Caroline Eisenmann

A great query gets my attention, but a great first few pages is what gets me to start reading the manuscript when I go home that night. #querytip

I often get the sense that writers are trying to flex their lyric/descriptive muscles as hard as possible in the first paragraph of their manuscript--which almost always ends up making it a pass for me. #querytip

A #querytip: if you are earnestly a fan of an agent's author, that's a fantastic thing to include in a query. But it's pretty easy for us to tell when you're just picking random names off our client list to look like you've done your research.

Thinking this morning about the difference, as an agent, between a good query and a GIMME query. Both are queries that I’ll ask in, but what happens after that differs pretty widely between the two. (ramblings/thread ahead) (also #querytip)

A #querytip: the categories an agent says they do and do not represent ultimately trump the themes and qualities they describe liking. Your romance novel may be about intimacy and obsession, but romance isn't a category that I work in, so I wouldn't be the right agent for it!