[SPEAKER_01]: and welcome to our show.
[SPEAKER_01]: The shit no one tells you about writing.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm best selling author Bianca Marie, and I'm joined by C.C.
[SPEAKER_01]: Lira of Wendy Sherman Associates and Carly Waters of PS Literary.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hi everyone, welcome back to another Books with Hugs.
[SPEAKER_01]: As per usual, we are diving straight in.
[SPEAKER_01]: CC, can you please kick us off of the first query?
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's do this.
[SPEAKER_02]: Dear CC, please consider my 75,000 word literary LGBTQ novel The Nest.
[SPEAKER_02]: which blends the communal storytelling of tales of the city with a rural queer life for readers of Thomas Grittons in tongues and Alejandro Varella's The Town of Babelot.
[SPEAKER_02]: When journalism student Matt learns that the nest, the only queer bar in his rural hometown is shuddering, he decides to document its history.
[SPEAKER_02]: But the stories he covers, along with his return home, stern memories he's avoided for years, straining his relationship with his boyfriend Danny.
[SPEAKER_02]: As Matt digs into the bar's history, a pattern begins to emerge.
[SPEAKER_02]: One that points back to a night he's never fully confronted.
[SPEAKER_02]: The deeper he goes, the harder it becomes to separate the story he's telling from the one he's been avoiding.
[SPEAKER_02]: Matt can't complete the article or move forward without facing what happened and the silence he's built around it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like my protagonist, I'm a survivor of sexual assault, and I wrote this novel out of a deep interest in queer history and the silence is that shape it.
[SPEAKER_02]: My work has appeared in Cupbank, ANU, magazine, does it have pockets, and other journals, and anthologies.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was nominated for a push-cart prize in 2018, and my fiction was recently featured in the Florida Reviews Queer Folio.
[SPEAKER_02]: I teach high school English in Brooklyn, where I live with my husband and our cat.
[SPEAKER_02]: I would be happy to send the full manuscript at your request.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for your time and consideration.
[SPEAKER_02]: Michael Zimmerman.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, CC.
[SPEAKER_01]: Before we go into discussing that query, for those of you who are not watching on YouTube, I suggest you do, because I think we're about to have a snowstorm because this is the first time I've seen CC dressing for summer, which shows you how hot it currently is in Toronto.
[SPEAKER_01]: CC is wearing a sleeveless, beautiful top, which lovely color, but to CC not wearing
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, warm tops of laser.
[SPEAKER_00]: She always has laser.
[SPEAKER_00]: She seems to have a laser.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is this?
[SPEAKER_01]: CC has won her blazer to, she will blazer to like one of my book launches.
[SPEAKER_01]: That was in the middle of July.
[SPEAKER_01]: In Ben McNally bookstore and it was like 40 degrees in there and there was no egg on and CC was rocking this blazer.
[SPEAKER_01]: So to see CC wearing sleeveless tell us, CC, how hard are you really?
[SPEAKER_02]: I am, though my AC isn't working.
[SPEAKER_02]: I knew something was up on you.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's what's happening and it's been forcing me.
[SPEAKER_02]: My hands are freezing though because I have re-nodes disease.
[SPEAKER_02]: So one of the reasons why I'm always wearing long sleeves is so I can tuck my hands into my blazers or my coats or whatever it is.
[SPEAKER_02]: And my hands are freezing.
[SPEAKER_02]: It does not matter what temperature it's outside.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like peak summer, it does not matter.
[SPEAKER_02]: My hands are always freezing.
[SPEAKER_02]: My husband quite likes it because he runs hot.
[SPEAKER_02]: So what I do is I put my hand on his forehead or on his neck and if you guys watch me on YouTube And you notice that I'm always doing this and for those of you who are only listening, I'm putting my hands on my own neck
[SPEAKER_02]: It's to my hands will warm up or else my fingers turn purple and then blue and blistery so yeah fun stuff I feel like a new fashion statement is going to be sleeveless but with mittens yeah yeah I have fingerless gloves sometimes I rock them today.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm choosing to just you know figure it out.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, well, sorry, I've taken us off on a tangent.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, CC, let us know what you think of that query later and what was the word can't they?
[SPEAKER_02]: So the word can is 253 words, so definitely on the short side.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll go have to start at the top, the title, the nest.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a really popular novel with that title.
[SPEAKER_02]: The nest is one of my favorites, not shirts the best title for this novel.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think I would try to play around with it a little bit more.
[SPEAKER_02]: I looked up your comps and I always hate seeing this, unfortunately they don't seem to have great sales.
[SPEAKER_02]: So for intangues, books can tells me this was published in 2024 and reported sales on the book scan art about 6,000.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I haven't hung on my shelf right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: I haven't read it yet.
[SPEAKER_00]: I bought it at the indie bookstore we got whenever it was in May.
[SPEAKER_00]: So one of those copies is mine, but I haven't read it yet.
[SPEAKER_02]: One of them is Carly.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then the town of Babylon, 22 I think.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then similar number of copies a little bit lower.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I don't know.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think I would pick different comps just because of the track record.
[SPEAKER_02]: I always see this as an agent.
[SPEAKER_02]: I wouldn't mind at all if the comps you're using have low sales or high sales or whatever.
[SPEAKER_02]: I would care about them editorially at the stage.
[SPEAKER_02]: When it's time for us to submit to publishers though, that's when we really have to make sure to find comps that
[SPEAKER_02]: do you have a solid track record?
[SPEAKER_02]: Some agents, however, say, hey, I would prefer that to be done at the writer stage, you know?
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's in your best interest, I think, to choose different comps if you have them.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't want people to feel too stressed out if they can't find good comps.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I just to stick on that for one second because I was going to say kind of the same thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: But that book, so we can kind of discuss this easy because that book was nominated for
[SPEAKER_00]: It was finalists for the Lambe Literary Award for Gay Fiction, longlisted for the 2024 Carol Joyce Oat Prize, named the Best Book of the Year by Glamour, you know, all these like great award lists.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would argue that I think in tongues, probably is a good comp, I can't have it right yet.
[SPEAKER_00]: But in terms of like, to just admit it is literary fiction, I do think it.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that are the words.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: That are the words.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then you want to balance that out with a comp, maybe that's more sales oriented.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know your cops have to do a lot of work, but usually they're in conversation with each other So like one could be more of a literary darling and then one could be you know more sales heavy back anyway I digress.
[SPEAKER_02]: No, but I love that note.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for saying that it's an excellent point One that I should have thought of to be quite frank.
[SPEAKER_02]: It makes total sense if your vision is that if your vision is to focus on the words and Yeah, why not?
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that idea It all depends on what the author's vision for the work is and you know what their priorities are.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, plot paragraph
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, I am a big believer that every novel is a mystery novel, not just those in the mystery genre.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like every single novel out there has a mystery at its heart, and sometimes the mystery is quiet and introspective, something like who is this character, who is he really?
[SPEAKER_02]: It could be something like that, but every novel is a mystery, and the reader and the author are playing a game.
[SPEAKER_02]: The author is planting clues, and the reader is trying to solve that mystery before the author actually wants them to solve.
[SPEAKER_02]: And this is kind of like a social contract between the reader and the author, and this novel, which I think is on the literary side, maybe on the quieter side, has a clear mystery, which is what happened that night at the bar, you know, that is so dramatic, this trauma
[SPEAKER_02]: I have a sense based on the author bio, the author bio mentions, and we so appreciate the author's vulnerability in sharing this, quote, like my protagonist, I am a survivor of sexual assault and quote.
[SPEAKER_02]: So now I'm putting pieces together, and I'm thinking that's probably what happened that night at the bar.
[SPEAKER_02]: but I'll be honest with you.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not sure that should be something that I should be putting together based on the author bio.
[SPEAKER_02]: I actually think it's a little bit smarter since you are comfortable sharing that part and since agents are going to make that connection anyway to be a tiny bit more specific with the mystery in the actual plot paragraph itself.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some genres do require the mystery to have a specific shape.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some genres require the mystery to have a lot of clarity, not of exactly how it happened, but of what happened.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like a murder.
[SPEAKER_02]: There was a murder on the character has to solve it.
[SPEAKER_02]: This is not one of those genres.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's okay to be a bit more on the vague side, a bit more on the mysterious side.
[SPEAKER_02]: But since we are going to get clarity on in the author bio anyway, I think I would just develop it a little bit more.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a lot of a language, things like night he's never confronted, story he's been avoiding, facing what happened.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I have no sense of what that is.
[SPEAKER_02]: Again, I do because I read the author by all the bass on the plot paragraphs along I don't.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I think you can make it a little bit more specific.
[SPEAKER_02]: That being said, it's a really great pitch and we'll get to the pages in a second but the writing is also really excellent.
[SPEAKER_00]: KCC?
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, Kali, handing it across to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, a lot of the same notes I already chimed in on the comms.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had the exact same note about the title, which is, you know, it's a very famous book.
[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore, it might need to pivot and brainstorm some more ideas there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really like the hook, but it ends up being a bit passive, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it's like he's documenting the history.
[SPEAKER_00]: The history's already happened.
[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore, why do we need a book about him discovering the history, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, and I think C.C.
[SPEAKER_00]: is getting at some great points there, but we kind of can infer what happened, but we actually need to know what happened.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would reframe the hook something more like, while documenting the closure of the only queer bar in his role home town,
[SPEAKER_00]: Matt must face the, the, the, the, the, right and we need to know what that is.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, to be honest, like if this sexual assault, it's obviously a crime, you know, like must face the crime that happened to him at the, at this location, right.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we, like I think we've got to be a little more point blank there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we understand.
[SPEAKER_00]: what he's trying to investigate and what's kind of coming up there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would name it a crime.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, what we're obviously doing a lot of inferring here, you know, and like CCC said, it is a mystery.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're trying to figure out what happened here.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would really kind of just work on nailing that hook in a bit more active way, as such as CCC suggested.
[SPEAKER_00]: Other than that, I really don't have any notes, like it sounds fascinating, I already mentioned in tongues is a comp that is on my bedside reading table, which takes me a long time to get to, so I look forward to getting to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But this sounds really interesting, you know, really complicated and I really enjoyed this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, thank you so much.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, CC, will you tell us what's in those opening pages?
[SPEAKER_02]: So we began chapter one with Matt and Danny in bed just having like a slow morning, but there are stirrings of sadness because he has to leave soon they are doing long distance and then Danny takes a deep breath and Matt knows something serious is coming and Danny says the nest is closing and I want to go back for closing night.
[SPEAKER_02]: And Matt's just like, no, you know, it's the only gay bar for a hundred miles.
[SPEAKER_02]: And Danny's like, it's true.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm sorry.
[SPEAKER_02]: I called the bar myself.
[SPEAKER_02]: Get on the bus and meet me there.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the protagonist thinks to himself about the history that's going to end with the bar closing and he at first isn't sure Danny insists and he agrees and seamlessly we go into Danny in the bus ride going to the bar and there was a really seamless transition there he is observing the town as he arrives he stops at his parents house waits for Danny to pick him up and then
[SPEAKER_02]: They're in the nest in the parking lot and they're talking Danny and Matt remembering a night a specific night They're bundled up, trekking across you know black ice When they see someone they recognize or at least Matt recognizes and says hey, I'm gonna help you and it's
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a drag queen and you know she's in heels and so they're like we're gonna help you because black eyes heels not Not a good combo.
[SPEAKER_02]: So her name is pumpkin and Matt recognizes her as a friend of his uncle's and he isn't sure a pumpkin recognizes him So they yeah, they they make their way through the icing parking lot.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you C.C.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay So I very care in sighting incident there.
[SPEAKER_01]: What is your take on the pages
[SPEAKER_02]: pages are beautifully written.
[SPEAKER_02]: The writing is absolutely top-notch, the writer should be very proud.
[SPEAKER_02]: I found it strange that Matt never asked Danny how he knew.
[SPEAKER_02]: Whenever someone gives me news like that, I'm always like, how did you know?
[SPEAKER_02]: Because neither of them live in the town or work in the bar, or, and so to me, it didn't feel natural that he wouldn't be like, wait, how did you find out?
[SPEAKER_02]: Especially because there's always a little bit of a, well, how did you find out before me?
[SPEAKER_02]: tucked into that question.
[SPEAKER_02]: And not because he doubts that it's true, because it's established that Danny called the bar, so he has verified the information, but just because typically we want to know where people got their information, because that's the origin of the news.
[SPEAKER_02]: There was a lot of things that I really enjoyed.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a line that reads, even the name of the town they'd grown up and left his mouth dry and his stomach fluttering.
[SPEAKER_02]: He'd only gone back when his dad fell
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a really subtle way of adding context in a way that doesn't feel like story splinging, it doesn't feel dry, it doesn't feel forced, it feels very organic and baked into the story and that's something that's really, really important, especially on literary fiction.
[SPEAKER_02]: Something that confused me a bit is Denny shared the news with Matt.
[SPEAKER_02]: in a way that suggested that Danny knew it was going to be a really big deal and then asked him to meet him.
[SPEAKER_02]: But then when Matt hesitates, Danny kind of goes, well, what's the hesitation?
[SPEAKER_02]: You're acting like this place did something to you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And to me, because we know the place did something to him, that feels a little forced.
[SPEAKER_02]: Either Danny thinks this place is just a place with great memories and the issue of getting Matt there is logistical or something like that.
[SPEAKER_02]: or Danny does have a sense.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then I don't think he would frame it like that.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think he would frame it as, well, what's the hesitation?
[SPEAKER_02]: You're acting like this, please did something to you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And if that's his personality, if he's the kind of person who does think or plays did something to him, and would say it like this, pretending like it's not a big deal to see if Matt would then confess, then Matt needs to be figuring that out in his interior, or he needs to be going, he's trying to get me to confess.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, he's always had a suspicion, but he knows how private I am.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know what the thoughts would be exactly,
[SPEAKER_02]: but that needs to be mapped out.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think that what I think, I suspect that what's happening here is the storyteller wants to hint that something did happen, but doesn't want Danny to actually think that, but then Danny wouldn't say that.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like I said, when I was briefly describing what happens, the transition is really seamless.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like we are in their bedroom together, and then we go to the bus, and then there's a very quick pit stop at his parents' house and then we're in the parking lot.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's just an incredibly seamless movement happening in this scene, in a very, very sophisticated way.
[SPEAKER_02]: I found that we're in the hands of a really savvy storyteller here.
[SPEAKER_02]: There were also lots of messy emotions.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, the one same thing making him feel both furious and aesthetic, which is wonderful.
[SPEAKER_02]: I missed a little bit more future rising, because they're about to arrive.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, they arrived at the end of the scene at this bar.
[SPEAKER_02]: And there would be one last hurrah, one last night, and it would never open again.
[SPEAKER_02]: And there's no futureizing of like how he wants the night to go, how he's expecting the night to go, whether he's just like trying to get through it or whether he plans on enjoying himself.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that I thought was missing a little bit.
[SPEAKER_02]: I overall thought this quality here was truly excellent.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wonderful.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hi, praise indeed coming from CC congratulations to the author.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, colleague.
[SPEAKER_01]: What do you think?
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, I have some thoughts.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I agree this is a this feels like a masterful storyteller.
[SPEAKER_00]: What I didn't agree with CC on was the transitions.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like to me, I needed some more stage directions.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I felt like when we got to the town, he gets there, we have no idea, if you're in a small town in the middle of nowhere, how do you get from the bus station to the parents' house?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, just some of the logistics, maybe it's just my style of reading and what I enjoy, but I want to know who picked you up because if you have tension with your family,
[SPEAKER_00]: that's a huge thing to ask a family member to get you or how do you call a taxi in a small town, you know, in winter, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So like, I don't know, I actually would have preferred more integration of like the stage directions about how we get from a to beep, but as a free one disagrees.
[SPEAKER_02]: Everyone who's ever taken a course with me is now yelling at the screen Either yelling at you or yelling at me going why do you guys disagree on things?
[SPEAKER_02]: I am always like do not bogged me down with stage directions I don't care how someone got to a place unless there's actual you know digging your tuition there But if you're not including it there isn't any so just move on, you know
[SPEAKER_02]: And you're saying the opposite, and it's like, writers, I know we torture you, and I'm so sorry.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I said, why?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's because if you're gay in a small town with a lot of history, again, family complications, like, you know, there is a lot of tension there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm not saying to do it just to do it.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, not necessarily, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like he could have a family family family.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then his boyfriend goes, but then you have to see your family.
[SPEAKER_00]: It didn't seem like you wanted to see his family.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not what you thought.
[SPEAKER_00]: But he also said his family loves him.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can, your family could love you and you saw that what I see them.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, but he said, like, it's going to be great.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I definitely didn't pick up on, on, okay.
[SPEAKER_02]: I thought it was like, no, but if there's tension, then I agree.
[SPEAKER_02]: No, but then, then we're an agreement, because if there's tension, I agree.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was just like, there wasn't any tension in that meeting.
[SPEAKER_02]: It went fine, but you're right.
[SPEAKER_02]: There was a moment of where he, where he mentioned that.
[SPEAKER_02]: I want to try to find that.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was something about them disagreeing about.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, anyway.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so I can't go without seeing my parents, so see them.
[SPEAKER_02]: They'd love it.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll visit with you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And there's no interiority on him not wanting to see him's his parents.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's just more like, I can't go without seeing my parents, which could just be like, that'll add extra days.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, he says this is an excuse, not the truth, though.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, excuse, extra days, like logistics, you know, extra days to the trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: Does this cinema infection is meant to for us to have these conversations then?
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm very glad that we disagree.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love agree.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm currently in CC disagree because again, it shows how subjective this all is.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, bye.
[SPEAKER_02]: But to everyone listening, just remember this, if there is tension with the parents, we both agree you should go there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, Bianca, since you chimed in, I have a question for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I felt like this was kind of an interesting POV choice because it felt, it's third, but it felt very close third to both of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, it almost felt like we were in both of their heads, which, to me, drained a bit of tension because if we know everything that Danny is feeling and we know everything that's Matt's feeling, then it's really just about what they're not telling you to other on the page.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I don't know, did you pick up on that Bianca at all?
[SPEAKER_00]: Did you, how did you feel about that?
[SPEAKER_01]: interesting question, Carly.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I really think that when you sit down to write, it's so important that you choose your POV with intentionality, because it does make your question, why is this not been written in first person, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And if you're going to write in third person, limited, then it needs to be from one character's perspective very particularly.
[SPEAKER_01]: The minute you are giving away other character's thoughts and feelings, you're tending
[SPEAKER_01]: So a question to the author is like, I wish we had them on the show so that we could ask them specifically why they chose that particular POV.
[SPEAKER_01]: CC?
[SPEAKER_01]: I would just be defending the author.
[SPEAKER_02]: In no moment did I think we were in Matt's POV.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, we read different books, guys.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm sorry.
[SPEAKER_02]: I really read different books.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm just on mission third like there is no mission.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're in no, we're sorry.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're like We're in sorry.
[SPEAKER_02]: I said the wrong name my apologies.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, and never did I think we were in Danny's head I we were always in Matt's head in my opinion
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I disagree like the line like Danny took a deep breath something serious was coming was Danny taking the deep breath We don't always know when someone's taking a deep breath, but you can see their chest moving and Matt's interpreting that something serious is coming He's anticipating what's about to come see I was confused.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was confused.
[SPEAKER_02]: No, no, go away I don't know how to read this seriously.
[SPEAKER_02]: This is all wrong.
[UNKNOWN]: No
[SPEAKER_01]: Carly, would you like to finish?
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll see if I have any other notes on that.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, I'm good.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we're gonna end on me saying go away.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, honey.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh my god, I'm so mean.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, fine.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I think Alice must enjoy this as much as I do.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, before we dive into our next query first a message from our sponsors.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, Kali will you kick us off with your query, please?
[SPEAKER_00]: Dear, Kali, I'm seeking representation for where the Mariatches sing an 85,000 word upmarket slash book club novel told in dual timelines.
[SPEAKER_00]: Set within a morally ambiguous expat community in Guadalajara, Mexico, the story follows a British woman caught in a love triangle that defines the course of her life for decades to come.
[SPEAKER_00]: It will appeal to fans of Miranda Cali-Hellers, the paper palace,
[SPEAKER_00]: In 2002, Tara is a young British ex-pat teaching English in Guadalajara, haunted by her mother's influence in the belief that her future happiness is dependent on finding a man.
[SPEAKER_00]: She falls not for one, but two American men, Ben, who makes his interest clear from the start, and Charlie, who keeps her at arms length despite their undeniable chemistry.
[SPEAKER_00]: When Tara moves into the infamous Gringo Cage, an apartment building nickname by its ex-pat residence, and begins teaching out an elite private school she finally feels she's where she belongs, but rumors circulate and Tara begins to suspect that the Gringo Cage hides something far darker beneath its Bohemian charm.
[SPEAKER_00]: As a relationships with Ben and Charlie Unravel in turn, tragedy ripples through their expat community leaving Tara as unmoored and alone as when she first arrived.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, 23 years later, Tara returns to Guadalajara to finish the novel she's been writing for two decades.
[SPEAKER_00]: What she doesn't expect is a sudden wave of cartel violence or reunion with the man who once broke her heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now in investigative journalists, she holds answers to what happened in the Gringo Cage back then, but only Tara can decide whether life she's built since
[SPEAKER_00]: is strong enough to withstand what her heart still refuses to let go.
[SPEAKER_00]: Where are the mariachi sing?
[SPEAKER_00]: Drows loosely on my own experiences teaching English in Guadalajara.
[SPEAKER_00]: Raised in England, I now live in Minnesota where I run a digital marketing agency and squeeze and writing around parenting four kids.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would be thrilled to share the full manuscript upon requests sincerely, Karen Sam's.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, Kali.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, can you give us the word camp there and then you'll take on that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Karen, put it right in the dark for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, Karen, 354 words.
[SPEAKER_00]: I also take you guys at your face value.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't double check it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So listen, it's 354 words.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll take your word for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not gonna do the double check it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so let's start at the top here.
[SPEAKER_00]: So a market book club.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your comps are...
[SPEAKER_00]: interesting because love in other words is a very commercial romance novel.
[SPEAKER_00]: I actually read that when I was on vacation this past trip I was on.
[SPEAKER_00]: So very like very classic romance novel, Lily King, very literary paper palace, more literary to a market, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So if we really feel like these are the comps we need to have, I get it, but you're not really kind of like narrowing the scope of focus with these comps necessarily.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, something to think about
[SPEAKER_00]: Next point.
[SPEAKER_00]: So first paragraph.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first paragraph is the first thing we read, obviously.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it frames our entire understanding of what's to come here.
[SPEAKER_00]: In this first paragraph, you have an A plot of romance.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if the A plot is romance, then arguably it's potentially not the club or a market.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so if the A plot is actually something else, then I think the A plot needs to start the pitch here so that we don't go into this thinking, like, okay, we're reading just a romance and not that just a romance is a bad thing, but if you're framing this as up market book club, then we need a different A plot.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think the A plot is something to do obviously with the building, right, because this is the whole secret, this is something that happens, this is the reason she comes back.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I definitely think we need to kind of rewrite this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Also, you know, one of these men doesn't really show up again in the story.
[SPEAKER_00]: Unless one of them has something to do with the crime and the apartment building and the other one becomes a lover or they're both lovers potentially, again.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not really sure because there's so much vagueness happening on the page that I actually can't answer this question.
[SPEAKER_00]: about necessarily how all of these three are entangled with this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm assuming crime, they say tragedy happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, not really sure what happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really wish I did, because I'm like, is this a thriller?
[SPEAKER_00]: Is this a romance?
[SPEAKER_00]: It can be all of these things, but I can't be so unsure that I actually don't know how to pitch this.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's the part that worries me a little bit.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because far darker beneath the Bohemian charm, tragedy rippling, like is it
[SPEAKER_00]: death, is it a scam?
[SPEAKER_00]: Is it like a grief?
[SPEAKER_00]: What is it?
[SPEAKER_00]: That's kind of a looting to this tragedy?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, yeah, I don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like the hook itself really needs to focus on potentially just like this friend narrative piece, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like 23 years after she leaves Guadalajara, she's back to investigate the crime that she lived through and has reunited with a former lover, then, then, then, then, then, some thing like that, I think would do a better job of kind of explaining the book as opposed to burying
[SPEAKER_00]: the lead at the end that she's actually back in the place where she came from.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think this is very interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like there's a ton of potential here.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just the framing, you know, again, what's the A-plot?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's the B-plot?
[SPEAKER_00]: What actually is the hook?
[SPEAKER_00]: It seems like a great book.
[SPEAKER_00]: We just kind of have to, again, narrow that scope a little bit more.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I understand what everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, Collie.
[SPEAKER_01]: Just before we go into CC's take on that, remember that we're opening our comps line for September, Emily will be back, giving comps in September and we'll open those lines in August for you to record them.
[SPEAKER_01]: So for those of you who are waiting for that, that's when it's going to happen.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, CC handing it across to you now?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think, Carly, you mentioned how unsure you were.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was equally unsure.
[SPEAKER_02]: There is
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like I said in the other query just critiqued.
[SPEAKER_02]: There are genres where the mystery can be vague.
[SPEAKER_02]: Not saying it has to be vague.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm saying it can be vague.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then there are genres where that's just not okay.
[SPEAKER_02]: This is not okay situation.
[SPEAKER_02]: So to the lovely writer, I don't want to pick on you, but you're not giving us enough.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like you're giving us more vibes than plot.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it is leading to me being like,
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't understand enough to have specific curiosity and then to be like theorizing with specificity and to be expecting a certain kind of story.
[SPEAKER_02]: It just needs more shape, you know, rumors circulate, suspected the Gringo Cage hide something far darker.
[SPEAKER_02]: No idea what that means like no idea and it could be anything and that really affects the tone of the novel So I very much agree with that note, and we just say like I like that there's a clear mystery and Whenever we talk to authors like nine times out of ten they know how to write
[SPEAKER_02]: aligned with more specific shape.
[SPEAKER_02]: They're just worried that they're giving away the goods.
[SPEAKER_02]: But remember, it's okay to give us the specific shape because they're still going to be other twists and reveals that come later.
[SPEAKER_02]: You do mention in the present timeline that he holds the answers to what happened in the Gringo cage back then.
[SPEAKER_02]: So whatever it was that happened past timeline, protagonist thinks it was A and then she's going to find out it was B.
[SPEAKER_02]: Whenever we're dealing with single POV dual timeline, the trick is always to make us feel
[SPEAKER_02]: Dread about the past and hope about the future.
[SPEAKER_02]: Meaning there's a big plot point that's established right away, right in the beginning, and we read the past timeline knowing it's about to happen and we can't look away.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's kind of like that.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're being tortured, but like your God, I hope it lasts, you know, because you want to be tortured.
[SPEAKER_02]: And but you read the present timeline, hoping to feel that catharsis, that sense of resolution, that will come after so many years.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that can be in any genre.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sweet romance is for example meet me at the lake by Carly Fortune you have the protagonist chapter the first two chapters of both timelines It's clearly established that that guy she spent that magical day with internal Never showed up to their meeting place
[SPEAKER_02]: And so you read the entire past timeline where they meet for the first time and spend the day together knowing that at the end he's never going to show off this isn't a spoiler, it's chapter one, but you dread that and that dread keeps you turning the pages because the present timeline has them reuniting again chapter one, no spoilers here and you read the entire present timeline hoping they will reunite.
[SPEAKER_02]: so it could be in thrillers, it could be in romance, it does not matter, that dread versus hope needs to happen, connected by a big plot point that is established right away.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I need the query letter to do that job, so I can be curious with specificity.
[SPEAKER_02]: Lots of potential here, I just think you need to be way more clear.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you, CC.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, Kali, will you tell us what's in those opening pages?
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so we have a prologue called now, and this is when our protagonist is leaving the airport, communicating with the driver about where they want to go, making their way through the city, kind of just chatting about different things, you know, she sees buildings she recognize, she's familiar with the route, but still unfamiliar, they're turning different ways.
[SPEAKER_00]: she gets out to where she's going at the hotel and then she hears her name and it stops her in her tracks.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we go to chapter one which is 23 years earlier.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are again at the airport.
[SPEAKER_00]: She gets picked up at the airport from the person who is introducing her to her new job.
[SPEAKER_00]: She is staying with expats from South Africa, a lovely couple and then they say, you know, once she settled in, she might move from there to the Gringo cage.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that is where we end.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, well we should take on them.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so I'm going to do big picture first.
[SPEAKER_00]: I actually liked that both sections were at the airport, even though they were slightly different.
[SPEAKER_00]: It didn't really bother me.
[SPEAKER_00]: It reminded me of the concept of passing the baton back and forth of the past storyline has to pass the baton to the present storyline and back and forth.
[SPEAKER_00]: and obviously it shows the differences between what it was like then, what it's like now.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I didn't overly mind it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think the only issue that I had with the prologue was it introduces the concept of the husband.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the phone vibrates in my pocket.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a text.
[SPEAKER_00]: Did you land?
[SPEAKER_00]: How is your flight?
[SPEAKER_00]: I begin to tap out of response but then stop a race.
[SPEAKER_00]: How can it be so normal?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have it in me, not after what he said, not after the way we left things.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would cut a bunch of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would just, you know, just maybe just keep it to like, how can it be so normal?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have it in me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would probably cut like not after what he said, not after the way we left things.
[SPEAKER_00]: That felt like we were doubling down a little bit.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we want a little bit of a mystery for the reader to kind of unpack like, what happened in their marriage before they left?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because
[SPEAKER_00]: If it's justified, maybe we want to think that it's something more and it would be more exciting to the reader.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would probably trim that out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Other than that, you know, as I said, I kind of liked it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I was ready to settle in.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have a lot of notes.
[SPEAKER_00]: The one thing are one of our producers.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am not Latina, but one of our Latina producers commented on the use of the term Gringo.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she says Gringo is a term technically used for Americans and not British people.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I was thinking if this is an apartment filled with English expats from all over the world, maybe the Gringo cage makes sense, but just flagging that because I don't I'm not an expert on that, but I'm just flagging that for you to think about.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, Kali, and thank you to our producer Rosanna for flagging that.
[SPEAKER_01]: It shows you how invested everybody is in our team in your queries people.
[SPEAKER_01]: So okay, CC handing it across to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You guys don't check slack, do you?
[SPEAKER_01]: Either of you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I saw our Slack messages about the Gringo Cage comment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I was on vacation, so I saw that there was a comment.
[SPEAKER_02]: I checked in with my friend who is Mexican, the term is widely used for any white foreigner.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's totally fine to use it in my opinion, especially since it's being used for the...
[SPEAKER_02]: the name of the building like even if even if because of course different places use words in different ways, but even if the term is only used for Americans, for example, which I don't buy.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm sorry.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like you see a Canadian who's white, you're also calling him a green go.
[SPEAKER_02]: But whatever, at least in Brazil, you do and according to my friend Azelia in Mexico too.
[SPEAKER_02]: But anyway.
[SPEAKER_02]: Even if that's true, it's still the name of the building, you know, where predominantly Americans live presumably.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's not like people would go, oh, let's not use the name of the building.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, it's like, for example, in North America, you use entree as main dish, but entree means entree which means appetizer.
[SPEAKER_02]: So people use words incorrectly, and that's actually sometimes even more authentic to use it in that way.
[SPEAKER_02]: If as long as people actually, like they use it incorrectly literally, but as long as it's customary to use it, it might make sense.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I liked it.
[SPEAKER_02]: I thought that the arrival, the mirroring, worked, which it doesn't always sometimes if you have two arriving at the airport, it seems it can be like a little bit too much and it wasn't too much at all.
[SPEAKER_02]: I did get the sense that the mystery in the prologue needs to be just clearer or the prologue can go as well.
[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't mind it, but I do think that for the prologue to feel earned, the mystery needs to be a little bit more clear for my taste.
[SPEAKER_02]: To me, the genre calls for specific curiosity.
[SPEAKER_02]: There were some excellent lines, which I flagged, and our substack supporters will see, and I so appreciated the care that the author put into this.
[SPEAKER_02]: I also wanted to know more, like, for example, in the past when she arrives and the person who picks her up at the airport says, people show up here expecting a holiday, like, did does that surprise her that people are showing up expecting a holiday?
[SPEAKER_02]: If so, is she used to being the only one who typically shows up with different expectations to places?
[SPEAKER_02]: or was she also going?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I kind of wanted a little bit of holiday.
[SPEAKER_02]: She does respond and she says an expensive one and she thinks about the expenses which was good, but I also just kind of wanted a little bit more depth about her place in the world.
[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't get too much of that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And whenever I'm curious about these things, it's always a very, very good sign.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I thought the author did a really
[SPEAKER_01]: Wonderful.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thanks so much to ColleanCC for their incredible insights as per usual.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you would like to submit to books with hooks, go to the show about writing, go to the books with hooks tab and you can submit your work in progress there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay everyone, we'll see you next week for an all the interview and in two weeks for another books with hooks.
[SPEAKER_01]: Bye!
[SPEAKER_01]: CCLera is a literary agent at Wendy Sherman Associates.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you'd like to query CC, please refer to the Submission Guidelines at www.wshoman.com.
[SPEAKER_01]: Carly Waters is a literary agent at PS Literary Agency, but a work on this podcast is not affiliated with the agency,
[SPEAKER_01]: and the views expressed by Kali 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.