Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Back to the drawing board

Two very swift rejections have me reconsidering my query letter. I'm an optimist when is comes to my writing career, so two isn't a bad thing. Some of may favorite authors talk about the scores of rejections they received before finally finding an agent. So because all authors must have a (public) blog, and because I cannot find a decent poll app on facebook I've created this today for the purpose of soliciting some feedback.

So here are two options for the synopsis part of my query. One that I've sent, and one that I just typed up today. Please let me know which you like better, or if you've got questions or comments.


A) 
 Ana Owen knew her life was over when a deliciously familiar boy she’d been having dreams about walked into her real life and kissed her in front of her boyfriend before vanishing into thin air. She expected her friends to hate her. She didn’t expect the whole world to go mad.

Eden wasn’t the birthplace of humanity but the most fertile place in an already inhabited world that Heaven could use to create cherubim—winged immortals from whence sprang the angels and demons.

And the world isn’t just divided into Heaven and Hell, good and Evil. Ana’s pretty sure Aletta, the angel working for Heaven who wants to wipe her mind is a Heavenly bitch. And a demon saved her life. But he doesn’t make up for the other countless demons attempting to kidnap her. There’s even a third neutral side, the elendi, who are sepratist angels, banished from Heaven and sworn to protect mortals. It’s almost too much for Ana to keep track of. And this doesn’t even take into account the rogue angels with no affiliation, switching sides as it suits their needs.

What Ana needs to find out is why. Why is Hell after her? Why do the demons recoil in pain at her touch? Ana must decide who she can trust, and find out the answers before it’s too late.

B) 
Tam’s a rogue angel running from his past. He attends a meeting in Hell about a bounty on a girl named Ana. He starts to question what’s really going on when he finds her, and she’s not at all what he expected.

For Ana it all started with a kiss. The perfect kiss from the perfect boy. But he was only a dream. Until he waltzes into Ana’s real life, kisses her in front of her boyfriend, and vanishes into thin air.

But Dreamboy ruining her life isn’t Ana’s only problem. Someone’s trying to kidnap her. When four strangers attack Ana, she only escapes because the kidnappers have a strange, violent reaction to her touch. They can’t grab her without suffering horrible pain. One even breaks into boils.

 Ana can’t tell her friends because they all hate her now, except one. But it turns out Laith isn’t even human—he’s Elendi, a disenfranchised group of separatist angels, banished from Heaven, and sworn to protect humans. It’s his job to protect her. Because the kidnappers keep coming and they aren’t your average bad guys. They’re demons. But stubborn, secretive Laith won’t give the answers Ana craves, so she must turn to another source.

Tam. He’s charming and handsome, and Ana finds herself drawn to him despite the fact that she knows almost nothing about him. Tam has the answers Ana’s looking for. But the more answers she gets, the more questions she has. Like why is Hell after her in the first place?

Ana struggles to answer this question and to figure out who and what she is before the demons succeed in dragging her down to Hell.


9 comments:

  1. I liked elements of both, but favor B more.

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  2. I can tell your summaries are getting better with practice.
    "A" is better.
    Also, if you're going to capitalize "Evil," you should capitalize "Good."

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  3. These sound really good!! I like A the best. Good Luck, hope someone publishes this so I can read it :o)

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  4. I like A and I CANNOTWAITTOREADTHIS!!! EEEEEEK!

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  5. A sparkles more and is more succinct and original. (I would scratch the whole second paragraph though.)

    What B has going for it is its chronology--more play-by-play and less of a teaser than A. So it depends on what the agent is asking for--more "what actually happens" or more "hook me so I want to read more"?

    B just needs two things: tightening and, as much as I hate to use this word, pizzazz. I dare you to delete 60 words and make your average words-per-sentence shorter. I'd give some serious thought to word choice as well, if you want it to feel less cliche, yet read as "movie trailerish" as A does.

    Perhaps a hybrid of the two is in order?

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  6. To me,I liked the story line of B better.

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  7. Definitely B, it seemed A jumped all around and was hard to follow.

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  8. Exactly what Emily said. A has the voice, and B has the info. I'd order a hybrid for sure.

    With A, I agree that you should cut the second paragraph. With B, I'd cut the first paragraph and start with the smokin' hot kiss. Also with B, I couldn't figure out who was who, so maybe be more clear about who's the boyfriend and who's the dreamboy.

    Either way, I must read it! Too bad I'm not an agent, yes?

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