How do you stay sane while querying agents?

[CakeRage]

I finished my first book earlier this year (after saying for years I was going to write it), and started submitting to agents 3 weeks ago.

I’ve had a couple of replies, both really encouraging, but ultimately both rejections, and I feel like I’m losing my marbles. How do you keep it together while waiting? Not sure I can take the emotional rollercoaster

The first agent replied within hours to ask for the full manuscript, emailed again the following day to say she was halfway through and absolutely blown away by it, then a few days later to say she did love it, but thought it needed a few changes making. I revised the whole thing (10,000 extra words of work), then she replied just to say it wasn’t working, and she wouldn’t be taking it further.

To be honest I’ve been pretty gutted by it. How do you stop the little judgy voice in your head which tells you you were an idiot for getting your hopes up?

The second agent replied to say she was really impressed by my writing, but didn’t feel I was a good fit for her list at the moment, and recommended another agent (different agency) who she thought would like it. I handled that one much better, even though I guess it was more of an abrupt no.

Please tell me how you cope with this stage - or come commiserate with me at its horribleness!

(Sorry for my crazed rambling - feeling all my feelings this week!)

Good luck Captain - get your writing hat on! Sounds really encouraging

I swear this thread is like a Siren. Every time I post that I haven’t heard anything, a rejection quickly follows to dash my fading hopes on the rocks.

12 rejections and counting

I am the Greek myth person and desperately want to finish by the middle of August. It is so difficult to carve out proper time to write and I feel like I’m snatching brief windows of opportunity whenever I can! Going to need to call in some serious childcare favours.

So sorry to hear about the rejection, Cake .

Can I join the thread? I'm trying to finish the first draft of my second novel (first one couldn't find an agent but I got enough semi-encouraging rejections to motivate me to try again). Am a few thousand words away from finishing this draft, but will obviously need a substantial rewrite and then I'll send it to some trusted friends for feedback. Have two small kids so most of this one has been written on my laptop in the car while my toddler naps in the back

Don’t be like approp, it’s an amazing achievement to write at all with small children, let alone finish a second novel.

Thank you for this thread, been a real eye opener.

Completed my first novel, making final changes before submitting it to agents. Scared, absolutely bricking it. Dream will collide with reality.

Got a list of 30 agents will send out in batches of 10 soon. Eeekkkk!!

Hello Adult and Matey! Welcome to the thread

I definitely agree with Boiling - when I had toddlers I could barely write my own name, let alone two books! You should be proud of yourself.

I find myself suddenly, with only a few days to go, wondering if I should enter the CB competition after previously deciding not to. It would have to be book two, and I still have a few thousand words to go to reach 10k. Am I insane, please?

The CB competition rules say 'up to 10,000 words' so I don't think you need to worry if you're a bit short of that, Cake.

What if I’m a lot short of it?

Well, they don't specify a minimum, so I doubt they'd disqualify you - the worst that could happen would be not getting placed.

Hehe. I’ll try and get a bit closer, I think!

I was chatting with my friends last night and we had a brilliant idea for a book. Only thing is, it wouldn’t be my usual thing at all. Would you write outside your genre for an idea you think could be great?

There are some genres I don't think I'd be able to write in, because I never read them so don't know the style and conventions. I'd have to treat the idea in a more literary way (assuming it was suitable) to avoid being bound by genre rules. But, yes, if it was a brilliant idea I'd at least want to have a go.

I don’t think it’s a million miles away. I normally write women’s fic and this would be more cosy mystery but a lot of the elements are the same - quaint setting, quirky characters, all that jazz.

It’s just not the kind of thing I like to read so I’m not sure I could totally pull it off. Maybe for book three!

Of course you could! Write an outline and a chapter and see if it takes you! No harm done if it doesn’t!

Okay so my actual writing does not contain so many exclamation points!!!!!!!!

preparing isn’t that what happened to Ian McEwan recently with a sci-fi-esque novel? Don’t know the details but believe there was a furore.

Also I always think Brooklyn has all the elements of a saga, but a very literary one. Not a criticism! I love colm toibin.

My friends who are knowledgeable about sci-fi were unimpressed with the McEwan novel, and say it’s uninformed, derivative, and clearly written by someone who hasn’t read much in, or thought much about, the genre — but presumably, it’s not a sci-fi audience he’s writing for, but his usual established literary fiction readership, who are almost certainly not wide sci-fi readers? It’s rather like some sci-fi fans responses to Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go being complaints about the lack of ‘science’ or an overview of how this cloning world came about — when that’s simply not the kind of writing he does...

It’s a bit different to, say, John Banville writing a series of detective novels as Benjamin Black.

Yes, I do remember reading something about Ian McEwan, now you mention it (I haven't read that novel) and I've seen a few people querying the technical elements of Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, which I really enjoyed. Apart from NLMG, I haven't read any sic-fi written later than the 1970s, so it didn't bother me that conventions of the genre were ignored.

Agents often claim to be looking for something unusual and 'different' so in theory genre-crossovers should appeal ... although, I am learning that what agents say they want might not be what they are really looking for.

sic-fi .. sci-fi autocorrect .

I think there is a fine line between ‘different’ so that it’s fresh and original and ‘doesn’t fit neatly into a tried and tested marketable genre so no one wants to invest in case it doesn’t sell’!

Total novice to this but I have an idea for a book but no idea what to do with it after. How do you find the right sort of agents for your genre/book?

I have a very outdated copy of the writers and artist yearbook which lists agents and publications that accept submissions but otherwise no idea where to even begin!

Write it first, @beckywiththegoodhair27 . Then, using either an up to date edition of the Writers' and Artists' Yearbook and/or searching agency websites/agents' twitter accounts/other online resources, make a list of agents who represent books like your book and/or who say they are open to your sort of thing and whose lists are open, check what they want as an initial submission, and start sending out in small batches.

I haven't read the McEwan either, @Preparing, but I liked the Ishiguro but I am absolutely not a sci-fi reader, despite open-mindedly following recommendations from friends I've read Dune and Kim Stanley Robinson and Philip K Dick and Iain M Banks, and it doesn't do a lot for me. With the honourable exception of Ursula LeGuin, I'm always already bored if there's a spaceship and a Mars colony with lengthy worldbuilding, the same way I am by superhero franchise films.

@beckywiththegoodhair27 Another tip is to look at the acknowledgements in books which have a similar appeal to yours - they almost always include a 'thanks to my brilliant agent Joan McAgentface' - you can then look Joan McAgentface up online, find out which agency she is with and what her/their submissions guidance is.

The first step is to get your first draft down on paper - different things work for different people, but I find setting myself a words-per-day goal works, and also not trying to be a perfectionist - once you have your first draft, you can then start to edit and refine it and make it sparkle .

Another rejection today, and losing the will more than ever.

The self-publishing game is looking more and more appealing by the day. I’ve been following a FB group recommended on here, and it’s full of people seeming to have a much happier time of it than me, writing whatever they damn well please and some of them making a lot of money out of it.

I wanted to go down the trad publishing route because I was sold the myth that if my writing was good enough, I WOULD be picked up by an agent. Based on the feedback I’ve had, I honestly don’t believe that anymore.

This process is making me feel less like an artist and more like a product every day and I hate it. Someone help me out of my aimless disillusionment

Hello. I got a rejection today too. A personalised one with some very helpful-sounding feedback EXCEPT, again, different from other rejection feedback I’ve had.
I’m trying to ignore it and focus on Book 2 (although difficult to get ANYthing done during school holidays...).
And yes self publishing does sound appealing in many ways but for me I think I’d struggle with the marketing, so I’m going to continue to aim for the traditional route at the moment.

Sorry to hear of your rejections, Cake and Lurking.

I was looking at this Harper Collins digital imprint the other day - might be worth a try for those of us who've written a sufficiently commercial novel, as an alternative before going down the self-publishing route.

www.avonbooks.co.uk/submissions/