Ice
crytersPenpusher
When her ex-husband and the love of her life is killed by a vicious drug-manufacturing motorcycle gang, a letter-of-the-law undercover cop infiltrates the gang but must battle addiction and her moral code especially when her estranged 10 year old daughter is kidnapped by the gang.
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Great, so if the ex being killed is the inciting incident better to call him the love of her life as this is in fact what drives her not the fact that he is her ex.
Now what would be a good goal for her to pursue as a result of the killing that will resolve her problem?
Wow to much going on. You need clear Protagonists. Logliner Code of Structure.
Avoid cliches and coincidence.
yes and the i.i is the murder of her ex-husband. the other things ARE part of the main plot of the story I will tell but should not be included in the logline by the sound of things.
Remove them if they are not part of the main plot.
Inciting incident happens to the flawed MC making her must achieve a clear goal. see my example above.
I think the others have given good feedback. I’d just like to point out that if you’re writing for the international market and you stick with the drugs bit in your logline, call it crystal meth and not ice. It’s called ice in Aus and parts of Asia, but not in the US. At least that’s my understanding.
Yep; point taken about the long and verbose logline – I knew that from the beginning. No; the child being kidnapped is not an inciting Incident in my story and is also too cliched anyway (cf. Taken). Perhaps I should leave out the addiction and the kidnapping, although I’d included those to highlight the stakes my heroine faced and had to overcome. But like I said, they were midpoint events and probably don’t belong in a logline. Thoughts anyone?
This loglein is too long and wordy.
As mentioned above the daughter’s kidnapping is a better inciting incident but comes in at the end. Even if both events are in the story best to focus the logline on one plot which means one inciting incident. If this is the husband been taken then don’t mention the daughter’s kidnapping.
Her fighting her own addiction and moral code need not be mentioned all together. You can use the character description to indicate that she is an addict and will encounter harsh obstacles as a result.
As an example:
After her husband is killed by an outlaw gang an Ice addicted cop must go undercover in the gang to prevent them from killing her daughter.
Hope this helps.
Your logline: (Second attempt)
“When her ex-husband and the love of her life is killed by a vicious drug-manufacturing motorcycle gang, a letter-of-the-law undercover cop infiltrates the gang but must battle addiction and her moral code especially when her estranged 10 year old daughter is kidnapped by the gang.”
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The logline is still too long, however the ‘drug manufacturing’ line is far more clear than the original, ‘ice manufacturing’ line.
As for the rest, I think you should concentrate on either the husbands death or the kidnapping of her daughter and leave the other plot point for the script but not the logline. That will tighten the logline considerably.
That being said, I do believe this to be a solid idea for a story.
The first is the inciting incident and the abduction is a second act, mid-point event. Does the new version read better?
It sounds as if the incident that motivates the protagonist would be the kidnapping of her ten-year-old daughter. That should be the lead.
btw, what is an ice-manufacturing motorcycle gang? Is that important to the story?
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“When her husband’s killed and their daughter taken, a by-the-book officer goes undercover, but soon discovers she must break a few eggs if she’s to win the trust of the biker gang who took her child.”
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hope this helps, good luck with this!