Plugging Along

Dead in His Tracks has now been rejected by one agent and is awaiting the verdict of a second--one who seems to simply not reply if she doesn't like it, per the following stats:



But, those are the risks. She's on vacation, so the clock on her four-week evaluation period will start running on Monday.

I have to say that I don't quite get it. When you only take queries via email, why is it so difficult to send a form rejection once you decide you don't like something? Just as a courtesy. Just as I give her the courtesy of only querying one agent at a time (multiple submissions are done, but are frowned upon) and in following the limitations she sets out on her webpage. I know that she gets a lot of blind queries like mine, and that she will have a mountain to wade through come next week, but are those any reason not to have some standard text that you can copy and paste into a reply email? Maybe there's something that I don't understand here, and you can bet that I would gladly send her the entire manuscript if she requests it. It's obviously not a deal-breaker or an approach that makes me unwilling to submit. I just wonder why.