I’ve sat down with a book editor and asked her how many pages she actually reads at the query stage, and she said, “Zero.” I got the same reply from a magazine editor. And two agents. Plus a publisher friend of mine. So what do they actually read when they get a query and manuscript? The cover letter.
And how much of the cover letter? The first sentence.
One sentence.
Peter Brown Hoffmeister, on how the importance of the first sentence of a query letter has become greater than that of the first sentence of a novel.
The last time I met my with my agent she said she was a little stressed because she had 900 queries waiting in her email in-box. When I asked her how many queries she receives per week, she said, “600 to 700.” Per week. Writer’s Digest and online writers’ websites say that the first paragraph of the query letter should be a hook, be informative, and one sentence. This is standard. So you have a one-sentence paragraph to sell your manuscript.
(via oliveryeh)
Hmmm…probably time to look at the query letter again.
