Barratt Miller asks:
1) Is there such a thing as querying too soon? 2) Although I expect that it’s something one just “knows” instinctively, are there a set of guidelines to follow? 3) When did you know you were ready to start querying? 4) What sort of writing had you done up until that point? I’m Sweating With Sven as well, and I’m wondering if I should even bother sending out queries for this project once it’s completed. I don’t think I’m ready, but I tend to be my harshest critic. While I want to trust my gut and wait until the next project, I don’t want to “wait until the next project” for the rest of my life.
Sometimes I’m really happy there’s a link to the blog. For instance, now I know how to pronounce “Barratt” — it’s not like “Barack.”
In this case, I wasn’t quite sure what the question meant, because the simple answer is to start querying when you’re done writing the book. Chapter One all the way through to The End, revise, get second reads, polish, then query.
But now that I’ve read your blog, I don’t think that’s what you’re asking. In this post, you talk about how you think this book isn’t ready for prime time. You know it even while you are writing it. You are clearly much better at seeing that sort of thing than I was. As I mentioned the other day, I didn’t know my “under the bed books” weren’t publishable when I was writing them. If I did, I probably wouldn’t have finished them. It doesn’t fit with my personality. But it was necessary for me to write “training” books, even if I didn’t know that was what I was doing. They taught me how to get to the point where I could write something publishable. Other people are fine with the idea of writing books just for practice.
Back to the questions:
1) Yes, there is such a thing as querying too soon. Querying projects before they’ve properly developed is way too soon. If you’re a new author, that means you don’t query until you have a complete book, polished, vetted/critiqued. However, I’d like to clarify that there’s only “too soon” on any given project. It’s not like you get one chance to be a writer and that’s it. If you feel like you have a good book, go ahead and query it. Or even if you want to see if what you’ve got is a good book. There’s no drawback. If you get a rejected everywhere, you can still query everywhere with your new book. Seriously, get used to the idea of rejections. I think a lot of the “we only get one chance” mindset is really fear of rejections in disguise.
The only time I think it’s too soon to query as a writer is when you’ve never finished a book. You need to have a product to sell, and that’s what a query letter is — a sales pitch. So yes, it’s too soon to query until you have a completed, polished book. (I wonder how many times I can use that phrase in one blog post.)
2) Guidelines vs. gut instinct. I think this varies from writer to writer. If you’re the kind of writer who is into entering contests, you might take your contest feedback as a good guideline. If you are getting great scores and/or finalling, you might be ready to submit. If you write short stories and have sold a lot of those, you might be ready to submit. If you have critique partners that you trust and they are all saying “get it out there, you silly girl!” (hint hint, person that reads this blog and has been sitting on her awesome book for weeks) then you might be ready to submit. And yes, listen to your gut, but don’t let the doubt demons keep you down.
3 and 4) I think I answered this above. When I wrote my first novel, I was doing it specifically for the purposes of publication. It wasn’t for practice. I knew I could write, I just didn’t know if I could write a whole novel. So when I finished it and polished it, I queried it. It wasn’t even a question for me. I’m not writing fiction for fun, so when I had something to submit, I submitted it. Since everyone’s process is different, it really is impossible for me to answer this question. Some folks write hundreds of short stories (some even publish them) before tackling a novel. Some just sit down one day and write a novel. There’s no way to compare.
Do you have a critique partner? I’m also my harshest critic (actually, no I’m not, the nice reviewers at Amazon are!) but having a critique partner is great — they have distance from your story, so they can see the things you’re missing, and help you get a more objective handle on your work.
But whether you are writing books “for practice” or “for publication” you need to HAVE a book before you can query it.
Hope that helps!
August 1st, 2007 at 5:02 am
Hi Diana, this answer really helped me, too, so I’m glad you posted it! I’m writing what began as an adult novel (am at 50K out of a projected 90-100K), but I really think it wants to be a YA book. There’s a voice in my head that keeps telling me I must just FINISH it at all costs – just to finish a Whole Novel – but you helped me when you talked about ‘writing for publication’. I am definitely writing for publication – not just for practice – so I think I’m going to revise my book NOW, before it’s finished, and then complete it as a YA.
Thanks again for – inadvertantly – helping me clarify something for myself.
Karen
August 1st, 2007 at 8:29 am
I’ve definately said “I only have one chance” before. It is definitely fear of rejection, but for me it’s more than that. It’s fear of querying too early and get rejected when I knew there was more I could do to improve my chances. When I say “I only have one chance,” I mean one chance with each agent with this particular book. If I query Agent X with WIP and she rejects it, that’s it. I don’t get another shot at her with WIP.
So for me, it means doing everything I possibly can up front so that if I get rejected I never have to think, “what could I have done better? Another round of revisions? More polish on the letter? More research on the agent?”
Of course, as I tend to be a worst-case-scenario kind of gal, this can also lead to long long delays during which I almost paralyze myself with the enormity of the task. Thankfully I have a full week off coming up — time to finish revisions and get the sucker out into the world!
August 1st, 2007 at 9:04 am
Diana, great advice as usual. This is like your very own Dear Diana column.
Carrie – I’m one of those people who can easily get stuck in obsessive rewriting and tightening, but trust me here (even though yer momma said not to trust people who say that) – when the story is the right story for you, you WILL get requests. And since rewrites are never done – you can still tweak it after a round of queries. Rejection always sux, but tweaking your letter and hitting send on another one always makes me feel better
Best advice I ever received – and it had nothing to do with writing at the time: If you don’t play, you can’t win!
August 1st, 2007 at 10:36 am
Great post Diana. I remember when I first joined TARA and heard the stories of how long answer from an agent/editor query could take. Back then I thought, well why not go ahead and query. If may take them months then surely the book will be done and ready when they asked for the full.
You noticed I said ‘when’. Oh the joys of the newbie writer’s mind. I think it was Julie who spoke at the next meeting I attended. I remember her saying, no pounding into our heads, Do Not Query unless your book is finished. At first I thought, but why???
I think she read my mind because the next word out of her mouth was, “What if you can’t finish the book? What if for some reason it is magical pulled from the slush pile and they love it and want the rest now, today.” She scared me to death right then and there.
The advice was not only sound but something I took to heart. Much like the wisdom, knowledge, and advice I glean from your blog daily.
August 1st, 2007 at 10:44 am
Karen, practice or publication sort of comes later.
The perspective of that comes after it has sold or not sold. Right?
I think saying it is a practice novel is a way of taking pressure off one’s self to be ‘perfect’.
My problem is if I say it’s a practice novel, I make progress, then I start to realize its potential and then I put the pressure on.
The comparisons to running a marathon are numerous. There’s something to be said for just finishing. After finishing one, you can really comprehend what it takes. You can read all you want on running a marathon and do all the training regimens, but until you run a marathon, you don’t really know.
It’s certainly possible that you put up a respectable speed on your first marathon. But it’s not like there is only 1 marathon in you. Either way, you know more in your second and third marathon.
August 1st, 2007 at 12:26 pm
Hi Patrick, yeah that’s all true – thanks for sharing your process/experience.
I guess I’m just someone who knows what they want, and I suppose we all have to find our way through this journey. The way I see it, if I know with certainty that I want a career writing, selling and publishing my books – and I accept that may take a long time to even get close to! – if I realise that my current project isn’t working, I might as well change things now. I’m an impatient person!
I can’t sit down and write something that I don’t 100% believe will be something that will get published. Sometimes I wish I didn’t feel that way – maybe I would make more progress in the longrun! – but there you have it…
August 1st, 2007 at 1:42 pm
Hi Diana:
Really sage advice. I wrote a novel at 21 years old and submitted it to this big-name editor at St. Martin’s–actually, correct that . . . I wrote about 75 pages of a novel. And I didn’t know she was such a big shot . . . and I figured I wouldn’t hear back for months anyway. And then I heard from her the next week that she wanted to see the full of my thriller.
I finished it quickly . . . got great feedback from her (a turndown, but really very encouraging) . . . and learned a HUGE lesson. I wasn’t ready. The next time I tried to sell a novel, it was completed (Spanish Disco) . . . and it sold in a few weeks . . . so I was really glad it was done. But anything can happen in this biz. And like others here, I just “assumed” that there were “always” these unbearably long wait times and I had time to hone it and to try to perfect it. That’s not the right approach. Hone and perfect beforehand.
E
August 1st, 2007 at 2:42 pm
Karen, What I just heard you say was, let me go back and re-run that last mile because I know I can run it faster.
I say it all the time, too.
August 1st, 2007 at 3:52 pm
Good post, Diana!
I did learn some critical things from querying my first novel, even if it was practice.
(and looking back even after 6 months, I can really see why it didn’t sell, too. I just 5 minutes ago had a friend begging to read it anyway, but I said no, that it just isn’t my best work now.
)