Synopses: The Broad Strokes

Writing a synopsis has more rules than cricket. And the broad strokes go like this: Tell the story without telling how you tell the story. Provide a taste of the story with some colour, but don’t add anything that isn’t essential! Capitalise your characters names when first introduced. Write in present tense. Don’t forget POV. And, as you’re obviously demonstrating your writing skill, you’ll need to fit the plotline into succinct paragraphs with deftly smooth segues. Here’s a website that tries to help by assassinating query letters: http://queryshark.blogspot.com/

After all that, I’m fairly happy with my synopses now (3 sizes) and have sent them to my friends, who I like to refer to as proof readers. So, the next step is a week off work soon to finalise research, the query letter and fit in a few final once-overs of Orla’s Code.