15 words or less
Oooh… challenge!
“Please describe your book in 15 words or less.”
Two ad agencies
Clash of cultures and bodies
True love wins the day
Show vs Tell: the art of not stating the obvious
I just read arguably the worst romance novel I’ve read in a long time.
It’s taken me a while to work up the courage to blog about this (22 hours), because I am now aspiring to be published and have my book loved and accepted by dozens (I have small aspirations). Ripping into another work of fiction that actually got published is therefore kinda hypocritical. Who am I to cast the first stone? I can’t even finish a damn draft, right?
So as a writer, I tried really hard to root for the book. And I liked the premise – it had great promise. There was a hunky has-been celebrity. There was a young mother of a teenager. There was a bed and breakfast. Which meant there was a bed. And there might have been breakfast after. Cosy.
But as a reader, I couldn’t get past the annoyances. So as a book lover, I’d like to glean a couple of lessons learnt and share them with you.
- Writing from different viewpoints only works if it’s believable
This one actually freaks me out, because I’m writing in third-person which means I get to report on what each character might think or feel. This book did a Jodi Picoult, however – and wrote in first person from three points of view (POV). Which is challenging, because you’re now trying to articulate the inner-voices of three radically different characters. And if your hero’s inner voice sounds like a woman fretting – you know you’re really hearing the author, and then your character’s screwed. - Again with the hidden story!
Because of the 3 POV, the other two characters sounded like a Greek chorus to the protaganist. And I was therefore left in no doubt as to why the other two characters were behaving the way they were behaving. Seriously, the author took the mystery out of everything so there was no hidden story. And because romance novels are typically predictable (“The Hero and the Heroine end up together? Forshizz???”), all the reader has left is the fun of guessing why the hero’s being so distant, and when he’s finally going to fall in love. But instead, I got treated to a running commentary of his brain. No fun. - This is not a blog or a screenplay
If the action starts at the bar, start your scene at the bar, paint the picture, and show why your protagonist is there. Don’t tell me what she had for lunch. Or how she arrived at the bar. Or what she and her girlfriends chatted to each other about – in detail – on the way there. There were so many superfluous details that could have been done without. Again, this one makes me tremble because my characters talk heaps. And after reading this book, I’m now petrified that I’m flooding my pages with banal dialogue.
I don’t know. Perhaps I’m being too harsh. There’s a part of me oddly cheered that if a book like this got published anyway, there’s hope for me yet.
And then there’s the other part of me that’s petrified I won’t even make it that far.
The house that Jack built
“And ye shall know him by the house he keeps”
This might seem duh to most learned and experienced writers, but I read about a writing exercise that I thought was quite useful.
Namely, descibing your character’s house. Read more
And yet another about the Hidden Story
Had this blog post open for a while, because I thought this writer put it well when he said,
The major players in your story must have… subterranean motivations, and ideally provide such curiosity-sparking mysteries for your readers. Perhaps you eventually reveal what makes those gears whir — in a revelatory flashback, for instance, or a final, crucial sliver of information presented in act three — or perhaps you don’t. What’s important is that you must know what makes them tick (and tic), and slyly weave these details into your narrative.
Don’t put it all on the page. Hold a few of those cards close, damned close, to your vest. And understand that if your entire knowledge of your characters is what your readers directly experience on the page, you may have written a Good story … but probably not a Great one.
Not always so easy.
I just started the first scene of the new draft – and really, it’s the prologue. I’d devised an entire back story for the Lovable Schmuck that will probably never make it to the pages – but writing the resulting voice for him? Harder than I thought. I thought I had it when I was drafting his character, but now that I’m actually making him interact with others, I’ve had to stop and think.
The trick, I reckon, is in the nugget dropping. Leaving a trail of clues along the way before the final Ah Hah at the end. And the hardest part of all: doing it elegantly. Avoiding an extra scene, when a sentence or two will suffice. Crafting the smallest moment that paints the thousand words, without detracting from the main story but adding to it.
Am I up to the challenge? I’m hoping so.
Carrots – The art of rewarding good work
So it’s Saturday, and I have a lovely long weekend. And I’m still procrastinating, although I think I’m getting closer to doing what I need to do.
Just read a post on Word Wenches about Risk and Reward. And I suddenly remembered this nifty little notepad I bought from Kikki K in late June this year. Read more
