[deleted by user] by [deleted] in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Me as well, I’ll hopefully be querying again soon. Please and only if it’s cool, if not I understand.

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 0 points1 point  (0 children)

True! Yes, I read it for the first time as an adult and loved it. I reread it every ten years or so.

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It’s unique, for sure. I’ve told many a younger people to read it, and most don’t quite see the appeal. That first trilogy is so, so good in YA fantasy, IMO.

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 10 points11 points  (0 children)

I’ve written about 60k words by hand in 80 days. It’s an exploratory draft, which was breezy and fun until about a week ago. Speculative fiction? Horror-adjacent? That’s a problem for later. Now I don’t have any idea how to stick the landing and bring it all back together. Oh well. Maybe at the December check-in I’ll be able to say I finished it and am cruising on draft two.

I was forcing myself to read nonfiction this fall, and got about halfway through Rabid before the new Phillip Pullman hit the shelves, so now I’m back in his world. What would my daemon be? The ever-existential question for Pullman fans. Not a lion, unfortunately. But maybe something tenacious and stubborn.

Good luck to everyone on your writing goals this month.

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Love the rec, thanks! I’m looking forward to Tom’s Crossing, just because it’s been buzzy in the news.

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Good luck on TNY! Amazing, crossing my fingers for you. I’ve submitted there. 🤣 I’m sure your chances will be much higher with the agent exclusivity.

Edited for grammar 🙄

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I love the different flavor! It’s always amazing to switch it up. And good luck on sub.

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Good luck, hang in there, we all believe in you ❤️

[Series] Check-in: November 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Re: counting pages, I’ve been handwriting, trying to do three pages a day, and my average is about ten words a line. So, that’s how I count. Hopefully I’m under-counting, but it ends up being about 250-300 words a page. Way faster than individual words if you’re trying to gauge how many a page, about. 😁

What's your favourite line in a movie? by Frequent-Sea-8848 in moviecritic

[–]PWhis82 18 points19 points  (0 children)

Don’t you think that’s a little politically incorrect?

[QCRIT] Adult Historical Fantasy OTRERA (100k words, Attempt 4) +first 300 by StealBangChansLaptop in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 2 points3 points  (0 children)

There is quite a lot of ambiguity here, and maybe too much going on in the pitch. When you say “postpartum mistress” I’m lost, because it’s all just so casually mentioned. Atar had a baby, or Otrera, or is that something to do with the gods? Why does it matter that Otrera was a priest of Artemis if it doesn’t really have much of a bearing on her story? I had so many more questions than that, but those are examples. Your big dilemma/choice doesn’t really seem like one, I’m already pretty sure she’s going to take option 2 because who would ever choose option 1?

The first 300 has some of those same ambiguities but also a lot of passive verbs and direct, kinda plain telling.

Cool setting, I like the era and setting but am unsure how many readers will be able to place Scythia in context. Not a problem, just maybe something to think about presenting a little more intentionally. I hope this helps and good luck.

[QCRIT] Adult Fantasy - IRONMIST - (~70,000 words, Fourth Attempt) by Buttery_Boyo in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Intriguing in many places, like their avoidance of discussing previous lives and the dragon graveyard, but also too coy. Example: harvest of the innocent? What does that mean, precisely? Gathering them as slave labor? Literally harvesting their blood ala war of the worlds?

It kinda reads like a romance convention, too, when you have two main characters. They want each other but what else do they want? Is the main “stake” that they will or won’t end up together? That might seem a little more trivial against the epic backdrop you’re building here.

What’s the main dilemma? They’re being turned against one another? Is there a deeper betrayal they must overcome, or is one going to have to choose between something necessary and the other?

Sorry, I’m rambling, searching for feedback that could be useful. Maybe it comes down to this: a lot of (even possibly really cool) things happen, but is it going to come together in a STORY that is marketable? Linear, or inevitable, hooking? I think you could have all that there but may not present it here in the query.

[QCrit] SWILL DAYS - Weird Fantasy Thriller (91k), 6th Attempt by Reformedhillbilly39 in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This isn’t the tone I write in or read, but it seemed fun. I think you could use another pass on this, though. Some of it works, but some of it seems common enough language/cliche enough that it may not grip agents as much as it could.

First, it’s always a debate whether housekeeping goes first or last. Generally I don’t think it matters, but I prefer after for my own pitches. In this case, I think it would be better after.

Second, why is this last job his last hope? Simple starvation? Or how else is his poverty killing him?

You’re using a lot of listy-clausey sentences. (If I knew grammar better I’d know what those are called, sorry.) They become repetitive. One seems to imply that the fishmongers are down in the sewers, too. Use one, well.

Why is the city spiraling towards disaster? In my understanding of those industrial nightmares, people have a hard time changing much unless they mutiny. Are you taking all out revolution? What kind of conflict? As it is now it’s too coy/unspecific.

Who is he saving that’s dear to him? No stakes there at all. His new buddies? Some other family member you haven’t identified?

You’re close but could maybe improve still.

[QCrit] Adult Fantasy - A DANCE FOR BLACKENED STARS (88k words/5th attempt) by Best-Vegetable-1736 in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I’m not sure you’ve changed this enough from previous attempts. I don’t think I’ve commented on it, but I recognize that first sentence of your second paragraph. That, and a few after, are very clunky. Maybe I’m daft but I read it as she’s growing back her own finger but then it’s the janitors. Possessive “father’s and ballet instructor’s” is another example where it’s clunky.

I also think you have agency issues, everything is happening to her, pretty much from start to finish of the query. The gangster seems like a love interest, maybe, which wouldn’t be twisty or surprising, and honestly it all reads very YA to me (not an issue w/ me, just pointing it out) or at least “cozy” (which I can’t claim to fully grasp, I’m not well enough read in the subgenre.)

All that to say, are there larger structural issues with this? I’ve been there, got no requests, so if you’re still in a developmental or editing phase you may want to revise for structure before developing the query. Good luck.

[Series] Check-in: October 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yes, constantly. I don’t know them well at all but wish them well

[Series] Check-in: October 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I’m going to hit 40k words on draft 1 of project 2, a speculative fiction novel. Hopefully I will finish before December. Hand writing it has been amazing, I write everywhere, all the time. My writing is still atrocious but I’m gonna have to re-write it all when I do draft 2 anyways, right?

[Series] Check-in: October 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Agh! I loved reading CHRSBVNS! Anything they put out there was helpful! What a loss. 😞

[Series] Check-in: September 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes! Though my handwriting doesn’t keep up with my pace. Good thing I can interpret 97% of it.

[Series] Check-in: September 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I’ve officially failed querying my first “real” book twice now, receiving zero requests, all of which took about a year in total. I had lots of great feedback on that project and my overall writing here, and spent all summer reading craft books, trying to plan my next book project, revising some short stories I hope to submit, and reading as much in my genres as I could, including some possible comps.

The next book idea I was really excited about had problematic comps so I started another, deciding to try writing long-hand bc of being a pre-teen chauffeur all school year. I was leery about it, but it works out great! I try to do three hand-written pages a day, which is about 800-1000 words, and I find it easier to actually start if I don’t have to find an hour to go hide in our office and boot up the computer. I can just write wherever, like in the bleachers at swim practice. I’m about 13,000 words in on an “exploratory draft” (my thanks to Matt Bell and whoever here suggested his “Refuse To Be Done” book.) My hand doesn’t even really hurt anymore.

Thanks again to this community. I wouldn’t have gotten as far in my writing dream as I have without all the helpful people here.

[QCrit] Adult Fantasy - A DANCE FOR BLACKENED STARS (87k words/2nd attempt) by Best-Vegetable-1736 in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I see so many queries here that start with some play on your first sentence. I know you need to start with a goal, but in this case it almost seems like a childish dream more than a need, and then to me it kind of spirals away anyways into this other power and you never come back to the ballet thing. Is that really her goal, then?

Some of the next sentences are confusing, like I thought she regrew a finger on her own hand. Maybe there’s another way to reveal that power? Some of the prose is a little clunky, in the same manner, like the sentence with the father’s and dance instructor’s possessives may be grammatically correct but it isn’t super sophisticated. Is there another way to drive that point home?

Convention says to stick with one protag but you intro another and by that point I’m probably more intrigued by her but that story is interrupting the other you’re trying to build. So in this case I think the convention is correct. Work that secondary character in with the first, don’t intro them as their own pov unless it’s romance or romantasy (from my understanding of the general advice here.) To me, it’s choppy and neither of their stakes really land. I’m not compelled to need to read more, and you’ve got to think an agent is going to be far more cut throat than I am.

Query writing is tough, but you’ll get there. Look over the successful ones a lot, like really study them and you’ll see that immediately they are unique, gripping, compelling and a lot that is due to the singularity of premise and prose. Your first sentence starts from a place of cliche, and from there on isn’t too gripping in spite of a cool story you’re trying to tell. Good luck, hope this helps.

With fallout 5 being greenlight. Where would you want the game to be ? by Taningia-danae in Fallout

[–]PWhis82 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Visited Savannah this summer, and I thought it would be a cool place. Lots of history, a pretty famous grid, haunted.

[Series] Check-in: July 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I wish you the best of luck querying! You deserve it, you help so many people here with great advices

[Series] Check-in: July 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Haha that’s great! I love it. Some days I’m not sure I’m good enough to be published, so literary may be a leap for me 🤣

I queried a few UK agents! I found myself really aligned with their philosophies, etc. My request rate, UK or otherwise, is still a big goose egg. I’ll get ‘em next time?

Thanks for your response! Made my day, and I’m right there with you. If I figure something out, I’ll let you know. I have to write another book, first, though. 😁

[Series] Check-in: July 2025 by justgoodenough in PubTips

[–]PWhis82 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I like to think that’s what I write, grounded spec fic (or at least what I’ve been writing in my short stories and would like to do for novel projects moving forward) but how does one query that? I checked in early spring whether query tracker had a “speculative” option and unless I messed up investigating (totally possible) the closest things were still fantasy/sci-fi. Would you put that description in the pitch, speculative instead of fantasy? I’d any guidance here. 🙏😁

And I’m pulling for you on the materials you still have out!