Query Tips 5: Conference Etiquitte

1. When people ask you where you get your story ideas, tell the truth: you think most of them up while you're sitting on the toilet.


2. Tell agents how many rejections you've gotten. Challenge them to be see the potential their idiot colleagues missed.


3. Agents reading your query want to know who you are. Tell them about your failed marriage and your struggle with mental illness.


4. Demonstrate social-network prowess by posting your query on a Facebook fan page about yourself. E-mail agents a link to it.


5. Never assume readers are stupid, even though readers are stupid.


6. If you soak your query in blood and bury it by a crossroads at midnight, the devil will send you a form rejection in 4 to 6 weeks.


7.  The only way you can fail is if you stop trying. Or if you are a bad writer and your book is shitty.


8.  When you pitch at a conference, bring a jar of your own urine. Hand it to the agent and tell her it's proof you're drug free.


9. When you pitch at a conference, be sure to bring dental floss. Use it during the pitch. It shows you are conscientious.


10. You can foster an intimate, conversational tone during your conference pitch by lighting a joint and offering the agent a hit.


11. Cutting lines of blow with a Platinum AmEx card during your pitch makes you look rich and glam. Always offer the agent a bump.


12.  Good grooming is necessary because first impressions are crucial. Before you go to a conference, wax off all your pubic hair.


13. The best method for approaching an agent is from behind, with a rag soaked in chloroform.


14.  When calling to schedule a meeting about your fiction novel, talk only to the agent; you're too important to deal with assistants.


15. Not getting an agent doesn't mean you are a failure. It just means your writing sucks.


16.  Sometimes an agent rejects a manuscript because the author is not quite ready. Other times, the author is not quite sane.