Responding to agent's personalized rejection (not on full). Need advice

I'd revise the first chapter, or change the order of the first few chapters, so that in the first chapter, the MC interacts with kids.

Tough call - but based on your description, it sounds like your query letter could use a few revisions. Have you participated in QLH yet?

I'd say it never hurts to try - what's the worst they can say? No? They already said that!
Well, I guess they could not respond at all, or reply with a LMTFA response or a C&D order, but hopefully it wouldn't come to that. Of course, on the flip side, when a sales guy wants to sell me something and I reply with "No thanks, not interested." one of the worst things he could do to me is try again. Give me an hour and I can tell you some sleazy sales tactics that have been tried on me with the worst possible returns they could ever expect. The point here is that when you query an agent, you kind of are trying to sell them as quickly and painlessly as possible. Returning to the scene of the crime (that proverbial "no thanks") could just be setting yourself up for an ugly follow-up.

You said the response was nice and personalized, so my question would be - what does your gut instinct tell you? Follow that is my best advice, because your own gut instincts are usually right.

Of course all that said, the worst vice in the world is advice, so take it with a grain of salt.

(My 2¢ in a world where pennies are often meaningless...)

I would chalk this up to experience, do what you can to improve the query letter, and move on. There are a lot of YA agents out there to query.

And good luck!

I'm not an agent or a publishing industry person, but my understanding is (unless a revise and resend is suggested), rejections are final and agents don't like having follow up letters explaining how different their novel really is from the impression they got from the opening pages and query letter.

It sucks to find this out, but this personalized rejection is a rare gem (many agents give boilerplate rejections, even for requested material). It tells you something about what the market wants from YA fiction (at least as per this agent's views), and it lets you know that your query and opening pages might be creating an impression that your story is something it isn't. If you're getting lots of other rejections without any requests for more materials from agencies that rep YA, you might reconsider reworking your query to emphasize the parts of the plot where teens interact, and also try to foreshadow that somehow in the opening pages.

It's tempting to think that agents place too much emphasis on queries and openings, but consider that many readers also make their decision about whether or not to purchase a book based on back cover copy (sort of like a query) and the opening pages. YA readers tend to want books about YAs overcoming obstacles with other YAs as allies (and often as adversaries too). Hmm, is there a teen version of the Bechdel test?

Just my thoughts, though, and others might have different perspectives.

A personalized rejection with info you can use to revise your materials is a treasure, but it isn't an invitation to challenge the agent's decision.

Well, it sounds like whatever you do wouldn't change anything, because it sounds like it IS interacting with adults more. The middle schoolers part is the SIDE plot. For it to make a difference, you would need to redo your story, not the query, it sounds like.

Roxxsmom said:

I'm not an agent or a publishing industry person, but my understanding is (unless a revise and resend is suggested), rejections are final and agents don't like having follow up letters explaining how different their novel really is from the impression they got from the opening pages and query letter.

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mpack said:

A personalized rejection with info you can use to revise your materials is a treasure, but it isn't an invitation to challenge the agent's decision.

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Yes, and yes.

chompers said:

Well, it sounds like whatever you do wouldn't change anything, because it sounds like it IS interacting with adults more. The middle schoolers part is the SIDE plot. For it to make a difference, you would need to redo your story, not the query, it sounds like.

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Story and query both, I'd guess.

Congratulations on receiving a personalized rejection! It is a big deal. It means this agent took the time to give you thoughts on your writing instead of sending a form letter rejection.

If she said it would be a hard sell for publishers, I would take her at her word. This doesn't mean no agent will want your ms, or no one can sell it, it means she doesn't think she can. As it stands.

So, my opinion, you can either take her words as a compliment and continue sending queries to other agents, or you can give your query and pages the once over to see if she has a valid point(remembering that it's YA, so you want the beginning pages to deal with young characters, not adults.)

If you decide to revise to make the ms more YA agent/editor friendly by making it more centered upon young characters as opposed to adults, you can then resend the query to her at a future date, reminding her about her advice, how you've revised accordingly, and asking her to take a fresh look.

Bottom line, the best response to a personalized rejection, if you must, is to thank the agent for her time and kind words. It doesn't pay to challenge the agent. Use your energy in a positive way, to present yourself and your ms in the best light.