Face-Lift 59

Guess the Plot

Raise the Buried Dead

1. Her execution made headlines, but Dorothy’s miraculous return from the dead stirs hearts as she sets out on an inspirational speaking tour.

2. Nobody ever said voodoo was easy. But when Vance raises a trio of zombies, he finds that undead underlings are more trouble than they're worth.

3. Thirty years after dying in a coal mine, Luke realizes he can be born again. He recalls his past life as he waits for his second conception.

4. Voodoo King Ray Alleta must perform the most difficult resurrection of his life—his first wife.

5. When philosophical zombies hold a conference to become taken seriously by the world, unionized psychic vampires threaten the event.

6. A movie crew accidentally bulldozes sacred Indian burial grounds and unearths some seriously pissed-off zombies, who demand ancillary rights and a share of the gross.



Original Version

Dear :Evil Editor:

LUKE MACISAAC is dead but not restfully dead. [He's a zombie, right? A vampire? Wait, he's been reincarnated as a water buffalo?] Some thirty years after his demise in a Cape Breton coal mine, he realizes he can find physicality again--through Astrid, a girl not meant to survive her birth. [Thirty years? He's bones. How can he realize anything? Has he been realizing other things for thirty years, or is this the first thing he's realized?] All should be well [All should be well? Why should all be well? It's not like this happens every day. If Evil Editor suddenly reached a realization thirty years after dying, he would not think all should be well. He would think, What the . . . I can't see! I can't feel anything! I'm bones! Help! Get me outta here!] except that as he waits for his conception, he suffers recollections of his past life. [He remembers the night up at Lookout Point, with Mary Jane. He remembers the time he bowled 217. And he remembers the killing spree he went on when Mary Jane dumped him.] By the time he is born, he will discover his true connection to Astrid, and she will find out how his birth can save her.

Set in Eastern Canada, Raise the Buried Dead is an 87,000 word novel. In Posse Review published a very early draft excerpt in September of 2004, and InkPot printed a small excerpt as a flash fiction piece.

I am a freelance writer in Nova Scotia and a member of the Periodical Writers Association of Canada. While many magazines have published my non-fiction, fiction is my passion. Recent work has been in a variety of journals throughout Canada, the US, and the UK.

I hope to supply the entire manuscript upon your request either via snail mail or electronically. Please feel free to reply to the short sample via email at the address listed below.

Best Regards,


Notes

The plot summary is a mere four sentences. And it doesn't make it clear what's going on. Evil Editor suggests you expand that portion of the query, even if it means cutting the rest of it.