Hello, dreamers. It’s query season, and my prep work is nearly complete. I’ve written my synopsis, I’m polishing my query letter, and making a few minor adjustments to my opening pages. At this stage, I’m knee-deep in the final task of this process: selecting agents to query. It’s a big decision: the person I end up with could have a major impact on my writing career, and my life, for years or even decades to come. So in this post, I’ll fill you in on the modern practice of finding the person who will bring your book to life.

Finding a Literary Agent

As I’ve mentioned before, in the modern publishing industry, literary agents are the gatekeepers. Though there’s always the possibility an agent won’t be able to find a home for your book, generally the act of signing an agent is regarded as the final step prior to publication. And the query is the means by which a writer makes their introduction.

It’s hard to overstate how important this is. While every query focuses on an individual work, agents aren’t looking to publish just one book. They’re hoping to form a long-term, mutually beneficial relationship with you. There’s a reason why, upon signing you, the first question an agent is likely to ask is “So what else are you working on?”

This, ultimately, is what led to me abandoning my plans to query my first novel, Wide Horizon, years ago. The fact is, that novel was nothing like anything else I’d written, and as I suspected it was unlike anything I’ve written since. I knew from the start my goal was to write hard sci-fi almost exclusively. Thus, by trying to hook an agent who was very excited about my far-future, near-fantasy, hyperdramatic space opera, I was wasting my time (and theirs, too).

Any agent looking for hard sci-fi is going to find my current book is exactly what they’re looking for: a novel set in a rich, expansive fictional universe, with potential for multiple long-running series of novels as well as planned tie-in short pieces. I can keep them in hard sci-fi for decades to come.

I’ve talked a lot in my posts over the past year about the importance of query letters. And they’re very important: a modern writer must be able to sell their work. And if you can’t sell it to the person who’s going to sell it to everyone else, well…you’re screwed.

But finding an agent is about more than that. You’re not just trying to publish one book; like them, you’re looking to form a partnership. Everything from their wants and needs regarding fiction to their interests and personality can come into play. There have been several agents I’ve passed on (at least for now) simply because I’m afraid we might not be a good fit for one another.

And obviously, there’s nothing wrong with that. The fact is, literature is an art, and that means it’s subjective. I can write the next Dune or Rendezvous with Rama or Jurassic Park, and if I pitch it to an agent who doesn’t like that sort of thing, they’ll still pass on it. Doesn’t matter how well-written it is. They don’t like it. And that’s fine; it places them among the millions of people who probably aren’t in the market for a book like mine. But it would be unfair for me to expect them to put aside their personal preferences and plug a story they don’t believe in. These people aren’t running a charity. They’re running a business. And in any modern business, understanding the market is crucial.

As of this writing, I’ve narrowed my list to five agents for my first round of queries. Each agent asks for different things. Some want a synopsis, others don’t. Some ask for a bio or comp titles separate from the query letter. Some want the first five pages of your novel, others the first ten. One agent I’ve selected asks for the first four chapters. Got a good feeling about that one.

Now, I begin targeting my query materials to these five people. If, as I anticipate, they all pass on my work, I’ll do the same for the next five names. And so on, until I finally get that one “yes”.

And to whichever literary agent gives me that yes…buckle up, my friend. I’m about to take you on one hell of a ride. – MK