Title: MY NAME IS KARMA
Genre: YA Speculative Fiction
Word
Count: 88,000
Query:
Abelia Blackwell is a Karma: a being sent
from another dimension to regulate the actions of mankind. Her time in the
human world should be spent supporting good Samaritans and derailing society’s
criminals. Not befriending two teens with horrible pasts to help them overcome
their suffering, as she’s been assigned to do. One of the teens lives in
complete neglect. The other blames herself for all of her life’s misfortunes,
including her father’s disappearance when she was a baby. Both of them mean
trouble for Abelia.
Her biggest
problem with the assignment is that it tears her away from what she really
cares about: her rebel organization back home. As its leader, she was captured
and sent to the human world as punishment. She’s certain the tyrannical king of
her world did not send her with the intention of helping humans. He did it to get
her out of his way.
While Abelia
would love to save the teens, she’d much rather go home to stop the king’s
injustices. Unfortunately, saving these two girls is her only chance to return.
It’s not just her only chance to return -- and her only chance to survive.
Under the king’s cruel reign, the punishment for failing a Karma mission is
execution. If Abelia can’t lead these teens from the self-destructive paths
they're on, she’ll die.
First
250:
It's not like
I killed someone. Hell, I 'd been saving someone from being killed. Yet my new
guardian is glaring at me while she reads, all because I've been arbitrarily
branded a criminal.
The trained focus of her eyes on the page make it
obvious that she's reading the guide word-for-word. I settle in for a boring
hour of being lectured.
“As a Karma
living in the human world, you will be responsible for regulating the good and
bad deeds of mankind," she starts.
"Is this based on the
normal idea of good and bad, or the messed up version where it's totally cool
to kill an innocent little kid and absolutely vile to try and save them?"
I can't help the spite that leaks into my words.
I didn't think it was
possible, but her glare increases in intensity. Sorry to separate you from your
plethora of books, madam, but I don't want to be here either. She'd been
reading when I arrived and one of the first things I noticed in the room was
the books. Books everywhere. On the coffee table, on the shelves. Hundreds of
them. It's almost claustrophobic.
"The
former," she replies with a clipped tone. It seems like arguing with her
won't get me anywhere. Begrudgingly, I allow her to continue reading the
guardian manual.
Augh, I did a last-minute revision to the query and apparently messed it up.
ReplyDeleteThis:
"It’s not just her only chance to return -- and her only chance to survive."
Should be this:
"It's not just her only chance to return -- it's her only chance to survive."
Sorry for the confusion!
I like the concept here. I'd read more!
ReplyDeleteThis is very different and sounds like something I could really get into. Your MC has an excellent voice! I would like to see how she handles earth haha. The only comment I would make is that you have a couple of superfluous lines.
ReplyDelete"I can't help the spite that leaks into my words" I feel like this isn't necessary because the sentence before it is obviously full of a lot of sarcasm and spite. If you took it out, it wouldn't harm your story any, which is why I usually take things out :)
The next one is "She'd been reading when I arrived" it is also obvious she'd been reading since your MC made a snarky comment about it (which I adored :D) I think the rest is really solid writing. Those are my only two suggestions! Good Luck!!
You did a great job with your mc's voice - she feels real. A great feat in a mythical setting.
ReplyDeleteA line break got lost in that middle paragraph. Now for a few suggestions.
You have a few instances of "telling" - for example, the "boring" bit would be so much better if shown. The mc could slump into her chair and try to read the titles, anything to block out that droning voice...This would be particularly good instead of the last line since "allowing" doesn't seem right.
I suggest a word change from "arbitrarily" since it doesn't seem arbitrary at all, what with that big book o' rules.
There is some cleaning up you could do. For example, "Hell, I 'd been saving someone from being killed" would read well as, Hell, I 'd saved someone from being killed, or maybe even better, Hell, I 'd /saved/ a life. "Is glaring" could become just "glares" etc. This sort of thing is my *personal* aesthetic: limit -ing words, adverbs & adjectives to where necessary and seek out and destroy every unnecessary "that", form of "is/was" and similar. Good luck!
Thanks for the comments, everyone!
ReplyDeleteI'm working on draft three of the MS now, which I plan to have finished by the end of this competition. While I'm revising, I will take your suggestions into consideration.
Argh...I just noticed the formatting is off. A couple of paragraph breaks are missing, and they weren't in the email I sent. I wonder if cupid can fix that? This is how it's supposed to look:
ReplyDeleteIt's not like I killed someone. Hell, I 'd been saving someone from being killed. Yet my new guardian is glaring at me while she reads, all because I've been arbitrarily branded a criminal.
The trained focus of her eyes on the page make it obvious that she's reading the guide word-for-word. I settle in for a boring hour of being lectured.
“As a Karma living in the human world, you will be responsible for regulating the good and bad deeds of mankind," she starts.
"Is this based on the normal idea of good and bad, or the messed up version where it's totally cool to kill an innocent little kid and absolutely vile to try and save them?" I can't help the spite that leaks into my words.
I didn't think it was possible, but her glare increases in intensity. Sorry to separate you from your plethora of books, madam, but I don't want to be here either. She'd been reading when I arrived and one of the first things I noticed in the room was the books. Books everywhere. On the coffee table, on the shelves. Hundreds of them. It's almost claustrophobic.
"The former," she replies with a clipped tone. It seems like arguing with her won't get me anywhere. Begrudgingly, I allow her to continue reading the guardian manual.
Query:
ReplyDeleteThe first paragraph sounds like Abelia is an adult. It’s not a YA voice, and the way the teens are referred to is an adult viewing teens, not a teen looking at her peers. This just continues into the second paragraph as we’re told she’s the leader of a rebel organization (it reinforces the idea she’s older). The main problem here is that I don’t believe it’s a YA story; I believe it’s an adult MC with adult issues. And until I can connect to a teen MC, I don’t care about the plot.
I’m trying to view the plot as a YA story, and I’m having trouble. How does Abelia intend to help the girls? Isn’t that a pretty mundane task? Why is this harder than usual?
And a premise note: if Karmas are sent to earth as their “job description,” why is it a punishment for her?
Page:
Looooove the beginning! The second sentence is a little awkward. You can just put “Hell, I’d saved someone.” More tightening “Yet my new guardian glares at me while she reads” and easy stuff like that. I don’t think “arbitrarily” is the word you want…that makes it sound like they just grabbed a random person off the street and it happened to be her. I get the feeling she had a real reason for being pulled in, even if it isn’t actually worthy of this punishment.
Replace “starts” with “says.” Is “Is this based…and save them” said by Abelia or the guardian? Each piece of dialogue on its own line. “She’d been””she was.” “replies with a clipped tone” is too much…keep dialogue tags simple.
Lastly, I’m not sure what “Is this based…and save them” even means…whose idea is to kill an innocent kid? This needs to be explained better, because right now it’s too confusing.
Thanks so much for the response, Taryn!
ReplyDeleteBased on the comments on this post and the responses of my crit partners to my work, I've written a new query and a new version of the first 250 words.
New Query:
When teenaged Abelia discovers she’s not the only Karma at her assigned high school, she thinks she’s found a way to return to her home world. Like Abelia, Grant can read minds, possess humans, and manipulate matter – all for the sake of rewarding good deeds and punishing bad ones. Unlike her, he isn’t an exiled rebel determined to overthrow the Karma world’s corrupt king. On the contrary, he’s the king’s freaking grandson.
That should mean there’s a zero percent chance of him helping her out. Then he asks her to be his ally in fulfilling his own grudge against the king. Abelia thinks it’s a trap and vows to avoid him, but that proves to be a beast of a task. As she thwarts bullies and befriends suicidal teens, Grant pops up wherever she is. Eventually, he does something she can’t ignore: he gives her a letter from her co-conspirator boyfriend, who is still imprisoned in the Karma world.
Abelia will do anything to remain in contact with him, even if it means playing nice with the offspring of her greatest enemy. A wrong move around Grant could result in death, but maybe, just maybe, a right move will help her get home.
New First 250 Words:
It's not like I killed someone. Hell, I ‘d tried to save someone from being killed. Yet my new guardian glares at me while she reads, all because I've been arbitrarily branded a criminal.
The trained focus of her eyes on the page make it obvious that she's reading the guardian manual word-for-word. I prop my legs on the coffee table and shut my eyes. Maybe it’s time to try out the whole “sleeping” thing.
Her next words attract my attention. “As a Karma living in the human world, you will be responsible for regulating the good and bad deeds of mankind-“
"Is this based on the normal idea of good and bad, or the messed up version where it's totally cool to kill an little kid and absolutely vile to attempt to save them?" I interrupt. It’s ridiculous that the king thinks it’s okay to stage executions of innocent people. There’s nothing righteous about that. The fact that he’s composed a guide lecturing Karma on how to be righteous would be laughable, if it weren’t so pathetically sad.
I didn't think it was possible, but my guardian’s glare increases in intensity. Sorry to separate you from your plethora of books, madam, but I don't want to be here either. She'd been reading when I arrived and one of the first things I noticed in the room was the books. Books everywhere. On the coffee table, on the shelves. Hundreds of them. It's almost claustrophobic.
"The former," she replies. Her fingers tighten around the book’s spine.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOops, I forgot about replacing "arbitrarily." I'll make sure to do that in the MS.
ReplyDelete