Query Contest: First Place

Is it hot in here or is it just the query contest? I think it’s the latter. Here we have a sizzling hot YA query from Kirsten Rice, my first place winner:

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Dear Ms. Kole:

After big city California, Sophie’s new life is weird. There’s one grocery store in Morrow. One gray, windy coastline. And one legend that even the sane locals fear.

The opening three lines make this sound like many “teen moves to small town” stories, but the last line COMPLETELY turns that on its ear and gets my attention. The element of surprise and of playing with expectations is very important in query letters. Must read on!

Weirder, Sophie discovers the legend is true. In the woods south of Morrow, a witch gives unhappy kids keys to happier worlds, but always for a price.

The first paragraph included a turn at the end of it. This paragraph also includes a twist. A terrifying legend that turns out to be true. The plot thickens! And I love the ominous tone of “always for a price.” I am hooked.

Weirdest, the witch gives Sophie a key for free. It unlocks a world where her brother Luke plays the piano like he did before he drowned four months ago.

Another twist! This query is windier than a mountain road, hooking me deeper and deeper into it. Sophie gets her key for free! And she’s got a dead brother! And she must find him! Tension is mounting and stakes are getting higher by the second.

Real life is suddenly good, too — full of colors that sizzle after months of gray grieving for Luke. The high school quarterback’s green eyes are as bewitching as the secret he fights to hide from her. Falling in love is dangerous, though, because he’s more mixed up with the witch in the woods than she is. And Luke’s music makes Sophie blue as she starts to realize that the past and future don’t mix. Can’t mix. Worse, Sophie might lose both, because the witch always demands payment — but what did Sophie pay?

There’s a romance element, too. Very nice. And finally, the witch’s bargain comes back to bite Sophie in the butt, as we knew it would. The query has wound through some very interesting twists and come full circle. I also like the ideas of grief and secrets and music that are echoed in this paragraph.

I’m seeking representation for my 80,000-word YA urban fantasy novel THE INBETWEEN, which will appeal to fans of Libba Bray’s Gemma Doyle Trilogy and Melissa Marr’s Wicked Lovely series. The full manuscript is available upon request. Thanks for your time and consideration.

Great comp titles here and it does sound like it might fit in well. Short, electrifying. Good thing I’m critiquing this manuscript as Kirsten’s prize because I cannot wait to read it!

(and thanks for this contest!)

Kirsten Rice

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I have to say that Kirsten’s was one of the tightest and most tension-filled queries I’ve read in a long time, either from my slush or from contest submissions.  (You should see the note scrawled on the print out, it goes something like “OMG!!!!”)

It helps that she’s got a great idea, but she’s also crafted her pitch to me very much like a thriller novel. In writing, making the reader read on and turn the page and start a new chapter and continue to the end is an art. If Kirsten has mastered it this well from paragraph to paragraph in her query, I really can’t wait to see what she does with the prose. (No pressure or anything!)