Jennifer Moorhead's Blog

This week is starting with new ideas. I have the characters in mind but I have no earthly idea what happens to them.

Now is the time to huddle up my writing tribe. They force me to answer the important questions like – What happens? Ha. And more importantly, WHY did that happen?

I’m what is referred to as a pantser writer. I write mostly by the seat of my pants – without plotting. This means I usually write a lot of words, I mean a lot like 30,000, before I really know what is going to happen. This system has worked well for me in the past. But this next book might require me to actually plot some. The empty screen is a little more daunting now that I’ve got skin in the game.

I haven’t been at the beginning of a book in a long time. Sort of scary. Especially now that it matters. It’s so much easier to write when you have the freedom of knowing it may never be read. This one will not only be read but it will be considered for purchase by my publisher. No doubt the pressure is there. I just have to figure out a way for that pressure to make diamonds, not dust.

What do you do when the pressure is on? All tips and tricks welcome here!

Cheers until next time!

The post Brainstorming New Novel Ideas appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

I keep thinking of the lyrics from that Whitesnake song (yes, that gives you an idea of when I was in high school): Here I go again on my own. Going down the only road I’ve ever known.

I will say, I entered this next phase a little jaded. I now understood landing an agent does not always equal selling to a publisher. But here I was, trying again.

This is what my second attempt at querying looked like:

Winter 2019 – I sent my NaNo novel to a freelance editor for fine tuning.

Spring 2020 – Rewrites!

September 2020 – Querying agents a second time with my 2015 NaNo book, Broken Bayou.

Did I mention I’m tenacious to a fault?

I was excited and nervous. I was about to send my new baby out into the cold, harsh world. I’d prepped for months. It was ready. Surely one agent out there would love my baby as much as I did! Okay, let’s do this. I pressed send on that first query, butterflies flapping in my stomach. I did it! Eleven minutes later a reply came back! I almost threw up. That has to be a record, a good sign. I opened it to what is still my favorite rejection. Three words: Not for me.

Huh. I’d sent her a query, a three page synopsis and 10 pages. Eleven minutes. Three words. Balloons don’t deflate faster than I did. Uh oh.

But this little engine kept going and going and going.

September 2021 – I’m one year into querying and something wasn’t working (obviously.) I was getting a lot of requested pages and fulls, but those pages were getting rejected.

At this point my book had been through one developmental edit and one R and R (revise and resubmit) for an agent at a great agency – who, by the way, then rejected my R and R with a form letter. That one got under skin, which is saying a lot since my skin resembles a thick, weathered hide by this point! Anyway, I’d invested too much to stop now so I reached out to another freelance editor I’d learned about from a blog I follow.

I sent her my manuscript and waited. She was a game changer.

November 2021 – Got my edits back and went to work.

March 2022 – Edits done. Restart querying. (Are you getting dizzy yet on this merry-go-round?) I told myself I’d only query 30 agents, then it was 50. To date, with both books, I’ve queried 134 agents. Move over Alice, this is my rabbit hole!

April 20, 2022 – I sent a query to an agent I found on Reedsy.

April 20, 2022 – She requested the full manuscript the same day!

April 21, 2022 – Full manuscript sent. At this point I had forced myself to stop checking my email every day so I didn’t know she’d requested it until the following day.

April 29, 2022 – Offer of representation!

We scheduled a phone call and when I spoke with her, I knew. Her enthusiasm over my book and her vision for it matched my own. I asked for two weeks so I could notify the other agents who had my full manuscript.

May 2022 – I accepted her offer.

May 29, 2022 – Got my agent edits back and, yes, went back to work.

October 2022 – The book was ready and, you guessed it, we went out on submission to publishers.

This business is not for the faint of heart nor the thin-skinned. Rejection is the name of the game. If you’re not getting rejected, you’re not trying hard enough. My writing friend Phylis said something on our walk the other morning that resonated with me. It referred to an interview with a K-pop singer/songwriter but it holds true for any art form. You have to feel rejection or it isn’t art. You have to put it out there and open yourself up to criticism. Period.

Don’t be afraid of it, embrace it.

You never know when lightning will strike.

Cheers until time!

The post Querying Literary Agents (Part II) appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

Querying literary agents is the base camp on the mountain where you learn writing the book is the easy part.

A query is 250 word hook of your novel. It sets up the characters and what’s at stake for them. It’s an agents first look at your story and your writing style. Most agents ask for pages too. Some ask for the first five. Some the first fifty. Just depends. You also need to know what other current books are like yours (comps) and what your reader demographic is.

I’m going to pause here to say in November 2015 I challenged myself to do NaNo WriMo (National Novel Writing Month). It takes place online in November and the goal is to write a 50,000 word first draft in a month. (Novels are typically around 80K-100K depending on genre.) I wrote 51,000 words that month on a book I called Broken Bayou.

So now I have technically written four books. The first one and the poster one have been put away forever and labeled learning curve. The NaNo novel wasn’t quite ready but I thought it would be at some point. So I went back to the one I was calling Trapped about the bride in a truck, trying to beat a train. I hired a freelance editor I met at a writing retreat to help with developmental edits on it. It was time to polish it and get it ready for the ball.

Part of the prep is researching agents and what they are looking for, hours scrolling Twitter and #MSWL (manuscript wishlist) and making lists of those dream agents and those dream agencies you just know are going to love your book. PSA to all you writers: strike the word “dream” from your vocabulary. If you get hung up on the word dream, you can pass by the best fit for your book!

Once that was done I headed for the crazy that is Base Camp 2.

This is what my first querying journey looked like:

February 2017 – I started querying agents. I queried over 80 agents. I got a handful of full requests – which means they asked to read the whole book – but no offers of representation. The rejections trickled in, most form letters. (My favorite one is yet to come.)

April 2017 – I discovered a Twitter pitch where you write the hook of your novel in a tweet and if an agent likes it that means they want to read more. This was mine: To avoid being committed, troubled bride-to-be flees to Louisiana swamp where
dangerous ex-con & horrific memories await. It got a like from an agent but another agent at his agency had my query and pages so I needed to wait for her to pass before I could send him my pages.

September 2017 – The agent (finally) passes so I send my query and pages to the other agent from my Twitter pitch.

October 2017 – He asked for the full and I sent it to him that day.

February 2018 – Four months later, I sent him a nudge to see if he’d read my book yet. This gives you an indication of the speed at which things happen at this stage. Slow!

March 2018 – He responded it was ALMOST there (in all caps) but he didn’t feel the hook was strong enough to place it.

March 2018 – I replied by thanking him for his time. I was prepared to move on when he replied to me again. This time he said “Well, maybe this one is good enough to get an offer.” He wanted to know if I was working on anything else, and I said yes. Then I asked for a phone call because I wasn’t exactly sure what was going on. Was this an offer of representation? I had no idea. (This should have been my first clue this might not be the best fit for me).

May 2018 – Two months later he was finally able to talk on the phone. (Another clue). He made an offer to rep me, and I accepted, even though something in my gut was still a tiny bit worried. I knew I was going to need some hand holding and I was about to sign with an agent who out of the country and out of communication for large chunks of time, but I felt this was an offer I couldn’t refuse. (No horse heads, thankfully.)

October 2018 – After a massive revision and lots of patience on both our parts, we went out on submission to publishers.

So YAY. I have an agent for the first time and I’m out on sub to publishers for the first time – about one year after I started querying. I was giddy and it was a great confidence booster. But then, as with most publishing stories, reality struck.

October 2019 – One year later my novel still had not sold to publishers, and my agent and I were having a hard time connecting because of his travel schedule. I realized something: I may have over-edited my manuscript. This is as bad as under-editing. Another part of my learning curve: don’t say yes to every edit.

I think of it like the bronze statue of St. Peter at Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Visitors are encouraged to rub his foot for good luck. But, over the decades, hell centuries, his foot has changed into something unrecognizable after all the hands that have touched it.

I feared this may have happened to my manuscript. And I was starting to become disillusioned with the idea of traditional publishing. So I emailed my agent and told him I may need to find another path. We’d exhausted our editor list and I wasn’t sure I wanted to go through that again with another book. We parted on good terms. He was so kind and so understanding, and I will forever be grateful for his hard work. But I decided I was going to self-publish my next book.

So I pulled out the NaNo book and turned back to Base Camp 1 and started revising. I hired another freelance editor and started researching the best way to self-publish.

Suddenly, traditional publishing didn’t look that bad.

Then one of my writing friends read my new draft and said I might want to at least try to get an agent with it. It was better than the last book. It might have better luck – and, yes, luck is huge part of this process.

Have you ever heard the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over but expecting different results. Welcome to my insanity.

Tomorrow, Querying Lit Agents (Part II)…

Cheers until next time!

The post Querying Literary Agents (Part I) appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

I woke up the other morning thinking about the amount of time I’ve spent on this journey to traditionally publish my novel. And there’s a part of me that thinks I’m getting a little long in the tooth for all this waiting! It can be grueling, yet, here I am. Still writing. Still fighting.

And I’m one of the lucky ones.

I have a wonderful literary agent who is fighting with me. An advocate who came along and plucked me out of a slush pile and helped keep me on this mountain. And, let’s be clear, it is a mountain. Although it seems some can scale it quickly and without oxygen, I am an example of the typical climber — painstaking slow and sucking on wine oxygen every step I take. That’s why I’m writing this. Because sometimes hearing another writer’s story helps you understand you’re not on the mountain alone.

I’m at what I consider Base Camp 3, landing an agent.

Base Camp 1 is writing the book and editing it one million times. Many a writer turns back here. They look at the path in front of them them, realize the costs and the pitfalls, and say no thank you.

Base Camp 2 (or Dante’s tenth circle of hell) is querying agents. Many a writer stops here as well. I almost did. Twice. It’s full of crevasses and false hope and, unless you have the skin of a rhino, some pretty serious frostbite.

This is where I started understanding the appeal of self-publishing. I did more than my share of research on it and decided I might not be able to pull that off the way I’d want to. See, I can be a tiny bit competitive (my tennis team may or may not be laughing right now) and a tiny bit tenacious. So I took the “get an agent” route. I also refused to believe my past would predict my future.

But the past is exactly where I need to start.

I want to go back, way back, back in time to a decade where querying meant paper letters and full requests meant printing 300+ pages of your manuscript and securing them with a rubber band only!, oh, and don’t forget the SASE (if you have to Google that acronym you probably don’t buy neck firming cream). That’s where all this crazy started. That first time I walked into Base Camp 1 and thought: I can write a book and sell it. How hard can it be? I had no idea. No. Idea. Yet off I went armed with shiny, new ballpoint pens, floppy discs, and a backpack filled with over-confidence and naïveté.

A dangerous combination indeed.

Next week, that’s where my story will pick up: my first Base Camp 1 (yes I’ve been back to Base Camp 1 multiple times). Hope you’ll grab a cup of coffee and join me every Monday as we set off on this journey together.

Sometimes the past is worth revisiting, even if just for a laugh.

Cheers until next time!

The post My Writing Journey appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

My first Base Camp 1 started years ago when I went to my husband with a wild idea.

“I want to write a novel.”

He said, “Great idea. Write one.”

To which I replied, “How?”

His answer started me on the path. “There has to be a class on that somewhere.”

Turns out there was a class. A continuing education class on creative writing at SMU, near where we lived in Dallas. I will forever be grateful for that class and for Professor Barbara Wedgwood who pulled me aside after class one night and told me “You’ve got what it takes.” She played an integral part in my journey. She was the first person not related to me to tell me I was a good writer.

So I took my first class, brainstormed plot ideas, and started my first book. Took a second class, Master Novel, and honed that book. In those classes, I learned an even more valuable lesson, how to critique. Constructive critique is critical for creative writing – say that three times fast! My classmates and I formed a tight knit critique group where we learned together. That sense of community stuck with me over the years, and I knew going forward I would always find a support group of other writers.

But back to those first classes.

Our professor somehow managed to get our class a writing retreat to Archer City, Texas where we would dine at the Lonesome Dove Inn with none other than Larry McMurtry. We were beside ourselves. We loaded up our cars and hit the road. I know Montana is considered Big Sky country but I’d put it up against west Texas any day. Once there, we filled our days writing and shopping at the local bookstore Booked Up and waiting.

Then the night came when Mr. McMurtry was coming to dinner.

We sat around the table staring at him, waiting for his priceless words of wisdom. Pearls of knowledge we could take with us in order to write timeless books. He didn’t speak for a long time. So long I was starting to think he may have fallen asleep. He sipped his soup in silence, a little of it dribbling onto his sweater. Finally, our professor asked him what words of advice he would give to young writers. Okay, here we go. We shoved our food aside and brought out our pens and paper, ready to take notes. He looked up from his soup and said, “Read the classics.” Then he left. Read the classics? What classics? Wait a minute! What about plot? What about character development? Where are the pearls Larry!

Alas, we packed up the next day and left. And, you guessed it, I read the classics. Every thing I could get my hands on from Eudora Welty to Jane Austen to Walker Percy. I even slogged through Faulkner, which almost killed my love for reading. And I went back to work on my noveel.

Then something even more exciting happened.

Based on our first few chapters, a few of us in my class were selected to attended a conference in NYC where we would pitch to publishers in person. Which I did, in a small room, alone with an older man with deep creases between his brows as he stared at me and said my dialogue sounded like it came from a soap opera. Needless to say, he would not be offering me a book deal. The excitement of the trip ended there. I gathered up my pages, thanked him for his time (oh, if I could go back and have a do over!), and walked out. Later that night at the cocktail party, someone in our group raised their hand (bless their heart) and asked what are our chances were of getting published. The same surly gentleman informed us we had a better chance of being struck by lightening…twice.

Needless to say, I left NYC a little downtrodden. But, being the tenacious fool I am (and in the words of Jim Carrey in Dumb and Dumber) I thought: So you’re telling me there’s a chance. See, I actually know someone who was struck by lightening, twice. But that’s another story for another day.

Anyway, I doctored up what remained of my ego, finished my book, and started querying agents. I even got the attention of one who wanted an R and R (revise and resubmit). Then something bigger happened. I had my first child. The book baby went in the drawer…on floppy discs. The real baby came into our lives.

But the siren song of writing kept calling and I answered again a few years later, discovering the process had changed dramatically in my absence. And that path proved to be my biggest learning curve yet.

Next week I’ll pick up here and share more on the insanity that is traditional publishing…

Cheers until next time!

The post So You Want To Write A Novel appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

In the early 2000’s I returned to Base Camp 1.

A shift in our world happened. We moved to a new town. My hometown in Louisiana. A place I said I’d never return to as I peeled out of my parents’ driveway at 18, heading for LSU and any city that wasn’t here. See ya suckers. I’ll never be back! Cut to: My husband and I loading up our two littles and moving back.

I heard a writing coach speak at a local college and I hired him to help me write my next novel. He had a revolutionary way of writing (please insert heavy sarcasm here.) His trick: writing a novel on poster boards. Y’all I can’t make it up. And, you guessed it, I did it. I wrote a first draft on poster boards. (There are so many emojis I want to insert here.) Anyway, I then realized I no longer had the time (or the space!) to deal with that novel. Two small babies 18 months apart proved to be more of a distraction than I anticipated. Ha.

I was still in the “I can handle it all” denial phase of motherhood.

That is until I took my oldest daughter to school one day (at age 3) with her baby sister strapped in the car seat next to her, dropped her off, and promptly got a call from her teacher that she’d walked in bare footed. I’d forgotten to put her shoes on. As the mom who can handle everything, this was devasting. I told them I’d go home and bring her shoes back up to school. But oh no, this was Montessori. No need to come back – it would just upset her. See, she’d just gotten to the point where she’d let go of my leg in order to walk in on her own. I was under strict orders to stay in the damn car. Anyway, my daughter had to go to the lost and found and pick out a pair of shoes to wear at school all day. Fine. Except she had a sensory perception disorder that would send her into fits if the slightest odd fabric touched her skin. Seriously. Tags, florescent lighting, and toilets that flushed automatically were the bane of her existence. But you know what? I think being in someone else’s shoes all day may have cured her.

Isn’t that usually the case?

Anyway, I did realize I may need to slow down, refocus. So, that poster book never really got off the ground (literally.)

But my babies grew up and got their drivers’ licenses and suddenly the house was empty. I needed a new distraction. Something to keep me from chewing my fingernails off every time one of them drove away from me. I know! I’ll write another book.

I went back to the formula I knew and found a continuing education class on creative writing. The idea for my next novel hatched while I was driving home one day alongside a train track. A train was next to me blowing its whistle as I neared my turn. There were no flashing lights or bars at this crossing. I stopped but I saw a woman in my mind in a truck, wearing a wedding gown, who didn’t stop. She tried to beat the train and failed. That kicked off a whirlwind of questions that would lead me to my third book.

I wrote and edited and polished my mystery. Then it was time to enter the pit of hell Base Camp 2, querying agents. If you want to be traditionally published, you need an agent. They are the gatekeepers. So I started making my list. No more paper and SASE’s, now it was all done online. No more books listing the current agents, now there was Query Tracker and Manuscript Wishlist and Publisher’s Marketplace websites. It was overwhelming, but I pulled up my big girl pants and went in.

 And that’s when things got crazy…

Next week I’ll show a timeline of what querying agents looks like and one of my all time favorite rejections.

Cheers until next time!

The post Motherhood and Writing Novels appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

When I started this blog, I didn’t know this would be the title of one. Especially so quickly. I may still be in shock, needing one of those tin foil EMS blankets wrapped around me.

Lightening has struck. I sold my book!

Shortly after my first blog post, I got an email from my agent informing me an editor from Amazon Publishing wanting to video call with us. My heart stopped for a moment. We set it up and the call went amazingly. She loved my book, read it in one sitting. During the conversation I had an out of body experience and forgot she was talking about something I wrote. I’m pretty sure I didn’t breathe until the call ended.

But…

In publishing, it seems there is always a but. She had to take it to her team to see if they agreed with her. To see if my book was worth on offer. First, she had to take it to her editorial team. Second, she had to take it to her marketing team. Many a marketing team has killed a writer’s dream. If they don’t think they can sell it, you don’t get an offer – even if the editor loves it.

So back to waiting.

Thankfully, this time, I didn’t have to wait long to see the words “Offer for BROKEN BAYOU” in my inbox. Followed by an even more surreal one: Welcome to Amazon Publishing!

I still can’t believe it.

My little book that started as a NaNo book in 2015 has a scheduled publishing date of June 2024. I am grateful beyond words. And I’m also thankful to you for reading and replying to these blogs and cheering me on.

One of my favorite sayings is: Let go or be dragged. This blog was my way of letting go, releasing the stress and anxiety of trying to traditionally publish a novel by connecting and telling my story. And it’s crazy to me how quickly things changed as soon as I stated telling it.

Sharing this journey with you is a privilege. And now a new journey is just beginning. I’ll be posting my good news on social media soon but I wanted to share it here first.

I’m going to be a published author!!

Cheers until next time!

The post When Lightening Strikes appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

I’ve been asked several times recently about how I came up with the idea for BROKEN BAYOU. Thought I’d share a few blurbs from the articles that sparked that very first moment I thought, “This could make an interesting book.”

The original article was in USA Today. Back when the papers I read were actually, um, paper! I remember it caught my eye because the story was in southern Louisiana. It told of a missing school teacher who possibly drove her car into Bayou St. John. But when divers went into the bayou to look for her, they found several cars instead – 25 cars to be exact. They did eventually find the school teacher in the bayou too, still in her car. A horrible accident. But it got me thinking…what if?

What if divers went into a bayou to find a missing school teacher but found something much more sinister than abandoned cars? What if the missing person is only a catalyst for the bigger story?

That’s what got me started. One random newspaper article.

Here are a few of the quotes that grabbed my attention once I started researching the story:

“Waterways are good dumping grounds when somebody wants to get rid of a car for insurance reasons.”

— Equusearch founder and director Tim Miller / The Times-Picayune

“Old cars in Bayou St. John complicate search for missing teacher’s vehicle ”

— Nancy Parker / News 8 New Orleans

Terrilynn Monette’s car found in Bayou St. John

(Gallery by Michael DeMocker,  NOLA.com  and the Times-Picayune)

On Friday (June 7), 97 days after the disappearance of  Terrilynn Monette , Slidell police officer Mark Michaud and state Rep. Austin Badon met at the lawmaker’s home in eastern New Orleans, fired up a computer and tried to identify the various routes the West Bank elementary school teacher might have taken to get home the morning she vanished in the vicinity of City Park.

On the morning of Day 98, Michaud, the leader of the Slidell Police Department’s dive team, went to Bayou St. John on his 17-foot boat during his free time. Scanning the waters with a portable sonar device, he found a submerged car close to a bridge at the corner of  Harrison Avenue and Wisner Boulevard .

Cheers until next time!

The post Idea to Book appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

When I was a querying writer, I found myself wondering what in the world those elusive literary agents were thinking. So many questions, but no one to ask them to. I did try though. One time during a face-to-face pitch session at a writers conference, I asked the agent so many questions she finally said, “Are you even going to pitch your book to me?” Oh yeah.

Now that I am lucky enough to have an agent, I can finally ask away! Let me introduce you to Jacklyn.

Jacklyn Saferstein-Hansen is an agent at Renaissance Talent & Literary in Beverly Hills, California. She graciously took time out of her very busy day to answer six questions I thought might help the next querying writer.

1. What exactly does “building their list” mean and why is it something to look for when querying agents?

When an agent builds their list, they are looking to add new clients to their roster. These agents are typically the most open to receiving queries and the most responsive. Research what niche, genre or subject that agent is interested in, and if it lines up with your project, mention in your query why you think your project would be a good fit for them. Not only does this provide a personal touch, it also shows that you’ve done your research and are targeting specific agents rather than sending an impersonal email blast to as many agents as possible. And never open a query with “Dear Agent” or “To Whom It May Concern” —  take the time to address the recipient by name!

2. What is the first thing you look for in a query or opening pages? Are they the same or different?

The query and opening pages are two different worlds! I like to see queries that are short, sweet, and to the point. If a query goes on for several long paragraphs, it tells me the author hasn’t yet boiled down what the essence of their story is, doesn’t understand their audience or doesn’t know how to pitch it. When reading so many queries and manuscripts, the last thing agents want to do is read several paragraphs of plot summary. If an agent asks for a separate synopsis, use that to lay out the plot. But in a query, tell me what your story is truly about at its heart. What deeper human themes does it explore? How will your characters and plot illuminate those themes? What is the reader to take away from the story? I also like to see a few sentences about the author. What is your writing experience? Have you been published before? Why are you the perfect person to write this book?

When it comes to opening pages, I look for a distinct voice on the page that is palpable from the very first line. Can I feel the texture of the world you’re setting up? Can I hear the narrator’s or protagonist’s voice clearly in my mind? As in a query, agents (and readers!) don’t want to read several paragraphs of explanation or backstory right at the start. Opening a manuscript that way tells me the author doesn’t have a handle on how and when to reveal important information to the reader. Always show, never tell! Show us your characters’ quirks and flaws, introduce tension and conflict. Throw us right into the story.

3. Is word count, either too low or too high, a deal-breaker? Why?

Word count often depends on genre. Epic fantasy and science fiction can easily be over 100,000 words given the worldbuilding required. Romance can be as short as 65,000 words. For a debut novel, my sweet spot is between 70,000 and 90,000 words. If a general fiction novel is over 100,000 or 110,000 words, it’s not a dealbreaker, but it’s a sign that the author might not know what to cut or how to be more succinct. If a novel is shorter than 50,000 words, it’s getting into novella territory and novellas are a harder sell.

Flow and pacing are more important than word count. If a novel is 110,000 words but moves along swiftly without slow stretches where the reader might put the book down, then that’s an appropriate length. Are high-emotion moments balanced by quieter, more reflective moments where the reader can take a bit of a breather without getting bored? Put yourself in the reader’s shoes when editing and determining length. Where might you put the book down if you were reading it?

4. How important are comps and what kind of comps get your attention?

Listing comps in your query shows an agent that you know your audience and how your book fits into the marketplace. They are useful in demonstrating that your book taps into what audiences want but that it hasn’t been done before. I like to see an author list comps that have similar elements to their own story (the suspense of abc mixed with the lyric quality of xyz). Always aim to mention comps/authors whose writing style is similar – if you’re writing a commercial novel, don’t list literary comps, and vice versa. Don’t list books that are massive bestsellers as that is a hard standard to live up to, and don’t list books that are too unknown. In the end, fiction is all about the writing – you might have stellar comps, but if the agent doesn’t connect with your writing, those comps won’t matter. Don’t spend too much time finding the perfect comps – focus on the letter and the sample.

5. When reading a query or opening pages, what would you consider an immediate red flag?

Queries that do not address the agent or company by name have an impersonal feel, like you’ve put us on an email blast list going to a million other agents. Why should an agent bother reading your query if you don’t bother addressing it properly? Unnecessary platitudes like “I read your bio online” or “you have a great list of clients” take up space in your query that could be put to better use. Misspellings or grammatical errors show you haven’t proofread. The query letter is the first impression, so always put your best writer’s foot forward!

One of my biggest pet peeves in opening pages is when a character’s full name and title (such as “Sherriff’s Deputy John Smith”) or the full date (month, day, year) are mentioned in the opening lines to introduce the protagonist or establish a sense of time. This comes off as drab and dull – find a more creative way to engage your audience. There are caveats, of course – if the author is confident in their style and does this ironically, it can be endearing. Heavy exposition or backstory sucks the energy right out of an opening – don’t lull your reader to sleep on the first page. Hook them, entice them, invite them in!

6. What is currently on your wish list?

When it comes to fiction, I’m a sucker for an offbeat, vivid narrative voice. Think Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou or Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher. Flawed and quirky female characters are also a must! I’m open to all kinds of genres – characters and story trump plot trappings – though I’m not the best fit for hard sci-fi. I love a thrilling story with a speculative element, like Mexican Gothic. I love older female characters maligned by society but who have tons of agency in their story, as in Killers of a Certain Age or The Change. Give me a story that makes me laugh and cry at the same time, like Corelli’s Mandolin, or stories that strike me with an overwhelming sense of wonder like Piranesi and Circe. I read all Greek myth retellings, but haven’t seen one that dives into the life of Cassandra. I’m also looking for myth retellings from non-European cultures. Kaikeyi was a fantastic read! I want a story rife with tension – put your characters through the wringer so I can see who they really are. And I’m never opposed to a happy ending. Like many things, I don’t always know what I’m looking for until I find it, so I’m always open to novel queries.

In the nonfiction space, I’m looking for writers who are experts in their niche and have a dedicated following, whether that’s culture, history, humor, health/wellness, food, etc. I’m looking for fresh, subversive takes and deconstruction of traditions and norms. Give me a new way to think about something, show me a new perspective!

Cheers until next time!

The post Q&A With A Literary Agent appeared first on jennifermoorhead.com.

When I was a querying writer, I found myself wondering what in the world those elusive literary agents were thinking. So many questions, but no one to ask them to. I did try though. One time during a face-to-face pitch session at a writers conference, I asked the agent so many questions she finally said, “Are you even going to pitch your book to me?” Oh yeah.

Now that I am lucky enough to have an agent, I can finally ask away! Let me introduce you to Jacklyn.

Jacklyn Saferstein-Hansen is an agent at Renaissance Talent & Literary in Beverly Hills, California. She graciously took time out of her very busy day to answer six questions I thought might help the next querying writer.

1. What exactly does “building their list” mean and why is it something to look for when querying agents?

When an agent builds their list, they are looking to add new clients to their roster. These agents are typically the most open to receiving queries and the most responsive. Research what niche, genre or subject that agent is interested in, and if it lines up with your project, mention in your query why you think your project would be a good fit for them. Not only does this provide a personal touch, it also shows that you’ve done your research and are targeting specific agents rather than sending an impersonal email blast to as many agents as possible. And never open a query with “Dear Agent” or “To Whom It May Concern” --  take the time to address the recipient by name!

2. What is the first thing you look for in a query or opening pages? Are they the same or different?

The query and opening pages are two different worlds! I like to see queries that are short, sweet, and to the point. If a query goes on for several long paragraphs, it tells me the author hasn’t yet boiled down what the essence of their story is, doesn’t understand their audience or doesn’t know how to pitch it. When reading so many queries and manuscripts, the last thing agents want to do is read several paragraphs of plot summary. If an agent asks for a separate synopsis, use that to lay out the plot. But in a query, tell me what your story is truly about at its heart. What deeper human themes does it explore? How will your characters and plot illuminate those themes? What is the reader to take away from the story? I also like to see a few sentences about the author. What is your writing experience? Have you been published before? Why are you the perfect person to write this book?

When it comes to opening pages, I look for a distinct voice on the page that is palpable from the very first line. Can I feel the texture of the world you’re setting up? Can I hear the narrator’s or protagonist’s voice clearly in my mind? As in a query, agents (and readers!) don’t want to read several paragraphs of explanation or backstory right at the start. Opening a manuscript that way tells me the author doesn’t have a handle on how and when to reveal important information to the reader. Always show, never tell! Show us your characters’ quirks and flaws, introduce tension and conflict. Throw us right into the story.

3. Is word count, either too low or too high, a deal-breaker? Why?

Word count often depends on genre. Epic fantasy and science fiction can easily be over 100,000 words given the worldbuilding required. Romance can be as short as 65,000 words. For a debut novel, my sweet spot is between 70,000 and 90,000 words. If a general fiction novel is over 100,000 or 110,000 words, it’s not a dealbreaker, but it’s a sign that the author might not know what to cut or how to be more succinct. If a novel is shorter than 50,000 words, it’s getting into novella territory and novellas are a harder sell.  

Flow and pacing are more important than word count. If a novel is 110,000 words but moves along swiftly without slow stretches where the reader might put the book down, then that’s an appropriate length. Are high-emotion moments balanced by quieter, more reflective moments where the reader can take a bit of a breather without getting bored? Put yourself in the reader’s shoes when editing and determining length. Where might you put the book down if you were reading it?

4. How important are comps and what kind of comps get your attention?

Listing comps in your query shows an agent that you know your audience and how your book fits into the marketplace. They are useful in demonstrating that your book taps into what audiences want but that it hasn’t been done before. I like to see an author list comps that have similar elements to their own story (the suspense of abc mixed with the lyric quality of xyz). Always aim to mention comps/authors whose writing style is similar – if you’re writing a commercial novel, don’t list literary comps, and vice versa. Don’t list books that are massive bestsellers as that is a hard standard to live up to, and don’t list books that are too unknown. In the end, fiction is all about the writing – you might have stellar comps, but if the agent doesn’t connect with your writing, those comps won’t matter. Don’t spend too much time finding the perfect comps – focus on the letter and the sample.

5. When reading a query or opening pages, what would you consider an immediate red flag?

Queries that do not address the agent or company by name have an impersonal feel, like you’ve put us on an email blast list going to a million other agents. Why should an agent bother reading your query if you don’t bother addressing it properly? Unnecessary platitudes like “I read your bio online” or “you have a great list of clients” take up space in your query that could be put to better use. Misspellings or grammatical errors show you haven’t proofread. The query letter is the first impression, so always put your best writer’s foot forward!

One of my biggest pet peeves in opening pages is when a character’s full name and title (such as “Sherriff’s Deputy John Smith”) or the full date (month, day, year) are mentioned in the opening lines to introduce the protagonist or establish a sense of time. This comes off as drab and dull – find a more creative way to engage your audience. There are caveats, of course – if the author is confident in their style and does this ironically, it can be endearing. Heavy exposition or backstory sucks the energy right out of an opening – don’t lull your reader to sleep on the first page. Hook them, entice them, invite them in!

6. What is currently on your wish list?

When it comes to fiction, I’m a sucker for an offbeat, vivid narrative voice. Think Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou or Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher. Flawed and quirky female characters are also a must! I’m open to all kinds of genres – characters and story trump plot trappings – though I’m not the best fit for hard sci-fi. I love a thrilling story with a speculative element, like Mexican Gothic. I love older female characters maligned by society but who have tons of agency in their story, as in Killers of a Certain Age or The Change. Give me a story that makes me laugh and cry at the same time, like Corelli’s Mandolin, or stories that strike me with an overwhelming sense of wonder like Piranesi and Circe. I read all Greek myth retellings, but haven’t seen one that dives into the life of Cassandra. I’m also looking for myth retellings from non-European cultures. Kaikeyi was a fantastic read! I want a story rife with tension – put your characters through the wringer so I can see who they really are. And I’m never opposed to a happy ending. Like many things, I don’t always know what I’m looking for until I find it, so I’m always open to novel queries.

In the nonfiction space, I’m looking for writers who are experts in their niche and have a dedicated following, whether that’s culture, history, humor, health/wellness, food, etc. I’m looking for fresh, subversive takes and deconstruction of traditions and norms. Give me a new way to think about something, show me a new perspective!

Cheers until next time!