JAIMIE D. KRYCHO

You may recall the “best rejection letter ever” I received from Linn Prentis Literary Agency awhile back. Well, I responded with a question to which I didn’t necessarily expect an answer.

Thank you for your serious consideration nonetheless! As this is my debut novel, I was afraid that might be the case, particularly in the first portions of the book. My writing has progressed quite a bit since I began “The Thief’s Throne,” so I hope to submit stronger material to you in the future.

I do have one question: I’m currently working on a trilogy of novellas, and the first one is almost finished. Would you even consider representing something as unorthodox as that? I certainly won’t waste your time with a query if not.

Again, thanks.

However, Amy Hayden was kind enough to shoot me an email back when she finally saw it.

Were it up to us we might but the truth is, the market is not kind to novellas. They aren’t easily picked up by publishers and normally don’t perform particularly well in general markets. And often if one doesn’t perform well once published, this can become another obstacle when one tries to get something else published trying to rep authors to the publisher. We really only take them on if a client already on our list has written one. I would say try very hard to find a specific pub that specializes in the novella format. You may want to look into boutique publishers. That might work.

That response might have been discouraging if my goal were to publish my novella, “Bloodlines of Epheria” (which of course you can read on my blog page), through traditional means. Instead, I wrote the first book with the intention of publishing the collated version on Kindle after posting it first in serial form. So, no worries there.

Anyhow, I hope that information is helpful to you writers out there who have thought about writing novellas for the New York market.