Pitch Perfect

You have 30 seconds to sell your book—Go!

Taking a Stance: Because where you stand matters.

Know your genre. It will help agents, editors, and readers know where to place your book, how to sell it and how to market it. For an excellent “genre map” check out http://bookcountry.com/books/Map/Default.aspx The genre map is interactive so you can click around and find which genre is the best fit for your book.

The Fast Ball: Can you pitch your book in 140 characters (or less)?

Here are the examples I used for my own books.

Hourglass Door:

It’s a love story with a mystery that dates back to Leonardo da Vinci. (70 characters)

When Abby meets Dante, a foreign exchange student from Italy, her life changes forever. This YA love story has a time-travel twist. (131 characters)

After Hello:

When Sam and Sara meet in New York, they have 24 hours to see the city, find what they need, and just maybe—fall in love. (121 characters)

Use the Fast Ball pitch for when you have less than a minute to tell someone about your book. It’s a great way to introduce your story, pique someone’s interest, and encourage them to ask for more information.

The Curve Ball: What makes your book unique, special, or different?

I like to call this the “movie poster tag line” pitch. It’s a way to introduce your book by way of a comparison to something else. So Cujo is “Jaws with a dog.” It’s Romeo and Juliet on the Titanic. It’s snakes . . . on a PLANE! (Guess what that last movie is about?)

I like this because it’s short and to the point. It doesn’t always have to be two books or two movies. You can compare two different authors. We did this in our class and here are a few of the responses (as best as I can remember them): “It’s the movie Taken but in Gotham City.” “It’s Pirates of the Caribbean, but with a redemption twist.” “It’s Fablehaven for hikers.”

The Slider: How can you slide the most important information into your pitch?

(Confession time: I stole this technique from Jeff Savage, but it totally works.)

Write a one paragraph “hook” that starts with either “When” or an “If/then” construction. Tell me the following 4 things:

Who is the protagonist?

What is the goal?

What is the obstacle?

What is the consequence of failure?

What I love about this is that it can introduce the heart of your story in just a few sentences.

Another great thing about this kind of pitch: You can use it as the first paragraph of your query letter. Score!

The Change-Up: Wait—I have more time? What do I say now?

So you’ve hit someone with the 140 character Fast Ball, or maybe you’ve dazzled them with your Curve Ball pitch, but now they want to know more. What do you say?

Well, I’d bet money that one of the reasons why you buy a book is because you read the back cover copy and said, “Hey, that sounds like a good book.” So write your own back cover copy for your book. Write 150 to 200 words about your story. Make it compelling, tease us with an unanswered question, showcase your voice. There is a reason why every book has copy on the cover. If it works for published books, it’ll work for your unpublished book too.

I highly recommend you check out this blog post from my friend Becca. Point 5 in her post is a brilliant discussion of how to summarize your story for a one-page synopsis. Write 500 to 1,000 words by making a list of what someone did, not what happened. Then expand those fragments into sentences, and those sentences into paragraphs. Try it—it works!

Summary:

Tweet it! 140 characters

Tag it! 1 short phrase

Hook it! 1 paragraph

Blurb it! 150-200 words

Summarize it! 500-1,000 words

One of most important things to remember, though, about these pitches, is to choose the right pitch for you, your book, and your situation. You might not use all four pitches at the same time. You might start with one and move to another one. You might not feel comfortable with the Fast Ball pitch. You might not have easy comparisons for a Curve Ball pitch.

That’s okay.

Try them all. See what works for you.

And then practice, practice, practice. The more you pitch, the better you’ll be. And if you keep pitching, sooner or later, someone will take a swing and it’ll be a home run.

After my class, I was talking to some people and he asked me, “What’s the most important thing to say in your pitch?” And after some thought, I said, “Tell me what the problem is and how your hero solves it.” And in the end, I think that’s really what a good pitch is all about.

If you want to come to the conference–and I recommend that you do, even if you don’t read or write sci-fi/fantasy stories–then feel free to find me after one of my panels and say hi.

Thursday, February 9, 2012

10 am: What Exactly Does an Editor Do, Anyway?

12 pm: Queries and Pitches

1 pm: Writing for LDS markets

Friday, February 10, 2012

4 pm: Local Publishers

6 pm: You’ve Written Your Book–Now What?

8-10 pm: Mass book signing!!!

What if the first day of your relationship was the only day you had?

Seventeen-year-old Sara is a seeker. She’s always on the lookout for the perfect moment to capture with her ever-present, point-and-shoot camera, especially on her first trip to New York City. Sam is a finder. He has a knack for finding what other people can’t—a first-edition book or the last two tickets to a sold-out Broadway show. In New York, there is always something interesting to find. But when Sara sees Sam coming out of a bookstore, a wrapped package under his arm, a gray hoodie emblazoned with the name of her favorite, no-one’s-ever-heard-of band, Sara can’t help herself. She snaps a picture and then follows just as Sam disappears into the crowd.

When Sam and Sara’s paths cross again, neither one of them is prepared for what they will find out about each other—and about themselves when they form an unlikely partnership in search of a seemingly elusive work of art. They have one day to find the impossible. Fate brought their talents together, but what happens when time runs out? Will love last? Or will their last words be good-bye?

Title options:

After Hello

Everything after Hello

What Comes after Hello

But the good news is that my draft of Hello, Good-bye is DONE! I finished the last chapter around 1:30 Wednesday morning. Whew!

I’m really happy with how the story turned out, and while it still needs some polishing and a few revisions, I think all the bones are there. I hope my early readers/reviewers agree.

The nice thing is that since I’m done writing before the holidays, I can sit back and enjoy the season without the stress of a deadline hanging over me. (Now, if I can just get all my Christmas presents wrapped in time…)

I hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Final word count: 65,800/70,000 (70K was my target, but the story ended up needing only 65K)

Favorite sentence(s) so far:

“I believe that happiness is always there,” Sam continued, looking up and away at the dim stars. “That’s why we have to keep looking for it. Because we can’t always see it.”

And I do feel the need to write. Since I’d been away from the story for a few days, I took some time this afternoon to reread what I had written so far. And you know what? It’s pretty good. Yes, there are bits that need fleshing out, and bits that are a bit rushed, but I think the voices are strong and the action is moving along at a pace I like. Sometimes it’s good to take a step back (whether that step is voluntary or not is debatable) and see how far you’ve come and the bright points that still make you smile.

And adding a few words to my count–even just a handful–makes me smile too.

Word count: 13,946/70,000

Favorite sentence(s) so far: He unzipped his hoodie. Zipped it again. The tiny teeth clacked as they met and separated, met and separated. The sound of being devoured was oddly comforting.

One of my favorite classes was at the Heart of the West conference about writing romance. Lani Rich had so much amazing information and advice on building strong romantic leads and making your plot engaging and interesting. One of my favorite things she talked about was the idea of vulnerability. She said that while it’s important to give your characters flaws and weaknesses, you should also allow them moments of vulnerability. It was one of those aha moments, where I felt like something I knew but hadn’t articulated had been presented in a clear and concise manner. I immediately thought about Sam and Sara and took another look at my story to make sure I had enough moments of vulnerability from both characters. It was a great chance to change my perspective and look at my story in a new way.

Word count: 13,890/70,000

Favorite Sentence(s) so far:

She shook her head. “You help strangers with impossible tasks?”

“I help friends with adventurers.”

But what? I can’t say no to my work; I can’t say no to my writing. I can’t say no to my family or my church responsibilities. And a girl’s gotta sleep and eat, right? So what can I say “no” to? I don’t know, so instead I’m going to find places to say “yes.” I will say yes to the 20 minutes of  time I have on the train every morning and every night as I commute to work: 20 minutes of time to write or edit or read. I will say yes to doing laundry right after work instead of on Saturday so I can consolidate my weekend time more effectively. I will say yes to offers for help.

And before I know it, it’ll be November, right?

Word count: 12,935/70,000

Favorite sentence this week: “Lettuce has no taste. It’s like a bad stage magician of the food world. No style, less substance.”

Not the ending of Hello, Good-bye–not yet, but endings in general.

Saturday afternoon I went to see the musical Next to Normal at Pioneer Theater Company. It was flat-out amazing; who knew you could write a musical about mental illness? And even though I loved the play, I had mixed feelings about the ending. There was a glimmer of hope, but I worried about the future of some of the characters. I couldn’t help but think that they weren’t going to have such a happy ending after all.

But after I thought about it for a while, I realized that the ending was perfect for those characters. And that is such an important distinction in writing. An ending doesn’t always have to be happy–or even perfect. Just as long as it’s perfect for your characters.

Sunday night I watched Breaking Bad, which is a clinic on character development, pacing, and writing. Best show on TV–seriously. Sunday’s episode was as intense an hour as I’ve seen in a long time. And here’s the thing–it wasn’t even the season finale. There are still two more episodes to go. I have no idea where the story can go or how it will end. (I suspect it will be bad, whatever it is.) And that’s the thing I’ve been thinking about endings–you want to keep your audience (or your readers) guessing. That’s what will keep them coming back for another episode–or reading another chapter.

So how will Hello, Good-bye end? At the moment, I think only Sam and Sara know–and they’re not telling me yet. But as long as it’s a blend of perfection and unpredictability, I think I’ll be on the right track.

Favorite Sentence This Week: Hamburger, fries, soda. The holy trinity of lunch.

Word Count: 12,257/70,000

So even though my word count isn’t as high as it should be this week, I did a lot of other book-related things, and that makes me happy.

One thing I’ve been trying to do while writing Hello, Good-bye is to make sure I didn’t beat myself up about the deadline. Yes, I’ve set myself a goal, and yes, I’m working to meet it, but I also don’t want to end every week in tears berating myself for missing my word count. I want the writing process to be fun and enjoyable–a party where my new characters can come and play and we can discover the story together. If I tell myself, “Well, you missed a day–you better write 1400 words tomorrow. Wait, you missed two days, then you better write 2100 words today” then I fear I’ll focus too much on the numbers of the book and not the emotion of the book.

And after looking at my calendar and looking at my deadline, I think I can revise my goal to write 1000 words a day and still make my end-of-November goal. And what’s 300 words between friends?

Word count: 9,458/70,000

Favorite sentence as far: My heart quivered, shot through with an arrow of fear.

I’m going to Disneyland!

It is my favorite place to visit after all. And last weekend, my husband and I spent a couple of days at Disney and then spent Saturday at the Utah v. USC game. (So close, but my Utes didn’t quite get the win.)

And even though I had some vacation days, I also had some work days on Hello, Good-bye. And even while I was on vacation, I was still working–thinking of character motivations, shifting and sorting ideas, reviewing my favorite bits and feeling my excitement grow about the story. And perhaps that’s my lesson for this week: all work counts. The words you commit to paper. The scenes you revise and rewrite. And even the musing and thinking that you do while waiting in line to ride Star Tours for the fifth time. It all helps with the story, and in the end, it all counts.

Word count: 8,656/70,000

Favorite sentence so far: “You don’t know me well enough to know when I’m lying,” Sam said.