Past Articles
Query Frustration
In my mind, querying is far more difficult than writing a book.
There are many complex aspects of writing a successful query. When I discover a successful formula, I will post a new article. This article covers the frustration associated with the absent response.
I have two types of responses to query responses, the emotional and the logical. Let's start with the emotional, everyone goes there first.
Emotional
Sending a query into the void is difficult. You research agents; you find the perfect matches and you send your query. When no response returns, you are the pauper who invited the fairytale princess to the ball. Did she get the question (query)? Did she laugh at it, showing her friends? "Who does that pauper think he is?" you imagine her saying.
For me having no answer to my query is far worse than getting a no. If I am being honest, getting a response telling me I am a talentless hack is preferable to getting no response. On Twitter I have quipped, an email with the agent giving me the finger is preferable. For me it stems from the lack of closer. Did my query reach the agent? Is it lost in the ethereal abyss of the Internet (or inter nets depending on your pronunciation)? For me the question is worse. I am an IT professional and familiar with the mechanisms of email. When you know how they make the sausage, it always makes it worse.
So after we throw the bottle into the sea we sit on the beach rocking back and forth hoping someone will see it and send us back a lifeline.
Logical
The logical side of me understands the lack of response.
We often see ourselves being the only person querying an agent. This, I hope for the agents sake, isn't true. Every day my logical brain imagines the inbox for an agent. With hundreds or thousands of unread messages waiting for them when they come into work. The picture associated with this article represents the frustrated author. I am convinced it represents the agents trying to juggle reading new queries, querying publishers and working with agents they have offered to represent.
Even with the logical part of my brain working at full power, the emotional side of my brain is overpowering.
I have noticed one thing which helps ease my frustration levels with "no response." When I get an automated message after I send my query it calms my emotional brain. The auto-response tells me my query made it to the agents inbox. It's still a "no thank you" without a response. It is comforting to know at least they received it.