Writing a New Summary/ Or setting as Character
After I sent my 80,000 word novel, HUNGRY FOR CHOCOLATE, to the publisher last week, I decided I needed to do a new summary for this particular publisher.
Since the book is set in West Virginia and that's where the publisher is located, I felt I needed a summary that incorporated all the mountain state elements and flavors of the story.
Earlier summaries of this story centered on the surrogacy itself and on the relationships between the characters. Setting wasn't mentioned. Not so, this new one.
I wanted to play up the setting as character. The story takes place in 1998, in the small fictional town of Shady Creek, West Virginia. The people are close knit, not tolerable of strangers, or new ideas. And, surrogacy to the people of Shady Creek was indeed "strange."
The fact that the main character lives in a historic landmark, an old Victorian home built in the late 1800's, that First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt visited in the late 1930's when she toured West Virginia was never mentioned in any other summary but in this one it's relevant.
It felt good to tell this story from the perspective of setting. Funny, but you think of a story as having only one summary. I can see now how a story can have many summaries. It all depends on perspective. Looking at the story from another lens, or from another angle.
Am I crazy or do you think this is true? That a story can have many or at least more than one summary? I'd never thought about this before now, until I experienced it.
Let me know what you think.
And blessings to you whatever you think!
Since the book is set in West Virginia and that's where the publisher is located, I felt I needed a summary that incorporated all the mountain state elements and flavors of the story.
Earlier summaries of this story centered on the surrogacy itself and on the relationships between the characters. Setting wasn't mentioned. Not so, this new one.
I wanted to play up the setting as character. The story takes place in 1998, in the small fictional town of Shady Creek, West Virginia. The people are close knit, not tolerable of strangers, or new ideas. And, surrogacy to the people of Shady Creek was indeed "strange."
The fact that the main character lives in a historic landmark, an old Victorian home built in the late 1800's, that First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt visited in the late 1930's when she toured West Virginia was never mentioned in any other summary but in this one it's relevant.
It felt good to tell this story from the perspective of setting. Funny, but you think of a story as having only one summary. I can see now how a story can have many summaries. It all depends on perspective. Looking at the story from another lens, or from another angle.
Am I crazy or do you think this is true? That a story can have many or at least more than one summary? I'd never thought about this before now, until I experienced it.
Let me know what you think.
And blessings to you whatever you think!
Absolutely! Stories have many facets-and you can write your summary and /or query letter to emphasize what you think will best get your market interested.
ReplyDeleteYep. I think stories can have as many summaries as there are possible ways to view a story. I write my summaries to draw out what I think are the most important aspects of the story for the market I write in. But there are many ways I could write the summary.
ReplyDeleteThanks for visiting my blog :)
Congrats on getting your book sent to the publisher. I like the idea of different summaries for one book based on differing themes or points of view or literary elements. Thanks for the new thought.
ReplyDeleteI agree, I think your summary should point out what a certain publisher would be interested in. Considering who you sent it to, pointing out the location and other facts that pertain to WV should be very helpful in getting them to accept it. Let's hope so, anyway.
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