I have the results from Brent
Taylor with TEEN EYES EDITORIAL. I'm
amazed at all the writers who entered the contest on my blog and on the other hosts'
blogs. You all are very talented and I'm sure this was a tough decision for all
the editors. Make sure to check out Teen Eyes services. They aren't that
expensive and it's great to get a pair of young, professional eyes on your
work.
Here's
what Brent said...
Query
letters are so important in terms of pitching to agents and editors, but also
to help a writer hone in on the meat of a story: evolution of character and
plot.
That being said, some of my
favorite queries from this contest weren’t necessarily perfect, but they
revealed the right amount of information and left me with pressing
questions—I’m dying to read some of these books.
Some queries that really hooked
me were…
Name:
Krystal Sutherland
Title:
THE GASLIGHT ALIBIS
Genre:
YA Psychological Thriller
Dear
Brent,
18-year-old
Katherine Cavert receives the same letter every week, hand delivered to her
house by a man dressed in black. The words never change: '11.00pm. March 30th.
Pyrmont Flats. Not guilty.' The cops couldn’t care less about Katherine’s
so-called “stalker”. No one else has seen him, he has identical handwriting to
her, and – creepiest of all – her own saliva is used to seal the envelopes.
Then,
when the letters are finally linked to a string of similar cases that ended in
the murder of their recipients, Katherine’s little sister is abducted. By the
time the police realize they’re dealing with a serial killer known as The
Haunting Man, it could already be too late. The only ransom the kidnapper wants
is Katherine. The only thing he wants from her is to be at Pyrmont Flats at
11.00pm on March 30th. Come alone, come unarmed, or her sister dies.
The
Haunting Man wants Katherine to see something, and then he wants her to die.
But what she’s about to learn is that not all murders end in death. Sometimes,
very occasionally, the people who die wake up.
THE
GASLIGHT ALIBIS is an 80,000-word psychological thriller aimed at a young adult
audience. I am the current features writer at Blitz, a Sydney based
entertainment magazine published weekly to a readership of over 30,000. I like
zombies and pajama pants an inordinate amount.
Name:
Ambiguous_A
Title:
THE DRUMMING SONG
Genre:
YA speculative fiction
Dear
Brent,
There’s
a drumbeat calling to 17-year-old Drea Rune.
She
hears it at sunset on her first night in small-town Oregon, and if that weren’t
weird enough, the music makes her feel like she’s on some seriously hardcore
drugs. Refusing to believe she’s losing it, she tracks the intoxicating beat
through the town’s meadows and finds four teenagers who have been playing the
drum for years.
They
thought the beat only called to them.
Soon,
the nights Drea used to spend perfecting recipes and working toward culinary
school are complicated by her nightly cravings for the drumbeat. As much as she
loves the high, she’s starting to hate the drumbeat’s power over her more. Trying
to understand her addiction, she searches for information on the drum’s
abilities and discovers a local myth: centuries earlier, a creature with
unfathomable powers was slaughtered...and its hide might be on the drumhead.
But
the other drummers quickly forbid Drea from digging deeper, and she starts to
wonder if they’re more scared of the myth than they let on. After all, another
drummer once spent a night in the creature’s forest. A night that left him
nearly catatonic.
If
Drea disobeys, they’ll ban her from drumming—and her body can't handle that.
She must decide if she can live with an addiction that’s taking over her life,
or risk losing the drum and her only friends.
But
both consequences might cost Drea her mind.
THE
DRUMMING SONG is a YA speculative fiction complete at 84,000 words. Thank you
for your consideration.
This query definitely hooked me, and speculative fiction
isn’t one of the genres I’m ever really drawn into. The writing in this query
is sharp which makes me believe that your prose will be strong. I can seriously
hear the drumbeat in my head right now.
Name: Mark Fenger
Title: ProXy
Genre: Science Fiction
When Ethan sleeps he no
longer dreams. He lives other people’s lives. He controls every action they
take like they were his own. And he only wakes up when they die.
Whenever Ethan arrives in
the body of a stranger it means the men in dark suits are on their way. At
first all they want to do is kill his proxy bodies, but then they recognize his
presence and they’re no longer satisfied with killing. They want to meet Ethan
in person and they’ll do anything to find him.
Night after night, Ethan
is forced into a deadly game of cat and mouse. The only way to win is to change
the rules. Ethan has to find the men in suits and kill them, before they catch
him and torture his true identity from him.
A few weeks ago he’d
never seen one of the strange men. Now they’re everywhere, whispering in the
ears of powerful politicians, orchestrating some kind of power play involving a
data centre in Utah, and hunting down the people in Ethan’s night wanderings.
Amidst all the chaos, the
woman Ethan loves finally sees him as more than a friend. The two of them
become romantically entwined. They make love for the first time.
Then Ethan wakes up in
her body.
The last line in this query does it for me—I HAVE to know
what happens. I actually think this query breaks the rules a little bit and
reveals too much, but I don’t mind it at all—that last line! It gives me the
impression that your stories in general have organic twists and turns as well.
The authors of these three
queries will be receiving a $25 gift voucher to use towards any of my editorial
services.
My winner is…
Name: Melinda Gray
Title: PIECES OF ME
Genre:YA
Dear Mr. Taylor:
After 16-year-old social-nobody Olivia is stunned by
random kisses from two guys claiming to be her boyfriend, she discovers she’s
somehow jumping between alternate versions of her life, each shaped by
decisions she made—or didn’t—in her past. Along with an increasing slew of
boys, she also finds her grandma still alive, a baby sister she never had
before and a new position at the top of the junior class.
She has everything she ever wanted, sort of. If only she
could control the jumps. And stop finding so many new sides to her best friend
Drew. She barely recognizes this boy who spouts crazy sci-fi theories or plays
in a rock band.
She knows she can’t switch between the alternate-Olivias
forever. The more she tries to juggle, the more she drops. If she keeps
switching realities, she’s going to mess up the alter-Olivias' lives as badly
as she must've messed up the original. The only way to make it stop is to
choose where to land for good—back in her normal life, or in one of the new
ones. But none of her options give her everything, and deciding where to stay
will mean losing more than one person she loves.
My YA novel PIECES OF ME is complete at 65,000 words. I
look forward to hearing from you.
There are so many things I like about this query. It’s
concise, dives directly into the story (which, in my two years reading queries,
I always appreciated), and there’s a big high-stakes feeling to it, which I
would argue is absolutely essential in any query.
In the first paragraph, we’re introduced to what I hope is
a major aspect of the story: the romantic relationships between Olivia and
others, both between boys and members of her family. Just from the sentence
“Along with an increasing slew of boys, she also finds her grandma still alive,
a baby sister she never had before…” I get the sense that the story has some
very interesting family dynamics, which I personally am a fan of when it comes
to YA literature.
For a story with so much action/adventure, I can tell
this one has some strong emotional punches. The last paragraph sets the stakes,
and touches on some key YA issues: making tough decisions and over analyzing the
outcomes of all of them.
This summer I made some really tough, shocking decisions
that I spent weeks and weeks fretting over, and this query really hits home for
me. I’m dying to find out which life Olivia chooses, and I haven’t even read
the first page yet. I would absolutely forward this query if I’d come across it
in my agency days.
The author of this query will
be receiving a $100 gift voucher to use towards any of my editorial services.
Congratulations, Minnie and the runners-up! Please email me at brendadrakecontests@gmail.com to
get instructions on how to contact Brent.
Thank you, Brent,
for co-hosting this contest with me. You are amazing! Everyone else, go visit Teen Eyes website and check out their services for wonderful and affordable critique options.
You can also visit
Teen Eyes Editorial around the web:
Don't forget to stop by the other bloggers
sites to find out the winners for the other two editors. You can also visit
Teen Eyes Editorial around the web:
Matthew MacNish hosted Editor
Grace Smith. The winner received a 20,000-word in-depth critique.
Yay! Thanks Brent and Brenda for hosting the contest.
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