CAGI Entry #32

Title: MIRE

Genre: YA paranormal mystery

Word Ccount: 70,000

Query:

Most teens would do anything to have a celebrity parent. Diya would do anything to give hers up.

Adopted from an Indian slum as an infant by her movie star mom, she's grown up, amidst whippings and alcoholic meltdowns, into a sixteen-year-old with prematurely thick skin and a deep hatred for her abusive mom.

Seventeen-year-old Matthew grew up in a different type of family – the Seer's disciples. He guards a powerful crystal with the ability to control minds, a crystal entrusted to Matt's grandfather by his Indian Seer.

When Diya crashes her car en route to her aunt's house, Matthew hauls her out of the wreck. He's gorgeous enough to send her heart racing. But not enough for her to be oblivious to certain odd things about him, like his ability to see in the dark. Matt, on the other hand, recognizes Diya for who she is – the Seer's granddaughter. He needs her help to find the missing mind control crystal and trap a murderer.

Someone's using the crystal to force people to kill themselves and masking the murders as suicides.

Matt knows Diya is the only person who can reverse the crystal's power. But first, he has to convince her of her true identity. Being more comfortable with her loner status, Diya's not too keen to believe anyone, however hot he is. Plus, she has her own list of murder suspects. And, Matt, with his unusual abilities, is way up at the top.

But when her aunt is nearly killed, the threat hits home. Now the teens have to pool their abilities to try and outsmart the killer, before he figures out who they are and destroys them first.

  

First 250:

Most kids would do anything to have a movie star parent, but as far as Diya was concerned, having a celebrity parent was way over-rated. If she had the choice between Miranda and being stranded in a deserted island without Wi-Fi, she knew what she'd pick.

That thought echoed in her mind, as she found herself in yet another staring stand-off with her mother across the length of the humongous dining table. Miranda’s hard face rivaled the cold wooden surface of the table.

Diya took a deep breath and counted to ten, waiting for the familiar explosion. And then it came.

“You’re not going anywhere, you brat. You owe me.” Miranda's skin stretched tight over high cheekbones, courtesy of the most popular plastic surgeon in LA. Any more stretching, and it would rip right down the middle. “I want you at the benefit.”

“No.” There was no way she was spending another second here. She'd planned to leave right after school, but Miranda had stopped her in the hallway.

A line of white crept around Miranda's compressed lips, a sure sign of an impending tantrum. Diya's mouth went dry, but she forced herself to meet the woman's glare with a steady gaze. Years of verbal sparring had taught her one thing. The woman could spot a chink in your armor from a mile away.

CAGI Entry #31

Title: OF ICE AND ASHES 

Genre: YA fantasy

Word Count: 76,000

Query:

Sixteen-year-old Wren is Tainted.

Unlike the other survivors of the toxic explosion, Wren’s body isn’t disfigured by hideous black spider web scars. Her skin is pale and perfect—and dangerous. Her icy touch causes excruciating pain for everyone she touches, but her flawless skin is the reason she wasn’t banished with the other Tainted. Still, she’d give anything to walk through her town without inducing the usual cringes and gasps of fear.

When a town leader declares that the Tainted are diseased and demands the normal townspeople purge them, Wren barely escapes to search for them. What she finds are not the battered people she expected. They are knife-wielding, eager for a fight, and welcome Wren into their hidden home with scarred arms. Then Wren meets Asher, a normal boy whose aid has kept the Tainted alive since the explosion. If she ignores his exasperating confidence and knack for getting under her skin, she’s almost eager to have him around.

But the battle between the Tainted and the townspeople is ballooning out of control. As the fires of slaughtered Tainted bodies burn at night, and more of her new friends leave to save the others, Wren realizes her new life could crumble into the ashes. Unless she can do something she never wanted to: utilize her skin’s terrible power and fight back.

First 250:

Three layers of hand-knit sweaters and my gloves protected my skin. I tweaked the silk over my wrists, ensuring that no portion of my flesh was exposed.

“You’re too cautious, honey,” Jolie said. Her soft, clumsy hand pinned my mother’s old jade brooch to my outermost sweater. “Everyone knows what will happen if they touch you.”

“Accidents happen,” I said firmly. Actually, an accident hadn’t happened in years thanks to my layering, but I didn’t dare risk it. It’s not as though I could overheat, anyway.

I saw Jolie’s lips purse in the silver-framed mirror by my bed. Her full face was fatigued from a morning volunteering in the kitchen. One frizzy knot of hair stuck out of her brittle blonde bun. She’d been my caretaker for a decade, yet I didn’t think I’d ever seen her hair out of that bun.

I smiled, contemplating how much trouble I’d get in for snatching the tie away. Since Jolie was the only person who could touch me without any painful consequence, she’d probably chase me down with the broom.

My grin was all it took to wipe the pout from her expression. Simple, hair-brained Jolie. Her Scar never altered her cheerful view on life.

Her fingers prodded against the back of my neck as she adjusted the sweaters. I experienced no heat, no cold. Just the pressure of her touch on my skin.

Neither of us had felt temperature for ten years.

CAGI Entry #30

Title: ONE FIFTY ONE

Genre: YA sci-fi/fantasy

Word Count: 96,000

Query:

17-year-old Aeneas doesn’t belong to a Colony. As the bloody scars on his back remind him, he was one more than needed. One more than necessary.

He survives as a thief in the depths of the Ilium Underground, until his world begins to slowly fall apart: a mobster tortures him for secrets, the band of pirates that raised him is slaughtered in cold blood, and the Secret Police seem to be following his every move. Then he meets Casseopea, and his world gets turned around once more. All is not well in her Colony: the new Head Mistress is terrorizing its members, a secret rebellion is brewing, and the Chieftain has cast her out in order to help him find a mystical Key.

Only by joining forces with this girl from the Colonies will Aeneas learn the truth about his past, unlock the power of the Key, and change the fate of Ilium forever.

First 250

This can’t be the true Son of Ilium.

Panicked thoughts swept through Memnon’s throbbing forehead as he reached for the silver-plated battle axe that had hung from his war belt since he was a young man. Cool steel-coloured eyes bore into him from the intruder—the boy—watching his every move. Tattered robes, soiled from the filth of the city Underground, lay at the boy’s feet.

First a beggar, now a boy. This can’t be the true Son of Ilium.

Memnon’s heart beat a little faster. The axe wasn’t there. Only nothingness. It should have been there—it was always there. Instead, the cold leather of his belt gave way to the folds of velvet from his tunic. Something wet. Something warm.

Blood?

He felt more eyes on him now. He was surrounded. The Elders of the Colony. His people. But they weren’t his people anymore. Not now. Not with this boy, this stranger, this outcast, standing in his way. They used to be his people. Now, their hatred burned a hole in his chest. The horrible feeling of revenge flowed from their eyes, through the room, and settled in the bowels of his stomach. But they didn’t move. They seemed to be waiting. Waiting for the boy. Memnon’s heart beat faster still.

How dare they! This is sacrilege, treason. After all these years, years of peace, years of stability, contentment! I am their Chieftain! How dare they…

The boy didn’t flinch. Memnon studied his face. It was young, but it looked battered, resolute, like it had survived decades of work in the Mines.

CAGI Entry #29

Title: THE WORLD NEXT DOOR

Genre: YA 

Word Count: 95,000

Query:

Luc’s childhood is destroyed the night his best friend, Auri, falls through a rip in the fabric of Trillua and disappears into a parallel world—our world. Luc soon Luc soon discovers he’s still connected to Auri through his dreams. In them, he watches her grow from a lost, lonely child into a beautiful sixteen year old girl who doesn’t trust anyone. When he leaders of Trillua discover a way to travel to Earth, Luc risks banishment from the home and family he loves to hijack a spot on their mission and rescue Auri. But Auri doesn’t remember Luc or Trillua. She’s built a new life for herself—one that includes a baby foster brother and sister she’s determined to take care of.

Luc has one month before the Portal back home closes again. One month to convince Auri she belongs with him. But, as the clock ticks down, the leaders of Trillua discover that Luc’s proximity to Auri has somehow made him faster, stronger and almost invulnerable to pain or injury. Luc’s unheard of powers are too much like magic—something punishable by death in his world. The leaders demand he immediately Portal home to be examined as a potential danger to Trillua. Forcing Auri to travel before she accepts the truth of her forgotten past could destroy her mind, but the leaders have threatened to exile Luc’s family into the treacherous Outerlands if he doesn’t return. Now Luc must choose. Abandon the girl he was born to love, or save the family who’s depending on him for their survival.

I’ve written twenty-five articles for the local paper (the GA Harbor Sound) and been published in Woman’s World Magazine. 

First 250:                                                                                                 

The sun creeps over the mountains, turning the windows to red fire that match the searing burn in my chest. Auri’s face dances behind my eyes. Ivory skin. Eyes neither blue nor green, but a mix of both, as if the heavens swirled emeralds and sapphires together to create them. Hair with every shade of red and gold, like the sun is rising in each strand…sun…rising...

I rub my hand over my heart and blink a few times. Outside the window, the ThriceMoon has been replaced by the glare of the rising sun. I bolt upright from the hard floor and whisper as loudly as I can, “Sin! Sin! Wake up!”  I wave my hand, as if I can physically brush away the ashy emotion-trails surrounding me.

On his bed, Sin jerks as his eyes fly open. “I wasn’t with that girl.”

I snap my fingers in front of his face. “Sin! It’s Luc! I cannot believe we were witless enough to fall asleep. My father and Emelina will banish me if they realize I stayed out all night. Emelina warned me a million times to be rested for my Test today.”

My voice comes out choppy and breathless as I press both hands against my heart. The pain of missing Auri is always worse after dreaming of her all night. I try to take shallow breaths, struggling against the urge to curl up in a ball until it dies down. The grey trails of pain and fear floating around me intensify.