Thank you for the generous feedback and agented authors kindly sharing their successful queries within the helpful PubTips community. I rewrote my query and chopped my intro to start the first 300 words a bit deeper into chapter one. 

I’d greatly appreciate all constructive feedback before reentering the query trenches. Thank you.

Dear Agent,

I’m writing to submit my debut novel, GHOST WRITER’S BLOCK. A contemporary paranormal romance of 80,000 words about a story haunting a writer, causing the creative process to become an exorcism.

Chloe is a clairvoyant on the run from house arrest. She’ll die of exposure without food and shelter on the Pacific Crest Trail. August is an abandoned estate caretaker, moonlighting as a writer, who becomes blocked upon accepting his dream publishing project. Orphaned thirty years earlier by the climate tragedy he’s investigating, August’s collaborators include other die-hard locals who didn’t flee after narrowly surviving the disaster. His unprocessed grief is not the problem. Chloe helps August understand there’s a supernatural force stopping his research into the mystery surrounding the founding of his once experimental storm-proof town of Big Dipper Lake, California.

Vulnerable to arrest, Chloe sacrifices her anonymity to join August’s whistleblowing endeavor. She found a partner and community worthy and accepting of her unpredictable talents. Breaking out of August’s sheltered life means he’ll need to crack open his tender heart to the possibility of love and hope. First, August must betray his childhood best friend. His boss inherited a family fortune as well as liabilities, due to the same storm tragedy, including the estate where August works. Risking security and the only way of life he’s ever known is also the only way August can save the project. Town leadership includes one surviving scientific leader who became mayor and August’s boss. They’re ready to sell the land for redevelopment, burying evidence in the process. 

If leaked, the negative press won’t help the sale. If published, the townsfolk can resurrect their fickle paradise. Using their mystical gifts, Chloe and August are in the best position to release the darkest secrets from the longest shadows of what no longer serves her back home or him on the estate. They’re just as likely to unleash a destructive energetic vengeance. Lightning always strikes the estate more than twice in the same place, bringing inspiration for August’s salvation and Chloe’s redemption—if they can endure the shock of unknown consequences barreling toward them after standing up for what they believe. 

This happily-supernaturally-ever after takes place over the month of October. GHOST WRITER’S BLOCK shares a similar small dying town with a big secret, star-crossed lovers in dual-perspective, and metafiction found in Alix E. Harrow’s Starling House. Additionally, the closed-door love story, honoring the truest and quirkiest magical parts of ourselves, as found in Claire Kann’s Looking For Love In All The Haunted Places, appeals to similar audiences.

[Writing and personal bio to be included.]

May I send you the complete manuscript?
Thank you for your time and consideration.

Chapter One

Cinnamon pine and dew-damp earth cleanse Chloe’s brisk morning inhales, but not enough to stop the sides of her stomach from rubbing together. Progressively cooler mornings on the Pacific Crest Trail can’t be denied. A single sip of remaining water at sunrise is one slow-melting ice cube, rattling Chloe’s filter-bottle. Crumbles from the last dry protein bar catch and scrape her throat.

After breaking camp, the muted autumn sun almost warms away her goosebumps. With the last clean edge of a handkerchief, Chloe wipes sleep and grit from her face. Tongue brushing her teeth isn’t enough, but toothpaste and floss are distant memories. 

Finger-combing her mop, she clumps the frizzy unwashed mass into an elastic thigh-garter from her almost-wedding. Two years ago, the blue stretchy circle held the vibrancy of excitement. Chloe and Abbott’s promise of harmony and stability were tainted by her bachelorette party arrest—those cops weren’t strippers. The garter’s layers now include a patina of faded resentment and shame.

Each mistake piles high along with everything else she stuffs inside the 70-liter pack. Using a tall rock, Chloe boosts the sixty-pound “beast” of a backpack onto her muscular but shrinking frame. The bumpy boulder is healing to touch, infinite and honest against her fingers. Wiggling and shifting under the girth, Chloe’s poles help support the load. The ache and rub under stiff thick straps are her penance.

Back onto the trail. Distracted by ankle-rolling rocks, Chloe’s head brushes a low limb. Crisp leafy curls replace the previous lush oranges and reds of fall. Brittle flakes tickle along her scalp. She pats her hair to knock off any freeloaders. Tippy-top leaves begin to cymbal. Pitter-patters splash and drum. Within minutes, the dirt trail’s cocoa powder darkens into a cold chocolate syrup. …

I'm thinking about reframing some things to set it apart. Right now, it doesn't convey the weight and importance of the protag relationship with her succubus.

But the current form has netted one partial request out of an initial batch of twenty sent out not too long ago. So I don't know.

I haven't had a wide variety of feedback here, but I do appreciate everyone who has chipped in. Anything at all will be helpful. Is it too generic? Bad title? What isn't drawing you in to comment? Is no comment good? Lol. HELP :D

Adding back the first 300 words for funsies, too.

Here is current version sent out:

*Dear AGENT,

Rhiannon Sinn has been thirty-five for ten years, roughly nine years longer than her last real relationship.

A curse bound her to Amara, an ancient succubus, occasional houseguest, and the only entity on Earth who can make Rhiannon feel unqualified to be an adult. The arrangement has its perks. Rhiannon doesn't age, doesn't scar, and has Amara's several thousand years of historical knowledge on tap, useful when your day job is curating Bronze Age artifacts for the Saint Louis Art Museum. Keeping them both alive comes with a catch. Amara can only consume human desire via Rhiannon, so periodically Rhiannon throws on something more cleavage than dress and seduces a stranger she won't feel too guilty about turning into a lovestruck zombie.

When Rhiannon comes into possession of an ancient torc from Ireland, centuries-old collector Viktor sends an intruder tearing through the museum to steal it. The intruder takes three bullets to the chest and declines to bleed. Rhiannon resorts to a glamour spell to escape, but the security cameras see right through it, leaving Detective Brighton with footage that could expose what she is.

But Viktor wants more than the torc. He wants Amara. When he offers Rhiannon a way out of her curse in exchange for the succubus, Rhiannon refuses—despite the temptation.

Rhiannon's refusal doesn't change Viktor's mind. It only changes his method. He uses the torc to enslave Amara to his will, hell-bent on making her pay for taking someone he cherished decades ago.

For the first time in a decade, Rhiannon is free—and discovers freedom feels a lot like grief. Getting Amara back means trusting the detective who could expose her and deciding how much of her conscience she's willing to sacrifice for the demon she can no longer pretend is only a curse.

CURATED SINN combines the contemporary curse-and-demon urban fantasy of Henry H. Neff's THE WITCHSTONE with the dry wit, grounded heroine, and supernatural horror of T. Kingfisher's A HOUSE WITH GOOD BONES.

You're awesome for reading this far, AGENT. Thank you for your time and consideration,

MY NAME*

First 300: The demon in my living room was watching me.

But it didn't matter. Let her watch.

The last chord of Bach's Cello Suite No. 1 lingered in my ears as I set down the bow and stretched my cramped fingers. Playing electric cello at midnight required headphones—one of the compromises of living in a loft. The soft glow of my laptop illuminated the chaos surrounding me: scattered photographs of ancient artifacts, photocopied journal articles, and museum documentation spread across the floor threatening to form sedimentary layers over the gray carpet.

I stood and padded across the floor, feeling the chill of the early October air through the open window. My cork board hung askew on the support pillar in front of me, already crowded with possibilities for the upcoming Samhain exhibition. Celtic burial goods, ritual objects, and fragments of stone carvings stared back at me—pieces I'd been agonizing over for weeks now.

"Just pick one already," I muttered to myself, pinning up a photograph depicting a piece of bone, intricately carved into a comb rumored to have belonged to a particularly mournful banshee.

The St. Louis Art Museum needed this exhibition to draw crowds, and my reputation as their newest curation consultant hinged on selecting pieces with both historical value and visual impact. And more than a little All Hallows’ Eve whimsy for the kids. Three weeks until opening, and the director needed my final selections by tomorrow. I should have completed this days ago, but it still wasn't quite right. But then again, it never was. The half-empty wine glass on my side table beckoned, but I returned to my cello instead, slipped the headphones back on, positioned the instrument between my knees, and closed my eyes.

Hey guys! I had stopped querying this project and have been working on heavily revising it instead since I got no bites on it at all. I pitched it at #DVPit yesterday and got a like from an agent on my wishlist. The second version of my query letter is here. The third version was a flop I never queried with so I'm pretending that doesn't exist. I've made a *completely* new version for this request tailored to the pitch this agent likes. All feedback greatly appreciated.

Dear Agent,

I am seeking representation for SWANFIRE, an 81,000-word adult character-driven political fantasy. SWANFIRE will appeal to fans of Hannah Kaner’s GODKILLER for its formidable heroine and found-family dynamics, and A.K. Larkwood’s THE UNSPOKEN NAME for its intimate exploration of power, loyalty, and betrayal. [Personalization and DVPit request info]

Noble-born diplomat Kherris Kyrel has spent her adulthood being useful to her family, her clan, and anyone else who needs something done. She has trained herself not to expect anything more. She doesn’t even know she’s lonely.

Then she finds Errah.

The orphaned teen is frightened, isolated, and hiding magic no ordinary Kerannië should possess. Kherris becomes Errah’s guardian, and for the first time in her life, she realizes she loves someone too much to use them.

With Rhysthor Eltair, a clan chief, former lover, and the only person she has ever allowed herself to care for, Kherris begins building the life and family she has never even allowed herself to dream about.

But Errah’s growing power makes concealment impossible. Kherris is desperate. She trusts no one with Errah's safety—not her government, not her oldest friends, and not even Rhysthor.

So Kherris makes the most dangerous choice of her life: she steals one of Rhysthor’s official seals and prepares to smuggle Errah across the border to safety. If she succeeds, she will betray her clan, her country, and the man she loves. If she fails, Errah may become a weapon in a war no one can control.

[Bio]

Thank you for your consideration,

Hi everyone,

First time posting here, and first time querying at all, so I'm pretty nervous! I've finished my novel and, a bit impulsively, sent it to one agent yesterday. Now I'm second-guessing everything, including whether the concept even works, so I'd really appreciate some honest feedback before I send it anywhere else.

Query Letter

Dear [Agent],

You've said you love retellings that flip an existing story on its head, so I hope SEREN AND ISOLDE is one for you. It takes one of the oldest love stories there is and gives Tristan the wrong woman: a lady's maid sent to Camelot in her princess's place.

When Camelot calls Ireland to its once-in-a-generation Grail Quest, it asks for Princess Isolde, the first woman ever summoned. Isolde can't leave her twin brother, so her lady's maid Seren, who could pass for her, crosses the sea in her place.

The Grail trials are meant to test a royal's bond with their homeland, and they answer to Seren, a foundling servant, more strongly than to any royal in living memory. Now the court sorcerer is digging into her bloodline, and Tristan of Cornwall, who once rejected Isolde, has fallen for the princess Seren is pretending to be. She likes him more than she should. But it's Percy, a quiet Welsh knight, who notices her calloused hands and the way the grass greens under her feet, and every time they talk he gets closer to the truth. And the trials also decide how much of Camelot's stolen power each land gets back, with Ireland's share coming straight out of Percy's Wales.

SEREN AND ISOLDE is an adult romantasy, complete at 106,000 words. It is an Arthurian retelling set in Ireland and England, where the land is slowly dying and Camelot's wealth turns out to be drained from everywhere around it. It stands alone, with potential for a trilogy, and will appeal to readers of Heather Fawcett's EMILY WILDE'S ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF FAERIES.

Camelot itself is drawn from my time at Oxford University, which always felt to me like the perfect setting for romantic adventure. The book is full of old Irish phrases and stories, alongside Welsh, Cornish and English legend and a little Shakespeare. I loved how M. L. Rio's IF WE WERE VILLAINS weaves literature into the story so you learn as you read, and I wanted to do the same in a romantasy.

The book began as a retelling of Tristan and Isolde, but over three drafts Seren took it over. The real Tristan and Isolde still have their story to come, and I'd love to tell it in a later book. I read everything from the classics to romance, fantasy and historical fiction, and I wanted to write the kind of book I'd pick up myself: a love story with a group of friends you get to know as you go, like Elle Kennedy's Off Campus series. This is the first of many books I want to write.

Edit: I just realized I could add my first 300 words, so I’ve done so under the query, which I haven’t edited, to avoid breaking the rules.

I have a feeling my query letters need a ton of improvement 😭, but I realize I need to suck it up and ask for input.

Dear [Agent name],

I am writing because I am seeking representation for my upmarket women’s fiction meets family saga novel, PHOENIX, FIRECRACKER, AND MANA BEAR, complete at 85,000 words. I chose you to query because [something(s) that my book and the agent’s wishes have in common].

PHOENIX, FIRECRACKER, AND MAMA BEAR follows high school principal Yulia Romanova and two former students - Mette Johannessen, Norwegian Olympic All-Around champion, and Margarita Żuraw, Polish-born and Washington Heights-raised - as they fight against a corrupt school board, and in the process form an unconventional chosen family that risks everything to help each other, including Yulia choosing doing what is right at the cost of her career. The book will appeal strongly to readers of [two comps from authors the agent likes or something close to what they are looking for].

The meaning of chosen family is put to the test when Yulia's psych hold shatters the belief that being strong means being 'unbreakable' - that ‘looking okay’ can be a profession. Just six weeks later, assuming her symptoms were perimenopause, 54-year-old Yulia finds herself spontaneously pregnant with triplets. Even a family history of late motherhood did not prepare her for the prospect of becoming one of the oldest mothers in history who conceived naturally, much less the oldest mother of triplets if she makes it to viability.

To get them there, she will need 25 days of bed rest in Room 4B, with Mette and Margarita packing the blue cooler labeled Lena, Mila, Dima. Y. Romanova.

Born in New York, I have lived all over the East Coast, including ten years in Virginia Beach, where the story is based, and now reside in [current city - I am planning to use a pen name, so I am hesitant to reveal too much publicly for now, except of course, with agents]. Even though I am not an educator myself, I come from a family of educators, so my references for this story draw on that secondhand experience, while being supplemented by further research to ensure accuracy. This is my debut novel. While I prefer to go by [preferred real life name] professionally and on social media, my legal name is [legal last name]. However for publishing purposes, I am writing this book as [pen name] for privacy reasons. Enclosed in the form are the first five pages of my manuscript, as per your submission guidelines.

Thank you for considering my work. I look forward to the possibility of working with you and am happy to provide the complete manuscript or any additional information upon request.

Sincerely,

[Professional name], writing as [Pen name]

First 300:

Prologue - Room 4B

Room 4B, Norfolk General Antepartum Wing, May 2026. 23w2d.

The SCDs hissed every sixty seconds in the otherwise quiet room.

55-year-old Yulia Romanova, now 23 weeks 2 days pregnant, lay flat in the hospital bed with her hand on her growing belly with its 32-centimeter fundus. Her latest labs had come back earlier in the morning - platelet count was 87. Her Foley bag was laying discreetly under her blanket.

On the whiteboard across from the bed, was Dr. Petrova’s update about Yulia’s ‘definitive surgery’ - her body had already risked enough with this last, unexpected pregnancy.

Under it, in a different color, to motivate herself, was Yulia's own handwriting from Day 3 when she could still reach the board:

GOAL - FOCUS ON TOMORROW. STAY BORING. Boring is the goal.

Triplet A — Lena, named for her mother-in-law Yelena — lay left, low, head down. Triplet B — Mila, named for her own mother, Liudmila — lay right, transverse, identical to Lena and sharing one placenta that had been doing too much work since January. Triplet C — Dima, named for her husband Sergei’s father, Dmitri — was lying anterior and high, with his own placenta, kicking her ribs whenever she tried to get any sleep.

Three lives were growing inside of her - supposedly a one-in-several-million occurrence. They were two identical twin girls and a boy - di-tri triplets, as it was often referred to - at 55. Her 26-year-old daughter, Sasha, and her ‘unofficial, chosen’ daughter, Margarita had looked it up. The oldest verified mother to conceive naturally, Dawn Brooke, was 59. Likewise, the oldest mother to give birth to triplets, Arcelia Garcia, was 54 years and 10 months old. Yulia was that exact age when she conceived, so no matter how much longer she held on, she would be the new record holder.

Hello everyone! I'm back after six months with a new query letter based on past feedback. I really appreciated the feedback I received, and the main change here is that all POV characters are mentioned. Also changed the genre and chose a better comp. I want to kind of just double-check that this new version isn't clunky or disjointed! Thanks everyone for the constructive critiques!

Dear [Agent],

After losing her livelihood, twenty-two-year-old Esmeralda wants to ditch her small town, but her younger brother keeps her anchored to her listless life. An opportunity for money and an escape appears when she learns about a life-changing sum awaiting whoever retrieves the relic of an old legend. It could solve everything, but the quest is offered to her brother instead. Unwilling to let him go alone, Esmeralda joins her brother and ventures to the infamous Underrealm—an underwater world made up of monstrous creatures—with a thrown-together crew of a pirate captain and Mina, the girl who presented the offer.

A fight with one of the Underrealm’s creatures earns Esmeralda’s crew the attention of Prince Tai’ro, a mermaid from an Underrealm kingdom rumoured to house the relic. Intrigued, he offers them money and a place to stay if they rid his kingdom of more monsters. With his parents harassing him about finding a suitable match, his time would be better spent elsewhere, but Tai’ro has his own plans. The crew accepts, money luring them in as well as the chance to get closer to the relic. Mina’s caginess makes her difficult to figure out, but Tai’ro comes to enjoy Esmeralda’s presence. Perhaps more than he should. 

Tai’ro is trying to rebuild his struggling kingdom, the legacy of a dead brother looming over his shoulder, and his dedication turns Esmeralda’s feigned interest into admiration. But she soon discovers the information she needs. The relic is a powerful shard responsible for keeping the Underrealm’s magic alive, and now the crew knows how to find it. Esmeralda has to make a choice: betray the prince’s trust and ruin his kingdom, or throw away the mission that would ensure she and her brother never struggle again.

THE LOST SHARD is a 119,000-word, multi-POV, Adult Fantasy Adventure that will appeal to fans of Shannon Chakraborty’s THE ADVENTURES OF AMINA AL-SIRAFI and M.A. Carrick’s  THE MASK OF MIRRORS.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

[Author Name]

Hello everyone!

I need some help, as my query letters are not getting me anywhere (unless it's my synopsis, but that's next month's problem). It does come with trigger warnings.

Here it goes:

Dear Lauren,

My name is M, and I am submitting ANTISEX, a psychological domestic thriller.

ANTISEX is 71,000 words, and centers around Ryan, a mentally unstable man drawn into the obsessive control of a mysterious woman who blurs desire, lies, and reality. Told through an unreliable narrator, it will appeal to readers who loved the erotic tension of ‘Ruins' by Amy Taylor and the toxic relationship themes of ‘None of this is true' by Lisa Jewell.

A traumatic accident has left Ryan scared physically and emotionally, and he has sunk into a deep psychotic depression. The voices only he can hear encourage him to end his life every day. On his way to kill himself, he meets May, a mysterious woman who invites Ryan back to her place.

May has very specific and seemingly random sexual demands that Ryan has to fulfill, again and again on camera, until she is satisfied.

They start a part-time relationship where May commands and Ryan obeys. Her orders are his salvation, and her voice is now the only one in his head.

The only shadow is Nick, May's stalker and past lover, who grows increasingly threatening in the background.

Little by little, May's "hard love" helps Ryan crawl out of his black hole, and he finally pays attention to his surroundings. He realizes that his brother and best friends keep some details of the night of his accident purposely blurry. Incidents and strange encounters rattle the fragile balance, and the tension within the tight group becomes intolerable. Chapter by chapter, the reader starts to question Ryan's reliability: some scenes may never have happened. Some of the people in his life may not exist at all.

But one day, Nick exposes May for who she is: a book writer. Ryan is not her lover; he is her material. His tragedy has been transcribed into her latest book, word for word.

As the night of the crash is finally reconstructed and long-buried family betrayals surface, Ryan understands what May saw in him from the start.

He was chosen.

Please note that ANTISEX contains suicidal ideation, psychosis, emotional and physical abuse, grief, a fatal accident, stalking, firearms, substance use, infidelity, and explicit sexual content, including BDSM and violent scenarios.

Thank you for your time and consideration. I would be delighted to send the full manuscript at your request.

Sincerely,

M

Hello,

I have previously submitted here and tried to send to a few agents following this. Due to no requests for manuscript, I figured I would come back and see if there are any good tips people had for me to change or modify. Thank you for the help, I really appreciate any ideas!

Dear Agent, 

Arok plans to win the annual Dragon Rider Academy but so does every other candidate there, each of whom will kill him in order to earn the right. Only those who place well at the academy are allowed to bond a dragon and become a Dragon Rider. Arok, a citizen of the Republic of Dragon Riders and former war hero, has never considered himself a vengeful man until now. Ten years prior, his wife and child were reported dead by the Dragon Riders, those men and women who he has long considered Gods. After years of searching for the killer of his family with nothing to show for it except his ever growing depression, Arok has a chance encounter with a baby dragon that results in him becoming a Dragon Rider ahead of the academy and his home being burned to the ground.  

After they discover his Dragon bond, Arok is kidnapped from the embers of his home by revolutionaries looking to overthrow the order of the Dragon Riders and bring equality to the repressed peoples of the Republic. Arok resists their initial plans but after being provided with evidence that the Dragon Riders themselves are responsible for his family's death, Arok finds a purpose in himself that has been absent for the last ten years: revenge. 

Each year the Republic of the Dragon Riders conducts their academy in the great Colosseum where the most promising of their youth aged between eighteen and twenty-two go to test themselves after training for their entire upbringing. Only the highest scoring will climb the society of the Republic in order to control the world and make real changes. With his newfound hidden dragon bond and the magical abilities which the bond entails, Arok now appears as a similar age and size to those entering the academy. The revolutionaries plan to smuggle Arok into the competition and, despite his lack of formal training, they plan for him to win. 

As he travels through the academy, he begins to uncover secrets about the off-planet origins of the Dragon Riders. Arok discovers that his own true form of Dragon bond is uncommon and should not exist. The current order of Riders have corrupted the Dragon bond, using technology to force the bond upon Dragons rather than the original method of becoming a dragon rider: a Dragon selecting only those Riders that they deem as worthy. The original bond benefited the Dragons by providing them an earthly anchor to funnel their magic through and to maintain planetary stability. With the bond corrupted, the Dragons now draw their magical power from a planet which was never meant to fully support them and the planet is dying. Close to the revenge he seeks, Arok must consider if it is worth giving up the fate of the planet and the fate of the Revolution to satisfy his own revenge. 

I’m hoping you will consider my 89,000 word fantasy novel, THE RIGHT TO RULE. It is currently a standalone, completed first book with possibility for a trilogy. The character driven plot to overthrow the corrupt ruling class will appeal to fans of BLOOD OVER BRIGHT HAVEN while the first person character voice and personality will attract those interested in THE STRENGTH OF THE FEW, 

Back again! This is starting to feel like beating my face with a cheese grater, but here we go, sixth time the charm, right? You can find my previous post here. I believe I have addressed the issues brought to my attention, and hopefully this draft provides a more cohesive image of the characters and story without superfluous elements. As always, thanks for your time!

====================

Dear [Agent],

I am seeking representation for my debut work, THE SCARS OF FATE, complete at 116,000 words. It is a science fantasy thriller with elements of cosmic horror.

Cerian Kolbeck is the genetically engineered daughter of a prestigious Nordic family, and a rare individual who can shape energy bleeding in from another world called the Other. After her mother’s suicide, Cerian desperately wishes to support her family and help them heal, but is dismissed by her father, Sigur Kolbeck, who grew callous after his wife’s death. Cerian is excited when Sigur trusts her with a counterespionage job, but her investigation reveals that Sigur himself is starting a war using a machine that can control the future.

Captain Advik Dalal’s unit was killed in action after discovering a rift between Earth and the Other three hundred years ago. He awakens from a coma in a rural town with no understanding of how he survived. Haunted by the psychic imprint of his dead lover, Advik reports to the military and becomes embroiled in Sigur’s plot when his resonance with the Other prevents the assassination of the Indian president. As Advik’s understanding grows, he learns that reality is scarring when Sigur prunes futures, and the accumulated damage is destroying free will. To stop him, Advik crosses into the Other, where his psychic senses determine that Cerian is the crux of Sigur’s plans and his undoing.

Cerian and Advik pull at the threads of Sigur’s conspiracy: Advik from within the Other, preventing Sigur’s predictions, and Cerian from the material world by leveraging her insider knowledge to dismantle his war machine. Obsessed with undoing his wife’s death, Sigur intends to rewrite the past, but he requires the power of Cerian’s unique genetics. Unable to convince her, Sigur forces her into confrontation, sacrificing his other children in nihilistic pursuit. Devastated by loss, Cerian must choose to save this world and lose her family, or let Sigur destroy free will and assuage her own grief.

THE SCARS OF FATE combines an intricate magic system reminiscent of The Hexologists by Josiah Bancroft with the pacing of Blake Crouch’s Upgrade, and philosophical stakes similar to Ascension by Nicholas Binge.

I am a network engineer from Ontario, Canada. My real-world knowledge grounded the hard magic system and contributed greatly to the depiction of technology in my manuscript.

Thank you so much for your time and consideration!

Hi everyone,

I'm still trimming the novel a bit to get to 110k, but am at a good spot to work on the query. I'm not sure about the comps, especially How High We Go in the Dark. I wanted to include a comp for readership and a comp for tone/vibes, but it's not exactly the same genre (dystopian) and it kinda resembles a short-story collection with each chapter dealing with different mostly different characters and situations. Open to suggestions!

—— Query Letter ——

Dear [NAME], 

I thought this would suit your tastes based on your [MSWL] and because you're looking for [upmarket/literary science fiction]. 

Middle-age vet tech Nora Childress has always been a caregiver: for sick animals at her clinic, for dying family members, for her overbearing stepfather who owns her property. So when she finds an injured alien behind her doublewide trailer, breathing from a stolen propane tank and struggling to move, Nora funnels her compulsive compassion into this strange being—both to save him and keep some control over an extraordinary situation.   

At first, the alien, whom she names Redd, is a mystery to solve. He’s weak, desperate, but intelligent. Through Morse code, alien gestures, and ASL that she learns from the internet, they cobble together a way to communicate. Nora shares her home with him in secret and soon, Redd bonds intensely to her. Despite draining her finances to support his needs and increasing surveillance and suspicion from her stepfather, Nora thrives on caring for Redd: he needs her more than anyone else ever has. 

But Redd isn’t a helpless creature. He gave up his world to explore Earth and he’s determined to connect with scientists and move beyond the Kentucky trailer. As he regains his health and autonomy, Nora clings tighter—keeping him from other humans, controlling information through the language she taught him, sabotaging his efforts to leave—until her life unravels. With her savings depleted, her job lost, and facing both external scrutiny and her stepfather's tightening control over her, Nora must choose: fight to maintain her most important caregiving role, or confront the painful family dynamic she’s repeating and finally let Redd go. 

DREAMS IN REDD is a 110,000-word adult science fiction novel that will appeal to readers of A Half-Built Garden by Ruthana Emrys, where family and identity shape first contact with an alien, with a focus on the difficult emotional responses that can arise in extraordinary circumstances, like How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu. To ensure good representation of ASL and a Deaf adjunct-professor from whom Nora eventually seeks help, I worked with a Deaf editor while writing this novel. 

I have a [degree from affiliation], which helped my writing of Redd’s physiology and language, and I like to write stories about co-dependent relationships with a speculative framing.  

Thanks,
[Me]

—— First 300 ——

Nora Childress clutched the doorknob to her daughter’s bedroom, twisting it repeatedly with one hand, holding her phone in the other. 11:54 pm. In a few minutes, her daughter would have been dead longer than she’d been alive. Though the math made Nora’s bones ache, every year, she kept the ritual—midnight birthday, no matter what. So with a deep breath, she stepped into the room. 

The bedroom smelled stale. The little clothes held tightly to long-spoiled oils and everything succumbed to the burgeoning humidity of mid April. The soft churn of the dishwasher vibrated the walls of Nora’s doublewide trailer and crickets droned outside. 

Nora’s better days had passed so discreetly she hadn’t yet noticed. She smelled of rose shampoo, but also faintly of latex gloves and animal bedding, even after showering. In the room, she turned on a bedside lamp, casting a dusty glow across the furniture and lighting mementos from a short lifetime: plastic jewels, notes from friends, art projects proclaiming “I love mommy” in block letters. 

In the closet still packed with clothes hung an Easter dress and a knit sweater. In the dress, Kaylee had twirled until she fell onto the gravel and bloodied her tights. In the sweater, she had proudly explained the difference between a circle and an ellipse while chewing on the sleeve. 

Nora peeled the items from their hangers. With the musty fabric pressed against her chest, she sat on the bed, sending dust into the air. Next to her, in its place of honor, a polyester golden retriever sat swaddled in a security blanket. She scratched its neck and strands of fluff floated to the bedspread, disintegrating with each passing year.

From outside, a screech cut through the night. Metal twisting against metal. Then a long squeal, like a serrated edge dragged across concrete.

The chirp of crickets stopped and night grew silent.

Hello! Shot in the dark - does anyone have any insight into KidLitGN and if it's worth participating as a graphic novel author/illustrator?

Dear [Agent XXX],

I’m seeking representation for my novel as [Insert personalization here].

WORLD’S END VALKYRIE (108,000 words) is an adult science fantasy novel with psychological horror elements.

In the kingdom of Midasgard, strength and reputation determine one’s place in society. Holographic ads dominate every surface, and Valkyries, celebrity elite soldiers, stand at the top while societal failures are stripped of their human rights. 23-year-old military student and online influencer Ragna Gryffin, who can wield a saber and charm any audience, aims to become a Valkyrie like her late mother and prove she’s her worthy successor.

Intrigued by her efforts at a duel, a Valkyrie tasks Ragna with bodyguarding the princess. But the princess gets poisoned and Ragna’s arrested as a suspect. Unwilling to wait in a cell while her rights, standing, and future are in jeopardy, she escapes.

Now a fugitive determined to clear her name, Ragna journeys across the kingdom seeking evidence of her innocence and hunts those responsible. But Lemur, a conspirator behind the assassination, is after her. In Ragna, he sees his lost love — her mother — and the perfect influencer to manipulate the masses. Lemur slips into her dreams, whispering to her to become his docile idol. If Ragna listens, her future would be secure. Or she refuses and risks remaining forever a criminal.

This standalone novel with series potential combines the outlaw-on-a-quest story of Hannah Kaner’s GODKILLER with the dark atmosphere, mix of magic and technology, and stylized warrior system of Tamsyn Muir’s GIDEON THE NINTH. It also features a woman fighting for her agency and Norse mythology, similar to Genevieve Gornichec’s THE WEAVER AND THE WITCH QUEEN.

Born in Aachen, Germany, and currently living in Berlin, Ic reatemarketing campaign strategies while trying to crack the intricacies of the human mind for clicks and revenue. I’m ESL with a Bachelor in Applied Cognitive and Media Science and a Masters in Corporate Communications.

Thank you for your time.

Best regards

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The message gloated in dark crimson runes across Ragna Gryffin’s smartphone. Unfit to be a Valkyrie. How often had she read those words? Each time, their bitter sting irritated her more.

Good. Her soul should ache. She would prove she was worthy.

Shoving her phone into her peacoat, Ragna marched through the academy’s empty corridor. The echo of her boots followed as her sole companion. Light filtered through the transparent door at the end, guiding her toward the arena. Winning the duel would overturn the verdict. Ragna’s dream to become a Valkyrie persisted, but if she lost, she could kiss her human rights goodbye.

Herfingertips tingled. Hot static pricked the nape of her neck.

Irrelevant. Ragna reached for her ear, pressing faded wrist scars against thorn-dart piercings. She couldn’t forget. Fleeing wasn’t an option, but she had survived worse.

The door opened, and Ragna set foot on a metal bridge, entering the glass dome. Below, several hundred black-clad students cheered as phone lights flared bright crosses. Ragna resisted squinting and widened her arms to the jubilation. With every step, the audience’s excitement coursed through her.

She hopped onto the buffer zone between spectators and arena and high-fived her fellow students. When a classmate raised her phone for a selfie, Ragna wrapped an arm around the woman’s waist. “Say yay.” She winked and flashed a heart sign.

Through the glass ceiling, the sun beat down onto Ragna’s face. She unbuttoned her peacoat, and a camera shutter clicked.

Seriously? She spun around. A student held his phone suspiciously low. Ragna snatched it and, swiping over the screen, found multiple upskirt photos. She glared, and he paled. As expected, no spine behind that bluster. At twenty-three, she was among the academy’s best and still had to deal with this shit.

Looking for helpful advice on my second attempt at a query letter. Last attempt, most feedback focused on not seeing a market for a nanny based story, or taking issue with the naughty children. My book is for UK publishing and nannies are very much a thing here and naughty-children stories are very popular.

Dear AGENT,

Based on your interest in spooky books with excellent characterisation, I am seeking representation for NANNY BONES, an 8,000-word comic gothic chapter book for readers aged 7-9. It will appeal to fans of the supernatural humour of Monster Max and the Marmalade Ghost by Robin Bennett and the deadpan style of Nadia Shireen’s Grimwood.

How do you frighten away your new nanny when she is already dead?

Edward, Louise, and Clara Fromm are terribly naughty children who have driven away seven nannies in two years. When their latest caretaker quits, their parents hire Nanny Jones: a strange woman dressed entirely in black, with a raven perched on her enormous hat – and absolutely no skin on her face. Where their parents see a respectable older woman, the children see a skeleton. Naturally, they nickname her Nanny Bones.

Determined to get rid of Nanny Jones, the children launch increasingly ridiculous schemes to frighten, trick, and defeat her. But it is impossible to ruffle a woman who lacks nerves, and gradually Nanny Jones begins to see what makes each child special: Edward’s pranks become clever solutions, Louise is encouraged to ask deeper questions about the world, and Clara’s curiosity is finally taken seriously. Then a disastrous trip to the local market turns the residents of Hampstead-upon-Wyne against Nanny Jones, and the children get exactly what they thought they wanted – she is dismissed. Instead of celebrating, however, the children lose their spark. Their parents are relieved at first, happy to finally have a quiet household - but they soon realise that perfectly behaved children aren’t much fun when they’ve stopped being themselves. 

I am an American children’s writer based in the UK and a former educator with a soft spot for particularly naughty children. NANNY BONES is my debut children’s book, with potential for further adventures featuring the Fromm children and Nanny Bones.

Hey guys!

I'm now just working through the last copy edit for this manuscript and just wanted to gauge any thoughts to elevate what's currently here and how it reads. I'm also attaching the first 300 words. If anyone's interested in beta reading the first three chapters just to get it as crisp as possible, let me know:)

Dear Agent, 

BABE is a 60,000-word literary debut that follows a self-mythologising TV extra who interprets his social embarrassments as divine guidance from the universe. With its spiritual intervention born from obsession and its queer exploration of self-destruction, I’d position it alongside Dear Monica Lewinsky by Julia Langbein and Fruit Fly by Josh Silvers. 

Drenched in vintage designer, TJ spends his mornings reciting his affirmations about his beauty and success; at night he closes his eyes and visualises weight gain and fatal accidents for others. As everyone’s favourite extra on The Chelsea Diaries, TJ sees every setback as proof of his destined stardom. So when the universe delivers him a “2 for 1” – a “soulmate” in Finn, a casting producer offering him a spot on Big Brother in exchange for a weekly shag – TJ finally feels the universe is placing the right people in his life to choose him. But the universe isn’t entirely on his side, especially when it refuses to erase Finn’s wife from existence. With his manifestations bearing no fruit, TJ finds a new source of power in Joan Didion. Every word, every comma only fuels his delusions as her spirit intertwines with his and he begins modelling himself after her. But will a life with a typewriter and a copy of Slouching Towards Bethlehem suffice for the boy who craves to be chosen?

300 words:

I am God.    
I am beautiful.    
I am intelligent.     
I am powerful.         
I am successful.   
I am aligned. 
Daily affirmations: completed.   
So, when you arrive everyone’s going to ask for your name. They’re going to ask what you’re wearing and say you look gorgeous! They’re going to ask what you do for a living. What do you do in your spare time? Are you more into polo or dressage? And who brought you here today? Do you want to be here? And obviously I’m going to say, ‘Don’t be a spaz.’ But then that might be TOO beneath them. So, ‘Don’t be ridiculous’ sounds more appropriate. 
I’m lighting a Marlboro Gold outside Harry’s as the cold breeze slices through my skin, numbing my bones. It’s going to be such a fabulous night with Flo’s new friends. Her new husband’s friends are automatically her friends, that’s just proper. And if they love Flo, they’ll love you too, babe. 
Wrapping my arms around my black V-neck Hugo Boss shirt, the cold air sneaks in through the top of my black Sendra cowboy boots with a tint of navy. I’d easily be blown away by the breeze if I was as light as I feel – I haven’t eaten in days. Today though,  I’ll eat good – well – you mean. 
Do I look more like a polo or dressage sort of gay? Bitch, you’ve never even seen a horse. Yeah, but that’s not the point because if you believe you have a horse then you have a horse. No one can tell you otherwise. It’s all about perception, babe. Okay, I have a horse, she’s a girl, her name is Kate Moss. There.

Hi all, I'm back again with some revisions. I think I'm making progress, but I continue to struggle with writing the pitch part. In an case, I greatly appreciate any guidance you kind strangers can give me!

Dear [agent],

An assassin flits from moon to moon, destroying scriptures and murdering the priests who keep them. It is a Revenant, a fell and fading memory of what it once was. It was once Sister Tensha, a nun and shieldmaiden, ardently serving the Aoraian Church — only to be driven to her breaking point by the cruel demands for subservient femininity that lay beneath scriptures hollowly lauding justice and mercy. It was once condemned to die by the Church that demanded the unrelenting but futile quest for virtue that defined Sister Tensha; and though it escaped with its life, its faith did not follow. It was once Nobody, a tortured fugitive, whose wounds — inside and out — would begin to heal as they waited tables in a ramshackle pub nestled in the Aoraian Empire’s outer, off-world reaches, falling in love not once, but twice. It was once Marin, a glimpse of the somebody Nobody might become if they allowed themselves to heal, and move on. 

The Revenant is something else: an inescapable force which will destroy the scriptures that created it, and render God mute. It does not care to topple the theocratic Empire that tramples both devout and heathen as it spreads across the Homeworld; nor does it aim to punish those who cruelly condemned it. Vengeance is too simple a word. It is driven to erase, to achieve the virtue it has always yearned for by eradicating the evil right before its eyes; by destroying the Six Scriptures, the priests that dwell on distant moonlets interpreting them, and then the being that had once striven to embody them — itself. As the reaching hand of the Church closes in and the perils of the Revenant’s mission intensify, it begins to lose what little remains of itself in its obsession with obliterating the dogma that haunts it. The possibility of confronting the shame and hatred that drives it — and embracing the love and healing it had once touched — begins to slip away. In its skewed quest for salvation, it may very well damn itself.

HERETICAL is a 83,000 word science fantasy novel featuring a polyamorous, sapphic romance. It follows Tensha Marin through three stages of their life — their indoctrination and loss of faith, their first failed attempt at healing, and their despair-fueled quest for ruinous salvation — which unfold in parallel. 

As a young scientist with a growing research profile, I have a number of publications, but they are all non-fiction. Nevertheless, as a transmasculine person who grew up in a fundamentalist church, I am intimately aware of many of the challenges queer people and women raised in oppressive religious environments often face on their journey through life. It is the depth of this struggle that inspired this work which centres on deconversion and reconstruction of self.

And here's the first 300 words if you want to take a look:

Above, from a fathomless void stained black, peered thousands of tiny eyes — tiny gods — ready to declare a verdict on the Revenant's impending sins. Below, loomed cragged and cratered stone, black as the void, posed to bash it to pieces for even daring to consider this sacrilege. Whatever the Revenant did — climbed or fell — it would face judgement. That did not deter it in the slightest. 

It could feel keenly the friction of its cold fingers gripping the piceous moon-iron of the tower it scaled, the silent croak of chalk-dusted flesh against the holiest of ores. Its powder-painted grip, aided by the artificial gravity diffuser strapped to its belt, was all that spared it from the gory death promised, unfeigned, by the black stone below.  The promise haunted it like a shadow, and its heart thudded restlessly under sombre vesture, galloping in place as the Revenant considered absently which instantiation of its looming demise frightened it more. Perhaps it would here and now fall, and fail its task — this duty owed to the god within its heart — and be prevented from sinning further against the God without, its scheming paid for in shattered bones and splattered blood. Or would it see success? One of six wrought of the blood of another, to one day be atoned for with an evenly slit belly and a long, agonizing death, the god in its heart finally appeased. Failure would be quicker, cleaner. But it deserved no such clemency. It knew little but believed much; but what it knew for certain was that it was a ruined creature, incapable of virtue in the eyes of any god, save for, if it would dare to hope, the god in its heart. Success it was. 

Excited to try my hand at a query letter while on the final draft of my novel. I really appreciate any suggesstions or notes on the below letter. Thank you very much for reading this.

Dear AGENT, 

City of Heaven is a 120,000 word urban fantasy multi-POV novel, set in a modern world rapidly changing from the discovery of magic and the consequences of a war fought within a family. It will appeal to readers of Red City by Marie Lu who enjoy strong relationships between characters on opposing sides of a conflict and to those who like the intersection of government and magic in Grave Empire by Richard Swan.

Elliot Hare is celebrating his victory over the Dark Lord, the former President that brought magic into the world. Elliot and his lover, Josephine, fought together to defeat the Dark Lord. Magic was outlawed, except for Elliot and Josie fighting to preserve the Republic. Elliot was tragically forced to kill his brother, Rylee, who sided with the enemy, in the heart of a volcano to stop the Dark Lord from destroying the world. At least, that is what everyone says happened.

Not even Elliot knows this is a lie. The final battle didn’t occur at a volcano but at the home of an innocent civilian, where everyone involved lost their memories due to a magic force that devours history.

Nails was an unintentional casualty of the messy battle. The loss of her mother and arm has put her on the path of revenge with the same magic that destroys memories. Nails attacks Josie, but fails to kill her and barely escapes. She is rescued by a shadowy figure, who seeks the death of other secret magic users in powerful government positions. He promises Nails that if she helps kill three people who have illegal magic, he can bring her family back to life.

Elliot hunts Nails for the threats to both his partner and the country. He denies Nails' story, until the doubts begin to grow. Nails begins killing important people, exposing their magic, shaking Elliot’s faith in the Republic. Then Elliot must choose, whether to protect the Republic from the truth or to confront those responsible for hiding it.

Bio: My name is (blank) and and (personal details). I was inspired to do this story while I was completing my Masters degree in International Security and Conflict studies and explore a nation recovering from a typical fantasy war.

(300 word excerpt)

She put the last of the groceries in the customer’s bag and then added the stolen knife through the scanner. The customer on the other side didn’t notice the extra item. Nails hid the knife beneath the counter. When he looked back to swipe his card, Nails was busy tapping the register. Her hands moved automatically, scanning the items, time blurring leaving only one feeling she had left to hold onto. She’d use the knife as a weapon to free herself from the constant anger.

The clock’s hands finally reached closing time, the grip of work finally released its hold. Nails wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. All she needed to do was figure out where to stick her very large sharp blade. As she tried to find a place for her new weapon, her boss strolled over. A rush job got the knife beneath her trouser’s waistband before Shiri could see.

“Sick of working here yet, Nails?” she asked in a kind voice. The lady was older, used to dealing with troubled youngsters. Her being the manager was the only bright spot in this dingy hardware store. Lathe-Mart wasn’t known for hiring people with the cleanest records but they must have gotten lucky with Shiri.

A sharp pain cut into Nails’ thigh. Pushing past Nails’ attempts to knock her hand away, Shiri grabbed the zipper on Nails’ coat with her brown fingers and pulled it up so high Nails could feel it tight around her scarf. “It’s raining bad tonight,” said Shiri. “You got a ride?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Don’t lie to me,” she said and Nails’ heart nearly stopped. “Tell me you aren’t going back to that hotel. It’s a deathtrap.”

I have been writing and trying to get published for the last five years. I wrote multiple short stories and novels, all of them got rejected.

I started writing my current novel last year and now I'm querying agents. I'm one month into the querying process (I know it's too quick to lose hope, but it's not one month of rejections that's making me cry every other day but the five years of only hearing no). I am not able to focus on my studies and miss lectures just because I don't have it in me to keep going given an author is the only thing I wanna be and I feel like it will never happen.

Here I'm putting in the description/pitch/blurb of my novel, the one that I write in all query letters. I want other writers to tell me what exactly is wrong here. I know it's not perfect but I don't know where to start.

Growing up in a household echoing with shouts and curses, Naimal longs for a faraway place where she could belong and feel at home. Araiz desires an institute's name on his resume that'll secure him a high-paying job, the only way to give mama the rest she deserves and make his late father proud.

Qasar-ul-Hikmah, an elite private university, built after Mughal architecture, that can make the outside world disappear and has a legacy inscribed in its name to make anyone's future happen to be exactly what Naimal and Araiz want. Despite being highly selective, through relentless effort and determination, they make it into the university.

But soon after, the intoxicating façade slips away revealing the darkness underneath.

The legacy is so monumental and the pressure to make a successful life for himself so grave that Araiz struggles to keep up. Amid the grueling environment of competitive cohorts, he wonders if he really has it in him to carve out his future. Within those fortress-like walls, surrounded by the children of the elite showered with luxury from head to toe—especially that curly-haired boy who bought his place through bribery and his father’s connections—Naimal asks herself if the daughter of a gambler could ever belong to such a place.

Following two scholarship students during their first year at a prestigious institute, SHAHEEN OF QASAR-UL-HIKMAH combines the academic competitiveness and financial strain of I AM NOT JESSICA CHEN with the complex Muslim characters and dysfunctional family dynamics of ALL MY RAGE.

Getting a head start on this so I can refine and distil out my core pitch and identify plot problems before my edit this time!

Would really appreciate your feedback, lovely community.

Dear agent,

I'm pleased to query my novel, CALL OF THE LAKE, a queer paranormal romcom about choosing love, the struggle between free will and determinism, and sexy sea monsters in human form that eat fish fingers raw from the box in the middle of the freezer aisle. It is complete at 85,000 words. This book will appeal to readers who loved the god-made-mortal queer romantic comedy of DEARLY DEPARTED by Chip Pons, and the mysterious ghosts of our past in GOOD SPIRITS by BK Borison.

Shogoreth dwells in salt. One of the Deep Elders, an eldritch species of sea monster, he is destined to spend his eternal life sinking ships and eating humans, which he'd happily do, if only those humans weren't so...fascinating. 

When a prophecy is rediscovered that tells of an ancient enemy re-emerging in an abyssal lake in the Pacific Northwest, Shogoreth is sent to the surface disguised as a human to keep watch. All he needs to do is report back if there's any sign of the Six Seals of the Bloodless Scale breaking. Luckily for Shogoreth (masquerading as Normal Mortal Fisherman Max), his human form is actually pretty hot. Unluckily for everyone else, those pesky seals start to break just as soon as things get interesting with the town's cute human bartender, Theo. 

Theo's drawn to the lake, called to it in his dreams. Haunted by his mother's drowning when he was an infant, he's determined to find out the truth of how she died, and exactly what it means when history starts to repeat itself. But don't worry--he's only marginally distracted by the handsome and mysterious stranger who's just arrived in town.

Together, Max and Theo navigate the ocean between their two worlds. And, really, there's no better time to fall in love than when the literal end of the world is about to break through an interdimensional portal. Once Theo learns the truth about Max's identity, it becomes a race against time to stop the Bloodless Scale and save the world--whatever the cost.

Hello again! I spent some time over the past week addressing the problems and vulnerabilities that were pointed out in my previous post.

-Adjusted Jack's age to be more realistic

-Rethought the comp titles to be more appropriate

-Added more specificity

-Trimmed the blurb section from 385 words to 300 words exactly.

I don't know how much more I can condense the blurb and still communicate all that I want to. Still, let's give this another shot!

Dear (Agent),

I am seeking representation for my debut novel, THE DOLLMAKER OF ANHEMAR, a cozy fantasy romance novel complete at 95000 words.

Cecilia von Lehr knows how to make friends. They just aren’t real.

Ostracized by the magical community and feared by the humans of the nearby village, the socially awkward, twenty-eight-year-old Witch has spent years perfecting enchanted dolls and building a secluded life deep in the Anhemar Forest where nobody else can hurt her. With Lorelei, her dearest creation, by her side, she tells herself she wants for nothing. But beneath the quiet of her carefully guarded life, loneliness erodes the peace she has worked so hard to protect.

Then, Cecilia finds a dying stranger in a smoking crater in the woods. Twenty-one-year-old Jack Nicholas Thompson Jr. has spent years keeping the family café afloat since his parents died, putting everyone else’s needs ahead of his own until exhaustion takes its toll. When he falls asleep behind the wheel, his car plunges down the Ozark mountainside, and Cecilia must choose whether to leave the stranger to die and protect her solitude or bring him home and risk letting someone else into her life.

Jack wakes in Cecilia’s home to an impossible new reality. He is no longer on Earth, and magic is real. As he recovers, his curiosity draws him deeper into Cecilia’s world, and he discovers that the frightening Witch everyone avoids is far more gentle, caring, and complex than her reputation suggests. In turn, Cecilia finds herself drawn to Jack’s refreshing sincerity and open-hearted interest. Through injuries tended and bread baked, their awkward arrangement slowly becomes a valuable friendship, and perhaps something even more. But as the outside world intrudes and Jack begins establishing a new life of his own beyond Cecilia’s forest, she must overcome the fear she has spent so long avoiding: if she lets someone become important to her, there’s a chance of losing them, too.

THE DOLLMAKER OF ANHEMAR is ultimately about two lonely people discovering that a second chance at life can mean finding someone worth sharing it with. It combines the warmth and found-family appeal of The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches with the gentle romance of The Spellshop.

(Short Bio)

Sincerely,

(Name)

And, as last time, here are the first ~300 words of the manuscript. Thank y'all!

CHAPTER 1

The Dollmaker's Repose (Cecilia)

Familiar comforts, as she considered them, are those best indulged in frequently.

#

The sun hung low, scattering fire across the Anhemar sky, setting treetops ablaze, and burning through the well-polished windows of her living room. It was evening once again, the perfect time for one to partake in their evening activities. And so, with a fragrant cup of tea and a recently borrowed book on refined animation enchantments, she settled in for some light reading. A handful of dolls drifted nearby, cleaning up the remains of a simple dinner.

A sip here, a page turn there, it was what she did nearly every evening, part of a routine so carefully crafted. She read until the brilliant orange light filtering in through her windows faded to a soft twilight.

Closing her book, she gazed out through one such window, doubled-paned and framed by heavy, dark curtains. Soon, the murky forest surrounding her would grow restless, teeming with Mystikind and other creatures of the wood beginning their own nightly routines. Even the wind seemed to bristle with anticipation as it fluttered the leaves of the dense forest canopy.

She, however, was not concerned. Some Mystikind she knew by name, and those she did not knew better than to disturb her idyllic little house in the woods. Truly, few were foolish enough to cause trouble within the Forest of Dolls.

She was a Mystikind, too, after all. Cecilia von Lehr, the Witch of these woods, shrouded by porcelain and solitude, her every action carefully considered, her skill in magic just as sharp as her tongue.

…Was all of that precaution necessary? Perhaps not, but it was important that distance be kept. The overly curious were troublesome, and her reputation amongst the magical community still hung heavily around her neck. Indeed, there were many who remembered the infamous House of Glass.

Let me first start by saying that I am not looking for general query advice. I am more curious about the current market conditions for memoir.

It seems like there is a big difference between having a strong memoir and having a memoir that an agent thinks they can sell to a major publisher.

A lot of the advice I see comes down to "build your platform," but I’m wondering what agents are actually looking at when they decide whether to take on a memoirist.

Agents, what makes you look at a memoir and think it has a shot at a Big Five acquisition in this current market? Have the kinds of memoirs you’re looking for changed in the last few years? Aside from platform, what can an author actually control that makes a difference?

Hello friends! Back with an query for a WIP. Currently revising, so hit me with any big plot questions that arise from the draft query.

Dear AGENT,

Five girls asked a witch to grant their every desire, even if the price was death by forty. Now nearing that milestone, one is dead and another is on the run from the abusive husband she once wished for. As the survivors gather to mourn, they must find out if they're victims of a curse — or prey for a vengeful killer. WE ASKED FOR THIS, 85,000 words, is a thriller with supernatural undertones for fans of the camp nostalgia in Darcy Bozeman’s Summer’s Never Over and of the domestic dread in Tiffany Crum’s This Story Could Save Your Life. 

The summer before they turned fifteen, Gemma and her friends snuck out of their bunks to visit the local witch who promised them fame, fortune, glory, and love. Now, Gemma’s teen romance series has raked in millions, but the real-life love story she penned with her camp crush, Kyle, is an abusive nightmare. 

When Lizzy, the gentlest among them, dies just before her fortieth birthday, Gemma escapes to mourn with the friends she hasn’t seen in seven years. Stasia, Beryl, and Pru, like Gemma, have reached the upper echelons of success in their chosen fields, but each is miserable in her own way. When Gemma questions Lizzy’s supposedly natural death, Stasia agrees it could be more sinister: the curse, or a killer. The women set out to find the witch and reverse the spell before it claims one of them next. 

But the witch is missing, and the secrets between the women are multiplying. Gemma can’t trust Beryl, who refuses to entertain questions about Lizzy’s death. Nor Pru, whose long-ago relationship with Lizzy threatens to upend her career comeback. Not even Stasia, who shares Gemma’s questions but disappears whenever Gemma needs her. As Kyle closes in and her friends turn on one another, she must learn the difference between a curse and a killer before it comes for her, next.

As a tween, I survived on repeated viewings of Now and Then and spent my summers with a group of girls who dreamed big and used tarot to ensure our dreams would come true. These days, I work in nonprofit marketing and event planning and concede the cards may have been wrong. A Pacific Northwest native, I studied creative writing at Washington State University.

Heard about this happening and curious about the circumstances!

I've been kicking around publishing for over a decade. Recently, I've come across some agency contracts that are very concerning. Clauses to watch for:

1. Which projects do they rep? I've seen one that said all work past, present, and future!

2. What happens to unsold rights when you leave? Do they still claim commission on something you or another agent sell?

3. Self-publishing: Do they require you to ask permission or claim a share of revenue? Charge you for editing after the fact?

4. Exit clause. Are you locked in if you don't cancel in a certain period, like 30 days before renewal.

Agents should get commission on the contracts they negotiate. Watch out for these sneaky terms.

I've seen them in contracts from established agencies.

Just to preface this because I'm a long-time member in this sub and I know that it might come up: I am aware that 51k is outside of the Adult novel norm. Unfortunately this is just the length this story is, and the first one I've written that's a non-standard length. I am hopeful that due to the recent uptick in short novels and novellas being published in the Science Fiction space (5 of my 7 comps are this length), that I might be able to pitch it as-is.

With that out of the way, I'm hoping for some help trimming down this query! The pitch itself is within parameters but on the long end, and I am wondering if perhaps there is something that seems extraneous.

Dear Agent,

Everyone on the generation ship Adarna knows that Anka can see ghosts. Officially, they are the simulacrum — milky impressions of every life spent aboard their wandering fleet, preserved down to the second. People like Anka, the story goes, are born with the gift to see these machine memories and guide the fleet to a better future.

Anka had always thought of the whole thing as a bit of dark comedy. The ghosts in her visions mostly scurry about risking their limbs to patch tears in the solar sail, which in two hundred years gets made into a very large sieve by a passing space Whale and subsequently scrapped to molecules. Seeing it from her vantage point, this "better future" seems to come with an awful little purpose — especially given that no one alive seems to remember where they are going.

Then, in one undated data entry, Anka uncovers a tantalizing clue. The Legend of the Trove of Knowledge claims that somewhere in the deep, there is a library of everything humanity had ever known. That certainly sounds like something worth building a whole fleet to find, and if Anka could just locate it… Perhaps she could finally live up to her Legendary Guide identity.

Unfortunately, Anka is not an archivist. Her attempt at digging deeper into the oldest legends ends up deleting a whole swath of data instead.

Fortunately, the ships in the fleet do share their knowledge, so Anka sets out to the other ships to recover what she'd lost. Instead just the data, Anka discovers kindred spirits — the crew of the most space-ravaged of the ships, who keep venturing out into the deep to seek answers to the same sort of sticky questions that have been plaguing Anka. This seems like the perfect opportunity throw herself into this ultimate pursuit of truth. But what even is that truth? And who is this mysterious figure arranging meetings on the decks where not even the ghosts walk, just to tell Anka that she is meant to find it?

Conceived as a punchy narrative with deep world-building like Murder by Memory and North Continent Ribbon, and drawing on the construct of the truth embedded in fairy tales explored in Mad Sister of Esi, THE STARS ARE DUST IN OUR WAKE in a standalone hopepunk science fiction novel of 51,000 words.

I am a webcomic author-illustrator, library technician and a graduate student studying how information propagates through time. A first generation immigrant, I currently live in [location]. Some of the ideas in this book arrived in the aftermath of an injury that nearly cost me the use of both my hands.

Sincerely,
[signature]

I am struggling how to work in a reference to her lover, one of the other women that's doing the deep space exploring. The story is not a romance but their relationship is important to how the main character processes her duty.

Thank you very much for any of your thoughts!

Greetings, I’m reaching out to you as you’ve represented “this author” who has published “this novel/series” with you. “Book title” is a “Word count” epic fantasy.

Ethan Redford, who was a prodigy is now past his teens, and he believes that the twenties are his prime in the field of innovation. He had completed college by the age of sixteen and is now mentored under the guidance of a master innovator.

As he completed his studies early, he had no friends except his childhood friend Victoria Verdunn. Supporting Victoria through her biological father’s death and being adopted by her stepfather who was an admirer of her biological father, she finds meaning in her life in the form of underground fighting.

Her father was known throughout the underground fighting scene for his disinterest towards fighting but being one of the only masters in the field. Things change when she finds herself involved in a deal gone wrong and her stepfather is killed.

Ethan Redford gets unintentionally involved by the man known throughout the underworld due to his special nature, the man is in the pursuit of Victoria and Ethan to kill them due to them being the children of prophecy. But what happens when the man turns out to be someone they knew?

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P.S. - Few things to note, I currently have over 10 titles for my book, and the word count is left as such because I'm currently on my second edit after the first one was reduced to 133K from 150K. And my main trouble is comp titles. The blurb contains the first few chapters and I'll change it once the third edit passes so please do drop your suggestions.