Thursday, October 10, 2013

Fall Query Extravaganza #Uno

I'll be doing a limited number of query critiques this fall. 

Contact me on twitter if you want your query showcased. Comment on the query before and after yours. All query critiques are subjective. And rabbits don't come out of my hat, but I'll do my best. Objects in mirror may be closer than they appear. Buy one and I'll throw in a set of free steak knives, just pay separate shipping and handling fees.

As sent to me:


Twenty-year-old Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago.

Armies are forbidden and war is substituted by a gruesome game called Orrek in which kings gamble kingdoms, cities, and women. But an evil king has secretly bred an army of thousands of monsters and is feeding citizens of Chaelsey to them. The only way to save Chaelsey is to win it from evil king’s champion, Azal in Orrek.

In Orrek, sixteen sorcerers of one country fight until death with sixteen sorcerers of another one by one on command of their Champion.

While searching for his father, Eric comes across a tourney of a variant of Orrek organized by his king. Eric participates in it, wins it, and comes to the castle for more clues. There he is appointed as deputy to their treacherous champion, Redrake. In castle, Eric discovers that Azal knows about his father. But Azal is a dangerous man to reach for outsiders. Only Redrake will have a chance to talk to Azal while playing Orrek against him in scheduled match for Chaelsey. Eric finds proof against Redrake, gets him removed, and takes his place.

As a champion, Eric leads a team of fifteen sorcerers in the match for Chaelsey against Azal, but fifteen fierce monsters instead of sorcerers stand in his way. Eric cannot save his fellow sorcerers dying one by one by his own command, save his love, save himself, and keep playing while the sand is running out.

Complete at 130,000 words, WALLS OF INFINITY is a fantasy novel. Thank you for the time you took to read my query.

Best Regards

With my silly comments:


Dear Agent: (don't forget your colon.)

Twenty-year-old Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago. Interesting. Not really digging beginning and ending with twenty. If you use the term 'father' the time period is pretty established. Maybe go with: Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago. 

Armies are forbidden and war is substituted by a gruesome game called Orrek in which kings gamble kingdoms, cities, and women. But an evil king has secretly bred an army of thousands of monsters and is feeding citizens of Chaelsey to them. The only way to save Chaelsey is to win it from evil king’s champion, Azal in Orrek. Now I'm confused because this seemingly has nothing to do with Eric, nor is he or his father mentioned. It's like we ran into a different story.

Plus you've given the reader no reason that Eric would want to save Chaelsey. In other words, we have no motivation for Eric being the hero of this tale. What pushes him into the fray? 

In Orrek, sixteen sorcerers of one country fight until death with sixteen sorcerers of another one by one on command of their Champion. I doubt that this detail is crucial to the story. You really need to keep the details to the very most important in your query. Save this for the synopsis.

While searching for his father, Eric comes across a tourney of a variant of Orrek organized by his king. Eric participates in it, wins it, and comes to the castle for more clues. Now I'm skeptical, because you told us nothing about Eric that shows he is an incredible warrior. So far he is more of a name on a page than a living character. You have to get us to invest in Eric by telling us a little about him.  There he is appointed as deputy to their treacherous champion, Redrake. In castle, Eric discovers that Azal knows about his father. But Azal is a dangerous man to reach for outsiders. Only Redrake will have a chance to talk to Azal while playing Orrek against him in scheduled match for Chaelsey. Eric finds proof against Redrake, gets him removed, and takes his place. That's a lot of names to keep straight. Remember that the characters are all new to us. Keeping your query to as few names as possible really helps an agent make sense of what's happening.

As a champion, Eric leads a team of fifteen sorcerers in the match for Chaelsey against Azal, but fifteen fierce monsters instead of sorcerers stand in his way. Eric cannot save his fellow sorcerers dying one by one by his own command, save his love, save himself, and keep playing while the sand is running out. I'm afraid that I lack a reason to feel enticed here. I don't have a clear reason to care for Eric or a clear idea of the stakes. What does this have to do with finding Eric's father? Is Eric's goal to find his father or save his country? I believe the beginning led me to a conclusion about the plot which isn't true.

Consider this hurried example of reorganizing:

Dedicated and intent (something about his personality), Eric wanted to find his father and tear him apart for raping his mother twenty years ago. But not every goal comes easy. Years of sweat and toil training in sorcery for that task, and it turns out the only way to accomplish it is to save his country first.

The key to finding his father lies in getting close to the king's champion, Azal. By law, war and armies are forbidden, and disputes and gambling debts must be settled in a game, by proxies. So Eric works his way into the system by entering a tournament and using his sorcery skills to win. He's hired by Azal's rival champion.

Just as Eric is ready to pound his father's location from Azal's ass, he learns the king has secretly bred an army of thousands of monsters and is feeding innocent civilians to them. Now Eric's torn between chasing the father he hates or saving the lives of thousands. He needs to blank or bad bad blank will happen.
     
Complete at 130,000 words, WALLS OF INFINITY is a fantasy novel. Thank you for the time you took to read my query. This paragraph kind of shouts newbie. No offense. I've been there. My first manuscript actually beat your word count at 146,000. You're probably going to need to whittle that number down by 30,000. Critique partners can really help with that. 

My fantasy, WALLS OF INFINITY, is complete at xxx,xxx words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Best Regards Go with the tried and safe Thank you for your time and consideration. 

You've thrown a lot of facts at us with this query, but not really given us a reason to care about the main character. My suggestion is to work in more personality for Eric and clarify what motivates Eric, In my example, I used finding his father as the motivation for why he would be at hand to save his country.

This sounds like a fascinating plot, it just needs a little reorganizing and a little pruning of the details. I hope this helps.  

33 comments:

  1. This was one of the best critiques I ever had for my query. I thank you for all the time and effort you took to strip the query of all the latent problems. Good luck with the blog and the query contest you are organizing. I would surely like to participate in it. :)

    Xander

    ReplyDelete
  2. I wanted to add more to it. You paid attention to the tiniest details, keeping the good name of blog. Eric is looking for a bigger purpose in life than finding his father, of course I have to work on that in query. He hides his sorrow under his anger and he had been shunned and outcast for twenty years by so called civilized people. I have to mention that too. I spent a year on story, and you spent minutes with my story, and yet you worked out a finer query than I did. That was amazing.

    The thing is, The plot is way too complicated. Too much is happening in the book, and I cannot streamline it.

    Cutting 30,000 would be a tough, but I will do it. My first book was a whooping 210,000 words, I never touched it again. WALLS... is my second.

    You mentioned lots of essentials that I need to put up there. Sharpe eyes, Michelle. Thanks again

    Xander Ironheart

    ReplyDelete
  3. I think you have all the pieces you need, but you're trying to put too many of them into your query. This risks confusing the reader. I recommend writing the query as if the main character was telling it to us (some people trial this in first person first, then convert it to third), in their own quirky voice. The idea is to show as simply as possible, what the MC wants, what's standing in their way of getting it, and what happens if they don't achieve their goal.

    Any great book has multiple subplots running through it, all interconnected. The trick is to pick one overarching goal (i.e., Eric seeking his father), and go with that in your query, rather than trying to bring in too many of the other subplots and then confusing the reader. You want to entice them to read more, not give them all the plots so they don't need to read the story.

    It sounds like you have a great book here; best of luck!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Martha. You mentioned a very nice trick. Simple and powerful: Use first person, and then convert it to third. I'll definitely use that. And I haven't told all the subplots here. I still have a lot of cards close to my chest. But I get it. I'll pick the overarching goal. Thank you for commenting. :)

      Delete
  4. I agree with Martha and Michelle. If you are going to use killing Eric's father as the hook, you need to use it as the thread that pulls the whole query together.
    And this is just a personal thing, but why does he want to cut his father in half? If there is a reason for this very specific punishment, I think that's worth noting. As it stands, my only thought is "Gross!"

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, there is a good reason. And yes, it sounds gross, for now. Curious isn't it? ;)
      Thank you for comment. I liked your response. :)

      Delete
  5. I see an opening hook which could be stronger. Such as "Eric's only goal is to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago." Not perfect but you get the idea.

    Next we have a rather long insertion of back story before getting back to Eric and the inciting event which propels the protagonist forward. Which is the overriding element that drives Eric forward?

    [Armies are forbidden and war is substituted by a gruesome game called Orrek in which kings gamble kingdoms, cities, and women. But an evil king has secretly bred an army of thousands of monsters and is feeding citizens of Chaelsey to them. The only way to save Chaelsey is to win it from evil king’s champion, Azal in Orrek.

    In Orrek, sixteen sorcerers of one country fight until death with sixteen sorcerers of another one by one on command of their Champion.]

    Now we get to what should be the inciting event but this needs condensing. This should be the paragraph after the hook. It feels too much like a synopsis.

    [While searching for his father, Eric comes across a tourney of a variant of Orrek organized by his king. Eric participates in it, wins it, and comes to the castle for more clues. There he is appointed as deputy to their treacherous champion, Redrake. In castle, Eric discovers that Azal knows about his father. But Azal is a dangerous man to reach for outsiders. Only Redrake will have a chance to talk to Azal while playing Orrek against him in scheduled match for Chaelsey. Eric finds proof against Redrake, gets him removed, and takes his place.]

    Here parts such as 'As a champion' and 'fifteen sorcerers" are not necessary Just 'Eric leads his team against fifteen fierce monsters but cannot save his team, his love, himself and continue playing. The sands of time are running low and something has to give.'

    [As a champion, Eric leads a team of fifteen sorcerers in the match for Chaelsey against Azal, but fifteen fierce monsters instead of sorcerers stand in his way. Eric cannot save his fellow sorcerers dying one by one by his own command, save his love, save himself, and keep playing while the sand is running out.]

    Finally, don't forget to put the category in such as MG/YA/NA/Adult etc so it reads something like

    WALLS OF INFINITY is an Adult Fantasy complete at 130,000 words. Thank you for your consideration.

    [Complete at 130,000 words, WALLS OF INFINITY is a fantasy novel. Thank you for the time you took to read my query.]

    As a debut author you may find 130,000 words a hard sell.

    The book sounds like a great read but the query feels more like part query, part synopsis. If you narrow the query down, focus on a couple of characters and cut to just the hook, inciting event and what happens if he fails you should have a leaner and stronger query. Good Luck :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A keen observation, Carl. Thank you. I have to find a more clever way to dismissing the back story and yet show what is important. I’m working on condensing and modifying the synopsis.

      Yes, I’m trimming the novel close to 100k words. You mentioned some vital points. I’m considering and paying attention to your words while I’m re-writing the query on Word in other window. Thank you. :)

      Delete
  6. Okay, I took advices of Michelle, Carl, Kara, and Martha in my consideration and wrote a new query from scratch. Excited about it, even knowing it would needs tons of editing. I'd be glad if anybody in this universe somehow reads this. BTW thank you guys, you all are so cool.

    QUERY:

    Dear Agent: Xxyyzz Aabbcc

    Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago.

    The cruel society made lonely Eric’s childhood excruciating. His mother still has to work in a brothel. And Eric can never accept his identity. Eric blames his father for that. Eric knows that his father is a murderer, rapist, and Champion of Orrek. Orrek is a gruesome game in which sixteen sorcerers of one country fight until death with sixteen sorcerers of another one by one on command of their Champion. Eric hates Orrek because kings gamble kingdoms, cities, and women in it. But only Orrek will get Eric closer to him. So with Orrek in mind, Eric embarks on a quest to find him. Eric goes through pirates, wicked sorcerers, bad tempered princes, and cranky twin girlfriends, almost getting killed. But his quest takes a weird turn when he becomes Orrek champion of his king.

    Eric lives in a world where armies are forbidden and Orrek substitutes war. His king has gambled away his entire country except capital to the rival king. Eric doesn’t care what flags wave on gates of a city. But if the rival king feeds people of his country to an army of monsters, Eric has a problem. Eric wants his cities back.

    So Eric leads a team of sixteen sorcerers in a match of Orrek for a city but something much worse than sorcerers stand in his way. Eric cannot save his fellow sorcerers dying one by one by his own command, save his love, save himself, and keep playing while the sand is running out. The only relief is that he gets closer to his father.

    My fantasy, WALLS OF INFINITY, is complete at 130,000 words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

    Xander Ironheart


    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Xander,

      It is getting closer, it took over six months of tweeks to get mine where it is now. It will should be on here soon and there will still be comments on how to improve it.

      One thing I will say is try not to be too wordy. Each sentence must flow and have a sense of progression.

      1. The hook
      2. The inciting event
      3. The protagonist's goal
      4. What happens if he fails

      This should be boiled down to 250 words or less. You query is now down to 302 words meaning at least another 50 should be trimmed from it.

      Good luck :)

      Delete
    2. Hi Carl,

      That's a good formula. I'll surely keep that in mind while editing. Yes, I'm trimming it to 250. It might take a day, if not more. You copy pasted the query in word to check the word count, didn't you? Thanks, pal. Can't wait to read what your book is all about. :)

      I visited your blog. You have some awesome children. :) I feel sorry for your loss. Digby looked great.

      Delete
  7. This does seem simpler. From this query, I get the picture that Eric must play Orrek to get to his father. I would skip over the bits about the cruel society and Eric blaming his father and all that. Your hook is that Eric wants to murder his father. In my opinion, the next paragraph is stronger if you just cut to the chase: his father is so famous, or so protected, or whatever, that the only way he can get near enough to kill him is through the legitimate playing of this game.
    So Eric has a plan- play Orrek, win, kill father. What happens to upset that plan? Spend a sentence or two on it. Does Eric now have a new goal? Or a difficult choice to make? Tell us what it is.
    I don't think you need many details about Orrek, like how many sorcerers play it. It's a fight to the death to settle conflict without resorting to war, right? Keep it as simple as possible. Even if the intricacies form a big part of your story world.
    And I agree with what Carl (hi Carl! We're doing this again!) said: You need to add what age group you are targeting instead of just saying "my fantasy." And again, just a personal thing, but "my fantasy" sounds a bit weird. Why not just slam into "WALLS OF INFINITY is an adult fantasy novel, complete at..." blah blah etc.
    Keep it up! Queries are hard! You'll see the 5th or 6th version of mine up here in a couple of weeks- I still haven't gotten all the kinks out.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Kara :)

      Yep, I would skip over them. Cut to the chase, got it. O Oh! I think you got the ending wrong. The climax isn't exactly what you feel after reading the query. But if I tell you what is different, I would spill the beans of story too soon.
      I would hide the details of Orrek, thanks for the tip, but Orrek is still very different and vivid than what it sounds from what I have revealed so far. But, yes, got it.

      Yeah, I missed to mention that it is adult fantasy in excitement. Silly me. I'm little confused. I wrote that sentence as Michelle said in her critique, "My fantasy, (title) ..."

      I would surely like to read your query. I can grasp some query writing tips from it as well.

      Thank you for pointing these all out. :) I'm working on it.

      Delete
  8. This is a great improvement! I like the hook of Eric wanting to cut his father in half. It makes me want to read more.

    The hard part about queries if finding a way to show what happens, rather than telling the reader. While this version is more concise, it seems more like you, the narrator are summarizing the story. I want to hear how Eric views his world. A good way to do this is to reword each sentence from Eric’s perspective.

    Also, try not to use broad statements, like “Eric can never accept his identity,” because, although you know your world inside out, I don’t, and this really tells me nothing about Eric, because it’s not explained why he feels this way (and maybe doesn’t need to be in the query).

    I agree with the comment above that you can leave out a full explanation of the game. Just knowing it’s a game that substitutes for war is sufficient to spark my interest. The query has to be about Eric and his quest, not the game itself, only because you have few words (they recommend <250 for the entire query).

    You list who he must go through (pirates, sorcerers, girlfriends, etc.). It might be better to weave them into the query other than in a list form, if they’re necessary to show how they try to stop him from completing his quest. When you list them, I wonder how they try to stop him, but of course, you can’t explain the details without bogging down the query. Including them alone doesn’t add to the query for me, it just confuses it.

    You could reword something like this (this is rough):

    Each morning, when Eric wakes up alone, knowing his mother lies with a man who pays for her favors, he blames his father, a champion Orrek player. As he grows, he realizes the only way to find his father is to enter his father’s world, and become an Orrek player himself. He sets out for the city, determined to become the Orrek champion, a game that substitutes for war in his land. (Then save the bulk of the query for what is preventing him from killing his father.)

    Or something like that.

    I hope this helps!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you. If you like the hook, you would love the book (says Christian Bale of The Dark Knight). Sorry, bad joke. I Actually tried your method only. I wrote it first entirely from Eric's perspective, then converted it. But I still lack Eric's voice in query. Working on it.

      Eric told me that he might address his father as 'pig'. It might be too offensive to use something like that in query. Eric would burn the query if I unleash him :)

      Yes, getting it. It was the just the first draft, I would refine it. I would take out the details of the game and set those sentences of pirates etc proper.

      Martha, that para you wrote in the end is admirable. I might use it. You all are so cool writers. You all just sniffed my story and look at the beauty you all have added to it.

      Thank you. :) Hopefully I would produce next draft of my query today.

      Delete
    2. My feeling about this is that you should unleash Eric. If Eric would call him a pig, then use pig in the query. This is a selling tool, and you want it to sell the voice in your book.

      Delete
  9. Another trick is to write a logline with less than 100 words. If you can get the goal/stakes/consequences with credible voice into less than 100 words, it trains you to consider every word before you use it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree with Martha. Try different ways to pitch your story. Twitter pitch - 140 characters or less; 2 sentence pitch; 3 sentence pitch; 100 word pitch; 75 word pitch. These all come up in competitions around the web and are a great way of tightening your query. :)

      Delete
    2. Thanks Martha. A resourceful trick. I'm trying it. :)

      Carl, if you come across any such contest and participate in it, let us know on your blog. I'm reading something interesting recently, if you know what I mean. ;)

      I'm posting the next draft of my query. Thanks guys. :)

      Delete
    3. I have used an absurd language to captivate Eric’s voice. I feel little guilty over the language. Please let me know if you find it gross. I’d modify it. Please don’t judge me. :) I tried to cover all your tips, but I might have missed a thing or two. And Martha, I’m using that sentence of yours. Squeezed this one in 248. Yeah!

      Dear Agent: Xxyyzz Aabbcc

      Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago.

      Each morning, when Eric wakes up alone, knowing his mother lies naked with a stranger who pays for her favors, he blames his father, an Orrek champion. Orrek is a f***ed up game that has substituted war and in which sorcerers fight until death when champion commands. Kings gamble kingdoms, cities, and women in it. Yuck! But only Orrek will get Eric closer to that pig. Eric embarks on a quest to find him. But pirates, sorcerers, and cranky twin girlfriends try to stab Eric. His quest takes a weird turn when he becomes Orrek champion of his king.

      Eric’s king has gambled away entire country except capital to the rival king in Orrek. Eric pisses on that. But if the rival king feeds his countrymen to an army of monsters, Eric has a problem. Eric wants his cities back.

      So Eric leads a team of sorcerers in a match of Orrek for a city but something deathly stands in his way. Eric cannot save his sorcerers dying one by one by his own command, save his love, save himself, and keep playing while the sand is running out. And if he fails, the monsters will feast on capital. The only relief is that the pig smells closer.

      My adult fantasy, WALLS OF INFINITY, is complete at 130,000 words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

      Xander Ironheart


      Delete
  10. I commented under Martha's reply instead of the common space. Sorry for that :)

    ReplyDelete
  11. I think you're getting closer. You've tightened this up some. I recommend you read it aloud to catch missing words here and there.

    The language used doesn't offend me. I do wonder about a few word choices, such as yuck, and whether a young man would use them, however.

    I still think you could lose the list of characters trying to kill him in the first paragraph. You're still trying to tell us how wonderful Eric's world is, but you take a chance confusing the reader. Remember, you need to focus on only one thing in the query, and that seems to be finding his father and killing him. I think the game itself is intriguing enough to use as something standing in his way of achieving his goal and you should use your words for this instead.

    Your last paragraph names lots of things he stands to lose (his fellow sorcerers, a love, himself), etc., but it's not clear how he will to lose them, esp. a love who isn't mentioned except here. I think you're still trying to pack too much information into your query, and you need to pull out everything except those things directly related to Eric's goal/stakes/consequences. Save these for the synopsis.

    Also, consider reconstructing a few sentences to say them from Eric's perspective, such as the one describing Orrek, otherwise it comes across as telling, rather than showing, and it feels like narrator intrusion.

    Hope this helps.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Thank you all, guys. You all are gems. Michelle, Carl, Kara, Martha, you all have given excellent tips and critiques. I don't know how to thank you all. You all have been awesome.

    And yes, it surely helps. Thanks Martha. :) I'm reading all you mentioned. I will work on all of those one by one. You offered some cool tips, yet again.

    Thanks Kara :) You were great as well. I saw you blog. Sam and Ben are very cute kids. Reynolds rock. :)

    Michelle and Carl, you both have were deep in your critiques. I appreciate the effort you both took. I'm still trying to grasp and implement what you both described. :) Carl, I'm enjoying the read. :)

    I think I should let my query rest for a couple of days. Then I will get back to it. I think I have missed many fundamental things you all have pointed out. I will carefully look at all the things you all have mentioned, and then I will work on them with a fresh outlook.

    Thanks guys. :)

    ReplyDelete
  13. Dear Agent: X

    Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago.

    Each morning Eric wakes up alone knowing his mother lies naked with strangers who pay for her favors, because of his father, an Orrek champion. Orrek is a f***ed up game that has been created as a substitute for war. In it, sorcerers fight until death while Kings gamble kingdoms, cities, and women. But only Orrek will get Eric closer to his father, the pig. Eric embarks on his quest of revenge, but pirates, sorcerers, and cranky twin girlfriends block his path. His quest takes a strange turn when Eric becomes Orrek champion for his king, who has gambled away almost his entire country to a rival king. Eric wants his cities back, but if the rival king feeds his countrymen to an army of monsters, Eric will have a problem

    Eric leads a team of sorcerers in a match of Orrek for his king’s last city, but something deathly stands in his way. Eric can’t keep his sorcerers from dying one by one, and save his love and himself while the sands of time keeps running out. If he fails, monsters will feast on capital. His only relief is that the smell of the pig is closer.

    My adult fantasy, WALLS OF INFINITY, is complete at 130,000 words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I will consider the changes you made, F.M. Thanks pal. It was a nice critique with subtle edits. :) Good luck for Empire, Nevada.

      Delete
  14. Draft 27: (phew!)

    Dear Agent: Xxyyzz Aabbcc

    Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago.

    Each morning, when Eric wakes up alone, knowing his mother lies naked with a stranger who pays for her favors, he blames his father, an Orrek champion. Orrek is a f***ed up game that has substituted war and in which sorcerers fight when champion commands. Only Orrek will get Eric closer to that pig. Eric embarks on a quest to find him. The quest leads him to castle where he learns that becoming his king’s Orrek champion is the key to finding his father. But the cunning and treasonous reigning champion is a thorn in his foot. Eric exposes reigning champion’s filthy face, and kicks him out to become the new champion.

    Eric’s king has gambled away entire country except capital to the rival king in Orrek. Eric pisses on who rules his country. But if the rival king feeds his countrymen to an army of monsters, Eric has a problem. Eric wants his cities back.

    So Eric leads a team of sorcerers in his first match of Orrek for a city but something deathly stands in his way. Eric cannot save his sorcerers dying one by one by his own command, save himself, and keep playing while the sand is running out. And if he fails, the monsters will feast on capital. The only relief is that the pig smells closer.

    My adult fantasy, WALLS OF INFINITY, is complete at 130,000 words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

    Xander Ironheart

    Alright I wrote this one in hurry (Again! Xander?). If anyone's reading this, don't be like me, be patient. :)

    ReplyDelete
  15. I like it!

    1st full para- I'd change foot to side. “Eric exposes reigning champion’s filthy face, and kicks him out to become the new champion.” If this isn’t his father, I’d say current. I also think the exposing the filthy face thing could be confusing. Maybe just simply, “Eric beats the current champion to become a champion in his own right.”
    2nd full para- “Eric’s king, an Orrek addict, has gambled away entire country except capital to the rival king.” I don’t like the dangling “in Orrek.”
    I still don't love the "pisses on" line. It makes me imagine him actually peeing on someone, versus him not caring who rules his country. I also think the "Eric has a problem" line could use some help. If he doesn't care, why does losing matter?

    3rd full para- It reads like you are talking about Eric's first match ever. If that's not the case, you might want to clarify that.

    I think you’re about there. It’s getting pretty.

    Mine is awful. I tried another draft in the MC’s POV, but ended up writing a full one-page summary. I have no idea how to fit all mine in a query. It’ll be up here at some point, so I’ll post the synopsis when it’s up.

    It’s much easier to throw darts at someone else’s query than it is fix your own- in my opinion.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That should give me the finishing touches. Thanks, pal. I think you can send your query to Michelle. She might critique it here on her blog before the query contest, and we all will help you out. Or you can post it on AQC. That's cool as well.

      Delete
  16. "It’s much easier to throw darts at someone else’s query than it is fix your own- in my opinion."

    This is 100% true. It's difficult to see issues in your own query because you understand your world. A simple phrase makes perfect sense to you, but confuses everyone else.

    Something to consider in the future: write the query before you write the novel. I did this with my current WIP and it really helped define the story for me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I just threw some darts at Fall Query Extravaganza #2, even when I'm struggling to write my own query. :P
      You are very resourceful with these tips, why don't you start blogging? :)
      Martha, What's WIP? I came across that term at several places. (Work in progress?)

      Delete
  17. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Eric wants to find his father and cut him in half for raping his mother twenty years ago.

    Each morning, when Eric wakes up alone, knowing his mother lies naked with a stranger who pays for her favors, he blames his father, an Orrek champion. Orrek is a messed up game that has substituted war and in which sorcerers fight at their champion’s commands. Only Orrek will get Eric closer to that pig. Eric embarks on a quest to find him. The quest leads him to castle where he learns that becoming his king’s Orrek champion is the key to finding his father. But the cunning and treasonous current champion is a thorn in his foot. Eric exposes that man’s real face and becomes the new champion in his stead.

    Eric’s king has gambled away entire country except the capital to the rival king in Orrek. Eric doesn’t care who rules his country. But if the rival king feeds his countrymen to an army of monsters, Eric has a problem. Eric wants his cities back.

    So Eric leads a team of sorcerers in a match of Orrek for a city but something deathly stands in his way. Eric cannot save his sorcerers dying one by one by his own command, save himself, and keep playing while the sand is running out. And if he fails, the monsters will feast on capital. The only relief is that the pig smells closer.

    My adult fantasy, WALLS OF INFINITY, is complete at 125,000 words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

    Xander Ironheart

    ReplyDelete