How to Write a Query Letter

One of the most comprehensive sets of advice about queries is free for the taking at Writing.com: How to Write a Query Letter. Author Kim-Merry covers queries both for magazines and books, suggesting actions in a Do/Don't format and providing examples of good and bad queries. She covers a lot of ground with explanations of her advice tidbits:

Don’t use exclamation marks, bold, or caps.
State what enclosures are attached.
Proofread your letter.
Don't tell them you're new to this.

I like the last two, especially. Even now, after decades of writing, I tend to rush off an email without checking it, other than an automatic spelling check that the software does. And I know I'm prone to writing "Thank your" instead of "Thank you"! (Exclamation mark O.K. -- this is a blog post, not a query letter.) If you are new to the biz, your writing, if not your credits, will probably reveal this fact. I reviewed a query recently for someone who claimed to be an established writer. The query had all the right elements covered, but the way the writer expressed them simply screamed "amateur". Sentences were awkward and didn't flow smoothly.

It is important to get the query process correct in the beginning, or you'll be doomed to doing freebies for online ezines. Find a critique group that includes professional writers and/or editors, get a mentor, buy (and follow) a good book on the subject. Jenna Glatzer provides an autopsy of a "killer query" on the Absolute Write website.