tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post1825289051175689791..comments2024-03-26T18:28:06.391-04:00Comments on Evil Editor: Face-Lift 420Evil Editorhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03879826770199639420noreply@blogger.comBlogger28125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-27740277914575152932007-09-14T17:36:00.000-04:002007-09-14T17:36:00.000-04:00Hey cool, the html instructions are in German toda...Hey cool, the html instructions are in German today.<BR/><BR/>(if you want to do something about people who don't like vampire novels, make sure they don't give them a try anyway with "The Historian"; it will only confirm they should NEVER read vampire novels (once they wake up))nonehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00415222406280230021noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-52912894130194215362007-09-14T17:28:00.000-04:002007-09-14T17:28:00.000-04:00Or as another lead-in:It's hard to be disgusted wi...Or as another lead-in:<BR/><BR/>It's hard to be disgusted with vampires when you learn you can share their powers.<BR/><BR/>Or:<BR/><BR/>The only thing more shocking to MC NAME HERE than discovering a group of four vampires down the street is discovering that she can absorb their powers herself.<BR/><BR/>Or something.pacatruehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04125048243775811714noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-18469940225210333542007-09-14T16:01:00.000-04:002007-09-14T16:01:00.000-04:00I doubt anyone is reading this comment trail anymo...I doubt anyone is reading this comment trail anymore, but just in case....<BR/><BR/>I think you should take Bonnie's comment seriously if you are worried about the query letter as a sales device. As you indicated in your response, an agent is probably reading a few vampire novel queries a week. Vampire novels are still selling, as people have talked about, so the agent might want to represent one. The key is that you want her to choose YOUR vampire novel and not one of the others in her stack. So, in your query, you need to make yours stand out.<BR/><BR/>If the heroine adopting the vampiric powers isn't common, emphasize that in the query. If their are interesting relationships other than hanging out with cute guys, emphasize that. If your voice is funny and sarcastic, emphasize that. You get the idea.<BR/><BR/>You can't do anything about people who don't like novels with vampires. But you can do something about making your query be different from the others.pacatruehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04125048243775811714noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-41058761948867505412007-09-14T15:44:00.000-04:002007-09-14T15:44:00.000-04:00Yes, vampires are still hot. Look at the I Am Lege...Yes, vampires are still hot. Look at the <I>I Am Legend</I>-sounding trilogy that just sold for, like, $1.5M (which may include film rights -- I'm not going out and double-checking). I'm guessing there's SOMETHING about that trilogy that's different and unique enough to be worth the hype.<BR/><BR/>Now, many, many agents admit the way they read a query is in this order:<BR/>1) First couple of sentences to see if it's a genre they even rep.<BR/>2) Credits to see if they should pay extra attention.<BR/>3) Hook to see if it's attention-grabbing.<BR/>4) Skim-thruough to determine if the writing is coherent.<BR/>5) Assuming the query hasn't been rejected already, a full read-through.<BR/><BR/>You'll want to put right up front what makes THIS story different from all the vamp stories Bonnie's seen before. Rebecca's mind-linking ability appears to be that hook. Stick it right up front, whether you start the query with a one-sentence summary of the book, or just introduce this hook in the first sentence. Something like:<BR/><BR/><I>When Rebecca stumbles across four vampire brothers in hiding in a quiet Baltimore suburb, she discovers her mind-linking ability to share their strength, rapid healing, and manipulative powers.</I>Phoenix Sullivanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03290349031002504007noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-18387575910071415362007-09-14T13:35:00.000-04:002007-09-14T13:35:00.000-04:00Whoever wrote the Four Horsemen gtp, you are a bri...Whoever wrote the Four Horsemen gtp, you are a brilliant, brilliant person. LOL.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-9123785547321118002007-09-14T09:03:00.000-04:002007-09-14T09:03:00.000-04:00I'll go back over to MSWord and delete the whole t...<I>I'll go back over to MSWord and delete the whole thing! Wow, what a rush! Problem solved!<BR/><BR/>Maybe my next novel will be about a conspiracy dating back to the days of Christ...</I><BR/><BR/>If your characters share this kind of sarcasm, you should have no problem. It won't be just "another vampire novel."Blogless Trollhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03983848259551488867noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-40538917409031521072007-09-14T08:31:00.000-04:002007-09-14T08:31:00.000-04:00Thank you all for the crits and support. Writtenwy...Thank you all for the crits and support. <BR/><BR/>Writtenwyrrd, your guess is a little off the mark. Gareth isn't really the good guy in the end. The four brothers think he's there to take over their territory, but he's actually come to Baltimore on the run from an enemy. He's an older, powerful vampire, and he has no allies against this enemy. When he discovers that Rebecca can share his powers at no cost -- and therefore be an equal ally -- he wants her to help him. Unfortunately, because he's on the run and paranoid, he thought that the four brothers might be in cahoots with his enemy, which is why he kept fighting with them. When he is in the process of telling Rebecca the truth and asking for her help, the brothers have ambushed him, and after learning Gareth's back story, she has to decide whose side to fight on.<BR/><BR/>I reworked the query last night to include Gareth's motivation. It's not something that would ever go on the back of a paperback, because it reveals the twist, but maybe its necessary in the query, so someone wouldn't think the story is so straightforward. If anyone is still reading these comments, I'd love your opinion.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09215557278096889044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-20489797604467470262007-09-14T07:03:00.000-04:002007-09-14T07:03:00.000-04:00Should you have any interestJust a minor thing--ch...<I>Should you have any interest</I><BR/><BR/>Just a minor thing--change this bit of your query. "Any" comes off sounding weak. Best of luck, Brigid.Lynn Sinclairhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07033551915991015255noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-56433592233559387552007-09-14T06:51:00.000-04:002007-09-14T06:51:00.000-04:00BTW, the way it was written, I really thought GTP ...BTW, the way it was written, I really thought GTP #4 couldn't be the real one.writtenwyrddhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02280711822302493122noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-15723372701537868312007-09-14T06:50:00.000-04:002007-09-14T06:50:00.000-04:00You give us a lot of plot details but nothing that...You give us a lot of plot details but nothing that grabs me. Why should I care about these characters? I find myself suspecting that Gareth is the good guy, and he must be using her to get to the four brothers.<BR/><BR/>I think you need more emotional grab in the letter. My inference was that the real story was something like this:<BR/><BR/>She is a commodity of some sort because she can share their powers, and is thus wooed by the four evil vampire brothers; but on the cusp of doing something truly stupid she is saved by the good vampire Gareth who she has been told is bad. Then the confusion is cleared up after she's probably used against Gareth or he actually saves her, and she gets together with Gareth or the bad vampires are slayed.<BR/><BR/>Am I close?writtenwyrddhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02280711822302493122noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-80061606570900749152007-09-13T23:26:00.000-04:002007-09-13T23:26:00.000-04:00I don't see an end to vampire novels. They burst o...I don't see an end to vampire novels. They burst out after "Interview with the Vampire" hit as a movie. The novel came out in 1976 and the movie didn't get made until 1994. <BR/><BR/>There are numerous remakes of the Dracula story and vampire novels, and, as numerous as they seem, are still being pumped out. It only takes a little to fuel the "undead" in one form or another. <BR/><BR/>Just to prove the point, the latest incarnation of Richard Matheson's <B><I>I am Legend</I></B> is due out this December. The SciFi legions are lining up to buy tickets already.Dave Fragmentshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17985158361431606939noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-69523628940561163632007-09-13T22:31:00.000-04:002007-09-13T22:31:00.000-04:00Gotta love those people who come in and piss on so...Gotta love those people who come in and piss on someone's novel and offer nothing constructive. What's the word for what bonnie has contributed? "Shitique", I think is what they call it.Wonderwoodhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13118126631519254865noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-37165365000037179692007-09-13T22:17:00.000-04:002007-09-13T22:17:00.000-04:00brigid says:I couldn't come up with a title, and I...brigid says:<BR/><BR/><I>I couldn't come up with a title, and I was desperate. I knew, after sending, that I could do better. I considered "Four in the Morning," but for some reason -- though still dark -- it just didn't seem to jive.</I><BR/><BR/>That's "jibe,"<BR/><BR/><B>intr.v. jibed, jib·ing, jibes <BR/>To be in accord; agree:</B> <BR/><BR/>but meanwhile, how about the raunchy:<BR/><BR/>VAMPILE?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-49766239664463821422007-09-13T22:11:00.000-04:002007-09-13T22:11:00.000-04:00Literary groups are always threes. Take the biblic...<I>Literary groups are always threes. Take the biblical characters, Shadrach, Meshach and Horshack. Or The Three Musketeers (Athos, Porthos and Abednego).</I><BR/><BR/>Wasn't that last one Abedingo?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-5808460084099736432007-09-13T20:12:00.000-04:002007-09-13T20:12:00.000-04:00Really, Bonnie? Thanks! I'll go back over to MSWor...Really, Bonnie? Thanks! I'll go back over to MSWord and delete the whole thing! Wow, what a rush! Problem solved!<BR/><BR/>Seriously, I know there is now a huge glut of vampire novels on the market. When I started this novel over a year ago, I hadn't read <I> Twilight</I> or any of the number of other vampire novels that have cropped up recently. The only vampire series I'd read were Anne Rice (which started 30 years ago) and Laurell K. Hamilton. When I started this, I had no idea that vampire novels were going to be so hot in 2007, therefore killing any market for my book. (And I can imagine this applies to anyone else who posted a vampire query/pages here as well.)<BR/><BR/>Maybe my next novel will be about a conspiracy dating back to the days of Christ, and having to do with paintings in the Louvre. No one has done anything like that, have they?Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09215557278096889044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-4977275765940642042007-09-13T20:11:00.000-04:002007-09-13T20:11:00.000-04:00I'm personally always happy to see another vampire...I'm personally always happy to see another vampire story, especially one with a new slant, such as this one (love the idea of a human woman who metaphorically feeds off of them). So as soon as people who read vampire stories tire of them (which won't happen anytime soon judging by the recent success of Stephenie Meyer), then I say bring 'em on. Vampires, like werewolves, are much older than literature and so is our fascination with them.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-3276780246378208882007-09-13T18:52:00.000-04:002007-09-13T18:52:00.000-04:00It leaves me thinking, "Oh, another vampire novel....It leaves me thinking, "Oh, another vampire novel." *yawn* "Next query, please."Bonniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07895569211498067204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-3252528314608899372007-09-13T17:52:00.000-04:002007-09-13T17:52:00.000-04:00Thank you all for the great comments. Her borrowin...Thank you all for the great comments. Her borrowing their abilities turns out to be pivotal for the story, so I think you're right that I need to highlight that even more. I appreciate all the feedback.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09215557278096889044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-68117905696525800302007-09-13T16:52:00.000-04:002007-09-13T16:52:00.000-04:00Evil Editor: the Roget of the underworld.Evil Editor: the Roget of the underworld.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-80404973537992180902007-09-13T16:21:00.000-04:002007-09-13T16:21:00.000-04:00EE's suggestion of brutal may work. There's a poin...EE's suggestion of brutal may work. There's a point where the villain almost kills one of the brothers, but doesn't succeed, which is why I used "deadly." Dire and grave, while good words, don't have the right impact. All good suggestions, but as you're all writers, too, you know how important it is to have just the right word!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09215557278096889044noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-31593215440994021552007-09-13T16:20:00.000-04:002007-09-13T16:20:00.000-04:00Hi Brigid,Even though the other three brothers are...Hi Brigid,<BR/><BR/>Even though the other three brothers are important, as you've indicated, you might still drop them from the letter. The query doesn't need to fully explain the story, it just needs to get someone interested enough to read your sample pages. I think if an agent was interested in the story of Christopher and Minnie the Moocher (I mean, Rebecca; just doing Cab Calloway here), they won't be shocked to learn later that he has three brothers which do stuff.<BR/><BR/>Overall, this was a query where the story sounded enjoyable, but I kept thinking it's been done before.(In fact, it's rather similar to fello minion December Quinn's 'Blood Will Tell' in its broad outline). You need to find a way to move this from "oh, another vampire novel" to "oh, that's a different take on it; I wonder how Rebecca would handle THAT." As EE hints, maybe the emotional manipulation part will help on this. Also, Rebecca never seems to use these amazing abilities that she shares with vampires. Maybe you could pursue that somehow?pacatruehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04125048243775811714noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-64729922216782496312007-09-13T15:50:00.000-04:002007-09-13T15:50:00.000-04:00How about "as the threats to his brothers grow pro...How about "as the threats to his brothers grow progressively more dire" or "more grave"?Lightsmithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00396366702192330680noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-34676656430452165762007-09-13T15:10:00.000-04:002007-09-13T15:10:00.000-04:00The word you're looking for is: Deadlyish.The word you're looking for is: Deadlyish.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-4615232285877764482007-09-13T14:45:00.000-04:002007-09-13T14:45:00.000-04:00Words that may mean what you want to say without b...Words that may mean what you want to say without being ambiguous:<BR/><BR/>barbaric, brutal, depraved, malevolent, pernicious, ruthless, sadistic, viciousEvil Editorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03879826770199639420noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26791026.post-71198755139394869332007-09-13T14:24:00.000-04:002007-09-13T14:24:00.000-04:00I couldn't come up with a title, and I was despera...I couldn't come up with a title, and I was desperate. I knew, after sending, that I could do better. I considered "Four in the Morning," but for some reason -- though still dark -- it just didn't seem to jive.<BR/><BR/>The brothers are all important, but like you mention, it's six characters to work into a query, and I typically see people get hammered for listing too many people in their query. That's why I brought it down to bare bones. I'll have to see if I can somehow highlight their importance without making the query into a synopsis (which was my original problem). <BR/><BR/>As far as the debate over the word "deadly," I always took it to mean "capable of causing death," not the definite "death causing," and after jetting over to google, I see it can be used either way. Since more than one person has called out this word, I may have to change it to something equally potent yet not as confusing. Maybe "lethal," though I always took THAT to mean someone actually died, and a trip to www.m-w.com says that the meaning is equally ambiguous. <BR/><BR/>Maybe I should just call him a big ol' meanie, and leave it at that.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09215557278096889044noreply@blogger.com