Gate Keepers

Photo by Emma Peascod

I am a professional gatekeeper. In my day job as an institutional investment advisor to endowments and foundations, I get three to four calls a week from private equity managers, hedge funds and others wanting me to look at their products for use with my clients. Usually I try to call them back, because I know how frustrating it can be pushing at gates. Many of these products are good, they just aren’t a good fit at the time, and there are so many of them it’s hard to keep track. Sometimes I get tired of tending the gate, so I keep it closed and hang out a do-not-disturb sign.

One of my night jobs is writing fiction. I guess it’s not really a job, but an avocation. Writing comes with its own set of gatekeepers: literary agents and editors. For the last few months I’ve been sending out query letters, trying to open the literary agent gate. The volume of material agents receive from wannabe authors swamps what I get from investment managers. Hundreds of queries per agent per week. As a result, agents often send back form letters addressed Dear Author. This is perfectly understandable. There’s too many submissions and not enough time.

Angie related her summer internship experience of being on the receiving end of this submission avalanche⎯slush pile is the literary term. She “learned that the slush pile, like the sea, will beat on ceaselessly,” and suggested that the best chance of getting published was by finding someone who knows the gatekeeper.

I took her at her word and a friend of mine was kind enough to make an introduction to a New York literary agent, who in turn is willing to read my manuscript. I packed it up and sent it out via two-day delivery so it would be there before the weekend. Chances are the agent will find my novel is not a good fit for her firm, but I’m okay with that, because after a half dozen form letters, it will be nice to receive some personal feedback. So much of writing is done in silence, as it should be. Yet the thought that my characters might be bouncing around in somebody else’s head this weekend, making themselves known, brings me great pleasure.