Querying
and pitching one’s work is a craft in itself. Books and hundreds of websites of
how-to are devoted to this craft and will greet a searcher.
The
bottom line is that pitching is competitive, and a pitch must stand out.
An
article I read got me thinking about a thornier matter. This
article suggests writers must pitch themselves (as in “I am the product”)
before getting into the work they are offering.
I
have to say this rubs me wrong. Nay, very wrong, especially for fiction,
where you can’t box the imagination and narrative powers by saying, “I did such and
such.” However, as wrong as it is, it’s also part of the truth regarding
successful pitching.
Most
how-to query formats say to start with the hook of the book and end with the
cook, i.e., the writer. The art of good hooking sentence/paragraph could fill library
shelves, and I have one small shelf of such in my room.
That’s
rational. That’s how it should work.
Apparently,
this isn’t how it works much of the time.
Of
course, if (as in the examples cited in
the post) the writer has won a Pulitzer or was the first to land an aircraft
upside-down, (the aircraft or the pilot being bottom up) this alone is a hook
of sorts. It gets attention. Sentence one will lead the publishing professional
to read the next and, eventually (hopefully), a request to see more. That’s what
pitching is about, after all.
But
few have such monumental statements to make about self, and most pitching would
wind up sounding like the “fun facts” many writers mistake for an interesting
bio. You know, “I finished a jar of jelly beans in eight minutes and won the
Jelly Queen title at the state fair” sort of nothings. I wrote a
post about this before.
So
what to do?
If
you won a Pulitzer, it’s worth considering the selling-of-you in the first
paragraph. I’m less inclined to agree with this for most of us, good hardworking
storytellers.
Story
comes first.
