Test Subjects Needed -Must be Willing to Handle Infectious Materials

Okay, so there is another "pitchfest" this week. This time with one of the agents from the Knight Agency. Unlike the previous one, she'll be accepting submissions all week and it will be private.

So, I'm doing a second run through on Re: Straint, but then I'll need some betas to read. I'm planning on submitting to this pitchfest, but it'll just be a short submission. I have a bit to get the full ready. Normally, I'd love to reciprocate on Beta-ing, but I really struggle NOT to do line-by-line, and these next two weeks are going to be freakishly busy for me, so it wouldn't be an immediate reciprocation.

Before anyone volunteers, let me tell you what I need and about this one: I converted the entire manuscript to first person from third person as well as adding in epistolatory sections in between each chapter. So, I need third person typos found and those sections typo-checked. (That's as deep of a line-by-line as I'm looking for. Glaring typos.) Also, in the conversion between third and first--there are going to be some "kinks" especially with exposition. (I.e. Lucas shouldn't spend paragraphs talking to himself about things to do with the Strain for no reason... it would be odd.) I've been working on that last night and this morning. That will create possibly new problems, though, in that I might cut enough exposition that it'll be confusing. So, I need continuity, clarity, and flow watched.

Let me give you a summary of this before you get nuts too:

The skeletons hiding in Lucas's closet are microscopic, but deadly. He's never had a normal life. Genetics have predetermined what he eats for breakfast and who he can be around. Nothing about his existence is healthy including his reaction to Hallie. He's been stalking her as his desire to be around her has proven to be irresistible. Like an infection, she's in his blood, but he desperately wants to keep his germs... and family to himself. There are those among the Strain who'd kill to keep them apart.

The feeling of hollowness and waiting has finally lifted in Hallie's life, but the mystery surrounding Lucas just seems to grow exponentially. She keeps trying to convince him she needs him in her life completely and forever, but he's convinced he'll prove fatal to her. His mother is rather terrifying, but how bad can she really be? What is the Strain and why do its members hide in dark and quiet corners?

Not everything is visible to the naked eye in this story of infectious love.

Re: Straint is an Urban Science-fiction YA 89,000 words, with mild profanity (PG-13 rating for violence and so on) It does mention cannibalism in an off-hand, glib way--so if that bothers you... this isn't the book to read. It's first person with three POVs.

Anyway, my email address is wendy at sparrow dot us I think two or three betas would be perfect on a stick.

Okay, I'm going back to revising. Have a good Monday everyone. Hugs.

Oh and, in the end, I decided not to do ABNA even though that's what originally spurred-on this rewrite. Best of luck to those that entered.