Hatrack River Writers Workshop   
my profile login | search | faq | forum home

  next oldest topic   next newest topic
» Hatrack River Writers Workshop » Forums » Fragments and Feedback for Books » Blood Will Tell Synopsis

   
Author Topic: Blood Will Tell Synopsis
Meredith
Member
Member # 8368

 - posted      Profile for Meredith   Email Meredith         Edit/Delete Post 
I decided to get a start on the synopsis for Blood Will Tell, even though the novel isn't ready to go out into the world yet. I've actually written two versions. Here's the first two paragraphs of each version.

Version 1:

quote:
Valeriah returns home for the first time in eight years to visit her dying grandfather. For her, that means returning through the portal from this world to Chimeria, where magic takes the place of technology and her grandfather is a powerful wizard. She has stayed away so long because her grandfather would not help her find out who murdered her parents twenty years ago. Valeriah’s one purpose has been to avenge their deaths.

Valeriah is angry and bitter when she is disinherited merely because her mother was a werewolf. All anyone ever thinks about is that she’s half werewolf. No one ever remembers that her grandfather was a wizard or her grandmother on that side was a unicorn. She has trouble enough, balancing the contradictory natures of the werewolf and the unicorn as they ebb and flow with the course of the moon. Carnivore at the full moon, vegetarian at the new moon—and that’s the easy part.


Version 2:

quote:
As a bodyguard for the privileged of Chimeria, Valeriah is familiar with the worlds on both sides of the portals—ours, where technology prevails, and Chimeria, where magic is used to accomplish the same things. Valeriah doesn’t look much like a bodyguard. But looks can be deceiving, especially in Chimeria. Her mother was a werewolf, which gives Valeriah unexpected strength and speed, as well as other abilities. And, on her father’s side, her grandmother was a unicorn, which gives her formidable healing powers. Of course, balancing the two sides of her nature—raging carnivore at the full moon, vegetarian at the new moon—isn’t always easy. For her, her duties as a bodyguard and as a member of the Portal Watch are only a means to an end. Her family was murdered twenty years ago and Valeriah is seeking any clues that will lead her to the killers.

Valeriah’s grandfather is a wizard. She returns home when she gets word that he is dying. And she finally gets the one piece of information that can help her solve the puzzle of her parents’ deaths. The only beings in Chimeria capable of using the methods that killed her parents are dragons. Her grandfather meant to warn her to drop her quest for vengeance because it’s too dangerous. Valeriah can’t just let it go. But she can’t fight dragons either. Not yet and not alone.


I'm interested to know which first two paragraphs work best. And anybody willing to read either or both versions would be appreciated.

If I can figure out the synopsis on this one, maybe it'll even help me get the synopsis for The Shaman's Curse right, finally.


Posts: 4633 | Registered: Dec 2008  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
ScardeyDog
Member
Member # 8707

 - posted      Profile for ScardeyDog   Email ScardeyDog         Edit/Delete Post 
I like the second version best. In the first the break between the first two paragraphs is too abrupt. It could almost be about two different novels.
Posts: 238 | Registered: Jul 2009  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Wolfe_boy
Member
Member # 5456

 - posted      Profile for Wolfe_boy   Email Wolfe_boy         Edit/Delete Post 
What's the purpose of this synopsis? To put in a query letter? Are you looking for feedback on your story idea as a whole?

In my opinion, you're spending a little too much time setting out the world for us, and not enough introducing us to (and making us care about) the novel's central conflict. It's clear that you've invested a lot of time discovering the backstory of your characters and defining the worlds that they will inhabit. For a reader though, the main draw will be in the story being told, of which there isn't quite enough detail in either synopsis.

And, to critique the idea you've got going on here, I have two niggling questions that make me wonder how you're going to pull these things off.

1. How does a wizard breed with a unicorn?
2. If her parents were killed by a dragon, and the dragons in your story aren't huge deviations from what we typically consider to be dragons (See: Smaug), then how could Valeriah not know they were killed by dragons?

The answer to these two questions would dictate whether or not I would finish reading your book. You know, presuming it gets published and I found it on a shelf at my local book store.


Posts: 733 | Registered: Apr 2007  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Meredith
Member
Member # 8368

 - posted      Profile for Meredith   Email Meredith         Edit/Delete Post 
This, eventually, is intended to be the synopsis that would accompany a query for those agents that want an approximately two-page synopsis.

quote:
1. How does a wizard breed with a unicorn?

Interestingly enough, one of my characters asks this exact question.

quote:

2. If her parents were killed by a dragon, and the dragons in your story aren't huge deviations from what we typically consider to be dragons (See: Smaug), then how could Valeriah not know they were killed by dragons?

The answer to both questions is that all the magical creatures of Chimeria are able to take human form. Dragons are pretty much exactly what you're thinking of, except smarter. But when they're in human form, there's very little to let on what they really are most of the time.

And, since any of the creatures can take human form, they can potentially interbreed with each other and with humans. The hybrids, though, usually can't take any other form.

But, it happens that Valeriah is making an erroneous assumption. It wasn't the dragons who killed her parents after all.

quote:
I like the second version best. In the first the break between the first two paragraphs is too abrupt. It could almost be about two different novels.

At the moment, subject to change without notice, I have a preferrence for the second version, too. But not for this reason. Rough edges like that can be smoothed off. The first version is written in much the same way that I approached the synopsis for The Shaman's Curse--something happens, the MC does something (makes a choice) which has consequences that cause something else to happen, repeat x times until it ends like this. The second is more like an extended query pitch--who is the MC (why should we care), what happens to change her direction, what choices does she make, and what consequences does that have--in the main arc, not every try/fail cycle.


Posts: 4633 | Registered: Dec 2008  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
shimiqua
Member
Member # 7760

 - posted      Profile for shimiqua   Email shimiqua         Edit/Delete Post 
Version two, no question.
Sounds good.
~Sheena

Posts: 1201 | Registered: Jan 2008  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Kitti
Member
Member # 7277

 - posted      Profile for Kitti   Email Kitti         Edit/Delete Post 
I cast my vote for version #2 as well
Posts: 715 | Registered: Nov 2007  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
   

   Close Topic   Feature Topic   Move Topic   Delete Topic next oldest topic   next newest topic
 - Printer-friendly view of this topic
Hop To:


Contact Us | Hatrack River Home Page

Copyright © 2008 Hatrack River Enterprises Inc. All rights reserved.
Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.


Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classic™ 6.7.2