WRITING SYNOPSES SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[erastes]

That is all. - - -

Comments

[copperbeech.livejournal.com]

Indeed, they do. My pattern seems to be I start writing whatever my project is, then part way I write a synopsis (in my own weird language) to keep on track. Then I have to go back and retrofit it.

I hate writing all of that stuff. The writing around the writing.

Good luck!

[liriaen.livejournal.com]

That may be, but they're the key.

[vashtan.livejournal.com]

Write me my endings, I'll write your synopses.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

*kicks them*

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Do what I do, and write your ending first. That way you've always got something to aim for.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

It just seems so .... DULL. A did this. Then he did that. Then he went and did that. It turns what I find to be an interesting book (sorry about the non-modesty) into a list of dull actions.

grrrr.

[vashtan.livejournal.com]

Do they end like that, then, or do you change the ending when it turns out differently?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

No, so far, they've all ended that way - i find that it keeps me focussed and that I know how it ends I have to get there, one way or another. Originally I took the idea from JKR, and now it's become "the way I work" - Mere Mortals is all done and I'm just workin gout how to join the dots from where I am to there, it's working, but slowly.

I can't change things easily, once they are written, as they've happened, if you get what i mean.

[vashtan.livejournal.com]

Thing is, my characters do things in the middle and that changes the outcome. No book has ended the way I erote it in my "working outline". Not one. Characters that were supposed to live, die, those that should die, live, antagonists turn out to be douchebags and get replaced by tougher/better antagonists... I wish I was that much in control of what I'm doing.

[liriaen.livejournal.com]

Not going to help, I'm afraid. Try looking at your original text twice removed and from a ladder and then halve every sentence you've got so far?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I suppose it's a bit easier for me, writing romance at the moment, I have to keep the protags alive, or at least two of them! I don't outline, the ending is the only outline i have.

[vashtan.livejournal.com]

Yeah, maybe it's the fluidity of my non-genre - it's all open for debate, ad characters always misbehave, regardless of what kind of text I write. The worst thing is - they are right. If I can get an ending, it's usually better than the one I had in mind. :)

[chris-smith-atr.livejournal.com]

Write it bitch. ;)

Or option 2 - I'll write it. There may be more unicorns, smexing, and squid. And pegasuses!!!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

it would be more interesting than it is now.

[chris-smith-atr.livejournal.com]

Bollocks.

Pass it over tonight. I'll take a look. Are you concentrating on the right aspect of it? I.e. the mounting horror - as opposed to a litany of X does Y... you showing the consequences in the synopsis?

[essayel.livejournal.com]

Writing the ending first! That's a good idea.

I've never had to write a synopsis, but hope to be as frustrated and annoyed as you are one day, if I produce anything worth subbing. For the moment you have your sympathy. It must be awful to have to condense something you've sweated blood over down to a sheet of A4.

[dcjuris.livejournal.com]

Someone recently said to me, about my synopsis for "One Year", something on the order of it would benefit from being cut down to one page. ::sigh:: I did *not* reply about the fact that it took me THREE MONTHS to get it down to TWO PAGES. Trudge ahead, lovely. :-)

[kcwarwick.livejournal.com]

I agree absolutely. I can write the things, but how on earth do you make them sound interesting?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Personally I think one or two pages is perfectly adequate, some publishers want pages of stuff! eek!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

The best synopsis I have is for Junction X and that was written by Lee Rowan, it focusses on the concept rather than the plot A+b+C and really rocks. I just wish i could write 'em like that.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Writing the ending first really really works for me, not always first, exactly, but certainly pretty early on.

Yes, the "writing about the writing" blurbs, synopses, bios are the bane of writers' existence.

[spindriftdancer.livejournal.com]

If you didn't find it interesting then you wouldn't be writing it... (:

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Well the book is interesting - and i have to write the synopsis, if I want to sell it!!

[spindriftdancer.livejournal.com]

Courage...

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

Send me what you've got and I'll check it out.

[crawling-angel.livejournal.com]

OMg, I know! Once I'd finished SC's I thought, shit ... nobody's going to want to read this pap. Then I fell asleep...