New Release - A Broadway Romance!

Ever since I was a kid, I've been enthralled with the stage. I love Broadway/West End shows and especially musical theater. For me, good theater has always been a magical experience. And there's something extra special about watching a live production, the actors and dancers working "without a net," at the top of their game, having to deliver perfect performances every time.

Romance author Devika Fernando and I have teamed up to bring you a new novel set in this unique artistic environment.  Called Broadway Bound: an Inspirational Romance Set in the Musical Theater, it's about a young, handsome, up-and-coming Broadway actor who suddenly finds his career derailed. To wait out the storm, he moves to a small town where his parents have retired...and that's when he meets the beautiful, young local ballet teacher. The romantic sparks begin to fly, but he has no intention of giving up his lofty dreams and settling down in a small town, and she's equally opposed to the stress of living in a huge city, surrounded by "shallow" people who are trying to claw their way to the top. 

There is a lot of humor in this novel, and because it is set in the Christmas season, it makes a great holiday read.

To try it out, you can download Book 1 free from all the usual ebook retail sites.  The 1-2-3 book set is also available on all stores here, and also from my online bookstore in Kindle and ePub formats at a significant (25%) discount - use the code AMXNZSP5CY at checkout (hurry, offer expires in 3 days!)

Also, Devika and I are now offering our double-trilogy, bestselling series, Forbidden: A Novel of Love & Betrayal, as a special boxed-set on Amazon for only $9.99, or free if you are a Kindle Unlimited subscriber. You can still download the boxed set from my online store in both Kindle and Epub formats, and also at a 25% discount - use code LGLQPO6BKT at checkout (hurry, offer expires in 3 days!)

I hope you enjoy the books!

Mike

Does Bruce Willis Have a Dog? Less is More

I’ll never forget the first time my wife read one of my novels.  As she was finishing the last few pages, I sat at my computer, pretending to work,  butterflies in my stomach.  Would she love it or hate it?

When she was done reading, she set the manuscript aside and gazed over at the TV set.  She seemed lost in thought.

“Well?” I said uneasily.

“Mike, does Bruce Willis have a dog?”

I was taken aback.  “Excuse me?”

She went over to the VCR and picked up the videocassette case for Die Hard, the movie we’d watched the night before. 

“In Die Hard, does the character that Bruce Willis plays have a dog?”

“Well...hell if I know!  I don’t remember any dog in the movie.”

“Exactly.  We don’t know whether he has a dog or not because it doesn’t have anything to do with the story.”

I looked over at my manuscript.  “What are you saying?”

“What I’m saying is that you could have a really great book if you did a lot of cutting.  The way it stands, the story is bogged down with too many irrelevant details.”

Irrelevant details?  What an insult!  A long, heated discussion ensued, and I viciously defended each and every word in the book.  It ended with me shouting “What the hell do you know?” and storming out of the house, vowing to never let the moron I married read another word of my writing.

But after a little time passed and I calmed down, I opened up the manuscript and started reading it myself, trying my best to be objective.  I decided there were maybe one or two places where I went overboard, explaining too much about the hero’s background and other details.  Finally I went back to my wife, apologized, and gave her the manuscript and a yellow highlighter.  “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d love for you to go through entire book and mark each and every word that you think isn’t necessary.”

“My pleasure.”

When she was done, there was so much yellow on the paper it looked like Bruce Willis’ nonexistent dog had taken a leak on it.

As a writer, this was one of the most eye-opening processes I’ve ever experienced.  What I learned from it is that if you’re writing plot-driven stories, like I usually write, each and every bit of information you include should have something to do with the story.  If it doesn’t, the words needs to be mercilessly cut.

In the famous words of William Faulkner:  “In writing, you must kill all your darlings.”

Die Hard is a very good example of how important this principle is.  In the movie, do we know if the hero (John McClaine, played by Bruce Willis) has a dog?  No, we don’t.  What about his home—does he live in a house or an apartment?  Again, we don’t know, because there are no scenes set in his home.  What about his family?  Does he have any aunts or uncles?  Again, we don’t know, because that has nothing to do with the story.

Now, in contrast, consider The Wizard of Oz. 

Do we know if Dorothy has a dog?  Of course we know this—the dog’s name is Toto.  We know it because Toto plays a key role in the story.  Among other things, it's Toto that pulls back the curtain to reveal the Great and Powerful Wizard of Oz is nothing a harmless old man hiding behind a bunch of fancy equipment.  

Does Dorothy live in a house, or an apartment?  We know that, too—she lives in a house, which is sucked up into the tornado—this is inciting incident for the entire story!  Furthermore, the house lands smack on top of the Wicked Witch of the East and kills her, which is what gets Dorothy in so much trouble in Oz.

Finally, does Dorothy have an aunt?  We know that, too. Good old Aunty Em.  Dorothy misses her terribly when she believes she’ll be stuck in Oz forever and can’t get back to Kansas.  The aunt plays a key role in the story.

So, back to the original question:

Does Bruce Willis have a dog?

In Die Hard, it doesn’t matter.

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Close Encounters of the Seedy Kind: Why I Left Hollywood to Become a Novelist

When I first started to take my fiction writing career seriously, I decided to try my hand at screenwriting.  I’ve always loved movies just as much as books.  Plus, I figured writing screenplays might be easier than writing novels, as you don’t have to put in a lot of fancy description in film scripts (In hindsight I don’t think it’s any easier, but that’s what I thought then)

I was lucky with my first screenplay.  The working title was Art & Soul. It was a tight psychological thriller about a romance novelist who eavesdropped on private cellphone conversations to get his story ideas, and who falls in love with one of the women he’s been spying on.  I pitched it over the phone directly to producers.  I soon had one interested, an indie film producer who had won the prestigious Palm d'Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival a few years before.

“Mike, you’re a fantastic writer,” he told me with great sincerity.  “You should move to California, where the action is—you’ll do very well out here.”

I packed up and headed West, giddy about my seemingly fast-track Hollywood career.    

The man was a seasoned producer, in his 60's, and planned to finance the movie himself.  He bought a one year option on my screenplay, meaning that he had a year to pay me the full price for it.  He planned on doing that as soon as I'd made all the “minor” changes he wanted.  

A soon as I arrived in LA, he took me under his wing.  “Mike,” he said, putting his tanned hand on my shoulder, “before we start working together, there's one thing you should know about Hollywood.  Out here, we all practice The Golden Rule.”

“The Golden Rule?”

He grinned.  “He who has the gold, rules.”

We began “polishing” the script. I worked long, long hours, with me doing revision after revision, making small changes that he wanted.  He'd started out as a screenwriter himself, and he taught me a lot of subtle tricks  that greatly improved the screenplay, made it more gripping and engaging.  Some of the changes he wanted me didn't feel quite right.  But I remembered The Golden Rule, and I ended up making all the changes he wanted anyway.

Then, when I thought we were almost finished with it,  he said, “I think Melina (the young woman my hero falls for) should be a long-legged, fiery redhead.”

I wasn’t sure about this.  “But Melina isn’t a ‘fiery’ character.  She’s just the opposite—she’s cool and collected.”

“Trust me, Mike.”  There was deadpan look in his eye.  Don't forget The Golden Rule, it seemed to say.

I made the change.  But when I reread the script, I felt the story no longer worked.  With Melina’s new personality, her actions were no longer believable.  I mustered up my courage and decided that at the next script meeting I would tell the producer this in no uncertain terms, Golden Rule or not.

Well, he brought his new girlfriend along to the meeting.  She was about 1/3 of his age.  It happened that she was a long-legged redhead with a fiery personality.  Coincidentally, she had recently had started taking acting lessons.

The producer began asking for even more changes, telling me to crank up the “voyeurism.”  He wanted new, more titillating scenes added, scenes that were beginning to turn the film into—in Hollywood parlance—a schlocky B movie, the type that would bypass theaters altogether and be released straight to cable TV.

“It may be a little schlocky,” he admitted, “but schlock sells, Mike.  This film will be profitable right out of the gate.”  He gave me a winning Hollywood smile, his bleached teeth nearly blinding me.  “You can write your dream script later.”

I soon lost all my enthusiasm for the project.  I vividly remember staring at the computer screen one day, reading one of the seedy scenes I’d just written, and thinking I can’t do this anymore.  I felt like I was turning my own well-raised, cultured daughter into a cheap tart.

I called the producer and told him I was quitting.  

I left the Great State of California.  I began working my first novel. 

Believe it or not, I don't have any hard feelings about this experience—I pretty much knew how things would be in Hollywood.  Today—20 years later—readers often tell me that my novels have a tight, cinematic feel.  I have no doubt that this is a key element of my “unputdownable” style, and results from the intense training I underwent working with on that first screenplay.

Still, I was disappointed that Art & Soul was never made into a movie.

Maybe one day I will go back out to Hollywood and give screenwriting another try.

But not until I have accumulated enough gold to make the rules.

Why I Will Never Change the Cover of Wild Child

Although many readers love the cover illustration of my young adult thriller, Wild Child (paperback edition), it is occasionally criticized, and there is a certain pattern in the comments.   “Looks amateurish”, “Not polished” and “Unprofessional” are a few examples.

Well, there's a reason that the cover may appear appear amateurish, unpolished, and unprofessional to some people.  It was created by a 17 year old art student in Atlanta, the winner of a city-wide student art contest I held in 1997 for the best cover illustration for the book.  His name is Seron Fuller, and he is an phenomenal artist.

Over 150 students entered the contest.  No guidance whatsoever was given other than to read the book and come up with the design that they believe best depicted the story and characters.  There were lots of interesting designs, but when I saw Seron’s illustration, I was awestruck.  He chose to depict what I consider the perfect moment in the story, when Briana shows Kyle the magical green water.  The expressions on their faces, and their body language, it says it all!  Briana:   euphoric, hyper, and slightly out of control. And Kyle:  bewildered, concerned and uncertain, as if thinking, “What am I going to do with this girl?”

Before I go on, I want to emphasize that the readers who have criticized the cover design had no idea that it was done by an art student, or that I’d even held such a contest.  I know that these well-meaning readers have only had my best interest at heart—most raved about the story and the writing.  They only want to see Wild Child get into the hands of even more readers, believing that a more professional-looking cover would help make that happen.  And they may well be right.

But there are several reasons I will never change the cover design of Wild Child.   

First, a key part of art contest prize was that the winning illustration would be used as the paperback book cover forever.  Not just for the first six months, or until the second paperback edition was published, or until I got tired of the design, but forever. To change the cover now would be going back on my word, and I would never do that.

Second, my books are like my children, and I think most other authors feel the same way.  If you’ve read The Wild Publication Story, you know that I threw 3,000 paperback copies of this little baby in the trash can—every copy I had—before the poor thing could even walk!  Miraculously, she was able to crawl out of  that rubbish bin all by herself and make her way into schools, to help teach young people English, and into the hands of a dozen Amazon resellers, to help those people make a living.  To change the cover now would be like telling my 16 year old daughter, “Honey, you’ve done absolutely amazing things up to this point, but some people think you’re ugly so we’re going to give you plastic surgery.”

Whenever I’ve been tempted to have a new cover designed for the paperback, I always remind myself that it was Seron’s cover that was on all those copies that found their way out of the trash can, and not another.   This may sound silly to some people, but I believe there is a certain magic in his cover illustration, just as there seems to be in the story itself, and that this magic comes across to readers, at least on the paperback edition that you can hold in your hands.

Seron Fuller's Self-portrait

But there’s a far more important reason that I would never change the cover.  When Seron Fuller won the contest and I presented him with his $250 check, I asked him what his future plans were.  He answered, very modestly, “I want to be an illustrator at a Hollywood movie studio.”  I thought this was very ambitious, but on the other hand, with his amazing talent and quiet determination, I did not think that goal was beyond his reach.  I told him so, and I encouraged him to go for it.

Today, 14 years later, Seron Fuller works in as an illustrator in Hollywood, at Paramount Pictures.

Just knowing that his winning the Wild Child cover illustration might have played some small role in his journey to achieve his dreams is worth more to me than any amount of money I could every make from selling mere books.

Thank you, Seron, for being part of the Wild Child magic!

Writers Beware: The Fast Yes and the Slow No

In Hollywood, screenwriters soon learn that there are two types of responses that movie producers give to a screenplay:  The Fast Yes and The Slow No.

With the Fast Yes, the producer instantly “falls in love” with the script, clearly sees its commercial appeal, and can't wait make the writer an offer.

With the Slow No, the producer kind of, sort of likes the screenplay, and believes that if the writer would just make a few “minor” changes, he/she would (maybe, probably) like it a lot better and even (maybe, probably) buy it. 

Some writers run off and spend months, even years, dutifully making all these changes, only to find that when the screenplay is polished to the producer’s perfection and resubmitted, the producer still says no! 

The result is that the writer wastes a huge amount time and experiences untold anger and frustration.  Worse, the writer ends up with a screenplay that has been highly customized to the subjective tastes of one particular person, and is of very little interest to anybody else.

The same thing happens in the music business, and the A&R reps in the record industry have a similar saying:

“If it’s not a hell yes, it’s a no.”

Guess what, folks?  It's no surprise that the same thing happens in the publishing industry.  A literary agent or publishing house editor likes your book, kind of, sort of, and strokes your ego by telling you what a good writer you are, and that if you would just make these “minor” changes for them, they will “take another look” (and maybe, probably—you think—make you an offer to represent or buy the book)

Utter hogwash.

Most of the time, this is The Slow No.

If you find yourself tempted to fall for this (and if you really want to be published, you will be), tell yourself the following:

1.  You are not a slave.  You deserve to be paid for your work.

2.  Even if the agent or editor does not understand the highly subjective nature of the feedback he or she has given you, you do!  You know better than to spend weeks, months or years customizing (free of charge!) your book to please the taste of one person, no matter how “powerful” that person would like you to believe he or she is in the industry.

3.  You have developed confidence in yourself and your writing ability.  You believe in your work.  You do not let so-called industry experts dictate what is “good” or “bad” to you.  You let readers decide, because at the end of the day, that’s who you are writing for—readers—not literary agents, book editors or even book reviewers or critics.

It may come as no surprise that when you learn to "say no" to The Slow No, you start making real progress in your writing career.  

That's when people stop viewing you as an amateur and start treating you like a professional.

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A Tribute to the Late, Great Sidney Sheldon

Author Sidney Sheldon

A few days ago, a reviewer of my book Lust, Money & Murder said “Not since Sidney Sheldon has a male author captured the female perspective so well.  You’ll be hooked!”

I was deeply moved by this comment.  So moved, in fact, that I decided to write a post about Mr. Sheldon. 

Why?

Because Sidney Sheldon was my favorite contemporary author, and he was my hero.  It’s not at all surprising that he had a tremendous influence on my writing.

Born in 1917, Sidney Sheldon first worked as a screenwriter in Hollywood, winning an Academy Award, and then went on to become one of the world’s bestselling novelists, penning 19 books over the last 35 years of his life.  Sidney Sheldon books have been translated into over 50 different languages and sold over 300 million copies.  He died at the ripe age of 89, still writing.

Sidney Sheldon was not my hero because of all the books he sold.  Sidney Sheldon was my hero for the countless hours of entertainment he gave me and millions of other lucky readers.   Curling up in a chair and reading the latest Sidney Sheldon book was the literary equivalent of eating a moist slice of Death by Chocolate cake, an experience you relished every moment of and left you hungry for more.

His plots were packed with twists and surprises.  Do you remember in The Other Side of Midnight when you found out that the obnoxious bum that came on to the hero was actually a decorated air force pilot?  Or when the assassin in Memories of Midnight turned out not to be one of the three men you suspected, but the meek office boy the hero befriended?  Of course you do—these literary moments are unforgettable.

But Sidney Sheldon’s books provided far more than entertaining plot twists.  His heroes were truly inspirational, strong women who also maintained their softness and femininity.   Even though I'm a man, his books gave me hope when I was down, inner strength when I was weak, and gave me the courage to pick myself up again after my most dismal failures. His books were so engaging that I could become completely absorbed in them, so much so that when I finished, I often had new perspective on things.

Who can forget Jennifer Parker’s struggle to become a successful lawyer in a men’s world in Rage of Angels?  Or Tracey Whitney’s determination to avenge her mother’s death in If Tomorrow Comes?   Sidney Sheldon’s characters never gave up, yet even the most ambitious protagonists always showed tenderness and compassion.

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But probably the biggest reason that Sidney Sheldon is my hero that he wrote to entertain.  Unlike many authors, he did not put on airs, show off his knowledge of obscure French phrases, or try to impress you with how beautifully he could describe a sunset.  He entertained you.  Period.  He nailed you to the first page and kept you turning them all the way the end of the book, increasing the tension to the point where you’d stay up all night just to know how it all turned out!

This is precisely what I aim to do in my books.  Whether I succeed or not is up to readers to decide.  But it’s not surprising that many people see similarities to my work and Sidney Sheldon's.

For Sidney Sheldon was not only my hero. 

He was my greatest teacher.

What Lady Gaga Taught Me about Fiction Writing

Yesterday I watched Weird Al Yankovic’s video parody of Lady Gaga, and I ended up reading a lot of  posts criticizing her.  The usual stuff.  How her music is "superficial crap," how she is nothing more than a Madonna clone, and how her weirdness was carefully crafted for marketing purposes and is not who she really is.

First, I want to say that I’m not the biggest Lady Gaga fan, but whenever millions of people are responding positively to something, I pay attention.  I pay attention for the simple reason that I don't believe they can all be wrong.  Plus, I don't want to miss out on the fun!  Is her music superficial crap?  I don't know, but I happen to like some of it, and I like some of her outrageous videos as well. 

Second, yes, of course the woman has influences!  She is an artist. She acknowledges that Madonna is one of her sources of inspiration.  She also cites Queen and David Bowie.  If you look at her work, you can clearly see the mark of all those superstars.  In turn, if you study Madonna and Queen and David Bowie, you will see their influences, too.  And so on, all the way back to the beginning of music.

But third—the accusation that her weirdness is not genuine—well, this brings me to the subject this post.

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The Paradox of Weirdness

One of the most interesting things about success—and I’m talking about success in any field, not just the music business—is that being weird or different is ultimately the most important factor.  Yet, ironically, when you first set out to be successful at something, it seems everyone you encounter pressures you to be like those ahead of you who have already established themselves, to conform to the formula that results from studying the already-successful group as a whole. If you succumb to this pressure, you will inevitably be lost in the sea of other wanna-bees who are following the same formula.

 

Two perfect examples are Cindy Crawford and Arnold Schwarzenegger. When Cindy Crawford began her modeling career, she was repeatedly told by agency owners to have the “unsightly” birthmark removed over her upper lip or she would never make it as a model.  Yet that “unsightly” facial feature became her trademark, the characteristic that set her apart from every other model she was competing against.  It played a significant role in her rise to stardom.

Similarly, Arnold Schwarzenegger was repeatedly told that he would never be successful in Hollywood unless he lost his Austrian accent—“American audiences don’t like foreign accents” was the mantra.  Yet who can ever forget those famous words, “Hasta la vista, baby!” that made motion picture history.  Had they not been uttered in that deadpan, self-assured accent that is pure Arnold, would they have had the same impact?  I think not.

I’ve personally run up against this paradox over and over again in my own work.  It started with my very first novel, Wild Child, which the big NY publishers said was too short.  But I tend to write short books, it’s my style and a way I’m different from many other writers, especially the long-winded ones.  I tried lengthening the book to please the industry experts, but it slowed down the pace.  I eventually published the novel myself, and it went on to be a very successful book.  What is one of the most common praises? “Wild Child is a short, super fast-paced read!”

The same type of thing happened with my book Lust, Money & Murder—the publishers said the protagonist, Elaine Brogan, was “too plain,” that she needed to be more of a superhero.  But that was the whole point!  This is a thriller about an ordinary young woman who goes on to do extraordinary things,  butts heads with one of the most dangerous criminals in the world.  She's able to do this not because she’s a superwoman, but out of sheer tenacity and determination, simple qualities that are within everyone's reach.  I withdrew the book and published it myself.  Readers love this story, and one of the main reasons is that Elaine Brogan is an ordinary person that everyone can identify with. 

Similarly, I was told by the big publishers that readers would find an “evil” baby offensive.  And later:  no female readers are interested in the romantic affairs of a New Age playboy.  Yet my novels Baby Talk and Cosmic Casanova are both receiving outstanding reviews.

Odd, isn’t it?    

The very elements the experts criticize and want changed always turn out to be the strongest elements of my books.

It takes courage to fly in the face of all that criticism and advice (well-meaning, I'm sure) and stick to your guns, to maintain your uniqueness.  At times you really wonder if you're shooting yourself in the foot by not conforming. 

So, back to Lady Gaga, and the third criticism I mentioned.  Is her weirdness natural, or is it part of her act?

The answer is, it doesn't matter.  The fact that she's different is a major factor in her success, there's no doubt about that.  It took a lot of guts to do what she's done.

Lady Gaga, even though I know you will never read my words on my little blog, I thank you for the inspiration.

You dare to be different.

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How to Write a Short Synposis for Your Story

For most writers, creating a compelling synopsis for a short story, novella or novel is a challenge. Many people pull their hair out over this. You have to compress your entire story into just a few sentences...yet you have to catch the overall arc of the plot, make the characters seem appealing, give readers an overall feeling for the story's style and tone.  This is a daunting task for even the best writers. On top of that, the thing has to be good. A powerful synopsis for a novel will make the prospective reader feel that he or she just must read the book.

How the heck do people do it? Is synopsis-writing a black art?

Well, it turns out there is a very simple, easy-to-apply formula for writing story synopses. It was developed in Hollywood and is one of the most powerful writing tools I know. It will allow you to write a strong synopsis for your story in only two sentences. Don't believe me? Read on.

First, you have to understand and agree that every story is composed of the five basic elements. If a story doesn't have any one of these elements, it isn't a story. These five elements are: hero, situation, goal, villain, and disaster.

If you string these elements together as follows, you form a synopsis:

(1) hero who finds herself stuck in a (2) situation from which she wants to free herself by achieving a (3) goal. However, there is a (4) villain who wants to stop him, and if he's successful, will cause the hero to experience a (5) disaster.

Now, before your Inner Artiste tarts screaming, "This is a formula! This is a formula!" I want to stop for a second. Yes, this is a formula, and anyone with any experience in writing (or painting or composing music, etc.) knows that formulas do not work when creating a new piece of art--the most you can hope for is a cookie-cutter type result that will be mediocre, at best. However, what we are doing here with this formula is summarizing a piece of art that has already been created.

Having said that, the only thing that is actually formulaic about this approach is the order in which the five elements are presented, and the structure of the sentences. You can change this around later and make the synopsis appear as original and unique as you desire. (Are you satisfied now, Inner Artiste? Good, now settle down!)

So, back to the method. Another way to write this compressed synopsis is to move the goal into the second sentence into the form of a question, as follows:

Hero finds herself stuck in situation from which she wants to free herself. Can she achieve goal, or will villain stop her and cause her to experience disaster?

All you have to do is identify the elements and plug them in to create a rudimentary two sentence synopsis for your own story.

The best way to demonstrate this formula is with a real example. As virtually everyone knows the story of The Wizard of Oz, let's use that. The five elements are:

HERO Dorothy, a Kansas farm girl

SITUATION Finds herself transported to faraway land called Oz.

GOAL To find her way back to Kansas

VILLAIN The witch

DISASTER To be stuck in Oz forever

Plugging the elements into the two-sentence structure, we have:

Dorothy, a farm girl, finds herself transported to a faraway land called Oz. Will the witch kill her before she can find her way back to Kansas?

Now, before you begin to think that this sounds too simplistic for your story, or if you don't believe your book contains one on more of these elements, or that they seem too melodramatic, etc.--you're wrong. Your story has all five elements, or it would not be a story.

Your story must have a hero, even if that hero happens to be a cat. And your hero must be stuck in an untenable situation and develop a goal to escape that situation, or you have nothing but a character study, not a story. The untenable situation could be something as mundane as boredom or as abstract as a blocked unconscious need to act out rebelliousness. But that untenable situation is there, and the hero must have a goal to escape it. Furthermore, if there is nothing to stop the hero from achieving her goal (i.e., a villain), then you have no conflict. No conflict, no story.

Granted, some of your story elements may require some thought to identify. For example, your villain might be society as a whole, Mother Nature, or even your hero's self-doubt. Similarly, your disaster could be little more than your hero having to live with an unbearable self-concept or overwhelming guilt. It's also important to remember that the "disaster" is seen through the eyes of the hero. This is usually the worst possible scenario he or she can envision at the beginning of the story, but may in fact be the just outcome, or the outcome that does the hero the most good in the long run.

Back to The Wizard of Oz. While the two sentence synopsis we wrote is accurate, it is also painfully dull. This because we started with the five story elements distilled into their absolute minimal forms (done intentionally by me for the purpose of this exercise). To jazz it up, let's go through the list and expand each element:

HERO - Dorothy isn't just a farm girl, she's a lonely, wistful farm girl

SITUATION - Dorothy isn't merely transported to Oz, but is whisked away by a tornado and dropped there. Also, Oz is far more than a faraway land, it's a magical but frightening place, full of strange characters, little people call Munchkins and witches, both "good" and "bad."

GOAL - Dorothy's main goal is to get back to Kansas, but she soon learns that only the great and powerful Wizard of Oz can help her do that, and he lives in Emerald City, a long and dangerous journey from her starting point (You'll note that in any story, the hero's main goal breaks down into a series of sub-goals).

VILLAIN - The witch is more than "just a witch"--she is the Wicked Witch of the West.

DISASTER - Dorothy's possible fate is actually worse than being stuck in Oz forever--the Wicked Witch of the West is determined to kill her.

So, let's plug these expanded elements into the original formula.
 

Dorothy, a lonely, wistful farm girl, is whisked away by a tornado and dropped into in a faraway land called Oz, a magical but frightening place, filled with strange and wonderful characters--little people called Munchkins, and witches that are both good and bad. Can Dorothy make the long and dangerous journey to Emerald City to see the Wizard, the only one who can help her return to Kansas, or will the Wicked Witch of the West kill her first?

Note that we still have exactly the same structure as before which does make the synopsis read a bit clumsily. But you have to admit it's a lot more colorful and engaging. For better reading flow, the first sentence can be rearranged as follows:

When a tornado strikes her home in Kansas, a lonely, wistful farm girl named Dorothy finds herself transported to a faraway land called Oz, a magical but frightening place, filled with strange and wonderful characters--little people called Munchkins, and witches that are both good and bad. Can Dorothy make the long and dangerous journey to Emerald City to see the Wizard, the only one who can help her return to Kansas, or will the Wicked Witch of the West kill her first?

Once you have this much, you can keep expanding, rearranging, and enriching the synopsis to make it as long and original-sounding as you like. You can pull in more information--for example, that Dorothy's house fell on the Wicked Witch of the East (which sets up the motivation of why the Wicked which of the West loathes Dorothy, as the two witches were sisters), and you can break the main goal down into sub-goals (for example, that Dorothy is only told that she must "follow the Yellow Brick Road" to reach Emerald City, and that once she does manage to see the Wizard, he tells her she must bring him the Wicked Witch's broom in order to prove her worthiness, and so on).

In my query letters to literary agents, I always include a two sentence synopsis similar to that above in terms of detail, then usually expand on it in another paragraph and introduce more subtle elements. In this second paragraph, I always try to point out the villain's motivation to stop the hero (as above) and also the most important character conflict. Although I did not do this above for The Wizard of Oz, the most important character conflict in that story might be between Dorothy and the wizard--after she does manage to return with the witch's broom, he gives her the runaround, and she must find the courage within herself to stand up to him and demand that he deliver on his promise.

The two-sentence synopsis method takes a little practice, but once you get the hang of it, you will find the task of writing synopses--of any length--much easier. In fact, now I often write this type of two-sentence synopsis as soon as my story idea has jelled, because the "top down" approach helps me stay focused as I begin the actual process of putting it into words.

One word of caution: if you are having trouble generating interest in your book, resist the urge to "reposition" the story to make it more appealing to agents who represent other genres. For example, if you had written The Wizard of Oz and could not get any fantasy genre agents to read it, you could compose the following short synopsis:

Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets, then teams up with three total strangers to kill again.

I'm joking, of course, but you get the idea. Such repositioning misleads agents and wastes their time.

To see the two-sentence synopsis method applied to ten different well-known stories from literature and film, go to Story Synopsis Quiz. All ten of these synopses are written in exactly the same form as I have outlined here. To practice, you might try writing up a few from your favorite books, plays and films.

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A "Secret" Formula for Creating a Short Synopsis for Your Book

If you're like most authors, summarizing your book in a couple of sentences is a daunting task.  However, if you're going to sell your book, it's simply something you have to do.  If you choose to go the traditional route, agents and editors alike are bombarded with so many queries that if they find themselves having to do much mental work to understand the gist of your book, they will simply pass on to the next one.  The same goes for self-publishing--all the retailers and distributors require short descriptions of your book.  For example, Smashwords requires a description that can be no more than 400 characters, including spaces!  That's short, folks!

To help you do this, I want to share a formula I learned a long time ago, one that was created in Hollywood.  I can tell you from my dealings with the people in the movie industry that when it comes to stories and story structure, they really know their stuff.

Each and every story is composed of the same five basic elements.  If you can identify them in their purest, simplest forms, you will be well on your way to writing a good two-sentence synopsis of your book, regardless of its length or complexity.

The five elements are:  a (1) hero who finds himself stuck in a (2)  situation  from which he wants to free himself by achieving a (3)  goal.  However, there is a (4) villain who wants to stop him from this, and if he's successful, will cause the hero to experience a (5)  disaster. 

Actually, what I've just written above IS the two sentence synopsis which will work for any story, no matter how complex the plot or characters may seem.

Before I go further, I want to stop for a moment and address the "Is this a formula?" question that will undoubtedly come up in many writers' minds.   Anyone with any experience in writing (or painting or composing music, etc.)  knows that formulas do not work when creating a new piece of art, that the most you can hope for is a cookie-cutter type result that will be mediocre, at best.  

However, what we are doing here is summarizing a piece of art that has already been created.  Because we know that each and every story must contain these five elements, if we can step back from our own story and identify them, it makes the job of summarizing the story much easier.

The only thing formulaic about this approach is the order in which the information is presented, and the structure of the sentences.  You can change this around later and make the synopsis appear as original and unique as you desire.

So, back to the method.  Another way to write this compressed synopsis is to move the goal into the second sentence into the form of a question, as follows:

Hero finds herself stuck in situation from which she wants to free herself.  Can she achieve goal, or will  villain stop her and cause her to experience disaster?

All you have to do is identify the elements and plug them in to create the most basic  two sentence synopsis for your own story.  By the way, you don't have to put the second sentence in the form of a question--you could write,  She must achieve goal, or villain will stop her and cause her to experience disaster.    I posed  it as a question only because it emphasizes the main narrative question in the story--discovering the answer to that sticky issue is what keeps readers turning the pages until (hopefully) they reach the very end of your book.

The best way to demonstrate the process of creating a two-sentence synopsis is with a real example.  As virtually everyone knows the story of  The Wizard of Oz, let's use that.  The five elements are:

HERO  Dorothy, a Kansas farm girl

SITUATION Finds herself transported to faraway land called Oz.

GOAL  To find her way back to Kansas

VILLAIN  The witch

DISASTER  To be stuck in Oz forever

Plugging the elements into the two-sentence structure, we have:

Dorothy, a farm girl,  finds herself transported to a faraway land called Oz.  Will the witch kill her before she can find her way back to Kansas?

Now, before you begin to think that this sounds too simplistic for your story, or if you don't believe your book contains one or more of these elements, or that they seem too melodramatic, etc.--you're wrong.   Your story has all five elements, or it would not be a story.    

Your story must have a hero, even if that hero happens to be a cat.   And your hero must be stuck in an untenable situation and develop a goal to escape that situation, or you have nothing but a character study, not a story.   The untenable situation could be something as mundane as boredom or as abstract as a blocked unconscious need to act out rebelliousness.  But that untenable situation is there, and the hero must have a goal to escape it.  Furthermore, if there is nothing to stop the hero from achieving her goal (i.e., a villain), then you have no conflict.   No conflict, no story.   

Granted, some of your story elements may require some thought to identify.  For example, your villain might be society as a whole, Mother Nature, or even your hero's self-doubt.  Similarly, your disaster could be little more than your hero having to live with an unbearable self-concept or overwhelming guilt.  It's also important to remember that the "disaster" is  seen through the eyes of the hero.  This is usually the worst possible scenario he or she can envision at the beginning of the story, but may in fact be the just outcome, or the outcome that does the hero the most good in the long run.

Back to The Wizard of Oz.    While the two sentence synopsis we wrote is accurate, it is also painfully dull.   This because we started with the five story elements distilled into their absolute minimal forms (done intentionally by me for the purpose of this exercise).  To jazz it up, let's go through the list and expand each element:

HERO - Dorothy isn't just a farm girl, she's a lonely, wistful farm girl

SITUATION - Dorothy isn't merely transported to Oz, but is whisked away by a tornado and dropped there.  Also, Oz is far more than a faraway land, it's  a magical but frightening place, full of strange characters, little people call Munchkins and witches, both "good" and "bad."

GOAL - Dorothy's main goal is to get back to Kansas, but she soon learns that only the  great and powerful Wizard of Oz can help her do that, and he lives in Emerald City, a long and dangerous journey from her starting point (You'll note that in any story, the hero's main goal breaks down into a series of sub-goals).

VILLAIN - The witch is more than "just a witch"--she is the Wicked Witch of the West.

DISASTER - Dorothy's possible fate is actually worse than  being stuck in Oz forever--the Wicked Witch of the West is determined to kill her.

So, let's plug these expanded elements into the original formula.

Dorothy, a lonely, wistful farm girl, is whisked away by a tornado and dropped into in a faraway land called Oz,  a magical but frightening place, filled with strange  and wonderful characters--little people called Munchkins, and witches that are both good and bad.   Can Dorothy make the long and dangerous journey to Emerald City to see the Wizard, the only one who can help her return to Kansas, or will the Wicked Witch of the West kill her first?

Note that we still have exactly the same structure as before which does make the synopsis read a bit clumsily.  But you have to admit it's a lot more colorful and engaging.  For better reading flow, the first sentence can be rearranged as follows:

When a tornado strikes her home in Kansas, a lonely, wistful farm girl named Dorothy finds herself transported to a faraway land called Oz, a magical but frightening place, filled with strange and wonderful characters--little people called Munchkins, and witches that are both good and bad.   Can Dorothy make the long and dangerous journey to Emerald City to see the Wizard, the only one who can help her return to Kansas, or will the Wicked Witch of the West kill her first?

Once you have this much, you can keep expanding, rearranging, and enriching the synopsis to make it as long and original-sounding as you like.  You can pull in more information--for example, that Dorothy's house fell on the Wicked Witch of the East (which sets up the motivation of why the Wicked which of the West loathes Dorothy, as the two witches were sisters), and you can break the main goal down into sub-goals (for example, that Dorothy is only told that she must "follow the Yellow Brick Road" to reach Emerald City, and that once she does manage to see the Wizard, he tells her she must bring him the Wicked Witch's broom in order to prove her worthiness, and so on)

In my query letters, I always include a two sentence synopsis similar to that above in terms of detail, then usually expand on it in another paragraph and introduce more subtle elements.  In this second paragraph, I always try to point out the villain's motivation to stop the hero (as above) and also the most important character conflict.  Although I did not do this above for The Wizard of Oz, the most important character conflict in that story might be between Dorothy and the wizard--after she does manage to return with the witch's broom, he gives her the runaround, and she must find the courage within herself to stand up to him and demand that he deliver on his promise.

One important point about "spoilers."  Readers don't like them in synopses or book reviews, and you want to avoid them if at all possible.  But it's hard to entice readers without including some information that falls into the spoiler category  For example, in the synopsis above, the fact that we reveal that a tornado is responsible for Dorothy's arrival in Oz could be considered a spoiler--it's certainly a surprise when you experience the story the first time.  As the author, you have to use your instincts and find the right balance between giving away too much/not enough.

Also, if you are writing a synopsis for a literary agent or publishing house editor, they expect you to reveal everything, spoilers included. They don't like to be treated as ordinary readers. Without knowing all the surprises, plot twists, etc. in your book, they cannot evaluate it properly at the synopsis stage. Many of them use the synopses as a screening tool and will not read the whole book unless they know the entire story structure in advance, and that includes plot twists and other surprises.

In summary, the two-sentence synopsis method takes a little practice, but once you get the hang of it, you will find the task of writing synopses--of any length--much easier.  In fact, now I often write this type of two-sentence synopsis as soon as my story idea has jelled, because the "top down" approach helps me stay focused as I begin the actual process of putting it into words.

One word of caution:  if you are having trouble generating interest in your book, resist the urge to "reposition" the story to make it more appealing to agents who represent other genres.  For example, if you had written The Wizard of Oz and could not get  any fantasy genre agents to read it, you could compose the following short synopsis to make it into an edgy thriller:

Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets, then teams up with three total strangers to kill again. (By Rick Polito)

I'm joking, of course, but you get the idea.   Such repositioning misleads agents and wastes their time.

To see the two-sentence synopsis method applied to ten different well-known stories from literature and film, go to  Story Synopsis Quiz.  All ten of these synopses are written in exactly the same form as I have outlined here.  To practice, you might try writing up a few from your favorite books, plays and films.

If you found this article useful, feel free to buy me a cup of coffee 😃  click here  - 

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Story Synopsis Quiz

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Common Questions about Agents & Publishers

Q:  Do I really need a literary agent?

If you are going the traditional publishing route, absolutely.  

 First, let me say that there is no advantage whatsoever for me, personally, to advise you to use a literary agent to represent your work.   The only reason I recommend that you, as an author, have an agent is simply because that today's environment, I sincerely believe it is in your  best interest to have one.

As you probably know,  many of the larger publishers will not accept submissions from unagented writers.  However, even if such publishers were anxious to get their hands on manuscripts from such writers, there are several reasons that it is wise to have an agent.

A good literary agent:

- knows the current market value of a book in your genre and can get the you best possible deal

- knows which editors and publishers are most interested in, and can effectively market, your type of book

-  can hold an auction if there is enough interest in your book and get you an even higher advance 

-   from experience, knows the ins and outs of all the mind-boggling legalese in publishing contracts and can negotiate the best possible terms for you

- knows when it might be necessary to audit a publisher's books to make sure you are being paid all your royalties, and can instigate the process

- only gets paid when you get paid, taking a fixed percentage of your royalties.  The more money you make, the more money your agent makes.  This perfectly aligns his/her motivation with yours and inspires the agent to work hard on your behalf.

For these reasons, I believe a good literary agent not only saves you a lot of money in the long run by keeping people from taking advantage of you, but actually makes you far more money than you could make dealing directly with publishers yourself.  Furthermore, a good agent takes much of the "business" side of authorship off your shoulders, which leaves you with more time to write. 

Q:  What happens once I sign a contract with an agent?

First, your agent will work with you to make sure your manuscript is edited, polished and ready to submit to publishers.  Be forewarned that most agents do not involve  themselves in extensive editing--their primary business is marketing.  They usually expect the manuscript to be in good shape before they will take it on in the first place.  There are exceptions, of course--in some cases an agent may want to help mold the book into its final form.

The next step will be for the agent to develop his/her own pitch to editors.  This may or may not be based on your query letter and synopsis.  Agents believe they know how to best pitch each particular book they represent, so the author is generally left out of this process and usually does not see the marketing materials.

After the pitch is developed, your agent will begin the submissions process, often sending only a few copies out at a time to gauge the response.  If the response is strong, the agent may elect to hold an auction for the book .  More often, however, the agent will continue with the normal submissions process until either a) the book is sold, or b) all the possibilities are exhausted.  Your agent will most likely start with the largest publishers and work her way down, consulting with you on how small a press you are willing to consider.  She should share any letters from agents which give feedback on your book or reasons for rejection (often this is stipulated in your contract).

With a little luck, a good agent will be able to place your book (yes, luck is still a factor, even at the agent level).  If not, then you must decide whether or not you want to try another agency (difficult if the book has been well shopped around) and also whether you want to submit your next book to the same agency or try a different one.  You should know that many agencies have contracts which allow them to pick and choose which of your books they represent so that they are not bound to try to market something they don't believe will sell.  In any case, you should strive to maintain as amicable relations with your agent as you possibly can, as the publishing industry is relatively small and you do not want to develop a reputation of being a difficult client.

My overall advice in dealing with agents is to make the best possible choice you can in the selection process, and then stand back and this professional do her job.  Pushing your agent, second-guessing her, and annoying her with a lot of emails and phone calls will only interfere with the process of selling your book.  Ultimately, that's what you want--how she manages to do it should be left up to her.

Q:  What if a prospective agent says she'll "take another look" if I change my book in a certain way?  Should I make the changes?

This is a dice roll.  From experience, I believe the answer is:  if you honestly agree with the changes that the agent wants (i.e., you think they improve your book), go ahead and make them and resubmit.  If the agent passes again, then you can continue submitting to more agents, knowing that you have a better manuscript to send out.  If in doubt about the changes, then don't make them--just move on.  If and when you feel you have exhausted all your possibilities with other agents, you can reconsider--you may feel differently about making the changes then.

Q:  When querying more than one agent at a time, I obligated to put this in my letter?

This is a touchy issue with some agents, but in my opinion, you are not obligated to do so.  If you do not state that you are sending out multiple queries in your letter, the vast majority of agents will assume that you are.  This is because they know that any intelligent writer would inform them that the query is an "exclusive," as this gives the writer an edge over other writers submitting non-exclusive queries (see next question for more about exclusives) . If an agent has doubts about investing time into evaluating any particular submission, I feel it is his or her responsibility to ask the writer if the submission is exclusive.

Incidentally, when you make multiple submissions, if an agent asks you if you are submitting to other agents, an answer such as "Yes I am.  However, I will gladly agree to notify you and see where you are with my manuscript before I accept any offer of representation" is enough to satisfy most.   Agents simply want to be assured that if they invest the time required to evaluate your book, when they finish, you will still be in a position to seriously consider their offer.

Q:  What is an "exclusive" query and when should I go about sending one?

The terms "exclusive" or "giving an agent an exclusive" means that you are querying that particular agent and only that agent, which eliminates the agent's competition.  This allows her to freely invest time into evaluating your book because she doesn't have to worry about losing you to another agent during the evaluation process.  This should give you an advantage in their eyes, obviously, but many agents don't seem to give exclusive submissions much weight.  In any case, this approach must be used with care.  If you decide to give an agent an exclusive, she will have expected you to have thoroughly researched her and her agency, and thus will expect you to jump for joy if she makes you an offer of representation.  Any vacillation on your part upon receipt of the offer (other than asking to review the legal contract, perhaps with the help of a lawyer, and ask any questions you may have, which is prudent and reasonable), will get you off on the wrong foot and likely damage your relationship.   Therefore, when you give an agent an exclusive,  you should be 100% sure you want this person as your agent and have no doubts whatsoever about the agent's experience, credentials, or abilities. 

Having said all that, I don't recommend giving exclusives, as I feel it's just too limiting as far as your own options are concerned.  Plus, as I said, exclusive submissions from unpublished writers just don't seem to mean much to most agents.

Q:  How do I handle agencies that have more than one agent who seems a likely prospect for me?

You must query only one agent at a time within any given agency and wait until you receive a response from that agent before you move on to the next.  Some smaller agencies have a "team" approach, so a query to any agent there will be considered a query to the entire agency--you can tell if this is the case by the wording of their rejection letter.  It will say something like "After reviewing your work, we have decided..."  In the event that this is not clear, simply write back and ask if the rejection was from the agency as a whole, or just the particular agent whom you queried.  If it was just from one agent at the firm, you're free to query others there.

Q:  What if my book is long enough but it is a collection of short stories, not a novel?

Short story collections are rarely published by an author who is not already known.  This is simply because short stories are not popular with readers these days.  If you have such a collection, the best thing to do is put it aside and write a novel--once that is published, you may be able to sell the collection.  Still, having said that, it is not impossible for an unknown author to sell a short story collection--it has happened.

Q:  What if I want to market my books in another country?

This is a complicated question.  The general answer is, you should get an agent in the country where you live now and let your agent handle all foreign rights.  However, there are exceptions to this.

Before I discuss this in detail, here are a few facts you should know.

- All good agents in one country have partner agencies in other countries who can sell translation and marketing rights for all the books they represent.  Also, many agents go to international book fairs for the purpose of selling foreign rights, the annual Frankfurt and London Book Fairs being the largest two.  

- Books are rarely sold outside of one country until they sell well (to end readers) in their home countries.  Because agents and publishers naturally want to minimize their risks, they will not buy foreign rights for a book until it has proven itself in its home market, which is usually where the author happens to live. 

- Similarly, publishers only invest the money to translate books into other languages when the book has proved itself in its home country.    

- Even the largest publishers rely heavily on the author to help with the promotion of the book—in fact, as I'm sure you know, the author is the cornerstone of all promotional activities (media interviews, book signings, etc.)  Therefore, it is advisable for the author to live in the country where the book is first marketed so he/she can participate in these activities and maximize the success of the book.

Now, based on the above, things get complicated if  you have previously lived in another country and the story in the book takes place there, or if you are writing in a language that is not the main spoken language of the country where you live, and so on.

The best way to understand how all this works is to consider a few examples.  Suppose you grew up in the USA and now live in Australia.  If the book is set in Australia and has an Australian hero, probably it's best that you have an Australian agent, because the largest reader base (as a percentage of reader population) will very likely be there.  If the book does well, your agent can work through co-agents and sell rights in the USA, Canada, the UK, and all other English-speaking countries, and then perhaps sell translation rights to other non-English language markets.  However, if your book is set in the USA and has an American hero, it may be better for you to have a USA-based agent, as the reader base will probably be greater there…but you would have to consider that helping promote the book from Australia would be difficult.

Now, let's make things even more complicated.  Suppose you grew up in Morocco, immigrated to France, and later, through some bizarre twist of fate, ended up in Flottsam's Mistake, Wyoming.  Let us further suppose that French is your native language and English is your second.  If you have written a book in French about your experience of growing up as an immigrant in Paris, having a French agent might be the best choice.  This is because the largest market would probably be in France (partly due to the French language and partly due to the large Moroccan population there), and few publishers in other countries would want to take a risk on the book until it was proven in France.  However, if your book was written in English and was a romance that took place amidst the scintillating night club scene of Flottsam's Mistake,  Wyoming, an American agent would be best.  If, on the other hand, the book was written in English and based on your experience on living in Liverpool one summer (do you have a headache yet?), a UK-based agent might be most appropriate. 

If you have a complex situation like the one above--and they are not uncommon--the best way to answer it is simply to query a few agents in the relevant countries and ask for their opinions.

Q:  What if I would like to see my book made into a film?  Do I need a separate agent for that?

No.  Similar to the case with foreign rights above,  your literary agent will also handle film rights, either directly or through partner agents who specialize in that business.

Also, I should mentioned that this will take some time, and that in some cases, may never occur at all.  First, Hollywood does not buy unpublished books written by unknown authors.  In fact, they don't buy books at all—they buy screenplays, and what they buy from agents is the right to pay someone to adapt the novel into a screenplay.  Like anyone else, movie studios and producers want to minimize their risk.  If you are an unknown writer and sell your first book to a publisher, even a big publisher, the movie industry will usually wait and see how well the book does before they consider buying film rights.  There are rare exceptions.  If a book gets a big advance and the sale generates a lot of media hoopla and seems particularly well-suited for the screen, sometimes a producer or studio will feel confident enough to buy the rights before the book actually comes out (this happened with John Grisham's The Firm and Stephen King's Carrie, for example, and is part of the reasons they became mega-hits). 

But, as I said earlier, even if your book is published, and even if published by a big house, it may never be made into a movie.  Adapting a novel into a screenplay is not easy, and can be exceedingly difficult with certain kinds of stories, especially those with intense character introspection or complex subplots.   The Naked Lunch, Master and Margarita, and Don Quixote are three examples.  Also, for artistic or other reasons, some authors decide that they do not want their books made into movies at all.  An example of this case is J. D. Salinger and his classic, Catcher in the Rye.

As a final note, I believe that authors who are especially keen on seeing their books made into movies should consider adapting their books into screenplays themselves.  Having your a version of your story in the proper form (medium) will increase your chances of having it appear on the silver screen.

Q:  If I write a screenplay or a stage play, will my literary agent handle those as well?

It depends.  Some literary agencies handle both novels and screenplays, some handle only novels, some agencies that handle only screenplays, and even some that handle only stage plays.  

In any case, if your literary agent does not represent all the types of material you write, he or she will readily refer you to another agent who will rep the extra pieces.  It is to your agent's benefit for you to sell as much material as possible, as every sale gives your more credibility as a writer.  Also, there is great synergy between the publishing, film, and theater businesses.  Making a sale in one makes it easier to make a sale in the other.  Obviously, if a book or film or stage play becomes a hit, selling rights in the remaining forms is much easier, as there is a ready-made audience for the work.

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