By: Jordan Smith
Let’s say you
and I get onto an elevator together and I ask what your book is about. You
could do one of two things.
You could start
from the beginning and try to pitch me your entire 300-page novel in the brief
elevator ride. If you take this approach, you’ll probably be eyeing the
emergency stop button as the elevator gets closer and closer to my floor while
you haven’t even gotten to the story’s hook yet. But, alas, you’re too late. We
arrive at my floor and I get off rolling my eyes and wondering why I asked.
Or, instead of
trying to pitch your entire book in such a short time, you could give me
one sentence that summarizes your story’s hook and key elements. In the time
that it takes to ride an elevator, you’ve hopefully tickled my fancy enough for
me to give you my e-mail address and say, “I’ve gotta run now, but tell me
more about this!”
That
one-sentence pitch you gave me is called a logline. It’s a tool
that originated in Hollywood and is used by screenwriters to pitch their
screenplays to movie producers. Basically, it’s a one-sentence summary of
a story.
Loglines aren’t
exclusively for screenwriters, though. Every storyteller
should be able to say in one sentence what his or her story is about. And so,
let’s take a crash course in the art of crafting a great logline for your
book.
Why Do I Need
a Logline?
You might still
be wondering why you need to be able to write a logline. Well, a logline is a
way for you to do a few things:
. . .
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read the rest of the post, click here:
~*~
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