Ship Dock

What it does

Finishing the manuscript is only half the job. To get a series in front of readers, an author has to write a second, smaller set of documents about the book: a logline that opens the blurb and the ad, a synopsis that feeds the back matter and the series page, a short list of comp titles that set the categories and ad targets, and a sober read on how the book sits against others in its category. The few deals that still need a pitch letter, foreign rights, audio, or a hybrid press, need a query on top. This is a different craft from the novel, and it rewards different instincts: where the manuscript wants depth, launch copy wants compression. Most authors write these documents in a rush at the end, alone, with no reference, after the part of the brain that loves the book has lost the knack of compressing it.

The Ship Dock is the workspace in StoryHelm where you build those materials. It draws on what the analysis already knows about your manuscript, the cast, the central conflict, the genre signals, the pacing, so the draft StoryHelm hands you starts from the real shape of your book rather than a blank page.

Ship Dock covers five things in particular:

• Logline: the single sentence that names the protagonist, the want, the obstacle, and the stakes. It becomes the first line of the blurb, the ad headline, and the series-page one-liner.
• Comp titles: two or three recent, comparable books. They set your Amazon categories, your ad targets, and the "for readers of" line in the blurb.
• Synopsis: the full-plot summary, ending included, that shows the story holds together from first page to last. It is the raw material for your blurb, your back matter, and the newsletter that sells the next book.
• Bestseller benchmark: a read on where your manuscript sits against 11 concrete conventions of its genre, among them the expected word-count band, how quickly the opening establishes its hook, and chapter length. Each shows your score beside a genre average, an estimate rather than sales data, so you can see the places your book runs short or long before a reader does.
• Query letter: the one-page pitch for the deals that still need one: a foreign-rights agent, an audio publisher, a hybrid press, or a traditional agent if you go that way. The hook, a short paragraph on the book, the housekeeping, and a brief bio. Ship Dock's draft leaves the recipient, the comps, and the bio for you to fill in.

What each output does at launch

It draws on the analysis, it does not replace it

The Ship Dock sits at the end of the line. Its drafts wait for a finished read of the whole book, so by then the Plot DNA and the rest of the analysis have already mapped your scenes, your threads, and your genre signals. The Ship Dock reads from that map, so your logline reflects the actual central conflict and your comps reflect the book you actually wrote rather than the book you meant to write.

An example

The hardest job in a pitch is the logline: one sentence that names the real stakes. Almost every first draft hedges, naming a situation instead of a choice. Here is a logline written from memory beside the one-line version Ship Dock drafts from the analysis, shown on an invented book.