Focus on the helpful details (query critique)

If you’d like to nominate your own page or query for a public critique, kindly post them here in the discussion forums:

• Nominate Your First Page for a Critique on the Blog
• Nominate Your Query for a Critique on the Blog

Also, if you’d like to test your editing chops, keep your eye on this area or this area! I’ll post the pages and queries a few days before a critique so you can see how your redline compares to mine.

And, of course, if you need help more urgently or privately, I’m available for edits and consultations!

Now then. Time for the Query Critique. First I’ll present the query without comment, then I’ll offer my thoughts and a redline. If you choose to offer your own thoughts, please be polite. We aim to be positive and helpful.

Random numbers were generated, and thanks to amymunro, whose query is below.

NurenCorp sent a colony ship, the Venture, to Nuren-1821 one hundred and seventy years ago, but a suspensapod malfunction left no adult survivors. The children were presumed to be a lost cause, and Nurencorp abandoned them to a savage planet where humans without technology were nowhere near apex predators.

Saren, a girl of twelve, led as many survivors as she could in a daring escape from the Lord-of-the-Flies brutality that erupted in the wake of the landing. With the guidance of three children’s stories, a survival manual, and a rigid set of rules, Sarin’s group learned to live on the planetary surface.

Now, her ancestor Baron, already banished from the tribe of Children for genetically bonding with a Gralla against the council’s wishes, breaks the Children’s most forbidden taboo and visits the Venture. It’s not like they can banish her twice.

Those left in the Venture didn’t die as her people believed. They are still locked in a desperate battle for survival within the failing technology of the colony ship, fighting for scraps of food in a brutal hierarchical society called the Kings.

One fierce warrior, Alira, secretly protects a group of refugees that have escaped to live within the mechanics of the vessel and call themselves the Rats. When Alira glimpses Baron outside the ship, a human who must know how to live on the surface, she feels their salvation has come.

Alira and Barron must build trust with each other and the survivors to coax the remaining humans onto the planetary surface before the technology that makes food on the colony ship, fails and chaos takes the ship and all the lives on board.

NUREN-CORP-1821 is a space opera complete at 70,000 words. This is my first novel.

This is quite a long plot description (276 words — not leaving much room for other elements to come in below the max 350 I recommend), and yet I didn’t come away with a clear sense of the overall story. We bounce around between different characters without getting a clear sense of the whole.

Sci-fi and fantasy queries are tricky because you need to weave in context for unfamiliar elements without going too long on the plot description, which makes it more difficult to write a crisp two-three paragraph summary. It’s okay to go a bit over as long as we have the information we need.

But here, we both go long with the summary but also don’t have clarity around key elements of the story, like why specifically it’s so hard to survive on this planet and what Grallas are. The first paragraph in particular feels like it has quite a lot of detail that doesn’t come into play in the rest of the plot description, so it doesn’t all feel helpful.

Baron feels like the protagonist and the query is organized around her, and yet I didn’t ultimately understand why she’s doing what she’s doing and what’s at stake for her. Okay, she is an outcast who wants to check out a forbidden spaceship, but what compels her to put try to save everyone on board, and what’s at stake for her if she succeeds or fails?

If we were anchored a bit more cleanly to Baron, had key context, and if we had a keener sense of what’s at stake, this query would be in stronger shape.

Here’s my redline:

Dear [agent name],

[Insert personalized tidbit about the agent to show that you researched them individually]

NurenCorp sent a colony ship, the Venture, to Nuren-1821 oOne hundred and seventy years ago, but a suspensapod malfunction left colony ship, the Venture, crashed on the planet Nuren-1821, leaving no adult survivors. The children were presumed to be a lost cause, and Nurencorp abandoned them to a savage planet where humans without technology were nowhere near apex predators. Saren, a girl of twelve, led as many survivors as she could the remaining children in a daring escape from [WHAT SPECIFICALLY THEY ESCAPE] . from the Lord-of-the-Flies brutality that erupted in the wake of the landing. With the guidance of three children’s stories, a survival manual, and a rigid set of rules, Sarin’s group learned to live on the planetary surface. [It feels like there are quite a lot of superfluous details in this opening]

Now, her Saron’s ancestor Baron, already banished from the tribe of Children for genetically bonding with a Gralla, [What’s a Gralla?] against the council’s wishes, breaks the Children’s most forbidden taboo and visits the Venture. It’s not like they can banish her twice. [Good voice]

Those The adults left in the Venture didn’t die as her people believed. They [They’re still alive 170 years later?] are still locked in a desperate battle for survival within the failing technology of the colony ship, fighting for scraps of food within a brutal hierarchical society called the Kings. One fierce warrior, Alira, secretly protects a group of refugees that have escaped to live within the mechanics of the vessel and call themselves the Rats. When Alira glimpses Baron outside the ship, a human who must know how to live on the surface, she feels their salvation has come.

Alira and Barron must build trust with each other and the survivors to coax the remaining humans onto the planetary surface before the technology that makes food on the colony ship, fails and chaos takes the ship and all the lives on board. [I’m not grasping what’s ultimately at stake for Baron in this and why she wants to take this risk?]

NUREN-CORP-1821 is a space opera complete at 70,000 words [70,000 words is pretty short for a space opera]. [Consider including comps] This is my first novel.

[Brief bio]

Thanks again to amymunro!

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Art: Józef Szermentowski – Morning Star