Saturday, October 20, 2012

Spooktacular Pitch #43: OF FIRE AND SHADOW

Background came from this design.


Title: OF FIRE AND SHADOW
Genre: YA Urban Fantasy
Word Count: 64,000 words

3 line Pitch:

Sixteen-year-old Talitha's body turns into smoke, and for two battling factions she is of prime interest. Both want her to locate a vessel that can turn the tide of battle for either side. One grants her control over her power, the other will save her friend.


First 250:

My mother died a week ago. Smoke inhalation, the coroner’s report said.

The problem: there was no fire.

The cause: my freakish powers. Not that I could admit it, unless I wanted to become a science experiment, or thrown in jail.

I leaned against the rough brick wall of the lawyer’s office and nearly crossed my arms, except something across the road caught my eye.

The shadows there were oddly darker than the midday sun warranted, as if they had swallowed the very ground. Goosebumps prickled down my neck.

I stepped away from the wall, intrigued by the shadows.

Something, or someone, stood in the shadows across the street. I squinted, trying to overcome the glare of sunlight off towering office buildings. The figure swayed like branches caught in a breeze. My eyebrows furrowed as I stepped into the gutter, ignoring the cars blurring past. The shadows writhed and crept towards the buildings away from my direction, the figure moving in their safety.

“Talitha?” I spun and faced my grandma’s inquiring face. She’d finished inside the lawyer’s office—finished with the aftermath of my failure. I swallowed hard and glanced back at the shadowed trees and sidewalk. They were normal.

“Everything sorted?” I asked, and shook my head to clear it. It wasn’t the first time I’d seen the writhing shadows. But it was the first I’d seen a figure.

She squinted at me through her round glasses. “Yes.”

Grandma thought I was too young to know about all the legal affairs involved with my guardianship.

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