(drawing courtesy of RSPB)
I have been wondering if I should rethink my submission letters. What about this one?
Dear Sir or Madam
I just know that you are going to love the enclosed novel it is just your thing and you are just the person who is going to “get” the totally new concept of a love story set on the moon between a rock and a sparrow which hitched a lift on Apollo 13. It takes romance to a whole new dimension and is going to be the book that makes your name as the most forward thinking agent on planet earth.
I have taken the liberty of enclosing the whole book (complete at 300,000 words) because I know that you are going to be so hooked and drawn in by the magic of the words that I weave as I create a very unique tale of love lost and found. You won’t be able to put it down, you will be on the phone to me before you have even reached chapter 59 and I will be here waiting for your call. Together we can make marvellous literary music, soar to heights never before reached by a team that will be as fantastically amazing as ours.
I haven’t bothered with a synopsis as I don’t want to spoil the ending for you but as you will see I have a very sparse style of writing, neat and closely edited with carefully constructed sentences that contain only the key essence of that required to get the full meaning of their content across and you will find the book, despite its size, a simple yet meaningful read.
I won’t waste your time with any more of my words as I know that you are just chomping at the bit and dying to get your teeth into “The Rock and the Sparrow on the Moon” subtitle, “The story of a rock and a sparrow who meet on the moon.”
Yours
Did anyone spot the deliberate error?
skybluepinkish 
I haven’t read the book, obvsly: but if its anything like as funny as this letter, it can’t lose.
Fortunately that particular book is as made up as the letter!
Shades of “Slush Pile Hell” here …
Firstly … I’m most disappointed to find that this has not been written and, if you don’t, I might!
Secondly I’m not sure which of these is deliberate:
– The first sentence is two and needs a period or semicolon?
– Forward-thinking?
– “Key essence” = redundancy?
– The “key essence” sentence is a train wreck?
– The sparse style seems to have edited out a few essential commas?
– Chomping at the bit and dying to get your teeth into some more mixed metaphors?
Did I spot it?
Right … ahem … back to editing …
Oh yes, plenty of grammatical and stylistic errors. But did you spot the factual one. Feel free to use the idea, particularly if you can take it to 300K!
Ah …. Apollo 13 never made it to the moon!
There’s only one deliberate error, Gillian? I can spot a few: run-on sentences, plenty of over-used cliches, and an inflated sense of awesomeness, to name a few. You made me laugh! I love this: “you will be on the phone to me before you have even reached chapter 59 and I will be here waiting” Haha! You go, girl!! (I actually want to read this book, now, to see what happens between the sparrow and the rock, but perhaps in a shortened digest.)
It is full of grammatical errors and poor use of English. But there is a factual error too 🙂
Would the error be that the sparrow couldn’t have hitched a lift on Apollo 13 due to the lack of a moon landing?
Love the letter. You should definitely send a version of it that’s more relevant to your novel.
Well spotted Carole, Apollo 13 never made it to the moon.
I think I have a sparrow and a rock story. Wasn’t expecting that. Something to keep me occupied tomorrow afternoon!
*with an agent hat on* just what is your record for the biggest number of words you can cram into one sentence, strike that paragraph?! Your post made me laugh out loud remembering just how many scripts like this we got through the post!