Sample Pitch: Rebirth Interrupted by Ralph Walker

Rebirth Interrupted pitch by Ralph Walker delivered at the 2015 Writer’s Digest Pitch Slam

Good afternoon. My name is Ralph Walker. I have written an Adult Science Fiction novel titled REBIRTH INTERRUPTED. The book is comparable to NEVER LET ME GO by Katso Ishiguro, THE BODY ELECTRIC by Beth Revis and the TV Series ORPHAN BLACK. I have previously pitched this project to editors at McMillan and Berkley who are currently interested in reviewing my manuscript.

Zell knew that suicide would be hard, but she had no idea that rebirth would be harder.

She is desperate to follow her father, a gravity engineer, to a fractured plutoid on the galaxy’s frontier. Now nineteen, she refuses to miss this once in a decade opportunity to sling-shot across the stars, even if that means getting a ripple installed. The controversial appendage, hanging from the back of her head, will record her memories and essence for transmission into a perfectly copied body.

The trip is quick and painless, even remembering your life in reverse. She just has to leave behind her ocean barrier home, her distracted mother and her original earth ‘husk’ for a state sanctioned suicide and disposal.

To make matters worse, a zealot group of traditionalists lead protests against rebirth, publically making the case that only original birth and organic death should be allowed by law. When protests erupt into an angry mob, Zell and three other husks are kidnapped mid-transfer. Instead of quietly leaving one world for another, they are suddenly trapped on Earth, and reborn across the stars.

These four; a miner, a daughter, a criminal and a scientist, are each confronted with an impossible dilemma. By law, by ethics, by choice, only one; – husk or replicant, -can exist. The whole galaxy is watching and their choices will change humanity forever.

Torn between planets and parents, Zell, this resourceful young woman knows she can’t be in two places at once, and she won’t go quietly.