Tag: query

Query Letter Help

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[found on maxbarry.com; by Max Barry]

“The Query Letter

The idea of a query letter is to take this book you’ve written, this incomparable masterpiece that took five years and destroyed your marriage, and summarize it on a single piece of paper while still leaving enough room in the margins for a publisher or agent to scribble, “Sorry, not for us.” You have to try to pitch your book in such an intriguing way that the publisher immediately writes back to you, demanding to see sample chapters (or the entire manuscript). This may sound tough to do, but in truth it’s even harder. Your query needs to stand out from the other 80 the editor is going to read that day, but avoid amateurish gimmicks, like $50 bills.

There are plenty of good web sites on how to write a query letter and approach agents/editors. Some of them are:

One thing you must do is say what sort of book you’ve written. This is what agents/editors will be scanning for when they read your letter: is it a thriller, a comedy, a rural human drama? Most writers, including me, find this very difficult to do, and tend to produce descriptions like, “It’s kind of a futuristic science-fiction comedy-come-romance set in Medieval France with a strong anti-war message.” This is why authors should be banned from describing their own novels.

So I suggest enlisting help: have your friends read your book and ask them what novels they think it’s similar to. Then at least you’ll have a rough genre to start from. Also, for practice, try to describe your book in a single, short sentence. Ask people if it sounds interesting, and rework it until it does.

This is very much personal opinion, but I think a good description often combines something common (“It’s a detective story”) with something original (“where the PI has a terminal illness”). The common part grounds the story, letting us know what ballpark it’s in. The original part shows it’s something special.

Update (May-07): If you’re interested, I’ve posted my old query letter, which I sent out while agent-hunting in 1998. It’s kinda cringe-worthy reading it now, definitely over the top, but since it worked…”

For more great info from MaxBarry, click here.

[found on http://maxbarry.com/writing/help.html]

Query Query Quite Contrary…

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[found on queryshark.blogspot.com]
Query Shark: “How To Write Query Letters … or, really, how to revise query letters so they actually work…” A site that works for YOU. Query questions? Read on…

Example of this tool:

“Dear Query Shark,
 
Winston Smith has been a foolish man, and on Christmas Day of 2012, it’s going to cost him his life.
 
This is a great opening line. Do I want to find out what happened? You bet.
 
On top of a faltering marriage – and there’s been no sex for eight months – not only has he neglected to tell wife, Julia, their heavily indebted dairy farm is up for an income tax audit, but he’s corresponded with the auditor that “the thought of having to hand over my life in letters and source documents for examination by you, a total stranger, on pain of punishment, makes me physically ill,” and he will not be cooperating with the Inland Revenue Department.
 
And then you take veer so completely off the path of taut, lean prose that it’s almost like you’ve morphed into Prolix Man.
 
For starters, don’t quote the novel in the query. Also, we don’t need to know why the marriage is faltering, just that it is. And the only thing we really need to know is the audit is going to be a big surprise to Julia.
 
Tom Parsons life previously could have been summed up in a word: inertia. Married to mousy Sally, the one girl he dated at high school, their marriage has become routine since the birth of their son, Syme.
  
What? Wait. Who? What happened to Winston and Julia?  This abrupt segue is confusing. Remember, I’m not sitting on my sofa with a cup of tea, savoring your query. I’m not reading this like I read a novel. I’m sitting at my desk, I’ve got ten minutes before a scheduled phone call and I’m trying to find the queries that entice me to read on. In other words, I’m reading fast and mostly skimming. Whether you think this is a good idea, or fair is immaterial. It’s reality and  a smart query writer will write to his/her audience.
 
What that means: You make sure I know who a new character is by telling me “Inland Revenue agent Tom Parsons”
 
And you don’t have FIVE NAMED CHARACTERS in the first two paragraphs. At the most you have two….“

[found on http://queryshark.blogspot.com]

How to Write an Author’s Bio

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[found on annerallen.blogspot.com]

“How to Write an Author Bio When You Don’t Feel Like an Author…Yet

(by Anne R. Allen)
  • Maybe you’ve got a novel finished and you’ve been sending out queries. Lots. And you’re getting rejections. Lots. Or worse, that slow disappointment of no response at all.
  • Or maybe you write short fiction and poetry and you’ve got a bunch of pieces you’ve been sending out to contests and literary journals. You’ve won a few local contests, but so far you haven’t had much luck getting into print.
  • You may still be afraid to tell more than a handful of people you’re a writer. You’d feel pretentious calling yourself an “author.”
  • But it might be time to start—at least privately.
  • Because one day, in the not too distant future, you’ll open your email and there it will be:
    • The response from an editor: “You’re the winner of our October ‘Bad Witch’ short story contest. We’d like to publish your story, Glinda: Heartbreaker of Oz in our next issue. Please send us your Author Bio.”
  • Or just when you were giving up hope, you get that reply from your dream agent:
    • “I’m intrigued by your novel Down and Out on the Yellow Brick Road.Please send the first fifty pages, and an Author Bio.”You’re so excited you’re jumping out of your skin, so you dash something off in five minutes and hit “send.”  Wow. You’re going to be in print! Or maybe get an agent. Let’s get this career on the road!
  • Whoa. You do NOT want to dash off an author bio in five minutes. Every word you send out there is a writing sample, not just those well-honed pages or stories.
  • So, write it now. Yes. Right now. Before you send off another query or enter another contest. Even though you’ve never published anything but the Halloween haiku that won second prize in your high school newspaper.
  • Actually, you want to write two bios: A paragraph suitable for a magazine byline, and a longer one-page version for sending to agents and later posting on your website, blog, etc.

♦♦♦

How to Write an Author Bio

  • Title it only with your name. Write in third person. Keep to about 250 words: one page, double-spaced–or 1/2 page single-spaced, if you include a photo above it. (I advise against this unless it’s specifically requested or you have a great, up-to-date, professional photo that makes you look like a contestant on one of those Top Model shows.)You’re aiming for a style similar to book jacket copy. The purpose is to make yourself sound professional and INTERESTING.
  • This may be perfectly accurate:  “Mrs. H. O. Humm is a stay-at-home mom who lives in Middle America with her dentist husband, 2.4 children and a dog named Rex.”
    • But a bio is all about making yourself stand out. “Hermione Oz Humm was born in the Emerald City and is an expert balloonist, ventriloquist and voice-over performer.”

♦♦♦

Things to consider including:

1) Whatever might make you newsworthy: OK, so you aren’t the baby who got rescued from that well forty years ago, and you never cheated on Robert Pattinson, but whatever is quirky or unusual about you, trot it out. Keep homing pigeons? Run marathons? Cook prize-winning chili? Put it in.

2) Work history: Here’s where you say you’re a welder or a fourth grade teacher or whatever, even if it isn’t related to the subject matter of your book.

NB: Don’t call yourself a “novelist” if you haven’t published one.

If you’re seriously underemployed and want to keep it to yourself, you can call yourself a “freelance writer,” but consider saying what else you do, even if it’s less than impressive. I remember when Christopher Moore’s first book, Practical Demonkeeping, came out and all the Central Coast papers ran stories about how a “local waiter” had just sold a book to Disney. If he’d called himself a “writer” there would have been no story.

3) Where you live: Your hometown might make a good focus for marketing. Plus people like to be able to picture you in your native habitat.

4) Education: This includes workshops or conferences as well as formal education—especially if you worked with a high-profile teacher. If you took a playwriting workshop with Edward Albee, even if it was 30 years ago, go ahead and say so.

5) Life experience and hobbies that relate to the book, or fascinate on their own: If you collect vintage Frisbees, and the book is about angsty teen werewolves at a Frisbee contest, include it. If you invented the Frisbee, it doesn’t matter what your book is about: toot that horn!

6) Travel/exotic residences: “Rudy Kipling once took a two-week tour of Asia,” meh. But “Mr. Kipling was born in Bombay and spent a year as the assistant editor of a newspaper in Lahore,” is something you want them to know.

7) Writing credentials/prizes: Here’s where you can list some of those credits in small presses and prizes that didn’t fit in your query. Include any books you’ve published, even if they were in a different field.

If you’re writing this for an agent or publisher, remember books that didn’t sell well are going to work against you with a marketing department, so you might want to leave out self-published books if your sales weren’t in the thousands. You should also skip older books self-published with a vanity press, unless your sales were spectacular.
8) Family: Use discretion here. If you write for children and have some of your own, it would be useful to mention them. If your family has an interesting claim to fame (like your sister just won an Olympic medal) or if family history has made you uniquely qualified to write this book (Your grandfather was Dwight Eisenhower’s valet and you’re writing about the Eisenhower/Kay Summersby affair.)
9) Performing history: It’s helpful to show you’re not paralyzed by the thought of public speaking. You can mention you’re the president of your local Toastmasters, or host a jug band program on a public access station, or you played the Teapot in last year’s production of Beauty and the Beast at the local community theater.
10) Your online presence: This is where you can mention your blog. Also put in your twitter handle and list what other social media you participate in.

♦♦♦

How to Write a Short Author Bio

  • Again, write in third person. For the first sentence, this format works pretty well:
    •  “Name is a ______ who lives in ______ and does ______. “
  • Then you can add one or two of the following:

1. S/he is a member of _____ (if you’re a member of any writing organizations like RWA or SCBWI)

2. S/he has won_____ (writing awards—yes, you can mention the Halloween haiku.)

3. S/he has been published in _____ .

4. S/he has a degree in _____ from_______.

  • Then add something interesting and unique about yourself, preferably something related to the piece, like:
    • “S/he played Glinda the Good Witch in a Middle School production of The Wizard of Oz.”
  • When writing these bios, think like a reporter. What would make good copy in a news release? Think unique, quirky or funny.
  • All set? Good. Now go look in the mirror and say, “hello, author!”
  • Then sit down at the computer and write those bios. Right now!“*
 [found on http://annerallen.blogspot.com/2012/09/how-to-write-author-bio-when-you-dont.html]