Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Practice Query #1


It was a typical morning in Marion, Iowa, when John went out to the fields. Warm, pleasant, soft clouds on the horizon. No one ever saw the tornado that slammed him onto the corn crib. It was just a 'freak accident'.

At the hospital, they give him a choice: spend a miserable life as a quadriplegic, or permit experimental cyborg surgery. Unable to face a life without motion, John opts for the surgery.

Melded to a harrow, with small pitchforks for hands, he grows restless for his farm. But before he can return to his beloved land, one scientist makes him an offer. Join the underground Cyborg Fight Club, where he can make a small fortune that will allow him to expand his farm and truly live comfortably.

The fight club is easy money and no worries, at first. Until the day he meets Suzy Cola, a lovely vending machine cyborg. Unfortunately, her unscrupulous handler is forcing her to dispense her favors for anyone who can put in enough coins.

Determined to save her, John makes a rash vow--to meet the deadly Jean-Luc Zamboni in a fight. If he can beat the ice crusher, Suzy will be free and they can escape to his farm. If not? There's no 'if not'. He's taking down that Canuck junkmobile, or going to the scrap heap trying.

Cyborg Harrow is complete at 143,000 words. I'm a small time farmer who practices cyborg taxidermy, so this story is close to my heart. May I send you my MS?


--Khazar-khum

5 comments:

IMHO said...

I would love to see this written, if not as a novel, as a short story. Suzy Cola! dispensing her favors!

Dave Fragments said...

I think I'm in love with "Jean-Luc Zamboni" . . .
You're my laugh of the day, today.
Good fun. Thanks. (and let the rest figure it out)

To be nerdy:
People who write queries (nearly all of us) should see that there's two setup paragraphs in this. That takes up precious words and a full paragraph.

Mister Furkles said...

KK, for amusement, it’s a 10. As a query, it has too much set up. Do you really care?

Maybe you should change the genre to Cyborg Eroticism and promise kinky sex between the cyborg harrow and a cyborg soda machine. The inciting incidence could be an erotic rape of Suzy Cola by Jean-Luc Zamboni.

Or is it better as Harrow Fiction? Stephen King, eat your cyborg heart out.

Whirlochre said...

And to think, we could have had this instead of Game of Thrones...

fairyhedgehog said...

"Cyborg taxidermy"? I love it!