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PW #228: YA Paranormal Comedy: ALEXIS VS THE AFTERLIFE

Monday, 2 November 2015  |  Posted by Brenda Drake

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Manuscript Status: 2 weeks delivery

Mentor Name: Tamara Mataya and JC Nelson
Mentee Name: Marcus Alexander Hart
Title: ALEXIS VS THE AFTERLIFE
Category: YA
Genre: Paranormal Comedy
Wordcount: 92,000

Pitch:

When seventeen-year-old former child star Alexis drops dead, she finds the afterlife disturbingly similar to her old sitcom. Monsters are real, and so is the nonsense TV magic she used to destroy them. But Alexis wants no part of fighting off a paranormal apocalypse until she falls for a ghostly Chinese cowgirl who gives her something worth fighting for.

Excerpt:

I slouched on a stool at the end of a Hollywood dive bar, feeding a sticky tumbler of peach schnapps to tomorrow’s hangover. I was lucky nobody ever checked my ID south of the Miracle Mile. Or maybe I just looked more burned out than any seventeen-year-old had a right to be.

A girl-and-boy twee pop duo were ukulele-and-tambourining their way through their set on a stage behind me. The drunks tried their best to tune them out, but the girl’s piercing warble refused to be ignored. Six acts were performing here tonight, each of us getting twenty-five bucks to show off our talents. Most were being grossly overpaid.

I shot the rest of my drink and signaled the bartender—a curvy brunette wearing a shirt cut so low it could have doubled as a tip jar. She looked playfully disappointed in me as she refilled my glass. “You might wanna cut back a little, girlfriend. Your bar tab is about to eclipse your gig payment.”

I shrugged. “Eh. No money, no problems.”

She raised a pierced eyebrow. “Tell you what, how ’bout I hold onto a few bucks and pick up a little something special for you?”

My heart raced at her wry smile. Was she… flirting? Holy crap, she was flirting! I sat up a little straighter and smiled. “Sure. What do you have in mind?”

“Some deodorant. You reek.”

Not flirting. Definitely not flirting.

 

Filed: Pitch Wars

5 Comments
  • Carrie Pestritto says:

    I absolutely love this! Please send the first 100 pages as a Word doc attachment to carrie@prospectagency.com, with the subject line “Pitch Wars Request.” Thank you and I look forward to reading more!

  • Leon Husock says:

    I’d like to see more! Please send a query + the full MS to leon@lperkinsagency (with Pitch Wars in the subject line), along with a one-sentence description of your book.

  • Laura Zats says:

    This is right up my alley! Please send a query (with #pitchwars in the title) as well as the first 100 pages to laura@redsofaliterary.com!

  • Moe Ferrara says:

    I love this and definitely want to see more. Please send the query + synopsis + First 50 pages (I know the question always asked — you can go to the end of a chapter, but no more than 60 pages!) in one word doc to MFsubmissions [at] bookendsliterary.com with “PitchWars Request – ALEXIS VS THE AFTERLIFE” as the subject. I can’t wait to take a look!

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