Query Letter—Part I

Overview

Photo by Simone Secci on Unsplash

While I’ve been mired in the manuscript editing process, my old query letter, written over a year ago, remained largely unchanged (and unread) until late June. But it, too, needed attention, focus and revision.

I responded to Karin Gillespie’s Substack call-to-action. She critiques query letters and was offering a sale price of just $50 to do so. She was wonderful to work with, providing a quick turnaround and a remarkably thorough critique. She offered examples from novels I’ve actually read and that bear some genre-relevance to my own. She even offered me a second round of advice which dove in even deeper. I recommend her should you need your query letter reviewed, even at her non-discounted prices.

The job of a query letter is two-fold. Primarily, its role is to entice an agent to read its accompanying sample (usually 5-25 pages, always from the very front of your manuscript.) And secondarily, to elicit a request for your full manuscript.

• A query letter should include these sections.

• A Greeting

• A Pitch

• A Story Hook

• A Book Description (aka blurb)

• A Comp Title section

• A bit of personalization to demonstrate how or why you chose the agent

• A Close

I’m going to break down these sections over my next few posts, at the same time detailing my process (and often vexation!) with writing them.

Although I have 30+ years of writing experience -- marketing and fundraising copy followed by fiction and poetry -- crafting my query letter really challenged me.

I know my novel and can describe it in just a few sentences. But those sentences, while snappy and intriguing, don’t accentuate the plot points or stakes. Add to this the fact that the ideal query letter should give a taste of a story’s literary voice!

After a couple months of reworking, I have a query letter that I like. It covers the required points, achieves what it should. Do I love it? I’m not sure. Is it intriguing? I think so.

Stay tuned for Part 2!