Nathan Bransford - The Forums

Hey ya'll, it's been a few years since I visited these forums, so thanks for having me back. I'm looking to pitch my new project soon, so any help regarding my query would be super helpful. Thanks everyone!

Fifth grade comic geek Jack McLellan is the new kid at an elementary school infested with kids so malevolent they could almost be supervillains. Terror runs through the halls so rampantly that the principal never leaves his office, and even the teachers travel in packs. Without the guts or muscle to fight back, Jack’s future seems destined to victimhood and random bruises, until the day he’s saved from a hallway attack by Super Tough, a masked student with a tendency to appear at just the right time to protect his innocent classmates. The encounter inspires Jack, and later that day he uses a simple trick to defend a pair of brothers from the attacks of a much larger foe when he’s accidentally drawn into their melee. The next day, he’s rewarded with a mysterious letter in his locker, asking him to meet with Super Tough in secret.

The school hero throws Jack in front of the school’s worst bullies, from a giant to a bone-chewing maniac, and when he finds the new kid able to pass his tests by means of brains rather than brawn, presents him with an opportunity: Super Tough will be moving on to middle school next year, and he’d like Jack to take over his hallway superhero operation.

Jack eagerly accepts, but when he overhears a bully talking about a student he’s scheduled to attack, Jack starts to question the seemingly random nature of the bullying around him, and begins to wonder if his status as a new kid is blinding him to questions of who in the school is truly worth protecting, and who has more to hide than they’re letting on. THE RISE AND FALL OF A HALLWAY SUPERHERO is a middle-grade thriller of 51,000 words.

Wow. This is a hard nut to crack, ddgreff. This is SO much the query I would write. Our pitch style is so similar. And it's probably why I neither one of us have an agent.

And I mean this: I'm intrigued by the story. I think you've got a compelling MG here. You just need to get out your sander and smooth out the vocabulary a bit. (And I hope there is an asbestos component in my office chair, because I'm about to spontaneously combust in flames of hypocrisy.) You are getting in the way of your own good pitch.


Fifth grade comic geek Jack McLellan is the new kid at an elementary school infested with kids so malevolent they could almost be supervillains. [Malevolent is a great word. It's a precise word. It's a perfect word. It's too perfect of a word, and it stands out when pitching a MG. I'd tone it down one notch to evil or mean, or even dastardly. On second thought, the fact that I would use dastardly is a good reason to ignore my advice completely.] Terror runs rampant through the halls of Jack Kirby Elementary. The principal never leaves his office, and even the teachers travel in packs. Without the guts or muscle to fight back, Jack’s destiny seems be nothing more than victimhood and random [I'm waffling on the use of the word "random." Punches aren't random. They are deliberate.] bruises, until the day he’s saved from a hallway attack by Super Tough, a masked student with a tendency to appear at just the right time to protect his innocent classmates. The encounter inspires Jack, and later that day he uses a simple trick to defend a pair of brothers from the attacks of a much larger foe. The next day, he’s rewarded with a mysterious letter in his locker, inviting him to a secret meeting with Super Tough. [Jeez, I really hope this meeting is somehow on the roof of the school, next to a broken spotlight pointed at the flag pole.]

Super Tough pits Jack against the school’s worst bullies. When he finds the new kid able to pass his tests by means of brains rather than brawn, the masked crusader presents Jack with an opportunity: Super Tough will be moving on to middle school next year, and he’d like Jack to take over his hallway superhero operation.

Jack eagerly accepts, but when he overhears a bully scheduling an attack, Jack starts to question the random nature of the bullying around him, and begins to wonder if his status as a new kid is blinding him from the larger truth about who in the school is truly worth protecting, and who knows more than they’re letting on. THE RISE AND FALL OF A HALLWAY SUPERHERO is a middle-grade thriller of 51,000 words.


Sorry that no one has offered any help for you to date, ddegreeff. Like I said, it's a hard query to critique because it's merely a phase off of greatness and it's hard to describe where that phase shift stops and starts. I'm guessing you already have sent out a query by now. How's it going? You getting Full requests?