by Katherine Reay, @Katherine_Reay 
You’ve finished your manuscript and you’re ready to write that one page of perfection, your query letter to that ideal agent — in hopes that agent will request your full manuscript and fall in love with it.
Here are a few tips for one-last-read through before you hit send on your letter. Because when they do make that request, you want to be ready!
- Assess your Story Arc
I recommend reading your manuscript aloud. This takes time, I know. But it is truly a great way to get out of your head and hear what’s actually on the page — rather than what you imagine to be there. As you read, make sure each beat builds to the story’s climax. Don’t be predictable, but make sure your steps are well-laid and you haven’t leapt too far too fast and lost your reader. Out loud reading can and does help you detect all this.
- Connect with your Characters
For a few minutes, focus on each of your characters. They need to be three dimensional and grow and change. While two-dimensional characters may support movement within your story, there should be very few of them. If there are more than a couple, ask yourself if they are vital to the story and are not just filling to meet an arbitrary word count.
As for your three-dimensional characters, make sure you’ve drawn out the unique and unexpected in each. Character complexity lies in tapping into that second or third emotion in any situation rather than being satisfied with the first. Where there is anger, there is often fear, distrust, guilt, or something deeper driving it. Go after those hidden emotions for added complexity.
- Visit your Settings
Setting constitutes a vital character. An argument on a public street corner should not translate to a bedroom. If it can, if setting doesn’t matter at all to that moment, go back and ground the scene more fully where you’ve placed it. Draw out what is unique about that setting and how those attributes influence the scene and push and pull upon your characters. If you can’t find compelling reasons to be in that place at that time, consider another setting that interacts with the moment more powerfully.
- Tighten the Tension
Tension propels novels. That doesn’t require every scene to feature a bomb, a chase, a mystery, or a fight, but it does mean that, even in your “rest” moments between action beats, your characters do not sit around and agree on all that has happened and all that is yet to come. Two people never truly see eye-to-eye on anything — we can’t enter into their heart and soul no matter how well we know them. You and I might agree that “a certain book is worth reading,” but my reasons for liking the story, my experiences, and my worldview are different from yours. Therefore you and I have some underlying tension even about this book we both enjoyed reading. That, at it’s most basic level, is micro-tension — and it adds a necessary and exciting spice to your story. Make sure you are using it liberally.
- Formalize the Format
You have done the work! Congratulations!!! You have created somewhere between 75, 000 to 125,000 words that make sense, tell a story, and are ready for submission. It’s an amazing accomplishment and I hope you celebrate it in some way.
And, if you’ve used the few tips mentioned here, you’ve given your story a final read and added a little more gloss. That manuscript is glowing and ready to go… Don’t ruin it now with improper formatting. Check basic submission requirements. Then review each agency to which you are submitting for any special expectations. You’re in the homestretch and the details do matter.
Have fun!!! And, again, congratulations on writing that manuscript.
All the best to you and your writing,
Katherine
An uncovered family secret sets one woman on the journey of a lifetime through the history of Britain’s WWII spy network and glamorous 1930s Paris in an effort to understand her past, save her family, and claim her future.
One call could bring ruin to her family name.
The letters tell a different story.
But history won’t let its secrets go so easily.
Katherine Reay is a national bestselling and award-winning author of several novels, including Dear Mr. Knightley, The Printed Letter Bookshop and the upcoming The London House. She has enjoyed a lifelong affair with books and brings that love to her stories. Katherine has also written one full-length nonfiction work, Awful Beautiful Life. She holds a BA and MS from Northwestern University and currently lives outside Chicago, IL. Publishing credits also include Redbook, USAToday, Christianity Today and FamilyFiction. You can meet Katherine at www.katherinereay.com or on Facebook: KatherineReayBooks, Twitter: @katherine_reay and Instagram: @katherinereay.