agent – R. J. Howell

The first batch of queries for Dead God’s Bones have officially been submitted! The novel has embarked upon its journey to agents and I am now, once more, wading into the query trenches. The number of submissions this time around is, quite honestly, small, but I’m trying a new approach to querying. With In Blood, I tended to shotgun query (even when they were personalized, they weren’t, per say, strategic). In the end, I submitted 43 queries, had two partials and one full request, but ultimately shelved the book.*

With DGB, I’m going for strategic. I am also trying damn hard to not only choose agents to submit to with intention and careful consideration of who and what they represent and what I, personally, am looking for in an agent, but to actually express this in the query letter itself. The letters are, by extension, taking a great deal longer to write, but I feel a more confident in the submission. With IB, I always feared I was pestering. With DGB, I have done my homework and chosen these agents specifically, so I feel less like I’m wasting their time. What will the end result be? I have no idea, but the immediate effect is that I feel more centered. So there’s that.

Fly, novel! Fly to inboxes! Fly and be read! And maybe garner a request or two!

In other news, still plugging away at the new novel. At 110K or so, and things have, necessarily, slowed. Because I need proper nouns. Like names. And locations. And words in this conlang I’ve been putting off semi-constructing. So! For the past week or so, I’ve been poking at phonetics and grammar and working on making it have a consistent “sound” so I can mash consonants and vowels together in a way that has an internal rational behind it so I can finally name some things. So far, I have letters and phonemes. Rules for what can and can’t follow certain things and what syllable you stress. Most of this will not be in the book, but I need to know something of it, otherwise, it’ll all be a garbled mess.

As for drafting, I’ve gotten to the point where the book starts drawing in some horror elements. My main character, Gev, has a sixth finger growing out of the back of his hand and can’t touch anyone, else he’ll curse them with extra unwanted digits sprouting from unexpected places. Soon, he’s off to meet the wizard in the magic, floating rock-castle-thing for a consultation. Drama will occur. The finger will be addressed. And then it’s smooth-sailing to the end of the book.

Well.

Smooth-sailing for me. For Gev? Not so much.

Also, have a potato-Gev, courtesy of a joke with a coworker that led to some spudsy doodling.

* This was not due to rejections, but rather, a new understanding that, really, that book, as much as I love it, had little marketability and wasn’t up to snuff, not for publishing. So it has been shelved, but fondly.

Beyond the Stars: Infinite Expanse has hit shelves (or, at least, Amazon) and we’re already #1 bestseller for new releases in the Science Fiction Anthologies category! Infinite Expanse will be available until the end of August at the sale price of only 99¢, or free with Kindle Unlimited.

“This popular anthology includes 11 brand new tales from familiar names as well as a couple of stunning debut writers. Don’t miss their mind-blowing stories of alien encounters, space battles, and epic empires in the latest volume of this prestigious space opera series.

Join us, as we take you on a voyage through…the Infinite Expanse.”

And as a taster, here’s the first page or so of my story, “Oresa” about intergalactic espionage agent Threnody Winters and her mission to bring hope to a dead planet:

According to her employers, Threnody Winters carried hope in her hands.
To her, it just looked like a sample canister. And after four interstellar jumps, six local space transfers, countless station layovers, and lines—oh, so many lines—she was starting to wish she could put the damn thing down.
She heaved her side-satchel onto the duraplastic table. The customs officer—a middle-aged person with short-cropped hair, red-brown skin, and station coveralls—popped the magnetic seals on the bag and started passing their hand-scanner through Threnody’s luggage.
The bag had started out crammed, the seals strained to bursting. A change of clothes, toiletries, an insta-shower box complete with shampoo compatible with most station hygiene units, data chips with preloaded books and an immersive city builder simulator (Watch Your Utopia Grow in Real-Time!), petty cash chits in every mainstream denomination for the vending bots, an expanding pocket tent, and lightweight bedding—everything one might need for a layover in a station port.
Now? Now she could probably leave it in a shuttle kiosk station and wouldn’t miss it. At least she didn’t have the tent anymore; that had been confiscated by the hostel on Ophi Station. She’d figured she’d lose it, but not before the halfway point in her journey.
So close. So close to delivering her burden. So close to completing this job. One last local space tug and then…
“—to declare?”
Threnody blinked. “What?”
“I said, do you have anything to declare?” A quick scan of the officer’s face with her optical interface implants pulled up their public ’net profile. Which was scant. They hadn’t selected a gender identifier, sticking with the default undisclosed, and their name was under a privacy lock. So much for the personal connection approach.
Threnody held up the canister. “Sample capsule. For research purposes.”
The officer tapped their scanner-headset, aimed the scanner-pad hand at the canister. And scowled. No doubt displaying glitchy data, courtesy of the scrambler integrated along the backside of Threnody’s belt.
They tapped the scanner again, then huffed. “We’ll need to inspect it. For contraband.”
“Contraband,” Threnody said, injecting every syllable with bewildered disdain.
“Could you place the item on the table…”
“Oresa” by R.J. Howell, Beyond the Stars: Infinite Expanse