[QCrit] Adult Dark Fantasy, 75k, Carve

Dear (Agent)

I am writing to you because(personalize).

Carve is a fantasy novel(75 000 words) with dark fairytale elements similar to Holly Blacks ‘The Darkest Part of the Forest’, and a peculiar protagonist reminiscent of that in ‘Human Croquet’ by Kate Atkinson.

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Queen Idora occasionally daydreams of watching her kingdom burn.

She is not the ruler her people need, nor the wife her husband wants. Living in the shadow of the Carve, a great chasm splitting their world in two, she is a subject to her King and his ambitions of crossing it.

When the stranger arrives, a Mage long awaited, it seems even the monsters which thrive on the Carve's mysterious influence won’t stand in the way of the Kings conquest. But as a banquet takes a dark turn and blood is spilled before an audience of stuporous guests, Idora realizes she is the only one who can see the truth of Mage Marten. But his mischief doesn’t go unnoticed, and soon people look to their eccentric Queen to lay fault. Concerned with what else they may find, whether it be the truth behind the Kings timely bouts of sickness, or the creature that sometimes visits her from her bathtub, Idora finds an unlikely ally in Marten himself. Struggling with what may be love or bewitchment, she must discover his intentions, and who he really is.

To protect herself, to protect her secrets, Idora's actions begins taking on increasingly fatal consequences. She’s always known the monsters, hunted almost to extinction, aren’t the greatest threat to the Kingdom. Soon she sees that the threat may not lie with the stranger either. For as the blame for the increasingly bizarre things accosting her people falls more and more on her, Idora can’t help but wonder. They could be right.