QK Round 1: Skateboarding Sherlock versus Split Sister

Entry Nickname: Skateboarding Sherlock

Title: Skidsters

Word Count: 62,000

Genre: Science Fiction

Query:

Adrenaline junkie Jedediah Tank lives for the thrill of a perfectly landed trick on his frictionless skid-board, until he crashes into the most dangerous ride of his twelve-year-old life.

Falling into an alley during an illegal race, Jed witnesses two men in purple suits threaten a physicist employed by mega-corporation, Skid Technologies. Three hours later the physicist turns up dead and Jed’s the only one holding any clues. Too bad he can’t go to the police.

Created in 2020, Skid Tech reduces friction by ninety percent, eliminating the need for gas-driven vehicles and creating a cleaner future. But it’s also illegally applied to the bottom of boards, allowing kids, codenamed skidsters, to race through the city as if it were their personal playground. Jed himself is a skidster prodigy, targeted by the cops, who'd love to hand him a one-way ticket to juvie lock-up. There’s no way the coppers will take him seriously—unless he uncovers some hard evidence.

Jed recruits his friends to investigate Skid City’s world of corporate criminals. As Jed peels back the layers of lies protecting the ruthless men in purple, he exposes a project that could level the entire city. To stop the mysterious syndicate from demolishing his city, Jed must bend the laws of physics to their breaking point or it’s—time’s up, you’re dead, Jed. 

First 250 words:

In about 2.07 seconds, I was going to crash. The math didn’t lie—the acceleration of an object by the pull of gravity is 32 feet per second squared and falling at a velocity of…Nevermind. I was going to crash, plain and simple.

I glanced down at my skoard as I fell, jamming my back foot against it, praying for the magnets to catch. Please catch, c’mon. Please.

They caught. I now had milliseconds to save my neck. As I fell into the alley, the glint of an awning caught my eye. I kicked my heel back on my skoard and the sleek bottom of the board bumped the metal canopy. My skoard and I hit a railing a story below, then a dumpster, and finally the alley floor. I grabbed the dumpster’s lid and ground to a halt.

Allowing myself to release the breath I’d been holding, I shook my head. Lucky that dumpster was there. That’s the trouble with skoards. They just keep going—nearly impossible to stop. But that’s also what’s great about them.

It’s a love-hate relationship.

I double-clicked my heel on the skoard and the magnets from the bottom of my shoes and the top of my skoard separated. After that near-crash, I wanted to stay still for a second or two. Resting my hands on my knees, I took deep breaths. I could still feel the adrenaline shooting through my veins like electrical currents through a cell tower.

Calm down Jed, you ain’t dead yet.

VERSUS

Entry Nickname: Split Sisters

Title: Rift Runners

Word Count: 91,000

Genre: YA Fantasy

Query:

Everyone knows that “the other world” exists. Sixteen-year old Shasta Adler's parents often told stories of the futuristic city they once lived in, full of metal buildings and plastic packaging. But all that was taken from them when they got sucked away by the violent rift storms. Portals of sorts, the rifts stranded the Adlers in Gyra long before Shasta and her siblings were born. 

But that “city of the future” Shasta heard so much about might have a cure to the illness that’s cutting a hole through her father’s chest. For months she has been on the run, searching for a way to enter the rifts safely, but all she has found is a backwater fishing village full of religious superstition about spirits who guard the rifts.

Shasta knows her father is running out of time. So when her older sister, Ali, manages to track her down, Shasta is sure Ali comes with nothing but bad news. But Ali’s not one to leave home without a plan and in her hand is a talisman with powers almost as hard to believe in as the spirits. Soon the sisters are one step away from crossing the rifts back to a place strange and dangerous to them – a city driven desperate by the rifts that tore the earth apart. A world the girls know only as “Seattle.”

The plan seems simple - get to Seattle, get the cure, get out. But Shasta never considered the lives her parents left behind. Now a violent rebel group wants her loyalty and to make matters worse, Ali disappears. With no chance of finding Ali alone, Shasta knows she's going to have to trust someone if she wants to salvage her family. But when everyone has an agenda and those that know the secrets of the rifts hold all the power, trust is a dangerous gift to give.

First 250:

Through the wall, I heard his coughing start up again. I winced, pulling my blanket closer to my chin as I listened to each ragged breath. It was like the disease was digging for something, carving a path through my father’s chest. But for what?

A door clicked open and then shut again, the coughing following the movement. Dad must have gone into the front room.

I pushed my blanket off and lit a candle. Next to me, my older sister, Ali, murmured a soft groan. Even in the candlelight, I could see Ali’s eyes were ringed with lines, her nose red from crying. I slipped my boots on, careful not to disturb her.

The kitchen smelled of Mum’s healing herbs. Comfrey and yarrow leaves dangled by the window, swaying in the spring breeze. Dad hunched close to the fire, his shoulders dwarfing the chair he sat in. Nothing in our house ever looked big enough for him.

Dad turned as I closed the door to my room, his half-smile lit by the fire. “You should be asleep.”

“And what about you?” I asked.

“Didn’t want to wake your mother. She’s got work tomorrow.” His gaze drifted to the fire, illuminating a pale, haggard face.

My heart sped. This wasn’t like him. He was one of the most ferocious men in Gyra and balt it, I loved that. My gentle giant. Another cough rattled his body and I nearly dropped the candle. “Can I get you something to drink?”