Wilde's Fire Writing Contest

Have you heard of Sharon yet? She's an amazing author and blogger who devotes valuable time to helping other writers. I highly recommend you add The Blue Word to your list of blogs to stalk. I've gotten to know her through some of my other writer buddies, and the resources she posts about on her blog are fantastic. Not to mention the super exciting fact that she just signed a publishing deal!

And true to character she's spreading the love and opening up her own contest.  It's all based around the release of Wilde's Fire by Krystal Wade. I haven't gotten to read it yet, but it sounds amazing.

(Ha Ha! Take that Egyptian internet, I managed to get the picture on here through all your attempts to thwart me!)  :)

For this contest I need to post my query letter and the first 500 words of my novel, AMPED. There will be a few rounds of critiquing with other contestants to get everything in the best shape possible and then they will be judged by Krystal Wade, an editor from Curiosity Quills Press.

This is a great opportunity for me, and I can't wait to read all the other posts! Feel free to leave comments and suggestions about my post. I have three days to make adjustments before submitting.

Here we go....


Query

Seventeen-year-old Avery Lancaster worries she might be crazy.

When an asteroid collides with the sun, a purple solar flare erupts across the sky. Now Avery has visions when she’s touched. She has no idea what these images mean, and she’s not the only one with a new, freaky ability. Teenagers everywhere are becoming Amped.   

The Flare Research Center is formed, and flare victims are brought in for “their own” safety.  They’re not calling it a prison sentence, but Avery has no intention of being used as a science experiment. She and her friends flee into the mountains of Colorado before they can be captured.

Hounded by FRC agents, they find another group of runaways hiding in an abandoned mine. Now Avery is surrounded by kids whose eyes glow purple and orange. They can scale walls, detect metal and cast the room into silence.  

Their Amps help them stay hidden from FRC agents combing the mountains. But hiding isn’t enough. They must learn why the Flare only affected teenagers. When they discover the military rigged the Flare to create an army of Amped soldiers, they form a plan to bring the whole system down.

In order to stop the FRC, Avery must face her greatest fear; embracing her Amp. If she doesn’t learn to harness her power, she may lose more than her sanity. She may lose her life.

AMPED is  a young adult science fiction novel complete at 76,000 words.

First 500 words

I can’t stop imagining how things would be different, if I’d never looked up.

The last mile of my bike ride takes me down a country road lined with verdant pine trees. I take a deep breath, and lean my head back so the breeze lifts the sweat-dampened hair from my shoulders.

It's exhilarating to close my eyes and trust the bike and the dirt beneath me. The bike takes control and I glide like a bird on the updraft. Seven seconds of uncertainty, then I open my eyes. Squinting through wind and sunlight, my house appears through the foliage. Tucked into the pocket of Mt. Lamborn, we live in the pint size town of Paonia,Colorado. The house, like the town is surrounded by trees; huddling, emerald sentries.

            A persistent chirp escapes my backpack as I pedal up the driveway. I swing a leg over the bar, and dig the iPhone from my pocket. The photo on the screen is a woman with wavy chestnut hair in a sun hat, blowing a kiss.

            "Hey mom." My mood brightens as I answer the phone. 

            "I got your text, what did Cameron say?" Her voice is breathless; she must have had to run for the train again. If she misses the last shuttle she’s screwed, I don’t have a car.

            "He’s coming home tonight. His class tomorrow got cancelled."

            "Did he say what time?  Do we have enough food? What does he want for dinner?" Her questions spill out like a bag of rice ripped at the seams.

              A shriek from the woods steals my focus, and my eyes are drawn to the enormous oak tree near our front porch.

             "Avery, are you there?” she asks.        

              A hawk soars out of the tree into the air. Russet wings shimmer inthe sky. My eyes follow its' flight, breathless, as I watch the hawk swoop and glide towards the sun.

            Just as I turn my head and look up, the sun explodes. Purple streaks of light rush at me like a tidal wave of electrical current. The handle of the bike slips from my grasp, and my eyes sear with pain. Electricity surges to my fingertips and the light burns into my brain with such intensity, I'm sure I'm dying, already dead, burning, crying, there is nothing but the pain, no pain like this before, pain until the end of time. No cohesive thoughts, a muddle of color and fire swirl in my mind.

My thoughts are sucked down a drainpipe as the purple light recedes, followed by an orange afterglow striking my befuddled senses like a bell, ringing, resonating and I'm sliding, sinking, drowning. Everything is black and I’m gone.

Hope you enjoy this bite size morsel of AMPED and it leaves you wanting more!  :)