Janelle Fila
The Gravedigger’s Assistant by Janelle Fila
Complete at 70,000 words, THE GRAVEDIGGER’S ASSISTANT is a YA, magical realism novel with an unreliable narrator in the vein of WE WERE LIARS.
It’s Halloween, and the Blood Moon calls Reese’s ancestors to a family graveyard. Reese doesn’t know anything about Gravedigger, the spirit in charge of digging graves for her dead relatives, and she doesn’t care. After a stint in rehab for drunk driving, she’s finally free to go back to senior year. Except now, everything’s changed. Her parents fight about who forgot to defrost the chicken. Her best friend finds a replacement and demotes Reese to tagalong. Her boyfriend scurries down the hall without a word, expecting Reese to give him space until he’s ready to talk. She doesn’t even get the courtesy of a breakup text.
Screw that. When Reese stumbles upon the graveyard, she befriends Gravedigger and replaces her fraying real-world relationships. She bonds with ghosts like Frances, a 1900’s suffragist, and Frances’s mother, who threw herself into a creek after her husband left to prospect gold and never came home. Reese promises to find her missing great-great-great-grandfather and return his ghost to the graveyard before the end of the Blood Moon’s cycle, a journey that will connect her worlds in ways she cannot imagine.
My stories and poems have appeared in YARN, WORD HOTEL, Golfwell.net, and the PROUD TO BE Anthology. In May, I will earn my MFA in Writing for Children and YA from Spalding University.
Vote for your favorite pitch. The pitch that receives the most votes will be awarded the “Fan Favorite,” and the author will receive a free one-hour consult with us (worth $250).
Liz Boeder
March 2, 2017 @ 10:48 am
This sounds like a fun read. I’m sure it will do very well. Best of luck!
Janelle
March 5, 2017 @ 5:35 pm
Thanks Liz! I am so humbled by all of the support so far.
Noel
March 3, 2017 @ 10:25 am
Love this!! I’ll totally buy this!! I hope you win!
Janelle
March 8, 2017 @ 8:44 pm
Thank you so much Noel! I really appreciate your support. (I hope I win, too!) *big author smile*
Pamela Thompson
March 9, 2017 @ 1:32 am
Janelle,
That book sounds so good and intriguing, I want to buy it now!!!
Avis Taylor
March 13, 2017 @ 10:12 pm
Sounds like a great book! I would buy it.
June Corbett-McFarlin
March 15, 2017 @ 12:49 am
Janelle, This is exactly the type of book I love to read. It totally pulls you in and gets you involved from the get go. Hope you win so we have a chance to read it in full.
Good luck and keep writing.
Josette Abruzzini
March 16, 2017 @ 3:34 pm
Congrats Janelle! Interesting and well-written query and a great job on the vote count!
Good luck on your path to publication!
Lorinda McKinnon
March 16, 2017 @ 8:00 pm
A great big congratulations, Janelle! Well done. I’m looking forward to seeing it in print!