Tag Archives: publishing

Query Reflections

Posted on by Henry

I had the opportunity to connect with an agent while I was at Arisia, a friend of a friend, and I’ve really appreciated speaking with her since. She was generous enough to share her insight on my query letter for Bury’em Deep. I’m very grateful.

My key takeaway is that my past edits of my query letter have not helped. I created distance from Barry’s emotional throughline. That made it harder for a reader to empathize with Barry, and didn’t convey the emotional intensity of the story itself.

I think I got so caught up in trying to convey the totality of the story, and in trying to make that summary snappy and engaging without being in Barry’s head, that I forgot to give the query letter heart. It doesn’t help that I have been staring at various drafts of this query letter for years at this point. Once I’ve been looking at any collection of words for long enough without clear external feedback, I stop feeling able to judge them usefully. Thus, without any useful feedback from my target audience, judging what was wrong with my query felt like making random stabs in the dark.

With this insight though I feel much better. I feel like I have a target. I might miss that on my first few tries, but at least there’s something I know I can revise towards. In fact, I started redrafting the letter in my head yesterday while I was meditating (I know, that’s not actually good meditation practice). 

That felt like good creative exercise. You know the feeling I’m talking about? There’s a certain feel to that exploration for me—it’s closest to the relaxation of freeform dance, or the undirected play of sketching and coloring, except that I do have a target. My target, as much as possible, is to write a captivating third person version of Bury’em Deep that conveys Barry’s first person emotional journey. Because of the constraints of query letters, that has to be around 250 words. More meditation may be in order.

Anyway. It’s time for yet another rewrite. Wish me luck.

Slushpiles and Rejection Letters

Posted on by Henry

My day today has been rather full.  After reading homework in the library, I had the privilege of spending three hours going through a slushpile for someone I know (for the uninformed, a “slushpile” is what you call the vertiginous heaps of unsolicited submissions received by agents and publishing houses).

It was enlightening, and somehow encouraging and discouraging at the same time.  It puts me in mind of the internal rejection notes from Houghton Mifflin Company that I read while doing research last spring; I found reading committee notes on why HMCo shouldn’t print Poul Anderson, Philip K Dick, or even George Selden’s The Cricket in Times Square.  That’s two iconic mid-1900s sci-fi authors and the 1961 Newbery Honor recipient, all rejected with pithy and sometimes caustic internal notes exchanged between the various submissions readers.

It was enlightening because I found myself rejecting anything that didn’t closely match the guidelines I’d been given, even things that I thought might have been perfectly decent books.  There were no hard feelings, the submission simply wasn’t *exactly* what I was looking for.  It was encouraging, because a number of them weren’t very good and I’d like to think that I could do a better job than that.  And it was discouraging, because in order to submit something and get an editor you need a finished manuscript, and finishing a manuscript that would be accepted is much easier with an editor.

Basically, you could do it if they’d let you, but they won’t let you until you do it.

It’s a mess.

So, it’s time for me to figure out how to finish my work.  Again.

And if your work has been rejected by people, don’t give up.  Submit again and again and again.  Everywhere you can.  Maybe you should tweak things, but do keep trying.