Would you be willing to look at a copy of the manuscript? I’m enclosing herewith a self-addressed stamped envelope for your reply, and I’ll look forward to hearing from you.
I would suggest you write a letter of this sort whether or not the house in question reads unsolicited manuscripts. You’ll get a reply, and a much faster reply than if you submitted a complete manuscript, as it takes rather less time to read a letter than a novel. If the reply tells you thanks but no thanks, that they’re no longer an active market for gothics, that they’re overinventoried with books set in Devon, or any other sort of negative reply, you’ll have saved the cost of submitting your novel to them and the time they’d take returning it.
If the editor agrees to consider the manuscript, you’ve cleared a hurdle. Trefillian House is no longer an over-the-transom submission, no longer pure slush. It’s instead a manuscript an editor has agreed to read.
This doesn’t mean Ms. Wimpole’s going to buy your book. It doesn’t mean you should get your hopes up, only to be deflated when the manuscript comes winging back to you. But it does mean that you’ve improved your odds a little bit.
Your query letter will have served another purpose. In it you’ve already described what you’re sending — not the nature of your novel, but the nature of your submission. You’ve labelled it not the manuscript but a copy of the manuscript, and that’s precisely what you’re going to submit.
To several publishers. Simultaneously.
Publishers, like everybody else in this imperfect world, like to have things their own way. For years they managed this by somehow getting the word out that it would be unethical for an author to submit his work to more than one publisher at a time. Never mind the fact that a manuscript could languish on a publisher’s desk for months on end. Multiple submission, one was given to understand, was underhanded and unfair.
The hell with that noise. The only possible argument against simultaneous submission is that it’s improper to lead someone to believe he’s the only person considering a novel if this is not in fact the case. By describing what you’re sending as a copy, both in your query letter and in the covering letter that accompanies your manuscript, you eliminate this possible source of unpleasantness, and you do this without displaying an unpleasantly aggressive manner. You wouldn’t want to say, “I’m sending this novel to ten other guys at the same time, so you better hop to it if you want to get there fastest with the mostest.” That just might rub Ms. Wimpole the wrong way.
It should go without saying that we’re talking about a clean legible copy of the manuscript, a photocopy equal in quality to the original. Not a carbon copy. Not one of those old-fashioned photocopies on smelly purplish plasticized paper. If that’s the best you can do, you’ll have to do better.
I would suggest that you have between four and six copies of your novel in circulation. More than that gets confusing. When you submit the novel, describe it again as a copy and make it clear that the editor has encouraged you to send it. Don’t take it for granted that she’ll recall your name or anything else about you. It may be hard for you to grasp this, but at this stage of the game Ms. Wimpole plays rather more of a role in your life than you do in hers.
You might write something like this:
Dear Ms. Wimpole,
Thanks very much for your letter of February 19th. As you suggested, I’m enclosing herewith a copy of my gothic novel, Trefillian House. I hope you like it and that it will fit your publishing requirements. SASE enclosed.
It’s virtually impossible, when submitting to more than one publisher at a time, not to project a fantasy in which two or more of them accept the book the same day. There are three things to keep in mind when this fantasy strikes:
(1) It won’t happen.
(2) It should be your biggest problem.
(3) Your agent will handle it.
Speaking of agents, do you need one? And, if you do, how do you get one?
It’s possible, certainly, to represent yourself, just as it’s possible for you to act as your own attorney or remove your own appendix. And there’s less potential hazard than you’d face in the courtroom or the hospital.
Some very successful authors act as their own agents, making their own deals and doing quite well at it. They let their publishers act as their representatives in the foreign market (usually at a higher commission than most agents charge) and generally remain with one publisher for many years.
Personally, I think they cost themselves money, but it’s hard to prove it to them. They see the 10 percent commission they’re saving and they don’t see the money they’re not earning by going it alone. They don’t see the clauses in their contracts that a decent agent would insist be changed. They don’t see the higher advances and better rates they might be receiving. But that’s their business. My business is writing, and I’m pleased to leave the dollars-and-cents side of it to my agent.
For a novice writer, it would seem that an agent would be all the more desirable. He’s in daily contact with the market, knows what editor is looking for what sort of material, and can pick up a phone and set wheels in motion. What he can’t do — and this is worth stressing — is get an editor to buy a book he wouldn’t want in the first place. He can lead the horse to water or carry water to the horse, but that’s as far as it goes.
How do you get such a person? The same way you bring your manuscript to the attention of an editor. By writing a query letter of the sort you wrote to Ms. Wimpole, explaining a little about your book, detailing whatever previous writing experience you’ve had, and asking if the agent would be willing to have a look at what you’ve got. And, let me remind you, enclosing a stamped self-addressed envelope.
The agent may already have a full house. He may not have any interest in representing the type of material you’ve written. If he’s willing to look at the script, send him a copy. If he reads it and expresses a willingness to represent your work, you’ve got an agent.
Let’s suppose you’ve managed to connect with an editor all by yourself. You’ve submitted a novel to Ms. Wimpole and she writes back that she’d like to publish it. Perhaps she presents terms. Perhaps she encloses a contract. Perhaps she asks for revisions without saying anything about terms or a contract. Perhaps....
Perhaps you need an agent now.
You may feel it goes against the grain to seek representation now that you’ve already done the hard part of finding a publisher. But it’s at this stage of the game that not having an agent can really screw you up. Before you sign anything, before you do any further work on speculation, in short before you make any conclusive move, you should have professional counsel. The commission you’ll pay is a small price.
Sounds like a good idea. But won’t Ms. Wimpole get steamed if I tell her I don’t want to do anything without an agent?
She shouldn’t. If she’s a competent editor working for a respectable publisher, she’ll probably welcome the news; she knows it’s easier to deal with a professional agent than with an unknowledgeable and perhaps scatterbrained amateur writer. She may even suggest of her accord that you avail yourself of an agent.
Even if she doesn’t, she’d be a good person to ask advice from on the subject. I know any number of writers who selected agents largely on the basis of their publishers’ recommendations.