Writing Spaces

Today I sent off my novel Hyssop Hill on its first real query to a real agent.

So let me tell you. I spent six hours getting this pitch package together. Looking up the agent. Reading about them and the type of book they want. Tailoring my letter and my synopsis so they fit the agent perfectly. Proofreading, again, my first ten pages. Signing up for the submission portal. Cutting and pasting. Re-reading. Pressing ‘send.’

I’ll be doing this again and again, through all the 100+ agents whose names I’ve found to populate my Excel spreadsheet.

I’d planned to send another query today, but um. Perhaps tomorrow. Perhaps today, the cat and I will take a break after our work. (Yes, the cat’s working too. Pressing solidly into my side for this number of hours takes dedication.)

Whether this particular agent wants my manuscript (or not, which is the usual turn of things, statistics show), the materials they’ve made available for preparing a pitch have helped me craft a package that’s better than it would have been otherwise. I’m grateful.

I’m also grateful for a rejection I received in the fall of ’25. I’d submitted the manuscript to some contests, and didn’t succeed in any. But one publishing house that declined the manuscript did invite me to send more work if I had a story that would better suit their more-commercial list.

They don’t lie about this stuff. They don’t have time. So even my self-deprecating brain believes that at least one editor thought my work had heft.

That encouragement is the type of priceless gem I polish and hold up to the sun on days when I get other writing rejections. Not that the work isn’t good: just that it’s not right for that person at that time.

So here we go, my novel Hyssop Hill and me, presenting ourselves to all the agents whose doors are currently open. It’s not quite a whirlwind of parties, but shiny and exciting all the same.

I’m submitting short fiction again too: a chance for more acceptances, more rejections, more spreadsheets to populate and keep up to date. I’ll post here about all of it. Thanks for reading along.

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