#TeamClownNation's Pitch Wars Wishlist

 
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For more information about Pitch Wars, click here.

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You have arrived at #TeamClownNation's wishlist! We are Tashie Bhuiyan and Chloe Gong, and this is our first time mentoring in Pitch Wars, so you can imagine how excited we are. (VERY MUCH SO!!!) Of all you amazing writers reading this, one is going to be our future mentee, and we can't wait to meet you! We hope this wishlist will give you an idea of what we are hoping to see in our inbox and help you decide which mentors to submit to. However, this is a friendly reminder that even if our MSWL doesn't line up exactly with your MS, you can still submit to us if you feel we'd be a good fit. We look forward to every single submission we're lucky enough to be receiving. Now, without much further ado… welcome to the circus!

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Chloe Gong

Chloe Gong

Tashie Bhuiyan

Tashie Bhuiyan

Chloe Gong is an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania, studying English and International Relations. During her breaks, she’s either at home in New Zealand or visiting her many relatives in Shanghai. Chloe has been known to mysteriously appear by chanting “Romeo and Juliet is one of Shakespeare’s best plays and doesn’t deserve its slander in pop culture” into a mirror three times.

Her debut novel THESE VIOLENT DELIGHTS (Margaret K. McElderry/Simon & Schuster) releases on November 17th, 2020.

Add it on Goodreads. 

Pre-order it at Barnes & Noble.

Pre-order it at your local indie bookstore.

Pre-order it at Book Depository. 

Pre-order it at Amazon.

Tashie Bhuiyan is a Bangladeshi American writer based in New York City. She recently graduated from St. John's University with a bachelor's degree in Public Relations, and hopes to change the world, one book at a time. She loves writing stories about girls with wild hearts, boys who wear rings, and gaining agency through growth. When she's not doing that, she can be found in a Chipotle or bookstore, insisting 2010 is the best year in cinematic history. (Read: Tangled and Inception.)

Her debut novel COUNTING DOWN WITH YOU (Inkyard/HarperCollins) releases on May 4th, 2021.

Add it on Goodreads.

Pre-order it at Barnes & Noble.

Pre-order it at your local indie bookstore.

Pre-order it at Book Depository. 

Pre-order it at Amazon.

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Chloe's Journey

I was a voracious YA reader during its boom in the 2010s, so when I ran out of books on my TBR in the summer after my first year of high school, I decided to just dive right into writing my own. Which is wild, I know! I didn’t even start with a short story first, I hopped right into a 110k manuscript. But it really sums up my writing journey, because then year after year, I was pumping out these huge books that I didn’t even consider getting published, I was just writing for fun. By the time I got the idea for THESE VIOLENT DELIGHTS, I had written so much for myself and grown my craft to a point where I thought, “well… this time, why don’t I try to get it out there?” I researched agents carefully and made very selective lists. Once I sent the manuscript out, my querying felt like it moved so fast, but in retrospect, I had spent all those years prior preparing my writing to that point! After signing with the brilliant Laura Crockett at Triada US, we revised and went on sub at the start of my college sophomore year. Flash forward to the start of the spring semester, and we had multiple offers come in, which ultimately resulted in THESE VIOLENT DELIGHTS landing with Simon & Schuster. I wouldn’t have done it any other way, and learned so much in the process. I truly am so excited to be a part of our mentee’s journey!

Stats

  • 8 manuscripts over 6 years before debut

  • Debut drafted after freshman year of college 

  • Cold-queried and signed with agent in 1 month

  • Sold on submission after 4 months

  • 2-book duology for 2020 and 2021 at auction in the US, preempted in the UK

Tashie's Journey

I wrote about two manuscripts in the year prior to COUNTING DOWN WITH YOU. They allowed me to explore original fiction and learn more about craft, and I needed them dearly in order to write my debut. I wrote CDWY during the spring semester of my junior year of college—I remember I was taking six classes and interning three days at the time, but every day I made time to write, and I somehow managed to draft it in the span of one month in April 2019. A month later in May, I started cold querying for the first time… and ten days later, I received my first offer of representation. Two weeks later in June, I signed with my agent JL Stermer at New Leaf Literary (who is the best!) and set to work on a few minor revisions. In July, we went on submission to editors, and I was more nervous than I've ever been. However, in August, we quickly received an offer, and by September, I'd sold both COUNTING DOWN WITH YOU and a second untitled standalone. Sometimes things work out in mysterious and wonderful ways, and I am grateful for the journey I went on. I can't wait to help one of you on your journey too!

Stats:

  • 2 manuscripts over 1 year before debut

  • Debut drafted junior year of college

  • Cold-queried and received agent offer in 10 days

  • Sold on submission after 16 days

  • 2-book deal for 2021 and 2022

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You're probably wondering why you should choose us as one of your mentor picks. Well, we have the answers! First and foremost, we are both clowns (and we hope you are one too!) who are super easygoing and love to joke around and have a good time. But more than that, we are dedicated to helping you make your manuscript stronger and will constantly scream about how brilliant your book is to any and everyone. Who could ask for more?

But also, if that doesn't sell you on #TeamClownNation, here are a few bullet points as to why we might be a good fit for you:

  • Both of us are in tune with the market, not only as authors, but because we are both Gen Z and have an understanding of the market from a consumer side. It was only a year or two ago that we were teenagers, aka the target audience for Young Adult, so we feel we have a good sense of what readers—and therefore agents and editors—are expecting and looking for.

  • We both read widely and are deeply immersed in the book community. You can find either of us on Twitter or Instagram or even TikTok, doing what we do best: yelling about books! 

  • Tashie lives in NYC and has interned in the children's departments of Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Macmillan, and Penguin Random House, giving her a good sense of how publishing works from the other side. 

  • Both of us cold queried our manuscripts and went through the query trenches. We're ready to guide our mentee through them, too. While we are excited about the showcase and hope it goes well, we are ready to help you afterwards as you navigate querying. We know what it's like to be an unagented writer, anxiously checking your email to see if an agent wants to have The Call. And after doing it ourselves, we are more than ready to hold your hand and wait with you.

  • Both of us have previous mentorship experience. Tashie mentored in the last round of Author Mentor Match and Chloe mentored in the last round of the Avengers of Color mentorship. We'd be happy to put you in contact with our past mentees if that's something you're interested in—they'd be happy to talk to you or answer any questions you might have about working with us!

  • Now that we are in positions of privilege in the industry, we want to uplift and pass the ladder down to people who are starting out. It's hard being new in publishing and feeling untethered, but we hope to provide our mentee with a sense of community. We are always here for you to turn to, we want to extend our knowledge and experience to you, and we can be reliable sources for industry mysteries.

  • We both have a strong understanding of pitch materials and commercial hooks, so we're excited to work on pitches, queries, synopses, etc. and make them shiny for agents to see!

  • Most of all, we will always support your manuscript in any way we can. Whether it's making graphics, pinterest boards, gifs, aesthetics (that Actually Look Good), playlists, or whatever else, trust that we will absolutely be making them for you. We can't wait to meet you and shower you with love!

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We both plan to approach this mentorship with loads of excitement and celebration, but are also ready to join you in doing hard work. We plan to read the entire manuscript over three times—once during the submission period, after which you'll receive an edit letter from us for developmental edits. When that's finished, we'll read it over again and offer you line edits on the entirety of the manuscript. And finally, after that, we'll read it over one last time to make sure everything is ready to go for the showcase. We will also read the pitch materials as many times as necessary until we all feel satisfied with them. Our plan is to set up a timeline together to ensure we meet our goals in a timely and organized manner. But through the entire process, we'll be there holding your hand and offering you support in whichever way you deem necessary!

Both of us are open to all channels of communication, so we hope to have an introductory phone/Skype call to get to know each other! After that, we're always down for more calls (just give us a heads up so we can plan ahead!) and we intend to stay in contact through emails/texts/DMs/whatever your preferred mode of communication is. Honestly, don't be surprised if we add you to a group chat and the three of us end up doing more clownery than work... (Kidding! Or are we?) We hope you always feel comfortable reaching out to us if there's an issue or just if you need to brainstorm. We're both here for whatever you might need!

But overall, we are both more love-oriented in terms of critique. We'll be honest about what we think isn't working and might need improvement, but we won't be overly critical for the sake of having something to say. And we will always tell you what we love about your manuscript! We want this to be a rewarding experience for you, not only through the mentorship, but even afterward. Post-showcase, we are happy to keep working on the manuscript with you if needed. We have no plans to ever abandon you—you're stuck with us for life!

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We want someone who:

  • Is hardworking

  • Is eager to improve

  • Is willing to hear out revisions but also knows the heart of the story they are trying to tell and will stick firm if they believe in something they are doing 

  • Comes to us if there is a problem, open in communication, works with us to solve it

  • Is dedicated to creating the best version of the story and knowing this comes with a strict timeline due to the showcase deadline 

  • Understands that we will be on your side the whole time throughout any ups and downs

  • Loves memes since they are technically clown-nation-in-training!

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Now, on to what you're really here for… our wishlist! If you have any of these—or if you have many of these—please consider sending your manuscript to us! And if you have any questions or need clarification, you can reach out to us on social media: @tashiebhuiyan and @thechloegong.

Ship Dynamics

  • Enemies to lovers/hate to love

  • Lovers to enemies

  • Rivals to lovers

  • Idiots to lovers

  • ~Y E A R N I N G~

  • Fake dating/marriage of convenience

  • Sunshine/grump

  • Villain love interest

  • Star-crossed lovers/forbidden lovers

  • Opposites attract

    • characters who represent absolute dichotomies, i.e. day vs night, fire vs water

  • Soulmates/reincarnation

  • Slow burn

  • I hate everyone but you

  • The Second Love-Interest

General Tropes

  • Found family

  • Old wizened mentor who is tired of the world

  • Random pet that really hates someone and then warms up to them

  • “Get rid of all your weapons” and then the character spends like, 10 minutes disarming, and even when they say they’re done… there’s one more knife in the sock

  • Foreheads touching before battle

  • “I love you” screamed in the middle of the argument 

  • Hurt/comfort

  • Character raised to be a weapon

  • There’s Only One Bed

  • Home is a person/people

  • Battle couple fighting back to back

  • “I know you’re in there somewhere” speech

  • Protagonist descends to the Dark Side/anti-hero — villain origin story

  • Character going absolutely feral because of love interest

  • Refusing to call a character by their first name/real name until something happens to them

  • Himbos!!!!!

  • Random thing that doesn’t look like a weapon is actually a weapon

  • Forced proximity

  • Undercover character gets too invested 

  • Asshole with a heart of gold

  • Climactic scene in the rain 

  • Weapon to the throat 

    • Bonus points if it’s something bizarre, like a fork

All Genres 

  • Own Voices

  • Characters who are struggling with their place in the world and trying to find themselves (especially POC and/or LGBTQ+)

  • Narratives focused on healing and recovery, regaining agency, surviving abuse 

  • Retellings — myths, fairy tales, popular media

  • High concept, commercial stories — anything that would inspire fanart 

  • Female friendship — especially subverting the mean girl trope

  • Underrepresented cultures/mythologies/histories, but also popular/common cultures/mythologies/histories with a new take from fresh, underrepresented perspectives

  • High stakes

  • Ensemble casts

  • Genre-bending books

  • A romantic arc that you can root for

  • Books with a lot of heart

  • Some good twists

  • Subverting tropes

  • Vigilante stories

  • Power couples who could rule the world as soon as they team up, but they refuse to/resist for whatever reason

  • Revenge-driven characters/narratives

  • Boarding school books

  • Angst, betrayals, secrets, lies

  • Diaspora stories 

  • Anything that make us want to scream on Twitter dot com

Contemporary

  • Rom-coms

  • Stories centering young people on social media (Twitter, Instagram, TikTok) and online friendships

  • Celebrities - internet stars, royalty, movie stars etc 

  • Anything involving competitions

  • People having to survive in the wild

  • Settings outside of high school (e.g. stories in bakeries, coffee shops, libraries, etc.)

  • College-set YA

  • Spy stories, especially if there is a scene where the MC and the LI are on the run from the MI6, and they are shooting at them, and the LI has to straddle the MC’s lap in order to shoot back

SFF

  • Sci fi subgenres: 

    • Space Opera, Near Future, Dystopian / Post Apocalyptic, Cyberpunk, "Hard", "Soft", Time Travel

  • Fantasy subgenres: 

    • High/Epic, Portal fantasy, Urban/Contemporary Fantasy, Magical Realism, Paranormal, Historical

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  • Political scheming/court intrigue/power struggles 

  • Supernatural creatures

  • Characters who are morally gray, unlikeable characters, ambitious characters—especially mean female characters, seductive villains

  • Characters who grow past the rigidity of what they were taught to believe 

  • How magic interacts with the modern world

  • Anything that drags colonialism

  • For anything historical: lesser-known history/uncommon eras, and magic interacting with history + magic explanations for strange things in history

  • For science fiction: anything with a setting with an Asianized future

Emojis

If your books can be described by any of the emoji series below, send it to us:

👁👄👁

🥵🥵🥵

🥺🥺🥺

🤪🤪🤪

😒 x 😏

🧠 x 💖

🤬 x 🥺

🤓 x 😎

😇 x 😈

🙄 x 🤤

😩 x 😦

🌚🌝

🤡

🤙🏻🥴

🔪🔪🔪

MSWL-vibes

Shows/movies

  • Avatar: The Last Airbender, especially Zutara vibes and redemption arcs

  • The Half Of It, especially the himbo

  • The Untamed, especially LWJ’s arc of going against his clan’s rules for WWX

  • Never Have I Ever, especially for the teen cheese

  • BBC Merlin 

  • Teen Wolf, especially Stiles and/or the Stydia dynamic 

  • The 100, but canon Bellarke 

  • The Vampire Diaries, but specifically Klaroline 

  • Hotel Del Luna, especially Man-wol’s arc

  • Set It Up

  • Pan’s Labyrinth

Books

  • The Cruel Prince

  • Daughter of Smoke and Bone

  • The Star-Touched Queen

  • The Diabolic

  • The Song of Achilles, but YA

  • A Very Large Expanse of the Sea

  • The Wrath and The Dawn

  • Shatter Me, especially the Warnette arc

  • A Court of Mist and Fury, especially Feyre’s character arc

  • Starry Eyes

  • Red, White, and Royal Blue, but YA

  • On The Come Up

  • To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before

  • Chain of Gold, especially Matthew x Cordelia dynamics

  • The Raven Cycle, especially Gansey-like characters

  • The Gilded Wolves

  • A Song of Wraiths and Ruin

  • Warcross, especially the hot billionaire 

  • The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

Misc

If your book can be comp’d to:

  • Any Taylor Swift song

  • Halsey’s Badlands

  • Florence + The Machines vibes

  • Rewrite the Stars

What we may not be the best fit for:

  • Romance where the characters have fallen for each other in the first few chapters 

  • Shakespearean retellings (due to similarities with own works)

  • Rapunzel retellings (due to similarities with own works)

  • Lower YA

What we are not looking for:

  • Anything with unchecked racist, homophobic, transphobic, acephobic, ableist, Islamophobic, zionist, anti-Semitic, misogynistic, or fatphobic content 

  • Unchecked slutshaming or bodyshaming

  • Unchecked abuse 

  • Oppressor/oppressed romances in which love is the thing that solves all oppression

  • Pro-police propaganda 

  • Romanticized incest or gratuitous rape/sexual abuse, though survivor stories are welcome 

  • Casts that are entirely allocishet and white (unless you are willing to add in diversity)

  • White savior stories/white feminism

  • Stories primarily featuring cultures from POC that are not your own — diverse worldbuilding is appreciated but appropriation of stories is not

Thank you for reading through our wishlist! We hope some of it resonated with you, and we can't wait to see your manuscripts in our inbox. As always, if you have questions feel free to reach out to either of us through social media and we'll be happy to answer.

Sincerely,

Tashie and Chloe

Twitter: @tashiebhuiyan & @thechloegong.

Instagram: @tashiebhuiyan & @thechloegong.

 
Tashie Bhuiyan