Ready to Test-Drive Your Query Letter? Check Out Evil Editor

By Debbie Maxwell Allen

After spending weeks (or months) tweaking your query letter to perfection, you may want to solicit some feedback before you send it out. Evil Editor is your guy. He'll post your query on his blog, often with tongue-in-cheek comments, where other writers can chime in with their own opinions.

But Evil Editor adds a twist. He posts the titles of the manuscripts the queries represent, and invites blog readers to guess the plot based upon the titles. The most interesting (and far-fetched) plot ideas get posted along with his query critique in his Face-Lift series.

Another feature on Evil Editor's blog is the New Beginning series. Writers submit the first 150 words of their manuscript, and blog readers show how they think the piece should continue. Evil Editor posts the most interesting continuation, and invites blog readers to give the original author feedback on how the opening captured their interest.

It's nice to find a site that gives good feedback with an element of fun. If humor is not something you want to mix with your fiction, you may want to stick to more "serious" sites.

Evil Editor conducts monthly book chats, where readers discuss recently published books. There's also a weekly contest for writers to contribute captions to a posted cartoon. The best captions get published on the blog. If you need a laugh to relieve your writer's block, check out Evil Editor's short films to give you some relief. And at regular intervals writing exercises are posted, with the best examples posted on the blog.

And during the month of May, Evil Editor has posted several items in Brenda Novak's Annual Online Auction for Diabetes Research.

Does humor help to relieve tension in your journey to publication?

About the Author: Debbie Maxwell Allen writes young adult historical fantasy in the Rocky Mountains. She blogs about free resources for writers at Writing While the Rice Boils.