Hello Authors! When I was in the query trenches, I found there were a lot of things I wished I’d known early in my query journey.

Now that I’m an associate literary agent, I thought it would be helpful to querying authors if I provided some guidance on how to polish your submission packet so your work shines.

Much of this may be personal to what I’m looking for. And you may do something differently that piques my attention, or another agent’s. These tips are only suggestions. At the end of the day, my goal is to help aspiring authors make their publishing dreams come true!

The Query

The query has one role—to hook an agent and entice them to read your manuscript. That’s it. I’m going to break down each paragraph and show what would hook me. Brevity is key in a query—three hundred to four hundred words is easiest on a tired agent’s eyes.

Paragraph 1:   Agent Personalization

• Did something on my MSWL fit your manuscript?
• Did we meet at a conference, and I told you to submit?
• Did someone refer you to query me?
• Did we interact on social media?

I want to feel a personal connection to you the author, before I know about your book. To me, the agent/author relationship should always come first.

Paragraph 2: Metadata

• TITLE in all caps
• Word count rounded to the nearest thousands.
• Age range
• Genre
• Comps
  • 2-3 comps published within the last 3-5 years and why these books are comps to yours.
  • Agents pitch to editors who require recent comps. They want to know where your book would sit on a shelf in a bookstore today.
  • Also, for these comps, you want to choose books that sold well, but not too well. If you comp Harry Potter, you’re setting a high bar.
  • And if your book is the next Harry Potter, the agent or editor will recognize that—and be SUPER happy!

Additional information you might consider adding is if your book has a unique structure such as told in dual timelines, dual POV, novel in verse, epistolary, etc.—anything unique about the storytelling or structure.

Paragraph 3: The Plot Paragraph

For your query, you want to avoid vague language. Use specificity. Your query needs to represent the plot of your book, not universal themes that could represent many books. Your plot paragraph should also make the setting (time and place) clear.

Introduce your MC – Consider…

• Who are they (age, gender, occupation, personality)
• What do they want (goals, motivations)
• What’s standing in the way of them getting what they want (obstacles, antagonists)
• What do they stand to lose if they don’t achieve their goals (stakes).
• In many cases, this can be written as a choice A, risks result B, and choice C risks result D.
• If dual POV, give a short paragraph for each MC.

The best way to know how to write a good query is to read good queries. Query Shark is a great place to start.

Paragraph 4: Short and Sweet Author Bio

These are just suggestions, again, reading other queries will help you learn how to craft your bio.

• What’s your day job?
• Do you have any publishing credits?
• Do you have any writing experience?
• Something in common with the agent. Just like the first paragraph focused on the author/agent relationship your bio can strengthen that connection.

The First Ten Pages

Most agents request either the first five or first ten pages of a manuscript with a query submission.

This is where you can make some calculated decisions that will work to your advantage.

These pages have to do A LOT to lead to a full request and you are in charge of what they do. For me, in the first ten pages, I want to see the following:

• A complete first chapter. This shows me that you’re carefully crafting to allow me to see the entire first chapter. If your submission is dual-POV, I’m going to love it if each character gets a five-page chapter. I see both POVs in ten pages. You can agree or disagree, but this is a calculated decision you can make with great reward. It’s also going to mean that you are economical with your word choice and probably avoid other pitfalls I’m going to list.
• Zero backstory. Backstory in chapter one is a hard no for me. Here’s why. Your reader knows nothing about your current world. They jump in disoriented. We don’t know where we are in time and place. We don’t know who to care about. As the author, you need the backstory in your head. But your reader doesn’t need it—at least not yet. You have hundreds of pages left to sprinkle in that backstory later.
• Zero exposition and lengthy descriptions. I want to experience your world-building by your characters interacting with your world through sensory details and experiences.
• Main character agency. I want to see your main character making decisions towards pursuing goals. I want to see them actively doing things, instead of things just happening to them.
• Brief interiority but not lengthy inner monologue. Interiority allows the reader brief glimpses into what your character is thinking. Often this is in juxtaposition to what they are saying or doing. Lengthy inner monologue is when the characters is thinking in paragraphs and paragraphs of narration as in a stream of consciousness. Often times the reader doesn’t know what the character is doing or where they are during the monologue. I’ve also seen writers insert a lengthy inner monologue in a dialogue exchange where it wouldn’t make sense for the narrator to be thinking that nor would they even have time. And not that you won’t have a time later where an inner monologue is needed, but the first chapter is much to valuable real-estate to start there.
• Start before the inciting incident. For me, I like to be dropped into a story right before the inciting incident. I want to see the main character’s status quo. What is the life they will never be able to go back to after the inciting incident?
• More than one character. Your main character needs to be interacting with other characters. We need to see some tension occurring. But don’t introduce characters on page one that we’ll never see again.
• Clear mood and genre. In other words, you don’t want to start with a car crash if your story isn’t action adventure with multiple car crashes and explosions. You don’t want to start with a meet-cute if your novel is horror. Obviously, you’ll have more than one mood throughout your novel and other genre elements will appear. But if by chapter three your story has taken a completely different turn from chapter one, you risk reader confusion and you don’t want that.
• Plant curiosity seeds. I want to have more questions than answers. Don’t tell me everything. I need to know only enough to know what is happening in this chapter. Curiosity seeds keep readers turning pages.
• Cliffhanger ending. The last line on page ten needs to make me want to hit Request Full IMMEDIATELY! But I won’t. I have one more step.

The Synopsis

If your query hooked me, and your first ten pages did the heavy lifting to get me excited, the next thing I’ll read is your one-page synopsis. I want to know if you delivered on the promise of your premise. This is where you’re going to lay out all the major plot points spoilers included.

I know this is the nemesis of the submission packet. I get it. Hopefully, these tips help.

• Go chapter by chapter and write one to two sentences that explain what happens in that chapter. This is where telling is better than showing. You are summarizing.
  • Once you’ve done that, examine your word count. Does it fit on one page? If so, you’re done! If not, keep going.

• Revise
  • Read each sentence.
  • Remove unnecessary words.
  • Cut adjectives or exchange them for adjectives with less letters.
  • If you can exchange two words for one, do it.
  • Use contractions.
  • Use as many pronouns without confusing the reader.
  • Does it fit on one page? If so, you’re done! If not, keep going.

• Remove Content
  • Can you remove minor characters and the synopsis still make sense?
  • Can you remove minor subplots and the synopsis still make sense?
  • Does it fit on one page? If so, you’re done! If not, work with a critique partner to help you identify what else you can trim.

In Closing

I know this was a lot. These are things I wish someone would have told me when I was querying. I hope it helps Please always feel free to reach out and ask me questions. Good luck! I can’t wait to read your submission packet!