When I did research about book agents, I also did research on book proposals and what the agents look for.
Most agents look for:
The focus of this blog post is chapter summaries.
One may forget to write one paragraph summary for each chapter because one may focus too much on characters, plot, flow, and English (or whatever language you write in). It is easy to forget about chapter summaries. However, if you have not done chapter summaries for your novels yet, start doing them now.
It’s important to have chapter summaries for several reasons:
Now an example from my unpublished novel (I am not going to share all my chapters, but here’s a glimpse into my mafia world)
Table of Contents and notes about major events
Chapter 1: Halo and Horns
Chapter 2: Bumping into Reality
Chapter Summaries
Chapter 1: Halo and Horns
Whatever the reason behind being at M’Heart University for Angel Svobodina proves to be, the quiet life of a freshman, disappeared upon seeing a campus fight, along with her new friend, Jack. This is made clear by the cutting remark by university girls after the fight ended that concludes the opening part of the chapter and Angel’s motivation to research Rayne Tarotia, the son of a local Don. In this way, the main theme — that is, the discrepancy between accepted normality and reality — hints, that somehow those two themes will collide bringing out the real reason behind being at M’Heart.
Chapter 2: Bumping into Reality
Chapter two, takes off with Angel’s second day at being a forensic science student at M’Heart University. However, since she only knows her roommate Laura, and her friend Jack, she can’t really ask anyone about the buzz that seems to be around her. She’s forced to buy a newspaper where she reads the title of the news— Swingers: Inside the Secret World of President Jones and his ‘Couples.’ Feeling sick, she throws away the newspaper and continues on her way to get food, however, she doesn’t reach her destination for she bumps into none other than, Rayne Tarotia and his two friends, TJ and Jem. Feeling apologetic, she buys them pizza and ends up being invited to play pool with them the next night. The collision of the themes starts right then and there.
Now, let’s analyze my example.
In the Table of Contents and notes about major events section one learns the title of the chapter, the date, specific event, meeting characters, and some key information. This information helps to organize your summaries.
In the Chapter Summaries section, one learns what happens one those dates with the information about the theme. Having themes for stories is important and noting a theme in your summary is important.
I hope that this post helped you to think about book summaries and how helpful they can be to your writing.
Please comment to let me know what you guys thought about this post.
I love reading a post where I learn new concepts. I had heard of chapter summaries, but hadn’t found a good example of them in practice. This is definitely something I’m going to start doing in the future. Not only for publication purposes, but also to assist in flow and continuity.
Thanks for sharing this!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Fantastic.
Yeah, at the end I decided to be self-published so now I create the summaries just for me. Helps me keep track of things for sure.
Good luck!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I tend to do scene by scene summaries with bullet points for the main objectives, but then let the story happen..
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on .
LikeLiked by 1 person
This was great information!! I need to start doing my chapter summaries.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m happy that it was helpful.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on I Suck at Writing.
LikeLike
Pingback: Feature Friday #5 (Bloggers & Books) « Quintessential Editor