The Saturday Slash

Don't be afraid to ask for help with the most critical first step of your writing journey - the query.

I’ve been blogging since 2011 and have critiqued over 200 queries here on the blog using my Hatchet of Death. This is how I edit myself, it is how I edit others. If you think you want to play with me and my hatchet, shoot me an email.

If the Saturday Slash has been helpful to you in the past, or if you’d like for me to take a look at your query please consider making a donation, if you are able.

If you’re ready to take the next step, I also offer editing services.

My thoughts are in blue, words to delete are in red, suggested rephrasing is in orange.

Complete at 78K words, THE WORST OF US is a romantic suspense exploring a conflicted love story tangled in past trauma and lingering guilt, similar to All the Missing Pieces by Catherine Cowles. It also mirrors the morally gray character and the found-family dynamic of The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave. Good intro! You're clear on your genre, comp titles, and audience.

Against her better judgement, thirty-year-old teacher Emma Johnson provides a false alibi when her troubled but beloved brother Tony is accused of a minor drug-related crime. However, a week later, Tony kills a single mother in a hit-and-run, leaving the victim’s eighteen-year-old daughter, Brianna—one of Emma’s students—completely alone. Overwhelmed with guilt, Emma vows to offer the girl support and a stable home, carefully concealing her brother’s involvement in the accident. Normally I would say that I need to know how the two crimes connect to each other, but that becomes clear later on, so I think this para is good as is.

Detective Nathan Stone has made it his mission to dismantle the drug organization Tony is tied to, committed to live up to his father’s reputation in the Narcotics Division. Despite his sharp instinct for reading people, he cannot determine whether Emma is a victim of her brother’s manipulation or a masterful liar hiding his whereabouts. Either way, he knows she could help bring Tony to justice.

Bound by their mutual concern for Brianna’s struggle with grief, Emma and Nathan find themselves unexpectedly aligned and slowly drawn to each other. Soon, their nightly conversations Nightly conversations seem like a lot. How did this develop? Did they cross paths as part of his investigation? shift from formal to intimate. But when Tony threatens to expose Emma’s false alibi But wouldn't that implicate him in the drug related crime? I'm not sure that makes a lot of sense in terms of something he's holding over her head; he loses his alibi if he rats her out if she doesn’t help him stay hidden, she must choose between the man she’s falling in love with, the girl she promised to care for, and the brother who protected her throughout their abusive childhood. Technically these are three things, so she's not choosing "between" them, because that implies two things.

Overall this is in pretty good shape in terms of plot. What it needs is a little more character injection. We don't have any feel for who these people are. Sad or scrappy? Doing great or pretending? We don't really have any idea what they are like as people, just what their purpose in the plot is. The last line says that Emma had an abusive childhood, which needs to be developed more and metioned earlier.

The Saturday Slash

Don't be afraid to ask for help with the most critical first step of your writing journey - the query.

I’ve been blogging since 2011 and have critiqued over 200 queries here on the blog using my Hatchet of Death. This is how I edit myself, it is how I edit others. If you think you want to play with me and my hatchet, shoot me an email.

If the Saturday Slash has been helpful to you in the past, or if you’d like for me to take a look at your query please consider making a donation, if you are able.

If you’re ready to take the next step, I also offer editing services.

My thoughts are in blue, words to delete are in red, suggested rephrasing is in orange.

I am seeking representation for “The Sound of Ice Melting,” Put your title in all caps or italics, not quotes a modern 95,617 Just say 95k word gay YA psychological drama comparable to Poor Deer, by Claire Oshetsky, The Secret of Us, by Lucinda Berry, and Words on Bathroom Walls, by Julia Walton.

Joe was ten when he first tried to kill himself, a month after his mother’s murder. Four years later, he tried again. His psychiatrist believes Joe saw his father murder his mother, but Joe says it feels like there’s a demon in his head that makes him want to destroy himself.

When Joe’s sixteen, he meets Troy and falls in love, and a year later, they’re still together and happier than ever. Right now this is just reading like a walkthrough of someone's life, more like a synopsis than a query. They’ve just graduated and have been accepted at the same college. Life is perfect! So, everyone is surprised when Joe tries to kill himself again. Seeing the pain it causes those he loves the most, Joe vows to never try it again. As a reader we don't have a great feeling for the "why" here, and not just for this most recent attempt. In order to connect more with the character the reader needs to understand what it's actually like inside Joe's head. Right now these are factual statements with very little emotion attached.

Two months later, he’s diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor and given two months to live. What doctors call “a tumor” and Joe calls “a demon,” Troy calls “a memory,” specifically of what really happened on the night Joe’s mother was murdered. In order to bring the repressed memory to light, Troy, desperate to save Joe, decides to treat the tumor as Joe sees it and exorcise the demon. What they discover is a truth much darker than they ever imagined. This is kind of a tease in that you're not telling the reader / agent what is actually going on. This is reading more like what the back matter of a novel would have to entice a reader. For a query letter, you need to let the agent know what makes this book different, what makes it stand out, what is unique here. If the "truth is much darker than they ever imagined," say what that is so that the agent knows whether this is worth their time as a read or not.

I’m an American writer, playwright, ESL teacher, editor, and copywriter with a BA in English. I’ve spent more than forty years working professionally with children and adolescents, twelve as a counselor and supervisor in psychiatric facilities treating severely emotionally disturbed children and adolescents, many of whom were suicidal or had self-injurious behaviors. Great bio!

The Saturday Slash

Don't be afraid to ask for help with the most critical first step of your writing journey - the query.

I’ve been blogging since 2011 and have critiqued over 200 queries here on the blog using my Hatchet of Death. This is how I edit myself, it is how I edit others. If you think you want to play with me and my hatchet, shoot me an email.

If the Saturday Slash has been helpful to you in the past, or if you’d like for me to take a look at your query please consider making a donation, if you are able.

If you’re ready to take the next step, I also offer editing services.

My thoughts are in blue, words to delete are in red, suggested rephrasing is in orange.

I am seeking representation for my debut adult fantasy novel, The Journeymen, a 102,000-word story that blends humor and philosophy through the adventures of three compelling characters. You don't need to state that it's your debut; they will assume that. I also wouldn't self-describe your characters as compelling. Of course you think they're compelling - you wrote them.

Set in a world where the era of gods, monsters, and proverbial energies is losing its grasp on the world echo (same word used closely together) with "world", like an ice age, the old era gives way, moving away from the equator toward the poles. I'm really not sure what this is saying. Is this all figurative language, or is something actually moving? Even if it's figurative, it's quite murky and is mostly just going to leave the reader trying to untangle what's being said, when what you want is an enticing hook, not a head-scratcher. Leaving behind sentient races So everyone that's still around isn't sentient? and lingering magic, here in the north, the old breath of the paranormal and the impossible still holds some grasp over these lands. Here on the frontier of the still partially settled north, life thrives on the border between the mundane and the mystical. Dangerous artifacts, reality-bending spells, and unfinished afterlives shape a landscape where power is coveted and the supernatural is never far away. This entire paragraph is mostly just confusing and isn't directly informing the reader of anything. It's also all setting, which isn't a great thing to focus on if you want to hook an agent's attention.

At its heart is an escaped slave striving to navigate the complexities of freedom. Haunted by his past and uncertain of his future, he embarks on a journey to find—or perhaps create—a place he can truly call home. His story anchors the novel’s emotional core, exploring themes of identity, belonging, and resilience. Does he have a name?

Alongside him is Laurent, a roguish goblin whose restless travels mask a deeper quest: to break a curse that keeps him apart from his beloved fiancé. His charm and cunning bring levity and intrigue, enriching the narrative with a sense of wanderlust and longing.

The third protagonist, Bel-shar-usur (Bel), is a young mage fleeing the violent legacy of his powerful war-mage father. His journey is one of self-discovery, as he seeks to define his own path and wrest control of his fate from the shadows of expectation.

But I don't know what is drawing these three together. It sounds like some sort of shared journey, but I don't know where they are going, why they are going there, or what brought the three of them together.

Each character brings strengths and perspectives the others lack, creating a dynamic where they rely on one another to fulfill their personal arcs. Their intertwined journeys forge bonds of friendship, kinship, and romance, making their collective story one of connection and mutual growth. Without one another, none could fully realize their destinies. This again feels like a paragraph where you're telling the agent what you think the story is delivering. It's an assumed in a novel with an ensemble cast that they complement and contradict each other in different ways. So in essence this paragraph is just you stating that you did something that is kind of expected anyway.

The Journeymen is a tale of scoundrels and misfits, filled with sharp wit, occasional coarse language, and moments of genuine insight. It will resonate with readers who appreciate stories that balance lighthearted adventure with meaningful depth—fans of Adventure Time, Patricia Wrede’s Enchanted Forest Chronicles, Kevin Hearne’s Iron Druid Chronicles, Diana Wynne Jones and, to a lesser extent, Terry Pratchett’s work. Right now this entire query is very vague and isn't telling us anything about the plot. A query needs to establish these things -- what does the main character(s) want? What stands in the way of them getting it? What are they willing to do to overcome those obstacles? And what is at stake if they don't? None of that is currently here in this query.

My name is Eugene Myznikov, and I’m a writer passionate about creating immersive fantasy worlds and characters. As an autistic person, storytelling is my special interest, and I bring a unique perspective and attention to detail to my work. Inspired by nature, cooking, and a love for fantasy sparked by the Witcher series, I strive to craft stories that blend adventure, magic, and authentic emotion. Good bio, but you need to work on getting the plot into this query, rather than taking up a lot of time with setting and then explaining the themes of the story.