Face-Lift 1564

Guess the Plot

Heart of the Wilds

1. Upcoming pop band The Wilds lost their mascot, a shi-tsu named Heart, while on tour. Amid a media frenzy with fan-posted "Missing" posters on every electric pole and fire hydrant, Heart saves a homeless shelter from being closed down.

2. Four generations of the Wilds will be converging on Pittsfield for the family reunion, and the heart of the clan is great grandmother Olivia, who is hosting the gathering, and planning to "cull the herd" by poisoning the lemon meringue pie.

3. A thief finds among her loot a mysterious orb. Could this be the legendary magical "Heart of the Wilds" that could give its possessor the power to take the throne of the Wilds? Or is it just a snow globe? 

Original Version

Fate always finds you[,] even in the Wilds... [That suggests that the Wilds is the one place no one would expect fate to find them, in which case you might as well just say Fate always finds you.]

[Eta,] The Heiress of Avérnach[,] is dead—or that’s what she would like people to believe. Six years after the fall of her kingdom, Eta has begun a new life as a thief in The Valley, [What was she doing the previous six years?] and she has no intention of returning to The Wilds. [Was Avérnach her kingdom? Her estate? Her Castle? Is The Wilds the kingdom? The wilderness around it?]

But when she steals an orb and absorbs the ancient magic from within it, she realizes that this life may be over for good. Eta decides to quest for [seek] more information about the magic now awakened within her. She continues [begins] training her new powers, she also learns about the history of the Wilds, and reunites with The Huntsman, who also happens to be the man who [supposedly?] killed her all those years ago.

When she learns that her former betrothed, Calen, has finally taken the throne of the Wilds, and that he is likely also seeking the power of the Heart of the Wilds. She must finally face her fear of returning to her old life and all that she left behind, or allow Calen to take hold of the Heart of the Wilds and her Kingdom forever. [Either those two sentences were supposed to be one sentence or the first sentence needs a predicate.] [Or you could change "when" to "then."] [Is the orb she stole the Heart of the Wilds?] [If Calen has the throne, he has her kingdom already. With the Heart he'll have it forever? Does it make him immortal? Why would Eta have to turn the Heart over to Calen? Can't she throw it into the ocean? Or use its power to destroy her enemies?]

I am excited to share for your consideration HEART OF THE WILDS (120K words), my fantasy novel with romantic subplot, [Period or semicolon.]  it is the first book in a planned series. HEART OF THE WILDS is a multi PoV story told in parallel narratives of the protagonist and villain. HEART OF THE WILDS [Stop screaming HEART OF THE WILDS.] caters to fans of fast-paced storytelling of Hashem’s The Jasad Crown, the unique magic system of Nicole Platania’s Scars Beneath a Serpent’s Scales, and the homey yet dense word-building of Ross’[s] A River Enchanted. [Is that supposed to be "world" building?]

Notes

Is Calen taking the throne a bad thing? Who's been on the throne the past six years? Someone better than Calen? To whom did the kingdom fall six years ago? 

If the orb is the Heart of the Wilds, I would have expected it  to be in a vault in the castle, not lying around some guy's house in The Valley, where anyone could steal it. 

There's some inconsistency in capitalization.  Paragraph 2: "The" Wilds; everywhere else "the" Wilds. Paragraph 2 her kingdom, paragraph 4 her Kingdom. Do the words "Heiress," "Huntsman," and "Valley."  need capitalization? The word "the" in front of some of them may not. (It's okay if the name of the valley is The Valley, but that wouldn't be the greatest name for a valley unless it was the only valley in the world. I assume the mountains surrounding the valley aren't all called The Mountain. This stuff, when added to the other nitpicky things I pointed out, may lead the agent to wonder if you've proofread your book.

Here's the plot as I assume it: Six years ago, Eta conspired with some huntsman to fake her death so she could disappear, either to escape those who'd just conquered her kingdom, or to get out of an arranged marriage to the evil Calen. Now Calen has taken the throne from whoever took it six years ago, but to cement his power, he needs something called the Heart of the Wilds, which Eta happens to have stolen a few days ago after deciding to become a thief..

Actually I was just messing around, but if it were cleaned up, that would be more intriguing than your summary, and would leave room for some additional information.

Face-Lift 1563

Guess the Plot

Fates So Twisted

1. Johannes thought he was just having a bad day when the boiler developed a crack, he broke his favorite coffee mug, and got a flat tire on the way to work. Thirteen hours later, in a conga line of former terrorists on a not-quite-deserted island in the south pacific, he muses on how things work out. And then the elephant hunters arrive.

2. When the three Fates start showing signs of dementia, it's up to Cosmo Bohegan to take charge of all life and death matters on Earth. But Cosmo's got a drinking problem, and it's not long before Chaos descends.

3. Amelia was hoping for an uneventful birthday. Instead, she gets transported to a parallel world where an ancient prophecy says she'll ally herself with a prince against an evil entity known as the Wreather, who has been wreaking havoc when he's not busy crafting wreaths. On the bright side, the prince is single, and hot.

Original Version

Dear [Agent’s First Name],

Filipino Australian Nurse, Amelia Andrada wants nothing more than to celebrate her twenty-fifth birthday in peace. But when the lady in her recurring dream offers information about her late parents—she accepts—landing her in Gaia, a parallel world reliant on power and magic, where she’s supposedly the prophesied savior to unite them against their enemies [Who is "them"? All Gaiaians? Why aren't they already united against their enemies?] and the Divine Soulmate for the prince of Axelis. [So Gaia is the world, and Axelis is the kingdom?] [Saying "unite them against their enemies and the Divine Soulmate" could be misinterpreted. Maybe she should be transported to Axelis. People are more likely to tell her what country she's in than what planet she's on.] 

 

Prince Damian Rosenthall is commanding the charge to find and defeat the Wreather, a mysterious evil figure kidnapping Mages, making them succumb to Forbidden Magic and wreaking havoc on Gaia. [I Googled "wreather." It's someone who makes wreaths. Even if your Wreather does make wreaths, I'd expect him to call himself something more intimidating. I suggest "Balor."] [Of course, maybe he doesn't call himself the Wreather, maybe that's what the Gaiaians call him to mock him.] But with the prophecy unfolding, Damian must navigate those complexities alongside Amelia. He believes the focus is to eliminate their enemies, not rely on written text passed down for centuries, and doesn’t see her fit to rule beside him, thanks to her mortality and lack of magic. [I refuse to work with someone who's gonna die in 60 years. That's not enough time to accomplish anything.] 

 

While Damian is determined to send her home—and ignores his growing feelings for her—Amelia reluctantly accepts her mortal limitations and begins to trust him. Armed only with her wits against a prophecy with no instructions, she learns about Gaia while braving judgement from those who question her role. But the longer she stays, the more she discovers her connection to Gaia, and her feelings blur the lines between Damian and her goal of going back to Earth. [Her goal is to go back to Earth, Damian wants her to go back, others don't buy that she's the savior, and the Wreather has control of the mages. It's time to cut and run.] When the opportunity comes, Amelia must decide—go home knowing she’d be stripped of her identity and memories [All of them, or just the Gaia ones?] or stay to live her mortal life with herself and memories intact.

 

FATES SO TWISTED is a standalone dual-POV Romantic Fantasy with series potential, complete at 112,000 words. It shares the themes of fate versus free will between two people forced into a reluctant partnership, wrapped in witty banter, as depicted in Imani Erriu’s HEAVENLY BODIES, and the burden of the chosen one while finding one’s identity from Penn Cole’s SPARK OF THE EVERFLAME, with BIPOC main characters.

 

Like Amelia, I’m a nurse and a proud BIPOC. Unlike her, [spoiler alert] I’m still on Earth, based in sunny Sydney, Australia.

 

Thank you for your time and consideration.

 

Notes

Amelia agreed to give up on the one thing she wanted, to celebrate her birthday in peace, in return for information about her late parents. But I don't see where she gets any information about her parents. The whole "deal" was a scam. It's like if you were living in poverty in a crime infested country, and were told if you came to America you'd have a better life, but after you got here you were arrested and shipped to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador. In other words, why should she trust these Gaiaians after they lured her to their world with lies?

Nothing you tell us about Amelia explains why anyone on this parallel world would think she's the person in the prophecy. That prophecy would have to be awfully specific for them to even find Amelia, something like: When an evil villain called the Wreather threatens to wipe out our civilization, we shall be saved by a 25-year-0ld orphaned nurse with no magical powers who lives on a parallel world in Australia or maybe the Philippines, and today's her birthday. 

You'd think if the prophecy says Amelia is the chosen one to unite the people against their enemies, there wouldn't be so many people not uniting behind her.

If it's just her Gaia memories she would lose, that's probably a good thing, as no one on Earth would believe she visited a parallel world anyway. 

Seems like 80% of agents are dying for books by and about BIPOC. That's one foot in the door. Good that you worked it into the query.

Help Wanted

 A new title in the query queue needs your amusing fake plots.

https://evileditor.blogspot.com/p/query-queue_7.html

Face-Lift 1562

Guess the Plot

All the Colors

1. The color "out of space" wants to join the rainbow connection in this children's Lovecraftian comedy that will make your eyes bleed if it doesn't kill you with laughter. Also, Cthulu's feelings are hurt.

2. Red, yellow, green . . . um . . . blue . . . and white.  Wait, orange. I forgot orange.

3. After a decade living under gray clouds, Anna decides to move from Canada to Crete, where the sun is always shining and life is full of color . . . until it isn't.

4. Tommy wants to make the most colorful painting in the world, so he mixes all his paints together. What he ends up with is grayish brown, thus teaching him a valuable life lesson.

5. A family of chameleons move from the jungles of Africa to Las Vegas, where they hope they can blend in with their surroundings.

Original Version

I am seeking representation for ALL THE COLORS, a literary novel told in first person, complete at [word count] words. It will appeal to readers drawn to the passionate, sun-drenched intensity of the love affair at the heart of Ann Patchett's Tom Lake and the shattering trauma and hard-fought recovery of Kristin Hannah's The Women.

Anna is forty-three, a social worker in Toronto, and a woman who has been quietly disappearing for a decade. Ten years ago, her young daughter drowned — and Anna was responsible. She has survived the intervening years the only way she knows how: by working, by numbing herself with tranquilizers, and never, ever stopping long enough to feel. When burnout finally brings her to her knees, she escapes to Crete, hoping that sun and distance will put her back together.

What she finds instead is color. A married American career officer — magnetic, complicated, wholly unexpected––who pulls her into an affair that is immediate, sensual, and sparkled with joy. For the first time since her daughter's death, Anna laughs. She swims at night. She wakes up wanting the day. She falls in love with the passionate totality of a woman who has had nothing to lose for a very long time, and the Greek light makes everything — even her own reflection — look beautiful.

Then he shatters it. A hit-and-run accident, a moment of cowardice, and he flees the scene. Anna is left staring at a man who, when it mattered most, ran. The affair doesn't end cleanly. He returns to the US for annual leave. She is left in the wreckage — but a different kind of wreckage than before, because this time she is coming awake

What follows is not a love story. It is a pilgrimage. Anna moves through Europe alone, not as a woman chasing romance or adventure, but as a woman whose anesthesia is wearing off and who must now face everything she spent a decade refusing to feel. She meets three people who lead her toward a twelve-step program and toI an ashram in the United States, where she begins the slow, work of rebuilding a self she can live inside.

When her lover eventually finds her in Toronto, he comes with everything she once wanted — devotion, a promise of marriage [as soon as his divorce is final,] a future. But Anna is no longer the woman he met on a Greek island. She has forged her own life, on her own terms, out of her own wreckage. The novel's final question is not whether she still loves him. She does. It is whether the woman she has fought to become can say yes without losing herself again.

ALL THE COLORS explores grief, addiction, desire, and the difference between being saved and saving yourself. It is a novel about the kind of love affair that cracks you open — and the harder, quieter love of learning to hold yourself together.

Notes

This is good writing. I can't speak for all agents, but in general, this is what an agent wants to see . . . if they request a brief synopsis. Below, I've taken the liberty of trimming the query from 480 words to 280, a length most agents prefer. Not saying agents will auto-reject a longer query, but if they can clear 100 250-word queries from their in-box in the time it takes to clear 50 500-word queries, guess which pile goes on the back burner. (If I've removed the wrong words, put them back and remove other ones.) 

Ten years ago, Anna’s young daughter drowned — and Anna was responsible. She survived the intervening years by working, numbing herself with tranquilizers, and never stopping long enough to feel. When burnout finally brings her to her knees, she escapes to Crete, hoping distance will put her back together.

What she finds instead is color. An American naval officer who pulls her into an affair that is immediate, sensual, and sparkled with joy. For the first time since her daughter's death, Anna wakes up wanting the day. She falls in love with the passionate totality of a woman who’s had nothing to lose for a long time.

Then he shatters it. A hit-and-run accident, and he flees the scene. Anna is left staring at a man who, when it mattered most, ran. The affair doesn't end cleanly. He returns to the US for annual leave. She is left in the wreckage.

What follows is a pilgrimage. Anna moves through Europe alone, not chasing romance or adventure, but facing everything she spent a decade refusing to feel. When her lover eventually finds her, he comes with everything she once wanted — devotion, a promise of marriage, a future. But Anna is not the woman he met on a Greek island. She has forged her own life, on her own terms. And she won’t say yes if it means losing herself again.

ALL THE COLORS, complete at [word count] words, explores grief, addiction, desire, and the difference between being saved and saving yourself. It will appeal to readers drawn to the passionate love affair at the heart of Ann Patchett's Tom Lake and the trauma and hard-fought recovery of Kristin Hannah's The Women.

I left out the fact that the officer is married, as, at least in the query, I think Anna would be less devastated by the end of the affair if it was unlikely to go anywhere. In the book you have more room to convince us her lover really does plan to leave his wife. No, really. Would he lie to her? Never.

Face-Lift 1561

No Guess the Plot

No one submitted a fake plot. I don't even know if anyone comes here anymore.

Rowan's Spinning Compass

I'm seeking representation for ROWAN’S SPINNING COMPASS, a YA fantasy-suspense blend complete at 87,000 words. This novel combines the time-bound curses of LITTLE THIEVES, the identity-shattering discoveries of THE HAZEL WOOD and the magical corruption of  SPIN THE DAWN. My novel is a standalone with series potential.   

By day, 16-year-old BEAUREGARD is a child star, wishing the tabloids would stop publishing humiliating clickbait [lies?] that ruins her attempts at friendship, [Wait, Beauregard is a girl? I'm sure someone somewhere was so sure they were gonna have a son that they chose Beauregard as their child's name, and stuck with it after the disappointment, figuring it might start a trend, but have you considered that every time a reader comes to the name Beauregard in your novel, they'll have to remind themselves that it's a teenaged girl and not an 1863 colonel in the rebel army who talks like Foghorn Leghorn?] but in her dreams, she lives in a peaceful town with her mother, free from fame and safe from her cruel, power-hungry father. [Change her name to Ivanka.] Then everything changes for the better when her father is murdered. Beauregard convinces her mother that it’s time to vanish and find a safe place to belong. [If your cruel husband/father gets murdered, and you immediately leave town, they're not gonna waste time looking for other suspects.] 

Then, she’s kidnapped by a man with a spinning compass tattoo. [Now that sounds like a character named Beauregard. Though I suspect you're gonna tell us his name's Rowan.] [When you said "everything changes for the better," I didn't expect her to become a murder suspect and get kidnapped in the next two sentences.] [I just learned that what I refer to as a compass is sometimes referred to as a spinning compass. I was thinking you meant that the tattoo itself was actually spinning, which would be kind of cool, and not impossible if this is a magical world.] [Not to digress, but you know those Magic Eye pictures that hide a 3D picture that you can see if you look at it long enough? Why can't they make tattoos that do that?] [Maybe they can make them, but no one ever orders them because they don't want people staring at their tattoos for minutes on end and saying, "Hold still, dammit, I still don't see it. Wait! Aughhh! I almost had it. Stop twitching! ] 

This man is convinced [claims] he’s taking her ‘home’, [to her birth mother?] and when Beauregard’s escape plan fails, she’s thrown into a magical world that feels strangely familiar. [I wouldn't say her escape plan failed, exactly, if she's no longer being held captive by the man with the compass tattoo.] [The Man With the Compass Tattoo sounds like a good title for a book.] A world where sirens own spas [Surely your list of what's magical about this world could lead off with something more fantastical than sirens owning spas.] [Not to digress again, but how does Beauregard know who owns the spas in this world? Is being owned by a siren such a big selling point that there are signs outside the spas that say "Siren-owned"? Out of curiosity, is there a reason so many sirens are drawn to careers in spa ownership?] and extinct animals roam free, having been saved by a poltergeist sabre-tooth[ed]-tiger. Still, she refuses to look into it. [Into what? The tattoo? The world? How can she not look into the world she's now in?] She needs to return home to her mother, live the life she’s always dreamed of and even make a friend or two. 

Then, she attracts the attention of a covenless witch, who mistakenly believes Beauregard cursed her. Heart set on revenge, the witch offers to help, and Beauregard reluctantly accepts. Instead of freedom, the witch administers a magical parasite that triggers hallucinations of one’s fears. If Beauregard doesn’t find the cure within three days, her worst fear [, the fearsome monster known as . . . the paparazzi,] will come to life and kill her.

What begins as a pursuit [search?] to survive descends into a dark discovery, where she confronts the truth: her parents kidnapped her as a baby to exploit her subconscious muse magic for musical stardom, [I bought into the extinct animals and the poltergeist and the witch and the magical parasite. I even accepted sirens who own spas. But I draw the line when it comes to kidnapping a baby to exploit her subconscious muse magic for musical stardom. Who would commit a crime knowing they have to spend the next sixteen years raising a kid before they get the loot? Raising the kid will probably cost more than the kid will make, even if she wins The Voice. Plus, you might get murdered before your child cashes in.] and she should trust the man who captured her, the man who knows where she truly belongs.

(bio)

Notes

I was wrong to predict you would tell us the guy's name is Rowan. In my defense, I figured a guy whose name is in the book's title warranted at least one mention of his name in the plot summary.

What a letdown to get all intrigued by this compass that's gonna play a crucial role in the book, only to find out it's just a picture of a compass on some guy's arm or wherever.

Is there a better explanation  in the book for how she ends up in this magical world than she's "thrown into" it? And how does she find information about her past in this world?

Does she still feel the need to get home to her mother after discovering that her "mother" kidnapped her as a baby? Or would she rather find her birth mother, who probably never kidnapped a baby?

Reduce the number of sentences that start with "Then" from three to one or zero. 

Why does the magical world with its witches and dinosaurs and sirens feel familiar?

Rowan may have good intentions, but kidnapping Beauregard has doomed her to never being left alone by the tabloids and paparazzi. Once she's found, she'll be followed everywhere. She'll be accused of staging the kidnapping for publicity. The only peace she'll ever get is when she's in rehab after her drug overdose.

This feels like two different books. We start with a YA teen whose goal is to leave her life of fame and fortune for a peaceful everyday life with a friend or two. I'm expecting the father to be the villain, insisting that she ride the fame train to her ultimate destruction until she's saved by a kind man with a tattoo. Instead the father dies, and the villain turns out to be an evil witch who wants revenge for something Beauregard had nothing to do with. I'm not sure the audience for one book is the same as that for the other. 

Even if it is, Beauri needs to actively do something to reach her goal. Things can't just happen to her. How she handles the discovery about her past seems more important YA-wise than how she goes about finding a cure for a witch's potion while trying not to get eaten by a Tyrannosaurus. 

Face-Lift 1560

Guess the Plot

The Skyward Sea

1. When the sea is accidentally lifted into the sky, it's up to one guy to put things right, but first he'll have to contend with land sharks and mutant sea creatures. Also, zombies.

2. Atlantis and LGBTQA+ mermen/maids in a Hamlet-esque plot with a dash of Macbeth and a sprinkle of Apollo 13.

3. Global warming happened, and sea levels rose, and everyone's feet got wet. The icebergs melted, and the water rose to our waists. Everything we thought would happen has happened, but now it's up to our necks and somehow it keeps getting worse. It's not just climate change, it's . . . glub glub glub.

4.  Apparently the earth has sprung a leak and nobody knows where all the water is coming from. Now it's up to Mario the plumber to find and fix the problem before we all become extras in a remake of the worst Kevin Costner film.

Original Version

Dear [agent],

I am seeking representation for THE SKYWARD SEA, a high fantasy complete at 115,000 words. 

A young artist cheats the blood pact protecting his island, accidentally lifts the sea into the sky, and crosses a mutant-infested seafloor to reverse the catastrophe – only to choose between saving his home and reclaiming the family stolen from him. [This paragraph isn't needed, as it's all repeated below.]

It will appeal to readers of Blood Over Bright Haven by M. L. Wang, Robert Jackson Bennett’s The Tainted Cup, and The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez. I saw that you’re interested and [TOPIC] and thought it might be a fit for you. [This paragraph could be tacked onto the first sentence, or placed after the plot summary.]

Orran Rast doesn’t want to inherit his late mother’s blood pact. He’d rather be scamming tourists with inkmancy, the ancestral magic [tattoos] he’s supposed to hide from the Eternal Order. But his bloodline is the only thing keeping his uncle’s zombies away from his Order-controlled island home.

When Orran cheats the pact, he triggers a magical cataclysm that lifts the sea into the sky, leaving behind twisted sea creatures that now hunt in the open air. [I see two problems here. 1. The sea cannot be lifted into the sky. 2, The only sea creature that can hunt in the open air is Aquaman.]

Orran crosses the exposed seabed to bargain with his sorcerous uncle, Keltzus, in hopes of reversing the catastrophe. With land sharks and flying squid ahead of him and the Eternal Order’s inquisitors on his tail, Orran will need more than trickery to survive. He’ll need to break the inkmancer’s taboo against using blood to fuel magic.  [The decision to walk hundreds of miles through muck and seaweed and rotting fish, with a trillion tons of water floating above him that could surrender to gravity at any moment, just to get to his uncle, who has zombie bodyguards, seems ill-advised.]

But when Orran uncovers the massacre that scarred his family, he’ll need to make a choice: he can save his island, or sacrifice it to resurrect the mother he lost. [I recently read a book in which a guy resurrected his mother, and . .. . let's just say your guy should save his island.]

I am a Toronto-based writer with 3,000+ published news stories as a professional journalist. My fiction blends the snappy prose of my reporting career with the world- and character-building I love in everything from Star Wars and the MCU to Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Moana, the Locke & Key comics, Dungeons & Dragons and video games like Baldur’s Gate 3 and Mass Effect 2.m [A list with more than three items becomes boring. And having already listed three comp titles, there's little value to also listing games and movies and comics.]

THE SKYWARD SEA is my first novel.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Notes

There's too much stuff here (which might be okay if it were billed as a comedy with comp titles by Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett). Just when one thing is brought up that I'd like more information about, we switch to another topic. Questions that might occur to the reader:

What is the blood pact, and what constitutes cheating it?

Why would someone with magic powers use them just to scam tourists? There's way more money in scamming the government.

Who declared that inkmancy should be hidden from the Eternal Order?

His uncle "has" zombies? Why?

How could zombies get to his island home? Are they swimming zombies?

If the sea were lifted into the sky, wouldn't the sea creatures be lifted with it?

Do all the vessels on the sea get lifted or do they fall to the seabed after it rises through them?

If the catastrophe is reversed, does all the water just drop onto whatever's beneath it, crushing them?

Why can't Orran save his home and resurrect his mother?

Whose blood does Orran plan to use to fuel his inkmancy?

Is the sea constantly above the seabed, or does it move, like clouds? I ask because I wouldn't want to wake up one morning in Iowa and find an ocean hovering over me. There'd be mass hysteria.

Am I saying you need to answer all these questions in the query? YES! Wait, NO! I'm saying if you don't mention the tourists and the zombies and the flying squid, the agent might not be wondering whether you've thought all this stuff through. Unless, at the beginning of the query, you put a disclaimer saying, Before you ask, the answer to all your questions is: Magic.

Usually we expect our hero to solve a problem the villain caused before we all die. But here our hero is the one who caused the problem, and his uncle is the one who's gonna solve it. 

Surely the uncle, on the other side of the sea, has noticed that the sea is in the sky, and will probably have fixed it, long before Orran finishes slogging through muck for months to get to him. 

Orran's goal seems to be to get back the family he lost, but he spends most of the book thinking his goal is to fix his blunder. At least Dorothy and Frodo believed getting to Emerald City and Mount Doom would let them accomplish their goals.

Feedback Request

The author of the book featured in Face-Lift 1559 would like feedback on the following version of the query.

 Dear XXX

I am seeking representation for The Black Bear Inn, an 85,000-word mystery set on Minnesota’s rugged North Shore. For readers who enjoy Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera and None of This is True by Lisa Jewell, this novel combines atmospheric small-town suspicion, a framed protagonist, and a media-driven investigation.

Out of options, self-proclaimed city girl Adeline Sinclair reluctantly returns to her family cabin on Lake Superior, accepting a job at the Black Bear Inn. For the first time in her life, she’s accepted into a friend group thanks to her charming manager, Val Grant, but her fresh start is threatened when a stack of photos and [No need to mention photos if you don't say what they depict.] a note addressed to Val arrives at the Inn: Stay out of it. [Maybe that message should be in all caps.] Val is cagey when pressed for answers, and days later, Val goes missing. Adeline turns to Val’s boyfriend for comfort, unable to deny her feelings for him. [It seems to me Val's boyfriend is more likely to need comforting than Val's employee.] When Val’s body washes up on shore with suspicious injuries, and a photo of Adeline kissing Val’s boyfriend surfaces online, the community accuses Adeline of Val’s murder. 

Once again, Adeline’s left alone, grappling with guilt. Desperate to clear her name, she [joins forces with Jackson Thorne,} follows the clues Val unknowingly left behind, confronting Jackson Thorne, a guest at the Inn: a true crime podcaster [who'd been] working with Val to uncover crimes against women on the North Shore. Adeline joins forces with Jackson, and together they discover another woman has vanished, just as the police are closing in on Adeline. Now a formal suspect, she [Adeline realizes she’s being framed by the one person who’s claimed to believe her. But can she prove it] must uncover what Val was about to expose before the police arrest her--and before the killer can silence her?—a killer would do anything to silence the missing woman who turns up dead—before she’s arrested for a crime she didn’t commit. Adeline discovers she’s being framed by the one person who’s claimed to believe her, but who will believe an outsider? 

(Bio)

Thank you for your time and consideration! I would be delighted to provide you with the full manuscript upon request. 

Notes

It's better now, with more specific information. 

I'm not convinced Adeline would be unable to deny her feelings for Val's boyfriend at this point. It undoubtedly makes sense in the book, but as this is a mystery, it might be better to leave the romantic angle out of the query.]

Feedback Request

The author of the book featured in Face-Lift 1558 would like feedback on the following version of the query letter:

Dear [agent],

 

Please consider my debut novel: HUNGERS ENTWINED. 90k words. Literary Suspense. Ten intimate, slow-burn character studies explore the sources and consequences of the hungers in our souls. Intricately woven into the backdrop of a sophisticated spy thriller, rapidly unfolding across four intense days.

 

Simone surveils her assets from her secret perch, high above the symphony crowd. She knows them all so well. Months of intricate planning and impeccable grooming have allowed Simone to exploit their true hungers. Mere pawns to be played [pushed? Moved? Promoted?] in the greatest heist of her storied career. Her last ride. It all ends tonight. [Is she a chess player or a cowboy?] 

 

The final scene lays out [lies?] clearly before her eyes. Her deft manipulations have revealed which strings to pull, and when. To wit:

 

• Laurie’s hunger for earth justice has driven her to invent TAMAR, a miraculous cure for global warming [process that transforms deadly greenhouse gases into life-giving water];
• which has fanned Peter’s hunger for entrepreneurial fame, hoping that TAMAR may catapult his startup to untold riches;
• which has tickled Jade’s hunger for erotic adventure, enticing her to pry the secrets of TAMAR from Peter’s gullible patent attorney;
• which has triggered Neil’s hunger for warped redemption, sacrificing his Pentagon career to weaponize TAMAR for a clandestine sale to the Russians;
• which has fueled Jenny’s hunger for revenge, burning her husband Peter, while counter-selling the malevolent TAMAR to the Chinese.

Simone’s orchestration of this complex web of deceit, betrayal, seduction, greed, and blackmail has culminated in a superpower bidding war, for which she stands to claim the ultimate prize. If all goes according to plan tonight, she will win her grand final escapade, hang up her spurs, and ride off into the sunset, with sweet Jade’s loving arms wrapped around her torso.

 

If all goes according to plan.

 

Simone’s perspective is interwoven with the nine remaining portraits to present a rich tapestry, in which each character wrestles with the conflicts spawned by their own hungers. Evoking the eloquently entwined renderings [That's your opinion; let the agent form her own opinion about your renderings.] in Emily St. John Mandel's The Glass Hotel; the time-layered multi-point-of-view reveals of Liz Moore's The God of the Woods; and the exciting international intrigue of Daniel Silva's The Collector.

 

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Notes

It's a big improvement. 

I don't think you need Jade in the query. Seducing a gullible patent attorney isn't likely to satisfy anyone's hunger for erotic adventure. And Simone, who considers the other characters her "assets," doesn't need anyone's arms wrapped around her torso. (I assume Jade is not the "ultimate prize.") Plus, it's a stretch to say without explanation that Jade's seduction of this attorney triggered Neil to commit treason.

In the beginning you say the character studies are woven into a spy thriller. At the end you say they're woven into s tapestry. That's a lot of weaving, especially combined with the entwining of the renderings and the title.

It seems odd that Jenny has access to TAMAR and connections with the Chinese. There's no room here to explain, so it might be better to leave Jenny out of the query too. In the book you have plenty of room to explain the connections. In the query, you don't want the agent assuming there are no reasonable explanations, just to get out of reading your book.

Face-Lift 1559

 

Guess the Plot

The Black Bear Inn

1. When she got hired to work at the Black Bear Inn, Adeline didn't expect the manager of the place to get murdered. Nor did she expect to be the prime suspect. Now she's trying to frame the guy in cabin 4, and let him worry about it..

2. Yes, there are talking bears, well.philosophizing bears but it is aimed at adults, not children, and is as quotable as Friedrich Nietzsche.

3. Snowed in at The Black Bear Inn, seven strangers find themselves trapped with a killer when a guest is found murdered. With phones dead, a relaxing retreat becomes a fight for survival. Also, an actual black bear.

4. With a limited number of caves available for bear hibernations, two women open a bear hotel in Wyoming to address the bear housing shortage. Their venture is a financial success, and they sell out to Google for a billion dollars. An American success story.

Original Version

Dear XXX

I am seeking representation for The Black Bear Inn, an 85,000-word mystery set on Minnesota’s rugged North Shore. For readers who enjoy Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera and None of This is True by Lisa Jewell, this novel combines atmospheric small-town suspicion, a framed protagonist, and a media-driven investigation.

After a failed engagement and career in teaching, Adeline Sinclair has no choice but to leave the city and move into her estranged parents’ cabin on Lake Superior,  [Why can't she move in with one of her parents while she looks for a new job? There have to be places where even terrible teachers can get jobs. For instance, Arkansas.] only to become the prime suspect in her friend’s murder. 

When Adeline reluctantly takes a job [Doing what?] at The Black Bear Inn, [Did she apply for this job? If so, why is she reluctant to take it?] she’s charmed by outgoing manager Val Grant, who introduces Adeline to her circle. But there’s a catch—Val insists on playing matchmaker. Newly single,  Adeline is hesitant for more reasons than one, but she’s tired of being lonely. [If she's newly single, she hasn't been lonely long enough to be tired of it. She's still in the "Thank God I didn't marry that asshole" phase.] [When you say "there's a catch," it sounds like Val will introduce Adeline to her circle only if Adeline agrees to start dating Val's friends. Or is getting the job what's dependent on letting Val be matchmaker? My guess is it's a downside rather than a catch.] Their new friendship suffers when a threatening note addressed to Val arrives at the Inn: Stay out of it. Adeline suspects the mysterious guest in cabin four, who hasn’t paid the Inn a dime and won’t show their face. [I don't see why Adeline would suspect anyone. Does Adeline even know what the "it" is that Val is told to stay out of? And why would this note cause the Adeline / Val friendship to suffer?] [Also, how did the mysterious guest get into cabin 4 without showing their face?] Val refuses to explain why she’s protecting [supporting?] them, and days later, Val is found dead. [What was the cause of death?]

The community Adeline built turns on her after an intimate photo of her and Val’s boyfriend surfaces online. [She built a community? I assume we're talking about Val's "circle," to whom Adeline was just introduced right before their friendship suffered. I guess more time is passing between events than it seemed like.] Things only get worse when Adeline is seen wearing the necklace Val had on the night she died, with no explanation. [Adeline has no explanation for how Val's necklace got around her neck?] Desperate to clear her name, Adeline follows the mysterious guest staying in cabin four: Jackson Thorne, a true crime podcaster. When she finally finds him, [If she's following him, she doesn't have to find him. He's right up ahead. She confronts him.] she learns Jackson and Val struck a secret deal before her death. [What is the deal? Let me stay here for free and I'll plug the inn on my podcast?] As suspicion tightens and another woman disappears, Adeline realizes Val’s murder is only the beginning. To prove her innocence, she must uncover what Val was about to expose—before the killer decides Adeline knows too much. [If she uncovers what Val was about to expose, the killer will definitely decide she knows too much. It might be nice if we were given a hint as to what the crime being exposed is.]

(Bio) 

Notes

It may be more a thriller than a mystery. Are there several suspects, each with their own motive for murdering Val? What is Adeline's supposed motive? Jealousy? The necklace? Is she suspected by the police, or just her community? What happened with the media-driven investigation?

There's too much backstory. We don't need to know about Adeline's parents or the matchmaker aspect. We need to know what's going on. Here's an opening: 

Addie's having a rough month. First she lost her job teaching kindergarten, then her fiancé broke off their engagement, and now . . . now she's being framed for murder. The victim: Val, Addie's new boss at the Black Bear Inn, where Addie reluctantly took a job because, hey, she's got bills to pay. 

When a media-driven investigation turns up damning evidence, Val's friends all accuse Addie of the murder. Addie's pretty sure she didn't do it; she suspects the reclusive guy who's been staying in cabin 4. So she confronts him. He claims to be a true-crime podcaster, investigating a series of murders and disappearances in the area.

That leaves room to tell us what happens next. Is Adeline arrested? Does the missing woman turn up dead? Do Adeline and Jackson work together to unmask the killer? Does Jackson have a list of suspects who wanted Val dead?