Team Mónica #6 -- THE FAMILY VYGIL

THE FAMILY VYGIL

MG Magical Realism

56,000 words

Query:

Jonathan Vygil is convinced he has the strangest parents ever. And he’d be right, but for all the wrong reasons. They aren’t obsessed with rescuing exotic animals – they’re busy saving monsters.

After turning twelve, Jonathan begins hearing disembodied voices that make him wonder if he’s going nuts. Spurred by their urgent cries for help, he ventures into prohibited areas of the Vygil mansion where he passes out cold when he’s frightened by Tertulius, a genuine monster. Later, once his parents assure him he isn’t crazy, Jonathan hears them out as they explain monsters aren’t make-believe or evil. He then joins the Vygil Pact, his family’s secret society that ensures the protection of all monsterdom. To become a full-fledged member, he must train with Tertulius where he'll learn why the existence of monsters is vital to all life on Earth.

But before his instruction begins, Tertulius disappears and Jonathan hurdles headlong into a frantic search for his guide. Through his journey, Jonathan realizes many people desire the rare creatures his family protects. The most perilous among them is The Plague, a family as intent on destroying the monsters as the Vygils are to save them. If Jonathan fails to find Tertulius in time, The Plague will go seeking out their next victims – his parents.

First page:

Jonathan dreaded this time of the year. He’d already wasted most of his afternoon battling the ravaging hordes instead of doing chores. Their blood lust was unquenchable. No matter how many times they were caught and dispatched, they came back for more.

Suddenly, Jonathan was attacked from behind. He swatted the enemy with all his might and tallied his latest kill. “993,” he said, flicking the dead mosquito from his neck.

Sweat trickled into Jonathan’s eyes, causing them to sting. In mid September in Georgia, the temperature still hovered around 90 degrees and the air was thick. If the heat wasn’t reason enough to work up a sweat, trying to protect his precious blood supply was. The mosquitoes plagued the town, which made the thought of going outside unbearable. Jonathan didn’t have the luxury of hiding indoors, though. Outside responsibilities needed his attention, per his mother’s instructions. Like a dutiful son, he braved the outdoors to take care of the tasks. But dutiful didn’t mean a fair amount of grumbling hadn’t been involved.

He crouched down in his mother’s garden pulling out stubborn weeds while the merciless sun beat down on his back. It was as though Mother Nature was baking cookies and left the oven door wide open. The cicadas overhead made the pine trees vibrate with their singing. Jonathan desperately wanted to finish up so he could get out of the muggy heat, but his mind strayed far from the task at hand.

Team Mónica #5 -- UNANSWERED

UNANSWERED

YA urban fantasy

83,000 words

Query:

When Sophie helps new-boy-at-school Hugh Kedoa, the last thing she expects is for him to claim he’s a Reddo, a being with infinite knowledge who can answer any question in the world. He offers her five answers in return for her kindness, but when Sophie finally takes his offer and asks her dearest question—does she have a true love?—Hugh can’t answer. So much for infinite knowledge.

Sure, the Kedoas believe something about Sophie’s phrasing stumped Hugh, but none of them can explain the strange connection that suddenly forms between her and Hugh. It doesn’t help that the more Sophie gets tangled in the Reddos’ world, the more guarded Hugh becomes around her. After she befriends the rest of the Kedoas, she learns that a power-hungry businessman with a vendetta is hunting them. He discovered how to kill Reddos and take their most dangerous ability for himself. Caught between a family she can’t help but care about and their merciless hunter, Sophie makes choices that expose secrets, start fires (literally), and put her in the path of the man who can destroy both her and the Reddos’ world.

First page:

The shadow in the forest flinched. At least Sophie thought it did.

She edged to her left to get a better look at it, ignoring the squelch that arose when she wrenched her boot from the mud. For a full two minutes she had scrutinized this shadow, the human-like shape that had appeared off this trail at Ellery Wildlife Preserve. If it ended up being a tree, she’d feel like an idiot for lingering in the woods so late in the evening, inspecting illusions. Her boss was probably going to skin her alive for taking so long already.

But if this shadow was a person, something about its stance made Sophie think its eyes were on her. Watching her.

She tilted her head to blink away the downpour. Her gaze froze on a trail of boot prints.

They originated at the edge of the path and disappeared into the green-tinged fog that had consumed the forest.

Sophie’s eyes traced the zigzag tread stamped into the mud. Her breath seized in her chest. Footprints couldn’t start at the edge of the trail, unless someone had dropped out of the sky into the preserve. And Ellery had closed to everyone except the preservation crew half an hour ago. 

Sophie peered up at the shadow—or, more likely, trespasser—again.

“Who’s there?” she called out, grateful that the wind muffled the quaver in her voice. “Uh, the preserve is closed!”

That sounded especially pitiful, even for her.

Team Mónica #4 -- ANOMALY

ANOMALY

YA Futuristic Thriller

68,000 words

Query:

Sloan's not a killer. So when she’s the next seventeen-year-old to get her brain scanned for the government initiative, Project Reform, she never expects to end up in the Desolate, an island full of teens marked as future killers.

On the island, Sloan makes a reluctant friend in her roommate, Fallon, who has a general dislike for every human except her boyfriend--the one guy Sloan hates most. When Fallon transforms into a programmed killer, Sloan believes she’s been brainwashed and hatches a plan to rescue her from the notorious Dark Hill, a prison on the island for the worst of the worst. 

As if that weren't enough to keep her toes curling in her sneakers, Sloan goes on the run with Fallon’s arrogant boyfriend and discovers that he knows more about Killer Island than he’s saying. As Sloan tries to fight a dangerous attraction to him, they stumble onto a plot against the government and find a drug that’s turning the teens on the island into actual killers.

Sloan has a decision to make--save herself or save humanity.

First page:

 

I wasn't a killer, so I had no reason to be nervous about the brain scan, but something tugged at me, something raw and unknown about today.

My hand shook as I reached for my locker. I flexed my fingers, willing the shakes to stop.

Relax, Sloan. But I couldn't. Not yet.

Someone yelled in the congested corridor, cutting off the words rotating in my head. Voices squawked and shrilled in the hallway, like flocks of birds let out of their cages.

I slammed my fist against the door. Why couldn't it just close on the first try?

"Locker close." It gaped open, like a mouth during a scream.

"Close locker?"

It always did this when I was late for class. You'd think I'd remember the correct voice command after three years. I glanced down at my clear wrist-phone.    

"Time?"

The numbers 8:01 AM hovered above my wrist in electric blue, while an ad for Coke Pure projected into the air beside it, then disappeared.

"Locker shut," I growled.

The door closed at a sluggish pace.

Hurried footsteps clomped behind me. I turned and saw my friend and resident gossipmonger, Jasmine, barreling down the hall in tight blue neon pants and hover boots, elbowing people in her way. "Sloan!"

“What?” I said. "Did you finally reach your gossip quota?"

"Smart ass." She leaned against the plastic doors and wrapped a lock of her pink hair around her finger. Her expression grew serious, the lines in her forehead crinkling slightly. “Zege didn't pass his brain scan.”