Hello VMac!

I found your beginning chapter of "Slearch and Scourge and the Enterprise" very, very interesting and imaginative. It's as though a creative writing teacher instructed, "Write your own version of your favorite Christmas classic," and you chose Dickens' "A Christmas Carol.In Prose.Being a Ghost Story of Christmas." (original title according to Wikipedia!)

You wanted to know if I think you can spin this into a book-length work. I'm not a professional editor and have yet to publish fiction of my own. However, I am a writer and a reader so here goes:

1. Ask yourself these questions-who are my target readers (buyers)? What are their demographics? Am I narrowing my options to sell my book by limiting sales due to its Christmas focus? Will a potential agent or publisher buy an obvious (no matter how cleverly written) parody of a beloved work by a classic author? What is my theme and what critical point am I trying to convey? How can I convey that point to an editor or reader in a totally new, original way?

2. Your writing is technically fine, as far as I see, and you're an intelligent and highly creative writer. Very strong skills there, but should you so closely follow Dickens' plot and voice? I think a less heavy-handed analogy (Scrooge as a modern day drug dealer) would make the excellent writing you've done more your own. As would using more of your own distinctive voice. Original VMac!

I don't want to know how you made the drug-dealing, witty, and somehow vulnerable, Scourge come to life using fascinating details and insight, but you did a darn good job of it. I also liked the lost, eternally chained "shadow souls," as an metaphor for drug addiction.

My final answer is this: Unless you self-publish this version as a book and energetically promote it, I believe you should rethink the Christmas Carol angle. Use the ghostly atmosphere, for sure, but try a different setting.Build a fictional world and bring it to life. Your imagination can make it just as unique and compelling as olde London town.

I hope I helped in some small way. And I hope you don't give up on your book. You have the talent to succeed!

Keep Writing! Dawsongirl



My review has been submitted for consideration in "Good Deeds Get CASH!" .