Is it really so hard?

(Rant Hat on and buzzing.)

Today, agent Nephele Tempest blogs about following directions on Romancing the Blog. Yesterday, she answered similar questions on the Knight Agency Blog.

And then, the synchronicity of the following quote from a recent Publisher’s Weekly column from a concerned writer:

“For many of us who spend hundreds of dollars on… mailings to agents who most of the time do not even have the courtesy to reply…”

Really? When I queried agents in the fall of 2004, I heard from every single one. Most of them were form rejections, to be sure, but I received a response to every single query that I sent out.

So I am a little skeptical about all the times I see statements on blogs to this effect. “Most agents don’t respond…” I hear it all the time. Either I was extremely and incredibly lucky, and picked the most courteous agents in the business, or it was something else that meant that I got a response (megative though it may be) and all of these blog posters did not.

Could it be that I followed directions? That I sent exactly what the agent asked to be sent, and therefore merited a read in the first place? (Nephele admits to not reading queries that do not conform with her agency’s electronic submission guidelines.) Could it be that I only sent queries to agents who stated they were taking new clients? Could it be that when I sent out the packages, if I was including three chapters off the bat or anything else more than a query letter, I said something to the effect of “as per the guidelines listed for your agency on your website/the RWA website/Jeff Herman’s Guide/whatever, I’ve enclosed…” so that, should it NOT be what the agent wanted , they at least knew that I wasn’t pulling it out of my butt (and they could go correct the info if wrong).

I see blog posters saying that agents should “streamline what they want” because it’s too hard to keep track of what agent wants sample pages and what agent wants a synopsis and blah blah blah. It’s hard? Really? Maybe it’s my background in waitressing, because I think that’s no harder than keeping a list of who is drinking the rum and diet and who wants ginger ale.

I still have my list. It took less than an hour to make a list of twenty agents, their submission guidelines and what they were looking for. It’s not hard at all. It took slightly longer to research each agent and see what kind of things they were selling and to whom. It’s no more difficult to find out what the agent wants sent than to jot down the address to which they want it sent.

Could it be that I didn’t call them, that I didn’t hassle them, and that I didn’t expect them to make an exception for my query, because it was “too hard” to keep all those different agents straight?

Yes, I know that there are some agents who fully admit that they only respond if they are interested. Usually, they admit these things on their submission guidelines. If you want a response, even if it’s negative, then don’t query these people. There are plenty of agents to query if you do want a response. I personally got responses from 22 of them.