Querying
Nathan Bransford
A good, concise post on the various ways to find a literary agent to represent your work.
25 Things Writers Should Know About Agents
Chuck Wendig
Excellent—and brief—points about the author/agent relationship and other things to know or consider before querying.
The Querying Process
Nathan Bransford
Straightforward advice (and links) on writing a query letter from a former literary agent, who is now a published middle-grade author. (Guess what? Even he had to go through the process of querying to get an agent. Knowing people in the industry doesn’t guarantee a free ticket.)
How to Revise Query Letters So They Actually Work
Query Shark
The best website around for helping writers perfect their query letters. Listen to the Query Shark. She bites if you don’t.
The Naked Truth (about submissions)
Greenhouse Literary
An honest and forthright post about why agents do what they do. Always remember: if you don’t like an agent’s policies, DON’T QUERY THEM. It’s simple, really. Don’t fight or respond rudely,* just move along to the next agent. Everyone will be less frustrated. I promise.
Red Sofa Literary
Don’t ever query via Twitter. Or Facebook. Or any social media. Dawn explains why.
On Word Counts and Novel Length
Colleen Lindsay
Word count guidelines for a variety of genres and types of books.
Jennifer Laughran
Word count guidelines for children’s through young adult books.
Jennifer Laughran
An overview of how one agent assesses her email inbox, including slush.
Synopses
Nathan Bransford
Helpful how-to on writing those tricky synopses. (Yes, we all hate writing them. It’s one of publishing’s perennial hazing rituals.)
Proposals
Start Here: How to Write a Proposal
Jane Friedman
Nonfiction is its own beast when it comes to querying and finding an agent. Most of the time, it requires creating a proposal. Here’s how.
Jill Corcoran
A few tips on finding books that are similar to yours or in the same market. Not every agent or editor asks, but it’s always good to know what the competition will be.
Rejection
Factors in Deciding Which Book to Publish
Michelle Witte
There are numerous reasons why agents and editors will reject a query or manuscript, not simply because a manuscript sucks. Which means you shouldn’t tell yourself that’s the reason why you’re getting rejections. It could be plenty of other things.
How Publishing Really Works
There are several good reasons why agents can’t write a personal response to every manuscript they reject. Here’s why.
