Fortnightly Writing Contest (Novel Synopsis: CLOSED)

[Mandle]

This time around, let's get all those big, juicy ideas out there that are too large in scope for a short-story format:

Write a synopsis for your dream novel, just as if you were sending it off to a publisher and/or agent. Traditionally, such things are one A4 page, single-line spaced, or about 500-600 words. This is ideal, but you can go over or under as you please.

The synopsis should condense your entire novel into a summary of character intros, key points, and story turns. It is not a thesis/essay on the book's themes or deeper meanings. Try to stick to the characters and plot. It is important that the synopsis shows why a reader will be drawn into the story and carried along by it to the conclusion.

Speaking of the ending: if you do not wish to spoil the ending here, especially if this is an actual novel you are working on or have in mind, then that is fine.

More than one entry per person is not only allowed, it is encouraged.

So, get your typewriters, correction strips, photocopiers, and a stack of envelopes and stamps ready, and let's blow those imaginary (or real) agents and publishers out of the water!

(Using confusion with varying month/date styles for different countries as my excuse, the deadline for entries is 6/6/2024)

[Mandle]

Oh, I forgot to mention that using the structure of a synopsis to tell a meta-story about the writer, or writing a tongue-in-cheek synopsis is completely acceptable.

[dharmadischarge]

Panzer Strider:
or, We're all wayward bound
By, Drew Freak.

Thomas Roberts is being court marshaled. The man is in a cell and his Panzer Strider (a biomechanical clone that has been genetically modified to be used as a psychically controlled bipedal tank) is going to be broken down to be used as raw materials in a printer. Thomas stopped his unit from massacering a village on a small moon of Toi-715. They had their orders and he had a conscience.

However when the Yama Yama man enters his life... Things get Phawking weird. The Yama Yama man is a near-omnipotent ambiguous force of nature and he looks like Koko the clown from the Max and Dave Fleischer cartoons.

He gives Thomas Roberts a ten-can of spun sugar (looks and tastes like cotton candy and this stuff gives the user psychic powers [though it can trigger psychosis and addiction.]) Then the clown disappeared. thomas used his psychic powers to fight his way to his panzer strider and flew off to freedom. But, Thomas will spend the next decade of his life hunting down a question mark... who is the Yama Yama man?

He will make friends with a psychotically induced hallucination that could be a sparrow or a dove named messiah. Fall in love with a young woman named Terry who has a different personality when she talks in her sleep. She will tell anyone in the room about her life in a strange nightmare realm called Wonderland and how her name is Alice. All the while running from and resisting Namomi Mercia and a Golum that skeleton glow in the dark named Little Horn: a pair of bounty hunters hired to hunt him down and bring him to "justice".

He asked messiah what to do... "how can I start over?" and the potentially hallucinated bird said, "You need guns lawyers, and money".

After adventure and misadventure to the point of absurdity, he lands on a planet of anthropomorphic carnivorous mushroom people. Who are they and why do they worship the Yama Yama man?  Their sacred scripture is a thousand-year-old piece of music that they sang both bawdy and disturbing. that dates back to the root of humanity a 1908 Broadway song... from the pre-star-traveling days on Earth. A Broadway show tune from a thousand years ago... Or, the demon in the Stars?

Is it all paranoid rambling from a spun sugar addict? or is there a solution to this puzzle? Can the juxtaposition of language in it's contrast create anything but reductive absurdity? A stone falls till it hits the earth, is there anything to transcend? all this the meaning and truth of life will be explained you only have to keep turning those pages! Tune in next week for all these answers and more.

[Mandle]

Two days to go... how're we faring?

[Sinitrena]

Stories of the Connected Continent
(Working Title)

This is not a normal novel. Nor is it just a collection of short stories.

Rather, it is multiple stories, varying in length, that form one coherent, overall plot-line, while each  one may also stand on its own and be read without knowledge of the other stories. This fairly unusual format not only allows for a deeper look at different characters, but also different narrative voices for different stories, rather than choosing one that might be too narrow or too broad for the part of the overall plot they tell. Such an approach also allows for different genres to be explored, from crime to love story to slice-of-life to horror without breaking internal consistency.

The story centres around Charlohmit, a thief and priest of the God of Thieves, though is not limited to him as a single protagonist. He comes from a noble family, though an impoverished one. We meet him for the first time as a child when he uncovers the truth about the disgrace of his family. Stealing from the true culprit of the crime his father was accused of, he manages to buy his mother and sister some financial security, though at the cost of his home, as his actions are soon discovered.

Forced into exile, though a slightly voluntary one, Lomin swears his loyalty to the God of Thieves and attempts to discover the main temple, travelling all over the continent. He finds the temple in the third story, traversing through a desert, and becomes a priest. Forced to choose a new name for himself, as is tradition in this order, he spontaneously decides to name himself Lomin, on the one hand because it is close to his birth-name, on the other because he read the name in old legends about the God of Thieves. Thus, he inadvertently sets himself up to become part of the legends himself.

Lomin learns to be a legendary thief, though his plans sometimes have unintended consequences. At the end of his apprenticeship, for example, he triggers a panic when he tries to free some other thieves from the gallows.

Though he also manages to build a network of unusual acquaintances, like a spymaster of a neighbouring kingdom or the mermaids, who were hidden by the God of Storms long ago to protect them from the other gods.

Slowly, over multiple stories, it is revealed that the gods are far more involved in the world of men than they are supposed to. Long ago, a treaty was formed between the gods to not interfere too much, so that the people could develop their own society and live according to their own free will. But the God of Justice, one worshipped by a large amount of the population, does not want free will, as it disturbs order and justice. As the main creator of the world, he considers it his to control.

Lomin, as the champion of his god, a god who values freedom more than most others, is soon thrown into the middle of this brewing conflict.

At the same time, he has to deal with his own goals, mainly restoring the honour of his family as well as their wealth. Though he also tries to protect other thieves, as is his duty as a priest, and getting the king to allow his order back in his home country, because it was forbidden many years ago, in favour of the religion of the God of Justice, which is the state religion.

Through his thieving and spying and with the help of some unusual allies, Lomin slowly unravels a plot that could not only topple a kingdom, but a whole continent, that could not only cost the lives of millions, but the freedom of all.

[Stupot]

Probbleham High
Book One: Probbleham Child

Welcome to Probbleham High, the worst school in England. The pupils don't care and the teachers have been driven to despair. It's scatterbrained Jax's first day, after being kicked out of High Browton High for accidentally having the hem of her skirt half an inch too far above the knee.

Jax, unused to the chaos of Probbleham High, finds herself at the centre of a playground turf war between three rival gangs, each led by teachers. She is knocked unconscious during a brutal game of British Bulldog. She vows to get out of this shithole and back to where she belongs.

However, the knock on the head must have done something to her. She begins to open up and forms a relationship with Max, Probbleham High's resident prankster, and his motley club of misfits. She begins to realise she has more in common with these crazy bastards than with the posh twats at Highbrow

One day, after a parents' evening in which three parents showed up, Jax finds Principal Trembly in the school gym on the cusp of suicide. Tragically for him, she saves his life. He tells her that the Ofsted inspectors are coming, and the school is on its last legs. The only way for Probbleham High to survive another term is by uniting the three gangs and pulling together as one. Jax has an idea.

Jax, Max and their rag-tag group of losers begin the task of infiltrating each of the gangs to slowly sow the seeds of reconcilliation. It's an almost impossible task, but Jax has a few tricks up her sleeve, as we'll learn.

As the story progresses, we learn about the difficult home lives of Jax's new friends and some of the other students. Meanwhile, dead animals start turning up at Probbleham High, and someone in a Highbrow High uniform is seen fleeing the school in the early hours of the morning. The heads of the three gangs call a ceasefire to work together and get revenge on the posh bastards at Highbrow.

All out war breaks out between the two schools, and things quickly spiral out of control. News that Probbleham High is on its last chance begins to spead, and the pupils are suddenly faced with the reality of their situation: if their school is closed down, it will affect their futures, and they will all amount to nothing.

Newly-united, the pupils begin to work together to save the school. Then, at the worst possible moment, the poshos at High Browton get revenge by setting fire to one whole wing of the school, almost killing a hopeful Principal Trembley.

Jax is forced to come clean. It was she who had earlier left the dead animals in her old High Browton uniform, and started all of this. But instead of hating her, the kids of Probbleham High are driven even harder to make her plan work and save their school from closure. As the book ends, she is titled a true "Probbleham child", a title made up just now, because until today, none of them cared enough to give themselves a cool nickname.

So concludes Book One of a planned "Probbleham High" duology. Book two will explore how the pupils of Probbleham High use all of their weaknesses as strengths in their attempt to turn their school around before the inspectors arrive, followed by the inspection itself. How bad could it be?

As it turns out, very very bad.

[Baron]

I expect to have something in at the deadline.  Stand by.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

FREELANCE
A cozy fantastical mystery thriller!

Life in the shadow of the magical Forest Vast is a gruelling slog for the farmers of Feorlen, and doubly so for the women folk.  For poor Rhetta Cur, buffeted by the poverty and social strictures, it feels something like being a ragdoll in a whirlwind of troubles.

One night, a plague of demonic rats terrorizes the countryside.  Rhetta thinks perhaps the Lances (the local police force) will investigate, but magical incidents are beyond their remit.  Instead, they've thrown her ne'er-do-well husband into debtor's prison and drag her off to be his guarantor.  Rhetta cannot fathom how she will ever pay off the small fortune he owes.

And yet...the inadequacies of the Lance force has created demand in the countryside for someone who investigates both minor mysteries and magical mayhem.  Rhetta begins a side-business conducting "freelance" investigations.  The local sheriff even grants her a licence, so long as her work does not interfere with official Lance business.

Alas, the good sheriff is murdered, apparently by witchcraft!  Rhetta now has a major case to unravel, just when her finances and personal life seem to be careening off the rails.  She discovers that the sheriff was investigating three major incidents when he was killed: the plague of rats, a missing stockpile of weapons, and a smuggler ring.  By careful reasoning and deduction, she creates a short list of suspects that includes the heir to the county throne, the local witch, and a respected businessman.  As the clues pile up, Rhetta is drawn deeper into a mystery that threatens to tear at the precarious balance between magic and mankind.

For every success Rhetta has in investigating, there are setbacks.  Through dogged persistence she discovers the route the smugglers use to circumvent the local authorities, but is hit over the back of the head before she can unmask the ringleader.  After a harrowing escape, she seeks the aid of the paranoid local witch to heal her cracked head.  Unfortunately the witch doesn't care for people nosing in her business.  Rhetta is pushed to the brink, but succeeds in overcoming the witch's power using the magic of her rational mind.  The witch ends up healing Rhetta and confiding her side of the story, indicating that the good sheriff's murder might be related to a mysterious new witch growing and testing their powers.

Rhetta tries to track down this new witch by triangulating clues left from each of the crimes.  She confronts gangsters and nobles, and retraces the path of rumoured magical occurrences to narrow down the centre of this new witch's power.  Subtle reprisals and personal attacks against her begin to indicate that someone behind the scenes is beginning to panic.  She is getting close—perhaps too close!

In the end she is arrested, thrown in a dungeon, and then dragged before the count to face the charge of witchcraft herself!  Can Rhetta solve the mystery and save her homeland before she pays the ultimate price for her meddling? 

Time is running out.

[Mandle]

A sweet batch of entries!

I liked Sini's "3 Points Wherever You Want" voting system from the previous round, so am going with that for this one again.

So, you have three points to spend any way you like on the following entries (please submit votes in the thread, in spoiler tags):


Panzer Strider by Drew Freak
Stories of the Connected Continent by Sinitrena
Probbleham High (Book One) by Stupot
Freelance by Baron


Voting open until June 11.

[cat]

Spoiler

2 for Probbleham High (Book One) by Stupot
1 for Freelance by Baron

[close]

[Ponch]

Voted! 

Spoiler

1 for Panzer Strider
2 for Stories of a Connected Continent

[close]

[Baron]

I'm quite impressed at the variety of novel genres to choose from here.  Everyone brought some very distinct stories to the table.  I know I say this every time, but I re-eally had a hard time distributing my votes.  You're all winners in my books. 

@dharmadischarge (a.k.a. Drew Freak)

Spoiler

Whoa!  You need to bottle the sheer energy from this novel and sell it to Hollywood actors.  I love the Total Recall-esque underlying question throughout the story: is this real or is this all just one heck of a mind trip?  Top marks for near-omnipotent ambiguous forces of nature in the guise of 1920s black-white cartoons, love interests with dissociative identity disorders, quasi-hallucinated avian sidekicks, and anthropomorphic carnivorous mushroom people.  I feel the editing of your synopsis could have been tighter - why are some names capitalized but others not?  But maybe it's all symbolic of the narrative's descent into spun-sugar induced madness....

[close]

@Sinitrena

Spoiler

This is a brilliant idea for a novel!  And I'm not just saying that as a fan of your Lominverse (although I am saying that as well  ).  I love the idea that each short story is distinct but with a coherent overall plot line - it's like the modular design philosophy just met the epic fantasy genre.  It's hard, having read your stories over the course of many years (and probably forgotten more than I remember  ), to piece together the overarching narrative, so I appreciated seeing how your previous works fit into a greater struggle between the concepts - and deities - of justice and freedom. 

[close]

@Stupot (a.k.a. Drew Freak)

Spoiler

It's funny, but sometimes I think I teach in Probble's village.    I loved the concept of a blighted community coming together for the common good, and the suspenseful atmosphere of flawed characters teetering on a knife-edge of disaster makes for an exciting read.  Your clever puns ("Probbleham child") and irreverent humour ("Tragically for him, she saves his life") are like adding sauce (sass?) to a tasty dish, turning what could be a depressing diatribe on social drift into a laugh-in-the-face-of-our-troubles inspirational message.  Although hardly my genre of choice, I would happily buy this book.

[close]

And my votes....

Spoiler

On concept alone I'd have to split my votes three ways, because I'm intrigued enough to read each of these novels.  As a FWC entry, however, I think I have to give the edge to Stupot based on gripping salesmanship and subtract a point from dharmadischarge due to the somewhat confused nature of his prose.  Thus....

I give 2 votes to Stupot and 1 vote to Sinitrena

[close]

[/b][/b][/b]

[Sinitrena]

@dharmadischarge

Spoiler

I'm utterly confused. I have no real idea what this story would be about. It is fine to have a character hallucinating or on drugs or suffering from a psychosis; it's also fine to never get a real answer to any questions, but for a synopsis I'd like a bit more clarity. This is a wild plot, and maybe an interessting one, but I can't really tell.

[close]

@Stupot

Spoiler

This one is a bit of a problem for me, voting-wise. On the one hand, I think it is the best synopsis here, it gives a clear idea of the plot, of the characters, of the themes. It is also a book I would never read. Absolutely no interest from me, zero, sorry. I do wonder though if the plot offers enough substance for a sequel. As outlined, it seems very complete.

[close]

@Baron

Spoiler

I'd read it. I'd change the title though, it's so nondescript that most people would just glance over it and it tells us nothing about what to expect from the story.

[close]

Votes:

Spoiler

Stupot: 1 point
Baron: 2 points
As I said above, I think Stupot's is the best synopsis, but I'd rather read Baron's novel, so that gives him a slight edge for me.

[close]

[Mandle]

@dharmadischarge (a.k.a. Drew Freak)
@Stupot (a.k.a. Drew Freak)

No, I'm Drew Freak and so's my wife!

[Baron]

You're all Drew Freak! 

I'd read it. I'd change the title though...

Spoiler

With luck you'll be able to this fall - my self-publish debut is off with the editor as we speak!    But your instincts serve you well - I haven't exactly nailed down the title yet.

[close]

[Mandle]

Oh, wow, Baron! That is exciting news indeed! Please keep us posted. I'll be picking up a copy for sure. Will there be physical printings or just e-book for now?

[dharmadischarge]

Panzer Strider is the game I am working on I just adapted it to the synopsis contest.

I have paranoid Schizophrenia and am trying to find a way to channel the subjective way of viewing reality into a creative endeavor. I agree the synopsis could have been tighter I wrote it in one sitting after two energy drinks lol

Also... the drew freak name thing is my stage name for music. On paper, it is Mason Andrew Freakbut I go by Drew

I would vote but I can't figure out how to hide the text behind the spoilers thing. Though I enjoyed everyone else's writing, my favorite was Stories of the Connected Continent.

[Mandle]

I would vote but I can't figure out how to hide the text behind the spoilers thing.

Oh, you can just vote out in public without the spoiler tags. It's fine. Please do!

[Stupot]

@dharmadischarge

Spoiler

This story seems to be a kaleidoscope of intriguing things, which I like, but I can't really get a sense from this synopsis of what is going on or what to expect. That could well be the point, with the trippy nature of the story and all, but I was left wanting a little bit more to hold onto.

[close]

@Sinitrena

Spoiler

I like the concept you've got here. Sounds similar to the "novella in flash" I've been hearing a lot about lately, with lots of shorter peices making up a whole story. I'll have to refamiliarise myself with the various stories in this world. Do you have them all in one place somewhere? Or do we have to wait for the book?

[close]

@Baron

Spoiler

I like the sound of this one. It feels sort of like the set up to The X-Files but in a fantasy setting, which I haven't seen done before. It sounds like you're actually going ahead and publishing this, which is exciting. Let us know when it's ready to order.

[close]

Votes

Spoiler

I am sharing my votes between Sinitrena and Baron. Both synopses told me enough about their worlds, characters and plots to give me an idea of what to expect from the books. Unfortunately, Dharma's left me scratching my head a little, although I would still love to learn more about the project. Baron's pips it for me because it feels more like my cup of tea.

Baron 2
Sinitrena 1

[close]

[Mandle]

Okay, I am giving Ponch and dharmadischarge the chance until end of day today to clarify their votes (I messaged them both about the issues soon after their posts).
If nothing is updated, then I will go with Ponch's 2pt total and, sadly, nothing from dharmadischarge as their vote is too vague at the moment as it stands.

[Sinitrena]

It's hard, having read your stories over the course of many years (and probably forgotten more than I remember  ), to piece together the overarching narrative, so I appreciated seeing how your previous works fit into a greater struggle between the concepts - and deities - of justice and freedom.

All my existing Lomin stories probably need a bit of work to work out these themes and this coherence a bit stronger, add some necessary details that I know of but never put into them, and to remove some inconsistencies. After all, they were written for FWC's topics. But a lot of it is at least hinted at, even in their current state.

I'll have to refamiliarise myself with the various stories in this world. Do you have them all in one place somewhere?

In reading order (though I know that I might change them around some if I ever find the time to properly edit them and add all the other stories).

The Naming of Names
The Square of Flowers
Wavedancer
How to Build a Reputation
Little Dove
A Future that Would never Be
Truth!
The friendly, social, honest man

Also note that they are all fairly early on in the overall story.