How NOT to be targeted by the evil #queryfail

Thursday, March 6, 2009

Yesterday various agents and editors got together on Twitter and posted a wild rash of reasons they will reject a query letter. If you haven't read the 140 or less character tweets we collected, now would be a really good time.

How do you write a winning query letter that won't be labeled "fail" by these editors, agents and interns working in publishing houses? We've collected a few really good articles that will help you get your foot in the door. Take a gander: (hint: click the links as they'll take you directly to the article we're referencing.)

• Mystery author, S. W. Hubbard, has a great article here: www.swhubbard.com
• Ester Heller, Editor-in-Chief, Targum Press posted the following guidelines Nov. 2008: http://blogs.targum.com
• A summation of yesterday's #queryfail experiment and lessons learned can be found here at the Belletrinsic blog: http://belletrinsic.blogspot.com
• Tara Lazar did a summation, too, that's worth perusing and can be found here: http://taralazar.blogspot.com
• Colleen Lindsay, the literary agent (FinePrint Literary Management) responsible for yesterday's #queryfail, has a site crammed full of useful information to pick through. Start here: http://theswivet.blogspot.com and be sure to look around the site, it's very useful!
• Jill Corcoran has a very well put together "how to write a query letter" post that's very timely, too, as it was published on March 1st, 2009: http://jillcorcoran.blogspot.com Be sure to check out the posts she links to as well (run your cursor over the page to find the links which aren't underlined). Bookmark the post as it is a great resource!

Still need more? Want a template of sorts? Short of sending out the monkeys to write it for you (and no, we won't do that -- didn't you read yesterday's capture of the #queryfail tweets?), Nathan Bransford with Curtis Brown LTD provides you with a great "Mad Lib" style query letter. Just be sure to change it up a bit so it's more personalized! Go check it out at: http://nathanbransford.blogspot.com/2008/03/query-letter-mad-lib.html

If you have your own tips, winning recipe, experience to share, by all means, leave a comment! Good luck, too!