I -- Introduction

Rilla: Hello! I am Rilla. Who are you?
rilla: Hi! I’m rilla!
Rilla: How odd! How many of us are there?
rilla: Stick around and we might find out!
Rilla: So, tell me something while I stick around. How did you go about getting the same name as I?
rilla: Emm…maybe it’s something to do with being you?
Rilla: Preposterous! I am unique. When they made me, they broke the mold…
rilla: Ahem!
Rilla: Quiet! I was saying… this level of perfection is impossible to reproduce…
rilla: Ahem!
Rilla: Well, what is it?
rilla: I think I see another one of us…
Rilla: Where?
rilla: Is that panic?
Rilla: Panic? I am not prone to mundane emotions.
rilla: How about if you tell me about yourself?
Rilla: There is nothing to tell.
rilla: Well, for instance, I am a writer and an artist. How about you?
Rilla: I am perfect.
rilla: Mmm…perfection sounds downright boring if you ask me.
Rilla: Tell me about your writing.
rilla: I really did think pomposity was accompanied by an insatiable desire to discuss one’s self.
Rilla: Are you going to tell me what you write or is the writing part just another one of your juvenile pretenses?
rilla: You sound like my therapist. It’s always about me, never about her.
Rilla: You have a therapist?
rilla: No one’s perfect…oh I forgot.
Rilla: WHAT DO YOU WRITE?
rilla: You’re on a short leash! Maybe I should introduce you to our therapist…Oh all right. I am a children’s book writer.
Rilla: Really! I would never have guessed. Think you are the next J. K. Rowling…?
rilla: Funny, no one has ever asked me that.
Rilla: Aren’t you afraid?
rilla: Of what?
Rilla: Rejection.
rilla: Oh that. I’m past fear. Get rejected all the time.
Rilla: Must be painful.
rilla: Right. You’re so perfect you probably never get rejected. Wait a minute, you haven’t actually told me what you do…
Rilla: So when was the last time you got rejected?
rilla: Just the other day. Arthur A. Levine.
Rilla: Aha! You do want to be the next J. K. Rowling. What did you write to him?
rilla: Oh please, be original, everyone says that. I wrote: ‘Dear Mr. Levine:’
Rilla: Excellent way to begin a letter. Most original.
rilla: ‘All these years, I pictured the eminent Arthur A. Levine as an elderly, distinguished gentleman with a full head of curling grey hair, Romanesque nose, pince-nez, goatee… the kind of person one only views in profile.’
Rilla: Yes, go on…
rilla: ‘Then I had the opportunity to meet you at the recent SCBWI Summer Conference in LA. I wrote this letter anyway.’
Rilla: Brilliant! Insult the editor! Guaranteed to get the result you desire.
rilla: Yes.
Rilla: Did he write back?
rilla: No. His office did. They sent a faded Xerox copy of their letter head with an unsigned ‘better luck somewhere else’ note.
Rilla: You are fortunate they even wrote to you. Look, why don’t you give up this nonsense and get a real job. One that pays, one that you go into an office for, every day, five days a week…a real job.
rilla: I have a real job.
Rilla: Not one that pays the mortgage.
rilla: You’re the one who wanted the house with the pool.
Rilla: You are the one who ‘needed’ the ‘happy’ space that would ‘allow’ you to be creative.
rilla: You’re the one who wanted the granite kitchen and the wooden floors…
Rilla: You are the one who refuses to get a real job.
rilla: What is it you do again?

Read the full Query Letter

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