As with most things, it’s good to have clear goals when you’re marketing your book to agents and publishers.  This week, I’ve been very glad that I set myself the goal of sending out 5 queries a week (one per weekday), because after getting my hopes up over an agent asking for more material, her subsequent rejection left me cynical and frustrated (despite her very nice rejection letter).

Fortunately, if I write down somewhere among my various and sundry notebooks, TO DO:  5 queries per week until accepted! I will do it no matter what, as if to prove to the piece of paper that I can actually do it.  So I’m back in the saddle again, although I did cheat the week I was waiting to hear back from her, and only sent one query out all week.

The good thing about a goal (especially an ambitious and time-consuming one, such as sending out a query every single weekday) is that you feel some sense of accomplishment from fulfilling it, even if you haven’t yet succeeded in the larger goal of getting an acceptance.  Plus, if you have twenty query letters out there, when you get a rejection, you know that there are 19 more chances at a “yes” waiting in the wings.