I ended my October roundup by reporting that I’m getting ready to begin a fresh set of queries, and that’s where I still am. My last querying experience (2019) did not go very well — I received very little in the way of replies at all, and those that I did receive were rejections — so I’m devoting a lot of effort to getting it right this time. I think I have a better piece of material to query this time, but I’m well aware that I can’t afford to get it wrong with the submission.
The first thing I did this month to prepare for querying was to read a lot of advice on querying. I also went and re-read my old query letter templates to see where it might have gone wrong, and made a surprisingly big discovery.
My previous query letter was focusing on entirely the wrong part of the story. Uh-oh!
Although all of the advice I’ve been studying has talked about how to bring out the most exciting and significant elements in only a few lines, my query letter from 2019 didn’t do that at all. The ‘elevator pitch’ focused just on the introductory plot elements — the stage setting, really — and left one without any impression of where the story was heading.
Obviously, I already have one area to improve!
As of this writing, I’ve worked up a reasonably polished first draft query letter, and I’m turning my attention to a synopsis. I’m going to write at least two (one page / two pages), since I know different agents are interested in different lengths. I think my synopsis was relatively okay last time, but it can definitely be improved upon.
After I’m done with that, I plan to get some editorial help reviewing my query letter. Ultimately, if it makes any difference to my chances of getting an agent, I’m inclined to think the price for professional help is very reasonable, and I’ll either get helpful advice on what to change or a pleasant feeling of confidence if (not likely) nothing needs changing.
After all that, I plan to take a holiday break and begin querying in the middle weeks of the new year.
Oh, and I hope to get the site overhaul done some time around year’s end as well. But that’s on the back burner for now. Writing query letters and working on synopsis copy is not something I want to mess with over the holidays, whereas tweaking the site appearance is more casual.