Unabashed

Queries suck. At least writing them does. The entire novel-writing process has never made me feel so futile as penning these two vexing paragraphs. I could fill this page with links to query-writing suggestions and formats and information I’ve read from various outlets all over the web, all of it very helpful in its own context, but essentially worthless in applying to my own book. Why am I re-confronting my greatest fear? Because la Gringa wants to know where all the adult fiction subs are. And I have one. And I want to send it to her. I fear her rejection, yes, but this is more than some short story that I’ve labored over for a week and a half. This manuscript represents five years of my collective creative output. It represents potential success in publishing. It represents the hopes and dreams of a writer who wants to be. It represents potential for disposable income. I’ve been well aware of la Gringa’s advent into the agenting business, and I’ve had my manuscript ready for a good while now, I just don’t have the query letter right yet. If my book represents five years of creative output, this query letter represents another six months at least. No, it’s not all I’ve been working on, but I return to it regularly, and I suffer for its potential. I tweak it, and then I scrap it and start over, and then I agonize for a little while before I toil some more. But to dedicate so much time to something that can be the realization of all the dreams of a lifetime of writing is so daunting to me that I convince myself that the query must be better than the story itself, that my story depends on this little 100-word document to be successful, that if the story doesn’t get published it will be because I didn’t write the query letter well enough. And the worst of it is that great bit of advice I keep pinned to the wall by my desk:

…the writer never gets any better than the writing you see in the pitch letter.

Ack! Such pressure! To prove I’m worthy, that my story doesn’t suck, that I’m…well, you know how it is, don’t you, Mr. Query Letter. And I’ll bet you’re the most successful and wonderful story pitch there ever was–You. Sick. Bastard. You’re enjoying my pain, aren’t you? You see this blog and you look at me and think, “Heh, he’s in the gutter now!” Well, I’m done eating your scraps, Mr. Query. I’m jumping off this bus and catching a…a train. Or a hang glider.

Or a noose.

Oh, well. On to ver. 15.9…

written by Matt Mitchell \\ tags: author, book, Fiction, query, story, synopsis, writer, writing

There are a couple of posts I’ve read lately about the writing of queries that I think are just brilliant. First, from Kameron Hurley:

If you’re working on writing up queries or synposes, I’ve found it sorta fun and helpful to write up one of those “back cover” blurbs that you see on the back of books as practice.

This is actually a tactic I’ve been straining to employ myself. The big pitch, you know, that reels in readers who, once they’ve read it, have no choice but to read on. Sounds good on paper, don’t it? The best-case scenario would be to write such a great pitch that they actually do use it on the dust jacket.

And then from Colleen Lindsay, literary agent-at-large of the FinePrint Literary Management Agency:

A well-respected agent I know who has been in the business for more than twenty years recently said to me “Colleen, remember this: the writer never gets any better than the writing you see in the pitch letter.”

This statement should be framed in gold and hung on a wall beside every writer’s favorite place to write. When I read this, it made perfect sense to me and kind of terrified me at the same moment. It also occurred to me that a really good pitch writer might sell a crappy book a long time before a poor pitch writer might sell a really good one.

And finally, this bit:

I’m also impressed by the number of really excellent query letters I’m seeing! Short, succinct and compelling. Particularly from those folks who identify as former Clarion and/or Odyssey students.

Some of the worst query letters I’m seeing are, surprisingly, from MFAs. They’re long and tedious and a little wind-baggy, telling me more about the writer’s background and education than they do about the book they’re hoping to get me to read. I wonder: do most MFA programs only focus on the craft and not the business of writing? Anyone?

Now I’m not biased against MFAs. I’m sure there are a lot of really great folks who also happen to have their MFA. But I’m quite certain a good portion of them are biased against me and writers of my ilk, kind of in the same way that actors are biased against reality TV stars. So forgive me this moment of unabashed mirth as I nyah you MFAs a little bit. I know you are all extremely edumacated, and that I’m just a lil ol’ genre-fiction nerd, but every now and then it’s good to hear that the little guys are doing well.

written by Matt Mitchell \\ tags: clarion, Fiction, genre, MFA, odyssey, query, synopsis, writing