For my regular readers, these are some special posts this week as part of a pitch contest I'm providing feedback for. My normal musings will return next week.
For participants, welcome to my blog! I'm happy to host you and excited to see what kinds of stories you've written. Please remember that only the author of this piece and the participating judges are supposed to comment. All other comments will be deleted.
We're Team Fluttershy! Because here on Balancing Act, we're both quite sweet unless you provoke us, in which case, we are terrifying.
You can check out other teams on the other hosting blogs: Rena Rocford (Rainbow Dash), Kathleen Ann Palm (Rarity), Elizabeth Roderick (Discord), Katie Hamstead Teller (Princess Luna)
______________________________________
Category and Genre: YA Science Fiction
Word Count: 98,000
Query:
In 2265, fifteen-year-old Mouse yearns to escape from the computer controlled foster system and fly to one of Earth’s exciting new colony planets. She can start over and become someone else. But she’s trapped for three more years, unless she can convince a foster parent to adopt her. Unfortunately, her sixth foster parent abandons her during a city evacuation, and Mouse barely escapes a kidnapping attempt. Desperate to avoid her former abusive group home and hide from the kidnapper, she programs a new identity and joins a group of runaway boys in their underground courier service. Disguised as a boy, Mouse avoids the unwanted attention she’s run from all her life.
Deep in the forest reserve, the biggest issue in seventeen-year-old Taryn’s life is telling her parents she wants to intern on a colony planet, until illegal miners blow up her home and kill her family. Taryn flees into the forest, her only thought survival.
Mouse’s safety is shattered when the kidnapper captures all the courier boys. Her first instinct is to program a new identity and flee, but she can’t leave them to face the horrors they might endure. She follows the clues to an isolated lab in the middle of the forest. Her friends lie in comas, and, in the next room, vacant-eyed kids are trapped in a virtual reality. Mouse rescues the only person still functioning, Taryn, captured while investigating her family’s murder.
Together, the girls must rescue the boys before the lab programs them into mining robot replacements and ships them to a distant asteroid to work until they die.
First 250 Words:
The Spaceport shuttle lifted elegantly over the rows of shipping containers and hovered above the burning city. So close, yet totally unreachable.
Mouse blinked away useless tears.
Ash billowed over the burnt transportation terminal and swirled around her head, obscuring her view for a moment. If everything had gone the way she planned, Mouse would’ve been on that shuttle in nine months, flying to the Jarian Spaceport and boarding a colony ship to Tanek.
Instead, she huddled at the edge of the cargo field with the last of the evacuees while flames engulfed the temporary city-block. Stuck on Earth.
It had been so hard not to beg Emma to take her with them. But it wouldn’t have changed anything. No one really wanted her.
Mouse had twisted her lips into a fake smile and waved her sixth foster parent off with the words she knew Emma wanted to hear. “Of course I understand. I’ve only been here three months. No time to change your colony application. It’s a great opportunity. Go. I’ll be fine.”
Emma’s grateful smile hadn’t made it any easier. Only twenty evacuees had received the offer to skip the emigration wait-list. Of course Emma chose to fly to Tanek now, rather than relocate to another city-block for the next nine months.
Mouse didn’t know why it still hurt. After fifteen years, she should be used to it.
Everyone leaves.
Mouse’s breath caught as the shuttle wings rippled, transforming to propulsion configuration. Flames reflected off the gleaming silver fuselage, a star about to explode.
Recycled Identities: I feel overwhelmed reading this by how much there is in this story. You might need to focus in tighter on fewer aspects of what sounds like a potentially sprawling adventure. In just Mouse’s half of the story, I see: futuristic foster system, restless orphan, kidnapping (why does someone want to kidnap a foster kid? what about her attracts unwanted attention?), programming, gender disguise, and a rescue mission. That’s a *lot.* And we’ve still got Taryn’s half, which seems to be another restless soul suddenly orphaned, an investigation, and getting captured.
ReplyDeleteThe query doesn’t need to (and probably shouldn’t try to) capture ALL the threads of your story, but just to present the heart, the core of it and give the potential publisher a feeling for tone and style. My guess is that the heart of this story is these two young women finding each other and saving the world together. But then again, the query is heavy on Mouse and light on Taryn, so maybe I’m wrong about it being a shared story. Maybe it’s Mouse’s story, and Taryn is just a guest star. I guess the point is, I can’t tell!
Now the 250 words: Good emotional appeal. Excellent working in of the necessary exposition without feeling like a data dump. A strong start that had my sympathy behind Mouse and my interest. So an excellent start!
Thank you for your feedback Samantha. This is great. I'll attack my query again and refine it to the core aspect of the story which is about Mouse using her skills of hiding from the world to save kidnapped kids and find her place in the world.
ReplyDeleteHello from Kathy aka #TeamRarity! All comments are my opinions only. Please take what helps you to make your words better and ignore the rest.
ReplyDeleteIn 2265, fifteen-year-old Mouse yearns to escape from the computer controlled foster system and fly to one of Earth’s exciting new colony planets. (Oh cool!) She can start over and become someone else. But she’s trapped for three more years, unless she can convince a foster parent to adopt her. (Why three more years?) Unfortunately, her sixth foster parent abandons her during a city evacuation (well, they suck), and Mouse barely escapes a kidnapping attempt. (AND SOMEONE IS TRYING TO KIDNAP HER?) Desperate to avoid her former abusive group home and hide from the kidnapper, she programs a new identity (Programs a new identity? How does this work?) and joins a group of runaway boys in their underground courier service. Disguised as a boy, Mouse avoids the unwanted attention she’s run from all her life. (what attention?)
Deep in the forest reserve, the biggest issue in seventeen-year-old Taryn’s life is telling her parents she wants to intern on a colony planet, until illegal miners blow up her home and kill her family. Taryn flees into the forest, her only thought survival. (OMG...)
Mouse’s safety is shattered when the kidnapper captures all the courier boys. Her first instinct is to program a new identity (Is it that easy, just program a new identity?) and flee, but she can’t leave them (Why? What do they mean to her? Why not run?) to face the horrors they might endure. She follows the clues (What clues?) to an isolated lab in the middle of the forest. Her friends lie in comas, and, in the next room, vacant-eyed kids are trapped in a virtual reality. Mouse rescues the only person still functioning, Taryn, captured while investigating her family’s murder. (Taryn was busy not just surviving!)
Together, the girls must rescue the boys before the lab programs them into mining robot replacements and ships them to a distant asteroid to work until they die. HOLY MOLY WHAT!?!?!? Is there a moment where she has to decide to save them or not? Why does she care about them that much? What is driving her?
What is the main story? There is a lot in the query...I get a little lost.
First 250 Words:
ReplyDeleteThe Spaceport shuttle lifted elegantly over the rows of shipping containers and hovered above the burning city. So close, yet totally unreachable.
Mouse blinked away useless tears.
Ash billowed over the burnt transportation terminal and swirled around her head, obscuring her view for a moment. If everything had gone the way she planned, Mouse would’ve been on that shuttle in nine months, flying to the Jarian Spaceport and boarding a colony ship to Tanek. (Where what would happen? What is she dreaming of?)
Instead, she huddled at the edge of the cargo field with the last of the evacuees while flames engulfed the temporary city-block. Stuck on Earth.
It had been so hard not to beg Emma to take her with them. But it wouldn’t have changed anything. No one really wanted her. (No one wanted her who? Emma? Or Mouse? Maybe no one wanted a girl who (insert her main characteristic?))
Mouse had twisted her lips into a fake smile and waved her sixth foster parent off with the words she knew Emma wanted to hear. “Of course I understand. I’ve only been here three months. No time to change your colony application. It’s a great opportunity. Go. I’ll be fine.”
Emma’s grateful smile hadn’t made it any easier. Only twenty evacuees had received the offer to skip the emigration wait-list. Of course Emma chose to fly to Tanek now, rather than relocate to another city-block for the next nine months.
Mouse didn’t know why it still hurt. After fifteen years (of being stuck in the foster care system?), she should be used to it.
Everyone leaves.
Mouse’s breath caught as the shuttle wings rippled, transforming to propulsion configuration. Flames reflected off the gleaming silver fuselage, a star about to explode.
Dude. I am emotionally hooked. I want to know what has happened to her and what will happen to her. This future is a bit grim, but Mouse has a light to her in that sadness. She's been left, she's stuck. She wants so much more. A great first page!
Thanks for the feedback Kathleen. Queries are so hard. Looks like I've got way too many elements and it's causing confusion. The questions and reactions help to pin down where to fix things.
ReplyDeleteIt's so rewarding you could see some lightness in the first page. Thanks!
I've played with the query a bit:
ReplyDeleteIn 2265, Earth is busy colonizing three planets to ease the stress on its resources. Fifteen-year-old Mouse yearns to leave Earth and start over. Stuck in the foster system since birth, she’s mastered the art of becoming invisible to avoid the unwanted attention of predators in the computer-controlled system. Unfortunately, that means her foster parents claim she’s difficult to connect with. So she’s not surprised when her 6th foster mom abandons her during a city-wide fire evacuation, but it still hurts. Desperate to avoid a former group home where her problems with men started, she joins a band of runaways in their underground courier service. They teach her how to alter her mandatory id-chip to change her identity. Disguised as a boy she finally feels safe and discovers she has a knack for programming fake identities. She could hide forever.
But corrupt city-workers are using disasters and abandoned city-block recycling to capture kids, somehow tricking the system monitoring the implanted id-chips to declare the kids as dead. No one will search for them. When the runaways are kidnapped, Mouse escapes because her id-chip is in her wrist instead of her brain. Even with a new identity she won’t be able to hide forever. Mouse follows the kidnappers to an isolated lab, where she discovers her friends in comas and vacant-eyed teens controlled by a program in the next room. She’s determined to save the runaways before they’re turned into programmable zombies, but she has no idea how without becoming one herself.
Or should I stick with the original final sentence? Mouse rescues Taryn, the only teen still alert, and together the two girls fight to rescue the boys before the lab programs them into mining robot replacements and ships them to a distant asteroid to work until they die.
This new version is a lot clearer. Since you keep the focus on Mouse throughout, I wouldn't bring Taryn in at the end. Leave her for a publisher to discover when they ask for a full!
DeleteThank you for giving it another look and I love the optimism in your final thought. :)
DeleteIn 2265, Earth is busy colonizing three planets to ease the stress on its resources. (This new opener doesn't do much for me, I liked when you started with Mouse!) Fifteen-year-old Mouse yearns to leave Earth and start over. (This would be a good first sentence...short and to the point.) Stuck in the foster system since birth, she’s mastered the art of becoming invisible to avoid the unwanted attention of predators (like abusive? Bullies?) in the computer-controlled system. Unfortunately, that means her foster parents claim she’s difficult to connect with. So she’s not surprised when her 6th foster mom abandons her during a city-wide fire evacuation, but it still hurts. (Dude. Ow.) Desperate to avoid a former group home where her problems with men started, she joins a band of runaways in their underground courier service. (They teach her how to alter her mandatory id-chip to change her identity. I don't think you need this sentence, too much info for the query.) Disguised as a boy she finally feels safe and discovers she has a knack for programming fake identities. She could hide forever. (Oh...Oh...BUT?)
ReplyDeleteBut corrupt city-workers are using disasters and abandoned city-block recycling to capture (runaway) kids, somehow tricking the system monitoring the implanted id-chips to declare the kids as dead. (No one will search for them. not needed) When (the runaways...her friends) are kidnapped, Mouse escapes because her id-chip is in her wrist instead of her brain. (I think 'Mouse escapes capture' will do it. We don't need to know about the chip.) (She can program herself a new identity, but she won't be able to hide forever.)Even with a new identity she won’t be able to hide forever. (And she wants to save her friends? Because maybe she finally had a home?) Mouse follows the kidnappers to an isolated lab, where she discovers her friends in comas and vacant-eyed teens controlled by a program (in the next room...not needed). She’s determined to save the runaways before they’re turned into programmable zombies, but she has no idea how without becoming one herself. (Those are pretty good stakes! This feels much more focused. GREAT WORK!)
Or should I stick with the original final sentence? Mouse rescues Taryn, the only teen still alert, and together the two girls fight to rescue the boys before the lab programs them into mining robot replacements and ships them to a distant asteroid to work until they die. (I do like this too...Mouse finds Taryn, the only teen unaffected and together... I think you gotta go with your gut and use the end you like.)
Thanks for taking another look at my revised query. I feel closer. Yay! Sounds like still a bit too many details. I'll keep at it. Thanks for your help.
Delete