Agent A said that my story was indeed "the Anti-ROAD" as I had characterized it in
my pitch, and she was glad to find it did not share the bleakness of Cormac McCarthy's novel THE ROAD. 

The problem was that my story was "still a little too post-apocalyptic" for her tastes. 

I think she had her hopes up that my story would be THE post-apocalyptic she would
like as a non-post-apocalyptic-loving reader.  Alas it was not.

And there was much rejoicing.

"Why?" you're asking.  "Why are you rejoicing after Agent A -- who you liked and respected enough to send a submission -- has said she does not want to represent your manuscript?  This makes no sense.  Where are the tears?  Where is the depression?  Where are your demons of insecurity and woe?  What about Aunt Fay?  Has the demon of Fatalism forsaken you in your moment of rejection?"  (Apparently you are a little verbose and melodramatic.)

"Because," I say.  And since I'm not nine years old, I don't leave it at that.  "Because I want people who like post-apocalyptics to like my story.  If this very knowledgeable, well-respected literary agent who doesn't typically like post-apocalyptics does not like my story because it's too post-apocalyptic, then I must be on the right track."

I'm not saying I'm not a little disappointed that Agent A didn't go crazy for my manuscript.  Just that the disappointment does not warrant a demon, at least not in this case, mostly because the rejection from Agent A was a "good one" -- it was personal, complimentary, and provided some criticism I can use to improve.  Agent A even said that if I don't land an agent this time around, she'd be interested in seeing my next project. 

That's far from disappointing.  I'd call that downright encouraging, and I'm going to let it fuel my fire, refill my mojo, and propel me forward.  (Because I, too, can be a little melodramatic.)

I wasn't the only one who received a rejection letter this week.  My friend Bonnie got one and she is wearing it as a badge of honor.  Why?  Because this rejection puts her one step closer to an acceptance.  I've read Bonnie's writing.  I know the story she's shopping around.  And I can tell you for a fact that her success is inevitable.  So Bonnie and I are celebrating her milestone, sans demons.

You see, not only are Bonnie and I both in the same rejection club, Bonnie also has a personal writing demon -- Spike. 
(Not everyone is "lucky" enough to have an army of demons like I do.)  Spike sits on Bonnie's shoulder while she writes, and she has a hard time shutting him up.  If his mouth is open it's because he's telling her she can't write worth beans.  He scoffs at her efforts and says her writing is beyond terrible.  That it will never be any good no matter how much she studies or how hard she tries.  That she should be embarrassed to ever allow her work to see the light of day. 

But for some reason Spike is nowhere in sight while Bonnie and I celebrate.... 

Maybe Spike and Aunt Fay are out having a cuppa.

As for my writing goals last week, I had the ambitious plan to edit 5 chapters.  That doesn't sound ambitious to you?  Clearly you didn't have two kids graduating, house guests from out of town, a Memorial Day - slash - birthday - slash - graduation party, and a partridge in a pear tree this week, as I did.  I have to tell you, I was doubtful I'd triumph because it was indeed a lofty goal, but I got up early every morning and wrote.  This is a bonafide miracle in itself as I'm not even remotely a "morning person."  (You other night owls know what I'm talking about.)  But as a result of this unlikely miracle
I got really, really close to meeting my goal:  I finished 4.5 chapters.  With the week I had, I'll take that as success!

For the coming week I set an even higher goal.  I still have house guests, more birthday parties to throw, and a host of partridges in my pear tree, but I'm going big and setting my goal at six chapters.  Why?  "Because you're nuts," you say.

"No," I say.  "It's because they're the last six chapters of the book and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel." 
I'm like a horse heading for the barn.  Each step closer makes me want to go faster.  The tunnel spurs me on.  The end is beckoning me, and I'm heeding her call.  Can you hear it?  "The End is near."

If you don't need your fingers to type, please cross them for me this week.  Send some anti-demon powder, and perhaps a little birdseed for the partridges, and wish me luck.  Then check back here next week to see if I made it.  

I’ve spent a lot of time here talking about my writing demons, but no time at all introducing you to my ducks.








 I have a little posse of ducklings I try to keep in a row: 
Family stuff.  House stuff. Work stuff.  Pet stuff.  Health stuff.  Volunteer work stuff.  And of course writing stuff.

Sometimes it’s hard for me to keep track of all my ducks.  I’ll focus on a squirrelly one and get him in line, only to lose track of a different one.

Even though I had a lot of really busy ducks last week, I was proud of how well I was keeping them in line.  Even the Writing Duck, who had been particularly untamable the week before. 

    LAST WEEK'S GOAL: 
    Revise outline to reflect recent changes to storyline, and
    complete revisions on 5 chapters.

    RESULT:  Epic Success! 

    Not only did I meet my goals, I exceeded them. 

I was feeling like a regular duck overlord.

Then I caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of my eye. 

I turned to get a better look, and there she was: 
my problem-child duckling, Exercise. 

It had been so long, I almost didn’t recognize her.  But I knew it was her when she stuck out her tongue, waggled her little wings and laughed at me, then ran away in her cross-trainers.

Why does she have to show up to nag me now, just when I’m getting my strut back and feeling like I’ve got all my ducks and demons under control?

“I’ll never be able to manage them all!” I wailed, channeling Fay (who you may remember as the demon house-guest of fatalism who comes to stay periodically, permeating my life with a cloying perfume that’s nearly impossible to get out even with Tide, Lysol and the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser).

I sat down and burst into tears.  With one little flick of a ducktail, my recent writing accomplishments, mastery of the family calendar, and deft handling of a full-to-overflowing to-do list no longer seemed strut-worthy.

I was too distraught to write that day so I didn’t meet my writing goal.  My tennis elbow flared up, I missed an appointment and I blew a deadline.  Then I ate a pint of ice cream in front of an inane TV show and felt sorry for myself while my kids played a game without me.  And NO, I did not exercise. 

Fail, fail, fail.  There wasn’t a single duck in the row.  There wasn’t even a row.

Like the butterfly that spawned a tornado, that tiny gust of ducktail wind had initiated a cascade of all my carefully placed duck-demon dominoes.  When it was over, I was left sitting in a puddle of woe with my goals, my dreams --my very life-- in ruins around me, never to rise again.

Apparently it’s pretty easy for Aunt Fay to take over my psyche.

Lucky for me I have a mentor who stopped by and opened the windows to clear out the stink of Fay’s perfume.  Despite Fay’s lingering power, she could not withstand the clean, fresh Colorado breeze stirred by my mentor’s words: 

“Perfection is the enemy of the good.”

“That’s right!” I exclaimed.  Well, maybe not exclaimed.  More like sniveled.  “That’s right,
I don’t have to be perfect.”

(You may recall that I’ve had a life-long love-hate relationship with Harpy,
my perfectionist demon.)

“Is it really okay,” I asked my mentor, “if I don’t have every single duck lined-up under 24-hour surveillance?”

“Sure,” my mentor said.  “It’s perfectly okay to neglect a duck or two while you’re taking care of the others.  As long as it’s not one of your children,
a medication you need to live, or an actual duck.”

So I stood up, dusted off the woe, and caught as many ducks as I could. 

I can’t say those ducks are in a neat row, but most of them are at least back in the coop.  I let Little Miss Exercise run off to do a 5K.  After awhile she’ll notice I’m not there and she’ll come back, flicking her shapely tail around to remind me I’m neglecting her.  Until then I’ll look after the ducks I’m able to corral. 

Maybe I’ll even strut a little.  So what if it makes me slightly out of breath?

THIS WEEK'S GOAL: 
Complete revisions on 5 more chapters.

THIS WEEK'S CHALLENGES: 
2 kids graduating, 1 kid home newly home from college, and a
relative visiting from out of town (don’t worry, it’s not Aunt Fay).

ATTITUDE: 
Bring it on, Ducks & Demons!  I’m prepared to give you 90%. 

You hear that, Harpy? 

The time has come to reveal how I did over the past week achieving my writing goals.  For those of you just tuning in, here's what I pledged to accomplish:

LAST WEEK'S GOAL:  Edit in short bursts to limit strain on elbows – specifically, edit for 30 minutes at a time, twice per day, Thursday through Monday.

RESULT: 

It seems like the goal I set should have been completely attainable, but alas it was not.  At least not for me.  Or should I say, not for me and my demons.

DEMONS:  Remember eMal, my email demon?  He paid me another visit.  Specifically, he came a-callin’ each and every morning this week when I was supposed to be writing.  I thought I could take a quick look at email first thing when I woke up—you know, just to make sure no fires had started in the night—then smoothly and gracefully transition to editing my novel.  You can guess where this is going.  Apparently opening email is like opening a bag of chips:  you can’t stop after only one.  Or maybe that’s just me.  Regardless, eMal and I ran away together every morning, and kept running well into the afternoon and evening.  We were like two lovers who lose track of time in each other’s company, only a lot less romantic.

To compound matters, eMal wasn’t the only demon circling my psyche this week.  I was also haunted by a demon I’ll call Bruce who outright ridiculed my goal of writing for 30 minutes at a time.  Whenever I’d think about getting down to business, Bruce would whisper insidiously, “Thirty minutes?  That’s not enough time to get into the story.  It won’t make any difference, so why bother?”  And silly me, I believed him more often than not.  You see, I’m a “binge” writer.  I prefer to immerse myself in my story for days on end, only coming up for air when forced.  This has been my way for as long as I’ve been writing, and old habits die hard.  Die Hard.  Bruce.  As in Willis.  Get it?

This week I also became reacquainted with a tiny but powerful demon I first met when dieting years ago.  I call her Snickerdoodle because when I’d break my diet and have a cookie, she’d say, “You’ve already blown it for today.  You can’t undo it, so you might as well have another.  In fact, eat the whole bag and start your diet tomorrow.”  With regard to my writing goals, Snick and the others teamed up to give me the one-two punch—after eMal or Bruce derailed me from editing for 30 minutes in the morning, Snick sneaked in and persuaded me not to even try for second round. 

Tuesday morning I guiltily entered the confessional, I mean I attended my weekly “check-in” to report how I did on my goals.  It wasn’t my proudest moment.  I had no idea how to answer the questions “why didn’t you meet your goals?” and “how can you do better this week?”

DIGGING IN:  After the check-in, I “dug in” with my mentor to try to determine what had gotten in the way of my success.  I dredged up my demons, feeling like they were legitimate excuses for my shortcomings, but at the same time feeling ashamed of my failure.  I failed because of who I am.  After all, these demons are part of me—manifestations of my fears, residue from past traumas, and damning evidence of dietary cheating.   “How can I be any different?” I thought. 

That’s when another demon reared her ugly head:  Fatalism.  Fay for short.  “I’ll never break these habits,” I told my mentor, channeling Fay.  “It’s hopeless.  My novel will never be published.  My only literary legacy will be a massive volume of email.”

GOING FORWARD:  And so I gave up on my writing dreams.  My mentor rode away into the sunset on a gleaming motorcycle paid for with royalties, and I returned to my dungeon to live out my days writing email after email, with my personal demons as my only company.

If this were a theme-heavy, cautionary parable meant to provoke deep thought and meaningful discussion, perhaps that’s how it would end.  But I don’t write that kind of story.  Nor the kind where demons win.  Besides, my mentor wouldn’t give up on me that easily.

The real story is that my mentor asked me to reflect on a time when I had been successful meeting a goal.  I recalled that just three weeks ago I'd strutted around this blog after meeting my writing goals.  So what was different that week? 
What had kept eMal, Bruce and Snickerdoodle at bay?

Here’s what I think made the difference:
    1.    A product-based goal (i.e. edit 50 pages) rather than a time-based goal (i.e. 30 minutes)
    2.    Daily goals in addition to a weekly goal
    3.    A promise to myself to finish the daily goal before going to sleep for the night

“So revise this week’s plan to reflect that,” my mentor said.  “And in addition, have you thought about rewarding yourself for good behavior?  Even demon-riddled prisoners in deep, dark dungeons have that to strive for.”

Hmm.  This sounds like good advice.  “I’ll try it,” I said.

THIS WEEK'S GOAL:  Revise outline to reflect recent changes to storyline, and complete revisions on 5 chapters.

PLAN FOR SUCCESS:
Divide weekly goals into specific, measurable daily goals:
            Wednesday – revise outline
            Thursday through Monday – revise one chapter per day
Write each morning for two hours or until achieving daily goal, whichever comes first.
Don’t go to sleep for the night until meeting daily goal.
When goal is met, reward self with a little TV-time with the family.

So take that, eMal.  Piss off, Fay.  Hasta la vista, Snickerdoodle. 

And Bruce? 

All I have to say to you is:

I can feel you cringing as you anticipate a barrage of insipid platitudes, clichéd adages, and trite expressions like “don’t back the wrong horse,” “get off your high horse” and “don’t spare the horses."  But have no fear.  There will be no motivational life lessons about trying your best, being graceful in victory, or learning from failure.

Why? 

Because I don’t identify with Orb or Verrazano or any of the horses who crossed the finish line.  I’m feeling the pain of Black Onyx, the horse who had to withdraw from the race at the last minute due to a fracture in his ankle.  Oh, the bitter disappointment after preparing for months--nay, years—only to have the finish line in sight and be forced to turn and hobble away.  I, too, suffered such a loss last week.  After setting my sites on finishing my novel, my hopes were dashed and my dream was yanked from under me like the proverbial horsehair rug. 

Well, that may be overstating it just a tad. 

The truth is, I had to take week off from the computer because of tennis elbow.  Granted it was both elbows, but still not a tragedy of Kentucky Derby proportion. 

The real tragedy was that I’d just come off a victory, having met my goal of sending a partial manuscript submission to “Agent A.”  I’d hoped to keep that momentum, and I’d set high-but-achievable goals that would propel me toward the next big milestone:  sending a full manuscript to “Agent B.” 

Alas my elbows did not permit me to meet those goals.  Instead I sat all week with idle hands watching the Kentucky Derby, sappy movies, and entire seasons of past TV shows.

“So why are you telling me this?” you may ask.  “What’s the lesson in this?”

There’s not a lesson in this, Dear Reader.  There are several.

LESSON ONE:  There are applicable adages for every situation.  Many involve horses, but a fair number involve cats, pigs, chickens and apple carts.

LESSON TWO:  Sometimes you have to walk away so you can return to fight another day (which is the applicable adage for my situation this week, in case the segue was too subtle).

LESSON THREE:  Hats are awesome.

LESSON FOUR:  Some racehorses have really creative names: 
Gimcrack, Search Engine, Redundantredundant, Acid Reflux,
Elbow Beach, Sensible Shoes, Quack, Semi True Story,
Senior Discount, Reduced Sentence, Snail, Atswhatimtalknbout.

LESSON FIVE:  There are strict rules governing the naming of racehorses,
including limiting a name to only eighteen characters.

LESSON SIX:  “Eighteencharacters” is the registered name of a racehorse. 
The name “Eighteen Characters” would have been disqualified for containing nineteen characters (spaces count).  

LESSON SEVEN:  It’s virtually impossible to go a whole week (nay, a whole day) without using a computer; it must have really sucked to live in pioneer times when computers were so scarce.

LESSON EIGHT:  Sometimes you gotta bet on the longshot.

LESSON NINE:  You can’t get blood from a stone, except in a fantasy novel (which has nothing to do with the Kentucky Derby, in case you’re keeping score).

LESSON TEN:  If wishes were horses, my novel would be named Orb and I’d be in the winner’s circle draped in roses.

LESSON ELEVEN: 
(I bet you thought I'd stop at ten, but eleven is my lucky number)

Not all hats are awesome.

So what’s the moral of this non-story?

It’s time to stop wishing, ice those elbows, put the idle hands where they belong and type up a new goal for this week!

NEW GOAL FOR THIS WEEK:  Edit in short bursts to limit strain on elbows – specifically, edit for 30 minutes at a time, twice per day, Thursday through Monday.

NEXT STEPS:  I have a “goals check-in” on Tuesday where I’ll report my progress on the above goal and set a new goal for the coming week. 

I’ll report back on Wednesday to fill you in. 
I know you can hardly stand the suspense, but
good things come to those who wait. 

On second thought, why wait when you can create? 

Get busy and make some goals of your own. 
Yes, I mean you. 

Post YOUR goals for the week here in the comments. 

Bonus points for goals tendered in rhyme. 
Brownie points for those in iambic pentameter.

A “standard” logline for fiction* may include these 3 elements:

1) Character:  Who is your story about?  Give a description, not a name.  A common technique is to provide a “dominant impression” which is an adjective plus a noun (like timid writer, neurotic housewife, murdering dentist, etc.)

2) Goal:  What does your character want?  The character's overarching goal in the book.

3) Conflict:  What's keeping them from getting it?  Can be internal and/or external.

It’s a good idea to add a fourth element – what I call the “Plus” – to provide a little something extra to “hook” the reader.

Arriving at the logline
Loglines are invariably too detailed or too general.  It takes work to hone it to the perfect short one-liner that hooks the reader and conveys information about your story without sounding like a thesaurus. 

I’ll try to illustrate what I mean using the Hunger Games.

LOGLINE EXAMPLE:
A girl on a reality TV show has to make difficult ethical choices in order to win.

If I hadn't told you, would you have known this logline is for the Hunger Games?  Maybe, but it's awfully general, isn't it?  It could take place in any time period, in any place.  It reveals nothing about the world, and almost nothing about the character.  There’s nothing intriguing or unique to hook the reader.

Let’s try to improve on that example.

IMPROVEMENT #1: 
In the future, amidst the ruins of North America lies the nation of Panem where a 16-year-old girl who is a loner and sole-supporter of her family, Katniss Everdeen, takes her younger, weaker sister Prim’s place in the nationally televised Hunger Games where she’s a longshot to survive the fight to the death against other teenagers from every District—a fight to the death on live TV.

An improvement?  Well, it’s certainly not too general any more!  But I think this version is too wordy with way too many clauses and details.  It does convey more of the world and the character, and it has a hook, but the sentence is too dense to make it memorable or even understandable.

IMPROVEMENT #2:
A desperate 16-year-old fights to be the sole survivor of the Hunger Games, but at what cost to her humanity?

I think we’re getting somewhere now.  This has the three elements I list above.  Here’s how it breaks down:
A desperate 16-year-old (CHARACTER) fights to be the sole survivor (EXTERNAL CONFLICT, GOAL) of The Hunger Games, but at what cost to her humanity? (INTERNAL CONFLICT)

So this version is better, but I don’t think it’s as good as we can make it yet.  Let’s try adding the “plus” – that something extra to hook the reader.

IMPROVEMENT #3:
In what used to be North America, a desperate 16-year-old girl battles to be the sole survivor of the nationally televised "Hunger Games" where teens fight to the death, but at what cost to her humanity?

Here's the breakdown:
In what used to be North America (PLUS), a desperate 16-year-old (CHARACTER) battles to be the sole survivor (EXTERNAL CONFLICT, GOAL) of the nationally televised "Hunger Games" where teens fight to the death (PLUS), but at what cost to her humanity? (INTERNAL CONFLICT)

Did we nail it?  Would that logline get me a “send it” if I pitched it to an agent on an elevator at a writer’s conference?  Maybe, assuming The Hunger Games hadn’t already sold!

Ultimately the success of a logline comes down to a matter of personal opinion, market considerations, and a host of other factors we (the writers) don’t have control over.  But we do have control over creating a clear, straightforward, succinct sentence that conveys the essence of the story.  And by adding a little “plus,” hopefully we can hook the reader.

This is not the ONLY way, by any stretch of the imagination, to create a good logline. 

The “Hollywood Pitch” has become a common way to address the logline.  This type of logline is a catchy “tagline,” like you might see on a movie poster.  It gives a tease, the flavor of a story, maybe the big-picture concept, but typically does not address all of the elements I list above. 

I have some examples to help illustrate this approach in case you want to try it. 
But first I have some cautionary notes:

    1. This approach does not work for every story. 
    2. If you use a Hollywood “tagline” you must nail it, meaning
        a) it must be good/catchy, and
        b) it must actually be demonstrative of your story
    3. You should be able to follow up this tagline with a SECOND line of more substance, such as the traditional 4-element logline described above.

As such, if you decide to experiment with a Hollywood-type logline, I recommend you ALSO compose the more “standard” logline, as I believe both will serve you.  

1.  Tried and True (CLICHÉ)
    a.  Beauty and the Beast
    b.  Marriage of Convenience
    c.   Fish out of Water

2.  Tried and True with a Twist (CLICHÉ "PLUS")
    a.  Beauty and the Beast BUT the Beauty is an 80 year old man
    b.  Marriage of Convenience BUT it's between two aliens

3.  Equate and Differentiate (AN EXISTING WORK "PLUS") where you equate your project with a book/movie with a proven track record, then differentiate it from that story to show your unique take
    a.  It's like Lord of the Rings with giant alien spider creatures
    b.  It's a Native American Wizard of Oz

4.  X + Y = mine:
    a.  The Flintstones in Jurassic Park
    b.  Sleeping with the Enemy in futuristic Athens

5.  General “High Concept" (like a tagline for a movie poster) that does not follow any certain formula:

A PIECE OF HEAVEN:  A man sues God.

STAR WARS:  A ragtag band of rebels is the only hope of saving the universe.

AGENT CODY BANKS:  Save the world, get the girl, pass math.

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY:  For three men the Civil War wasn't hell, it was practice.

HOOK:  What if Peter Pan grew up?

THE FUGITIVE:  A murdered wife, a one-armed man, an obsessed detective. The chase begins.

MOONRAKER:  Outerspace now belongs to 007.

THE SPY WHO SHAGGED ME:  Double-O Behave

So if it sounds like Hollywood-style might work for your story, give it a shot.  Then try out your favorites on friends to gauge effectiveness.  Be sure to assess your own personal comfort level in delivering a Hollywood tagline (on paper or verbally, whatever applies to you) because if you don't "own it," it will be hard to sell anyone on it.

For those of you writing NONFICTION, as promised I also have some ideas for you.  Rather than a “logline,” I suggest working on your title, to include a subtitle.  The title should be catchy; the subtitle should tell what it's about.



Here are some examples:

PRICELESS:  How I Went Undercover to Rescue the World's Stolen Treasures

THE ENDURANCE:  Shakelton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition

BEYOND THE BLUES:  A Workbook to Help Teens Overcome Depression

IN CONCLUSION
I hope this not-so-little aside helps you with your own loglines. 

See you tomorrow for an update on my journey to achieve my wildest writing dreams :-)

Life has played a cruel joke on me.  No, I'm not talking about it snowing in May and ruining a good day of tennis.  I'm talking about tennis elbow.  Or elbows, rather.  Both of my elbows. 

And I don't even play tennis. 

As a rather embarrassing aside, I once tried to learn to play tennis. 
After a few lessons my instructor said it was impossible to teach me.

So my elbows are not broken from tennis.  Apparently TYPING can somehow cause tennis elbow, and I've been doing a lot of typing.

THIS WEEK'S GOAL:  major revisions on last chapters of manuscript, to the tune of one chapter each day

MAJOR HICCUP:  must stop using computer and allow elbows to heal

ATTITUDE:  not good

CHANCES I'LL MEET MY GOAL THIS WEEK:  slim to none

CURRENT PLAN:  stop typing, put laptop aside, use my hands as little as possible, feel a bit sorry for myself, watch movies to keep my mind off not being able to write

REQUEST:  what movies do you recommend???