It's That Time - Query Letters

Like so many unpublished writers, once the book is written, and rewritten, and edited and revised, and molded into something your friends say is worth reading, I have now entered into the dread time known as "sending out query letters."

Fact is, I've been down this road before. I spent ten years in an independent rock and roll band. We sent our demos, then complete recordings, to record labels and got nowhere. We got a sniff or two, a call, someone from a regional indie came out to see us, but nobody bit. In the late '00s, I wrote screenplays. Most were bad, some were okay, maybe one or two where good. Still, I sent them out, even entered them into contests, but generally got rejections.

My first book, Power Ballad, was sent to a few folks, but I knew it was niche, and the feedback I received confirmed that. I didn't bother with my second book, Small Stories, because that's not why I wrote it. It was a personal thing, getting it published didn't matter.

But The Black Sky is different, so I'm taking a different approach. I'm being methodical, I'm being thoughtful, and I'm focusing. Sending out 100 queries to every name I can find is not the goal. The goal is locating folks who I can find common ground with in my story, and who have a track record with this sort of material. Maybe it will lead to the same dead ends, but I won't know until I start hitting send.