TITLE: Multiple Choice
GENRE: YA Contemporary
Maddy, Nina, and June have always been til-death-do-us-part, epic best friends--until junior year, when one sexy secret, two destructive sisters, and three little lies force them to fend for themselves. Just when the girls need one another the most, their unbreakable friendship breaks--and their choices will determine whether or not they can pick up the pieces.
It's just a little pink box, Maddy thought, trying to calm the twist of her stomach as she opened the front door to her house. Covered by a drug store circular, triple-wrapped in plastic bags, and shoved in the very bottom of her gigantic purse, the pregnancy test box made her feel like a terrorist sneaking a bomb through an airport. She glanced at her reflection in the foyer mirror. Was her face flushed? Did she breathe too quickly? Everything about her said one thing: guilty.
She motioned behind her, encouraging her best friends, Nina and June, to follow. The clinking of glasses told her that her mom was in the kitchen unloading the dishwasher.
"Is that you, Maddy?"
"No mom, it's your other daughter," Maddy said, like she did every time her mother asked that question. Except her voice wavered and cracked like a boy going through puberty. Hello, obvious.
"Hey Ms. Ferguson," Nina said, loud and clear. Maddy shot her a grateful look.
"Thank you for having us over tonight," June added.
"Oh, no problem." Maddy's mom peeked her head around the kitchen doorway.
Maddy clutched her purse, and her heart skipped. When she was little, her mom told her that all mothers have x-ray vision, in addition to the extra pair of eyes hidden beneath their hair. A part of Maddy still believed her.
Miss Snark's First Victim
I'm hooked :D
ReplyDeleteI can really see the MC arriving home with a pregnancy test/bomb in her purse. Nice opening!
Since her firends are so important (it seems because of the premise), I'd like a quick description to "see" them clearly, too. But maybe that's just me ;)
Good luck!
I second Monica. I'm totally hooked. I feel the tension and I'm curious about what's gonna happen next.
ReplyDeleteLove this!
ReplyDeleteGood luck.
I like the excerpt, you really put us there. And the logline is full of tension, which is great, but we don't get any sense of the actual plot in the logline. What is this story about? Who is it about? I have a better idea from the excerpt, but I think you need to put some of that in the logline, too.
ReplyDeleteGood luck - awesome start!
Love this. Hoping the "sexy" secret isn't the pregnancy. I'd take that word out of the logline, you don't need it.
ReplyDeleteI thought this worked well as is. We immediately learn the problem amd meet the three central characters, the set up seems real and the dialogue natural. Perhaps consider losing the 'Hello, obvious' because it really is obvious, and saying so seems redundant.
ReplyDeleteI like the excerpt much more than the logline. The excerpt feels natural and introduces the characters and the conflict quickly and cleanly. The logline doesn't really say anything about the story, but focuses on the relationship between the friends. I'd like to see more of the plot.
ReplyDeleteI like the logline, but the last line fell a little flat - felt a little cliche.
ReplyDeleteAnother cliche is having characters look at themselves in mirrors.
I like the voice and it's well written. Nice job with the tension, I can feel Maddy's anxiety.
Nice job. Good luck.
This logline is vague and doesn't actually tell us much about what happens or who this novel is about.
ReplyDeleteI like the excerpt a lot.
WOOOO! I wish I could high-five you! This blew me away. Its true what's said so far about the logline being pretty vague, but it WORKS all the same. I feel like if you gave too much detail you'd risk a reader thinking, "eh." Right now the line screams that this is all about rescuing a deep FRIENDSHIP, and that's what drew me. I don't care who did this or that.
ReplyDeleteAnd your opening is just beautiful. That's about all I can say about that!!!
Awesome opening with a great voice - it pulled me in right away. The tension and pacing are nice, and the descriptions are good and brief without breaking the flow of the scene. I agree with macaronipants that I hope the sexy secret isn't the pregnancy - a sexy secret is more like sleeping with a hot teacher than getting pregnant. But that's just my opinion. Again, really fantastic writing here!
ReplyDeleteFantastic excerpt. I think it's smart and the pacing's terrific. We get introduced to the three main characters and the conflict at the beginning of the story -- which I like.
ReplyDeleteLogline:
ReplyDeleteGreat logline.
Line comments:
-Hello, obvious = great voice
Overall:
Well done! The writing's solid and the premise interesting
I enjoyed the voice and tension in the text. I felt like it flowed well, and loved being inside Maddy's head as she smuggled the "bomb" into her house and worried that her mom could tell it was there. Perfect.
ReplyDeleteGood luck!
Maybe I've just read too many fantasy/ paranormal/sci-fi excerpts, but nothing in this really stood out to me, it seemed kind of ordinary. And apart from the pregnancy test, the voice seems more MG than YA.
ReplyDeleteLike a lot of others, the logline seemed really vague to me, and I couldn't get a good sense of what the story really was from it.
ReplyDeleteI loved the opening, however, and I wanted to keep reading. I was disappointed that there wasn't more, and that's a good thing!
Agent here!
ReplyDeleteI bid to read the first three chapters.
I bid four chapters.
ReplyDeleteHmm . . . Here's a bid to read the first half of the manuscript, however many chapters/pages that is. :-)
ReplyDeleteWeronika Janczuk
D4EO Literary
I bid the first half plus 1 page
ReplyDeleteThe first half plus one chapter. Ooooh-- gotcha Michelle!
ReplyDelete--LM
The Strothman Agency
ROTFL. :D
ReplyDelete42,000 words. Take that!!
ReplyDeleteWait, how many words is it?
ReplyDeleteSneaky! Can I bid for the full, or did Michelle (coughcheatercough) get it? Because I would like to win.
--Lauren MacLeod
The Strothman Agency
BIDDING ON THIS ITEM IS NOW CLOSED!
ReplyDeleteMichelle and Lauren, you will have to sit in separate corners until I figure out which of you has won.
:D
Come on, baby! Be 42,001 words!
ReplyDeleteI'm rooting for you, Lauren.
ReplyDeleteLOL.
ReplyDeleteCongrats to this author!!
Word from author: The novel is 85K. Lauren wins, fair and square. :)
ReplyDeleteI want to go to the country fair with Lauren MacLeod and bid on antiques. And cows.
ReplyDelete"Come on, baby! Be 42,001 words!"
*dies of laughter*
Hmm, I was going for a somewhere between 1/2 and 2/3 number guess anyway. I wasn't trying to end it there. But who started the chapters versus pages then switched to fractions?!?!
ReplyDeleteDon't you know, word count trumps all in the end. She will be mine.
And I think the word verification word: feduc will be my new curse word
Nice. My only nitpick comes with two vivid similes so close together.
ReplyDelete"like a bomb" then "like a boy". Separately, they're awesome. In close proximity, they're like throwing neon yellow over shocking purple. I think it might serve your intro better to mellow them a bit.
Love the logline--that's the kind of just-vague-enough, just-specific-enough thing that works well in cover copy.
ReplyDelete(Aside: interesting that we get two pregnancy tests in a row here.)
Great voice, nice moving the plot forward and making the reader feel what Maddy is feeling. Makes the reader curious to know what's up, who the pregnancy test is for (I'm assuming Maddy, but it could be one of her friends). I'm hooked.
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