In Which I Write Backwords

I started The Monster of Dewsberry Drink last weekend. Given my work and family life, I'm really more a weekend novelist, so I expect to get some more words down this weekend.

This is the first book that I ever started by writing a query letter first. In it's own way, it's a hook and outline to help me remember what I'm writing about and not get distracted by every shiny idea that passes my way. So, here is the query letter for The Monster of Dewsberry Drink. (No, I will not be using this as my query letter when I send it to agents :)

"Sape" is starting 7th grade with a normal set of problems. His best friend is drifting from him, getting heavily involved in sports. His parents are almost ready to flip the house they've been working on for the past year, which means moving again. His brother's girlfriend thinks she's a Witch (eye roll), and his brother is… his brother. Oh, and it looks like he's going to lose this year's Science Fair to Katherine. Again.

All of that pales when he finds a real live, actual-for-true monster living in the local reservoir. Sure, it won't solve all his problems, but he's bound to win the Science Fair at least. Unfortunately for Sape, a local developer doesn't want anyone to know about the monster. When a mysterious man tries to drown Sape in the reservoir and the monster saves his life, things go back to super complicated.

Now he's got to enlist the help of his (former?) best friend, his arch-nemesis, and even (gulp) his big brother to save the Monster of Dewsberry Drink.

Favorite Query Letter Ever

I've been reading lots of query letters over the past couple of years (no, not just my own!) and this one is my favorite. Right up to and including the author's bio.

There have been lots of letters that made me want to read the book, and there have been a couple where I bought the book based on the query letter. ("Real Mermaids Don't Wear Toe Rings" just today, for example.)

But the query letter for A Comedy of Terrors was wonderful. I still remember it three months later. When I'm trying to write a query letter, it's this one I think of. This one I judge my query letter on. No, I don't want to do the same thing, but I want to figure out why I love it (probably voice) and do that in my query letter. So when I'm saying "Not right yet", it's because of the query letter for A Comedy of Terrors. (And boy I hope this book gets published, because I really, really want to read it!)

Query Letter Time!

Ok, here's a new version of my (ongoing) attempts to write a query letter for Troll Wife. I'm not there yet, but in writing this I discovered a little plot hole and was able to fix it. It tied up a loose thread that I didn't know was there. Yay for writing mock query letters!

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It's hard being a young female troll. First off, unless you're really special, you haven't earned a name and everyone just calls you "Troll Wife". Second, it's hard to get work (except maybe as a bouncer) because, hey, you're a troll. Third, you don't have any friends because again, hey, troll.

So when Troll Wife gets accepted into the tooth fairy training program, she wants three things. A job, to make friends, and earn a name. She's not thinking about why tooth fairies collect teeth and she certainly isn't thinking about monsters.

But there is a monster. Oubliette is determined to kill any human that hasn't kept the terms of an ancient pact between the humans and the fae. And any child that has lost a tooth but hasn't received money for it yet, hasn't kept the pact.

As a tooth fairy, Troll Wife has friends, a job, and the tools to continue the long fight against Oubliette. As a troll, she has the ability to actually stop Oubliette. She must choose. Give up everything she is and continue the fight against Oubliette? Or give up everything she's ever wanted and stop Oubliette?

Book Trailers

I don't really get book trailers. I mean, I understand that they're designed to whet the appetite of your potential reading audience. I'm just not sure how they work. Who makes them? The publisher, the author? I saw one that had a cast of characters including a cameo by Deepak Chopra! Yow! Who pays for that?

I liked the one for Stay, though. I liked it so much, that I had a sample sent to my Kindle, even though it's a genre I don't care for.


And since I'm working on my query letter and a book trailer is like a query letter, I figured if I did a book trailer, it would be like this:

Voice: When Oubliette comes to call

(image of long fingered hand with claws, sliding under the bed)

Voice: Only a troll can protect you

(silhouette of troll, cut to hand with claws emerging from the finger tips)

Voice: And if she’s a tooth fairy, so much the better

(silhouette transforms from troll to tooth fairy, small and cute with wings)

Query Letter, draft 1, version 1

I'm working on my query letter. I started by posting it on my LJ, then posted it on the Public Query Slushpile, and now I'm posting it here.  I really like some of the suggestions I've received, and I'm thinking about how to work them in, so there are sure to be future versions :)


I took stock of my injuries. I hadn't even been on the job a month and I had 14 bruises, a concussion, multiple cuts and abrasions, a broken bone, and now, a gunshot wound. Being a tooth fairy shouldn't be this hard.

So opens my 95,000 word urban fantasy novel, A Troll Wife's Tale.

When Troll Wife first becomes a tooth fairy, all she can see are the good things. She has a steady job. She's making friends. Best of all are the tooth fairy wings and flying.

After a few days, she starts to see the problems. She's racking up an impressive number of on the job injuries. Her friends only accept her because they can't tell she's a troll while she's wearing the wings. The wings take away her troll ability to smell a person's character and emotions.

She notices that going even a day without wearing the wings makes her irritable. Are the wings addictive? If so, why?

It seems that tooth fairies also have enemies. Oubliette, the most efficient soldier in the human/fae war hundreds of years ago, hasn't given up fighting the war against the humans.

Tooth fairies keep the peace pact with humans and Oubliette wants to end that pact. Oubliette seems determined to convince Troll Wife of the dangers of humans. If Oubliette is right, is the peace pact actually destroying all the fae?

When a homeless boy that Troll Wife has befriended loses his first tooth, Troll Wife has to make sure he keeps the pact before Oubliette catches up to him.

(snip reason I'm submitting to this agent)