Writing the Perfect Query Blurb 

This is very true. I grow my stories, I don't plot them, so I have no idea what I've got until after it's done, and sometimes not even then.

Thanks so much! And yes, feel free to write the query in your own style, so long as it has all the required info

Either will be fine.

Whichever email you prefer would work fine

Do you want to include this info in your query? If not, chances are the agent won't even understand you aren't a native speaker. In this case, only the story will matter

I'm in the same situation. I decided to include the info in the query letter, because it's an essential detail they should know about, should they decide to work with me. But it's your choice if you want to include it or not!

@@christyush I think so, I want to include it because if an agent will choose my story to work with, he should know that I'm not a native speaker and this can cause some problems~ By the way, я носитель Русского, как и вы, полагаю~~

@@SiiKei I think it's right to include this information~ Because it's a business and agent should know such an important information about the person with whom he may decide to work with.

@@aneulbi3754 дааа) приветик) я, наверное, не буду про это явно упоминать) только если намекнуть)

You may already have an answer to this, but in case not....If the entire story is necessary to the bigger story line, cut it in half, make sure each half stands alone (i.e., has a complete plot arc and complete character arcs, even if the plot and characters aren't at their final point), and pitch the first one only as the opening to a series. 180k is actually too long for a debut epic fantasy by about 60k-70k words. See their other video about word counts. :) ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-vUIDgekFqVE.html

We usually recommend writing a query blurb as if it were the copy on the back of a book. So if your comps/other memoirs use third person, you might want to also do that!

Hi, I've heard your question being answered on another channel. Unfortunately, I cant think who said it at the moment. Anyway, that person said when you have a huge cast, pick the one that effects the story the most or has the most appearances (mindset) throughout your story. In the story I'm writing, I have 3 main characters. I made a tally mark of how many times I wrote in thier mindset. I saw I wrote one character mindset a few more chapters than my other 2. I hope this answers your question. Happy writing!

Hey! I've also heard this discussed a few times by authors, agents, and editors (at writing conferences mostly). There's effectively two answers I've heard regularly: 1. "You probably have one main character and a bunch of side characters and just don't realize it." This answer always sounds a little snobby to me (it implies that you don't know your own book) but there's something to be considered there nonetheless. If you have 9 characters who share equal "screen time" but two of them are mostly comic relief, one of them is a wise mentor character, and the other four are paired off into "important but sparring with each other for various forms of moral/physical superiority" then...well, you've basically rewritten the Lord of the Rings character dynamic, and the main characters of that were Frodo with Sam coming a close second (or the other way around, depending on personal opinion). 2. "If you actually have multiple main characters, focus your query on introducing one or two who are closely tied to the primary plot and discuss the others as unnamed companions." This is probably the route most people want to go (although it is not always the correct route). This means if you have (for example) a fantasy story about a D&D party (generally made up of 5-ish people with different skill sets who are all equally important to completion of the mission) you'll pick the one or two members of the party who are best representatives of why the party is going on their quest and say something like "Joe the Warrior has Goal X because Backstory Y, but Bob the Cleric has Conflicting Goal Z. When their longstanding band of adventurers is forced to combat Plot Problem A..." Except, you know, with something approaching original writing style. :) Hope that helps!

Chelsea & Jes make some good points. That said, there are other ways to approach this. I'd suggest you find a similar book with many main characters & read its blurb. From the back cover of The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley as an example: All of them are friends. One of them is a killer. During the languid days of the Christmas break, a group of thirtysomething friends from Oxford meet to welcome in the New Year together, a tradition they began as students ten years ago. For this vacation, they've chosen an idyllic and isolated estate in the Scottish Highlands--the perfect place to get away and unwind by themselves. They arrive on December 30, just before a historic blizzard seals the lodge off from the outside world. Two days later, on New Year's Day, one of them is dead. The trip began innocently enough: admiration of the stunning, if foreboding, scenery; champagne in front of a crackling fire; and reminiscences about the past. But after a decade, the weight of secret resentments has grown too heavy for the group's tenuous nostalgia to bear. Amid the boisterous revelry of New Year's Eve, the cord holding them together snaps. Now one of them is dead . . . and another one of them did it. Keep your friends close, the old adage goes. But just how close is too close? *** Note the words 'group' and 'friends'? This is another approach. Good luck.

I have a similar problem, a novel with 5 characters crucial to the plot, with three that deserved to be named. My story had one main character who set off a bunch of other characters, each on their own arc that had nothing to do with his, until they all came together at the end. I never could create a query hook for it, even though it was eventually published by a small press (that trusted me enough to never demand a query letter from me). I'm revising it now to be self-published, and I decided to write a different blurb for the back cover. That's where I determined that only three characters really needed a name The blurb can't be too long. One source you might check out about writing multi-character hooks is a book called Gotta Read It, by Libbie Hawker. Not very long, it mostly deals with how to write single character hooks, but towards the end it discusses techniques for stories with multiple protagonists. If your story is linear, the way most agents and publishers seem to prefer (given the way they describe the structure of the hook), it might work for you. Good luck.

Yes you can definitely have two couples!

​@@BookEndsLiteraryGreat. Thanks.

not usually, although occasionally some of our agents may offer query critiques for various reasons!

It can be confusing! A lot of words get mistakenly used interchangeably! But a synopsis is a full point-by-point summary of everything that happens in the book from beginning to end, and a blurb can refer to either: 1. the back cover-copy type summary, which only tells you the main details and the conflict to draw you in, or 2. a quote from another professional used on the covers of the book to advertise it (you might hear some authors say that they will "blurb" other authors' books, and this is what they are referring to!)

Hi! Yes, if you undertake major revisions to the blurb/query/manuscript (if the agent passed on the sample/partial/full) then you are almost always welcome to resubmit to the agents who passed!

@@BookEndsLiterary perfect, thank you.

LOL. Do you at least consider genre first?

so u just look at the cover?

I mean, I can't judge though, I do the same with movies :)

@@christyush I select with Genre mostly, sometimes reviews and when I have nothing specific in mind I ask the book seller to select for me. I stopped reading the back of the book after several disappointments. The blurb would be really good and the story would just be Meh. I also never select a book by its cover.

@@dollypop2022 I see! Though you're bound to learn something about the plot while reading reviews. True... Recently that's happened to me. Read the blurb of "Wilder Girls" and it was sooo enticing I wanted to read it right away. In my opinion, the blurb is better than the actual book by far :( There's nothing wrong with selecting books by their cover, though :D Pretty covers catch your eye