* Updated 06/24/09

Dear Agent Person,

Nineteen year old Adam has just failed a suicide attempt. He’s trying to win back the trust of his strained family. His father hardly speaks anymore, and his overworked mother abuses Adam’s painkillers. But most of all, Adam wants to help Evelyn, his young sister whose last memory is that of him bleeding on the floor of his bedroom with a gun to his head. Now he sits in the office of Richard White, a young ambitious psychologist who’s become a close friend. Though their prepaid appointments are running out, Adam hopes Richard can help him reconnect with all he’s lost.

But then one day in the waiting room, Adam’s whole life changes completely. He falls desperately in love with Cherith, a quirky teenage girl with a rapturous personality. Though shy and awkward, Adam manages to ask her out on a date, and soon Cherith falls for him too. But once Adam learns she’s been diagnosed with cancer, he starts to suffer from vivid nightmares that look and feel real. Soon, Cherith’s condition declines, and Adam vows to take care of her through her ups and downs. His dreams change along with her, from frightening glimpses of a purgatory world where the very air he breathes is made of lost souls and dead stars, to the radiant beauty of space and the violet skies and red grass blades of what could be heaven.

Reality’s blurred, and Adam’s tugged through a schizophrenic dream world. More than anything though, he just wants to see his sister Evelyn again, and keep a promise he made to Cherith on Valentine’s night: that he will find her in the afterlife if anything happens, and nothing, not even death, can keep them from being together… and he just may find his dreams are the answer he is searching for.

VALENTINE is a work of literary fiction of approximately 105,000 words. I am seeking your representation because I am an avid reader of your helpful and informative blog.

Thank you for your time and consideration!

Sincerely,

Josh Everett Ryan