What should i tell them? Advice please

Deborah F Anderson · Jan 31, 2015

Hiya,

How ya doin? Could do with a bit of advice about my novel, it is my first one so i am not so experienced with this guff. I sent it off to one agent and waited for the reply and then had to chase them after six weeks. It says wait 5 so i wasn't being impatient. Anyways I got an email back. As I expected it was a NO, no one forgets stuff they want. It was encouraging though but i am guessing it was the usual cheers but no ta standard industry speak. I have pasted it below. Anyways what I am asking is whether I, firstly, should keep flogging this horse - surely they all want the same regarding what sells (should i just get cracking on a new one) or secondly, if I should keep going with this, as it has taken quite a while, should I tell them about this rejection? I don't want to lie but I don't want to ruin my chances and the rejection don't seem too bad. Would they think this was a good thing that the reader thought it was ok or would they think oh right, it's not worth it if someone else thought it was not of selling quality?

I hope you can understand this and help with me situation.

Cheers
--

Hi Deborah,

Thanks for your email, and sorry for not getting back to you until now about this manuscript. Your work was pulled out for my special attention by our reader, Dave Llewelyn, and I can quite see why - it's well written, and a story that deserves to be told.

I think there is a good chance that you'll be able to find a champion for your work, but I'm sorry to say that I don't think I'm the right person for the job. While I admired the work, it's just not the type of thing I would normally represent, and I wouldn't know what to do with it in the market.

I wish you luck finding someone to represent you with the enthusiasm you deserve.

Best wishes,

Carrie

Kay27 · Jan 31, 2015

Hi Carrie

That is a super reply back. OK, it is not an acceptance, but it is the best rejection I have seen.

I am new to all this as well. I took some great advice from here and joined www.querytracker.com.

Have a look there at all the agents that represent your genre and get querying.

Publishing is so subjective so you can't take one person's no as an across-the-board rejection. No need to mention the rejection. It is not important to another agent at all.

Thicken that skin and continue with your querying. It sounds as if you have something very good to query, so get to it, girl!

Kay

Deborah F Anderson · Jan 31, 2015

Ok thanks for your reply, Kay. My lips are sealed

Lonegungrrly · Jan 31, 2015

Brilliant start to querying, definitely keep sending stuff out! Do it in batches of 6-8 so it won't take the rest of your life. Don't mention rejections to other agencies. You're off to a great start, get sending this out, but at the same time make the most of your time waiting and get writing the next!! The first thing an agent will ask if and when you get The Call is what else have you written.

Good luck

Maryn · Jan 31, 2015

I can't say with certainty, but that reads to me like a form rejection with a merge-to-personalize feature added to the first paragraph.

In any case, it's a no, so scratch 'em off your list and move on.

Maryn, who's gotten plenty of rejections

Calla Lily · Jan 31, 2015

What Maryn said. Good luck with the agent hunt!

Deborah F Anderson · Jan 31, 2015

I think you're right it's the usual guff and best to keep quiet about it.

looked at the website querytracker as kay said but it seems it's no good cuz Im in the UK. Buggered if i know where to find what agents accept what. All i have is a list off wikipedia and when I click all they seem to want is thrillers. what a yawn.

I dunno how you authors keep stamina to research. If anyone has a list of em who accept gritty literary fiction. Please may I see it? erm...

Thanks for your help, appreciated

Lonegungrrly · Jan 31, 2015

Fellow UK querier here: buy the Writers and Artists handbook. Preferably the 2015 edition. It is literally a list of agents, what they accept, and how to query them. I buy it every year. It does all the work for you.

Calla Lily · Jan 31, 2015

It's international, right? Soho Press. The only unagented subs they're accepting right now are gritty litfic subs! They are great. I'd tell my agent to sub to them if I even remotely wrote gritty international fic. (I don't. Not even when I try to. :tongue

)

As for the agent hunt, It'll take both legwork and a lot of Amazon searching. In both cases, find gritty litfic books and read the acknowledgements page. Authors thank their agents.

Also search the websites of agencies to see what books their writers have pubbed. Then look for their agent listings. A lot of them will have a short bio which includes what they rep.

Good luck! Brew coffee.

Deborah F Anderson · Jan 31, 2015

fantastic. Cheers for the advice

Treehouseman · Feb 2, 2015

Hi!

Firstly you cannot query just one agent at a time. Trust me, you'll be waiting for years. You need to send the queries out in batches of 5-15, amd make sure you always have a few out there.

Second (and I suppose others have said it) that's a nice but very form letter, and you'll encounter the sweetest essays about your novel, as most agents let down writers gently. You can tell a form when they only make vague comments about your book ie: "well written" rather than specifics: "I think Joe Bloggs made a credible farmer but I wasn't certain about the romance with Jennifer, his dog, so I must pass."

Oh, and do go to Querytracker.com - that's how I found mine.

Deborah F Anderson · Feb 3, 2015

Treehouseman said:
Hi!

Firstly you cannot query just one agent at a time. Trust me, you'll be waiting for years. You need to send the queries out in batches of 5-15, amd make sure you always have a few out there.

Second (and I suppose others have said it) that's a nice but very form letter, and you'll encounter the sweetest essays about your novel, as most agents let down writers gently. You can tell a form when they only make vague comments about your book ie: "well written" rather than specifics: "I think Joe Bloggs made a credible farmer but I wasn't certain about the romance with Jennifer, his dog, so I must pass."

Oh, and do go to Querytracker.com - that's how I found mine.

Really???

you would send out that many! No way. That agency I sent to is one of the top ones in uk. There aren't that many to choose from. I'm not sending to any old one. As it wasn't the usual form one from the subissions team, I won't drop me Standards just yet. Need something to hang on to. I found two other top agents. If I'm gonna get rejected at least then it'll be from the best

Fuchsia Groan · Feb 3, 2015

Batches of five or 10 is pretty standard in the U.S. But we have a lot of reputable agencies to choose from (well, depending on genre), so I would take the advice of a UK querier on that point.

Whether you want to query only "top" agents is a personal decision. For some, it makes sense. But I can tell you that a newer agent with a smaller sales record can sell a book, provided that agent has the necessary connections and contacts and understands the book's potential. An acquaintance of mine queried a newish, not-famous U.S. agent; his book ended up published by Penguin and reviewed in the New Yorker, boosting that agent's rep in the process. It's not the most common story, but it's well within the realm of possibility.

That said, the first paragraph of the letter doesn't sound form to me — no form R I've ever received has mentioned a reader pulling the query out for special consideration. I'd take it as encouraging, though specific comments and an R&R would be more so.

Drachen Jager · Feb 3, 2015

Rule of thumb: you're not allowed to just give up on a manuscript until it's been queried to at least 50 agents (100 if you work in a popular genre).

Try Query Tracker to find more agents and track your querying progress. It's free to use if you sign up, or you can pay a fee for some added features.

Bryan Methods · Feb 3, 2015

Fuchsia Groan said:
Batches of five or 10 is pretty standard in the U.S. But we have a lot of reputable agencies to choose from (well, depending on genre), so I would take the advice of a UK querier on that point.

Yeah, most of my writer friends usually query in batches of 6-8 over here in the UK. That's certainly not unusual - and nor are the people who go for 20 at once...

Lonegungrrly · Feb 3, 2015

UK person here, and yeah, I usually go for about 8 at a time. You can do it in stages in the UK (and presumably in the US) because there are several agents at each house, and if one rejects you, you can query the next there. So don't write off an agency just coz one agent has shot you down.

Also, this might sound arse-backwards but I try with some B choices first, because even if you don't realise it now, the query letter you're sending out will be improved upon with each batch and you will KICK YOURSELF That you sent something so unpolished to your top tier choices straight out of the gate!!

Deborah F Anderson · Feb 3, 2015

Lonegungrrly said:
UK person here, and yeah, I usually go for about 8 at a time. You can do it in stages in the UK (and presumably in the US) because there are several agents at each house, and if one rejects you, you can query the next there. So don't write off an agency just coz one agent has shot you down.

Also, this might sound arse-backwards but I try with some B choices first, because even if you don't realise it now, the query letter you're sending out will be improved upon with each batch and you will KICK YOURSELF That you sent something so unpolished to your top tier choices straight out of the gate!!

---
This actually makes a lot of sense to me cuz I read me submission through and oops, I left the "E" off hope and missed out a few ins and thes in the letter, not to mention the stuff ups in synopsis. Oh well, at least they've given me chance to get that right Next time.
I reckon I'll do ten at most and that's pushing it, can just self publish and write another one I suppose. Its hard to have patience with all this, I could actually do with an agent to find me an agent

Cheers for the advice

What should i tell them? Advice please

Deborah F Anderson

Kay27

Deborah F Anderson

Lonegungrrly

Maryn

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Calla Lily

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Deborah F Anderson

Lonegungrrly

Calla Lily

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Deborah F Anderson

Treehouseman

Deborah F Anderson

Fuchsia Groan

Becoming a laptop-human hybrid

Drachen Jager

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Bryan Methods

Lonegungrrly

Deborah F Anderson