The indoor writer finally plucked up the courage to submit a pitch for her children's novel to a publisher. In accordance with the guidelines she emailed the first 3 chapters and a brief synopsis. This particular publisher only accepts enquiries via email and an automatic response came whizzing back: You will be contacted only if successful. Great - so she got her finger out and submitted - but what happens now? How long do you wait to hear if your pitch was successful? If a publisher wants to see more then when will they get back to you - in a week, two weeks, a month? What is the etiquette here?
Many agents and publishers want single submissions. Okay understandable but there doesn't seem to be any accepted timeframe involved. It would help if an auto reply indicated a timeframe e.g. If you do not hear from us within XX weeks then assume... (rejection, desolation and time to hit the chocolate biscuits etc etc).
The publishing industry seems unique in its approach to clients. As the writer is the client (unless commissioned) and also the provider of the product (manuscript) then we would anticipate a certain amount of attention from those who need our product to survive. Yet the converse is the reality. Guess we live with this because we live to write and not the other way round.
Would appreciate hearing other's thoughts on this etiquette and how long should you wait before pitching to other publishers/agents.
Keep writing!
Have absolutely no idea what the etiquette is here. As far as I know there are no rules. Maybe after a couple of months you could query via email?
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