say to query about ten to start with; others say thirty, forty, fifty. My feeling is that the recommendation to query just a few agents is probably perpetuated by the agent industry for a couple reasons: one, they receive so many queries and they would rather receive less queries that are more specifically targeted to them; and two, they naturally would rather be the only agent considering a project that they like, for obvious reasons. I say screw it—query ‘til the cows come home! As an author, it’s hard for me to know whether a given agent will consider my book their type of “narrative non-fiction,” and it’s to my advantage to have multiple agents offering me representation at once. Oh, and I don’t want to wait two months just to be rejected by the first ten agents I query. I've spent a year researching and writing this book, and it's time to get this baby rolling!

Of course, I’m not just mailing a letter to every agent in New York. I have narrowed my list down to agents who express interest in my genres: narrative non-fiction, creative non-fiction, and travel. My two main sources have been Jeff Herman’s Guide and the Writer’s Market. Both are big fat books, and they can be fairly expensive, so here’s my advice: get a slightly older one used (which is how I got Jeff Herman’s 2005 edition) or put it on your wish list (Writer’s Market was given to me as a gift). Other invaluable sources have been: the internet (amazon & google books) and the bookstore.

Let me explain. Authors generally thank their agents in the acknowledgments section, which allows you to find the agents representing books like yours. You can do this very easily in the bookstore, or—if you’re a more cyber kind of person—you can search for the word “agent” and the book title on google books. One of Google’s myriad products, this one allows you to search through the many books they have scanned into their system. No joke. Conversely, if you already know an agent’s name and want to find out what they’ve represented, you can search for their name on amazon, which will also lead you to the acknowledgments section of books they have scanned in.

So, the letters are off. Yes, it cost me over a hundred dollars in stamps (don’t forget about the self-addressed stamped envelopes – so each letter is 41 cents times two). But I consider it an investment, and I want to see the return on my investment sooner, rather than later.

I’ve never been called a patient person.

My Book

First, I should tell you a little bit about the book that leads me to harass the mail slots of so many literary agents with my snappy little query letter. To paint a broad-stroke picture of the story, it is a non-fiction narrative—a bit of a travel adventure with a social and environmental conscience. I’ve invested over a year of traveling, researching, and writing in this baby, and I’m finally ready to send her off to fly on her own wings. Wish me luck!

An introduction to this blog, and rejection.

Writers, it seems, are an under-represented lot.
Well, let me clarify. When it comes to our books, you probably won't be able to find us in the deepest darkest corners of Borders or Barnes and Noble. (Thank goodness for Amazon.) But books for us -- now those suckers are on display at every bookstore in the country, whether it's independent or chain.
They target books to us because we'll read them –- hoping that somewhere, hidden inside one of the big fat floppy plastic-covered marketing tomes, we'll find the secret to writing success.
Why the Da Vinci Code sold 25 million copies.
Why J. K. Rowling's fantasy series became an empire, when many great (and, dare I say it, more imaginative and original)writers before her have been forgotten.
Why, as of today, the wife of a famous country singer is the number one selling non-fiction author in the country. (More or less because she is the wife of a famous country singer.)
It's enough to make a writer weep. Which is why I'm starting this blog.

As I try to write and sell and --gasp, dare I say-- earn a living from a creative non-fiction book, I'm going to chronicle my miserable rejections. My tiny triumphs. The little tips and tricks I glean along the way so that you can read them here, for free, instead of buying one of those $50 books. I know there are a number of blogs on this topic already, and to them I say: vive la hyperlink.

I'm also looking for suggestions from you, a fellow writer or reader. On how we can do it. How we can bring quality works from unpublished authors into the marketplace, how we can bring the concept of "reading a book" back into the mainstream, and turn the world into a slightly more writer-friendly place.

I look forward to hearing from you.