Query Draft #3487

Not really, but sometimes it feels like it. I decided that due to my high word count and the fact that my MC's ages range between 17 and 24, I am going to tailor my query to the New Adult category rather than Young Adult. I know, I know, some agents don't accept NA as a category yet but luckily for me there's at least one at GUTGAA that does. So what do I need from my dozen or so readers? I need you guys to crit this new draft with a quickness. Because unless I am mistaken, the GUTGAA Pitch Contest entries start at 11am tomorrow. Which means I have tonight to get this new draft into better shape.

*gulp*

I opened up comments so that anyone can post their thoughts, even if you don't have a blog or Google ID. I know this was a problem for some people before. Let me know what you think of the new draft and the first 150 words that are not the prologue.

Things I changed:

• I tried to condense it more since it was a bit on the long side. However, now I feel like it is too vague.
• I tried to tighten up the first paragraph.
• I replaced the first 150 words with Chapter One instead of the Prologue.
• I tried to make it more obvious that Zelene is also a MC and not just random pronoun thrown at the reader.
• I tried to add a bit more about why the bad guys have the right ideas but wrong methods. 
• I took out the bit about the girls finding a way to come into their own power and rescue Ariana before time runs out. 
• No prologue since apparently they are the devil.

Dear (Agent),

Prophecies are overrated. Ariana thinks that they are no different than the horoscopes in the back of Seventeen Magazine. She doesn’t realize that the pentacle-shaped birthmark on her wrist mark her as the fifth daughter of the most powerful bloodline in all the worlds foretold in an ancient prophecy. 

Ariana leads a normal life for a seventeen year old; ignorant of the sisters she has been separated from since birth. She has never even crossed paths with her twin sister Zelene. Zelene is quite the opposite of Ariana with a life that belongs in the plot of the most tragic of Lifetime movies. The twins know nothing of Estridia, the world of their birth, or the war that has been raging on for generations that they are destined to end. But they are about to find out.

Ariana is captured by enemies that intend to sacrifice her in order to gain her power and destroy the caste system the worlds follow. Zelene is taken back to Estridia where a loving family welcomes her and she is reunited with the three other girls of her generation. Together they make up the prophesized five, but without Ariana as the fifth they are doomed to fail. But when they find that the good guys are proving to be not so good and the bad guys seem to have the wrong methods but the right ideas, where does that leave them?

HEIRS OF WAR, PROPHECY ORDAINED is a new adult fantasy novel with elements of suspense, action, political intrigue, and romance. Fans of the SWORD OF TRUTH series might also enjoy HEIRS OF WAR, PROPHECY ORDAINED.

 
Thank you for your time and consideration with this project.

First 150:

The football stadium was still littered with kids when Varrick got there. His chest lifted as he sucked in a breath and suppressed a growl at the same time. This part of his job always frustrated him. He understood that Ariana was seventeen and therefore entitled to a certain amount of angst, but he hated having to deal with it. They had bigger problems to deal with. Of course, she was blissfully ignorant of them.

He scanned the stadium through his dark sunglasses, trying to assess where she would be. A group of girls were running on the track that encircled the grass of the stadium, ponytails bouncing as they chatted with one another. When he noticed the cheerleaders edging the track, he knew where she would be and marched over.

He cocked a brow as the girls began chanting in time with their moves. Sure enough, directly in front of them in the stands stood Ariana with camera in hand, snapping away pictures.