Query - Fallen Knight

Dear Ms. Agent,

My research led me to your agencies web-site and your particular interest in mystery/thrillers. I believe my 105,000 word novel, FALLEN KNIGHT, fits the mold of material you’re in search of and hope you consider representing me. If successful, I envision the characters from my novel evolving into a series.

In 1984, the largest bioterrorism attack documented in US history took place in Dalles, Oregon. More than 750 individuals were sickened, but luckily there were no fatalities.
Now, somebody thinks they can do better. When Lee Hamilton answers an early morning call asking for help tracking down the person responsible for a viscous attack of a close friend, little does he realize that it will put him on a collision course with the person determined to make just that event happen.

Lee is just a middle-aged human resource manager from a small southern town, but he’s also a knight. One of six college friends who in their hey-day were labeled ‘The Knights Who Say Ni’, Lee’s troubles begin when he rallies the other knights to assist Dianne Williams, the manager of the detective agency where their stricken friend works, to search for the assailant. The trail of clues leads them to a six-month old deadly high school shooting sixty miles outside the nation’s capital and a cryptic suicide note that brags I’m not finished yet. Although the knight’s method of solving jigsaw puzzles are unconventional, when the pieces do start coming together it pulls the covers back on an unbelievable pattern of crimes.

In over their heads with the boundaries of the knight’s friendship tested, they must scramble to avoid arrest by a suspicious police detective and the FBI. The rag-tag group seeks to unravel a sinister plot as they race the clock. At stake if they fail, the unleashing of a bio-terrorism attack on the streets of Washington DC.

From an agoraphobic taxi-driver, to a love-sick high school student forced to hide a terrible secret, even the secondary characters in FALLEN KNIGHT are memorable. Thank you, Ms. Agent, for your consideration of this query. At your request, I will be happy to send along the complete manuscript.


Sincerely,
DL Hammons

QUERY - INTELLIGENT DESIGN REVISION 1 (original posted Oct 31, 2009)

Click here to read the original query.

Detective Inspector Lane has less than a week to prove three recent deaths were not the work of a serial killer. All three died in a similar way after falling from buildings and all three died on a Sunday.

Coincidence? Or is there a vicious killer on the loose in London with a liking for high places and an aversion to Sundays?

David, a journalist for the London Evening People, thinks the story makes good copy and he has piqued public interest with a series of articles designed to convince his readers there is more to the deaths than just coincidence.

All the press interest is proving much more difficult for DI Lane to deal with than the investigation itself. The Chief Inspector has given her until Sunday to prove the deaths were nothing more than accidents and quell the rising public hysteria. But when a witness also dies in mysterious circumstances, it seems there is very little DI Lane can do to convince the public a serial killer is not stalking the streets of London.

And now, she too is having her doubts.

Intelligent Design is a completed 95,000 word crime novel set in contemporary London.