Christine Kelly Reads and Writes

I was inspired by an editor from Sourcebook, who came and gave a talk back in June 2024 to The Purcell Agency writers. She did a great segment on what are red flags when she’s looking at submissions and I wanted to do the same.

Here are a few red flags I see in my inbox that will likely be a quick pass from me:

** Please note that even if I do immediately note the red flag, I do read to be sure I have a sense of your pitch, if it’s for me, if I want you to re-query me once the flag is fixed, or if I can help provide more actionable feedback.

RED FLAGS:

• Word Count
  • This above all else is almost an immediate no. Many times I’ll read the pitch and ask to re-query once it’s within the standard word count for the genre.
  • Here is a great resource for you to reference if you are unsure if your word count is too long.
• Wrong query format.
  • So many times I get a pitch that says, “This book is great! It touches on themes of x, y, and z!”. Wonderful! So glad you wrote a book you love! But…I need to know what’s it about.
  • Here is my blog post about how to format your query. Without knowing what your book is, I’m not sure if I’m even a good fit, or if the story is for me.
• Not for me
  • There are so many wonderful people who ask questions to clarify my “not for me” portion of my MSWL, or generally stick to what I’m looking for. But if you pitch me something not on my MSWL, I will be passing since I will not be the best fit for your book.
  • Here is my MSWL.
• Not necessarily red flags, but a few things I have noticed going through queries
  • Lack of stakes. I will admit, I am someone that generally likes high stakes, meaning that there is a lot for the main character to lose. Inately, some story premises will have high stakes immediately (think if they have to do something to save the world), but many times stories like Romances will have lower stakes. While I do like internal stakes (will she learn to love herself?), I also like external stakes (will she make it to the wedding in time!?).
  • Low curiosity or tension in the first pages. I need to want to keep reading and feel the *need* to request more pages. Many times, I don’t have that. We need to be wondering what will come next? Sprinkling smaller questions that has us eager to turn the page. Many times it does….
• Backstory/info dumps
  • Many times first pages are too much informing us what has happened, how we got to where we are, and filling in information that can be found out later. I don’t need to know details listed to me. I can deduce that through interactions, dialogue or even finding out in later chapters. We don’t need it all up front. It will drag pacing and you’ll lose readers because it will feel like we’re reading something more academic or journalistic rather than a story, escaping into a different world. Which also can tie into…
• Telling versus showing.
  • So many times backstory, and additionally world building in the first pages will rely on telling the reader a lot of what we can learn in showing. Again, this will be something we can learn in dialogue, or we can understand from how the character acts (they’re nervous around this certain person because they keep twisting their rings and their heart beats like a hummingbird).
  • This is a great resource to help you identify if you’re struggling with this.

I hope this will help explain why I passed, as well as explain why I have been passing on what I’ve been passing on. As I mentioned, I have been seeing a lot of this and I want to help everyone learn where they may need a bit more focus.