Writer Tips

Summarizing It All

You've got it all written down, feeling rather accomplished (as you should!). Then you look at the big box that says Description. How do you just describe all your work and dreams? How do you ensure people get it? But also, how do you make sure they don't get it because, you know, spoilers?

Summarizing your content down into a handful of paragraphs, sentences, or words can be one of the hardest parts of writing your story. It's important to remember that summarizing isn't really a writing skill and is more of a marketing skill, so you have to change hats.

We're going to cover three types of summarizations, all of which are part of the Wattys process.

Loglines

These are the smallest unit for your story. The thing to remember with a logline is that you are pitching to someone's memory. This is one sentence that is always going to stick in someone's brain. It means when they're looking at a list of stories, they can quickly remember what it's about.

A young boy with magical powers sets out to become king of the pirates by finding a mythical treasure before anyone else.

Oh right, that's what One Piece is about. I remember. I remember.

It's a very powerful tool where the focus is on hyper-simplifying your story down to just a couple of elements:

Who is the protagonist?

What do they want?

What is blocking them?

You'll also notice that a lot of loglines make a lot of stories sound really similar, or will make you want to say "but it's about so much more than that!" That's okay. It's meant to help jog someone's memory or pique their interest enough to find out about those other details. It's not meant to explain the entire plot.

Summary

That's what the summary is supposed to do!

Summary is when you put your entire plot, from beginning to end, into one small chunk. For the Wattys, and most Wattpad-related stuff, you've got about 500 words at maximum. With such limited space, you have to maximize every word you're using. When you're summarizing your entire plot, keep some tips in mind:

Everything in your summary is the most important information to understanding the plot. Don't put in stuff that's interesting, like world-details or character backstory. Don't talk about the side plots.

Don't use flowery language. Every word matters. Summaries are not intended to show off your strength as a creative writer. They're meant to market your story to someone who is evaluating it, be they an editor, an assistant, or a judge.

Cut down on context wherever possible. You want to make sure your summary follows a very simple logical flow (A causes B which results in C) because you don't have space to go into detail about the character's history. You only need enough for the logic to make sense.

Make sure your summary has one consistent narrative throughout it. No matter how complex or broad your story is, focus in on the biggest element and tell its story from beginning to end. If the story is about redemption, then every part of the summary is about the redemption storyline.

Summary is about conflict and resolution. Just focus on that dynamic, which will also help you with tip 4.

Here is a super short example that cuts down to the bones and showcases how few words you really need:

16-year-old Katniss Everdeen, a girl from District 12 who volunteers for the 74th Hunger Games in place of her younger sister Primrose. Also selected from District 12 is Peeta Mellark. They are mentored by their district's only living victor, Haymitch, who won 24 years earlier and has since led a solitary life of alcoholism.

Peeta confesses his longtime secret love for Katniss in a televised interview prior to the Games. This revelation stuns Katniss, who harbors feelings for Gale Hawthorne, her friend and hunting partner. Haymitch advises her to feign feelings for Peeta in order to gain wealthy sponsors who can provide crucial supplies to the "star-crossed lovers" during the Games.

In the arena, Katniss allies with Rue, a young tribute from District 11 who reminds Katniss of her kid sister. When Rue is killed, Katniss places flowers around her body as an act of defiance toward the Capitol. Then the remaining tributes are alerted to a rule change that allows tributes from the same district to win as a team. Katniss finds a seriously wounded Peeta and nurses him back to health. When all of the other tributes are dead, the rule change is abruptly revoked. With neither willing to kill the other, Katniss comes up with a solution: a double suicide by eating poisonous berries. This forces the authorities to concede just in time to save their lives. During and after the Games, Katniss develops genuine feelings for Peeta and struggles to reconcile them with what she feels for Gale.

Haymitch warns her that the danger is far from over. The authorities are furious at being made fools of, and the only way to try to allay their anger is to pretend that her actions were because of her love for Peeta. On the journey home, Peeta is dismayed to learn of the deception.

Thanks The Hunger Games wikipedia entry!

Summaries are also a great tool for identifying weaknesses within your own story. Once you have it written in such plain language, it can become obvious which points are bugging you or feel weaker than the others. This isn't a problem with the summary, it's a problem with the story that you can now go in and fix. It's like a check-up at the doctor. It's not like they run every test on you, they just do the basics to see if anything stands out that needs further investigation.

Description

Finally, we get to that box.

Description, also often called back cover copy (because it's the thing on the back of a book), is meant to sell your story to readers. Loglines jog anyone's memory. Summaries sell to evaluators and helpers. Descriptions are for readers.

Your description needs to achieve the following:

Pique interest (obviously)

Establish premise/conflict (still obviously)

Make clear the genre/tone/style (no surprises!)

You'll pique interest through unique concepts and powerful language. This is where you reintroduce some of the creative language you stripped out of the summary, but not too much because description is usually only a paragraph or two.

For example, "boy travels sea" is not inherently interesting. People do that all the time. Lots of stories already exist there. "Boy with magic powers (that make him unable to swim) travels sea" is interesting. Magic is now involved, as is a risk related to it. If he can't swim, how will he stay safe at sea?

You also need to establish the conflict that is going to come up. The conflict might also be what piques interest, which is fine, you just have to let people know what these characters are fighting for. Descriptions that just introduce a set-up and then say "when these two meet, what could happen?" isn't super helpful because it could still go in so many directions.

Will they meet and then start a relationship? Will it be rocky? Start fake dating? Hate each other? Try to kill each other?

This also moves into ensuring the style of your description makes clear what the style of the story is going to be. You're selling to potential readers and you shouldn't trick them into your story. This also means that sometimes your description will turn people away. People interested in science fiction stories will probably be turned away by a romance description and that's totally fine.

Let's also address the element of spoilers. Telling people about the genre, telling them the characters and the conflict really doesn't spoil anything. Yes, informing them of what might happen does give them the chance to start guessing but that's just what humans do. Remember, if nobody is interested in your story because of a lacking description, nobody will ever read that amazing twist.

With all three of these, you will also want to consider getting someone else involved. Remember, this is more a marketing exercise, and you might not be good at marketing. Bring in outside help and get extra opinions.

That wraps up our Wattys Writer Tips for this season. We can't wait to read your incredible submissions soon!

- Wattpad HQ