There’s been a new flurry of comments on last week’s Queryfail post, with kt literary client Maureen Johnson sharing her thoughts. A snippet:
The guidelines aren’t that hard, and they’re there for a reason–to get everything organized and read correctly. It takes, what, a minute to read them? If you can’t correctly comprehend three lines [...]
…A no-snail-mail queries policy here at kt literary. As it stands right now, I do get the bulk of my queries from email, but every once in a while, I notice the pile of unread hard copy queries to go through, that unfortunately sit and sit and sit. My promise of a response within two weeks applies only to email queries, and with those coming fast and furious, it’s only when I’m caught up on them that I can spare the time to look at a snail-mail query.
Eek! The time is just running away from me. How did it get to be 4pm, and me without a post for the day? To be fair, there were some technical difficulties at the home office this morning — strange internet outages and ridonkulous slowness — but that was this morning! What ELSE have I been doing?
A classic lone shoe movie poster for MD, who writes, “Since I couldn’t drum up agent interest with my first book, I have written a sequel (how dumb is that?). I’m testing with new critters to make sure it’s standalone, but should I mention that this second book is just that: a second book in a series. I have a few more ideas to continue this series, so I’m sure it could be at least three or more. How do I pitch a second book?”
Traditional Japanese shoes for Tiffany, who writes, “I wrote a Japanese grammar book. I’ve submitted my book to a number of agents who specialize in education but have never received a reply – because they don’t speak Japanese! The agents have no way to judge my book. My searches for literary agents that specialize in foreign language books has proven fruitless. I don’t know what to do.”
