Marcy Hatch's Current Query Critiqued

I'm not feeling well this morning (I hope it's just a cold, but my nose is running like a faucet) so I'm going to get right into this. Hopefully the cotton in my head doesn't mess with my query skillz.

If you haven't seen me do this before, Marcy's query is in plain text, below. My feedback is in red.

Dear [insert agent's name properly spelled]:

It is the winter of 1805 and the only thing sixteen-year-old Arlen Devlin is thinking of is the ball that will introduce her to high society and that elegant madness known as The Season. This is a great opening. Full of voice, and style. I would set this into its own paragraph, and would maybe like to see one more word that tells us about Arlen's character. But when tragedy strikes tell us how. The mention of meeting her grandmother leads me to believe she may have lost her parents, but you should almost always be specific in a query. Arlen's life takes a decidedly witchy this is so bad-ass, great writing! turn, beginning with the discovery of a grandmother she never knew you need another verb here, to be parallel with "beginning," maybe "continuing?" to a book of spells that has been handed down from mother to daughter for generations. That's what you mean, right? It wasn't handed down just once, was it? This, however, isn’t just any book of spells. This is a family’s heritage, a compilation of every scrap of magick gathered over the course of history. It’s the family’s grimoire. Someone said yesterday they didn't know what a grimoire was. It probably is a somewhat rare word these days, but being an old D&D nerd, I know exactly what a grimoire is, and I say don't you dare change it. It's a perfect word, and it really sets a great tone for your story. And someone wants hers.

Soon Arlen learns that the tragedy that took her parents’ lives all right, now I see, but this is still vague. How did they die? Tell us at the beginning. You can be brief. may not have been an accident and hers isn’t the only heirloom book of spells. Each of the great witch families has one and whoever holds the book holds the power in this England, where magick has as much influence as money, where witches are courted, what does this mean, witches are courted? Courted by who? and spells are traded for favors. It will take every talent Arlen has – including her mastery of the imp, Vathek - you see how the first dash is longer than the second? That's because email (and blog posts) do funny things to formatting. Be careful about using em-dashes in query letters. Unless you want to go for the dreadfully ugly double hyphen -- or you're a master of formatting, your em-dashes are going to get screwed up in emails. to navigate this maze of conspiracy and intrigue, and maybe, if she’s very lucky and very careful and very clever, she’ll survive.

Okay. So at this point I'm sure this query will have done it's job. It's full of amazing voice, amazing style, and it clearly clues you in on that fact that here is a great writer, with a great story. If you fixed the few small things I've pointed out, you'd probably be good to go, assuming your pages are as good as this query.

But you came here asking for my advice, so I will say that in spite of the things this query has in spades, what it is lacking is specific information. If you want to get this query to be the best it can be, you need to give us a better sense of the conflict, and the choice Arlen will have to make to overcome it. You don't need to name or go too deeply into any characters like a potential antagonist, but right now all we know is that there are other witch families, who vaguely may or may not be after Arlen's grimoire. I think you have room for a few more words here, so I think so should get specific about what she has to overcome.

However, if you choose to keep it succinct, this query will probably work as is. It's already very good.

Grimoire CAPITAL: GRIMOIRE is complete at 93,000 words and set during the Regency I'm no expert in this, because I don't read romance, but to me using this term will make the reader think of Regency Romance novels. We know from the year above when it takes place, so I would consider skipping this word, although the point about it being a sort of alternate history is pretty important, so you should keep that in. period in England – albeit a slightly different England. I have a BA in History and I've written several other books. Are they published? Traditionally? If not, don't mention them unless you've sold more than 10,000 copies. I have pasted included the first five pages per your guidelines. If you would like to see more, I would love to send it to you. You don't have to say that, agents know you would love for them to read your manuscript.

Thank you for your time,

Marcy S. Hatch

Okay. So to summarize: this query is already very good. A historical fantasy young adult novel like this sounds very fresh and unique to me, and I'm sure you're going to find a lot of success when you begin submitting. There are a couple tiny things to fix, but they're no big deal.

If you really want this query to shine I would suggest adding another sentence or two about some specific bit of conflict, but I also don't think it would be required in order to get someone to read your first five pages.

And a short note: I love the hint of her power over the imp Vathek. I don't know if she summons him or just controls him, but either way it reminds me of the Bartimaeus Trilogy, and I LOVED those books.

So that's it. What do you all think? Am I trippin? Is this query as good as it looks? What kind of one or two word terms could be used to describe Arlen in that first sentence to really make it pop with hook?

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