Title: AFTRLYF
Genre: YA Contemporary Fantasy
If there's one thing teen angel Tia is bad at, it's her job. After bringing the wrong soul to limbo, killing him with a single touch, she doesn't think the afterlife could get much worse. Then an angel of death is murdered. Shit. Her father, head honcho in the death department, is supposed to be the only one with the power to kill angels, so how the hell is this self-proclaimed "Reaper" destroying angels' souls? When the Reaper targets Tia's family and her little brother disappears, Tia will go to any length to find him and stop the Reaper.
No investigative skills of her own, she enlists the help of the fresh-from-the-academy human cop, Sean, who caught her standing over the dead body of her last soul pick-up. But the last thing she needs is a hot guy to distract her--particularly when that distraction doesn't die after touching her. It can't be a coincidence that Officer Immortality just happened to appear at the peak of the Reaper's hostile takeover. Tia needs to figure out Sean's role in the Reaper's plan before her entire family is destroyed--and before she falls for a guy who might be doing the destroying.
AFTRLYF is a 65,000-word YA contemporary fantasy. At your request, I am prepared to send the completed manuscript. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Okay, I've only read two queries so far, and I want to request a full from both of them ... yours included. Too bad I'm not an agent. :(
ReplyDeleteI love your hook and your voice. You could have edited it a little better.
For example: After bringing the wrong soul to limbo, killing him with a single touch, she doesn't think the afterlife could get much worse.
It would be better as: After bringing the wrong soul to limbo and killing him with a single touch, she doesn't think the afterlife could get much worse.
You wrote: No investigative skills of her own . . .
It should be: With no investigative skills of her own . . .
Remember, if your query is filled with weak writing, the agent will assume your ms is as well.
Good luck!
There's not much I can say from this. It's amazing, very well done. The only advice I can give is that the second paragraph maybe would read smoother if you add a 'With' at the beginning: "With no investigative skills of her own etc."
ReplyDeleteAlso, I am questioning a bit the hot guy being a cop fresh out of the academy. He'd probably be 20-something right? I think for YA people might expect him to be a bit younger considering the angel herself is a 'teen', but then again Rachelle Meade's main hottie is also quite a bit older than the main character so maybe that won't matter.
All in all great voice, interesting premise, and I'd probably buy this book ;)
A great query. Loved the voice! Be careful with the spelling of your title. It was wierd to read a first!
ReplyDeleteI like the title and the premise. I detect a little humor in this piece as well. True, the query could be edited a bit more, but overall, I'd still request this on voice and premise alone.
ReplyDeleteI've loved this since the SMP contest.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing that trips me up is the second line of the second paragraph. There is nothing grammatically wrong with it, but "particularly when that distraction" always makes me do a double take. I know you're talking about Sean, but for some reason it never clicks with me until a second read. I'm probably the only one who feels this way but I thought it was worth mentioning :)
Loved this query :) You've got it all down-voice, story description, conflict. Great job!
ReplyDeleteI'd like to get a stronger sense of Tia's personality in this query. You have room to expand, so see if you can work in her voice and more character development details.
ReplyDeleteThere are a lot of angel-themed books on the market, and soon-to-be-published, so agents and editors will be looking for how this one is different.
A strong start.