Query Guru (Speculative Thriller)

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The Query:

Dear [Agent],

[Personalization for agent.] THE SCENT OF A LIE is a dual-timeline thriller with speculative elements, complete at 99k words. Set in Northern California, New York City, and 1980s Prague, it combines the female-empowerment-through-time element of Sarah Penner’s THE LOST APOTHECARY, with the psi-power thrills of Robert J. Crane’s THE GIRL IN A BOX series.

KAT BECK, 27, can’t remember the night her father died. Or the ten years leading up to it. She survived their car careening off Devil’s Slide into the Pacific Ocean. But tequila and double espressos have become her constant companions—a way to avoid her grief and deal with the disassociation that comes with amnesia. And when her BFF calls a time-out, Kat resolves to detox, hunt down her memories, and mourn her father properly.

Chemical changes in her body during detox unleash a suppressed psi-power—empathic synesthesia. This power allows Kat to smell people’s emotions, laying bare their souls and triggering her memories. She’s devastated to discover the people closest to her have been lying to her. When she suddenly finds herself pursued by MATIN ZAKHAROV, a wealthy philanthropist and rumored Russian mafia boss, Kat fears for her life. She comes to suspect her memories can prove Zakharov killed her father. But Zakharov, who Kat apparently worked for, is facing jail time or worse without her psi-powered abilities. He doesn’t want her dead—he wants her back. As returning memories force Kat to accept that she willingly worked for a mob boss, she vows to make amends and avenge her father by ridding the world of his menace. She joins forces with a teen super hacker who has her own reasons for wanting to take Zakharov down. 

Throughout Kat’s flight from Zakharov, an alternating timeline reveals her memories won't be enough. Kat needs Zakharov's memories to understand why her father died and how she could have worked for such a monster. She finds out just how hard it is to seek truth and revenge at the same time. And if she wants to safeguard not only her own future but those of her psi-powered brethren, she has a choice to make.

[Bio]

Thank you for your consideration.

First of all, thank you to the author for sharing this with us. I really enjoyed this query. I’m always a fan of the character-with-memory-loss trope for a thriller. And I LOVE this unique speculative twist: Kat can smell people’s emotions, and this power helps as she tries to untangle the circumstances surrounding her father’s death and her potential involvement with the Russian mafia. Sign me up!

Also well done: we aren’t overwhelmed with too many character names in this query, so that’s good. FYI, your character names should not be in all-caps. That is the convention for a synopsis, not for the query letter.

Overall, it’s not a bad query letter. It certainly gives me specific details about the story, which you know I’m always begging querying writers to do. But here’s what I think could make this query better: