![]() ![]() Even in a romance novel that does not involve state affairs, though, interesting character goals may involve suspenseful situations and dilemmas. Stakes in genres such as Baldacci’s and Penny’s (thrillers and detective novels) will naturally be intense. Logline for Louise Penny’s Kingdom of the BlindĬontaining flu epidemics and hijacked nuclear missile situations keeping deadly narcotics off the streets – these are high-stake core goals! While on suspension, Chief Inspector Armand Gamache is made an executor of a stranger’s will and tries to keep a deadly narcotic off Montreal’s streets. Logline for David Baldacci’s Tom Clancy: Oath of Office President Jack Ryan must contain the fallout of a flu epidemic and two hijacked Russian nuclear missiles. Loglines are even more compelling when these goals have higher stakes (such as having to keep a bus above a fixed speed to avoid a bomb onboard detonating, as in Speed).Ĭonsider these examples from Hawes’ bestseller list: When a teenage schoolgirl outs her kind chemistry teacher as a shapeshifting mutant, she must deal with the tragic consequences.Ĭompelling loglines often describe characters’ goals. Include one of the emotions from the list above. Try to write a logline for an imaginary situation that includes either an implied (prior) inciting incident or describes the inciting incident directly. Fear (a situation a character wants to avoid, such as the bomb on the bus going off)Įxercise: Including inciting incidents in loglines.Desire (what a character wants to do, achieve or attain).Interesting inciting incidents include emotional elements such as: The inciting incidents alluded to are the act of sabotage (the bomb’s placing) and the bomb’s discovery. For example, the logline from Speed (the classic 1994 thriller starring Sandra Bullock) above doesn’t describe the moment the bomb is placed, but rather the tense situation that results. In other loglines, the inciting incident is implied. Made-up logline for Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll When a curious young girl falls down a rabbit hole, she finds a strange world of riddle-telling creatures and meets a bloodthirsty queen. Often, these begin ‘when’ and describe the first significant plot point, e.g. Often loglines have an explicit inciting incident, describing the event that sets the story in motion directly. It’s the falling-down-the-rabbit-hole or finding-out-there’s-a-bomb-on-the-bus. Share intriguing implied or explicit inciting incidentsĪn ‘inciting incident’ is the ‘call to adventure’or founding event that sets the story in motion. Loglines are useful for story planning – writing a scene-by-scene outline using loglines (as you can when you use our Scene Builder tool) helps you work out key events each scene and chapter will focus on.A compelling single-sentence summary of your story is useful for pitching publishers who don’t have time to read vague and wordy summaries.This helps you keep the main focus of your story clear Loglines help you distill what matters in a story or individual story ‘episode’.Writing loglines is a useful exercise to master for not just screenwriters but novelists and other storytellers too because: ‘A young police officer must prevent a bomb exploding aboard a city bus by keeping its speed above 50 mph.’ Logline for the 1994 movie Speed via Why master logline writing? ‘A computer hacker learns from mysterious rebels about the true nature of his reality and his role in the war against its controllers.’ Logline for The Matrix via Other key narrative details such as setting, key characters (protagonists and antagonists) and character goals.An emotional hook to grab potential viewers’/readers’/producers’/publishers’ interest.The big studios would own hundreds of scripts, and the studio head would keep a log book that recorded concise summaries (or “loglines”) that described each script in the studio’s possession.’ Term etymology via LoglineĪ logline is a useful type of story summary because it gives potential readers, publishers or TV/film producers: The creators of Logline App explain the term’s origins: You could describe the hook-driven summaries of bestsellers Hawes lists here as loglines. Many use it to describe single-sentence book summaries, too. What are loglines, why is this type of summary helpful, and how can you write better ones? Read these logline definitions, tips and examples: Defining loglinesĪ logline is ‘a synopsis of a script or screenplay’ ( Collins Dictionary). A word you might come across from time to time is ‘logline’. There are many technical writing terms to learn as you become a writer. ![]()
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