What I'm Listening To: Telephone-Lady Gaga ft. Beyonce
I sent out a batch of query letters last week, and got my first rejection letter today. No one needs to know who it is or why, but I wanted to talk a little bit about getting those rejection letters, especially form ones. If you are a writer and are seeking representation for your work, first of all I want to say that you are brave, trying to put your creation out there in the world. Secondly, I want to say prepare to be rejected A LOT. Sure there are those exceptions when a writer magically combines what the industry is looking for + her own voice/style and it gets to an agent who that resonates with. When you don't get a form rejection, to me that means that an agent actually cared enough about your work to give you advice or to actually respond with their own words. And of course there is the rejection part where an agent may request a partial or full and then decide that it isn't something that they want to represent. I'm still waiting to get to the level of the second type of rejection letter from an agent.
Above all, you have to remember to stay positive. Don't trash the agent or agency, don't email them an angry letter back--none of that. Just file the rejection letter away, research another agent to add to your list to query, and then get out there again and query them. Right now I have three other query letters out that are still waiting for a reply. So any one of those could possibly be a request for a partial or full. You honestly have to look at the bright side and remember to query widely. Even if that was your dream agent, the one that you thought would be the absolute best fit for your work, you need to get that out of your head because there are plenty of capable agents out there. I suggest that if you have the time and money, to go to a book conference and meet some of them.
Another thing that I would recommend is to make sure that you are adhering to query letter guidelines. It's fascinating to me that most all agents have their own guidelines for query letters listed on their website or blog. So pay attention to that. DO YOUR RESEARCH when querying agents and it will definitely pay off. Always google your agents and definitely check to see if they have a website or blog, and what their preferences are. If the agent doesn't list any preferences, I suggest that you adhere to Noah Lukeman's How to Write a Great Query Letter The man knows what he's talking about, and even better, the book is free. Another thing is to make sure that you know your genre, you state your word count, and that you state what happens succinctly and the choices/consequences that the main character makes.
Just remember, there are so many agents out there and I bet you haven't queried them all. This wasn't my first rejection, and it most certainly won't be my last, but if you truly want representation for your work, you aren't going to let one person dissuade you. Another person could like it. Make sure that your book is finished and your adhering to the guidelines of the agents for the query or a general one like Noah Lukeman and you will be fine.
