Query Response Round-Up: Week of 8/18/23

I’ve been querying my novel SECOND DAWN a lot, and the responses have been trickling in. I thought I’d collect the ones I’ve received in the last week or so, share them with you here, and maybe indulge in a little bit if query rejectomancy. 🙂

First, here are my overall stats thus far.

• Total Queries: 23
• Rejections: 7
• Full Requests: 3
• Pending Queries: 13
• Pending Requests: 3

I’m quite pleased with these numbers. A 13% request rate is certainly validating. I did have one CNR, but the agent got back me to this morning with a rejection. That said, at least one of those pending queries will likely turn into a CNR by early next week.

Rejections

I received two rejections over the last week, both form rejections, and here they are.

Rejection #1 – 8/12/23

Thanks for writing me and letting me take a look at SECOND DAWN. I apologize for the form letter, but the volume of query letters I receive makes it impossible to send personal responses to every writer.

Unfortunately, I must pass on your material. I realize it is difficult to judge your potential from a query and first five pages alone, but please know that I give serious attention to every letter and writing sample I receive.

Best of luck with your agent search,

Pretty standard form rejection here. The one thing that jumps out at me is the mention of five pages. In my experience thus far, the number of pages an agent asks for seems to fall into three broad categories: 5 pages, 10 pages, and three(ish) chapters. Yeah, I’ve run into one 50-pager and a few that wanted no pages, but these three are the most common. Currently, I have three full requests: two from agents who wanted three chapters and one from an agent who wanted five pages. I think the strengths of my book is more apparent after about 15 pages, but that’s just conjecture at this point.

Rejection #2 – 8/18/23

Thanks for sharing your query with me. I regret to inform you that I won’t be requesting additional materials or offering representation. While I was intrigued by your concept, I’m not the best fit for fantasy.

Please know I can only responsibly take on a few new clients each year, and my decision to pass does not mean another agent won’t be a passionate and energetic advocate for your project.  

Please accept my very best wishes for your writing success. 

Another standard form rejection and another “liked your concept, but . . ” rejections. I think those are gonna be pretty common.

Full Requests

Okay, now on to the good stuff. I had two full manuscript requests in the last seven to ten days. Let’s take a look at those.

Full Request #1 – 8/10/23

Thank you so much for querying me. I really enjoyed the first few chapters of SECOND DAWN and would love to read the rest! Please follow the instructions to submit the full MS at your earliest convenience.

This is the kind of response you want to find in your inbox, right? This agent, like my first full request, asked for three full chapters with the query package. Other than that, not much to dissect here. The agent liked what they saw and wants to see more. Of course, I sent the manuscript right away. Unfortunately, this agent is listed under an agency on QueryTracker, and for some reason the software can’t track specific numbers on entire agencies. That said, with the number of clients the agency represents, I’d guess the query numbers were on par with the agent in the second full request below.

Full Request #2 – 8/14/23

Thank you for sending me sample pages of SECOND DAWN for consideration. I would like to take a look at the entire manuscript.

Please upload your submission as a Word document, preceded by your bio and a two-page synopsis (ALL IN ONE DOCUMENT). Make sure your manuscript is in Times New Roman font size 12, double space, with 1″ margin all around, your last name/title appearing on the upper left corner of each page and the page number on the upper right corner.

Kindly allow me at least 12 weeks for a reply before contacting me to inquire about your manuscript’s status (although I will try to respond sooner).

I look forward to reading.

Obviously, this manuscript request is a little more involved. It should go without saying that you should follow an agent’s formatting guidelines when they request our manuscript. In this case, my manuscript was already in this format, so that part was pretty easy. I like that the agent gives me a time frame for a response, and looking at their numbers on QueryTracker, they routinely response far sooner than 12 weeks. The other thing of note with this full request is that I sent five pages with the query. My first two full requests were from agents who wanted three full chapters.

According to QueryTracker, this agent has received over 5,000 queries in the last twelve months and requested full manuscripts from 109, or about 2.2%. Out of those 109 full requests, 98 manuscripts were sent, and the agent offered representation to one author. Those are daunting numbers but, I feel pretty good about making it through the first stage.

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So, that’s my last week in the query trenches. Not too shabby. 🙂

Are you querying a novel? I’d love to hear about your query journey in the comments.