Miss Snark's First Victim Query Contest
My entry went up on Miss Snark's First Victim yesterday. It was a very educational critique. My query letter was regarded as pretty strong, but my excerpt had too much tell.
I labored over those first few paragraphs, and probably labored too much. They were overwritten. It's never fun to be told that, but I needed to know. This morning I opened up my manuscript and deleted well over a hundred words from the opening of Normal. It's much more streamlined, though it says pretty much the same thing.
Acacia Levine’s new heart was on the way. I lay back in bed with a smile, letting the phone fall limply from my hand. The hospital never seemed to confirm organ donors at a sensible time of day - not that I really minded. Acacia had been on the transplant list since she was born ten months before. Giddiness surged through me, and I couldn’t wait to bound out of bed and get my coffee started. This was the big day.
As I flung back a spare pillow, an indignant meow caught me by surprise. Minerva. She lay in a perfect nest beside me, her white-socked paws kneading the sheets. Morning sunbeams cut through the blinds and cast perfect vertical lines across her body. I must have left the bedroom door cracked open during my mad scramble to find my ringing phone. The cat usually knew better than to get close to me when I was ungloved, but I guess the bed and sunlight provided too great a temptation.
I rubbed crumbs of sleep from my eyes. When did I last check on Minerva’s status? A week ago, two? Too long. Her feline leukemia could make a return at any time if I wasn’t cautious. I reached out for the ginger tabby. As my fingertips alighted on her side, I closed my eyes, waiting, bracing.
My outstretched fingers sank into soft fur. Soft fur. I felt soft fur. My eyelids burst open. I stared at the cat, watching myself touch her. Minerva yawned and looked at me quizzically. Beneath my hand, her warm, cozy body began to rumble in a purr.
“What’s happening?” I recoiled to stare at my fingers. They looked normal and intact. I grabbed the cat again, this time delving with both hands. I didn’t feel anything. I didn’t see anything. It was gone - the red-tinged dark fog, the roar of a rhythmic heartbeat, the zooming extension of my soul as I explored and corrected the weaknesses of her body. Minerva purred and squinted her eyes. I had never petted her without gloves before. I couldn’t. It was physically impossible.
One of the most frustrating thing in a critique like this is that I can't jump in and explain everything. There were several comments where I wanted to say, "She loses her power in just a few more paragraphs," or "The limits of her powers are explained within the first few pages." It's so hard to get context across in just 250-words - and that showed in a lot of entries, not just mine. Ah well. I probably won't win the contest, but at least Normal will be stronger as a result.
It also surprised me to see the Crossed Genres blog found my contest entry because I mentioned that publication credit in my query's biography. I was reading along on LiveJournal, la la la, and suddenly I'm reading about me. Wow. The internet is a small world sometimes.
I labored over those first few paragraphs, and probably labored too much. They were overwritten. It's never fun to be told that, but I needed to know. This morning I opened up my manuscript and deleted well over a hundred words from the opening of Normal. It's much more streamlined, though it says pretty much the same thing.
Acacia Levine’s new heart was on the way. I lay back in bed with a smile, letting the phone fall limply from my hand. The hospital never seemed to confirm organ donors at a sensible time of day - not that I really minded. Acacia had been on the transplant list since she was born ten months before. Giddiness surged through me, and I couldn’t wait to bound out of bed and get my coffee started. This was the big day.
As I flung back a spare pillow, an indignant meow caught me by surprise. Minerva. She lay in a perfect nest beside me, her white-socked paws kneading the sheets. Morning sunbeams cut through the blinds and cast perfect vertical lines across her body. I must have left the bedroom door cracked open during my mad scramble to find my ringing phone. The cat usually knew better than to get close to me when I was ungloved, but I guess the bed and sunlight provided too great a temptation.
I rubbed crumbs of sleep from my eyes. When did I last check on Minerva’s status? A week ago, two? Too long. Her feline leukemia could make a return at any time if I wasn’t cautious. I reached out for the ginger tabby. As my fingertips alighted on her side, I closed my eyes, waiting, bracing.
My outstretched fingers sank into soft fur. Soft fur. I felt soft fur. My eyelids burst open. I stared at the cat, watching myself touch her. Minerva yawned and looked at me quizzically. Beneath my hand, her warm, cozy body began to rumble in a purr.
“What’s happening?” I recoiled to stare at my fingers. They looked normal and intact. I grabbed the cat again, this time delving with both hands. I didn’t feel anything. I didn’t see anything. It was gone - the red-tinged dark fog, the roar of a rhythmic heartbeat, the zooming extension of my soul as I explored and corrected the weaknesses of her body. Minerva purred and squinted her eyes. I had never petted her without gloves before. I couldn’t. It was physically impossible.
One of the most frustrating thing in a critique like this is that I can't jump in and explain everything. There were several comments where I wanted to say, "She loses her power in just a few more paragraphs," or "The limits of her powers are explained within the first few pages." It's so hard to get context across in just 250-words - and that showed in a lot of entries, not just mine. Ah well. I probably won't win the contest, but at least Normal will be stronger as a result.
It also surprised me to see the Crossed Genres blog found my contest entry because I mentioned that publication credit in my query's biography. I was reading along on LiveJournal, la la la, and suddenly I'm reading about me. Wow. The internet is a small world sometimes.