The Query Letter
A few people have asked about how I landed my wonderful agent, Michelle, for my novel. I would really love to tell some grand story about luck and serendipity, but the truth is it happened the old fashioned way: with a query letter. (Though I won’t rule out a little good luck all together. :))
Anyhow, the story of sending out queries has sparked some interesting discussions with my friends. There seems to be a lot of mystique surrounding query letters. So, with the hope of maybe helping someone who has been wondering about what query letters can look like, I decided to post my own here for anyone to check out.
Hope you enjoy! (And if you have any questions, please post them. I would love to get a discussion going.)
P.S. “Alive in Arcadia” was my novel’s original title. Michelle and I later changed it to “The Returned”…which in much, much better, I think.
Dear Ms. Brower,
Harold and Lucille Hargrave weren’t the type to get unsettled. They were too old now. Too old and southern and ornery. They hadn’t particularly minded getting old—that’s just what a person did, they felt—but it was getting old without their son, Jacob, that hurt. He died on his eight birthday, on a warm August day in 1958. Now, more than fifty years later, the couple found themselves very unsettled on account of the fact that it had taken little more than a knock at their front door to return Jacob to them—alive again, by some miracle, and still only eight years old.
At least Harold and Lucille weren’t alone. It was happening like this all over.
“Alive in Arcadia,” is a Literary Fiction novel that tells the story of a small, North Carolina couple caught up in a global event in which the dead, very unexpectedly, have begun returning. But unlike the late night movies that Harold and Lucille could never develop a taste for, these people have not returned with a hunger for human flesh, but only with a desire to return to their lives, something which people are finding may be even more difficult to comprehend and react to. When a person loses someone and closes their heart to the pain of that loss, what are they to do when that person returns and, very suddenly, throws open the door to those buried emotions?
“Alive in Arcadia” is meant to be something of a “Book Club” book—something that offers an idea that, when pondered long enough, seeks to spark discussions about topics such as loss, coping and love. I believe it would fit well with your particular aesthetic—forgive me if I presume too much.
I am a graduate of the MFA program at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. I have published both fiction and poetry in various journals such as The Thomas Wolfe Review, Chautauqua and Measure. I am the author of a book of poetry “We Call This Thing Between Us Love” (Main Street Rag) with a second poetry collection pending publication. I was recently nominated for a Pushcart Prize in poetry.
“Alive in Arcadia” runs 90,000 words. A sample of the manuscript is available at your request. I look forward to hearing from you and thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Jason Mott
4 Responses to “The Query Letter”
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Can’t wait to get our hands on a copy !
Thanks! 🙂
I second!
Thanks, David!