Just a heads up for those of you subbing to Paula. She is also an author, signed to Minotaur, along with many of her clients. Which means she competes against her own clients for publisher slots. There’s much I don’t know about publishing, but this seems unethical to me.

1/11/22 Received offer of representation.
I accepted and Paula is now my agent.

Met at the NYC Pitch Conference. Paula asked for a query and 50 pages of ms.

Submitted via the KOD pitchfest 10/5/20

85K adult dystopian

EQ 11/29/19 (Requery Chain Reaction--adult thriller)
ER 3/2/20 (Passed with positive feedback to have it more psychological than procedural, but not good fit)

3/03/2019 EQ
7/31/2019 ER - Sent from Tia - We’ve read your material with interest, but we have ultimately decided to pass on this project.
You are a talented storyteller. That said, we're afraid we don’t think we could sell the manuscript as it now stands. We don’t think that it’s ready to shop, at least not for us.
There is a level of craft that is missing here. You're about 75 percent there. Which far exceeds most of the material we see. But publishers are looking for work that is 95 percent there. So we can only take on projects that are 90 percent, and help take them to that 95 percent level.
What this boils down to is an attention to detail in terms of point of view, tone, dialogue, setting, and sentence quality. This is that final polish, polish, polish that makes all the difference.
We wish we had better news for you. We have a full complement of writers right now, so we are only taking on projects that require little to no revision.
Again, you are a talented writer, and as you work on your craft and polish, polish, polish you are bound to succeed.
Thank you again for your submission and we wish you the best of luck in finding representation in the future.

EQ 9/23/19 (Diplomatic Immunity--adult political thriller)
ER 11/13/19 (Personalized rejection via Tia--said I'm a good storyteller and they only accepting mss that need 90-95% revision when mine is 75%. Made comments on voice, setting, description, tone, pov. Different rejection I got from Gina who asked for a full ms a year ago and declined in January--same as below though.)

I received exactly the same rejection as PortiaDe below. What I thought was a personal letter is not. Beware.

EQ: 22 September 2019
ER: 13 November 2019

YA contemporary/historical 92,000 words

Form from Tia Mele

....You are a talented storyteller. That said, we're afraid we don’t think we could sell the manuscript as it now stands. We don’t think that it’s ready to shop, at least not for us.

There is a level of craft that is missing here. You're about 75 percent there. Which far exceeds most of the material we see. But publishers are looking for work that is 95 percent there. So we can only take on projects that are 90 percent, and help take them to that 95 percent level.

What this boils down to is an attention to detail in terms of point of view, tone, dialogue, setting, and sentence quality. This is that final polish, polish, polish that makes all the difference.....[etc, etc]

EQ: 11/8/19

NA/Adult Fantasy 105k

EQ: 9/14/19
ER: 11/5/19

historical fantasy 175K

EQ: 9/19/19

NA Fantasy Saga 115k

EQ: 5/4/19 (107k YA fantasy)
Confirmation of receipt (out of office reply): 5/4/19
ER: 9/12/19 (kind form letter from Tia Mele)

EQ: 5/8/2019
ER form from Tia Mele: 9/10/2019

“We’ve read your material with interest, but we have ultimately decided to pass on this project.

You are a talented storyteller. That said, we're afraid we don’t think we could sell the manuscript as it now stands. We don’t think that it’s ready to shop, at least not for us.

There is a level of craft that is missing here. You're about 75 percent there. Which far exceeds most of the material we see. But publishers are looking for work that is 95 percent there. So we can only take on projects that are 90 percent, and help take them to that 95 percent level.

What this boils down to is an attention to detail in terms of point of view, tone, dialogue, setting, and sentence quality. This is that final polish, polish, polish that makes all the difference.

We wish we had better news for you. We have a full complement of writers right now, so we are only taking on projects that require little to no revision.

Again, you are a talented writer, and as you work on your craft and polish, polish, polish you are bound to succeed.

Thank you again for your submission and we wish you the best of luck in finding representation in the future.”

EQ: 8/8/18
Had originally closed this as a CNR on 10/13/18
Received a surprise partial request in my inbox today, 208 days after my initial query. Will send through, but that's a heckuva backlog? Partial request was from an assistant.

Update: It's been 119 days since the partial request, and that was with a nudge about 30 days after that said my MS was next on the pile. I'm closing this one out as CNR. 7/1/19

81k historical fantasy

EQ: 4/2/19
ER: 4/9 - Assistant Tianna Mignogna replied. Said agency (TN) read with interest and the premise was interesting, but they didn't feel they were the right agency. Did provide notes on writing for first 10 pages.
80K suspense/thriller

EQ 3/11/19 adult literary mystery (about 98,600 words)
ER 5/15/19