When, after your first round of queries, do you begin to despair?

jwhite1979

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Over the last two weeks I've submitted queries to twenty agents who represent upmarket fiction. One form letter rejection, one personalized rejection, and radio silence on the rest. I know they say to allow 4-8 weeks for a reply, but I'm guessing the majority of them have read my query and silently passed me over. So, as it says on the label, when does despair set in for you? (I'm posting like crazy on these forms so I can submit my query to Query Letter Hell and get some feedback. 25 more posts to go.)
 

jwhite1979

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Ha! Rationally, I know what you're saying is true. I repeat it to myself like a mantra. :)
 

soulrodeo

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Yeah, as said, two weeks in publishing is like a minute in normal time. No reason at all to worry yet.
 

lizmonster

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Relax! Almost certain most of the agents haven't read your query yet. 2 weeks is literally nothing in publishing.

This is absolutely true. From what I see agents discussing, it's not at all uncommon for them to have only an hour or so a week to dedicate to queries - if that - and often they have email backlogs in the hundreds.

Don't despair. (And - easier said than done, I know - try not to let Rs get you down. No book is beloved by all, and you want an agent who's solidly behind your work. Much better to get an R than to contract with the wrong agent.)
 

Layla Nahar

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Start writing your next book. It will give the despair something useful to do with its time.
 

mccardey

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(I'm posting like crazy on these forms so I can submit my query to Query Letter Hell and get some feedback. 25 more posts to go.)

Off-topic, but a really effective way to get your post-count up is to crit other people's queries. You'll learn a whole lot about queries, get a sense of how SYW works, sort out who the critters are that will work for you - and you'll build up a bank of people who know that you crit and will return the favour.
 

jwhite1979

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You wouldn't think it's presumptuous to critique queries when I haven't even landed an agent yet? I've considered doing so, since 90% of the posts I've seen exhibit a total disregard for industry standards, but I don't want to come across as a know it all.
 

lizmonster

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You wouldn't think it's presumptuous to critique queries when I haven't even landed an agent yet?

People who don't write critique books all the time, often extremely well.

Personally, I've found it helps me understand my own strengths and weaknesses better when I articulate the strengths and weaknesses I fnd in the work of others.
 

Gillhoughly

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It took two years and 25 rejections before my first book sold, but by that time I'd finished the second and begun the third.

Each time a rejection came in I looked over the sample chapters, picking them apart, worked to figure out what wasn't working, and tweaking the balance of the book. I got feedback from beta readers and did rewrites, 25 of them.

All this on a manual typewriter. I'd have killed to have the laptop and printer I use today, so no whinging about it being too much work. Nothing is too much when it comes to honing your craft.

The smartest thing I did was cut the first 5-10 pages to begin the book where something interesting is happening. That was two years into the go-round. We all kill our darlings. It's part of the job.

It got me a request and then an acceptance. I was over the moon until PW reported that the publisher went belly up in a bankruptcy. Good thing the contract hadn't arrived.

Then an agent told me I was a good writer but unpublishable. THAT made me furious, so I rewrote the whole book -- again -- and sent it off to the biggest dog on Publisher's Row.

It sold.

Two years of it, so pack up the impatience, this is a marathon, not a sprint. If you want a career as a professional writer with books in stores, focus on your CRAFT and write every day.

WRITING, telling a story that's burning inside you demanding to be shared is the goal. Selling it is just the cake under the frosting.
 

Gillhoughly

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It took two years and 25 rejections before my first book sold, but by that time I'd finished the second and begun the third.

Each time a rejection came in I looked over the sample chapters, picking them apart, worked to figure out what wasn't working, and tweaking the balance of the book. I got feedback from beta readers and did rewrites, 25 of them.

All this on a manual typewriter. I'd have killed to have the laptop and printer I use today, so no whinging about it being too much work. Nothing is too much when it comes to honing your craft.

The smartest thing I did was cut the first 5-10 pages to begin the book where something interesting is happening. That was two years into the go-round. We all kill our darlings. It's part of the job.

It got me a request and then an acceptance. I was over the moon until PW reported that the publisher went belly up in a bankruptcy. Good thing the contract hadn't arrived.

Then an agent told me I was a good writer but unpublishable. THAT made me furious, so I rewrote the whole book -- again -- and sent it off to the biggest dog on Publisher's Row.

It sold.

Two years of it, so pack up the impatience, this is a marathon, not a sprint. If you want a career as a professional writer with books in stores, focus on your CRAFT and write every day.

WRITING, telling a story that's burning inside you demanding to be shared is the goal. Selling it is just the cake under the frosting.


Now -- butt in chair. Be brilliant. Go forth and kick ass.
 
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-Riv-

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You wouldn't think it's presumptuous to critique queries when I haven't even landed an agent yet? I've considered doing so, since 90% of the posts I've seen exhibit a total disregard for industry standards, but I don't want to come across as a know it all.
It's not presumptuous to let someone know what's grabbing you and what isn't. Plus, if you have knowledge of industry standards that you're not seeing addressed by 90% of critiques, then by all means, jump in.

All the best,
Riv
 

mccardey

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You wouldn't think it's presumptuous to critique queries when I haven't even landed an agent yet?

Not at all. As it says in the stickies - do read the stickies, because they're fun and sexy and you can win prizes!* - you crit as a reader. Readers all have opinions, and all opinions are valuable. They don't need to be right, they just need to be aired. It's the writer's job to assess them for helpfulness and take what works.

I've considered doing so, since 90% of the posts I've seen exhibit a total disregard for industry standards, but I don't want to come across as a know it all.
If you currently work at the pointy end of the industry and know first-hand when information is wrong, it would be very valuable to point it out. (in a RYFW kind of way, of course.)

ETA: *they're not, they're not and you can't - but do read them anyway. It saves tears and time-outs.
 
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Helix

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Over the last two weeks I've submitted queries to twenty agents who represent upmarket fiction. One form letter rejection, one personalized rejection, and radio silence on the rest. I know they say to allow 4-8 weeks for a reply, but I'm guessing the majority of them have read my query and silently passed me over. So, as it says on the label, when does despair set in for you? (I'm posting like crazy on these forms so I can submit my query to Query Letter Hell and get some feedback. 25 more posts to go.)

Two weeks is nothing! It pays to have patience and a thick skin.
 

Layla Nahar

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You wouldn't think it's presumptuous to critique queries when I haven't even landed an agent yet?

Oh heavens, no! You're a reader, right? Just describe the effects the SYW excerpt had on you as a reader - as Riv says:
... let someone know what's grabbing you and what isn't.

No one can argue with our experience as readers, and that experience shared is a valuable tool for when the writer revises - s/he will know frex - a lot of people got confused on this part, people said they liked that part etc - & can use that to tune thier writing to evoke the effect they really desire.
 

Sonya Heaney

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Relax! Almost certain most of the agents haven't read your query yet. 2 weeks is literally nothing in publishing.

I'm still getting used to emailing someone, not hearing anything for ages, and then having them reply to me weeks later, like our conversation only just began!

Every time I start worrying about not hearing from someone I picture a big, busy office, and everyone there running around like mad, forgetting half the people they're meant to contact. I'm still waiting for a phone call from a publishing director I was meant to receive on the 13th of March!
 

Fuchsia Groan

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My now-agent didn’t respond to my query for at least a month. Some will say that full requests always come quickly, but that’s no universal. That said, QLH can indeed be helpful. I put my query through there and continued to tweak it with each batch I sent. I didn’t aim to please every critter, just to avoid obvious sources of reader confusion.
 

Auteur

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I think I'm just going to self-publish rather than going through all the crap associated with agents. I'd rather keep the drama out of my real life and reserve it for my novels.
 

lizmonster

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I think I'm just going to self-publish rather than going through all the crap associated with agents. I'd rather keep the drama out of my real life and reserve it for my novels.

So this is perhaps slightly off-topic, but IMHO this is the wrong reason to choose self-publishing. It shouldn't be a fallback, or something used to avoid the bureaucracy of trade pub. It should be a choice based on what you want for your writing career, what sort of work you do, how much you want to own of the process, etc. etc. It's also not an either/or - there are writers who both trade and self-pub, but I'll say the ones I know who self-pubbed first did a lot of homework and prep.

TL;DR: Successful self-publishing isn't less work than trade publishing, it's just different work, and it's not easier or faster. Decide on your goals, and pick the best path based on that.
 

macleod1972

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I don't see a problem with critiquing others' queries as an amateur, because a book is for everyone, and if a layman (i.e. me) is not intrigued by the query, then no one will be.
 

calisterol

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I agree with this here, no matter what you write, most the time Agents will reject a writer just because it isn't what they are looking for at the moment. We should never take it badly (EVEN though I do all the time, I know I am a little hypocrite.) Just keep writing and try to stay strong. After two weeks though, you will most likely get more responses soon.
 

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Every rejection (or ignored query) takes you one query closer the acceptance.

My ongoing belief is that there is one agent out there who will love my work and sign me up, and querying is merely the means I use to find him or her.

I have no interest in self-publishing - I am traditionally published by a small publisher, with a new book coming out in August - but I will keep querying until I get an agent who can help me climb up the writing ladder.