Describe your novel in one sentence.

[cpg35223]

Okay, this thread comes from the advice Flo Ziegfeld used to give people: If you can't write your idea on the back of a business card, you don't have an idea.

When you go to pitch conferences, many agents will have the same viewpoint, wanting the skinny on your novel in just a few words.

So what's yours? Here's my one-sentence description:

A man copes with the death of his wife by attending the funerals of strangers.

[sarahkate_m]

The most unbelievable survivor of one train wreck after another. A true story with changed names.

[Mightyqueen801]

In 1859 an anti-slavery white northerner travels to Virginia to buy the son of a Black neighbor.

[Basiliximab]

Bound by prophecy, a boy's life is shattered both by fate and a cruel dark mage whose jealousy and thirst for power know no limits.

[stormchaser9878]

You can change the world for the better, but only if you get the right information, because bad people control the world and good people just want to live in it.

[linicx]

I am not writing a novel, but I am writing a family history for my grandchildren: The Little Dutch From 1550-1950.

[Naturen]

Her life became a battle to be won against the Federal government who said in 1994 that she could not rest her head in their bunkhouse because she was too dark.

[JerZ]

I have always heard one paragraph, not one sentence, though I don't have a credit for that; I believe it was part of the "snowflake method". (I believe the idea was first, one paragraph; next, what the book jacket would say.)

Mine would be:

From beyond the grave, the true limits of a mother's love are tested. Who will raise Phoebe--the woman who lost her to tragedy, or the one that carries her now?

[JerZ]

Originally Posted by cpg35223

A man copes with the death of his wife by attending the funerals of strangers.

Completely fascinating, BTW. That's just the kind of book I'd read!

[sarahkate_m]

Originally Posted by cpg35223

Okay, this thread comes from the advice Flo Ziegfeld used to give people: If you can't write your idea on the back of a business card, you don't have an idea.

When you go to pitch conferences, many agents will have the same viewpoint, wanting the skinny on your novel in just a few words.

So what's yours? Here's my one-sentence description:

A man copes with the death of his wife by attending the funerals of strangers.

Almost like Harold & Maude... which could use a good remake.

I say: write your book & make your own screenplay. When it gets produced: I'll buy a ticket & I'll read the book first cuz the book is usually better.

Kate