Oh how I Love Query Rejections!

Ok, for those of you who are currently bemoaning the querying process and the rejections you're getting (hopefully more acceptances than rejections), here's a quick list of why searching for a job is ten times WORSE than looking for an agent (and not just because your entire ability to live rests on looking for a job)

5)  Query letter responses are quick, even if they're negative.  They're the equivalent of a great phlebotomist knowing how to give you the shot and get out quickly.  Still sucks, but it's fast.  Job hunting is like a phlebotomist driving a needle in, searching for a vein, twisting the needle, pulling it out, trying a different arm, twisting it around some more, and finally hitting a vein to pull a pint or two of blood.

4)  Query letters are cut and dry - you either have a good story and present it well or you don't.  Interviewers for a job like to trip you up with goofy questions and absurd situations.  Imagine an agent saying "ok, tell me about the one time you completely screwed up a chapter and had to revise it.  What would you have done differently?"

3)  There are thousands of people who can tell you how to write a query letter, but thanks to the blogosphere most of the advice is free and some will even critique it for you for free.  Contrarily, the internet is filled with vampires preying on the exposed throats of those without a job, and thus, no money.  And they want to be paid.

2)  Query letters usually get a response.  Job apps and submissions get sucked into a black hole, sent backwards in time to the Jurassic period, are fossilized and then reviewed by a neanderthal man who then buries the results only to be dug up by your email server millions of years later...   Ok, that might be a slight exaggeration.

1)  Query letters and stories can be revised to be more appropriate.  Heck, novels can be entirely rewritten if necessary to land an agent.  You can't go back in time and redo your entire career.  If I could, I'd go back and be an agent.


Oh, and I'm NOT bitter.  I'm very optimistic.  Seriously.  :D

See the smile?