posted
Since it's okay to post all three blurbs at once here there are.
I decided to place them on their own thread to have less causes of confusion
Version Number two starts out like Number one, but it ends differently. So:
# 1
My name is NA-short for Nadir-I am one of a number of people who have the ability to use V-nergy-a form of energy that can manipulate the very tiny vibrations that make up the building blocks of matter. The idea behind this is sometimes it’s called the String Theory. All that means is that I can reshape or in other ways change matter. It’s not all powerful for it takes a lot of work, concentration and study. There are different levels, Users, Mages, and Adepts--some of the last are almost god-like. I’m a mid level Mage. When we reshape matter it’s called a Trick. I wear my hair short--like me--and currently it’s purple with a white patch in the middle. White because I am one of the good guys, when I’m not verbally blasting my friends. I can be as bitchy as a room full of disappointed divas. I also usually wear black, no piercings though. To me they are as cool as a door to door salesman during dinner time. I work in a coffeeshop by the name of the Rusty Bean. I play also play the Congas and bongos when I can get a gig as a substitute, which isn’t often, so I am usually broke. I said all that to say that basically I’m a freak.
NA finds herself in the middle of a situation not of her choosing. There’s a flu going around making Users and Mages sick and killing some. It’s her job--she has a special geas to prove it-to find the cause and to stop it before something really bad happens. If she can get around her emotionally baggage, a griffin, ghosts, an AI Trick and an angry abuser who wants revenge for NA helping his girlfriend to leave him and getting him arrested for molesting a female police officer in the process, and if she can figure out what a friend is at the same time. She’s out of her pay grade, has no plan to find or defeat the cause, is caught in a wave of anger at her friends, has no experience with anything on this level, yet somehow she is the only one who can stop it. The geas and the Power behind it must have made a mistake and sent the geas to the wrong person, but since she has it, it’s her job to stop the horrible event from happening.
# 2
My name is NA-short for Nadir-I am one of a number of people who have the ability to use V-nergy-a form of energy that can manipulate the very tiny vibrations that make up the building blocks of matter. The idea behind this is sometimes it’s called the String Theory. All that means is that I can reshape or in other ways change matter. It’s not all powerful for it takes a lot of work, concentration and study. There are different levels, Users, Mages, and Adepts--some of the last are almost god-like. I’m a mid level Mage. When we reshape matter it’s called a Trick. I wear my hair short--like me--and currently it’s purple with a white patch in the middle. White because I am one of the good guys, when I’m not verbally blasting my friends. I can be as bitchy as a room full of disappointed divas. I also usually wear black, no piercings though. To me there are as cool as a door to door salesman during dinner time. Besides working, I help people, one at a time, to escape abusers, fight Mythos-mythical animals and beings that really aren’t mythical, and in anything related to the first two. To earn a living I work in a coffeeshop called the Rusty Bean. I also play the Congas and bongos when I can get a gig as a replacement drummer, which isn’t often, so I am usually broke. I said all that to say that basically I’m a freak. I found myself in a situation, as in as astronaut calling NASA and saying “We have a situation.” Users were catching a flu, which left them exhausted and in some cases dead. Someone-Being-the cosmos-decided it was my job to find the source and to stop it. They gave me a special geas to help and to push me toward that goal. That irritated me, I can work without someone looking over my shoulder and pushing. Before I could figure it out, I ran into; an AI Trick, an abuser who wanted revenge and knew how to get it, a griffin, ghosts, plus my own emotional baggage and need for friends. Before I could get the last I had to figure out what a friend was. All that before I could solve the biggest and most dangerous mission I’ve ever had--if I survived long enough to solve it than survive the cause of the flu.
#3
Na finds out it’s her job--she has a special geas to prove it-to find the cause and to stop a flu that leaves its victims exhausted and sometimes dead, before something really bad happens. As a Mage NA has an advantage over normal humans. Mages, Users and Adepts, are members of a small handful of people who have the ability to use a type of energy to reshape, shift, and transfer the tiny vibrations that make up the smallest building block of all matter and energy. NA-Nadia before her rave days-works for a living as barista in a local coffeehouse called the Rusty Bean. Na also plays the conga and bongos and sometimes substitutes for sick drummers in various bands. On the side she helps woman escape abusive boy friends and spouses, and anyone who has a problem with Mythos. The last are Griffins, werewolves, fairies, ghosts, and any other type of creatures and beings most people think are not real. This mission is her biggest and most dangerous of any she has every even thought about helping with. If she can get around, a wave of anger toward her friends, a griffin, ghosts, an AI Trick and an angry abuser who wants revenge for NA helping his girlfriend to leave him and for getting him arrested for molesting a female police officer, and if she can figure out what a friend is, she will still have to face the very powerful cause behind the flu. She’s out of her pay grade, has no plan to find or defeat the cause has no experience with anything on this level, yet somehow she is the only one who can stop it. The geas and the Power behind it must have made a mistake and sent the geas to the wrong person, but since she has it, it’s her job to stop a horrible event from happening. A large job for a Freak with a lot of emotional baggage and doubts.
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posted
Forgive me, I only read the first one, and skimmed the other two.
There's a lot of weak language in the first one. Present tense prose is always tricky, as it feels stilted and artificial. I thought the same in "Hunger Games", so it's not just you. But I think it turns many people off.
This sentence can be shortened:
quote:I am one of a number of people who have the ability to use V-nergy-a form of energy that can manipulate the very tiny vibrations that make up the building blocks of matter.
To:
"I use V-nergy [to] manipulate the tiny vibrations that make up the building blocks of matter."
I would cut out a lot of the explanation. It sounds like you're giving a lecture. And it felt weird when she described herself. Who is she talking to? I take it that she's talking to us, the reader, but breaking the fourth wall is off-putting. It makes me realize that I'm reading a story, which makes it difficult for me to suspend disbelief and become engage in the narrative. I don't want 'myself' to be called attention to, I want to submerge into the world you're writing.
With how formal the rest of the prose was, this really stands out:
quote: I can be as bitchy as a room full of disappointed divas.
She sounds like a professor, she sounds like a professor, she sounds like a professor, and now she's a teen, though the use of the word 'disappointed' makes even that sentence unbalanced. Adults are disappointed. Teens are something else.
Oh wait, is she a teen? She works at a coffee shop, but that doesn't help in placing her age.
quote: I play also play the Congas
This typo is a bit worrisome. One of the noted and often discussed shortcomings of self-published fiction is how badly edited it is.
quote: I said all that to say that basically I’m a freak.
Again, you sneak in a younger vernacular with 'freak', but actually, there's nothing even close to "freakish" about her description. And the maturity of her voice makes me think of a confident individual, not someone whose self-conscious of how her behavior comes off to others
quote:she has a special geas to prove it
You explain in detail everything else, but not 'geas', which is mentioned twice in this conclusion. I don't think more explaining is helpful, however. Is there a more organic way to let the reader know what's going on?
Ultimately, I think you can use fresher, more engaging language to sell your story.
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posted
Thank you. I am already working on how to shorten her comments. But she called herself a freak because that is the way she thinks of herself. It's part of the emotional baggage I referenced.
I was going to double check the word Congas, but obviously got side tracked. But the book has been edited by someone else.
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posted
A blurb of this type tradtionally fits on the inside jacket flap of a book's slip cover. Each of these is on the long side.
The blurb working closest for me is the second half of the first one, in which Nadir's external complication is clearly spelled out. Problem, a flu causes problems for mages and Nadir's geas calls upon her to satisfy the problem. Want-wise, I don't see a personal connection, though, between a geas and Nadir's personal complications.
"Na" as a nickname for Nadir is problematic from that letter sequence fitting other meanings. "Nadir," though, is a rich name for its celestial meanings. Developing both's mythology may be too much for a blurb; however, one is not too potentially burdensome.
"Geas" is a Scots Gaelic term meaning an idiosyncratic taboo, either a proscription or a duty; "geis" is the Irish Gaelic term. An example of a Welsh geas, idiosyncratic taboo, is the muse proscribes bards from using the four-letter word for air movement. In either case, neither is in conventional dictionaries, in unabridged ones though. A writing principle best practice is to either not use such terms or develop their context mythology for accessibility's sake.
Numerous grammar faults in all three blurbs, on the raw and rough side. I suspect posting's intent is to try out which features most intrigue auditors. For me, that is the second half of the first blurb relating a life complicating event of a flu killing mages and such. Developing Nadir's personal stakes-conflict related to that complication could strengthen that appeal.
posted
Denevius oops. I went right by that twice. I was going to double check that word anyway and got distracted as I said. I came back here to say I just did check it. But as extrinsic figured I knew these needed work, I want to work on the one that is best. I think each have their good points, even though I am partial to Number Two.
And thanks extrinsic for your comments.
I can see how each one would too long, as I said in my last post I can see where I can cut some.
As to her name--everyone calls her NA and her real name comes up only twice as I recall. She got the nickname while attending raves. It fits with what she feels about herself.
However this blurb would go on the back of a paperback.
As to geas I just looked it up on Google in case I misspelled it. And of course extrinsic is correct in the original context. But it has come to mean any spell that compels someone to do something. Evidently D&D might be responsible for that but in either case that is the contemporary definition I am using. Many fantasy and urban fantasies use it that way. Maybe I should define it, but in the story I think the definition is implied by how NA and friends talk about it and she acts with it.
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Okay I redid Version Number Two since that was the only one to get a vote. It's significantly shorter and rearranged.
My name is NA. I am a Mage; we can transform matter, transport objects, form objects out of air, influence people, produce heat and cold and make shields to block all of the above. I wear my hair short--like me--currently it’s purple with a white patch in the middle. White because I am one of the good guys, when I’m not verbally blasting my friends. I can be as bitchy as a room full of disappointed divas. I also usually wear black, no piercings though. To me there are as cool as a door to door salesman during dinner time. Basically I’m a freak. Besides working, I help people to escape abusers or fight mythical animals and beings. I also play the Congas and bongos when I can get a gig as a replacement drummer, which isn’t often, so I am usually broke. Users were catching a bad case of the flu, which left them exhausted and in some cases dead. Someone-Being-the cosmos-decided it was my Mission to find the source and to stop it. I have a special geas they gave me to prove it. In the process of figuring out what was going I run into; a griffin on a street in Boulder, Colorado, an abuser who wanted revenge and knew how to get it, an AI Trick, ghosts, plus my own emotional baggage that needed taming. If I survived each of those, I would face something that turned all of those into training exercises. Now the question was could I survive fire, and my own emotional hang ups turned against me. I doubted it, I thought the geas had been given to me by mistake.......
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After advice from a couple of people and after rereading the blurbs on four UF books I decided to redo # two and three again. They are both much shorter.
# 2
My name is NA. I am a Mage-mid range. I help people escape abusers or fight mythical animals and beings. Just don’t get my upset; I can be as bitchy as a room full of disappointed divas. I usually wear black with short purple hair, because I look like what I am, a freak.
Someone-Being-the cosmos decided to give me a mission-I have a special geas to prove it. Users were catching a bad case of the flu, which left them exhausted and in some cases dead. My job was to find the source of the flu and stop it before something much worse happened. If I can survive, ghosts, my own emotional baggage that needed taming, someone bent on revenge and a griffin long enough to find out what was going on. I doubted I could, for this was way above my pay grade, therefore the geas must have been given to me by mistake.......
#3 A run of the flu that strikes only at Users-low grade Mages-and which leaves its victims exhausted and sometimes dead is running through Boulder.
Na, a mid level Mage, is living her live; working for a local coffeehouse, sometimes playing the congas in bands. Every now and again she helps women escape abusive boy friends or spouses, and assists those who have problems with Mythos. While helping a person in need of her special services, she has to deal with a mother grizzly that she meets in a dark alley. This begins a series of very dangerous events: she is attacked by a Griffin, by a man who wants revenge, a nest of ghosts and her own emotional hurts and hangups. On top of that she now has been inflicted with a special geas. It’s been a very bad month. Before it turns better she will face her own inner skeletons and emotional baggage controled by a run away Trick. If she survives that there will be one more mission that is high above her pay grade and could end with her death by fire.
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Okay, the lady who edited my novel also reworked my blurbs. She condensed one of them down to what follows. She said she thought it would work in First Person too. So here are bother new versions.
NA, Nadir, finds herself in the middle of a situation not of her choosing. There is a flu going around making Users and Mages sick, and killing some. It is her job—she has the special geas to prove it—to find the cause and to stop it before something terrible (or terrifying) happens.
She just has to get around her emotional baggage, a griffin, ghosts, an AI Trick, and an angry abuser who wants revenge on NA, because she helped his girlfriend to leave him(,) and got him arrested for molesting a female officer in the process. At the same time, she has to figure out what a friend is.
She is out of her pay grade, has no plan to find or defeat the cause, and is caught in a wave of anger at her friends. Yet, somehow she is the only one who can stop this flu.
The geas and the Power behind it, must have made a mistake and sent the geas to the wrong person. However, since she has it, it is her job to stop a horrible event from happening. A large job for a Freak with a lot of emotional baggage and doubts.
-----------------------------------------
My name is NA, I found myself in the middle of a situation not of my choosing. There is a flu going around making Users and Mages sick, and killing some of them. It is my job--I have the special geas to prove it-to find the cause and stop it before something terrible happens.
First though I need to deal with a real live Griffin, Ghosts, An AI Trick, an angry abuser out for revenge. At the same time I need to figure out what a friend is.
I am out of my pay grade, have no plan to find or defeat the cause and I managed to be caught in a wave of anger at my friends. Somehow though I’m the only one who can stop this flu.
The geas and the Power behind it must have made a mistake and sent the geas to the wrong person. However now that I have it it it is my job to a horrible event form happening. This is going to be a large job for a Freak with a lot of emotional baggage weighing me down.
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