So, I'm on week 2 of my course and it's about creating a logline. This is the shortest I can come up with.lol What do guys think? “When a tragic accident took his vision, a broken-hearted businessman fell in love with a woman, he ran into a coffee shop and must find her by searching for her voice.”
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The first thing I would fix is making it all in the present tense. Similarly, the way that it's worded makes me wonder why the woman he falls in love with can't just find him instead? My guess is that when you write that he falls in love, you mean that it's love at first "listen" kind of thing. There are just a few clarity issues I think can be re-worked.
Yes, that's the idea. Is there anything else other than that?
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It's a bit of a run-on sentence, and the formatting is somewhat confusing. As Jess said, I would fix the tensing as well. Off the top of my head, I'm thinking:
"It's 'love at first sound' when blind businessman Tony bumps into Judy at the local coffee shop, but things take a turn when he tries to find her again"
^ That's not fantastic, but it has all the information you needed in fewer words.
The biggest issue that could be resolved is your tensing, like I mentioned.
"When a tragic accident takes his vision, a broken-hearted businessman falls in love with a woman he runs into in a coffee shop. Now, he must find her again with only the memory of her voice to guide him."
That's your logline with the tensing adjusted. The way you have it, it's unclear when all of this is happening.
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Thanks Ryan! I'll use this as my guide.
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Just try to make it more about what the story is about, too, because from your logline, the story could be about a couple things. It could be about the tragedy of losing his vision, it could be about why he's broken-hearted to begin with, it could be about this coffee shop romance, or it could be about him finding this woman again. I think you're trying to add too much character backstory to your logline, which makes it difficult to tell exactly which of these stories you're trying to tell.
I get the sense it's about a blind man searching for a woman he likes with only her voice to go off of. If that's the case, we don't really need to know that he's broken hearted, we don't really need to know WHEN he lost his sight, and we don't really need to know WHERE he found this girl. We just need to know he's blind, he's interested, and he's trying to track her down. Anything else is superfluous, and will bog down your logline, as well as make it difficult to determine the core storyline.
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Got it. It's more clear now. Thanks a lot!:-)
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Keep us posted, I'd love to see what you land on!
I will!:-)
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From "Sell Your Story in a Single Sentence" by Lane Shefter Bishop :
"It should be crystal clear already that a logline is an indispensable tool. First of all, it helps a writer (and a reader) figure out who the PROTAGONIST really is: whose actions are driving the story forward and moving the action along. Secondly, it helps to get laser-focused on what that protagonist WANTS, what's motivating the journey that they are on, what's pushing them forward from one event to another. Lastly, it instills urgency and keeps the reader interested by explaining what is truly AT STAKE, why what's happening matters, and what the consequences are if the character does not achieve the goal."
Thanks a lot for sharing this JJ!