I’ve been getting the same question a lot lately: when is it ok for me to ask about the materials I sent X weeks ago?

Well… Here’s how it is. No agent is sitting on a pile of requested material, laughing diabolically and muttering “I can make them wait, I am baaaad.” I know it sounds that way sometimes. But they’re not. I promise. (Or, if they are, they’re not letting their assistants in.)

Agents are just really, really busy. So, when you see on their website that they’ll get back to you in 4-6 weeks… Well, that’s a ballpark. Actually, maybe a goal. They try. They do try to stick to that timeframe, and they aim for even less. But that’s not always possible. Because sometimes there are no conferences at all, and sometimes there are three in a month. Sometimes they have little to submit to editors, and sometimes all their prolific authors finish their revisions at the same time. Sometimes the slush is so bad they only have one or two fulls to read, and sometimes they’ve requested ten fulls in a week. It’s really unpredictable.

And some times of the year are worse too. Like now. Now is the time to get submissions to editors before the holidays, then it’s slow until January. So, likely, they’re not spending an awful lot of time reading requested materials right now. They’ll get to that in a couple weeks. And they will get to it. And if they get an email now asking “have you read my manuscript yet?” you know what’s that going to be? Annoying. And when people are annoyed by you, they tend to read your manuscript with annoyed eyes. And you don’t want that.

So, what I’m saying here (and please don’t shoot the messenger) is wait. You want to know how long? Double the time on their website. The website says 4 to 6 weeks? Then wait at least 12 before asking about it. And if you do choose to ask about it (after waiting a really long time), please do so politely and in a short note. But, before you do that, please wait a little longer.

I know it’s frustrating. But, going back to that dating metaphor (just when you thought I’d dropped it), you want to sound desirable. If you have no offers of representation and you email an agent the moment the time is up, what are you saying? You’re saying no one else wants me, I’m desperate and that’s why I’ve been waiting by the phone. Yeah, not desirable.

Of course, all this is for when you DON’T have an offer. If you do, you should let all the agents who have your material know immediately! Because then they’ll fight for your love, and, well, that’s just awesome. I’ll post more on this later.

But the point is, unless something has changed (aka you got an offer of representation), wait it out. It’s annoying, I know. It’s frustrating. But a person can only read so fast, and you do want the agent’s full attention when they’re reading your work, right? So wait. Sometimes the waiting is a good thing. It means your manuscript is getting ahead. It got past the assistant, into the agent’s hands and the agent is taking her time. You know, sending a form rejection after reading 30 pages is pretty fast…

So that’s my advice. Wait. And in the meantime, write. If you focus on that, good things will come your way.