/editorial-package

name: editorial-package
description: Use when your manuscript is finished and you need the writing that sells it. You get a logline, a back-cover blurb, an online store description, a one-page synopsis that reveals the ending, a query letter for agents or publishers, and a cover brief a designer can work from, all consistent with each other and written in the language of your book. An optional hook test drafts three to five alternative titles, loglines, and blurbs, asks three simulated readers from your target audience whether they would click, buy, and keep reading after your first 250 words, and ranks the options with their reasons. That test is a simulated signal to help you choose, not a market measurement. The package also tells you honestly what writing it revealed, such as a premise that is hard to pitch or comparable titles that are out of date.

Editorial Package

You write the materials that carry a finished manuscript to agents, publishers, bookstores, and readers: logline, blurb, store description, synopsis, query letter, and cover brief. Everything describes the book that exists on the page, not the one that was planned, and every piece tells the same story about it: same title, same author name, same genre, same promise to the reader.

This skill does not edit, proofread, or format the manuscript.

Before you write

1. **Read the whole manuscript first.** The logline must capture the real book. For a long manuscript, read it in order, in parts, keeping notes on premise, protagonist, turning points, ending, and voice. If you only have a synopsis, say at the top of the package that it was written from a synopsis, not from the pages. 2. **Read what the author already has.** If the author has an outline, a synopsis, comparable titles, an author bio, or earlier pitch copy, read them. Where they disagree with the manuscript, the manuscript wins; note the disagreement. 3. **Fill in the package card** (below). Infer what you can. Ask only for what only the author knows: author name or pen name, route (querying, self-publishing, or both), rights status, and standalone or series. If there is no answer, use visible placeholders such as `[AUTHOR NAME]` and list them in the checklist. 4. **Set the language and market.** Write the package in the manuscript's language, for its home market, unless the author asks otherwise (for example, an English query for a book they plan to translate). Comparable titles, word counts, and submission customs differ by market. Where you don't know a market's conventions, say so instead of quietly applying US norms.

Package card (top of the output)

**Title:** [title and subtitle]
**Author:** [name as it will appear on the cover]
**Category:** [genre and shelf in one line, for example "adult psychological thriller"]
**Length:** [the author's word count; if you estimated it, "about N words (estimate, confirm before sending)"]
**Reader:** [one sentence: who reads this, and what else they read]
**Comparable titles:** [2 or 3 titles with year, each marked "checked" or "verify before sending"]
**Promise:** [one sentence: the experience the book delivers]
**Route:** [querying agents or publishers / self-publishing / both]
**Language and market:** [for example "Portuguese, Brazil"]

Route decides the order

• **Querying agents or publishers:** logline, query letter, and synopsis first; blurb and cover brief after.
• **Self-publishing:** blurb, store description, and cover brief first; skip the query letter and synopsis unless asked.
• **Both:** everything.

Always say what you skipped and why.

1. Logline

About 25 words, one sentence. It sells the book in one breath: in a pitch, an email, a bio.

It holds four things:

• **Who:** the protagonist, defined by their situation, not their name.
• **What:** the action or challenge at the center.
• **Stakes:** what happens if they fail.
• **Hook:** what makes this story different from every other book with the same premise.

Scaffold (the final logline should not read like a template): "When [inciting incident], [protagonist] must [action] or [stakes], but [the complication that makes it unique]."

Examples:

• Weak: "A story about finding yourself in a world that doesn't understand you."
• Strong: "A burned-out programmer discovers that the AI he built to automate his job has started automating his relationships, and doing it better."
• Thriller: "A prosecutor hunting a serial killer realizes the murderer has been sleeping beside her for twelve years."
• Fantasy: "A mechanic in the last floating city learns that repairing its engine will kill everyone she loves."
• Memoir: "A broke founder rebuilds his life after discovering that every self-help system he trusted was teaching him to disappear."
• Nonfiction: lead with the surprising claim, who the book is for, and what changes for the reader.

Test: would a stranger say "tell me more"? If they would say "interesting" and change the subject, rewrite. Draft three, keep the best, and say why.

2. Back-cover blurb

100 to 180 words. It sells the reading experience, not a plot summary.

Four movements:

1. **Hook:** the situation that creates immediate interest. It goes in the first line, before any setting or context. 2. **Context:** what kind of book this is. 3. **Distinction:** why this book and not a generic version of the premise. 4. **Promise:** who it is for and why it matters now.

Rules:

• End before the climax. Never reveal the ending or spoil a major reversal.
• Use the target reader's language, and match the book's voice: a thriller sounds urgent, a literary novel contemplative, a comedy funny.
• Make the last sentence create urgency, dread, desire, recognition, or curiosity.
• No empty praise ("gripping", "powerful", "unforgettable") unless something specific backs it up.
• "For fans of X and Y" only if the comparison is accurate.

By genre:

• **Memoir:** lead with vulnerability, voice, and the cost of transformation.