Can you share your query letter for Blood Road?
What is the relation between Blood Road and His Own Good Sword?
Will there be a sequel to His Own Good Sword?

 Can you share your query letter for Blood Road?

Sure! Here is the query letter that got me both my agent and my publishing deal:

Dear [Agent],

The Empire seals its borders in blood. Torien Risto knows that; he’s seen dissidents dealt with before. He knows the young local girl who just knifed him will hang for assaulting an Imperial officer. And he swears on his life to keep that from happening, because he knows—whatever the authorities say—it isn’t justice. Someone inside the provincial government is kidnapping Imperial citizens and selling them across the desert to the salt mines, silencing anyone who tries to intervene. The girl’s brother is one of those who has been taken. Rejected by the courts, she’s waging personal war against the Empire as a last resort. Determined to save her life, even if it’s too late for the boy, Torien sets out in search of answers on the Salt Road, the ancient trade route running deep into the heart of the desert—territory claimed by the hostile Mayaso tribe.

His guides are signi, condemned to military service as punishment for violent crime, known to have sold their swords to the Mayasi in the past. His fellow officers all seem to be harboring secrets of their own. His adjutant, the only person he knows he can trust, is dead their first day on the Road. Surrounded by deception, corruption, and the very real threat of a Mayaso spear in his back, Torien uncovers a conspiracy that reaches to the highest levels of the Imperial government. The Emperor’s own guards are using profits from the mines to fund a coup—and, faced with unsettling truths about the royal family’s own brutality, Torien is no longer sure where his own loyalty lies, or how far he must go to honor his oath.

BLOOD ROAD (91,000 words) is adult fantasy set in a world inspired by Ancient Rome. I have included the first five pages below. I do want to let you know that the full manuscript is currently under consideration by other agencies.

I am currently pursuing my MA in History at the University of West Georgia, with an emphasis on Roman military history.

Thank you for your time,

Amanda McCrina

I personalized the letter for each agent I queried, according to their submission guidelines—some agents only want to see the query letter, at first; some want a synopsis with the query; some want to see as much as fifty pages of the manuscript. And I left myself a little wiggle room as far as age category; I pitched Blood Road as either NA or Adult Fantasy, depending on the agent. For more about my querying process, check out this interview.

 What is the relation between Blood Road and His Own Good Sword?

Blood Road and His Own Good Sword are companion novels in that they are set in the same fictional world, with some recurring characters between them. The events in Blood Road take place about twenty-five years before those of His Own Good Sword, therefore reading His Own Good Sword first will spoil certain (major) parts of Blood Road.

 Will there be a sequel to His Own Good Sword?

His Own Good Sword was not written as a stand-alone. Though I do think there is closure at the end of the book, my intention back in 2012, when His Own Good Sword was first published, was to write a sequel that would conclude the story arc properly.

Then a number of things happened, one of which is that I terminated my contract with my publisher. Another of which—and perhaps more important—is that I graduated college, moved out of my home country, and took a long hiatus from writing anything. All of that gave me the time to step back and think critically about the world I created in His Own Good Sword. And while I still love HOGS as my first novel, it is just that—my first novel, flawed, awkward, rough around the edges. There are so many things about it that I would change if I could. However, I do firmly believe that there is a point at which an author needs to let a book go, and I believe I’ve reached that point irreversibly with HOGS. It would be unfair to my readers to go back and tweak and fiddle with the text now. HOGS is out there to stay just as it is.

I am not finished with the world of His Own Good Sword. Far from it—I’m bursting with ideas for further stories. I am, however, finished with that particular story, at least for the present.* It is quite possible I’ll return to it in the future, but right now my focus is on Blood Road and its sequel, set in the same world as HOGS and featuring some familiar characters, but not directly related. Blood Road will be released by Month9Books in Fall 2017.

*ETA, as I continue to think about this: I may have chosen the wrong wording here. I am not “finished” with the story of His Own Good Sword, but I am approaching it now from a different angle. Blood Road is Torien’s story, and as I wrote it I began to realize how much of His Own Good Sword—and the originally planned sequel—was really Torien’s story, as well. In that light, I feel that Blood Road and any sequels are simply another way to get at the same story I was trying to tell with His Own Good Sword.