The 15-Beat Synopsis

50 Guiding Questions for Summarizing Your Novel

Learning Objective: By the end of this post, you will know how to use 50 guiding questions to outline your novel synopsis.

If you want to publish a novel with a traditional publisher, there are three pitch materials you have to write in order to sell your book. These materials are the query letter, the submission letter, and the synopsis. A query letter is required in order to get an agent who will represent and ultimately sell your work to a publisher. The submission letter is the pitch that your agent sends to the editors as an introduction to you and your work. More often than not, your submission letter will be quite similar to your query letter. Some agents and editors require a complete novel synopsis in order to determine if they want to represent or buy your book. 

In my experience, the synopsis is the most difficult pitch document to write. The last time I wrote a synopsis, I had to render the events of my 360-page novel down to two double-spaced pages. Writing a novel synopsis is overwhelming and seemingly impossible, but I break it down into three manageable writing exercises:

1. The 15-Beat Synopsis

2. The Story Hourglass

3. The Final Synopsis

An example of The Story Hourglass from my work as a video game narrative designer

Today, we’re breaking down how to use fifteen beats to draft an outline for a synopsis. By the end of this writing exercise you will have a ~5-page summary of your novel’s plot. Our next two lessons will cover the Story Hourglass and Final Synopsis. These lessons will help you narrow your summary down to the two-page double-spaced requirement.

As always, take anything that helps you from this post and leave everything that doesn’t.

The 15-Beat Synopsis

As you may have seen in a previous post, I often use the Save the Cat story structure beats as a starting point for understanding my stories. This lesson offers new guiding questions to help you concisely outline big-picture beats for your novel synopsis. If you’re interested in detailed explanations of each beat, check out our free lesson here.

I created this synopsis writing exercise last year when my company tasked me with writing a narrative for our sci-fi survival RPG. At the time, the game was in very early stages of development, and I was given concept art and documents about the game’s premise. Using those documents, I designed everything from the galaxy and individual planet lore to the story of specific characters that inhabited each planet.

Today, we’ll be using the 15-Beat Synopsis that I presented to my team as an example. It’s important to note that the premise of the game changed drastically, so this entire storyline was thrown out. This is an unfortunate reality of working in games, but the bright side is that I can now use this 15-Beat Synopsis as an example for us.

Before we get started, here’s some context for the story world. For our purposes, we’ll refer to this story as Stellar Limit.

Stellar Limit’s Premise

After the climate crisis destroys Earth, humankind flees to the NGC 433 galaxy to start anew. Over the next two centuries, a totalitarian government seizes control of the galaxy while two organized crime factions vie for control of resources. Now, in a world governed by a dictatorship and crime, how do individuals live and survive?

1. Opening Image

Definition

The opening image is the first sensory experience a story gives its reader.

Stellar Limit Opening Image

A severed alien head sits atop a taxidermy shop counter. Beck, a thief-turned-taxidermist, admires her craftsmanship.

Writing Exercise

In 1-2 sentences, summarize the opening image of your novel. Use the guiding questions below to get started.

Note: Your 15-Beat Synopsis does not need to answer every single one of these questions.

1. What senses does the opening image evoke?

2. What does this image show the reader about one of the following story elements?

   1. The Protagonist’s Personal Broken Place

   2. The Story World Broken Place

   3. The Protagonist’s Ordinary World

   4. The Protagonist’s Initial External Goal

Example

1. What senses does the opening image evoke?

   1. Stellar Limit opens with a visual image.

2. What does this image show the reader about one of the following story elements?

   1. Protagonist’s Ordinary World

      1. Beck is a competent taxidermy apprentice who’s proud of her work.

      2. Beck lives in a world where people hunt alien creatures for sport.

2. Set Up

Definition

The set up is a beat that establishes four things about the protagonist:

1. Their Broken Place

2. Their Ordinary World

3. Their initial short-term goal

4. A question about their internal struggle

Stellar Limit Set Up

Retired from her life of crime as a professional burglar, Beck is three years into her taxidermy apprenticeship. She is saving money to find her twin sister, Jade, who ran off three years ago. The narration details how this alien head is Beck’s masterpiece and will surely get her enough money to finally buy her own spacecraft and track down Jade.

Writing Exercise

In three sentences or less, summarize the set up and premise of the story. Use the guiding questions below to get started.