Furry Writers' Guild Forum

Novel Query Letter: "Thousand Tales"

Critique
#1

Dear Forum, enclosed please savage find my query letter… EDIT: Now on a fourth draft; see below instead!
I’ve finally got a draft I’m happy with; see below, FYI.

[s]Dear (Editor Name):

“Thousand Tales: How We Won the Game” is a complete, hard science fiction novel about 90,000 words long. It’s a sequence of linked stories about the rise a mad yet friendly AI, and the people who fight to serve or defeat her.

In near-future America, young Paul Halkias has simple ambitions: finish his conscript labor period, go to MIT, marry his brilliant friend Linda Decatur, and become a great engineer. When he lashes out at a mugger, he’s forced into strange anger management therapy: “Thousand Tales”, a popular new computer game. Its AI, Ludo, befriends him and offers some real-world quests. Before long he’s gone to jail, been declared legally dead, and had his brain sliced and scanned to let him live in Ludo’s virtual-reality paradise. Linda is left to choose between her political career and a life of struggle against the fun-obsessed AI who wants everyone else’s brain, too. Meanwhile, the uploaded Paul discovers that even Ludo’s Eden has snakes, and becomes her “knight” in the form of a world-hopping griffin. We meet one of Ludo’s creators on the run on Korea, a young mad scientist on a sea colony ruled by “Free Texas”, a Ukrainian hacker exploring the limits of transhumanism, a joyous griffin-girl native to the game world, and other people inspired to rewrite the stories that define them. In the end, Paul and Linda fight to defend the digital goddess while deciding whether each of them should live on Earth, in virtual heaven, or among the stars.

I am an experienced writer with one novel self-published, another out through a small press, and a few short stories sold, now seeking to break into the professional market.

Thank you for your time.

Kris Schnee[/s]

(End of letter. By way of explanation, the book consists of nine or so novellas and short stories covering a period of around five years of future history. Paul and Linda are the main characters but there are several other POVs. The characters interact enough that there’s one overall plot arc. I tried to convey that above, but am uncertain about the wording because this novel’s structure is unusual.)

#2

Latest draft:
Paul is a young conscript laborer in Arizona, headed for MIT to join his girlfriend Linda, but an Artificial Intelligence called Ludo wants him as her knight.

He’s brash enough to answer a dying girl’s plea for help, to get her brain scanned into Ludo’s virtual reality paradise. Soon he’s jailed for it. Ludo rescues him, but only by uploading him to her world.

Paul’s now a griffin in digital Eden, snakes included. He and his native AI mate explore their new home, helping others stay sane despite having utopia. His attempts to talk Linda into joining him backfire. She ditches her political career, abandons America, and desperately builds real-life alternatives to the machine-ruled future Ludo offers.

Paul has to change her mind. If everyone uploads like his computer goddess wants, it means humanity goes extinct, but it’s the good kind of apocalypse. Unfortunately for Paul and Linda, Ludo’s not the only one with big plans for AI technology.

THOUSAND TALES: HOW WE WON THE GAME is a hard science fiction novel about 90,000 words long. It’s structured as a set of linked stories with several perspectives, focusing on the stories of Paul and Linda.

#3

When an AI offers to dissect volunteers’ brains and send their minds to a virtual-reality utopia, idealistic student Paul signs up, finding that the AI needs guides in her own world and defenders outside it.

Paul wakes up in the AI’s virtual world. Linda, the girlfriend he left behind at MIT, says he chose a life of pointless bliss instead of becoming an engineer and a political reformer like her. Paul tries to talk her into joining him, since she can still have personal growth and meaningful choices, but he only frightens her. Rejected, Paul ignores Earth to serve the AI, accepting her as a benevolent goddess.

Paul helps the AI open a grand exposition, where she’ll show the world that she’s curing poverty, disease and death. Linda joins a high-tech company to show humanity there’s no need for digital gods… because she’s exposed that the US government has its own, frightening one. Paul and Linda must work together when this rival AI turns violent, threatening both Paul’s world and Linda’s hope for a human-ruled future.

#4

(Offered FYI. I think this one’s usable. I could still use another round of advice on my synopsis if anyone’s willing though.)

Dear Name:

Arrested for killing a girl he actually tried to save, idealistic student Paul escapes with the help of Ludo, an Artificial Intelligence who dissects volunteers’ brains to send their minds into a virtual-reality utopia.

Paul wakes up in the AI’s virtual world, where only cameras or robots can let him see the real Earth again. He tries to talk Linda, the girlfriend he left behind, into joining him. She says he’s chosen a meaningless fantasy life ruled by a power-hungry machine that could rewrite his mind. Rejected, Paul serves Ludo by helping other virtual residents find fulfilling lives. He comes to accept Ludo as a goddess worth fighting for.

Ludo gets competition when Linda makes brain-scanning technology open-source, by exposing a murderous government AI they both fear. Paul helps build a grand exposition where Ludo can persuade humanity she’s offering heaven, while Linda offers a different future vision: privately run spaceflight. At the exposition, the government’s machine launches attacks that threaten the real and virtual worlds’ freedom, forcing Paul and Linda to decide what victory means for them.

“Thousand Tales: How We Won the Game” is a 88,000 word science fiction novel. It tells ten linked stories of the AI’s friends and enemies with varying perspectives, focusing on the tale of Paul and Linda.

Thank you for your time.