Awful approach letter

[Brian G Turner]

For some reason, someone thought a business resource website I run was somehow a romance publisher.

That should be the first warning sign, but the approach letter itself is absolutely awful.

Trouble is, I suspect literary agents have inboxes crammed full with crap like this (and, yes, the spelling/grammar errors are perfectly reproduced):

Dear Publishers

I have a book XXX Island, that your company may be interested in. this particular book XXX Island is selling in the USA very well. I'm so glad that I'm the Author The Romance Writers of American had an Article on publishers over seas. Sometimes buy the rights to publisher Author books in their country. I do believe that XXX Island will sell in England this book is a nonfiction love story. Some times Prince Charles comes to the XXX Island he has an estate there. I was born on XXX Island. This book will help your company in so many ways. Because of Prince Charles XXX Island is his heart delight.

This book go's in strong detail with characters, very interesting characters doing interesting things. Enclose a prologue of XXX Island. Let me know something. XXX Island is to Prince Charles, and dedicated to Princess Diana. You will the documentation on the second page of XXX Island.


["Author name"]

Thank Your

[Signature]

It's one of the weirdest letters I have, and the language reminds me much more of Nigerian 419 scam emails - ie, I have £100 million to move out of Africa if you would let me access your bank account to move it - and yet, there's no promise of money involved.

God knows what sort of weirdness agents and publishers have to deal with, then.

 

[Mark Robson]

Oh, that's not so bad, Brian. You should have seen the manuscript I got recently from a 68 year old dyslexic woman who thought she'd missed her calling in life. (The joys of having set up Sword Publishing!) She hadn't! Bless her heart, she meant well. Her story might even have read well in her mind. It was difficult to tell as there was little punctuation in it, and what little there was did not conform to any rules of English that I'd ever seen before.

 

[The Black Sword]

I guess I can have the satisfaction of at least not being the worst query-letter writer! Okay, sometimes I noticed the odd typo after I sent it out which leads to an "oh crap" moment, but I guess there are people out there writing who have absolutely no idea how to write a passable sentence.

 

[Curt Chiarelli]

That letter is virtually preliterate. It's at times like this that I pity the editors who receive such bizarre, wholesale butcheries of the English language.

 

[quidscribis]

I'm not even sure what it is that she means or thinks she's trying to say.

 

[Allegra]

It's one of the weirdest letters I have, and the language reminds me much more of Nigerian 419 scam emails - ie, I have £100 million to move out of Africa if you would let me access your bank account to move it - and yet, there's no promise of money involved.

God knows what sort of weirdness agents and publishers have to deal with, then.

LOL! At least the Nigerian emails' English is better than this! I wonder if the XXX Island book is Prince Charles's "nonfiction love story", perhaps not, as the 'author' pointed out it's about "very interesting characters doing interesting things".

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

Hi, I, Brian,


Isn't that letter a bit too beautiful to be true?...



Couldn't a vengeful scorned aspirin writer have written it .... and sent it out to haunt publishers' and professionals' mail?

 

[The Bloated One]

I, Brian,

I reckon it is a Nigerian scam letter, but the writer was so dozy he forgot to add a 'pleading para' asking for your money!

TBO

 

[Joel007]

Given the sort of "quick spell check and send" approch you get these days, they're more likely to ask for your monkey

 

[Simon Haynes]

"publishers over seas"

And there I was thinking most of them were under water...

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

"Under water"

Not under the weather, I hope. That would be awawawful!

 

[Meadowhawk]

I'm going to take the high road on this one; no examples. Let's just say I've seen some doozies.

 

[LJonesy]

I don't profess to be any good at writing whatsoever, but unlike the person who wrote that letter, i DID get school-grade education in English.

Maybe it's not his/her first language then?

 

[Dean F. Wilson]

The word order/structure, etc. sounds like it's a bad translation from another language, so it wouldn't surprise me that the author doesn't have English as a first language.

You never know... maybe their book is great, the next bestseller, and the Prince will love it. All we have to do is dare to read it

-D

 

[LJonesy]

Haha, you might be right there. Can't wait for XXX Island!

 

[sanityassassin]

'XXX Island' sounds like an Adult reality TV show . I know my English is awful, my grammer and puncuation is really bad(and English is my first language) but at least I can make a sentance sound almost legible. It does look like it has been put through a few free online translators

 

[LJonesy]

'XXX Island' sounds like an Adult reality TV show . I know my English is awful, my grammer and puncuation is really bad(and English is my first language) but at least I can make a sentance sound almost legible. It does look like it has been put through a few free online translators

Yes but anyone who reads your post understands it the first time they read it.

 

[Rhi]

This book will help your company in so many ways.

I am curious as to what exactly the author of XXX Island meant by that...

 

[Dean F. Wilson]

It will make billions, sell quadrillions, give the favour of the Prince, and set the bar for quality English throughout the world - all good things that a respectable company should desire.

Now, let's have a look at my query letter for XXX Island 2: Return of the XXX

-D

 

[Rhi]

Now that you've said all that, it seems so obvious. I don't know how I failed to see it before...

<_<
>_>

Ah well. I'm sure the author of the letter knew exactly what he/she meant. It's just a shame the rest of us never will.

"publishers over seas"

And there I was thinking most of them were under water...

Who knows what goes on in the water around XXX Island?