Why you don't get published.
Saturday, September 30, 2006
Face-Lift 203
Guess the Plot
Calamity: This is How the World Ends
1. A giant squid wakes from its million year slumber cranky and hungry. Can Stouffer avert disaster and transform this calamity into calamari before its too late? Also: a vampire.
2. The year is 2036 and President Paris Hilton faces a dilemma: deal with pesky North Korea or make an appearance at the MTV Music Video Awards. Also: a CD.
3. A valley girl learns her father isn't rich, and she must get a job. The only job she qualifies for is cosmetic salesgirl at the mall's biggest department store. Her world ends when her friends discover her fall from snobbery. Also: perfume.
4. The noise is deafening, from machines gone haywire to dogs yapping through the night. Vince decides to end it all with a toothbrush and some lamp oil, McGyver-style. Also: a computer game.
5. The large-scale consequences of any potential natural disaster are compared with more localized hazards such as dying in a car wreck, through a single number: the Calamity Quotient. Also: short stories.
6. On Zignoid Elevtwo, a band of runaway emus spark debate that leads to conflagration and galactic catastrophe. Also: Bird flu.
Original Version
Dear Mr. Evil:
A supervolcano explodes setting off a millennium of severe cold. Soon humanity is starving and dying en masse until only one small band of forty people is left. The fate of our species depends on their survival. [They all said the cockroaches would be the one species that survived; turns out it's the penguins.] [Tell me the 40 people left alive aren't the Oakland Raiders.]
Fiction? No. As CALAMITY: THIS IS HOW THE WORLD ENDS explains, the exceptionally limited genetic diversity of Homo sapiens along with other evidence tells us such a disaster happened in the recent past. [Not to argue a minor point of semantics, but to you, the recent past is a million years ago; to me, it's Thursday.] A single group of individuals did survive, and we are all their descendents. [This confirms what Evil Editor has long suspected: that he's related to Einstein, Springsteen, and Clooney.]
This is just one of the little-known devastations my 75,000-word popular science book recounts. All chapters except the first open with 1000-word short stories depicting real events [Real fictional events, that is.] to more effectively convey important concepts and facts. My book also introduces the Calamity Quotient or CQ, a number derived from a simple equation that allows the large-scale consequences of any potential disaster to be compared with more localized hazards such as dying in a car wreck. [For instance, to determine how many people would die if a tsunami struck North Dakota, multiply the number of people who die in skydiving accidents by the CQ, which in this case would be 417, and there's your answer.] Calamity is the first book about natural disasters in thirty years to combine authoritative scholarship with a captivating easy-to-read style. [Plus, it has the CQ.] Unlike the speculation and hyperbole common in competing titles, [I'm more concerned with the hyperbole common in your previous sentence.] I include only natural calamities known to have occurred in the past. [As the CQ is used to compare "potential disasters" to something, it would seem you also include disasters that could occur in the future.]
In addition to the millions of adults who are increasingly apprehensive about natural disasters according to recent polling, I suggest marketing Calamity to the three million students taking earth science and beginning geology each year through direct mailings to their instructors. [If there are three million students, I'd hate to be the one charged with gathering the mailing addresses of all their instructors.]
I am an internationally known PhD geologist [I found this most impressive, until I realized that I'm an internationally known blogger.] with more than forty published professional articles. I have presented at international conferences and chaired conference sessions. I also enjoy teaching science to non-specialists and have led seminars and workshops for high school teachers, spoken to civic groups and was featured on a statewide TV program discussing geologic catastrophes. Well received, the program was repeated several times. I have long been interested in the numerous world-shaking calamities that have occurred during the Earth’s long history and have gathered a trove of information to use in writing this book. [Not sure "trove" is the best word there. "Oodles" is closer, but probably not the tone you're looking for. "Abundance?"] I also write fiction. The literary magazine Lynx Eye published one of my stories and the electronic magazine Nth Degree another. My first novel is available as an ebook and my second is being revised.
Thank you for your consideration. I have enclosed a mini proposal. A complete proposal including two 9,000-word sample chapters is available upon request.
Best regards,
Notes
I'd drop the CQ from the query. You haven't made it clear what good it is.
Declaring as fact that a volcano once left forty humans alive seems awfully specific, and had me thinking, Yeah, right. If there's hard evidence of this, maybe your credits (which were the best part) should come first; people are more likely to think you know what you're talking about. With the forty humans and the CQ up front, they'll think you're a mad scientist.
Choose a "for example" disaster and elaborate on it, while leaving out the hyperbole, the marketing plan, and the CQ, and you might have something. People do like to read about other people dying.
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15 comments:
Okay, while "in the recent past" makes much, MUCH more sense after knowing the author is a geologist (because, yeah, geologically anything involving humans or even mammals could qualify as the recent past), I still don't buy that 40 humans is large enough of a gene pool to continue the species.
As an SFF reader and a student with at least a passing knowledge of evolution, I'm fairly certain you would need at least 500 separate genetic samples to continue a species. I would buy that 40 people could successfully (meaning few genetic disorders and inbreeding problems) for a few generations, but that gene pool would be too limited to continue for several hundred years.
I would very much like to see evidence that past geological disasters ever reduced the human species to such a size. Or even evidence that a modern, extant mammalian species was reduced to a number on the order of 10 or 100 and then continued to today. I'm going to go look up gene pool sizes and breeding stability now...
I should have looked this up before commenting, but I'll share it anyway. Or you can delete this comment. :)
I'm guessing this author's work is based on a similar event to the Toba catastrophe theory, which involved an Indonesian volcano. But in that theory, the hominid (not human - human predecessors) population size was believed to be reduced to 1000 - 10,000.
A geologist should understand the order of magnitude difference between 40 and 1000. That's two orders of magnitude. To put in geologic terms, that's the difference between Mt. Everest and Olympus Mons. Or the difference between Mt. Everest and Atlanta, GA.
I can suspend my disbelief with the best of them, but as a reader you can't ask me to suspend my disbelief when you're presenting me with hard science, or even theoretical science. I'll suspend my disbelief on the Toba catastrophe theory, but I can't suspend it over two orders of magnitude when I'm being presented with a lot of very possible science.
I would fact-check with a geneticist, or an evolutionary biologist, or even someone who's studied animal husbandry or endengered species.
Either that or you could just market it as science fiction. I mean look what the Da Vinci Code did with a lot of slightly-fictionalized but real historical research. There is a market for hard SF.
I agree with EE that you need to remove your marketing suggestions. They have no place in a query letter.
Overall, I think the letter is too long and not specific enough.
Heidi:
Perhaps before you pretend to know more than a Ph.D geologist, you should take the time to learn as much as a Ph.D geologist. You listing your qualifications as a "SFF reader" and describing what you "think" would happen is simply embarassing. Don't act high and mighty about a subject that you don't understand (and apparently hadn't even heard about until this evening).
Species *do* come back from just a few individuals. Whooping crane: 54. Big bend gambusia: 3. Red wolf: 17. Florida Panther: 30-50. Mississippi Sandhill Crane: 40. Black-Footed Ferret: 18. American Burying Beetle: 1 population. Southwestern Grey Wolf: 22. Wood Stork: 29. How many do you want? I can easily keep going and fill up page after page.
Some of these have only had their populations triple or so. Others, like the gambusia, have gone from 3 to 50,000. A lack of genetic diversity does *not* mean that a species is doomed. It's not a good thing, but it's not a death knell, either. Countless species reproduce by clones (esp. plants), and some species have very little genetic diversity as a consequence. Some animals don't even have sexual reproduction, such as the Whiptail Lizard (it's parthenogenic -- only females).
As for the number 40 in reference to human populations: just a quick search *beyond* Wikipedia (which seems to be about all that you looked at) reveals that Harpending H.C. et al, 1993 estimated 40-600 females.
... and this is why I should never assume my tone comes across in text. *sigh*
rei -
I was not acting all high and mighty, nor was I trying to say you were just plain wrong. I should probably take this discussion to email, because I left a lot of this out of my previous comments for brevity. My comments were already kinda long.
As someone in your target audience, I would find the facts as I have thus far been presented them hard to swallow. Thank you for the examples of species that came back from small populations. Those would help me suspend my disbelief more.
However. The size of the population is not my only problem with this. Congenital health problems are. Inbreeding doesn't always produce bad results. This happens with horses, cats, and dogs all the time. To get a certain trait, they're practically inbred and you end up with low genetic diversity. Occasionally, you get good results. Most of the time, you don't. Great Danes are the best example. Can they survive? Yes. Would they survive in the wild? Probably not. They have a high incidence of poor eyesight, arthritis (at a very young age), and diabetes, among other things.
So, if you had a modern human population of 40, where are they coming from? What was their standard of health care? Do any of them have any predisposition to diabetes, heart problems, that sort of thing? If they're Americans, that's highly likely. Even if it's only one of them, those traits are going to be emphasized and debilitating over several generations.
From a genetic point of view, humans are not streamlined. We haven't been subject to true survivial of the fittest evolution for decades, not in the "developed" world anyway. That's the double-edged sword of heathcare. Take that healthcare away... you need those 40 individuals to be quite healthy. And that's another area you would have to suspend my disbelief on, and I'm not sure I would.
Oh, sorry for the length of this, and sorry if my tone comes across as mean or contrary or holier than thou or whatever else you could read into this. I'm trying to explain why, as a reader in your target audience, I would have problems.
Actually, cheetahs are so genetically similar that you can graft skin from one animal to another without any rejection. They exist in the wild, and have for many years. My understanding of zoological thinking is that the species went through a very narrow bottleneck (probably in the range of <12 breeding pairs).
Also, many island species are naturally few in number, so there's no way to maintain massive genetic diversity.
Yes, inbreeding is a bad thing in the short term. But when you're talking 40,000 years, as long as the survival rate exceeds the death rate, your species will survive.
This letter needs to make it clear whether these 40 survivors can be interpreted as supporting the Noah's Ark story. Also, the writer's credentials seem sketchy. There are quack publications and seminars and there are respectable ones. Just saying you've been published (and self-publsihed as an e-author) isn't all that impressive. How will the editor know the author isn't a quack?
I want to read this book.
The subject is fascinating and the author seems to be able to write. I'm willing to postpone my questions about whether a population can survive when it's down that small until I read the book and see what case the author makes.
Heidi:
I'm not the author. I'm just defending the author.
Great Danes are the best example. Can they survive? Yes. Would they survive in the wild? Probably not.
That's a horrible analogy. Most domesticated animals wouldn't survive in the wild. Early hominids were not domesticated species.
[quote]Thank you for the examples of species that came back from small populations. Those would help me suspend my disbelief more.[/quote]
There are literally thousands of species that have come back from catastrophe in modern times (where we can document it).
Even if it's only one of them, those traits are going to be emphasized and debilitating over several generations.
If there's no major threat to your niche, you're going to survive unless your population is limited too heavily by recessive lethal alleles. A population of 40 is very unlikely to have that problem. Humans could all be born with one leg, live to the age of 25, be blind in one eye, and only know how to quack, but if there was no threat to their expansion, they would expand and refill their niche.
There are species all over the world whose main limiting factor is (or was historically) each other. Many species have significantly debilitating features -- for example, the tail of a bird of paradise. Why would they evolve something like that? Because natural selection was not a dominant factor in their reproduction. Instead, in their niche, they were mostly limited by sexual selection -- each other.
750,000 years ago, populations were decimated by Toba. Furthermore, 750,000 years ago, we were no longer a prey species. H. antecessor hunted deer, elephants, rhinos, horses, and possibly even lions, mammoths, and other large species.
All of the sudden, thanks to Toba, the niche occupied by humans was almost completely wiped out. When the environment recovered, there were a tremendous amount of resources available to humanity that were unoccupied by humans. It was a boon for survivors. We see the same sort of thing in Europe after the biggest run of bubonic plague. With the major decline in population, those who survived inherited vast wealth, land, etc. In a way, the plague was a major, early step in the breakdown the feudal system and start of the rise of the middle class.
msjones:
let me just add that remnant populations of endangered species are only on their way back with a lot of human intervention and resources.
Some famously took intricate breeding programs. Most, however, simply required undoing the damage that we humans had done to their habitats. The gambusia, for example, was almost wiped out because someone dammed up the water running into Boquillas spring to make themselves a fishing pool.
In the case of Toba, the damage that caused the decline of human populations gets undone on its own simply by the passage of time.
Rei:
I'm not the author. I'm just defending the author.
Whatever you say. :)
That's a horrible analogy. Most domesticated animals wouldn't survive in the wild. Early hominids were not domesticated species
Yeah, early hominids weren't, but are you honestly arguing that modern humans aren't domesticated? Stick 40 modern people (again, assuming they're from "developed" countries) into a post-apocalpytic world and I don't believe for a second they could figure out how to feed themselves in such a competitive market as mass die-offs and changing global temperatures, and at the same time be successfully reproductive.
Modern humans are essentially domesticated animals. We benefit from healthcare and social structures and systems that require the support of a large population. How does that not change after an apocalyptic event? Sticking 40 modern humans into a post-apocalyptic world is the same thing as turning a bunch of Great Danes out in the wild.
If there's no major threat to your niche, you're going to survive unless your population is limited too heavily by recessive lethal alleles. A population of 40 is very unlikely to have that problem.
Do you mean "survive" as in not die prematurely, or do you mean "survive" as in species survival? In a group as small as 40, it needs to be a panmixia. Every male needs to mate with every female, and hopefully most of those would produce viable offspring. Again, can you see modern humans in a post-apocalyptic survival scenario actually suspending social stigmas against promiscuity?
All of the sudden, thanks to Toba, the niche occupied by humans was almost completely wiped out.
The niche occupied by hominid ancestors of humans. Not modern humans. The search for food was not new to them after Toba.
Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything was a pretty successful book thanks to the author's light and engaging touch with, and evident enthusiasm for, the subject matter.
Feels like Calamity could play in the same sandbox, though it doesn't have the Bryson name to carry it. If the short stories are engaging and the factual/speculative narrtive entertaining, there is a market for popular science.
However, also feels like a challenge to have both short fictions that are compelling and sufficiently crafted and equally crafted and engaging non-fiction essays without the book suffering from being (genetically) neither fish nor fowl.
Good luck to the author if he's up to it and can make it work.
Yay for Raider Bashing! Woot!
As for the query, I would probably pick up the book, but not because of the query itself. It's a little on the lengthy side.
Nope, I'm just a sick puppy who really likes reading about the end of the world and the few poor schmoes who survive. I've read The Stand like ten times.
Plus, with the possibility of this being "scientifically backed", if not exactly non-fiction, I'm just that much more interested.
But that is a really, really long query letter.
Wow, who knew that this would be the controversial query!
Anyway, whenever the author rewrites, I'd say go ahead and a couple of the refereed journals you've been published in so that no one has to wonder. You might leave it blank here to be anonymous, but you can be more specific, I would hazard, in the real thing. "40 journals such as Nature, Science, and International Geological Estimation Quarterly."
Watch it, EE. I bleed Silver and Black (and I've bled a lot already this season).
At least the dreaded "global warming" wasn't mentioned. Of course, then it would have been a work of fiction. Or, is this a work of fiction? -JTC
I feel like the #2 should have been the alternate ending to the film Idiocracy.
Great stuff.
thanks
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