Adam Heine's Blog, page 32

Query Letters: The Difference Between Not Screwing Up and Being Awesome

I'm going to start with a little formal logic here, but don't be scared. Logic is AWESOME.



So we all know the following is true:


If you screw up a query letter, then you will get a rejection.

 However, we often tend to assume this means the following:


I got a rejection.
Therefore I screwed up my query letter.

THIS IS NOT NECESSARILY TRUE. Not only is it a logical fallacy, but believing this will cause you to obsess over your query letter when the problem may lie elsewhere.



Even i...

Artificial Word of Mouth

They say -- quite rightly -- that the most effective kind of publicity is word of mouth. But in my experience, word of mouth has two kinds.



There's the natural kind, where someone reads a book (or sees a movie, or whatever), loves it, and tells their friends about it because they want to share the love. Natural word of mouth is extremely effective, because it's honest and it comes from people you trust.



Then there's the artificial kind, which is harder to define. It might be tweeting abo...

How I Got a Referral

You may recall that, before I got an agent, I had a referral to another agent. A lot of writers believe you have to know someone to get an agent -- that the industry is exclusive and likes to stay that way. It's an understandable belief what with all the rejections we all get, and there's even a teeny tiny bit of truth to it (e.g. we read things more favorably if we know the person).



This leads to the further belief that a referral is gold: just get someone to like your work, and you're in. ...

My Query and a Chat With My Agent

Many of you have been asking to see my query letter. Well, today's the day. To see the Air Pirates query, along with comments from myself and Matt MacNish, go visit Matt's blog. (If you'd like to read the query without comments, I've pasted it below).



But wait, there's more! To read more about Air Pirates, how it came to be and why my agent likes it, head over to Krista V's blog (wherein also my agent makes MY NEW FAVORITEST COMPARISON EVER).



What are you still doing here? Get thee to Matt ...

Tricking a Reader: Character Death

In the last post, I talked about misdirection as one of the ways you can hide a secret and fool a reader until that critical reveal. But how do you do that? I think one important aspect of misdirection is to believe your own lie.



For example, say you want the reader to believe, just for a moment, that a major character is dead. This is really hard to do because major characters almost never die (George R R Martin, notwithstanding), so the reader will always be looking for the trick. For exam...

Holding Back Surprises

I can't think of a story with no mystery at all, whether it's a revelation of secret paternity, a mentor back from the dead, or a social worker with government connections. So as a writer, you have to figure out how to hide your secret long enough to surprise the reader.



Unfortunately, readers will be trying to figure out your secrets the whole time and, as we've said before, they are super geniuses. Their reaction is directly related to the amount of time between when they figure out your m...

Holidays, a Sketch

Cross-posted from Anthdrawlogy's Holidays week. The floating lanterns are stolen from Thailand's Loi Kratong festival, but the scene is actually from Air Pirates (the lanterns are also in Tangled, apparently, but I swear I stole the idea first!).







I don't expect many of you to stick around next week, what with our Earthly holidays and all. And anyway, I thought you'd appreciate a break from the only thing I seem capable of talking about anymore. Have fun. Eat much. Sleep well.



Me? I'll b...

The Offer I Turned Down

If all the posts about getting an agent didn't drive you off, then you know I got another offer before Tricia called. I turned it down because it felt sketchy, for a number of reasons I'll go into here. Though I won't name anybody; for all I know, the agency and the offer was totally legit and it was just the way it was handled that scared me off.



When the Agent still had my full, I did some research on them (I do that sometimes; part of the Crazy) and discovered two things. (1) The agency w...

3.5 Years + 231 Rejections = 1 Crazy Author

(I've been using my temporary insanity tag a lot lately. That's what querying will do to you, I guess.)



So here are statistics on three rounds of querying, including some highlights and A Chart. Let's jump right in!





QUERY STATISTICS

("Queried From" counts from the months in which I sent out queries; it doesn't count when I got responses. "Rejections" are of the query itself. Consequently, "No Response" are also rejections.)



Travelers

Queried From: May 2008 - Jan 2009 (8 months)

Queries Se...

How I Got My Agent, Part II

You've all read everything leading up to this post, right? Cuz if you think querying is all excitement and roses, you should go back and read the last post.



So Tricia Lawrence is my agent, but it may surprise you that I never queried her. I couldn't have if I wanted to: she wasn't an agent until after I'd stopped sending new queries out.





Ammi-Joan Paquette was one of the first five agents I queried, being one who asked to see the YA version when it was ready. She had my manuscript throug...