Kelly Peterson

Usually if the manuscript has undergone large revisions, it can be requeried after a longer period of time with the statement that it has gone through major revisions. :)

Join online writing groups and find friends, and build a community physically near you, too! You’ll need the friends in this industry!

Work on the books you want to work on. There is something to be said about practicing and getting skill behind you first, but many people can’t force themselves to write something they’re not feeling then and there. Plus, you could always go back and revise!

Work on what you want to work on, and the rest will fall into place. :) Both cycle in and out of popularity, so there’s a time for both and people differ on these decisions, too!

If it’s just a short poem at the beginning of each chapter, I don’t think it will necessarily deter an agent from repping you if they like your story otherwise. When they say they don’t rep poetry (most don’t) we’re saying full books of poems/poetry.

You can just respond to the email and say that their submissions say to check back within this time and you were wondering if they had gotten to it yet. But you understand they’re busy and if they haven’t gotten to it yet, no biggie. Just checking in. It’s pretty normal!

It depends on the voice and overall story! It also depends on the stakes and agency, because if it’s quieter in voice as well as stakes and agency, it will be a tough sell to most publishers.

Sometimes! It depends on the agency contracts and who/what they sign with. There’s many stipulations for this matter in the contract itself, so read them carefully. And usually they’ll either still work, or they’ll have a trusted colleague or assistant help while they’re in leave

In my experience, we look for authors who have experience in the industry and who can market themselves, so seeing this background is always nice. However, if the story or voice doesn’t fit us, there’s not much a huge bio will do to fix that.

Of course! I have actually not signed any authors from conferences yet, and all of my current clients have been from Twitter pitch events, writing events (like @PitchWars), and the slush pile!

You can send an email explaining the situation to the agents who have your manuscript if you’d like. I don’t really see it as annoying, as I feel like it happens quite often.

Voice, character goals, and drive!

Meta isn’t really in right now, and satire is hard to place. I might suggest narrowing down those genres and descriptors before pitching in order to give agents better ideas of what you’re writing.

You should say it’s part of a planned series or has series potential, but make sure you only focus on pitching your first book and not the whole series.

It’s tricky because publishers need to see sales numbers for NA before they probably start buying them again and carving out a space for them in the shelves.

That’s not for anyone to decide but yourself. You know your manuscript and story best, and if you don’t know WHAT about your story to revise, it may be best to send to some beta readers and CPs first when considering revising to get their feedback.

It’s tough because YA seems to be aging up quite a bit, so 15 can even be a hard sell sometimes. YA is trending more 16-18 at the moment, and upper MG is going to 13. 14 is somewhat no man’s land at the moment!

Every agent and agency differs, so I usually suggest to have a 5 page, 10 page, first chapter, and 3 chapter samples ready to go. :)

You’d probably be better of looking at anthologies, presses who put out calls for short stories, and journals who publish the sorts of short stories you write. I can’t be too much of a help because usually agents don’t deal with short stories. Sorry!

Actually it costs publishers less to print shorter books. 😂 They have a tendency for debuts to lean shorter, while authors with proven sales records can go longer. So for debuts, it’s important!