To prepare you for Introducing Characters: A is for Aerial Artist Image from solid gold creativity Hossein Baghalan Aval by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images AsiaPac, |
I have been spending a lot of time visiting Deana Barnhart's GUTGAA blogfest.
Just to help you out, I linked you straight over to pitch #6, although I can't think why ;)
Over there, we are deep in the Pitch Polish process.
For the past few days, people have been reading queries and offering advice on how to make them shine. I have enjoyed reading all the query letters and the first 150 words.
It has been superbly useful.
Angela, Cat, Jayme and Katie as well as an anonymous commenter really helped me direct the focus on my MC.
Right now, my pitch for THE HIGHER ROAD reads like this:
The twelve-year-old girl who survives a traffic accident has mirrored
internal organs, but her doctors just consider that an interesting anomaly.
Unfortunately, when her injuries heal overnight she might as well have
Bio-engineered @ ALIEN LABS TM Everyone suspects she was created to appear human, in an alien laboratory.
The evidence stacks up against her when materials of non-terrestrial origin are
found at the crash site.
The government orders scientists and secret service agents to study and to guard her; but they don't want information to leak to the press and cause a mass panic. She is
kept in isolation and interrogated. The girl – who names herself, Thursday –
suffers almost total amnesia. Every flash from her past is painful but she
builds a memory of the boy who saved her from her sense of touch–his hand on
her arm and his mouth against hers when he breathed for her. She owes him her life and she feels she must repay the debt. In the face of
constant pressure, Thursday guards her rescuer's secret with courage and
loyalty–stubbornness. She is horrified when the boy, Ethan, is brought – willingly – to see
her at the loch-side castle, secret location. This is just the beginning of the adventure… two alien species are ready to infiltrate planet Earth, and
Thursday is the only person who might be able to persuade Ethan to do something
about that.
Thursday and Ethan learn a lot about themselves, and human nature, when
one of them is suspected of being alien and the other is… not from around here.
INTRODUCING CHARACTERS
A few months ago, and I can't remember where but it was definitely on line, I read a description designed to introduce a new character into the plot of a book.
My thanks to the unknown author of the piece, when I saw it I knew I had to write it in my work book. I had to develop it into a writing exercise I could work out with every week.
To tone my writing and shape my descriptions, I plan to use Tuesdays to introduce a character using the same basic sentence format. It's in present tense,which I never use, so it will be good for my skill-development ;)
A IS FOR AERIAL ARTIST
The once-noisy audience gasps. Swinging a foot as he sits on a narrow metal bar far feet above the crowd is the most perfect example of man I've ever seen. Dark brown hair short enough to give edge to his wild look and his body sculpted like Michaelangelo finished shaping him, yesterday. Pass the oxygen, the crowd has forgotten to breathe while he runs his hands up the trapeze wires and swings out over our heads.
You can almost hear every woman's thoughts:
I'm in Quality Control, just let me check those muscles are real.
Please! Don't get dazzled by those lights... it would be a shame to bruise perfection.
If you need to you could fall on me... but, make it later, after the show.
And every man's thoughts:
I'm in quality Control, let me check those muscles are real.
Please! It's not like they're real, it's all done with lighting.
If all I had to do was swing about all day, I'd look that good too.
My apologies for not posting yesterday, I spent AGES going around The Making of Harry Potter studio tour.It was so AMAZING I survived the concrete proof that the HP films weren't real. I say GO ME! During the tour, I was able to out-potter even my daughter who is so much the fan that I had to drag her out of the WB/PotterGift shop while they still had merchandise to sell.
HAPPY WEDNESDAY! IT MAKES A GREAT LATE-TUESDAY!
WHICH STAGE OF THE WRITING PROCESS ARE YOU AT RIGHT NOW?
Wow! Your Thursday story sounds so freakin' cool! Very interesting and unique premise.
ReplyDeleteAnd sorry about the HP reality. That sucks, eh? But at least it explains why you never got an invitation to school. :)
Hi Ali
ReplyDeleteThank you - * blushes - I love Thursday's story. I'm fine tuning it since re-wrote it in first person.
You know, I hadn't thought about the HP reality that way. It does make me feel a bit better about the boring nature of my secondary school. (I did get a letter from Hogwarts but I came late - I think my daughter had more than a hand on it ;)
Please, no more alphabet posts!!!!
ReplyDeleteGird up your loins, mon ;) Call yourself a writer? Those 26 letters are nothing to be afraid of. You can survive once more through the alphabet, I know you can ;)
DeleteGlad you enjoyed Harry Potter Tour we are trying to arrange a visit for our daughter in the near future as she is a massive fan and thought it would make an excellent birthday surprise!
ReplyDeleteHi Suzanne
DeleteI am sure you'll all love the HP Studio tour; there is so much to see and do. We were there for HOURS!
To travel to the Leavesden Studios, we set off at 09.55 and arrived at 10.02 - most people travel slightly further ;)
That's a great pitch. I love the concept!
ReplyDeleteThanks GE
DeleteI hope others get to love it too ;) Switching from third to first person made a huge difference.