There are so many ways to start a story. There really is no one right way. My own fiction stories come from everywhere. They come from the voices in my head, from the overheard conversations of strangers at Starbucks, from news bits on the radio, or from imagined lives and circumstances. Sometimes all I have is a one-sentence beginning or end. For example, I have this opening line prodding my consciousness: “Every morning she paints the Mona Lisa.” Or I may just have an ending, or the skeleton of a conflict that needs a setting and interesting people and colorful writing to make it real.
Some writers use loglines to frame the story they want to write. (Instead of “some writers,” I was going to say “real writers,” but changed my mind, as I don’t want to start a debate about what makes a writer real. Doesn’t that bring to mind images of The Velveteen Rabbit? But I digress.) I’m starting to use the logline mechanism. If you are a new writer or haven’t used this tool, give it a try. I think it can quickly and brilliantly drive the creation of a story.
What is a logline?
A logline is the story’s plot, summarized in one sentence. Loglines were born in the early Hollywood studio days, and provided a way to search quickly through film scripts.
If you’ve ever written a story, and someone asked you what it was about, what came out of your mouth was probably a logline, of sorts. Maybe you said something like “A group of American pioneers set off in covered wagons to travel through the Sierra Nevada in 1846 but get stuck in the dead of winter, and resort to cannibalism to survive.” If that sounds familiar, you’re right that it’s the story of the Donner party.
Loglines can be very simple, too. I found this one online for The Silence of the Lambs: “To enter the mind of a killer she must challenge the mind of a madman.”
That story is anything but simple. But that’s a pretty gripping logline! As you can see, there are different ways to write them.
There are formulas out there for loglines, and like the two examples above, they come in both complex and simple forms. For example, one popular formula involves writing down these elements and then assembling them into your logline sentence:
- The setting: The time and place of the story.
- The protagonist: The main character.
- The problem: Whatever it is that causes your protagonist to act.
- The antagonist: Who or what attempts to block the protagonist.
- The conflict: The key dilemma or challenge the protagonist faces.
- The goal: What the protagonist hopes to achieve.
Another formula simply states the logline as follows, where you fill in the three key pieces: When [a major event happens], [the hero], must [do the main action].
For my purposes (right now exclusively short fiction), I just write out a sentence that lists the protagonist, his or her desire, and the central conflict.
Uses of a logline
Traditionally, writers created the logline once the script or book was complete. For example, book authors can send the logline to editors for evaluation along with their manuscripts or in advance of submitting their manuscripts.
But obviously, I also think they are for more versatile than that, and can help you launch the writing of your fiction work as well. Here are some ideas for you.
Check your story’s pulse
Write your story’s logline to help you decide if the novel you want to write is interesting enough to pursue. The first test is whether you can summarize the book’s plot at all. If not, you might want to go back to the drawing board. The second test is determining whether it sounds intriguing.
Just for grins, let’s say you wrote this for a logline: Joe wants to swim the English channel, but decides the training is too rigorous so he becomes a swim coach at the university instead.
Right away, you would look at that and think, “Hmm, that may have sounded good in my head, but I’m not sure it’s actually viable. Maybe I need a better premise.”
Use the logline to frame your story
As this post’s title indicates, a logline can also help you to write your story, particularly if you are just having trouble putting all the critical story elements in place. Let’s say you you only have one or two of the elements so far, such as the protagonist and some of her traits. Maybe you know her name is Svetlana, and you know she is beautiful and terribly bashful, and that gets in the way of her success in life. Cool. Before starting to write you story, you need to pull together the missing elements. What does she want, and what will she need to overcome to get there?
Want some practice? Try writing loglines for real life stories, like the Donner Party. Or try writing them for your favorite movies. In doing so, you can get a feel for assembling the components and decide if this is a tool that will help you with your writing.
