Pitch Slam: THE BATTLE OF WONDERLAND GARDENS - MG Fantasy Adventure

Title: The Battle of Wonderland Gardens
Genre: Middle Grade Fantasy Adventure
Word Count: 41,000

Hero: The protagonist, Ellis Brown, best relates to Captain America because he is reluctantly recruited to participate in an adventure where he leads a group of unlikely team members toward a common goal. Captain America has superhuman physical skills and Ellis has above average physical skills. Captain America is susceptible to normal human vulnerabilities, while Ellis’s weaknesses are always being second best and bad dancing. These two would get along very well.

Pitch: After his middle school nemesis is kidnapped at a retirement home by its possessed dance instructor, Ellis must save the girl and lead the oddball elderly residents to battle the demon and its raven minions.

250:

Ellis Brown could not believe what he just heard. The air seeped from his balloon of hope and instantly ruined his once-promising Saturday morning. “You mean a girl has already been here selling these tickets?”

Mr. and Mrs. McGregor, the Wonderland Gardens Retirement Center’s hosts, sat in the lobby’s red velvet arm chairs smiling. Mr. McGregor returned the tickets that Ellis just tried to sell them and said, “Yes, she came about an hour ago. Still in the building, I believe.”

Mrs. McGregor beamed. “Such an angel, blonde hair, blue eyes, and beaming with joy.”

Yep, that’s Alicia. What a fake. Ellis forced a smile as the anxiety bubbled in the pit of his stomach. “And I suppose she sold you tickets to our show?”

“As a matter of fact, she did," Mr. McGregor said. “Such a sweet young lady. She did mention that a friend of hers, a boy, may be stopping by later, and here you are.”

Sweet? Maybe, if rattlesnake’s venom is sweet. “She does have a way,” Ellis said.

Ellis was good kid, but he had one big problem, Alicia Swanson. She’d been a thorn in his side all throughout middle school. She beat him at everything and, to make matters worse, she had a habit of broadcasting it to everyone.

Ellis planned to beat Alicia by selling more Alice in Wonderland show tickets than her and was banking on the retirement home’s residents. Not any more. He felt the satisfaction of his victory slip painfully through his fingers.