Writing a pitch for a Twitter pitch party can feel paralyzingly important. You have a lot of information to convey in a small space, and it has to entertain as well. In order to get the hang of what’s needed in a good pitch, it can be good to get an idea based upon books you have already read.
As such, I’ve put together a few pitches based upon popular novels in hopes to help, but I’ve also gone ahead and written a different style of pitch for each one. That way, you can see if there are a few that speak to your story. It’s a good idea not to put all of your pitch party eggs in one pitch basket.
The Fault in Our Stars by John Green
Hazel is navigating being a teen with cancer when she meets sarcoma survivor Gus. When he offers a chance to meet her fav author, Hazel must decide between living the life planned by her docs and risking it all for the opportunity of her possibly short lifetime. #FakePit #YA #R
This is by far the most popular type of pitch used by participants, and it’s easy to understand why. It’s basically a condensed version of an initial pitch for a query letter. If you’ve taken a bunch of time to put together a killer initial pitch, then you should allow it to do some double duty. Plus, you’ll know it already aligns with what agents respond to on the daily.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
What do you get when you put together…
👨👩👧 an unhappy marriage,
🥰 a long-lost lover,
📉 a bad business deal,
🟩 a green dock light,
🎇 a party for the ages,
👯 a torrid affair,
🚗 and a wild car chase?
Because Gatsby is so well known, it’s a good candidate to show off the other most popular style of tweet pitch going around. Not every agent is impressed by these, but they do stand out amongst the crowd. Using this format can be a high-risk, high-reward opportunity.
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
BATTLE ROYALE x 1984
Katniss is just a 16YO girl from the Seam trying to put food on the table. But when her sister is called to a last-man-standing game for the masses, she must intervene. Will she make it home, and will she lose herself along the way? #FakePit #YA #SPF
Here, I’ve given an example of including literary comps on your pitch party tweet. Keep in mind, comps can be made to literature but other forms of pop culture as well. This is a straight comp format, but you can also use more informative ones with a + or - like THE HUNGER GAMES + the opioid crisis.
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
Werner lives in Zollvereign, Germany.
Marie-Laure lives in Paris.
He's a member of Hitler's Youth.
She's a blind girl trying to rid the world of a curse.
Surely their lives were never meant to cross.
But cross they did. Now what?
This Twitter pitch technique is similar to the list used for the Great Gatsby but with fewer visual gimmicks and more context. It’s also a great way to highlight a multiple-POV narrative by giving each character their own space.
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
Alice, 7YO, was quite bored of her life, but she hadn't realized what she'd be getting into when she followed a talking 🐇 down his hole. Now she's surrounded by a mad 🎩er, an evil queen, a disappearing 🐈, and talking 🃏s. How will she ever get home? #CB #FakePit #BIZ
Sometimes stories just have too much going on in them to shorten them down to 280 characters while giving a proper scope. Enter thoughtful emojis. You can replace strategic words with their visual counterpart to meet tweet length maximums, but be careful to ensure that the visual looks the same across devices, as some emojis can look radically different.
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
Everyone my age remembers where they were and what they were doing when they first heard about the contest. It's been so long many believe there's no answer to the 1st clue. I do, but I don't have credits to explore the OASIS to compete. I do have an idea, tho. #FakePit #SF #YA
This is one of my favorite pitches that I also believe is still quite uncommon. If you look up Ready Player One, you’ll find that the beginning of this tweet is word for word the first line of the novel. If you love your first line, why not use it again? It’s designed to hook readers, and you’ll absolutely be capturing your authorial voice in the pitch. Just make sure you can fill out the rest of the tweet carefully to give a larger scope of the story.