/submission

name: submission
description: This skill should be used when the user asks to "write a query letter", "query", "querying", "pitch", "blurb", "back cover copy", "jacket copy", "comp titles", "comparable titles", "synopsis for agents", "submit to agents", "submission tracker", "self-publishing description", "retailer description", "ready to query", "submission readiness check", "submit a short story", "magazine submission", "short-fiction markets", "simultaneous submission", "reprint rights", "order a short story collection", or wants to prepare and track a finished manuscript's submission to agents, publishers, magazines, anthologies, or retailers. NOT for pitching a series of several books (use series-continuity), or self-publishing production, metadata, or book rights deals (use publishing). The blurb, retailer description, and the rights a short-fiction market buys, such as reprint rights, stay here.

Submission

Overview

Get a finished manuscript out the door. This skill checks submission readiness, drafts the submission package (query letter, pitch, synopsis, blurb, comp titles), builds the manuscript in submission format, and keeps a tracker of where the book has gone. Package files live under `submission/` in the story project. The author sends every submission themselves; this skill prepares materials and records outcomes.

Prerequisites

A story project with a complete or near-complete draft. Verify `story.md` exists in the project root and read its `status`, `genre`, `sub-genre`, `premise`, `author` (or `authors` for a co-written book), `contact`, and `language` fields. If `status` is not `complete` or `revising`, tell the user the package can be drafted now but the readiness check will fail until the draft is finished.

Language And Market

`language` (a missing field means `en`) is the book's language. Ask which market the user is submitting to. The query letter, Shunn manuscript format, comp conventions, and word-count norms in the references are the English-language (mainly US and UK) market's. Other markets have their own practice: some publishers take submissions directly rather than through agents, and many ask for a synopsis and sample pages in their own format. Ask the user for the guidelines of the agents or publishers they are targeting and follow those; never present English-market conventions as universal. Write the package in the language the agent or publisher reads, which is usually the book's.

When to Use

• Checking whether a manuscript is ready to submit
• Drafting or revising a query letter, pitch, synopsis, blurb, or comp list
• Building a Shunn-format manuscript for agents or magazines
• Writing a retailer or back-cover description for self-publishing
• Recording queries sent and responses received
• Submitting short fiction to magazines, anthologies, or contests:

simultaneous or exclusive submissions, rights, response windows, and status queries

• Choosing and ordering the stories for a collection, and its

previously-published acknowledgements

• NOT for self-publishing production (ISBNs, retailer metadata, print

interiors, launch, rights deals and contracts): use the `publishing` skill. This skill still drafts the blurb and retailer description it uses, and records the rights a short-fiction market buys

• NOT for pitching a series of several books or writing its series overview

(use `series-continuity`); the query for book one is still drafted here

• NOT for revising the manuscript itself (use `revision-continuity`)
• NOT for reader feedback rounds (use `feedback-triage`)

Hard Rules

• Never invent the author's bio, credentials, awards, publication history,

platform, or contact details. Ask the user, or leave a clearly marked `[TODO: author to supply]` placeholder.

• Never invent agent, publisher, or market names, submission guidelines,

pay rates, rights terms, response times, dates, or responses. Tracker entries come from the user.

• Never send, email, or upload anything. The user submits.
• Never claim sales figures, bestseller status, awards, or endorsements for

comp titles or the author that the user has not confirmed.

• Package copy describes the book as written. Read the manuscript and the

bible; do not promise events, tone, or an ending the draft does not deliver.

Workflow

1. Readiness check

Run the deterministic checks and report every finding before drafting:

story reindex .
story wordcount . --write
story check .
story prose .
story report .

Review the output of the commands above:

1. `story check .` (validate, links, and continuity) has no errors. List warnings for the user to accept or fix. 2. `story prose .` shows no avoided spellings, and the user has reviewed the other findings. If `style-sheet.md` is missing or still the scaffold, suggest the `voice-style` skill first. 3. No `[TODO` markers remain in chapter prose. `story validate` warns about each chapter that still has one. 4. Open questions and planted promises are resolved, or deliberately left for a sequel (check `story.md` `precedes`). Once `story.md` is `status: complete`, every open question and planned or planted promise or clue is a `story continuity` error, which fails the story-checks CI. An undecided thread stays open: a promise or clue at `planned` or `planted`, or a question at `open`. Once the user confirms that a thread pays off in the next book, record that decision in `continuity/exemptions.md` rather than changing the thread's status:

   ---
   type: exemption-log
   exemptions:
     - code: complete-with-open-promise
       pattern: "continuity/promises/the-sealed-letter.md is still planted"
       reason: "Pays off in book two."
   ---

Rerun `story continuity .` and confirm the finding shows as `dismissed`.

Then check what the CLI does not report:

5. Every chapter has `status: revised`, `final`, or `complete`. List any still at