Guess the Plot
How To be Fabulous
1. A little ribbon, some limburger cheese and a pipe wrench: essential tools that you'll come to know and love.
2. A freckle-faced dork is having the high school year from hell--until the head of a modeling agency spots her and signs her to the world's most coveted modeling contract.
3. Porn star Fabulous Fontaine offers a series of how-to videos that win critical acclaim and vault her to the top of the daytime TV popularity list.
4. Megan and Kylie hate their freshman year of high school until they start stealing clothes from the girls' locker room and selling them on eBay. But things get sticky when the IRS comes snooping around.
5. Aesop gets an update in this collection of comeuppance tales. In the first story, a hare and a tortoise get a makeover and take up power walking.
6. Liza Minnelli turns Martha Stewart's advice on it's ear and kicks it's ass to the curb in this fascinating addition to the lifestyle genre.
Original Version
Dear Acquisitions Editor:
I have recently completed my novel How To be Fabulous and read that you handle young adult fiction. [Color added by EE. Decision to capitalize "To" but not "be" made by author.]
How To be Fabulous is a comical novel about Spencer Garrison, a dorky Manhattan teen who at five foot nine with firecracker red hair, masses of freckles and no thongs in her closet [Her closet? Spencer's a boy's name. No thongs in his closet. Possibly a skeleton in his closet, if he's now a girl.] is about the biggest loser since Gigli. As if her life isn't already awkward enough, it seems that nothing ever goes her way; she's embarrassed by her fake chested, celebrity obsessed "Frussian" stepmother Regina, who walks around midtown in hot pink spandex and white faux fur; her best friend has just started dating the Upper East side's answer to Josh Hartnet, while at fifteen Spencer has yet to kiss a boy; and the bitchmonster Whitney Fellows has made it this year[']s extracurricular activity to humiliate Spencer.
Given the circumstances of Spencer's existence, she is baffled when a classmate's mogul father and owner of the elite Ideal Models modeling agency, Branson Stoddard, wants to sign her to Ideal. Still even [No need for both "still" and "even."] more surprising is when Spencer snags the most coveted modeling contract in the world as the new DuJour girl. Stepping into the limelight as the darling of the fashion industry Spencer is plagued with insecurities about her former dorkdom, especially as she returns to school as the most popular girl in the sophomore class.
How To be Fabulous is better than a modern day Cinderella story and is splashed with more secrets than the girl's locker room. [The girl has her own locker room?] The jealous Whitney Fellows plans Spencer's demise; Someone is spreading vicious lies about Spencer in a national tabloid; ["DuJour Girl Pregnant with Russell Crowe's Child."] ["DuJour Girl's Parents Named her Spencer Because She Was Baby Boy."] ["DuJour Girl in Sex Tryst with Space Alien and Manatee."] and why is Mike McKenna hanging out with Spencer's hottie history professor Mr. Robeson along with the notorious drug dealer Tommy G? [Why is who hanging out with whom and whom? I think we can do without this question involving people we previously didn't deem worthy of even being mentioned.]
Although this is my first novel, [Lose the "although," if not the whole phrase.] I am an editor at The Park Literary Review and a former contributing writer of the Tewks Adventure Society, a travel and exploration website. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Revised Version
Dear Acquisitions Editor:
I have recently completed a 50,000-word Young Adult novel, How To be Fabulous. It's a comical story about Spencer Garrison, a dorky five-foot-nine Manhattan teen with firecracker red hair, masses of freckles and no fashion sense. As if her life isn't awkward enough, it seems that nothing ever goes her way: she's embarrassed by her fake chested, celebrity obsessed "Frussian" stepmother Regina, who walks around midtown in hot pink spandex and white faux fur; her best friend has just started dating the Upper East side's answer to Josh Hartnet, while Spencer has yet to kiss a boy; and the bitchmonster Whitney Fellows has made it this year's extracurricular activity to humiliate Spencer.
Given the circumstances of Spencer's existence, she is baffled when a classmate's father, owner of the elite Ideal Models modeling agency, wants to sign her to Ideal. Even more surprising, Spencer quickly snags a highly coveted modeling contract as the new "DuJour Girl." Stepping into the national limelight as the darling of the fashion industry, Spencer becomes the most popular girl in her school--prompting the jealous Whitney to plot her demise.
How To be Fabulous is a modern-day Cinderella story that should appeal to dorky girls the world over--and who reads more books than dorky girls? I am an editor at The Park Literary Review and a former contributing writer of the Tewks Adventure Society, a travel and exploration website. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
Notes
The title sounds like a manual for drag queens. On the other hand, Spencer vs. the Bitchmonster sounds like fantasy.
One would think having the most coveted modeling job in the entire world would require enough training and responsibility that one wouldn't be able to return to one's high school so soon, if ever.
Try using fewer semi-colons.
If Spencer marries Dick Tracy, she should keep her maiden name.
10 comments:
If Spencer marries Dick Tracy, she should keep her maiden name.
I just snorted Hawaiian punch out my nose. Ouch.
Oh, and I also kinda like the "How to Be Fabulous" title. If it were an adult novel, not so much, but it's got a nice ring for a YA read.
I'm also reminded of Josie and the Pussycats with Spencer (isn't that an old-fashioned ladies' jacket?) being the model Dejour. Heh. I'm not sure teens would get it, but I think it's funny.
As a die-hard ANTM fan I was ready to buy this book just based on the title. Then I saw "young adult" and I lost all interest in it. Fabulousness is funny in adults, but in kids it's just sad. Lucky I'm not the target audience.
Still, if the query needs so much basic proofreading, I doubt the novel is ready to submit, either.
There are some great elements here, but I really dislike the concept that your book appears to be preaching to vulnerable young girls. It shouldn't be a requirement that a Cinderella saving grace like being a model will rescue your main character from being a geek. Now, if you made her LACK of the supermodel/cool girl traits a plus, you might be able to pull it off. But I wouldn't think it possible.
Umm, so, through absolutely no effort whatsoever on her part, the protagonist achieves fame, glamour and success. Is she just a passenger in the novel or does she actually do anything towards a goal? Having just read a novel with an along-for-the-ride protagonist, I would never look at another.
Timely.
Sounds like "Ugly Betty" for High school and YA. Of course, that assumes that anything created for TV is aimed at adults and not teens.
What is the overriding life lesson that my Young Adult is going to learn from this?
This sounds like a great book. I want to read the story.
Can I get an advanced copy. How will I know when it is published? I promise to buy a copy.
Thank you.
"Spencer" is a very trendy name for girls these days. It's amusing to see how parents seek cachet or redemption by giving their girls (mildly ambiguous) masculine names, and how boys' parents keep fleeing names that have been taken over and tainted by girls. "Shirley" was a masculine name when Charlotte Bronte gave it to the heroine of one of her books, thus staining it indelibly with femininity. "Leslie" is another formerly masculine name, now irretrievably feminine. The time will soon come when any schoolboy named "Spencer" will be spending a lot of time stuffed inside his own locker.
And Wesley was forever stained as feminine by the TV Writers in their magnificantly awful portrayal of Wesley Crusher!
(don't say it, I'll just go stand in the corner myself)
This is YA? Great title, but my first thought was, "This sounds like a chick-lit novel."
I think EE did a good job fixing your query.
Good luck with it!
~Nancy
Dave: gimme five!
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