Final report, I think, from the SCBWI British Isles conference. I did take notes from the two panel events, but am running out of steam.

This report was written by two members of my writing group: Astrid Holm with input from Lizzie Strong (who is working on a fab realistic MG novel). I wish I'd been to this session - but feel like I almost was having access to these great notes.

Lil Chase on Books that Sell and Sell Well

Lil Chase started with some mind-blowing statistics about Mills and Boon books.  Apparently they sell up to 150 million books every year.  She explained that these books make a ‘promise to the reader’.  The reader knows what she wants, a hunky hero and a heroine they can identify with, and always gets it!.  Her point was that whatever genre you’re writing in, you have to ‘keep your promise’.

She went on to talk about what was needed in a covering letter:

The hook- only five sentences

We spent some time on the hook.

It’s good if you can say your book is similar to something well known... ‘My book is like....but different because....’

Lil’s pitch had been ‘My book is a funny, coming of age story for 10 to 14 year old girls, similar to Louise Rennison, but with more heart.’

The most important word in the pitch or hook is ‘but’ (or similar words).  If there’s no ‘but’ then the story has no conflict.

We were then asked to write our hook for our own stories and some volunteers read theirs out.

The positioning of your story, e.g.10 to 14 year olds, coming of age story. (Earlier in the conference Editorial Editor at Orion, Amber Caraveo said she didn’t want to be told where your book fits.  She can work that out for herself! So decide if you want to go into too much detail with this.) This shows that you understand and have bothered to make yourself familiar with your target market.

The title. You should try and show the concept in your title as in ‘Snakes on a Plane’ or ‘My Sister’s a vampire’!

An interesting passage about you. The publisher wants to invest in you, so they want to know something else.  Lil Chase told her publishers she had started the book when she was ten.

Some tips on finding your characters and story:

The ordinary girl/boy becomes special in some way.

If the book is for 10 to 12 year olds, make your protagonist 12.

The protagonist should be ‘nice’/sympathetic.

For middle grade books, the protagonist should be a boy.  Girls will read about boys but boys won’t read about girls. If it’s YA, the protagonist can be a girl.  Lil did stress that this is a guideline.  If your story is middle grade and it has a girl protagonist, don’t panic!

Inciting Incident.

This kicks off the story.  It is a dramatic, visual external event.  You should show normal life before the event happens.

The protagonist must not be able to turn away from this incident.

It could be a goal.

It could be the introduction of an obstacle that gets in the way of a goal.

It must happen in the first chapter.  Back story could come later.

Scene Structures.  All scenes should have this structure

ABDCE

Action, character doing something

Background (brief)

Development of the scene

Conflict reaches a climax

Ending.  Who wins the conflict?  Often the main character will lose the conflict in each scene.The ending must resolve the conflict from the inciting incident in the first chapter.  Often the character is changed by the story.

Tick list for commercial fiction

Age range             Word Count

5-7                             8,000

8-10                          8-10,000

10-13                       10-50,000

13+                            40-80,000

• Absent or clueless parents
• Short chapters
• End chapters on cliff hangers
• Inciting incident in first chapter
• 1 protagonist
• Protagonist has friends they can talk to
• Protagonist is a boy (unless it’s YA)
• Protagonist is active, pursuing the goal.

The whole talk was very interesting and enjoyable. It gave us all lots of ideas of how to position our stories in a competitive market.