TITLE: The Healer
GENRE: YA Fantasy
When invaders attack Actae's outposts, leaving hundreds injured, Thera Airaldi must decide whether to use the healing powers she has kept secret since childhood. She could save many lives but will lose the respect of those she loves most, and possibly her life, in the process.
This one - sounds more like the line for a single scene rather than for an entire plot.
ReplyDeleteI'm intrigued, but if it's a choice between "losing respect" and "hundreds of people might die" I'm finding the stakes hard to connect to.
You say that Thera must decide whether to use her powers she's kept secret or ... you left off the other part of her choice. Why is it bad to have healing powers? I'm not getting how it's a hard choice for her.
ReplyDeleteWhat about something like ... "Thera Airaldi struggles with her desire to use her secret healing powers to help those ... even though she knows it goes against (society rules ??? ... explain why it's bad) and could leave her with a death sentence (here's where you show us the consequence).
Give us more and we'll care enough about Thera to want to read :)
Not quite hooked - the first sentence is interesting, but I want a stronger/more detailed consequence so that I can really start caring about what happens to her. I like Steena's suggestion above!
ReplyDeleteSo this seems like a pretty good summary of act one, but then what? What does she decide to do? Who tries to stop her?
ReplyDeleteI agree. I'm hoping this isn't a summary of the entire book. Unless it's a short story. (Read- Under 5K words).
ReplyDeleteIt tells the conflict, but right now the wording is not exciting enough to hook me and it seems to also lack the author's voice.
ReplyDeleteThis sounds almost exactly like Janice Hardy's THE SHIFTER, which came out last year. I'm sure it's quite a bit different, but you don't highlight that here.
ReplyDeleteI agree that it sounds like a scene. What are the underlying problems. why are they attacked? Why is healing bad? How might she lose her life? You need more specifics.
ReplyDeleteI think what everyone's pointing to here is that this is a decision, not a conflict. There is no goal.
ReplyDeleteOther than that, I found the mention of Actae very distracting/confusing. I don't know if this is a world, country, village, or person at first. We don't need a name here. Instead, just say "When invaders attack Thera Airaldi's [world, country, whatever], leaving hundreds injured, she must decide..." You can smooth that out better, but you get the idea.
I agree with all the other comments. You're telling me something more of the inciting conflict, a decision, not hinting at the climax of the story. Find your climax, and find a way to show the audience what that might be.
ReplyDeleteIs the climax of your book Airaldi deciding to use her magic, or is it something else? If it is just making this decision, then…well, I dunno, I guess I wouldn’t read the book. If it’s not, then you need to change the logline.
Aren't loglines so very difficult? I think I hate trying to write a logline. Anyway, my thoughts... It drew me in and I liked it, but I agree with the suggestion from S. Kyle Davis. It might make it tighter. Sorry I'm not much help...
ReplyDelete