THE CAREER NOVELIST
And that was how I came to spend an entire weekend in a roomy,
blue-curtained cubicle listening to pitches.
That may not be everyone's idea of a good time, but for me it was
fascinating. In addition to hearing a number of good story ideas, I
was also able to spend three days studying new writers' pitches—
and their pitching errors.
Some pitches worked better than others. Why? Before answering
that question, let me address the skeptics. Some writers think that
the pitch does not matter very much. They feel that the only pur-
pose of a pitch is to get people to read their stuff. If no one bites,
well, that just means that their pitch needs to be louder, faster, or
funnier, right?
A pitch does more than just grab attention. It says a lot about
you, too. It may say that you are serious, or it may hint that you are
a hothead. Given the avalanche of material that thunders into
Manhattan every day, is it not worth refining your pitch so that it
gives the right impression?
In case you are still skeptical, let me say a bit more about that
avalanche. How big is the slush pile, each company's stack of unre-
quested manuscripts? At the Donald Maass Literary Agency we
receive, on average, about five thousand queries a year. Now, out of
those five thousand queries only one or two per day persuade us to
request a partial manuscript. That means that as few as one in nine-
teen are chosen for this limited appraisal.
A more enthusiastic response from us is a request for a com-
plete manuscript. We read about forty per year, only a handful of
those having been requested following our reading of a partial. The
odds of getting to this point? About one in one hundred and twen-
ty-five.
Now, I will admit that it is not the pitch alone that catches my
eye. Recommendations from editors, clients, and other profession-
al writers carry weight. Publications credits are also a strong selling
point. Those who cannot offer such enticements, however, must use
persuasion alone to catch my attention.
I hope I have made my point: when the odds are longer than call-
ing the flip of a coin, it is best not to leave much to chance.
Learn to pitch.