Pitch wars #Pitmad is on

[Eva Ulian]

Hee hee.... a floating head!

Well, that was you, wasn't it? You mentioned the executive producer of all this was your husband,

 

[Rachel Caldecott]

Yup, the bastard turned the lights off and spent the evening giggling at me. No respect!!

 

[Eva Ulian]

Yup, the bastard turned the lights off and spent the evening giggling at me. No respect!!

Sounds like you two have a whale of a time together. My sister married her husband because he made her laugh... he has a typical roman nose... I wanted to put up a picture, but I daren't, I live next door.

 

[Nikky Lee]

@Eva Ulian

Principal claims she has a vocation

By vocation do you mean a calling? Because vocation can also mean a job, I was a little confused as to whether she has a calling to become a nun or is already a nun in secret.

4. THE ROSE OF JERICHO

Create meaningful paintings? Check

Become a world famous artist? Check

Tie a bond with her mentor Fr Lawrence? Check

Overcome the spite of Fr Lawrence’s jealous secretary? Not so much #Pitmad #A #WF

I like this one for THE ROSE OF JERICHO.

c. GOD’S APPAREL

Inconspicuous English teacher is determined to find the truth of who murdered the Mistress of Villa Carlucci in the Venice of the 80s, but is mortified when she discovers it could well be the man she cares about most #Pitmad #A #WF

This is my favourite of the three.

 

[Eva Ulian]

I got tired of Romans asking me what my name was and then waxing lyrical about it... "Rachele, que bello, comme la moglia di Mussolini!"

Superb! It deserves a translation for non-speaking-Italian Litonians which is as follows:

"Rachel, what a beautiful name, just like Mussolini's wife!"

 

[Eva Ulian]

@Eva Ulian


By vocation do you mean a calling? Because vocation can also mean a job, I was a little confused as to whether she has a calling to become a nun or is already a nun in secret.



I like this one for THE ROSE OF JERICHO.



This is my favourite of the three.

Thank you for pointing this out @Nmlee . I didn't specify the Principal is a nun and says MC has a vocation to the religious life and not a vocation to teaching. Will correct it. I hope I've answered you in the right slot, because I'm getting a bit side-tracked.
PS Thank you for your much valued opinion on the other two.

 

[Lex Black]

@Nmlee , @Rainbird , @Katie-Ellen Hazeldine , @Anyone-Else-Familiar-With-Unspoken: what do you think about this?

In a city plagued by supernatural evil, a team of monster hunters led by a mysterious old man race against time to find a series of kidnapping victims before they fall victim to an ancient evil. #PitMad #H #UF #MR

I know that's probably pretty weak, but I don't have much experience with the Twitter...ism...ocity...ology...things. Any thoughts on how to spruce that up? If I work feverishly I can have changes some of you have kindly helped with implemented just in time to be ignored all over Twitter in two days.

Here's a second possibility/draft:

A team of monster hunters led by a mysterious old man race against time to find a series of kidnapping victims. They face a paranormal black market dealer, unnatural juggernauts and an undead cult in a battle to make sure that in a city plagued by supernatural evil, no one goes alone. #PitMad #H #UF #MR

That's 24 characters too long, but if it's a better example I can pare it down.

A team of monster hunters led by a mysterious old man race to find a group of kidnapping victims. They face a paranormal black market dealer, unnatural juggernauts and an undead cult to make sure that in a city plagued by supernatural evil, no one goes alone. #PitMad #H #UF #MR

That one juuuuuust fits but I feel it might be stripped too much. Any thoughts?

 

[Emily]

just in time to be ignored all over Twitter in two days.

*Shriek shriek* [itchy palm]

ANYWAY, @Lex Black .

I like the first one, it's a bit clearer? Perhaps a slight change:

In a city plagued by supernatural evil, a team of monster hunters led by the psychometric George race against time to find a series of kidnapping victims before they fall victim to an ancient evil.

Would you describe him as psychometric? What was the word you used to describe his gift/supernatural-ness? And I think adding his name makes it more personable.

(Having said that, this is new to me and I think @Nmlee or @Katie-Ellen Hazeldine would be far more Twitter-versed than I)

 

[Nikky Lee]

@Lex Black I like both of these. I'd say use them both as you can post up to 3 times. Different copy may appeal to different agents too.

In a city plagued by supernatural evil, a team of monster hunters led by a mysterious old man race against time to find a series of kidnapping victims before they fall victim to an ancient evil. #PitMad #H #UF #MR

I'd consider flipping this out of passive voice, like so:

In a city plagued by the supernatural, a mysterious old man and his team of monster hunters race against time to find a series of kidnapping victims before they fall prey to an ancient evil. #PitMad #H #UF #MR (don't forget to include your age category).

Another possible one for you:

Bad things happen. That's George's motto for Ylelon, a city where the supernatural stalks the streets. It’s why his team of monsters hunters exist. But a new rash of kidnappings has him worried. Can he find the victims before they fall prey to an ancient evil?
#UF #A #PitMad

 

[Leonora]

Do the hash tags count as part of your character count? Do spaces count?

 

[Nikky Lee]

Do the hash tags count as part of your character count? Do spaces count?

Yep, they do. Thankfully, Twitter has up'ed its character count to 280 now, which makes it much more manageable than the old 140.

 

[Lex Black]

@Lex Black .

AAAAAAAAAAAAHH

*SLAM*

Darn it, stop that! Ow.

Anyway, thanks for the input, folks! I'll be obsessing over this driving myself neurotic thinking about pondering the best way to do this for the next 30-ish hours.

@Rainbird, psychometry is the technical term for the actual (supposed) ability to psychically know things about something through mere physical contact. It's not a commonly known word (so it fits with George's show-offy vocabulary) but I think it would look really weird and out of place in just a short blurb. I also considered, but hesitated, to use words like "psychic" and "wizard" to describe him (I'm sure we all remember what the crew of Pop-Up Submissions thought of me using the word wizard to describe George...). "Mysterious" may be trite, but hopefully it at least leaves room to pique a potential reader's curiosity. What do you think?

 

[Emily]

psychometry is the technical term for the actual (supposed) ability to psychically know things about something through mere physical contact. It's not a commonly known word (so it fits with George's show-offy vocabulary) but I think it would look really weird and out of place in just a short blurb.

I agree. Mysterious is just too... pedestrian. Enigmatic? inscrutable? And I like using George's name. I like @Nmlee s thirdd blurb: Bad things happen. That's George's motto for Ylelon, a city where the supernatural stalks the streets. It’s why his team of monsters hunters exist. But a new rash of kidnappings has him worried. Can he find the victims before they fall prey to an ancient evil? (@Nmlee , you are *excelent* at this!!)

 

[Rachel Caldecott]

I agree with @Nmlee's third blurb too

 

[Katie-Ellen]

@Nmlee , @Rainbird , @Katie-Ellen Hazeldine , @Anyone-Else-Familiar-With-Unspoken: what do you think about this?

In a city plagued by supernatural evil, a team of monster hunters led by a mysterious old man race against time to find a series of kidnapping victims before they fall victim to an ancient evil. #PitMad #H #UF #MR

I know that's probably pretty weak, but I don't have much experience with the Twitter...ism...ocity...ology...things. Any thoughts on how to spruce that up? If I work feverishly I can have changes some of you have kindly helped with implemented just in time to be ignored all over Twitter in two days.

Here's a second possibility/draft:

A team of monster hunters led by a mysterious old man race against time to find a series of kidnapping victims. They face a paranormal black market dealer, unnatural juggernauts and an undead cult in a battle to make sure that in a city plagued by supernatural evil, no one goes alone. #PitMad #H #UF #MR

That's 24 characters too long, but if it's a better example I can pare it down.

A team of monster hunters led by a mysterious old man race to find a group of kidnapping victims. They face a paranormal black market dealer, unnatural juggernauts and an undead cult to make sure that in a city plagued by supernatural evil, no one goes alone. #PitMad #H #UF #MR

That one juuuuuust fits but I feel it might be stripped too much. Any thoughts?

I feel it could stand more of a stripping back to rack up the punch. I don't understand about the juggernauts and I don't know how much they grab me at this point. What I understand from reading the pitch is that


A little old man is this city's best hope, the mysterious George and his embattled team, in cleaning up this monstrous plague, and hunting down the blackest of all black market dealers, but can they do it in time? #PitMad #A #H #UF

 

[Lex Black]

Ok, I'm going to have to keep working on this one.

I notice the suggestions here put a lot more emphasis on George. He's certainly a central character, but should he be front and center in even the pitch like this? Is it not better to hint at him and let the reader learn about him (and oh yeah, a bunch of other characters he works with?). I'm genuinely asking.

I may go with a couple of these variants for different times throughout the day. What do you guys think about this for a third: a pared down version of George's last speech to Cynthia, kinda like a dramatic movie trailer voiceover?

"What we do is a war that cannot be won, only fought to the bitter end. This is the choice: whether to risk horror, suffering and death to stand between those who are weak, and those who are wicked. Can you show that kind of courage? Can you make that sacrifice?" #PitMad #A #UF

I even had to leave off the tag for horror to make that work, but it includes two Georgeisms that I both actually like and have gotten positive feedback in the past. What do you guys think? Does it lose too much out of context, or does it pique interest?

@Nmlee's third suggestion is getting a lot of love here, but if nothing else I think I'd leave Ylelon's name out of it. I think it's just a bit too far out there to be used up front. I'm not big on including George's name either, but I could keep that, at last.

Thoughts? And I really appreciate all the help you folks are offering me on short notice. I'm editing in a frenzy here trying to have this ready for tomorrow.

 

[Lex Black]

Sorry to be a pest, but does anyone have a moment to comment on my last thoughts? Tomorrow is a busy day of time-sensitive errands for me, so I need to have as much ready to go as possible while I run around. Thanks so much to everyone for all the support and good luck to everyone else taking a shot at this!

 

[Nikky Lee]

"What we do is a war that cannot be won, only fought to the bitter end. This is the choice: whether to risk horror, suffering and death to stand between those who are weak, and those who are wicked. Can you show that kind of courage? Can you make that sacrifice?" #PitMad #A #UF

I actually quite like this. I feel it piques interest, but keep in mind that I've read Unspoken and am familiar with the context of this quote. I occasionally use quotes from articles to promote them for clients on Twitter. I'm not sure if its the same for Twitter pitches, but it never hurts to try and this seems like a strong quote to test it out on.

 

[Lex Black]

Thanks, @Nmlee!

 

[Emily]

Yes, I really like that one too. Katie Ellen's pitch above I like too. You have three to make, right? And I think use either George or Yelon, as a focus point rather than both, if using @Nmlee 's one above

Best of luck to everyone today

 

[Nikky Lee]

Good luck everyone. I've also updated the first post with additional upcoming dates for the 2019 PitMad contests. So if you miss this one, don't fret, there are four more next year.

Also, if anyone would like a retweet boost (helps exposure) let me know. I'm happy to do it. Just let me know what your Twitter handle is. Just keep in mind that I'm on New Zealand time (about 18 hours ahead of EST) so I might not get to it until the end of your day.

 

[Kitty]

Good luck to everyone with your #PITMAD pitches - if I spot you I'll retweet you!!!

@E G Logan Hey! Liguria!! My sister used to live in Lerici! Lovely part of the world. Whereabouts are you? And what takes you from Scotland to Italy?

 

[Emily]

I'm not on twitter much but happy to retweet if I can have twitter handles (will we make a list?)

 

[Lex Black]

Yes, please please please retweet me, I need all the help I can get! (I'm @DeadSunSaga.) I'll do the same for any who ask. Good luck, everyone, tweet incoming!

 

[Katie-Ellen]

I'll retweet if I spot them. Reminder. Please do NOT LIKE them. Liking is only for agents. Only retweet. I RT'd one by Lex just now.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

Try clicking on 'notifications' at the top of your screen.

 

[Lex Black]

OK, for some stupid reason, my first tweet has a time stamp of 6:18 Am, even though I sent it at 8:18 EST. Is this going to disqualify the tweet since it shows that way even though the event rules state to tweet between 8 am and 8 pm? I know most agents will be savvy enough to figure it out, but there's a LOT of these out there and I hate to think some filter is messing with me somehow. Anyone know how this works?

 

[Kitty]

Two tweets in and three likes already ...except - ah.... two from very dodgy looking 'publishers' and an agent with no sales record whatsoever!

Just for a moment there ....

 

[Kitty]

Some of the hashtags are very sparsely populated. I've been monitoring the #STEM one and there's only about six people pitching. #YA #SF seems slow as well. I suspect this reflects a general market trend. On the other hand there appear to be a lot of pitches tackling themes of disability and mental health.

 

[Leonora]

What time does it finish GMT?