The article “Why This Book, and Why Me”, by Talcott Notch literary agent Amy Collins in the September/October 2026 issue of Writer's Digest, is among the most candid and useful pieces I've read in a while. Collins’ theme throughout the article is that writers today must be capable of expressing the why of our writing project and the why of our being the person to write it. Here’s an overview of the piece and why it matters.
Since the article is about querying, online or in person, Collins begins with a hook, writes with immediacy, and gets right to the heart of the piece. The hook carries a reminder of something I learned when the Connecticut Authors and Publishers Association was sponsoring the yearly CAPA-U conference. Literary agents, the good ones, suffer the same tribulations as writers. We get ghosted, rejected and our hopes dashed. So do agents.
Rather than focus on the usual opening question for queries of what your book is about, Collins highlights the underlying question: Why your book and not someone else’s? We should be able to answer the first question, which mostly takes practice. But we must also be prepared to answer the second, which requires study, self-reflection and honest self-appraisal.
To answer the “why you” question, Collins lists points to consider before we query. These range from whether we’re more talented than the next writer, and if so how, all the way to whether we’re studying our genre, keeping up with new releases, and willing to continue these practices.
If this sounds like a job interview, in a way it is. Yet, we can benefit from the effort needed to prepare ourselves and our work for publication.
As an advocate for lifelong learning, I see these efforts as rejuvenating. Writing this blog, for example, keeps me abreast of what’s happening in publishing and the world at large. And that’s the underlying point. It takes mental, physical and emotional effort to remain engaged, but the effort helps keep writers agile.
Collins’ article also provides a case study all writers can relate to. Rather than recount that here, I suggest reading the piece and turning it into a worksheet you can use for preparing to query agents, editors and publishers, and as a checklist for completing your project.
One thing to remember, writing is always about more than writing. It’s also about developing ourselves as writers—something we can do at any stage of the writing life.
For more on aiding the querying process and the writing journey, see “Why This Book, and Why Me”, by Amy Collins, in the September/October 2026 issue of Writer's Digest.
Happy writing!
Adele Annesi is an award-winning writer, editor and instructor. Her five-star cultural heritage novel set in Italy is What She Takes Away (Bordighera Press, 2023). Adele coauthored and coedited Now What? The Creative Writer’s Guide to Success After the MFA. Her MFA in creative writing is from Fairfield University, and her long-running blog for writers is Word for Words.
