Christine Hardy's Current Query II Critiqued

Morning query critique readers. I'm beat, but I'll try to get through this. Notice a new A to Z Challenge 2012 Survivor badge, by Jeremy,  below my photo on the right. Feel free to nab it for your site, if you participated.

In case anyone is new here, Christine's query will be in plain text, and my feedback will be in red.

Here's the letter:

Dear Agent,

Faldur is a captain in the king’s rangers of Belhanor. It's much better to open with character like this, than what your letter did last time, but I'm not sure this is enough. I'd like to know more about what kind of person Faldur is. Just a word or two of backstory, and a word or two of personality would really help. He battles rebels, hunts killer lions left over from the last war, I'm not sure I understand what this means. Why would lions being still around have anything to do with the war? Unless Killer Lions is the name of some company of sellswords, I'm not sure I understand how the two could be connected. and keeps an eye on Marenya, the now-grown daughter of his deceased mentor. This is a bit vague. If he spends most of his time out hunting lions and rebels, he can't act as Marenya's full time bodyguard, so how exactly does he keep an eye on her? Try to be more specific. When Marenya’s is it necessary to use her proper name so many times? Is there a distinct reason you didn't refer to her as her in this sentence? cousin becomes engaged to the crown prince, he is assigned to escort the ladies to the capital for the wedding. Rebels attack them on the road and Marenya allows herself to be captured in her cousin’s place in order to allow an injured Faldur and the bride to escape. I like the way this opening paragraph ends. This was always your inciting incident, and it closes out your opening paragraph very well this way.

Faldur must leave Marenya behind in order to fulfill his duty, forcing him to realize his feelings for her aren’t as brotherly as he thought they were. By the time he is able to go back for her, she has been taken to a secret stronghold in the mountains by the leader of the rebel movement: the prince’s younger brother who is also Faldur’s long-lost friend. This is concise, raises the stakes, and hints at subplots of conflict, so I think it's pretty good.

Marenya believes her captor is under magical thrall to the king’s uncle, who is using him as a puppet to take over the throne. Faldur must decide whether to kill his former friend or help her try to free him, in order to save his country and the woman he loves. I mostly like this summary, but my one problem is with this choice at the end. It doesn't sound like that tough of a choice. I mean if he can free his friend, and save his girl and the country, why would he choose to kill him? I'm sure the reasons are clear in the novel, but you might want to clarify why that choice might be a viable option in your query.

THE GOLDEN GRYPHON is complete in at 100,000 words. [insert standard language]

In summary, this is much better than the last query we worked on together. Your description of the conflict in paragraph two is especially good, considering how much you cover in so few words.

My biggest concern is your opening hook. We don't really know who Faldur is, we don't get a sense of why we should care about his plight, and there are too many confusing things tossed in. I'd like to see a shorter, two sentence paragraph just about him, that packs a real punch, as your opening hook, before you even mention the stuff about Marenya.

Next, of less concern, is that this query is lacking all the wonderful voice you had in the last one. I know it's very difficult to include voice when I told you to leave off other character names and be more concise last time, but even a few world-specific words sprinkled in here and there might help.

Finally, as mentioned above, your choice at the end seems too simple. A tough choice has to have two viable options, neither easy, and neither clearly a better solution than the other. The way yours looks in this letter, I can't possibly conceive of Faldur choosing to kill Raynor.

That's it!

What do you guys think? Please share your feedback in the comments.

Christine Hardy's Current Query II

First - a few announcements. The A to Z Challenge banner has been removed. It's a little sad, because I'd gotten used to it, but the challenge is over, so it is what it is. The Challenge Reflection post badge is still up, so mark your calendars if you haven't already, and the navigation buttons will stay up for at least a month, because I'm still using them to try to make sure I visit every blog that signed up at least once.

In other news, I'm honored to have been invited to join the group blog YA Confidential, which is an exciting blog about YA Books, writing for young people, and everything in between. Please do visit, and make sure you're following us! Speaking of which, if you're new here, from the challenge, I also blog at Project Middle Grade Mayhem, which is another group blog, with a focus on Middle Grade books and readers, so please check and make sure you're following there as well!

Finally, I know a lot of people are taking some time off after the challenge, but I don't have that luxury. I've got several people waiting for query critiques, so I have to get right back to work. I will dearly miss those nice, easy, short posts, though.

So, here we have Christine Hardy's query, again. You may remember she had a query letter for this same project on the blog not long ago, but she asked me to critique her revision, so he we are. Visit the original post, to find links to Christine's blog.

Here we go:

Dear Agent,

Faldur is a captain in the king’s rangers of Belhanor. He battles rebels, hunts killer lions left over from the last war, and keeps an eye on Marenya, the now-grown daughter of his deceased mentor. When Marenya’s cousin becomes engaged to the crown prince, he is assigned to escort the ladies to the capital for the wedding. Rebels attack them on the road and Marenya allows herself to be captured in her cousin’s place in order to allow an injured Faldur and the bride to escape.

Faldur must leave Marenya behind in order to fulfill his duty, forcing him to realize his feelings for her aren’t as brotherly as he thought they were. By the time he is able to go back for her, she has been taken to a secret stronghold in the mountains by the leader of the rebel movement: the prince’s younger brother who is also Faldur’s long-lost friend.

Marenya believes her captor is under magical thrall to the king’s uncle, who is using him as a puppet to take over the throne. Faldur must decide whether to kill his former friend or help her try to free him, in order to save his country and the woman he loves.

THE GOLDEN GRYPHON is complete in 100,000 words. [insert standard language]

That's it.

Please save your feedback for tomorrow, and thank Christine for her courage in the comments. Happy May Day, everyone!

Christine Hardy's Current Query Critiqued

All right. First things first, my bracket is officially busted. I had Michigan State taking it all, and they really laid an egg against Louisville last night. I had been riding first place (and then third) in Nathan Bransford's Bracket Challenge the whole time, until last night. Oh well. It was a fun ride.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, ignore the previous paragraph. If you know exactly what I'm talking about, make fun of me in the comments.

Anyway, today we have Christine's query letter again, this time with my feedback, in red.

The query:

Dear [Agent],

Sometimes the aftermath of peace is war. What does this mean? I mean I know what it means, but why is it here, opening your query? You don't really want to do this. This sentence is not only vague, meaning it has no real bearing on your story, but it's also obvious, logically. What I mean by that is in wartime and peacetime, there are only two options: either you are at war, or you are at peace. So: obviously the aftermath of peace is war ... eventually. It's kind of like saying sometimes the aftermath of night is day.

Ten years after a civil war nearly destroyed the kingdom of Belhanor, rebellion is lifting its bloody head again. This is a much better place to start. This is specific, this is grounding, and this has a touch of world building. A Restorationist movement seeks to restore the pre-war order of lands that were apportioned away from the rebel lords as punishment, resulting in nighttime raids on disputed lands and the threat of open war. I'm a bit ambivalent about this. On the one hand, it's some great writing, and I get the sense that the voice here really matches the way your manuscript is written. On the other, this is a confusing way to open. It's sort of cart before the horse. You're setting up some decent sense of conflict, and giving us a glimpse of an interesting world, but we need to know who is going to need to overcome this conflict first.

Captain Faldur Relszen of the King’s Rangers wants to stay well out of the affairs of the magically-gifted nobles, but when the shadowy leader of the Restorationists enters his territory, he is forced to investigate. Faldur is heartbroken to learn it is none other than his friend, Prince Raynor, the king’s younger son. Raynor is planning to kidnap his older brother Melbrinor’s bride-to-be and use her as bait to lure the crown prince to his death. Faldur promises Melbrinor that he will bring her safely to the capital. In this paragraph, things continue in a similar way. You've got great writing, voice that fits the tone of the story you're telling, but otherwise, things get confusing fast. First of all, if you count Marenya in the next paragraph, you've got four named characters in this query. That's at least two, and possibly three too many. I get the feeling that your manuscript is told by multiple POV characters, and that's fine, it's certainly been proven to work well in fantasy, but other than mentioning that in your housekeeping comments, you can't let that muddy up the extremely critical need for clarity in a query letter. Who is this story really about? I get the feeling it's Faldur and Marenya. If so, name only those two, and refer to these other characters only by their positions, roles, or titles.

Another problem is the names of your characters. They're very cool names, and I bet they fit in well with the cultures that exist in the world of your novel, but if you must name more than two characters in a query, having their names be long and confusing fantasy names doesn't help.

Along the way they are attacked by Restorationists. The bride’s cousin Marenya, whom Faldur secretly loves, allows herself to be captured in the bride’s place so the injured captain and the future queen can escape. Faldur is forced to leave her behind for the moment in order to fulfill his duty. Meanwhile, Marenya discovers that Raynor the prince is under magical thrall to his great-uncle (the instigator of the previous rebellion) but desperately seeking a way to break his control. Faldur and Melbrinor the elder prince pursue the errant prince into the heart of the great-uncle’s mountain stronghold, while Marenya searches for a way to free Raynor and stop another war. The problem here is that trying to keep all these characters straight makes it almost impossible to tell whether there is a clear sense of conflict. Now that I've changed some of them, it seems to me that you do a pretty decent job of setting up a decent conflict, and some very high stakes. The one thing that's missing from your conclusion is a difficult choice your characters will have to make in order to succeed.

THE GOLDEN GRYPHON is a heroic fantasy complete in 100,000 words. I've never heard of heroic as a specific sub-genre of Fantasy. Usually the categories go like this: High/Epic, Low, Urban, Sword & Sorcery, and so on. I'm not an expert in this, so I'm going to ask some friends who know better to confirm.

I am a statistical analyst who has contributed to numerous statistical reports and medical journal articles, an activity that has trained me to write carefully and concisely. I don't think you need this. It has too much potential for shooting yourself in the foot when the inevitable typo is discovered. I have written devotionals for our local Mothers of Preschoolers newsletter, published how-to articles for an online dollhouse magazine, and I blog about writing at thewritershole.blogspot.com.

I am sending this because to you because [personal details] I would be happy to provide further material for your consideration. You may reach me at hanorja@yahoo.com or REDACTED.

Okay, so let's try to summarize here. I think you have the roots of a good query here. You clearly have the writing chops, and I can tell, after sifting through my confusion, that you've got a vibrant and entertaining world here, but your main problem is too much detail, and too many named characters, so much so that everything else gets buried.

I would re-write this. I would open with Faldur, introduce who he is, what his background is, and show us why we should care about his struggle. Then you can sprinkle in your world building elements (or even fit some into the way you introduce him) as you set up the main conflict. Try to see if you can get your query to work as three main paragraphs:

1) CHARACTER. Introduce us to Faldur, sprinkle in some bits about the world he lives in and his backstory.

2) CONFLICT. It seems to me the kidnapping is the inciting incident, and then the pursuit and the recon into enemy territory is the main plot conflict. See if you can clarify all that in your second paragraph.

3) CHOICE. In your final paragraph, make it clear what difficult choice your protagonist will have to make in order to overcome the obstacle from paragraph two. You can also use this paragraph to raise the stakes, and then summarize everything.

Sincerely,

Christine Hardy

That's it.

This one was tough. It's clearly a good story underneath, but there is a lot of information to process. What do you guys think? Can you write an opening hook?

Christine Hardy's Current Query

Do you guys know Christine? She blogs at The Writer's Hole, so go visit her, and follow along. For any new followers, when I critique query letters, I like to make it a two day process. For one thing, it means I have to write less posts, which leaves room for more real writing. But the real reason is that I like to let you see the query, on it's own, with out all my redline, so that you can form your own opinion.

What that means is, please save your feedback for tomorrow.

The query:

Dear [Agent],

Sometimes the aftermath of peace is war.

Ten years after a civil war nearly destroyed the kingdom of Belhanor, rebellion is lifting its bloody head again. A Restorationist movement seeks to restore the pre-war order of lands that were apportioned away from the rebel lords as punishment, resulting in nighttime raids on disputed lands and the threat of open war.

Captain Faldur Relszen of the King’s Rangers wants to stay well out of the affairs of the magically-gifted nobles, but when the shadowy leader of the Restorationists enters his territory, he is forced to investigate. Faldur is heartbroken to learn it is none other than his friend, Prince Raynor, the king’s younger son. Raynor is planning to kidnap his older brother Melbrinor’s bride-to-be and use her as bait to lure the crown prince to his death. Faldur promises Melbrinor that he will bring her safely to the capital.

Along the way they are attacked by Restorationists. The bride’s cousin Marenya, whom Faldur secretly loves, allows herself to be captured in the bride’s place so the injured captain and the future queen can escape. Faldur is forced to leave her behind for the moment in order to fulfill his duty. Meanwhile, Marenya discovers that Raynor is under magical thrall to his great-uncle (the instigator of the previous rebellion) but desperately seeking a way to break his control. Faldur and Melbrinor pursue the errant prince into the heart of the great-uncle’s mountain stronghold, while Marenya searches for a way to free Raynor and stop another war.

THE GOLDEN GRYPHON is a heroic fantasy complete in 100,000 words.

I am a statistical analyst who has contributed to numerous statistical reports and medical journal articles, an activity that has trained me to write carefully and concisely. I have written devotionals for our local Mothers of Preschoolers newsletter, published how-to articles for an online dollhouse magazine, and I blog about writing at thewritershole.blogspot.com.

I am sending this because to you because [personal details] I would be happy to provide further material for your consideration. You may reach me at hanorja@yahoo.com or REDACTED.

Sincerely,

Christine Hardy

That's it.

Please thanks Christine for her courage in the comments, and then we'll all save our feedback for tomorrow.