What We Harvest
BY ann fraistatdelacorte2022Query Letter
Sixteen-year-old Wren owes everything she has to her hometown, Hollow’s End, a place where miracles sprout in the soil and the wheat on her family farm shimmers in rainbow-kissed waves. She’s never questioned the magic beneath her feet—not until a silver-dark blight slithers up from the earth and begins corrupting one farm after another. Crops drip with eerie quicksilver, and infected animals and people disappear into the woods, coming back feral with rotting bodies and white-fogged eyes.
On the same day that Wren’s own farm falls prey to the blight, her parents go missing. Now, the only one she can turn to is the last person she wants to call: her boy-next-door ex. Struggling to trust each other again, they must race to save her home. But soon, Wren starts coughing black mold, and a dark whisper urges her into the forest. Unless they can discover the root of the blight, it will swallow Wren whole.
Yet the more Wren uncovers about its origin, the more the secrets and sins of her own family rise to the surface. With a home built on broken bones, their only chance for a future hinges on Wren destroying everything she’s ever loved—including the miraculous town she’d give anything to protect.
QUICKSILVER HARVEST is a YA dark contemporary fantasy/horror, complete at 68,000 words, and will appeal to fans of Wilder Girls and The Devouring Gray. Both QUICKSILVER HARVEST and my previous manuscript, OLIVE MCKNIGHT: PROFESSIONAL EXORCIST, were Pitch Wars selections in 2019 and 2018, respectively. I’ve also co-authored several plays, including Romeo & Juliet: Choose Your Own Ending, published by Playscripts, Inc., as well as alternate reality games funded by the National Science Foundation.
Thanks so much for your time and consideration!
About
Age Range
Young Adult
Genre
Horror
Word Count
79,000
Book Link
https://www.getunderlined.com/books/673233/what-we-harvest-by-ann-fraistat/
Agent
Christa Heschke
Query Stats
Number of Queries Sent
34
Number of Full Requests Received
20
Number of Offers of Representation
8
Number of Months Spent Querying This Novel
1 month
Number of Manuscripts Queried Before This One
1
Publication Status of The Book Queried
Published (Big 5)
Note to Querying Writers:
I think it's definitely worth noting that What We Harvest (formerly known as Quicksilver Harvest) was a Pitch Wars 2019 book and did well in the showcase, which hugely influenced the agent response and how quickly everything moved.