Is It My Query or My Opening Pages? Worked Examples
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Your query can hide the strongest part of your book. Your opening can also fall short of what a good query promises. To work out what to revise, examine each piece separately, then read them together.
Start with what you actually sent. An agent who received only your query hasn't evaluated your opening pages. If you sent both, a pass doesn't tell you which part influenced the decision. Agency requirements vary, so check each agent's current instructions rather than assuming everyone sees the same package.
You don't need to guess what happened in an inbox to find something worth improving. You need evidence in the writing.
About the examples: The fictional story, pitch drafts, and opening passages below were created solely for this guide. They do not come from a customer, an existing manuscript, a successful query, or a Request the Full report. They are teaching examples, not submission templates.
First, ask what the query actually communicates
Here is a short pitch for an invented contemporary YA novel:
Seventeen-year-old Romy has always found freedom in dance. But when the future of her crew is threatened, she must stand up for what she believes in. With her closest friendship on the line, she'll discover whether finding her voice is worth losing everything.
We know Romy's age and interest. We know the story involves a threatened group and a friendship. We don't know what happens.
“The future of her crew is threatened” could mean an injury, an argument, a competition, or the loss of a rehearsal space. “Losing everything” gives no clearer picture. The pitch asks us to care about consequences it hasn't named.
This is an identifiable query problem. It tells us nothing yet about the quality of the manuscript.
A more specific version of the same pitch
Seventeen-year-old Romy runs a free dance crew in the community center's only rehearsal room. When the center leases the room to a fitness company, the crew loses its space—and several dancers have nowhere else they can afford to rehearse.
Romy talks the center's director into considering a shared schedule, provided she can demonstrate local demand at the next public meeting. To make the campaign look bigger, she adds names from an old event list to a petition without asking permission.
Then her best friend, Tess, accepts a paid teaching job with the new tenant. Tess offers a compromise: a weekly class for the crew, with her as the instructor and fees Romy knows some dancers can't pay. Romy calls her a sellout. Tess asks why Romy gets to speak for everyone.
When the director contacts petition signers to invite them to the meeting, Romy's invented support starts coming apart. Telling the truth could cost her the room and her crew's trust. Keeping quiet means asking Tess to help defend a campaign she no longer believes in.
This version gives the reader something to evaluate:
- A specific loss: The crew is losing access to its rehearsal space.
- Action with consequences: Romy campaigns, makes a bad choice, and faces the result.
- A relationship under pressure: Tess wants paid work; Romy wants affordable access. Their disagreement grows out of the same problem.
- A reason to keep reading: Romy has to change how she leads if she wants other people to keep following her.
The pitch is also making a promise about the novel: contemporary YA about friendship, belonging, money, and the trouble with appointing yourself everyone's spokesperson. It doesn't promise a high-stakes dance competition or a romance. If either is actually the main story, the pitch needs another pass.
This is the story-pitch portion of a query. A complete submission also needs the book information and author details requested by the agent. See Jane Friedman's query-letter guide for an overview of those components.
Next, look at what the opening gives the reader
Imagine that the specific pitch is followed by this opening:
The community center had been built long before Romy was born. Its rehearsal room was on the second floor, between a storage cupboard and a classroom used for evening courses. Romy had been coming here for years. Dance had changed her life, and the friends she'd made here meant more to her than she could say. Now all of it was at risk.
The information is relevant to the novel. But the passage tells us how much the room matters before letting us experience Romy wanting or doing anything there. We receive a building description and a summary of her feelings.
That doesn't establish a problem across an entire chapter. It identifies a question to test: does the opening stay at this distance, or does it soon give us a reason to feel the loss ourselves?
Another way into the same scene
Romy had taped a square on the rehearsal-room floor for each dancer. Twelve squares. Twelve people who had promised that this week, absolutely, they would be on time.
Only Tess was there, peeling up the square nearest the mirror.
“That's your spot,” Romy said.
“I know.”
Tess wound the tape around two fingers. On the mirror, a notice announced the room's new fitness timetable. Every afternoon slot was taken. Someone had drawn a cheerful blue border around it.
Romy checked her phone. Three messages: bus late, stuck at work, can you send the steps? She put it away before Tess could look.
“We can rehearse outside,” she said.
Tess glanced at the rain dragging down the windows.
“When it stops.”
“And in winter?”
Romy reached for the tape. “Give me that.”
Tess held it out, but Romy tugged too soon. The loose end stuck across both their wrists. For a second they stood joined by a yellow strip, too annoyed to laugh.
Romy wanted Tess to say they would work something out. Instead, Tess pulled free, leaving the tape hanging from Romy's sleeve.
“They're hiring,” Tess said.
Here, the problem arrives through something happening between two people. The empty squares and messages suggest the effort it takes to hold the crew together. The timetable establishes the immediate loss. Tess's final line gives her an interest that Romy hasn't considered.
The scene also reveals a possible blind spot: Romy has prepared a place for everyone, but she isn't listening to the one person who showed up. That's more useful than simply declaring her a passionate leader.
The passage doesn't explain the petition, the public meeting, or every dancer's history. Those details aren't needed to understand this encounter. Later pages would need to develop them.
Check the promise between the two
Read your query, then turn straight to the pages. Ask:
- What kind of reading experience did the query lead me to expect?
- What does the opening actually emphasize?
- Is the difference intriguing, or does it make the pitch feel misleading?
In our example, both pieces emphasize Romy's leadership and her friendship with Tess. They connect without repeating the same information.
For adult fiction, the same check might reveal that a query promises a sharp workplace comedy while the opening spends most of its time explaining a company's history. The history may matter. The question is whether the pages also deliver the voice, relationships, or tension that made the pitch appealing.
A quiet opening can do that. You don't need an emergency, an argument, or the novel's biggest event on page one. You do need to consider what holds the reader's attention while the larger story develops.
Use a fresh reader without explaining the book first
If someone can spare a short read, ask them to read the query and write down what they think the story is about. Then give them the opening and ask where their expectations changed.
Don't explain away a misunderstanding immediately. Record it. You can decide afterward whether the missing information belongs in the query, the pages, or neither.
| What the reader can point to | Where to work next |
|---|---|
| They can't identify what happens in the pitch. | Make the query more specific. |
| They understand the premise, but the opening leaves them unsure who or where they are. | Examine grounding and clarity in the pages. |
| They can follow the opening, but say their attention drops in a particular passage. | Look at what changes there, what repeats, and whether the information is needed yet. |
| They expected a different central story from the one in the pages. | Check whether the query represents the manuscript accurately. |
| They understand both and want to continue. | Keep what is working; a pass alone isn't a reason to dismantle it. |
What the reader can point to
They can't identify what happens in the pitch.
Where to work next
Make the query more specific.
What the reader can point to
They understand the premise, but the opening leaves them unsure who or where they are.
Where to work next
Examine grounding and clarity in the pages.
What the reader can point to
They can follow the opening, but say their attention drops in a particular passage.
Where to work next
Look at what changes there, what repeats, and whether the information is needed yet.
What the reader can point to
They expected a different central story from the one in the pages.
Where to work next
Check whether the query represents the manuscript accurately.
What the reader can point to
They understand both and want to continue.
Where to work next
Keep what is working; a pass alone isn't a reason to dismantle it.
Get feedback on the part you're trying to examine
Request the Full's Query Assessment reviews your query, with the option to include a pitch and your first 5,000 words. It can help you examine the submission together. If your main question is how the opening develops over several chapters, the First 15K Assessment covers your first 15,000 words.
Both provide AI-powered assessment reports. You receive feedback to consider in revision; your writing remains yours to revise. Neither can tell you why a particular agent passed.
Get specific feedback on the submission piece you want to examine.
For the wider submission check—including agent fit and unanswered queries—read Querying but getting no requests?