On time, early, or just plain late

There are people who query too soon and there are people that query too late. Let’s face it: both are bad. It’s all about querying at exactly the right time.

For some people, the excitement of the project gets them querying too soon. And how fun is it to rein in that excitement? Psht. Not nearly as fun as letting it roam free!

Others (*cough*ME*cough*) want to be completely prepared before querying. When you make a goal to constantly learn and improve your craft, it kind of also means that you can constantly do another round of revisions and apply what you’ve learned. If YOU are always getting better, you can always make YOUR BOOK better. Same goes with the query and the synopsis. Plus there’s platform. Agents like platform. Maybe you should spend more time on that...

So there’s this little dude on one shoulder. He says, “You don’t want to waste that ONE CHANCE you get to query an agent! What if the agent most perfect for you— the one who would totally get your book and be able to get it into the hands of the perfect editor— passes because even though it was SO CLOSE, it wasn’t all the way there?”

And you say, “I know, right?”

Then the dude on the other shoulder says, “Come on already! What are you waiting for? The stars to align? All the fear of not being 100% ready to just disappear? Someone to kick you in the hind end? YOU have to kick you in the hind end!”

You sigh and say, “I know, right?”

Have you ever felt that way? Where do you stand— haven’t queried yet, queried early, queried late, or queried right on time?

Got any fears? Gems of wisdom? Please share!
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