Synopsis of a Bar Steward 2
Posted: 01 February 2010
Word Count: 532
|
Font Size
|
|
This is how my synopsis stands at the moment:
Memoirs of a Bar Steward are the accounts of Jacob Hank Cox young 18 year old life. Jacob sees himself as a young man with a magnificent future ahead of him, guaranteed because he is brilliantly clever, and practically wonderful in everyway, or at least that is how he sees himself. His life was all planned out. He was about to pass all of his A levels, get into the best university in the country and eventually become the prime minster of the United Kingdom, and best of all he was finally about to escape his most heinous family. A family which consists of a mother whose business involves beating the living pootang out of people and sticking their pet’s heads up where the sun don’t shine if you're unfortunate enough to run a pub, club, shop or even a paper round on the west side of Birmingham and you didn’t pay her O’Shea’s clan not to do these lovely things to you. A ratty face Father who was in the business of running up debt and then running away. A rule dodging, good life living, carefree identical twin who’s the exact opposite of himself in every way, another brother who everyone mistakenly believes is the one who is Gods gift to everything and a psychotic 10 year old sister who Jacob fears just might be more crazy and dangerous than the lot of them put together.
However, Jacob soon discovers that he is not going to be able to go to the best university in the country, in fact he is not going to be able to go to university at all, and instead of escaping a family who he regards as the shackles holding him down, stopping his rise to greatness, he is in fact about to embark on a whole new adventure with all of them as they all make the sudden and suspicious move to a new life in Devon, where the family is going to take over a seaside pub, a business which Jacob believe could be his new springboard to success. Soon Jacob discovers that if his family is his shackles, then his own delusions of grandeur, immaturity and vanity is the giant anchor that they are all linked to.
This is a story about chasing your dreams and the struggle to hold onto them, at any cost. The pub that the Cox family moves into may possibly be the solution to all of their individual problems, but the business is not the easy success that they were lead to believe it would be and if they want to stay then they must act fast or else they will all be returning to the Midlands before the summer is over, which would be an unimaginable nightmare for each of them for their own different reasons.
Join Jacob on his journey, along with his family, where he’ll face terrible perils, monstrous foes and maybe love (or just deadly sex). Memoirs of a bar steward is a humorous tale about growing up and finding out what the world is really like, well the world of a Cox that is.
|
Comments by other Members
| |
 The Bar Stward at 09:44 on 01 February 2010
 Report this post
|
I've changed the main text, instead of putting my changes in the reply section.
I've just been looking at this and was about to make some of the cuts NMott mentioned, such as
| Jacob sees himself as a young man with a magnificent future ahead of him, guaranteed because he is brilliantly clever, and practically wonderful in everyway, or at least that is how he sees himself. |
|
However, I believe this line sums Jacob up the most out of everything written. Jacob believes alot of things about himself, but most of them are completely untrue or wrong. The same applies to the following line.
| Soon Jacob discovers that if his family is his shackles, then his own delusions of grandeur, immaturity and vanity is the giant anchor that they are all linked to. |
|
While Jacob often blames his family for his failures, 99% of the time, all the bad things that happen to him are entirelly his own fault.
| This is a story about chasing your dreams and the struggle to hold onto them, at any cost. The pub that the Cox family moves into may possibly be the solution to all of their strange individual problems, but the business is not the easy success they were lead to believe it would be and if they want to stay they must act fast or else they will all be returning to the Midlands before the summer is over, which would be an unimaginable nightmare for all of them for their own reasons. |
|
I've added this in, in response to GaiusCoffey comments, to explain a little more clearly what the story is exactly about.
Do you think I should add in somewhere that it is character driven?
I'm still very much playing around with this at the moment.
| |
 NMott at 11:34 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
| Do you think I should add in somewhere that it is character driven? |
|
No, that will be obvious from the synopsis, which is mainly about the characters, and the plot is secondary.
| Memoirs of a Bar Steward are the accounts of Jacob Hank Cox young 18 year old life. |
|
This is unnecessary - not to mention and gramatically incorrect - so delete it, and start the synopsis with: 18 year old Jacob Cox sees himself... (Delete Hank).
| Jacob sees himself as a young man with a magnificent future ahead of him, guaranteed because he is brilliantly clever, and practically wonderful in everyway, or at least that is how he sees himself. |
|
I suggested removing the 'brilliantly clever, and practically wonderful' because it implies that you have an unlikable main character. Readers don't mind if their main characters are flawed so long as they know it and can pop their own bubble with a bit of self-depreciating humour.
| His life was all planned out. He was about to pass all of his A levels, get into the best university in the country and eventually become the prime minster of the United Kingdom, and best of all he was finally about to escape his most heinous family. |
|
Typos, and a few superfluous words.. Prime Minister
Delete the first 'all',
not sure you need 'United Kingdom'
Repetition of 'about' so replace 'was finally about' with best of all he could finally escape...
| A family which consists of a mother whose business involves beating the living pootang out of people and sticking their pet’s heads up where the sun don’t shine if you're unfortunate enough to run a pub, club, shop or even a paper round on the west side of Birmingham and you didn’t pay her O’Shea’s clan not to do these lovely things to you. |
|
Sentence is too long. Pop a full stop in somewhere.
| A ratty face Father who was in the business of running up debt and then running away. |
|
delete 'who was'
| A rule dodging, good life living, carefree identical twin who’s the exact opposite of himself in every way, |
|
| another brother who everyone mistakenly believes is the one who is Gods gift to everything |
|
Full stop. An older brother...
and a psychotic 10 year old sister who Jacob fears just might be more crazy and dangerous than the lot of them put together. |
|
Full Stop. And a psychotic....
| However, Jacob soon discovers that he is not going to be able to go to the best university in the country, in fact he is not going to be able to go to university at all, and instead of escaping a family who he regards as the shackles holding him down, stopping his rise to greatness, he is in fact about to embark on a whole new adventure with all of them as they all make the sudden and suspicious move to a new life in Devon, where the family is going to take over a seaside pub, a business which Jacob believe could be his new springboard to success. Soon Jacob discovers that if his family is his shackles, then his own delusions of grandeur, immaturity and vanity is the giant anchor that they are all linked to. |
|
See original suggestions for corrections.
| This is a story about chasing your dreams and the struggle to hold onto them, at any cost. . |
|
The story is about... - Sentences like this are more suited to the covering letter.
| The pub that the Cox family moves into may possibly be the solution to all of their individual problems, but the business is not the easy success that they were lead to believe it would be and if they want to stay then they must act fast or else they will all be returning to the Midlands before the summer is over, which would be an unimaginable nightmare for each of them for their own different reasons |
|
You have switched to 'their', when the synopsis is supposed to be about Jacob. Does Jacob want the pub to fail? What happens if it does? can he continue his dreams?
| Join Jacob on his journey, along with his family, where he’ll face terrible perils, monstrous foes and maybe love (or just deadly sex). Memoirs of a bar steward is a humorous tale about growing up and finding out what the world is really like, well the world of a Cox that is. |
|
Again, more suited to a covering letter than a synopsis. The synopsis should not be from the writer's pov.
It is important to keep copies of early drafts for reference, to see if parts worked better than in the redrafts.
I would go back to your first draft as it had a freshness to it that is missing here.
- NaomiM
| |
The Bar Stward at 12:17 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
| I suggested removing the 'brilliantly clever, and practically wonderful' because it implies that you have an unlikable main character. Readers don't mind if their main characters are flawed so long as they know it and can pop their own bubble with a bit of self-depreciating humour. |
|
Jacob starts off pretty unlikeable, he is big headed, but the fun in the story is seeing him getting knocked off his pedastal, one he places very high himself. Most of the humour comes from laughing AT Jacob, opposed to WITH him. On this basis do you still think the line should be removed, or altered?
| You have switched to 'their', when the synopsis is supposed to be about Jacob. Does Jacob want the pub to fail? What happens if it does? can he continue his dreams? |
|
Jacob certainly doesn't want the pub to fail as he sees it as his only chace now to make a success of himself. If he and his family fails he will have to return to Birmingham and he will get sucked into his mothers family business, the gangsters. Jacob couldn't stand this as he looks down on him and they equally hate him, though they would take great pleasure in pushing him around and he knows it.
It is important to keep copies of early drafts for reference, to see if parts worked better than in the redrafts.
I would go back to your first draft as it had a freshness to it that is missing here. |
|
Okay, but do you think I need to add any extra to that, like why the pub must succeed, or as I said above, Jacob will be subjected to a life of not being a King amongst the people, but a jester for the evil kingdom which is the O'Shea clan?
Cheers
| |
NMott at 12:49 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
| Most of the humour comes from laughing AT Jacob |
|
That is a problem, and part of the value of writing a synopsis is to highlight problems like that which might turn off an agent. Readers empathise with the main character, so you are essentially poking fun at them and asking them to find it funny, which most won't, and agents know that which is why novels with an 'unsympathetic main character' often get rejected.
So 'should you remove it from the synopsis'? Yes. You should also try to make your character more likable in the opening chapters of your book. You have enough other characters for the reader to laugh at; oyu don't need the main character too. As I said before, oyu can make him flawed, so long as he recognises those flaws and laughs at himself as he tries to correct them over the course of the book.
With regard to adding extra material to the synopsis. You want to avoid simply adding plot. This is a character-driven book, so plot is secondary to the main character. If you add anything extra it should be in the same style as the introduction to the pub:
However, Jacob soon discovers that he is not going to be able to go to the best university in the country, in fact he is not going to be able to go to university at all, and instead of escaping a family who he regards as the shackles holding him down, stopping his rise to greatness, he is in fact about to embark on a whole new adventure with all of them as they all make the sudden and suspicious move to a new life in Devon,...
All I can do is point out bits that work and bits that don't. You could write a paragraph that satisfactorally describes the plot but I might advice taking it out because it doesn't fit with the style of the synopsis. This is a blurb-style of synopsis and it all should be written in the same humorous tone, and focussed on Jacob's feelings, failures and desires.
| |
The Bar Stward at 12:58 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
Thanks. I'm jut thinking about Jacob now. A lot of people like this but Jacob is the flawed character, more so than everyone else, often he is what he thinks of othe people. However he does change but that is nearer the end of the book. So it is like you say, how to ake him likeable. I'm sure you have read a lot of Memoirs of a bar steward, what is our opinion of the character?
Have you heard of a book called 'How to kill your friends', a recent book, just a year or 2 old. The MC is that is not likeable in anyway, even at the end, in fact he gets worse. I kinda hope people will enjoy followng what happens to Jacob just to see that he lands on his arse, that is what the whole thing is bascially about, he's a bit of a David Brent character, but imagine a teenage verison of him who is a bit more big headed.
| |
NMott at 13:14 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
I liked the 'voice' from the moment I first read Memoirs of a Bar Steward, and I think the novel has a lot going for it. Nick Hornby also has flawed main characters, eg, in High Fidelity. Mark Haddon has a flawed mc in A Little Spot of Bother. So long as your mc is not mysogenistic or racist it should be fine.
Often it helps to keep a main character's commentaries 'objective', rather than make them 'subjective'. eg, he might see a girl dressed like a tart, but he would simply describe what he sees rather than make a value judgement such as 'what a tart/slag', because then you're asking the reader to share that character's racsist or mysogenistic values.
| |
 Cornelia at 13:30 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
I like the characters here because it's saidfying to read about characters who are riding for a fall or who think the world owes them a living and they about to find otherwise. So I'm happy not to like spineless dependent egotistical Jake and happy to read along unti he get his come-uppance.
I also like the idea of the Birmingham family uprooted to Devon and forced to cope with a whole new different way of life, It's a promising scenario.
Comments already made me see why I find the synopsis quite irritating although I like the sound of the book. A more straightforward style would allow the characters and siuatuations to speak for themselves without the overheated voice of the narrator and phrases like 'chasing your dreams''monstrous foes' and 'unimaginable nightmares' It's off-putting when the reader would like to decide for him/herself. 'Deadly sex' suggests a sudden change of genre which surely can't be meant.
Two other points are related to the title:
Memoir refers to an account of the past, usually by a middle-aged or elderly person, so I think this isn't quite right for Jake as he will only be a few months older when the story ends.Maybe it's meant to be a pun on the titles of films about window-cleaners, etc, but I'm not sure it works.
Bar Steward makes me think of cruise liners or aircraft. think 'bar tender' or bar man' or some more colloquial term would be better.
Sheila
| |
The Bar Stward at 13:33 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
Jacob isn't racist, or anything like that, he is basically big headed about himself, that is where he is flawed and also he moans about his family. He is never unplesant in terms of how you said would be wrong, in fact he is often eager to be seen to be a model person.
So now I'm thinking how best to describe this person,as I thought the following described him to a t
| guaranteed because he is brilliantly clever, and practically wonderful in everyway, or at least that is how he sees himself |
|
| |
The Bar Stward at 13:36 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
Hello Shelia, thanks for the comments
t is called Memoirs as it is based on the life of Jacob in the year 2000, and bar steward is a pun on the word barstard.
I probably need to completely rewrite this. Later on tonight I read back over all of your comments and redraft this and I'll post it tomorrow.
| |
NMott at 14:05 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
| and bar steward is a pun on the word barstard. |
|
I liked the pun in the title.
| |
Cornelia at 14:59 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
Oh, sorry I haven't come across this before.
Another two points, more of realism than anything, whih may not be legitimate in a critique of a synopsis but I'll go ahead anyway because I think they are questions that may trouble the reader:
As an ex teacher I may come across as pedantic here, but 18 year old Jake would bby now how a pretty good idea of his potential A-level success, because of mock exams, etc and previous schol record.
Again, I may be drawing on my own experience here : My own parents were hostile to my ambitions and decided I'd leave school. Although they didn't leave the county and there was no criminal activity, I decided to leave home, get a job and continue to study part-time. I was 17 at the time, younger than Jake.I wonder if it might be more convincing if Jake were younger and therefore more demonstrably dependent. I know he is supposed to be immature but wouldn't he put up some sort of struggle at this stage to realise his ambitions?
If there is some kind of physical threat to him if he doesn't go to Devon with his family , maybe this could be made clearer
Sheila
| |
The Bar Stward at 15:23 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
Hello
In the story it is never explained entirally what his a level results were, you would have to read it to see how that works. He moves to Devon because he convinces himself that being a licensee if a great position of power and another way for him to achieve greatness. These two points are very quickly dealt with at the start of the story. Jacob is very delusional, he blames others for his own faults, perhaps he failed his mocks and came up with an excuse for that and reasoned that he would ctally pass his a levels. If you read the first couple of pages hopefully you will understand what I mean.
| |
Cornelia at 17:29 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
OK, thanks, this clarifies, up to a point. I thought his mother would be the licensee, as i think you have to be at least 21, I suppose he's thinking of the future although forward-planning doesn't seem to be in his nature. It isn't clear how complicit he is with his mother's activities - I had the impression that he might wish to distance himself fom his family's violent ethos, but that's not the case. I think I understand him now as a kind of borderline schizophrenic who just wants power regardless of how he gets it but who is unable to perceive the reality of his situation.
Sheila
| |
NMott at 17:46 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
Jacob isn't racist, or anything like that, he is basically big headed about himself, that is where he is flawed and also he moans about his family. He is never unplesant in terms of how you said would be wrong, in fact he is often eager to be seen to be a model person.
So now I'm thinking how best to describe this person,as I thought the following described him to a t |
|
The thing is not to over think it. A blurb-style of synopsis gives a flavour of the novel, rather than maps out the plot, etc.
Both Gaius and I thought the first version could be cut down because we spotted repetition in the character sketch. The line you are so worried about simply isn't needed because you had already sufficiently described the character, plus it risked portraying him as an unsympathetic character (which, from reading some of the chapters, I didn't think he was).
- NaomiM
| |
The Bar Stward at 23:11 on 01 February 2010
Report this post
|
Shelia
The following is one of the opening entries from Jacobs memoirs, hopefully this will answer some of your questions:
I’m really excited about tomorrow because I will be getting my A level results and then I can at last escape from my repugnant family. That might sound a bit harsh, maybe nasty and you can be forgiven for asking what terrible actions they might be guilty of. Do they beat me, abuse me, ignore me? No. They do however fecking annoy me.
Until recently my tiny wild haired Irish mother (along with her raggy prehistoric side of the family) was in the business of beating the living pootang out of people and sticking their pet’s heads up where the sun doesn’t shine. Why? Because if you were unfortunate enough to run a pub, club, shop or even a paper round on the west side of Birmingham, you paid the O’Shea’s clan not to do these lovely things to you basically. A family to be proud of. Not!
My ratty face Father is in the business of running up debt and then running away. I have many fond memories as a child of listening to him answering the phone in a woman’s voice, proclaiming never to have heard of a Mr. J. Cox. He once took to wearing women’s clothes around the house. He wasn’t a cross dresser, really, it was just in case the bailiffs came unexpectedly. We expected their unexpected visits almost weekly.
Whenever you see a newspaper article reporting about today’s sh*t eating, fat bag, silly clothed, state sponging, abuse hurling, fuzzy face, scruffy haired yoofs, you are reading about my (allegedly) identical twin brother Miller. (There is, however, nothing portly nor disheveled about my appearance. I am well tailored and down with fashion)
There is also my brother Clint who is a bit of a slick Frank Sinatra wannabe, the cuckoo in the nest because he towers over the rest of his short arse family, looking down on us with his deep blue eyes and bastard good looks. Last of all is my sister Marie who is very quiet, in a disconcerting kind of way. She has lots of friends around her at most times but not one of the miserable ickle boggy nose munchkins look like they like her.
I feel that I have been trapped on an island of savages. I’m sure there has been a horrible mistake, I couldn’t possibly belong here. Perhaps a plane crashed or I was washed ashore, where I was unfortunate enough to be adopted by the local tribe. Now though I have become a man and I have built myself a boat. Tomorrow I will leave this god forsaken island. I will row away and leave the lords to their flies. Goodbye all. Return I shall not.
Yes tomorrow at 1400 hrs I will go to my old school for the last time to collect my exam results and then I can begin my journey to university. I need nothing less than C’s in English, Math’s and History (though I’m expecting B’s at least). My family is moving to Torquay at the end of the week to take over a public house that my Father has ‘somehow’ managed to acquire. He asked me the other day to be its licensee. HA! Noooooooo fookin way! I will be staying with Curly once my family has moved, and then I’ll hopefully be going to Oxford to study law. |
|
| |
Cornelia at 09:14 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Thanks, this helps to clarify. So Jake is all set to leave, but something happens so he is forced to go with his horrible family to Devon after all.In the extract he seems to reject the idea, and I don't blame him.
Just now it's coming across as Shameless meets the Larkins - at least I assume that'll be what the the Devon part is about. That's what I assumed the hook would be -slightly villainous urban family settles (or not) in idyllic country environment.
About the title because I'm still not clear and the hint here about being adopted, even if a commonplace fantasy, adds to the confusion - is Jake in fact adopted? Is he illegitimate? He shows no signs, so far, of beng a bastard in the sense of being a villain, quite the opposite in fact. Surely for the pun to mean anything he would either have to be born out of wedlock or he would have be an out-and-out rogue (a bit like the comic character B'stard played by Rik Mayall.
On the other hand, maybe as Naomi said it's best not to overthink it.
| |
Cornelia at 09:22 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Two more points -a) if he failed his mocks it seems highly unlikely he could get into Oxford to study law. I know he's supposed to be complex but he can't be bothe intelligent and dim at the same time, and b) I had an uncle who ws a licensee and I had the impression you have to have character references ( he was about the only non-drinker in a family of alcoholics) However, as you say, all this may come out in the wash, so to speak.
Hope you don't mind the nitpicking I find it helps to think about my own work mind of people ask questions.
Sheila
| |
The Bar Stward at 09:25 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Jacob, once working at the pub gets very big headed, so you could say he was a bastard to work for. Jacob isn't adpted, it is just fantasy.
| Just now it's coming across as Shameless meets the Larkins - at least I assume that'll be what the the Devon part is about. That's what I assumed the hook would be -slightly villainous urban family settles (or not) in idyllic country environment. |
|
Almost right. The mother is not as bad as Jacob makes out, and as the story progresses we learn that while she can be aggressive, she had to have been, but now in Devon she wants a quiet life. It in fact the people who live near the pub in Torquay who are the real trouble makers.
| |
The Bar Stward at 09:28 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Well I was a licensee. I had to pass a test and then go to court to get the license, where I think I gave a brief speech, I had met with the licensing oficer a few days before for a chat.
| |
NMott at 09:59 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Yeah, I wouldn't over think it, Sheila. There isn't room in the synopsis for explanations, so those will have to be left for the novel itself.
| |
The Bar Stward at 10:35 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Lol, unlike a hollywood film with its 2D characters, Jacob and his lot are quite complex, like real people, their not all good, nor all bad, so in my rewrite of the synposis I will keep it simple, basically keep to what is Jacobs situation and people can discover the rest when they read it.
As you have so many questions Shelia, I would like to hear what you think of the actual story if you get a chance to read.
| |
 Mand245 at 17:49 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Hi Scott
I'm no expert on writing a synopsis but this seemed to me more like the "blurb" you would put on the back of a book to draw in a reader, more than a summary of the book such as an agent would want to see (if that makes sense).
You use over half the length of this synopsis to cover just the very beginning of the book but then don't really cover the rest of the story at all. To my mind, what you are doing here is outlining Jacob's relationship to his family rather than outlining the plot.
I think any agent would want to know how the story resolves. You ask the agent to "join" Jacob on his journey but (to continue the analogy) you don't cover the destination.
I have read all (I think all) of the novel that you have posted to date and I have to be honest (as you have said "Go on, I can take it") that, with this synopsis, you really aren't doing justice to your work. On the strength of what you have written here, I would not pick up the book, and that would be a shame because it's a very entertaining and original read! There again, I am not an agent so what do I know! 
I think my best advice here is to take Naomi's advice. I think everyone on the site would agree that, when it comes to writing a good synopsis, she really knows what she's talking about!
Content aside, there are a few things in this that really jarred with me.
| Memoirs of a Bar Steward are the accounts of Jacob Hank Cox young 18 year old life. |
|
"Memoirs of a Bar Steward" is your novel title and therefore singular, so it should be "is the account of"
"young 18 year old" sounds a little clumsy and contradictory. I would have put "of Jacob Cox's young life."
| Jacob sees himself as a young man with a magnificent future ahead of him, guaranteed because he is brilliantly clever, and practically wonderful in everyway, or at least that is how he sees himself. |
|
You might want to reconsider using "sees himself" twice in the same sentence
In this context you can't start the sentence with "A family which". It would work following a comma rather than a full stop after the previous sentence but would probably be better written as: The family consists...
and | A rule dodging, good life living |
|
same comment as above - also, I think it should be "faced" rather than "face" and "father" shouldn't have a capital letter here
| However, Jacob soon discovers that he is not going to be able to go to the best university in the country, in fact he is not going to be able to go to university at all, and instead of escaping a family who he regards as the shackles holding him down, stopping his rise to greatness, he is in fact about to embark on a whole new adventure with all of them as they all make the sudden and suspicious move to a new life in Devon, where the family is going to take over a seaside pub, a business which Jacob believe could be his new springboard to success. |
|
I know I am often guilty of using overlong sentences, but this one makes my stuff look concise!
Obviously this is all just my opinion so feel free to pick any bits you think might help and just ignore the rest!
Best of luck with it.
Mand
| |
The Bar Stward at 19:25 on 02 February 2010
Report this post
|
Thanks Mand, I am working on a total rewrie of the synopsis and I will be uploading it asap.
| |
| |
Comments by other Members
