I have a question that I have been going over and I am ready to reach out to everyone to get their opinions. I live in the USA, but find that more agents in the UK find my work interesting, and so I have been submitting to agents based in the UK. Now, do you think that I should make it very clear to them that I am from the USA? The reason I ask this is because my partner made a comment about how the two countries writing styles are different. We use different words, construct our sentences different, and use a different tone in general. Does anyone think it makes a difference?
Hi Brad,
I'm a US-based author with a UK agents, and I know plenty of UK writers with US agents. Geography has become less and less important nowadays. Agents' websites will list whether the have rules about this (i.e. do / do not accept international submissions) and it's always best to mention it in your letter anyway, so they have a clear picture of how things might work. If you want, I did a blog post on how to write UK and US query / cover letters, as there are a few small differences: http://www.simonpclark.com/2013/02/uk-and-us-query-cover-letters.html It might be helpful for you - who knows!
And best of luck submitting your book.
I think it's more important that you target agents who specialise in your genre and target market than worry about in which country they are based. Email and Skype make international contact so much easier these days.
Deborah - that is exactly what I was trying to explain. Yes, one were to assume that by seeing my address on the query letter, agents would be well aware that I was from the USA. However, sometimes I feel they don't pay attention to that, read the query letter, see it is grammatically incorrect, and move on.
Louise - It is funny you mention how UK writers take more time to start stories. My story starts off slower and that might explain why I get much more interest in my stories from UK agents and writers.
Adrian - I will double check their submissions guidelines.
Thanks everyone for the feedback