Face-Lift 955

Guess the Plot

Quinn's Law

1. It's a long journey, especially by dogsled, and Quinn is running late as usual, but when he finally gets here, everybody had better jump for joy.

2. Always sterilize your equipment. Do no harm. And don't tell anyone their new doctor is a woman until it's too late to send you back East.

3. Using proven scientific methods to analyze the female, physics genius Albert Quinn publishes a paper explaining his third law: the bigger the hair, the smaller the brain. Outrage ensues.

4. After winning a national elementary-school essay contest, little Quinn gets to make up a new law of her very own. After she comes down with a traumatizing case of cooties, she demands boys be outlawed in the United States. Hilarity ensues.

5. Zebediah Quinn rules his ranch hands with a velvet glove. He has just one iron-clad law: hands off his lovely daughter, Virginia. But when a new ranch hand who comes to the farm has no hands, lost in a tragic combine accident, will Quinn's Law apply to the man's prehensile feet and toes?

6. Hubert Quinn is grubby, foul-mouthed and malodorous. Follow his career as he buys his way to the bench while representing the criminal who set rats free in his chambers and a fat Santa who got stuck up a chimney.

7. In 1887, Eustace Phillipe Quinn decides to go practice law in Dodge City. But kindly old Judge Hooper thinks that the fragile, effeminate Quinn is overmatched. Will he prove them wrong--and catch the eye of Sheriff John McClanahan too?

8. Arizona, 1885. The tough mining town of Burbage has claimed yet another sheriff. That's when Jonas Quinn, half-breed brother of the dead lawman rides into town, vengeance in his heart. Will he finally break Burbage--or will Burbage break him? Also, a Cheyenne medicine woman.

9. Quinn's mother is supposed to be getting rejuvenating treatments from a "doctor,' but the guy is actually draining her life force so he can live longer. But he doesn't know Quinn has special powers, and that she's willing to take the law into her own hands to rescue her mother. Also, a man with no face.

10. Robert Quinn is an outlaw, making a living by robbing banks and holding up tax collectors. But when Alamanno Gulch loses its sheriff and its deputy sheriff in the same week, he sees the chance to take over; unless the residents decide that they prefer their banks unrobbed.


Original Version

Dear Agent:

I recently completed a 60,000 word young adult horror novel, Quinn’s Law, for which I am seeking representation.

Quinn Sage is the only survivor of a crash that killed thirteen of her friends. [I always suspected it was dangerous to cram so many people into one of those clown cars.] She wanted to kill herself and join them but ended up in a psych ward instead. [Nothing gets you over suicidal impulses like being surrounded by other people who want to kill themselves.] When she’s finally sent home, she thinks things are getting back to normal. Until a man with no face starts stalking her. [If a man with no face is able to stalk you, you need to stop talking so much.] Quinn is terrified she’s having another breakdown. Nightmarish winged creatures scrabble at her windows at night, leaving deep claw marks in the concrete window ledge. [Yep. Another breakdown.]

When her mother, a Broadway actress, starts receiving rejuvenating treatments from a slick doctor, Quinn discovers that his great-grandfather was in the same business—until his patients were found drained of their fortunes and their health in a remote estate, insane, skeletal shadows of their former selves. As Quinn delves deeper, she realizes the doctor isn’t the great-grandson after all—he’s the same monstrous man, who has somehow found a way to drain the life force of his victims and maintain his own youth for centuries. [He sounds like a bad guy, but I have to admit that if I could maintain my youth for centuries by draining other people's life forces, I'd give it a shot. Though I'd try to drain the life forces of only bad people. Unless it turned out bad people's life forces caused indigestion, in which case I'd have to go with the weak.]

He’s become obsessed with the idea of restoring scarred, damaged Quinn to her former beauty. [With his rejuvenating elixir? Is he a plastic surgeon? Can he provide testimonials from former patients? Does he at least have an infomercial?] He’ll do anything in his power to get her, including holding her mother hostage and terrorizing Quinn with horrifying creatures of his own creation. Having balanced on the thin edge between life and death has given Quinn powers, and a purpose, she didn’t realize she had. [Commas not needed.] [What powers? Super powers?] She puts them to the test when she follows the monster to his lair to free her mother and put an end to his evil once and for all.

I would be delighted to send you a sample chapter or the complete manuscript at your request. Thank you for your time and consideration.


Notes

The YA genre having been overrun with vampires and werewolves and faeries; perhaps a mad scientist is just what it needs.

Let's drop the man with no face from the query.

Creatures capable of digging their claws into concrete oughta be able to get through a window. Unless . . . are they really stupid creatures capable of digging their claws into concrete?

Most teenage girls would want their mother taken hostage and drained of her life force. Maybe you should make it Quinn's BFF.

If the doctor is obsessed with restoring Quinn to her former beauty, he should just tell Quinn's mother he can do so. He can find some other person to hold hostage and drain of her life force so that Quinn's mom trusts him.

Has he met Quinn?

Why is the title Quinn's Law? What is her law? You need a title like The Island of Dr. Moreau. But not exactly that, as I assume his name isn't Moreau and he doesn't have an island. The Laboratory of Dr. Schizoid. Rejuvenation. My Mother Sings on Broadway: Kill Me Now.

The horrifying creatures of his own creation does remind me of Dr. Moreau. Usually the villain doesn't branch out into new fields. Usually if you can drain people's life force, you focus on that and leave creating horrifying creatures to other mad scientists.