Skip to main content

#13

Title: The Complete Guide to Being Evil
Genre: Quirky Urban Fantasy
Word Count: 50,000

Query:

Riches, youth, magic, Kalara has it all. She's a classic evoker--hurling fire, ice, and electricity is her specialty. As her father always said, the classics are important.

Meet Whitcomb, a powerful necromancer who doesn't want anyone discovering he's selling the souls of the dead who go through his funeral home. Kalara finds out he's also a mage, and lets him know they have that in common in an endeavor to network. His response is an attempt to teleport her into the Hudson River, and it almost works. Scared for her life, she elicits the help of a devil.

Enter Evander, son of a devil. He's fresh from failing his final test to join the ranks of Tartarus, and making a deal with a mortal would save him from disgrace. He has Kalara sign an overly fair contract: in return for borrowing his power for five days, she has to give him a heart from one of his enemies so he can eat it and grow stronger. If she fails to deliver the heart, he eats Kalara's instead.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

First Page:
Day 0

Kalara tipped her hand at a dinner party, late Tuesday afternoon. She didn't know the host, Brentley Whitcomb, but that was normal at these events. Only those originally invited had any connection to the host, and they RSVP'd saying how many extras they had, then tried to use the most interesting acquaintances they had as a way to be the most impressive at the party. All she knew about him was that he had well-trimmed salt-and-pepper hair, icy blue eyes, and a great socializing smile, and owned a few funeral homes around The City.

Kalara still could not believe she was here. She sidled over to the big, wide windows with a small smile and gazed down at the Hudson, swirling with life under the bright sun. She'd now eaten hors d'oeuvres in one of the richest condos in Manhattan, she was renting one of the most luxurious apartments herself, and she got to go to see Broadway whenever she wanted. She was certainly living the high life.

Then the feeling welled up in her, and she had to squelch it back down.

Another woman, probably twice her age, stepped up beside her. “Hello, there. I'm Gene. Would you mind if I joined you at the window?”

“Of course not.” Kalara gave her a polite party smile.

“Oh, but we shouldn't talk about the men. We don't want people thinking we're sexist.”

Kalara, despite all her good breeding, couldn't quite keep her face straight. How was she supposed to respond to something so nutty? Why wasn't whoever brought this bizarre woman out in public keeping an eye on her? She turned slightly away, being intentionally aloof, though to do so was considered bad etiquette. Perhaps she'd loose interest.

Comments

  1. Wow, talk about setting up a scene! Nice job. I so wish I could take a look at this fully because you have me giggling, whether or not that's your intent. Good job!

    Thanks,
    - Terrie

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was my intent. I guess I chose the wrong time to go absentee from the internet!

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Writer In Motion CP feedback

Hey beautiful guys and dolls! Here it is! My CP feedback edited story. Had a hard time with this, but I hope it makes sense. I've got a post I'm working on I plan to put up after Thanksgiving. Here ya go. Enjoy... Every morning I wake to carnival day.  Today, though, I have my key. If I don’t use it before midnight, my way of escape will gone. It’s a silver key with a twisted metal handle, a sapphire stone half moon and engraved stars. There’s a tiny inscription on the moon, but it’s so small, I’ve never been able to read it.I’ve always kept mine in my jewelry box, but today, I string it on a ribbon and tie it around my neck. My two best friends will be wearing theirs, too, and I wonder how they will escape this carnival of dreams. “What’s it for?” Cress asks as we stand in line for the swings. I run my fingertips over the entire silver surface. “I don’t know. It belonged to my grandmother,” I say. “Whatever.” She shrugs her shoulder in a dismissive way. “Have

Insecure Writers Group

Today, my feelings are mixed. On one hand, I've faced more rejection and that's not easy to write about or admit to the world. But I am not crying in my "milk" (no beer, folks:) I want to, but what good would it do??? I received a detailed critique from a "Best First Line" contest. The critique was the best I have ever received and seriously opened my eyes to "how" to improve my writing. Nice! Speaking of critiques, I am still looking for a critique partner. If anyone is looking back, please let me know and we can swap info. I'm sending off a YA query letter and first pages to 3 agents this week. Wish me luck. This will be the first time I have directly contacted and agent with a query. Yes, I'm nervous, so I'm saying again, WISH ME LUCK!!!

Workshop 13

First, sorry about the wonky formatting. I tried, but couldn't fix it... Passive voice. Do you know what passive voice is and why you shouldn't use much passive voice in your writing? It's fairly easy to define, but much harder to avoid in you writing. Passive Voice: It can be defined as using the object of a sentence as the subject, combined with a the "be" form and past participle. Example: The snowman                               has been melted                          by the sun. Poor snowman! Frosty just can't take the heat! But, seriously, here's the breakdown.   The snowman is the wrongly placed subject. has been melted uses the "be" form verb has been and adds the past participle melted . by the sun is a prepositional phrase, with sun as the object of the preposition. We can remove the "be" form helping verbs, change the subject and remove the prepositional phrase, and TA-DA! no more passive voice