Goodreads Authors/Readers discussion

Please don't construe this question as a promotion. I'm about to try and pitch my work to writing contests, book bloggers, reviewers, etc. Your honest opinion is all I'm asking for.

Update 5/26: It seems that every submission form (writing contest, book blogger, professional reviewer) wants a description with a different word count. I don't need one synopsis/pitch, I need five. My editor helped me out with one, but I'll need to learn how to do it myself if I'm to get the varying lengths. Thus this exercise.

Here are the two versions:

Version 1:
It's a bitch when your enemies know you better than you know yourself. Cassie's enemies knew that no amount of threats could compel her to commit treason and steal a prototype starship, so instead they fatally sabotaged her best friend's brain implant, offering to undo the damage in exchange for the ship.

They chose Cassie because she had access to the ship. They chose her because her career as a military pilot was in ruins. They chose her because she only had the one friend. They should have chosen somebody else: Cassie isn't one for doing what she's told.

As Cassie streaks across the Solar System, the Sol Alliance Government proves they’ll do anything to recover their stolen property. But even worse, the Consortian Republic, desperate for the next-generation tech crammed into that ship, has sent their flagship commanded by their most psychotic artificial mind. After all, there's no need to bring Cassie and her crew back alive.

Version 2:
Disgraced starship pilot Cassandra Hague must save her friend from a form of extortion – one that has left his brain implant fatally sabotaged. Time is short, and the only doctor who can cure him lives on a distant outpost deep in enemy space.

Cassie has no choice but to take the fastest starship she can get her hands on and head for the outpost, even though stealing an advanced prototype ship is bound to attract the wrong kind of attention. She soon discovers that the Sol Alliance government will do anything to safeguard the secret tech crammed into that ship, but – even worse – they are not her only pursuers…

A psychotic artificial mind with a strong interest in the stolen tech noticed her fleeing the solar system, and now she has become its prey.

Disgraced starship pilot Cassandra Hague must save her friend from extortion--one that has left his brain implant fatally sabotaged. The only doctor who can save him lives on a distant outpost deep in enemy space.

Cassie has no choice but to steal an advanced prototype starship and head to the outpost. But the Sol Alliance government will do anything to safe guard the secret tech inside the ship.

But even worse: a psychotic artificial mind has just noticed her fleeing the solar system with something it wants


Try something like this...a little tighter. Succinctness is a virtue when doing a pitch...

Disgraced pilot Cassandra Hague gets blackmailed into saving her best friend's botched brain implant by delivering an advanced prototype starship to a distant outpost deep in enemy space.

She counted on being pursued by agents of the Sol Alliance, but she didn't count on waking a psychotic artificial mind that will stop at nothing to get the stolen tech and use it for its own nefarious purposes...

Succinctness is a virtue when doing a pitch...

Perhaps I was wrong to say pitch; it seems that every submission form (book review, contest, etc.) wants a description with a different word count. I don't need one synopsis, I need five. My editor helped me out with one, but I'll need to learn how to do it myself if I'm to get the varying lengths. Thus this exercise.

Thank you Arabella for your suggestion and perhaps showing me that I could have asked the question differently. I'll update the title or add a word or two to the post.

She counted on being pursued by agents of the Sol Alliance, but she didn't count on waking a psychotic artificial mind that will stop at nothing to get the stolen tech and use it for its own nefarious purposes...

Martyn, I like that. You'v done this before :-)

Arabella, I like your version as it poses reader questions and gets to the conflict. One change--I would add form back in, as in "a form of extortion" because otherwise I couldn't make the leap from extortion to brain injury.

Bayard..you don't have to give the reader everything...just using extortion lets the reader know there is something illegal/nasty going on. You just need to whet the readers appetite. You don't have to give all the details

Bayard wrote: "Martyn, I like that. You'v done this before :-)"

Yes, I have. I even offered some advice on writing pitches in this article.

Someone even suggested that becoming a 'blurbmeister' might be a feasible career for me.

I don't know. I already have three jobs...

Bayard wrote: "Perhaps I was wrong to say pitch; it seems that every submission form (book review, contest, etc.) wants a description with a different word count. I don't need one synopsis, I need five. My editor helped me out with one, but I'll need to learn how to do it myself if I'm to get the varying lengths. Thus this exercise."

No, you don't.

You need one elevator pitch.
You need one regular pitch or blurb.
You need a teaser.
You need a short summary.
You need a synopsis.

All serve different purposes in promoting your book.

Martyn (a.k.a. M'sieur Sang Froid) wrote: "You need one elevator pitch.
You need one regular pitch or blurb.
You need a teaser.
You need a short summary.
You need a synopsis.

All serve different purposes in promoting your book."

^This. I like this.

And Martyn, you could probably make effective blurbs in your sleep. I like your idea of writing a blurb like a pitch, since that is essentially what it is to a new reader. You have just a few sentences to work with when pitching your book to strangers online.

Thomas wrote: "And Martyn, you could probably make effective blurbs in your sleep. I like your idea of writing a blurb like a pitch, since that is essentially what it is to a new reader. You have just a few sentences to work with when pitching your book to strangers online."

Not just to strangers online.

I'm often writing in public and there are always people who ask me what I'm doing. So you tell them you're writing a book and they will want to know what it's about.

The first time something like that happened, I told them what amounted to a synopsis, but that's not what they wanted to hear. A synopsis is too long, and not really intended for readers, but for acquisition editors, who determine on the strength of your synopsis whether they want to read your manuscript.

So I gave them a summary, but that was still too long.

In the end I just told them, "A freelance assassin breaks one of her rules when she's confronted with an unusual witness."

Then you have people's attention. "What are her rules? What's so unusual about the witness that she starts breaking her rules?"

And then you tell them that the answers to their questions are in the book.

Martyn, being asked what it's about has happened to me as well, but I didn't know what to do about it. Their eyes glazed over. Thanks for the advice and in particular explaining when to use each type of description. I certainly will be writing to a lot of strangers (not my favorite thing, but easier armed with you advice). Thanks -Bayard

You're welcome, Bayard.

I always found the elevator pitch the most interesting to work on: How To Give The Premise In The Least Amount Of Words.

Martyn,

Giving it a try... Of course, I still have the one you worked up. This version is just following the advice in the article.

Starship pilot Cassie steals a prototype warship when a spy threatens to kill her best friend…

Cassandra Hague pays for her tiny bunk on the Mars space station MS-17 by flying transport missions to Earth and, when money is really tight, boxing. It’s been six years since she resigned from the military, and she has no intention of reenlisting for the looming war. Cassie is content to let her combat flying skills atrophy until a spy threatens to kill her only friend unless she defects with a tech-heavy prototype frigate. Cassie steals the ship and makes plans to foil the spy’s plot but finds that she’ll have to be twice the pilot she ever was to survive the coming days.

Harbinger of Treason is the first novel in a series. This book features an intelligent, foul-mouthed heroine that has trouble making friends and an even harder time spotting enemies. She’s surrounded by believable, well-developed characters with suspect motives. Harbinger of Treason takes place in a technology-laden future where books, art and even clothing only exist in computers, superimposed over our vision. A future where deception is desirable. And expensive.

I would appreciate if you could also visit my new Lulu profile page and review my short story "Stay Smart, Shelby!". Here's link: http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/K_Marie...
Your opinions are invaluable; this is my first published work!