Upmarket Puns

I’m currently wavering on whether it’s a good time to send my literary fiction novel out for submission. All I keep hearing and seeing in my research is that, in general, the publishing industry is having a very hard time at the moment and the process is either very slow or just impossible for lots of books.

The problem is, most of the industry talk seems to be about more commercial fiction, especially YA/MG, which isn’t my demographic and so I’m wondering if anybody has info on what the literary/upmarket fiction submissions would be like at the moment?

Thanks in advance!

Dear agent x,

CELESTIAL SPRING is an upmarket fantasy for adults, complete at 95k words. It features a sprawling world inspired by my own Taiwanese heritage plus other Sinitic cultures. A standalone with series potential, my book will appeal to fans of THE JASMINE THRONE and POPPY WAR.

It was the season of dying stars. After failing her sworn duty as Celestial Guardsman, Yingyue escapes to the cosmos as a fugitive of the Heavenly Empire. Riding on the back of a dragonhorse, Yingyue nearly dies in a stellar storm until Renhu, an unassuming worker from the moon colonies, comes to her rescue.

Despite numerous losses, the Third Moon rebels strive to resurrect a decades-long cause. When Renhu learns of Yingyue’s prodigious swordsmanship, she offers her a chance to fight against the regime that had sentenced her to a cruel death. But Yingyue has another idea. If she finds and captures the infamous Tiger Witch hidden among the rebels, then she can restore her esteemed title and take back the glorious life she’s lost. To catch the tiger, however, Yingyue must betray the very person who saved her life.

While tensions rise between celestial bodies, the runaway prince Yanhui struggles to contain a god’s soul inside him. His journey towards freedom is cut short by a fanatical general, who seeks to uncover the secret to the prince’s power—a power that can erase anything from existence, a power to change reality itself.

As Third Moon rebels rise against the general’s army, Yanhui’s only hope for escape lies with his former protector—the failed Guardsman herself, Yingyue. If she frees the prince from the army’s control, she loses all chance of redemption in the eyes of the Empire. But if she fails, she risks giving the Empire an unimaginable power that could wipe out millions of innocent lives.

I am a writer of Filipino and Taiwanese descent. In [YEAR], I graduated from xxx University with a bachelor's degree in economics. I am currently unemployed. You may find me on twitter, where I go by my pen name xxx (@xxx).

Hello r/pubtips! I tried my best to make my book sound as marketable as possible. I couldn’t fit the whole plot, so I picked out the barest bones, but what if interested agents go into my book expecting something different? Dang, I don’t know. Hopefully they’ll like my pages either way. I tend to overthink thi

The room's finished to a high standard, every possible amenity, etc. but no kettle? Then being told by management they aren't provided, and to visit one of the numerous caffes in the area?

How is this even possible? I'd understand malfunctioning WiFi, no hot water, possibly even no electricity, but how are humans supposed to function without a cuppa?

Even the dodgiest youth hostels aren't this cruel/sadistic, what bizarre alternate universe is this?!

Hi all,

Just wondering what's the difference here? Trying to figure out how best to pitch a query and it seems to me that there is a lot of overlap between these categories.

Thanks!

Hello again! Many thanks to those who looked and provided feedback for my first attempt at rewriting the query letter. I tried my darndest to incorporate any of the feedback to make this better. My main concern is tying everything together into a nice present, so to speak. Another thing I want to mention is that the manuscript has four POVs. I was informed to focus on the main one of the four, but if it doesn't work as presented below, please let me know as well.

Many thanks in advance for whatever feedback and/or constructive criticism y'all provide!

>Dear (agent name),
>
> Tammy Mallard works her dream job as a radio DJ and has a passionate hobby of spotting storms with her father. Her job turns into a nightmare when a manager starts to sexually harass her. With the help of her father, she sets up a case against her manager and plans to report it. But before she can, she loses her father in a tragic accident.
>
> It’s been seven months since that fateful day and it’s supposed to be a normal Monday. After months of grieving and coping, Tammy is ready to report the sexual harassment she’s still dealing with. But nature, both the human and the weather kind, have different plans in mind. Her boss doesn’t believe her and dismisses it, leaving her to wonder if she should leave or always live in fear of her next shift. To assuage the rising anxiety, battling thoughts of having to find a new job, she and her best friend Paula decide to spend the afternoon spotting a storm that, unbeknownst to them, is about to give birth to a tornado that will threaten everything that they hold dear, including the job Tammy has grown to dread.
>
> Not in the Wind, an upmarket historical fiction novel complete at 83,000 words, follows Tammy along with Paula, Rosalind, and Joanna as they struggle to deal with being misunderstood and mistreated. Twister meets Elizabeth Wetmore’s Valentine in this story about the power of female friendship in the midst of chaos.
>
> I’m currently a Senior Provider Services Representative at (employer) and this is my first novel. I’m a card-carrying member of the Writers’ League of Texas and recently attended their Agents and Editors UnConference. I’ve had poetry and flash fiction published at websites such as Maudlin House and The San Antonio Current.
>
> I’m reaching out

Hello all,

I would love feedback on this revised query. The comments on my last draft were immensely helpful.

Dear [AGENT],

The Antarctic glaciers are melting and the krill are dying, but that’s not Josie’s problem. She’s been focused on keeping herself and her daughter, Louise, safe in Santa Barbara. Now that Louise is an adult in college, Josie is starting to relax—a little.

When Josie learns Louise is joining her father Peter’s research trip to study an Antarctic glacier, she panics. Peter attacked Josie before she learned she was pregnant, and she has often regretted letting him be part of Louise’s life, but never more than now. Soon, Josie is talking her way onto her best friend’s trip to study Antarctic krill.

Josie’s friend insists she’ll first need to make herself invaluable, but becoming a krill expert isn’t easy for a middle-aged realtor. Josie has to relinquish control over her business to make time to train. Cleaning krill tanks is gross, and the graduate student who instructs her is the first man she’s worked with in twenty years. Plus Louise is furious with Josie for following her to Antarctica. It’s almost enough to make Josie decide to stay home.

Then Josie discovers Peter has two weaknesses—he has been bullying a student and some of his work is controversial. She tries to use this information to derail his project, but her efforts backfire and her friend’s lab is targeted, instead.

Now there’s no way around it: Josie’s going to Antarctica. It’s that or trust Louise to keep herself safe from crevasses, storms, and Peter’s temper. But the last time Josie fought a man, she lost, and she’s not sure she’d do better in another round.

TO THE END OF THE WORLD is an upmarket novel of 95,000 words. It may appeal to readers of Kate Hope Day and [OTHER].

I am a Californian with a doctorate in Marine Biology, and I currently live in Paris where I have been working on my novel. In 2005, I spent three months in Antarctica, and my experience inspired me to send Josie on her own character-testing southern adventure.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

[NAME]

ORIGINAL Query

Dear [AGENT NAME],

I am a huge fan of many authors on your list, including [AUTHOR NAME/S] and I am hoping to interest you in my upmarket novel, TO THE END OF THE EARTH AND BACK AGAIN, which is complete at 95,000 words. Thank you in advance for considering my work.

Josie’s daughter is going to Antarctica; of course she is.

Josie has work

This is my first attempt at crafting a query after living and breathing Query Shark examples for the past few months. Here goes!

Dear (agent name),

Terry Booker hates nothing more than shiny, happy people who waltz through the mist of existence under the mistaken belief that they worked for their privileged position in life. She is thirty years old, single, pregnant and working in retail. She spends her days trying to cling to the whimpering spark of hope that is at risk of being completely extinguished by the wrath of creatures that the retail world calls ‘customers’. She understands quite poignantly that life is not fair and is worried that, pretty soon, her unborn child will too.

Lara McCullagh believes that you can attain anything you truly want in life with a little hard work and kindness. Or she used to. After three miscarriages, she would happily give up everything she has ever achieved for the chance to become a mother. She spends hours each night staring into the room that would have been her baby’s nursery, imagining the ghosts of her children that were never born. She is starting to realize that maybe you can’t always get what you want.

When these two women bump into each other after over a decade, they each discover something they were not expecting. Lara is committed to helping Terry find a new job and become the mother she wants so desperately to be, even as she watches her own dreams of motherhood float away. This may be Terry’s opportunity to break out of a cycle of poverty, but it will require accepting help from a woman who does not understand that the privilege Lara enjoys is the very force pushing Terry into an ever-deepening hole.

There is always someone who takes for granted the thing you want most.

The Missing Piece is upmarket/women’s fiction, 82,000 words, and would appeal to fans of Emily Giffin’s “First Comes Love” and Colleen Hoover’s “Regretting You”.

I’m a Human Resources Manager who holds a BA in Psychology. The endlessly fascinating antics of human beings keep me entertained. And gainfully employed. This would be my debut novel.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

(Contact info)

LLL, FTP.

I haven't actually finished this book yet, but I have a query letter class coming up in a few weeks and I would love to not embarrass myself too much. Any comments welcome. I know I have a lot of revisions before this is submittable.

__________________________

Dear {Agent},

{some personalization reason} recommended that I reach out to you about my recently finished novel. Hell of a View tells the story of a young software engineer’s impulsive relocation to Switzerland and her subsequent discovery that even the most beautiful places have a darkness to them.

In shiny, pine-scented Bellevue, Washington new college grad and perpetual fish-out-of-water Charlotte Smith is discovering that a fat tech paycheck can buy you a spot in a luxury high rise with a view for miles, but can’t get you out of the homogenous horde on the ground.

A shared eye roll at an endless standup meeting kicks off a romance with Daniel Stucki, a handsome consultant from the Zürich office who validates Charlotte’s growing disdain for the shallowness of the city. When he is called home on family business he makes her a tantalizing offer: marry him and relocate to his rural Swiss hometown. Dazzled by his stories of torchlit tobogganing and geranium-flanked Alpine vistas, Charlotte makes the first irrational decision of her life and accepts.

But no number of Sound of Music views or wine-soaked fondue nights can shield Charlotte from the realities of immigrant – auslander – life in a country whose valleys hide more than garden variety xenophobia, domestic horror, and heartbreak.

Hell of a View is complete at 85,000 words. The dry, detached humor of the protagonist as she navigates her international plight will appeal to readers who enjoyed Where’d You Go Bernadette, My Year of Rest and Relaxation, and Hausfrau.

For seven years I was a software engineer in {city} at a leading multinational tech company and a few startups. I have studied creative writing at {small liberal arts college with little name recognition} and {well known literary center}. Hell of a View, completed as I contemplated my own rash international move in anticipation of the 2020 election, is my first novel.

May I send you the manuscript?

Kind Regards,

Ajaxifyit

Thanks to everyone who commented on my first pass. Based on agent feedback I made some substantial changes to the beginning of the book, which has necessitated changes to the query. Thanks for looking!

Rosealie is a recent college graduate, curious to a fault and trying to rebuild her life after a devastating break up. Amelia is a jaded caseworker, stuck in the same job for decades. The only thing they have in common is that they’re both dead.

After a car accident, Rosealie arrives in the Life Imbalance Modification and Betterment Office, screaming and wild. In the moments after her death, she saw visions of her past lives and deduced that she’s a pawn in a centuries-long game. Amelia, the lead caseworker in LIMBO, is having a terrible day. It’s the 45th anniversary of her death, and fed up, she takes the simplest route to shutting Rosealie up: a Memory Wipe.

Both women are running from something; Amelia from the sin she swears she didn’t commit, and Rosealie from her stalker ex, Max, who followed her into the afterlife. They form a tenuous friendship, with Rosealie acting as therapist and Amelia as bodyguard. Max relentlessly pursues Rosealie. Someone––or something––is helping him, and hindering Rosealie and Amelia. The women painstakingly piece together Rosealie’s last day, obliterated by the Memory Wipe, and discover that she and Max are part of a fated relationship that just happens to be Heaven’s favorite reality show. They must convince Max that the cycle is corrupt and that there cannot be love without freedom, or they may be trapped––Rosealie in an endless relationship and Amelia in her own denial––forever.

NEVEREST is the book that would result if Celeste Ng and Alix Harrow teamed up to rewrite a genderbent Dante’s PURGATORIO. It is complete at 105,000 words. It casts the afterlife as a dysfunctional bureaucracy with whimsical punishments. It contains cultural commentary, a diverse cast, and a story about a love that lasted through generations––even though it shouldn’t have.

I am a [Job] and a Dante dilettante. For several years I have been a member of [Writing Center], and I have attended [conference]. Thank you for your time and consideration of my work.

Hi all,

I know it's been a while but I thought I would share my revised version. I'm lucky enough to have a friend who's an agent and she went over my query with me. I didn't take all of her advice but I thought some of it would be useful to pass on. She moved my title, genre, and word count to the first paragraph. She also said the a query typically should refer to the first 50 or so pages of the book, but she suggested that for my story I should hint at the mystery that's uncovered at the midpoint. She also didn't mention comps, though I didn't ask. And lastly, what surprised me the most was how quickly she went through it. It really showed me that as much as we should be careful and painstaking when writing queries, they're reading them looking for specific things and not dissecting them for flaws.

Current version. I'd love to hear your feedback. My current concern is length.

Dear [agent first and last name],

I’m writing to introduce ANNABEL RISLEY, an 83,000 word upmarket novel told from four perspectives. I chose to query you because [personalization].

Annabel is a 14-year-old seething ball of angst rebelling against her oblivious parents and the monotony of her Los Angeles suburb. In other words, she’s a teenager. But after she stays out all night for her first party, she overhears her parents commiserating about her adoption and discovers her life is a lie.

At first, Annabel gets nowhere. It’s 1982, the time of punk, Reagan, and Dallas, and her adoption is closed. She has no more right to her “parents’” names than a stranger on the street. A DCFS worker tells her to be grateful for what she’s got, but instead she sees her parents in a new light. No wonder they never understood her. No wonder she’s always felt alone.

She grows more reckless: sleeping with her boyfriend, sleeping with his best friend, dumping their clothes in the pool when they ignore her, and tormenting the neighbor who first let the secret slip when Annabel was too young to understand. Her accessory in all this is Tammy, a shy biracial transplant from New York who has a secret of her own.

Annabel’s mother ignores this less-than-perfect version of her, solely focused on a new surgery that promises to whisk fat away in an afternoon. Her father hides and drinks. But then Annabel breaks into the neighbor’s house and he decides to find out where she came from.

All it takes is a guilty social worker to confess a secret none of them suspected: Annabel's bio parents are a mas

This is long, and I'm not sure on comps yet.

I tried to include the pertinent information on all four main characters--they all, basically, get equal treatment in the novel (with Mark a bit more than anyone else).

Thanks in advance for any feedback!

Dear [Agent],

I am sending you my query for ANSWERS IN THE NEW ECONOMY, an upmarket novel complete at 85,000 words.

answers.cn is a website that can provide the guaranteed correct answer to most any question asked, but for a sometimes massive or dangerous price. With four alternating points of view, ANSWERS IN THE NEW ECONOMY follows four characters inextricably linked to one another, and to the website.

Mark is a troubled but ambitious and highly innovative man, living in the shadow of the expectations of his abusive and money-obsessed father. With powerful, but sometimes misleading, psychic abilities from a young age, he founds answers.cn. When he begins to lose his psychic abilities, his grasp on his legacy, his identity, and reality itself, begins to unravel.

Leslie, an early client of answers, becomes a minor, and then major, figure in anarchist and deep resistance activism. She joins a movement that aims to overthrow the contemporary capitalist world order, whilst toying with an ambiguously problematic addiction to stimulants.

Omar Darien, or OD, is the payment collector for the site. A first generation immigrant and Mark’s best friend from childhood, he struggles to find his place in his family and the world at large, eventually becoming drawn into a life of criminal pursuits.

Christiane is Mark’s devoted assistant, who has worked answers for five years. She is young, plucky and brave, always pragmatic, and when answers is on the verge of collapse due partly to an inconceivable betrayal by OD, she is willing to do anything to save the website, and Mark—and to win his heart.

I have been teaching secondary English and Humanities courses in schools in Canada and China since 2008. My story “[Title]” was long-listed for the CBC Literary Prize in [year], and my non-fiction has appeared in The Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail under the pen name [pen name].

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,

xzjaj

Hi again. On my first attempt, I got only one person to give a critique, so there wasn't a lot to work with. But the feedback was very good and I tried to address it in my second version. I didn't change the structure, because the main problem seemed to be my word choices when it came to MC. I hope this is better, but I welcome more feedback.

As always thank you very much in advance. I can't wait to hear (read =) ) what you think.

QUERY.

Sonya, a blunt and curious Ukrainian student, is fascinated by riddles and prone to bad choices. When she goes to the US with an exchange summer program, she soon meanders alongside credit card theft and drug dealing ventures. Her first bad choice, to kick off summer fun, is Vlad, a careless Russian boy seeking adventures. As Sonya befriends him, the two come across Freddie, a charismatic stranger shrouded in secrecy.

Every foreign student in the tiny town wishes to perpetuate their summer abroad. Freddie offers his help with chasing the American dream. Infatuated with their new acquaintance, Vlad and Sonya learn about Freddie’s unorthodox ways of making cash. What started as a childish attempt to amuse themselves comes with the price tag a student ends up paying with their life. Dazed but not disheartened, Sonya must solve her most intricate riddle to date—the riddle of Freddie—to safeguard her international friends and make the right choice at last.

[TITLE] is an Upmarket Contemporary Novel (75,000 words) about foreign students tackling a whole new world while withstanding culture shocks and just a sprinkle of a broken heart. [comps and bio]

Hi All, I would love feedback on this query letter. Thanks for your time!

Dear [AGENT],

I am writing to you because I love [author you represent], and I’m hoping to interest you in my upmarket novel, TO THE END OF THE EARTH AND BACK AGAIN, which is complete at 95,000 words. Thank you in advance for considering my work.

Josie’s daughter, Louise, is going to Antarctica; of course she is.

Josie has worked so hard to assure their safety in Santa Barbara: she bought a nice house with an alarm system, and traded running outdoors for video workouts at an all-women’s gym. She chaperoned Louise’s tennis tournaments and spied on her outings with her dad. And after all that, Louise is placing herself in harm’s way. If only she would disinherit her sense of adventure, the way Josie has.

By joining her father’s research trip to the bottom of the earth, Louise will be traveling to an extreme environment with an extreme narcissist. Josie has never told Louise what her father is capable of; what kind of mother would? But now Louise, Josie learns, believes she is going to help her father save the planet from glacial melting, and has already been working in his lab for months; she even refers to Antarctica as The Ice, she’s so in-the-know. How long before Louise experiences who her father really is? With tensions between mother and daughter already high, Josie will have to figure out how to keep her daughter safe from ten thousand miles away.

When Josie’s best friend, another Antarctic researcher, refuses to keep an eye on Louise, Josie knows what she must do. She’s always done anything to protect her daughter, but to do so now, she’ll have to take a risk, herself. After twenty years of not working with men, not dating, and not taking Louise camping, Josie is going to Antarctica, too.

TO THE END OF THE EARTH AND BACK AGAIN is a novel about the ways trauma can permeate our lives and what happens when we peel off our protective layers so we can come back to ourselves. It may appeal to readers of domestic fiction with an adventurous spirit, such as works by Maria Semple, Delia Owens, and J. Courtney Sullivan. I would be thrilled and grateful for the opportunity to send you a partial or full manuscript.

I am a Californian with a doctorate in Marine Biology, and I currently live in Paris where I have been working on my novel and attending writing workshops, when not attempting to help my two daughters with their French homework. In 2005, I spent three months in