On Writing Romance_ How to Craft a Novel That Sells - Leigh Michaels [141]
• Include details of the story line, plot, or characters (the synopsis will do that).
• Go into detail about how you came to write the book.
• Be written (or appear to be written) by anyone except you, the manuscript's author.
To see a sample cover letter for Ties That Blind, turn to Appendix B. The Synopsis
A synopsis is a summary of the entire story, including the major plot events, character motivations, conflict, development of the romantic relationship, and ending. The length of a synopsis depends on the publisher and type of book, but a synopsis can range from two double-spaced pages for a short category to twenty-five pages for historical, paranormal, or single-title books.
Synopsis writing, says a Harlequin editor, "is the toughest kind of writing there is. Nobody likes it—and nobody's particularly good at it—but it is the way hooks are sold." Few editors can buy manuscripts entirely on their own; most take the synopses of their proposed purchases to a weekly sales or acquisition
meeting, where the summaries are passed around and discussed before the decision to acquire is made. Salable synopses are:
• Clear. The information is straightforward and presented in a logical manner that does not force the reader to pause to figure out what you meant.
• Concise. It doesn't fill space with details, information unnecessary to the understanding of the main plot, dialogue, or introspection.
• Complete. It includes all the information necessary to understand the characters and the conflict, and it shows how the conflict is resolved and how the ending comes about.
An effective synopsis will address these six specific points:
• Hook. What's going to appear on the back cover of the book? What element in your story is going to grab the readers and make them say, "This is so different, so unusual, so intriguing that I have to read this book"?
• Heroine. What makes her interesting? Physical description is usually a waste of space, as is most of the character's history. The editor is more interested in what kind of person the character is now and—only if it's crucial to the story—how she got that way.
• Hero. Why is he in opposition to the heroine? What does he want, or why does he not want the heroine to succeed?
• Conflict. What is the main character's difficulty at or near the start of the story? What is the problem that will keep the characters apart, force them to work together, and change their entire future?
• Story. How is the conflict shown to the readers? How does it intensify? How does each event affect the main characters? What twists and turns in the plot will keep the readers fascinated and unable to put the book down? Sketch the beginning, middle, and end of the story in skeletal form, while still being as specific as possible.
• Resolution. How is the conflict resolved? How does the ending come about? What makes the ending satisfying for the readers?
Though these six parts of the story should be addressed in order to create an effective synopsis, there is no other formula or required structure for a synopsis. So long as you include the important points, you may use your creativity to best summarize the story.
A good synopsis will:
• Be double-spaced, to allow editing in the margins and between lines.
• Be written in present tense, to create a sense of immediacy.
• Be more like a book review than a book report.
• Capture the tone of the book (i.e., the synopsis for a humorous book should have a lighthearted approach).
• Be based on a completed manuscript.
• Be written so its parts are roughly in proportion to the book (don't spend the first half of the synopsis on the first chapter or two of the book).
• Tell the story in a logical way, not necessarily in the same order the information is presented in the book.
• Briefly describe important characteristics of the hero and heroine.
• Show the main action sequences, to allow the editor to judge whether the story is logical and believable and whether the plot is realistic and well organized.
• Show how the conflict is resolved.
• Tell