The Perfect Query Letter Myth
When I was querying my memoir a few years ago, I sought out the corners of the internet catering to the bruised egos and fragile emotional states of other writers going through it with me. Querying is a necessary evil in the quest to be traditionally published.* It’s just as brutal and lonely as the time spent actually writing—but without the balm of the occasional creative rush that makes it all worth it.
There was never enough of this content to slake my thirst for schadenfreude. I found myself diving into the deep Query Shark archives looking for a fix.
No one:
Me: “Look at this noob! He comped** Harry Potter. Rookie mistake. We all think we just wrote the next Harry Potter, sweetie, that’s why we keep writing.”
I nearly named this post “How to Write the Perfect Query Letter” —just for the clicks.
I also listened to podcasts that claim to “dissect” your query letter “on air!” Though I never submitted to either Query Shark or a podcast, I listened closely for tips. Because I believed the myth: that the only thing holding me back from the agent of my dreams, or any agent at all, was fixable. I just had to write the perfect query letter that no agent or editor could resist.
Dear writers, this is a myth.
It’s a myth that I still want to believe because it gives you, the writer, an element of control. Hey, I’m a writer. It’s what I do. Therefore, if I’m so good at it, I should be able to write the perfect query letter. I’m in charge of my own publishing destiny.
I know that the perfect cover letter does not guarantee an interview. The perfect LOI does not guarantee a grant. The perfect Tinder profile doesn’t guarantee true love. But, maybe, just maybe, the perfect query letter exists and I just haven’t cracked the code yet.
When I did, bless her, get a lovely agent, I was shocked that she didn’t seem to care very much about my opening line, which I’d crafted to show that I’d researched her but not in a creepy way. That kind of difficult balance is one of the many things you’ll learn from querying letter listicles. She never mentioned my comps (“It’s ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ but on a boat.”). She seemed unaware that I included spicy yet irrelevant tibbits in my bio to make me seem likable.
She waded through all that and liked the idea of my book.
It’s not that the query letter doesn’t matter at all. It’s the first, and let’s face it, for the most part the only introduction to you and your book that most agents and editors and other literary gatekeepers will see.
The most important piece of the query letter is to accurately describe your book in 2-3 sentences.
Present your book in the best, most true way possible, slap a “Dear Madam” at the top and a “Thank you for your time and consideration” at the end and then send it out into the world***, knowing that forty percent of your intended recipients won’t even open your email, thirty percent are going to stop reading after ‘dear,’ 25 percent are going to read the letter just looking for a reason to say no, 4 percent will accidently delete it when their cat walks across the computer, and 1 percent will read the entire letter, hit ‘reply’ and with tremendous gusto begin to type: “Thank you for your inquiry. I regret to inform you that Madam no longer works at this establishment, as she has decided to leave the agency to pursue a more lucrative career in taming the last albino rhinoceros. Best of luck with your book!”
What’s wrong with believing in this myth, you might ask. Why not wrestle for a modicum of control in this humiliating process? But you never had control, that’s the illusion!
Sure, okay, yeah, and it’s not really hurting anyone that a worrying amount of the population believe the Earth is flat. Believe all you want. But don’t pour too much of yourself into the quest for the perfect query letter. Save that energy for your books.
*or, as I like to think of it, publishing for writers who are not very good at marketing.
**A “comp,” for the blissfully uninitiated, is a comparison title (usually of another, better-known book but can also be a movie, a poem, a video game, or other cultural object or marker), and used as a quick way to describe your as-of-yet unknown passion project. For example: “It’s ‘Tess of the D’urbervilles’ meets the 2015 Budweiser Super Bowl commercial.” or “It’s ‘Witcher 3’ but underwater and with the snarky narration style of ‘Me Talk Pretty One Day.’”
***If you want better odds, only query agents and editors that are looking for your genre. Don’t send your ironic memoir about overcoming an addiction to cat food to an agent who is looking for sensitive crime thrillers set in Fresno. There you go, that’s my best tip. Ignore it at your own risk.
