Actually, Tompe, a couple of minutes is often enough to decide on a submission that definitely *won't* fit the bill. An author -- like anyone else -- doesn't get a second chance to make a first impression.
My own wee house is swamped with submissions, but when an author has obviously read our guidelines and made an effort, we make time to at least read the first two chapters -- even if we're almost certain to decline -- so that we can offer a word or two of encouragement and advice.
Submissions I tend to reject out of hand are those from authors who have ignored the plainly stated short list of genres we do
not publish or who send in material that isn't workable for one reason or another. I mean -- what's not to understand about 'brief synopsis and first two chapters only and in a single Word.doc or RTF'?
Communication -- and mass submission -- is so easy these days that authors often simultasneously submit the same closed PDF of a full manuscript (warts-n-all) to a whole bunch of publishers who will consider work without agency representation ... not even glancing first at the kind of books the houses actually publish. This is spam, people. I do not consider such proposals seriously. The authors (sometimes hopeless and obviously inexperienced agents) don't deserve it. Form rejection note.
I have rejected half a dozen submissions (with form letters) on these perfectly sound grounds this morning, and it's just 9:45am. So far today, I've been deluged with children's books, sword-and-sorcery fantasy, chick-lit and non-fiction 'inspirational' work ... all of which we plainly state in the *For Authors* section of the
http://www.bewrite.net website we will not consider. It's a waste of precious professional editorial time.
Cheers. Neil