Seventeen-year-old hard rock drummer and cupcake addict Zach Pembrook writes
a song that inadvertently draws the attention of the world and it brings him
unforeseen troubles.
He gets tangled up in a media circus after a world-renowned physicist publicly
states that Zach’s song completes the Theory of Everything. Then he almost gets
shot by a stranger outraged by fan claims that Zach is the greatest hacker of
all time for figuring out the original algorithm to human emotions and
spirituality.
But having both the scientist and philosopher camps out to get him is just the
start of Zach’s misadventures.
If you leave out all this stuff, you solve almost all the problems of the first two versions.
When the recording contract he so wanted turns out be a dud, Zach makes the
mistake of getting into business with his ex-nemesis Thomas to take advantage
of his newfound celebrity status. Soon, Zach’s reputation is virtually
annihilated. Without much else to hold on to he insists on merchandising his
song’s infamous happiness formula even after receiving anonymous threats
against his doing so. He never imagined his sister would get kidnapped as a
result.
But here again, we've got clunky language with long sentences that have no rhythm at all. There's no flow here and this is something that I can't fix because it's the writing, not the structure.
Now desperate, he can’t just sit around and wait for others to get his sister
back. With the help of his trusty sidekick Cuproo – a Roomba vacuum in an
oversized cupcake costume that he takes everywhere on account of his allergies
– he devises an infallible plan that draws on all his expertise as Rolling
Stone Magazine guru to repair his fractured family.
Ok, this just moves this off the ledge and right into freefall: a roomba vacuum in a cupcake costume? I don't even know what to say to that.
THE CUPCAKE PLAN, a 60,000-word contemporary YA novel is available upon
request.
Thank you very much for your time and consideration,
You've really improved things by ditching that dreadful E = mc² thing, but what this revision does is put the clunky writing into bold relief. That's both a good and a bad thing: it shows me that even if we get the query into structurally sound shape, you're not ready to send it out because the writing doesn't hold up.
This is a critical juncture for you as a writer. You're not ready. You need to spend some time, and by time I don't mean days, I mean months, if not years, honing your craft. You need to get rid of the clunk and the ONLY way to do that is to develop your ear. It's clear in three revisions now that you have NOT done that. You shouldn't feel like that's a failure; it's HARD to do that, and it takes time.
I suggest a long term plan of action: write every single day. Whether it's 100 words or 1000 words, write something new every single day. And read. READ. Read as a writer. Look for sentences that are beautifully constructed. Look for sentences that make you think "wow" And if you don't see those sentences know one of two things: you're reading the wrong books or you haven't yet developed your eye.
A writing group can often be of help at this stage of your career because looking at OTHER writers' efforts and helping them see flaws will also improve your eye.
Keep a writing journal and look at sentences and analyze why something works and why it doesn't. One of the things that helped me immensely is keeping this blog. If you have to say why something doesn't work, and say it succinctly you learn a lot about writing.
I know for an iron clad fact this isn't what you wanted to hear today. I do hope however that you'll wait before 1. burning me in effigy 2. dismissing this as twaddle 3. leaping out the window.
this is the stage where a lot of people give up and do something like self-publish. This is NOT the time to do that. You haven't gotten to the major leagues yet. Work on your writing. Get better. THEN query.
--------------------------------
SECOND REVISION
Zach Pembrook, a Malibu High hard rock drummer with an addiction to cupcakes is
hailed as the greatest hacker of all time after writing a song that gives an
unexpected use to E=MC² by linking it to happiness. There is just one catch:
Zach never meant it as anything more than an acronym. But at a time when every
invention that could ever possibly be invented is already old news the pull of
the media and the public thirst for a new mystery are too massive to resist.
I'd stop reading right here because you still haven't overcome the problem of
E=MC². What you say here just
doesn't make sense.
What did Zach hack?
Hack means something pretty specific: breaking in to a computer system,
or specific computer by nefarious codebreaking.
And by pairing it with "every invention that could ever
possibly be invented"--a statement attributed to the head of the patent
office, and used to illustrate that we don't know what we don't know doesn't
illuminate the metaphor---it befuddles me. As does your last sentence.
It's like saying "Zach is a lion, a witch and a wardrobe
and Narnia is calling." Whaaa?
Normally I'd jump up and down about being specific in a
query. I even have a screen saver
that says "precision is beauty" but in your case, you might want to
just ease back from the specifics.
Zach writes a song that inadvertently draws the attention of
the world and it brings him unforeseen troubles.
Happiness has been hacked. I
actually like this sentence but it doesn't make any sense either.
Zach’s adventures in hacker stardom begin on a high note and it seems rockers
can indeed have more fun, even in the boring worlds of business and science.
But then Zach’s ex-nemesis turned newfound best bud Thomas frames him with
fraud at an organic t-shirt company they start together and his sister gets
kidnapped.
ex-nemesis turned best bud? what??
who's sister? and what??
With a black hole of deceit and loss staring straight at him, Zach decides to
take matters into his own hands. With the help of Aetos, a Greek child gangster
that shares his love of cupcakes he recovers his sister. Then he gets another
shot at the t-shirt gig. Seizing the chance to rescue his reputation, he
vindicates all rockers at heart with a recipe for greatness any Rolling Stone
magazine fan should know.
At this point I'm so befuddled I don't know whether to scratch
my watch or wind my ass.
THE CUPCAKE PLAN, a contemporary YA novel complete at 60,000 words, is a new,
masculine take on Legally Blonde. While this novel stands alone, I have ideas
for turning it into a trilogy entitled BE A CUPCAKE, SAVE THE WORLD.
This doesn't sound anything like Legally Blonde. Not even close.
A query has to make sense. This doesn't. Last go-round I advised reading the
archives again. This time I think you might look for queries that get plot on
the page and follow what they did.
---------------------
FIRST REVISION
Seventeen-year-old Zach is being hailed as the greatest code cracker and pattern recognizer of all time. But Zach is no scientist or computer guru. He’s a lyricist-slash-drummer that who happened to use E=MC² as an acronym to happiness in a hip hop song that went viral on YouTube. Now, the media have over-hyped his acronym as the ultimate answer to the ultimate question, the missing link to the theory of everything, and he can’t get a break.
Well, ok, I guess. This sounds like a comic book but I'll keep going. (The writing is pretty clunky though. Long ass sentences will do that to a paragraph)
As Zach deals with the frenzy of scientific attention, all he really wants is to rock on and get a recording contract. But he’s having a hard time convincing anyone to stop analyzing that one song and concentrate on buying his band’s eco-conscious hard rock tunes.
Media over-hype and scientific attention are two VERY different things. As are hard rock and hip-hop. At this point, you've lost control of your query. I'm losing confidence.
With no recording contract in sight and set on making his sweet, musical dream a reality Zach embarks on a high voltage adventure that includes lightning bolts, scandal, a Roomba vacuum in an oversized cupcake costume, a Greek child gangster, and a kickass redemption plan.
That list reminds me of questions on those tests: what doesn't belong in this group.
It's also a list without context.
THE CUPCAKE PLAN, a YA contemporary novel complete at 60,000 words is “Legally Blonde” meets “The Da Vinci Code”.
Honest to chum I don't know what to say to this. Comp titles shouldn't make me spew coffee. These do. Why? Cause they're NOTHING alike. One is a light frothy rom-com. The other is ...well...something else.
Comp titles are supposed to illuminate what the book is about. I can't imagine this pairing.
Thank you in advance for your time and consideration.
Power to the sweet,
what??
This is a LOT better than the mess we started with but you've got some serious problems here. Fiction has to feel real. You've got a huge hurdle with the E = mc² thing but you can get over it if all the other details are right. But they're not.
And you've lost one of the main characters, and any kind of reason this book would be called THE CUPCAKE PLAN.
Somewhere in the archives is a template for getting plot into a query letter. Find it. Use it. Revise. Resend.
---------
ORIGINAL
Dear Query Shark:
E = MC², E = mc², the formula of light, is also the formula to happiness. This is what Sarah accidentally discovers under the pressure of heading a growing organic cupcake business.
well, no, it's not the formula of light. C in the equation is the speed of light. E = MC², E = mc², demonstrates that energy always exhibits mass in whatever form the energy takes. A simple Google search turns that up.
The problem here is that if you want to use this as a metaphor, you have to start with something that isn't just plain wrong. Metaphors are "wrong" but illuminating. Calling an agent a shark for example, does not mean you'd wax enthusiastic about swimming as a necessary skill for reading queries.
You'd do better to leave out "the formula of light" and just say E = MC², E = mc², is also the formula of happiness. The reason you'd do that instead is that this kind of basic fact error (like getting dates wrong in history) makes me crazy, and worse makes me stop reading.
But holding an answer in your hands is nothing if you don't take action.
So she decides to try out the formula by applying it to organize her life and the business. As she starts to see this in action, she wonders what other things around her had she not noticed before that might also be trying to say something to humankind?
Now you've lost me. These is a generalization. It's also going in the wrong direction. The line above says "is nothing if you don't take action." The logical sequence then is to tell us what action she takes, not veer off into what she sees in action, or wondering about other things.
Sentences in queries should flow in a logical order.
Light is everywhere, all around us day and night. How could we have missed this one humongous clue? This is the manual to life, the simple answer to happiness that we have been wanting forever. And it has been with us all along. All we have to do is apply its formula:
E = MC², E = mc²
Who the hell is "we" There is no "we" in querying, much like there is no crying in baseball. By this I mean, you're slipping disastrously out of third person and into first person here. This kind of slip is a huge red flag in a query.
Remember, while a query has to tell me about the book, it also shows me how well you write.
And worse, you're now out of the realm of specific action entirely, and into some absurd conclusion that sounds like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. If I hadn't stopped reading before, here is where I really click my ruby slippers and head home.
Her sci-fi daydreams take on a whole, new meaning like this, leading her to find her own dream, that cause for living that she has been longing for. Meanwhile, her best friend and business partner, Tessa, lays comatose in a hospital bed. If only she too could begin to see, really see things under this light.
"like this" requires an example to be logical. No one "lays" in a hospital bed unless they are a poem. It's "lies."
In its current form, Be a Cupcake. Save the World. is a 35,000-word, easy-to-follow guide to happiness that will electrify and empower young adults.
what? WHAT? In its current form? Does it shapeshift? No NO NO! You query only for FINISHED novels. Never ever use that phrase in a query letter.
And this is a novel right? Cause "35,000 word easy-to-follow guide to happiness" and "electrify and empower" are NOT the description of a novel. You'd find that in the self-help section. Making your novel sound like a self-help book is a very very bad thing.
Thank you for your time and consideration of Be a Cupcake. Save the World. for your list!
The only thing I like about this query is the title, and I like that a lot. However, you're punctuating it incorrectly. It's BE A CUPCAKE, SAVE THE WORLD and when you use it in a sentence as I did here, you'll notice there's no period.
This has failed to rise in the convection oven of the slush pile. In fact, you need a new recipe.
The only thing I know about Sarah after reading this query is that she runs a cupcake business. And I don't know anything about what happens in the book. That's absolutely fatal in a query.
Start over. Use the recipe you'll find listed in the QueryShark archives more than once. That's the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt. Make it your own by adding lemon, cinnamon, nutmeg and raisins to taste.
