Pitch Wars Early Bird Critique 2 - Query - YA Fantasy

When I read a query, or query blurb of a story, I'm looking for five major elements communicated crisply, quickly, and clearly:

Who is the book about, where are they (and when, if applicable)? What does the protagonist want? What's the conflict, and who or what is the antagonistic force? What's at stake--and for your final hook, what specific obstacle will potentially stop the protagonist from achieving their goal?

If a query can outline that in under 250 words, it's a winner.  So let's take a look at this first query and see how it stacks up:

QUERY CONTENT:

A millennium ago, the Pantheon used to consist of five states, before one of them, the Meridian Island, sank underground mysteriously overnight. Everyone blames its last ruler, the nefarious Prime Princess – after all, she did commit parricide. Little do they know, the princess was avenging her husband’s brutal murder. Everyone suspects she was associated with the Void (an entity who seeks the five elements to destroy humanity). Little do they know how much she sacrificed to protect humanity from the Void. With her kingdom, her true story's lost, and her fate unknown.

A millennium later, history is about to be repeated with Quince Shakran, a day laborer, who is blamed for his brother’s impending death. Only the High Priest of the Autumn Plateau can heal his brother, but the priest only obeys the Plateau’s king. To win the king’s favor, Quince accepts the scholarship to the Plateau he was offered instead of his brother. However, his relationship with an enigmatic royal prisoner jeopardizes his goals, and thrusts him into the hibernated battle against the Void the Prime Princess had incited a millennium ago. With the existence of humanity at stake, Quince must join the battle alongside the royal prisoner over the guardianship of the elements.

Inspired by Bronze Age civilizations, [TITLE] is a YA fantasy complete at 120,000 words. Written in dual POVs from Quince and the Prime Princess, it'll appeal to fans of AN EMBER IN THE ASHES and AVATAR: THE LAST AIRBENDER."

CRITIQUE (my notes in red font)

Please note, there’s a lot of critical analysis of this query, however the criticism is of the structure of the wording, not the story itself. I believe the right elements are here for a strong fantasy book. However, this query doesn’t answer the right questions or give information clearly, so it won’t do the story justice in a query:

A millennium ago, the Pantheon used to consist of five states, before one of them, the Meridian Island, sank underground mysteriously overnight. Everyone blames its last ruler, the nefarious Prime Princess – after all, she did commit parricide. Little do they know, the princess was avenging her husband’s brutal murder. Everyone suspects she was associated with the Void (an entity who seeks the five elements to destroy humanity). Little do they know how much she sacrificed to protect humanity from the Void. With her kingdom, her true story's lost, and her fate unknown.

A millennium later,

This is all backstory, and isn’t needed for a query, at least, not up front.

Quince Shakran, a day laborer (in whichever state of the Pantheon—just give the name and Pantheon at this point, that cues the reader this is a fantasy world), who is blamed for his brother’s impending death.

This is your hook. This is where you start. And you pull the reader in by, in the next couple sentences, telling them who blames Quince, and what he’s is accused of doing to cause his brother’s “impending” death (because that’s makes the entire situation a little less fraught—after all, the brother might not die?)

Only the High Priest of the Autumn Plateau, who answers to the Plateau’s King, can heal his brother, but the priest only obeys the Plateau’s king. To win the king’s favor, [and earn the right to ask for his brother’s healing—or something along those lines] Quince accepts the scholarship to the Plateau he was offered instead of his brother.

This last part is confusing and needs to be rephrased as a challenge in some way. If he’s being blamed for his brother’s impending death, why would they give him a scholarship, which is a positive thing? It would hook the reader more to hear that Quince will be forced to fill the gap left by his brother, but it puts him at risk in some way. So his goal is to save his brother, but the conflict is . . . what? We still don’t actually know. We need to know what’s at stake, and what the obstacle is (clearly)

However, his relationship with an enigmatic royal prisoner jeopardizes his goals,

How did he become friends with a prisoner if he’s in a scholarship and earning the King’s favor?

Needs to be phrased more along the lines of, “In his role as X, he is forced into close quarters with the royal prisoner, [NAME THE CHARACTER AND MAKE IT CLEAR WHETHER THE RELATIONSHIP IS ROMANTIC OR PLUTONIC ]. As their relationship develops, the [WHATEVER ELEMENT OF THE RELATIONSHIP IS A PROBLEM] will force Quince to [EXPLAIN WHAT THE CONFLICT IS, AND WHAT’S AT STAKE].

and thrusts him into the hibernated battle against the Void the Prime Princess had incited a millennium ago. With the existence of humanity at stake, Quince must join the battle alongside the royal prisoner over the guardianship of the elements.

This is all great fantasy phrasing, but is confusing in its structure and doesn’t actually tell the reader what we need to know: What could happen to Quince (presumably he could die), why should a reader care (presumably because the entire earth could be harmed in some way) and how Quince will be forced into war. We have no idea what the guardianship of the elements is/are and why are we calling a character “the royal prisoner” instead of their name? The prisoner is what they are, not who they are.

Inspired by Bronze Age civilizations, [TITLE] is a YA fantasy complete at 120,000 words. Written in dual POVs from Quince and the Prime Princess, it'll appeal to fans of AN EMBER IN THE ASHES and AVATAR: THE LAST AIRBENDER."

This is a great summary and would definitely grab an agent’s interest if the blurb of the story was much clearer.

I know I’ve really torn that query apart. I don’t want the author to be discouraged. Summarizing and hooking a reader with a blurb is a completely different skillset to writing a book. Many authors aren’t good at it (I’m one of them), so we get help from others to make sure our queries have the right information, in the right order:

1. Who’s your protagonist and where are they (time and place, though in a fantasy it’s really just place).
2. The villain, antagonistic force, or obstacle they’re facing.
3. What’s the protag’s goal.
4. What’s at stake (what does the protag have to lose).
5. And finally, a hint at something dire that’s about to happen that will make us fear for the protagonist. Not a question, but a statement “If protag doesn’t do X, in Y time, they face Z...)

I’m sure this critique would be hard to read, and I feel for the author (my early critiques were similarly muddied). However, I’ll say again, that I believe all the elements for a very strong fantasy world, and intriguing book are here. This query just doesn’t give enough clarity and stakes to make an agent jump on it.

I’m sorry to say, I think you need a complete rewrite. The good news is, with the right query (and tightly polished material), I think you’ll have agents jumping to request pages.

Take another stab at it and have it read by people who know nothing about your book. When they’ve read it, as them what they think it’s about, and what might happen. It’s the best way to gauge if your query is serving your story well. If someone who’s never read any of the book can describe the main characters and conflict, and what’s at stake, then you’ve done your job!

Don’t be discouraged. Keep going!

Handling Rejection

I'm heading back into the query fray, which means I'm girding my loins for rejection and returning to a lot of good advice I've absorbed in the past to make me stronger for the journey.

This post from Janet Reid has the whole thing boiled down to one simple point:

http://jetreidliterary.blogspot.com/2011/01/value-of-rejection-process.html

If you're querying now, or planning on querying soon, read it. And think about it until you are sure it's true. Then keep reading it and remembering it when those rejections start rolling in.

As for me, whether I'm successful or not, I promise a full analysis of the process, the stats, and what I learned from them later this year.

Wish me luck!

Ever Wondered What's REALLY Behind That Form Rejection?

Literary Agent, Marisa A. Corvisiero, shared an email on her blog that is at once humbling, and eye-opening.

Turns out, she'd had a writer respond (angrily) to a rejection letter. She took the time to reply to his concerns, outlining what the problems were with his query and feedback on how to improve it.

My favorite part of the letter was her opening:

"It has come to my attention that your story was declined by our agency because it does not fit our list. When an agency says this to you, it simply means that we either are not looking for your type of story at this time because they are not selling, or because we have too many of them, or it means that we don't like how you presented it - meaning that the story itself did not sound interesting."

Ouch, right? But seriously, if I read that, I'd figure this isn't the agency for me or my book. Move on. (And, honestly, I'd be grateful to the agent for a moment of honesty - because those are few and far between in any professional environment, in my opinion).

She goes on though, not only detailing exactly what was wrong with the query, but also how she personally felt about the author's actions in responding to the rejection. Her words are carefully chosen, and offer a great learning moment for an author who cares to take it on board. (Like us, right?)

Unfortunately, the writer didn't really appreciate the time she took to do this and responded again. Twenty-seven bullet points worth of responding, apparently.

But I won't ruin the experience for you, read her letter for yourself here.

Your Turn: How do you feel about rejection letters? Would you ever respond to a rejection from an agent? How would you feel if you'd received a letter like this one?