I have been slogging through loglines/elevator pitches for the last couple of weeks.  I have discovered that it is much easier to write a logline before you write the actual book!  This sounds like a disaster but it's actually helpful, because when I have the book complete I do that writer thing where I blather on like, "Well, it's about this girl who has a temper and gets bullied for her special needs and then she's trapped, and there's magic and homeless people and, oh! and there's this bad guy and then another bad guy, but it's really about belonging and self-empowerment couched in the metaphor of Alice in Wonderland and there's spirituality and chocolate and mushrooms and…" 

There is no chocolate. Why is there no chocolate?

I just have too many of the details living in my head, breathing their importance down my neck, clambering for attention, screaming for sugary goodness. "Don't forget me!"

However, my second book that I've just started, where I have nothing but a few thousand words and a preliminary outline?  That logline popped right out.  I was half asleep even and poof!  (Speaking of which, why hasn't anyone invented the machine yet that can capture the brilliant ideas we have while we're sleeping?  It could be an app even!  Just stick that electrode on your forehead, plug it into your phone, and snooze.  That would be SO USEFUL!)

So THAT is my new plan… write the pitch before you write the book. 

That and completely silly pitches for stories that don't exist keep popping into my head.  I'm just calling that practice. Like this one, in movie narrator voice of course…

In a world ruled by sorrow, where the horrific SKINBEARS use tears as currency, the perpetual perky PETRA must team up with the dour CANDYMAN to beat the system or have her smile crushed out FOREVER!! (ever… ever…)  She only wants to smile… but it may be HER DEATH!

*dun dun DAH!!!*