Sunday, September 16, 2012

CAGI Finalist #11


Title: LOVESENSE
Genre: YA Magical Realism
Word Count: 59,000

Query:

Seventeen-year-old Rae has spent her whole life with the ability to
smell when a relationship will sour just by looking a photograph of
the couple (rotting fish, anyone?). She calls it her “lovesense” and
uses it to anonymously run a love guru business at school. But after
seventeen years of smelling way more stinky socks than roses, Rae is
ready to give up on love altogether.

Until, that is, she finds a fifteen-year-old picture in her attic that
smells of apricots and honey. Even better? She's in the photo. Rae
seeks the identity of her mysterious playmate with a dedication she
usually reserves for her 100-meter hurdles, but as the semester
progresses, all she’s finding is trouble. She’s falling for her goofy
teammate, Sam—even though he’s already been crossed off her list of
possibilities, and, with just weeks until the city-county track
championships, her love-guru business is exposed. She is forced to
convince all her friends (and the administration) that she isn't a
psycho gypsy freak—or, worse, that she hasn't been taking advantage of
them for years.

Suspended from school, banned from the track championships, and
alienated from her classmates, Rae has one last opportunity to set
things right before her chance at finding the boy in the photo rots
like stink on cheese.

First 250:

I often regret my part-time job as the ice cream/photo counter girl at
Alfred’s Drug Store. But in a town as small as Sparrow, a
seventeen-year-old doesn’t have a lot of options.

No more reading relationships at work, I remind myself as I tap my
cross-trainers in time with the photo processor’s whir, whir, flip.
It spews three hundred prints of Mary Brighten and her fiancĂ©, but I’m
not looking--especially after last week’s debacle with Mom’s friend
Barb. Trust me, being the first to know that your mom’s best friend’s
husband is leaving her for their pool boy sucks the big one.

Craning my neck I see the “Alfred’s has the Answer” digital clock:
forty-seven minutes until the bride waltzes in. The whir is louder
than our cheesy elevator music. And my nose, even though I’m telling
it no, is taking in bigger and bigger breaths. I pop another Altoid
into my already crammed mouth. I don’t want to know! Think about Barb.
But I’m like a crack addict needing my next hit. And there isn’t an
addiction recovery program to save me.

I pull a photo off the top of the stack. Even with the wonderful aroma
of fresh ink, it doesn’t begin to cover the stench of this couple.
It’s more than that rotten-egg sulfur smell I made in chem lab
yesterday. It’s also rotting meat and moldy, squishy potatoes. A good
dinner gone wrong.

As I squint at the picture, the formally clad couple separates, not
mere millimeters like I usually see, but to opposite sides of the
photo.

5 comments:

  1. Hi #11,

    I'd love to read some more if possible. Please send your query letter, a synopsis (~1 page) and first 3 chapters to j.weber(at)jaw-litagent(dot)com (subject line: CAGI request: LOVESENSE). I hope to hear from you.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi #11,

    I'd love to read some more if possible. Please send your query letter, a synopsis (~1 page) and first 3 chapters to j.weber(at)jaw-litagent(dot)com (subject line: CAGI request: LOVESENSE). I hope to hear from you.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Dear #11,

    So far, so good! I'd be interested in seeing more if it's available. Please send your original query, a synopsis (one to three pages) and first three chapters to terrie(at)akaliteraryllc(dot)com (subject line should read: LOVESENSE - CAGI #11) Many thanks, Terrie

    ReplyDelete
  4. Fun! Would love to read more. Please send the query and first few chapters (in the body of the email) to JennL at Andreabrownlit.com - subject line CAGI query (or similar). Yay!

    ReplyDelete