Writing Query Letters

[Warren_Paul]

Hey peoples, I've been doing research into writing query letters for submissions and it seems every website has a different idea about how they are done.

I was wondering if any of the writers around here who have done successful query letters in the past have any advise or examples I could look at? Or if there are some tutorials around here on the topic that I can't find?


Thanks.

 

[The Judge]

First of all, query letters in the US and the UK are likely to be different, so you need to target them. Over here it's a letter with two or three lines summing up the book as an elevator pitch; in the US it's more a small synopsis. But, as ever, check what the guidelines for the particular agent to whom you are submitting.

We've some threads in Critiques which may be of help:
http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/533610-query-letter-help.html

http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/530584-query-letter-critique.html (that one's for a specific publishers' open month, though, so is different from normal)

http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/530612-please-comment-on-my-query-letter.html

There may well be others, and I know there was a US one in GWD, though off hand I can't recall the name of the member. I'll have a search around and see if I can find it.

Hope those help.



EDIT: found it http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/530150-query-advice.html

and here's a thread I started which might be of interest http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/529854-query-letters-and-how-not-to-write-them.html

 

[Warren_Paul]

Thanks Judge, for some reason when I searched for query on the forums it came up with no results, guess it was just trying to trick me.

well that's a good collection of links to follow all in one place now for anyone else who has the same question.

 

[The Judge]

No problem -- the search function can be a bit wayward at times!

I've just realised this is in Workshop not GWD, so I'll move it over -- Workshop is really designed for joint projects/exercises rather than queries.