Last month, I was covering a conference of the White House Office of Faith-based and Community Initiatives for a local publication in Indianapolis. Unfortunately on the first day I get there late and missed the videotaped address of President Bush going blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah.
Once I arrived, however, I settled in and started listening to a deputy director of the WH office talk about what not-for-profits should do when applying for government grants. I didn’t have the slightest interest in what he was saying and I quickly determined I wasn’t going to get a story out of him.
But out of the blue, he suddenly said something that piqued my interest, although not about obtaining a government grant. He said that getting a grant is one-fourth writing and three-fourths preparation.
It struck me that finding a literary agent was proving to be the same __ and then some.
Up until then, I thought that writing was the major part and I had already done that. My novel, “Fighting Chaos,” was finished. But when it comes to finding an agent and eventually getting published, writing is only the first part and not necessarily the smallest part.
In the current edition of “Jeff Herman’s Guide to Book Publishers, Editors and Literary Agents,” Jeff Herman writes that agents generally reject 98 percent of the submissions they get. 98 FREAKIN’ PERCENT. The only real way to get around that and increase your chances of being part of the lucky 2 percent is to be totally prepared, to know the market and to know the likes and dislikes of individual agents. And to write one smacking query letter.
So I have poured through the last two editions of Herman’s books, the 2008 Writer’s Market, a year’s worth of issues of Writer’s Digest and numerous websites __ I particularly like http://www.agentquery.com/ . I also have gone through the websites of each agent I expect to query.
To mitigate some of the need for luck, preparation is essential. But in prepping to find an agent, I have also discovered George McClelland.
Major Gen. George McClelland was the commander of the Union Army at the start of the Civil War. He worked his men hard to prepare them but President Lincoln spent a lot of time prodding him to take the offensive in Virginia. He prepared a lot for action that many historians say he just didn’t take. And in many ways, I have become McClelland.
For some time, I have probably been as prepared as I am likely to be for finding an agent. But I haven’t decisive action __ until now.
Starting today, I am sending out one personalized snail mail or e-mail query letter a day for five business days. Once I hear from three agents __ and assuming they are negative __ I will send out five more. And then five more after that, always seeking to learn something new from a rejection if there is something to learn.
I am prepared as I am likely to be.
So my advice to other aspiring novelists is to remember that good preparation is important but don’t let it keep you from taking action. Take the risk and let loose the dogs of war.
Thanks for reading. I will see you next week.
And remember, don’t give up writing.
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