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.

There is no love lost between Adrian Hunter and the Council. You need a stronger hook. I don't know who Adrian is, or the Council, what they disagree about, why I should care, or what genre this is. Yet as tension rises between the latter and the Aethlings, he must prevent the situation from becoming a stinky pile of myga poop. Same problem - I don't know who the Aethlings are, what the tension is over, orwhat myga poop is. Warning the Council of a takeover attempt (and not even getting a thanks in return) was just step one; the conflict can only be resolved if there’s true equality for misfits. A takeover by who? Are we talking about Adrian now? Who is Adrian? What is Adrian? Why do they care about what's going on here? What's at stake? What is the inequality? As if that’s not difficult enough, he must deal with an awkward reunion with his ex-partner—er, ex-work partner (whom he finds attractive)—and stop a spirit from causing more destruction than a clash between the factions would. Again, just not enough info. I don't know what the spirit is causing destruction to, why it matters to the plot, or what Adrian does for a job or why the partner / ex would matter.

It all started with a spirit Adrian had been chasing on a job. I don't know what their job is, and "it all started" isn't a phrase that should be buried in a query. Somehow the Aethlings were involved, and he reluctantly infiltrates the group upon the Council’s orders to discover their intentions.Again, so vague. Things only become more complicated as he finds that someone is plotting to open a portal to another dimension…which will have consequences of disastrous proportions.Like what? Add in some connections to his forgotten past and it’s the perfect recipe for disaster. All he has are his (sometimes unreliable) ability to do what? and a small ragtag group that may or may not contain spies from different parties.

The Palabrian is a 75,000-word debut urban fantasy novel with a heap of humour, a dash of LGBTQ romance, and loads of spirits.

This is on a multiple submission. Thank you for your consideration. I look forward to hearing from you.

You're suffering from a little bit of query blindness here - you know what the backstory is and what each group is, what their roles in the story are, etc. The reader doesn't. So I have no clue how all of these moving parts work together to create a story, or what the story is. I also had no idea that this was urban fantasy - it reads like it could be high fantasy. There's no mention of real world concerns here, so I didn't guess it was urban.

You'll need to take a hard look at my questions above, and find concise ways to get the worldbuilding, plot, and character motivations into this query.

Right now, it just reads like a generic concept - there's an unclear struggle between groups, a demon and a portal, and a love interest. I don't know how they interconnect, or why this is any different from any other story with those elements.

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 was looking for Literary Agents in the market for unique, out-of-the-box Science Fiction stories featuring BIPOC, and a search led me to your website. I am writing in hopes that you will find my 51,560 word sci-fi sports story “War/Game” interesting. Not a bad way to start, but I always encourage writers to open with the hook. They know that you're looking for an agent, b/c you're querying them. Everyone has a title, a genre and a wordcount. Start with what makes you unique - the hook of your book. Also, word count can be rounded - so this would be 52k.

Ahmed Dean is a star point guard for a lowly basketball team in the midst of one of their worst seasons. Right now this hook isn't indicating in any way that this is an SF story. It sounds like a straight up sports tale He came to this team to change its losing attitude and habits for the better, but inept play from his teammates, clashes with coaches and the selfishness of the other star player on the team are wearing on him. He is losing track of time and alienating himself from his friends, fans and girlfriend. What does this mean? How? What does losing time look like? A season-defining game against his defending champion former team is right around the corner, and Ahmed cannot afford to fail. Again, all the focus here seems to be on sports, not SF.

Ahmed Dean is a leader of a small army of freedom fighters sent from planet Earth to liberate planet Mars from a tyrannical rule. The enemy is always well prepared for Ahmed’s army, and his troops are losing every battle. The grind of surviving a losing you've got an echo here with losing war on a foreign planet with a harsh climate, hazardous sandstorms and giant man-eating wurms is making it hard for him to rest, and he frequently blacks out from sleep deprivation. One final, desperate raid on a crucial military post is his last hope of turning the tide of the war, and Ahmed cannot afford to fail.

One of these worlds is real. The other one is all in Ahmed’s mind.

And Ahmed needs to figure out which is which before his losses cost him everything. What is everything? What is at stake? Losing his mind? Losing the war? Losing a basketball game? I think what you have here is interesting in a Fight Club type of way, but you'll need to be more clear about what is at stake - and I would also advise opening with the SF element, rather than the contemporary basketball element.

I am an African-American writer, and I have already had four novels published. Did they do well? If so, mention the titles. If they did badly, I wouldn't mention them at all. I wrote and illustrated a webcomic for three years, definitely link it and I was an entertainment journalist for the Michigan Daily Newspaper. I studied creative writing under the tutelage of Jonis Agee (Strange Angels, South of Resurrection) and Tish O’Dowd (Floaters). I also maintain a weekly writing advice blog at www.proseandquans.substack.com Just as an FYI, I get an error message when I try to visit this link = uses an unsupported protocol

The first few pages and a complete synopsis is available upon request. I thank you for your time and look forward to your response.

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.

When a severed arm washes up on shore of Cormorant's Roost, other island residents blame sharks. Mira knows it was no shark, but a monster with fangs and scales who killed to save her. I like it, but some clarification might be needed. Did the monster kill the owner of this arm to save her? Or was this a separate incident?

Years later, because you are unsure of whether this is YA or not, we need clarification on her age here Mira overcomes the fear that kept her away from the ocean to rescue an orphaned sea otter pup. She re-encounters the creature, a telepathic sea monster who is trapped in exile from his South Pacific home and calls himself Bardo. Her fear turns to wonder--Bardo is intelligent, majestic, and he only kills and eats those who deserve it. Some explanation here of what that looks like - examples, maybe, of those he has killed. This could easily be a sliding scale. Bardo is thrilled that his years of solitude are over, and Mira feels powerful by association with the predator.

Bardo is nearly discovered when Calder, a summer resident on his sailboat, finds Mira in the sea miles from shore and “rescues” her. From what? Is she in danger of drowning? In danger from Bardo? Mira finds Calder entitled and arrogant, but he starts to erode the seawall around her heart. How, if she finds him entitled and arrogant? Meanwhile, the body count on the island grows, again, who is he killing? Just bad people? How bad? along with suspicions about what’s in the water. Mira is desperate to help Bardo return home before he is captured or killed, but she can’t do it alone. She must decide whether she can trust Calder with her secret.

DRAWN ONWARD is Adult Magical Realism with YA crossover appeal, complete at 79,000 words. It features the fight for survival despite parental abuse and isolation Wait, what? How does parental abuse fit into this story? Isolation? found in Kristin Hannah’s The Great Alone with the hint of magic in the contemporary world found in The Shape of Water.

I think this sounds like a ton of fun, and if Mira is an adult for the majority of the manuscript, then this is an adult novel. The sudden dropping of parental abuse at the end needs to be drawn into the query as a whole. Is this indicative of how Bardo saved her when she was younger? What happened? How did that affect the rest of Mira's life? Why does she have seawalls around her heart? What is this isolation? Personal and priviate, or of the setting in general? How can there be a connection between Mira and Calder when the only characteristics we have for him here are extremely negative? Overall, I think this sounds like a cool idea, and like it could have some great themes - they just need to be included in the query.