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Craft of Writing

Lon Prater

Spook-proofing your Query Letter

The top-drawer editor you want doesn't have time for sloppy, unprofessional writers. Neither does your dream agent.

Through long experience, these elusive creatures have become attuned to the little signs that presage a waste of their time. This heightened sensitivity makes them more difficult to pin down than Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster combined. After having their intuition validated time and again, the most successful of the species aren't going to stick around to read your manuscript if something in your query letter spooks them off.

What can you do to make sure your one-page masterpiece won't induce a flight response? Compare it to the list below and discard any of the offending stimuli you find there.

HOW TO SCARE OFF EDITORS AND AGENTS EVERY TIME

Any mention of your family (and other social acquaintances) - Unless you're writing the next Cheaper by the Dozen and have the progeny to back it up, there aren’t very many ways your family can be pertinent to what an agent or editor cares about: the salability of your book. It doesn’t matter if Aunt Trudy the veterinarian thought you described a horse's internal organs lyrically. It doesn’t matter if your kid brother says it's better than Harry Potter. Honestly—the person reading your letter only wants to know if your story sounds enticing enough to pursue. And she'll base that on her own experience and judgment, not the local Girl Scout troop's, thank you very much.

Cutesy stationery - Say it with me: An unobtrusive, graphic-free letterhead centered at the top of a single sheet of white, 20 pound (or better) 8.5" by 11" paper. No perfume, advance headshots for the bookjacket or gifts of chocolate necessary. Add nothing to your query beyond whatever combination of synopsis and chapters the guidelines allow.

Writing in review-speak - If you see the words sensational...gut-wrenching...thrill ride...climactic, or any similar blockbuster nonsense, yank them out immediately. Save the reviews for—well, the reviewers. Let the story sell itself in your query.

"Dear Whoever Reads This," - How much of your own time and money do you spend pursuing the great offers addressed to RESIDENT that show up in your mailbox? (And don’t get me started on spam!) Taking the time to research the name of a particular agent shows that you pay attention to the details and that you aren't just shotgunning the entire AAR and publishing industry with form mail. Ever hear of Garbage In, Garbage Out? Same is true of form letters, if you get my drift.

Bad grammar, spelling errors and typos - This one should be a no-brainer. Imagine your query letter is under a high-powered microscope. One little error will appear to be the size of a Volkswagen. Two errors will look like a pair of Hummers. Go beyond that and you're more likely to open a car lot than you are to get the busy editor or agent to keep reading. Before they see your query, put it under the microscope yourself, several times. Have someone you trust look it over as well. You only get one chance to make that first impression.

The letter that just wouldn’t end - Keep your query under a page in length. Devote one short paragraph to the genre and length of your story; one or two to identifying the overarching plot and theme, the protagonist and his internal/external conflicts; another paragraph to your writing credits, or anything that makes you uniquely qualified to tell this story; thank your prey for their time and sign the darn thing. Any more than this and you start making your quarry skittish. Need I remind you? Skittish is bad.


About the Author
Lon Prater lives, works and writes just two minutes from the Gulf of Mexico. His fiction has been Honorably mentioned in Year's Best Fantasy & Horror and placed as a Published Finalist in the Writers of the Future contest.  He is currently shopping his first novel and writing his second.