K. I. S. S.

By Darvell Hunt

If you can’t pitch your story to an editor in an elevator in ten seconds, you may need to refine the focus of your story. It may just be a matter of changing the way you look at your story, or it may not be that simple—but it needs to be.

Why? Because simple sells. If your idea is so simple that you can say it in ten seconds, yet is something that has never been done before and you do it well, your book will sell itself.

Sure, don’t forget to be creative, but remember K. I. S. S.: Keep it simple, stupid!

Here are some examples of simple but effective story ideas:

Jaws in Space. (The first Alien movie)

I See Dead People. (The Sixth Sense)

What if your entire life was a TV show and you didn’t know it? (The Truman Show)

What if you were a superhero, but you didn’t know it? (Unbreakable)

What if your boyfriend was a vampire? (Twilight)

What if you found an alien in your backyard? (E.T.)

They have forty-five minutes to save the world. They need forty-six. (Big Trouble)

You probably get the idea from these examples. What’s a short tagline for your story? If you can't write one, maybe you need to refocus your story. Or, perhaps you need to think more on what your story is about. You might have to add something to focus it or remove some things that are making it too complicated.

Remember to keep it simple, refine your focus, and write your pitch with as much passion as you wrote your story—then all you need to do is find some excuse to ride a lot of elevators with book editors.