One of our guild members, Kathryn Cunningham, is looking for some help with query letters, and she missed the open combox weekend. If you have some experience with querying Catholic magazines as a beginning writer, and have a few minutes to help her out with practical tips, could you say hello in the combox of this post?
[I’ve seen her work and it is nice! Now — how does she get it into print?!]
Thanks!
Jennifer Fitz
Jennifer Fitz is the author of The How-to Book of Evangelization: Everything You Need to Know But No One Ever Taught You from Our Sunday Visitor and Classroom Management for Catechists from Liguori Publications. She writes about all things evangelization and discipleship at jenniferfitz.substack.com. For updates on where else to find her, visit JenniferFitz.com.
Brother, thank you so much especially for the "advanced season" thinking. I am getting used to checking for their policy.
I used to help produce Pastoral Life Magazine (now discontinued). Match your genre, purpose or goals with a similar magazine. Now is the time to get Lent, Easter, Spring topics into the hands of Editors. Advent and Christmas might be filled this year, but still worth trying. Look for publisher's web site, look for submission policy. If not policy, compose a short synopsis and then draft hyour letter.
I am happy to send you one of my past query letters to look at, if you would like. My email address is: marykdoyle@sbcglobal.net
Kathryn, if you want to email it to me, I'd be happy to take a look at it. I'm no expert, but I'm happy to help. 🙂
Laundry waits for no man (or woman)! I have done some research and am a still a little confused. Some pubs tell you exactly what to put in the letter. Some don't. Some pubs want suggestions for articles, some don't. The particular mag I am looking at (Catholic Digest)only says: "write a queery letter"??? So, I'm not really sure of what to include or exclude….I'll give it a shot with my ideas of what should be in there. Nothing ventured, nothing gained! Thanks.
If you google "how to write a query letter" you'll come up with some decent stuff. Additionally, there are great resources available over at Savvy Authors and some of the other writing portal places (I didn't do an exhaustive search). And now I must fold laundry. Bah.
Kathryn,
Have you read up on query letters in general? There's a lot of good information available online (Rachelle Gardner's blog is a good starting place) and there are also many help books at the library.
Being specific to the publication is always helpful, which is why I pointed you to their guidelines. If you're looking for general information, though, I would say Catholic pubs don't differ from secular ones, except that they are a bit more forgiving (or so I'd like to think).
That more what you were thinking?
The encouragement does, Sarah. Thank you! What I need to know, though, is what is "expected" in a queery letter and what is a "no-no" so that I have some idea of a direction.
In my experience, Kathryn (and I am nnot really good at this freelancing thing, mind you), it's best to just get out there and TRY. I started with online venuesa that weren't paying, but it gave me contacts and a place of common interaction with some of the editors.
My first advice: just try. Write your best query letter and make it compelling and irresistible. Make sure you've studied any guidelines they've given you and you're within it.
Sometimes you won't hear back. (Often, sadly, for me.) Other times, it will rain down on you and you'll wonder what you were smoking to submit so many places at once.
Hope that helps!
Jen………..is a gem! I am interested in the content when a mag says "send a queery letter". What is that code for? Should it include Edu background, places I've published, ideas for articles?? All of he above, none of the above? What is "de riguer" in the business for "queery letter"? Blessings,
Kathryn lyricalkat@sbcglobal.net