I struggle to write the back of the book blurb, largely because I don’t like reading them myself. I find they often give away too much about the novel, spoiling some of the better moments of a novel. I decide what to read by opening the book and reading a few lines (or lately, downloading a sample to my Kindle.)
After struggling with the blurb for Making Family, I came up with a meta-blub.
Imagine a world in which readers determine what novel to read based on a two paragraph summary of the entire novel. Readers are enticed to read the novel without giving away too much information or fooled into expecting a different type of story than what is presented.
All of this can be avoided by opening the novel, or downloading a free sample. This author encourages you to do this now.
Barry and I found it amusing. If only I could use it and avoid struggling with a blurb ever again. Of course, there’s still the description on Amazon. Sigh.
Here’s what I actually came up with after dozens of revisions, advice (contradictory, but both with good points) from Ivan and Kirsten.
Making Family
Reeling from the unexpected death of her beloved husband, Ruth loses the opportunity to adopt her foster daughter. With her children grown, she faces middle-age with only an orange cat named Snowball to share her daily life.
A phone call from a busy social worker changes everything. Eight-year-old Kata is sweet, but doesn’t speak a single word. Her teenage sister could help, but she wants nothing to do with the foster system.
While the adorable eight-year-old could find a home in Ruth’s heart, she isn’t ready for a teenager.
I was wondering, just a little, why I was working so hard on my dystopian novel, Hierarchy. While I find it engaging, some of the critiques on critiquecircle.com have suggested basically changing the whole novel. I’ve had a few encouraging readers, but since it has a more depressing world-view than most of my novels, I was wondering why I was working so hard on it. I was enjoying revising it, enjoying it a lot, actually, but why keep plugging away at it? Especially when I’m not usually very fond of dystopias myself.
After reading, http://www.marcandangel.com/2013/03/12/one-thing-you-must-stop-doing-to-be-happy/, I have at least part of the reason. When I’m working on Hierarchy, I’m happy. Making it better is what I want to do. I’m not sure if it will be a book that people want to buy, sometimes I wonder if people will ever want to buy any of my books, but most of the time I try not to worry about it. I’m a full-time writer, and a self-published one, and that is what I’m doing. Having people buy my books would be nice, but isn’t required for me to enjoy what I’m doing.
From Marc & Angel’s site: “We believe that if there’s no planned purpose to an event or activity, there’s no point in doing it. In reality the best things in life are unplanned and without an appointed purpose.”
While I do have a purpose, it may not happen. But I’m happy to be working on a novel that I find interesting. I’m happy to make it better, but I’m not going to change it completely because that might sell better, which is a big might. That wouldn’t make me happy. I’m happy working on my novel. So I’m going to keep at it.
As I was trying to improve a minor scene that was dragging down a chapter, I realized that if I deleted it entirely, the chapter would be better, and I could write the minor character out of the book. Zap. The guy, who I was thoroughly tired of since he didn’t do much, was gone. One of the many things I love about editing is how it can make me think about the role minor characters have in my life. If I encounter someone annoying, it is up to me, often, to determine how much that affects my day. And it is possible to basically write them out of the story I tell, either myself or others.
One way or another, we’re all editing our life stories by what we choose to think about, what we tell others, and what we remember. Is it time to get rid of an annoying character?
While working on making a character nicer, I found that I needed to redo one interaction, then just minor tweaks to later scenes. In particular, I needed to reveal her vulnerability just a little to change her from rude and arrogant to doing the best she could in a situation.
It got me wondering how much effort is required in real life to be nice.