Instead, here are a few of my notes:
PART 1: PITCHES, SYNOPSES, & FIRST PAGES
- The elevator pitch needs to be clever, interesting, concise and should include the title and sometimes comparative texts. (Mark Gottlieb, agent)
- My attempt --
- With wit similar to Jenny Lawson's in Let's Pretend this Never Happened and the darkness of The Liars' Club, A BIRD IN MY HEAD is a loss of innocence memoir about Rena, an eleven-year old, gap-toothed Mormon girl wrestling with familial expectations and her own ambition.
- Synopses (Josi S Kilpack, writer)
- Why do you need one?
- You need it for preparing for pitches or writing queries.
- An agent will need to see how the story arc works
- Editors - same
- Marketing Dept. - need it as a quick way to become familiar with the story
- Art designers - same
- Compress or condense your story down to the bones. Keep in mind your MC and plot.
- Should be 2 pages or 1,000 words approx.
- 12 pt font, TNR, put info in the top right-hand corner
- Capitalize your characters' names the first time you use them in the document
- Single-spaced, unless the synopsis is two pages.
- Write it in third person, present tense.
- Don't write as one of the characters.
- Tell how the story ends; no cliffhangers in the synopsis.
- When write one? Before or after?
- Before it can serve as an outline
- Makes writing it easier
- It's revisable
- After it can assist you with revisions
- Agents, editors want it
- First pages (Jennifer Rofe, agent)
- It is a promise to the reader that something in these first few pages will come true.
- If it isn't going to matter later, get rid of it.
- How does your first page reflect your last?
- When revising your first page, consider:
- Did you start in the right place?
- Do you place the reader in the world of the story?
- Do you give the reader a taste of the conflict to come?
- Is it tightly written?
Up next: Slush Pile Secrets and Plotting: Hill-shapes and BEYOND.
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