Middle Grade Fantasy: THE BOOK DOCTOR

Author's name: Sussu Leclerc

Category: MG

Genre: Fantasy

Stage of Completion: Mostly Polished

Critique Style: A Spoonful of Sugar Helps the Medicine Go Down

PET: Cat Person

DRINK: Coffee and tea equally. 

Short Pitch

Thalia might be smaller than an eraser, but she has big powers. She hides in stories and changes their outcome on demand, for a fee. When her creator catches her and throws her among discarded characters in the wastebasket, Thalia is on a mission: gaining her freedom and untangle the mess of her life! But that’s without counting on her new entourage and their personal agendas.

Writing Sample

ONE: Binder here I come!

Thalia flattened her belly against the collected works of Hans Christian Andersen, sliding sideways along their spines. Being as small as an eraser made it easy for her to disappear inside the smelly library stinking of glue and varnish, but it also made her vulnerable. She threw her legs and arms around the books like a spider. She wished she could waft aloft, attached to a silk thread, but nah, she wasn’t that lucky. An iron chain, locked around her waist and linked to a library card stuck to her back with a Velcro dot weighted her down. Courtesy of her creator.

She perused the names on the covers. These were old and unknown tales nobody had heard of. She couldn’t even pronounce the title on some of them. Nowhere could she find the story of, “The Old Woman Who understood Witchcraft.”

This part of the library was usually out of reach and for a reason. Thalia had a vague idea, but preferred to keep it for herself. As innocent as the leather-bound books looked, lying on their sides like that, quietly, peacefully, there was no telling what could come out of them. There was no telling what could crawl between them as well. She preferred not to think of it at all.

“Thalia. Pssst! Thalia,” a book whispered to get her attention.

She startled and grabbled for balance, leaving tiny finger scratches on the dusty volumes as she fell backward and rescued herself from falling down a bookshelf.