15 Agents Seeking Literary Fiction
Where to Query This Week (10.23.24) | Plus how one writer landed an agent after nine months of querying
Welcome to Sub Club’s Where to Query This Week!
I’m so excited to welcome my first guest writer,
! I met Kolina here on Substack, as we subscribe to each other’s newsletters. In her newsletter, Words on Words, Kolina writes about her love of literature. And she’s always giving the best reading recommendations.When I wrote a post in my newsletter about starting to query, Kolina emailed me and very generously offered to let me see her query letter and give me feedback on my draft. I took her up on it, of course, and her edits were extremely helpful!
Today, she is sharing an essay with us about the highs and lows of her nine-month querying journey, and how exactly she landed her agent. It's an inspiring story for all, especially those who are in the querying trenches right now!
» » If want to ask a question in our Query Hotline, fill out the form here with any questions you might have about querying—whether that’s around agents, indie presses, book contests, formatting, genres, or if you just need someone to tell you you’re doing just fine. (Submit your question here) « «
The Highs and Lows of Querying
If you’re reading this, you’re likely either preparing for or are already entrenched in querying literary agents. When I was querying, I was unquenchably desirous for articles about other authors’ experiences. I lapped it all up, simultaneously feeling better and worse about myself in the process. My hope is that by the end of this essay, you’ll both feel more prepared for the ups and downs of querying and have a better understanding of how to approach the whole nebulous process.
My story
I began querying in March of 2023, knocking out my top agent choices right away. Two days after sending off my first query I already had a response: it was a request for my partial manuscript. What a wild ride this will be! I’d thought. (How cute.)
By April, I received a full request. A wild ride, indeed. Twenty days after sending off the partial, I was let down kindly. But it was okay because I had another interested agent, who, in May, emailed me with an update. She had brought a second reader onto my novel who said they’d been tearing through it at “quite a clip; I really like it! It’s dark and kind of sexy and is paced really well.”
I was winning! But I wasn’t delusional, so I kept querying. By June I’d collected several rejections and had no other requests. Then there was a six-month silence. Six months during which I didn’t hear from a single person, despite having continued to query. And that agent with that very positive update? I never heard from her again.
It was December–nine months after I began querying–when responses started coming in. First, a full request, then another, then two more, all from agents I’d queried months prior. One was a newer agent, and while my book was not for her, she knew it would be for her colleague, a brand new agent. She passed my query letter, synopsis, and first three chapters on, and then her colleague reached out to me to request the full manuscript, if I was willing.
Was that a question?
The following week, my first offer came in. The colleague who was passed my manuscript offered representation, which meant I was then able to reach out to other agents I was extra interested in working with. This stirred up a small flurry of full requests and resulted in my now-agent also offering representation.
The ups and downs and sheer volume–nine months, 94 queries sent, 25 rejections, 69 no responses–of my story may give you hope. I could’ve used that hope when I was querying, but I also wanted specifics about how people actually got their agent.
Here’s what I can give you.
In the query letter that caught my agent’s attention, I pitched my book as a “75,000-word literary debut novel about a widow’s first year as a single parent to the daughter she loves but never wanted.”
Then I got specific about my comps. I didn’t just include The Days of Abandonment and The Guest, but said, “This book features frenetic energy like Elena Ferrante’s The Days of Abandonment and a woman-on-the-edge protagonist like that in Emma Cline’s The Guest.”
In later queries, I changed the title of my book and removed the Ferrante comp in lieu of something newer. The reason I originally included Ferrante is because of what
(who happens to be my agent) calls vibes, but I was able to find other vibey books that were more current. Other comps I used at times were Want: A Novel by Lynn Steger Strong “for motherhood plights,” and My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell “for forbidden love.”I also said my book would appeal to “readers of books on
’s Women Making Bad Decisions Bookshop.org list.” This was a sneaky way of comping many other novels at once.While I tweaked many parts of my query letter, my genre remained literary fiction.
wrote about how she originally pitched her book as literary fiction, then realized it was upmarket. The thing about querying is that you learn a lot while doing it, even if agents don’t send you feedback. This was a smart move on Kailey’s part, and she figured it out by querying. Similarly, I didn’t know who my ideal agent was until I was well into the process.I hit a very broad range of agents. I queried the senior agents and the new agents hungry to build their lists. I queried the big agencies and the small ones. I ensured that everyone I queried represented my genre and was looking for books like mine while also being open-minded and thinking broadly.
Ultimately, I chose a more senior agent who had offered representation because I was familiar with her work and she had an impressive track record. She had a great perspective on my novel and guided me into changing the title to As Good As Anybody, which is much more fitting. And for what it’s worth, she was query #63.
Since tallying the stats for this column, another rejection rolled in. It was for a query I sent on April 16, 2023. The querying process really is wild.
Your story
I don’t know your book or how your query letter looks or if your synopsis needs to be trimmed (it does). But I know that you will soon be querying agents, or you’re already there, and you will face rejections. You are going to hear no often, and you’ll dread it. But what you’ll dread more is not hearing anything.
I know you’re going to do your research and you’re only going to pitch agents who represent your genre. I know you’re going to be clear on what your genre is and who your readers are. You’re not going to tell your prospective agents that you couldn’t find any comps because your book is so unique. You will picture exactly where your book will one day in a bookshop, and you’ll even visit it, finding where your last name falls in the alphabetized shelf of books.
I know you are not going to give up, and you will query 10, 50, 100 agents, maybe more. And your perseverance will pay off, and one day you’ll be reminiscing on how you survived the querying process, and you’ll be sharing your experience with others who are thirsty for it. And I will be here saluting you.
I always knew you could do it.
Kolina Cicero is a writer of fiction who is interested in how absence shapes our lives. Her first novel, As Good As Anybody, is currently out on submission. She writes the Substack newsletter, , where readers discuss what they love about literature.
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15 Agents Seeking Literary Fiction
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