In reference to my entry
Feb. 13th, 2009 08:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
megwritesDear Agent I Will Not Name,
That's it. I'm done. Your entire blog has devolved into a never ending game of Poke Fun At The Querying Writer. You do realize that you're really not being helpful at all, right? In fact, you're becoming part of the problem and working against yourself.
Sure, it's funny the first ten times a writer proclaims that they're going to be the next [Insert Huge Bestselling Author] or that their book will make you rich, or that their book is sure to be the next Pulitzer winner. But in their ever-so-meager defense? They're trying to get you to help them get their books on the shelves and they understand that they need to wow you.
Queries aren't just a form you fill out, and you agents have made it abundantly clear to us writers that we have exactly the space of one letter and, maybe, the first five pages to impress you or get rejected.
Sure, some writers just aren't paying attention and maybe a few of them are just that stupid, but a lot of us are sweating every detail. Some of us are giving ourselves ulcers trying to get it just right. We panic over sentences, over clauses in sentences. We invest in useless books on how to write queries. All for a little bit of your attention. And I'd argue the vast majority of us are honestly doing our best. So if some of us are clumsy, maybe you could extend a little benefit of the doubt.
Writers don't always have the resources to read every little agent blog, or buy the How To Query Agents books, or go to workshops and conferences. Some of us are flat broke and it's all we can do to keep putting words on pages. Some of us are working two jobs and raising kids, or trying to figure out how we can keep going to school, or trying to find jobs because we're unemployed and in a bad spot. Some of us are sick and can't afford a doctor. Some of us are all of the above.
Maybe some of us are doing our goddamn best and that's all we know to do. And sure, maybe a few of us have unrealistic ideas about what writing can bring us, financially, but god, you try being broke and nervous and without health insurance and seeing what you'll believe when you just need a little bit of hope.
Playing your little Let's Laugh at the Writer game may make you feel oh-so-snarky and witty, but it also makes you come off as a vicious bitch, and you're kind of perpetuating every stereotype and myth about agents that makes writers do the things you hate in the first place.
So yeah, keep right on doing what you're doing. Because you're just convincing more writers that agents are horrible soul-sucking creatures who can't be trusted and are out there just to hurt their feelings.
Which is so very sad. There are a lot of good agents out there blogging. Agents who are helpful and wonderful, who give back, who do the entire profession a service with how they blog and how they carry themselves. Agents who post things that writers did wrong not to get a cheap laugh, but to show how to do it better. Agents who know the difference between being witty and being unbearably bitchy.
Them I'll continue to tune in for. But sorry, you're right out. I'm done with you.
No Love,
This Writer
PS - Also? Your "let's post examples of bad queries and laugh at them" game is so 2005. Bitch, please. Get a new schtick.
PPS - May you get nothing but queries written in crayon for the next calendar year.
PPPS - I looked you up, just out of curiosity. Apparently your turnaround time is way worse than average. Hmm. Wonder where all your time goes.
PPPPS - You and this guy should get together. You'd like each other.
That's it. I'm done. Your entire blog has devolved into a never ending game of Poke Fun At The Querying Writer. You do realize that you're really not being helpful at all, right? In fact, you're becoming part of the problem and working against yourself.
Sure, it's funny the first ten times a writer proclaims that they're going to be the next [Insert Huge Bestselling Author] or that their book will make you rich, or that their book is sure to be the next Pulitzer winner. But in their ever-so-meager defense? They're trying to get you to help them get their books on the shelves and they understand that they need to wow you.
Queries aren't just a form you fill out, and you agents have made it abundantly clear to us writers that we have exactly the space of one letter and, maybe, the first five pages to impress you or get rejected.
Sure, some writers just aren't paying attention and maybe a few of them are just that stupid, but a lot of us are sweating every detail. Some of us are giving ourselves ulcers trying to get it just right. We panic over sentences, over clauses in sentences. We invest in useless books on how to write queries. All for a little bit of your attention. And I'd argue the vast majority of us are honestly doing our best. So if some of us are clumsy, maybe you could extend a little benefit of the doubt.
Writers don't always have the resources to read every little agent blog, or buy the How To Query Agents books, or go to workshops and conferences. Some of us are flat broke and it's all we can do to keep putting words on pages. Some of us are working two jobs and raising kids, or trying to figure out how we can keep going to school, or trying to find jobs because we're unemployed and in a bad spot. Some of us are sick and can't afford a doctor. Some of us are all of the above.
Maybe some of us are doing our goddamn best and that's all we know to do. And sure, maybe a few of us have unrealistic ideas about what writing can bring us, financially, but god, you try being broke and nervous and without health insurance and seeing what you'll believe when you just need a little bit of hope.
Playing your little Let's Laugh at the Writer game may make you feel oh-so-snarky and witty, but it also makes you come off as a vicious bitch, and you're kind of perpetuating every stereotype and myth about agents that makes writers do the things you hate in the first place.
So yeah, keep right on doing what you're doing. Because you're just convincing more writers that agents are horrible soul-sucking creatures who can't be trusted and are out there just to hurt their feelings.
Which is so very sad. There are a lot of good agents out there blogging. Agents who are helpful and wonderful, who give back, who do the entire profession a service with how they blog and how they carry themselves. Agents who post things that writers did wrong not to get a cheap laugh, but to show how to do it better. Agents who know the difference between being witty and being unbearably bitchy.
Them I'll continue to tune in for. But sorry, you're right out. I'm done with you.
No Love,
This Writer
PS - Also? Your "let's post examples of bad queries and laugh at them" game is so 2005. Bitch, please. Get a new schtick.
PPS - May you get nothing but queries written in crayon for the next calendar year.
PPPS - I looked you up, just out of curiosity. Apparently your turnaround time is way worse than average. Hmm. Wonder where all your time goes.
PPPPS - You and this guy should get together. You'd like each other.
