Chasing Kate

Clear narrative voice, good plot and strong beginning. I found this very 'read-on'. Backed
Lara
A RELATIVE LOSS

Stylish, funny, black and incredibly written. What's not to like.

J.S.Watts
A Darker Moon

Kelly, I loved Chasing Kate many months ago and still do. Just came back for rating the story. Pia

i'm not great on commenting but this is surely one of the most publishable books on this site? scary really that it hasn't been snapped up. madness... love it.

I just read the first two chapters of Chasing Kate and I loved it. If I were an editor in NYC and this crossed my desk, I would have been laughing in the first few pages. Kelly's punchy and unique writing style is hard to ignore. This story grabbed my attention and kept it. I could relate to the characters, especially Kate because she was imperfect, clumsy, and used a string of colorful language I wish I was able to pull off. I especially liked Kelly's use of adjectives and metaphors in all the appropriate places. And oh yeah, I love short sentences. Very easy to read. Run on's take too much effort to sift through. I really hope this story gets published so I can read the rest. Happy publishing vibes to you Kelly.

- Rachael "Thundercat" Westfall - Changing the world, one moto blog at a time

I just read your entire offering here and I must say, it's been a long time since I've read that much of anyone's work. What an escape! Your prose just gallops along, always with a laugh here and there. At first I thought maybe it was too much but then I didn't. What you do most excellently is get us into the mind of Kate. I felt at every moment as though I was there with here, present in the scene. And you've created an interesting and original character, which in and of itself isn't easy. Kate is sort of a lovable loser prototype, with a sharp wit though and some astute observations. Really, really great read--fun and accomplished prose, great rhythm, great start to an intriguing story. Loved this.

---Mary
The Qualities of Wood

Your skill in revealing the MC's thoughts and weaving those thoughts through narrative and snappy dialogue exceeds many of the authors represented on this site. Your images, metaphor, and character revelation are fresh and electrifying. I look forward to see this move up the charts quickly. Good luck. You definitely have "it."

Memphisgirl
Ashes By Now

Dear Kelly
your short pitch has to be one of the best on site
and your long pitch is so well crafted it sell s your book absolutely
I have started to read your writing and must say that it is compelling. Already you have established your animated characters in my head, ( they are not leaving soon) and i feel strongly to back your book now. I do wish to be part of your climb to the top on this site. CONGRATS and I will comment more as I read more
BACKED BY ME FOR SURE.
Please take a moment to look, comment which is important to me, and back my book. if not that is OK also

The VERY best of luck to you

Denise
The Letter

Your pitch is fantastic and your writing is immensely charged. Got to be a winner

backed
Great great read

A great opening line and the humour throughout is exactly that sharp attack on the senses that great comedy must be.
EXCELLENT

BACKED

Dear Kelly, I love your amazing ride :) - what a ride! :) Great story & action :) - with a little girl in tow. :) That happened to me about a hill & taking the car out of gear :) - I have it in my memoirs. Your pitch enticed me to the read & your tight paragraphs & dialogue kept me reading more. :) Great write. :) Hope you write many books. :) I'm backing your book & hope you'll back my 2 memoir books. :) Thanks. :) Love, Susie :)

Chasing Kate appealed strongly to my sense of humour - the way you weave comedy into your narrative shows real skill. I immediately felt sympathy for Kate, because my family and I also have experience of arriving in Salt Lake City on a Sunday - I didn't know my wife could swear so fluently! On the downside I felt in places your characterization of Kate is close to being over the top, and you need to be careful she does not come over as a caricature; in contrast I found your portrayal of Sadie very much stronger, with a clear 'voice' and convincing personality. These are nitpicks, though, that can be dealt with through polishing - overall I enjoyed the read and I'm sure your target audience will as well so I'll back it with pleasure.

Hi,

I have backed you book because I found it eminently readable
and have to cover 25 books a day just to keep my place on here.
If you would like a more specific comment please return the favor.
Good luck with it.

Tim Chambers
Moonbeam Highway: With Apologies to Miguel de Cervantes.

Your opening line hooked me. Kate is energetic, intelligent and likable. Your descriptions are vivid. I can hear and smell your characters and settings as well as see them. Great imagery. Your dialogue is clever and engaging. You enrich your narrative with superb similies like 'his voice was loose and irritating, like a dump truck had deposited down his throat' or ' he looked like the weathered love child of Harrison Ford and Robert Redford.' And most of all, you've provided us with lots of great humor. Fresh lines like 'they melt in your mouth, not in your pants' had me laughing out loud. What a delightful romp. Backed.

What a hoot. Kate is a delightful character. Sadie too. And in their own nasty ways, Lovechild, Adam and Randy. The first two chapters are a roller coaster ride, with nice quiet moments tucked in such as looking for the moon kisses. Maybe that's when the coaster is climbing slowly to the top toward another plunge such as the wild rubber chicken battle. Both the dialogue and the action and the moments of self-revelation are beautifully handled. I stumbled on this by accident, and I'm so glad I did. Maybe it's because I grew up in SLC. (The closed liquor stores and Mormon boy tantrum resonate). Backed, of course.

I like this. It's funny and true and smart.

It just is good. You don't try harder than you should. You just nail each word down and build this amusing foundation that this great character stands on. It's just good in all the ways so many books just aren't.

I would buy this book. I don't back books to build a rank built on artifice and alliances. I back books because they’re good. I’m backing this book because you’ve earned it.

Mark R. Trost
“Post Marked.”

Kelly,

Great first line! “The first tune I kidnapped Sadie Beck it was an accident.”

This is quite good, it flows well, and Kate despite all her foibles is extremely likable. The meeting between Kate and Sadie was well done. I also really enjoyed Kate escapade into Adam’s back yard. You use a lot of great descriptions and you work the flashbacks in flawlessly.

Happy to back this!

Laurie – Into The Master’s Lair

Great first line. I very much like the voice of this – its dismissive shrug and cornered snarl. Kate feels evasive-eyed, but I found her oddly engaging. You have a succinct, precise way with description, which appealed to me. This is sharp and smart and made me laugh. This is writing with personality.

I laughed...and trust me that hardly ever happens when I read!
Backed it!
A look at mine would be appreciated.
Frank, Sicilian Shadows.

fantastic character voice and grat concept. there is a grittiness to your style that really sets the mood for th reader. wonderful. well done. shelved.
sam
/forgive my format writing from my kindle/

Love this!
backed
Genevieve
Under the Same Sky

Wonderfully and completely captivating! Captivatingly and completely wonderful!
SO appreciated! backed. Jedward (Knut)

You know this is going to be good, just by reading the short pitch. Funny, fast and tightly-written...the story whips along at breakneck speed. Backed..

Really enjoyed reading this. I love your humour, it feels so natural and uncontrived.

Ibby (Near Miss)

so much on here that it's easy to miss little gems like this

Gordon Dalton
The Art of Lying and Dying

Both your pitches are a work of art, especially the short one. So much told in so few words! I feel humbled by your accomplishment. Not surprisingly, the story itself is a delight. Backed.

Iva P.
Fame and Infamy
(history, comedy, crime and more)

The writing is very good; it allowed me to be absorbed into the story

I liked the premise of this story

You set the beginning up very well and I think the story may have a universal appeal

Readers and other writers will connect with the story

I wish you all the best

Scott
The Esrevinu Chronicles/Secrets of the Elephant Rocks

I love this line, "I blew through two pinkish lights and almost impaled Batman on a BMX as I hurdled the curb into the grocery store parking lot." From there, you just continue to great lines: "I deftly remedied that by slipping in the puddle of bubbles the little brat threw on the floor." Your description and dialogue are great. This is a pure pleasure to read. "I want Esmelda Poppycock . . . but now I suddenly felt like I was sending a little Jewish Strawberry Shortcake off to Auschwitz." I'll read more when I can find a little more time. Shelved with pleasure.

Absolutely adorable, evocative portrait of two sweetly dysfunctional people, hilarious.

all the best
sue

Kelly
The blog had me entertained before I'd even started on the book! This is a proper read, proper indulgence. It was hilarious when she was calling the bag of M&M's names when she was wrestling to open the bag. Scaring the children off wearing Halloween costume, the stowaway child hidden beneath the piles of rubbish. Parts are undeniably based on the harsh realities of life, but humour has always been a mix of that ailment. You have the exact measure of how much to give the reader, and how much to take away. If this was out in the shops, I would make a point of buying this today. Enjoyed it so much. Backed. Rosali
Fieldtrip to Mars

This is very funny. I am from the US but have been living abroad for a long time (more than 20 years). This is the only text so far on this website to accurately depict the beauty that is strip mall America. Not that I miss it. Backed.

Kate is a fantastic character. OMG this girl can EAT! haha

I love what you do with the narrative varying up long passages and then a short sentence fragment. Really, it's a genius way to get a punch line in without too much telegraphing. Stunning tribute to Martha Graham - hysterical. Comedy is so hard to do, and you have a gift for making it look so easy.

What's interesting to me is how you do expose another layer of depth to your character in the second chapter. It's one thing to have a lot of farcical scenes, but it's another to be able to do with with such a compelling protagonist.

Bravo! It's four effin in the morning now so I'm backing this, knowing I'll return to reading it again and again. Thanks for sharing.

George Sand (Laugh Your Way into Skinny Jeans)

Kelly

Chasing Kate - the voice captures, a touch surreal, moving and compelling. I could read on and on. Happy to support this story on my shelf. Best success.

Pia (Course of Mirrors)

What a great opening. 'the second time was too' - classic. I read the first chapter, its hilarious, really excellent witty / sarcastic style . Good plot too and it rockets along at a good pace. Setting it at halloween only adds to the carnage and weird lines you end up reading. Backed, good luck with this, I hope it does well.
Charlie

Hilarious, wonderful hook in the first paragraph. I don’t know what I would give to be able to write a pitch like yours!

Backed with best wishes

A.P. Constantin

The Crystal Butterfly Club

I saw on a thread that this book was something special. I started to read it and wow. This is beautifully written and the MC is hugely endearing and just the right side of nutty.

I am so glad I was curious enough to come over and read.

Blimey. What we have here is a flawed heroine. Redemption beckons in the form of a precocious child-in-need.

This is pretty damned terrific in every way. What a journey it will be, in the company of Kate. First person used to express character.

This is going to fly.

i wasn't here the first time you put this up, so I won't have the pleasure of backing it twice like so many of the others.
Jane Alexander never steers me wrong, she said this was a cracking read and how right she is.
I love Kate, her attitude, her MM battles and her life view.
Sadie is perfect, its hard to get kids right, they either come over as too sickly sweet to live or monster needing to be drowned, but you've created a real child who speaks and acts like a real child.
All in all, this is a great read.
Backed.

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THIS BOOK!!! Nothing and I mean nothing I've read on this site (or anywhere else for that matter) has made me split my side like this has tonight! You better get published and quick 'cause I need to put this on my REAL shelf. Good job!

This has to be one of the funniest books I've read, ever. Stayed up till 3 AM reading it. My side hurts from laughing out loud.

I love your writing

You make this whole writing "thing" look deceptively easy! Backed.

This is a book which is both funny and moving. Kate starts off in a very unhappy position. Her attempt to steal from the grocery store is amusing, so is her attack on the M&M packet which bursts on her dashboard. But Sadie is also in an unhappy position, and for her, there's a lot less that's funny. You make us subtly suspicious of Sadie's stepfather in the store, and when she tells Kate some of her story, though not much, we are even more concerned for her. The last sentences of Chapter One crank the worry up considerably. Kate is a strange, complex character, tough, feisty, badly hurt, but able to laugh. Her actions in Adam's garden and garage are side-splittingly funny, and it's no wonder she decides to leave town. Your writing is smooth, fast moving and professional as well as being full of humour. Backed.
Gerry McCullough,
Belfast Girls.

What sort of grotesquely aberrant state doesn't sell liquor in its grocery stores? - probably my favorite line of all time. I snorted tea all over my keyboard! in fact, I found myself doing that more and more often as I read. Your comic timing is impeccable, you have me at the edge of tears and then make me laugh. Beautiful tight dialogue and prose that is descriptive and efficient, never flowery. i need to go back and read more now. backed, of course.

Sessha

Hi Kelly, I love your dark sense of humour. Chasing Kate is hillariously funny, but sad too. Sad that Kate has slipped so low, she has to resort to stealing choclate and ice-cream from a supermarket, despite one of the funniest lines I've read, unpant those pints.
The interaction and blossoming relationship between Sadie and Kate is fantastic, two lost souls in need of each other. I'm looking forward to seeing it develop. Tears from laughter mingling with tears of sadness.
Paul.

Of course I will back this again, it's hilarious. Beautiful Disaster was one of my favorite books in here and I even started a thread about it. I'm glad you brought back under this new name. The part that sticks out in my mind the most is her bouncing up and down on the seat of her car trying to get the M&Ms open, streaming out curses while the trick-or-treaters are watching her. You create great imagery. Love it.

Amanda

I backed this a long time ago. I loved it then and am delighted to see it return, even if the excellent former title has been usurped by another writer. A remarkably assured book, it goes back on my shelf.
Jared.

Backed it 139 day ago
Still as good as I remembered it
Backed it again just now

This is funny and yet quite enchanting. You have made the series of disasters that have beset Kate into a compelling, emotional roller coaster, filled with humour and great writing. Backed

Kids and cats, if left to their own devices they choose who they want to be with. Some compelling writing here, emotional but not tacky, funny but not silly. Well done, Jim D Serpent's Blood

Hey Kelly,
Katie's life might be a beautiful disaster but your book certainly isn't. After two chapters I've decided that it's marvelous storytelling. Kate has a strong voice from the first line and while she’s certifiably crazy that makes it all the more entertaining for the rest of us. You want to reach in to the story, take her by the hand, and say, ‘nooooooo’, do not stalk Adam - it is a stupid name - and set fire to his snowboards, but that would take all the fun away. There’s many great one-liners and the reader feels confident the author is in control of her material and knows exactly what she’s doing. Best of luck with finding a publisher or an agent for this, in my humble opinion it's a winner.
Cheers,
Heather
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