Pub Rants

STATUS: TGIF. I’m off on vaca all next week but will probably still blog since I won’t be off in distant lands or anything.

What’s playing on the iPod right now? THE ONE THING by INXS

Before anyone gets too comfy, it’s not just the romance queries that lapse into the cliché. All the genres have their lingo but I think Fantasy has to be the next biggest culprit.

So here is my list of Bingo catch phrases for the realms of fantasy:

beloved/fresh characters

completely unique world

the plot thickens

as the journey unfolds

tempted by evil

fast-paced

group of unlikely heroes

unwilling heir to the throne

unwilling pawns

a power he didn’t know he had

unleashed evil

the last hope/restoring hope

story of survival

on the brink of darkness

bound by their fates

destiny in life

forced together in a quest

And yes, yes. I know many of these phrases capture common themes in fantasy but you folks are good writers. You just need to work a little harder to nail those pitch paragraphs.

Happy Friday!

STATUS: Busy but good. I have two projects that will be going out the week after my vacation and I’m very excited about them both.

What’s playing on the iPod right now? LOVE ME LIKE A MAN by Bonnie Raitt

I’m a big fan of the Dilbert cartoons. There is this one strip where Dilbert and his office colleagues are in a meeting with the pointy-hair boss diligently taking “notes” when Wally quietly says, “Bingo.”

Makes me laugh every time. For those of you who haven’t seen the strip, they all have “bingo” cards with office jargon and they cover a square for every cliché the boss says and Wally manages to win within the opening five words of the meeting.

Sometimes I feel that way when reading romance queries. BINGO!

There seems to be an excessive use of romance jargon that writers like to include when writing their query letters and all I can say is the more common the phrase, the more generic the query reads. And you don’t want anything tilting the agent reading to a NO.

So here are some of my Bingo phrases when reading:

a beautiful but feisty…

the dashing and wealthy heir

independent, strong willed woman

alpha male

rekindled passion

her world crashing down around her

tortured soul

face her past

time running out

See if you can eliminate and rejuvenate. There are certainly others and I’ll have to start keeping a running list for future blogs.