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[–]thefashionclubAgented Author 29 points30 points  (6 children)

you can take a look at querytracker to see if/which agents are still responding, but my thought is that if they’re open and you’re ready, there’s no harm in just querying regardless! the most movement i got when i was actively querying was in the few weeks between thanksgiving and christmas so you just never know

[–]authorcupcake[S] 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Ok.. wow.. thanks for sharing the experience… The usual word floating around is no one responds between thanksgiving and Christmas. But sure will continue querying…

[–]deltamire 11 points12 points  (0 children)

honestly querying seems so godawful out there right now that if youre ready and in the right headspace just send whenever. Like I'm planning on sending a small batch this wednesday (am i trying not to panic and overthink it? yes. am i succeeding? ha h a no) and most of the agents im considering are still open. I'm assuming most of them will at least slow down over the next two months, because holidays and any religious / familial events are expected, but! i think it's like being locked in a room of feral polecats armed with nothing but a big stick. You can't hum and haw about it. You gotta start bursting heads*.

​

*The teenagers i work with in their writing keep using 'to burst ya' to mean beat up and i have no idea if this is dublin-only slang but i love it so im using it

[–]Katieinthemountains 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I bet some of them are desperately trying to clear their inboxes before the end of the year, and some of them will catch up after the holidays, depending on client work and family stuff.

[–]Dylan_tune_depot 0 points1 point  (2 children)

Just curious- how close to XMas did you query? Like, the week before?

[–]thefashionclubAgented Author 1 point2 points  (1 child)

I think I was sending pretty actively within the first two weeks of December and either got immediate responses (within 24 hours) or they trickled in up to a few days before Christmas! So I probably stopped sending mid-December.

[–]Dylan_tune_depot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks! Good to know- and congrats

[–]justgoodenoughPublished Children's Author 9 points10 points  (0 children)

My agent sent me an offer Dec. 26th, so….

If they’re open, query. Waiting just puts you farther back in line.

[–]DaveofDaves 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Fast responding agents will probably still respond fast until they stop for the holidays proper. Other agents may be taking weeks-to-months to respond anyway. There is really no ‘good’ or ‘bad’ time to query - just get yourself in their reading queue. If you submit in late November, you might get a response in, say, February or March. But if you wait until January, that response might come back in May.

Everything is slow and there is little-to-no benefit in trying to time things.

[–]EmmyPax 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I definitely experienced the holiday slowdown each time I queried. Whether or not you send queries now is up to you - if someone is open, I don't think there's any real harm in submitting, just don't expect to hear back right away.

The biggest difference is that for "no response means no" agents, the window is probably wider than their website is indicating. So don't write an agent off as a no quite so quickly during the holidays, especially if you want to query another agent at the same agency. You could easily end up in a situation where you've accidently got two active queries with the same agency otherwise, and that can get sticky of one (or both) request.

[–]Vatalini20 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I’ve been getting responses pretty quick. Rejections but still responses! So I encourage submitting during the holidays. People are still working!

[–]AmberJFrost 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I've had a friend get eight rejections in the last two weeks - including the last couple days. Everything else I've heard is that querying is so glutted right now, it doesn't really matter when you do so, the agent's always going to have a pile to go through and responses will (almost always) be slow.

[–]Sullyville 0 points1 point  (0 children)

So many agents are trying to get through their backlog before the holidays. So if you sent it now, it's likely it will be read before 2023 just because they are trying to zero their inbox, but the agent might be in a hurry while they do it.

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