“A vain nobleman finds that the way to his heart is through his wardrobe when a tailor’s daughter is abandoned in his town.”

“A vain nobleman discovers passion lies between the neckline and the hem when a tailor’s daughter is abandoned in his town.”

I really appreciate your total response to my question. I knew the whole 25 words or less thing but I thought “less” was key and that a log line was the shortest possible blurb you would ever write about your book. Sigh. I will definitely check out those resources and get back to work on it. Thanks so much for your time!

Jill

In the next to last paragraph the phrase ‘hone it done’ should be ‘hone it down.’

Again, sorry…my only excuse is that I got up really early for a doctor’s appointment. Basically, another day without enough sleep. Looks like a nap is in my future. LOL!

Again, I apologize for not reading through before I posted.

Lynn

If I were to choose now, I would say number 2…however…writing log lines is one of my things and none of these are really log lines but more like take lines. You know, the zippy little one-liners that you see on a Hollywood movie poster? Personally, I see no difference between the two BUT many people have told me there is one. LOL!

There are two articles at The Log Line Blog, which describes it even better than I can. Gini Koch (here’s the link: http://theloglineblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/guest-blog-gini-koch-on-log-lines.html) does what’s called a Hollywood, Comparison and Expanded log line for her books. All of them serve a different purpose.

Cindy Carroll (here’s the link: http://theloglineblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/you-want-me-to-do-what-in-25-words-or.html) goes over what is needed within your 25 words and three different structure types to get you there.

A log line is basically the whole premise of your story in 25 words or less. And it should generate excitement in the reader just from reading it.

Personally, I use a combination of both ladies ideas ending up with the three types of log lines that Gini uses but I tend to use the structure from Cindy. First, I write what I see the premise of the story in an expanded version then I let it sit a day. I’ll read it again, and hone it done even more, making it clearer and more concise. I’ll do this a few times until I am satisfied with my log line then I’ll work on the other two. So, I develop my expanded one first, then the other two.

I’ll be the first to admit, log lines are hard. Getting a great one is even harder. There’s only once I felt it was stellar the moment I wrote it down.

I hope this helps.

Lynn Crain