Tired of getting form rejections from literary agents?
Or, perhaps you haven’t started querying
yet and you’re looking to stand out in the
query box.
Learn how to write specific vs. vague conflict
in a query in this iWriterly video.
Heya, book nerds!
I’m Meg LaTorre, and on this episode of
iWriterly, I’ll be answering one of your
most popular questions on Twitter: how to
write specific vs. vague conflict in a query.
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The purpose of a query is to entice a literary
agent or editor to read (more of) your manuscript.
Some literary agents will only read the manuscript
pages if the query entices them enough, other
agents will read both the query and pages
for each submission they receive, and yet
others will read the pages before they query.
But in order to receive a partial or full
request, it’s essential for agents to finish
reading your submission thinking, “I need
more.”
And there’s an easy way you can do that
within your query: specific conflict.
When I worked as a literary agent and read
through the query box or perused the feed
of Twitter pitch contests, writers would often
over-simplify their stories or plot.
This over-simplifying not only doesn’t provide
an overview of the story in the plot summary
(also called the story blurb), but it doesn’t
leave a reader eager for more.
Here are a few examples:
1.)
Michael is faced with a dark secret that turns
his world upside down.
If he doesn’t learn how to control his new
powers so he can fight off the impending evil,
the darkness will devour the world and everything
he loves.
2.)
Mia has always wanted a normal life.
When she finds herself on a mission to learn
about her family’s history, she learns of
their dark secrets, which, if revealed, could
change the course of history.
3.)
Trae’s father committed a crime that tore
an empire apart.
Or that’s what everyone has been told.
He must befriend murderers and thieves and
outsmart politicians to prove his family’s
innocence and prevent civil war.
In these examples:
We don’t know who the protagonist is (vocation,
motivation, etc.) or what s/he wants.
The plot appears to be moving the protagonist
(rather than his/her desires or actions impacting
the plot).
We know nothing of the individual circumstances
leading up to the inciting incident, who the
antagonist is, or what the force is the protagonist
is facing.
Without any specific examples of what the
protagonist is facing, the stakes’ impact
is lessened.
For example, in #2, what are the family’s
dark secrets, specifically?
Why would those secrets change the course
of history?
What would happen if those secrets were revealed?
Why weren’t they revealed already?
In general, the following phrases are all
vague conflicts (and should be swapped out
for specific conflicts): “dark secret,”
“turning her world upside down,” “dark
past,” “darkness will devour the world,”
etc.
If an event happened that has sparked the
inciting incident, such a father’s crime
in example #3, the reader needs to have a
general idea of what that event was.
Let’s rewrite these three examples to include
specific conflict:
1.)
In Short Hills, most sixteen-year-old boys
get cars for their birthday.
Michael received the unfortunate news: he
was from a long line of witches.
The best part?
As a male descendant, he didn’t get powers,
not cool ones anyway.
But he did inherit the family’s enemies—including,
but not limited to, the town mayor, chief
of police, and wealthiest families in the
community, all of whom were set on exacting
revenge on his family.
And for crimes his ancestors supposedly committed.
Michael must learn how to control and interpret
the strange visions he’s been getting since
his sixteenth birthday before the town can
awaken a sleeping demon
that 
is said to steal witches’ powers—by stealing
their memories.
2.)
While unearthing what some historians theorize
to be the ancient city of Atlantis, Mia discovers
strange artifacts with her family’s crest.
Upon touching the artifacts, she begins blacking
out and waking up days later without memory
of what happened.
Desperate for answers, she travels to libraries
in Southern Europe and North Africa, where
she learns the true location of Atlantis—and
how her family was the reason it was sunk
beneath
the sea.
3.)
Ten years ago, Trae’s father stole the king’s
scepter.
In most kingdoms, you’d think the king would
waggle his jeweled finger at his smiths and
demand they make a new one.
Not in Galoecia, where people are sentenced
to death for stepping on a royal’s shadow.
When Trae discovers his father’s secret
journal, it seems he never stole the scepter
after all.
If his deceased father’s writing can be
believed, he was framed for stealing the scepter
and executed as a disrupter of the peace.
To get to the bottom of the mystery, Trae
must befriend murderers and thieves—the
last people to see his father alive.
But if he doesn’t find the evidence he needs
and soon, civil war will break out on the
streets, with Trae right in the middle of
it.
Granted, all of these 
examples are too long for Twitter pitch contests
(and probably too short for plot summaries,
which are often three paragraphs long), but
hopefully you get the idea.
Pitches and plot summaries both need to have
story-specific conflict and stakes.
If the conflict is vague enough that it can
be applied to stories other than yours, take
a look at the writing and see how you can
tweak it to convey the uniqueness of your
story.
By conveying the uniqueness of your story
in a query (as well as having a polished manuscript),
you may just land yourself a few partial and
full requests from industry professionals.
If you’re interested in learning more about
how to write a strong query or pitch, join
me on September 24 for my Query-Writing Boot
Camp with Savvy Authors.
There will be two lessons on querying, two
live Q&As with yours truly, as well as live
query critiques during the class.
To learn more about the class, check out the
link in the description.
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on how to write specific vs. vague conflict
in a query.
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As always, keep writing!
