200: September 2025 Q&A

 

Welcome to the September Q&A episode! Topics discussed include:

  • what to do after querying 80 agents with no offer 1:55

  • if you should include comp titles in your query letter 8:29

  • taking a book from 3 stars to 5 11:49

  • how to know when you're done editing 18:28

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September Q&A

Hi, friend. Welcome back to Your Big Creative Life Podcast. I'm Katie Wolf. Thanks for listening. This is our September Q&A episode. A reminder that if you would like to submit a question for me to answer like this on a future episode, you can do so at the link in the show notes. The last Tuesday of every month is a Q&A episode, and you can submit questions on writing, mindset, editing, querying, creativity, business, personal stuff, basically anything you want. So yeah, you can do that and I'll answer them for our next month, for our October episode. Yeah, let me think if there's anything I need to update y'all on. This is our 200th episode. And next week we're going to have a bit more of a like, I don't know. I was going to say like celebratory episode, but I guess it's not really celebratory. It's like sharing things I've learned about writing over the last 200 episodes and just some good takeaways that I hope will be helpful for y'all. And I'm also going to talk about my writing story a bit. So that'll be coming out next week. But yeah, it's wild. So thank you for listening to the podcast for 200 episodes. We're going to keep going. Okay, we have four questions to discuss this month, and a couple of them are about querying.

So I'm actually going to do those two first, and then we'll get to the other two. Okay, first question. This is the one, this is from a former client, actually. She put her name in here, but I'm not going to read out her name since it's anonymous. She, her question is, I've been querying for about 8 months and feel like my manuscript is so strong and polished. I've had two full requests and queried about 80 agents, but no offers so far. I'm feeling really discouraged and wondering if it's time to revise the book or just give up. So I just want to say, first of all, to this person's former client, hi. I'm so sorry that things have not been working out for you. And I get how frustrating and discouraging it can be when you're in the trenches of querying and just, it's not going the way that you hoped. Querying is fraught with rejection. Even if you end up finding an agent, you still have to usually, most of the time, go through a lot of rejection to get there. And the thing with querying, too, is there's no hard and fast rule about when to stop, when to pivot, when to revise. You kind of have to evaluate on a case-by-case basis. I edited this person's manuscript, and so I can tell you that I really thought that this person was ready. I feel like they had a solid book, a well-paced story, good conflict. Like, yes, there were suggestions that I gave her for sure to kind of beef it up and take the book from good to great, but like you're probably with the revised draft, we're in a good position. But this is the challenging thing.

Okay, before we, before we get into the things to evaluate, I just want to say like, this is one of the most frustrating and difficult things about an editor, about being an editor. The vast, vast, vast majority of my clients are indie authors, but I do have some authors who are querying to try to find agents and it's hard. I can with clients who are indie authors or people who are querying, like I can feel like, oh my gosh, I can't wait for this book to be a huge success. I can't wait for this to get published. I can't wait for yada, yada, yada. And then like the book just doesn't really hit or they're disappointed with book sales. Or if they're querying, they don't find an agent. And it's like, I just want to bang my head against the wall because I'm like, yes, I know I'm not an agent, but surely someone sees potential in this. Like I would read this. I think this is solid. But of course, it's not up to me. And that's one of the things that's really difficult as a book editor, that it's not just about writing a quote unquote good book. There's so many other factors that go into why an agent would say yes or no to a book. Like maybe it's just too similar to other books that are already on the market. And that's why you're getting a lot of passes from agents.

So it has nothing to do with the quality. It's just The book's too similar. Maybe the trend, if you're writing about a particular trope or a particular setting or a particular kind of book that's been trendy, maybe that trend has kind of passed. And so agents are not really, they're just seeing too much of that kind of thing in their inbox. I don't know. I'll just say it's really hard as an editor because all I can do is help someone and provide feedback, but I can't control agenting and querying and everything. So I'm, yeah, I'm frustrated on your behalf. But okay, here are the things to evaluate in terms of like what your plan should be. 80 agents is a good number of agents. I mean, I imagine there are probably some more that you could do, but honestly, if you've had, let me check, two full requests, and if I don't know if you've heard back from those two or not, but actually I guess my answer would be the same.

If you've only gotten 2 full requests after 80 queries, I would say it's time to tweak something. I would say that's an indication to tweak either your query letter and or I guess your manuscript and your opening pages, the full thing, whatever. Like, okay, so let's break this down. Normally, if you were to get a ton of full requests, like you had a really good request rate, but every single one of those agents was passing, that usually indicates that your query letter is working, your opening chapters are working, but there's something going on with the rest of the book that is leading agents to pass. So if you had had 25 full requests and all of them had passed, I'd be like, yeah, let's definitely look at the rest of the book. The fact that you've only had two makes me wonder if there's something that's not working with your query or maybe you're opening pages that is leading agents to pass right away and not even want to see the rest of it. So I would say, of course there's no hard and fast rule, but I would say maybe revise it. Yeah. if you've done 80, knowing that you can probably pull it, make some tweaks, make some adjustments, and then send it out again to query any remaining agents that you can find that you feel like would be good fits with that revised version.

So this doesn't have to mean the end of the road for you. I think there's probably still more agents that you could query. But of course, you're going to know that. You're going to know if you can find agents who are truly going to be good fits for your genre, the type of book, all that kind of stuff. It's, and in terms of a plan about like revising, There are a couple of options for how you proceed on this. You could just put it down for a while, withdraw it, not look at it for a bit, take a break, and then come back to it. If you suspect that there are things not working that you know need to be addressed, you could look at those things. If you've gotten any feedback at all from agents about like, yeah, I didn't really connect with this character, or the world building was a bit clumsy for me, or the voice wasn't strong enough. If there's something you can, something tangible from agents about why they're passing, maybe that's a place to start.

But I know that agents don't always give that feedback. So maybe this is an opportunity for some beta readers. I can't remember if this person used beta readers or not in their process before we work together, but, or maybe even, I mean, You can hire an editor to look at it again if you're really like just totally stalled and like, I don't know what to do with this. So yeah, I would say my two cents, again, no hard and fast rule, but my two cents would be to revise it and also look at your query letter and then you can send it back out. Yeah, but it sucks. I, yeah, it's tough. Querying is very, very tough. Tough, but I think there's probably a little bit more of a road for you before you decide to pivot and do something else with the book. Okay, next question: How oh wait, we're doing the query ones first. Do you need comps in a query letter? I've seen arguments for both yes and no. What I've always heard agents say is comps are very important and absolutely include like 2 comparable titles, but only if you can find good ones. Bad, like really bad comp titles are worse than having no comps at all.

So if you truly don't know and you truly can't find comps, then just don't include them. That's why there's kind of the yes or no about it. So for anyone who's not sure what this person is asking, part of A query letter is what you send to agents when you're querying and part of what's included in it is like a couple of comparable titles, comps just stands for comparable titles, to give the agent an idea of where your book would fit in the market, like where your book would fit in on the shelf. Readers of this book will also like my book. It helps the agent wrap their head around what your book is, tonally, vibely, I don't think that's really a word, but So you want to think about your book on the shelf and then the whole like readers of this will enjoy readers of this. The other things that are important about comp titles, pick either traditionally published titles or titles that were self-published but then got picked up by traditional publishing. Don't pick indie, like self-published titles. So traditionally published titles. And then also you want to pick titles that are published from the last like few years, three-ish years is best. And don't pick massive bestsellers.

So don't comp to Fourth Wing. I'm not even sure, actually, let me look when Fourth Wing was published. I can't remember when it first came out. But okay, 2023. So that's within three years, but it's massive. I've edited a number of client query letters this year that, and like multiple of them have comped to Fourth Wing. And I'm like, no, pull it out. Fourth Wing is just too big. Like everyone and their mother who writes fantasy is probably comping to Fourth Wing. So it's just not meaningful anymore. It's like people who would comp to Harry Potter or comp to Twilight. Like these books are so massive that it kind of just loses meaning and it doesn't really tell the agent much about your book. So yeah, no massive bestsellers. Pick the like three-ish years, that's best, maybe five years, and then do traditionally published titles.

Jane Friedman has a blog about querying, and she has an article or a blog post about finding comp titles. And she says that if you can't find any comp titles, like if you're doing research and you truly can't find any, you are probably getting way too specific with it and focusing on plot. Your plot does not have to match the plot of the books that you are using as comp titles. That's not exactly what it is. So you're probably just getting way, way, way, way, way too specific and being like, well, my book has this super complicated plot in an imaginary world. And so therefore I need to find a plot that matches this roughly in this kind of similar imaginary world, but that's not what it is. So yeah, that's what I would say. Do your homework, do your research. You will be able to find comp titles. But if you truly can't or you feel like you're really not sure and you think yours are probably bad, then just don't include them.

Okay, next question. How do you take a book from being a three-star book to a five-star book when you're writing? First, I just want to say that remember, reviews are subjective. I'm sure we've all had the experience of going to look at a review or like pulling up an Amazon listing for a book that you loved and seeing like it has shockingly low ratings and you're like, wait, I love that book. Or people who leave reviews will sometimes leave a review absolutely gushing about the book. Like this was my favorite book I read all year. It was incredible. I loved the characters. The writing was gorgeous. I didn't want it to end 3.5 out of five stars. Readers do that kind of stuff, which is fine. We're not here to police readers. It's fine. But I'm just saying that kind of illustrates the point that. rating systems are kind of like, it's arbitrary. And I don't know that we should really be like striving for a five-star book because so much of it is just subjective. Or people might rate your book three stars because they don't like the protagonist's name, you know? So just with that caveat and that understanding, but I get the gist of what you're asking. Like you're asking, how do you take a book that's good, that's fine to be like really, really, really good and great? And Some of this is going to depend a bit on genre.

For example, if you're writing romance, the love interest and interaction between the couple is extremely important to the story. Whereas if you don't have a love interest and that's not part of your story, you're writing in a different genre, then obviously that doesn't matter. So some of it's going to be genre specific. But just in general, I would say a very solid, well-paced plot, meaning no big plot inconsistencies. There's an arc to the story, beginning, middle, end. Catalyst, midpoint, climax, resolution in the structure. Well-paced, meaning it's not too slow, it's not rushing, it's just the sweet spot in the middle. Not too short, not too long. So this is where word count kind of does matter, right? Because of reader expectations, whether it's a traditionally published book or a self-published title. characters that are so strong and nuanced and complex. Strong meaning well-developed, not necessarily like physically strong or emotionally strong.

I just mean strong as in well-developed and thought out and everything. But yeah, complex characters who have agency and are working towards something in the book. Dialogue that sounds natural, feels authentic, doesn't feel stiff or forced. And then the right balance of dialogue with description, with action, with that all of these different pieces are well balanced so that the book isn't 98% dialogue, 1% description, and 1% action, because that's going to be, I guess if you're like writing very literary fiction and doing like an experimental type of thing, that could work, but for most genre fiction, that's just going to be a no-go. So having the right balance of that is, which is a bit of a stylistic thing, I know, because some writers have lots of dialogue, Some genres have lots of dialogue, so there's not an exact formula, but just thinking of that balance in different scenes, that it does feel balanced. And then that there's enough conflict to sustain an entire novel. And then if there's any sort of world-building element, like if it's any sort of speculative fiction, that the world-building is solid and makes at least some sense and doesn't have big inconsistencies in terms of the magic system or the rules. that it just feels immersive.

I think when people read a five-star book, they don't want it to end. They get attached to the characters. They want to live in the book. It produces some kind of emotional response. And I want you, just as an exercise, to think about books that you rate five stars. Whether you're reviewing or not, like I don't actually go on and review books very often because I'm just not, I'm not on Goodreads. And I don't leave a ton of actual reviews, so I don't do this very often. But if I were to, what books would I rate as five stars? So I want you to just sit, you can pause the episode and think about what books you've read recently that you would give five stars and see if you can articulate, like, what is it about those stories that was so five star worthy to you? Understanding that, again, some of this is a bit subjective, but like, that can help you pinpoint it. But just in terms of an editor looking at books that I think are really, really great, like 5 star worthy, that's... That's what I would say.

Oh, and I guess just one final note too. In a five-star book, you don't have to have the most beautiful prose, the most beautiful sentences to ever exist, but it has to be readable, it has to be polished. Because if you have a book that has an incredible plot, incredible characters, incredible world, incredible dialogue, but there's a lot of typos or inconsistent verb tense or a point of view that switches around and it shouldn't, those things are all going to detract for it. And then in that case, you could have a five-star book that would get knocked down a star or two because of that. So it is important to have a polished book because that does impact readability. So I think that's something that's important with a five-star read as well. But the ending part of your question was when you're writing, And I just want to remind you that the way that I suggest writers approach the process is to get the first draft out quickly and do it, just let it be messy before you go back to edit.

So when you're actually writing it, the characters might be kind of flat. The world building might not be that great. You might not have a ton of description. The dialogue might be stiff. That's okay. You're just getting the foundation down and then in editing you can go back and polish those things and really make it good. So I would say when you're writing isn't really the place to be thinking about like taking a book from three stars to five stars because that happens in the editing process because you're shaping what's there. So that's a little thing too. All right, final question. How do you know when you were done with your edits? This is a good question and difficult to answer, but I'm going to give you a few things that you can almost think of as like a checklist. So #1, the fact that you've done Have you done multiple rounds of editing? How many rounds depends. It depends on what kind of writer you are. It depends on how rough the first draft was, so there's no number, but at least several rounds of editing. This is not just like do one pass of editing and boom, it's done. So, number one, have you done at least a few rounds of self-editing? Number 2, have you let it sit, if possible, for at least a couple weeks? I know this is not always possible. I have indie authors who work with me. Like they hire me to edit their books and they publish like 3, four books a year.

 So they don't always have time. Like sometimes I'm editing a manuscript right now that's getting, it's the end of September when I'm recording this and it's getting published like the beginning, like the second week of October and the person just finished it like in August. So there's not like they're on a very tight timeline and I understand that's not always possible for people. But if you can, if you don't have that deadline, Have you let it sit for at least a couple of weeks? Number 3, this is kind of like a how do you know when you're ready for the next step part, but I would say it's important to let at least one other person read it and give you feedback because you might need to do more editing based on suggestions from other people, whether that is an editor that you hire or just beta readers, critique partners, your writing group, right? Because you can think, okay, I'm done. I'm going to let someone else read it. And then a couple of people point out that you've got a big inconsistency, that something's just not working. So then you realize, oh, I've actually got to do some more. So that's important. And then four, there gets to be a point in editing for most of us. where the things that we're changing in the book, we've changed all the big picture stuff, we've changed all the plot stuff, the character stuff, we've made all that better. We've gone through and polished the sentences and looked at word choice and grammar, if that's something that you're editing. And then you're just, then there's like this thing that happens where you kind of go through an editing round of looking at the manuscript from beginning to end, and you're just like tweaking little things that don't really matter. Like, If you're changing, I don't know, if your character goes to a coffee shop and they order a latte and they sit at a table by the window, you decide to have them sit next to the barista counter instead. Like not for any particular purpose. It doesn't matter. It doesn't signify anything, but you're just like, oh, that's, I should just change this. And it doesn't matter.

That's not making the story any better. It's just making the story different. And if you're at that point where you're just tweaking little things and it's not really making a difference because all of the other stuff is so polished and so done, then I would say that's probably a sign that you're done or close to done because we could endlessly tweak those little things. And one final thing I'll say is do a gut check and try to get honest with yourself about your mindset around it because some of us can use editing as a way to prolong what's next or to put it off because we're worried or we're nervous or whatever. For some people that's querying, they want to just like take their time and be, get it absolutely perfect. And so even though their manuscript might be super polished, super ready to go, They just keep editing for another three, four, five, six months and tweaking word choice or little things because they just can't let it go because they're nervous to query or publish if you're self-publishing. So do a gut check and get honest with yourself to see if you get a feeling of like, oh yeah, I think I'm kind of just procrastinating on what's next or I'm procrastinating on like sending this to beta readers because I'm really nervous. our books are never going to be perfect. Which, I know, shocker, right? But yeah, they're never going to be perfect. But of course, the other side of that though is you have to remember, especially if it's your first book, this is your debut. This is, it's important. So you do want to get it as good as it can possibly, possibly, possibly be. because you only get one shot to either publish, submit your work to a small press, to query, whatever it is.

So yeah, that's what I'll say. I think I have a podcast episode about this as well, but honestly, I don't really remember what I say in that episode, but I have a feeling that it's like everything I just said, but it might be a little longer if you want like more explanation of what I just said, basically, but I'm pretty sure that's what's in that episode. It's like how to know when you're done, writing your, or done editing your book, or maybe even tips for self-editing or something like that. But yeah, I think that's it. I can, so I used to be, when I wrote my first book, I was on the side of... agonizing over little things and changing little details because I wanted my book to be perfect. Even though rationally, intellectually, I knew it was never going to be perfect, of course, but I still was tweaking it for probably longer than I should have. But now I almost have the opposite problem where like, well, I guess it's a little different though, because when I write a book, like my last book that I wrote last fall, I wrote it and then did some editing on it. Of course, like I did a couple of rounds myself of editing it. But then I'm sending it to an agent. So it's a little bit different because it's not like it's going out to on submission or it's not like I'm publishing it right after that. It's just letting someone else read it. So I guess that's a little different.

But I was going to say, if anything, I can be too, I can jump the gun a bit because I'm so excited. So that can happen sometimes too. Like maybe he'll do a gut check and realize, yeah, I still need to keep working on this. I'm just so excited. to query or publish it or whatever. Okay, that is all of the questions that we have for this month. Again, if you want to submit a question, you can do so in the link in the show notes. It's just a little Google form and you put your question and it's anonymous. You can ask about anything you want and I will answer it for you next month. All right, I hope that was helpful. Thank you to everyone who submitted this month. And I will See you next week. Thank you so much for listening.

Katie Wolf