Writers in the Storm

Chuck Sambuchino

(This column excerpted from Chuck’s latest book, GET A LITERARY AGENT, which was released in January 2015 and is available anywhere books are sold. Comment on this within 2 weeks for your chance to win a copy of the book. A winner will be chosen at random.)

I’m a big student of query letters. I collect successful ones to share with aspiring writers. I compose roundup blog posts full of query letter tips. And I’ve probably edited more than a thousand of them over the years at writers’ conferences and on my own. All in all, I’m a big fan of a great query, and I know that an amazing letter is your first key tool to getting agents interested in representing you.

But that said, I also know full well that writing a fantastic letter is extremely difficult, and some writers just have trouble with this step of the submission process. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard a writer say, “Writing a query seems harder than writing the book itself!”

So, for a moment, let’s just say: Forget the query letter. Forget it. Just throw it out the window—and let me tell you about 4 side doors to getting an agent.

While submitting cold query letters through an agency slush pile is the most frequent way writers find their agents (and therefore should be taken seriously and not ignored), it is by no means the sole way to get your work in front of agents. There are four other acceptable routes you can use. In fact, a certain percentage of agents in publishing actually close themselves off to cold queries altogether and only accept solicited submissions through such “side door” methods listed below.

1.  Contests. Agents—especially new/newer ones who are actively building their lists—judge online contests. Oftentimes writing-oriented websites will host writing competitions—such as for the first page of a manuscript, or the first 1,000 words, etc. The agent judge reviews the entries and sees your writing during the contest. If she likes what she sees, she will contact you and request more material.

Don’t believe me? Take Tamar Rydzinski of the Laura Dail Literary Agency. She judged a previous installment of the “Dear Lucky Agent” Contest on my Guide to Literary Agents Blog. The DLA Contest is a free, recurring contest where people submit the first page of their unpublished novel. Tamar’s top three winners won an agent critique from her. Tamar was so impressed by one winner that she asked to see the full novel. Soon after, Tamar offered representation to the writer and sold the writer’s novels in a two-book deal. Still skeptical? The exact same thing happened a few months ago when agent Paula Munier of Talcott Notch Literary judged a more recent installment of the DLA Contest on my blog. She signed one of the three winners as a client.

So whenever you see an agent-judged contest—especially if it’s free—jump in and see what happens! You could win a critique and even find your agent match. Following agents on Twitter is a great way to stay abreast of these opportunities.

2.  Critiques that come as part of some kind of class/instruction. Agents sometimes do critiques as part of a conference or class or online instructional session. A critique is a straightforward way to get your writing in front of an agent’s eyes. At minimum, you’ll get helpful feedback, but if she likes what she sees, you may just find your agent match.

 (Hi, everyone. Chuck here chiming in for a second. I wanted to say I am now taking clients as a freelance editor. So if your query or manuscript needs some love, please check out my editing services. Thanks!)

For example, Writer’s Digest runs instructional webinars each week, usually with a literary agent instructor. Typically each attendee gets a critique from the agent to help make their work better. As with agent-judged contests, if the agent really likes what she sees, she’ll request more. Agent Barbara Poelle of Irene Goodman Literary, for instance, found clients from the first two webinars she did.

(I know that my examples here have to do with WD, but, obviously, know that while WD has contests and classes and such, we are by no means the only fish in the water. Agents are teaching lots of classes and judging lots of contests that have nothing to do with us, so take advantage of any & all of them!)

3.  Referrals. When you query an agent, normally your unsolicited e-mail lands coldly in their inbox (the slush pile). It’s reviewed quickly as the agent tries to assess whether your writing or the story seems good enough for them to invest more time. In other words, submitting to a slush pile means your query/work will only get a quick look. Getting a referral usually changes all that.

A referral is when an agented writer passes your work to their agent with a stamp of approval. Referrals are often read very soon after they arrive—pushed close to the top of the agent’s to-do list. After all, if one of the agent’s trusted authors is giving this new writer’s work a thumbs-up, the agent will take a longer look at the writing, going beyond what they would do for an average submission.

So put yourself in a position where you can hope for referrals. The best way to do this is join one or more writing critique groups. You’ll need other writers in these groups to see your work and hopefully take a deep liking to it. In order for them to agree to critique your work, you’ll need to reciprocate and offer them editing feedback on their own writing. The hope is that some of these critique group writers either 1) already have a literary agent, or 2) will sign with one in the future. Then any of these writers who have representation and like your work will be ideal people to offer to refer your work. (And keep in mind that even if the referrals don’t pan out, joining a critique group is an excellent step for any aspiring writer.)

4.  Meeting agents at writers’ conferences. Every year, there are anywhere between 125 and 200 writers’ conferences in the United States and Canada. Plenty of these have literary agents in attendance, and those agents are present specifically to meet with writers one-on-one and hear pitches. Many times, the agents aren’t even making any money to attend events—so the key upside of their attending is to find that diamond in the rough who’s got an amazing book up his sleeve.

To prove my point, I’ll tell you this: I was once moderating a panel of about 10 agents at a conference, and I asked how many had found clients at a conference—and all 10 said they had. And if that wasn’t enough proof, know that I myself found my own literary agent at a conference after schmoozing with her. It’s all proof that conferences simply work. (By the way, if you want to attend a writing event but don’t know where to start, see a large list of writing conferences on my website here.)

I’ll close by kind of repeating what I said above: If you seriously want to find an agent, compose a great query—because a quality letter is one of your biggest and best tools. In other words: By no means should you ignore the query process because you find it difficult. But a bigger point to make here is that you should not ignore any opportunity to get yourself and/or your work in front of an agent. So consider these 4 side door options and pursue any that seem like a good fit for you!

About Chuck

Chuck Sambuchino of Writer’s Digest Books edits the GUIDE TO LITERARY AGENTS and the CHILDREN’S WRITER’S & ILLUSTRATOR’S MARKET. His Guide to Literary Agents Blog is one of the largest blogs in publishing.

His 2010 humor book, HOW TO SURVIVE A GARDEN GNOME ATTACK, was optioned by Sony Pictures.  Chuck has also written the writing guides FORMATTING & SUBMITTING YOUR MANUSCRIPT and CREATE YOUR WRITER PLATFORM.

Besides that, he is a freelance book & query editor, husband, sleep-deprived new father, and owner of a flabby-yet-lovable dog named Graham.

Find Chuck on Twitter and on Facebook.

Heather Webb

You’ve been DYING to hear back from that critique partner, editor, agent, friend. You stalk your inbox. When the document finally arrives, you break into a sweat. What if they HATED everything? Then you think, naaah. That’s not possible. Your pages are so shiny you’ve gotta wear shades just to read them. So you open your manuscript with confidence only to find the page is bleeding, okay, SPURTING red ink. How do you deal with the mountain of criticism?

Most of us fall into one of these four categories:

THE SELF-DEPRECATING SNIVELER
If you’re this writer, you implode when you receive feedback. You’re paralyzed for days, weeks even, because you’re nothing but a phony anyway–the one who barely calls themselves a “Writer”. You don’t have any talent and now the critique has just proven that. You have a meltdown (possibly in public, though let’s hope not).

THE PROACTIVE SUPERHERO
You ponder the comments for twenty-four seconds and then pull on your revision cape and x-ray grammar mask. You attack your manuscript with force, adapting everything. The critiquer must be absolutely dead on, right? You thank your reader and tell them they’re the smartest person on the planet. Your savior!

THE ANGER-MONGERING INFIDEL
You’re insulted by the comments. WTF does this person know about your research, your characters, your method of madness? What do they even know about writing? Nothing! Not only that, but they don’t even have the experience you do. You tell that ingrate how massively intelligent you are, how stupid they are. You even consider degrading their reputation all over the internet so that others won’t be foolish enough to seek their help. (I doubt anyone will admit to being an anger-mongering infidel, but denial ain’t a river in Egypt.)

THE YODA
You read the feedback and calmly digest it. It flows over you, through you, and the important pieces stick to your subconscious. You digest it for as much time as it takes and make notes on how to fix the issues. Next you attack the draft with newfound wisdom and inspiration. You send thanks to your beta reader and offer something in return. GAME ON.

Recognize yourself in any of these categories? Once you know your strengths and weaknesses, you may better be able to shape and reshape the kind of writer you’d like to be. Knowledge is power. So what do you do with that knowledge?

CONSIDER THESE WORDS OF WISDOM

1. GROW A THICK SKIN. It doesn’t matter how you process feedback, this is essential in the biz. Period.
2. TRUST YOUR INSTINCTS. Don’t assume you’re inferior and that your critiquer knows everything. It’s your book, your characters, and your style after all. On the flip side, don’t disregard advice entirely just because you think someone doesn’t “get you”. There is ALWAYS something to learn. Always. Even if you’re Stephen King or J.K. Rowling or Phillipa Gregory. If nothing else, the feedback sheds light on how the manuscript affects readers.
3. EMBRACE YOUR IDIOSYNCRACIES, but aim high! Work toward THE YODA. Ultimately it will make the writing and editing process more enjoyable.
4. LET IT MARINATE Give yourself proper digesting time—especially if there’s quite a bit of feedback to work through. Take on one piece at a time to avoid becoming overwhelmed. You will get there. You’ll shape your novel into something beautiful, with one word at a time.
5. TREAT CRITIQUERS WITH RESPECT. This is the golden rule. Someone has just spent hours of their time, paid or not, on your work. Their goal is to help YOU, the writer, improve both the story and your skills–not make you feel lousy. Don’t lash out, even if the feedback you receive is harsh. Show gratitude for their effort and be professional. You never know who that writer/editor/agent knows. The last thing you want to do is damage your reputation, thus your ability to sell books, because you were a hot head one day. Publishing is a small world, after all.

Tell us how you dealt with criticism and you'll be entered to win a signed copy of Heather's newest release, RODIN'S LOVER.

About Heather

Heather Webb writes historical novels for Penguin and HarperCollins,which have been translated to three languages and have been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Cosmopolitan magazine, France magazine, and Reuters News Book Talk. BECOMING JOSEPHINE follows the life and times of Josephine Bonaparte set to the backdrop of the French Revolution, and RODIN’S LOVER releasing Jan 27th, chronicles the passionate and tragic story of Camille Claudel, sculptor, collaborator, and lover to the famed Auguste Rodin. A FALL OF POPPIES releases in 2016. Heather is also a freelance editor and contributor to award-winning writing sites WriterUnboxed.com and RomanceUniversity.org. She is a member of the Historical Novel Society and the Women’s Fiction Writers Association.

Steena Holmes

My house is quiet and I’m nursing a hot cup of coffee (my third actually) while staring at the screen and wondering what else I have left in me to write today. I don’t think there’s much. You see, last night I stayed up until the wee hours of the morning working on some chapters that literally yanked my heart out of my chest and I haven’t quite recovered. Which isn’t a good thing because the story isn’t complete and I am on a tight deadline.

This is only my sixth novel where I’ve experienced this but I’ve learned something about the process I wish I had known back when I wrote my first book. I’m sure the more I write the more I’ll learn and I may discover a better way to experience the heartache but for now, it’s a process.

What process? Of realizing when to write those scenes that destroy me and when not to.

You’d think it would be simple right? It was when I wasn’t on a deadline, when I could write or not write whenever I wanted. If I needed to take time off from writing the next chapter, then okay … whatever it took. I heard of authors who took a year or more to write a novel so it must be okay. My first novel took six months to write. Now I average less than three months, although this one I’m working on now has been less than that thanks to poor planning on my part and the holidays just being here.

I’ve learned that I can’t write those scenes that are dark or painful while my kids are around. So that means on weekends or holidays or even at night before they go to bed. And if I wait until everyone is in bed and stay up for hours (like last night) then I need to make sure my family will not be home the following day either.

There’s a reason for this.

When I write a story about a woman whose marriage is falling apart because she can’t handle her grief, or about a woman so lost in her own mind that she can’t tell truth from reality, or if I touch on subjects dealing with abuse…I become those women. I am those characters in that moment while I’m writing about them. It’s my marriage that is falling apart, it’s my child that I’ve just lost, it’s my husband that was killed and my baby who died in my arms, I am the one reliving the memory of being raped…it’s hard for me to walk away, to close the screen and go back to my every day life as if what I’d just wrote didn’t matter. (I will always remember hearing Jodi Picoult tell an audience that she is able to do this and wondered what I was doing wrong because I couldn’t).

So you can image I’m an emotional wreck. I’m low, quiet, needing space, alone time in order to regroup. My husband once asked me if it was worth it – if the emotional toil was normal and worthy of my energy. Normal? I’m really not sure (if it is, and you go through this as well – I’d love to know how you handle it!) but worthy of my energy – absolutely. Writing these type of stories…it’s what fuels me. I face my fears as a woman, a mother, as a wife in these stories. It’s my happy place (as odd as that sounds) - when I feel the most fulfilled and energized and excited! Worth it? When I read reviews from people who believe that I must have gone through these experiences, that I write them as if I know first hand what it feels like…yes, it’s worth it to me as a writer. I’m always afraid that one day he’s going to ask me if it’s worth our marriage. I hope that day never comes.

There is an emotional toll, make no mistake about it. In order to write a story that comes from your heart (and every story should if you want to touch your readers hearts) then you have to be willing to go to that level. How everyone reacts will be different. I would love to be able to walk away after a scene and be fine – to be able to distance myself from my characters and not have it affect me so much. Maybe one day I will. But maybe by then, I’ll realize that I don’t want to. That this is the process that works for me.

In the meantime, I sit here, sipping my coffee (I should get a refill) and waiting for that boost of energy to open up my laptop where my story is stored (yes, I have a ‘writing’ laptop and a desktop computer where I do all my ‘other’ work – helps me to ‘switch gears’ when I need to.) If I wasn’t under such a tight deadline, I’d take a few days breather, enjoy the slightly warm weather, maybe make a cake for dessert tonight and just enjoy life. But I can’t – and so with my choice of profession comes discipline, and that means pressing on. Or as my mother would say suck it up buttercup.

How do you handle emotional scenes when you write?

About Steena

NY Times & USA Today Bestselling Author

Growing up as a small town Canadian girl, there wasn’t much to do but ride your bike, hang out with friends on the beach and daydream. I always wanted to write but never dreamed it was something I could do as a career. I love to travel and fell in love with the sheep covered hillside, old castles and romantic history of Scotland and England. I dream about waking up in Tuscany and touring small town shops in the south of France with my husband, of placing my toes in the ocean and experiencing history first hand. As a mother with three daughters, I’m learning that teaching them to pursue their dreams is a lasting legacy. I love to wake up to the Rocky Mountains, will forever enjoy the taste of coffee and chocolate and can’t imagine the day when a story doesn’t unfold in my heart. Living a life with passion and pursuing dreams is a life well lived. Find her online at www.steenaholmes.com