Why Agents and Editors Are Simply Not Responding You You Anymore

As you know, this is a pet peeve of mine, not only in the publishing world but in the world of communication in general. I am a firm believer that if you email someone, that person deserves a response back. I also believe that response should be a timely response and not a "Oh, my bad, I just missed it" response. 

However, I do want to address this and talk about one of the biggest reasons why so many editors and agents are simply not responding to authors anymore. I want to deal with the ugly reason first.

It is due to the authors out there who simply cannot read submission guidelines, cannot keep track of their own submissions, believe if they bombard the system with submissions something will stick, or just argue with us. In other words, the bad seeds of the group.

Yes, there are those people out there. 

This weekend, I answered countless emails just like that. For example, as you know, my submission guidelines clearly stated that I accept only traditional romance and women's fiction, AND YET, I was getting memoirs, science fiction novels (and novellas), self-help books, cookbooks and... Good lord people, can't you read? So, I send my response of telling them this is not what I represent, and sure enough I will get one of the three responses:

1) My bad, I didn't read your guidelines. 

2) I just thought you would be more open to accepting things that were well written

3) Getting slammed on the internet for sending a form response stating that their "form query letter" was not a genre I represent. 

We also get people who think that if they just submit the same project, change the name and "pretend" it is something different, things will change. I get if you revise the book, but tell us that. But come on...sending the same query and project? We aren't idiots!

So, what is the easiest approach to this? Editors and agents simply use the statement, "Due to the high volume of submissions we receive, we will respond to authors if we believe your project is something we would like to move forward with." In other words, "we are going to ignore some of you. 

Now, it is that part that personally I am not a big fan of. If you want to skip on the project, then send that darn form letter at least acknowledging receipt of the project and a decision to pass. Authors at least know. 

But for now, please know that your lack of hearing from so many of us (not necessarily me) is due to your fellow writers who cannot seem to do the right thing. 

More Is Not Always Better

I was reading submissions this weekend and once again, I was seeing a common trend among writers. In an attempt to make their stories interesting, authors are just adding sub-plot upon sub-plot to what could have been an outstanding story.

And this is a problem!

I want you to think of it this way. Why is it that we often laugh at (although we might be addicted to them) soap operas? Consider the plots. For those of you who are old school, consider everything Ericka Kane went though in all of her years on All My Children!

Can we say "OMG!!!!!!" How many marriages? How many times was she in a crisis or in a hospital or in the middle of who knows what was going on. If there was a problem happening in the town or in anyone's life, you could guarantee, Ericka was either involved, or it was going to have an effect on her emotionally, physically, mentally or who knows how else. 

And it was simply too much!

Well, the same is true with your stories. The reality is that we, meaning the readers, have to connect with the characters in the stories. We can often relate to one (maybe two) of the emotions or problems, but when you pile on too much, we simply cannot handle it.

I would also add that trying to keep track of all of the plots in our heads is often difficult. Come on authors, you know you struggled to keep the stories straight when writing it. How do you think the readers are feeling?

The better approach is to pick one and add depth to it. Take us INTO the story and INTO the characters. Immerse us in story and not overwhelm us with an avalanche of plot!

My First Story Ended Up Going No Where After I Published It

This was an overheard statement from the conference this last weekend. Now, you will need a lot for context for this statement for it to really make sense. But before I dive into this, let me just say that this is a cautionary tale of "learn how to do something before you dive in head first."

As I have said before, there are a ton of writers who self-publish and fail horribly (note my comment I ALWAYS make. People can succeed in self-publishing so this is in no way a negative slam against this approach). These authors fail because they have not gotten what they want from sending things to editors or agents OR, when they get on sites such as Query Manager or read books with lists of editors and agents, the come up with no one representing their work. Clearly, these people are not open to creativity, they will say.  So they self publish.

You have heard me talk about this before.

OK, so back to our author. When the author sat down at a table with another author, they were talking about what each wrote. This author state, "I write a mix of Cyber-punk, mystery, thriller, sci-fi and fantasy all rolled into one story." Hmmm, intriguing. This alone should start to tell you a lot. 

But wait, there is more. 

During the conversation, the author stated "I have a character that was only supposed to be there for one chapter. In the end, that character ended up being the main character." Um what?

In both of these situations, it came down to the author not planning ahead. Not knowing what to do. Not knowing the business. And simply put, running blindly into brick walls!

So why did this author fail? I think you can see it!

Have The Guts To Try

This last weekend, one of the sessions I was a part of was a group blind critique of authors' first two pages. Myself and 2 other authors read their stories out loud and then gave them honest and straight forward feedback. It really is a fun session and for those people in the audience, it is a great way to really learn about what is going on in our heads either as a reader or as a professional receiving your writing. 

I have always found it interesting of the number of writers I hear who will make statements of "there is no way on earth I could ever do that." 

But here is my question... Why?

A lot of authors have a complete fear of sharing their writing with other people. I get it. Writing is personal. It is often private. In fact, when I am writing this (yes, I am writing this at the conference so my reference to this last weekend is a bit of time shift), I am watching people sitting in this large room. There are 14 tables, with 4 seats a piece and no one is talking to each other. This is a conference to network and share ideas (see my previous posts) but no one is talking. OK, there are two people with legitimate reasons. Me, and the one person who has her computer plugged into the wall.

But think about this. If you are not showing other people your work, or you are not getting feedback from other people, who will read it first? Editors and agents. 

"But Scott....," you whine, "I have my critique group!"

Of course you do. These are your friends and I am sorry to say, they are your protective shield. They are the people who will, like your mother, always give you those encouraging words of kindness and sugar coat things with that wonderful Oreo cookie approach to critique. Come on! Remember your mother hung all of your "great work" on the fridge?

I have always found it interesting that after I have been a part of any of these sessions, I am flooded with authors thanking me for the honesty. They often make comments such as "I knew something was wrong and I am glad that you pointed that out." I have also had authors say things such as "I am glad that you told me this now because I had planned on sending this out to editors and agents next week." 

Whew! Saved the day again!

Remember, we learn from failure. We learn from making mistakes. If you don't try, you will never learn and grow.

Trust me!