Feedback on My Query?

My writing career has been taking a really circuitous path over the last couple of years, and unfortunately, there's still no end in sight. As such, I've been working on a new project and new query and would love to hear your thoughts.

Content warnings: mass shootings and suicidal ideation

Dear [Agent]:

It’s been five years since Roxy’s life fractured into Before and After, since her then-fourteen-year-old attempted suicide by cop. This is the lie they told, at least, to hide an even fouler truth, and now the weight has fractured them. She and her husband have divorced, she and her son have relocated, and they never, ever speak about that day, their very worst.

Until her son, who’s now a sophomore at the university, shows up on her townhouse’s doorstep on the eve of winter solstice. He was meant to spend the break in California with his father, but apparently, plans changed; now he’ll be going to an all-night party called The Longest Dark. Roxy’s suspicious of this change—her son’s a classic introvert and not spontaneous at all—but though she questions him at length, she can’t get Nathan to confess.

Roxy’s suspicions are confirmed when she discovers that her gun safe has been opened (broken into?) and her guns have disappeared. She tails him to the party venue, a vast entertainment complex floating, dreamlike, on a lake. Mid-search, a vision seizes her, and Roxy sees the party venue through the would-be shooter’s eyes. When shots break out and others flee, she stays behind to find her son, using her visions as a guide. But doubts creep in as time runs out. What if her son is not the shooter and these visions aren’t a gift? What if she’ll have to watch him die?

THE LONGEST DARK, not yet complete, is psychological suspense with complex mother-son dynamics and a speculative twist. I hope to find an agent who embraces the proposal and would like to have a say in how the manuscript takes shape.

I’m the author of four novels for discerning middle graders (read: they didn't sell that well): THE SOUND OF LIFE AND EVERYTHING (Putnam, 2015), DON’T VOTE FOR ME (Sourcebooks, 2015), EARTH TO DAD (Capstone, 2018), and THE MULTIPLYING MYSTERIES OF MOUNT TEN (Bloomsbury, 2019). I’m also the creator of #PitchMe, a curated pitch event that has allowed me to connect with editors at St. Martin’s Press and Sourcebooks, among several others.

Thank you for your time and especially your consideration.

I know I'm committing a faux pas by querying a manuscript that I haven't finished yet, but if I've earned anything as a four-time published author, I've decided I've earned this.

What Do You Think of This Query for My YA Fantasy?

As many of you know, my agent medically retired toward the beginning of last year. I'd already been struggling to come up with my next project, and this setback didn't help. Gladly, #PitchMe came along, which gave me time to plot and plan. I wrote and revised a PB as soon as #PitchMe was done, then started working on a YA I'd been pondering for months. I've nearly finished the first draft, so now I'm just starting to think about how to pitch this project. It's still several months away from being ready to query, but I would love to get your thoughts on my query in the meantime. This is only the first draft, so I'm open to all feedback:

Dear [Agent]:

As the adopted son of the highest high chief of the Lands, Almundemba’s never felt like he actually belongs. He’s too pale, too paranoid, and more interested in plants than in governing the Lands. But Almund has one use for his political cachet, and that’s to alter the Exchange. For too long, this exercise of trading children like kukuis has benefitted his birth country more than his adopted one; he wants to rebalance the scales.

Relentless as the Tide used to be the only child of the highest high chief of the Lands—until he traded her for the Homish sovereign’s newborn when Relentless was a toddler. Twelve and seven years later, Relentless finally figures out why her adopted mother willingly Exchanged her son: because she needed a daughter to pledge marriage to the heir of her country’s vengeful neighbor. Relentless wants no part of this and hijacks the steamer bound for the Lands and the Exchange to abolish it for good.

This won’t be easy, though. The highest high chief of the Lands doesn’t wish to void the treaty that has kept his nation safe, and Almund has his own agenda. Luckily, Relentless has one more bargaining chip: a biological half sister who resembles her a lot. Setting her principles aside, Relentless kidnaps her half sister to pledge marriage in her place.

When Almund learns they’ve disappeared, he vows to bring his sister back. She’s the heir their country needs. But sisters have minds of their own, and this one has other plans. Now Almund must convince her she requires rescuing before she marries a monster—and he’ll need Relentless’s help.

[TITLE] is a 100,000-word fantasy for young adults inspired by h­ānai, the traditional Hawaiian practice of informally adopting children to bolster alliances. After my previous agent medically retired last year, I spent the next several months formulating the right project with which to secure a new one. This manuscript is that right project and has never been submitted.

Like my main characters, I was adopted as an infant. I’m also part Hawaiian and the author of four middle grade novels, including THE SOUND OF LIFE AND EVERYTHING (Putnam 2015) and THE MULTIPLYING MYSTERIES OF MOUNT TEN (Bloomsbury 2019).

Thank you for your time and especially your consideration.

A New Query/A New Hope

I know, I know, long time, no blog. What can I say? It's 2020. But one of the many things I've been working on this year is an MG contemporary that I'm rather in love with and that I intend to query. ("Oh, no!" you're probably thinking if you've been around the blog for any length of time. "What happened with you and Brent?" Nothing really, and therein lay the problem. I think we both knew it was time to move on.) As such, I'd love to get your feedback on the first query I've written in almost five years. First draft below!

Dear [Insert Agent Here]:

Twelve-year-old Ingrid Adler really doesn’t like her aunt. She’s a know-it-all, she’s rude, and worst of all, she left the faith. Then Ingrid’s mom passes away, and her aunt nobly volunteers to help her dad take care of her. She’d much rather have her mom.

She avoids her helpful aunt by reading her mom’s diaries. They’re spontaneous and fun, everything her aunt is not. They also reveal a handful of her mom’s last wishes--to help Ingrid know her birth mom and to ride a roller coaster.

Ingrid dislikes roller coasters as much as she hates her aunt, but she also wants to be as courageous as her mom. When her aunt reads the diaries, she doesn’t give Ingrid a chance to weigh in on her crazy scheme, just organizes a massive cross-country road trip on the fly. With her grieving dad in tow, Ingrid grudgingly sets out to ride the baddest roller coasters between here and the Atlantic. But will this roller coaster road trip help her find her birth mom, too?

[TITLE] is an #ownvoices MG contemporary complete at 50,000 words. My previous agent and I parted on amicable terms several months ago, before I finished the first draft. Neither he nor any editors have read this manuscript, and it will be available to submit immediately.

Like Ingrid, I was placed for adoption as an infant and raised in a mixed-race home that was genuine and nurturing. I’ve also recently begun my search for my biological family. Though I’ve identified my birth dad, who was the younger son of a Filipino immigrant and a native Hawaiian, I still haven’t found my birth mom--but I haven’t given up.

I’m also the author of THE SOUND OF LIFE AND EVERYTHING, a Junior Library Guild selection, and THE MULTIPLYING MYSTERIES OF MOUNT TEN, among other MG novels.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

A few other notes: I've included my previous books, including publishers and release dates, in my signature block, which is why I haven't put them in the paragraph above. I just thought this looked less cluttered, but feel free to disagree! Also, while I'm looking for feedback on anything and everything, I'm especially not sold on the last line of the summary. Lastly, if you have any ideas for the title, please, please, please lay them on me. My best two ideas so far are HOW NOT TO FIND YOUR BIRTH MOM and THE SECRETS ROLLER COASTERS KEEP, but I'm not sold on those, either.

All right, then, have at it!

In Which I Introduce Team Maries and Share Some General Thoughts

The teams are set, and #TeamMaries is looking pretty great:

Clarissa Hadge and JETSTAR FIGHTER PILOT (#109)
Fataima Ahmad and THE SHAPE OF THE MANGO (#169)
Katelyn Larson and WHISPERMAGE (#29)
Kristin Reynolds and THE LAST PAPER DAHL (#69)
Maria Hebert-Leiter and REVELATION (#81)
Sarah Adair and THE DREADFUL GOOD (#67)
Triona Murphy and MONTANA GOLD (#140)
Wendy Daughdrill and TRUE NORTH (#159)

And last but not least, the other half of #TeamMaries, Anna-Marie McLemore, my brilliant guest coach!

That gives us two MGs (a fantasy and a contemporary), five YAs (a sci-fi, a fantasy, a historical, a mystery, and a romantic adventure), and one adult project (which is literary fiction). I always try to spread my teammates' entries out on the age/genre spectrum, but I was especially pleased with how this group turned out.

Before I go any further, a disclaimer: I'm not an agent, so I'm in no way an expert on queries, the market, or publishing in general. In other words, please take all these thoughts for what they are--my thoughts. These are just a few of the things I noticed as I whittled down my list:

1. A good comp title can signal that you know the market, but an overused one may do just the opposite. Quite a few of the YA fantasies in this batch compared themselves to GRACELING or THRONE OF GLASS, so it wasn't long before my eyes glazed over every time I spotted one of those titles. The best comps aren't so obscure as to be unheard of, but they probably also aren't the best-selling books in your genre.

2. It's really easy to sum up your characters or underscore your themes at the end of your query, but resist the temptation! If your summary's done its job, you won't have to tell agents what your story's really about. You might also want to avoid laundry lists of plot points. If we can't tell how the pieces will fit together, we probably won't care about them as much as you think we should.

3. I thought there was a ton of intriguing sci-fi in this bunch. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it's good to be aware of what other people are writing so you predict how the market might shift.

4. I'm still leery of anything that smacks of dystopian. If your futuristic thriller mentioned a revolution, it probably didn't make it onto my lists. Which isn't to say futuristic thrillers can't sell-- they've just got to bring a new hook to the table. It seems like a rebellion should immediately raise the stakes, but because we've seen so many, they typically serve to LOWER a story's stakes. There are a thousand and one other ways to inject conflict into a plot, so at least for the time being, pick one of those. Seemingly small, deeply personal stakes can often end up being the biggest stakes of all.

5. There were quite a few entries I was really excited about--until I discovered that they'd been in three other contests. Overexposure is real--agents get ornery if they have to keep reading the same entries over and over--so picking and choosing your contests might be a good idea.

What stood out to you as you went through the entries?

Introducing Team Krista 2013! (Plus a Few Thoughts on the Entries)

And here's my awesome team (in alphabetical order)!

Alexa D. and FUTURESHOCK (#19)
Catherine Lo and THIS IS HOW IT ENDS (#136)
Heidi Lang, Kati Bartkowski, and MYSTIC COOKING (#35)
Jenny Kaczorowski and THE EXTRAORDINARY ART OF FALLING (#41)
Jerilyn Patterson and WISHING (#94)
Jessie Oliveros and A PRETTY PIRATE PICKLE (#14)
Laura J. Moss and WATER LILY (#127)
Mackenzi Lee Van Engelenhoven and DEATH AND THE GLASSMAKER'S DAUGHTER (#124)

with Ashley Turcotte and LUMINARY (#3) as my alternate

That gives me two MG projects and six YA projects, with a YA alternate. Interestingly, that breakdown matches last year's breakdown almost exactly (though I did have a few adult projects on my team last year as well).

To be honest, I found redeeming qualities in a lot of entries (though I did spot problems, too). In the end, it came down to my personal tastes, which is what it's always going to come down to. Hopefully, you'll find an agent--and especially an editor--whose tastes will match your own, but if you don't, there's always the next manuscript. That was my mantra for so many years: "There's always the next manuscript" (assuming, of course, you really want to go traditional, which, admittedly, not everyone does, and that's okay).

Before I go any further, a disclaimer: I am in NO WAY an expert on queries, the market, or publishing in general, so please take all these thoughts for what they are--my thoughts. These are just a few of the things I noticed as I whittled down my list, and they say a lot more about me than they do about any of the entries.

A few things that stuck out to me as I was reading through the entries (in the order that I wrote them down):

1. There was a lot of fantasy in this group, and the queries didn't always match the first pages. A lot of the summaries seemed to describe high fantasies, but when I got to the pages, they were obviously set on our world, in our time. That disconnect was jarring and made me worry that the writer didn't really know what they were writing.

2. The plot points in a query need to build on each other. This is especially true for contemporaries. Real life is something we can all relate to, but contemporary stories still need to have an inciting incident, rising action, a climax, and a denouement. Of course, you don't need to summarize all of these plots points in your query, but you do need to show a strong cause-and-effect relationship between the events you do mention.

3. It was weird when a query would summarize the whole plot in a few sentences at the beginning, then go back and summarize it again in another two or three paragraphs. I know some agents and industry sites encourage writers to develop loglines, but I don't think you're really supposed to squish loglines and queries together. (Some queries do start off with taglines, one-sentence (or less) hooks of the sort you might see on book covers. I'm not a huge fan of these, either, but at least they flow a little better with the query itself.)

4. Several of the entries suffered from what I call the bait-and-switch. The queries described one project, and then the first pages seemed to start another. This is related to point one above, but it's not restricted to fantasies. You want your query and first scene to flow together. Readers should be able to immediately see how they relate.

5. Some concepts blended fantastical and normal elements for no apparent reason, and I had a hard time getting excited about those. That's mostly just my own personal preference, though I do think everything in a query--and a manuscript--should serve a specific purpose. If you can't show how the pieces fit together in the query, then it makes me think you haven't put them together in the manuscript very well, either.

6. I noticed a lot of ghosts and a surprising number of werewolves in this batch of entries. That's not necessarily good or bad; it just means you're going to have to compete directly against all the other people writing about ghosts and werewolves, so your project has to be that much better.

7. I came across several well-written projects that I actually loved; the only problem was that they were several years too late. In one case, the premise was too similar to a recently popular book (and movie), and in several others, the genre was off. It's all but impossible to sell a dystopian right now, but then, you wouldn't want to launch a dystopian series at the moment, as it would look kind of derivative and probably not sell many copies.

That's it from me! What stood out to you as you perused the entries?

Bullies, First Days, and Magical Realism

After poring over Pitch Wars applications for the last couple of weeks, I had a few thoughts I wanted to share with you. Keep in mind, I was reading applications for MG manuscripts only, so I don’t think these points necessarily extend to writers in other categories (except for the definition of magical realism, of course).

 

On the whole, I was quite impressed with the MG applications in this contest. Of the 49 applications I received, I ended up hanging on to about 25% of them, kicking another 50% into the “Up for Grabs” folder, and flagging the other 25% as not quite there yet. I can’t remember the last time I thought 75% of the queries I read had potential, so that’s quite a feat in and of itself. And now for a few more trends I noticed:

 

1. A TON of the opening pages involved bullies or first days of school (or both), so if you’re going to use one of those motifs, you shouldn’t rely on it to be your hook. I’m not saying you can’t have a bully or a first day of school in your first chapter; in fact, several of my favorite applications involved bullies or first days of school in one way or another. Just know that, if you do, you’re not alone, so you’re going to have to do something special with it.

 

2. A query needs more than a paragraph-long summary. I know a lot of websites, including some prominent agency ones, encourage writers to use this query formula: one paragraph for business (title, category and genre, word count, etc.), one for summary, and one for bio. But I found I didn’t get a very good sense of the plot if the summary was only a paragraph long. Specifics are the lifeblood of a query, and you don’t have enough room to cram very many into a single paragraph. So I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that the summary in a query should be at least two paragraphs and, in some cases, maybe three or four. So long as everything fits on one single-spaced page (and you haven’t overly adjusted your margins), you’re good.

 

3. No one really knows what magical realism is. I’m not sure I do, either, but I feel like I have a better handle on it than I did even six months ago, so I wanted to share some of the ideas that have been bouncing around in my brain. I’m pretty sure none of the magical realism applications I received actually fit within that genre, so hopefully, this will help.

 

The problem is, magical realism is a misnomer; magical realism is NOT a realistic story with magical elements. Well, it is, but the definition has more to it than that. In general, magical realism involves an Unexplained Phenomenon--hereafter known as the UP--that actually exists outside, not inside, the story. Put another way, the UP creates a frame for the story that affects the main character’s perspective while leaving everything else unchanged. Here are a few other characteristics of magical realism:

 

--The main character is usually the only person who can even tell the UP is happening. She could try to explain it to the people around her, but since there’s no evidence of the UP outside her own head, they probably wouldn’t believe her.

 

--Even though the main character can tell the UP is happening, he can’t control it. By the end of the story, he understands it no better than he did at the beginning, though he’s probably learned something from this change in perspective. That’s one reason why magical realism is a really tough genre to write in: because you have to get your readers to completely suspend their disbelief without ever finding out why or how the UP was occurring.

 

--If your story involves an object, a creature, a physical transformation, or superpowers, it’s probably NOT magical realism. Contemporary and/or urban fantasy, certainly, but not magical realism.

 

By those criteria, the best examples of magical realism I’ve encountered are Lauren Oliver’s BEFORE I FALL and Gayle Forman’s IF I STAY. And that old movie with Bill Murray, Groundhog Day. I saw it again on TV a few weeks ago, and I was like, “Holy cow! This is magical realism!” :)

 

That’s all I’ve got. Hope you have a great weekend!

Gearing Up to Write a Query?

I’ve read a lot of queries. When you’ve spent as many years in the query trenches as I have, that’s just what happens. I’ve written probably two dozen drafts of queries for my own manuscripts, and I’ve done my time at sites like Absolute Write and Nathan Bransford’s forums, reading, learning, critiquing. Hosting “An Agent’s Inbox” has also exposed me to mountains of queries, and I can assure you I’ve read every single one of them. (You can thank Gmail and Blogger’s inability to preserve each other’s formatting for that.)

All of this is the roundabout way of saying I’ve had a little time to figure out what works and what doesn’t, and as I read through the “Gearing Up to Get an Agent” entries last week, one thought kept running through my head:

I don’t think these entries are as good as some of the other judges seem to think.

Now I only read the entries on my assigned blog (and as you read on, it’s going to become pretty apparent which blog that was if you followed the contest), and I really, really, REALLY don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings. I only want to point out a few of the overarching problems I noticed in the hopes that, someday, somewhere, this might help someone make it through the hair-pulling, teeth-gnashing experience that is writing a query.

1. Contemporary queries, perhaps more than any others, have to showcase compelling, unique hooks. So many of the contemporary entries I read relied too heavily on a hot-button topic to draw the reader in. If you’re hoping your current, edgy subject matter will carry your query (“SUICIDE!” “ADDICTION!” “SEXUAL ORIENTATION!”), you’re probably going to be disappointed. The vast majority of the contemporary entries in this contest addressed one of these issues, so the issue in and of itself isn’t a strong enough hook. You need to do something more with it.

2. Historical queries must entrench us in their time periods and, at the same time, introduce us to timeless characters and/or problems. Historicals are tough, no doubt about it. You have around two hundred words to introduce us to a world and character we won’t immediately relate to, and yet you have to do it in such a way that we’ll see the parallels to our own lives. Most of the historical queries in this contest didn’t quite rise to this standard, at least in my opinion. I either didn’t buy the voice (because I thought it sounded too modern), or I didn’t buy the world.

3. When everything is said and done, tastes really are subjective. After I finished my first read-through, I had exactly ten entries on my short list but only felt strongly about three. I ended up crossing a few of those off and adding a few others, but one that I kept coming back to was also one that didn’t have the strongest hook. Still, I had a personal weakness for that type of story, so even though I knew it had some problems, I voted for it, anyway, and I stand by that vote. An agent may very well do the same.

Last but not least, I’ll add that there’s no one right way to write a query--and that there’s certainly no one person who has all of this figured out. So take this with a grain of salt, and keep plugging away. All the blog posts in the world won’t teach you what you’ll learn simply by giving it a try.

In Which I Introduce Team Krista and Share Some Thoughts About the Entries

First off, allow me to introduce my awesome team (in alphabetical order)!

Anna-Marie and THE COIN DIVER (#35)
Ben Spendlove and DRIVERS (#149)
Carla Cullen and THE FALLEN PRINCESS (#152)
Erin Petti and THELMA BEE (#117)
Jennie Bailey and SILO (#64)
Lisa Koosis and THE ROAD OF THE DEAD (#45)
Michelle Mason and DUET WITH THE DEVIL’S VIOLINIST (#75)
Noelle Henry and FACE THE MUSIC (#50)
Ryan Hancock and AN UNCOMMON BLUE (#122)
Sarah Henson and PLAYING WITH FIRE (#146)

with Lori Eastep and CHRONICITY (#101) as my alternate

That gives me two MG projects, six YA projects, and two adult (sci-fi) projects, with an MG alternate. I like the balance of my team, and the truth is, most of it evolved on its own. I did go in thinking that I needed to have more YA projects than anything, just because it’s the most represented category among the participating agents, but these really were the projects I loved most.

As I was building my team, I originally divided the entries that caught my interest into two groups--“Contenders” and “Strong Contenders”--then realized that I was going to have enough strong contenders as it was and that I didn’t need to keep two lists. I ended up with thirty-nine strong contenders total, and of those, eleven ended up on my team (obviously), at least five or six on someone else’s, and another withdrew just yesterday after receiving an offer of representation. (Congratulations, Andrea Berthot!)

Before I go any further, a disclaimer: I am in NO WAY an expert on queries, the market, or publishing in general, so please take all these thoughts for what they are--my thoughts. These are just a few of the things I noticed as I whittled down my list, and they say a lot more about me than they do about any of the entries.

A few thoughts I had along the way:

1. After reading through a batch of entries (say, twenty or thirty), I sat back and asked myself, “Now which ones do I remember?” And the truth was, not many. Quite a few of them sounded like something I’d read--or heard of--before.

2. And speaking of things I’d read or heard of before, I’ll admit that words like “guardian,” “demon,” and “angel” immediately made me pull back. In all of those cases, the writing really had to stand out to make me take a closer look. Angels and demons are the new vampires--a lot of agents have blogged/tweeted about how they’re overwhelmed with those creatures--so you might be facing an uphill battle when it comes to querying a manuscript with those elements.

3. When I did remember an entry, it was almost always because the concept had captured my attention.

4. At least in my opinion, writing followed concept. If the concept stuck out to me, the writing usually did, too. (I’m still trying to decide if that’s because I was giving the high-concept folks the benefit of the doubt or because the people who did the best job explaining their storylines were also the best writers.)

5. I passed on several entries--including several great entries--simply because I knew the writers had been querying them for a while and worried that our agents might have seen them before. In a few cases, I knew the writers and their querying histories, but in a few others, the writers specified in their introductions that they thought the manuscript was on its last legs. I wouldn’t do this. You want every agent to think that she’s the first agent you’re querying, so I’d keep your manuscript’s battle scars to yourself.

6. So many entries seemed to have a good story buried in there somewhere, but I had a hard time picking it out from all the subplots/extraneous words in the query. I thought a lot of the queries were trying to do too much. (“Then this happened, then THIS happened, then THIS happened, and now here’s a list of all the other interesting elements that I couldn’t work into the summary.”) If you don’t think your main plot is strong enough to hook an agent, then your problem isn’t your query or first page--it’s your manuscript.

7. I noticed a lot of huge stakes without much explanation. Almost every other query ended with some line about how the world was on the brink. You can dangle the fate of this world and every other on a string, but if I can’t tell how exactly the world is in jeopardy--and more importantly, if I can’t tell why the characters care that the world is in jeopardy--then I’m probably not going to care, either. As I learned back in high school debate class, you can link pretty much every story to nuclear holocaust, so huge stakes for huge stakes’ sake might not hook an agent.

8. I sat up a little straighter every time I stumbled across an entry for a YA or MG contemporary, and to be perfectly honest, quite a few of these impressed me. However, I worried that the agents would find most of them too quiet. Quiet novels are the opposite of high-concept ones, so if your YA contemporary doesn’t have a strong hook (think French boarding schools for ANNA AND THE FRENCH KISS or backpacking for WANDERLOVE), then even if you do land an agent, he or she is going to have a hard time selling it.

All right, I think that’s all for now. This post is already way too long:) What stood out to you as you read through the entries, and which ones would you have picked?

Steve's Query and First Page

I'm half excited and half nervous to share Steve's query and first page with you. Gives me a new appreciation for how you "An Agent's Inbox" entrants must feel, and this isn't even a contest!

Anyway, here they are (for the time being, at least). Feel free to leave your feedback in the comments. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Steve's Query Twelve-year-old Ella Mae is a sensible girl. She believes in the Good Lord Jesus Christ and tunes in once a week for that new television show I Love Lucy (but only when Dragnet isn’t on). So when some egghead scientist starts spouting nonsense about deoxy-something-or-other and how he can regenerate her auntie Mildred’s long-dead son from the blood on his old dog tags, Ella Mae doesn’t believe him. Or at least she doesn’t until a man steps out of the bio-pod and drips yellow-green slime onto the floor.

Problem is, the man who steps out of that bio-pod isn’t her cousin. He’s a Japanese.

Ella Mae knows that she should hate him, but when he can’t remember his own name, she feels more pity than hate. Ella Mae gives the man a name and, like any good mama, vows to protect him from the world. She spits at the reverend for calling him an abomination and even tells off her loose-lipped cousin for trying to kiss him. But when the man’s memories resurface, memories about the war and what really happened on the day his blood splashed on her cousin’s dog tags, Ella Mae has to learn the hard way that she can’t protect him from some things.

[TITLE], complete at 52,000 words, is an MG historical with a dash of science fiction. [Agent-specific comments]

I am a BYU graduate, a stay-at-home mom, and a blogger. My blog, Mother. Write. (Repeat.), receives an average of 8,000 pageviews a month.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Steve's First Page Mama said it was plum foolishness to keep my cousin’s dog tags like that, with his blood still stuck between the ridges of his name. “Don’t know why Mildred won’t wash ’em,” Mama muttered one day while scrubbing dishes. “It’s like she thinks that blood will keep Robby alive somehow, like it’ll keep him with her. And we both know that’s plum foolishness.” She shook a soapy finger in my face. “That’s foolishness, Ella Mae, and don’t let anyone tell you any differently. Especially Auntie Mildred.”

But that was exactly what Mildred told me. “It’s not foolishness, Ella Mae,” she said one day while sweeping floors. “It’s science.” She gave the broom a flick. “And one of these days, those eggheads who invented the atomic bomb are gonna figure out how to create life instead of just destroy it.”

I never told Auntie Mildred what Mama had said, and I never told Mama what Auntie Mildred had said, either. Those two already had enough to fight about, seeing as how they were sisters and all. In fact, when Mama answered the telephone that Saturday afternoon, I figured it was Auntie Mildred calling to resume their ongoing argument about Ajax.

But I was only half right.

“Settle down, Mildred,” Mama said, since she wasn’t the sort to stand for anyone’s shenanigans (especially Auntie Mildred’s). “Now what’s this about Robby?”

I stopped chomping on my asparagus. Something told me I’d want to hear every word of this particular conversation.

A Big Black Cat, an Interview, and a Little Bit of Steve

First things first. Agented writer and blogging friend Mindy McGinnis--better known to most of you as bigblackcat97--has started a new query critiquing series on her blog. Basically, you e-mail her your query, and she posts it on her blog and sinks her claws into it gives you some constructive criticism. (In all seriousness, though, Mindy is one of the nicest people you’ll ever meet, so she dispenses her advice in the kindest possible way.) Other readers share their thoughts with you as well, so you end up with several worthy opinions (which is good, since the truth generally lies somewhere in the middle).

This is especially helpful if you’re looking for feedback before you reach the query stage (and heaven only knows we could all use a little feedback then), so hop over to her blog and give The Saturday Slash a look-see. You do need to be a follower to participate, but I’m sure you’ll want to be one once you check out her site.

Next things next. I (finally) have another installment of “Interview with an Agent” in the pipeline, and better yet, it’s going to be INTERACTIVE. Hannah Bowman, the newest agent at Liza Dawson Associates, will be here this Friday, October 28, to answer any questions you may have. Definitely plan on checking in that day to catch Ms. Bowman’s responses to the usual questions--and a bunch more.

Lastly, I’ve felt a little bad that I always ask you guys to put your queries and first pages on the chopping block but never offer up my own. (Not that I would ever enter one of my own contests, but still.) So in the spirit of not cowering behind the chopping block any longer, I plan to post the current drafts of Steve’s query and first page tomorrow morning, and I’d love to hear your thoughts. If you have a minute, you might check those out as well.

Well, I think that’s it. Anyone else know of any other exciting goings-on around the blogosphere this week?

P.S. Don’t miss the winners Ms. Testerman picked from last week’s round of “An Agent’s Inbox.” Did one of your favorites make the list?

Bob's New Query

With Bob's revision winding down, I find myself in need of a new query. It's still a little rough, but here's what I have so far:

Sixteen-year-old Adair’s life isn’t as glamorous as it sounds. She lives in Mandalay Bay, sure, but the Bay hasn’t seen a high roller since the Last Recession, just an army of luckless squatters. She goes to school at Wynn, but it’s more of a prison camp than an actual high school. And while she doesn’t have a lot of parental supervision, that’s only because her mom is dead and her dad has to work long hours for the man who ruined their lives.

Old Man Hermes did a lot more than revolutionize the biomedia industry when he invented Wingteeth, oral implants that link people’s brainwaves to the Stream. He also created a class system based on technological orientation, with the sharks and their Wingteeth on top, the Toothless grannies on the bottom. Oh, and he also sacrificed her mother’s life to save his precious company. Adair wants to return the favor--by taking his company away from him.

With the help of her secret society, Adair plans to carry out her hostile corporate takeover in five easy steps: First, rustle up an invitation to Old Man Hermes’s annual symposium. Second, assassinate him at the banquet. Third, shut down the Stream. Fourth, make the whole thing look like an accident. Fifth, install one of the grannies as chairman of the board.

What she doesn’t plan is to fall in love with one of the sharks at the symposium or to turn them into zombies when she shuts down the Stream. And she certainly doesn’t expect not to have the guts to murder Old Man Hermes when she gets the perfect chance.

All right, tear it apart. What doesn't make sense? What needs more explanation?

The "Help! Bob Needs a Title" Blog Contest

Hooray! It’s the day we’ve all been waiting for! (Okay, maybe I'm the only one who's been waiting for it...) The “Help! Bob Needs a Title” Blog Contest is here!

As many of you know, I’ve been calling my work-in-progress Bob for almost a year now, and while it’s an affectionate nickname, it’s not a very useful title. I’m thinking you can come up with a better one.

To enter, simply read Bob’s query and first page below, then leave your suggested titles in the comments section of this post. You’re welcome to include feedback in your comment, but make sure you clearly identify your entries so my trusty sidekick (read: Honey Bear, my husband) doesn’t miss them.

I plan to judge the entries blindly, meaning I won’t know who submitted what. My trusty sidekick will transfer all the entries into a separate document, no names attached, and I’ll make my picks from there.

The Rules

1. Anyone may enter.

2. Everyone who enters may submit up to seven entries. (You don’t even have to do anything to get those extra entries--I just don’t want you to have to choose between several equally good titles.)

3. In the unlikely event that the same title is entered more than once, every entry but the first will be disqualified (although the disqualified entrants may submit other entries).

The Prizes Four lovely agents have agreed to offer query and/or first-page critiques to the winners:

Amy Boggs: Query plus first-page critique
Sarah LaPolla: First-page critique
Andrea Somberg: Query plus first-page critique
Marissa Walsh: Query critique

I plan to name three winners, so the first-place winner will get to pick two of these prizes, the second-place winner will get to pick one of the remaining prizes, and the third-place winner will receive the remaining prize.

And here’s the kicker: If I like the first-place winner’s title enough to actually use it AND this manuscript lands an agent, the first-place winner will also win a fifty-dollar Amazon gift card. In addition, if said agent likes the title enough AND the manuscript lands a book deal, the first-place winner will also win a Kindle (or another comparable e-reader of his or her choice).

The Query The 2046 International Biomedia Conference is the most celebrated event for high school students on the planet. But when Seth receives an invitation to attend, the last thing he wants to do is celebrate.

Seth hates biomedia, especially his Wingtooth, the tooth-shaped implant that links his brainwaves to the Stream. The too-smooth voices give him headaches, and he’s never found much use for a Camera that takes pictures with his eyes or a Music Player that blasts its sounds straight into his brain. His parents, though, are less concerned about his health than they are about his chance to meet Marvin Hermes, the industry’s reclusive founder. He has to go--and use his Wingtooth, which he hardly ever does.

Not ten minutes off the shuttle, Seth introduces himself to the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen by accidentally dumping his breakfast on her. Worse, the girl is Toothless, part of the recession-ravaged class unable to afford Wingteeth, and probably took the dumping as an insult. Little does Seth know that wearing his breakfast on her sleeve is the least of Adair’s concerns.

Ever since her mother died in an overcrowded Wingtooth factory, Adair and her father have been masterminding a Toothless takeover. Their plan is simple: Shut down the Stream, assassinate Marvin Hermes, and make the whole thing look like an accident. Then install one of the Toothless as chairman of the board. But their plan collapses when Adair doesn’t go through with the assassination--and when shutting down the Stream leaves the city’s Wingtoothers unable to think or even eat for themselves.

Now Seth and Adair are the Wingtoothers’ last hope. Seth will do anything to save his parents, but Adair isn’t so eager. Can she really abandon the cause she’s worked so hard for? But is she willing to let the Wingtoothers just die?

The First Page The principal’s office was bad, but the principal’s office waiting room was much worse. Seth shifted in his toothpaste-colored seat and tried to concentrate on his homework (Problem number eight. Find the limit as x approaches e of the natural log of x, b-Reader droned inside his head), but his own thoughts were so loud he could barely hear the words.

What could Ms. Mahoney possibly want with him?

The secretary looked up, almost like she’d read his mind. “Sorry for the wait.” She flashed him a phantom grin. “But I think you’ll find it worth your while.”

Problem number eight. Find the limit as x approaches--

Seth pushed the words aside, out of thought. “What do you mean?”

She cupped one hand around the corner of her mouth. “Don’t tell her I said anything, but … congratulations.”

Problem number--

“Congratulations?”

“Not so loud!” The secretary leaned over her laptop, bleached blond curls bouncing stiffly, like she was going to say more. But then something on the screen caught her attention, and she forgot all about him.

Problem number eight. Find the limit as--

Seth closed the calc book with a thought and exited b-Reader with another. But that only made way for a new flood of sounds and pictures, which burrowed into his brain with almost no thought at all. In the quiet of the waiting room, without his homework to distract him, Stream Surfer’s smooth-talking voices were impossible to ignore.

Phew. I think that’s everything. The contest closes on Monday, August 23, at 11:59 p.m. PDT. The winners will be announced no later than Friday, August 27. Good luck, and happy titling!

Bob's Query (So Far)

I started writing Bob’s query last week, and it ended up coming together a lot faster than I thought it would (assuming, of course, my beta readers don’t uncover a massive plot revision that renders the whole thing obsolete). I posted my first draft on Nathan Bransford’s forums, got slammed, and put together this draft, which garnered (winks at Myrna:) ) a few good reviews. So now that I won’t be completely embarrassed by it (I think), I wanted to share it with you and get your opinions and advice.

Dear [Agent]:

The 2046 International Biomedia Conference is, according to the pamphlet, the most celebrated event for high school students on the planet. But when Seth receives an invitation to attend, the last thing he wants to do is celebrate.

Seth hates biomedia. He hates Hermes United, the company that pioneered the industry, and he loathes his Wingtooth, the tooth-shaped implant that links his brain to the feed. The too-smooth voices give him headaches, and he’s never found much use for a Camera that takes pictures with his eyes, or a Music Player that blasts its words and sounds straight into his brain. The truth is, he hardly uses his Wingtooth, even though ripping out Wingteeth is about as socially acceptable as ripping out real ones.

But his protests fall on feed-deafened ears. Monday morning finds him at the conference, which gets off to a not-so-promising start when he slips and dumps his breakfast on the most beautiful girl in the whole world. And that’s the high point of his week. The low point hits the night of the Last Banquet, when Hermes United’s Toothless workers launch a hostile corporate takeover--literally--and disable the feed.

The Toothless rebels meant to humble their Wingtoother colleagues, but they end up crippling them instead. Because the feed’s smooth-talking voices have left the Wingtoothers incapable of independent thought--except for Seth. As the last Wingtoother standing, he’s biomedia’s last hope.

But does he really want to save the thing that turned everyone into thoughtless nothings? And if he wants to save them, does he have any other choice?

[BOB] is a 63,000-word YA dystopian. [Agent-specific comments]

I am a BYU graduate, a stay-at-home mom, and a blogger. [BOB] will be my first publication.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Respectfully,
Name
Contact Info

Any thoughts?

Anatomy of an Agent Hunt: Writing the Query

The query letter is probably the single most important tool for marketing a novel, and it’s made up of four main parts: a plot summary; a plot summary; a plot summary; and a brief biography, appropriate conclusion, and contact information. People disagree about a lot of things (whether you should have an introduction, what to include in your biography, whether you should even have a biography if you’re not a published author), but pretty much everyone agrees that the plot summary is the single most important component of the query. Fortunately, that means that pretty much everybody’s talking about it--and about query writing in general, too.

Perhaps the best place to turn for query-writing help is to the people who have to read and judge them every day: agents. Here are a few of their blogs that I’ve found useful.

1) Pub Rants Kristin Nelson is one of the best agents in the business, and in addition to the fairly frequent posts she makes on the subject, the Pub Rants sidebar is jammed with query-writing information. About midway down the page you’ll find the heading “Agent Kristin’s Queries: An Inside Scoop.” These are the actual query letters she received from several of her now clients, along with her commentary on the things that worked and why. A little farther down the sidebar you’ll find “Agent Kristin’s Query Pitch Workshop On The Blog,” which is all about that infamous plot summary.

2) Nathan Bransford - Literary Agent Nathan Bransford, another dynamite agent, also regularly discusses queries and query writing on his blog, and he’s kindly grouped several of his most informative posts under the sidebar heading “The Essentials (Please Read Before You Query).” Definitely some must-reads.

3) Janet Reid, Literary Agent Oh, look: another fantastic agent. And this one’s provided a few more fantastic posts about writing that query under her sidebar heading “If you’re looking for an agent.” I’m sure you’ll notice that Ms. Reid is a bit, er, more abrupt than either Ms. Nelson or Mr. Bransford, which just goes to show that agents have personalities, too, and that you should be looking for one that complements yours.

4) Query Shark This is another blog maintained by Janet Reid, and this one is all about the query. Here’s how it works: A bevy of unsuspecting victims jump into the shark tank (i.e., e-mail their queries to her Query Shark address) and hope that they get chomped. The getting chomped is often painful but always instructive. And the rest of us get tank-side seats to watch. It’s a great way to learn what the more common slipups are and how to avoid them.

There have got to be at least a million other websites with helpful information on this topic, including Kate Schafer Testerman’s ongoing “Ask Daphne! About My Query” series and Jennifer Jackson’s “Letters from the Query Wars” posts. So look around, and if you find a good one, feel free to share it below.