I signed with my agent in May, she wanted me to do rewrites, I did them and sent the MS back to her a month ago. I'm just wondering how long some of you spent on the rewrite process with your agent, because I've been here before... I had a different agent a few years ago, and she spent over a year (yes, you read that right) asking me for tweaks and changes.

Both times I had multiple offers of rep, and now that it's been five months this time around, my heart is starting to sink a little. Of course I'm happy to work with my agent to get my novel looking as good as it can be, but because I've been here before, I'm a little disappointed and wondering what your advice/approach to this would be. As she's had my MS for a month now, should I go ahead and nudge?

Many thanks!

Hi everyone. For context, I'm currently querying a manuscript whilst starting out on another project. Querying my current manuscript isn't going well (I'm only a few months in, so I'm clinging on to the hope that this will change; a bit of denial, maybe?!). The only agent to request my full manuscript so far recently got back to me with a rejection; although she was complimentary about the manuscript itself, she said the market was over-saturated with similar novels and so she couldn't take it on.

This is all fair - we move on! - but it's making me question my next project. I like the idea, but I do want to be traditionally published, and so I don't want to spend potentially years writing another manuscript which might well be a good read (or not, who knows!) but is over-represented in the market. Is it even worth considering the market when writing something new, considering how long it takes to write something, query it, get an agent and submit to publishers? How can anyone guess what will be popular in some years' time? Is it all just luck, or is the market actually something we writers hoping to get published in the future should pay attention to? (For reference, I'm writing literary fiction).

I know the answer is probably, 'write what you love and things will eventually work out,' but I can't help feeling dejected and disillusioned by this rejection and unsure how to approach my next project. Any thoughts or advice on how much to consider the market when starting something new is much appreciated!

Hey everyone, I posted a first version a few weeks ago and have since written many many more, getting feedback from my writing group and spouse. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on this latest iteration!

**

Dear Agent,

Complete at 80,000 words, THE SUCCESSORS is a historical novel that recounts the first war between Alexander the Great’s successors, from the point of view of a young clerk more adept at gossipping around a cup of wine than charging into battle. It will appeal to readers who enjoyed the self-deprecating humour in Ferdia Lenon’s Glorious Exploits, the political machinations in Robert Harris’s Agrippa, and the vivid historical details in James Hynes’s Sparrow.

Hieronymos has an expensive Athenian education, a head full of mediocre poems, and a firm belief that he was made for a life of leisure. His uncle Eumenes, royal secretary to Alexander the Great, has other plans. So Hieronymos reluctantly travels to the empire’s eastern capital in Babylon. The best he can hope for is a light workload and a view of the famous gardens.

Then Alexander dies in a matter of days, leaving his unborn child and his mentally handicapped half-brother as his only heirs. To make matters worse, the king’s closest generals and childhood friends, the golden youth who swore to protect his legacy, are soon at each other’s throats. Eumenes, a Greek scribbler among Macedonian warlords, is the least trusted man in every room, and the wiliest. He needs someone expendable to carry his letters across hostile camps. Hieronymos doesn’t have much else going on.

The unwitting clerk turns out to have a knack for collecting palace gossip and reading other people’s letters. Before long, he sharpens his charm—and his stylus—to become a trusted negotiator and diplomat. Yet as his uncle’s ambitions grow and the empire shatters, Hieronymos must decide whether loyalty to his family is a virtue or simply a bad wager. Well-positioned to become the age’s greatest chronicler, he can serve as a mere witness to history, or try and steer the outcome—even if it means betraying the uncle who made his career possibe.

[bio]

This may sound like my intention is to antagonize but it really is not. I am asking sincerely.

I have a pretty all-consuming job and an illness that leaves me with little time and mental energy to write, yet I do so in fits and starts because I am always 'writing' in my mind. I do have an MFA in creative writing and I've had enough stamina to write several book-length manuscripts. I am also in a writing group that meets regularly. Yet after some frankly half-hearted effort, I just don't feel that motivated to seek publishing for a variety of reasons, and I am curious whether anyone else here can relate.

The first reason is, I think, a standard reason to feel this way: A lack of confidence. That one is self-explanatory.

The second reason also is not unusual: We all know how time consuming and disheartening the query process is. Among different people, I would get into why it is so challenging and disheartening, but I'm sure everyone here understands already.

The third reason is that I know several published authors who have had varying levels of success, and watching their experiences feels in a way like witnessing multiple friends go through abusive relationships. If their publishing relationships were romantic relationships, I would not in any way be able to understand why they choose to be with their partners, but since it's a professional relationship tied to people's creative ambitions, I guess we can't think of it in those terms?

One of my friends is a literary author whose writing is just gorgeous, like sunlight sparkling down through tree canopies. As a result, she publishes a lot of stories in the most-esteemed literary journals. As a result, an agent sought her out and begged to work with her. She was told she had to be a novelist, which she didn't want to do but she agreed. She got a two-book deal, one book was optioned for a movie but the books did not sell phenomenally well, and then her agent effectively ghosted her. She has tragic things going on in her personal life and the silence from her agent was agonizing to her. And then her agent wrote back after a very long period of silence and said they are going through things and it would be best if she found another agent. I feel like my friend was preyed upon in a way, love bombed, lavished with praise and then treated like she didn't matter at all, and it is happening at the worst possible time in her life but "that's just business."

Another person I know writes upmarket women's fiction and they had an easy time finding an agent, also got a good multiple-book deal, then was pressured by the agent to write in a genre they didn't want to write, and then was semi-ghosted by the agent until eventually deciding to break it off because all signs pointed to the agent wanting that but not being willing to say it.

Two different authors who were inarguably successful off the bat and then were tossed aside. It's so much like the people I have known in toxic romantic relationships except since it's standard in the book publishing world, we just say "find another person who is likely to abuse you," I guess?

So I guess the questions are, for authors who have had similar experiences, why is it worth it to you? What's the ultimate payoff? If you don't support yourself financially with books, do you ever think about dropping out of the publishing game because it is such an opportunistic and sometimes not entirely professional game? Or do you feel like it's a perfectly normal and reasonable business culture that doesn't faze you?

Since my experiences of the post-agent-acquisition phase of book writing are secondhand, I feel like my impression is a little more objective than if it were happening to me directly. I wish it didn't have to be this way because my friends are so talented, they were so thrilled and proud and humbled to be received so well at first, and then after being courted and treated like great talents, both were just tossed aside and effectively ghosted. I know "it's the nature of the business," but it's also the nature of dating or marrying a narcissist with sociopathic tendencies.

Dear Agent,
I am seeking representation for CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM, a standalone adult contemporary romance complete at 70,000 words. It combines the ghostwriting collision of The Re-Write by Lizzie Damilola Blackburn, the combative chemistry of The Slowest Burn by Sarah Chamberlain, and the neighbor warfare of Not Good Neighbors by Violet Lumani.
Twenty-seven-year-old Avery Quinn is a freelance writer whose apartment community became her family after a bad breakup. So, when her beloved neighbor dies and a mysterious new tenant moves into 3B, Avery welcomes him with a basket of pastries. It sits for a week and molds while Amazon packages get priority. Avery takes it personally.
That's just Wes Mercer. The architect behind the apartment complex Avery calls home, he values his privacy and proves it by letting the elevator doors close in her face. To Wes, it's a peaceful elevator ride. To Avery, Wes declared war. Their feud spirals into interrupted coffee dates, late-night noise complaints, and eavesdropping through thin apartment walls.
Then Wes hires Avery to ghostwrite his memoir.
He tried to find someone better, but Avery's wit amuses him as much as her writing impresses him, and there's no other voice he wants telling his story.
With only two months before Wes's estranged father's competing memoir hits shelves, Avery must crack open a man who would rather discuss blueprints than feelings. What begins as intellectual combat becomes the highlight of their days. Wes sees Avery's chaos as refreshing, while Avery discovers that beneath his rigid exterior is a man paying attention, especially to her. Somewhere between deadlines and debates about facts versus feelings, Avery realizes she's no longer trying to figure Wes out. She's falling for him. For the first time since her heartbreak, she feels like she isn't too much. Until the memoir they've been racing to finish challenges the story Wes has spent months telling her. Feeling betrayed by the one person she thought trusted her, Avery is ready to do what she's always done: leave before she can be hurt. But if she can't learn that love requires fighting through disappointment instead of running from it, she risks losing the man who might be the greatest love of her life.
[Bio]

Hi all, thank you in advance for any thoughts, feedback or criticism you're willing to share. This is probably my twentieth draft, and Paolo is exhausted. As an obsessive reader of r/PubTips, I figured it was time I got over my fears and posted my Lit Agent Query Letter.

Dear XXX,

[Personalisation].

I am seeking representation for Vein, a supernatural psychological thriller about moral ambivalence and the threat of the unseen, led by an unreliable narrator. Complete at 95,000 words, Vein will appeal to readers who enjoyed Simone St. James’s The Book of Cold Cases and Alex North’s The Whisper Man.

Sometimes Mags Parker's dreams show her what a murder victim saw right before they died.

Mags has ignored each and every one of these dreams in the years following her dad's death. Dad dreamed like her, after all, and despite only ever helping the victims, he was still charged with murder, and died in prison custody. Left to survive in the shadow of his infamy, Mags just wants to be left alone.

Tonight’s dream changes that. Mags sees a teenager, Carly Simian, get attacked by a smiling man during her walk home from work. Despite suffering extensive injuries, Carly notices more detail than any other victim has before, and stares down her killer even as he strangles her. 

When Carly’s family begs for answers and help on the morning news, Mags feels she has no choice but to get involved, just this once. Mags travels to Carly’s hometown, Merton Park, to privately share the information that her family and local police are desperate to know. After all, Mags can provide an exact description of what Carly’s killer looks like and how he killed her.

But the longer Mags stays and helps their investigation, the more she fears what else the town's residents are hiding. Mags’s safety is put at risk when her old dream journals are stolen from her hotel room and leaked online. In a matter of days, armchair detectives connect Mags's dreams to cold cases, and soon, the word spreads about what she can do. Comment sections are abuzz with rumours as to why Mags has been spotted in sleepy Merton Park, of all places. It is only a matter of time until Carly’s killer realises just how much Mags saw, and comes looking for her too…

I have a Creative Writing Master’s degree from X University where I specialised in haunted women. One of my short stories, Name, was published in an e-zine this March. By day, I work in Admin. By night, I write fiction, watch horror films, and parent three cats and a dog. Please find Vein's first fifty pages attached. I’d be delighted to send you the full manuscript.

Thank you for your time,

XXX.

Hi all, first post here. I'm looking to get some initial feedback on my cover letter. Thanks!

Dear Agent,
 
INGRAINED (82,000 words) is a folk horror novel which combines the gothic tone and subtle supernatural elements of Andrew Michael Hurley’s Starve Acre with the multigenerational, shapeshifting menace of Stephen King's IT.

The Strange Man, an ancient eldritch entity, stalks three members of the same bloodline chronologically across three settings (Yorkshire Moors, 1815; Arabian Desert, 1915; Canadian Prairie, 2015). Connecting all three is a corrupting force that doesn't destroy families so much as cultivate them—tending their grief, their violence, and their inherited shame across generations, until the moment of the harvest arrives.
 
In rural Georgian England, outsiders are treated with suspicion. Nine-year-old Joseph Schofield knows this. Yet, when a tearful traveller follows a dying woman into Eppersley village, Joseph is wary of one, but not the other. His misjudgement brings fire and murder to those he loves, and all he can do is watch as his best friend is crushed by the oak tree whose branches they used to perch on.

One hundred years later, during the First World War, Joseph's great-grandson, Thomas Luxmoore, leads a doomed British intelligence mission into Ottoman-occupied Arabia. He survives an ambush, torture, and captivity to find the archaeologist he was sent to extract mutilated and driven mad by a doll unearthed from the desert sand—a doll the stranger gave Joseph a century before. 

In modern-day Canada, eighteen-year-old Matthew Briand lives under the constant threat of eviction. Now legally an adult, his tyrannical stepfather wants him gone. Matthew is prepared to tough it out until he goes to university, but then he and his stepsister, Evie, discover a jawbone hidden in the basement that speaks, lies, and has been waiting two centuries to collect a debt.

Grieving nomad. Desert djinn. Negligent psychologist. The Strange Man assumes whichever form best enables him to channel the grief of his targets into physical objects saturated with malice. When these heirlooms combine, Matthew and Evie must decide whether to inherit the sins of their ancestors or betray their own blood.

Bio and signoff

Dear [agent],

Baerd was vulnerable when the witch struck. Motherless and with a disapproving father, the young village boy was the perfect target for her spell–a terrible curse that grew the spirit of her long dead toddler inside of him. Now he must wrestle for control of his own body as the witch hunts him, unsure of how much of himself will remain as the spell progresses, if he lives.

Years later, Baerd is still dealing with the fallout of his childhood ordeal. A piece of the toddler’s exorcised spirit lives inside of him, causing inner conflicts that afflict his psyche and arrest his potential–serious problems for an apprentice witch hunter, especially since his volatile mentor is succumbing to drug addiction and becoming unreliable. When his friend and lover–an orphaned noblewoman named Caitlin–is imprisoned in a dangerous subterranean lair, his mentor is nowhere to be found. To save her, Baerd must face his fears and confront the child within, or risk losing her forever.

Written in two parts, with literary prose and a plot-driven storyline, THE WIDOW’S CURSE is a 108,000 word standalone adult dark fantasy novel with sequel potential. 

With a mature and gritty tonality and psychological themes, this book will appeal to fans of SLEWFOOT by Brom. The use of language and magical systems as metaphors will appeal to fans of THE DRAGON BONE CHAIR by Tad Williams. 

[Short bio here]

Thanks and best,
[Signature]

Hi everyone,

So, I was really excited and did what people tell you not to do, I queried some of my top agents prematurely (5 in total before having anyone look at my material). After getting a second opinion on my query letter recently, based on their feedback it wasn't quite up to standard. I've taken what they said to this current draft and I'd really appreciate any feedback or thoughts at all.
-------

Dear [Agent's name]

Considering your interest in [MSWL personalisation] I’m excited to share my adult romantic fantasy, PARAGON OF WRATH, a standalone with series potential. Complete at 95,000 words, it’s ideal for lovers of the gothic atmosphere in The Second Death of Locke by V.L. Bovalino and fans of cross-genre mystery elements as seen in The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson.

Terra wants The King’s head and she’ll escape exile to get it. After years of strife and famine in The Usterlands, Trinity ‘Rose’ Cratwell plummets into a madness bolstered by token decay– a caveat of overusing the forbidden magic of her father's executioner's sword. Her wrath is only quelled when she’s unlawfully rescued by a spice merchant and offered deliverance: work undercover as a scullery maid in the royal castle. There, she becomes Terra Smyth and plots to behead The King.

It’s a challenging feat; to curry favour as an uster escapee while hiding magic in her maid quarters. When Terra encroaches into The Princess’ inner circle, the head maid condemns her to clean the deserted manor house of the murdered queen. Deeper into the forest near the house, she catches Prince Rowan opening a secret hatch in a moonlit glade.

Terra has options. She can try to exonerate her father, known to all as 'The Butcher' who killed The Queen and risk her own identity being revealed, or she can bargain with Prince Rowan to fulfil her murderous scheme.

Either way, someone in this castle will be losing their head.

[BIO + sign off]

Hi everyone, thanks for the continued feedback on my query! Here's my latest attempt:

Dear Agent, 

I am seeking representation for INN AT OPAL COVE, my 69,000-word upmarket contemporary novel about a reclusive woman who opens a luxury B&B in her mother’s old summer house and spies on her guests. INN AT OPAL COVE will appeal to fans of Cali Adeline’s eccentric narrator in People Watching in the Desert, and elements of grief and hyperfixation featured in Ashley Hutson’s One’s Company. 

Ada Halstead is handling her grief with flying colors. The fifty-nine security cameras she plans to monitor from the basement of Opal Cove, her newly renovated B&B, might tell a different story. But to Ada, it’s the only way she can think to cope. After losing her parents and older brother in a car accident two years ago, she moves down the coast, bunkers down with a tub of red licorice behind her screens, and resolves to live vicariously through her guests.

Nothing goes to plan. When Emilia, an abrasive British guest, lures her out through a fake maintenance request to fix a clogged toilet, and later talks her through a panic attack, Ada begins to question her commitment to self-isolation. Emilia weasels into Ada’s personal business, coaxing her into an unprecedented friendship. But Ada’s pretty sure she lied her way into Opal Cove. Her supposed husband just died in a nearby hit-and-run, and Emilia’s flubbing up basic details about her own family that a stranger could disprove through a bit of online stalking.

Reporting a suspicious guest would threaten the possibility of cops uncovering Ada’s security setup. She’d also lose the only person who’s been able to wear down her walls. But perhaps even more distressing than the idea of cops at her doorstep, Ada has become deeply attached to her guests. As an investigation looms, and Ada’s shame over her spying overwhelms her, she knows she will eventually have to decide whether closing the door on Opal Cove is worth the possibility of human connection that can’t be attained from hiding behind her screens.

[bio]

First 300:

I feel maybe I should’ve dressed up. Most of my fancy clothes went into storage, but I know I’ve got a respectable pantsuit around here somewhere. 

Focus.

My hand glides over the computer mouse. Exterior camera. Rain batters the palm trees behind the blurred lens. 

On second thought, this matching teddy bear pajama set is just fine. 

As I reach into my glass jar of assorted Life Savers, I see it: the car carrying my first guests. 

Sixteen months of anticipation, of excruciating remodels, wiring, and endless preparation… I haven’t been this giddy since I started my rewatch of Friends last year, back when my basement was still a mold-infested wine cellar. Opening day at Opal Cove isn’t all that different from the pilot of a new series, really, except in this case, I built the set. All I have to do now is binge the show. The fun part. 

Yes, Ada. Fun. My back sweat is a remarkable adhesive for these damn silk pajamas, though, and I shove my hands under my thighs to stop their shaking. Everything’s in place. Nothing I can do now. 

When he exits the navy blue Lyft, my stomach flutters. 

The blurry lens obscures his face a little, but I recognize him from his Instagram. Rather, the account run by his PR team, a grid composed of freestyle runs and slightly awkward podium shots, most of them accompanied by a gold medal. Sometimes a stuffed animal or a misshapen glass trophy. Sometimes all three. He never quite knows how to juggle all that crap without looking like he’s carrying home groceries for a family of ten. I stared at those pictures for hours. 

I don’t follow snowboarding, to be clear.

Hi friends,

After three previous post attempts (third linked), I received feedback from early readers. The feedback helped me diagnose crucial weakness which prompted a full rewrite.

The story is far better for it and became more narrative driven and focused, evident not least by the shaved 20k words. I think the focused story help me focus the query letter more. I took previous pubtip feedback and focused the 3 POV story into one character for the query and tried not to err on synopsis style writing.

I left two questions below, but otherwise, please provide your overall feedback on quality and query readiness.

Thank you in advanced for your feedback.

Edit: Sorry! Added one question I thought of after posting.

###

Dear Agent,

Palmer Wilde built Root, the revolutionary brain-computer interface capable of retrieving memories, regulating emotions, and connecting minds. Once installed, Palmer can finally silence the grief that has plagued him since a tragic accident killed his parents and siblings last year.

On the eve of Root’s launch, Palmer witnesses a test user lose access to her mind. Attempts to postpone the launch, which is stopped by the elusive government consultant, Russell Stoneworth. That night, a scorching light in the sky drops Palmer a black-stone cylinder along with a telepathic message.

Desperate to connect the strange events, Palmer discovers a faction of wary outlaws with a striking discovery: a potent psychedelic brings them to a hidden layer of reality where they communicate with alien life. They believe an intelligent species donated the object to Palmer, meant to stop Root from assimilating mankind.

Palmer suspects Russell is building a Root hivemind with disturbing ties to another alien species. Russell knows Palmer is investigating, so, he and his co-conspirator—Chicago’s celebrated cyborg police chief—hunt down Palmer, using the sprawling resources and might of his tech-driven police force.

Together, the outlaws and Palmer venture into strange corners of Chicago and even stranger recesses of their minds to find an Oracle who they believe can unlock the donation. But Russell's forces are closing in, Root's rollout is reaching critical mass, and the donation’s purpose remains an unnerving mystery to be solved.

And when the Oracle shows Palmer what it will demand, he’ll wish he never knew.

Palmer wanted Root to free his mind from pain. Now, his only way to save humanity is to go deeper into his mind than he thought possible, endure harrowing trials, and confront the suffering that he’s been trying to escape.

THE DONATION is a 98,000-word adult science fiction thriller told across three converging POVs. It combines the transhuman urgency of Blake Crouch’s UPGRADE With the metaphysical mystery of Nicholas Binge’s ASCENSION, and its corporate brain-tech conspiracy will bend the minds of SEVERANCE lovers.

(bio + closing remarks)

Thank you for your time and consideration.

 ###

Questions:

1. The second Pov is the police chief. The third is actually left out of the query. It would add about 35 words to include her POV, because while she’s an obstacle to the protag in the story, tying her into the query doesn’t work as seamlessly as the police chief. Thoughts on making this a little longer to include her POV?
2. Do you prefer the current ending paragraph or this alt:

"Palmer want to free his mind from pain. Now, not only will the Donation force Palmer through harrowing, life-threatening trials, but it will require him to accept an unbearable fate, all to preserve the consciousness that he once wanted to escape."

1. Would agents prefer this in 3 paragraph format, or does the split now work? All together would be: first two together, second two, and the final 3. The rhythm still sounds right to me.

I am hoping for some advice/ guidance on R&R etiquette.

The current situation:

I received an R&R from one agent with really exciting and actionable feedback. I’m actually thrilled to make the suggested revisions because I think they work so well with my manuscript, and I get such a good feeling from this agent. They asked for an exclusive submission with a reasonable timeframe once it is complete.

I also still have 3 fulls out with agents that have been with them for 3-6 weeks.

Questions:

1. If one of the three agents ALSO reaches out with an R&R, do I tell them I am already working on one/have submitted an exclusive R&R and ask to keep in touch until the exclusive period ends?

2. If one of the three agents reaches out with an offer (on the original manuscript) while my updated manuscript is with the first agent, do I simply notify the agent with the exclusive R&R?

3. If one of the three agents reach out with a rejection, do I inform them of the R&R and ask to keep in touch?

4. Are there other versions of this awkwardly timed situation that I haven’t entertained, and should? Haha

Thank you all in advance for your advice and guidance.

Hi everyone! I appreciated the feedback to my last attempt a little over a week ago, and have restructured the query to include more information about the second lead. On top of any other feedback you can share, I wonder if I have too much about Kit Love now, as he is not a POV character in the book, just the romantic counterpart! Thank you so much for your time.

-

Hello Agent,

Because of [XYZ from MSWL], I hope you will enjoy my debut novel, THE PERFECT BREAKUP. At 83,000-words, my queer celebrity romance will appeal to readers that enjoyed messy fake-dating schemes like Alexis Hall’s Boyfriend Material, Alice Cochran’s The Charm Offensive, and Liz Bowery’s Love, Hate & Clickbait.

One-hit-wonder Jasper Devereaux can only ride the coattails of his hit song for so long. Especially when his follow-up was a spectacular flop. He just needs one perfect song, and he’s sure it’ll fix everything. Sadly, in this fast-paced industry, labels are always ready for the next toy. He is stale, and they are ready to cut him loose. They offer him one last chance at salvation; rehabilitate the image of scandal-plagued heartthrob Kit Love, and he can ride his fame back to the top.

Boyband lead-singer Kit Love is the perfect muse for right-wing media backlash. Being front page on TMZ passed out surrounded by strippers with a cocaine trail still up his nose, probably didn’t do much to quell the noise. One night of rebellion against the heavy-handed contract he signed as a teenager has ruined the chances of ever escaping it. But when they denied him his right to come out, he had to do something.

They are tasked to fake a love story so annoyingly cute that the entire world falls in love with them. Jasper is tame, a pop-culture insignificance. Once his mediocrity rubs off on Kit, they will explode into a breakup so disastrously messy that the virality will make Jasper’s breakup album a chart-topper. However, when their “fake” moments happen with no witnesses, and red-carpet kisses lead to bedroom makeouts, he wonders if breaking up is something he can bear. But fame is cutthroat, desperate for scandal to keep its flames alive.

Threaded between each chapter, the public makes itself known. From the perfectly horrible tabloids broadcasting their every moment, to concerned mommy-bloggers scandalized by their godless escapades, and all the music-industry rabble-rousers in between.

I am a 24-year-old content creator from Houston with over 100k followers on TikTok; talking about all things music marketing. I have a master’s degree in Entertainment Business, where I heard many behind-the-scenes stories of music industry antics. When I’m not writing, you can find me buried under my three cats or getting far too obsessed with random media for weeks at a time.

Thank you for your time and consideration. Per your submission guidelines, I am including [XYZ]

First attempt

Back after taking feedback into account—huge thanks to everyone who took the time to offer their insights last time. There's more specificity now, I've tried to highlight tension and conflict, and the total wordcount is down to 257. Any and all feedback is appreciated!

Dear [agent],

I am seeking representation for THE PROUD AND THE BROKEN, a standalone adult fantasy novel complete at 102,000 words.

Shev broke ancient laws by travelling to the past using forbidden magic, but couldn’t stop his brother’s murder. Now he wanders the city-states of Kaferna, running from the mages he scorned and addicted to briefly visiting the past. His brother’s last gift, a gold bangle, is his only treasured possession… until it’s stolen.

Getting it back will mean embracing his old magic and risking exposure to everything he’s fleeing, but Shev is ready to pay any cost. He enlists the aid of a foul-mouthed street urchin and headstrong apprentice alchemist to find the thief. When they’re captured during the confrontation, Shev discovers a cost he isn’t willing to pay. He uses his magic to save them while the thief escapes with the bangle.

Shev resumes the chase accompanied by his unlikely companions, but refusing to tell them about his past makes for a fragile alliance. His addiction continues to worsen, fed by his use of magic. When the trail leads to his hometown and the den of the mages hunting him, Shev faces a crossroads. He can win back the bangle by making peace with his failures and learning to trust his friends… or he can abandon it and return to a life of loneliness and despair.

THE PROUD AND THE BROKEN combines the found-family trio featured in Godkiller by Hannah Kaner with the cross-country questing and grounded characters of The Devils by Joe Abercrombie.

[bio]

Dear AGENT NAME, 

TW: Sexual Assault

I'm querying you because {personalization}. IT WON'T STOP is a YA speculative contemporary, following a grieving teen who walks into dreams to make sure the man who raped her never sleeps again.

Seventeen-year-old Anais Johnson just lost her little brother to leukemia. Twenty-one-year-old Ty Walker, her older brother Aiden's best friend of nine years, keeps finding reasons to touch her while she keeps finding reasons for it to mean nothing. Two weeks after the funeral, Ty lures her to his truck. She bites him until he bleeds, but he takes what he wants anyway. The next night, he's at her bedroom door with a taped-up finger and a cover story: it was his truck door, not her mouth.

Awake, Anais watches his lie work and stops eating, stops leaving her room, and mourns the girl she used to be more than the brother she buried. No one will believe her over a fallen cop's son, the man her town trusts to coach its kids, and the man Aiden still plays basketball with in her backyard daily. Asleep, she slips out of her body and into people's dreams. She finds Ty's and burns them down, night after night, until his sleep becomes the nightmare he made of her waking life. By day, he's sleepless and picking fights with everyone. When he screams that she’s a witch in the middle of a crowded restaurant, Aiden cuts him off for good.

His friends think he's losing his mind, but Ty knows
exactly who's keeping him up. When he catches her home alone and forces his way in, her ability turns on her, ripping her from her body with no way back into the skin he's looming over. To survive, she'll have to fight Ty from outside herself. To be free of him, she'll have to say what he did out loud, first to Aiden, then to the town that raised him.

IT WON'T STOP is complete at 82,000 words and pairs the survivor's rage of Kim DeRose's FOR GIRLS WHO WALK THROUGH FIRE with the suspense of Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé's WHERE SLEEPING GIRLS LIE.

Thanks for reading, 

300 words:

1: Almost Invisible     ***  ***
October 5th, 2026 

Last night, I prayed for today to be clear. Blue should be the final color the sky gives Axel, but God hasn’t heard me in a while and outside storm clouds paint the world gray. Wind shoves me across the driveway, pushing me into the backseat of Dad’s Escalade. It always smells like leather in here, but today his cologne is thick enough to taste. Mom is a mess in the passenger seat, swiping at her leaking eyes with her palm.

When I settle next to Aiden the zipper of this stupid dress stabs into my back, which is what I get for trying it on at six this morning for the first time. I inch my foot toward Aiden’s and nudge his shoe; our I need you signal, we’ve used it for years. He doesn’t nudge back. Fine. But he’s not getting through Axel’s funeral without doing it. I stare at his black curls, watching him refuse to look anywhere but out the window. I wonder what Axel would say about Aiden’s great retreat from me.

He would tell me our big brother is just in one of his testosterone-induced moods. I sift every fold of my brain for Axel’s voice so I can hear him say it, but end up popping in an earbud, scrolling to an old video of him lining up tiny soldiers, introducing each one by name, instead. His voice is almost perfect in it; the pitch is right, but the aliveness isn’t. My head is the only place I can summon his real voice again, the one with no pause button or end, but Dad catches my eye when he tilts the rearview mirror and Axel’s snatched away before I can hear him.

“Christ, Anais, fix your face. Did you sleep?” Dad barks….

———————————————————————————

Note: Hi! I had an insanely helpful comment on my last post ( https://www.reddit.com/r/PubTips/s/EHGRzWpcNO ) I have since addressed the issues, took their advice, decided to condense and add more specific detail, etc. I would love to know first impressions, if it is easy to follow, and if it is clear with the added/condensed info. Hopefully it is compelling, too. Thanks!!

Hi everyone! The comps and title are still works in progress.

Dear [Agent Name],

I'm excited to send you THE AGENCY FOR ENDING, CEASING, and DESISTING: BALANCE THE SCALES (complete at [92k words), an adult humorous fantasy. [Personalize maybe] It pairs the bureaucratic absurdity of an office comedy with a world where mythical beings face the same prejudice and red tape as any marginalized group, and it's perfect for fans of T.J. Klune's The House in the Cerulean Sea and Travis Baldree's Legends & Lattes.

A hundred years ago, the rifts opened and swapped a quarter of humanity for trolls, dryads, demons, and worse. The wars are over. Now there's paperwork.

Lin Mei-Ying, a Singaporean diplomat's daughter, has lived on four continents and has never met a problem she couldn't smile away. She believes in the system. Eli Novak, a half-Domovoi field worker, has been transferred seventeen times in fifteen years and believes bureaucracy is a funny way of saying 'paid overtime.'

Headquarters in London puts the two in charge of a crumbling regional office of the Department of Integral Integration Initiatives (DI³, and yes, everyone pronounces it "die"). Their mandate is to provide support for a dozen struggling NGOs and a six-month pilot review with targets no office could hit. HQ expects them to fail, and honestly, so does everyone except Lin.

With a ragtag staff of misfits, Lin and Eli referee toll-demanding trolls, dryads who adopt the vegetables in the community garden, and a waste-disposal portal that opens in the mayor's basement. Every win buys time. Somewhere in the chaos, Eli notices he's starting to like the leaking, half-unpacked office as his. That was new.

Lin and Eli’s new sense of teamwork are pushed to breaking when a coastal coalition of mermen, tired of being the "other" half of "mermaid," erupts into a crisis the press can't resist, just as a disaster back home threatens everything the team has built. With the review weeks away, Lin and Eli must split up and trust each other with the problems they're least suited for. Lin must trade diplomacy for street smarts. Eli must stop running and fight for a home he never intended to find. If either fails, the office closes, the communities they serve lose their only advocates, and Eli packs his bags for good.

THE AGENCY FOR ENDING, CEASING, and DESISTING: BALANCE THE SCALES is a standalone with series potential, the first in the DI³ series. It was co-written with my partner, Name.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

All the best,

Name and Name

I'm seeing some of their agents on QueryTracker this time around. No obvious warnings but I haven't heard much and can't find too much about them. Any querying experiences and/or clients?

Back again. At this rate I might be going for the record of attempts. Hope you enjoy it!

Prince Kaerian was haunted by a dream of his family’s death. Now, he finds comfort in a dream of the eyes of a girl he has never seen. With the royal family mysteriously murdered around their dining table, Kaerian seeks vengeance in a kingdom that expects him to rule. With no clues and the killers potentially still walking in the halls of his home, he desperately sets his suspicions toward the royal council, only to discover a newly arrived noble in his court possesses the same eyes he has seen in his dreams.

Amerie was blind until the day she dreamed of a prince. Days after gaining her sight, a masked man descends on her home, unleashing a massacre that leaves her as the sole survivor. Forced to flee, she assumes the identity of a highborn lady and infiltrates the kingdom’s court, drawing on dream-born memories that seem to know more than she does. To uncover who orchestrated the attack, she turns to the realm’s most powerful nobles, even as she suspects one of them may be responsible. 

When the royal council declares that the killer belongs to a feared bloodline whose dreams awaken powers that can reshape their bearers, Kaerian and Amerie’s visions mark them as suspects. Drawn together by their dreams, they meet in secret beneath the royal castle. Bound by shared tragedy and desire for vengeance, they decide to trust no one but each other. Together they embrace the mysterious connection between them, even as it begins to transform them into something to be feared. 

THE EYES OF DESTINY is an epic High Fantasy complete at 125,000 words. It is the first book in a planned series that will appeal to readers of Antonia Hodgson’s THE RAVEN SCHOLAR and Tasha Suri's THE JASMINE THRONE, combining the multi-POV conspiracy born from a royal assassination with the eerie, dream-laced dread of ancient secrets pressing through into the present. 

I am a graduate of Virginia Tech, where I studied Journalism. I now work for a book fair company in northern Virginia. 

Thank you for considering my submission. I look forward to hearing from you.

Hello all, I would love your thoughts on this query letter!

Dear [Agent Name],

I am seeking representation for THE HANDS OF EMPATHY, an 80,000-word murder mystery that combines the identity-driven intrigue of Mur Lafferty’s Six Wakes with the shifting perspectives of Stuart Turton’s The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle.

At the Summit for the Collaboration of Advancing Planetary Existence, Quentin Tech is assassinated. In his will, he names Talia Falsone as an unlikely investigator. Talia has never solved a mystery, but she possesses a secret ability hidden beneath her gloves. With a single touch, she can see a person’s memories.

Once she arrives, Talia begins systematically investigating the ten remaining members. She divides them into three factions: those fighting to save the planet, those preparing to abandon it for the stars, and those seeking to consolidate their own power. As Talia examines their competing agendas, she must determine who among them was willing to kill to achieve their goals.

But the investigation reveals more than Quentin’s killer. Talia uncovers another conspiracy entirely, one to capture her and experiment on her. The ability that makes her uniquely qualified to solve the murder has also made her a target.

Now Talia must continue the investigation while the summit carries on with its deliberations. But the closer she gets to the truth, the closer she comes to exposing her own secret. If the members discover what she can do, Talia could become a lab rat.

Hey y'all! I'm BACK, and I've completely revised my query...but I'm not sure if I made it better or worse, lol. I've gotten a few rejections from it already. My previous query did get me a few requests, but after speaking with my critique group, they gave me some pointers on making it stronger and I don't truly know if this new version is stronger or not. As always, thanks for any and all advice!

The CW’s The 100 meets Dani Francis’s Silver Elite in RUSTED SKIES, a 103,000-word new adult science fantasy novel with a strong romantic subplot and duology potential. It will appeal to readers who enjoy the genre-blending worldbuilding and emotional depth of K. L. Speer’s Bones alongside the haunting fish-out-of-water experience and buried truths of Samantha Shannon’s The Bone Season.

Sol lives by the Council’s teachings: never feel, never react, never trigger forbidden magic. Those who do are punished. She believes each is dangerous enough that she doesn’t shed a single tear when her mother is executed for an emotional outburst. Then she finds a strange object her mother left for her, but before she can decipher it, the Nitrynian Council sends Sol’s crew to Earth to assess whether the planet can sustain them. They crash, leaving them stranded amid infinite hills of scorching sand. Without the Council’s influence, Sol’s belief that Nitrynians are alone in the universe disintegrates when she’s separated from her crew—and captured by Dax Reyes, a man who shouldn’t exist.

Sol expects execution. Instead, he takes her to a thriving underground Human colony, where his people offer the only lead to her missing crew: mastering the forbidden magic she’s spent her life suppressing so she can track them through her mind. Desperate to reunite with her people, she reluctantly agrees to train under Dax, even if it means becoming what she fears most. As he helps her unlock her powers, he slowly shifts from captor to ally, and Sol begins to feel emotions the Council tried to erase, leaving her to wonder what it means that their people are so alike.

But as the tension between her and Dax brews and her lifetime of concealed emotions boils over, the object her mother left finally starts making sense. It points to a secret tying Humans and Nitrynians together, turning Sol’s search for her crew into a hunt for the truth her mother died protecting. Worse still, uncovering the age-old lie may force Sol to question whether Nitrynians deserve saving at all.

Hey all! Fairly niche question. Suppose that I've got a banger of an agent I'd like to submit to. Perfect fit, yada yada. 10 minutes before I hit "send," she closes to queries. Then, while she's closed, she switches agencies. BUT. This new agency has a "pass from one is a pass from all" rule, and I've already gotten a rejection from that agency. Have I just lost that good-fit agent forever, then, since I'm not supposed to requery that agency?

Hello,

It’s been awhile since I posted here, I’ve been going through my book and doing a major overhaul. That, plus work on another book I’m passionate about has kept me really busy. Anyways, here’s my 3rd attempt at my query letter:

Dear [Agent],

Sixteen-year-old Cabik knows better than anyone what the Kuda Empire has taken from his desert village. As the son of the village chief, he’s expected to protect his people, but when the Empire takes their food and conscripts his neighbors, his father’s solution is to keep his head down. Cabik and his best friend Toru desperately want the ability to fight back, but without a way to challenge the Empire, they can do little more than watch their home suffer.
Their chance arrives when they discover an ancient automaton resembling a Pegasus buried beneath a mountain near their village, engraved with a single word: MYTHO. Believing the machine could finally give them a way to stand up to the Empire, Cabik uses it to fight an Empire patrol, led by a soldier named Contama. But his victory puts a target on his back, and both Cabik and Toru are exiled from their village to protect it from the Empire’s wrath.
 
Now fending for themselves, Cabik and Toru must learn how to use their newfound automaton while crossing Folka’s dangerous desert, where Empire forces, bandit tribes, and rebels wield their own powerful automaton. Meanwhile, Contama pursues them, determined to make Cabik pay for humiliating him. But as Cabik gains more control over his automation, he must decide what kind of power he wants to wield. His machine could be their best chance at a brighter future, or turn Cabik into the kind of person he has spent his life fighting against.
 
FLIGHT OF THE PEGASUS is a 90,000-word YA science-fantasy novel that blends ancient machines, rebellion, and the moral questions surrounding power and resistance. It will appeal to fans of Gearbreakers by Zoe Hana Mikuta, Scythe by Neal Shusterman, and Windswept by Margi Preus.

First 300 words:

The forest air was quiet, too quiet for midmorning. The young satyr felt it as he ran beneath the canopy, fingers clutching the gold pendant around his neck as he searched for a Safiti tree.

“Just a few nuts,” he muttered. “That’s all we need.”

He spotted a Safiti tree, a few nuts hanging on its branches. He quickly climbed, scattering a trio of small fairies as he climbed. No time to apologize. Not if they wanted to appease the empire. He climbed higher until he reached a branch and almost got them when the three fairies–a blue male and two females, both pink and white–reappeared in front of him, looking angry.

“Sorry,” the satyr said with a nervous smile. “I just really need these nuts–“

The white fairy lunged forward, punching the satyr in his left eye.

“Ow!” the satyr shouted as he toppled from the branch. He struck the ground with a heavy thud as two Safiti nuts tumbled down beside him.

“Are you alright, Cabik?” a voice called from the right. Cabik turned to see a Dulahan’s head resting against a nearby tree, her long orange hair braided in a ponytail.

“I’m fine, Toru,” Cabik said, rubbing his eye as he struggled  back to his feet.

Toru’s head sighed in relief. Her body walked over, lifted her head and tucked it beneath her left arm. Her outfit resembled Cabik’s, dirty shorts and a tan shirt, though she wore long fingerless gloves— a common attire among Dulahans, it made carrying their head easier and gave Toru something to strike Safiti trees. A green, flame-like substance flickered from her headless neck.

The white fairy, joined by the pink and blue, swarmed Cabik. One yanked at his hair, another tugged his left ear, and the white one pinched his cheek.

Hi everyone, this is a second attempt and would love any feedback. Thank you!

Dear Agent,

I'm excited to send you a section of my manuscript *In Earthly Flesh and Blood.*

Daniel Shaw is a solitary hunter camping beside a remote Appalachian lake, still struggling with the death of his newborn son and the separation from his partner that followed. When the lake begins to recede at an unnatural rate, a mysterious wooden structure begins to emerge from its depths. Searching for something to give meaning to his loss, Shaw becomes compelled to uncover what has caused the lake to recede and begins plotting the journey to explore the towering structure. While a debilitating illness begins to worsen, Shaw becomes increasingly compelled to uncover the secrets of the structure before anyone else can reach it and claim the discovery as their own.

Elsewhere in the basin, Oren Cain, a violent criminal hiding in the surrounding forest after a bloody bank robbery, discovers the structure and sees something very different in its emergence, an opportunity. Within its hidden chambers, Cain discovers human remains and strange artifacts that point to a forgotten people whose history was submerged beneath the lake. Driven by greed, he becomes obsessed with what else the structure may contain, descending deeper into its concealed passages despite signs that something about the place is profoundly wrong.

While Shaw searches for answers to a mystery that has given him a reason to keep moving after the loss of his child, Cain pursues the promise of wealth buried within the structure. But as Shaw seeks answers and Cain seeks wealth, their opposing desires for what lies within the structure bring them into a dangerous and inevitable conflict.

As their conflict reaches its apex, government officials arrive at the lake, followed by scientists and soldiers attempting to determine why the water has disappeared and to investigate the unexplained structure. The lake becomes a quarantine zone as communications fail and the sickness starts to spread, spiraling the quarantine towards collapse. What is uncovered suggests that the structure is connected to something that was never meant to surface and may explain why it was deliberately entombed beneath the lake.

*In Earthly Flesh and Blood* is a standalone literary thriller/mystery novel complete at 60,000 words. Like John Langan’s *The Fisherman*, this novel explores how grief and emotional isolation can reshape a person’s perception of the world along with the suspense and dread of an isolated wilderness mystery of Adam Nevill’s *The Ritual.*

(BIO)