I started sending out queries for my novel last month. So far, I’ve sent 8 queries and gotten 6 rejections. Ouch.
But rather than feel sorry for myself, which is what I would normally do, or declare that agents are heartless fiends, which is what some writers seem to do, I decided I would try to figure out what I could have done better in each query that got rejected to increase my chances of having that agent request a partial.
So, for agent #1, here’s what I should have done differently.
First, I mentioned that I read his blog. This isn’t a bad thing. But I only mentioned the blog. Big deal. A lot of writers read his blog. That’s not going to make me special. Instead (or in addition), I should have written that I like book X that he represented and that book Y, which he mentioned he liked, is similar to my book (which means I needed to read books X and Y before I sent the query).
Second, when I went back and looked at the sample queries on his site, I realized they gave a sense of the main character’s arc and the larger theme of the book. My query was too plot-focused and didn’t include much character growth and no sense of what it was about, theme-wise.
Third, I didn’t say thank you. Duh. He gets 70 queries a day, and I didn’t say “thanks for reading mine”!?! I’m surprised his response was as polite as it was. (Please, if you ever send a query, don’t be a bonehead like me, okay? Say thank you.)
Of course, there’s no guarantee that these things would have made him say, “Send me a partial, stat!” He might still have said no. But I’ve burned this bridge, so I’ll never know. Lame.