✨Considering Querying a Rewrite? Carly Watters Has an Essay for That✨

Plus, the UNBELIEVABLE prizes Deep Dive Virtual Retreat attendees could win, and fan fave Jessica Waite is back with even more excellent advice!

Greetings, writing friends!

It’s a great time to be a podcast listener—Jessica Waite, whose essay on her bold approach to querying was a reader favourite when it ran in our July 30th issue, returns to The💩 this week with more great insights and advice. Tune in to hear Jessica and Bianca talk all things memoir, from authorial choices around structure, tense and dramatizing real life events, to the challenges of the publishing process and how writing can help heal authors who are dealing with grief. Jessica’s insights go beyond the specifics of memoir, and her advice for anyone who might be tempted to throw in the towel is particularly on target (Editor’s note: In fact, it may well be one of those very rare pieces of writing advice you should follow 100% of the time. Also, I maintain that The Widow’s Guide to Dead Bastards is one of the best titles for a memoir ever). 🙌🏼👏🏼😀

Speaking of things that might make you feel like giving up…Querying is already just about the worst thing an emerging author has to contend with, with its rules that vary from agency to agency, the long silences while you gnaw your fingernails, form rejections, and more. The worst-case scenario, and an emerging author’s biggest nightmare, is that you don’t get any requests in response to your queries. Obviously, that’s not going to happen to you, our loyal listeners and readers, because you’ve been paying attention, absorbing insights and honing your craft. But what if you get an “R&R”? Requests from agents to revise and resubmit a manuscript are a great sign about your writing, but they also come with their own sets of rules and complications. Or what if you get feedback and make substantial edits? Can you go back to agents who’ve previously rejected your ms? We know this is a topic a lot of you are keenly interested in, and fortunately for your, agent and co-host extraordinaire Carly Watters is back with an all-new insider’s perspective essay on this very thing. ✍🏼📄📖

Last, but certainly, absolutely, positively not least, we’ve got a Deep Dive Virtual Retreat prize pack recap for anyone who might have missed it in our Tuesday issue—these are some seriously amazing prizes up for grabs and we don’t want you kicking yourself later if you don’t register and miss out on your chance to win. We can’t imagine there’s anyone out there who wouldn’t give just about anything to have an agent, editor or bestselling author critique 10,000 words of their work, and it could happen to you…if you register for the retreat, that is. 😉🏆🥳

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading! ❤️

The Shit No One Tells You About Writing Team

P.S. Still not sure about upgrading to paid? Check out our Tuesday Teaser below to see what you’re missing!

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This Week’s Podcast✨🎙️✨

This week on the podcast (listen to it here!), Bianca interviews Jessica Waite about her bestselling memoir, The Widow's Guide to Dead Bastards.

Jessica discusses her writing journey as a form of healing, the challenges of the publishing process, and the complexities of grief. She and Bianca also discuss the intentional choices behind the book's structure, the use of present tense, and the importance of dramatizing scenes to engage readers, as well as Jessica’s tips for bringing memories vividly to life on the page.

“I did allow myself the idea that I could quit but I could never quit when I was in the fetal position… you can only quit from a place where you're standing up and have a clear view of what's going on. You can't quit when you're down and discouraged.”

– Jessica Waite

More information about Jessica can be found on her website. She’s also on Instagram!

You can purchase The Widow’s Guide to Dead Bastards on our Bookshop.org affiliate page here. Buying books through this link supports a local indie bookstore, as well as The Shit No One Tells You About Writing 📚❤️

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Did Someone Mention Prizes? 🏆🎁

In case you’re still not convinced about signing up for the Deep Dive Virtual Retreat, perhaps now might be a good time to remind you that not only do participants get to hear from twelve knowledgeable and successful book industry insiders, they’re also eligible to win one of twelve fantastic prizes (and we really do mean fantastic)! Check them out! 👇🏼

Prizes:

Every registered delegate will automatically be entered into a draw which will be done live at the end of the retreat. Twelve (!) lucky participants will win one of the following incredible prizes:

• A 10,000-word critique done by one of our speakers. There are 9 prizes available being offered by Jenny Jackson, Cherise Fisher, Annabel Monaghan, Pilar Garcia-Brown, Mark Tavani, Sarah Cantin, Diane Marie Brown, Stephanie Delman and Tiffany Yates Martin.

• Free Registration for Deep Dive 2026 — 3 of these prizes available

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How Do You Query With A Rewrite?

By Carly Watters

Querying your first novel is a process that morphs over time. In a perfect world, agents request (and LOVE) the book you are querying, and you find an agent quickly without (many) revisions.

However, for most of you it won’t be that ‘perfect world’ scenario. You might not get any requests, or you might be lucky enough to get some direct feedback from an agent. If you’re REALLY lucky, they’ll ask you to re-query your novel after you’ve done work on it.

So how to do you query again after you’ve done a rewrite? Do agents want to see the book again? What if you already sent it to your dream agent and they passed? Will they want to see it again? Are you even 'allowed to re-send?

Yes, you are ‘allowed’ to re-query, but you must be strategic about it. Here are some general guidelines to keep in mind:

1. Let us know that we’ve seen a version of it before.

2. If you’re going to send it to us again, make sure you’ve done a considerable amount of work.

3. If we provided you with specific targets for revision, let us know that you accomplished them.

But be warned: you only get one chance to make a first impression and you’ve already used it. If you’re going to query us with a rewrite and you haven’t done what we’ve asked, you are not setting yourself up for success with that manuscript—or any new one you might query in the future.

Books are never considered finished until they go to the printer. They are in a constant state of creating, editing, revising and writing. It’s okay to tweak and polish as you go. However, you only have one chance to wow us and the truth is that most often querying with a rewrite is only beneficial if we’ve specifically requested it.

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Tuesday Teaser 😉

Can’t get enough of querying insights? Or maybe memoir is your jam? Then you’ll love next week’s newsletter exclusively for our paid members. First up, we’ve got an EXTREMELY relatable essay from emerging author Michelle Sanchez (appropriately titled Querying Isn’t for the Faint of Heart), followed by a video by Marion Shambari, where she shares her unique approach to writing her memoir, A Little Less Broken.

Not yet a member? For just $8USD a month or $80USD a year you get:

• an exclusive newsletter on Tuesdays featuring bonus author Q&As and other exclusive content from industry experts

• weekly access to Carly Watters and CeCe Lyra’s written notes on queries from the podcast’s Books With Hooks feature

• monthly bonus podcast episodes, AND

• regular Ask Me Anythings / Q&As with Carly, CeCe, and Bianca Marais.

If that doesn’t kickstart your writing journey, we don’t know what will!

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The Ultimate Planner for Writers is the Ultimate Christmas Gift!

Have you been frustrated with the limitations of your daily planner which, while allowing for hour-to-hour scheduling of your usual appointments, doesn't allow you to include all the myriad activities associated with your rich writing life?

This planner allows you to:

• Keep track of your daily word count, as well as assign and monitor time spent on brainstorming, researching, drafting, editing, etc.

• Log and track your agent queries

• Brainstorm and make editorial notes

• Outline your WIP

• Create character profiles

• Outline your plot/scenes

• Complete scene cards

• Keep all your ideas in one place

• Keep a record of your research and material sources

• Make notes of inspiration

• Track the books you've read

The Ultimate Planner for Writers has all the monthly, weekly and daily functionalities of a usual planner, but with added features designed specifically for writers. It’s available for purchase either as a hardcopy or as an e-planner that's been designed for use on an iPad or similar touch screen tablet, and makes the ultimate gift for the writer in your life.

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That’s all for this week’s news! If you enjoyed it, why not share the love? 🥰

Tune in again next week for more invaluable wisdom from our wonderful hosts! Until then, happy writing! 😍

❤️ The Shit No One Tells You About Writing Team

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Carly Watters and CeCe Lyra are literary agents at P.S. Literary Agency, but their work in this newsletter is not affiliated with the agency, and the views expressed by Carly and CeCe in this newsletter are solely that of themselves and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of P.S. Literary Agency.

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