The Hand of Sorrow- An Open Query Letter
While anyone is always free to read anything they see, please enjoy this post if you’re ok with potentially spoiling a book you may never read. For example, if you’re an agent looking for a new work.
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I am seeking representation for my novel THE HAND OF SORROW, a 146,000 word work that blends trappings of epic adventure fantasy with a core of far-future science fiction.
The people of the fourteenth century know the stories of the goddess Éo of Andevale: as stories, songs, psalms, history or myth. But what really happened hundreds of years ago, when Éo, in the words of a father ’s bedtime story, was just “a simple woman with a terrible fate, and one day she woke up and decided to do something about it.”
Having survived a childhood infection that should have killed her, transforming half her body into incomprehensibly strong iron and blackweave, Éo decided to use her skill as a warrior, and a body that’s a natural weapon, to avenge her father’s death. After the retaliation destroyed her hometown, she entered a self-imposed exile, struggling with
the use of violence in a violent world, swinging from pacifism to Angel of Death, compelled to act any time someone vulnerable faces an injustice.
During her journey, she befriended many people that later became mythologized as disciples and saints: warrior-merchants, a woman that talked about anything except her personal past, an iron -blodded adversary turned ally. Together they hacked, slashed, and (rarely) talked through tygers and canyids, pirates, witches, wild-men turned mad by ancient technology, wizards with skewed ethics, and forests of angry trees.
Éo came to be one day as I was rocking my son to sleep, reading a “classic” work of adventure, and realizing that when my children were grown, I didn’t want them to hand them “classics” that I had to apologize for. THE HAND OF SORROW works to be inclusive: you might be mauled by an inhuman beast, but you’re free to court whomever you wish (as long as you’re not too noble and want to marry a commoner).
As for me, I have lived up and down the eastern United States. I have worked as a pharmacist, as a researcher, a safety policy expert, and as the director of a home infusion facility. I live in Albany, New York with my wife, a four year old, an eight month old, a dog that’s getting fat from the food the children drop, and more books and board games than shelf space.
Thank you for your consideration,
Bryan Eikwood
bryaneikwood@gmail.com
