Either twelve-year-old Cat Brökkenwier has lost her last marble or she really does see ogres and faeries walking around in broad daylight. Fortunately – or maybe not – Cat isn’t imagining these faerie-folk. With the help of an ancient diary and an even more ancient dryad, she learns the fae were real but they mixed with humans over the centuries so now they look just like us. Cat can spot the fae-born because she’s one of them. Oh, and this “fae-dar” proves she has royal blood, which makes her a candidate to become the last Princess of the Fae.
But Cat isn’t the only candidate. Her quest to learn more about the fae-born gets sketchy when she meets Prince Bone-Breaker, a goblin changeling who doesn’t intend to let some stupid girl steal “his” crown. Bitter because his real parents abandoned him, the goblin boy uses his changeling magic to make anyone he touches adore him, and if Cat doesn’t back down her little brother will be his next victim. Now Cat must choose between protecting her family or becoming the princess and stopping the wanna-be prince from brainwashing all of the fae-born and turning them into an army ... to destroy the filthy humans who ruined his life.
Complete at 63,000 words, THE LAST PRINCESS is a stand-alone middle grade contemporary fantasy with series potential.
P1, S1-2 - I don't think you need the first two lines. If you were doing an 'are these things real or am I crazy?' story, yes, but you tell us the Fae are real in sentence 2.
P1, S3 - We don't see anything about the diary or dryad after sentence 3, which makes me think they're not important to the query. Maybe keep one and give us a little more on how it helped Cat learn the Fae are real. I'd say intro the character, tell us she's discovered Fae are real, and go from there.
P2, S2 - The book's title is The Last Princess, you've told us Cat is a candidate to become Princess of the Fae, but now we're being introduced to a male character also in the running. There's a conflict there. I know what you mean - that he'd be Prince and not Princess, but the writing needs to be sharper to avoid the conflict.
P2, S4 - I don't understand how the filthy humans ruined his life when all I know is his parents abandoned him. That calls his motivation into question.
I'm always down for a fairy story (my first novel was one, oddly also with a twelve-year-old girl named Cat and a shapechanger), and if I saw this on a shelf I'd pick it up and take a look, but the query needs some focusing I think.
Hope that helps
Thx.
Last Edit: Jun 1, 2017 12:50:22 GMT -5 by rdelaneyjr