posted
This letter has already been run past Evil Editor and his minions. *cringe* Kings_falcon, you helped me pin-point what the real interest/focus of the story was, so, thanks. Hopefully, this is better.
So, everyone, is this letter clear and intriguing? Please point out what's good, as that's as helpful, too.
-------
Dear Editor:
I’d like to tell you about my 82,000 word fantasy novel, Queen’s Justice.
High ministers ruled Santor for the twelve years that the throne remained empty. When a commoner girl who was raised as a soldier is unexpectedly chosen to become the Queen of Santor, her high ministers believe that it will be easy to manipulate her into doing their will. They were wrong.
Rica may have been raised to follow orders without question, but that doesn’t mean she can’t spot when her ministers aren’t giving her accurate information. Rica finds herself engaged in verbal battles with her high ministers as she attempts to sort through their deceptions and make good decisions.
When two commons try to kill her during a grievances court, Rica suspects that her high ministers and members of her army were behind the failed assassination. Uncertain of who to trust and fearing for her safety, Rica flees the palace disguised as a mercenary. She attempts to find proof of who her enemies are as she travels, but Rica is frustrated to find that no one will speak to a nosy mercenary--even when it’s obvious that they’re unhappy.
She finally stumbles across a group of rebels that have the evidence she needs against Lord Darris and his uncle, Sansu Kobri. She isn’t about to let these two go unpunished, but Sansu Kobri has usurped Rica’s power and has people out searching for her. The only way to bring her enemies to justice now is to lead the rebels against them, despite the odds.
The full manuscript of Queen’s Justice is available upon request. A self-address, stamped envelope is enclosed for your reply. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
------
Revised version below. Another revised version below that. And yet another revised version below that.
[This message has been edited by DebbieKW (edited May 16, 2007).]
[This message has been edited by DebbieKW (edited May 21, 2007).]
[This message has been edited by DebbieKW (edited May 21, 2007).]
quote:[High ministers ruled Santor for the twelve years that the throne remained empty.] I wouldn't start here, start; When a commoner girl who was raised as a soldier is unexpectedly chosen to become the Queen of Santor,[after the throne was empty for twelve years (or something along those lines) her high ministers believe that it will be easy to manipulate her into doing their will. They were wrong.
Rica [Who's Rica? If its the girls then say so in the first paragraph] may have been raised to follow orders without question, but that doesn’t mean she can’t spot when her ministers aren’t giving her accurate information. Rica finds herself engaged in verbal battles with her high ministers as she attempts to sort through their deceptions and make good decisions.[This second sentance is great, but the first sounds clunky to me. Try something along the lines of Raised to follow orders, Rica can still spot when her ministers are.... ]
When two commons try to kill her during a grievances court, Rica suspects that her high ministers and members of her army were behind the failed assassination. Uncertain of who to trust and fearing for her safety, Rica flees the palace disguised as a mercenary. She attempts to find proof of who her enemies are as she travels, but Rica is frustrated to find that no one will speak to a nosy mercenary--even when it’s obvious that they’re unhappy. [The second and third sentances don't really tell me enough to need being here. I would try to say this in a shorter sentance]
She finally stumbles across a group of rebels that have the evidence she needs against Lord Darris and his uncle, Sansu Kobri. She isn’t about to let these two go unpunished, but Sansu Kobri has usurped Rica’s power and has people out searching for her. The only way to bring her enemies to justice now is to lead the rebels against them, despite the odds.[I think you need to reveal the outcome of the rebel uprising]
You need to say who Lord Darris is, instead of putting him in at the end because I would be wondering where he fits in. I know its difficult to do a summary in so few words - and if this was a one page synopsis, you could go into more detail; ie, motives and more about the characters. Do you send a detailed sysnopsis too, or just what's in the queery letter?
I tend to do both. A two paragraph summary in the letter, then a full, one page synopsis. They can read it if they are interested enough, or not if they don't want, but the chioce is there.
The part about her being a commoner chosen for the throne is interesting, and that her ministers want to kill her, I'd want to know why though too.
Hope this helps.
[edited to fix quote]
[This message has been edited by darklight (edited May 15, 2007).]
posted
I probably should wait for more replies, but I fiddled with my query letter for several hours and came up with the following. Is it better? If not, are any parts better?
------- I’d like to tell you about my 82,000 word fantasy novel, Queen’s Justice.
High ministers have ruled Santor for the last twelve years when Rica, a commoner girl who was raised as a soldier, is unexpectedly chosen to become the Queen of Santor. The high ministers console themselves with the expectation that it will be easy to manipulate her into doing their will. They were wrong. Rica was raised to follow orders without question, but that doesn’t mean she can’t spot when her ministers aren’t giving her accurate information. Rica engages in verbal battles with Sansu Kobri and her other high officials as she attempts to sort through their deceptions and enforce her decisions.
When two commons try to kill her during a grievances court, Rica suspects that her high ministers and members of her army were behind the failed assassination. Uncertain of who to trust and fearing for her safety, Rica flees the palace disguised as a mercenary. She attempts to find proof of who her enemies are as she travels her country as a cargo caravan guard. She finally stumbles across a group of rebels that have evidence implicating Lord Darris and his uncle, Sansu Kobri, in the assassination of the previous king. She isn’t about to let these two go unpunished, but Rica discovers that Kobri has usurped her power and has soldiers out searching for her. The only way to bring her enemies to justice now is to lead the rebels against them, despite the odds.
posted
The second one is much better. I feel that I know more about the story now and would read the first page at least.
Posts: 626 | Registered: Mar 2007
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posted
I think you are too close to it. You've got to shorten it a bit.
Maybe something like:
'Rica was torn from her mercenary training and thrust into the long-vacant throne of Sandor, only to discover that she had been made the target of assassins. Everywhere she looked there was misdirection and ambitious plots. Eager for the truth Queen 'Rica fled the palace. She stumbled upon a group of rebels that knew the truth: Sansu Kobri (her royal advisor) and his nephew, Lord Darris were behind the murder of the previous king and her own assassination attempt. Kobri used Queen 'Rica's absence to seize control of Sandor. The only way to stop her enemies, and regain her throne, will be to lead rebels into a civil war that could tear Sandor apart.
By the way, I have no problem with giving the ending away (of the success or failure of the rebel uprising), but 1) I can't think of a non-boring, non-confusing way of saying it in one sentence, 2) my synopsis will cover that if a synopsis is requested, 3) take a guess on if she succeeds or not. I'll bet you'll be right.
InarticulateBabbler, thanks for posting. However, I don't need to make the hook shorter just for the sake of making it shorter. The complete query letter fits on one page with room to spare. Is that the only reason you felt that the hook needed a re-write, or did you find something about it confusing or boring?
I could see the hook leading off. A shorter, cleaner hook catches the interest and doesn't let it go. IMHO, you were getting away from the hook with the excess (This is what I meant by you being too close to it. You're going to want to cram every bit of the story that you can into this, and you're still going to feel that you're cheating a bit of the tale.). I started to drift while reading both versions, so I thought I'd made a suggestion that is short and to the point.
I wasn't just saying it's too long; I was hinting at trimming the sidetracks out of it for cementing the sale (or punch, if you like).
[This message has been edited by InarticulateBabbler (edited May 16, 2007).]
posted
Much better. You seem to focus a lot on the unnamed ministers in the first paragraph. Try to draw the focus back to Rica as soon as possible.
quote: High ministers have ruled Santor for the last twelve years when Rica, a commoner girl who was raised as a soldier why not just say "a common soldier?" I'll assume she's not noble because she's just a soldier. , is unexpectedly This word doesn't help you. Of course it was unexpected. chosen to become the Queen of Santor. IMHO - Give me a bad guy's name here. So maybe: The First Advisor, Sansu Kobri consoles himself with the thought that Rica will be easy to manipulate and he will remain the true power in Santor. The high ministers console themselves with the expectation that it will be easy to manipulate her into doing their will. They were wrong. Very nice. IMHO, end this paragraph right there. I'm hooked.
I'm not sure you need the next two sentances. If you want to keep something like this, it might be better to tell me in a line or two the event that makes her distrust Sansu.
Rica was raised to follow orders without question, but that doesn’t mean she can’t spot when her ministers aren’t giving her accurate information. Rica engages in verbal battles with Sansu Kobri and her other high officials as she attempts to sort through their deceptions and enforce her decisions.
When two commons try to kill her during a grievances court, Rica suspects that her high ministers and members of her army This is the first reference to the army. Since you don't really go back to it, you might want to cut it were are - keep it in present tense behind the failed assassination. Uncertain of who to trust and fearing for her safety, Rica flees the palace disguised as a mercenary the palace is disguised? Move the description up to hook in with Rica . She attempts to find proof of who her enemies are as she travels her country as a cargo caravan guard. She finally stumbles across a group of rebels that have evidence implicating Lord Darris and his uncle, Sansu Kobri I'd reference Sansu first since he's the only other person with a name and then his nephew , in the assassination of the previous king. She isn’t about to let these two go unpunished, but Rica discovers that Kobri has usurped her power and has soldiers out searching for her. The only way to bring her enemies to justice now is to lead the rebels against them, despite the odds.
Why not tell us what the evidence is? Or do what IB suggests and just tell me - Santus murdered the previous king. I think you can probably drop the name reference to Darius since he's not as important to the revised query.
The "She isn't about . . . for her" sentance bothers me but I can't put my finger on why.
Take whatever you can use. Good rewrite though.
Edited for bolding
[This message has been edited by kings_falcon (edited May 21, 2007).]
The throne of Santor has been empty for twelve years when Rica, a young woman who was raised as a common soldier, is chosen to become the Queen of Santor. High Minister Kobri consoles himself with the belief that Rica will be easy to manipulate and that he will remain the true power in Santor. He is wrong.
Rica is frustrated by the deceptions of her high ministers and their resistance to her decisions, but she’s determined to win the battle. When two commoners try to kill her during a grievances court, she suspects that her high ministers and members of her army are behind the failed assassination. Uncertain of who to trust and fearing for her safety, Rica disguises herself as a mercenary and flees the palace. She searches for proof of who her enemies are as she travels throughout her country as a cargo caravan guard.
She finally stumbles across a group of rebels who have evidence implicating Kobri and his nephew, Lord Darris, in the assassination of the previous king. Rica also discovers that Kobri has usurped her power and has soldiers out searching for her. The only way to bring her enemies to justice now is to lead the rebels against them, despite the odds.
You seem to still be a bit heavy on summary and not enough on hook. Think of it as a movie clip (forgive the cross genre reference). When you see a movie clip they show you the best few minutes of the show to get you interested. Even horrible movies have great clips. The trick, of course, is picking the right details.
I do love the "He is wrong."
"Finally stumbles. . . " makes her sound less than competent and like an accident that she found out the information even though she's searching for it. It also undermines the "He is wrong." Try to rephrase it.
I've cleaned out some excess language and reordered some information.
quote: The throne of the kingdom of Santor had been empty for twelve years when Rica, a common soldier, was chosen Queen. No longer the highest official in the land ,High Minister Sansu Kobri believes the teenaged Rica will be easy to manipulate and he will remain the true power in Santor. He is wrong.
Frustrated by the Kobri's resistance to her decisions, Rica is determined to win the battle of wills (or something less cliche) . Barely escaping an assignation attempt, and uncertain of who to trust, she flees the palace. Disguised as a caravan guard, she seeks to unravel the conspiracies surrounding her throne.
The trail leads her to evidence that Kobri murdered the previous king. Desprate to keep the truth hidden, Kobri places a bounty on her head. To bring him to justice, Rica will lead the rebels against him, despite the odds.
I don't need you to tell me she's "a young who was raised as a common soldier" when you can and do work that information into the rest of the query.
I'm not sure I care about the assasignation attempt details - but again that could be a personal preference.
The last paragraph is still not right but since you only have one enemy (or at most one and his nephew) in the query the reference to "enemies" raises more questions that you can answer.
I can accept if you say that she learns that Kobri killed the king without saying how, but I want to know what the evidence is when you use that term. Howeverm that could just be a personal nit.
posted
Okay, so how about this? Still getting better?
(By the way, 'Sansu' is the name of a position, so either I call Kobri a Sansu or a High Minister.)
-------- The throne had been empty for twelve years when Rica, a young woman who was raised as a common soldier, is chosen to become the Queen of Santor. High Minister Kobri believes that he can easily manipulate Rica and that he will remain the true power in Santor. He is wrong.
Rica is frustrated by the deceptions of her high ministers and their resistance to her decisions, but she’s determined to assert her authority over them. When two men attempt to kill her, she suspects that her high ministers and members of her army are behind the failed assassination. Uncertain of who to trust and fearing for her safety, Rica disguises herself as a mercenary and flees the palace.
She searches for proof of who is plotting against her as she travels throughout her country as a cargo caravan guard. She discovers a group of rebels with a witness who tells her that Kobri and his nephew, Lord Darris, assassinated the previous king. Rica also discovers that Kobri has usurped her power and that Lord Darris has soldiers out searching for her. The only way to bring her enemies to justice now is to lead the rebels against them, despite the odds.
-------- Edit: Rather than post the whole query yet again, I'll go ahead an ask people to mentally change that first sentence to:
The throne of the kingdom of Santor has been empty for twelve years when Rica, a young woman who was raised as a common soldier, is chosen to become the Queen.
[This message has been edited by DebbieKW (edited May 22, 2007).]
posted
"The throne" - I'd like to know a little more about the throne - is it for the king of the world, of a small city? is it near an ocean or mountain? Is it a rich kingdom, poor? Has it been chaotic with no one on the throne--if they survived for 12 years without someone on the throne why do they care about putting someone on it now? Not necessarily a big long thing to answer all those questions, but a little little something to place it in time/location.
Does the high minister choose her? Or someone else? Why did they wait so long? Why a commoner?
Present tense always confuses me, that's just a personal thing XD I just see EVERYTHING happening at once and it's dizzying.
Makes me wonder why she doesn't get rid of the high ministers if she's on the throne now.
In the vein of 'show, don't tell' I think you could leave out the part about the high ministers deceptions because her suspicions about them being behind the assasination attempt is SHOWING their deception in a very solid way.
It strikes me as very easy to pop someone on the throne, for them to run away without caring what happens to the kingdom, for the kingdom to survive 12 years without even needing someone on the throne, etc.... I'm getting the impression that the throne isn't very important.
I need more explanation about her search for who is plotting against her. Logically, I would think that whoever is plotting, had attempted the assasinations....would be close to the throne, not out in the middle of the country where she has headed.
"has soldiers out" - something stronger would be nice "has ordered soldiers to search the countryside / has sent soldiers into the mountains to search / has required" etc etc whatever fits the story.
Wondering why high ministers put her on the thrown if they were just going to take it once she's gone? (At least, it sounded like it was them who put her on it--if not, then who? and why didn't these guys take over the throne before she was there?)
Wondering why they are rebels, what are they rebelling against, would they have been rebels against her if she was still on the throne?
A one or two word modifier might help clear up a lot of my confusion so I wouldn't be thinking there are plotholes in the story itself.
What are the odds? How long has she been off the throne that a resistance has been paying enough attention to Kobri to form a rebellion against him?
Since it's a fantasy novel, is there any magic/unusual creatures/etc involved? What defines it as fantasy? It would be good to mention the type somewhere because otherwise I was thinking it might be more like historical fiction.
A lot of the points that you bring up seem to run counter to what I've learned so far about query letter writing from Evil Editor, Miss Snark, and various other professionals. Yes, there are more obvious fantasy elements than just the sword-wielding era in a made-up country. However, it's impossible to bring those elements up in the query without raising more questions than they answer. Also, answering all of the many question you had is impossible in the query letter--though it probably bodes well that you're interested enough in my world that you'd like to know the answers. Anyway, a description of the location and productivity of Santor in the query letter would be boring and thus counter-productive. Most of your other questions involve said fantastical elements that can't effectively be covered in the query or the answers would slow down the pace of the query without adding much.
The novel is written in past tense, third person. However, I believe that query letter hook is supposed to be written in present tense.
Can I ask what words or sentences made you think that Rica "ran away without caring what happens to the kingdom"? That wasn't the impression that I was trying to give in the query. If you can help me pin-point the problem, I'd appreciate it. You also say that she should stick around the palace since that's were the plotters are.
Okay, I said: "When two men attempt to kill her, she suspects that her high ministers and members of her army are behind the failed assassination. Uncertain of who to trust and fearing for her safety, Rica disguises herself as a mercenary and flees the palace."
To answer a previous poster's comment, the whole reason that I kept 'and members of her army' in this was to bring home the point that the very people who are supposed to protect her and arrest the plotters seem to be involved in the conspiracy against her. The 'uncertain of who she can trust' was meant to point out that she's not certain that anyone in the palace will help her uncover the plotters, so it's safer to leave and search from afar. Is this unclear, then? Would changing it to 'and members of her guard' help make this clearer?
Thanks for saying that my query was "Quite professionally written. Very smooth."
[This message has been edited by DebbieKW (edited May 22, 2007).]
posted
Certainly, take their advice over mine....they're the ones with experience I'm going on classwork and books.
Part might be my personal preference too--yes, bringing up fantasy elements brings up even more questions but eh...I like those elements, those are what draw me into a story.....that's why I read sci-fi/fantasy over traditional fiction. So for me, in reading a blurb about a fantasy story...I want to know what's unique about this world, why I should care about what's going on in this world as opposed to any other novel with political issues, how the fantasy element is going to change the potential of the story -- without the time travel element of Doctor Who...you wouldn't have much of a story, that element changes all the potential paths for the story. I also don't personally read a blurb and immediately question the mechanics of the magic/etc, I trust that the author will explain that within the story.
Running away without caring--there is a lot about her personal struggles with the ministers but nothing about her actually running the kingdom, caring about the people she rules, worrying about what will happen to them without her to rule it, leaving someone in her place to take care of things, etc It's not so much a sentence as a lack of acknowledgement about what will happen to the kingdom without her. I'm reading Shadowmarch right now and the king is kidnapped, the next in line is assasinated but there's a whole ordeal about how the prince and princess, despite the danger, love their kingdom so much that they could never leave it, they have a loyalty to their people, they know the kingdom would be ruined if it was left in someone else's hands, etc Not that EVERYTHING has to be explained but a litte 'She knew she could not serve her people if she was dead [so she retreated to a safe distance to prepare to stop the ministers]' kind of thing would help clarify it for me.
'so it's safer to leave and search from afar.' - Okay, this sounds like she's trying to keep an eye on them from a safe distance which makes sense but I was reading it as 'they try to kill her at location A, she goes to location B to stop them.'
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