You’ve done it. You’ve finished your manuscript and can’t wait to shop it around and see who bites. But as exciting as the idea of having your book published may be, it’s important to be fully prepared before querying agents. If you feel that it’s time to start pitching your book, here’s how to get your manuscript ready to query agents.

Finish your manuscript

This may sound obvious but don’t ever try to query your manuscript unless it is 100% complete. Only in cases where an author has built a large audience (and typically this applies to nonfiction) can they land a book deal on a proposal alone.

So while you may have 50K+ words on the page, is it truly finished? Is it as refined as you can conceivably make it? Is the word count aligned with the average expectations for your genre? Have you added details where information was missing and removed extraneous exposition?

Typing “The End” is incredibly exciting, but it does not mean you’ve finished.

NEVER (and yes, we’re saying NEVER), send a first draft to agents. Walk yourself through as much self-editing as possible, then move on to the next step.

Have multiple people read the finished manuscript

If you haven’t let anyone else read your book and give you vital feedback, you are not ready to query agents. Whether it’s giving a copy of the manuscript to your sister, friend, colleague or a beta reader online, it’s important to get some feedback before querying to ensure you’ve worked out the majority of the kinks and cleared up any confusion. Ideally these will be people with at least some experience in publishing. In some cases (for example, if this is your first book) it may even make sense to hire a developmental editor or to run your novel through editing software.

Acknowledge the weaknesses in your manuscript

If you know there are problems with your manuscript, so will any agent who requests a full. Before trying to send out your work, make sure you’re honest with yourself and address anything you find wrong with your story. Don’t send a manuscript off knowing there is a plot hole here or missing character arcs there. Assuming that an agent or editor will clean it up later is the wrong move. Make sure your story is the best it can possibly be.

Make sure your first three chapters are stellar

When you’re getting ready to query, make sure that you are completely in love with your first three chapters. When sending your pitch out to agents, you may get some interested in viewing your work. With this in mind, if you send over chapters 4, 18 and 38, you will raise immediate red flags. Agents want to know that your book has a strong beginning that will hook a reader. So if there is any place in your manuscript to be extra critical, it’s those opening pages.

Write your query letter

In another post, we discuss in detail how to write a great query letter. Writing the query letter for the sake of editing your manuscript is a different task. Before you can say your manuscript is finished, you should write your synopsis, an elevator pitch and your query letter. This practice will help you further hone in on areas where your book need improvement.

Are you able to easily place your book into a genre? And find titles similar to it? Can you come up with a one-two line hook that will get readers interested? Is your book too simple to sum up, or too complicated? Do you find yourself tripping over how to explain the story?

These questions can help you identify key needs in your story that will be useful prior to pitching.

So while finishing a first draft is a tremendous accomplishment, make sure you’re stopping to do the work to get it truly polished and ready for agents to receive.