Banging my head on the wall - one page summary?!

<empathy vibes> I know! It sucks royally! I think the one-pager is even worse than the query letter. Good Luck!

Maprilynne

Try this: Pretend everything in your book happened to someone you know. You're dying to tell your best buddy what happened, but you have two minutes left on your cell phone, you talk slowly, and your buddy spends forever saying hi. What do you say in the forty-five seconds you have left?

Don't you know nothin'? You're supposed to bang someone else's head against the wall so when the frustration passes you can still focus and write.

My only advise is to focus on your keys scenes. Make them the emphasis of the summery, and don't try to kill it with extra details. I've written a number of one-page summerys and every time I tried to fit in all the little things I felt were important it felt bloated and stale. Talk up the key points, make them want to read the entire manuscript. This is like a sales pitch so if you can get their mouth watering over a few details you've sold it!

I had to do a one-line blurb (still working on revising it, actually). I couldn't at all, until someone who had read the book sent me one.

Then, I revised that one. Then, I re-wrote it a few times from scratch with a clearer head. Just seeing it done once by someone else made a huge difference for me.

One page is not the hard part. The hard part is making it an entertaining read.

(Why did I pick writing? There must be another choice less humiliating and more lucrative. Does anyone need a 6'2" organ grinder monkey?)

What Aconite said!

I usually find a quiet spot, then pretend I'm telling the plot of this really cool movie I saw to a friend. Spoilers and all. Publishers want spoilers.

Use a timer to get it down to one minute.

Try practicing with a movie you're already familiar with as it will teach you the basics, then apply it to your own work.

I went through this and the big problem was being too close to my own work. People would ask what the book was about and I'd either pin them in place for thirty minutes with their eyes glazing (I was better at writing than talking) or I'd choke.

Then I got impatient and began blurting out a one-line TV Guide synopsis just to get past the ordeal. It worked--they wanted to know more.

"A spoiled southern belle comes of age during the Civil War while loving a man she cannot have." That's Gone With the Wind. Using that for a base I could do a 1-pager on it.

It has who, where, when, and what, which are 4 out of 5 for the basic questions you need to answer. You can cover the rest in the synopsis.

Try practicing with another writer's book and it can teach you about distancing yourself from the work. It CAN be done, you just have to prime the pump, and that's easier to do with a book that's not yours.

Step right up, all those book reports we did in grade school had a purpose after all!

This is what I do.

I write down the major plot points and characters I want to include in the summary. Play with the order, see where I can sneak in each. Then fill in the spaces and expand, then tighten up the summar.

Not sure if it's the right way, but its the only way I can do them.

Try outlining the major milestones first:

1. Death
2. Discovery
3. Sex
4. More death
5. Cool car crash
6. Lambert asks for Gemma's hand in marriage -- on horseback
7. Cake or death
8. Green Goblin sweeps in.
9. The rabbit dies; Etruscan vases fall

Then, write them as sequential sentences. Add transitions. Then polish.

And don;t forget the sentence "I loved it when you guys published Salman Rushdie's stuff. Killer."

Just checking -- you are single-spacing it, right? So you've actually got about 500 words, not 250.

Generally, one-page synopses are single-spaced.

Then introduce the protagonist (or hero and heroine if it's romance or there's a strong romantic element, or the antagonist if he/she is a major character) with his/her goal and motivation, a couple sentences for each turning points and the conclusion. Then go in and smooth out the transitions.

Personally, I don't worry so much about the "make it interesting" thing. I'm not convinced it's possible to make a synopsis interesting. And, because we're writers, we spend a lot of time obsessing about the prose, about the voice, about the "interesting," and it's just not gonna happen. Synopses are functional, but they're not fun, for the writer or the reader. If they were, we wouldn't need to read the whole book; people would just read synopses.

If you want to see some good examples, check out Miss Snark's archives from the end of December 2005 into January, I believe, when she commented on about a hundred synopses. Read a few of them in one sitting, and your eyes will start to glaze over. Even the ones she gave her stamp of approval to were less than scintillating reading, but you can see that they do the job they're supposed to do, which is to cover the main points of the story and prove that there IS a complete, comprehensible story.

JD

I love writing queries. They don't gother me at all. THey're even FUN - if you can believe that.

But summaries????????

I almost want to bang my head against the wall event hinking of them! I think it's hard enough doing a 3-pager! I was never very good at summaries in school. I can do it with someone else's work, but not very well with my own.

That 1-sentence description thingy is also a pain!
Ronda

I hate summaries, I have always hated summaries...but they aren't as hard as properly quoting references and doing bibliographies...But I feel your pain. In Jan I managed to turn a 8 page 'summary' into a 2 page summary. I didn't like doing it, and I can't tell you how it's worked out yet, heck, the only advice I can give you is the same as was given to me. Put it on 'Share..." and ask people to hack at it with a chainsaw.....

Sorry. Have a nice day anyway!

Even though I haven't gotten to that stage of needing a 1-pager for an editor, I'm working on it (and the 3- and 5-pager as well). Here are a couple of tips I've heard and am incorporating:

If you created an outline for your book, start with that.

Or, you can start by writing a one-paragraph summary of each chapter. Boil each of those paragraphs down to one sentence (i.e. what's the point of the chapter--what gets accomplished?). Take out anything that doesn't make sense or isn't absolutely necessary for the summary. (Got a sub-plot about the protagonist's sister needing a date for the prom? Axe it!) Then, from there, you can start polishing.

Hey, the hard part's over. You've got an editor interested in it. When you're done, you can submit it to that special thread here, and we can all pick it apart and put it back together for you.

Actually, it's not that difficult, bylinebree. Here's what to do:


What is the PRIMARY plot? Is it a mystery and you find the killer? Is it a fantasy and the hero saves the world (or universe?)

Ignore all subplots and everything that is a WHY event. (WHY the hero goes from point A to Point B, WHY he finds the villain or WHY he defuses the bomb, etc.) Say that there ARE subplots. "While looking for the bomb, the hero rediscovers a love of Chinese food." Yes, one sentence might rip the guts out of a hundred pages of the rationale why he stopped eating Chinese food because he was shang-haied as a child and he grew up on a junk where he learned to hate his captors, etc. etc. For the purpose of a synopsis, it doesn't matter.

Describe the characters in enough depth that you don't HAVE to discuss the subplots. Give the editor a thumbnail sketch of their appearance (the hero is approximately 35 with dark hair that his mother constantly tells him to cut, and pale blue eyes that are often compared to a husky's. He's a loner who fights for the underdog and rescues stray kittens.) The editor then knows he will a) meet people who will compare his eyes; b) there are underdogs that he fights for; c) there will probably be a subplot about a kitten; and d) his mother is a PITA but he spends enough time with her to hear her complaints about his hair.

Limit the HOWs. How the hero gets from Point A to Point B. Just say he does. If it takes awhile, just say, "After a series of adventures, the hero makes it to Point B." Four paragraphs were just eliminated in a single swoop.

Always include the ending. No teasers. No "hooks." The editor wants to see that you have a fully formed plot without major logic gaps. Include a statement that both the main plot and subplots are fully resolved (or, if they aren't, tell WHY they aren't.)

That should take you down to a page with no problem. Good luck!

My method:

- Write a 3 to 5 page synopsis detailing ONLY the main characters (up to 3 or 4) and the main plot. No subplot. No character sketches. Describe all the key plot twists. Tell the climax and ending.

- Then cut, trim, and prune. Cut adjectives. Cut adverbs. Use strong verbs and nouns. Cut unnecessary details.

Do that until you get exactly one page.

Writing the 3-5 page synopsis really helped me draft a one-pager. Having pared the story down that far, it was easier for me to cut down to the bare essentials. Also, I suspect the sense that there's a document that has the "full" story helped me leave out things I otherwise would try to shoehorn in. (Not that the longer synopsis has all the subplots either.)

I didn't even try to edit down the 3 page synopsis to a single page. I started from scratch.

I'm still running about two hundred words long, but I expect to whittle that down. Probably won't be easy or fun, though. And man, my story looks so cheesy cut down like that.

Write it like the summary on the back of paperbacks, and then include the ending - - but make it compelling enough that the editor believes that he or she can make money on it. That is, after all, the only reason they accept a manuscript, you know. Is it a money maker? or isn't it?

greetings...

I wonder, you said that "they" wanted your 450 page novel, are you a first time novelist? Because I have written a 400 page novel (250k words) and I am being told that it will be impossible for me to get published being that I am a first time novelist and my book is so big. Most of the books that I pick up in the bookstore are 600 to 800 pages long! And yes I agree with you, one page is not enough space to compress a 450 page novel! If you have a reply to this post write me at [email protected] and let me know your thoughts. I have written an outline for my novel, but it's more like fifteen pages long than one; that's just rediculious. Tell me more about how you found an agent or an editor, because I am in that very process right now, and I have done extensive research on agents (spent a lot of money too)...until then....

Hi, argenianpoet, and welcome to the forum!

First, if you have a 250,000 word novel, it's not 400 pages--at least as publishers consider pages to be. If you really have a word count of 250K according to your word processing program, then when you're discussing the book with agents/editors, you probably need to tell them you have a 900-1,000 page book. Here's why: Publishers and agents like to receive a manuscript that's formatted using 1" margins, double spaced lines and using Courier New font. This creates a page that has about 25 lines of text and about 250 words per page. Divide 250K by 250 (word per page) and you get 1,000 pages.

Yes, it's difficult to get a 1,000 page novel sold for a first time writer, but it's not impossible. A recent example is Susannah Clarke, whose Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (her first novel) weighs in at an impressive 782 pages. The question you have to consider that the publisher will ask is: "Are all the pages necessary to the story?" With a first time author, that answer is often "No." But there's no way to judge to be certain until someone agrees to look at it. You'll hear lots of people say that you can't publish a book that's over 100K words. The best I can say is that they're wrong--if the book really is good enough to warrant that number of pages.

As for finding a publisher or agent, you'll just have to do like the rest of us. Hone your query letter, write a solid synopsis and if the book is good, there's no reason it can't get purchased.

You say you've spent money looking for agents, though, which concerns me. Where have you been looking? There are a number of places on the web that don't charge you to find information.

Good luck!

I just had to do a 2-page synopsis a few days ago (they actually said one or two pages; I hope I'm not already messed up), and I have to say that was one hard job to pull off!

But I did do it, and if I can do it, anyone can.


I personally like Maestrowork's idea. It makes a lot of sense, especially if you're used to writing a manuscript and then cutting it down to size to meet editors' requirements.

Double-spaced or single-spaced is fine. Agents and editors are usually quite happy to get shorter, rather than longer. Just wanted to give you a little more room if you want.

But one-page synopses are generally single-spaced. It was discussed on Miss Snark's blog just a few days ago, and her bottom line was just to do whatever made the synopsis easy to read.

JD

Actually, it should be single-spaced. But, if you're happy with it...

maestrowork said:

My method:

- Write a 3 to 5 page synopsis detailing ONLY the main characters (up to 3 or 4) and the main plot. No subplot. No character sketches. Describe all the key plot twists. Tell the climax and ending.

- Then cut, trim, and prune. Cut adjectives. Cut adverbs. Use strong verbs and nouns. Cut unnecessary details.

Do that until you get exactly one page.

Click to expand...

Good suggestions. 'spose I should cut the illustrations too.... (jes kiddin, I cant draw worth beans)