The Saturday Slash

Don't be afraid to ask for help with the most critical first step of your writing journey - the query.

I’ve been blogging since 2011 and have critiqued over 200 queries here on the blog using my Hatchet of Death. This is how I edit myself, it is how I edit others. If you think you want to play with me and my hatchet, shoot me an email.

If the Saturday Slash has been helpful to you in the past, or if you’d like for me to take a look at your query please consider making a donation, if you are able.

If you’re ready to take the next step, I also offer editing services.

My thoughts are in blue, words to delete are in red, suggested rephrasing is in orange.

I was looking for Literary Agents in the market for unique, out-of-the-box Science Fiction stories featuring BIPOC, and a search led me to your website. I am writing in hopes that you will find my 51,560 word sci-fi sports story “War/Game” interesting. Not a bad way to start, but I always encourage writers to open with the hook. They know that you're looking for an agent, b/c you're querying them. Everyone has a title, a genre and a wordcount. Start with what makes you unique - the hook of your book. Also, word count can be rounded - so this would be 52k.

Ahmed Dean is a star point guard for a lowly basketball team in the midst of one of their worst seasons. Right now this hook isn't indicating in any way that this is an SF story. It sounds like a straight up sports tale He came to this team to change its losing attitude and habits for the better, but inept play from his teammates, clashes with coaches and the selfishness of the other star player on the team are wearing on him. He is losing track of time and alienating himself from his friends, fans and girlfriend. What does this mean? How? What does losing time look like? A season-defining game against his defending champion former team is right around the corner, and Ahmed cannot afford to fail. Again, all the focus here seems to be on sports, not SF.

Ahmed Dean is a leader of a small army of freedom fighters sent from planet Earth to liberate planet Mars from a tyrannical rule. The enemy is always well prepared for Ahmed’s army, and his troops are losing every battle. The grind of surviving a losing you've got an echo here with losing war on a foreign planet with a harsh climate, hazardous sandstorms and giant man-eating wurms is making it hard for him to rest, and he frequently blacks out from sleep deprivation. One final, desperate raid on a crucial military post is his last hope of turning the tide of the war, and Ahmed cannot afford to fail.

One of these worlds is real. The other one is all in Ahmed’s mind.

And Ahmed needs to figure out which is which before his losses cost him everything. What is everything? What is at stake? Losing his mind? Losing the war? Losing a basketball game? I think what you have here is interesting in a Fight Club type of way, but you'll need to be more clear about what is at stake - and I would also advise opening with the SF element, rather than the contemporary basketball element.

I am an African-American writer, and I have already had four novels published. Did they do well? If so, mention the titles. If they did badly, I wouldn't mention them at all. I wrote and illustrated a webcomic for three years, definitely link it and I was an entertainment journalist for the Michigan Daily Newspaper. I studied creative writing under the tutelage of Jonis Agee (Strange Angels, South of Resurrection) and Tish O’Dowd (Floaters). I also maintain a weekly writing advice blog at www.proseandquans.substack.com Just as an FYI, I get an error message when I try to visit this link = uses an unsupported protocol

The first few pages and a complete synopsis is available upon request. I thank you for your time and look forward to your response.

The Saturday Slash

Don't be afraid to ask for help with the most critical first step of your writing journey - the query.

I’ve been blogging since 2011 and have critiqued over 200 queries here on the blog using my Hatchet of Death. This is how I edit myself, it is how I edit others. If you think you want to play with me and my hatchet, shoot me an email.

If the Saturday Slash has been helpful to you in the past, or if you’d like for me to take a look at your query please consider making a donation, if you are able.

If you’re ready to take the next step, I also offer editing services.

My thoughts are in blue, words to delete are in red, suggested rephrasing is in orange.

When a severed arm washes up on shore of Cormorant's Roost, other island residents blame sharks. Mira knows it was no shark, but a monster with fangs and scales who killed to save her. I like it, but some clarification might be needed. Did the monster kill the owner of this arm to save her? Or was this a separate incident?

Years later, because you are unsure of whether this is YA or not, we need clarification on her age here Mira overcomes the fear that kept her away from the ocean to rescue an orphaned sea otter pup. She re-encounters the creature, a telepathic sea monster who is trapped in exile from his South Pacific home and calls himself Bardo. Her fear turns to wonder--Bardo is intelligent, majestic, and he only kills and eats those who deserve it. Some explanation here of what that looks like - examples, maybe, of those he has killed. This could easily be a sliding scale. Bardo is thrilled that his years of solitude are over, and Mira feels powerful by association with the predator.

Bardo is nearly discovered when Calder, a summer resident on his sailboat, finds Mira in the sea miles from shore and “rescues” her. From what? Is she in danger of drowning? In danger from Bardo? Mira finds Calder entitled and arrogant, but he starts to erode the seawall around her heart. How, if she finds him entitled and arrogant? Meanwhile, the body count on the island grows, again, who is he killing? Just bad people? How bad? along with suspicions about what’s in the water. Mira is desperate to help Bardo return home before he is captured or killed, but she can’t do it alone. She must decide whether she can trust Calder with her secret.

DRAWN ONWARD is Adult Magical Realism with YA crossover appeal, complete at 79,000 words. It features the fight for survival despite parental abuse and isolation Wait, what? How does parental abuse fit into this story? Isolation? found in Kristin Hannah’s The Great Alone with the hint of magic in the contemporary world found in The Shape of Water.

I think this sounds like a ton of fun, and if Mira is an adult for the majority of the manuscript, then this is an adult novel. The sudden dropping of parental abuse at the end needs to be drawn into the query as a whole. Is this indicative of how Bardo saved her when she was younger? What happened? How did that affect the rest of Mira's life? Why does she have seawalls around her heart? What is this isolation? Personal and priviate, or of the setting in general? How can there be a connection between Mira and Calder when the only characteristics we have for him here are extremely negative? Overall, I think this sounds like a cool idea, and like it could have some great themes - they just need to be included in the query.

The Saturday Slash

Don't be afraid to ask for help with the most critical first step of your writing journey - the query.

I’ve been blogging since 2011 and have critiqued over 200 queries here on the blog using my Hatchet of Death. This is how I edit myself, it is how I edit others. If you think you want to play with me and my hatchet, shoot me an email.

If the Saturday Slash has been helpful to you in the past, or if you’d like for me to take a look at your query please consider making a donation, if you are able.

If you’re ready to take the next step, I also offer editing services.

My thoughts are in blue, words to delete are in red, suggested rephrasing is in orange.

To stop a corrupt queen from invading his kingdom, Keil of Istria must find a fearless girl willing to ride the most belligerent dragon in a race that will decide the fate of his homeland. This feels like a lot up front. I don't understand why a race decides things, and why Keil isn't riding the dragon himself Because in the fae realm, clashes are settled by dragon race, and the fiercest dragon is often victorious. However, such a beast cannot be raced by merely anyone. When Keil sets his sights on a Seattle teen aiming for a career as a BMX racer, Why wouldn't he look for a fae to ride a dragon? Why would he search for someone in the human world? he doesn’t expect to have to protect her from life-threatening attacks by wild fae under the queen’s spell. But why not? Wouldn't he expect the queen to do something to defend herself, of play a game? Fae are tricky by nature, and if he is one, why is he surprised? Nor does he expect to fall for her. The stronger his feelings for her grow, the more he questions his mission. Why would his growing feelings make him question his mission?

In a world where humans and fae live side by side, Skylar Thomson must choose between appeasing her driven coach or dating the charming fae who comes to her races. She knows he’s a distraction, but for once, she’s willing to take a chance off the track. Yet when she’s kicked off the team, she struggles to find a way to achieve her racing dream. I almost feel like you should be starting with Skylar rather than with Keil, becuase here is where we learn that the human and fae live side by side. Also, why is she kicked off the team? For being distracted? Because he's a fae? What are the relationships like between the species?

By the time Skylar discovers Keil has been keeping secrets, What's his secret? A query isn't the place to tease she has a target on her back, and time is running out for his kingdom. But he refuses to let her risk her life—he’ll find another way to save Istria. When the queen kidnaps him and poisons the wild fae in his land, What do they have to do with anything? an angry Skylar knows what she must do. But racing a bike is nothing compared to racing a dragon.

HER STERLING FAE is a stand-alone novel with series potential that will appeal to fans of Rachel Morgan’s Creepy Hollow series and Sarah K.L. Wilson’s Dragon School series, and readers who enjoy stories about ordinary girls who accomplish the extraordinary.

I am a freelance web designer with a master’s in Environmental Science and a love for Pomeranians and Manta comics.

Good comp titles! Overall, I think you've got all the pieces, but they aren't in the right places. We need to understand from the beginning that fae and human share a world, what the relationship between the two is, why Keil would seek a human to do this job, and what the secret he is keeping actually is. The threads are all here, but they're not joined together in the braid that you want from a query.