While I wouldn’t call any part of the writing process easy, generally speaking it flows well for me. I usually have several stories going at at time so if I burn out on one, I can work on another and then return to the original, feeling revived. Even editing is relatively painless.
However, writing a blurb to describe a story is torturous. The blurb needs to be short and catchy while still conveying what the story is about. It has to capture the reader’s attention and sell the book. Being concise has never been my strong suit. If I have a word limit I have to meet for a story, I’m more like to have to trim it back than fill it out more. I am wordy.
So trying to distill my what my short story was about into something neat and concise was difficult. When I submitted the story to the editor, I had to include a summary of the story. Last week, the blurb coordinator sent back much shorter version for me to take a look at. It didn’t work for me. At ALL. So I spent a couple of days writing and re-writing and agonizing. I (metaphorically) ripped my hair out and flailed and finally came up with three possible versions.
I sent them all to the blurb coordinator explaining what concerns I had with the version they had sent me, and that although I wasn’t thrilled with what I’d come up with either, it was at least closer to my goal. She tweaked one of them a bit and finally we had something that would work. It conveyed what the story was about and was short and catchy enough to grab a reader’s attention.
It puts me one step closer to my story being published and that is worth all of the agony.
At least until the next time I have to do it.
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