Face-Lift 1473

Guess the Plot

Splintered Queen

1. After getting hit in the head with a wooden baseball bat, tween girl Queenie believes she's the actual Queen of England. Absurdities ensue.

2. A booby trap placed by an offed sibling shatters Amalacia across time, space, and reality. She must find and gather her various shards to be crowned queen. But her shards have other ideas: rock band idol, chess champion, super spy, mother of ten.....

3. A lesbian whose heart got broken returns to her hometown to be with family, and enters a wood-chopping contest, where she competes against her childhood crush and former best friend.

4. She was once a pawn in her nation's affairs, but with the country on the brink of ruin, she becomes queen and destroys the enemy king, saving her people from utter destruction. Still, she'll never forget her checkered past.

5. Drag Queen Fab Ulysses is struggling to make ends meet with a boring 9-5 until invited to a magical adventure on a yacht with the best and brightest Queens of our time. Their cruise becomes a murder mystery when the ship's captain turns up dead.

6. Despite her parents' marriage to one another, their countries couldn't reconcile their differences, and now  Princess Tatiana must decide between saving the homeland of her brutal, sadistic, tyrannical father . . . or her mother, who wouldn't let her go to the ball.  

7. Arvin cleans statues in the museum. One night, he accidentally knocks one over, freeing the queen trapped inside. She goes on to take over the museum, the city, as well as the Tri-State Area.

8. An artist who makes stained glass windows falls in love with the Father of the church she lives near. Heartbreak is the theme, lead veins are the seams.

9. When Accalia's plan to destroy all the gods goes awry, the soul of her youngest sister, Randalin, is splintered, enraging her eldest sister, Bledri, who vows revenge on their mother, who is actually her sister who is dead.

Original Version

Dear XXX,

I’m seeking representation for SPLINTERED QUEEN, a 115,000-word adult dark fantasy and stand-alone novel with series potential. I’m submitting to you because XXX and XXX in my book will seize your interest as well. [As well as what?] [Never mind, you had me at XXX.] Readers will love SPLINTERED QUEEN if they enjoyed the feminist themes of The Night Ends with Fire by K. X. Song or the multiple perspectives and espionage of Five Broken Blades by Mai Corland.

Bledri’s hand drifted to her belt of knives as her magic ran in metallic rivulets from her tattoo. She would be her mother’s weapon. [That was . . . what? A two-sentence excerpt from the book? If it's the first two sentences of the book, put them first and then say So begins The Splintered Queen, my 115,000-word etc. If it's an excerpt from somewhere else, just drop it. You don't have room for it.]

As a skilled and loyal assassin, Princess Bledri does what her mother, the queen, orders without question. The “Dagger” is always ready to strike. She has only one goal: to protect her youngest sister, Randalin, from the attention of their vicious mother who has hinted that she wants Randalin to bloody her hands as well. 

Yet their mother is not who she says she is. Once born as a bastard and half-sister of the princesses, Accalia is now a ghost clandestinely possessing their mother’s corpse. To stay alive, Accalia hides the truth at any cost and selfishly trains Bledri to take out anyone who might expose her secrets—secrets that she doesn’t even want Bledri to know. Accalia has plenty to hide: the witch queen always hosts a goddess. The queen’s body should host a goddess, but Accalia possesses it instead. Nobody can know that Accalia is a ghost rather than a god, so she expertly wields the “Dagger” to carve out a safe place for herself in the witches’ court. [Lemme see if I've got this straight. The current witch queen had three daughters. This queen, as per the norm, was possessed by a goddess. This queen died. Normally, her heir (daughter Bledri) would become the witch queen and be possessed by a goddess, but daughter Accalia's ghost found and possessed the witch queen's corpse first, and now everyone thinks the original queen is still alive? What happened to the goddess who was possessing the original queen when she died? Shouldn't she blow the whistle on Accalia's deception? Shouldn't she inform the gods that they need to send someone to possess Bledri?]

 

But with Bledri’s looming coronation, Accalia’s time as queen is running out. [Do queens have term limits? Or can ghosts possess corpses for only a limited time?] As the heir, Bledri will become queen and host to a goddess, losing all control over her body and mind. Accalia’s secrets will be exposed and she will also lose Bledri, whom she has grown to love. Accalia gains nothing from her half-sister becoming a god and stands to lose everything.

Accalia resolves to destroy all the gods to protect Bledri and her own secrets. [That seems like an unrealistic undertaking for one princess.] That protection turns deadly when Accalia’s spell to destroy the gods goes awry, splintering the soul of Bledri’s youngest sister, Randalin. [So is Randalin the Splintered Queen? I ask because she's not the current queen, and Bledri is the heir to the throne.]

Bledri willingly put herself through years of bloody work for Randalin, who now lies shattered at the altar of their mother. Bledri chooses revenge. She chooses to become more than a weapon wielded by others. Acting without orders for the first time, Bledri gives up her old life to relentlessly pursue the queen with killer intent. 

Still, Accalia will do what she must to protect Bledri—the protégée turned huntress.

I graduated from XXX in XXX with an English BA. I enjoy gardening, long-distance running (5-K every day), and never baking the same recipe twice. 

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Notes

This is too long and I find it pretty complicated and confusing. It's probably a result of trying to fit all the rules of this world you've created onto one page while also summarizing the plot. And it's probably less confusing in the book (which is also pretty long) but you want the query to be crystal clear. 

Is Bledri looking forward to becoming queen, or dreading it because she doesn't want to lose control of her body and mind? 

If a ghost can possess a corpse, bringing it to apparent life, could the original queen possess her own corpse? Can anyone possess any corpse? Can you tell, when talking to someone, whether they're a person or a possessed corpse?

Why has Accalia taken possession of her mother's corpse? Just because being alive is better than being a ghost? Or does she have an agenda? If Bledri's coronation is looming, I guess Accalia can't be trying to rule the world.

Was the queen vicious before she was possessed by Accalia?

Try putting this in a three-paragraph format with ten sentences total. 

p1: Who's the main character, and what's her situation?

p2: What's her problem, and what's her plan to solve it?

p3: What will happen if her plan fails? What decision does she face?

Here's a rough idea of what that might look like, parts of which may be inaccurate depending on your answers to some of my questions.

Long ago, the gods commanded that the witch queen would always be possessed by a goddess.

Bledri is the eldest daughter of the current witch queen, heir to the throne . . . and the witch queen's personal assassin. Or so she thinks; actually, her mother has died, her body now possessed not by a goddess, but by the ghost of Bledri's sister Accalia. Accalia will do anything to keep her secret, including ordering Bledri to murder anyone who suspects it.

Above all else, Bledri wants to protect her youngest sister, Randalin, from the attentions of her vicious mother. What Accalia wants is to destroy the gods so that Bledri, who she loves, will not be lost to her. Unfortunately, Accalia's spell to destroy the gods goes awry, and splinters Randalin's soul. 

Bledri is enraged. Believing her mother responsible for Randalin's [death?], and not realizing that she, Bledri, is now the rightful queen, she chooses revenge. Acting without orders for the first time, Bledri gives up her old life, vowing to relentlessly pursue the queen with killer intent. 

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

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

Facelift 1472

Guess the Plot

The Kintsugi Cognition: Apparancy

1. Quinn was raised in the church of Scientology, sheltered from the real world, so he grows up knowing nothing about the Kintsugi cognition. Which may put him at a disadvantage when he discovers he's gay.

2. Sequel to The Buchaechum Perspicacity: Discernability, but focusing on calligraphy rather than musicology.

3. Hailey Smithson "improves" her new AI doll with her kintsugi art kit. Suzann-Ai now does her homework and cleans her room. The school bullies mysteriously go missing, but that's totally unrelated. Or is it?

4. British agent Kyle Evans is assigned his latest mission: infiltrate Japan's Kintsugi Syndicate, a consortium of billionaires seeking domination of Japan's politics and economy. Step one will be to figure out a way  to pass as Japanese.

5. An order of monks have spent decades trying to understand the hidden messages in the ancient tome  known as the Kintsugi. When Brother Ren announces that he's deciphered the work, and it's a book of recipes, will his fellow monks stone him to death?

Original Version

Good afternoon [Name], 

I am excited to present my debut novel, The Kintsugi Cognition: Apparancy, [It's always a bit alarming when Blogger draws a red squiggle beneath two words in a query, even more so when both words are in the title. But people like to make up words, and Blogger doesn't know everything. Google, however does know everything, including that kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery. Possibly used metaphorically in this case, unless this is a book about a potter with magical powers. (Which has been done.) When I Googled "apparancy," Google wanted to know if I meant "apparency," which means "the state of being apparent," and which Blogger also never heard of. "Apparency" apparently is a word, but Google also suggested the author might have meant "aberrancy," which means a state of being abnormal or deviant. Perhaps reading the query will provide a clue.] which spans 114,000 words, for your review. [Not crazy about "spans" there. That usually refers to distance or time. You could just call it a 114,000-word debut novel. Even better would be to call it an 84,000-word debut novel.] Considering your preferences and your interest in LGTBQ+ characters and theology, I believe that my book closely aligns with your interests. [You spelled LGBTQ+ wrong. It may seem the order of the letters doesn't matter, but if I wrote BLT+GQ you'd probably think I was talking about my favorite sandwich and magazine.] [Also, that sentence, without the specifics, boils down to: Considering your interest, my book aligns with your interests. You could combine the two sentences into something like: I am excited to present my 114,000-word debut novel, The Kintsugi Cognition: Apparancy, which closely aligns with your interest in LGBTQ+ characters and theology.] [Also, because many agents will reject you when they see your word count, and others will have already rejected you when they saw your title, it might be advisable to put this at the end of the query, by which point you'll have already hooked them.]

 

The narrative follows Quinn Ryan, who grew up as a Scientologist in Calgary, Alberta, [Ah. So you did mean "aberrance."] shielded from the outside world by the Church. However, a chance encounter with his estranged father introduces him to Larkin Childs, a mysterious figure that [who] disrupts Quinn's controlled existence. As Quinn grapples with newfound perspectives on life, love, and spirituality, the Church's cruel and oppressive tactics intensify to maintain its influence over him and recruit Larkin. [Are you prepared to deal with their cruel and oppressive tactics when your book is published?] [I'm not even sure I'm prepared to deal with their reaction to this query being posted.]

 

The Kintsugi Cognition: Apparancy chronicles the intertwining journeys of Quinn and Larkin as they navigate their shared vulnerabilities and confront the formidable Church of Scientology to break free from their past traumas. It features Western Canadian voices and characters, which are underrepresented in literature. [If you're saying that because the agent specified they're looking for books by and about underrepresented people, I don't think they meant Western Canadians.]  [Wait, that's it? You're wrapping up without telling us what happens? All you've given us is a guy who grew up sheltered from reality by Scientology meets a mysterious guy, and they navigate their vulnerabilities while breaking free from past traumas. That's totally vague. You might as well just say SCIENTOLOGY! MY BOOK HAS SCIENTOLOGY!

 

The first of two novels following Quinn and Larkin’s story, The Kintsugi Cognition: Apparancy has been professionally edited and reviewed. [This might be a good place to explain the title. Not that you're required to do so, but in my opinion, if that's gonna be your title, you better have a good explanation. Especially since I had to write most of the fake plots!!]

Following the success of Leah Remini’s book Troublemaker and television series, “Scientology and the Aftermath” as well as the notoriety of the Danny Masterson sexual assault trial, the inner workings of the cult of Scientology have never been more exposed, or of more public interest than it is [they are] now. Apparancy contains elements of horror and eroticism in an LGBTQ+ story that has been written to appeal to a broader commercial audience. [In other words, your LGBTQ+ book will appeal to readers who normally wouldn't read LGBTQ+ books, because . . . SCIENTOLOGY!]

 

While written for an adult audience, Apparancy is in the same vein as Hell Followed With Us by Andrew Joseph White and Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle. [I can infer from your phrasing that those books aren't written for adults, but that doesn't tell me what "vein" you're talking about. Then again, I'm not the one you're querying.]

 

I have three degrees in English literature, including a Ph.D. from the University of Bristol, UK. My thesis “Hells Bells Calling: Salvation and Saving, Mourning and Memory in the Canon of Anne Rice” [You certainly have a way with titles.] is currently held in the British Library. [My book, Why You Don't Get Published, is currently held in the Library of Congress. Unless one of my minions stole it.] I also presented a lecture on Rikki Ducnoret’s view of the Catholic church at the 2009 Academic Conference on Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy. My previous studies regarding religion and the influence of the Catholic church assisted me greatly during the research needed for The Kintsugi Cognition: Apparancy. [I don't find any of this relevant. Possibly the last sentence, but your "previous studies" seem to be focused largely on English literature and the canon of Anne Rice. Relevant would be anything involving Scientology, like if you survived a Scientology brainwashing. As the query is already pretty long, and will be even longer when you add what happens in your book, I'd sacrifice this bio.]

 

Please feel free to contact me if you would like to read more of the manuscript or if you have any questions. Thank you for your consideration and your time.

Notes

I don't know about the book, but that title wasn't written to appeal to a broad commercial audience. I suggest How Harry Quit Scientology and Lived to Tell About It. Note that I changed his name from Quinn to Harry.

Surely some specific events occur in your book that drive the plot forward and shape the main character's arc? Your first paragraph introduces the main character. It's fine, though I'd work in his age. After that we want specific information about his goal, the main obstacle keeping him from succeeding, his plan to overcome this obstacle, and what's at stake (What will be different if he fails/succeeds?). Does he reach a crossroads where he must make a difficult decision that will decide his fate? 

This is already longer than most debut novels, and it's only half of the story? Is the other book more of the same, or does new stuff come into play? You might have a better chance if you trim this book, give it a satisfying conclusion, and declare that it has series potential. 

Feel free to submit a revised version.

Face-Lift 1471

Guess the Plot

The Cineres Incident

1. When his New Latin website garners a DDOS handle, Vox goes out and buys whiskey, tinfoil, and a sheet and becomes Tinhat Toga-man, saver of lost kittens, capturer of escaped balloons, and garnerer of 100K views on a viral video of his antics.

2. High school senior and international superspy Lydia Summers must stop the evil Dr. Cineres from incinerating the planet with his giant space laser, or she'll never get asked to prom by her crush.

3. A revolutionary organization kidnaps a high school class and feeds them food containing the magic-giving cineres plant. Their plan: convince the kids to use their new magical abilities to help them change the world. But for good or evil?

4. When the cruise ship Cineres is lost at sea, carrying 9,000 passengers, conspiracy theorists blame pirates or some mystical portal like the Bermuda Triangle. When it eventually drifts ashore on the coast of Chile, everyone is relieved . . . until they discover it's empty.

5. Starship captain Jannic Dinic crash lands his scout pod on the planet Cineres, where all the planets in the galaxy exile their most dangerous criminals. Now Dinic must convince hundreds of thousands of serial killers to accept him as their leader before they accept him as their dinner.

Original Version

I am seeking representation for 99,000 word THE CINERES INCIDENT, a standalone YA contemporary fantasy with series potential. It provides a more youthful spin on The Project by Courtney Summers and will appeal to readers of All of us Villains by Amanda Foody and Christine Lynn Herman in the arcs of morally conflicted characters. [It's usually best to put this stuff at the end of the query. Also, on the off chance the person reading your query hasn't read The Project, you might mention something specific about that book that  is getting a more youthful spin. Some theme or plot point, for instance. Not sure I like "the arcs" as the appealing aspect of the second comp title. "Its empathetic treatment" (if accurate) sounds better.]

Fifteen-year-old Eloise May will stop at nothing to escape the revolutionary organization Disconformity. She may have chosen to go with them, but that doesn’t mean she agrees with their plans to change the world, forcing those able worldwide to gain magical abilities. [Why do people need to be forced to gain magical abilities? Nobody doesn't want magical abilities.] She went only in order to save a friend, as the other one  [a member] of her kidnapped class whose abilities hadn’t yet developed. Disconformity didn’t require allegiance but rather that she [Eloise] be willing to go, and she is willing – willing, that is, to get everyone home. [Apparently everyone in Eloise's class was  kidnapped, except Eloise, who announced to the kidnappers that she would willingly go along for the ride, but that she was not officially kidnapped. And they agreed to this.]

Along with her group of other kidnapped kids, she tries again and again to escape Cherith, their group's leader, and again and again they’re stopped. [Apparently the kidnappers have now decided that Eloise was officially kidnapped.] In the middle of their closest escape yet, Ellie comes to realize that leaving isn’t possible. She has to join them as they want, stay forever, or bring down Disconformity itself -that, or be hunted for the rest of her life. [That's four choices. More than most characters get in these books.

Choice 1. Join Disconformity, the ones who kidnapped her class. The bad guys.]

Choice 2. Stay forever. As Disconformity's hostage? She'd be a burden eventually, they'd have to kill her.

Choice 3. Bring down Disconformity. I vote for this one, assuming she has a viable plan.

Choice 4. Be hunted for the rest of her life. [I find it hard to believe an organization with plans to change the world would drop everything to hunt down a 15-year-old girl for the rest of her life. Although, as she's determined that leaving is impossible, I don't see why they would need to hunt her at all. They already have her.] She decides that, if her suspicions are correct and others in Disconformity are planning a revolt, they are the only way to truly free everyone. However, Ellie knows that her group may not believe in such an uncertain hope or have the patience to wait, so she chooses to go against the plan she formed, betraying everyone. 

Choice 5. Betray everyone and do nothing, hoping some members of Disconformity revolt and take her with them.] She must give up on the loyalty she once believed defined her if she hopes to make it out of Disconformity. [Is that Choice 6?]

__________

[The Cineres Plant is the magic-giving plant Disconformity uses to cause so much drama.] [If it's the plant that gives the magical abilities, and Disconformity provides the plant, then none of the students' abilities had developed when they were kidnapped. Yet you claim Eloise and her friend are the only ones whose abilities haven't developed. Unless . . . was she attending a school for kids with genetic proclivity for magical ability?]

Notes

I'm guessing everyone else in the class went willingly, presumably because the idea of acquiring magical powers appealed to them? Which suggests that the students were duped rather than kidnapped. The duping part being that Disconformity told them they were gaining powers for the good of the planet, but it was actually for the good of Disconformity. If I'm wrong, change the book to make me right.

I must admit your heroine's decision to betray everyone, go against her plan, and give up on the loyalty that once defined her, wasn't my guess as the choice she would ultimately make. Kudos for not being predictable. Of course, if she eventually saves the day and brings down Disconformity, you may want to hint that this is a possibility so she doesn't come across as a selfish quitter who abandons her friends.

I don't find this query clear at all. How does Disconformity want to change the world? Are they the only ones who have cineres plants? How do they choose the people they recruit? What do they want people with magical abilities to use them for? Is Eloise the only person trying to stop them? Is there hope for us now that Eloise has betrayed us? What would it take to bring down Disconformity? What will happen if no one brings them down? 

Start like this:

When three buses pull up outside Eloise May's school during recess, and a loudspeaker announces that anyone who wants to can ditch school, board the buses, and go to a special place where they'll develop magical abilities, the buses immediately fill to capacity. The students are whisked to a remote, walled-in encampment run by evil overlords calling themselves Disconformity. This organization plans to use their captives' magical abilities to rule the world. 

Realizing they've been duped, the students attempt to escape, led by Eloise. But the moat surrounding the encampment is filled with sharks and crocodiles, and escape proves impossible.

You can take it from there.

Face-Lift 1470

Guess the Plot

Keys to the Van

1. Indie musician Danny inherits a van from his uncle--just what his band needs for their upcoming tour. Good-natured shenanigans and life lessons ensue as Danny drives his uncle's old ride cross-country.

2. In an attempt to understand why he treats women so badly, an artist drives his VW van from the California coast to the dying industrial towns of the midwest. 

3. Aspiring serial killer Jack Lovett has planned his first murder for months. He's got his weapons, his shackles, and his dungeon. Now if only he could find the keys to his van.

4. Harry has a job offer in LA, but he's in Georgia, with no transportation and no money. So he gets a job with a moving company, and takes a gig driving a moving van to LA. Turns out the moving company job pays a lot more than the job he went there for, but how's he gonna get back to Georgia? 

5. After carjacking a minivan, Rudy stops at a burger joint, but when he returns to the vehicle he realizes it's got one of those push button starters that only works if you have the key with you. Wait, what's this Apple air tag thing on the dashboard? Hey, why are the cops blocking him in? Damn modern technology.

Original Version

The steering wheel spins uselessly on Interstate 5 as Nash splits from his San Diego beach house. [Hard to believe he got from his beach house onto Interstate 5 without a functioning steering wheel.] The twenty-seven-year-old artist grinds the VW down a cement retaining wall, then pawns stolen tools to fix the van [Luckily his van stopped within walking distance of a pawn shop. But he should probably use the stolen tools to fix the van, then pawn them to get gas money.] in his rush to escape the fallout from hurting his girlfriend. Unwilling to admit what he’s done, he alienates all his friends, loses his home, and turns to the only person he can trust–himself. [He's the last person I'd trust.] [Up till the retaining wall, the first 1.4 sentences feel like the first two minutes of your novel instead of the opening of a business letter. The rest of the paragraph feels like the next two months of your novel. 1. Leave beach house. 2. Fix van. 3. Alienate all my friends and lose my home.]

Nash, a resourceful charmer, searches for a new home in America’s underclass of 1991, running small-time scams in Venice Beach, stealing drug money from a San Francisco squat, and making beer runs into Pine Ridge Reservation. He forges new friendships he can’t sustain because he pushes responsibility onto everyone else then splits. He drinks to cover the bleakness of his desperation, echoed by the closed factories and hordes of unemployed he meets in the dying industrial towns of the Midwest. [This house on the California coast has got me down. I need a change of scenery--to some blighted, desolate, dying industrial towns.] [Reading the query is reminding me of the bleakness of my own desperation. If I read the whole book I'd probably be suicidal.] 

On his own, Nash possesses little hope of confronting his inner ghouls and seems destined to drift into addiction and ruin. Yet the hardened goodness of the people he meets offers slim hope by lovingly shoving insight into Nash’s blind heart. ["Offers slim hope" strikes me as negative. It's like saying "I have slim hope of selling my novel." Removing "slim" would fix this.]

I seek representation for Keys to the Van, a 94,000-word upmarket fiction novel about a young man’s journey to understand his treatment of women. [Change his name to J.D. Vance, and you've got a winner.] Set in the early 1990s, it’s a travel story similar in tone to David Carr’s The Night of the Gun and in substance to the flipside of Colleen Hoover’s It Ends with Us. [Not sure what the flip side of a novel is, but if it means the opposite, that's a weird way to comp your book. You're gambling that the reader has not only read It Ends With Us, but can do the mental gymnastics of figuring out what the reverse of that book is.] [By the way, Ms. Hoover wrote a sequel titled It Starts With Us. Maybe that's the flip side?]

The novel grew out of a half-year kicking around the country in a VW van and what I’ve learned through working with people on restorative justice processes with Symbiosis Revolution. [English, please.] As it is for our protagonist Nash, the long, painful path to understanding one’s rage and violence starts with denial, progresses in fits and starts, and requires input from slews of people. Many men never finish the journey, and perhaps Keys to the Van can provide hope and even a map for readers seeking to understand their behavior. [So, you were Nash, and now you're writing this book to help other Nashes. Unfortunately, Nashes don't read books. Admit it, there wasn't a single book in your San Diego beach house.]

Notes

Italicize all book titles.

I was surprised to find this is about a young man’s journey to understand his treatment of women. There's one brief mention of hurting his girlfriend.

There's no plot. In the query, not necessarily in the book. Though if the book is just a series of incidents connected by them happening to Nash, maybe it's a book problem too. 

Not that that can't be done with success, but if Nash's goal is to understand his treatment of women, I would like to see specifics on what he did to his girlfriend that he's unwilling to admit, and how he is changed by whatever changes him. The only hint that anything changes him is the vague comment that some people lovingly shove insight into his blind heart. 

Also, your main character needs to have some redeeming qualities if you want people to care about him enough to slog through the miserable parts of his life. Women aren't gonna want to read about a guy who mistreats women, unless they know he's gonna be punished in the end, by which I mean physically tortured and then murdered. And women read books.

Feedback Request

 The author of the book featured in Face-Lift 1469 would like feedback on the following version of their query.

Dear [Agent],

Seventeen-year-old Victoria Tauber leads dual lives in dual worlds, sewn together with the thread of dreams.

Victoria “Vic” von Tauber has royal parents, a magic sword, and a loyal band of teenage monster-hunters. All that’s missing is her best friend Simon, who vanished two years ago. Still grieving his absence, Vic vows to bring him home after receiving a letter from the monstrous Beast of Shadows. Its offer is deceptively simple: prove her skill by hunting it to the ends of the fantastic Otherwise, and it will tell her how to find Simon.

Meanwhile, in suburban Chicago, Victoria "Tori" Tauber dreams of herself as fantasy heroine Vic, but struggles to talk to anyone at high school. Sick of being an anxious recluse, Tori pushes herself to befriend new girl Marcy at the start of junior year.

Though Vic stalks the Beast and Tori battles social anxiety, their paths become increasingly intertwined. Vic wonders at her dreams of suburbia as she grows closer to new hunter Marcia. Tori uncovers traces of her old friend Simon, who has vanished from memory in the waking world. Both grapple with the realization that they are lesbians, head over heels for Marcy/Marcia. And as the year goes by, both discover that the alternate versions of themselves they see in their dreams are all too real.

Two Victorias face two choices. Play it safe in the closet, or listen to Marcy’s careful hints and ask her out? And when Vic learns that the Simon she seeks is none other than Tori's old friend, kidnapped by the Beast of Shadows, the two must choose again. Dismiss their other selves as fantasy, or work together to send Simon home?

I am thrilled to present A WIN FOR VICTORIA, a 97,000 word standalone fantasy with series potential, for your consideration. It would be ideal for readers who enjoyed the haunting dreams of H. E. Edgmon’s Godly Heathens and the slow-building mystery of Ryan La Sala’s Reverie, as well as fans of the dual-world narrative of Omori.

I channeled the joy and enlightenment of realizing I was part of the LGBT community into the creation of this story. When not stealing every available moment to write, I can be found testing flight hardware at [College University] or giving dramatic readings of Beowulf at parties.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Notes

This is well done. It's at least 100 words longer than the generally accepted standard length of a query, so I've taken the liberty of cutting to about 300 words:

Seventeen-year-old Victoria Tauber leads dual lives in dual worlds, sewn together with the thread of dreams.

Victoria “Vic” von Tauber has royal parents, a magic sword, and a loyal band of teenage monster-hunters. All that’s missing is her best friend Simon, who vanished two years ago. Still grieving, Vic vows to bring Simon home after learning the monstrous Beast of Shadows kidnapped him.

Meanwhile, in suburban Chicago, Victoria "Tori" Tauber dreams of herself as fantasy heroine Vic, but struggles to make any friends in school. Sick of being an anxious recluse, Tori pushes herself to befriend new girl Marcy at the start of junior year.

Though Vic stalks the Beast and Tori battles social anxiety, their paths become intertwined. Vic wonders at her dreams of suburbia as she grows closer to new hunter Marcia. Tori uncovers traces of her old friend Simon, who has vanished from memory in the waking world. Both grapple with the realization that they are lesbians, head over heels for Marcy/Marcia. And both discover that the alternate versions of themselves they see in their dreams are all too real.

Two Victorias face two choices. Play it safe in the closet, or listen to Marcy’s hints and ask her out? And when Vic learns that the Simon she seeks is none other than Tori's old friend, the two must choose again. Dismiss their other selves as fantasy, or work together to bring Simon home?

I am thrilled to present A WIN FOR VICTORIA, a 97,000 word standalone fantasy with series potential, for your consideration. It would be ideal for readers who enjoyed the haunting dreams of H. E. Edgmon’s Godly Heathens and the slow-building mystery of Ryan La Sala’s Reverie.

I channeled the joy and enlightenment of realizing I was part of the LGBT community into the creation of this story.

Thank you for your consideration.

Now if you want to get it down closer to 250, you might find a way to leave Simon out of the query. In fact, as Simon is missing in both worlds, he's not exactly a main character. Maybe we should drop him from the book! Replace him with Marcy/Marcia, the new hunter who gets kidnapped, and the old friend who moves away. I wasn't a fan of the Simon "vanished from memory in the waking world" part, anyway. 

Of course that would be a radical change, and a lot of work, and would probably cut your word count, but at 97,000, you can afford to lose a lot of words. Just thinking out loud here, ignore me.

Face-Lift 1469

 

Guess the Plot

A Win for Victoria

1. Despite her name, Victoria has never won anything. Not even a luck of the draw item. But now she has practiced to finally win the county fair's pie eating contest. As long as there are no cream pies. She's lactose intolerant.

2. Victoria has tried out for every team in her school, even chess, after which she was forbidden to come within 30 feet of any of them. Fortunately, there's still archery where 30 feet isn't even the minimal distance.

3. Queen Victoria of Great Britain single-handedly smashes the Russian Army during the Crimean War, then marches on Moscow Prigozhin-style in this alternate history doorstopper.

4. Two lesbians, both named Victoria, fall in love, but not with each other. With Marcy. One of the Victorias is a sword-brandishing monster hunter. The other is a shy high school student. Which one will win the heart of Marcy?

5. Victoria enters the national spelling bee and makes it to the finals. But she's up against all these foreign-born ringers who've memorized the dictionary. You'll never guess who ends up winning, unless you looked at the book's title.

Original Version

Dear [Agent],

Seventeen-year-old Victoria von Tauber has it all: royal parents, a magic sword, and a loyal band of teenage monster-hunters. [Not sure the "it all" applies, as it's immediately contradicted in the next sentence.] All that’s missing is her best friend Simon, who vanished two years ago. Bitter from her failure to find him, she vows to bring him home after receiving a letter from a powerful monster. Its offer is deceptively simple: prove her skill by hunting it to the ends of the fantastic Otherwise, and it will reveal Simon’s fate. [I find it hard to imagine Godzilla sitting down at a writing desk and composing a letter.] [I'd want Godzilla to offer something better than I'll reveal Simon's fate; at least an assurance that his fate wasn't being eaten by Godzilla.] [This seems analogous to a situation where the police are investigating a child abduction, and they receive a letter saying I know where the kidnapper has the child, but if you want me to tell you, you'll have to find me first.] 

Meanwhile, seventeen-year-old Victoria "Tori" Tauber dreams of herself as a fantasy heroine, but struggles to talk to anyone at her suburban Chicago high school. Sick of being an anxious recluse, Tori pushes herself to befriend new girl Marcy at the start of junior year. [I know a lot of novelists have trouble coming up with names for all their characters, but if your two main characters have the same first and last name, you might want to try an online fantasy name generator.]

Though one battles monsters and the other social anxiety, Victoria and Tori's paths become increasingly intertwined. Victoria grows closer to new hunter Marcia, while Tori uncovers traces of her old friend Simon, who has vanished from memory in the waking world. Both grapple with the revelation [realization?] that they are lesbians, head over heels for Marcy/Marcia. [Are Marcy and Marcia aware of each other? Is there a Cy to go with Simon?] And as the year goes by, both discover that the alternate versions of themselves they see in their dreams are all too real. [Does Victoria dream of being an anxious recluse?]

Bending the barrier between their two worlds, Victoria and Tori must work together to solve the mystery of Simon’s disappearance and accept themselves as lesbians. Should they fail, both Simon and Marcy will slip through their fingers forever. 

As you are [Agent-specific personalization not to exceed 400 words], [30 words would be more reasonable.] I am thrilled to present A WIN FOR VICTORIA for your consideration. A WIN FOR VICTORIA is a standalone dual-POV YA lesbian fantasy novel of 98,000 words with series potential. It would be ideal for readers who enjoyed the haunting dreams of H. E. Edgmon’s Godly Heathens and the slow-building mystery of Ryan La Sala’s Reverie, as well as fans of the dual-world narrative of Omori.

I drew on my experiences in the LGBT community when conceiving this story, and put it to paper [Some agents may be unwilling to request novels that have been put to paper. Just say you wrote it; you're covered no matter how they want it.] in between my work as a research engineer at [College University] and my performances in the [City] DIY music scene.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Notes

One advantage of your putting the description of the book at the end instead of the beginning is that you don't have to describe the book as a standalone dual-POV YA lesbian fantasy novel of 98,000 words with series potential, because a lot of that is obvious from the plot summary. To me, "a 98,000-word standalone fantasy with series potential" is more than enough. (Another advantage is that it doesn't matter whether you do it my way or yours, because by the time the reader gets to that part, they've already decided whether they're intrigued enough to request pages.)

A monster telling a band of monster hunters it'll reward them if they hunt it down is like a parent telling their kid they can have ice cream, but only if they eat all their cake. They were already planning to eat all their cake.

If Tory and Victoria were head over heels for each other, would the universe implode?

It seems like a lot of books hype the fact that they have a lot of twists, or a twist you'll never see coming. This feels like a query with several twists, and I'm not sure whether that's a good thing, or confusing: 

P1: We're dealing with a standard fantasy with a heroine named Victoria

P2: Oh, Victoria just fantasizes she's a fantasy heroine. They're one person. Walter Mitty-like story?
P3: Possibly same as P2, till the end when Oh, we see they're separate people in 2 worlds. Apparently the waking world and dream world. Maybe alternate universes? And they're lesbians!

P4: They can work together. Presumably they can communicate with each other, possibly meet physically.

I can envision Agent A saying, "I must read this book, it's Red Sonja meets Pretty in Pink meets Vanilla Sky." And Agent B saying, "WTF? This author can't figure out what her own book is about. The whole book probably turns out to be the monster's hallucination."

Maybe try introducing the dual worlds up front and see where that takes you? 

Monsters seem like something from a middle grade book. You could make up a cool fear-inspiring name for them or make them lizard men. Or remove them from the book and make Victoria a ninja who leads a band of crimefighters.

Questions for my own curiosity.

When two girls are born in alternate worlds are they twins, appearance-wise? Is it a rule of nature that their parents give them the exact same name, such that if Victoria and Tory both have daughters, they'll independently decide to give them the same name?