Comments on Nathan Bransford - Literary Agent: Query Stats by Word Count

Woohoo! I had read this post before but just re-re...

2009-05-11T17:01:09.393-07:00

Woohoo! I had read this post before but just re-read it today... I'd been worried that my query letter was too short at 264 words (counting the words after "Dear [agent]" and before "Sincerely,"), so this definitely makes me feel better. :) Thanks, Nathan!

entire blog * oops

2009-02-18T07:52:51.920-08:00

entire blog * oops

wow this helped me alot.im on the stage of writing...

2009-02-18T07:52:25.878-08:00

wow this helped me alot.
im on the stage of writing my queries and it's very quite stressing.

Your entire is so helpful.

:D

- Hailey

good comment

2008-09-11T23:09:10.961-07:00

good comment

good post

2008-09-11T23:08:12.449-07:00

good post

Everyone seems to want to write! Thanks for the ad...

2008-09-11T07:57:52.953-07:00

Everyone seems to want to write! Thanks for the advice.

Hmmm, this was interesting. Mine has been sliced a...

2008-09-03T08:29:13.787-07:00

Hmmm, this was interesting. Mine has been sliced and diced to 250 words and I STILL had people telling me to cut it further.

Thank you.

WRT the query letter from this blog: by 'copied' I...

2008-09-03T04:47:22.906-07:00

WRT the query letter from this blog: by 'copied' I means 'cut-and-pasted' - not 'plagiarized.'

I opened my 'query letter' file with trepidation a...

2008-09-03T04:45:28.881-07:00

I opened my 'query letter' file with trepidation and peered at the little word counter on the bottom....

493 words! Oh no. I am verbose and overly wordy and perhaps I even unintentionally obfuscate. But the query looks so neat and trim on the screen! Clearly I am also somewhat delusional about my own ability to write.

Then I scrolled down.

HUZZAH! Half of the document is taken up by a query letter posted on this very blog as an example of a Good Query Letter, which I copied for close study.

After deleting it, I once again checked the word counter.

265!

For once in my life, I'm proud to be average. :D

ohhh now I get it..you just do not publish any blo...

2008-09-02T21:05:16.241-07:00

ohhh now I get it..you just do not publish any blogs/posts that do not agree with you, Nathan. Very American!

Nathan -Better the 10 Townsend that the 22 Fillmor...

2008-09-02T20:55:01.213-07:00

Nathan -

Better the 10 Townsend that the 22 Fillmore. Just sayin'.

:-P

The query I was planning to send tomorrow is a lit...

2008-09-02T19:10:00.975-07:00

The query I was planning to send tomorrow is a little on the long side. I'll cut in half by just using every other word. When you get one that refers to JUSTICE A LIGHT you'll know I paid attention to your blog! You can fill in the missing words with your imagination and probably be right on.

Was there a correlation between the size of the qu...

2008-09-02T17:32:11.045-07:00

Was there a correlation between the size of the query and the size of the manuscript, or not so much?

starrie-Ha! Yeah, that was me. A very exciting d...

2008-09-02T17:27:20.555-07:00

starrie-

Ha! Yeah, that was me. A very exciting day on the 10 Townsend.

Thanks. This is most helpful for those of us writ...

2008-09-02T17:14:40.018-07:00

Thanks. This is most helpful for those of us writing queries to magazine editors as well. Great blog topic.

Unrelated to the post, really:A funny thing happen...

2008-09-02T17:09:33.330-07:00

Unrelated to the post, really:

A funny thing happened to me on my way home from work today. I got on the bus and ended up beside a man who was holding what I thought might've been a Kindle. I'd never seen a Kindle in real-life before, so I worked up the courage to ask if that was what it was. The guy looked up to answer me and I thought, "Hell, he looks like Nathan Bransford!", but I kept that to myself. Then he mentioned that he was in the publishing business and confirmed that he was a literary agent. And I, thinking "So, are you like, Nathan Bransford?" was really stalker-ish, decided to let the conversation die there.

I really wanted to ask, though.

Dear Mr. Bransford,I've just stumbled on your site...

2008-09-02T16:31:16.854-07:00

Dear Mr. Bransford,
I've just stumbled on your site and am so delighted. It's all orderly and so relevant.
I've just completed a nine-month Master Memoir program with Samantha Dunn at UCLA and have been so focused on finishing and editing, and editing, and editing that a lot of this slipped out of my consciousness.
The dreaded and exciting query and what to send.
So grateful for this and I have carefully read through all of your posts and the comments.
I'm not ready to "sweet-spot" query you as you, sigh, want a finished product. Wouldn't it be sweet ...
I did use so much of what you talked about to send a proper and sweet query to the agent (UCLA honorarium) that had agreed to read and respond to the eight of us in the program.
The only possible thing I could add to the plethora of relevance here is not to wholly trust Word. Alas. Word corrected the spelling of Louisa to Louis (Lous May Alcott - oh mortification) and I am shamed to say I missed it. I'd unwittingly depended on that red mark that meant error.
Thanks so much.
Madeleine
Oh and the greatest influences on me ever were Mary Rakow (The Memory Room) and Margaret Mitchell (Gone With The Wind). The first for its dreamy intelligence and haunting prose, and the building of dread and Margaret Mitchell for some of the greatest one liners ever, anachronistic or not.

Amateur hour.Where's all the writers at?

2008-09-02T16:22:33.539-07:00

Amateur hour.

Where's all the writers at?

This included the credits paragraph? Well, I gues...

2008-09-02T15:53:31.547-07:00

This included the credits paragraph? Well, I guess I shouldn't have published so much prior to subbing novels. No, I didn't list every single thing.

Still, I'm in at 389, so I'm in the ballpark of okay.

Nathan,This is awesome information. I was the pers...

2008-09-02T15:37:35.500-07:00

Nathan,

This is awesome information. I was the person that asked about the idea word length for a query (mine are usually about 450 which I think is a bit long) and this really helps. Thanks for taking the time to compile the information!

I'm surprised over some of those super long queries. I'm sure this will help some of those cut their word count down.

Thanks! Amy

Mr. Bransford, you could NOT have posted this at a...

2008-09-02T14:40:05.289-07:00

Mr. Bransford, you could NOT have posted this at a better time. I am working on my query letter to a particular agent and it's over 500 words, which makes it EXACTLY one computer page. Now I know I needs to downsize my synopsis, but hopefully that won't be too much a problem.

And over 2,000 words for a query?!? That's insane! They might as well have sent you the whole mss. which means it would STILL have been rejected. Oh well. I guess some people just don't want to do the homework.

Good golly miss molly! 2,200 words??? How long was...

2008-09-02T14:25:50.704-07:00

Good golly miss molly! 2,200 words??? How long was their manuscript? Did you read the entire thing or just toss it?

I love this variation on query stats. I'd love to see them broken down in other ways, as well, just out of curiosity.

But which ones did you like? Average is just...av...

2008-09-02T14:16:24.768-07:00

But which ones did you like? Average is just...average. Your two favourites may have been 50 words, or 1024. A big kiss to you and your orange t-shirt.

Interesting, thanks for compiling and sharing this...

2008-09-02T13:54:55.330-07:00

Interesting, thanks for compiling and sharing this.

Oh, I like the new query stats. It gives me a bett...

2008-09-02T13:43:14.609-07:00

Oh, I like the new query stats. It gives me a better visual of where I fell in (luckily in the bold). Would definitely love to see what not to include in a query. I think my query is good but watch me be horribly, horribly wrong.