Helpful Tips: How To Guarantee Rejection

August 25th, 2005 · No Comments
by Booksquare

Though some authors seem to know instinctively the best, most expeditious, ways to get rejected, others require a primer. For those souls, Deidre Knight and Justin Knight of The Knight Agency have put together a helpful list of things to do to ensure immediate rejection:

But we’ll confine ourselves to encouraging writers with ways to get themselves turned down by agents or publishers, and trust that you’ll understand how to apply these lessons in a broader context. Nor are we going to insult anybody’s intelligence by telling you about the really basic, simple ways that a writer can ensure that no one will read her query letter, let alone her manuscript. We’re sure you already know about obvious things like using unusual fonts and paper, though we will point out that a really fuzzy, beat-up printer for your letter and manuscript is certainly a plus. Extra points if you could dig up a dot-matrix, though of course the real prize goes to those who handwrite their letters. That takes a special person.

File Under: Agents · Tools and Craft