Tuesday, September 11, 2012

The Pitch (Can anybody tell me how to improve it?)

The Darkness of the Womb

Speculative fiction
62,000 Words




Unborn child, Aiden Haunt, is destined to be the messiah. There’s only one problem. He doesn’t want to be born. As he rests in his mother’s womb, he dreams all day on the Tree of Life where he sees his future and wants no part of it. So he throws himself from the tree, only to be saved by one of the many storks that inhabit this world called the Internal Landscape. The Landscape is a dangerous place governed by Lords Imagination, Logic, Purpose, and Instinct. It exists within all people at the center of the human brain. 

Meanwhile, in the world we live in outside the mind, Jeff and Marigold Haunt are first-time, soon-to-be-parents in their late 40s. This baby means everything to them as Marigold has suffered miscarriage after miscarriage over the years. But ever since she became pregnant, Marigold has been hearing voices, and after a dangerous fall down the stairs, she lands brain dead in a coma. This leaves Jeff heartbroken at losing the love of his life. He commits suicide.

But death is not the end. Both Marigold and Jeff are now caught in the Internal Landscape along with their unborn child, Aiden, who is being held captive by Lord Imagination. Aiden still wants no part of being born, and if not for Imagination keeping him asleep until his parents reach him, the child would have miscarried himself long ago. Imagination wants the parents to convince Aiden to want to be born, since Marigold’s body is still alive, even if her brain isn’t. 

Lord Logic doesn’t want this to happen. Forever rivals with Lord Imagination, she fears what the fate of mankind could be if Imagination promotes this child to be a messiah. Banding with Lord Purpose, she fights to stop the parents from ever reaching their child, but what can stop a mother’s love? 

Opening words


Aiden Haunt turned over in his cradle.
He dug his cheek into his pillow and pulled up his blanket to shelter himself from the whistling breeze and hide from the birds circling below him around the Tree of Life.
From the tree grew a million limbs, and on each rocked cradles. Enormous birds circled the tree and picked up the babies when their mothers were ready to give birth to them.
It was on the highest limb that gently rocked Aiden’s cradle that the gargantuan bird with the gangling legs, spindly neck, and a bill just as long came to perch. Aiden couldn’t see the bird because his eyes were closed, but he felt its presence weigh down on the branch. The bird was early; several months so, actually, but Aiden had known this day would come

3 comments:

Nicole Zoltack said...

Your query is too much like a synopsis. You need to simplify. Stick to the MC, his goals, obstacles, the consequences, and the stakes.

Rich Knight said...

Thank you so much.

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