Check out the WritersWeekly Podcast Episode 4, which is on this same hilarious topic! And, find out how to get free copies of two of Angela’s books, Query Letters That Worked and Book Proposals That Worked!

It’s that time again!! The non-sensical emails with off topic pitches, badly worded questions, and meaningless statements keep rolling in. Today, we’re going to share another installment of our popular column, World’s Worst Query Letters and Book Proposals.

We’ve been saving these for a few weeks now so there are a LOT to entertain you! As always, we’ve saved the best for last!

Featured below are real quotes from query letters and book proposals submitted to us over the past few weeks. Yes, we can learn from others’ mistakes!

In case you’re a new reader, please know that we are a publication about writing and publishing FOR WRITERS. When someone contacts us using our online contact form, directly above that form is a link to our writer’s guidelines, in a very large, bold, red font. The link to our guidelines is also at the top of every page on our website.

Are you ready? ENJOY!

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i would like to be one of your writers. how can i start?

First, you need to get the shift key on your keyboard fixed. Second, you need to read our writer’s guidelines. 

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My name is chizzy and I’m excited to share my article with WritersWeekly. This is my first submission, and I look forward to contributing more in the future. Kindly confirm if my article meets your editorial requirements or if there’s any feedback. After ten years doing freelance writing, one thing stands out clear. Curiosity drives everything, but it kills productivity too. The internet feels like a trap built just for folks like me. You begin searching for the history of window cleaning around two in the afternoon. Before you know it, four oclock rolls around. You find yourself lost in a video from the 1930s. That one shows how to make soap out of animal fat.

That’s the entire article? That’s not even long enough for a query letter! And, It has NOTHING to do with writing and publishing! Delete!

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I’m reaching out because I work with health and psychology content and noticed your site is a great fit.

Liar, liar, pants on fire! You’ve clearly NEVER been to our website. 

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I’m a health and wellness content writer with a background in “nutrition, yoga, psychology, or public health”. I’d love to contribute an article to your website.

It’s so obvious when people like you spam multiple publications at once without doing any research whatsoever. You’ve been blacklisted. 

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I just dropped an article. It’s below

It has NOTHING at all to do with writing or publishing!

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I want a jobs without investment and registration fees

You won’t get any job offers at all if that’s how you’re approaching employers. 

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I would adore to write articles for you.

I adore our writer’s guidelines. You should read them. 

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The article is related to your website and will be appreciated by your readers.

The entire query letter was vague to the point of saying absolutely nothing about the proposed article.

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I’m reaching out to pitch myself as a contributor for [Publication Name]. With experience writing feature articles that balance storytelling and reporting, I specialize in uncovering narratives that resonate with readers and spark conversation.

Lazy, lazy, lazy! You forgot to fix the code to insert the name of the publication in the brackets! And, you sent this to dozens of publications simultaneously. Dumb, dumb, dumb!

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“I have a unique and compelling article idea that will captivate your readers and provide them with fresh insights—I’d love the opportunity to share it with you.”

Why didn’t you submit the article idea with your email? You’ve wasted your time AND mine. 

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Hello I am an experienced writer not only on artcles but also content,accounting and business guideness

If you actually write articles (you don’t), you should be able to correctly spell articles. Business guideness? This tells me you’re not a native English-speaker…and that you aren’t smart enough to use translate.google.com. 

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I hope you are doing well. My name is Jehan. I have been following your posts, and am truly impressed by the value you provide to your followers. I would love the opportunity to contribute a guest post to your blog. My content would resonate well with your audience.

Another liar! You’ve never read our publication. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be using such vague language. And, if you’d bothered to read our writer’s guidelines, you’d know that we don’t accept guest posts. I know it’s hard to do research, honey. But, we only hire writers who KNOW how to do research. You don’t. 

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Hello. I am a psychologist by profession. I write articles on mental health. Is that an area that will be accepted here for submission?

If you’d bothered to even look at our website, you’d have answered your own question. 

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How can I write for you and earn my money .

You will get zero writing assignments sending that email to publications. ZERO. 

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Do you select medical articles?

You were literally ON our website, using our contact form! Go back to the website so you can answer your own question. 

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I need a contract

Good luck with that, buddy!

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How can I start getting paid?

You’ll never get paid by us so why are you asking? 

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I had a ex -drafting of articles and books, I have a very strong skill in this area. I will be there to do good service to everyone who will kind of my experience

If you can’t speak (or write!) English, don’t contact English-language publications. 

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I want to work with your organization as a writer and be paid at the end of the day.

Ha ha ha ha ha! We do pay our writers on acceptance but we don’t work with people who send such unprofessional emails. 

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i want to submit my article in writers weekly and herres a shortsummary from at
title:How Walnuts Can Benefit Cancer Patients

Herres a shortsummary of my response. DELETE!

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I ready to write for your company.

I ready to bang my head against a wall! SOMEBODY, PLEASE MAKE IT STOP!!!

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Objet : Proposition d’articles :
Madame,

En tant que lecteur assidu de WritersWeekly.com, j’admire votre engagement à fournir des conseils concrets et lucratifs aux auteurs indépendants et pigistes. Je vous propose 1 sujet inédit, spécialement conçu pour votre audience, qui évite les thèmes récurrents (blocage de l’écrivain, bases de l’autoédition…).
J’attends de vous lire prochainement.
Salutations
Yassine 

I used Google translate. Similar to the plethora of book club scams hitting everybody’s inbox right now, this “query letter” was written by AI. 

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I am a freelance writer with a special interest in health and wellness topics. My main area of focus is Familial Mediterranean Fever (FMF), a chronic condition that I am personally familiar with.

Why would WritersWeekly.com be interested in an article on that topic???

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I write poetry on cards and I want to see if you would be interested in poetry

I write poetry, too.

So, here’s what you need to do.

Ditch my email, and go away.

Stop wasting your and my time today. 

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Yes firdt of all, my greeting to everyone.
My name is Dan Richard from Akwa ibom state Nigeria. My interest that movtivest me to this platform it’s how sure this can work when you are written and you will endup collecting 30,000 US dollars by every month ending? How it’s that so possible to achieve? And when your answer to my questions so special clear to me through my questions i will definitely provide and start up my writing immediately.

Hey, Nigerian scammer! Your name definitely isn’t Dan Richard!!!

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See more entertaining installments of World’s Worst Book Proposals and Query Letters RIGHT HERE.

Please tell us what you think in the comments box below! 🙂

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• Copies of real query letters that resulted in writing assignments worth $2K and much more!
• If This Article Offends You, You’re Not a Professional Writer
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• More opinionated articles from Angela’s Desk

Have questions about Writing, Print On Demand, or Self-publishing? Ask Angela.