I was delighted to have such a terrific response to my query letter -- 11 out of 24 requesting chapters in response -- that I even allowed myself to indulge in fantasies. Fantasies? Yes, you know what I mean: two agents battling for the right to represent me/my work ... nice ... no, wait, one really BIG NAME agent offering to represent me immediately, even without reading the rest of the manuscript ... yes, yes ... offer from a well-known publishing house pronto ... mmmmm ... contract signed within the year ... aaaaah.
Ahem.
Reality check: I've heard back from about half of those agents who requested chapters, all declining. Worse yet, they have all written something along the following lines:
"Thank you for your letter of March 18, 2005, and the opportunity to consider the synopsis and first three chapters of your novel ...
Unfortunately, I wasn't drawn to the characters of Charlotte Brooks or Mao
Kai-Ming as I had hoped I would be. As you know, you need an agent who is
passionate about the material she is submitting. Of course, there is
nothing more subjective than evaluating fiction and another agent may feel
differently. .."
In other words, feedback has been limited to: Not interested enough.
The bottom line, then, is: My book is not interesting.
Or, OK, "not that interesting."
(although my query letter obviously was -- too bad I'm a one-page writing-wonder).
How the heck am I supposed to fix THAT?
Ahem.
Reality check: I've heard back from about half of those agents who requested chapters, all declining. Worse yet, they have all written something along the following lines:
"Thank you for your letter of March 18, 2005, and the opportunity to consider the synopsis and first three chapters of your novel ...
Unfortunately, I wasn't drawn to the characters of Charlotte Brooks or Mao
Kai-Ming as I had hoped I would be. As you know, you need an agent who is
passionate about the material she is submitting. Of course, there is
nothing more subjective than evaluating fiction and another agent may feel
differently. .."
In other words, feedback has been limited to: Not interested enough.
The bottom line, then, is: My book is not interesting.
Or, OK, "not that interesting."
(although my query letter obviously was -- too bad I'm a one-page writing-wonder).
How the heck am I supposed to fix THAT?
