Now that Greetings From Sunny Aluna is closing in on 90,000 words (with probably another 10k to go), it’s probably time to start talking about it. You know, ramping up interest in a book that’s not even done yet in the hope that when it finally drops it won’t land with a dull thud.
I’ve been doing more research about how to do a better job of pitching the story and learning about the quick hooks that will lure people into a false sense of security. No, wait. Excitement. A real sense of excitement. Even now, when someone asks me to summarize the Henchmen series, I’m usually at a loss and wind up changing the subject. As a result, the people that have taken the time to read it usually enjoy it, but it’s the getting people there part that’s still the problem.
What excitement might look like
Of course, there are three major components that can generate interest in a book: The cover, the blurb, and the first page. If any of those blow, you’re well and truly boned. That’s for people looking at the book, though. They have to actually see it in front of them before any of that matters. What about the times where you’re on an elevator or talking to people you work with? There has to be a way to summarize the plot to a point that it covers the gist of the story without being overly onerous. One line. That’s really all you get before people put their eyes on screensaver. And guess what, the blurb is far too long and formal to talk about while you’re at a restaurant.
Blurbs are important, don’t get me wrong, but they’re not what we’re after here. Information on writing blurbs can be found anywhere. Hell, I’ve written a post on writing blurbs. Everyone who’s ever written a blurb has likely written a blog post on writing blurbs. What we want is a blurb for a blurb.
Loglines work on that kind of level. They’re hooks designed to generate interest. They don’t tell the whole story, they don’t even really reveal much about the plot. The general gist of a logline is it’s a quick and dirty sales tactic, the kind of thing you can tell someone when you’re in an elevator without resorting to half-assed declarations about thematic unity or your book being a tale of redemption. If you want a good examination of loglines, go check out Sean Carlin’s post on loglines. He does a marvelous job of explaining how to distill an entire story into a compact statement that can be delivered at the drop of a hat.
That’s the kind of thing you need when someone asks what your book is about. No one is going to listen to a rambling discussion of how a super villain’s henchmen work with her to topple the United States government because they’re really pissed off about random things and, oh yeah, there’s this girl that they pick up and her father was into some shady things and that leads the henchmen to a place they never even knew existed. And everything goes all gooey-kablooey with invisible people and guns and stuff. Oh, and it also has bondage sushi in. Like totally right in the beginning, too.
Zoidberg can be a real jackass.
How about: While celebrating their latest robbery, a group of villains bent on destroying the United States stumbles across a terrible secret that the government will do anything to keep hidden.
Or
In the New Mexico desert, a group of villains searches for the ultimate weapon – a weapon the US government will do anything to keep hidden.
Admittedly, not my best work, but both convey the general gist of Henchmen pretty well. And, yes, it does have bondage sushi in it, but only for a short while. While Albuquerque may not be by-the-books desert (I think we get too much rain to be true desert), most everyone thinks of New Mexico as a whole as being desert so who am I to disagree. I don’t work in the tourism department, I just live here.
So, now that I’ve prattled on a bit, it’s time to get to the meat of this post: notably drumming up some interest in the forthcoming (sometime late this summer) Greetings From Sunny Aluna. To do that, I’m going to try my hand at the two immediate challenges of getting someone to read something: the cover and my new friend, the logline.
The Cover:
The Logline:
In a world of magic and martial arts, four people with different reasons dodge gangs and violent cops to find and eliminate a mysterious crime lord known only as The Beast before he can kill more innocent people.
I think it still needs work.
Drop me a note in the comments about what works, what doesn’t work, and any other thing you feel like chatting about. I like chatting.
Eric Lahti 