Agent 001

Mood: A little, well, bitchy
Music: Bitch, Meredith Brooks

So this is the post which inspired me to create the new blog, as well as the post I've been avoiding.

I received my first rejection. It was not quite the fun and thrilling experience I anticipated.

I am not so upset that the agent rejected my query letter (very politely; he didn't feel he was the appropriate agent for my work. I smell a form response, but at least it didn't cut too deeply).

What frustrated me were the technical glitches which joined together to present my query sloppily, and therefore, I will forever have a hard time accepting that it was ME, and not my font, which sucked ass (although common sense says it was me).

So what happened?

I'd been nervous about querying agents and it was pissing me off. I wasn't nervous about being rejected, that is par for the course. I was nervous about the act of sending off the letter, which was annoying.

I don't get nervous about job interviews. I don't get nervous about the millions of dollars in revenue I manage every day in my day job. Why, then, should I get nervous about a letter? I know how to craft a letter. This was silly.

So I went on the hunt for an agent who accepted (preferred, actually) email queries. Email, because then I'd have no excuses to not send the query. I didn't need paper, or gas, or patience to stand in line to buy stamps. I just needed the internet and a pair of balls.

Obviously only literally on the former.

In all my agent research, I concluded that one thing they hate more than anything is a poorly formatted query letter. I can relate: I am the boss who has chucked resumes into the trash because they contained too many grammatical errors (not unlike this blog, I am sure, but be assured my resume is always grammatically flawless). I didn't begrudge them the desire to know a writer put effort into crafting a well formed letter.

Which is why I carefully typed my letter into Word first, and then pasted it into the email.

Which screwed up the formatting.

So I deleted the text, and retyped the letter directly into the email. I sent it. I checked the Sent folder; the message left my account looking perfectly formatted.

It arrived in his account looking like shit.

What the agent received looked like a letter typed in five different fonts by three different people, one of whom had a crack habit. I have no idea what caused it. I nearly reached out to my friends to ask if they had any tips for preventing this in the future, but then I just decided that in the future, I will be standing in line to buy stamps, making sure the car has gas, and stocking paper which cost more than the printer I'll use it in. From now on, I'll stick to agents who require/accept paper queries, because I have more control over the end product. I need to know, when I receive those rejections, that I put my best foot forward. That what the agent is not interested in is my story - not that the agent believes I am a careless idiot.

I don't want to be back in tenth grade, pining after the star quarterback, deluded into thinking he's not noticing me because we share no classes (insert the hysterical laughter of his gorgeous girlfriend here).

And that's why I'm feeling bitchy right now.