I got to teach a class on the top ten querying tips for fiction and nonfiction writers. The tips I shared all come from conversations and interviews with literary agents and editors, and some of the advice is surprising.

One of the first tips?

Don’t make it an easy rejection by not knowing the genre and preferred word count for the genre the agent you’re querying represents.

Another one involves hooks again. Yes, hooks! Get right to the heart of what your story is about. This is my hook from the query that got me my agent:

“When fourteen-year-old AnnaGrey meets a horned horse-like creature called an aeobanach in the forbidden Wildwood, she crosses the threshold from this world to a magical one in the hope of finding answers about her night-vision ability.”

What’s your query hook?