Cooking the Perfect Synopsis

So, I've been working on my synopsis for my middle grade novel, which means I've scoured sources for suggestions, formats and instruction on getting it right. 

Why? Three reasons: 

1- It's a vital marketing tool, next to the Query.

2- If it isn't right you may have a flaw in your story. 

3- At some point someone is going to request one.

I've coalesced what I've researched into a basic recipe. 

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Rockin' Synopsis
Preheat: Present Tense
Serves: Agents, Publishers anyone looking 

1 cup Voice               [Gives a taste of your unique voice.] 

1/3 cup   Who       [Main characters: What do they want?]

1/3 cup   Why       [Why should we care?]

1/3 cup   How       [How is he/she going to get it?]

1/2 cup   What      [What goes wrong, who/what gets in the way?]

1/2  cup  Risk            [What is he/she risk? No risk, no story.]

1/2 cup  Reward    [Do he/she get what they want or version of it?]

Mix well trimming extra words, unnecessary phrases until you have a succinct mix. Set aside for several days. With fresh eyes, revise again perfecting every sentence until you have the exact flavor you want. Then share it with several  CP's or Beta's to see if they see what you see, feel what you want them to feel. If not, revise again. Repeat this until the synopsis has risen to the desired level. 
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I found several excellent suggestions for how to obtain the perfect ingredients and boiling them down to the exact proportions. Here are a few links you may find helpful!

How to Write A Synopsis
How to Write A Book Synopsis: Tips, Techniques
Writing A Synopsis
Synopsis
Writing a Synopsis That Rocks

I know there are tons more out there! Do you have a post on your blog? Share a link in your comments! 

*Check in next Monday for Middle School Review of Savvy and Scumble by Ingrid Law

What I've Learned About Scene

     I wanted to talk about scene today. I'm working on the first draft of a middle grade novel. (I've had a few false starts.) In the process I have noticed a few things. 1) I keep trying to order things 2) My "beginning" is getting vague as I go deeper into my story.3) I keep reading over my written scenes.  *pulling out hair*

    I've continued to look for all the advice I can about the role scene plays in the novel. The main point idea: scenes are the starting point for story. Usually, scene presents itself long before you have a coherent story. However, we who are control freaks or want to sound "authory" try and explain the scenes instead of just writing them. Don't misunderstand this is not the editor showing its fangs--that comes later. This is our need to order things, understand exactly where we are going, write everything in our minds eye and plan accordingly.

     So, what to do. Well, here it is...*listen up you pantsers your gonna love this*. Story shouldn't be our concern until we have created enough narrative that the "elements themselves begin asking for the coherence of structure" (Vandenburgh, 27). Simply stated: Write our brains out without thinking about order or where it's taking us. As far as this draft is concerned, the writing should suck. Vandenburgh calls this "prewriting" to make it easier to toss later.(Resource: Architecture of a Novel by Jane Vandenburgh.)

    Holly Lyle on her post about scene states,"As the atom is the smallest discrete unit of matter, so the scene is the smallest discrete unit in fiction..." Our scenes are to story what scaffolding is to skyscrapers. It appears we try to manipulate our scenes before we give them a chance to spill out on the page. 

     Kay Kenyon writes,"If you are reading and re-reading your last few pages to get a run-up on your next scene, stop this now. Rereading causes revision blindness later."  She suggests using a tool called a scene list to jot down things that occur to you while you are writing to keep you from going back. I believe this is similar to the process Joyce Carol Oats uses when the story is first being born.

     Linda Clare explains that the most important element of scene is change, something has to happen. We still have the work of choosing, we need not tell everything in our minds eye. The adage..."Enter late, leave early" should be all the order we care about at this point.

     I love Jean Oram's analogy of a scene to a Thanksgiving dinner. What if you sat everyone down, insisted that everyone act a certain way, eat in an order you dictate and not allow any spontaneity. Why? Because, it is your dinner and you have a vision of what it "should" look like. She goes on to explain that this would create a "cardboard cutout of real life". This is what too much pressure to order can do to scene. (Besides, whats Thanksgiving without some drama?)

Bottom line folks...there is a ton of great advice out there. At some point you discover what works for you and I have great faith that I will too.

What helps you to get the story on to the page? What role does scene play in that process?

Am I Really a Writer?

Source: yuribaranovsky.com

Tweet     Of all the questions we ask ourselves, there is one question that does more to gum up a writers muse than all others:   Am I Really A Writer?

   By itself it seems harmless enough and self reflection is good for us. Right? So why does this question carry such dire consequences? 

    Sometimes the very act of discovering the perfect descriptors, a basic exercise for any writer, for what it is we do creates an insurgent inadequacy powerful enough to knock the pen from our hands.  

    For we idealize the artist as we do the movie star. Each of us carrying  a vision of what a true writer looks like. 

    Perhaps yours is of the lone writer struggling tirelessly against the curse of vagueness.  Or a Stephen King-like voraciousness that continues to spew forth published works or the Emily Dickenson-like surreptitious strength of brevity bubbling quietly from within.  

     An impossible measure that can leave us barren.

     A writer, not unlike an artist,  is someone who views the world in a way that demands the act of expression and wields the pen like a brush upon a canvas.  

      Roland Barthes  said  "... I cannot but ascribe to some super-humanity the existence of beings vast enough to wear blue pajamas at the very moment when they manifest themselves as universal conscience."

Source: kaboodle.com

So as I don my pink footie pajamas armed with nothing but my keyboard and a cup of joe I plunge again because I don't know any other way to live.

What's your vision of a writer and how do you remind yourself that you are indeed a writer? 

Sometimes, it's What You Don't Know

Source: travel.ca.msn.com

     Silence is golden. 

     As writers we often talk about the deficiencies in telling instead of showing. This idea is far more than one of aesthetics or sophisticated writing. It is fundamental in the telling of a story or the unfolding of plot.

     As a reader, I want the experience of knowing the questions as the clues are presented by the writer. That way I may not know the details, but I feel them. I become emotionally engaged, pulled in by the tension that subtext creates. 

     "Meaning is only compellingly elusive when the reader must struggle to reconcile the tension that arises from plot, " writes Catherine Brady.

   So when I say, silence is golden, I mean exactly that. The gold I am after as a writer is that magic that cumulative clues create in the telling of the story.  

For a more in depth look at this concept check out "Story Logic and the Craft of Fiction" by Catherine Brady. 
  
Did you prospect any gold today?   For me, it often requires sifting through the dirt, if you know what I mean.

Monday, Monday, I'm Not Cryin' But I Could Be

 Tweet    Monday's are sometimes tough for writers, at least they can be for me. This is when I plan my week. What I have to do, what I want to do and especially what is most important to do.

It is always easy to plan the have-to's,  they are usually scheduled appointments, things that have deadlines this week, people you have committed to. Done!

Similarly, want-to's are often easy simply because they don't even have to to written down and they still have a pretty good chance of happening. You know...read that book, eat that last piece of pie, call a friend, watch a movie...buy those boots you saw on sale... Done!

It's the most-important-to-do's that seem to have the hardest time finding space on the calendar. Now, let me clarify. I'm not talking necessarily about need-to's either. Need to's are like the laundry, changing a diaper, cooking a meal. They will happen and if they don't there are consequences: screaming baby, nothing to wear, starvation. What I'm talking about are the things like...cut calories and eat healthy, exercise, work on my WIP,  the things that no one is going to call you on if they don't happen.

So, how can I make this happen? Here is the hard part...schedule it just like an appointment.

You have to set aside a special time to actually do it. Even more important is you have to be specific. Exactly, what is going to happen during that time. What is this bite going to look like? This is where I often go wrong. I either plan way too huge a bite that I choke on it or I make it too vague and spend most of the time fumbling around without really accomplishing anything.

Is this easy?   Hell no!  Do I always succeed? Double hell no! Why do I keep trying? I try because I believe that is why we have new days, new hours, new minutes so we can try it again.

How is your Monday going? Sometimes I have to push my Monday to Tuesday, what about you?

Why Isn't This Scene Working?

Tweet    "It's 2:00am and I have been up for two hours frantically typing a scene for my current middle school MS. You know what I'm talking about, the kind of scene that won't let you get on with anything in your life until you get it on paper."

    Sound familiar?  Well, it had been two months since that night and I still couldn't figure out where the scene fit.  Still sound familiar? Well,  I revised it, tried it in several different positions but it still wasn't working. So I decided that I would just put it aside and deal with it later and picked up one of the current books I'm reading, The Architecture of the Novel by Jane Vandenburgh. In her section on plot  she writes:

      "So plot is story's sequence--the 3,2.1 or the 2,3,1 of it's scenes. These are events arranged not necessarily in the order in which they chronologically happened. Rather, they are positioned so they best show us what we are to understand about each event in the moment in which it occurs. Sequencing has everything to do with the way plot weaves layers of time... we can look back...and understand and events significance-- only later, when we encounter meaning in the story's narrative future.' (Vandenburgh, 78) 

Eureka! It suddenly occurred to me that the scene that I believed was for my protagonist,  was actually a scene involving her deceased mother. So now I had to discover where in my plot this information/ scene would be meaningful and how my protagonist would learn about it.

Uncovering story and plot is such an adventure! Have you had any eureka moments you would like to share?

It's still not to late to enter my 80 followers celebration give-away, enter here. Amazingly in only two days I have now jumped to 103 followers, so....in celebration I will be adding another copy of Possession, doubling the chances of winning!! :) Be sure to enter before 12:00 midnight on December, 9th.

Craft Analysis: Seer Of Shadows by Avi

About The Book: In Avi's "Seer of Shadows" this prolific writer takes us on a chilling journey of mystery and gives an insiders view of what photography was like when it first began, something that many of us know little about in this digital age. 
Favorite Line:"It was as if, having always believed coal was black, I now began to see it as white" (Shadows,106).

What Others Are Saying: “.  .  . In perhaps [Avi’s] best work yet, [he] has created a truly chilling tale that will stay with the reader long after the last page is turned and the lights are turned out.” -Children's Literature

"This tale proves that the time-honored ghost story, capably researched, well-paced, and fusing the Gothic elements of mystery, madness and romance , can still thrill in the hands of a skilled craftsman." -Kirkus Reviews

Log Line: "It’s the tale of a boy who has been taught that there is a scientific explanation for everything and who then confronts something that is beyond reason. While at its heart is the world of photography, most of all The Seer of Shadows is—I hope—a creepy ghost story." See his essay on the book here.

First Five Pages:  Avi crafts the setting, introduces his main characters and their desires and opens his creepy plot in only two pages. An incredible feat for even the most gifted writer. 

Other Observations: His extensive research is evident in the details about early New York in the 1800's and photography at that time. Each chapter if fast paced always ending with a sentence that leads to the next chapter like mini-cliff-hangers.

Writer Info


Who: Edward Irving Wortis better known as Avi was born in 1937 and has gone by the name Avi since his twin sister gave it to him when they were children in Brooklyn. He writes in several genres and forms always working to find the best way to tell the story. He has written novel length comic books, stories all in dialogue and one completely told through weekly installments in newspapers.


When: He started his interest in writing in high school. "I think you become a writer when you stop writing for yourself or your teachers and start thinking about readers." "I wanted to prove that I could write"

Challenges: Avi has Dysgraphia which made him a poor writer as a child. He uses a word processor and needs absolute quiet to work.

How: His process begins with a rough draft of the story. This generally takes a year and he often has several going at the same time. Then his favorite part begins, the rewrites. He is very invested in the collaborative process of bringing a book to print. Avi does extensive research for all of his books, reading everything he can about where and what and often going someplace. (As he did for the Crispin series going to England and France.) 


First Book: Things That Sometimes Happen  1970


Day Job: Librarian for years, although he now writes full time.


Marketing Strategy: Author website, Blog, school visits, conducts Skype visits to libraries, book clubs, and classrooms. "I think it is very important for me to hold these kids in front of my eyes. They're wonderfully interesting and they hold me to the reality of who they are."


Advice To Other Writers:  "Rewrite! No one ever writes anything well the first time. The first draft cannot be the last draft. (I rewrite my work fifty-sixty times- or more). Here's a tip: read your first draft, and if you think it's good, you are in trouble. But, if you read it and you see it's not that good, you are in great shape, to get going. The more you rewrite the better your writing will be." 
See his Six Secrets To Good Writing here.


Have you read any of Avi's books? What are your favorites and why?