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Love that line about plastic princesses ensnaring men! Good luck!
ReplyDelete-Zoë #176
Thanks, Zoe! Best of luck to you!
DeleteI love the break-down of the princesses and how they got their princes! ha! It's a perfect balance of frustration and humor. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Amalia! I just popped over to your entry (awesome #14, guys) and I can't believe I'm having sympathetic feelings for. An Orc in so few words!! :) good luck!
DeleteThis sounds fantastic! Good luck to you as well!
ReplyDeleteThank you! And thanks for stopping by!
DeleteI love your MC's name - IMOGEN (side note) did it stem from Imogen Heap? I also LOVE (LOVE LOVE LOVE) your first page. Best of luck to you Kelsey.
ReplyDelete-Random Andrews Entry # 165
Well... I love Imogen Heap, so maybe that contributed to my choosing it. But in the story, she was named after Imogen (a character in a Shakespearian play) so, I guess it's a bit of both!
DeleteThanks for stopping by! :D
I love the voice in your query and first 250 words, and I love the name Imogen.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the kind words, Carrie-Anne! I appreciate it. And thanks for stopping by!
DeleteThis sounds great. Imogen sounds like a great character and I would love to read more. Good luck in the contest!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much, Danielle! :D
DeleteWow, I love this idea! Good luck!
ReplyDeleteThanks a lot! :D I appreciate your taking the time to drop a word of encouragement. :)
DeleteI liked this a lot! I love the voice of Imogen!!
ReplyDeleteGood luck in the contest!
Summer - #40
Thanks, Summer!
Delete*scampers off to read your entry*
Ooh, got myself some chills reading your query! Good luck, fellow contemp! ~Dahlia, #70
ReplyDeleteI JUST commented on yours! Seriously. Killed me with its awesomeness. :D
DeleteThanks for the words of encouragement!
*contemp highfive!*
...super stubborn plus-size... great lines and lots of hints at what is to come. Great entry, Good Luck!
ReplyDeleteThank you very much! That line (in particular) required a lot of trial and error. Thank you! :)
Deletethis is great! both the query and the first page - loved it - funny and great voice! good luck! ferris #175
ReplyDeleteThank you so much! I appreciate your time, and kind words! Cheers, and good luck to you as well!
DeleteLove your line about Cinderella. Hilarious. I like your MC's attitude. Really nicely done.
ReplyDeleteThanks a lot! She's got a ton of attitude alright. I'm glad it came out in her first 250. :D
DeleteYour 250 - great voice. I like this girl already.
ReplyDeleteThe first line of your query is awesome. Great voice. Maybe a little less synopsis throughout. I've read that you should tell about the first 1/3 of your novel in your query. What is the conflict? I think you've covered that pretty well.
I don't know if any of that helps. lol
Good luck!
Tina (#194)
That's great advice! Thanks a lot for taking the time to read! I appreciate it!
DeleteLove the voice. Got it in spades.
ReplyDeleteI'm not really going to touch on the query as I'm no query master.
250: What you have here is an internal monologue, a hilarious one, but still just her talking to herself. The breakdown of the princesses is fabulous, but is there any way to weave some action into this? Could she possibly be explaining her hatred of fairy tells, or rather it's the princesses she dislikes, to Grant while they're at school, walking to school, etc?
This still made me laugh out loud.
Best of luck! #6
Thanks for the compliment on the voice of my piece! :)
DeleteI'll definitely think about the internal nature of her monologue and think about adding some action.
I so appreciate your stopping by to comment. Thank you so much!
Your query + 250 contain such a strong voice! I'm already sympathizing with and rooting for your main character even before I've really gotten to know her - I'm definitely wondering what happens to her. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteWell, that's great to hear!! Thanks for stopping by to leave a comment! I appreciate it! :)
DeleteImogen sounds like a fantastic MC! Good luck in the contest!
ReplyDeleteThanks a lot! I know I love her! ;-)
DeleteHi Kelsey. I'm stopping by from the Writer's Voice contest (entry #58) to wish you the best of luck. I'm now also your newest follower, so: nice to meet you!
ReplyDeleteHey, Matthew! Thanks so much for stopping by, and for following!
DeleteHi Kelsey,
ReplyDeleteYou see I thought by bringing up my daughters as bona-fide Disney girls, complete with Belle's yellow dress and holidays spent learning all the main tunes in French (Paris is a lot closer than Florida), I was doin' them a favour.
Absolutely not! My eldest would so-oo resonate with Imogen (as do I, but then I'm just Peter Pan, I'll never grow up!).
Stunning voice and anything about the courage to face bullies gets my vote - I was that fat, specky, spotty geek!
Very best of luck to you an' Imogen
Cheers
Jacky (#130)
xxx
Hahaaa! Thanks so much for such a thoughtful and personal comment!!
DeleteI hope that Imogen has a good chance in the world, cause I feel that so many people could relate to a true outcast... not just a beautiful loner.
Thanks so much!
1. Query tweaks:
ReplyDeleteAlmost every facet of seventeen year old Imogen Keegan’s life can be divvied up into one of two categories: Things-That-Suck and Things-That-Suck-Slightly-Less. Fairy tales—particularly ones with happy endings—have no place in her life at all. Stories of plastic princesses ensnaring their insipid men hold no magic for her since her mom died in a car crash seven years ago and her life took a spill down a rabbit hole of pain and sadness.
The items in the “suck pile” just keep adding up. She’s earned herself an “Emotionally Disturbed” special education label at school for her clinical depression. She’s virtually alone except for Grant, her boy-next-door best friend, who is the only person who can see past her super stubborn plus-sized status from an emotional addiction to food.
To top things off, her father has recently married Evelyn Cinder, whose daughter “Ella” is equal parts beauty queen and devil-spawn. When the lead in the school musical is expelled and Imogen steps out of her shell and into the role, Ella is there, waiting in the wings to cut down her last shreds of self-esteem.
While the chances of her “happily ever after” seem more out of reach than ever, Imogen must find the strength to be more than the sum of her stigmas, or stay forever in the ashes.
(or something more applicable to your story, on that last line. But that keeps the consequences feeling dramatic.)
First 250:
I love that first paragraph.
But after that, I have to nitpick:
Cut out Seriously.
"Princes want hot girls, so hot girls get the fairy tales.
I'm not bitter. Okay... maybe I'm a little bitter, but I have my reasons. Several of them in fact, each more tragic and pitiably clichéd than the last. The most obvious is that I, Imogen Keegan, am not a hot girl. Hell, I'm not even a pretty girl, at least not according to any human being with eyeballs. Sadly enough, I might have been lovely, if life hadn't dealt me this hand full of pain and sadness. As easily as a footprint is wiped from a sandy beach, my grief swept like a great wave and stripped me and my life of all of its current and potential beauty. Grief can do that."
Hope that helps! Good luck! :)
Leigh Caroline (#47)
Thanks for taking the time to leave such detailed feedback! I appreciate the extra set of eyes so much!
DeleteI like it :) - And you're right. Our stories have a very similar vibe going. Good luck to you!
ReplyDeleteVeronica (#88)
Yay! I thought it was so fun to find a like-minded author! Thanks for stopping by! :-)
DeleteThe first paragraph in your excerpt had me laughing. :) Good luck!
ReplyDelete~Nicole, entry 68
Thanks so much! Good luck to you!!
DeleteAhhhh Kelsey I LOVE it so far! Gimme more!
ReplyDeleteAnd I love you, my darling!!! :D
DeleteOh, I would so read this. :) Good luck!
ReplyDeleteThanks a lot for the encouragement! :)
DeleteHello!!!!
ReplyDeleteSo I love so much about this. I love that she's a "stubborn plus size"! I love the whole first page with the bitter comments on the princesses! Great concept and strong writing!
A few small things might make this better! So excited to work with you on this!
Yaaaaaaay! I WANT YOU!
THANK YOU, CUPID!!!
DeleteI can't tell you how excited I am for this project! I really, really can't!!! :D
Thank you!!
#TeamCupidsLC FOR THE WIN!
This is a great entry, go Team Cupid! :D
ReplyDeleteThank you, Cortney!! :D
Delete