Literary Agent Sara Crowe – Agent Shopping day

UPDATE! I just sent out the FOUR FULL requests from Ms. Crowe.

—I think I heard a mad dash to the inboxes—

But, for now, Sara was awesome to leave a list of comments.

Here they are – and remember, this is GOLD to have an agent give feedback. You’re a lucky group!

FROM MS. CROWE:

#25 and #4 are great pitches, just not for me right now– but close.

#1—  Think about losing some details– this is too complicated, I think.  Romantic fiction is not something I am looking for, but I think this pitch would be stronger if simplified.  Sometimes you have to let go of trying to tell the entire story!

#2, This first para/sentence also has to much in it.  I would suggest you lose some of this info.  We do not need it all up front. 

#6,  Would lose last sentence– do not try to market in the pitch.  Also, when Stacy comes in, I get confused–  if she is a major character, and it seems that she is, I’d like her paragraph to be hers- who is she and what does she want.  

#8—  Sounds interesting, but I think this pitch is too short–  also, I am not looking for romance.

#9–  Confusing, would lose some details.
#11– This sounds fun- not a category I am looking for but great pitch.

#12, same as above-  great pitch, not for me.

#14- For me, the tone of this query is too sarcastic.  I would stay away from that in a pitch—  I know it is a balance, because you want to show us her voice. Also, there may be too many details given here.

I like a lot about #16, but it feels too close to projects I have.  Also, take another look at your closing sentence– it feels very general.

#20 is a really great pitch– just not what I am looking for.

#21, I feel like this might need two paragraphs– to let us know what the book is?  It sounds fun, but I also am not left with a true sense of it.  

#22— I like that this is simple and direct– but it might bee too much of a good thing.  I think we need a few more details and some fleshing out!

#27 also needs more room- two paragraphs I think.  And though it explains the world of the book– we do not get enough about the main characters.

#29 intrigues me, could be my Owl obsession– but it feels too much like telling and not showing.  I think there may just be too much info being presented here, and not enough focus on who Iris is and why we want to read about her.

Those I did not comment on are in good shape– just not for me.

Good morning All!

It’s ‘Agent Shop’ day. I’ll make it quick since you’re all dying to scroll past my babbling and get to the goods.

The pitches that made it through are listed below. Our TOP PITCH SLOT winner is first!

YAY! for WHEN DARKNESS FALLS.

As always, here are the stats:

• Pitches received: 52
• Pitches accepted: 30
• Pitches deleted: 22
• *2 – Missing info
• *13 – too long
• *2 – No title
• *5 – Came in after I reached 30

Not too bad!

Okay, now that we have THAT out of the way, please welcome Sara Crowe, fantabulous agent with Harvey Klinger Inc.

Sara, thank you for sharing Marianna Baer and FROST with us.

Let’s hope we can help you find something you love. The pitches are below, happy shopping! If you find something you like, simply e-mail me the number of the pitch, (or Top Pitch Slot), what you’d like to see, how you’d like it sent, and I’ll spread the joy!

SQUEEEE! Good luck everyone.

***********************************

***TOP PITCH SLOT WINNER***

WHEN DARKNESS FALLS

Horror/thriller

83k words

One woman’s desire to reunite with her dead twin is about to become very real.

Following an unfortunate car accident, Gwen’s soul is trapped, along with those of her friends, in an old hotel that acts as a holding place for those who are not quite dead. Allowed to roam the halls, she is unaware that her broken body is lying in a hospital in the world of the living waiting for her. As she wanders the area, each door opens into another frightening mystery that makes her question whether they survived the wreck. Throughout the night, voices in the darkness beg her to give in to them, but her sister’s spirit warns her not to listen. Wanting desperately to be joined again with her twin, she has a decision to make.

As dawn breaks, she notices one by one that her friends have begun to disappear. Her desire to die is quickly replaced by a need to survive. Determined not to give in, she continues her search for answers– and a way out. She knows it’s only a matter of time before the incorporeal
entities find a way to trick her. It’s a mistake she can’t afford to make

*

#1

SIN’S FLOWER

Dark, Romantic Women’s Fiction

104,000 words

A thirty-two year old musician assistant extraordinaire, Trista Hart knows she needs to find a way out of the nocturnally persuaded world of her best friend and boss, Jaxon James. But no matter how dark that route has become lately, he and his band Sin Pointe are her family and she’s not prepared to leave them for Jaxon’s visiting cousin, Lucky Mason of Tennessee, if it’s just going to take her down another of life’s pot-hole littered highways. She has valid reasons to question Lucky and his beloved south—having experienced at an early age the sometimes hypocritical underbelly of the region’s good manners and charm.

Her hourglass has been turned upside down and now with Lucky’s heartfelt proposal before her, she has to decide one for the other at the most inconvenient of times—just as Sin Pointe’s tour is taking off and on the heels of a horrendous late night attack on her and Jaxon that leaves her sure of only one thing…

It’s time for Trista to be her own savior.

*

#2

STICK FIGURES

Commercial Fiction

110,000 words

The sole survivor of a devastating fire from her childhood, seemingly polished documentary film advisor, Chloe Jacobs, courageously leads a team of college students as they set out to study the effects of brushfire near the sleepy mountain town of Julian, CA.

While prepared for the grueling emotional and physical work she is about to endure for the film and the secrets it may unleash, Chloe is thrown completely off balance when a member of her live-in crew, introverted Englishman Oliver Andrews, decides to pursue her.

Not wanting to lose focus on their mission but having grown increasingly curious about Oliver, thirty-year-old virgin Chloe must decide which personal demons she wants to deal with—conquering her fears of the element that robbed her of her family, justifying a relationship with any man, especially one six years her junior, or the most daunting of them all—finding out if fate is ready to just let her be?

*

#3

THE BLACK DESERT

Suspense

93,000 words

Forty-eight hours into their Moroccan vacation, Julie’s best friend, Fay, disappears.

Frantic to determine Fay’s whereabouts, she quizzes the hotel staff and snoops through Fay’s luggage. Julie’s anxiety for Fay’s safety turns to fear for her own when she suspects she is being followed. Then, a vicious attack meant for Julie kills an innocent woman.

Having learned enough to guess Fay’s destination, Julie rushes to intercept her friend. But Julie’s channeling of her inner Kinsey Millhone deserts her after she gets lost and has to ditch their disabled rental car. She’s stranded somewhere in the barren Black Desert. Disoriented and delirious, she eventually stumbles onto a military patrol. She is reunited with Fay – in a prison cell on the Algerian border – and learns the extent of Fay’s lies. Although furious at Fay’s deception and still weak from her ordeal in the desert, Julie understands that they must work together if they are to survive. The women pit their wits against the soldiers and the Sahara in a fight for their lives.

*

#4

POWER STRUGGLE

Young Adult Paranormal

85,000 words

When sixteen-year-old Melody’s father is killed by psyfons—power-draining psychics—she’s driven to join the fight against these evil creatures. This takes her to a boot camp for psychic kids to master her telekinesis. Although focused on her psyfon-destroying goal, she makes friends with trainees who have other abilities and catches the attention of Jonas, the gorgeous junior trainer whose very presence makes her feel dizzy and distracted.

When a few trainees collapse, Melody begins to suspect that the evil psyfons have infiltrated the camp. The dizziness Jonas makes her feel whenever they’re together starts to become less romantic and more suspicious. Is it possible that the boy she’s falling for could be one of the monsters who killed her father?

*

#5

TROUBLE IN THE BREW 

Young Adult 

90,200 words

Mrs. Ghoul is an evil witch; she had no idea how powerful her deceased mother’s witch’s items were. Until one night, while she was gazing at her reflection into the mirror, her mother’s face appeared into the mirror as it disappears quickly.  The evil witch steps back quickly and realizes it’s time to set revenge on RayAnn to get her mother’s items back.

Jake is a wizard, he came to live with his grandmother, Mrs. Ghoul, after his mother was vanished into another world. He has no idea that his sweetheart to be lives across the street. Once he lays eyes on RayAnn for the first time, he knew they would have a magical connection between them.

RayAnn and Cindy have been friends for years. Together, these girls go through some magical reject spells to try to defeat Mrs. Ghoul at her own game. Nevertheless, this magical adventure these girls endure, they will never forget.

*

#6

ZACH’S FIGHT

Contemporary YA

60,000 words

Black eyes, broken homes, bloody fists. Beyond Zach’s exterior lies a deep well of protection and pride. He’d do anything to protect those he loves; even staying at home with his abusive stepfather to save his mom.

Unfortunately for Zach, that means putting himself in the middle of the abuse as well. The frustration he feels with his mom combined with the rage he’s holding in, thanks to his stepfather is coming, to a boiling point. Zach’s ready to explode, and anyone who gets in his way will end getting up hurt.

Stacy may be the only person who can turn the heat down and help Zach gain control over his rage. The problem with that is Stacy and Zach can’t figure out what they want from each other. Zach knows he wants more than a friendship; Stacy’s the one holding back.

Somehow Zach has to figure out how to make Stacy see a relationship is good for both of them, get his mom away from his stepfather, and try to get out of the house alive.

ZACH’S FIGHT is my contemporary young adult manuscript that could appeal to both male and female readers.

*

#7

SIXTH SENSE

Women’s Fiction with elements of romantic suspense

90,000 words

Reluctant Psychic Katherine Crystal, dubbed “Crystal Ball Kate,” is thrust into the national spotlight when she accurately predicts that the young son of actor Vince Rivers (think John Travolta) will die in a private plane crash. Skeptical Atlanta Police Detective Beauregard Lee Jackson Hale (Jack), who has a deep-seated distrust of psychics, is the by-the-book officer who ignores Katherine’s warnings when she calls to report her premonition, with disastrous consequences. When Katherine and Jack team up to catch a serial killer, the brief and fruitful chase leads to romance and the ultimate discovery of a mystery and a murder surrounding Kate’s birth in the quaint spiritualist community of Cassadaga, Florida.

*

#8

THE EDGER

Women’s Fiction

85,000 words

The Edger is a completed 85,000-word humorous women’s fiction about landscape artist Alex Newborn’s shocking reunion with her former college art professor, Nick Anselmo, now a homeless lawn man, which sows the seeds for murder, mystery and romance.

The Edger received first place in the Suspense Romance Category of the 2010 Ignite the Flame Contest, sponsored by the Central Ohio Fiction Writers chapter of RWA.

*

#9

GUITAR GOD

YA—Contemporary Fantasy

195,000 Words

Polly’s moment had finally arrived, and it couldn’t have come at a worse time. Barely a teenager, Polly had reluctantly accepted the role of human guardian of the Green. Now, about to begin college and leave her hometown and all the weirdness behind, fate calls her, except to save the Green she must defeat Isaac, the boy she loves.

Isaac was the kid nobody liked until a mysterious faerie granted him his greatest wish. Now bestowed with incredible musical prowess, Isaac is loved and admired by all. But there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Polly is the only one who can save Isaac’s soul, but her first responsibility is to the Green. Can Polly save the Green and save Isaac as well?

Guitar God is a Jewish, suburban rock and roll fantasy with a 1970s soundtrack. It’s urban fantasy in the suburbs. It’s War For The Oaks meets Portnoy’s Complaint. It’s crossover YA for teens and their parents. It’s a world where the faerie folk walk among us, but we don’t know it. It’s about the magical places where we grew up. Maybe we knew about them or maybe we walked by them every day without even noticing.

*

#10

INSIGHT

YA

97,722 words

Some say that dreams are the doorway to the soul. Willow is no stranger to that doorway. Each night she shares a silent dream with a stunning blue-eyed boy. With each new moon she’s haunted by a nightmare shared with a different boy, who is always hidden by the shadows.

In her waking hours she must battle her sixth sense. The one that allows her to feel others emotions as if they were hers. This insight is exhausting, causing her to draw inward, only trusting a few close friends. Oddly, this sense also attracts ghostly images that seem to appear out of nowhere.  With a touch, they take her to wherever they may be, allowing her to change their emotion. This alone would cause most to go insane, but Willow filters her aggression by painting, capturing the emotion.

One August night, a nightmare came days after the new moon. In this dream the shadowed boy marked her wrist with a star, leaving her father no choice but to share a family secret that would tie all of the odd attributes of Willow’s life together. Now, she has no choice but to outrun the fate that is closing in around her.

*

#11

INTERSECTION

Contemporary Romantic Suspense

120,000 words 

A hostage crisis in a Dallas hotel brings wounded undercover cop Johnny Logan and divorcee Alexa Bailey together when they escape to the rooftop. As rogue IRA terrorists complete the takeover of the hotel, Alexa tries to care for Johnny’s injuries, hoping that they will remain undiscovered in the maintenance housing. But someone else has invaded their tenuous sanctuary–a secretive homeless man wanted for murder, known only as Daniel.

As Johnny’s brother, Pete, barters himself to negotiate the release of the hostages below, the inevitable happens. Daniel makes a fatal slip that will lead the terrorists to the rooftop hiding place.

Once Johnny and Alexa are found, can they survive what the terrorists have planned?  Have they finally found an unlikely love only to lose their lives? Can Daniel buy them some time to come up with an escape plan inside the maze of ductwork in the hotel?

Now, with everything at stake, it’s up to Johnny to survive a “winner-take-all” battle to the death with the terrorist leader, Kieran McShane, high above the city.  Can Johnny settle the score before the bomb is detonated in the hotel below them? Time is running out.

*

#12

LOST IN MUMBAI

Contemporary Romance

80K words 

For Hollywood screenwriter Daci Bishop India has been a dream all her life so when her latest script is optioned and she is given the chance to join the production in Goa, she looks upon it as a stroke of fate. Ramu Khanna is Daci’s ultimate idea of a hero, little does the naive American know; he is all of India’s as well. Can Ramu keep Daci in his life and still be the Ram of Bollywood and can Daci come to grips with the fact her perfect man is really a Bollywood superstar splashed all over billboards? Anything can happen in Bollywood!

*

#13

TROUBLE IN TINSELTOWN

Romantic Thriller 

80K words

Dema Maria Morielli is running scared after witnessing her brother get gunned down on a lonely street in Venice, California. The down-on-her-luck actress is desperate to find Micah’s killer and stay alive in the process. There is only one person she can turn to and he’s the one person she is determined to keep out of her life.

Detective Reynaldo “Rey” Villegas is harder then diamonds when it comes to law enforcement…and Dema, ever since the hot woman left his bed one morning after an insane night of sex, she has consumed his thoughts. But when his sexy obsession waltzes back into his life via a murder investigation, Rey has no choice but protect her.

As the pair searches Tinsel town for Micah’s killer, they find a cover-up bigger than any backlot and a romance that burns hotter than a brushfire.  Now if only Rey can keep Dema alive…and in his bed.

*

#14

MADDY, REDEFINED

Contemporary YA

55,000 words

The last thing 14-year-old artist and gamer extraordinaire Maddy Caldwell wanted to do was a triathlon. As in, “I’d rather skip through a blizzard in a bathing suit” last. But when Maddy’s mom asks her to do one, she finds some reasons to say yes: a chance to wow her crush (code name: 28), the promise of falconry lessons, and victory over the embarrassing Gym Class Incident.

Yet the road to the finish line isn’t easy, and not just because Maddy considers herself a notch or 12 below “athletic.” A condescending triathlon rival, a big-mouth nemesis who makes school miserable, and a boy-crazy best friend who leaves her on the outside looking in take the fun out of, well, everything. Long-time gaming buddy Check was fine, until he got a girlfriend and went MIA. Then there’s Olivia, her art class idol, whose health advice sends Maddy into what-did-I-get-myself-into territory. Throw in a swim outing gone wrong and a prank that shatters what little confidence she has, and it’s no wonder this race seems like a mistake of epic proportions. Ok, maybe not epic. But at least major. If Maddy makes it to race day, she’ll be more surprised than anybody.

*

#15

EXES, GATORS, & THE DEATH OF THAT FONTENOT BOY

Contemporary Women’s Fiction

50,000 words

Veronica Paige has gone from the Country Club to low-income housing. Once a stay-at-home mom, she’s learning to manage a budding career in the legal field and raising her son while trying to find her place in society. When the law firm she works with lands a huge case involving an accidental death on a construction site she has a sinking suspicion things aren’t at all what they appear. With the help of a couple of quirky neighbors, she launches an investigation of her own which will not only jeopardize her career, but also her heart.

This novel is the third in a series that follows the residents of the fictional town of Dunham, Mississippi.

*

#16

THE GATHERING

YA Dystopian Thriller

60,000 words 

The Gathering is the first book in the Teen Harvest trilogy set in a world where the government tampers with everything, even the water supply to get compliance from its citizens, but 17 year-old Jed is sick of being told what to do.

When he and best friend Ava are forced into the government’s elite teen army, they discover that the kids are really being gathered for a specialist breeding program where only those who produce superior offspring are allowed to live.

All babies are being injected with a dog like, genetically engineered strand of hormone that makes them age seven times faster, so that toddlers have the physical maturity of 14 year-olds. They are fed obedience drugs and prepared for army service from birth.

When Ava and Jed are matched together in the breeding program against their will, they are determined to fight their growing attraction for each other and the government enforced coupling. But if they don’t comply, they will be convicted as traitors and killed.

They start a rebellion that puts their lives at risk, but it’s their only hope for long-term survival and freedom for all teens.

*

#17

JUMP, FALL

Romance – Contemporary women

60,000 words

Katie Scarborough isn’t like all the other Southern Belles that surround her. She’s brunette, she’s freckled. She’s also short and a little more round than the pageant queens that seem to fill her world. To top things off, she’s painfully shy as well. The one thing that ties her to her Southern sisters is the dream that the fairy tales they all heard as young ladies will somehow come true.

Throughout her coming of age years, she suffers a series of miscues and embarrassments where gentlemen are concerned. She begins to wonder if the fairy tales are just lies and if a girl who doesn’t quite fit the norm is capable of being loved. Although, once she goes off to college and catches the eye of her dream man, she starts to think maybe she was better off single.

Set in the fictional town of Dunham, Mississippi, Katie’s story is the first in a series of novels featuring the quirky, yet lovable characters of the Mississippi Delta.

*

#18

BY GRACE ALONE

Contemporary Women’s Fiction

60,000 words

Vivienne LaVoie is a 27 year old engineer working to restore a hurricane ravaged New Orleans to its prior splendor. Samuel is an orthopedic surgeon desperately trying to make the most of the news that he and his beloved wife, Delilah will never be able to have children. Charlie is a man coming to terms with his sexual identity in a new town, having run far away from everything he knew before.

An unsuspected pregnancy brings these three people together, forever changing the paths they had planned for themselves. They find love, heartache, loss and joy, each character narrating his or her own part of their interwoven story in his or her own voice. Each of them feels lost in his or her own way, but are ultimately able to find comfort knowing that they aren’t alone in their world-turned-upside-down. The city of New Orleans itself plays a major role in the culmination of Vivienne, Samuel and Charlie’s stories.

*

#19

MOST LIKELY TO SURVIVE

YA Sci-fi Thriller

80,000 words

Seven months ago, the senior class of Oakdale High went up the mountain for one last end of summer party.  None of them ever came back down.  This is the story of Matthew Davis, the one boy who didn’t feel like partying that night.  Haunted by the ghost of his girlfriend Nadia and obsessed with other mass disappearances like Roanoke and the Bermuda Triangle, his search for answers leads him to an inescapable conclusion:  Matthew Davis, Survivor of the Class of 2012, didn’t survive anything.  He got left behind.

*

#20

BLOOD ON THE MOON

Paranormal Romance

85,000 words

Mia Langdon – tomb raider and adventure-seeker extraordinaire – has everything she wants. Freedom. Independence. No chains (a.k.a. a man) holding her back. Her troubles begin when she’s attacked on a dig in Peru. Soon, she’s forced to use her tomb raiding talents to find the flaming arrows of an Egyptian goddess. In the wrong hands, this weapon could destroy the human race – and nearly did once.

Used to doing things her own way, it isn’t long before she figures out that, to succeed, she needs the help of Harrison Braden Stanton, her stuffy, but oh so yummy, Egyptologist and ex-lover. There’s one problem. He despises what she does.

As a curator for the British Museum, Harrison protects the world’s treasures from falling into greedy hands and being lost forever. He just never thought he’d have to protect them, and his secret, from the woman he loved.

As Mia and Harrison find themselves in the middle of a battle between the Egyptian gods and goddess, there’s no choice for the woman with a Grand Canyon-sized independence streak and the man working for the Egyptian god, Osiris, but to work together to prevent the destruction of all they love.

*

#21

FEAST OF ALL FOODS

Adult commercial fiction

83,000 words

Philadelphia’s thriving underground dinner club scene relies on the skills of one person: illegal foods smuggler Varda Adler. But when Varda finally earns enough money to fulfill her dream of being a professional cheesemaker and get out of smuggling, Anthony Carluccio, head of one of the dinner clubs, issues a foodie fatwa against her. Varda must enlist the help of her devoted boyfriend, his family, and their friends — many of whom harbor their own surprising secrets — to find a way around the hit without getting whacked themselves.

*

#22

STATIC – Soundcatchers

YA Paranormal Thriller

65,000 words

Kristy McMullen attracts all things broken. Now she has to fix them.

A broken life. A broken town.

A broken boy catching sounds.

But how does she fix a dead girl?

Kristy must become like the Soundcatcher listening beyond to find the answers—
even if it brings her face to face with the same fate as the other girls.

Not everything has to remain broken, not even Kristy.

She’ll prove that or die.

*

#23

ALL GROWN UP

Romance – Erotic

103,362 words

Do you remember when you were young, thinking that when you grew up you knew exactly what you wanted and what you were going to do? Tech geek, Chloe, learns that being all grown up doesn’t mean you get all that you want, or does it?

Well, when the Mackeys move next door to Chloe Fisher and her blended family, she gains a best friend, a crush on Leo Mackey- the boy next door, and a future she could never planned on.  In fact, just when she thinks the crush of her dreams is coming true it’s whooshed away without her understanding why.

After years of separation, Chloe and Leo are now parted by different paths of life and marriages to other people.  As both their lives enter pivotal life altering moments, they come together as they did years ago.  But misunderstandings and silent treatments push them farther apart than ever before.  Will either of them ever truly grow up?

*

#24

BRIGHT STAR

Historical/paranormal

98,000 words

Pandora Mavros is on the hunt for one of her own.  A high ranking Siren has gone rogue, murdering innocent men.  Her mission is to locate the rogue and the artifact she has stolen.  If she fails; the destruction of her people will follow.  The licentious and dashing Alexander is a complication she is definitely not looking for.  Could he be working for the rogue? 

Alexander Knight is searching for his business partner who mysteriously disappeared and with him the ancient map of the elusive island of Eudora.  Alex doesn’t need the impediment of his desire for the mysterious and guarded Pandora, but something or someone is forcing them together.  Is she his salvation? Or the destruction of everything he holds dear?

*

#25

MEMORY KEEPER

YA Post-Apocalyptic adventure

81,000 words

Skylar turns seventeen in two weeks.

At best she figures she has eight years left to live—more likely four. The Dying wiped out most of the world’s population seventy-five years ago. To this day, not many survive past twenty-one.

Unlike other girls her age, Skylar isn’t following the way of the compounds and having children. She doesn’t want to. The genetic mutation that granted her flashes of memories from a time before the Dying has also shown her what life could be like: surviving to see her children grow to adulthood, to see her grandchildren. But the compound doesn’t share her outlook on breeding, and they’re no longer willing to waste resources on a virgin.

Most people call Haven’s Glen—a place where people live to advanced age—a legend. Skylar always has too, but now her only hope is to believe, and she’s willing to risk everything to find it and bring back its answers. Answers the inhabitants of Haven’s Glen don’t want to be found.

*

#26

AT THE END OF THE WATER

Romantic Women’s Fiction

80,000 words

In her heart, Kate would rather be her good friend Oliver’s second wife than anyone else’s first.

Seeing his strength and courage in battling back from his wife’s death has made Kate love Oliver in a way she knows will only ever belong to him.

And that is why she sits alone, today, in her cold basement.

Unfortunately, such a desperate love can leave one half of the heart lost in the other’s wake.  Kate gave herself to Oliver when she’d been whole.  His promise of a woman he could build a new life with.  Love fruitfully, bear his babies, hold heaven.

Kate shouldn’t have let him fall so hard for her.

His good heart will always love but never forget.

Her decision to be sterilized breaks him again and again and again.

How desperate is his love for her?

Enough to leave him sitting waiting, today, on her doorstep.

*

#27

INTERWOVEN DECEPTIONS

Urban Fantasy

100 K words

The Dimensional Collision of 2001 changed the geographical surface of the world and introduced the mythological species of Elves, Dwarves, Fairies, Shifters, and Vampires, into the general population. The barriers keeping out the Segregated Species; trolls, goblins, and demons are weakened. Then, Demons break through their magical barrier and attack. A blind educator and her detective lover must gather the forces necessary to rescue human hostages and reinstate the demon’s barrier to save humanity from enslavement.

*

#28

WHEN TIME STOOD STILL

Futuristic romance

70,000 words

In 2076, 3-D artist Beryl Hesketh falls in love with astronaut Roger Kemp.  But he leaves on a dangerous mission—lasting forty years.  He will not age due to time dilation, but much goes wrong.  He returns one hundred and sixty years later.  On an intrigue-ridden moon colony, he spots a woman who looks exactly like Beryl.  But how can she?

He discovers this is indeed Beryl—now Hildegard Heidt.  She went into suspended animation to await his return.  But her memory of her life as Beryl is gone, replaced by a disgruntled scientist’s programming in a plot against the authorities.  Even so, Hildegard falls in love with Roger.

Both get involved in dangerous intrigues and must rescue each other.  But nothing can save their relationship.  Roger insists on seeing Hildegard as his lost love, not the woman she now is.  They break up.

When Hildegard is nearly killed in an earthquake, and he saves her, she has a near-death experience.  Her life passes before her; she finally learns of her lost years.  Again she wants Roger; he can now love all of her.  The two are married, and depart for a new life on an Earth-like exoplanet.

*

#29

OWLET

YA

50,000 words

The voice that has always guided Iris’ dreams is now speaking in her reality. Slowly it is leading her to a frightening discovery. She is a Stryx, a human whose soul is half Avarian, who has been hidden from the ‘flock’ known as the ‘Society of Feathers’. Slowly everything the voice is telling her is showing to be true and she learns that she was accused of being a Raven, who are killed at birth, but her family managed to save her and were forced to make a painful choice. Risk the rest of her kind to keep her alive or let them kill her.

The one who was sent to kill her had instead become mesmerized by her heart and was the key to keeping her hidden. The more people she sees and interacts with, the more her abilities grow and everyone around her starts to realize that she was never what she was accused of being.  When she falls into the ocean and her soul is split in two in confirms her fate. Iris soul is entwined with an owl…meaning she will rule the Society that once marked her for death.

*

#30

OPPOSITION

YA Fantasy

64,000 words

The Aerisians—people living on the invisible, floating continent of Aeris—were given a power beyond the elements and a legendary task centuries ago: protect the Yin Shadow and the Yang Light, the pair that makes up the balance of the Earth. But in the week Atalanta Raire turns fifteen, suddenly the Light is stolen, her sister goes missing, and the only thing Ata can do is go to the Earth Plane, where a trapped Cimmerian bent on twisted revenge shatters free of his prison, and Ata’s nonexistent luck is about to make her his bait for a desperate and crumbling world.