Query critique 10/8/20

Offer up your page (or query) for Nathan's critique on the blog.
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Nathan Bransford
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Query critique 10/8/20

Post by Nathan Bransford » October 5th, 2020, 11:43 am

Want to see how your editing approach compares to mine?

Below is the query up for critique on the blog on Thursday. Feel free to chime in with comments, create your own redline (please note the "font colour" button above the posting box, which looks like a drop of ink), and otherwise offer feedback. When offering your feedback, please please remember to be polite and constructive. In order to leave a comment you will need to register an account in the Forums, which should be self-explanatory.

I'll be back with my own post on the blog and we'll literally be able to compare notes.

If you'd like to enter a query for a future Query Critique, please do so here.

Dear [Agent],

According to your agency’s website you’re actively seeking middle-grade fantasy and diverse voices, so I’m hoping you will consider my 72,000-word novel, SOLOMON LIN AND THE SORCERER’S KINGDOM, for representation.

When solemn twelve-year-old Solomon Lin sees other students waiting at the bus stop for his new school, he hides in a nearby park, telling himself he’ll catch the late bus. Instead he stumbles through a red door into a kingdom without a sky, where phantoms laugh in lantern-lit stairways and no one ever grows older. The kingdom is ruled by a mysterious Sorcerer, and when Solomon mistakenly trespasses in his enchanted castle, the Sorcerer strips Solomon of his shadow and casts him into the street – with no way of getting home.

Afraid and desperate, Solomon joins a den of child thieves and strikes a deal with their mischievous leader, Pax: Solomon will go undercover for her as assistant to the Grimket Keeper, the cold-hearted undertaker of the kingdom’s ensorcelled mausoleum, and in exchange, Pax will take Solomon to see the kingdom’s Witch about his lost shadow. But to Solomon’s dismay, the Witch tells him he must recover his shadow himself. Worse still, she tasks him with finding the sky, hidden long ago by the Sorcerer to keep the kingdom under his cursed reign.

Solomon must contend with the Grimket Keeper’s watchful eye; the resentment of the other thieves, who threaten to kick him out of the den; and the impossible task of uncovering the Sorcerer’s deepest secrets. He is helped by his new friendship with Pax – until they find a way into the Sorcerer’s castle, and the revelations within cause them to begin keeping secrets from each other. In a world where nothing is as it seems, Solomon must learn to trust himself and his friends, or be trapped in the kingdom forever.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Sincerely,

S Chan

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