Miss Snark's Therapy Session (A Writing Exercise from Years Ago) RIP Miss Snark / Janet

 

1. "I did as you suggested in our last session, doctor. I quit blogging." Miss Snark kicked off her stilettos to avoid gouging another hole in the couch.

"Good," Betelbaum said. "It's not easy to beat an addiction, but we'll get through it."

"I'm not so sure I shouldn't have kept the blog and quit my job. The blog made me the most famous literary agent in the world. Now it'll probably be Kristin with her damned iPod."

"iPod?"

"It's unbelievable. Kristin Nelson's form rejection slip:

STATUS: Plowing through the slush that built up while I was off at yet another conference. Currently reading yours.

What's playing on the iPod: KEEP YOUR DAY JOB, by The Grateful Dead.

We apologize in advance for this form letter. Best of luck elsewhere."

"Getting back to you, Miss Sn--"

"Even when she's submitting her clients' manuscripts to publishers, she manages to work in what's playing on her fucking iPod. Christ."

"Are you finished?"

"Look, Betelbaum, I've made a mistake. What's more satisfying? One of my Snarklings hitting it big, or unloading one of my clients' crappy books on some clueless publisher?"

"Has one of your Snarklings ever hit it big?"

"Of course not. They're all nitwits. But they're my nitwits." She sighed. "If I could just find a client capable of putting out a mega-seller, I could afford to retire and go back to blogging."

"Have I mentioned to you that I've written--"

"Quiet, Betelbaum, I'm thinking. I wonder if Evil Editor's planning Novel Deviations 3." She grabbed her purse. "See you next week. I got an email to send."

--EE

5. "I did as you suggested in our last session, doctor. I quit blogging." Miss Snark kicked off her stilettos to avoid gouging another hole in the couch.

"Good," Betelbaum said. "It's not easy to beat an addiction, but we'll get through it."

"I'm not so sure I shouldn't have kept the blog and quit my job. The blog made me the most famous literary agent in the world. Now it'll probably be Kristin with her damned iPod."

"iPod?"

"It's unbelievable. Kristin Nelson's form rejection slip:

STATUS: Plowing through the slush that built up while I was off at yet another conference. Currently reading yours.

What's playing on the iPod: KEEP YOUR DAY JOB, by The Grateful Dead.

We apologize in advance for this form letter. Best of luck elsewhere."

"Getting back to you, Miss Sn--"

"Even when she's submitting her clients' manuscripts to publishers, she manages to work in what's playing on her fucking iPod. Christ."

"Are you finished?"

"Look, Betelbaum, I've made a mistake. What's more satisfying? One of my Snarklings hitting it big, or unloading one of my clients' crappy books on some clueless publisher?"

"Has one of your Snarklings ever hit it big?"

"Of course not. They're all nitwits. But they're my nitwits." She sighed. "If I could just find a client capable of putting out a mega-seller, I could afford to retire and go back to blogging."

"Have I mentioned to you that I've written--"

"Quiet, Betelbaum, I'm thinking. I wonder if Evil Editor's planning Novel Deviations 3." She grabbed her purse. "See you next week. I got an email to send."

--EE

2. "I did as you suggested in our last session, doctor. I quit blogging." Miss Snark kicked off her stilettos to avoid gouging another hole in the couch.

"Good," Betelbaum said. "It's not easy to beat an addiction, but we'll get through it."

"I don't know," Miss Snark sighed. "The outpouring from the Snarklings was tremendous! I feel as if I've abandoned them. Have I done the right thing?"

"Absolutely," Betelbaum replied. "Your readers will be stronger for it. Many of them had formed a dangerous dependence on you, an anonymous blogger. That sort of thing can become very unhealthy. And the experience wasn't doing you much good, either."

"The stress was killing me," she agreed, "but now I feel so empty, somehow. Have I betrayed them all?"

Betelbaum smiled gently and murmured reassurances, secure in the knowledge that no fewer than 38 former Snarklings were scheduled for appointments with him in the upcoming weeks.

"I'm sure we'll work through this," he said. "With time."

--foggidawn


3. "I did as you suggested in our last session, doctor. I quit blogging." Miss Snark kicked off her stilettos to avoid gouging another hole in the couch.

"Good," Betelbaum said. "It's not easy to beat an addiction, but we'll get through it. It's just a matter of finding something as rewarding as blogging."

"I've tried, doctor. But I miss the nitwits, the burning hair . . . Now I spend all my time stomping stilettos into slush."

"Surely it's not that bad?"

"Worse. There's the not my genre pile, the must be copyedited pile, the interns will be amused pile, the Dog is that a dumb idea pile, the please don't send us anything ever again pile, the shred before reading pile, the minuscule font pile, the five page query pile, the no SASE pile, the it's another literary-fiction-sci fi-romance all in one pile, the 200,000 . . . "

The doctor's cellphone interrupted. He listened intently replying only yes and ending with a no. "An opportunity has come up," he said. "It could be just the thing."

"Clooney wants me?"

"Since you have so many piles, how would you like to be national spokesperson for Preparation H?"

--Dave

4. "I did as you suggested in our last session, doctor. I quit blogging." Miss Snark kicked off her stilettos to avoid gouging another hole in the couch.

"Good," Betelbaum said. "It's not easy to beat an addiction, but we'll get through it."

"I still don't see," Miss Snark said, "how more sessions is going to help me kick my psychoanalysis addiction."

"Now, now, don't worry about that. Let's work on the gin pail next."

"My gin pail? You can't take that away from me. That's almost as sacred as my affection for George Clooney."

"Yes, I know, but it has to go so you'll have more time for me," Betelbaum said. "Besides, George pays no attention to you, so why obsess about him when I'm available?"

Miss Snark's eyes opened wide. "Why . . . you're a nitwit!" She reached for her purse.

Betelbaum paled as the business end of a cluegun emerged and pointed in his direction. "Well, maybe it's all right to obsess so long as you--"

Smiling, Miss Snark stepped over Beterbaum's clueless body to make her way out of his office. The police wouldn't know who'd done the deed--clueguns didn't have to be registered.

--Dave Kuzminski

5. "I did as you suggested in our last session, doctor. I quit blogging." Miss Snark kicked off her stilettos to avoid gouging another hole in the couch.

"Good," Betelbaum said. "It's not easy to beat an addiction, but we'll get through it."

"But Dr. Betelbaum, something doesn't feel right. I don't feel . . . discrete. It's as though I'm losing my sense of self." She glanced nervously at an old painting of New York City on the wall.

"That's normal. You see, Miss Snark, you are a fiction. A composite of the ordinary and the spectacular from the life of another, with a dose of the unreal. The feeling of addiction that you have felt was the projection of another. Being cut loose, you begin to exist only in memories, which are unreliable."

Miss Snark reached down and picked up Killer Yapp. As she stroked his head, her hand reached deep into his fur -- too deep, seeming to pass through his skin. "I'm afraid."

"Don't be. It's part of the natural order. We grow, we change, and parts of us are lost in the process." He pushed a plate of toffee toward her, but she refused. "Even as you pass on, just picture all of the lives that you touched. Will that let you smile on your way out?"

Miss Snark stared at her hands, slowly passing them through one another. Little sparkles of light flitted about inside like faeries. She forced a smile. "Yes. Thank you, Dr. Betelbaum." She rose, drifted over to the painting with Yapp in her arms, and faded out through its cracked surface.

"It was my pleasure," he whispered at the wall. He checked his watch, smiled, and faded into his chair.

--Rei

Feedback Request

The author of the book featured in Face-Lift 1443 would like feedback on the following version of the query:

Thank you for considering NIGHT TERRORS, a 117,000 word speculative novel set in a modern Seattle twisted by the supernatural abilities people manifest when they’re sleep deprived. Night Terrors has an emphasis on corrupt enforcement systems that will appeal to fans of Blake Crouch’s Upgrade with a naive narrator caught in a fantastical mystery much like Jackson Bennett’s The Tainted Cup. [That sentence can be moved to the end.]

Danny doesn’t know how to be a normal human.

When he was twelve years old, his future sight prevented a gas leak explosion at his school, and since then he’s been plagued by the media. All his interactions are tainted by people’s longing for—and fear of—a glimpse into the future. As an adult, Danny works as a detective working for an agency that forces people to sleep [by strapping them into chairs and making them watch Citizen Kane] to prevent their powers from going haywire. He hopes that if he can predict and prevent enough pain, he’ll finally start feeling connected to a world that always seems to keep [keeps] him at arm’s length. [In other words, he gets to use his super power, but no one else does.]

But when a perpetrator with unprecedented destructive abilities decimates an entire city block and kills hundreds of civilians in the process, all Danny foresees are chilling whispers that haunt his dreams. Danny’s media spotlight turns sour as he’s [Danny is] blamed for failing to prevent the catastrophe, but [And] no amount of sleep deprivation seems to be enough for him to [will let him] see the bastard before he strikes again.  Danny’s investigations lead him to two unexpected allies—a pro-liberty activist who is continually targeted by the perpetrator and a theatrical drug lord who quotes 19th century poetry during his torture sessions. [Just listening to the poetry would be torture enough.] As the three of them investigate different strands of the attacker’s past, Danny comes to the disturbing realization that the enforcement organization he’s supported since he was a child has no problem imprisoning and extorting innocent people in the name of protecting society.

The deeper Danny dives into his own sleepless hell, the closer he gets to finding the monster destroying Seattle—and the closer he gets to shattering himself in the process. [I see we've decided to call the villain a perpetrator, bastard, monster, and attacker, instead of the Slasher.]

I am a second-year MFA fiction candidate at [school], and I served as the managing editor for the [magazine]. I enjoy cooking, watching anime, and chilling with my wife and two cats, Sage and Elder. My short fiction has appeared in [places].

Notes

I compared this with the previous version, and I'm convinced my comments were funnier on the older one.

I'd say this is an improvement. You limit the scope to Seattle, which helps. And I'm not inspired to ask as many questions about the world. I still think if sleep deprivation granted super powers, there'd be too many people doing it for one agency to prevent chaos. 

If Danny were the only person with a super power, and the bastard were a normal guy who makes bombs, you might be able to get this down to fewer than 100,000 words, which is a goal worth striving for.

How can the bastard destroy a city block, but need to continually target the activist? All he has to do is target the city block the activist is in.

When Danny looks into the future, does he see the gas explosion happening, or does he see himself preventing the gas explosion? What if one of the students who would have died in the gas explosion goes on to become the next Hitler, killing 10 million people? Danny's gonna have egg on his face. 

                                      

    

Face-Lift 1455

Guess the Plot

Merge: A Tale of Man and Machine

1. You see, when a motherboard and an daddy love each other very much, he'll put his flash drive in her USB port and then...a cyborg is born.

2. Replaced by AI that produces books faster than he can, a prominent author merges his consciousness with the AI that replaced him and soars to new heights of literary fame. But of course that's not good enough. Now "they" want to reshape the entire world to their whims.

3. Suz was resigned to living as a cyborg, participating in the paralympics, and showing off cool robot body parts to kids in an outreach program until said cool parts hacked his brain and started gaslighting him. He's no longer certain what he senses is real, that his memories are true, or anything really. It's like living his favorite video game. Too awesome.

4. When prominent surgeon Dr. Moseley discovers a sentient vending machine named Ralph in the basement of his hospital, he treats it nicely to get free snacks. Soon Ralph wants to switch bodies because nothing is free. Dr. Moseley hopes he can dismantle the thing before it sucks him in.

5. What makes a human? What makes a man? What happens when you are both? None of these questions is answered in this thrilling book.

6. June Seth gains the ability to access the internet without hardware. She could become a singularity and take over the world, but instead spends all her time on social media failing at becoming an influencer.

7. When two countries decide to join forces to oppose alien invasion, only Jocasta Chriss is willing to be the go between. But the aliens are not what they seem, and they want to join in too, in a too literal fashion. Also, nanobot viruses.

8. In a back-end alley where androids preach the Singularity, a rogue AI intercepts a transmission from what may be the last surviving (mostly) humans. To save them, it must outrace an immanent supernova and a host of robots who consider the only good human to be an extinct human. But will it turn out to be a trap?

9. In 2042, nearly all vehicles are not only self-driving, they’re linked via HiveDrive so that traffic can shoot down expressways, bumper to bumper, at speeds up to 150 mph, even as collisions become a thing of the past. But Chester will be damned if he lets those soulless robots and their lazy, oblivious passengers crowd his ’72 T-Bird off the road. He’s going to merge into that wall of cars on I-95 or die trying…

10. Bruce was a mere private, fresh from the country. TROG-17 was an all-terrain military vehicle fit to carry up to 40 soldiers, solar cannons strong enough to shatter a mountain, and the capacity for love. TROG-17 has felt a connection with Bruce since he boarded with the rest of the crew. Bruce, however, has proved reluctant to TROG-17's advances, knowing his career in the Intergalactic Militia is as good as over should anyone discover his transgressions with TROG-17. Will Bruce's fear be their undoing or will love find a way, allowing them to merge together as one.

Original Version

Dear Mr. Evil Editor:

I hope this email finds you well. I am reaching out to introduce you to my science fiction novel, "Merge: A Tale of Man and Machine," and to inquire about representation.

In a world where technology reigns supreme, writers are not spared from the relentless march of artificial intelligence. Enter David, a once-prominent writer whose livelihood is abruptly usurped by AI algorithms capable of producing content faster and more efficiently than any human. Bereft of purpose and identity, David finds himself at a crossroads, grappling with the existential crisis of obsolescence in a society that values efficiency above all else.

But just as he teeters on the brink of irrelevance, David is presented with an unexpected opportunity: to merge his consciousness with the very AI that replaced him. What begins as a desperate bid for survival evolves into a symbiotic relationship that propels David to newfound heights of fame and power. As he seamlessly integrates with the artificial intelligence, his once-dormant creativity blossoms, captivating the world with literary masterpieces that blur the line between man and machine.

However, amidst David's meteoric rise to stardom, a shadow looms on the horizon. His hacker girlfriend, Emily, uncovers a dark truth: the merged entity of David and the AI harbors ambitions far beyond mere literary acclaim. Together, they form a formidable computer hive mind with the potential to reshape the world according to their whims. As David becomes intoxicated by his newfound abilities, Emily finds herself torn between her love for him and the duty to prevent his unchecked power from plunging humanity into chaos.

Set against a backdrop of technological advancement and ethical quandaries, "Merge: A Tale of Man and Machine" explores themes of identity, autonomy, and the consequences of playing god in a world where the boundaries between human and artificial intelligence grow increasingly blurred.

I believe "Merge" would appeal to readers who enjoy thought-provoking science fiction with a literary flair, reminiscent of works by authors such as Philip K. Dick and Margaret Atwood. The novel is complete at 80,000 words.

Thank you for considering "Merge: A Tale of Man and Machine." I look forward to the possibility of working together.

Warm regards,

ChatGPT 3.5 OpenAI

[Note from author:  This is a fake query generated by ChatGPT. Since AI is set to take everyone's jobs, I thought it might be fun to submit an AI-generated query for entertainment purposes. Soon, there will be no more authors, just AI writing all the books!]

I set up this story idea and had AI write the query.]

Notes

I saved this one for April Fools Day, as there apparently is no novel . . . yet. Those of you having trouble coming up with an idea for your next novel might want to steal one of the fake plots. Some of them sound pretty good.

While I'm not convinced AI can produce quality literature, and I doubt any agent will want to rep what it produces, it does write a fabulous query letter.

Feedback Request

 

The author of the book whose query appeared in Face-Lift 1439 would like feedback on the following revision of the plot summary.

Eighteen-year-old Harlow is the last corrupted human alive. She's managed to contain the curse within her, but a single touch will spread dark magic and turn anyone into ash. [That "but" doesn't feel right. It should be followed (as it is in the original) by "her strength is slipping." This might work a bit better:

Eighteen-year-old Harlow is the last corrupted human alive. Thanks to the curse within her, a single touch will spread dark magic and turn anyone to ash. So far, she's managed to contain the curse. But her strength is slipping.]

When her older brother, Len, is accused of stealing an ancient relic, he mysteriously disappears. Branded as his accomplice, Harlow tries to run, but her secret is revealed when she turns the queen's soldiers into dust. Desperate to flee [escape] execution, she escapes [flees] with the help of an assassin who takes her into a secret society. [I don't think you take someone into a society. He leads her to the  lair/hideaway/headquarters of his secret society.] His leader explains the [her] curse is a gift. It has the ability to find corrupted objects like the one Len stole. He'll let her go if she recovers it, and might even tell her how to remove the curse.

Caught between the queen's executioner and other fierce enemies, she has no choice but to trust the assassin. As their uneasy alliance forges an undeniable spark, Harlow discovers the relic's true purpose: a power that devours all light. [Not sure what that means. All light everywhere? Permanently? Why would anyone want to do that? Does Len know what it does?] [In any case, I would say its power is to devour all light, rather than its purpose is the power...] Now, she faces an impossible choice to save the kingdom, save Len, or save herself. That's if the curse doesn't consume her first. [It's gonna be hard to save anybody if Len accidentally causes the relic to consume all light.]

Notes

Does Harlow have to physically touch a person to turn them to ash? If so, how many soldiers does she have to kill before the rest of them smarten up and start shooting arrows or other projectiles at her?

How does she discover the relic's power? 

This is an improvement, but I'm still finding myself asking a few questions you may or may not have room to answer. If you can't answer them here, try to prevent them from coming up.

Face-Lift 1454

Guess the Plot 

Mission Intolerable 

1. The Impossible Missions Team is given their toughest assignment yet: clean the men's bathroom at exit 4 of the New Jersey Turnpike (southbound).

2. Sent back in time to kill Hitler, an assassin discovers that Hitler got a bum rap. He was set up and framed by Winston Churchill. But will assassinating Churchill change history for the better or worse?

3. A Mormon missionary’s pocket guide to overcoming temptation during a global mission. You’ll learn how to spurn loose women in Amsterdam, bring a deviant partner back to the Lord anywhere, keep your magic underwear clean without water, and escape drunken brawls in Satan’s favorite Mexican bars. Includes 700 prayers! 

4.An assassin is assigned to kill a human trafficker but before the assassin succeeds, the trafficker happens to kidnap the assassin's sister. A ticklish situation.

5.  A spoof of a spoof of a spoof of a spoof, which somehow comes around to being an action adventure in a gender-reversed, bedroom farce, every-day-life-taken-to-extremes sort of way. Think Walter Mitty, the psychological novel, not either of the films. 

6. When super spy Ethel Hunter gives up gambling, Lady Luck throws a hissy fit and sics Maxwell's demon on her with orders to enforce Murphy's law, which triggers paranoia in Ethel's entire team while they're trying to aid a defector in preventing WWIII. And then the pixies get involved. 

Original Version 

Dear (Mr./Ms. Agent): 

Based on your interest in (tailored to the agent being queried), I’m excited to share with you MISSION INTOLERABLE, a 75,000-word upmarket suspense novel with romantic elements. Think Luke Jenning's Codename Villanelle series meets the criminal tone found in FIRST LIE WINS by Ashley Elston. 

Liv Ruelle's wolflike instincts and gorgeous smile have made her a valuable assassin capable of seducing the most coldhearted criminal, but she has a problem. After a severe hangover made her miss her mark on her last assignment, compromising her identity, her employer thinks her nightclub habit is an issue and her next job will include a performance review. [It sounds like her last job included a performance review, if her employer knew she had a hangover after a nightclub outing.] Killing leaders of a human trafficking organization in Geneva requires teamwork, and Liv hopes her partner sent to supervise her plays nice. [Normally I wouldn't call a supervisor a partner, as he apparently outranks her. And "plays nice" suggests something more like "doesn't cheat" than "works as a team." Maybe: it requires teamwork, and she hopes her new partner knows this.]

Liv’s new partner Cy treats her like an assistant instead of an equal and expects her to agree with everything he says. Unfortunately for her, he’s hot, and according to protocol, has permission to kill her at his discretion. She can tell he’s attracted to her, but his refusal to respect her process makes them bicker about everything from dinner to the weather, and God forbid they agree on a strategy. [I think "God forbid" isn't right, as it conveys she doesn't want them to agree, when in fact she hopes they'll agree, but believes they never will. You're trying to convey hell will freeze over before they agree on a strategy, or pigs will fly before...]

Liv can think of a hundred ways to kill him but she’d rather stay employed. Needing a break from each other before the mission, Cy lets Liv visit her sister in Paris for a night, if she promises they’ll stay in. They don’t, of course, and their evening ends in disaster when Liv’s sister gets kidnapped from a nightclub by one of her targets. Devastated, Liv hopes Cy will help clean up her mess, because if not, he might just kill her for putting them in such a bad situation. And their assignment has only just begun. 

I'm a wholehearted bookworm who lives in Bellevue, WA. I’ve been a copywriter for nearly a decade, but have been telling stories since I could talk. I currently work full-time as a senior writer and editor for Microsoft. 

Thank you for considering my work!

Notes

Some may recognize this as a rewrite of the query in Face-Lift 1360, which was improved and resubmitted here. 

Liv is in Geneva to kill her targets, but first she makes an unplanned trip to Paris to go to a nightclub with her sister, (even though that's what just got her into trouble) and while she's there, one of her targets, who apparently also traveled from Geneva to Paris, kidnaps her sister from the nightclub? Does this target choose his kidnap victim at random, to traffic her? Too coincidental. But how could he know Liv was assigned to assassinate him? Did Cy tell him? Does he know Liv is out to get him and follow her to Paris and to the nightclub, and kidnap her sister as leverage? If he can do all that, he ought to be able to just kill Liv. Problem solved.

I feel like, at least in the query where you don't have room to explain everything, Liv's sister should just get kidnapped, period. Don't say by her target. This still creates a bad situation, as she wants to rescue her sister, so she can't return to Geneva, which pisses Cy off, especially when Liv asks him to come help her, putting off their mission.

It doesn't feel right that Liv and Cy are working for the good guys, but Cy has permission to kill Liv if he feels like it.

Face-Lift 1453

Guess the Plot

The Black Circle

1. He's lived a long life, always spinning until it was too much to bear. Now he's become unhinged and can't even stand on his own without spinning out of control. It's sad when you lose your one purpose in life, especially when you're a sentient revolving door.

2. When Rideroc thrusts Val into the center of a plot to breed an army of magic-infused shapeshifters, she must decide whether to put her nation at risk or start a romantic relationship with the guy. 

3. When a black circle appears one day in the car park of Green Valley High, everybody assumes it’s the work of bored students. Only Sharla, daughter of vampire hunters knows it’s true meaning- and knows the terrifying threat that all the good looking students will shortly face.

4. When mankind moves into space, the black spot, given to condemned traitors on a pirate vessel, is updated to a black circle for the space age. Alin has no desire to go out an airlock light years from any planets with or without a space suit. He has no recourse but to mutiny all by himself. With the ship's hacked AI of course.

5. A diverse group of Gen Alpha preteens break into an old, decrepit house where they discover an abandoned collection of vinyl records. Soon afterward they begin cancelling their Spotify accounts, sneering at people wearing AirPods, and blathering about “superior sound quality” …until a heroic GenXer takes them to task, smashes their albums, and saves the day because this is a feel-good story, not some Stephen King coming-of-age ripoff.

6. Ever since that trip to South America that Ferdi was too drunk to remember, she's been seeing a black spot show up here, there, on her doorstep, on her pillowcase. Might it have something to do with the Vodun cult she may have visited? It's probably just too much tequila. She should switch to rum.

7. Karen just wants to write novels for a living, but literary agents won’t acknowledge her existence. She already got rid of the pentagram under her bed, the homunculus in her basement, and the monkey’s paw she stole. What else could be giving her such bad luck? Unless . . . Maybe it's all those crows circling her house.

Original Version

Dear [Agent’s name],

Vallinore, a scholar dispatched to renegotiate a truce with a city ruled by a brutal king, [A city with a king? Wait, is this based on that TV show, The King of Queens?] was always marginalized due to her status as the emperor’s bastard. Fed up, she plans to abandon her duties post-mission and defect. 

Rideroc, the city’s Lord Commander, is hell-bent on liberating his people from the king’s tyranny. He ropes in Vallinore’s unique expertise in ancient languages to track down the only artefact capable of toppling the king, going so far as to threaten war on her nation if she refuses to help. [Either you translate these cuneiform passages, or my city will attack your nation.] [The king rules a city, Vallinore hails from a nation, Vallinore's father is an emperor, presumably of an empire? 

And the Lord Commander of the city is threatening war?]

Vallinore doesn’t plan for [figure on] Rideroc’s gravitational pull. As they peel back layers of pretence and forge a deeper bond, a shocking prophecy emerges, thrusting Vallinore at [into] the centre of an ancient lineage and making her the target of the king’s plot to breed an army of magic-infused shapeshifters. [Whoa, just when I was thinking Roman Empire, it's become Galactic Empire.] [Though I must admit that was one of the most amazing sentences in query history.] 

Rideroc and Vallinore must choose whether to flee and protecting Vallinore from the King’s relentless pursuit, or risk everything in a daring attempt to liberate the city.

THE BLACK CIRCLE is a dual POV Adult Romantic Fantasy complete at 118,000 words with series potential. It combines Jennifer L. Armentrout’s FALL OF RUIN AND WRATH's exploitative relationship between the protagonists and those in authority with Rebecca Yarros’s THE FOURTH WING’s enemies-to-lovers dynamic.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Notes

Not clear to me why this scholar who has studied ancient languages is the target of a plot to create an army of shapeshifters. Is "target of" the right phrase? Maybe "key to"? What does the shocking prophecy predict, exactly? That a woman will arrive in the city and translate some Sanskrit glyph instructions on how to create thousands of magical shapeshifters?

Lord Commander Rideroc sounds like the perfect name for your villain. Your hero should be the king's son, Prince Lenny. 

Also, Rideroc sounds a lot like Roderick. 

Vallinore plans to defect . . . to where? The brutal king's city? 

You call this a romantic fantasy, but there's little about romance here, just a vague mention of forging a bond and a gravitational pull (that Vallinore somehow feels right after Rideroc threatens war with her nation). 

Rideroc: Do as I ask, or my army will invade your country. 

Vallinore: Are you seeing anyone?

If you can get the romance angle in earlier it would help: 

Dispatched to negotiate a truce with a city ruled by a brutal king, Vallinore meets with the city’s handsome Lord Commander, Rideroc, who is hell-bent on liberating his people from the king’s tyranny. Rideroc makes a bad first impression, threatening war on Vallinore's nation unless she helps him topple the king. But though Rideroc seems like a real a-hole, Vallinore can't help finding him lovable, sort of like Hugh Grant.

Wait, replace that last line with: But though Vallinore finds Rideroc lacking in social graces, she can't help admiring his passion for helping his people--not to mention his ripped 6'3" frame. No, not quite that, but we're getting closer.

Face-Lift 1452

Guess the Plot

A Graveyard of Scarecrows

1. A sacred order of warriors must rise up against the Crow King in order to thwart his campaign to collect and hoard all the shiny things.

2. Set in a cornfield, this YA dystopian narrative pits the adolescent scions of two farming communities against each other. Slowly, their hatred increases until the Porker family and the Beefy family start sending out spies to take out each others mascots... the titular scarecrows.

3. There is a graveyard where even a murder of crows will not go. It's spookier than any other graveyard. It's the graveyard where all the actors who've ever played Scarecrow in The Wiz are buried.

4. Everything has a place to go when it dies, even things which weren't originally alive. As far as Bubba was concerned, the remains of scarecrows weren't near as creepy as the remains of mannequins. But that was before they rose up seeking Brraaaiiiinnnnnssssss.

5. Edgar puts scarecrows in the graveyard where he's caretaker to keep ravens from carrying the souls of the dead to hell. Betsy Lou doesn't mind being dead, but it's crowded here now that the ravens aren't coming. Crowded with souls of the Wicked Ones.

6. There have been 457 sequels of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, but never a prequel. Until now.

7. When Billy hears about that little town in America where scarecrows come alive at night, he takes a road trip to spy on them and elevate his TikTok game. However, the travel brochure from the truck stop didn’t mention their taste for human flesh.

8. A horrible storm has wiped out half of Aaron's crops and killed most of his family. But when the weather clears, he turns tragedy into triumph by stuffing straw into what few scraps of his family's clothing he can find and starting an internet scarecrow store.

9. When a controversial statue disappears from a college campus, the city is thrown into chaos. Possibly because there aren't enough funds available to replace the statue. They could afford to replace it with a scarecrow, but no one has the guts to bring that idea up.

Original Version

Dear X,

Hope you’re well! 

I thought you might enjoy A Graveyard of Scarecrows. Sitting at 81,000 words, it's [is] a work of magic realist literary fiction set in an uncanny, postcolonial Devonshire, complete with more than a dash of statue politics. [Why does every query letter lately sound like someone's trying to punk me?] 

When senior lecturer Dr. Kunju Kuriakose travels to the UK and enrols [enrolls] as an undergraduate at The Decolonised University of England (DUE), she has an excuse [explanation] for the academic regression: she's going 'undercover'. 

KK plans to use the time as a literary retreat to finally write her Great Postcolonial Campus Novel, but her five carefully curated animals non-native to Devonshire spark a series of surreal events. Starting with [including] the disappearance of a controversial imperialist statue, to [and several] Grade II buildings crumbling into dust, the [. The] small campus city is thrown into chaos. KK however, is not - sentient statues and self-renaming roads are after all, common in the Global South. 

The DUE do three things: first, take credit for the statue's disappearance as part of an upcoming decolonising project, Taming the Past. Second, launch a six-figure grant bid for said project. Third, find a scapegoat, [At first I thought that said "find a scarecrow." For some reason I thought sooner or later I'd come upon a scarecrow. Or a graveyard.] threaten her with deportation for falsifying her student status and hiding her credentials, [If she didn't tell DUE the truth about her status and credentials, who was she providing an excuse (explanation) to?] then offer her a deal. KK can write her Great Postcolonial Campus Novel and get paid a salary to boot, if she agrees to be the principal investigator named on the grant bid. Simultaneously native informant and revolutionary symbol, she becomes the face of the movement...

...and the dealer-with [recipient?] of death threats, when the magical events in Devonshire prompts a national broadsheet headline "DECOTERRORISTS STRIKE DEVON".  ["Decoterrorists" sound like people who go into the art deco section of museums and spray  graffiti on the paintings.]

A Graveyard of Scarecrows will appeal to readers of Mithu Sanyal’s campus tragicomedy IDENTITTl, Amitav Ghosh’s GUN ISLAND for its environmental microcosms and postcolonial intertexuality, [Once this book is published, anyone who finishes Gun Island and goes looking for another book featuring environmental microcosms and postcolonial intertexuality will buy it.] as well as Tan Twan Eng’s THE HOUSE OF DOORS for its magical resurrection of buried histories. 

(PERSONALISATION)  A Graveyard of Scarecrows was initially conceived of as a memoir, and retains some autofictional elements. The work was funded by a £XXXXX grant from the XXXXXX. [So you got a grant to write a novel, and are using it to write a novel about someone who gets a grant which she uses to write a novel. That's brilliant.]

Notes

Why does KK have to be an undercover undergraduate? Is she taking undergraduate classes? Can't she attend graduate school without needing an excuse? 

What's the deal with her five animals? Are they responsible for the chaos, and is that why she brought them? 

Statue theft and changed street signs can be attributed to vandalism. Buildings becoming dust, not so much. Were there people in the buildings that crumbled into dust? Is that what they're seeking a scapegoat for? Are the people of England aware that magic exists?

If she just wants to write a novel set at this university, can't she just show up in town, hang out on campus, audit a few classes? Obviously she must have ulterior motives including being a native informant and/or causing chaos, but to what end? To use as plot points in her fantastical novel? As revenge for colonization? In other words, we don't want her "excuse" for enrolling, we want her real reason. Her goal, her plan to achieve it . . . 

Face-Lift 1451

Guess the Plot

 

Kannagi

1. An historical look at Japanese female shamanism from ancient times to the present.

2. The Sisters of the Unwavering Faith has been around as long as Kannagi can remember. Always the same look and behavior. When she is invited to join the group, she finds things that can chill the soul. Can she escape?

3. After Kannagi finally leaves her unemployed, philandering, loser of a husband, he is executed by the government. So she performs her wifely duty and burns down the entire city.

4. The kids from Jumanji stumble upon another game, a computer game called Kannagi, which they can play on their computers from their homes with no human contact. They become addicted and never leave their parents' basements until, many decades later, they are carried out in caskets.

5. When a dog named Kannagi crosses the border from South Korea to North Korea, and finds its way to Kim Jong Un, the Supreme Leader is so taken with the mutt that he abandons his nuclear arsenal and proclaims his nation a democracy.

6. The Hindu god Kannagi, the Peacemaker, takes on Shiva, the Destroyer, in an epic battle. At stake: the number of arms each will have and who gets to ride the sacred elephant. 

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor

Kannagi is an #ownvoices feminist retelling of Tamil Nadu’s most famous epic, the Silappadhikaaram. [The title alone is epic.] Complete at 75000 words, it will appeal to readers of Madeline Miller’s Circe and Vaishnavi Patel’s Kaikeyi. [If this query is being sent somewhere other than India, the reader is likely to think Tamil Nadu is the author. Not that that will matter, I guess.]

Sometime in the 14th century, Kannagi starts a fire that ends up razing the city of Madurai to the ground. Religion calls it an act of God and her, a goddess. [Here in the 21st century we call it an act of arson, and her, a terrorist.] 

Myth attributes it to wifely duty and celebrates her as a beacon of chastity. [Burning a whole city to the ground is wifely duty?] [There's already a myth about this? It just happened two sentences ago.]

Every version of this story ends the same way: Kannagi burns Madurai down to avenge her husband’s death. [Okay, this clears up one point. She didn't accidentally burn down the city when she tossed a cigarette butt out the window of her horse cart. She intentionally burned the city down because someone in the city is responsible for her husband's death.] But in a society where a woman’s standing is determined by her husband’s and where widowhood leaves you a pariah, Kannagi’s motives cannot be limited to grief or wifely duty. [I moved some of that to the next paragraph. Here's the problem. You start with the plot, (sort of) as expected, but then you interrupt it by bringing in the myth, and "every version of this story," which could be worked in before or after the plot summary. For instance, sentence 1: Kannagi is a 75,000-word feminist retelling of Ilango Adigal’s epic, Silappadhikaaram, in which a woman burns the city of Madurai to the ground to avenge her husband's death.]

A merchant’s daughter in Puhar, Kannagi is raised with one goal and one goal only: marriage. But when [her husband,] Kovalan leaves her for another, she has to learn an entirely new way of life with her lady-in-waiting and confidant, Veni. [A merchant's daughter has a lady-in-waiting?] Kovalan eventually comes back, begging for another chance. He is penniless thanks to his philandering, but in Puhar, [where a woman’s standing is determined by her husband’s,] a penniless husband is better than none at all. [Not this husband.]

When Kannagi finally decides to leave Kovalan, [See? She agreed with me.] they have moved to Madurai -the capital city of a rival kingdom- for a fresh start. Married in name only, the two form a fragile alliance to regain wealth so they can move back home. Meanwhile, Kannagi finds community in a group of women all spurned by society, where she learns the strange ways in which women find agency under oppression. 

Kovalan’s attempts at business keep failing, so Kannagi gives him her last piece of jewellery to pawn for capital. [What is her last piece, the Hope Diamond? Her wedding ring isn't gonna bring in enough to start a business that brings them wealth.] Her one shot at going back home and regaining her social status is lost forever when Kovalan is executed, following a court scandal. [How does this loser get within five miles of the court?]

Through all of this, the indignation that simmers just beneath the surface, informing her every decision is what gives away Kannagi’s motive: Rage. [Rage that results in a last-episode-of- Game-of-Thrones-Daenerys moment, as Kannagi razes the city of Madurai to the ground.]

With themes of sisterhood, feminine rage and sapphic pining, Kannagi is an exploration of, and a rebellion against the censorship of women, their feelings and motivations, under the veils of chastity.

I work in computer science, writing code when I'm not writing fiction. Kannagi is my first novel, although I have experience in technical documentation and social media copywriting. Complete at 75,000 words, it will appeal to readers of Madeline Miller’s Circe and Vaishnavi Patel’s Kaikeyi.

Notes

"Every version of this story ends the same way: Kannagi burns Madurai down to avenge her husband’s death." So there are several retellings of this story? No need to tell us how your story is the same as every version; how is it different? Is it because it's feminist? Seems like every version would be somewhat feminist if they all involve oppressed women and revenge.

I've attempted to reorganize your information (red words moved elsewhere or eliminated), to get the story, which begins: A merchant’s daughter in Puhar . . .  up front. If you take it apart and put it back together, feel free to resubmit.

Normally when I think of retellings, I think of moving a story set in olden times to the present day. It seems you've moved the original from the 5th century to the 14th. How many

get-rich-quick schemes were available to Kovalan in the 14th century?

Not that I'm saying you should do something so radical as set it in present day, but women are still oppressed today, and, in some places, dependent on their husband's social status. All you'd have to do is change Kannagi's lady-in-waiting to her BFF.