u/Direct-Combination-9

Thank you everyone who has provided feedback on here! I really believe I’ve cleaned this query up quite a bit. If you have any feedback prior to me sending to agents, please let me know it’s so helpful!

Hi NAME, 

I am seeking representation for my debut novel, EULOGY OF A FROZEN VILLAGE, a 105,000 word adult gothic fantasy blending folkloric horror and a tragic love story. It stands alone with duology potential. For readers of Rachel Gillig’s The Knight and the Moth and Ava Reid’s The Wolf and the Woodsman, it combines* lyrical prose with a dark-fairytale, whimsical tone.* Because of your interest in “X” my novel might be a good fit for your list. 

In a Grimm-inspired winter village, baker Anneliese Eiskerze trusts what she can control. The rise of bread in her oven offers her certainty, a baking craft that never deceives her. Tethered to duty, she supports her brother Wil, but resents his belief that spring will eventually come and the folkloric tales he clings to for comfort. 

But when Wil lights a forbidden candle and falls into an unbreakable sleep, Anneliese realizes his tales were truer than she ever let herself believe. 

Desperately seeking a remedy, Anneliese steals one of the Crown’s cursed candles and ventures into the creature-filled forest encircling their village, all while the Crown hunts anyone with knowledge of their wick-curses. Anneliese seeks out Lioran, the subject of an old folktale who knows the forest paths. Bound by a curse of his own, he wants freedom from a cruel enchantress. As the forest closes around them, Anneliese and Lioran search for a candle vault containing her brother’s soul. Slowly, they fall in love, while Anneliese learns she cannot keep him. Soon, she discovers that the Crown’s candles trap the land in eternal winter and demand a life in exchange for saving her brother. 

To wake her brother and restore spring, Anneliese must decide whether to condemn another to die in her brother’s place, or honor a final promise to Lioran and lose her brother forever. 

Hi NAME, 

I am seeking representation for my debut novel, EULOGY OF A FROZEN VILLAGE, a 105,000 word adult gothic fantasy blending folkloric horror and a tragic love story. It stands alone with duology potential. For readers of Rachel Gillig’s The Knight and the Moth and Ava Reid’s The Wolf and the Woodsman, it combines* lyrical prose with a dark-fairytale, whimsical tone.* Because of your interest in “X,” my novel might be a good fit for your list. 

In a Grimm-inspired winter village, baker Anneliese Eiskerze trusts what she can control. The rise of bread in her oven offers her certainty, a baking craft that never deceives her. Tethered to duty, she supports her brother Wil, but resents his belief that spring will eventually come and the folkloric tales he clings to for comfort. 

But when Wil lights a forbidden candle and falls into an unbreakable sleep, Anneliese realizes his tales were truer than she ever let herself believe. 

Desperately seeking a remedy, Anneliese steals one of the Crown’s cursed candles and ventures into the creature-filled forest encircling their village, all while the Crown hunts anyone with knowledge of their wick-curses. Anneliese seeks out Lioran, the subject of an old folktale who knows the forest paths. Bound by a curse of his own, he wants freedom from a cruel enchantress. As the forest closes around them, Anneliese and Lioran search for a candle vault containing her brother’s soul. Slowly, they fall in love, while Anneliese learns she cannot keep him. Soon, she discovers that the Crown’s candles trap Fluch in eternal winter and demand a life in exchange for saving her brother. 

To wake her brother and restore spring, Anneliese must decide whether to condemn another to die in her brother’s place, or honor a final promise to Lioran and lose her brother forever. 

Hi NAME, 

I am seeking representation for my novel, EULOGY OF A FROZEN VILLAGE, a 105,000 word adult gothic fantasy blending folkloric horror and a tragic, whimsically charming love story with series potential. 

It will appeal to readers of Rachel Gillig’s The Knight and the Moth for its* object-bound, dreamlike magic and SenLinYu’s Alchemised for its obsessive, doomed love story set against an oppressive regime. It may also resonate with readers of Ava Reid’s The Wolf and the Woodsman for its dark-European, winter setting and folkloric horror.* 

In the Grimm-inspired village of Fluch, locked in endless winter, baker Anneliese Eiskerze trusts what she can control. The rise of bread in her oven offers her certainty, a baking craft that never deceives her. She has no patience for her brother Wil's faith that spring will eventually come, or the folkloric tales he clings to for comfort. 

But when Wil lights a forbidden violet wick-curse, he falls into an unbreakable sleep. 

When the village grants no answers on the wick-curses, Anneliese leaves the world she can control behind. She steals one of the Crown’s enchanted candles and ventures into the Albwald, a predatory, snow-buried forest surrounding their village. The Crown, the reclusive monarchs governing Fluch, hunts anyone with knowledge of their wick-curses, sending a candle-wielding executioner dragging their bodies through the Albwald. 

There, Anneliese seeks out Lioran, a lantern-bearing wanderer from an old folktale and the only one who knows the forest paths. Bound by a curse of his own, Lioran seeks the candle that controls him by entrapping his soul to a cruel enchantress. Finding it is his only chance to reclaim true freedom and to escape a devastating past. Helping Anneliese risks the attention of the enchantress who keeps his life in her grasp. 

As the Albwald closes around them, Lioran’s doomed hopefulness thaws Anneliese’s rigid practicality, and she finds herself falling for him, the one man she cannot have. Playful but unpredictable, he is the only one who understands how far the Crown will go to silence the village and control forbidden flames. Together, they discover the memories the Crown buried, the origins of the system of colored wick-curse magic. One that feeds on souls and emotions to keep Fluch trapped in eternal winter.

To wake her brother, Anneliese must decide whether to condemn another to die by the Crown’s wick-curses in his place, or honor a promise to Lioran and lose her brother forever. 

This is my debut novel. I hold a BA in Government and a minor in English from UT Austin. I speak German at a B2 level, and have traveled to the Black Forest twice, which inspired the Albwald and novel’s folkloric horror, dark fairytale elements. My husband and I run a holiday lighting installation company, which inspired my novel’s descriptions of wintertime festivals and focus on light as a motif.