Friday, May 25, 2012

The Wilde's Fire Editor-Judged Contest


The Wilde's Fire Editor-Judged Contest Begins....NOW!

Wilde's Fire, by Krystal Wade - Cover

“There is no pain in this death, only peace, knowing I am going to die with the one I love the most.”—Katriona Wilde.

It's time for another contest! I know, I know, I've been a little contest happy lately but I promise this will be the last one posted for awhile. 

Anyways, there's still time to sign up (it's also a blog hop) so if you are interested, just sign up on the linky at the bottom of this post. Then, you'll need to post your first 500 words and query on your own blog and leave constructive criticism on the entries for as many of the other participating blogs as you can before the 28th. At that point, all submissions will be sent in and a winner will be chosen. The prize is a full request from Curiosity Quills Press.

Title: DAUGHTER OF THE MOON
Genre: YA Urban Fantasy

Query:
Seventeen-year-old Selina Kane always knew she was different, but never imagined she was last-living-necromancer different. Not until she starts speaking the language of the Underworld and visiting Acherusian Lake in her dreams. And then Blake storms into her life, claiming to be her bonded protector and making her blush and stumble over her words. Blake warns Selina about Ciara, queen of the undead. Ciara has gained ground in the world of the living, and it isn’t a secret that she feels threatened by Selina’s return.

Before long, the undead attack and Selina watches helplessly through the only spell she can conjure – a protective shield – as Blake is dragged away in her place. Selina assumes the undead have murdered him and she turns to the necromantic powers she hardly knows how to use, risking her life to search for Blake in the Underworld. But Selina doesn’t find his soul resting peacefully in Acherusian Lake. Blake’s been transformed into one of the undead, and the guards of the Underworld expect her to find and destroy him.

Selina doesn’t care what the guards’ idea of her duty as a necromancer is; she’s determined to get Blake back in one piece. There is one spell, one that would save Blake’s soul, but she’d have to kill him to use it, and worse, transform him into a ferryman for the Underworld. There may be other ways to save him though, if she's willing to make dark alliances with the undead. Selina knows she shouldn’t, but with Blake’s life in jeopardy, the line between good and evil starts to blur.

First 500
As far as she knew, Selina was the only seventeen-year-old with her own burial plot. And once a year, she looked forward to nothing so much as to visiting her grave.
“I can give you a ride to school today, if you want. Since it’s your birthday,” Jess said, jingling the keys to the old Chrysler she’d inherited from Grandpa last summer.
“Thanks, Sis, but actually, I want to visit my mother on the way so I’ll just ride my bike.”
“We can stop at the cemetery on the way home,” Jess offered.
“I’d rather go now.” She would have already been at the cemetery a minute past midnight, if she’d dared.
“Yeah, sure. No problem. See you tonight,” Jess said. Her eyes were full of understanding and Selina turned away to hide the shame creeping into her face.
Selina and Jess, like all of their brothers and sisters, had been adopted. But Selina had only a few fragmented memories of the mother she’d lost.
Soft, brown hair twined around her chubby, toddler fingers.
The  smell of soap.
A hummed tune.
Reaching out to accept the urn of her mother’s ashes.
Jess had been thirteen when her parents died. Using the loss of a mother she barely even remembered with someone like Jess was wrong, and Selina knew it. But she had to get to the cemetery before the wild roses covering her grave bloomed.
Her hands shook with excitement as she pulled her bike out of the side yard and closed the gate behind her. She jumped onto the saddle and pedaled down the driveway as fast as she could. Every moment spent on the road was one moment in which her roses might bloom without her. One moment in which the message they were meant to bring her might be forever lost.
Selina hunched down and lost herself in the sound of wheels on pavement and the rhythm of her breathing. Before long, she was skidding to a stop before the black, wrought-iron gates of the cemetery. She leaned her bike against the fence without bothering to lock it up and raced onto the field of graves. The grass was slippery with morning dew and it squeaked beneath her shoes. Although she was only ever here once a year, she expertly wove her way between headstones in a near beeline to the oak tree which shaded her grave.
Please, don’t let me be too late.
A vine of wild rosebuds emerged from the grass in the center of her plot. A sigh of relief whooshed out of Selina’s lungs even as she tried to catch her breath from the sprint over; she’d made it. She leaned against the oak tree with her hands on her knees and her eyes glued to the rosebuds. In the morning shade of the oak tree, the rosebuds were black. Four years of experience told her though that they were actually a deep purple.
There are so many. More than ever before.



18 comments:

  1. Excellent opening line! And I like the details of the cemetery. Best of luck!! :D
    Thanks for all your comments on my query. Appreciate the help.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Really loved your query. I love strong heroines and that really comes across in the detail of it. Great excerpt as well. Selina is very intriguing.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Really cool premise, and the first 500 leave me wanting to know a lot more about those roses. My only critique is to smooth the transition between the opening line and the first line of dialogue. It was quick and jarring. The rest of it is great. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  4. The premise is so deliciously morbid. Great opening line. It really sets the tone of the story. Good luck on the contest.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I'm drawn in already with the first line. And knowing the book is underworldly and she has her own grave that she rushes to once a year? And knowing something is going to happen at that grave? Gives me the shivers! Well done:)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thank you everyone for your kind comments :) Your feedback means so much to me!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Heya :)
    I loved your query :) I love the name of your characters too. The only thing that jumped out at me was the slightly jerky dialogue at the start. But it wouldn't have stopped me from reading on. :) Good luck :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hello A.K. Thanks for entering the contest! I thought the query was solid, you might want to add the title, genre, word count, and character's age to the body of the query somewhere. The first lines of your 500 were awesome!

    ReplyDelete
  9. I LOVE your opening line! I'm sure I've seen this before, and I got excited all over again when I got to that opening line of yours. Great query and first 500! I didn't notice the jarring affect of the first line of dialogue until I went back to reread it. I think I was too into your first paragraph and ready to read on!! ;) Good luck to you in the contest! I'm now following your blog too! ;)

    ReplyDelete
  10. I felt there were too many names in the first paragraph of the query. Do we really need to know about that lake in the query?

    The first 500 were great, though. I want to know what those roses had to say!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Oh, nice. This sounds like a story I would enjoy reading. Good luck!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Great query just picked up the missing word, thought you would like to know.

    but never imagined she was last-living-necromancer different./ but never imagined she was the last...

    I thought your first 500 words were good, dialogue does need a little work though,try to make the sisters more real. They need to show more of a sisterly connection.

    Good luck!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much for stopping by! I wanted to stop by your blog too and check out your entry but I receive a warning that I might get a computer virus by going to your blog, so I didn't. Sorry about that!

      Delete
  13. This looks really interesting and unique. The necromancer story line isn't told very often so you're in a good niche market! :) The query was pretty good, though there was one line that I think needs to be reworked as it is difficult to read. I found myself going back over it a few times. "Selina doesn’t care what the guards’ idea of her duty as a necromancer is" Good luck with the contest! :)

    ReplyDelete
  14. Hi Kassel! You know I already think you're a terrific writer. :)

    I'd recommend seeing what it looks like if you take the dialog out of the opening. Maybe she could reflect on the conversation with Jess without actually showing it in scene. That way you could keep the info that the conversation brings out, without jarring the reader out of the introspection of the first lines.

    Rock on!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Love your premise and your writing! I agree with Larissa, take out the dialogue and run with it :) Good luck!

    ReplyDelete
  16. Eek, turning people into the ferryman can't be good! Now I want to know which way Selina decides to choose!

    I personally didn't mind the dialogue, but it might be stronger without it. But that's the beauty of computers - you can easily take something out temporarily just to see how it would work, and put it back in if you hate it :)

    ReplyDelete