Aces Wild

BY amanda dewitt

peachtree teen

2022

Query Letter

Some people join chess club, some people play football. Jack Shannon runs a secret blackjack ring in the school’s basement. What else is the son of a Las Vegas casino mogul supposed to do?

Everything starts falling apart when Jack’s mom is arrested for their family’s ties to organized crime. His sister Beth thinks this is the Shannon family’s chance to finally go straight, but Jack knows that something’s not right. His mom was sold out, and he knows by who. Peter Carlevaro: rival casino owner, mobster, jilted lover (gross).

Jack hatches a plan to break into Carlevaro’s inner sanctum and find what Carlevaro is holding over his mom’s head, but he’s going to need help. He recruits his closest friends, his online asexual support group, to form his team. All he needs to do is infiltrate a secret high stakes poker ring, save his mom, and dodge any dark secrets about his family he’d rather not know, all while hopelessly navigating what it means to be in love while asexual. All before the end of the summer. Easy, right?

ACES WILD is a contemporary YA novel with an asexual main character and a non-binary love interest. With the action of HEIST SOCIETY meets 21: BRINGING DOWN THE HOUSE, and the quirky humor of A GENTLEMAN’S GUIDE TO VICE AND VIRTUE, it’s completed at 78,000 words and intended to be a standalone novel.

About

Age Range

Young Adult

Genre

Contemporary Fiction

Word Count

78,000

Book Link

https://bookshop.org/p/books/aces-wild-a-heist-amanda-dewitt/17812545

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Query Stats

Number of Offers of Representation

2

Number of Months Spent Querying This Novel

15 months

Years Spent Writing Before Getting an Offer

6

Number of Manuscripts Queried Before This One

More than 3

Publication Status of The Book Queried

Published (Independent /Boutique / Indy Publisher)

Years Spent Writing Before This Book was Published

7