I've never gotten a full or partial request

madforest

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I don't want to count exactly how many queries I've sent for my book, but I think it's around 50. All rejections, or silence. The best I've had is an agent saying she enjoyed the voice, and would like a synopsis, but I was ultimately rejected after sending it. Is there hope for me? Currently working on revising my query, in case its just the query letter thats the problem.
 
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cornflake

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I don't want to count exactly how many queries I've sent for my book, but I think it's around 50. All rejections, or silence. The best I've had is an agent saying she enjoyed the voice, and would like a synopsis, but I was ultimately rejected after sending it. Is there hope for me? Currently working on revising my query, in case its just the query letter thats the problem.

The query letter is a problem.*

Have you been to Query Letter Hell?




*Potentially not the only problem, but no requests at all on 50 queries suggests heavily that it is a problem.
 
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PiaSophia

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Of course there's hope!

Not only did J.K. Rowling get 12 rejections for Harry Potter (can you imagine how they must be feeling right now?), did Margaret Mitchells' Gone With the Wind get rejected 38 times, did even Stephen King initially see only rejections, 30 of 'em, in response to Carrie, and did Beatrix Potter have to self-publish The Tale of Peter Rabbit herself...

...and they all found their way and became extremely successful. So, yes, there's hope. It's your job just not to give up on it.
 

cornflake

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Of course there's hope!

Not only did J.K. Rowling get 12 rejections for Harry Potter (can you imagine how they must be feeling right now?), did Margaret Mitchells' Gone With the Wind get rejected 38 times, did even Stephen King initially see only rejections, 30 of 'em, in response to Carrie, and did Beatrix Potter have to self-publish The Tale of Peter Rabbit herself...

...and they all found their way and became extremely successful. So, yes, there's hope. It's your job just not to give up on it.

Sorry, I know you're just trying to encourage the OP, and these are pervasive, but they're mostly myth.

Rowling was picked up by an agent immediately. The rejections were from publishing house subs, which are for all sorts of reasons (as are many rejections).

Mitchell was never rejected; she never sent Gone... anywhere. It was discovered when she crossed paths with someone in publishing.

Potter self-pubbed not because no one wanted Peter Rabbit, but because she had a particular vision for it that the publishers who did want it didn't want to capitulate to.

King did get a bunch of rejections on Carrie -- it was probably not the book to start with, heh. He was, however, at the time, published and teaching.
 

Drachen Jager

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If you've got 50 rejections I guarantee the query letter is not the only problem. Many agents will read the first page unless they are certain the book is not for them based on the query. Unless you sent it to agents who don't rep your genre, it's pretty likely around half of them at least looked at the first page. I strongly recommend you post your first page to one of the "200 words" threads in Share Your Work, and once you've ironed that out, try the full chapter.

You'll need to get to 50 posts on here before you can submit a thread in SYW for views. One of the best ways to get there is to critique other work in the SYW forums you're familiar with. Doing that will give you an idea of what other writers are doing, you'll see the critiques from other critters, and it's surprising how much you learn about your own writing simply by thinking critically about the writing of others.
 

buz

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If you've got 50 rejections I guarantee the query letter is not the only problem. Many agents will read the first page unless they are certain the book is not for them based on the query.

Well, I mean...both query and pages (and synopsis if they want one) have to click and be hooky and have that "special thing" the agent is looking for and be something they feel they can sell in order for them to take it on. The volume of stuff sent wildly outpaces the amount of things an agent can consider, which itself wildly outpaces the amount of things they can represent, which means the bar is generally set very high... So good books still get rejected this way, if they haven't got that "thing," if one bit or the other seems not-quite-right to the agent. I'm not sure anything at all is guaranteed really :D

But regardless of whether it's query, pages, synopsis, all three, etc -- this is still good advice:

One of the best ways to get there is to critique other work in the SYW forums you're familiar with. Doing that will give you an idea of what other writers are doing, you'll see the critiques from other critters, and it's surprising how much you learn about your own writing simply by thinking critically about the writing of others.

Critiquing and receiving critiques can be a good way of learning, and of testing waters. :)

Whether there's hope or not is pretty much up to you -- as long as you're still working at something, there's hope. You never really know. But, if you haven't already, getting your query, pages, synopsis etc looked at -- and looking at others -- is a way to improve your chances.
 
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cornflake

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Exactly. Were there even 38 publishers accepting historical fiction back in 1936?

This is the other thing about those 'X was rejected n times!' things (again totally not directed at you, Pia, this is an endlessly pervasive thing and I recognize people do it to be helpfully encouraging -- which is nice; it's just that the stuff isn't true). The authors cited are often people who wrote or started writing when the business of publishing was wholly different. King did get rejections -- sending his work directly to publishers, which was a thing people did and sometimes got results. There were agents then, obviously, but slush piles of legend were a thing in every house, and every house had stories of stars pulled from within.

Now the stories seem to be a mix of the 'Rowling was rejected a dozen times' (true but not, as see above she got an agent and HP made it into print quickly in publishing terms), and 'EL James self pubbed and is super successful,' (she didn't).
 

PiaSophia

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Oh, man, I'm sorry. I didn't know that! I honestly thought this was true.

Well, thanks for educating me, Cornflake. :)
Indeed, I just tried to cheer OP up.
 

Drachen Jager

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Exactly. Were there even 38 publishers accepting historical fiction back in 1936?

Actually, this got me thinking. I started with the hypothesis that the book industry, like so many others, consolidated through the twentieth century with larger publishers absorbing smaller ones, so perhaps there may be fewer publishers now than there were then.

I can't find a list of how many active publishers there were in the 1930s, but I did find a list of how many publishers were established by year. Between 1930 and 1936 there were 70 new publishers founded in the United States. From 2010 to 2016 there were 75.

I have no idea what that means to the overall scene, but it seems to me there were probably a similar number of publishers around at that time as there are now. It's far from conclusive, but I think it's fairly reasonable to assume there may have been 38 publishers accepting historical fiction in the 1930s.
 

mccardey

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when the business of publishing was wholly different
I found myself in quite a heated discussion with someone a few years ago who was quite adamant that my publisher is not a real publisher because they don't pay me while I write. Underlying his intractable certainty, his refusal to let the topic slide and his truly jaw-dropping rudeness at a dinner party, was the fact that he knew exactly how publishing worked because he'd just finished reading a book about James Thurber.
 
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Laurel

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I don't want to count exactly how many queries I've sent for my book, but I think it's around 50. All rejections, or silence. The best I've had is an agent saying she enjoyed the voice, and would like a synopsis, but I was ultimately rejected after sending it. Is there hope for me? Currently working on revising my query, in case its just the query letter thats the problem.

Yes, there's hope for you!

I agree with the advice you've already gotten about revising both the query and the manuscript. Maybe with a few changes you'll start getting a better response. Then again, maybe not -- which is why I also recommend working on a new manuscript. It's a lot easier to handle rejection if you don't have all your eggs in one basket.

I didn't get any requests on the first manuscript I wrote. Looking back, I know it's because my writing just wasn't ready yet. I got a slightly better response on my second manuscript, an even better response on my third manuscript, and, well, you get the picture. It took me a while to get a book deal. But there was always hope because I was always improving my craft, revising what I'd already written, and working on something new.
 
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CJSimone

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I don't want to count exactly how many queries I've sent for my book, but I think it's around 50. All rejections, or silence. The best I've had is an agent saying she enjoyed the voice, and would like a synopsis, but I was ultimately rejected after sending it. Is there hope for me? Currently working on revising my query, in case its just the query letter thats the problem.

Hi madforest. Good for you, working on your query, and like others have said, SYW is super helpful. It can let you know how others receive your work, if it fits genre expectations and so on. For me, I learned I wasn't writing in a YA voice. Before joining AW and learning this, I had a 0% request rate also. Since then, my request rate improved to 10% and then 25% with loads of compliments and R&Rs offered. But I'm clearly still learning (or write risky stories) b/c I don't have an agent yet.

Yes, there's hope. It may be that you need to improve and/or alter your query and story. It may be that your stories are good and publishable but not commercial or fitting with current trends so you can either write a different story or switch from querying agents to querying small presses or even think about self-publishing. Or it may be that you just need to persevere. I've seen people get 100 or 150 rejections from agents, then finally land an agent, and be the ones who go on to get a publisher quickly. And even if some of the examples of successful authors being rejected are inaccurate, others are true. I think the Chicken Soup for the Soul books had loads of rejections (though I won't swear by it and someone could correct me), and I'm pretty sure 13 Reasons Why was initially self-published b/c the author was being rejected (someone I know was in a writers group with him and said he was getting exasperated that the publishing world didn't get his books, so he went ahead and self-published).

Anyway, hang in there! And if you hang out here and share your work, you'll likely learn what it is you need to do moving forward. It is a tough business. But best to you on your writing journey. :)


CJ
 
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MaeZe

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First, of course there's hope as long as you're willing to accept critique, study writing skills when it's pointed out you need to improve something, and most importantly with this book, did you get critique and beta reading?

Because if not, go back to chapter one and get some feedback.
 

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I don't want to count exactly how many queries I've sent for my book, but I think it's around 50. All rejections, or silence. The best I've had is an agent saying she enjoyed the voice, and would like a synopsis, but I was ultimately rejected after sending it. Is there hope for me? Currently working on revising my query, in case its just the query letter thats the problem.

I'm in the same boat. I have no advice, just commiseration. It's really hard. I feel for you.
 
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mafiaking1936

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I sent out 80 queries before getting any request. I had serious problems with the query and pages both, and probably wasted many chances because I sent them out without having them looked at first by someone who knew what they were doing. Don't be like me!
 

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As others have said, there is definitely still hope for you. I think the whole "this author had X amount of rejections before they got published" does still apply, however, many of those authors were rejected for an early book in their career, wrote more books, and found success with the later books. It's definitely worth a shot to edit the query and edit the manuscript itself, but you may eventually have to come to terms that this may not be "the" book. Keep writing, keep learning, keep growing.

I think that persistence is the real key to getting published. That, and learning to take criticism and improve your work. Be patient, keep writing, and if you really have a passion for writing, never give up!
 

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Echoing that you have the option to learn through the process of rejection, to improve your manuscript (and query).

Looking at some agents on QT, and their request rates, at best the occasional agent might request pages on maybe 15% of queries, but far more often, most agents request closer to 3% or less. And, plenty of agents that say they represent a certain genre but in actuality don't make any requests in that genre (if QT is accurate.)

Mathematically, what all this means (on average) is that of the fifty queries you sent, you might expect a handful of requests (like two or three), and yet, (<black box> apply statistics and distributions and sh*t </black box> ) it's still possible your story is good and you've simply hit bad luck.

In other words, learn what you can and be your own advocate and your own critic. Keep at it--the writing and learning--and assess for yourself if you're improving.
 
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madforest

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Thank you so much every single one of you! You all make good points. I've never gotten my manuscript critiqued, only the query letter. I definitely want to find beta readers and critique partners and whatnot but I'm just bad at networking/being social/finding people online, which is pretty much the only reason that I haven't done that. Maybe I'll submit here once I get to 50 posts.

Another problem I have with that is I feel like I'm awful at critiquing other people's work. It's difficult for me to find problems in other people's writing, usually I only come out with positive thoughts. And if I post something of my own, I want to give back!

For now I will hold off on sending anymore queries, and wait until everything's revised.
 

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Another problem I have with that is I feel like I'm awful at critiquing other people's work. It's difficult for me to find problems in other people's writing, usually I only come out with positive thoughts. And if I post something of my own, I want to give back!

Very few people are naturally good at critiquing. The good critters here on AW mostly got that way by doing a lot of crits.

If you're inclined to write all-good crits, there's nothing at all wrong with that! It's nice for people to hear what works as well as what doesn't. Something like "this action sequence was really tense and engrossing" is just as useful as "this part dragged in the middle and lost my attention."

Don't avoid critting just because you suspect you'll mostly be positive. :)
 

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Thanks, Cornflake, for correcting that GWTW myth that is relentlessly making the rounds. I've made it my personal mission to correct that one as well, LOL. Mitchell was friends with a woman named Lois who was an assistant to Harold Latham, at Macmillan. Mitchell had told Lois about her book and Lois suggested that Latham check it out while he was scouting in Atlanta (editors used to go to cities to 'scout' books a la today's book conventions). She gave it to him (without a first chapter, mind you) and he eventually accepted it. What is kind of funny is that even Margaret Mitchell was kept waiting and after three months of no response from Latham, she sent him a telegram asking him to return the MS. At that point, he got to reading.
 

Dan Rhys

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I don't want to count exactly how many queries I've sent for my book, but I think it's around 50. All rejections, or silence. The best I've had is an agent saying she enjoyed the voice, and would like a synopsis, but I was ultimately rejected after sending it. Is there hope for me? Currently working on revising my query, in case its just the query letter thats the problem.

Some people on this site have taken issue with my position on agents, but I assure you that getting all these rejections says NOTHING about the quality of your queries. In the hundreds of queries I sent out, only two agents ever asked for a sample of my novel before I never heard from them again. I've done research and have heard many different reasons for it and gotten tips to be more appealing to them, but nearly every insider has a different theory on agents, and nothing I tried ever worked. In many cases, I suspected the agent didn't read my query, and I now have reached the point where I definitely would not rely on a literary agent to recognize quality work.

Ultimately, it's up to you where to go--I will not try to persuade you to do anything--but your situation is exactly why more and more people are turning to self-publishing. In my case, I turned to a contest that I did very well in (not to brag), and it got the attention of a publisher. If you think you've tried agents long enough, don't be afraid to seek other options. Again, though, it's your decision to make.
 

lizmonster

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Some people on this site

Hi, Dan! :)

have taken issue with my position on agents, but I assure you that getting all these rejections says NOTHING about the quality of your queries.

I think it's absolutely important to point out that there are outliers in every situation, folks who went against the conventional wisdom and did well.

I think it's also important to state what the conventional wisdom is, and why it's offered.

In general, if a query (no pages) doesn't get you a 15-25% request rate, you should revisit the query.
In general, if pages don't get you any requests at all, you should revisit the pages.
In general, if you want an agent and you can't get one from a particular manuscript, you shouldn't treat self-publishing as a fallback.
In general - yes, agents miss good books, but if you get no requests at all, you should revisit the manuscript.

On self-publishing in particular: it can be a great strategy, although it's worth mentioning a few things:

1) Some genres do much, much better in self-pub than others. This isn't about quality; it's about where readers look for new books.
2) Self-publishing well takes time and research (and often some cash up front).
3) If your ultimate goal is to get an agent, be aware that agents will look up your self-published work, and your sales will matter. (I don't know that poor sales would keep an agent from offering on a book they loved, but it's a data point that trade publishers will pay attention to as well.)

Every agent I've ever talked to opens every query wanting to like what they read. They're not parsing your greeting or your fonts (although yeah, avoid crayon and Comic Sans), searching for ways to reject you. All they're looking for is a book they can love and sell (and yes, it needs to be both). They're subjective readers, just like the rest of us, and it's perfectly possible for a good book to be passed over by a lot of agents. But they're not passing it over to spite you, or because they're agents of The Man.
 

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Some people on this site have taken issue with my position on agents, but I assure you that getting all these rejections says NOTHING about the quality of your queries. In the hundreds of queries I sent out, only two agents ever asked for a sample of my novel before I never heard from them again. .

A lot of queries and few or no responses suggests a poorly executed query. It doesn't say anything one way or another about your book, just that your queries didn't work.

There's no one-method-for-all route to success; it depends on the book, and the writer, and many use both trade and self-publishing successfully.
 
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Welcome to my world!!! I also haven't been able to get my foot in the door. For me, this is a typical phenomenon in life though. I have also been undateable and unemployable for substantial periods of time in the past. I altered relevant variables and changed those situations. I am currently working on revising my novel and query again. It's a pain in the $#%, but I know that sooner or later, I will have something that will hit the right notes with the right people. Hang in there.
 
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