From the Synopsis to the Pitch

Following up on my idea of how to write the imperfect synopsis, here’s my idea on how not to pitch a book when you get the publisher on the telephone:

“OK, Walter, I’m back.  I just had to close the door.  H-mmm… uh-huh… no, I’m always up for buying the rights if it’s the right book.  I don’t care too much about genre.

Children’s?  Yeah, that’s OK.  The only reason we didn’t go with that Gruffalo thing you sent us was the merchandising.  We couldn’t get the dolls to work.  Cuddly toys with poisonous warts and purple prickles?  Our health and safety guy had a conniption.  Please tell me the hero in this one is more normal.

Sort of?  What do you mean, ‘sort of’?

He’s a wizard? …With glasses and a facial scar?  OK, I guess we could live with that.  He’s not exactly ‘pre-teen market’, is he?  I mean, girls won’t fancy him.

No… no… I’m not being negative.  Tell me more.  Start from the beginning. 

A family with a secret?  Yeah, I like that.  Let me guess, the head of the family is a secret wizard, from an ancient cult or something.

Did you just say, ‘drill salesman’?

Sure, it’s unexpected.  And this is his uncle, you say, and they’re keeping the kid under the stairs?

Hmm, he gets kidnapped?  OK, I start to feel a tingling of interest.  Uh-huh, this big hairy guy on a motorbike, he’d be some kind of Hell’s Angel, right?

A gardener?

Well, I would very much hope it keeps getting better.  Yes.  Yes.

Walter, let me tell you, if an eleven-year-old boy goes off to some sleazy secret quarter of London with a giant holding a pink umbrella, people are going to start putting two and two together, especially when the kid starts seeing the walls move around.  We have name for it here.  It’s called grooming.

Hmm.. mm… Goblins, like in Noddy, right?   Oh, and a bank raid?  When you say a stone, do you mean a big diamond?  Because frankly, Walter, a piece of rock doesn’t make it the ‘Italian Job’.

The action switches to where?   A castle?   OK, that’s more like it… Uh, huh… She mends his glasses.  And she’s the love interest, this witch?  No visible warts, please.  Tell me, she’s pretty, at least.

No, I didn’t say ‘clever’, I said, ‘pretty.’  You can’t print posters of clever and pin it on your bedroom wall.

She and this kid, Harry, they get it together, right?

No, you didn’t mention him yet.  Who’s Ron?

Uh-huh.  Scruffy, ginger hair, no money, no charisma.  Sounds like the kind of loser my sister always falls for.  Quite frankly, Walt, I got other things to do – a lunch to go to, that kind of stuff – and it’s all a little one paced so far.  Who’s the bad guy?

What do you mean you can’t tell me his name?

Oh, ‘he must not be named’.  Where’s this guy while all the cavorting around castles is going on?

Did you say ‘dead’?

Well, I should hope he’s not exactly dead.  He wouldn’t be very threatening if he was dead.
Uh-huh, and he’s grafted onto the back of this other guy’s head?  Being half-dead and drinking blood is a good start, but it doesn’t make him Dracula.  

Well, OK, you got me there.   But if he crumbles into dust when he touches you, he’s just like some cheap version of Midas.  No, I must admit, I am not loving it so far.

Oh!  He can FLY?  Why the hell didn’t you say so?”