Irene Goodman Literary Agency

tbrosz · Apr 1, 2009

I sent an e-mail query on July of 2008, and heard nothing. I went over my list this past February, and sent followup e-mails to a number of "hanging" queries where I had heard nothing for six months or more.

The Irene Goodman agency was one of these. Shortly afterwards, I got this in e-mail:

"If you haven't received a response, it's likely that it was lost in transit. We sincerely apologize - please resubmit it and I'll make sure Ms. Kriss gets it."

I did resubmit, and was rejected about a week later, but it shows it never hurts to follow up if you think way too much time has passed.

Spring · Apr 1, 2009

Thanks for the advice, tbrosz. I'll give the the next week to reply (nearly rounding out the two month mark) and then I'll send along a polite inquiry.

Erin · Apr 1, 2009

I queried Miriam in 8/08, then again in 12/08 and still haven't received a response. I queried Barbara Poelle early 2/09 and haven't received a reply either.

dragonjax · Apr 1, 2009

Keep in mind that the agency moved locations in February; make sure to send to the new address (if sending by snail mail).

KikiteNeko · Apr 1, 2009

dragonjax said:
Keep in mind that the agency moved locations in February; make sure to send to the new address (if sending by snail mail).

I think they prefer equeries now. New address is listed on their website's front page. If you haven't heard back in a month on a snail query, double-check the address. But the response time with any agency can run upwards of a month sometimes.

Erin · Apr 2, 2009

My queries went by email. They still don't reply.

KikiteNeko · Apr 2, 2009

Erin said:
My queries went by email. They still don't reply.

From the website:

Send a query letter and the first ten pages, along with a detailed synopsis of the entire book, in the body of an email to [email protected].

You will hear from us in one to two months. If we are interested in your work, we will contact you and ask to see the entire manuscript. If we are not interested, you will receive a form letter. We are genuinely sorry that we have to use a form letter, but we get far too many submissions to make personal responses possible. We are receiving an unprecedented amount of e-mail queries. If you find that the mailbox is full, please try again in two weeks. E-mail queries to our personal addresses will not be answered.

All submissions should be sent by e-mail. We do not consider snail mail queries. We expect a professional presentation that fits basic industry standards.

Hope this helps...

Erin · Apr 2, 2009

Read it already. Miriam still hasn't replied with the "form" rejection. I've used Barbara Poelle's personal email address because I was invited to. Still no reply. I'll nudge her using the generic email address at the end of 2 months.

KikiteNeko · Apr 2, 2009

Erin said:
Read it already. Miriam still hasn't replied with the "form" rejection. I've used Barbara Poelle's personal email address because I was invited to. Still no reply. I'll nudge her using the generic email address at the end of 2 months.

Sorry I can't be more helpful then =/ Good luck!

JenWriter · Apr 2, 2009

Sometimes emails can get lost. It could be that your email address is getting snagged in the spam filter or something.

dragonjax · Apr 2, 2009

JenWriter said:
Sometimes emails can get lost. It could be that your email address is getting snagged in the spam filter or something.

I've found this to be true with my own email -- for some reason, sometimes I just **don't** get some emails. I don't know if it's a case of some domains not playing well with others, or if it's all magic, or what. I don't get an error or a bounceback, and neither does the person sending the message (one person experimented with a few different emails; only one came through. Weird).

I'd say a good rule of thumb if you're getting absolutely no response is to resend your query to the queries address from a different account. Perhaps that will get through.

Good luck.

Erin · Apr 2, 2009

dragonjax said:
I've found this to be true with my own email -- for some reason, sometimes I just **don't** get some emails. I don't know if it's a case of some domains not playing well with others, or if it's all magic, or what. I don't get an error or a bounceback, and neither does the person sending the message (one person experimented with a few different emails; only one came through. Weird).

I'd say a good rule of thumb if you're getting absolutely no response is to resend your query to the queries address from a different account. Perhaps that will get through.

Good luck.

That's why I still haven't given up on them! I hadn't thought to use a different email address of my own, but that's a good idea when I send my nudge email to Barbara. I know one of my Y*hoo accounts has trouble receiving emails, but I don't use that for queries. Thanks!

Rebecca_Rogers · Apr 3, 2009

I queried Miriam a couple of weeks ago and heard back from her a couple of days ago with a polite rejection.

JenWriter · Apr 3, 2009

Good idea, Erin. Good luck!

mcc · May 1, 2009

Miriam Kriss

does anyone know if mk has a track record with upscale commercial fiction for adults? I see that she has represented romance, young adult and fantasy.

another question: why does she have so few sales listed on publishers marketplace?

raburrell · May 1, 2009

I e-queried Barbara in early April and received a polite rejection about ten days later.

Spring · May 1, 2009

Hmmm...
I sent Ms. Poelle a query on Feb 11th. I heard nothing.
So I sent her a polite inquiry on my query on April 8.
I have still heard no reply.
I am assuming that she's not interested, but their website does say that a response will be sent one way or another after a few months, right?
So what's up with this?
Oh well.

KikiteNeko · May 1, 2009

Spring said:
Hmmm...
I sent Ms. Poelle a query on Feb 11th. I heard nothing.
So I sent her a polite inquiry on my query on April 8.
I have still heard no reply.
I am assuming that she's not interested, but their website does say that a response will be sent one way or another after a few months, right?
So what's up with this?
Oh well.

Per their listing in Publisher's Marketplace, unsolicited queries sent to their individual emails will be deleted. Try sending to [email protected] and just addressing the actual query to her.

Spring · May 1, 2009

I wrote the wrong thing. I did, indeed, send my query to Ms. Poelle via their queries dot com address.
So that's not the problem, I suppose.

KikiteNeko · May 1, 2009

Spring said:
I wrote the wrong thing. I did, indeed, send my query to Ms. Poelle via their queries dot com address.
So that's not the problem, I suppose.

Odd. I think the website says a 6 week turnaround. I hope you hear back!

Spring · May 1, 2009

Thanks.

Poetlore · May 1, 2009

Hi, Spring--I had a request for a full manuscript from Irene Goodman, which I sent January 21st via email. The agency rejected it today, May 1st (via form letter). Somewhere along the line, I've heard this agency has a rep for taking their time, but honestly, three months has been standard with everyone who's looked at and then passed on my book. I don't know why that is. I hope that you hear from them sooner and that they give you a positive response!

tbrosz · May 1, 2009

Poetlore said:
Hi, Spring--I had a request for a full manuscript from Irene Goodman, which I sent January 21st via email. The agency rejected it today, May 1st (via form letter). Somewhere along the line, I've heard this agency has a rep for taking their time, but honestly, three months has been standard with everyone who's looked at and then passed on my book. I don't know why that is. I hope that you hear from them sooner and that they give you a positive response!

Two or three months is not at all unusual for an agency to deal with a full manuscript.

To avoid going nuts when a full is out, it probably helps to have more than one project going.

Erin · May 1, 2009

Yesterday, I got a nice rejection and referral from Barbara Poelle on my 2/21 query (unfortunately, I'd already queried and been rejected by the other agent).

kitytize · May 14, 2009

Sent Miriam Kriss a query on 5/4/09 received rejection on 5/14/09

Irene Goodman Literary Agency

Got the hang of it, here

Little Miss Sunshine

Listening to my other selves

I write stuff and break boards.

.

Listening to my other selves

.

Listening to my other selves

.

Word Count Slayer

I write stuff and break boards.

Listening to my other selves

Word Count Slayer

Treguna Makoidees Trecorum SadisDee

Little Miss Sunshine

.

Little Miss Sunshine

.

Little Miss Sunshine

Got the hang of it, here

Listening to my other selves