Sample Pitch

Here's a sample pitch for my novel "Doleful Creatures." I'm seriously thinking about entering Amazon's Breakthrough Novel contest. I don't have a ghost of a chance. But I'm going to do it anyway. What do you think of this pitch? What is it missing?

Jarrod is a murderer. Cold-blooded, the badger says. Sang as only a magpie can, glorious over the corpses of the beavers slaughtered in the box canyon above Purdy Farm. Watch him, young ones, and beware. For there is another who will use that evil amongst us to bring the creeping fungus black of death to this peaceful place, if we are not watchful. The marmots? They're simple, innocent folk, looking to take Purdy Farm into modern times. And for everyone's benefit.

Ware the murder of crows. They proclaim the magpie' s innocence. They distrust the industrious, prosperous marmots and their grand plans. They are allied with the evil that comes on the starlings' wings. Death they mean for us, if we welcome them and their news. We'll see the satyrs' dance and hear the owls hoot, if Jarrod is freed from his isolation.

Then freedom comes. But on the wings of sparrows and at the behest of the one who notes the sparrow's fall. The inhabitants of the barn and wood at Purdy Farm learn who the true DOLEFUL CREATURES are.

REVISION NO 1:

Jarrod is a murderer. Cold-blooded, the badger says. Sang as only a magpie can, glorious over the corpses of the beavers slaughtered in the box canyon above Purdy Farm. Watch him, young ones, and beware. For there is another who will use that evil amongst us to bring the creeping fungus black of death to this peaceful place, if we are not watchful. The marmots? They're simple, innocent folk, looking to take Purdy Farm into modern times. And for everyone's benefit.

Ware the murder of crows. They proclaim the magpie' s innocence. They distrust the industrious, prosperous marmots and their grand plans. They are allied with the evil that comes on the starlings' wings. Death they mean for us, if we welcome them and their news. We'll see the satyrs' dance and hear the owls hoot, if Jarrod is freed from his isolation.

Then freedom comes. Jarrod escapes his isolation on the wings of sparrows. At the behest of the one who notes the sparrow's fall, Jarrod awkwardly leads the animals of wood and farm to stop the evil they bear within and proves to the badgers the past they remember is not the past that was. The inhabitants of the barn and wood at Purdy Farm learn who the true DOLEFUL CREATURES are.

REVISION NO 2:

Jarrod is a murderer. Cold-blooded, the badger says. Sang as the magpie he is, glorious over the corpses of the beavers slaughtered in the box canyon above Purdy Farm. Watch him, young ones, and beware. For there is another who will use that evil to bring the creeping fungus black of death to this peaceful place, if we are not watchful. The marmots? They're simple, innocent folk, looking to take Purdy Farm into modern times. And for everyone's benefit.

Ware the murder of crows. They proclaim the magpie' s innocence. They distrust the industrious, prosperous marmots and their grand plans. They are allied with the evil that comes on the starlings' wings. Death they mean for us, if we welcome them and their news. We'll see the satyrs' dance and hear the owls hoot, if Jarrod is freed from his isolation.

Then freedom comes. Jarrod escapes his isolation on the wings of sparrows. At the behest of the one who notes the sparrow's fall, Jarrod awkwardly leads the animals of wood and farm to stop the evil they bear within and proves to the badgers the past they remember is not the past that was. The inhabitants of the barn and wood at Purdy Farm learn who the true DOLEFUL CREATURES are.