Please provide feedback on my query letter.?

Question

Please critique:

CONTACT INFO HERE

Dear Mr./Mrs. Agent:

William Brice left an abusive father when he walked out of the Phoenix housing projects for good at 18 years old. With him he carried only two things: a backpack, and a promise to himself that his life would be a success. Years of hard work consumed with creative attempts to fulfill the promise seem for naught as a tragic event forces William to relive his life failures and, more importantly, rethink his definition of success.

THE ------- is a 62,500 word contemporary fiction novel based in Phoenix, Arizona as well as other Western and Midwestern locales. On a desolate stretch of Camelback Road in Phoenix, William loses his wife in a tragic car accident. Following her death, William's life quickly crumbles into a sad realization that his appearance of success was predicated solely on his artificial, half-witted attempts at it. As the layers of his disappointment are peeled away he is forced to accept the harsh reality of his life. Working within the quirky confines of the Anderson Marketing firm serves to highlight his professional failure at securing a position with a more respected marketing agency. Taking a leave of absence from his work, he decides to revisit the get-rich-quick book he had written a few years before; The ------, a rapidly produced, under-researched and unsuccessful self-published book. Included within the book had been a registration card for membership in an exclusive group of elite thinkers called The -----. Only a few registration cards were returned and long ago filed away with memories of other failures. When William re-discovers them he decides to go on a desperate journey to track down The ------ in an attempt derive some self-worth from their success. Along the way, William is stalked by a mysterious long-haired old man who seems to hold the ultimate answer. Before the old man finally speaks the truth, William must confront his biggest fear, and ultimately accept an alternate truth to his life.

I am a new author, having made the shift from a successful healthcare management career to pursue a writing career. A self-addressed and stamped envelope is included for your convenience and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Respectfully submitted,
ME

Answer 1

Nope. not working. Firstly, get rid of that huge paragraph. Show that you can actually write by properly breaking it up. This is hard to read (which isn't good), but I did somehow manage to get through it.



2ndly, You're being too vague about what's plaguing him. A literary agent posted on his (or her, can't remember) blog that vagueness is one of the top causes for rejection. Be as specific as you can without giving away too much. That's a fine balance. To be honest, I can't imagine anyone reading past the first few sentences of the second paragraph and the first paragraph is annoying because it's.too.vague. It tells me nothing. This was very hard to read. The grammar is terrible and the sentence structure is terrible - which is why it's hard to get through from beginning to end.



Read it aloud and any sentences that you stumble on should be rewritten. If the words garble in your mouth. Rewrite. If the prose does not flow well, rewrite. Your sentences should have a rhyme to them and each sentence flows nicely into the next. I don't need to read this aloud to know your sentences do not flow well. Once thing agents have learned is if the query letter is badly written then the manuscript will be badly written. You've put your heart, sweat, and tears into your manuscript, so make sure you're query letter is perfectly written, else they're going to reject you without even looking at sample pages.



What is it about? - as far as plot.



Lastly, if you're emailing this, leave your name, address and telephone number at the bottom. More and more agencies are taking queries by email these days and fewer are requiring that you submit by post. Always review the guidelines on the agency website before submitting anything. This is because the most up-to-date info will be on the website.



I HIGHLY suggest you read every single post in the http://www.queryshark.blogspot.com blog. This will help you understand how to properly write a query. GL.



ADDING: One last thing - NEVER EVER refer to your novel as a "fiction novel." If you don't understand why then you might need to take some time off and research publishing a bit more before jumping into it. Just a suggestion!

Answer 2

I'm not very good at query letters (where I live, agents tend not to bother with them), but this looks pretty good.



I wouldn't say you're a new author or what you worked as before you started writing, as that's not relevant to the question of whether the agent should ask to see any of your manuscript. I would perhaps delete the word "soon" from "I look forward to hearing from you soon," as it could imply you're impatient. Some agents take a long time getting around to looking at submissions, and don't like to feel you're trying to hurry them along.



I wouldn't mention the locations where the book is set, unless the sense of place is important - and if it is, perhaps it deserves to be called out.



Good luck!



EDIT: I take it all back. Listen to Joss. Except that I thought "fiction novel" was acceptable if "fiction" was part of the name of the genre, as in "literary fiction", "science fiction". Is "contemporary fiction" a genre? I thought it referred to fiction that's being written now, or was written recently. So by definition, all fiction that you would query an agent for is contemporary fiction. So you don't need the term.

Answer 3

well let me start by saying that this is my first query letter I've ever read, and from what I've heard a query letter needs you seem to have it. it looks professional, but you might want to get more feed back k. just to double make sure nothing is wrong, I really hope you get published then I'll be able to say I gave advise to this author before she was published lol jk. good luck.