This morning I've been beavering away getting my first submission of 2010 - a gay paranormal romance - ready to send. The publisher is asking for the first 3,000 words, the last 1,000 words, and a summary. The first two weren't a problem but I suck big time at synopses and can never, ever seem to break my work down into its salient points while still making it sound exciting. Too often I end up with a series of 'then he did this' and 'then he said that's which must be deadly dull to read.
For my novel, Roses in December, I actually binned my synopsis and wrote an extended blurb instead. I included several brief quotes from the book and kept the ending pretty much under wraps. That wasn't an option this time, though, as the publisher said they wanted to know the ending. Describing the end of a book is one of the hardest things I've ever come across - you either end up with a row of exclamation marks or make the whole thing sound like a total let-down. I'm worried I've done the latter but hopefully it doesn't read quite as badly as I think it does.
Now I sit back, chew my fingernails and wait to see if they want to read the whole manuscript. Fingers crossed...
2 comments:
I sympathise, Fiona. When you've written 80,000-100,000 words, it's bloody hard to convey what they say in a single page or couple of paragraphs. I think your blurb idea is the right one - just give them something that makes them want to read the thing itself. Good luck with the submission.
Thanks Bill! Believe it or not this was only 20,000 words but it's quite a complex plot so it was still bloomin' hard. :)
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