For the last several years, I’ve periodically taught a publishing industry course for the MFA program in Northwestern University’s School of Professional Studies. (I give you all that verbiage because there’s a second Northwestern MFA program housed in another department).
About halfway through the quarter, each student writes an agent query letter pitching either a work-in-progress or a manuscript the student hopes to write in the near future.
It’s an assignment they seem happy to do, in part because query letters inspire fear in some of us (or, at the very least, fear of a tedious task), and it provides students with an introduction to the form, which isn’t particularly hard to become proficient at. I’ve had four agents since 2002, six if you count the two who left the industry for other professions, and consequently, have had to write my share of queries.
In this post, I’ve detailed the component parts of a standard query letter and included a sample query, along with some advice about how to find an agent and what to expect during the query process.
One reliable way writers find agents to query is by reading the acknowledgments included in most books—in this section, the author often thanks their agent and editor. You might also ask other writers with whom you have a supportive working relationship to recommend an agent. You can subscribe to Publisher’s Marketplace too; it lists each business day’s book deals and who sold these new books to whom. It’s a much-used tool of the publishing trade.
An agent query letter generally contains these components:
Salutation, e.g. "Dear Ms. Harris"
First paragraph: Explain why you’ve contacted this particular agent, which should ideally be based on one of the following: your admiration for the work of an author the agent represents, an interview they did for a trade publication such as Poets & Writers or The Writer, an article you read that highlighted their agenting policies and techniques, or a personal recommendation from another writer who knows this agent and thinks you and she/he/they would be a good match.
Second paragraph: a short synopsis of your manuscript/book project (in some cases, you might need two paragraphs for your synopsis, but keep both paragraphs as concise as is feasible).
Third paragraph: a few biographical details about you that are writing-related or in some way address the subject(s) you focus on in your manuscript.
Fourth paragraph: Some variation on the following: “If it’s of interest, I can send you a partial or the full manuscript of…” and “Thank you for taking the time to consider my query. I hope to hear from you soon.”
Complimentary close: "Yours sincerely" or "Best regards"
I also suggest including your Twitter, Instagram handle, your website URL, and/or Facebook page if you have them.
Sample query letter:
Dear Ms. Harris,
I admire the work of the authors you represent, Penelope Lively’s and Tessa Hadley’s novels in particular, and was also impressed by what I read in a past issue of Poets & Writers about your approach to selling your authors' manuscripts.
I have recently completed a comedic novel, Coffee Breaks, that focuses on two female friends just out of college who decide to start their own detective agency specializing in tracking down wayward husbands and wives who have skipped out on financial, child-rearing, and/or emotional obligations. Coffee Breaks examines and satirizes different gender and cultural stereotypes, including those that characterize women as natural-born mothers and homemakers, and men as natural-born philanderers. Its tone is comic, but it's a novel with, I hope, meaningful ideas and realistic, likable characters.
Some of my short stories have appeared or are forthcoming in The Southern Review, Glimmer Train, New England Review, Story, and a number of other journals. I teach first-year writing courses for Loyola University-Chicago and have an MFA in creative writing, fiction specialization, from Indiana University. My website is www…..
I’d be very happy to send you a partial or the full manuscript of Coffee Breaks. I hope to hear from you soon.
Sincerely yours,
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A Few Notes About Querying Etiquette
- In most cases, you don’t need prior publications to interest an agent in your work, but you should have a polished, full draft of your manuscript ready, one that you have likely redrafted at least a few times, after your most trusted readers have given you strong feedback that you’ve taken into account in your revisions.
- Don’t query an agent until your novel, memoir, essay collection, etc. is enitrely done. After you find an agent and have published a book or two, however, it is sometimes possible to sell a manuscript based on a partial draft - often this is for nonfiction projects, which frequently sell based on a proposal and a few early sample chapters. But for fiction manuscripts, this isn't very common (unless, again, you are an established author, and your previous books have sold well).
- Do your best to come across as reasonable, polite, and easy to work with in all your interactions with an agent. They are most likely looking for the smallest reason to hit "delete" when your query comes in because any good agent receives hundreds, possibly thousands, of queries a month from writers looking for representation.
- I probably don’t need to say this, but just in case: resist the urge to tell the agent how tired, demoralized, or sad you might feel about how long it's taking to find an agent. Be straightforward and keep your tone neutral in your letter.
- You should plan to query anywhere from 20-120+ agents. It’s hard work. Muster your toughest hide and strongest work ethic to keep at it. When you do have interest from agents, be sure to talk with them on the phone or meet in person if this is a possibility, before agreeing to let them represent you. Objectively speaking, they need you and your work more than you need them (although at the outset, it doesn’t often seem this way).
Furthermore...
- I learned from an agent at ICM that his email inbox routes messages with "query" in the subject line to a folder that he only checks a couple of times a week. With this in mind, you might avoid using "query" in your subject line and instead use, for example, "New novel" or "Seeking representation for a memoir" - in any case, something that expresses your intent but doesn't including "query" or "querying."
- If an agent asks for your pages, it's fine to ask them how long they expect it will take them to get back to you (if they don't readily offer up a timeline). If, for example, an agent says they'll need a month, give them a month and a week or so if you don't hear from them before you write to ask for an update.
- Keep your query letter as succinct as possible, e.g. aim for somewhere between 300-500 words. Some query letters might need to be a little longer, especially if you’re writing with a complicated nonfiction project, but I would say do your best not to go beyond 600 words, even in these cases.
- Be patient and polite, always. Agents are overwhelmed with queries.
Coda: If you’d like feedback on your query letter or other work, please contact me here (scroll down a ways to the “Contact” box, enter your note, and email address.) If you sign up for an annual Bookish membership, I offer a reduced rate on query critiques. Turnaround is usually 24-48 hours.
I’m not ready to do any of this yet, but it’s encouraging to see that all of this looks like things I could manage to do. Thanks for posting!
This is the first query advice I’ve seen that doesn’t recommend novel comparisons, a one(ish) sentence summary, genre, word-count, a pitch that could be the back-copy of your book, or the intended audience. These fall under ‘tell the agent why the book will sell’, an area not loved by creatives but important for the business end of things.
The method above is delightfully more about connecting and interesting the agent in your work—but is it viable in the current market?