← The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
When Reality TV Meets Cli-Fi: Hooks, Depth, and the Dreaded Coincidence
00:48:31
Books with Hooks, Bianca, Carly and Cece
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- [00:00]
Carly Waters
You know, I am not exaggerating when I say my coffee is my life. My brain doesn't come online until I've had that first amazing cup in the morning. And as writers who spend so much time and staring and thinking at a screen, you need that moment of ritual and focus more than anyone. For years I was chasing that perfect cup. But between messy presses and clunky pour over setups, I was spending more time on the brew method than at my desk. And if you haven't tried coffee made with an AeroPress yet, you are absolutely in for a treat. The AeroPress is a manual coffee maker, kind of like a French press, but frankly, it's just better. It uses completely unique brewing methods that combine the best of all the worlds. A little French press, a little pour over, and a little Espresso. This patented 3 in 1 technology gives you an exceptionally delicious and unique cup of classic coffee that you can only get with an AeroPress. And here's the coffee secret you need to know. AeroPress coffee is less bitter than coffee made with other methods because it brews faster. You can actually taste the delicious notes of the coffee you bought. Things like the roast and the country of origin. And that flavor profile instead of bitterness, you get incredibly smooth richness and body coming through that unmatched. This is the ultimate lifestyle hack for a writer because aeropress was designed to fit your life. For the audience who spends hours in front of their computers, here's why. The AeroPress Clear model is what you need. First, convenience. This is the fastest single cup coffee maker I've ever used. It takes about two minutes to brew and clean. That means less time futzing with gear and more time on your pages. Secondly, it brings consistently great coffee wherever you are. Maybe you're traveling for a conferencing a cafe cabin for a writing retreat, or just working out on your deck. The AeroPress is compact, durable and reliable. And it puts an end to bad coffee when you're on the road. It's the perfect, easy to clean solution for the office, your home desk, or anywhere your writing takes you. The AeroPress is shockingly affordable. Less than 50 bucks and we've got an incredible offer for our audience. Visit aeropress.com t s n o t y a w that's a e r o p r e s s.com t s n o T Y a W and use the promo code tsnotya to save 20% off your that's aeropress.com tsnatyaw and be sure to use the code T S N O T Y a W at checkout to save 20%. It's time to ditch the drive thru, toss the French press and say yes to better mornings fueled by Better Coffee. AeroPress ships to the USA and over 60 countries around the world and we thank AeroPress for sponsoring our show.
- [02:21]
Bianca Murray
Have you been sitting on the fence about signing up for the Beta reader matchup? Or have you signed up before but haven't as yet found your writing soulmates? The next matchup is the last one of the year, so don't snooze on it. Get matched up with those writing in a similar genre and or time zone so they can critique your work as you critique theirs. Your manuscript doesn't have to be complete to sign up for this 3,000 word evaluation. This particular matchup will be open to registrations from now until the 2nd of November, with the matchup emails going out on the 3rd of November. For more information and to register, go to Biancamarae.com and look for the Beta Read a Match up tab. Please spread the word. Even if you aren't signing up this time, the more writers we have registered, the better the matches will be, which means you'll be paying it forward to your fellow authors. Hi there and welcome to our show the Shit no one tells you about Writing. I'm best selling author Bianca Murray and I'm joined by Cece Lehrer of Wendy Sherman Associates and Karlie Waters of P.S. literary.
- [03:37]
Cece Lira
Hello everyone. If you're watching us on YouTube, you already know it's just Carly and myself today. Our fearless leader Bianca isn't here. Bea, we will miss you. But you know what? Our listeners will miss you even more because Carly and I, we're good to do this. We're game. You know, we can rally but we always fumble. So we'll miss having you here.
- [04:01]
Carly Waters
There's something about like the books with hooks where we fumble because we don't fumble when we're doing our segment shooting the Shit, our Monday show. I don't know why there's something about the like cueing each other. I like the off the cuff. Maybe between the two of us we need Bianca to kind of mediate us going back and forth on books with hooks.
- [04:17]
Cece Lira
It's that too. And also like whenever Bianca isn't here, the comments also say I missed having Bianca's perspective as a writer because I feel like she adds that extra dose of, you know, the creative hat of someone who creates as opposed to like two agents who's who are focused on market stuff. So.
- [04:33]
Carly Waters
And let's Just say a bit more sympathy. She gives a bit more sympathy maybe for that empathy. This is what the author was trying to do here.
- [04:40]
Cece Lira
Yeah, you know what? Thank you. Thank you for saying it. Yes, Bianca, you add a much needed dose of empathy to our critiques, but we will do our best. So Carly, will you kick us off and read that first query letter?
- [04:51]
Carly Waters
Yeah. Here we go. Dear the Shit Team, There aren't enough words even for a writer to appropriately convey my gratitude for the wealth of knowledge y' all share through the podcast, newsletter, workshop and social media. Thank you Carly. Based on your interest in contemporary romance by LGBTQ authors, I am pleased to share. I love you too. 79,000 words about a bisexual woman who accidentally falls in love with siblings on reality tv. Fans of Love Is Blind the love triangle sans grief in Taylor Jenkins Reid's One True Loves and the Second Chance dual timeline of Kiss Her Once For Me by Alison Cochran will enjoy this forbidden celebrity romance. Madison Hyland has spent her life under the relentless glare of the camera thanks to her celebrity mother and the reality TV show High Life. When a passionate vacation romance with Samantha ends in heartbreak, Madison is left questioning if she'll ever find authentic love again, or if her name will always preclude that. Two years later, she takes a leap of faith with Pod Love, a reality show where contestants get engaged sight unseen after dating on either side of a wall. She's supposed to be promoting High Life brand, but Madison hopes to meet someone who will love her for who she is. Away from Hollywood, wholesome and steadfast, Brian is everything Madison thinks she wants, a man who shares her desire for a quiet life, their whirlwind engagement seems like the fresh start she's craved. But when Madison meets Brian's family and discover his sister is Samantha, the woman she's never stopped loving, Old feelings rekindle with three hearts on the line and secrets threatening to unravel on national television as the wedding approaches, Madison must confront her fear of the spotlight for a shot at true love. My love of reality TV romances provides an ideal backdrop to explore when real life collides with the one on screen. Though thankfully I've never been involved in a love triangle. A D.C. born writer, I'm at the tail end of an international nomad year with my wife and 5 year old son. When not writing, reading or updating eermediareview bookstagram, I am the CEO of a real estate services company. May I send you the full manuscript? Thank you, Teddy Thomas all right, what.
- [06:50]
Cece Lira
Did you think of that query letter and let us know the word count as well.
- [06:54]
Carly Waters
Yeah, absolutely. Teddy did us the favor of summarizing, so 355 words, excluding 31 for the TS Ya paragraph. We always appreciate those pats on the back. Okay, so a couple things to note off the top, which is the first one, Cece and I just recorded an episode of Shooting the Shit on Monday where I talk about reality TV show books. So I'm not sure which is going to come first. I think the Shooting the Shit episode will have come first and then this one will have followed based on our timeline. But yeah, so I talk all about reality shows and how I feel about them and yeah, so let's get into it. So. And I think I feel like I said this before, but maybe I can explain why I feel this way or try to explain why I feel this way. Sometimes as an agent, I don't always have the words. Sometimes it's just I feel this way because somehow of all of this stuff I've consumed and all of the knowledge in the industry, these things just get kind of biases in my brain. But one of the reasons I personally struggle with reality TV show books, one is maybe that I am not a reality show junkie. And I don't mean this in a bad way. I just, I don't consume enough of it to be like in the zeitgeist way. It all the time, know all the memes, know all the characters. And yes, I call them characters. I know they're humans, but they create characters on TV for themselves. So I'm just not like into that world enough. So that's probably one of my challenges. The second one is we heard this from our foreign rights manager. She talks about this all the time. That reality TV show doesn't travel sometimes in the same way to all these different markets. So it doesn't always have foreign rights potential in a big way. Is this isn't to say that I don't sign up books just because or, you know, they do or don't have foreign rights potential, but it is something you think about when you think about kind of the global picture for a book. And sometimes this falls under the quote, you know, to American, unquote, bucket of books and whether they can and can't travel. Lots of reality shows obviously do travel, but it is something that can be seen as very American. And the third, I think just being the kind of amount of like buy in that you have to create in terms of like building this world. Sometimes I find the reality show books that I see in terms of, you know, books that are pitched to me, they're a little bit. One note in terms of they're just trying to create a TV set environment. When I think the type of book that I would be looking for would be something that kind of somehow is able to kind of critique the reality show industry in a way. And I know this is a more commercial book. It's a contemporary romance, so maybe its job isn't to critique culture. That's okay. If it was able to kind of fit that in there and critique reality show culture while it was doing this, I think that'd be very meta and I think that would be very cool. And that's why we talked. When we talked about on the Shooting the Ship episode, we talked about the Compound and why we think the Compound works as a reality show book because it's a little bit more kind of. I don't want to say experimental, because that's not fair. It's not super experimental. It was a GMA pick. But it's a lot more surprising in terms of the way that it is presented in terms of the setting. So those are some reasons that I feel the way I do about reality tv. I would love to be wrong. I would love for somebody to end up sending me a reality show book that completely knocks my socks off. And I don't know if, you know, the compound came into me. If I saw the pitch, how I would feel about it. If I read. As soon as I read the pages, I'd be hooked. But sometimes I have that little, like, oh, reality show book. So that's kind of my long winded answer to that. I really love this hook. So bisexual woman who accidentally falls in love with siblings on reality tv. I mean, this really, it is. It is a. It is a very strong hook. One thing that I worry about with this one is the coincidences. That's another one of my long standing threads that I love to talk about on this show is I get the ick around coincidences. Like, how could it possibly be of all the humans in the world, that this is the love triangle that ensues? So I made a note about where I think the kind of coincidental element is coming in. You know, does Brian know this? Does Samantha know that? Like, what does everybody know? I don't know. Again, not all of this we can always convey in a query letter itself. But I have a lot of questions about coincidence and how we can guard against coincidences. Because I'm a little bit worried about that here. Let's See if I had any other notes here. I really like your bio. You know, I love that you are a lover of reality TV show romances. That's great. You know, as I said, I think there are lots of agents out there who definitely understand this world and are very dialed into it. And again, if you are attempting to somehow critique reality TV show culture, then I think you should say that in the query, because agents like me would be like, what are we trying to do here? What are we trying to say? And once you get into the pages, we kind of get a little bit more of the, like, celebrity culture and how this character feels about their role within the larger structure of, you know, Internet fandom and celebrity fandom. So I think there's a lot to work with here. I would just. I think I would love a line about what you're trying to say about the reality show industry in here, if it can. If it fits. And again, that's just a little bit selfish. But I also think that would serve yourself well with other agents. Cece, what did you think of this query letter?
- [11:48]
Cece Lira
I had the same thought that you did about how we just talked about this on Shooting the Shit, right? I read this, and I'm like, oh, my God. We literally just had a conversation about Love Island. And by the time this episode airs, if anyone who's listening who does also listen to Shoot the Shit, will have heard it. I am actually a huge fan of Love is Blind. I have watched not all seasons because I got into it late. I usually get into these things late. Like, I usually let my friends tell me whether I'm gonna like it or not, because my friends know my taste really well, and they told me, you're gonna like Love is Blind.
- [12:20]
Carly Waters
And I did.
- [12:20]
Cece Lira
I enjoyed it. I think I've watched. I don't. I don't know how many seasons I've watched. Maybe three. But I like it. I have fun. I love the psychology behind it. I'm such a cynic when it comes to these things, and yet I'm, like, drawn to it, which is such a weird contradiction that still makes sense in my head. So I really like the hook. I agree with Carly. The hook is fantastic. The elements of coincidence didn't bother me because, again, I think I was so into the idea of, like, oh, my God, it's gonna be like Love is Blind, but in a novel. And imagine what you can do, being inside someone's head. Like, imagine the layers that you could have access to. Because whenever I watch tv, I miss having access to those Layers. So I was super excited. I thought the plot was great. I thought the author did a really great job of setting up the protagonist's situation in the world, her place in the world, what kind of power she has, what power she doesn't have, what she ultimately wants, and then sending her off on this journey where the plot kept escal. So I thought that was great. And I also thought to myself, this is going to make me sound like such a sadist. As I was reading this, I thought to myself, I would love it if this actually had happened on Love is Blind. Are you kidding me? They leave the pod, and then she. One of the. She's right. I have a favorite she, which I will not name. She realizes that her ex is the sister of the guy she chose. Like what? Like, that's just so cool, so juicy. So, yeah, apologies for being sadistic, but I thought this was great. So I was totally hooked. If this query letter had been sent to me, just as, you know, a normal query letter, not an educational opportunity, I would be scrolling down so fast to read the pages. So the author did a great job. All right, Carly, will you let us know what happened on those opening pages?
- [14:05]
Carly Waters
Here we go. So we start with chapter one. It says Cancun. I'm gonna argue this is a prologue. We can get into that later. But this is called chapter one. Cancun. And so our main character, Madison, is in the elevator. She is trying to go down. She starts on floor 19. She's picking up the phone, talking to a friend of hers, and they're talking about kind of like, what they have going on in their life. They're talking about their work. We find out that Madison is, like, potentially having a panic attack. She's really trying to get out of whatever situation she's trying to get out of. She's counting down the elevator floor, is trying to get out of there, chatting with her friend. Her friend's talking about the project she works on. She seems to be a reality TV show producer, and she's kind of pitching some ideas of different reality shows as they're going down in the elevator. The elevator starts to slow, and then she's, like, getting worried somebody's gonna come in it. And so she's like, very, very high alert mode. She gets out of the elevator, says goodbye to the friend, and then somebody recognizes her from her family television show that we learned about in the. In the query letter, and touches her, and she's very like, oh, this is not feeling good. Somebody. A woman cuts in, kind of grabs her by the arm and is like, oh, that's not who you think it is. You know, she looks like her, but it's not her, and steers her away just to intervene, to kind of get her out of that situation. Kind of apologizes for grabbing her, but obviously could see she was doing the right thing. Here they have a very short conversation, and that's where it ends.
- [15:27]
Cece Lira
And what did you think of the execution? Did it work for you? Did it make you curious? What are your thoughts?
- [15:33]
Carly Waters
Yes. So what I really liked about this was the countdown. I love that you say, like, what floor she's on. It's like 19, 18. And then we have a bit of prose, 15, 14, bit more prose, and, like, we're counting down the floors in the elevator. I love that. I love a ticking time clock of any kind. I also like the sense of urgency. One of the things I really liked was in the first line, she says, Madison Hyland tucked herself into a corner of the elevator and stuck, stabbed the button for the lobby. She bowed her head, the white baseball cap covering half her face. I love the stab the button. It's not like, push the button like you. Like, if somebody's, like, hits that elevator button really hard. Clearly there's an urgency there. So I really liked that. And then the covering of the face, we get the sense. It's like she really wants to get out of that situation. I really enjoyed that. There was something I was a bit confused on, which was, I think a name or. I don't know if again, Cece, you can. You can let me know if this was maybe like, a copy and paste error of some kind. But there's an name that says it's small A, Big Zed, big R, small Azra. I don't know if this is Azra's name. Azra chooses to write their name as small A, Big Zed, big R, small A. I think I needed a bit of context to this name. I, again, out of context, I kind of was like, this is a name. I mean, clearly the person she's on the phone with, her best friend knows who Azra is. Maybe a little bit of context there would have helped because it seems like a straightforward book and not experimental. So I was just a little bit unsure about the spelling of that name. That jumped out to me. But really, the biggest pluses here were the ticking time clock. I love that kind of going down the elevator. I think, you know, the energy in terms of the interaction, I think was done pretty well. Like the intervention. That kind of happened. I think it was done pretty well overall. Would I keep reading? Probably. But I also haven't learned anything new that I haven't learned in the query letter yet. So that's what makes me think this is a bit more of a prologue than it is a chapter one. So I don't know. I'm kind of on the fence of, like, whether we're starting this in the right place. The fact that I'm on the fence about whether we're starting in the right or wrong place makes me think that we're probably starting in the wrong place. But again, I really like this going down the elevator business. That really, really worked for me. Cece, what were your thoughts?
- [17:47]
Cece Lira
Yeah, I feel like we're just going to agree with this one, and I don't want to repeat myself. But on the name, I think I understood who Azra is. It's her mom, her boss. The spelling is just because she's this reality TV person who wants to spell her differently because she wants to be, I don't know, like a celebrity. Like, special, Whatever. I don't recommend it. Find another way to make her mom special. Or, you know how Madonna only has one name? Like, do that. I don't know. Do something else. It is very distracting. It was very distracting for my eyes. And you have good pages. These pages are super polished, well written, in keeping with the genre. And then I got to her name, and the line reads, hardly. Azrah knows I haven't been out. And I wrote in the note, I said, I assume this is intentional. The lowercase A and the uppercase Z, Right? And then uppercase r again, Lowercase A again. So, like, the A's are bookending it in lowercase with the Z and the R uppercase. But to me, I'm like, my eyes are like, what? And you want to remember you are querying agents who are reading hundreds and hundreds of queries, Right? Hundreds and hundreds of sample pages. I know that sounds unfair there. I know that someone's probably listening and going, well, But I don't want to take that into consideration. Like, I want someone to look at my work with fresh eyes. But I'm sorry, that's just not reality. Like it or not, I don't think that this is smart, and I really feel very strongly that you should change it. Like, whatever this is accomplishing, you can accomplish it in another way, and you won't have any downside to this other way. I thought the Paradise Trials was evil and genius. I also want that reality TV show to exist. I'M just further exposing myself as a. A sadist for people who are not our substack subscribers. Paradise Trials is essentially a TV show in which newlyweds thought they were going on a prepaid honeymoon, but then they are dropped on a deserted island with minimal supplies to test their bond. I think that's what it is. She's talking to her friend about it. But anyway, I read that and I was like, I think you'd be a.
- [19:39]
Carly Waters
Great reality show producer. You'd be like, how can we make this worse? How can we up the tension, up the stakes 100%?
- [19:46]
Cece Lira
But I get sued for, like, torturing people, like, all the time. So I don't know.
- [19:50]
Carly Waters
I'd be not characters.
- [19:53]
Cece Lira
I'd be like, I think. I think this is not what I'm supposed to be doing as a human. But also I am supposed to be doing it as a producer. Anyway, my note, my big picture note here, other than the name, which is an easy fix, actually ties really nicely with Carly's note about how to Carly's taste and also to my taste. We want reality TV show novels that will say something. Now, a story is what happens. The say something is the larger meaning, the zooming out that comes with the story. It's psychological acuity. It's depth. It's some type of truth that you're exposing about the human condition. It's an argument you're making. And it's never smart to start with that. Whenever you're pitching your story, you want to start with story. It's very important to start with story. But I need to have a sense of what that meat, what that depth is, or else it becomes, and again, mean. I know this is mean, but it becomes like a reality TV show novel that's just like every other reality TV show novel, and there are so many.
- [20:53]
Carly Waters
Yeah, it's kind of like the Gilmore Girlsization of reality show. Right. Which I think we're trying to avoid in this day and age.
- [21:01]
Cece Lira
Yeah, exactly. And I just think that, again, I spotted opportunities for depth in your pages, that if it's in keeping within your vision, you could take this a step further. You could add more depth to this. The situation where she says leaving the hotel without a bodyguard was a rookie mistake. Okay, but she's smart. She wouldn't make a rookie mistake. So why did she? When was the first time she did that? What does it say about her? You are doing it on surface level. There's a line where she reads, I'm a commodity. She has opinions, she has thoughts. She's an interesting character. I see it, but I see it surface level, maybe with like one layer of depth. We need eight different layers of depth. And the fact that these are the first pages is no excuse not to have it if. If your vision is to have this standout in the market. And I think it is. Another example is there's a moment where she's talking to her friend and her friend teases hot date. And then in her head, she thinks to herself, that makes her laugh because despite what the tabloid suggested, she was always single, she was always alone. And, you know, I kept thinking maybe she would say something like, her friends all assumed that she got angry at the tabloids for lying about her dating life or lying that she dates everyone. But really she got mad that the tabloids weren't right because she wishes she could have a dating life. Like something like that, you know, like just adding more layers to her character so that when it comes time to have the stories plot points result in something meaty or juicy or something with teeth. Yeah, that'll really help having those plot points there. Having that character development there will really help. So I don't know. I think you have the start of something special. I just don't think it's query ready. And I know you're not saying it is, by the way, to the author who's sending this, but I do like it. I do like it. And I think there's potential. I just think that for my kind of taste. And I'm betting Carly's too, based on what she said. We just need more, you know.
- [22:56]
Carly Waters
Yeah, I think one of the issues also, I think coming back to one of my issues with reality TV show books is that when we're watching reality TV show, as CeCe was alluding to, like, we are watching, we are experiencing it in such a passive way. And to pick up a book about reality tv, we want behind the scenes. Like, we don't want a passive experience. We want to know everything that's going on, why she is the way she is, how she feels about her celebrity identity, how she feels about maybe the wealth that's been built in the family through this reality show. So we don't want to watch it as if we would watch a show. We want to go really, really deep here. But one of the reality show books that I really, really like, one of the only reality show books that I've really, really liked, which is one to watch by Kate Stamen, London. This came out in 2020, I believe, or maybe that was the paperback But I adored, I adored that one. And to me, what that one was doing different was it was a plus size character, right? So like we have to do something in order to kind of infiltrate that industry and you say, oh, you know, this character feels like a commodity. Like there's just so much that we can do to critique this world and have a, you know, backstage view into this world. It is ripe for opportunity and I think this author sees that. So, Teddy, keep going. Keep going on this one.
- [24:07]
Cece Lira
Yeah, keep going. I like that.
- [24:10]
Carly Waters
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- [27:53]
Cece Lira
Let's do this. Dear Bianca, Cece and Carly, your weekly dose of wisdom and encouragement keeps me going on this wild riding journey. Thank you, I'm excited to share arctic futures, my 89,000 word cli fi mystery set in the insular, high stakes world of Alaskan firefighting. Blending the fierce Environmentalism of Charlotte McConaughey's Once There Were Wolves with the twisty storytelling of Jodi Picol's Leaving Time, my novel follows a woman who will do anything to defend the land she loves. 28 year old smoke jumper Lee Frost doesn't jump out of airplanes for the thrills. She does it to fight wildfires raging through Alaska's backcountry and threatening its remote villages. After her PhD project devastated the glacier it was supposed to protect, she fled to Alaska, joining an elite all male fire crew to fight climate change from the frontlines, not from an ivory tower. But when she discovers a bizarre sludge that appears to be killing fish native Alaskans depend on, she fears her past has caught up with her. Has Matthias, a world renowned glaciologist and her former lover, stolen her innovative glacier growing formula and unleashed it in the Arctic despite knowing its destructive consequences? Ben, Lee's fire boss, helps her investigate the source of the mysterious sludge. As they brave deadly wildfires and crumbling glaciers, Lee gets closer to the truth and to Ben. Then Matthias shows up in Alaska and she learns he's not just trying to grow glaciers, he's created a technology that can cool the climate and needs her help deploying it. Lee finds herself swept back into Matthias's orbit, but a spate of unusual, grisly attacks downstream of his research site make her question the technology's true danger. With her world on fire, Lee must decide whether to join a moonshot effort to override climate change or put her faith in people and their ability to change. I'm a journalist in Fairbanks, Alaska, where I ski and bake excessively to get through the long winters. I published my first book in 2021 with the University of Alaska Press. Finding True North, a memoir about rediscovering the Alaskan frontier through stories of indigenous people and pioneers. My reporting for Alaska Magazine and Alaska Public Radio has taken me out on the sea ice with Inupiaq whaling captains and across the tundra with cute furry sled dogs. I'm currently a science writer at a national lab where we try to change climate every day. I would love to send you the full manuscript. Sincerely, Molly Reddick thank you so much.
- [30:36]
Carly Waters
Cece, what was the word count of this one and what was your analysis?
- [30:40]
Cece Lira
One day we should have a bloopers episode where people can see how many times I fumble when I'm reading query letters. So the word count was 4. 15. I will start from the top. The very first paragraph. I think the author did a great job at the hook book.
- [30:55]
Carly Waters
Hook.
- [30:55]
Cece Lira
Right. I know the title. I know the word count. I know the genre. I understand the hook. The comps made sense to me. I just understand what kind of story I'm getting into. And this is why I love this formula so much. I like it when query letters first give me the metadata and then tell me what the plot's going to be about. Because by the time I'm reading the plot, I know what shelf it would sit in. So I'm like, okay, I'm prepared. I know what kind of book to expect. I know what kind of tension to expect. I also thought. Moving on to the plot paragraphs, the author did a really great job of sharing the story setup. So your story setup is everything that happens before page one. I don't like the word backstory. I think it has a connotation that gives people the wrong impression. It's not necessarily something that's shown through flashbacks or anything. It's essentially like what happened to your protagonist before their journey that starts on page one begins. And here we have the fact that her PhD program did the opposite of what she wanted. And it's very compelling to know that this protagonist is going to start her journey on page one with this level. Level of failure behind her, if I'm being honest, because failure is actually a really great motivator for change. And I understand why she fights the fires. I understand why she puts herself in danger. I understand why she lives in this place. So, you know, great job there. Story setup is super important. A story can really only be as strong as it's set up. And the author did a fantastic job here when it comes to the plot points. Present timeline. Right. The actual book, not the.
- [32:24]
Carly Waters
The.
- [32:24]
Cece Lira
The setup. Everything was going great. Like, I understood every single plot point until the major dramatic question or mdq. That question is. And I'll read it to you guys again. With her world on fire, Lee must decide whether to join a moonshot effort to override climate change or put her faith in people and their ability to change again. I was following every word of the plot. I could see it in my head. I could shoot the movie trailer. And then I got to this line, and I'm like, I don't get it. Because this choice, it's unspecific. And I also don't see how they're mutually exclusive. Can't she override climate change and have her faith in people? I just don't understand what the choice is. Choices are a great way to have the protagonist be in a position where they're pressured. They're pressured because they have to choose A or B. Choices are great, but the way this choice is framed, I don't understand what the choices are if I'm being super honest, not with the specificity that I need. And I also don't understand why they're. Why can't she pick both? Storytelling is about change. And as I look at this query letter in front of me, the changes here are clear. The plot points are solid, but I'm not clear on what it culminates in. And that's what the climax is. That's what the major dramatic question is, right? Like, all these plot points have to culminate in a what? And I get that the author wants it to be a choice, but I personally don't see how it is. And maybe I'm missing something. Maybe it's just my brain that's being slow. That happens sometimes. I also want to say that if you're listening, your lived experience is really cool. And I thought you did a great job with the author paragraph of showing me why there will be authenticity in this story when it comes to her scientific knowledge and all that. So I really liked that. How about you, Carly? What did you say?
- [34:10]
Carly Waters
Think so. The line that you highlighted was the exact line that I. I mean, I highlighted many lines, but that was also where I was like, huh? But okay, we'll get there. So from the top here, Clifi in general is a very, very challenging category. I think that this person does have a super unique hook, which is definitely gonna help them stand out. But cli fi is really hard because as very real as climate change is, it is depressing. And books in the space don't really tend to move as many copies because people want to escape how challenging our contemporary world is and maybe go off into another place. But for a cli fi hook, I actually think this stands out quite a bit. The Leaving Time comp is quite old. I was thinking, if you need a comp that's in Alaska, this one's historical. The Great alone, Chris Nahanna. Also a bit old, though. But as I was reading this, to me, this is way more sci fi than cli fi. I know most Clifi could have a sci fi element to it, but I think we need a sci fi comp here because we Definitely get into some science fiction here, I think, with this. Like, unless this person does something I don't know about healing our planet. This is definitely sciencey, much more sciencey. So I definitely think we need a sci fi hook here. I also really like the story setup. This is a very strong setup. This will definitely get people's attention. There's two things that trip me up. Number one was the word sludge. So this person made it all the way to having a PhD, or they didn't finish their PhD. They made it all the way to a PhD in climate science. And we're using the word sludge. I mean, we need a better word here. That really tripped me up. I mean, I just. Nobody in the science industry, I think in a context like this would use the word sludge. Like, used it twice. I don't know, is there a better word? Is there a more sciency word that we can use for this? It just felt juvenile compared to the type of word that we could use here. So maybe that's just me, but I'm just going to flag that. You might want to check with your beta readers on that one then. The next thing that tripped me up was the exact same thing that tripsi up with her World on Fire, Leigh must decide whether to join a moonshot effort to override climate change or put her faith in people and their ability to change. All of a sudden I thought, what is the inciting incident of this book? Like, what are we actually covering in this book? This is a lot to cover in this book if we're trying to do all this, plus talk about her faith in people. Like, I just couldn't. I couldn't figure out if this was a throwaway line. I kind of think this is a bit of a throwaway line. And I mean throwaway as in, like, I gotta find a way to wrap up this query. I gotta find a way to kind of, I don't know, hit on some of the notes I'm trying to hit thematically while pulling it all together in the movie trailer version of this. That's why I call it like a throwaway line. I mean, more of like a summarizing line. So it didn't really work for me. If this is a throwaway summarizing line, it made us question everything that we just read. And I agree with cece on that one. Author bio is great. So I think there's a lot of things that are really standing out here. I think one of the themes of the show today has been like, how can you Stand out within a category that is really busy or potentially has its challenges. Both of the hooks we saw today are stand out in their category, so well done. Absolutely.
- [37:15]
Cece Lira
And both query letters are really well written. Like, you guys did a good job. Like, there's room for improvement, but we see a lot of query letters, so that was awesome. I want to give an opinion on the sludge. I like sludge because I think there would be. Yeah. So I feel like there would be an official name, like a scientific name that I won't know. But then, like, as a. As. As jargon, as like a playful thing they call kind of like we call the slush pile slush. Most agents have great vocabularies, I think. Right. But we still call it slush, you know, Like, I think it just ends up happening where you use silly words.
- [37:46]
Carly Waters
Everybody in the comments on YouTube, everybody on the reels watching this, let us know what you think. Do you like the word sludge in a scientific context? Do you like the words? Do you like the word?
- [37:58]
Cece Lira
I know I'm going to lose on this one. I know, but I just think it's realistic. I think, like, I think technical people end up using words that sound juvenile for serious things just among themselves, you know?
- [38:09]
Carly Waters
So, yeah, I. Way I interpreted it was, okay, we don't know what this quote unquote sludge is, therefore we can't give it an official name. It's kind of how I read it, which again, makes sense. But to me, it still doesn't excuse, like, sl. Like, I think you give a color to it. I'm just scrolling back. Mysterious sludge. Do we have a color? A bizarre. So she called a bizarre sludge. And then it's a mysterious sludge. Like, is this something under the surface? Is this something on top of the surface? Is it small? Is it big? What's its texture? Like, I have no scientific background, and yet I am asking scientific questions of this because is. Yeah, it's bizarre. It's mysterious. Yeah.
- [38:49]
Cece Lira
It's making me think of flubber. Do you remember that movie, late 90s.
- [38:53]
Carly Waters
Movie with, of course, like, Robin Williams.
- [38:56]
Cece Lira
The really funny Robin Williams movie with flubber. Yeah, Yeah, I watched it. I watched it as a kid. I mean, I think I was a teen.
- [39:04]
Carly Waters
I don't know.
- [39:04]
Cece Lira
I don't know how old I was. But, like, I remember watching it in the movies with my friends, and I remember laughing. And anyway, it's making me think of flubber now. So we went from sludge to slush to flubber, and we're Just being very silly today, Bianca. You have to be here, or else Curly and I are being silly.
- [39:18]
Carly Waters
Too silly. Too silly. Okay, Cece, run us through the pages here.
- [39:22]
Cece Lira
Okay, so the protagonist. Okay, so first of all, the chapter's called Jump. June, 2024, Brooks Range, Alaska, latitude 67 degrees north. The protagonist, Lee Frost, is on a plane, and she's about to jump. And she wasn't usually so nervous about jumping. That's established. And we see a description of the plane, the towers of smoke that are rising from the tundra. And we meet Ben, who asks the crew who's ready for flames? And the crew says they are. And Lee's thinking to herself, like, I'm not, but, you know, I'll. I'll do it. She catches Ben's eyes, and Ben looks at her in a way that is different. And then she. Her hand clutches her side. And then we learn that that happens because she hurt her ribs. You know, she's healed now, but in a different jump. And in fact, this is woven in through her interiority. The fact that, you know, she had a bad season last time because she got hurt, but now she hopes that this won't happen again. Then we also meet Gilbert, who is fighting for his home. He is local, and he is thinking to himself, you know, I'm going to do this because I'm going to save my home. And she thinks to herself, this is one more reason why I need to have my head in the game. It isn't just the forest that he was fighting for. It was his home. So then we have more description on the camaraderie and on the logistics, and the airplane does what it needs to do, and they. They jump. And, you know, the fear. The fear flies away. So that's what happens.
- [40:54]
Carly Waters
All right, and what did you think about those pages?
- [40:56]
Cece Lira
Okay, so I want to. I want to go through notes, and then I'm going to give my big picture note, which I'm, like, seriously worried about how I'm going to explain this, because I feel it, but I don't know that I can explain it. First of all, you are starting with direct quotes in italics for anyone listening. Do not start any book with direct quotes in italics. Just don't do it. Oh, there's this one book that does it, and that does it. Well, yeah, that book's the exception. Do you want to be the exception? Just don't do it. We are in her head. You know, you don't need direct thoughts in italics as the first sentence. It's a pet peeve of mine. It's purely a matter of taste. You should do whatever you want, but you also shouldn't. You should do what I'm saying because. Yeah, so I really liked that When Ben is saying, who's ready for the flames? We have her act one way, but think something else. That chasm between action and interiority is what makes us connect with character, because the reader feels like they have an insider access to the protagonist's psyche. And while all the other characters present see one type of person, the reader sees a much deeper type type of person. So I love that. You also did a great job when it comes to writing tension on a micro level. The paragraph where we see Ben looking at her and that gaze is intentional and lingers on her beat too long. That paragraph, that line. That first line in that paragraph made me curious because I'm like, why is he looking at her in that way? Why are his eyes lingering on her a bit too long? And then you have another line which her hand goes to her side, and my brain already starts going, wait, this guy is looking at her. Her hand immediately touches her body. What's going on? And then we have another line where we get the explanation, and it doesn't feel like explanation at all. It feels super natural where we learn that, you know, she did have an injury last year, and that, of course, Ben's eyes on her are all about concern. But the way you framed that, a beginner writer would have been, like, explaining first and then mentioning the eyes second. And I love how you framed that. Like, I want all our substack subscribers to go to that paragraph. It is on page. What page is this?
- [43:06]
Carly Waters
3.
- [43:06]
Cece Lira
It's just an excellent way of how the order of how lines unfold can build tension on a micro level. So that was excellent. I really, really congratulate you on this because you did a great job. I love the metaphor of the dragon. The author's using a metaphor of the dragon to illustrate the fire. You know, like, the dragon reared its head and snapped its tail, breathing a wall of red hot flames across the tundra. It's not an actual dragon. It's just the metaphor of a dragon. That's what the fire is. Love that beautiful, smart. Love how you described fear. Fear was a monster under the bed. The more you hid from it, the bigger it got. So beautiful. Like, I thought this was well written, polished. Her job is cool. Her interiority is inspiring. She did feel like someone who exists in the world. She didn't feel like someone who was created for page one. But I must say, and this is where, again, I'm as agents. Carly has said this before, and I fully agree. We feel it's instinct. Does this work? Does this not work? Is the story sellable or not? And we can try to explain why. We put in a lot of effort in explaining why or why not on this podcast. We want this to be a good educational experience. But first we feel. It's almost like we conclude before we elaborate. But it's not a conclusion because the conclusion is rational. And this is not rational at all. It's all gut, it's all emotion. It's all like, did this make me curious? A really great way to think of curiosity. It's kind of like hunger. I don't decide whether something makes me hungry, whether something makes me salivate. It either does or doesn't. You know, like, is my mouth watering? Then I'm hungry, I'm salivating. Is my mouth not watering? Then I'm not hungry. And that didn't make me hungry. And here, these pages did not make me curious to read more. And I feel like the world's biggest mean person saying this. And I hate it. And I don't want to be saying it, but I also don't want to lie. It might be that you're starting in the wrong place because you're starting in a spot that has action. And I've talked about this before, action does not equal curiosity, necessarily. Right. Like you can have action that does, but it's not a guarantee. It might be that there's no disruption. You know, she expects to jump off a plane and she does. And yes, we learn things along the way, but again, we're not reading this book to learn about her. We're reading this book to feel with her. And to be surprised, surprise is a big part of it. Like, I wasn't surprised when I read these pages and I need to be. I know that that makes me sound like I have a lizard brain that just needs to be surprised all the time. It needs to be stimulated, kind of like a child. And yeah, that's how most humans are these days. We live in a world where people have no attention spans and we need to be surprised right away. And I know that's a tall order, but I just, like, something isn't working. I think you need more tension. Tension requires disruption. Speaking of which, I am teaching a class, my very popular Writing Tension class. It's going to be a four day course this time. It starts in October. So if you're listening to this, check out My Instagram page for the link. But one of the things I talk in that class is, is sources of tension. If you don't have lots of sources of tension, your tension will fall flat. And here I think that what you might need to do is add sources of tension. Almost like, here's an example. What if one of the people who's on the plane is not someone she expected? Like, is that even possible? Where she would board a plane depending on the number of people and how small the plane is? She didn't see someone at the very end, and she only sees him later. Again, that could be something that's bigger, like a surprise that that person's there. And, you know, she didn't think they would be. That might be a surprise. Again, I don't know what it is. I realize that it's not my job to. To. To suggest changes, but my brain can help it. My brain always thinks of suggestions, and I always mean it in a way of don't follow what I'm saying, because there's just no way. It's. It's too big of a coincidence that I'll get it right. But maybe it could prompt you to think about this and brainstorm a little bit more, because I do think it's good. And I think the potential of your lived experience here and the authenticity that you'll bring to these pages is awesome. But I don't think that this is working as it is. Like, it's just not making me curious. It's not making me hungry. It's not making my mouth water. So I think you should consider rewriting this. Keep the scene just not in the beginning. How about you, Carly? What did you think?
- [47:07]
Carly Waters
Yeah, that's really. That's really interesting. I had a lot of different notes. I felt like we were on quite a roller coaster. Right. This is a very aggressive scene of just, like, being in the air, the jumping, the drama. One of the things I thought that this author did really well was really slow down time. All of this would have been happening really fast, going from, like, you know, being up in the air, da, da, da, da. Like, opening the door, the jump. Like, all of that would have happened so fast. And the way that this author was able to, quite literally, in my opinion, like, slow time was very successful. But whether that would services the larger story here, I think, is what Cece is getting at with this, you know, with this question. To me, it felt like a short story. It felt like a closed loop. It felt like a closed scene. Right. Everything that happened, happened in A way that made perfect sense. And perhaps this person was just sending this in because this felt like a contained sample of their writing. You know, again, we're here to. We're here to give you feedback, and I think the writing is really, overall, really strong.
- [48:05]
Cece Lira
So smart. What you're saying right now. It did feel like a short story.
- [48:09]
Carly Waters
Yeah.
- [48:09]
Cece Lira
Oh, my God.
- [48:10]
Carly Waters
I mean, a short, short story, but, yeah, No, I think that's my thought. But okay, starting at the top here. First line. There's no such thing as hell, Lee Frost told herself. But as she watched the horizon fill with flames, she wasn't sure she believed it. Great first line, so kudos to that. But next we had some, like, going through all of her feelings, right? This is a section all about her feelings, essentially, about the jumping. And obviously, the jumping is the. Is the plotty business. But she says usually she wasn't so nervous about jumping. It was the best part of the job. Colon, like love and sex and drugs and chocolate all wrapped into one that felt very generic to me. Are those everybody's favorite things? Why are they her favorite things? It's not like dark chocolate or, I don't know, a certain type of drug or, you know, the love and the sex of the person that she loves. Do you know what I mean? Like, it just felt a bit like a list of things that people are supposed to feel are hedonistic pleasures. I don't know. So I think that we need to get more specific there or that needs to go, because a lot of the writing is much better than that. Then we talk about Ben on the first page. So who's ready to beat some flames? Ben Yell is blonde curls flying everywhere, setting off a chorus of whoops and hell yeahs from the seven smokejumpers huddled around her. Even if we can just get, like, a reaction to Ben or just her, because really, we just have her reaction to the setting for most of these pages. We rarely actually get a reaction to Ben. Does Ben inspire her? Does she trust Ben? It just seemed like he was part of the scenery, he was part of the setting, whereas he ends up being a crucial part of this book again, which we kind of know from the query letter. So the fact that we didn't actually spend any real estate on Ben, and I don't think we need a lot of real estate. It could just be like, I've heard his, you know, his pep talks before. This one felt no different. That was terrible. Don't write. You know, how does she feel about his pep talks? Cece's laughing at me. She's trying not.
- [49:57]
Cece Lira
This is where Bianca would add the empathy, being like, see, it's harder than it looks. And she'd be right.
- [50:03]
Carly Waters
Write a better pep talk than me. But I'm imagining. Okay, I can't stop with the sports metaphors. We're going into football season, but, like, you know, oh, God, they're ready to go out on the field. She's, like, having a bit of pain.
- [50:15]
Cece Lira
Sports metaphors again. Oh, my God.
- [50:16]
Carly Waters
Okay, everybody has their shoulder pads on. They got their jerseys. They're ready to go out through the tunnel to the football field. Like, what's the thing that Ben is gonna say to get them out the door? Right. This is their first jump of the season. Again, should this be the first jump of the season to start the book? That's another question mark. I actually don't think it should be the first jump of the season.
- [50:36]
Cece Lira
What is a jump of a season? People are jumping in football.
- [50:40]
Carly Waters
What? No, I back. Back to. I back to fire. I'm back to fire.
- [50:43]
Cece Lira
Oh, okay. Just.
- [50:46]
Carly Waters
This is just.
- [50:46]
Cece Lira
Okay, well, I don't. I don't know what's happening in the sports world. I like jumping from planes. That part I like. I don't like football.
- [50:53]
Carly Waters
Okay? I'm leaving football behind. Cece, we are no longer talking about football. We're back to the smoke jumpers. Ben's right. Like, Ben. What is Ben gonna say to them to get them out this door? That's what I want to know. What is her reaction? Was this a good pep talk? Not his best pep talk. Why didn't he give the best pep talk? Did he look at her while he was giving the pep talk? This is what I want in that exact moment. Very small amount of real estate, but a little bit there. I also wanted to know more about this. Like, practice all winter. She goes. She practiced all winter. Nailed her training jumps this spring. What kind of training are we doing? Is she, you know, five days a week in the gym, training, strength training, working with a new physio? You know, she training in the air? Like, I think we need some specifics there. It kind of goes back to my, like, sex, drugs, and rock and roll comment above. Like, what does getting ready for the season mean? How hard is she working as a woman? Does she have to, quote, unquote, work harder than the men to maintain a certain amount of strength? I don't know. I'm throwing things out there. Right? But those are the specifics, I think that will really matter here. Another line that I really Liked was beneath her feet the miniaturized Grayling river, twisted and turned like blue silk through a tumbling green quilt. I love that imagery of the quilt and the silk of, like, how fast a river would be moving by. You absolutely adored that. That was really incredible. Yeah. And my last note was really kind of what we already said, which is, I really like that we slowed down time to experience this because all of this would have been happening so fast. So fast. Right. Like the way that they just be, you know, the scenery be flying by them. They see the jump point. Like, they have to go. There is no time. So I did really feel like we did slow down time in a nice way. And maybe again, that weren't align in these pages. Right. Of how she feels like she can slow down time when she does this job or when she looks at Ben, Time slows down. Something like that. But it really did feel like a short story or a prologue or a closed scene of some kind, which is, I think, what Cici's getting at, where it's like, we're not actually curious to go on because we have an end point here. Something has to go wrong. Something has to malfunction. And I know you're like, dropping this off at five pages because we asked for five pages because this is our show, but what could happen here? All of a sudden, everybody jumps and she's the last one to jump and there's a malfunction on the plane or she realizes she doesn't have her lucky blah, blah, blah in her pocket. You know, like, something has to go wrong here at this moment if this is going to be a stop point. But ultimately, your job as the author is to continually get us to turn the pages. So just because I'm saying this is five pages, so what? It actually, it is five pages. So, yeah, you got to be getting us to turn the page every time. So end rant. That is it for today.
- [53:24]
Cece Lira
It's the hardest job. Listen, we know this. It's the hardest job in the world because as a storyteller, your job is to seduce. And seduction is the art of creating desire. Your job is to create desire in another person. I love the note about the short story. It was brilliant. It got to the heart of what I was feeling. I'm like, why isn't this working? Yes, you're right. Because it felt contained and satisfying at the end, like I didn't need more.
- [53:47]
Carly Waters
You know, started on the plane, ended on the plane.
- [53:50]
Cece Lira
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, Bianca isn't here. So we acted up, we laughed we made jokes. We did not stick to the script people. And so. Bianca, I'm sorry.
- [53:58]
Carly Waters
Don't tell on us. Don't tell on us.
- [54:00]
Cece Lira
Yes. Probably she won't listen. Probably she's too busy. So don't tell on us, people. When the adults leave, the kids have.
- [54:06]
Carly Waters
Fun, but tell us what you feel about sludge. I do want to know what you think about sludge.
- [54:12]
Cece Lira
And about football. I'm gonna lose on both counts because people probably like football. Yeah, it's just so weird. It's such a weird sport. First of all, people don't play it with their feet and it's not shaped like a ball because it's an oval form. It's like, why do we call it football? You know, like. And then why do we call actual football soccer? It's just so weird. It's so weird. Everything about the sport is weird.
- [54:33]
Carly Waters
I'll slow down on my sports analogies. I'll do some more cookie analogies and off we go. Have a great day, everybody.
- [54:40]
Cece Lira
Bye, everyone.
- [54:42]
Bianca Murray
Cece Lira is a literary agent at Wendy Sherman Associates. If you'd like to query save, please refer to the submission guidelines@www.wsherman.com. carly Waters is a literary agent at P.S. literary Agency, but her work on this podcast is not affiliated with the agency and the views expressed by Carly on this podcast are solely that of her as a podcast co host and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, policies or position of PS Literary Agency. Have you been sitting on the fence about signing up for the Beta Reader matchup? Or have you signed up before but haven't as yet found your writing soulmates? The next matchup is the last one of the year, so don't snooze on it. Get matched up with those writing in a similar genre and or time zone so they can critique your work as you critique theirs. Your manuscript does it doesn't have to be complete to sign up for the 3,000 word evaluation. This particular matchup will be open to registrations from now until the 2nd of November, with the matchup emails going out on the 3rd of November. For more information and to register, go to Biancamarae.com and look for the Beta Reader Matchup tab. Please spread the word even if you aren't signing up this time. The more writers we have registered, the better the matches will be, which means you'll be paying it forward to your fellow authors.