Face-Lift 221

Guess the Plot

The Horizontal Life

1. Jake Stone wakes to find that the life he led for six years was nothing but a coma dream. Instead of the lucky young man who side-stepped a speeding car and went on to football fame and fortune, he is a shriveled scarecrow doomed to years of surgery and physical therapy.

2. Finding and keeping gainful employment when you're a narcolept isn't easy. Myron is barely making it when he auditions for a mattress commercial and suddenly strikes it rich.

3. This book about modern-day hookers is highlighted by my first-hand up-close-and-personal interviews with dozens of prostitutes.

4. After thirty-two years spending most of his waking hours prostrate before the childish emperor, Vlad finally sees his chance to stage the coup he's always dreamed of. Also, a dragon.

5. Born lazy, Joseph has spent his life lying on the couch. But when rampaging elephants threaten his hometown, he must stand up -- or be forever flattened.

6. Living in an iron lung has not stopped Gene from getting a degree in aerospace engineering and turning his "capsule" into the Love Rocket.


Original Version

Dear Ms.Literary Agent:

Every day across America, businessmen sit down to their computers to book a business trip. They choose the airline, the hotel and their transportation all by pointing and clicking. [Actually, they have their secretaries do this. Most businessmen never touch a computer, unless they're looking for free pornography.]

They can also choose what type of woman they will go to bed with as well. [See what I mean? Now this is the part where the secretaries are left out of the loop.] Whatever his pleasure is---a brunette, a blonde, black, Asian [or one of each]--it’s all available online [What did you say that url was? (Just to confirm that you have your facts straight, of course.) ] and as easy as ordering a pizza. [Pizza or prostitute. Hmm, let's see . . .

..................................Pizza.................Prostitute

"The works".............$14.95........................$200.00
Cholesterol...............22 mg./slice.................0
Protection............Napkin: 2 cents.......Condom: $2
Chance of STD..........2%..............................64%
Chance of getting
murdered by pimp..0%...............................7%
Tastes better with
chocolate sauce?....No...............................Yes
Made by high
school kid 30
minutes before
arriving at your
house?....................Yes..............................Yes]


Prostitution has moved off the streets and into cyberspace.

My book, The Horizontal Life: Selling Sex in Cyberspace is all about the women who go online (and out of the sight of law enforcement) to ply their trade, the men who patronize them [I don't care what any of them said, that wasn't me. Everyone knows prostitutes will say anything for publicity. Especially Mandy.] [It was Mandy, wasn't it?] and the subculture of web sites, blogs and professionally run boards where the escorts and clients go to meet and greet.

There have been other books about Internet Prostitution, but most of them have been memoirs or how-to books. [Can you recommend a good how-to book?] No one has directly explored how popular and widespread the selling of sex online has become from an investigative journalism perspective. [No one else has plunged so deeply into prostitution.]

My hope is this book will not merely titillate, but educate. I’m not a crusader, but I recognize sometimes you have to start an argument before you can win one. [Not clear what you're talking about. Which side of what argument would you take?]

Included are dozens of interviews with prostitutes I have conducted [Actually, I think you mean it was the interviews you conducted, not the prostitutes--unless the prostitutes formed an orchestra.] [Which is possible. I've heard many prostitutes are quite proficient on the organ, and I imagine many of them have a fine pair of maracas.] over the last four years. [Interviews in which the prostitutes didn't even realize I was interviewing them--I managed to convince every one of them that I was just a regular customer.] I have 14 years experience as a reporter, columnist and managing editor for various mainstream, alternative and online publications.

I would be interested in sharing my proposal for The Horizontal Life with you at your request. This is a simultaneous query. Thank you for your time and consideration.


(The title, "The Horizontal Life" comes from an interview I conducted with one prostitute who said she had accompanied men to the White House, had attended parties with powerful politicians, changed cars every two years [After two years, the back seat starts to get pretty scummy.] and had a stock portfolio worth a million dollars. She said her way to the top had come via a view of the ceiling. Thus..."The Horizontal Life.")


Notes

To me the most intriguing part was the part that wasn't in the query, about where you got the title. Perhaps if many of the women you interviewed went from barely scraping by to millionaire, thanks to the Internet, the query would be made more interesting by including sample stories of a couple of these women.