AN INTERACTIVE WRITING WORKBOOK

Your Manuscript Is Finished. Now What?

A First-Time Author's Guide to Writing a Query Letter

You’ve written a book. After months, maybe years, of working on it–rewrites, revisions, and a few rounds of edits–you have reached a point where you’re ready to share your work with the world.

So, what's next?

If you’re new to the publishing industry, you might imagine submitting your manuscript directly to publishing houses, crossing your fingers, and hoping that someone will recognize its potential.

Unfortunately, it’s not that simple.

Many major publishing houses don’t accept unsolicited manuscripts. Instead, they rely on literary agents to identify promising work and connect authors with publishers.

Getting a literary agent interested in your work often begins with a query letter.

WHAT IS A QUERY LETTER?

A query letter is a concise, professional introduction to your manuscript, typically around 250-400 words. 

And it presents a whole new challenge: convincing someone else that it's worth reading.

It’s almost painful to consider: after spending countless hours and writing tens of thousands of words, you have roughly 300 words to capture someone’s attention.

EVERY. WORD. COUNTS.

A successful query introduces your manuscript, communicates what makes your story compelling, and provides relevant information about you as a writer.

If your query captures an agent’s interest, they may request sample pages or even your complete manuscript.

WHERE DO YOU BEGIN?

With a clear understanding of your manuscript, what makes it worth reading, and how to communicate those qualities clearly.

That’s what this workbook is designed to help you with.

Through five guided sections, you'll learn the conventions of query letters while completing exercises that are designed to help you develop the essential pieces of your own query letter.

By the end, you’ll have a foundation that you can revise, assemble, and personalize to fit the submission requirements of the agents you hope to approach.