Title: LAU DAI LÁ
Genre: Middle Grade Fantasy
Word Count: 41,000
Query:
Linh Briggston’s only friends are elves, fairies, and other
magical creatures who live with her in Dublin, Ireland—friends she must never
reveal to anyone, for fear of ridicule. When a windhorse whisks the
eleven-year-old girl from her home to Lau Dai Lá, a parallel world destroyed by
dark magic, she meets a male fairy Tombo who warns her about a terrible threat
from a group of dark magicians.
The magicians plan to enslave her to steal a sacred weapon, a
magic crossbow, after discovering that Linh lives on Earth. With the crossbow,
they will regain enough power to conquer Earth. Linh faces a daunting task: she
must locate the crossbow before they do and earn Tombo’s friendship to help
her, risking her life to stop them from putting her family, her magical
friends, and humankind in grave danger.
LAU DAI LÁ is a blend of Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson and the
Olympians and Grace Lin's Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, but
with Vietnamese lore and Western mythical creatures.
First 250:
As Linh descended the stairs, strange sounds came from the
living room. She looked around; her mother wasn’t home. Eeek! Eeek!
Probably mice. This didn’t stun her.
She’d grown used to hearing those horrible little rodents
scuttling inside the clogged drainpipes at school. Likely they’d come out
because of her house’s currently clogged drain. Then she heard thumps within
the wall.
These couldn’t be mice—unless their tiny feet had grown
overnight. Unless they were giants. She tiptoed toward the sound and tried to
pinpoint its source, but saw nothing. Stepping toward the window, she pulled
away the long, lacey curtains. Her heart seized.
A narrow door stood beneath the window. Linh couldn’t believe
her eyes. Had this small door always existed there, right beside the back door?
Why would she never have noticed? She bent down, knocked on the little mystery
door, and waited.
One minute. Three. The sounds had stopped.
Linh placed a trembling hand on the doorknob; it felt solid and
rough. Slowly, she opened the door—and with another hard squeeze of her heart,
walked through it.
She found herself gazing at another world: the sun beaming down
on a colorful, spacious backyard—so unlike a gray, Irish summer day in Dublin.
She blinked: she wasn’t daydreaming.
She
stepped into the different landscape, full of warmth and light, her heart
thumping with excitement. Plump mushrooms and lush green shrubs grew on each
side of the yard. On her left, a field of flowers—dandelions, roses, tulips,
and sunflowers—carpeted the ground.
Ok, straight up, I'm drawn in by this concept. I love a good fairy story and I like the cultural cross over.
ReplyDeleteThere are a few examples of telling One example: 'this didn't stun her' - I'd prefer to see this sort of reaction.
Another:
'She found herself gazing at another world' - again, I'd prefer to discover this - see her reactions and see the world revealed through some wonderful description.
I think you've definitely got a compelling premise and good start!
"She looked around;" while descending the stairs?
These couldn’t be mice—unless their tiny feet had grown overnight. Unless they were giants. She tiptoed toward the sound and tried to pinpoint its source, but saw nothing. Stepping toward the window, she pulled away the long, lacey curtains. Her heart seized.
A narrow door stood beneath the window. Linh couldn’t believe her eyes. Had this small door always existed there, right beside the back door? Why would she never have noticed? She bent down, knocked on the little mystery door, and waited.
One minute. Three. The sounds had stopped.
Linh placed a trembling hand on the doorknob; it felt solid and rough. Slowly, she opened the door—and with another hard squeeze of her heart, walked through it.
She found herself gazing at another world: the sun beaming down on a colorful, spacious backyard—so unlike a gray, Irish summer day in Dublin. She blinked: she wasn’t daydreaming.
She stepped into the different landscape, full of warmth and light, her heart thumping with excitement. Plump mushrooms and lush green shrubs grew on each side of the yard. On her left, a field of flowers—dandelions, roses, tulips, and sunflowers—carpeted the ground.
Hi #37! This is your first-round judge comment.
ReplyDeleteComments on your query:
First paragraph: I’d drop the “for fear of ridicule” from the end of your first sentence, because I don’t think it really adds anything and it’s otherwise a little long. And your second sentence has far too many elements without enough distinction. You mention that this world has dark magic problems twice, so you should drop one of them to avoid redundancy, and “a male fairy Tombo” has too many words running together. I’d rewrite that second sentence—something like “When a windhorse whisks the eleven-year-old girl from her home to a parallel world called Lau Dai Lá, she meets a male fairy named Tombo who warns her about a terrible threat from a group of dark magicians.”
Second paragraph: The whole second paragraph could do with some rearranging. You mention the crossbow twice and you could get around that. (“After they discover that Linh is from Earth, the magicians plan to enslave her in order to gain access to a powerful weapon: A crossbow that will allow them to conquer Linh’s world.” Something more concise like that.) I like the last sentence except you could drop “to help her.”
Third paragraph: I’d avoid saying your book is actually “a blend of” any established author’s work. Say instead that readers of those works will enjoy yours. The blending of elements does sound original.
Language notes on the query:
You don’t have any spelling or punctuation mistakes, but you have a consistent tendency to write overly complex run-on sentences. Try to cultivate an awareness of how many different ideas you’re throwing into one sentence and try to delete unnecessary words, avoid repetition, and conclude them before you’ve presented too many elements without a period.
Comments on your first 250:
ReplyDeleteSo we’re thrown in pretty immediately: Linh hears what she thinks are mice, but there’s something peculiar about it, and suddenly she finds a door. I’m not sure why her first course of action is “Hey, I’ll knock on it,” and at first I thought that was odd since I would probably try to open it and certainly not expect anyone to answer. But maybe her first inclination to knock on the door rather than open it tells us something about Linh, so I can’t really say.
You might consider giving us some perspective on exactly how big the mystery door is. It’s presented as being below a window (without telling us how high the window is), which seems like it’d be pretty low to the ground, and Linh refers to it as “small” and “little.” She then “walks” through it. I’d been picturing it as too small to walk through, so maybe we need more visualization.
It made me skeptical that Linh’s first reaction to opening the door and seeing sunshine was that it was “another world.” Because all we’ve been shown so far is that it’s unlike the dreary day she’d been having in Dublin and it’s full of flowers. I’m also a little concerned that we know nothing about Linh herself before she walks through an apparently magical door on page one. I know a lot of writing advice says to jump right in, and they’re not wrong, but I lack the perspective to care about what happens to this girl in fantasyland if I’ve never heard her speak and I don’t know what she’s going from any more than I know what she’s going to.
“This didn’t stun her.”—This feels a bit passive. Can you try something more active, like “She wasn’t fazed”?
“These couldn’t be mice—unless their tiny feet had grown overnight. Unless they were giants.”—I feel disconnected from Linh as the narration tells me this, and I don’t like the repetition of “unless.” If this were changed to relay her thoughts, or the setup was rephrased to show Linh being puzzled while this new information is being presented, we’d feel less like you’re talking to us.
“Stepping toward the window, she pulled away the long, lacey curtains. Her heart seized.”—This is a great way to bring us into feeling the reaction with Linh. Physical reactions help a lot. As long as you balance them well with gestures and expressions.
“Linh placed a trembling hand on the doorknob; it felt solid and rough.”—I felt this didn’t add anything I needed. The trembling hand is great. The “solid and rough” feeling of the doorknob seems extra.
“and with another hard squeeze of her heart”—The only mention of her heart earlier was that it “seized,” which means it stopped. (Hopefully not literally, but we get it.) If her heart is now squeezing, that’s different from seizing, so it’s not “another” squeeze.
“so unlike a gray, Irish summer day in Dublin”—I like that you use this to tell us where she’s from. But I think saying both “Irish” and “Dublin” is redundant.
“her heart thumping with excitement.”—Now that within 250 words we’ve had three uses of Linh’s heart to convey her emotional state, I’m going to suggest you try to switch up her reactions to avoid repetition. Try some blushing or gasping or have her do something with her hands.
I think in general your storytelling needs more connection with character; that might help your voice develop in this piece.
Language notes on the first 250:
* “Lacey” is actually a variant of “lacy.” You can make the choice because “lacey” isn’t wrong, but “lacy” is more accepted.
* Your punctuation choices are pretty sophisticated. You seem like you’re a good proofreader. You don’t usually overdo your adjectives. That’s very good news.
Please feel free to reply or contact me privately if you have any questions about my feedback. I’m honest but I don’t bite. Good luck!
You're clearly an excellent writer. You've already gotten some very detailed comments, so I'll just mention the issues that sprang out at me. I thought the eeek eeek were the steps creaking so got confused about the mice. I thought you rushed too fast into the magical world before grounding the character in her own. There were a number of instances where the voice felt too old for the character - heart seized, stun, currently, spacious. The same issue applied to some multi-phrased, adult-sounding sentences. Good luck!
ReplyDelete