Query Crit #3

Dear Awesome Agent,

Daphne Chase, an 18-year-old literary prodigy and daughter of Abelard Chase -- a famous, eccentric author known as the hero of his generation -- was not afraid of the shadow lurking around her family's grounds. It had been stalking her for nearly a year now, tirelessly watching her window day after day, without food or water, without rest. She knew he was after her, and only her. She was the only one who could see it: a shadow that had found a way to stand on the ground. He was nothing more than a dark mass with a man's silhouette. Faceless. Intentions hidden. But Daphne wasn't afraid of him. At least not yet.

When Daphne goes to college to study creative writing against her father's will, the shadow follows her. She is certain she will never go back home. She wants to be a writer, write a novel and start her career away from Abelard. Despite neither calling nor answering his phone calls, Abelard manages to interfere in her life by booking a room in the Franks' Inn, a house for students who don't want to live in the dorms. Daphne, an introvert, finds herself surrounded by extroverts and the many privileges that come from living with passionate young adults. They clash daily. They are loud. Some of them love her. Some of them hate her. One of them is an old high school friend. She wants to be away of them all, allies or enemies, to concentrate on her book.

During a visit to the woods that surround the school, the shadow surprises Daphne and introduces himself as Creativity. He is the entity that has inspired both tranquility and destruction. The voice in the back of her head. The dreams she sees when asleep and awake. He says she is ready to be just as successful as her father is. He's chosen her for a deal: in exchange of her love and devotion to him, he will help her write a masterpiece. 

Under pressure, Daphne agrees on a deal with Creativity and gives him a name: Apollo. He soon takes human form, and teaches her to write words in the air. Words that change into events. It's like watching a movie from within. Daphne can give her enemies the most terrible fates, ranging from being kidnapped by bizarre bandits on horses to being crushed by giant trolls. What Daphne had not imagined, though, was that Apollo sees her stories as hints to what she actually wished to happen and uses his influence on people to change their destinies to tragedies that resemble Daphne's ideas the most. Shocked that she is to blame for their sad fate, Daphne tries to run away from the deal, but Apollo punishes her by taking away the people she loved the most. She has to choose between keeping her allegiance to him and finishing the book she dreams to write, or fighting him to keep the few people that remain in her life.

DAPHNE'S BOOK is a 100,000-word New Adult fantasy and romance mashup, a cross between Death Note and Stephen Poliakoff's Capturing Mary, and will particularly interest readers who want to read about flawed characters that are neither entirely good nor bad, or characters that are trying to reconnect with family and friends by listening to their stories, instead of selfishly focusing on themselves.