Face-Lift 1479

Guess the Plot

The White Rabbit

1. I'm late! I'm late! I'm late! But why was the rabbit so late? Find out in this gripping tale of foxes, turtles, and doves.

2. The notorious terrorist known only as the White Rabbit is killing top executives at major corporations. It's up to one disillusioned ad agency employee to stop the killer . . . but should he wait till after the Rabbit takes out Elon Musk? 

3. Having accidentally lured one unsuspecting girl down into Wonderland, the white rabbit now seeks to do so on purpose, not for human trafficking, but because.... Ok, technically it is human trafficking, but not in a bad way. 

4. It was just a sweet white rabbit, couldn't hurt a fly, but Carrie's dad said she couldn't keep it. Of course Carrie keeps the rabbit anyway, hiding it in her closet when her dad's at home. When a fire breaks out, the rabbit makes scratching noises to alert the family. Will dad admit to being a jerk and let Carrie have her bunny?

5. When a hookah-smoking caterpillar gives Bob and Bev the call, they drop their rabbit-chasing quest just in time to avoid falling off a cliff. Also, a talking dormouse.

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor,

Former adjunct professor turned copywriter Ennio Mastroianni has been sentenced to advertising. Trapped in the office of a cult-like ad agency where employees resign by jumping out the window to their deaths, he spends his days contemplating a “no smoking and no suicides” sign in the bathroom, suffering through a Sisyphean revision process of the company blog, and clashing with coworkers in virtual meetings where the other party is [parties are?] only a few steps away. [You've described my day, except I don't have the bathroom sign or meetings with coworkers.] [I googled ad agency blog, and pretty much everything that came up was for "marketing" agencies. Apparently that's how they now prefer to market themselves. Also, I went to few random websites, and found Facebook, X, Instagram, and YouTube links, but nothing about blogs. By the time your book is published, company blogs may be extinct. Even if they aren't, the sign and virtual meetings are enough to get the point across, and we need to shorten a few sentences, so let's drop Sisyphus and his blog. (I got your second sentence down to a nice round fifty words.)]

When a client is exposed for waterboarding and illegally detaining US citizens, [In that order? If they're waterboarding people, it goes without saying that they're detaining them. Plus we just saved another three words.] the agency asks Ennio to clean up the client’s image while a mysterious anti-capitalist terrorist known as the White Rabbit wages war on business, gunning down corporate executives and causing stock prices to plummet. [Just because they're happening at the same time doesn't mean they belong in the same sentence. End the sentence after "image," and change "while" to "Meanwhile."] To calm the market, the agency insists that Ennio carpet bomb the airwaves with a militant ad campaign to counterattack the terrorist. 

[CEO 1: This ruthless terrorist is basically a savage serial killer. We need to stop him.

 CEO 2: I suggest an ad campaign designed to ruin his reputation.]

[For someone who was complaining about his boring job, Ennio seems to get a lot of big-time assignments.] ["Counterattack" seems like the wrong word to me, or maybe I just feel like the military comparisons are being overworked. How about "neutralize" or "retaliate against"? Actually, no word will convince the reader that an ad campaign is an effective response to a murder spree. Which may be the point in the book, but not be clear in the query.] Caught between his paycheck and his moral integrity, Ennio questions his role in rebranding war crimes, [Perhaps I was wrong to promote waterboarding as the most eco-friendly form of torture.] growing disillusioned and desperate for termination. 

However, after a jealous coworker’s sabotage backfires, Ennio is ironically promoted to the agency V-suite, sinking him deeper into a bizarre and corrupt company culture. Now in the White Rabbit’s crosshairs, he must escape before advertising takes his soul—and the White Rabbit takes his life.   

Complete at 72,000 words, The White Rabbit is a work of literary fiction that appropriates conventions of thrillers and action, satirizing the absurdities of modern jobs while exploring the moral compromises we make for our careers. The novel examines the power (and limitations) of language and storytelling. It would appeal to readers who appreciate Kafkaesque anti-work stories like Ling Ma’s Severance and Hilary Leichter’s Temporary. [I wonder what Kafka and Sisyphus would think about their names being turned into adjectives. Once your book becomes a classic, people who quit their jobs to take on terrorists will be described as Mastroiannical.]

I hold an MFA in creative writing from Wilkes University and teach American literature at Thomas Jefferson University. My short fiction has appeared in Pithead Chapel, The Big Click, and Mulberry Fork Review. 

Please find the first ten pages of the manuscript below.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Notes

I suppose if you're trying to sell literary fiction it's not a bad idea to demonstrate that you can  coherently handle 45- and 60+-word sentences, but a few 10-worders thrown in for variety and to give the reader a break are also a good idea.

This seemed okay as it was, but you aren't paying Evil Editor for praise, you're paying him for nitpicking. Which leads me to wonder whether an adjunct professor-turned-copywriter isn't, by definition, a "former" adjunct professor. For purposes of the query you could just call him copywriter Ennio Mastroianni. Another 4 words saved.

Face-Lift 1478

Guess the Plot

Wild Lines

1. The election was Tuesday, but some voters are still waiting in lines that extend for miles, hoping to cast votes they think might change the outcome they heard about on their i-phones.

2. When fifteen-year-old Edigailia notices wrinkles by her eyes, she panics. Is it a curse? Too much partying? Only the commoner witch Ephenero holds the answer, but Edi can't directly contact her, because royals and commoners do not mix.

3. In the post-apocalyptic world, America has fractured into numerous countries separated from one another by "lines" of wilderness patrolled by brutal, depraved monsters who destroy anyone who enters their domain. Captured by these savages and taken to their capital, one man can save the continent from being destroyed by a powerful ancient weapon . . . if he can first escape from the clutches of . . . The Emperor!

4. One year after graduating law school, Jason is overworked and under-appreciated at a top law firm. His housemate convinces him that cocaine will help him get through the rough times. One

month later Jason is unemployed and miserable, and wondering if heroin will help him get through the rough times.

5. When Earth's lines of latitude and longitude mysteriously vanish, it's up to one teenaged cartographer to prevent chaos in the shipping and travel industries.

Original Version

Dear [AGENT],

First Lieutenant Bear Blakely crosses the Lines for a living. Lawless post-apocalyptic borders surrounding the former states of the now defunct USA, these thin strings of wilderness are home to the Liners; [:] savages who rule from their captured capital of Cincinnati and devote their lives to destroying those who intrude upon their domain.

Motivated in unequal parts by patriotism and the promise of extreme hazard pay, Bear volunteers to transport technology with the potential to reunite the fractured continent. He must lead a group [squad? team?] of soldiers from Roanoke, Virginia across the verdant ruinous landscape to The Republic of Chicago, crossing through and into countries that push both his ability to survive and to lead to the limits. [I wouldn't describe a landscape as "verdant ruinous." One of those words suggests grassy meadows, and the other has me thinking war zone rubble.] 

Far from both the beginning and the end of their journey, Bear and his soldiers are waylaid by Liners armed with technology beyond anything they’ve ever seen. [When you're transporting crates of slingshots to your allies, only to find your enemies have bazookas and machine guns, it's time to abandon the mission.] Captured and brought to the Liner stronghold in Cincinnati, Bear confronts the man responsible for the brutality and depravity of the monsters haunting the dark spaces between the countries: The Emperor of the Lines. [I guess that's a better title for him than Head Linesman. Actually, it sounds like a good name for that machine that calls the lines in a tennis match.] [He confronts him? That's like Batman confronting Thanos with a batarang.]

Held captive in the rich and deadly metropolis of Cincinnati, Bear learns of unexpected forces wielding an ancient biological weapon potent enough to threaten the entire continent. All he has to do is escape the city nobody ever leaves. [I don't see why that's all he has to do. Shouldn't he also have to destroy the weapon, or steal the advanced technology? Save the continent?]

Complete at 130,000 words, WILD LINES is a science-fiction thriller and is the first book in a trilogy. It combines the vehicular insanity in Mad Max, the darkly relatable protagonist's humor from The Murderbot Diaries, and the surreal horror in The Dark Tower series.

Notes

Most of what I've said is nitpicking. Possibly what I've written below is too, but here goes:

Bear has two goals. First, make it to Chicago with some sort of technology. He fails; he may get there eventually, but not with his technology. Second, escape from Cincinnati, a place no one ever leaves. Now that he's been captured, and the Liners are laughing at his obsolete technology, we don't much care if he escapes. He needs a third goal we can root for him to accomplish.

How can no one ever leave Cincinnati? What about truck drivers who deliver food and fuel? What about Liners who bring their captives to the Emperor? What about the Bengals and Reds when they have road games?

I'm thinking you can have Bear imprisoned in Cincinnati within 25,000 words. Some hints about what goes on the the next 1o5,000 might be helpful. Maybe he has a decision to make after he escapes: on to Chicago empty-handed, or back to Roanoke for more slingshots. Also 130,000 is a lot of words. Maybe you could cut out 40,000 words worth of vehicular insanity.

In post apocalyptic America, soldiers trying to get from Virginia to Chicago are captured by savages and imprisoned in Cincinnati, never to be heard from again. That's everything I know about the plot, though I may have left out something important. Oh yeah, both sides have some "technology."

The most dangerous part of any trip in your world is crossing Lines. You seem to have them crossing lines into West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Four Lines. They could travel from VA to southern Kentucky, then go west all the way to southern Illinois. Two Lines. Takes longer, but better to be late than to never arrive because you're stuck in Cincinnati. 

These Liners who "devote their lives to destroying those who intrude upon their domain" don't seem like the type to transport Bear and his crew to Cincinnati when they can just kill them.

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Face-Lift 1477

Guess the Plot

Songs of the Empaths

1. "If you could read my mind," by Gordon Lightfoot. "Feel me" by Selena Gomez. Read My Mind," by The Killers. "I feel you," by Depeche Mode. "See me, feel me," by The Who.

2. Tired of humanity treating them like aliens, four empathic women form a Spice Girls tribute group, and tour Europe seeking acceptance. 

3. On a distant world, an exploration party comes across weird ruins with alien music playing over and over. The melody spreads throughout humanity driving everyone mad--not crazy, no, humans are used to ear worms. It's the aliens who will pay the price.

4. In a future where everyone is either normal or an empath, one empathic teenager is tasked with preventing time from unraveling--if she can avoid being thrown into the infamous Prison for Empaths. Also, a 14th-century Franciscan monk.

5. The empaths from the planet Torkon V are known for their mesmerizing voices. Also for their delicious organ meats. Will the newly arrived explorers from Earth treat them as entertainment? Or as dinner?

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor:

I seek representation for Songs of the Empaths, a 75,000-word science fiction novel.

Kati is a 16-year-old empath living in the 23rd century. In a world split between empaths and neurotypicals, empathic activities—like emotion and mind reading and mental persuasion—are banned by the authoritarian League. [If "emotion and mind reading" is one thing, I'd change it to "mind and emotion reading," as "mind reading" is often interpreted as a magic trick, like when a magician says think of a playing card and you think of the five of clubs, and then he cuts open a lemon, and there's a playing card inside and it's the five of clubs. Maybe just go with mind penetration and mental persuasion, which has the added bonus that it rhymes.] [If the empaths / neurotypicals split is about 50 / 50, the empaths could argue that they are the neurotypicals.]

Kati escapes the League's capital, Patriot City, to the Begelah tribe in the Western Territories. [If she hasn't been using banned empathic activities, why would she need to "escape"? Seems like the more empaths who leave the capital willingly, the happier the neurotypicals would be.] Here, empaths can openly develop and use their abilities. She forms deep mental connections with a diverse group of empaths from different historical eras, including Bernard, a 14th-century Franciscan monk skilled in the power of persuasion, [I wouldn't mind forming deep mental connections with a 14th-century Franciscan monk.]  [Just kidding.] and Anna, a brilliant polyglot from the 21st century. Together, they create a super mind called a "coterie," sharing thoughts, emotions, and, most importantly, their supernatural empathic abilities. 

As tensions rise between the League and the Begelah, a twist of fate brings Jaya, a 21st-century empath, into Kati's timeline. Jaya's arrival causes "time quakes" that threaten to unravel the entire timeline. Begelah spies discover that the League has coerced Jaya into using her powers as a shield against Begelah attacks. Merri, Seer of the Begelah, urges Kati to return to Patriot City and free Jaya from the infamous Prison for Empaths. Reluctant at first, Kati is driven to action when the League captures her mother. [No need to bring mother into the negotiation when you can just have Bernard persuade Kati to act.]

Kati returns to Patriot City with a small band of Begelah warriors, drawing on Bernard's powers of persuasion and her coterie's other unique abilities to outmaneuver the League soldiers along the way. 

[Soldiers: Hey, where do you empaths think you're going?

Bernard: I assure you it would be to your advantage to ignore these armed warriors.

Soldiers: What armed warriors?]

Their mission is clear: rescue Jaya from the Prison of the Empaths [In the previous paragraph it was called the Prison for Empaths. Not crazy about either name; considering the title of the book, you might call it Sing Sing.] and return her to her rightful time. This will stop the time quakes and give the Begelah the upper hand in the war. [What about freeing Kati's mom? Is that part of the mission?] 

The narrative unfolds through the perspectives of five main characters, including Jaya, Kati, and each member of her coterie. Immersive backstory chapters illuminate each character's journey. Songs of the Empaths will appeal to those interested in The First Law Trilogy's layered ensemble storytelling and the hero's journey found in Kingfisher's A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking. [Italicize these titles, including your own.]

I am a retired economics professor who lives in XXX, near XXX, with my husband and our toy poodle. I am currently enrolled in Stanford's Memoir Certificate program. Thank you for considering my work; I look forward to hearing from you.

Notes

Instead of empaths vs. neurotypicals, it should be polyglots vs. monoglots. 

So, if I have this straight, it doesn't affect the timeline if your thoughts and emotions go there, but if your body transports there, we could all be doomed? 

Are the neurotypicals okay with the timeline being upset? Aren't they worried they won't exist in the new timeline? Wasn't the timeline upset the moment Jaya disappeared from the 21st century?

Is this the only time a twist of fate has brought someone into a new timeline? And how can they send Jaya back, to the exact time she came from, if she only got here through a twist of fate? 

If they figure out how to send someone to another timeline, they'll start doing it all the time to change history or get rich.