Face-Lift 400

Guess the Plot

Reawakening

1. John and Barbara Fisher are roused from deep sleep by an unearthly howl. It sounds like it's coming from the next room. A strange being has invaded their house, and they're about to find out it's looking for food. And--can it be? Does it need a diaper change AGAIN?

2. During the long flight to Demeter 5, astronaut Dave Gavin becomes a born-again Christian. Can he preach the Gospels to the inhabitants of Demeter 5, or will they kill him--just as they did Jesus?

3. 4000 years after God turns him into the world's first vampire, an archangel gets bonked on the head and suffers amnesia. A thousand years later, he comes to, and encounters . . . Vlad, his old rival from the vampire wars. Talk about rude reawakenings.

4. When lawyer Gustav Klimptikov opens the will of an elderly, wealthy client, he uncovers a web of mayhem and murder that will shake the very pillars of the highest levels of government. Armed with a two thousand-year-old drop of blood, he joins forces with a gorgeous geneticist, risking everything to resurrect the one woman who can save the world . . . Mary Magdalene.

5. In the deep silence of space the passengers aboard the colony starship "Vegan" awake from their cryogenic sleep. "It's only 23,000,000 light years, for Chrissakes! Go back to sleep!" "Where's the bathroom?" "Are we there yet?" "I want a drink of water!" HAL knew they were going to reassign him after that Discovery incident. But this?

6. It's bad enough to awaken the dead, but Dr. Frankenstein just couldn't leave bad enough alone, and reawakened his monster. But this time, he knew, would be different. No way would the Windmill Preservation League allow a mob with torches to destroy the monster again.



Original Version

Dear Mr. Editor:

For a human, ancient times are a buried puzzle. For an ancient vampire, those times have faded into history like their youth. For me, they are a recent memory. I am Vincent, a former archangel, and I watched as the heavens and the earth formed. When man ate of the tree of knowledge, God appointed me the Angel of Death. [May I send you my 300,000-word manuscript, If I Did It?]

No mortal should have been capable of seeing me unless I chose it, but Anastasia did. [I never did find out where she got the night-vision goggles.] Intrigued, I visited her frequently and we eventually become lovers. The deeper I fell for her, the harder it became to leave and I began ignoring my duty. When God [, outraged that I wasn't killing enough people,] ordered my return, I refused. Infuriated, God punished me for choosing a woman above Him.

[God: You dare choose a woman over Me?

Vincent: Not just any woman. Anastasia. Have you seen her?

God: I'll take a look, but . . . Holy Maloly! Are those real?]

Since I wanted to stay, stay I would – cursed as the original vampire.

Four millennia later, I found one vampire killed by another. My search for answers led to a war against others of my kind and reunited me with the reincarnation of my beloved Anastasia. [Amazing to be this far in, and still not know whether you're writing to me or to your psychiatrist.] Just as the war should have ended with my army the victor, I suffered a near fatal blow. When I awoke one thousand years later, I had no memory of my past. [And yet I've somehow just managed to tell you all about it.] Vladimir, the leader of the opposing faction in the vampire wars, discovered me alive. [Discovered you in what condition? Why didn't he put a stake through your heart?] Revenge foremost in mind, he fostered Anastasia’s reincarnation [What does that mean? How long had she been dead?] and plotted to use her against me. He believed my love for Anastasia bound my soul to this world and her hate for me in this reincarnation could surely break that bond, sending me to hell and out of his way. He assumed incorrectly. Her love for me only tied her to this world. Still, his theory held merit. With Anastasia unable to return, [from where?] I would curse God and accept my place among the fallen angels – right after sending Vladimir to meet my old friend Lucifer. I, however, plan to win and to do so ancient battles must be refought and ancient passions reawakened. [I feel like you're trying to explain a bunch of complicated stuff when you should just be telling us what happens.]

My dark fantasy novel, Reawakening, is complete at approximately 92,000 words and ready for your review. I look forward to hearing from you. Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,


Notes

The two set-up paragraphs are clear enough, but I find the long paragraph confusing. If the majority of the book is set after Vince awakens, I'd concentrate on that and reduce the set-up. Though it's the clearest part, I'm not sure we need the set-up at all. If you start it something like:

For a human, ancient times are a buried puzzle. For me, those times have faded into history. I am Vincent, cursed by God as the original vampire . . .

omitting the Angel of Death, and forbidden fruit stuff, there'll be more room to provide a clear picture of the Vincent/Anastasia/Vladimir story, which I assume is your main plot thread.


There are but three queries left awaiting critique. Now's the time to get 'em in. If nothing else, you get to see what the Guess the Plot authors come up with for your title.

New Beginning 339

Vixen felt the sting of a needle as it grazed her cheek and twisted to the side, her spine curving far enough that if she were any less limber she would have been split in two. If she was lucky, the dart would contain an anaesthetic, designed to slow her down or put her to sleep. Unlucky and it would be a neurotoxin that shut her heart down before her feet found the floor again.

If she had earned the enmity of her superiors it would be- No. She didn't even want to contemplate that.

She hit the floor and stumbled. A sedative then. Her left thumb found the three hard nodules in the hollow of her left wrist and depressed the middle one, releasing a measured dose of stimulants into her bloodstream. She crouched in the darkness waiting for it to take effect.

Footfalls scuffed near where she lay; She looked up into familiar, narrow eyes. "Ah, we find you in this unfortunate predicament once more, Miss Vixen."

The stimulants were starting to work. She nodded and managed to croak out, "I turned my back on them. It won't happen again, Principal Martin."

Miss Vixen longed for the good old days, when the worst she could expect was a spitball.


Opening: Rachel Green.....Continuation: Anonymous

Face-Lift 399

Guess the Plot

Sealsong

1. Evie has discovered one of life's hard truths: It's tough to fit in with the other kids when you're new in town, when you're an orphan, and especially when you transform into a seal every night.

2. In a flash all nine hundred thank-you notes are written. Her new husband gazes at her fondly, clearly thrilled being married to a witch. But if she can't remember the sealsong, his tongue is going to be useless tonight.

3. Nine-year-old Chance can't wait to join his father and brothers at the annual hunt. But animal activists are once again threatening to interfere. Can Chance fulfill his destiny as a seal clubber, or will he have to kill a hippy first?

4. Herbert Micewort loves clean hotel bathrooms, reveling in the scent of exotic soap, the feel of those sample shampoos and the brilliant sight of white porcelain. But nothing compares to the satisfying sound of breaking that paper across the toilet bowl.

5. Kayleigh is the preacher's daughter; Harlan is the ne'er-do well-the good girls shun. When a single act of violence turns their world upside down, will their forbidden love find space to blossom? Also, they're all seals.

6. A powerful alien race sends a death ship that looks like a rusty Electrolux to Earth because they no longer hear a seal song from, what . . . 200 light years away? Can aging actors go back in time to get a pair of seals to scam the alien fools and save Earth?

7. While examining the connection between mythical Sirens and seals, zoologist Dirk Tweezle botches the gene-splicing experiment and turns himself into a seal. Can he communicate the reversing protocol to his fiancee through sealsong, or will he end up as dinner for the sharks?

8. Animal-rights activist Polly Turnpull has long suspected that seals are singing when humans hear them "bark". But when she proves this theory correct, she discovers there are a lot of people who want the secret to stay hidden. If she dies in the conspiracy cover-up, will the seals keep her memory alive in a new song?

9. In this contemporary romance, Edna Thripp discovers love among the salad keepers at her annual Tupperware Sales Party. But will the man of her dreams, twice-divorced Lester Goob, turn out to be just another leftover?

10. Brittany hopes to raise awareness of the plight of marine mammals with her new album 'Sealsong', which combines the mating calls of Elephant Seals with African chants and Peruvian flutes. Will her album deliver its message, or will it be crushed by the music industry?

11. Every day young Carla goes to the shore, to wait for her pirate father's return. One day a seal appears, her father's signet branded into its back. Is this a message from her father . . . or her father himself?


Original Version

Dear Evil Editor:

It's one thing to discover that an ancient legend is true;­ it's a whole other thing when the living proof is you [, that you are the Loch Ness Monster].

My 70,000-word young adult contemporary fantasy, Sealsong, thrusts a fourteen-year-old Australian girl into the heart of one of Scotland's most ancient legends:­ the half-human/half-seal world of the selkies. [Hey, I was close.] [Which would look weirder: a human with a seal head or a seal with a human head?] [Either one would be highly disturbing.]

Orphan Evie Cochrane is sent from her home in Australia to Scotland to live with an aunt she has never met. It's tough to fit in when you're the new girl in town ­ especially when "town" is a remote island where they refuse to adopt radical modern concepts like cars, TVs and shopping centers. It's even tougher when you discover you are a selkie [, and thus unable to resist the urge to balance a beach ball on your nose]. Life as a freak of nature doesn't appeal, but Evie has no control over her nightly transformations. Repelled by her own nature [Is she repelled by the idea of being a seal half the time, or the idea of being a human being half the time?] and disdained by the islanders, particularly the eerie minister, Mr McLellan, [who declares her cloven flippers to be the mark of the demon,] her alienation is complete. When Mr McLellan threatens to reveal the selkies' secret to the rest of the world, Evie must embrace her true identity to survive.

I am an ex-pat Scot living in Australia and I have used my experience of both countries to create the world of 'Sealsong'. I am a freelance copwriter [Does this mean you write to cops or that you write about cops, or that you are a cop?] and have had short stories published in Australian magazines, including xxxx and xxxx, and xxxx in the UK.

Thank you for your time and I look forward to hearing from you.


Notes

I can imagine how the world would react if some guy from a remote island held a press conference to reveal to the world that there are people who morph into seals every night. McLellan would be dismissed as a nutcase.

It's mostly setting up Evie's situation. Of course you need to set it up, but the main plot seems to be: When Mr McLellan threatens to reveal the selkies' secret to the rest of the world, Evie must embrace her true identity to survive. How about expanding on that? Is their secret that they exist? Is embracing her true identity enough? Shouldn't they try to stop the guy? What action do the selkies take? If that's not the main plot, maybe give us more about Evie's life as a girl and as a seal. We need to know a few things that happen.

What causes a person to become a selkie? Moving to Scotland? Reaching a certain age? Surely if she was born a selkie she'd have known it before turning fourteen.

New Beginning 338

Rumor had it I would be dead before morning.

My friends, having concluded from my weakened state of body that I was obviously too far gone to hear their words, whispered their opinions about my condition freely over me to one another. They all concurred, the murderer of my wife and child may not have laid a hand on me, but my imminent death was the direct result of his actions.

While I could hardly disagree, those whispers did nothing to lessen the symptoms of my illness, and neither did the doctor who came in behind them, sat down beside me, and lied to me through his straight, but yellow teeth.

Perhaps Dr. Benton’s lies would not have been such an insult if he had not put his hands on the sides of my face, his nose inches from mine, and said in his most commanding and loud voice, because he too obviously believed dying meant deaf, “Listen to me, Vincent. You may have got wind of a rumour going round that you don't have much longer."

My grunted reply became a cough.

"I'm sorry for starting that off. Bad form." He paused, perhaps to see if I had any comment; I could think of nothing appropriate. "It does rather appear to be true, though," he continued, and as his grip on my throat tightened, I came to understand how he had acquired his reputation as an infallible prognostician.

It was fortunate, therefore, that one of the symptoms of my malaise was an excess of internal methane, a sudden release of which rendered the good doctor senseless before his vice-like grip got the better of me.

This was, in fact, the third occasion upon which a timely fart had saved my life.


Opening: Katherine Haney.....Continuation: Anonymous

Title Search

Below are thirty-two movie titles with themes from the world of publishing. Half were made up by your fellow minions. The other half are the titles of actual films (source: imdb.com). Can you guess which are which? The author of each title is hidden after the title; use your cursor to highlight it. Twenty correct would be excellent.

Shadow of the Evil Editor Ouch!
Bleeding Ink writtenwyrdd
Escape from the Slush Pile of Despair Ouch!
The Missing Galleys Ouch!
Agent Z and the Penguin from Mars actual movie title
Contract Renewed Leatherdykeuk
Killer Instinct: From the Files of Agent Candice DeLong actual movie title
Red Letter Daze writtenwyrdd
Of Prose and Punishment Ouch!
Unwilling Agent actual movie title
The Editor Strikes Back Leatherdykeuk
Six Fountain Pens and a Dominatrix writtenwyrdd
Author Conan Doyle actual movie title
The Fable of the Author, the Dear Public, and the Plate of Mush actual movie title
Six Characters in Search of an Author actual movie title
The Writer, the Naked Girl and the Guy with a Hole in His Head actual movie title
A Publisher for Lunch Leatherdykeuk
Psycho Writer actual movie title
The Honest Book Agent actual movie title
How to Cope with Rejection actual movie title
The Lost Manuscript actual movie title
Axe Murdering Editors for Fun & Profit writtenwyrdd
Writer without A Clue Bill Highsmith
Horsewhipping an Editor actual movie title
Suck a Lemon Before You Say That writtenwyrdd
Copy That! Leatherdykeuk
Submission: Part 1 actual movie title
Novel Desires actual movie title
The Market Conspiracy Leatherdykeuk
The Plot Sickens actual movie title
Mr. Editor is Crazy actual movie title

Writing Exercise

Movie studios are always coming up with campy titles for farcical movies. You know, like 8 Heads in a Duffle Bag, Snakes on a Plane, Attack of the Killer Tomatoes.

Submit amusing titles related in some way to writing, publishing, this blog, genres, etc. Get 'em in by noon, eastern time Saturday.

Face-Lift 398

Guess the Plot

A Certain Kind of Girl

1. She loves kittens and walks on the beach. She dances in the rain. She has been known to sleep on the muddy ground behind the freak show tent at a carnival, just so she can watch the sun rise from a Ferris wheel. She's wanted on four counts of arson. She consumes a live ferret at every meal. You know the type.

2. She can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never let you forget you're a man . . . unless you mess with her golf clubs. Then, she'll crack your head open with said frying pan.

3. She's manipulative, clingy, and jealous of anyone who even looks at her guy. Everyone can see that she's an insane psycho. Oh, and she's killed hundreds of men over the years, but it's not as bad as it sounds, since she's immortal.

4. She's the kind who would stick a huge bag of pot in your underwear drawer and call the sheriff to tell him you're a drug dealer. When you're arrested, she means to call and let the sheriff know it was a practical joke, but somehow she never gets around to it.

5. She's sexy and she knows it and she's the kind of girl who wouldn't be caught dead at a football game but who will happily move in on the quarterback just to annoy her roommate who has a crush on him. Also, she's sleeping her way through law school.

6. She's tall and tan and young and lovely and when she passes, each one she passes goes, "Ah." Also, when she walks she's like a samba that swings so cool and sways so gentle, and when she passes, each one she passes goes, "Ooh."


Original Version

Meg Carter sees her first fairy when she's twelve. [Insert joke here.] By the time she gets to college, the supernatural doesn't seem that important anymore. Sure, she talks to dryads and bribes gremlins so they don't steal her date's keys, but there are other things to think about, like friends, [boys,] classes, [boys,] and the horrible girls her brother Fred brings home on vacation. The hidden world just isn't that big a deal. [Also, you tend not to run into as many gremlins when you're in college as you did when you were a kid.]

Except that now there's a weird parasite out in the woods. It's magical, it's scary, and it eats people. Meg knows, because a dryad warns her—but dryads don't talk anything like humans do. [Not sure what the point is there.] Meg and her friends aren't even sure what this thing looks like. As they try and fail to track it down, Fred gets involved with his worst girlfriend yet. [I Googled "dryad," and I gotta say, the image results are interesting. Apparently there are bad dryads, and there are the kind of dryads you want to just stare at for hours. However, I tend to think that no matter what kind of dryad it is, if it tells me there's a magical parasite that eats people in the woods, I'm gonna find an excuse to stay out of the woods. Why is Meg trying to track it down?]

Eva's manipulative, clingy, and jealous of anything [Are you sure we're not talking about Eva Longoria?] that takes Fred's attention off of her. Everyone can see that she's a psycho—except for Fred. But Meg doesn't have a lot of luck convincing him of that. [No guy likes to be told his girlfriend is a parasite.] Besides, he's always had bad taste in women, and he's always gotten over it. [If you get over something, you don't have it anymore.] Meg figures Eva will go away eventually. She certainly doesn't connect her to the parasite in the woods.

Then Fred disappears.

When Meg goes to look for him, she discovers Eva's real nature: immortal, insane, and extremely powerful. [How do you discover that someone is immortal?] Like mortal men have done for hundreds of years, Fred's gone to her world. Like them, he'll die there, horribly, when Eva finds a reason to doubt his love. And she always finds a reason.

A Certain Kind of Girl is a 93,000 word urban fantasy novel. Much of it takes place at Brown University, which I attended for four years. [I'm not clear on the setting. Fred brings home horrible girls on vacation. Including Eva? Where is home? Are the woods at home or at Brown? Do Meg and Fred both attend Brown?] I currently work as an editor at O'Reilly Media. [Can you get Evil Editor on The O'Reilly Factor? I have a few things I need to say to that guy.] "Higher Education," a short story which involves some of the characters from A Certain Kind of Girl, will be published October 1st, 2007 in Spacesuits and Sixguns.


Notes

Is there anything supernatural about Meg? Does everyone have the ability to see fairies and gremlins?

Parasites are better off keeping their hosts alive, not eating them. Sharks and zombies eat people. Which leads me to ask if people are the parasite's host.

You make it sound like Fred is doomed. Does Meg make an attempt to rescue him?

As they try and fail to track it down would be better stated As they try to track it down--and fail--.

I think I'd leave the parasite out of the query. Drop the second paragraph and start the third one: When Fred gets involved with his worst girlfriend yet, manipulative, clingy Eva, who's jealous of . . . This would leave more room to tell us what Meg does when Fred disappears.

New Beginning 337

Tom Blesset cradled the body of a dead bird in his hand and stroked the feathers with his thumb. It was a thrush, though why it had died he didn't know, for there were no wounds on its mottled plumage.

He carried it over to his special place, the only part of the paved back yard that couldn't be seen from the windows of the kitchen or back bedroom, tucked between the outside toiled and the compost bin. It was an altar of sorts, made from a slab of marble that was once the hearth of a gas fire he'd taken out five years ago and never replaced. At the back of it was an old mirror, angled slightly so that it reflected both the sky and the two pots of flowers on either side.

It was a naïve offering to someone he only hoped existed; a crude altar to fantastical beings that he'd only read about in books.

Tom placed the frozen thrush upon the chipped surface of the altar and studied the bird's curvature in the mirrors, the way its feet mimicked the shape of the flowers. Only his friend Janey knew of Tom's bizarre faith. He began the ritual:

"O unto you honest publishers, trustworthy agents, and kind editors. It is I alone who still believe in you. Answer my--"

No. Enough. Tom broke off and considered what he was doing. It was time to admit the truth and grow up. There were no such beings.


Opening: Rachel Green.....Continuation: Pacatrue

Face-Lift 397

Guess the Plot

The Librarian

1. Hard-driven lawyer, Jake, is defending two small businessmen against a corrupt, Enron-like, corporation. Researching the case, he finds himself spellbound by Libby, an attractive law librarian. As the case heads to trial, he questions whether she's assisting him or his opponent.

2. Librarian Madeline Pierce has it all . . . except a man. But when she starts feeling that she's being watched, even stalked, she puts romance on hold. Also, a 90-pound baby.

3. Detective Roscoe Butt follows the clues in a string of grisly murders. The list of suspects is virtually endless until Butt notices the overdue fines lodged in the victims' throats. Can he close the book on this one before The Librarian strikes again?

4. By day she is timid and bespectacled, shelving books and picking up after the hordes of messy kids in the Children's Room. But after dark . . . shh! Check her out at the Pussycat Strip Club, tossing spectacles and tweeds, bumping and grinding as . . . The Librarian.

5. Ex-Navy Seal, Dave Zepper, has seen things that still keep him up at night. Now, he just wants to live out his golden years, seated behind the front desk of the Library of Congress. But when Saudi terrorists break in to destroy a sacred Shi'a text, Zepper realizes that only one man can check them out . . . The Librarian.

6. Mildred Boggsley shelves books and answers questions in the library of quaint, quiet Eppingham-by-the-Sea. But when a book-banning movement rears its ugly head, and Mildred's boss, old Mr. Loxford, dies a suspicious death, Mildred must take on his secret identity to fight for free speech. She must become . . . The Librarian.


Original Version

Dear Agent:

I am writing to request that you consider my 80,000 word manuscript The Librarian for review and representation. I am querying agents who represent both Chick Lit and Contemporary Romance genres, in hopes that I will receive feedback about where this work might most comfortably fit. [You're unlikely to get it. Fortunately Evil Editor is here to help. Answer the following questions:

Is the heroine on a diet?
Does she wear Blahniks?
Does she work in Manhattan?
For a women's magazine?
Is she feisty and sarcastic?

If I'm not describing your book, it must be a romance--assuming the hero and heroine eventually overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles and live together happily ever after.]

Confident, quirky, Madeline Pierce believes she has her life under control—she is the youngest Head of Reference in the history of the Richmond County Library, [Man, they keep stats on everything these days.] her 3 bedroom, 2 bath “fixer-upper” with original hardwood floors, located in the heart of the river district, is shaping up nicely, and thanks to her newly discovered dog whispering talents, Baby, her 90 lb lab/boxer mix is much more manageable. [Psst, Baby . . . don't maul the neighborhood kids anymore.] The only piece missing is a partner to share it all with. She’s not looking for perfection in a man, just someone who is motivated, self-aware, has similar interests, and who won’t make fun of her wardrobe. [Her last boyfriend was Mr. Blackwell; it didn't go well.] Jack Bishop, the library’s audio-video specialist/weekend rocker has great potential.

But, after Madeline finds the first in a series of strange, black and white photographs hidden between the pages of a rarely circulated book, peculiar events, that are not part of Madeline’s “big picture” begin to cause her some concern—a missing file, muddy footprints outside her window, and the sense that someone is watching her. As Madeline intercepts the photographs, one by one, the short messages written on the back, oddly loving and threatening at the same time, [I love you . . . to death; I killed them all for you; Your heart will be mine . . . when I rip it out of your chest cavity and eat it.] seem to be directed towards her. She struggles to understand their meaning in relation to the events unfolding around her and the possible connection to a menacing figure from her past, the secret she’s kept hidden from family and friends. [Vague.]

As she battles the sense of paranoia and fear that threatens to shake her carefully constructed foundation, she finds herself attracted to an unlikely candidate for her affections-- Evan Payne, an aimless, aging, mama’s boy, whose most recent accomplishment has been to cut back on his partying. [One doesn't normally think of a mama's boy as a party animal.] Plagued by an unknown stalker [The ghost of Melvil Dewey] as well as her attraction to a man who is definitely not her type, Madeline’s future is put on hold while she comes to terms with her past.

Inspired by my strange, but wonderful, neighbor (a librarian), the plot unfolds within a fictional public library and picks up on issues of library culture. [Should homeless guys be allowed to sleep in the library, and if so, in what sections? Would more people use the library if they got rid of the books and showed first-run movies? Should Evil Editor's books be in every library, or would the incessant laughter be distracting to patrons?] It also touches on themes of harassment, both physical and psychological, but most importantly, it’s a love story. [If it's most of all a love story, that's not coming across. It doesn't sound like Evan is the hero, but Jack is barely mentioned. I'm guessing this is romantic suspense, since there's so much mystery/thriller querritory.]

Although my MFA is in visual arts, I studied creative writing with J(famous author) [Not James Joyce?] at the graduate level. I am a new mother and an Associate Professor of Art. This is my first manuscript, however, I am looking for representation from an individual who will assist me in planning a writing career. Thank you for taking the time to consider this query.

Sincerely,


Notes

It's longer than necessary. The Evan paragraph can go. Most of the last paragraph can go. And much of the plot is wordy. It would be easy to remove a few words from most of the sentences, leaving a much tighter description.

Are all the photographs hidden in books? There are too many books in a library for her to keep happening upon the few containing photographs.

Perhaps it wouldn't hurt to mention what the secret from Madeline's past is. And something about the romance.

New Beginning 336

The great hall fell into silence. The sudden absence of noise came so quickly and intensely that it made Rol's skin crawl. A pervasive fear had sprung upon every living thing in the hall; Rol could see it in every face he looked into. Even the hulking man to his right had a nervous look about him.

A figure swept through the archway and strode towards the center of the floor. It was a man, tall and gaunt, with a thin mustache and a small patch of beard on his chin like a dagger. His eyes were sunken and almost as dark as the tendrils of hair crowning his head. He wore a black suit of sorts, made of a thick material that crunched as he walked.

"We welcome his imminence, Lord Paril to the floor," croaked the head councilman, striking the gavel lightly, as if not to offend the man far below.

"Thank you, councilman," said Paril artificially. His voice had a cruel, mocking inflection. "It is always a pleasure to be in the presence of my loyal servants."

The large man to the right of Rol gave a small snort but remained still.

Paril spread his arms wide and cast his gaze upon the hundred or so beings seated around the great hall.

“Ambassadors, councilors, generals . . . ” Paril’s voice was rich and the distant walls of the great hall gave it an extra depth. “I have today received a communication from Corquin. The Niracs have surrendered.” A ripple of approval traveled through the hall. “We are triumphant.” The ripple became a wave. “We have conquered the twin planets of Miranden.” The shouts and cheers from the audience became deafening.

Paril waited for the noise to abate before continuing. “After seven long years, the war is over, and . . . ” He lowered his arms and looked around the hall; his voice fell and he shrugged. “That’s about it. We’ll pay you ’til the end of the week. Be sure and clear out your desks, and, ah, thanks for all your help. Couldn’t have done it without you. Really.”

The great hall fell into silence. Their fears had not been unfounded.


Opening: Nick Berggreen.....Continuation: Anonymous

Face-Lift 396

Guess the Plot

Rain on the Dust

1. Country singer Lady Winters had one hit--the haunting 'Rain on the Dust'. Now she's been approached by a young singer who wants to do a cover. But can she let go--and see her beloved autobiographical lyrics turned into droning hiphop noise?

2. During the Dust Bowl, three sisters--Molly, Sadie, and Sarah--decide to brave the road to California. Will they find hope and love, or only despair? Also, a guardian angel.

3. Small-town reporter George Keevers is looking for the big story that'll get him a job on the Washington Post, so he goes to Thailand to report on a typhoon. When he runs out of money, he has no choice but to rely on the kindness of his Evil Editor if he wants to get home.

4. Pamela Gleeb has given up on housekeeping. But leaving the windows open night and day has a downside when the storms hit her tiny village, and she finds herself buried in mud up to her pretty neck. Will the handsome hunk from the Fire Brigade dig her out?

5. Widow Kate Darby runs the only saloon in tiny Dos Banos, out in the wilds of Arizona. When Frank Jeffers is shot and left for dead in the street, she decides to save him. But to do that, she'll have to disguise him while his enemies are in town. Will they notice the strange new girl at the saloon?

6. A storm's coming. But Great-Aunt Muriel's urn just fell out the window onto the front lawn. Can Joanna Frisby sort aunt from lawn in time, or will it . . . Rain on the Dust.


Original Version

Dear Agent or Editor

Vietnamese Amerasian teenager Tran Thi Mai is stigmatized by her mixed race and abandonment by her soldier-father. Mai's bitter aunt unfairly blames her sister's death on Mai and presses her into a harrowing overland refugee journey from post-war Vietnam, across Cambodia, into Thailand. In Thailand, Mai finds a kind social worker, Mother Agnes, who arranges a stabile life for her with an expatriated Vietnamese farm family. However, a typhoon shatters that stability. Because of a personal myth surrounding her mother's death, Mai stands against the typhoon to learn if rain controls her life as it seems. [Not sure what "stands against the typhoon" means.]

Meanwhile, George Keevers, a dissatisfied small-town reporter in the US, makes an impulsive trip to Thailand to chase a typhoon story, to tweak and impress his "Evil Editor," Shelly Lyon (whom he loves/hates). He craves a career-defining story to pave the way to his beloved Washington Post [/New York Times]. He hears odd tales about Mai's behavior during the storm and smells his story. (Alternating viewpoints have allowed the two main characters to converge at this place/time without confusion.) [No need to boast about pulling off this feat.]

George is astonished by Mai's mixture of grace and fatalism. [grace/fatalism] Feeling like a waste of oxygen, he raises his ambition to a life-defining story about Mai. Mai's adoptive family asks George to return her to Mother Agnes due to the storm's devastation. But Mother Agnes is outraged that George would remove Mai from a family for a threadbare refugee aid station. George finally admits his desire to take Mai home with him. Mai casts her lot with George and they go to Bangkok [where Mai is kidnapped and sold into sex slavery.] to face the tangle of international emigration and refugee laws. George has only a few problems: he has no more money or credit; he's single; [This is an immediate problem? Or he just wishes he weren't single?] and worst of all: he'll have to make double-nice with his Evil Editor to get back home.

Rain on the Dust is a YA historical novel complete at 40,000 words that is imbued with humor despite its setting [and despite the fact that I've made it sound about as funny as the Bataan Death March]. I have found little YA fiction about Amerasians. My writing credentials are mostly for professional technical publications. Thank you for your time and I hope you will want to read the complete manuscript.

Best Regards,


Notes

The personal rain myth isn't clear, and seems more important than the backstory we get at the beginning. You could begin: Ever since she drowned her mother in the Mekong River, Tran Thi Mai has theorized that water is the dominant influence in her life. When a typhoon strikes Thailand, Mai is there to test her theory by braving the storm in a rowboat with no umbrella.

Then move on to George, and how he writes Mai's story and tries to take her home. I realize the book may be largely pre-George material, but unless it's a biography of Mai, your story seems to start with the typhoon. If they make it to the US, give us something about that, especially if it includes teenaged friends/classmates, as right now it doesn't sound like YA.

Getting rid of Cambodia and the refugee camp and Mother Agnes will help make it conceivable that the book is loaded with yucks.

New Beginning 335

On an autumn day more glorious than the inside of a cathedral, Harold Waterman wandered through Laverstone woods. His fingers, trailing across the rough bark of beeches, told of the easy summer that had tailed off with the arrival of the equinox. He breathed in the heady scent of ripened crab apples and rowan berries on the rim of the forest as the squabbles of hungry starlings echoed through the trees.

He reached the edge, the gloom fading as the trees thinned. The path that separated the forest from the rough brush and stone bluffs of the Cheviots ran south to the Royal Park and north into the hills, where it petered out into little more than a rabbit trail. His whistle brought a wolf pushing past his legs, its weight threatening to topple him into a copse of sloes. Thorns plucked at his jacket.

The trilling of a songthrush soothed Harold's concerns about his upcoming exams and his need to find a job. Before Goddess Nature, all worries evaporate with the dew. He checked his scribbled notes: yes, this must be the place. Sunbeams punctured the woodland canopy creating great colonnades of light to guide his way.

He heard voices ahead, laughter; the others must already be there, celebrating the season's change as the Gods intended. Harold quickly sloughed off his clothes. A woodmouse skittered warmly across his foot as he stepped into the clearing--his joy, perhaps, a little too pronounced--and into silence.

"Ah, um, is this the Druids' Festival?" he asked.

One of the women coughed. "No, it's the Senior Women Ramblers' Picnic," she said. She looked him up and down. "But do come join us for dessert . . . "


Opening: Rachel Green.....Continuation: Anonymous

Face-Lift 395

Guess the Plot

Her Dress is Darkness

1. Nudist Shelly Wellter is too demure to sunbathe, so she moonbathes at night. But her sweet shyness is no match for Bull Grumby's ardor - and his flashlight.

2. Physicist Moira Wartby is determined to make a splash at the company picnic. But the dress she fashions from a Black Hole does more than draw people to her.

3. Lynn hopes her Vampire romance novel, 'Her Dress is Darkness', is a bestseller. It has to be, because she poured her soul into it . . . literally.

4. To Walter, Lydia is sunlight, cloaked in a shroud of darkness. But when a strange black frog bites Lydia, Walter discovers an evil lurking beneath the shroud. Also, a dragon.

5. She likes to say she's in mourning for her life, but Bianca's black gown is neither a fashion statement nor an homage to Chekhov. It's pure Evil in wearable form. Unless Trevor Weiss can get her to take that dress off, Bianca could lose her soul with one swish of her taffeta ruffles.

6. In the cutthroat world of fashion design, Ellen DeLong has always been second rate. That is, until she makes a deal with Satan and gains the magical Shears of Endor.


Original Version

Her Dress is Darkness:
(95,000 words, dark, literary fantasy with epic overtones)

To eleven-year-old Walter, Lydia is sunlight in a dark place: a lone, caring presence in the face of his unstable mother and missing father. Together, they explore the innocent woods of their quiet valley and make up stories about a huge, brown blade left in a hidden copse. [No need to attach an adjective to every noun. The more you use them the less powerful they are.]

When a strange, black frog bites Lydia in the wood, [Bites her in the wood? What is she, a marionette?] Walter discovers an evil lurking beneath the shroud of the old Priory, an evil rooted in magic and Making, buried in his forgotten bloodline. [How does her getting bitten by a frog lead to him discovering an evil at the Priory?] Secrets conspire to return him to a lost world, [Return, meaning he's been there before?] a world belonging to a terrible Queen of ancient lore, a world where innocence is devoured. In the land of Temeres, nothing is as it seems. [Of course, we don't know how things seem, so it doesn't help to tell us we're wrong.] Dead gods stir in the Groves of the Deep, preparing for a return to the world of light, [Define "dead." Apparently it doesn't mean what I thought it did. Will the gods return as zombies?] while an eleven-year-old boy, a wooden knight, a glass dragon, and an ancient warrior strive to protect what remains of purity. Lydia has been taken, her soul trapped within the Queen's far tower. But nothing—not the Pale Queen, nor her hunger, not her Darklings or her beast and the Drum of its Heart, not even her cursed, immortal knight [All right already. Nothing.] —will keep Walter from fulfilling his promise.

He will find her. And he will bring her back. [I doubt it. He's eleven. The Darklings will stop him.]


Notes

How come Groves of the Deep is capitalized, but not the world of light? How come Making but not magic? Darklings but not beast? Queen? Priory? Drum of its Heart? Seemingly random capitalizing could get annoying if it's book-wide.

This reads more like an ominous prologue than a query letter. Try telling the story in everyday prose, rather than poetry. If that doesn't work we can go for a combination of the two, but this version, while it has tone, isn't telling me clearly what happens in the book.

New Beginning 334

Too-Early o'clock came around far too quickly, as far as Jasfoup was concerned, and the sound of heavy metal coming from the speaker of his clock radio was not the most soothing in the morning. He focused bleary eyes upon the tuner. That was certainly not the station he'd tuned into before going to bed last night, he preferred the soft music of the golden years and the dulcet, cultured tones of radio three. This was some local radio station where the announcer spoke in a mixture of street patois, broken English and broad Scots, sounding like a Glaswegian who had spent his formative years on an oil rig manned by skateboarding Australians. Tempted as he was to hit the snooze button, he instead turned the radio off and stood up stepping, as his foot toucked the floor, upon the stub of a pencil.

“Bugger in Hell,” Jasfoup ejaculated. A low groan drew his sticky gaze to the usually unoccupied other side of his bed where a not-quite-slim mound terminated in a shock of multi-coloured, frizzy hair. Memories clawed their way forward: images of a bar, or two, and a Scottish truck-driver girl and too many beers to count and driving rock music and rough hands grabbing his arse while a rough tongue inspected his mouth and, Jesus, what was that itch below his belt line?

“You’ll want ta watch where you’re walking,” a lilting mumble told him. “Dropped all me stuff over there.”

“I found it,” Jasfoup said and scratched himself. What had he told himself? Quit the drinking or--

“What time is it, darlin’?” The bed mound moved; the morning light was unkind.

Jasfoup looked at the clock again. “It’s just after Too-Fucking-Late o’clock,” he said.


Opening: Rachel Green.....Continuation: ril

Face-Lift 394

Guess the Plot

Singleton

1. When Dmitri Federov is badly injured, his twin brother takes his place. But going from pair to singleton isn't all it's cracked up to be--especially when your opposite number was an irresponsible, deceitful druggie.

2. When newly-crowned World Backgammon champion Gavin De Leon is found dead with a single backgammon piece plunged deep in his throat, his murder exposes the cut and thrust of the turbulent world behind this apparently sedate game.

3. John Singleton's life was a disaster: three marriages, four arrests, countless jobs. Can the mysterious woman he meets at church help him out of his rut--or is she just a demon looking for an easy soul?

4. Alone in a world inhabited by Multiples, Al Fishton is bullied and teased at school, until the Dark Triplets descend and an ancient prophecy is uncovered. Now he must take up his destiny as . . . Singleton.

5. Always a bridesmaid, never a bride, yada yada yada. Microbiologist Helen Drew is a closeted lesbian, and sick of being jibed at by her relatives for her single state. But she shows them, when she develops a virus that attaches to the Y chromosome, turning men into women.

6. CIA agent Shane Singleton thought his cover was blown when he heard someone whisper, "singleton." He slipped his hand into his pocket and palmed his piece. He swung around . . . and shot a bridge player 'tween the eyes.


Original Version

Dear agent:

Sash Federov expects he'll live and die in the shadow of his identical twin. Dmitri is dynamic, charming, and irresponsible: everything Sash is not. And everyone loves him. Sash has never expected this to change, and he's never really wanted it to. He'll gladly lead Dmitri's crowd of admirers. At least he has a front row seat for the madness.

But a soccer accident leaves Dmitri badly injured. [No, no, it's the fans who get injured in soccer, during the post-game riots.] [Most soccer injuries are faked anyway, like this: ] Now Sash is on his own, trying to find his identity in Dmitri's world of parties, drugs, and deceit. Can Sash take his brother's place? [You mean actually impersonate him? Does Dmitri want him to? Why?] Or will it take more than genetics to really understand all that Dmitri is?

Singleton is a quiet, honest, coming-of-age complete at 50,000 words. I believe it's subtle humor and absolutely fresh view of teenage life make it a perfect match for your needs in young adult fiction.

As a young writer, I'm able to write about teenagers in a way that's original and accurate. However, I am not inexperienced; My first novel, The Sublime, was accepted by Cantarabooks in January and will be released in September.

I've enclosed the first five pages of Singleton , and the remainder of the manuscript is ready for your review if you're interested in taking a look.

Sincerely,


Notes

The only thing that happens in this book that's worth reporting is a soccer injury? We need more than a description of the main characters, we need some plot. Why does Sash want to take Dmitri's place? Doesn't everyone know about Dmitri's injury? Why is Sash happy being around Dmitri? If he's not irresponsible and into drugs and partying, I would expect him to be highly uncomfortable hanging around with Dmitri.

It sounds more like he enlists in Dmitri's army of followers than that he leads them.

It's better to give us more facts about the plot than to use words like "subtle," "original," "perfect match," "absolutely fresh." Convince us it's these things without stating it. Besides, if you say it's an accurate depiction of teens, and then claim it's original and absolutely fresh, it sound like you're saying you're the first person to accurately depict teenage life.

Soccer players practicing their fake injuries

Q & A 118

I've been working on rewriting my query for my fantasy novel. I have five narrators who each tell their own part of the story (I promise, it all ties in at the end). Looking at other novels of this type, they are generally described as "epic fantasy". Does epic mean "lots of stories spinning into one" or "best-selling" in this context? The novel is under 100k words so it's certainly not epic in word-count.

If it meant "bestselling," it would consist of LOTR. Instead, it includes LOTR and countless ripoffs of LOTR.

Lots of stories spinning into one may describe epic fantasy, but it describes other genres as well. When I call something epic fantasy on this blog, I refer to fantasy involving kings and swords and a hero in a fantastical world and magic and quests for mystical eggbeaters. Word count doesn't matter, as long as you divide it into a trilogy.

The minions will fill you in on the correct answer, possibly even distinguishing among heroic, high and epic fantasy (if they aren't all the same thing).

New Beginning 333

"Christ!"

Stan's grandma grimly went about the business of disinfecting the apartment. She pushed strands of hair out of her face and grunted. "What a pigsty, and I don't mean maybe."

Stan sat on the corner of the couch. He had pulled his feet up off the floor because his grandma had to get the broom up under the couch. She swept out yellowing newspaper pages, toys, bits of food, and one or two unidentifiable items.

"Hey, there's my Army tank!" Stan reached down into the pile of trash and retrieved his missing toy.

"Mother of Christ. I do believe that's a dead mouse." She poked something with her broom and glared at Stan's dad. "Jesus, Jackie, come on! I taught you about being clean. You know what can happen if thing's ain't kept clean!"

"What, ma? Come on, what?" Stan's dad was preoccupied. "I got some money on this game, you know?" He sat in his armchair, chain smoking, his foot on the coffee table tapping endlessly.

Stan threw his army tank onto the coffee table and dropped his pants. "Number two, coming through!" He squatted next to the litter box and pushed everything out.

Grandma shooed him away with her broom. "Mother of Mother of Christ. We need TWO litterboxes around here. And I don't mean maybe."

"Will you two keep it down?" Jackie crushed a cigarette on the armchair and reached for another.

"What the hell . . . ?" Stan's grandma pulled a dust-bunny-covered body from behind the couch. "Brother of daughter of Christ," she said. "I think I've found Stan's mom!"


Opening: Steve Gallagher.....Continuation: takoda/Bill Highsmith

Face-Lift 393

Guess the Plot

Ether

1. When teen Mandy Flimm finds a magic potion in a strange silver bottle, she is convinced it will solve her all her problems. She lets her mom take a whiff . . . and it does!

2. Jay Smith is worried. An Oracle has prophesied that within a week he will be dead at the hands of a notorious psychopath. Can alliances with unsavory beings stave off the inevitable, or will Smith's molecules be scattered to the . . . Ether?

3. Esther Orr has given up on finding true love, and instead has devoted her life to raising Springer Spaniels. But will the handsome dog whisperer she meets at the vet's change her heart? Or will his lisp drive her crazy?

4. Her brothers called her Ether because she was so boring, but Esther Boondockle has matured into a curvaceous surgical nurse with a chip on her shoulder. Can psychiatrist Trent Trott help her overcome her deep aversion to anesthesiologists and an urge to murder anyone who asks for . . . Ether?

5. Freddie the Frog is both an atheist and the unwitting heir to the Frog Throne. His fellow frogs swear Ether, the God of Death, is real. When Freddie finds himself in a biology class, he is forced to admit it's true. Now Freddie must prove worthy of the throne and save his fellow froggies from being dissected. Can he do it? Or will he succumb to the . . . Ether?

6. An alchemist attempts to turn ordinary objects into gas, mostly by burning them. Dying of cancer, he figures if his wealth rises into the air with his spirit, he really can take it with him . . . into the ether. Unfortunately St. Peter takes rather a different view.


Original Version

Dear xxxx,

I am seeking representation for my urban fantasy thriller, Ether, complete at 98,000 words.

The Oracle has just told Jay Smith that he has less than one week left to live.

To save himself, he questions the vagrants, demons and creatures that infest Albuquerque's underworld and unravels a crucial piece information. An internationally notorious psychopath named Cromwell, [Sounds more like a butler:

There's a dead body in the library sir.

Thank you Cromwell. Notify the inspector . . . But first, another plate of crumpets if you would.]

and his hordes of monsters, are hunting him down. [It doesn't take an Oracle to predict you'll be dead in a week if there are hordes of monsters hunting you down.] Chased inside a building by the marauding undead, Jay uses his telekinetic abilities to save his life. [He keeps using his telekinetic power to move tables and chairs in front of the monsters trying to get to him, until they finally give up in frustration.] [Let's hope that earlier in the book he used his telekinetic powers to pass the salt shaker or to get a beer. Otherwise it's going to seem awfully convenient that just as the undead (we call them zombies here) are upon him, he suddenly has telekinetic powers.] Cromwell appears and placidly explains that he has spoken to the Oracle and is prophesized to kill Jay. He declares that he cannot do it now simply because the Oracle has told him it is 'not yet time.'

Enraged, Jay seeks out the Oracle and demands to know [Who is Jay Smith to be making demands of the Oracle? Everyone knows you take what the Oracle gives you.] why he was not told of Cromwell's involvement. [Hey Oracle, WTF? You tell me I'll be dead in a week, but you don't even mention that it's Cromwell who'll be killing me? I paid you for a full forecast!] She mirthfully hints that his death is fated and it doesn’t matter whom he kills or where he runs; he will perish. [Maybe so, but at least now he can kill all Cromwell's loved ones. It's called prevenge.] She exclaims his death will be lucrative but refuses to explain to who. [Whom. And mainly to the funeral home.] Jay is now forced to seek alliances and council with unsavory beings to stave off his ‘inevitable’ death. [In a query that has already mentioned vagrants, demons, creatures, marauding undead, and monsters, it's hard to be fazed by unsavory beings.] [Have you ever noticed that characters are never described in query letters as "savory beings"?]

As the clock runs down Jay finds himself losing a duel with Cromwell—and beneath them a soul devouring demon waits to consume the loser. [Apparently the clock was running down on this query and you decided to wrap it up quick.]

Thank you for you consideration.

Sincerely,


Notes

Wouldn't it be better for the soul-devouring demon to devour the winner? There's no guarantee the loser's soul hasn't already headed for the . . . Ether.

Apparently Jay has reason to believe he can save himself. Has the Oracle ever been wrong? Maybe that's the wrong question; has the Oracle ever been right?

So, is that the whole plot? Oracle predicts death, Jay tries to survive? There must be more. Who is Jay Smith? Did he go to the Oracle or did she come to him? Surely Cromwell isn't planning to kill Jay simply because the Oracle predicted it. Why does an internationally notorious psychopath want some guy from Albuquerque dead? Randomly? How is it that Cromwell has contact with the Oracle? I'd replace some of the less important stuff (like the death will be lucrative) with some of these answers. We're not going to care about Jay if we know nothing about him except that he's being hunted.

Poetry Corner

Drafting

I suppose a pen and a scrap of envelope
will do, for scribbles that hit mid-amble
along the street, or on a bus. And a keyboard
can take a good pounding of angst, or a tap-peck
for a milder bout of the muse.

But nursery scripts demand to be spelt
on alphabet bricks across the carpet.
Competitive strophes must be gridded
with Scrabble tiles, rhyme sacrificed
for the triple word score.

And the joys of play dough snakes pressed
into sentences across the dinner table
(or the workstation when the boss is away),
verse upon verse coursing across the surface,
punctuated with multicolour dinosaur stops.

Historical epics demand quill and parchment:
the local college offers courses in do-it-yourself
writing kits, supply your own pigeon wings
and kitten skins. Epigrams are built for clay
tablets, baked in the oven alongside the pot roast.

If an image hits as I walk along the shoreline
then a stick and sand will do, big poems
decorated with seaweed and conch shells
to be seen by seagulls until the tides of time
scrub my visions back into the beach.

Or for that one-time invitation only performance
piece, a neighbour's wallpapered lounge and a set
of day-glo crayons: it's art, I cry, as policemen smash
through windows, unbind the audience, muscle
me out of the house.

And then those special times, late at night,
when I creep to the kitchen and settle in
for a feast, and indulge in my secret vice:
chocolate, vodka, and magnetic fridge poetry.
Drafting while the rest of my world snores.

--Rik


A First Kiss

A cloud hangs.
Her shoulders shiver, and
He moves closer.
She tilts her face and hides a smile.
He notices.
She feels a warmth upon her cheek.
He is whispering into her hair,
And watching the corners of her mouth.
She doesn’t hear,
But she notices.
Feed the fire, she says.
He does. His hopes take flight.
His breath quickens.
He gazes at the fire, wondering, planning.
Their shoulders touch.
A drop falls. Then two.
They watch the fire.
It dwindles.
His fingers find hers.
He squeezes her hand. We have to go, she says.
He knows.
The cloud darkens.
More drops fall.
He helps her up.
He brushes rain from her cheeks.
He caresses a line down her nose.
She tilts her face, and her smile fades.
He touches his lips to hers.
A cloud gushes.
She giggles and runs.
She races through watery bracken.
She has so much to tell her diary.

--takoda


Guiding Light

Thoughts, fading in the winds
Images of bygone days, future times
Memories, floating through minds
Events celebrated and mundane

Letters on paper forming words, sentences, paragraphs, chapters, prologues, and in the end, novels

Ideas, launched to the crowd
Inventions, ordinary and otherwise
Strife recorded, struggling explained
History made and history unmade

Letters on paper forming Stories, queries, partials, wholes, drafts, galleys, proofs, covers, and in the end, books

Rhymes of times, elegantly portrayed
Sonnets to lovers, won and lost
Verses elegiac and heroic
Linguistic Legerdemain delighting the soul

Letters on paper forming Trochee, anapest, iamb, verse, refrain, dactyls, epic, free verse, and in the end, polaris

--Dave Fragments


Oh Evil One On Par

Oh! Evil One on par
with those awash in inspiration,
with those behooved
(in Prada) toting lattes down
the gritty streets of Printer’s Row and
slick alleys of inky desperation,
Edit me to glory, smooth
my rocky phrases with the
Acid-drip of your witty
Words in blue.
Edit me you fool!

Oh Evil One, on par
with those whose phone-in predilections
exceed belief,
(in Vera) estimating
volume discounts while chatting
on about current fictions
and relief pitchers on suspension,
Edit my joy, edit my grief-
drafted sentences into
sleek conveyances of brief
and delightful words
suspended of disbelief.

Oh Evil One on par
with the drives and puttering diversions
that swirl and spin
(in ’stocks) the deals
that surge out of bounds and beyond
the known universe,
that skip to the end –
quickly, Edit me, editor,
my intro, my query, if
my plot line’s too thin,
tell me, I’ll toss
a few zombies in.

--ME


Untitled

Sylvia, who lives in Spain
wrote a limerick that caused only pain
When asked why it didn't scan
she said, that's the plan!
Then no one will ask me to do this again!

--Sylvia


Slush

I laugh aloud
as flames frolic,
c o n s u m i n g
the day's invasion
of unopened manuscripts.

--EE


Untitled

My novel complete at a hundred K
(give or take) relates the tale of girls
who like to sleep around but only gay
relationships cast swine before the pearls
of U-haul trucks on second dates. But wait!
this book will make you loads of cash, you see,
for publishers will cream upon the bait:
no niche: it crosses genre policy!
It’s chick-lit thriller, murder tale with just
a dash of horror when an elf (or else
a goblin if you like) is filled with lust
for superhero Dave who is repulsed
by such a love (he’s a field marshal.)
I await your kind request for partial.

--leatherdykeuk


Two poems (with apologies to William Blake)

Writer Sorrow

My mother groand! my father wept.
Into the writing world I leapt:
Feckless, clueless, day-job vowed:
For I have no grants endowed.


The Agent

Agent, Agent, burning bright,
In the slushpiles of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy feared rejection slip?

In what distant bars or dives,
Burnt the fey of thine eyes?
What awards dare he aspire?
With yet another work Vampire?

And what novel, & what art,
Could seize the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What bland slush? & works effete?

Where's the Hawthorne? where's the Twain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
Where's the Alcott? what dread grasp,
Dare its slushpile's terrors clasp?

When the chumps wrote down their fears,
And water'd heaven with their tears:
Did he sneer their work to see?
Did he reject the Lamb AND thee?

Agent Agent burning bright
In the slushpiles of the night:
What immortal hand or eye,
Dare frame thy feared rejection slip?

--Bill Highsmith

New Beginning 332

Five minutes to go.

Ryan tried to relax into the softness of the lobby chair and sized up the York Hotel. Ritzy. Too nice and classy for something so sordid. He’d prayed all the way over it was a practical joke, and no one would show up, but the note sounded too sinister even for one of his jackass friends.

He tapped his foot, fiddled with his watch.

Ah, to hell with relaxing. That sure wasn't going to happen. He pushed himself up from the leather and straightened his tie. Last chance to go to the bathroom, splash some cold water, and comb his hair into unflappable cool.

But when he stood up, he locked eyes with a man near the elevator. Holy shit. It was going to be blackmail then.

The guy was good. As soon as he spotted Ryan, he strode over with a big shit-eating grin and his arm extended like they’d known each other for years.

“Ryan! You made it. That’s great.” The blackmailer nodded to the lobby chair and Ryan fell back into the soft leather. The man took a seat opposite. “Sorry about the note. I figured sticking it under your windshield wiper was the best way.”

Ryan looked nervously about the lobby and cleared his throat. He glanced at his Rolex again, aware that he was late for an appointment with an important corporate client, and his BMW was parked on a meter.

“Check this out.” The man reached into his pocket and took out a thick envelope. “I brought some photographs.” Ryan’s pulse raced and he could feel sweat beading on his forehead. “You at a Sinead O'Connor concert, 1992. Your keynote speech at the Young Democrats Convention, 1986. Your . . . ”

Ryan winced. The bastard was ruthless.


Opening: Anonymous.....Continuation: iago

Face-Lift 392

Guess the Plot

Demon Days

1. The Teamsters are threatening to go on strike unless they get twelve paid sick days and five Demon Days per year. When Seth Longhaul resurrects the ghost of Jimmy Hoffa to arbitrate, he unleashes an army of the living dead and they're siding with management. Can the rank and file take back their union and save their jobs?

2. All the saints have one, so why do the demons get the short end of the liturgical calendar? It will be raining fire and brimstone as the hell-dwelling minions escalate their protest, demanding equal time and Demon Days of Obligation. Can St. Patrick convince them that demon alcohol is a better tribute than some random day of the year?

3. Young department store worker Hillary Shakes is excited about her promotion to Women's shoe department manager, until she finds out that the store is having a big sale to attract business from the untapped demon market niche - but the shoes in stock won't fit their hairy feet!

4. When Asha Santos takes a job at Hell's Gate Enterprises, she discovers that the employees are all demons, and they all have PMS. What's worse, they've stuck her on the graveyard shift--literally. Can she survive long enough to land a spot on the day shift? Also, a weredingo.

5. As an Augustinian nun, Angel's nights are full of prayer and loneliness in her cloistered room. But when she receives the opportunity to work in the secular community, Baptists, Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses all bow to her power of prayer!

6. Mrs. Freida Tock, who just moved into Fair Oaks, decides to volunteer for the Parent-Teacher Association refreshments committee. Perhaps she wouldn't have if she'd known the other ladies in her neighborhood referred to PTA meetings as Demon Days....



Original Version

When a demon daughter joins the family business, she learns there's more to life than Hell. [Oddly, when most people join their family business they learn that life is nothing but hell.]

Asha Santos's absent demon father is in Melbourne to oversee operations of the new Hell's Gate Enterprises Complex. Asha takes a job there, if only because of the money.

But the Princess of Darkness didn't take into account the other demons, who seem to permanently have PMS. [And you should see the female demons.] [Asha is the Princess of Darkness?] The resident weredingo is in a suspiciously kinky relationship that intrigues voyeuristic Asha as much as it disturbs her. [A week ago I'd never heard of weredingos; now I can't get away from them.] Then there's the matter of policing the back-alley blood cartel who've taken their business downtown.

At first Asha assumes these are all separate things, part of the daily running of a supernatural empire. But working the graveyard shift – literally – links them in a way that points straight to Hell. [The company is Hell's Gate and the employees are demons and Asha's a demon daughter/Princess of Darkness. She shouldn't be bothered by her setting pointing to Hell. This makes it sound like she's shocked to discover she's working over the hellmouth.]


Notes

This is the fifth and final query from the author of the recent zombie and weredingo books. Had I not been desperate for queries at the time, he/she would have sent one at a time, and no doubt shown marked improvement. As it is, we again have a few highlights without connecting the ideas into a cohesive plot.

Writing Exercise

It's about time this blog got some culture. So we're looking for poetry. Any kind, from couplets to limericks to sonnets to unrhymed iambic pentameter. Whatever. This being the Evil Editor blog, I would expect submissions to somehow be related to writing, publishing, specific genres, EE, his minions etc. And of course funny.

Deadline 5 P.M. Saturday, but if lots are coming in I'll start posting them earlier. Don't forget the name if you want credit.

New Beginning 331

The sickening crunch-thud of metal on metal startled William out of his reverie, but not in time to avoid running his Camry, albeit gently, into the bumper of the blue Saab in front of him. He slammed on his brakes, of course, but whacked the Saab nonetheless. The Saab was available to be whacked by virtue of its having been plowed into on its front passenger side by the world’s largest and most ancient Cadillac, thus producing the sound which had, however belatedly, alerted William.

He sat for a moment in his stalled Camry, heart pounding, and assessed the situation. The driver of the Saab was getting out, slowly. She was a young woman, with blond hair, blue jeans, and big sunglasses. She walked around to the front of her car, peered at the point of connection, and then stood looking at the Cadillac, which was lodged firmly into the entire right front end of her car. The impact had pushed the Saab into the opposite lane, and cars coming from that direction were now stopped, unable to get around.

The woman went back to the door of her car and leaned against the roof, gazing into the interior of the car. William climbed out of his Camry to see if she needed help. As he approached, he noticed she was hyperventilating.

"Miss?" he said. "Are you OK?"

She didn't answer, but instead put her fingers into her mouth and started to retch.

"Miss?" William touched her arm. "I think maybe you're in shock."

Sunlight glinted off her sunglasses as she spun around to face him. "Fucking-A I'm in shock," she snapped. "That was a hundred and fifty dollar lipstick I just swallowed!"


Opening: Calendula.....Continuation: Anonymous

Face-Lift 391

Guess the Plot

To Serve in Heaven

1. Tired of not fitting in with the other angels, Shem joins a company of dysfunctional misfit angels. When demons and wizards unite against the angels, Shem gets his wish: his first chance to fight against evil. Also, an eccentric swordmaster.

2. Upon dying, Michelangelo sees the angry face of God . . . who didn't like how his portrait turned out. Now, Michelangelo has been charged with painting a much larger ceiling--the ceiling of Heaven itself--and getting the details RIGHT this time. Will God's micromanagement ruin Michelangelo's artistic vision?

3. Satan couldn't believe it when his performance review came in. No longer would the board of directors allow him to reign in hell. Now he must serve in Heaven. And God is a lousy tipper.

4. Sometimes the afterlife isn't all it's cracked up to be. Joe was a bartender in life, and while he narrowly escaped eternal damnation, in Heaven he's a busboy. Maybe that deathbed conversion wasn't such a great idea.

5. Hell just wasn't any fun. Sure it sounded good when Satan used that famous recruiting line: It's better to rule in Hell than to serve in Heaven. The trouble was, Satan was the only one who did any ruling. Everyone else suffered eternal torment. Can Elgin find that elusive chink in the brimstone that will allow him to escape? Also, a clock that runs backwards.

6. Jury duty in heaven is hell. After 1,562,354 years, Molly learns she still can't talk about Satan's trial after his fall from heaven . . . which means she will never, ever get to be on Oprah. This leads her to the biggest existential crisis she has ever faced. Luckily for her, she has plenty of time to think about it.


Original Version

Dear {Agent}

The Grigori—or, Watchers—is ostensibly an elite order of angels chosen to protect the City of Lights. In truth, it is a haven for the disaffected. [Angels. You just can't trust 'em.] Volunteers come seeking escape from the council's oversight [What council?] and the company of other misfits. A magician driven by obsession with forbidden research develops spells for the order. A berserker indulges his taste for blood. An eccentric swordmaster finds a use for his gifts—even if he'd rather be a dancer.

The day after young Shemyaza joins, the order's leader is found dead in a snowbank, murdered by demons. It's final proof of what Shem suspected all along—the demons and wizards have once again united against the angels. What he didn't suspect was that the ruling council would appoint him head of the Watchers despite his lack of seniority. [Is this the same council as the one in the first paragraph? Because earlier you said misfits joined the Watchers to escape the council's oversight. Now you say the council appoints the Watchers' leader, which implies they have mucho oversight.] Evidently, the other Watchers are too dysfunctional to be trusted.

The outbreak of war is the best thing that ever happened to him. Shem finally gets his to chance to fight evil—and is suddenly swimming in more respect and praise than he can handle. But the war isn't going well, [If his first chance to fight evil is going badly, why is he getting so much praise?] and he blames the council. Some days it seems they aren't even trying. [They're the Randy Moss of angelic councils.] He begins to investigate the council's origins, fining only secrets and misdirection at every turn.

Desperate for information about his own homeland's history, he turns to an unlikely source: Cain. The First Murderer and enemy general mistrusts his supposed allies, too; an alliance of necessity is formed. [I can see turning to Cain if he needs an ally; why did he turn to Cain for information about his homeland's history? Cain was, after all, an unlikely source. Aren't there any likely sources? Plus, if I'm a leader and I'm at war with demons and wizards, I think I'll put off the history lesson till things quiet down.] Shemyaza knows he's playing a dangerous game, but if he can win the war, isn't it worth it? Even if achieving peace means [destroying the entire universe?] betraying Cain and the Council?

To Serve in Heaven is a 90,000 word fantasy of power and divided loyalties. Set in another world, but infused with biblical symbols and imagery, it chronicles a young angel's growth from a naïve pawn to a canny iconoclast. May I send you the completed manuscript?

Sincerely,


Notes

We don't need the 1st-paragraph list of examples of the types of angels who are Watchers. You could start with the second paragraph, adding what it is Shemyaza joined.

According to Wikipedia, the leader of the Watchers was named Samyaza. He also had several aliases, including Shemyazaz, Shamazya, Semiaza, Shemhazi, Semyaza, Amezyarak, and Shemp: the fourth Stooge.

So was Shemp appointed leader because they thought they could use him, or because the others were too dysfunctional? It seems the plot starts when war breaks out. The Council appoints Shemp as leader, thinking he'll be their stooge, but he surprises them and leads his team of misfits to victory. That sounds interesting, but I'm not getting that from the query.

Wait a minute, a bunch of misfits save the day--isn't this the movie Stripes, with Bill Murray as Private Shemyaza?

New Beginning 330

"Zee cards," said Emma, without batting an eye, "predict doom."

The dupe across the table stared at her, fish-mouthed and sag-cheeked. "Are...are you sure?"

She arched an eyebrow. "You doubt?" She waved a hand across the nine battered playing cards spread on the table between them. Seven of them were turned to show their faces. "Zere eet ees. You got no luck in zees world."

The man's hand moved involuntarily toward the flask that was bulging out his jacket pocket. He caught himself and dropped both hands to his lap.

"You know zees," said Emma--currently known as Madame Moldovi, the gypsy seer of visions and teller of fortunes. "You got no luck in love, in business, in friendship, in family. Yah?"

"How--how did you know?"

She smiled. She wanted to say, Your BO, the stained dragon shirt, the fact that you're 300 pounds and your pasty face all scream loser. Instead she batted her eyes. "Zee cardzzzz, zey are nevair wrong."

"But . . . What if I--"

"Our time eez up. Others are waiting." She watched as he waddled out.

Low-cut blouse, long hair, fake accent . . . huge wad of twenties bulging in her skirt. Yep, Dave had been right. The geeks at a science fiction convention will pay anything for twenty minutes alone with a sexy woman.


Opening: Detritus.....Continuation: Khazar-khum

Face-Lift 390

Guess the Plot

The Consultant

1. Ava Grandler is a troubleshooter: when good contracts go bad, she's the one to call. But when handsome Gray Bradshaw's company begins to flounder, will she be accused of cooking the books?

2. He was brought in to stop the bleeding when Hemodynamics Industries was going down the drain. Now the top executives are turning up dead, drained of blood. Is there a connection between the string of grisly murders and . . . The Consultant?

3. Derek Wilberforce believes he is existent in a highly synergistic lifestyle until an impactful life event incents him to realign his priorities and rediscover his under-utilized assets in a paradigm-shifting circumstance. Also, a hyperinfrastructure.

4. He had a promising consulting career going until he woke up in the psych ward with his memories gone, accused of murder. Can an aging hypnotherapist help recapture the troubled past of . . . The Consultant? Also, ghost hitchhikers.

5. Immortal Loman Morgano was a consultant, offering affordable advice where he could. He was marriage consultant to Henry the Eighth. He advised Russia to sell Alaska to the US. Now, droolingly, he anticipates his most rewarding consultation: advising the American electorate on the 2008 political season.

6. A book of advice written by teenagers, during the years when they know everything, this pithy handbook will act as a personal consultant to clueless parents and guide them along a path carefully calculated to avoid humiliating their teenagers or sullying their reputation beyond repair.


Original version

Dear Mr. Evil:

I’m seeking representation for my new suspense novel, THE CONSULTANT. Set in New England, it's the story of a troubled young MBA on the run, a trio of unearthly hitchhikers, and the incredible road trip they take to save each others’ souls.

Despite the schizophrenia in his bloodline, Thomas Chace has it all: an Ivy League degree, a fast-track consulting career and a terrific woman who loves him. When he finds himself in a psych hospital beaten up, indicted for murder, and with zero recollection why, he must trust an aging hypnotherapist [I once trusted an aging hypnotherapist. Big mistake. I ended up braying like a mule as my brother kissed the bride at his wedding. My sister-in-law didn't find it nearly as amusing as the aging hypnotherapist did.] to help restore his memory. What she finds buried in his mind is beyond what either of them imagined.

The hypnosis takes Thomas back to the day he learns [I'd go with past tense here.] his employer, business icon Philip Kingstone, is involved in a criminal venture capital scheme. When Thomas steals evidence that will expose him, Kingstone comes after him with a vengeance.

Thomas’s escape takes him to a breathtaking Vermont canyon where tourists go to take pictures and desperate souls go to take their own lives.
While there, he loses his precious evidence against Kingstone. As hope vaporizes, he realizes he has company; sitting in his back seat [He's in his car? How did he lose the evidence? It blew out the sunroof and into the gorge?] are three shadows, two men and a woman who perished in the gorge. His strange passengers make him an offer: if he helps them resolve their unfinished business in this world so they can move on to the next, they will help him try to survive his own dire predicament.

With nothing to lose, he teams up with his late hitchhikers and the foursome embarks on a quest that is daring, humorous and romantic, but always on edge. And before it's over, Thomas encounters something even more threatening than Philip Kingstone: the truth about himself. [He died in the gorge three years ago, and it's the hitchhikers who are alive.]

At 95,000 words, THE CONSULTANT blends suspense/thriller with paranormal spine-tingler, a combination I hope will appeal to a large commercial audience. For a taste of my work, please see the enclosed, which need not be returned. The full mss is available; I’ve enclosed an SASE for your response.

With sincere thanks for your consideration,

Notes

I can't tell if the part about stealing evidence, going to Vermont, and encountering the hitchhikers is what the aging hypnotherapist unearths or if it happens after Chace visits the aging hypnotherapist. If you put what the aging hypnotherapist discovers in past tense, we'll know when you've switched back to post-hypnosis events.

I assume you do switch back somewhere in there. Usually you want the most interesting part of the story to be told to the readers, not to an aging hypnotherapist.

This is well-written, but isn't the plot the story of how the three lost souls help him, and he helps them? It's buried at he bottom of paragraph four. I think we can lose the hospital and the aging hypnotherapist and get the ghosts as close to the top as possible, not only because they're your plot, but because it feels like you're introducing aliens in chapter 14.

Actually, it's not clear why the aging hypnotherapist is even needed in the book. Man discovers boss is criminal, boss goes after him, ghosts appear in back seat as he tries to make escape. Man helps ghosts, ghosts help man. What is gained by man gets amnesia, aging hypnotherapist cures amnesia? If you get to the ghosts early, you might have room to tell us about their unfinished business.

What she finds buried in his mind is beyond what either of them imagined leads me to believe the aging hypnotherapist finds the ghosts. If she just finds the venture capital scheme, I wouldn't build it up so much. Does she discover who beat Chace up, who he supposedly killed, why he's in the psych ward? I'd rather hear about that than the boss's scheme.

As the book has paranormal aspects anyway, I think the hypnotherapist should be getting younger instead of aging.