Getting Drastic

- by ria, on Friday, 11th February 2011, 11:24am

In case any one is interested, I just cut the first 5 chapters from book 1. It doesn’t get exciting until then. Now I need to come up with 15,000 words of a more exciting start for this book.

Why are beginnings so hard? I guess it’s because so much has to be introduced, and at the same time it has to be well written and engaging.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while, and working on my query has really made me see how dull the first five chapter were. Now to come up with something better.

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category: writing

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Onwards to Book2

- by ria, on Wednesday, 26th January 2011, 4:18pm

Hey, it’s Wednesday.

I have news, too. I’m 10% through the first draft of book 2. That’s why it’s been so quiet around here. I’ve been putting all my time into outlining and starting this draft.

Other writers may laugh at this, and a lot of you may wonder how I ever wrote book1 when I say this, but for the first time today, I really had to consider two character’s points of view. Unlike book1, this book has more than one POV character and the characters are completely different.

I was writing from Zan’s (whose name will change) point of view, about Zachery and while I really had to consider her reaction, I also had to think very carefully about his. Zachery is a complicated fellow and he has a way of talking and doing things that is almost opposite to the way Zan does things. When I’m writing from Zan’s point of view I have to be careful to curb my enthusiasm when it comes to Zachery’s dialogue. I’ve cut a bunch of small talk from the last scene, because while Zan is into making conversation, Zachery isn’t.

It’s a new thing for me to have to think this much about character actions. It’s a lot easier when you have one character to worry about. I wonder should I have been worried about this stuff in book1. Should this have come up before now, and because it didn’t, does that mean all the characters in book1 except for Zachery, are shallow and one dimensional?

It’s something to bear in mind for book1′s next revision.

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Shoutout

I would like to give a shout out to Nathan Bransford. He’s running an opening paragraph competition on his blog: 4th Sort-of-Annual Stupendously Ultimate First Paragraph Challenge. That post and the ones that follow are interesting.

Reading all the entries has given me a good idea of what I like in an opening paragraph, and I think I have to say that the opening of book1 does not contain the magic ingredient. I think it’s too much about the surroundings and not enough about Zachery’s wants / needs / conflict / him being an interesting character. I think I need to open with a display of recklessness.

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category: shoutout, writing

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Opening with Action

- by ria, on Wednesday, 13th October 2010, 5:16pm

I have had problems with my opening scene since I wrote it. Until now, I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with it. I knew that it wasn’t good enough, and that was all. I read back over it today (looking for inspiration for my query letter) and I realised that the opening scene is utterly stagnant. Nothing at all happens. There is no action.

Make Things Happen

This is my personal preference but, I love books that open with action. I can’t stand a lengthy description where nothing at all is happening*. An opening that shows the main character dealing with a serious problem lets readers see his personality so much better. They instantly feel like they can relate (or not) to your main character based on the way he reacts and deals with the situation.

Now, I’m not saying open with a battle or a deadly fight. You can, but when I say action, I mean anything at all that brings the plot forward in time.

Examples

Your character is in a situation, say someone has just broken into his home. In a static opening, your character will stay where they are but he might look around, listen to the noises around him, and think about someone invading his privacy. He might also think about the people he knows, and try to figure out why this is happening. Has someone he knows let themselves into his house?

All this is fine, but all of it together at the start of a book is a bit much. There’s probably not going to be enough to keep a reader interested.

Take the same opening and straight away move your character from where he is. Immediately time comes into play and it feels like the plot is moving forward. This is what you want. You want readers to get a sense that something is happening. If you open with action, you have your character move through the house and confront whoever has broken in. Or, have him flee in fear. He should react as is appropriate for his character, but he should do something.

Things happen in Time

Time is the key to action. If you ask yourself, ‘Does time move forward in this scene?’ and if the answer is, ‘Yes,’ then you should have a scene that contains action. The only time this might not be true is if you have a montage kind of thing where you are showing time passing, but very little is happening.

Thoughts and description don’t happen in time. All thoughts and description stop the story. And you don’t want to start your book being stopped. Start in full sprint and you’ll have a better chance of catching your readers up in your momentum.

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*except the opening to the Belgariad, where Eddings is going on about Garion’s childhood – I like that opening. But that opening is so chock full of emotion and description it’s hard not to like it.

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