There have been rejections of various sorts in my mailbox and inbox, but I've finally received a request for a full copy of my manuscript.  Of course I don't know where this will lead, but I'm glad that I have the opportunity to provide it to an agent I met at ThrillerFest in Manhattan, last summer.  ThrillerFest is a writing conference targeted at the Thriller genre.  They had a session where we could make pitches to agents.  I saw about eight agents one afternoon. 

If you're interested in Thrillers, I recommend ThrillerFest.  It provided some valuable sessions about writing in general and elements associated with thrillers in particular.  There were many successful authors there, so there was ample opportunity to network and hear how others went from wannbe to successful.  Give it a try, you might like it.

I've sent out nearly 30 queries at the rate of about 3- 4 a week.  Most of them have been by e-mail, where agents will accept that form.  Following the submission guidelines, I've included synopsis and chapters where specified.  So far all responses have been negative, something along the line of "not right for us" or "I'm not the agent for this novel."  A few have commented positively on the the storyline, but said that the particular sub-genre is difficult to sell right now.

I continue to send, but have been thinking through an idea for a short story I'd like to submit to Writers Digest.  I need to start writing again, rather than focusing of querying, I guess.

Big event today...I sent out my first two queries to agents.  It's been a long time coming, nearly two years from the date when I started pulling together some ideas for a novel.  I don't know the "right" strategy for sending queries to agents, but until I see things differently, I'm planning on sending a couple each week.  By the time the first response comes in, I should have ten or so out there.

I've finished the short synopsis - two pages.  The long one will probably run to about 12 pages.  My day job has consumed so much of my time and energies for the past four months, that it's been difficult to devote time to writing. I see that changing as Jan. progresses. 

In a comment about my previous post, I was asked if I'd be willing to share my query. At first I thought I might, but when I spoke to a trusted adviser, she suggested I probably shouldn't.  She said that were I teaching the topic, it would be appropriate to post one that would illustrate the form and content of a query.  She went on to say, however, that my query is targeted to an agent who should be the one to decide the timing and content of any information released about my novel.

At this point, I'm thinking through her advice.   Should a query be kept private, and only made available to the intended recipients?  I'm ambivalent, in that I'd like some feedback, but want to be prudent about releasing information about my novel.  Hmmm,  what do you think?

I now have a query letter for my novel and am about to start on the synopsis.  I plan on writing two of them, one short and one long.  The short one will be one or two pages, and the long about twelve (the novel is 500 pages).  I'm also tweaking my outline since I've noticed that some agents say they want one.  My self-imposed deadline of sending out the query by end-of-year likely won't be met, but at least the process continues to move along.