How the hell do you write a synopsis???!!!

i've been struggling with a synopsis for such a long timenow it's starting to take longer than the novel itself!! don't know what genre the book is, can't decide what to include in it and, well, i'm well and truly stumped. anyone has any hints? i have read so many books on it and i'm thinking i'll never get it. if i was going to do it i would have done it by now surely.

You really should have an idea of the genre your book inhabits. You should have had that in mind when you started writing it, particularly if you ultimately intend to pitch it to agents and/or publishers.

To write a synopsis, take each chapter and boil it down to the key points established by the chapter's end. How has the plot been advanced in each chapter? Do that with each chapter, and you'll have the bones of the synopsis. Note that a synopsis is not a summary; the latter is brief and does not cover the plot points in the depth required by a synopsis.

Maybe ask someone else to do it. Even if there not a great writer, get the perspective off them and then maybe tidy it up yourself.

thanks. seriessix, i would try that if i could find someone willing. people tend to say they don't want to for rear of offending of some such excuse. but i'll try that. truth is that is my most likely way out.

about the genre, here is the problem.

after the first three chapters i put somewhere on this forum the gut wakes up and eventually-by chapter eight or so-after descovering people have dissappeared and and things are just too different to make sense it turns out he's been out sold for seven years. it's not a coma because the bathroom he was out cold in stands and people must have used it. so there that scifi timetravel type thing.

he's accused of having killed a few women. there arte these papers he can't remeber writing that but say some really strange things that point not so much to him killing the women to but one disturbed individual. a big part of the book is interogations and the police not having too hard a time of proving the majority of the boy's memories to be wrong. there are no records of him anywhere-banks, etc- and he starts to believe they might be right. blah blah-tha's the thriller or suspence bit.

but mostly he spends his timeworrying the killer-je's killing women similar to the girl he draws as his girlfriend- and he writes these journals trying to piece together whats going on and what he remembers. twice he escapes to try and save her and twice he's caught. that is the 'romance' bit i guess.

see, i can't even write a proper summary of the damned thing. it's hopeless.

this is jah work, only the mistakes are mine.

blessed rasta

Hi Kaimani,

The best qualified person to write the synopsis is usually the author, after all they wrote the novel so should have the most intimate knowledge of the characters motivations etc.

It sounds like you story is a difficult one to sum up. Try and imagine you’ve just sat down in the publisher’s office and they say “Tell me what your story is about.”

Now It’s great if you can use some verbal shorthand (“Its like Star Wars meets Frankenstein!”) but you score 0/10 for originality and will probably be shown the door very quickly.

A really good synopsis may sell the book for you. – ask Fredrick Forsyth – “The day of the Jackal” manuscript was rejected several times before he realised the publishers simply didn’t understand the ‘slow burning tension’ within the story, he wrote a twenty page synopsis that got them hooked, they read the manuscript and the rest is history.

The summary above looks very muddled, you’ve got to ask yourself: is your story the same? If it is, the chances of a publisher taking it on will be slim.

Based on your first three chapters and your above summary I think you would have to look at the running order of your ideas and use something like the list below to create a coherent synopsis.

(1) man wakes up in a public toilet, he cannot remember why he passed out or whether he as been attacked.

(2) Over the next few hours / days he realises that the world has altered subtlety, fashions are different, people he knew no longer work where they used to and buildings have been knocked down and new ones constructed.

(3) No one seems to know who he is, he has no identification, no records of him exist, after an altercation with the new landlord of the place he used to live he is arrested, before the police arrive he suddenly remembers he has buried his journal in the garden and is just lifting it out of the ground when the police arrive.

(4) The police tell him that his description matches that of a serial killer they are looking for and subject him to lengthy interrogations.

(5) The entries in the journal, which he cannot remember writing, give the impression that he is a disturbed individual, he seriously questions his own sanity and starts to believe the police’s theory that he is the killer, they consistently disprove his memories and “prove” an alternative scenario.

(6) In a moment of blinding clarity (or is it just further delusions?) he realises his girlfriend is in danger and she is probably the next victim because of her appearance or something to do with the killers past.

(7) He tries to escape several times to save her – does he succeed? Perhaps he gets there just as the killer has struck and is found cradling her dead body as the police arrive… did he do it after all? Or has the real killer escaped again?

This may be nothing like your original story as I’ve had to make some assumptions regarding the ending, I hope you find it useful and you manage to get the synopsis written, post it on this thread when its finished. -It certainly sounds like a very interesting story.

Best of luck.

spook, to say I am thankful would be to say ouch when you have five knives embedded in your sternum. you seem to have gone out of your way to read and help. this is most appreciated. hope one can repay in some way one day-a mention when i accept my booker, perhaps?!all praises and thanks to you. that said i'm afraid i'm going to have to steal your synopsis almost in all it entirety. it is better than everything i have tried in months. many months. thank you.