Thread: Describe your stupid story in 2 paragraphs so I can reject it quickly

Toughest part of the query letter, right? Two quick graphs telling about your book.

I wrote about this on another site, but am always eager to share my general wonderfulness with all and sundry so I will reproduce my deathless thoughts here.

I think this could be a cool thread if people posted good examples they've seen, perhaps resources on creating the dreaded synopsis.

I'll start off with my own strokes of genius.

Under those or any circumstances, a good question. And not an easy one to answer.

There are lots of systems for this...and like most writing systems....

I hate doing and suck at it.

The only two tips I can offer both come out of screenwriting.
1. It's not a precis or syopsis really. And sure as hell not a book report. It's not necessary to cram everything in. It's closer to movie trailer--the goal is not to inform or glorify, but to make somebody hot to see more.
That may seem simplistic, but it's a helpful mindset.

2. Don't try to carve your novel down to a paragraph. Build it up from an elevator pitch. With scripts you have a logline--a very bare sentence that encapsulates the work. Not too different from what you see on TV Guide. "An archeologist struggles to keep the power of the Ark of the Covenant out of the hands of Nazis"

There are tons of systems for writing loglines...and it might be worth googling for them. You see stuff like..
"When ______, a ______, encounters a problem because _____, he must _____ in order to avoid ______ and gain _____."

It is very worth the excrutiating pain in the ass time and effort to do this. Screenwriter sites have crits and workshops on loglines alone)

One of mine---not necessarily a good one-- "A beautiful, amoral revolutionary sucks batting champ/journalist Mundo Carrasco into a web of political murder during the peak of Mazatlan's Carnival. "

Once you have a workable logline, pad it up a little to an "elevator pitch". This is essentially a couple of sentences that get the whole idea across. Not a lot of detail, but encapsulate the skeleton of the story. Should include resolution: there is NO point in playing coy with agents and editors.

Then work it up into two short paragraphs of blurb. (The next step in screenwriting would be a one-page precis, then a "treatment", which is basically a blow by blow of the whole script. The one pager is not a bad idea for novelists, either)

"If anybody wondered why star journalist Mundo Carrasco would stop investigating Mazatlan's drug lords and politicos in order to run the shady new puppet mayor's press relations, then they had never been to bed with the scorching, amoral, monumental Mijares. Mazatlan's huge, blaring Carnival became the greatest time Mundo had lived since his days as a local baseball hero: access to the real power and closeted skeletons, a political future of his own, and...mostly...the perfect flesh of Mijares.
Then the mayor beats up his wife, the city government starts to unravel into scandal and panic, and they start killing people--with Mundo right up there on their list. Tumbling through the tumult of Carnival, mob violence, narco suites and wretched bulldozed hovels, musical mayhem, his own corruption, and three women who want to reclaim his soul for his own good and their own purposes, Mundo is either sorting himself out or getting totally mixed up...if he comes out of it with his damaged scruples and bruised hide intact."

That's a jacket blurb actually, but pretty close, I think, to the query graphs that sold the book.

The idea is... it's easier to pad things out than hack them down. Nobody likes going Texas Chainsaw Manuscript on their babies.
And these short bits, one liner, three liner, two graphs, one page are very useful to have on hand and part of the process of learning how to look at your book from that angle: the publisher, reveiwer, listing sort of angle.
Once it's out you'll be pimping it on web sites and such and will need this kind of material to paste in.

Sounds like you've been there, done that, reaped the rewards.

But suppose your book is concerned with developing policies that will utilise the conversion of subsistence level family farms into market driven, sustainable, integrated agricultural systems built on organic growing techniques, appropriate level technology, and diversity as a means of alleviating poverty in the rural areas of a developing country, taking into account the present policies of the World Trade Organisation, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the Group of Eight leading developed economies, and the international private sector dominated by mega-sized trading companies, energy companies, and manufacturers?

Is there a way to work in a wild-eyed hero, a hot babe, and a murderous drug lord to spice it all up a bit?

Seriously, what you have offered is obviously solid advice for novelists and screen writers. I'm neither, but I know the truth when I see it.

Thank you, lin, for posting this useful information. Those tips are really helpful...

Thanks for the advice lin. I'm still far from being in need of a query but I'll come back to this when I'm ready.

Fe fi fo fum I smell querty