The Synopsis — An Editors View

Imagine for a moment that you have just been hired as an acquisitions editor a small publishing company that publishes romance. Your task is to find a romantic suspense novel to fill a gaping hole in the publisher’s schedule. You are excited, thinking you have just landed your dream job. After all, you’ll get to read all day, something you love to do anyway, and you’ll get paid!

You’re shown to your office and logged onto your computer system. You open your email and are pleased to find several submissions already waiting for you. Books you get to read and don’t have to pay for! Does it get any better than this?

You open the first email submission and click on the single attachment to open the file. The file that opens has the author’s name address and phone number, but there is no letter and no synopsis. You think this is a bit odd, but figure that you were hired to read manuscripts so you settle into your chair and begin to read. The story opens strongly and you are drawn into the world of the heroine who is being chased down a dark alley. You’re on the edge of your seat, hanging on every word, wondering what will happen to the heroine. Will she escape the man who is chasing her? You turn pages, faster and faster, remembering that you’re supposed to be finding a romantic suspense novel. Now you are on page 60 and though the story has kept you on the edge of your seat and turning pages, there is no hero in sight and your heroine is still running for her life. You begin to wonder where the hero is, and when he’ll show up. You begin to wonder whether this book is a romantic suspense at all. Maybe it’s a straight suspense, there was no synopsis to tell you. You decide to read a few more pages to see if the hero turns up. A few more pages down the road there is still no hero in sight, and you decide that this manuscript really doesn’t work as a romantic suspense so you draft the rejection letter informing the author that the piece doesn’t work as a romantic suspense because it lacks a hero and a romantic element.

You’re now on to submission number two. Your boss has stuck her head in the door twice to see how you’re doing and to inquire whether you’ve found any promising candidates to fill that looming spot in the schedule.

You open submission number two and are pleased to find that this submission has a cover letter and a synopsis. The cover letter gushes that you’ll love the surprise ending the author has crafted for her heroine. You read through the synopsis and find that the hero and heroine meet early in the story, they have both a strong attraction and a strong conflict which keeps them at loggerheads through most of the story. You are just about to jump for joy thinking maybe you’ve found the piece to plug the hole in the publishing schedule when you read that the hero gets shot and the heroine goes off with the bad guy in the end. So much for loving the surprise ending! You open Word and craft your letter to the author telling her that though you loved the first part of the story as she’d described it, you weren’t blown away by the ending. You suggest that the heroine ending up with the hero at the end might be a better ending for the story and suggest that she resubmit if she decides to revise.

Well, it hasn’t been a grand day. This acquisitions stuff is harder than it looks. Your boss is getting jumpy now. She’s stuck her head in the door twice and keeps casting meaningful looks at the publishing schedule thumb tacked to your cubicle wall. You know you have to find a piece, and find it fast.

You open up submission #3, scan it quickly. It’s another submission that jumps straight into chapter one. You’d love to read it, but you wonder if it’ll be like the other one, start off great but not really work for you. You decide that you don’t really have time to read it right now. You need to find a romantic suspense to fill the spot in your schedule before your boss comes back. You close submission #3 and move on, looking for something that looks promising.

You open submission #4 and scan it quickly, mentally checking off the aspects of the story that you think will work for your readers. The hero and heroine meet early in the story, they have a strong reason to be together and an even stronger one to want to be apart. You cheer mentally thinking that the conflict will certainly be strong. The villain is a strong character in his own right with a good reason to want the hero and heroine out of the picture. More cheering. The author has led you to a scene where the hero and heroine have just jumped off a cliff and are plunging into the icy river below. At this point the synopsis ends with the words, I hope you enjoy my novel.

Far from enjoying the novel, you want to strangle this author. You now have no way of knowing whether the story ends happily ever after or whether the hero dies and the heroine goes off with the villain in a surprise ending. You really don’t have time to find out right now, so you push the manuscript aside, into the growing file of ones you’ll read when you have more time.

Time passes, the day is growing more and more hectic and you are feeling despair wondering whether you will ever find the perfect romantic suspense manuscript to fill the spot in the publishing schedule.

Finally, you open submission number #9. Silently blessing the author who has been kind enough to include a synopsis. You scan the synopsis looking for the elements that make a strong romantic suspense novel. The hero and heroine meet early on in the story. They are instantly both attracted and at odds with each other. The villain is strong and well motivated. As you read through the sub- mission you can see that the characters internal and external conflicts work together to propel the story. You can follow the path the characters take, you can see the situation getting worse and worse for them as both their relationship and their physical safety are put at risk.

You begin to feel hopeful as you approach that portion of the synopsis where the hero and heroine are facing their final showdown with the villain. You breathe a sigh of relief when the villain is captured, noting that the author has so far hit every mark for a romantic suspense. You keep reading, fingers crossed, hoping that this author delivers the happily ever after ending required by the sub- genre. When the hero and heroine melt happily into each others arms you sigh, feeling that just maybe you’ve found the romantic suspense novel to fill the open spot in the publishing schedule. You will still have to read the novel to be sure the writing is up to par, but at least you know that the plot works.

About the Author

Laurie Sanders is Editor and CEO at Black Velvet Seductions. The company publishes romance, erotic romance, and romantic suspense. The company offers a free newsletter for authors of romance and gives away free books each Friday. Visit
Black Velvet Seductions
to check it out.

Landing Page Editor

Creating Resumes to help you Land Good Jobs in Pakistan

As an HR consultant for small companies and a part of a website that advertises jobs in Pakistan, I have seen numerous resumes of the printed and online variety. Although there are some exceptionally well thought out resumes, by and far the quality of resumes falls short of the professional mark. Here are some common problems I run into and tips on how to fix them easily and improve the overall acceptability of your CVs.

Font & Format

Your employer’s first impressions count and you don’t want your resume in the trash bin before your employer even gets a chance to see just how qualified you are. Use the Times New Roman or Arial font with a font size between ten and twelve points. Remember this is not a test of your artistic abilities but a chance to advertise your skills and accomplishments. For format simply use a template from your text editor such as Microsoft Word.

Be Careful if you Cut and Paste

A lot of online job boards do not allow you to attach document or pdf files. Simply copying and pasting from a text editor into the designated area of the website does not always lead to desirable formatting especially if you’re using tables to align columns and rows. Double-check and reformat if need be.

Please use the Spelling Check

Most text editors like Microsoft Word have spell check and not using it to correct spellings is absolutely criminal. Be careful that spell checks cannot catch all mistakes especially when a word is being used incorrectly. ‘Effect’ and ‘affect’ mean different things and if misused, spell check will not catch your muistake.

Grammar

English is not the mother tongue in Pakistan and it’s understandable if your English is not perfect. But that is no excuse. Get your resume checked by someone who’s English is credible and ask them to correct grammar mistakes. They can also help you to form better sentences. There are also web services that do this for a nominal fee.

Size doesn’t Matter

A lot of believe that three to four pages for a resume will impress the employer and give a false sense of the candidate’s accomplishments. It is quite the opposite. Keep your resume to a maximum of two pages only if you have extensive and valuable experience that matches the employer’s current needs. Use points and bullets to convey your abilities and accomplishments. Keep it brief and to the point. The employer needs to know you’re a good communicator.

Email Address

If you don’t already have an email create one. Google, Yahoo and Microsoft all have free email services. Make sure your email is professional and serious sounding. The best emails contain your name and maybe a number and a dot. Do not use emails that contain words like ‘luv4u’ or ‘sexy55’. It creates an extremely unserious and childish impression.

These are just the basics to help you improve your CV and to ensure that your resume lasts the first fifteen or so seconds when the employer contemplates reading your life on a page any further.  Remember to get an interview for a job in Karachi or any other city, your resume needs to stand out of the crowd and be considered seriously.

About the Author

Maha Baig is an expert on finding jobs and HR systems for Small Businesses. To find great jobs in Karachi and Pakistan, visit Good Deal Hunting Free Classifieds

Can someone answer my web page questions?

1.Can someone rate my site?
2.What can I do to improve my site?
3.Using the HTML Editor… how would I move my ping box to the center on the Ping Page?
4.Does the video of the week become glitchy once the giant character land?

1a. Presentation: I am impressed! The graphics are stunning! Absolutely beautiful!
1b. Functionality not tested.
2a. It is a real pitty that it is just a blog! One among the millions of useless and uninteresting sites.
2b. Designed using templates and wysiwyg editors: another pitty.
2c. Free Hosting or sub-domain: incacceptable: buy your own domain.
2d. Do NOT relay on CSSs, Images, Menus from ANOTHER site (even if it is your “master” site. Use your OWN.
2e. There is much to look at when you enter: I have NO idea what your site is about.

Conclusion:
You are a fantastic Graphic Designer (If you designed it yourself), but a poor “web designer”: a home page should attract the visitor, not to rebute him with the splash of so many things. (Most bad designers want to put EVERYTHING they have to say on their home page. WRONG: You have 1.5 second to grab your visitor with something that interest HIM, not YOU!)

Keep up the good graphics. Maybe you could join with a proper coder/marketing designer.

Use the online site editor to personalise a landing page 1

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