Let's Practice Pitching!

Last Thursday, I did a post for The Writer's Alley, the group blog I'm a part of, and talked about pitching. If you missed it, you can find that post here. In that blog, I discuss in detail the elements of a successful pitch and outline the differences between a short pitch and a long pitch. I also gave some tips to give you an idea what to expect in your conference appointments and help you feel more prepared.

Today, I want to take all this information to an application level and actually work on brainstorming a few pitches with all of you. Something I love about pitches is that each person will highlight different parts of a story, consistent with their own particular writing voice. It's so interesting to see what people come up with!

So first let's review. An ideal pitch should include 1) Something your characters are moving toward 2) Something that's holding your characters back 3) Enough detail that we get a feel for your voice.

Remember that editors and agents are not out to to humiliate you. They genuinely want to hear what your story is about.  That's why they're attending the conference in the first place, and why they got into the book business. But they are also often tired from people who haven't spent time crafting a quality pitch... don't be discouraged by that.

Now I'm going to give a couple examples of famous movies and books to help break this down. First let's think about Pride and Prejudice. What is Elizabeth Bennett working toward? Well, two things come to mind. She would like a way to take care of her family, and she also wants to find true love. Unfortunately for her (but great for us as readers), her two goals work against each other when loveless prospects of marriage come. What is working against her? Well, pretty much everything about Mr. Darcy. He treats her as inferior to him, and yet throughout the book, a little part of her sees that he is the answer to both her goals at once.

So how can we get these concepts into a short little quip? Here's one idea that comes to mind...
Her family's ruin or her own? 
And then the long pitch could further articulate the story...
Elizabeth Bennett wears her independence like her custom-sewn clothes. But when her family needs financial stability, she must consider a marriage of convenience to provide for them, no matter the cost to herself. She'd love to find an alternative... if only it didn't involve that man. 


Let's take another example from the movie Casablanca. You know the one... brooding restaurant owner Rick has never gotten over his first love, but when she walks into the door of his bar with a patriot, he must decide who gets the exit visas... and who stays in Casablanca. How about something like this?
Two men. One woman. One stays, one goes.
Longer pitch...
Putting past love behind him was easier before Elisa walked into Rick's Cafe with her husband on her arm. Elisa and her patriot husband need the exit visas in Rick's possession in order to leave Casablanca. But before Rick hands out the visas, he's got some questions that he'd like answered. Like what really happened in Paris when she left him.



Isn't this fun? Allow yourself to brainstorm while you are working on your pitch, and don't get frustrated if it doesn't come right away. I've found that idea sometimes come at the strangest times. I thought up the pitch I used at last year's conference in the middle of the night!

Okay, so here comes the really fun part! Your turn! Everyone loves the movie You've Got Mail... I'd love to see what pitches you can come up with for it. Feel free to use a short pitch and/or a long pitch.

Also, if you want to include a pitch you are working on right now for one of your own projects, feel free to do that as well! I'm so interested to see what everyone is working on and would love to help if you if you have any questions!

Photos from http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20570221_21120217,00.html and http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/Casablanca?from=Main.Casablanca

The Meet

Let's talk today about that moment that sometimes frustrates writers but hooks readers, the thing the rest of your book hinges upon and that contests, agents, and editors all judge you upon.

The meet.

Which usually happens in the first chapter of a romantic book.

Sometimes writers complain about the typical romance structure feeling formulaic, and as a writer, to a certain extent I can understand that, because you may feel limited in what your creativity can do. And let's not forget there are exceptions to the "rule" (such as Sleepless in Seattle). If you think your story could be an exception, go for it! But most stories aren't exceptions, and for good reasons.

Because as much as writers may think they want to break with tradition, the formula exists for a reason. It works. As a reader of a lot of Christian romances, I can tell you that I have put many of them down after feeling frustrated by the story. A good rule to follow is that if something doesn't feel fun to you to write, it probably won't feel fun for someone else to read. But even if it is fun for you to write, that doesn't necessarily mean someone will want to read it. You have to prove to readers that your story rocks. And one way to do that is through establishing a really great "meet" between your hero and heroine. When a reader sees chemistry between the two main characters, it will make him or her want to keep reading! Looking back, I realize that some of my own favorite books held my interest because they had such a great first meet, and then had me wishing throughout the whole book that the hero and heroine could have that kind of moment again. In many ways, this mirrors the basic doctrine of Christianity, if you think about it. We were in perfect communion with God, we fell away from that, and we've been longing for it ever since. And isn't that what Christian fiction should do, demonstrate to the world the relationship between Christ and the church?

So here are a few ways you can keep your "first meet" interesting...

1) The spark. We want to see the "it" factor when we read. We want to think, "Oh yeah. I remember that that feels like," and we want our heart to skip a beat as we live vicariously through this heroine who's just found a major hottie.

2) The conflict. You need a reason to keep your hero and heroine from falling in love immediately, and we need a reason to worry. If the spark is really as true as you make us think it is, then these two people need some major obstacles to keep them from a relationship. If you can find a way to incorporate the conflict/obstacles into this first meet scene, all the better for your book because we know right off the bat what they're up against.

3) The need. Running opposite the conflict you set up, you need a force that pulls the hero and heroine together. It can be simple thing, like being neighbors, or a more complicated thing, like an arranged marriage. But if we don't have the assurance that the hero and heroine are going to be in regular contact with each other (resulting in more conflict and obstacles, of course), we won't want to keep reading. So be sure you build this element in early on, maybe even into your "meet" scene.

What questions do you have about these things? Do you like writing the first meet?