Christine Danek's Current Query Critiqued

Okay, first of all, sorry I'm late. I had to stick around at home this morning, and wait to find out whether school was closed in our county (it is). Having grown up in Minnesota, it's a little ridiculous to see school closings simply because the temperature drops below freezing, but I suppose when the community has no cold weather infrastructure (ice/salt trucks, plows) it does make some sense.

Anyway, let's get back to work. Here is Christine's query again, this time with my feedback, in blue.

The letter:

Dear Mr./Ms.,

Junior year sucks for Sadie Perkins, this is an independent clause. she creates a dream world (hot guy included) to escape her far-from-perfect life, but when monsters try to enslave her, she must fight to leave her growing nightmare alive. Okay, so you've got some very cool elements here, but this isn't really working for me as your opening hook. First of all, we don't know anything about Sadie, except that she's a girl, and a junior. The fact that her year sucks means nothing, because we all know high school sucks for everyone. Moreover, we don't have any understanding of the logistics of this dream world, or how literally you mean what you're saying here.

Does Sadie have the power to literally create a dream-like world? If there are monsters trying to enslave her (and not just in her nightmares when she's sleeping), and they're actually threatening her life, then it sounds like she does. How did she get this power? How does it work? Is it only a curse, or are there some elements of blessing to it as well?

Falling through the ground and waking up in the world of your dreams ruled by the hottest guy around would seem awesome if your ex wasn’t with you. It makes more sense now, as you start to expand on this concept, but do you see how the vagueness leaves the rules of your world making no sense in the opening paragraph? Seriously, trying to figure out how to get accepted by your parents is hard enough, but when you are asked to stay in a world you dreamed up with a super hot guy, this is the third time you've mention Nameless Hot Guy. Normally I'm all good with not naming too many characters in a query, but now I'm starting to wonder. Should you name him? Maybe. But I think you should definitely say a bit more about him. He rules the dream world? How so? Like a king or something? the decision can be harder than you might think, especially when he may swipe your imagination(,) making you a slave(,) or you just might flat out die.

Sadie must resist the temptation of her dream world, why? It seems mostly horrible. You may need flesh it out more, so we can understand why whether to leave or stay is such a sadistic choice. and face the reality of her real one before the Dream Thieves catch up to her. Now this I like. Brief, succinct specificity is at the heart of most good queries.

DREAM THIEVES is a young adult paranormal novel with fantasy elements, complete at 70,000 words. I am an active member of SCBWI.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Christine Danek

The rest of this is perfect.

Now, to summarize. Your query has some awesome elements, but you really need to work on explaining the logistics better. The writing is strong, the stakes and conflict build to what I'm sure will be an excellent choice at the end, once you can explain how this other world works.

It's your story, so how to go about it is up to you, but I would suggest you make it clearer right up front how this wold connects to Sadie's dreams, how much control she has over it's creation (you say "she creates a dream world (hot guy included) to escape her far-from-perfect life" in the beginning, but then it seems like she doesn't have control), and how exactly she enters it (and how or whether she is able to leave at will). The other world sounds cool (hot guy included), but with all your stakes and conflict tied to it, we need it to be clear that it's not just a dream (unless, you know, it is).

Finally, more about Sadie in the opening would be great. We can infer a bit about her character from her struggling with being a junior, and her choice to escape her troubles by dreaming (in other words, she's probably not the assertive, alpha personality type), but you could add another word or two of characterization here and there, and that would really help us sympathize with her from the get go.

That's it.

So, what do you all think? Are you as confused by this dream world as I am, or am I missing something?

Christine Danek's Current Query

There was a nice harvest moon, hanging low in the western sky this morning, nearly full. The air was crisp, but not too cold.

Anyway, today we have Christine's query. I've had her on before, but if you don't know Christine, definitely go follow her blog at Christine's Journey.

Now, her query:

Dear Mr./Ms.,

Junior year sucks for Sadie Perkins, she creates a dream world (hot guy included) to escape her far-from-perfect life, but when monsters try to enslave her, she must fight to leave her growing nightmare alive.

Falling through the ground and waking up in the world of your dreams ruled by the hottest guy around would seem awesome if your ex wasn’t with you. Seriously, trying to figure out how to get accepted by your parents is hard enough, but when you are asked to stay in a world you dreamed up with a super hot guy, the decision can be harder than you might think, especially when he may swipe your imagination making you a slave or you just might flat out die.

Sadie must resist the temptation of her dream world, and face the reality of her real one before the Dream Thieves catch up to her.

DREAM THIEVES is a young adult paranormal novel with fantasy elements, complete at 70,000 words. I am an active member of SCBWI.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Christine Danek

That's it.

Please thank Christine for sharing, but otherwise save your feedback for tomorrow!

Christine Danek's Current Query Critiqued

Okay. Today we have Christine's query letter again, this time with my thoughts and suggestions.

For anyone who is new to this, Christine's query will be in plain text, below, and my feedback will be in red.

The query:

For eighteen(-)yea(-)old Anna Page, a failed suicide attempt I'm not sure you need "failed" and "attempt." They're redundant, because if you only attempt suicide, by definition you did not succeed. and a subsequent? I want this word or something like it here, because I want it to be obvious that the two things are closely related. stay at the psych ward just may be easier than fighting the alien war she has been forced to fight. This has some great punch to it, but I'm not sure about the execution. How is she forced to fight? And by whom?

All right. So for your opening you're not off to a bad start. I like the characterization you've given us for Anna, as she's obviously a troubled girl, but I think you could re-word things here, to make her more active. What causes Anna to give up on life? Give her control of her own choices, then (and I love the alien war coming out of left field like that, it makes for a great hook) give us more specific information about this war. Did aliens invade Earth? Have they been here for a while and just decided to take over? Who is forcing an eighteen-year-old to take part in a war, and why?

Almost dying leaves Anna a broken mess in therapy and telepathic. Wait, what? I love telepathy almost as much as I love telekinesis, but this is worded too suddenly for me. I get that there may not be a logical explanation for her sudden telepathy, but ease us into it with a few more words. Maybe say "... in therapy and with some surprising new mental abilities. Like telepathy." Or something. That's not great, but you get my point. She even thinks her soul lingered over her body for a while. Something she doesn’t want anyone to know. I like this, but I need to have a better idea of what you mean. Is this near death? Out of body? How can she think but not know? But when Anna meets and falls for IAN MCCLENNEND being part Scottish, I ADORE this name, but you don't capitalize character names in a query letter. Not unless their name is all caps in the book for some strange reason. her life changes—don't put em-dashes in query letters if you can at all help it, they do not play nice with email formatting. and it’s not all good. Strange things begin to happen, like what? Be specific. her friends distance themselves, and she’s confronted by ghostly shadow people that try to kill her. Bad-ass.

Your second paragraph is a bit jumbled. You bring up some excellent and interesting concepts, but I really have no clear idea of what the root conflict is. I get the feeling that your novel has some internal conflict of Anna trying to outgrow her ... sadness, grief, depression, whatever, and then also some external conflict, which could either be the romance with Ian or surviving the shadow people, or both but either way we need a better picture of what and why. And another thing: what happened to the alien war?

As Ian and Anna become close, she soon discovers that he isn’t what she thought. He is part of a powerful race what does this mean, exactly? I'm not sure I like the term race. of humans created by Alien why is alien capitalized? refugees and was sent to protect her. I like the idea, but I want to know more about how it works, and what it means for the plot. Is he her protector? Did they meet by chance?

Shockingly, these Aliens had big plans for Anna’s lingering soul, this is vague. What plans? What kind of advantage would her soul give them? but since she surprised them by living through her suicide attempt, now the stakes are even higher. Why did that surprise them? Did they know the attempt was coming? Did they somehow play a role in it? Anna learns she has great power that the refugees can use against the evil lord RAIDEN, I'll share some links below, about famous characters named Raiden, who's names aren't in all caps (as an aside, this might be one instance where a character's name could be all caps. Maybe it's an acronym for some kind of alien AI: Radiant Artificial Intelligence Dynamic Electronic Node: R.A.I.D.E.N.) who has destroyed their planet and is ready to take over Earth. War is brewing, and Anna must fight to save Ian, I thought he was a powerful human sub-species that was going to save her? the aliens and the world.

Can Anna win the war, save the world and the guy she loves when her soul still dreams of dying? Wow. Cool. I like this summary. It's hints at something mystic, metaphysical ... spiritual.

LINGERING SOULS is a young adult, Earth-based, science fiction novel, complete at 62,000 words.This might be a bit short, especially for a novel that might need some world-building, even if it is Earth. I am an active member of SCBWI.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Christine Danek

Okay, here are a couple of links to some famous Raiden's, showing why you might not want to name a character that, although it is an awesome name:

Raiden, AKA Lord Raiden, the thunder god of the Mortal Kombat universe, and protector of the Earthrealm.

Raiden, AKA Jack, a part human part cybernetic androgynous ninja agent in the Metal Gear series.

Raiden, a character from the video game Fatal Fury.

And the deity who probably inspired all of them:

Raijin, AKA Raiden, god of thunder and storms in the Shinto religion and Japanese mythology.

Anyway, I don't think any of that means you have to change the name, but I think you should be aware he won't be the first.

So, to summarize: It's obvious to me you've got an awesome story here. I've got a decent sense of your main character, but most of it is from what happens to her, and I'd like to know a little more about what kind of person she is, and how she thinks/feels/reacts to all this external suffering. I'm still not clear what the main plot is, or whether the alien war or the shadow people are more prominent, but I think that's easy to fix. Other than some minor logistical things, I don't think you need any kind of major overhaul.

So that's it.

What do you guys think? What would you change? What of my thoughts do you disagree with? Would you like to see a story with a Radiant Artificial Intelligence Dynamic Electronic Node in it?

Please share your thoughts in the comments, and have a great weekend!

Christine Danek's Current Query

You all know Christine, right? She's very nice, and runs a great blog at Christine's Journey. Go visit it, and follow her.

Today I'm introducing you not only to Christine, but to her query letter. Please save your feedback for tomorrow.

Here's her query:

Dear Ms./Mr.

For eighteen year old Anna Page, a failed suicide attempt and a stay at the psych ward just may be easier than fighting the alien war she has been forced to fight.

Almost dying leaves Anna a broken mess in therapy and telepathic. She even thinks her soul lingered over her body for a while. Something she doesn’t want anyone to know. But when Anna meets and falls for IAN MCCLENNEND her life changes—and it’s not all good. Strange things begin to happen, her friends distance themselves, and she’s confronted by ghostly shadow people that try to kill her.

As Ian and Anna become close, she soon discovers that he isn’t what she thought. He is part of a powerful race of humans created by Alien refugees and was sent to protect her.

Shockingly, these Aliens had big plans for Anna’s lingering soul, but since she surprised them by living through her suicide attempt, now the stakes are even higher. Anna learns she has great power that the refugees can use against the evil lord RAIDEN, who has destroyed their planet and is ready to take over Earth. War is brewing, and Anna must fight to save Ian, the aliens and the world.

Can Anna win the war, save the world and the guy she loves when her soul still dreams of dying?

LINGERING SOULS is a young adult, Earth-based, science fiction novel, complete at 62,000 words. I am an active member of SCBWI.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Christine Danek

There you go.

So that's it for today. Please say hello to Christine in the comments, and save your feedback on her query letter for tomorrow. Have a great Thursday!