My book, Assignment 9, weaves together two narratives that take place in completely different timeframes. When writing a synopsis, should I be following the chronology of the book, or summarize each of the plot threads on its own? I've tried doing it both ways, and neither really works for me. Is there a standard way to do this or not? I'm afraid that by following the book's pattern, the whole thing sounds jumbled and insane, but doing it the other way doesn't illustrate the way the book flows together.
Should I maybe only go into detail with one plot and just use a few lines to explain that there is a framing story that weaves between it?
Help! Does anyone know the answer to this knotty problem?
In a query, you'd do what you've done and just focus on the one story, making reference to the other at some point. In a way, I think that makes sense in the synopsis, too.
ReplyDeleteI've heard that in a synopsis, if there are flashbacks, you should do the synopsis in chronological order.
I'd play with both of those and see which one comes out better. I'm curious to see the answers as well because I have a story that does something similar.
then again, I've put off querying anyone who wants a synopsis (though I'm about to cave) because I dread writing one so...hopefully someone else has the answer for you and I can cheat off your page ;-)
I've done the chronological one and it comes off sounding kind of weird. I'll send it to you later and you can see what you think...
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