Covering letter

You need to write a covering letter stating:

• the title of the book
• intended audience
• word count
• your writing successes (these should be exact i.e. which competition you won, when this was, who organised it, what prize you got)
• a paragraph or two on what the novel’s about.

Remember to do it in a mail-mergeable format because it will save you a lot of time. If you can’t mailmerge, it’s well worth spending an hour or two ploughing through the guidance in Word because it will be worth it in the long run.

Précis

You need a 1 to 2 page (maximum) summary of the whole thing, introducing the main themes, characters & plot. Follow it through right to the end… it’s a mistake to say, ‘to find out what happens, you’ll have to request the rest’. The agent wants the whole picture.

Sample chapters

An agent will be able to get a feel for your writing from a sample; they do NOT want the whole book at this stage.

You need to select the first couple of chapters, or around 15 pages of a novel.

• create a footer to add page numbers.
• create a header to put your name, address & contact details in a small, inobtrusive font.
• double space it all (very important).
• use a standard font for example, ariel or verdana. Not a strange one which is difficult to read.
• use a font no smaller than 12 point

Stamped, addressed envelope

Buy a large quantity of 2nd class stamps – you can get them in 100’s and a pack of normal sized plain white envelopes i.e. A4 sheet folded into 3. Then print off labels with your name & address on them & put a label & a stamp on each envelope.

If you don’t enclose an SAE, you won’t hear from many of these people as they’re not a charity.

Paper

If you’re serious, you need to obtain a box of good quality paper. I use Conqueror textured paper in cream. It’s quite expensive for a box, probably £20 - £25, but mine’s still over ½ full & I’ve sent out 3 novels.

Use paper as follows:-

• Covering letter – Conqueror
• Précis – Conqueror
• Sample chapters – plain white paper

Identify possible agents

You need a writers & artists’ yearbook or writers’ handbook – a current one as they go out of date quickly.

• go through all the agents & circle & number any who specialise in your genre & who accept unsolicited manuscripts.
• start an excel spreadsheet so that you can do a mailmerge i.e. you need title, initials, surname, co name & full address with each item in a different column.
• start another sheet with just the agency’s name, a column for when you sent an approach to them, when you heard back & what they said i.e. yes, no or any comments.

As a very rough guide, I’ve approached 90 for each novel. There is no point in sending one at a time, then waiting 6 weeks to get a rejection, if you even hear from them, then doing another one.

Mailmerge

If you’ve selected 90 agents, prepare an approach to the first 20.

• do a mailmerge to create the letters
• print the letter & 20 copies of the summary on conqueror paper
• sign all the letters individually by hand
• print 20 sample chapters SINGLE SIDED on plain white paper

You can either mailmerge the agents’ addresses onto labels or if you’re good at mailmerge, get the address in the right place to use window envelopes. Use A4 envelopes – don’t try to fold anything up because it doesn’t look professional.

Agent packs

Put together a pack for each agent. This should consist of:

• letter on top
• précis underneath
• sample chapters underneath the précis
• SAE at the back

DO NOT staple because this is frowned upon. Use a paper clip.

Pay attention to detail all the way through. For example, address your letter to a person if you possibly can, not to the company. Make sure their name & address is 100% correct. If you’ve used labels for the addresses, make sure they’re on the right envelopes, which is harder than it sounds if you’re doing multiple approaches.

And finally ...

Send them all out 1st class. When you get replies, mark them off on the spreadsheet. When you’ve heard from over half of the agents, start on the next batch.

Good luck!!