Category: agents

            Hey, a quick bonus post or Writers Coffeehouse folks.  Or any of you who are interested in such things…

            One of our Coffeehouse topics this past weekend was querying agents, and I told the folks there about how I actually got attention from two fairly well-known, high profile agents because I had a good query letter and could talk like a professional in one-on-one meetings. And I thought it might be useful to some folks to have said letter as a rough template.

            Ironically, the book I was querying with was The Suffering Map, my early novel that I use so often here as an example of how not to do things.  Seriously, I use it so often there’s a tag for it.  A big one.  You could figure out a lot of the book  just by reading about all the elements I screwed up in it.

            Anyway…

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                                                                          May 15^th, 2003

                                                                          My Old Address

                                                                          San Diego CA 92116

Name

Agency

Address

New York NY

Ms. ########,

            If you could travel in an instant to anywhere, or any-when, in the world, where would you go?  Now, what if there was a price?  What if each journey submitted you to a nightmare of pain and torture before you arrive, unharmed, without a mark on you, at your destination.  Getting there is not half the fun.  So why would Rob Fable do it a second time?  Or a third?  And what would happen if he got addicted to it?

My novel, THE SUFFERING MAP,  is a suspense/ horror novel that also involves a great deal of mythology, history, and a sprinkling of pop culture.  It’s set in my home city of San Diego, and the title refers to a mysterious device, found (well, stolen) by Rob, which allows him to travel while submitting him to the whims of a being called Bareback.  It also brings him into contact with Sondra, who develops an unusual bond with the Suffering Map, and Gulliver, who has his own plans for the mechanism….

        Rob comes to realize the financial potential of the device and travels with it more and more.  When he discovers some of the historical results of using the Suffering Map, though, he finds it isn’t that easy to stopusing it.  In the end, Rob must come to terms with his addiction to the ancient machine as his friends try to save him and themselves, for Bareback has his own plans, and the power of history is on his side.

            I would like to send you either the full manuscript of The Suffering Map (approximately 120,000 words), or some sample chapters and a synopsis, at your preference.  Please find a SASE enclosed for your convenience.

                                                                          Sincerely,

                                                                          Peter Clines

———————–

            So, look at what we’ve got here. First off, it’s short and simple–one page only.  I introduce the four major characters and explain the title.  Also notice that while pretty much the whole thing is talking about the story–this could almost be a back of the book/inside flap description,  I also slip in a bit of humor (okay, maybe he didn’t find the Suffering Map…) and some credentials (I’m not just writing about a city I’ve never been to or visited once).

            I wrap it up with a professional closing.  At the time this particular agent hadn’t set out firm guidelines past “query first,” so I suggested some options, each one showing that I have an understanding of the process.  By offering the full manuscript (with a word count) I’m confirming it’s done, and I have an idea how long such a book should be.  Offering a synopsis implies I either have one ready or know how to prepare one.  And all of that helps show that I’ve got an idea how to use words to convey ideas.  Y’know, like a writer…

            One more thing. The little device of asking questions—good, semi-rhetorical questions—encourages people to consider answers.  So even though I address these questions a bit later (to some degree), I’m still leaving room for the agent to wonder about what the answer is. The Suffering Map, as implied, has a mystery element to it, so questions worked well for me. YMMV.

            However… I hear that “asking rhetorical questions” has been getting used in queries a lot lately, and the device is bordering on gimmicky.  Most agents hate gimmicks, because even though it may be new and clever to me, odds are they’ve seen it a hundred times.  This week.  Some might just roll their eyes and keep reading, for others it may be a dealbreaker.  So be cautious with gimmicks.  Or something that may be bordering on gimmick-hood.

            And, again, please don’t forget—this is an example of what worked for me. Your individual query letter needs to reflect your book and your skills as a writer, so copying this and making minor tweaks won’t really help.  This is just a guide, so when you’re talking about your book you’ll have a sense of what to say.

            On our regularly-scheduled Thursday post, I wanted to talk about sucker punches.

            Until then, go write.

            And if you’re at that stage… query.

            If I can shamelessly namedrop a bit,  I heard a great Richard Matheson quote from Jonathan Maberry a while back, which I will now paraphrase as such.

            Writingis the art of telling stories.  Publishingis the business of selling as many copies of that art as possible.

            If you break it down, this collection of rants is probably 98% about writing, maybe 2% about publishing.  This week, if I may, I’d like to step away from the straight writing stuff that I normally do and touch on an issue more on the publishing side of things.

            Nobody here likes getting rejected. Not for an apartment, not for a job, not for a date. Definitely not for our writing.  But that’s life. Rejection happens all the time, even to the folks who get considered professionals.  I had a short story rejected from an anthology last year.  I’ve been trying to pitch a book trilogy to my editor for two years now, and he’s just not interested. Heck, my agent’s not even that interested in it.  These things happen.

            I bring this up because there’s a meme, or sometimes an article, that floats around a lot, presenting a bunch of facts that go something like this… 

            “Famous writer X showed their manuscript Y to twenty-three editors before someone bought it.  Not only that, bestselling novel Y2 by famous writer X2 was rejected by forty-two editors. Can you imagine that? Forty-two people passed on Y2?  Ha ha ha, how many of them are kicking themselves now?”

            This list can be ten or fifteen authors/books long, and I see it get used a lot to show how A) I shouldn’t give up hope just because of all my rejections, B) editors don’t know anything, C) the publishing industry is a dinosaur that’s going to die out any day now, just wait and see, or D) all of the above.

            So, at first glance, this list can seem like a really awesome thing. It makes me feel more positive about rejection.  It makes me feel more positive about that stupid editor’s decision.  It validates my feelings about big publishing and their ongoing habit of ignoring my letters.  And this is good, right?

            Thing is, there’s three problems here.  And I think they cause more issues than all this positive affirmation solves.  Y’see, Timmy, this list isn’t as clear-cut as it seems…

            First problem is the false parallel that often gets drawn because of this list.  Carrie was rejected many times and my early book– The Suffering Map –was rejected many times.  Therefore, logically, my book must be just as good (and just as worthy of being published) as Stephen King’s breakout hit.

            We can all see the flaw there, right?  Just because an editor rejected a good book doesn’t mean all the books they reject are good. Some of them—let’s be honest—some of them are not good.  Some of them are bad.  We can all probably name one or two folks who aren’t as good at writing as they think they are.  And they can probably name two or three folks, too.

            I can freely admit, I’ve had books rejected by agents.  And they deserved to be rejected.  They were awful.  Honestly, in retrospect, I’m kind of ashamed I submitted one of them. 

            The next problem, to be blunt, is that writers don’t always send stories where they’re supposed to go.  Sometimes we get overeager or don’t do all the research we should.  If I’d sent Ex-Heroes to Harlequin, of course they would’ve rejected it. So would the Black Library (a very specific niche press), Razorbill (a young adult press), or Lonely Planet (a travel book publisher).  Getting rejected from these places would be completely understandable, but would it really say anything about the quality of my writing?  Or that editor’s ability to recognize good writing?

            So should I consider those when I say that my book’s been rejected half a dozen times?

            Heck, a while back I spoke with a woman online as she lamented that her story had been rejected four times.  Ignoring the fact that four times is nothing, it turned out she’d submitted to four radically different markets.  She’d tried marketing it as young adult, sci-fi, fantasy, and as a horror novel.  Which really meant she’d been rejected once.  Once as a young adult story, once as a sci-fi story, and so on.

            Is that worth calling it quits over?

            Also, there are some writers out there who… well, who can’t take a hint.  They’re the literary equivalent of the guy who thinks if he keeps asking Phoebe out every Friday night, eventually she’ll break down and say yes. When an editor rejects a manuscript… that’s it.  Unless they specifically ask to see it again, I shouldn’t try to sneak it back in their pile six months later. No, not even if I explain that I tweaked three of the chapters. My goal is to convince them I’m a professional, and that’s not how professionals work.  But some people do it anyway, often the folks who tend to do “carpet bomb” submissions of twenty or thirty editors at a time.

            If Phoebe rejects my advances twenty times, is that twenty rejections?  Or is it just one (and I’m really bad at taking a hint)?

            So rejection numbers don’t necessarily tell a complete story.

            Finally, this list implies a really big misconception, something a lot of beginners (or willfully uninformed folks) don’t get.  When they hear that bestselling author Wakko Warner was rejected thirty times, they make the assumption that Wakko sent out the exact same book with the exact same query letter thirty times.  Thirty editors all saw the same book that got published, letter for letter, and every one of them passed on it.

            As someone who’s made those rounds, I’d be willing to bet some serious cash that’s not true.

            After a given number of rejections, a good writer’s going to take note that something isn’t working.  It might be a low number, just two or three.  It might be as high as a dozen.  But only a really deluded person is going to keep doing the exact same thing again and again and expect the results are going to radically change.

          Personally, I’d rewrite my cover letter after every fourth or fifth rejection.  Sometimes it would be to update it with a new sale or credit.  Other times I’d come up with a cleaner, slicker way to get a point across.  All too often, it was to fix the typo that had slipped past three revisions and didn’t get noticed until after I sent things out.   Whatever made me do it, it was rare for more than a handful of editors to get the exact same letter from me.  And  different people interpret those letters different ways

            Not only that, if I was lucky enough to get any sort of feedback… I listened to it.  I didn’t always follow it word for word, but if the people who were in the position to buy my stories offered suggestions, I considered them.  The Suffering Mapwent through a pretty decent revision halfway through my submissions, and then another one right after I attended the SDSU Writers’ Conference. 

            Out of its dozen or so submissions, I’d guess at least three different versions of it went out under three or four different cover letters.

            So, with all of this in mind…  is it that amazing a particular book was rejected forty-two times? 

            It seems kind of, well, normal, doesn’t it?

            It’s always fantastic to look back at the people who inspired us and how they got their start.  If I want to walk that same path, though, I need to look at that start without any blinders or preconceptions. Which is going to make the path look a lot tougher.

            But it’ll also make it easier to follow.

            Next time…

            I don’t know. Between the ranty blog and the Writers Coffeehouse, it feels like I’ve been going on and on about so many things, it all feels a bit repetitive to me.  Is there an appropriate writing topic anybody’d like to hear me babble on about?

            If not… I’ll put something together…

            Until then, go write.

            Never say never…

            I wanted to blather on about quitting for a couple of minutes.  There comes a point in many endeavors when you realize you’re not getting ahead.  That all the time, effort, and enthusiasm that’s been expended on this project just isn’t enough. For one reason or another, I didn’t make the cut.  The team picked that skinny kid with the limp and the glasses over me.

            At which point, I need to make a choice.  Do I keep trying to get on this team? Do I continue throwing myself unto the breach?  Forging on despite all odds with the strength of my convictions?

            Or should I give up?

            Honestly?  After working at this writing thing on one level or another for a good chunk of my life…

            I think it’s time to quit.

            If I’ve spent the past decade trying to get any publisher in the world to just look at one of my book manuscripts, and they’re not interested… that’s a sign.  If I’ve spent thousands of dollars on screenwriting classes and books and contests over the past ten or twelve years, but I still don’t even have a toe in the door…I should consider saving my money this year.  When I submit a story to a hundred magazines, journals, and anthologies and get back a hundred rejections… I need to take that hint.

            I should quit.  Cut my losses.  Stop beating my head against the wall, demanding to be recognized, and move on.

            No, hold on.  Don’t leave yet.  Keep reading ‘till the end.

            What I’m getting at ties back to an idea I’ve talked about a few times here.  I need to be able to look at my own work honestly and objectively.  Knowing when to give up on a project is part of that.  After querying a hundred or so reps or editors and not getting a single nibble, I need to consider the fact the problem may not lay with them.  My writing may be perfect, it may be gold, it may be what everyone in America is dying for.  At the moment, though, for one reason or another, it’s not what those specific people—those, dare I say it, gatekeepers—are  looking for.  And, right or wrong,  they’re  the ones who make that decision. 

            Now… here’s that important part.

            I’m not saying I’m going to stop writing altogether.  This doesn’t mean I should never touch a keyboard again or that it’s time for me to forget the big leagues.  It’s just time to sit back and look at what I’ve done and how I’m doing things.  Maybe the problem is the characters.  Maybe it’s dialogue.  Perhaps even something as basic as an overwhelming number of typos.   Heck, it could just be my cover letter.  At the end of the day, something is holding me back, and that needs to stop happening.

            I’ve met people who wrote one novel way back in college and have spent the past twenty years sending it to agent after agent, publisher after publisher.  They haven’t changed a single word since they first set it down on paper.  They haven’t written anything else since (“Why should I write something else nobody’s going to pay me for?”).  They’ve just got that one novel going out again and again and again…

            Same thing in Hollywood.  People write a screenplay over a long weekend, never polish or revise it, but try to use it as a calling card for years.  I know of a guy on the contest circuits who pushed the same script for almost a decade.  He hasn’t done anything else in the meantime, just sent that same script to contest after contest, waiting for fame and fortune as if winning was a lottery and he had to keep playing his lucky numbers.

            Knowing when to quit and move on isn’t a weakness. It’s not a flaw in my approach.  It’s a strength.  It’s the only way I can grow and learn new things, because I won’t get any better if I keep rewriting the same manuscript again and again for decades.  Sometimes you just have to give up on something. 

            It took me almost eleven years to finish my first solid novel, The Suffering Map.  Not an idea, not a work in progress, not something I’ve been poking at.  A complete, polished book manuscript, first page to last page.  Beginning, middle,and end.  Yeah, that’s a long time, but close to a decade of that was the film industry convincing me to go work on screenplays instead.  It probably only took about two years of actual work.

            So, eleven years of on-again-off-again work, and then the querying.  Letter after letter, rejection after rejection.  Go through it again, create a new draft, and then start the letters again.  Some folks asked to see it (one or two of them were powerful, well-placed folks).  Many letters and emails were traded back and forth. 

            In the end, though, after almost a dozen very major revisions, all of them passed on it.  And then I realized, this was done. I’d been working on that book on and off since graduating from college.  It was time to expand my horizons and write something else. 

            And that something was an early draft of a book about a government teleportation project gone wrong.  Which I followed up with a book about superheroes fighting zombies.  And then a few things since then.

            If I’d stayed focused for years on that novel no one wanted to see, though, I wouldn’t’ve done any of it.  I’d still be back there at square one.  And my list of published credits wouldn’t be the size it is now.

            I’m not saying I’ll never go back to The Suffering Map.  Many writers will tell you if your screenplay or novel gets rejected, put it in the drawer and wait a few years.  I’m also not saying it will sell in a heartbeat if I decide to try again in five years.  For now, though, I’ve given up on it. 

            So the next time you’re frustrated by months and months of trying to find a home for your work… stop and really think about it.  Maybe it’s time to move on and try something different.  Something new.

            Because that next thing could be the big thing.

            Next time might be a bit delayed.  Sorry. But when it happens, let’s flip this around.

            Until then… go write.

Oddly enought, this week I wanted to prattle on for a moment about one of those off-writing things I tend not to talk about much. It’s more of a mindset, and it applies to writers of prose and scripts alike. Simply put, I want to talk about dating.

I want to toss out a hypothetical situation for you. More exact, a hypothetical person. I’ll call her Phoebe. If you want to substitute a different name, go ahead.

Phoebe’s my dream woman. She’s what every man aspires to. I can’t think of anything I’ve wanted more than to be with Phoebe–and you can feel free to take “be with” any way you like and you’d be right. She is, in all ways, perfect.

Well, perfect might be overstating it. Just a bit.

To be honest, she’d be much hotter if her hair was a bit lighter. And not so long. If she was more of a platinum blonde, Phoebe would be unbelievably hot. So really she’s just a haircut and a box of dye away from being my perfect woman.

Okay, maybe if her chin wasn’t quite so sharp. Makes her face a bit too pointy for my liking. Rounded would bring out her cheeks and her smile more.

Speaking of which… slight overbite. You can’t really notice it until you’re close to her. That’s when you can also see one of her incisors has this little twist to it. Nothing braces couldn’t fix, though. Maybe those transparent ones.

Also–please don’t think I’m shallow for this–maybe a little more in the, well, the chestal region. Phoebe is a touch on the small side. Not flat, by any means, and they’re nicely formed. I’m not talking about anything grotesque, mind you, but something in a B-cup would give her an absolutely killer figure. Again that’s minor. Heck, I think these days it’s just outpatient surgery.

Y’know, if she wore some nicer clothes, it’d help show off that figure, too. Everything Phoebe owns is that kind of frumpy-baggy look. It was kind of cute in college, but come on. Dress up a bit now and then. Would it be so wrong to wear something eye-catching? Once we’re together, I ‘ll take her on a nice shopping spree before we go out anywhere.

Although I don’t know where we’ll go out. We don’t have many of the same interests. Her taste in movies sucks, to be honest, and she’s not really much of an athletic person. I’ll work on that, get her to watch something better and stop subjecting me to that crap stuff she likes to watch.

At least the sex will probably be worth it. As long as she doesn’t make that same weird noise she makes when she’s excited. That sound creeps me out.

Still my dream girl, though, and I’d love to be with her–in any sense of the phrase.

So, at this point I can guess what a lot of you are thinking. Why the hell is Phoebe my dream girl if I want to change everything about her? She sounds like an okay person as is, but it’s pretty apparent she’s not what I’m looking for, despite my insistence that I want to be with her. I mean, why would anyone want to be involved with someone just to change everything about them?

Which, as it turns out, is the point I wanted to make.

There are lots of folks who talk about how much they want to be writers. They’ll tell you it’s been a lifelong dream to see their name on a shelf in a bookstore, or to hear actors reciting their dialogue. There’s nothing they want more, and they’ll do whatever it takes, make any sacrifice necessary, to make that dream become a reality.

Then, just after this, they’ll tell you all the things that are wrong with Hollywood. That there aren’t enough musicals/ torture porn/ funny animal movies being made. Why scripts need to be put on the screen in their pristine, untouched form. How they need to let people walk in and pitch ideas without all these hoops to jump through like a resume or a list of credits.

Or maybe they’ll tell you how biased the publishing industry is. How publishers need to give as much time and interest to new writers as they do to Stephen King or Dan Brown. That they should be accepting all submissions, agented or not. And how books that aren’t interesting and would be hard to market need to get a fair shake from these publishers.

Don’t even get these folks started on agents. Agents of all types need to be a lot more open. They need to read everything that gets sent to them, and offer feedback if they don’t like it. All seven of the agents in the world need to start accepting more clients and getting more stuff sold to the top studios and publishers.

And as a finale, they’ll tell you all the things they’d change about the industry. The policies that make it so reprehensible. All the things they’re going to change once they’re in that position of power. In fact, the industry’s changing now and they’d better watch out and grab these would be-writers and their golden manuscripts before they all change their minds and become house painters or accountants, thus depriving the world of their genius.

By what I’m sure is a complete coincidence, none of these people have ever sold a book, or a screenplay, or even a short story. Which, they’ll hurry to tell you, only shows how corrupt and broken the system is and why it needs to be fixed.

Then they’ll continue to work on their epic nine-movie saga about cyborg ninjas from the future who’ve come back to our time to deal with their father issues.

Y’see, Timmy, you can’t go into any sort of relationship thinking I’ll be the one to change her! Or him. Or them, if you live on the wild side. Relationships like that are doomed to failure of one sort or another. Either they collapse altogehter or they “succeed” with one person or the other becomes a twisted, compromised version of themself (and probably hating the other person for it).

Likewise, you can’t expect to have any sort of success in the publishing world or in Hollywood if you’re starting from the mindset of “they’re all wrong.” It’s no different than my mad pursuit of Phoebe just so I can change everything about her. You either have to love it for what it is or… well, find something else to love.

I can sense a rising argument already, though. “Ahhhhh,” says Yakko, “but what if I don’t want to go with a traditional publisher? What if I just want to self-publish, or shoot my script myself with my friends?” And honestly, I see no problem with this. None at all.

IF…

…you’ve gone over your manuscript five or six times; listened to impartial feedback; gone through line by line looking for spelling, grammar, and consistency errors; sent it out to dozens of publishers or producers; sent it out to dozens of agents; and made necessary changes and edits and sent it out to all those people again.

Wash, rinse, repeat. You notice that Johnson & Johnson doesn’t tell you when to stop that process. They figure you’re right there in the shower, you’ll know when your hair’s clean without further instruction from them. What’s implied, though, is that you have to go through the process at least once before you can claim your hair is clean.

Maybe perfect Phoebe really is the girl for you. You got yourself cleaned up, best clothes, fresh flowers, and she still turned you down. Then maybe you should take a second look at Denise. Because there’s a good chance she’ll recognize all those good qualities Phoebe somehow missed, and the two of you will be happy together.

Some of those folks I mentioned above, though, like to skip the shampoo process and just announce their hair is clean. They declare themselves worthy of Phoebe and then say a lot of nasty things about her because she turns them down. In fact, what they tend to say is “I wanted to be with Denise, anyway. She’s way better than that #%@$ Phoebe!”

In the romance world they call this settling. It’s what you do when you don’t want to make an effort, or when you’ve already given up.

Hopefully, that’s not where you’re headed with your writing.

Next Thursday’s kind of a big day for everyone, so I probably won’t post anything. Perhaps a little something quick on Wednesday for the holidays.

Until then you’ve got a week. Go write!