How I Wrote My Query Letter
Hi, dear reader! I haven’t made a blog post in a while, so I figured it was time for me to make another one. As you can see from the title, I’m going to share the query letter that got me my agent (and four other offers) for my YA thriller, in the hopes that it will help you in your querying journey (or simply give you more information about my book if you’re nosy like me!)
A couple of small notes before we dive in: I didn’t have a lot of people look over my query letter before I started querying. However, I had written about three other complete query letters before this one, and by then I was pretty sure I knew what I was doing. If you’re unsure about how to write a good query or what makes a query letter great, I’d recommend reading the blog posts over at Query Shark and Shelby Mahurin’s blog post about querying her debut novel SERPENT & DOVE. They were super helpful to me as I was perfecting my sub package, and I really recommend both blogs as resources.
(One small tip: I like to approach query letters by including three body paragraphs about the actual book that build up CHARACTER, CONFLICT, and STAKES, with another paragraph for housekeeping (this includes your TITLE, category, genre, comps if applicable), and a final paragraph for your bio. For more info about this, I’d once again recommend looking into the links above.)
Also, I want to note that I broke a few small rules with my YA thriller query. For one, I included the themes of my book (something which is usually frowned upon) in it, but I intentionally did this because I really wanted to highlight the fact my story had #ownvoices LBGTQ+ rep, since the MC is pan like me. I also kept my bio short and simple, but I did try and personalize the first paragraph of my query to each agent where I could.
I also want to note that in every query letter I sent, I wrote my salutation as “Dear [Agent First and Last Name].” This was because I didn’t want to accidentally misgender any of the agents I was querying, and I definitely recommend doing this in your own query letter, along with putting your own pronouns in your sign-off if you’re comfortable. Make sure to spell the agent’s first and last name correctly, though! :)
Now. Without any further ado, here it is: the query letter that got me my agent!
MY QUERY LETTER
Dear [Agent First and Last Name],
Seventeen-year-old amateur detective Iris Blackthorn hasn’t placed much trust in the Hillwood police department ever since they failed to find her older sister a year ago. Instead, Iris counts on herself and her two-employee-strong agency, operating from the shadows to track everything from cheating boyfriends to stolen essays. So when Heather Nasato—Iris’ ex-girlfriend, the Blackthorn Agency’s most valuable client, and the creator of a locally notorious podcast about Iris’ vanished sister—goes missing, Iris wastes no time in taking up the case. After all, the professionals have already botched locating one Hillwood girl.
At first, Iris sees Heather’s disappearance as a second chance—one with a time limit. With her eighteenth birthday only a month away and her sister’s old detective assigned to Heather’s case, Iris risks jail time if she gets caught interfering with another investigation as a legal adult. But then the Blackthorn Agency unravels something sinister: Heather didn’t vanish by accident. Someone wanted her gone.
Now, Iris and her friends must question everything they thought they knew about the town they call home before whoever made Heather disappear comes for them, too. Because with every step closer the sapphic teen trio comes to uncovering Heather’s secret, the closer they get to the people willing to kill to protect it. And with the clock running and threats looming around every corner, Iris must decide: fight the system to get the justice she couldn’t for her sister, or abandon the case of her life before she loses her own.
Told from Iris’ point-of-view with interspersed transcripts of Heather’s podcast episodes, HOW TO FIND A MISSING GIRL is an 80,000-word YA thriller that combines the whip-smart amateur detectives from A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson with the spunky format of I Killed Zoe Spanos by Kit Frick. It contains #ownvoices LGBTQ+ elements, themes of found family, and sharp-edged girls who often do more harm than good.
When not researching methods of murder, I’m a full-time student who drinks way too many cups of coffee.
Thank you for your time and consideration,
Victoria Wlosok (she/her)
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@xvictoriawrites
