Email your queries to Diana (please include hometown details) at: diana@dianacambridge.co.uk or send them to: Helpline, Writing Magazine, Warners Group Publications plc, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds LS1 5JD. She will answer as many letters as she can on the page, but regrets that she cannot enter into individual correspondence. Publication of answers may take several months. Helpline cannot personally answer queries such as where to offer work, or comment on manuscripts, which you are asked not to send.
Q I have spent the past year working on a horror novel and I’m satisfied that it is now as perfect as it can possibly be. However, it is only around 40,000 words long. I am well aware that this is considerably shorter than the expected length of a novel for adults but I feel that in working on it further I would just be adding unnecessary padding. I’d like to know if I can realistically market it to agents and publishers just as it is. Would it qualify as a novella, and do agents consider novellas saleable?