First-page critique x 2

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By Joe Moore
@JoeMoore_writer

Today we present 2 first-page submissions– sort of a buy one, get one free or 2 for the price of one. You get the idea. My comments follow each.

CHAPTER 1.O

They say bad things happen fast but good things take forever, like saving up a hundred dollars one penny at a time.

I don’t know about that. Looking back it seems more like a cartoon avalanche that started with a pebble that hit a stone that hit a rock that hit a boulder that just buried me and everybody and everything I knew and loved.

Knowing what I know now I can see that it wasn’t a series of unconnected random events; even if that’s what they had meant for it to look like. Everything had been meticulously planned months – or maybe years – in advance.

They had contingency plans and had contingencies for contingencies.

The only thing they hadn’t counted on was Bill.

I like this one, particularly the voice. Although it’s short and there’s no sense of place or time, I know that the narrator is in trouble. “They” caused something bad to happen to him/her and others. There’s not a lot to pick at because it is so short. But I would definitely keep reading.

Friday, 3:08 am

Dan Taylor sat in the wingback chair next to his bed, watching the quietly dreaming form of his wife in the darkness. The pale sheets rose and fell ever so slightly as she breathed. Dreaming of starting a family, he was sure. Maybe that had been possible when they were living in Camden, but he couldn’t allow it now. Not until he felt safe in his work. He just wasn’t sure how to tell her that yet.

He hadn’t slept well since they moved to North Carolina. Vicki told him countless times how much she liked living in his hometown. She seemed really happy. He still hadn’t figured out how to tell her that he wasn’t. Not at all.

To be fair, Raleigh was a nice town. Always had been. And he had to admit that finally making detective at 33 was a relief.

Still, he left a lot of personal demons behind when he moved away. Every night for the last two weeks, they invaded his dreams to remind him they were still here. Lurking. The only solace he could take was that Vicki thought he slept as well as she did at night.

If only.

Glancing out the window, he watched the ghosts of past mistakes dance before him. Long gone, but still alive in his mind’s eye. He saw the anger, the handkerchief.

The blood.

He shut his eyes, but the images only became clearer. Too long ago, he thought. I should be over this. What the hell was he thinking, coming back here?

The blare of his cell phone in the stillness made him jump. He lurched for it, his pinky finger banging on the edge of the table. His eyes flashed at the sharp jab of pain. He bit his lip to stay quiet, involuntarily shaking the injured hand.

The phone rang again and Vicki twitched, groaned from somewhere in the depths of her slumber. He picked up the cell to keep it from waking her.

“You asleep, kid?”

Kid. Mark Harris, his partner, insisted on calling him that. Dan glanced at the face of his alarm clock, shining blue in the early morning darkness. He grimaced.

“Harris, it’s three o’clock,” he whispered. He considered going in the other room, but watching Vicki sleep was calming. Dan needed that calm right now.

OK, the good news is that I see this as strong writing. I feel the narrator’s pain. I have a vivid sense of place. I am aware of his mental and emotional tension including the conflict of family planning between the cop and his wife. Within a few sentences, I believe he is a three-dimensional character. There’s a wonderful sprinkling of backstory without explaining anything or slowing us down. And of course the proverbial call to action. We know there’s a dark past and more bad things are coming. We’ve been given a quick setup and now we’re ready. We read on.

Now the bad news. I’ve seen or read this central casting setup more times than I care to remember. Although it’s written well, it’s a cliché. There’s nothing fresh or unique or different here. Still, I see an excellent writer at work and would keep reading.

Thanks to both brave authors for submitting their work. Good luck to you both.

How about the rest of you Zoners? Any thoughts?

Transitions: Building bridgesbetween your plot islands

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Put on your waders because we’re going deep into the fiction-writing bulrushes today. I want to talk about one of my favorite micro-topics — transitions. Actually, maybe it’s quicksand we’re wading into, because if your book doesn’t have good transitions, it can sink faster than Janet Leigh’s ’57 Ford in Psycho.
We talk a lot here at TKZ about how important pacing is, and transitions go along way to creating that seamless narrative flow you need as your story shifts in time, location, or point-of view. But here’s the thing: Transitions look easy but they can be tricky to get right.
I think I dwell on transitions so much because I work with a co-author. Kelly and I write our books by talking out the plot then writing alternating chapters. So we don’t have the normal one-brain flow of a unified writing procedure. We always know the purpose of each chapter but often we write with no clear idea of what the links between the chapters will be. Sometimes we just leave red-ink pleas like this for each other —INSERT BETTER ENDING HERE — then we deal with links in rewrites.
I used to think this was nuts but then I read an interview with Katherine Anne Porter wherein she described her writing process as “creating scene islands” and “building bridges” between them. This gave me great comfort, knowing I could approach writing like a good engineer. Getting my chapters to flow became akin to making the long journey to Key West. 

It also made me think that maybe the island-bridge analogy is useful for those of you who work alone. Because the scene (and by extension chapter) is the terra firma of your plot structure and once you have that solid you can always go back and figure out the best ways to move between those plot clots. A consistent problem I see with critique manuscripts is that the writer often doesn’t know where to end a chapter for maximum impact. And that leads to not knowing where to pick up the next one. It is helpful, I think, for writers who struggle with this to concentrate on figuring out what the MAIN PURPOSE of each scene/chapter is, write that plot clot, and then fine tune the bridges later. I’ve often found that if I just keep telling the story — even if that means sticking in some really pedestrian transition just to keep moving forward — that when I go back later in rewrites the perfect transition jumps out at me.

So what exactly is a transition? Well, there are all kinds. Most are straightforward and literal; some are complex and sophisticated. But all good transitions do one thing: They strengthen the internal logic of your story by moving readers from idea to idea, scene to scene, and chapter to chapter with grace and ease. I’m going to move the lens out here and just talk about chapter transitions for now. Here’s some of the ones I’ve identified. Maybe you guys have some others?
Time Transition: This is when you want to move forward (or occasionally backward) in time with your story. These are pretty workmanlike but very useful in that they simply bridge time from your previous scene. (Unless noted, all examples here are from our latest book HEART OF ICE).

Chapter 4

It was nearly three by the time Louis met Flowers at the docks.

Chapter 7

Just over an hour later, Dagliesh had left the headland and was driving west along A1151. (P.D. James)

A word about time stamps. These are the tags you see at chapter beginnings ie “Sunday” or “November 1967” or even just “Later that day.” I have a slight bias against time stamps because too often they are a cop-out by a writer who can’t figure out how to gracefully weave time changes in the narrative. But sometimes you really need them, especially thriller writers who work on big canvases. If your story is happening at two different times, time stamps help the reader move between the threads, i.e. “New Orleans, 1855” or “Kabul 1999.” In his thriller The Phoenix Apostles, our own Joe Moore (with Lynn Sholes) pin-balls between Mexico, the Bahamas, Paris in present time and Reno, Washington D.C. and even 1899 Chicago. Without his time/location stamps we’d be lost!

Time/location tags can be pretty elaborate. In her complex novel about 9/11, Absent Friends, S.J. Rozan weaves multiple narratives together by using tags like so:

 PHIL’S STORY
Chapter Six
___
The Invisible Man
Steps Between You and the Mirror

This is grad school stuff; Rozan knows what she’s doing. Another good use of time stamps is found in Gone Girl. Gillian Flynn must find a way to bring the missing wife Amy to life so Flynn alternates the husband Nick’s present-day narrative with his wife’s diary entries, all clearly marked with time/name stamps.

Point of View Transition: When you move between characters, you could just pick up with the new character’s voice. But the flow can be enhanced if you find a way to subtly link them. Here is Louis talking to a police chief about the abandoned hunting lodge where they just found old bones at the end of Chapter 6:

“Nobody comes here. It’s just a broken down old dump,” the chief said.
Louis shook his head. “No, it’s important. It’s his Room 101.”
“What?”
“It’s from Orwell…1984.”
“Never read it.”
Flowers moved away and Louis looked back at the lodge. He could still recall the exact quote from the book – maybe because it reminded him of things in his foster homes he wanted to forget.
The thing in Room 101 is the worst thing in the world.

Chapter 7

There were thousands of them. Small, black jelly-bean creatures crawling around the plastic bin, piggybacking one another to get to that one last shred of meat on the bone.
The beetle larvae were hungry today.
This skull would be ready by nightfall.
Danny Dancer made sure the lid was secure on the bin and left the room.

By using the Orwell “room” quote we tried to lead the reader to the horror of what they were about to see in Danny Dancer’s room. Change of POV but bridged with purpose.

Continued Narrative Transition: Here, the story simply continues from what came in previous chapter. The main artistic choice you makeis how much time elapses between scenes. It can be minutes, days or years. Here’s John Sandford ending Chapter 14:

“He tried to hang Spivak, for Christ’s sake,” Lucas said, exasperated.
“That was just part of the job,” Harmon said. “You can understand that.”

Chapter 15

Lucas couldn’t. He got off the phone, breathing hard for a few minutes, backed off the gas.

Sometimes, the continued narrative transition can be deep in a character’s pysche. Here’s a nice transition  from Jeff Lindsay’s Dearly Devoted Dexter at the end of chapter 10:

The only reason I ever thought about being human was to be more like him.

Chapter 11

And so I was patient. Not an easy thing, but it was the Harry thing.

The thing with this transition is that you the writer have to make calculated decisions on where to pick up the action  and what you can leave out in the lapse. Say you end a chapter with a cop getting a call at home to come to a  crime scene. Where do you pick up the thread? Do you show him strapping on the gun, getting in the car, walking up to the yellow tape? Or is it more effective to begin the next chapter with “As Nick took his first look at the woman’s body, he realized with a start he had seen her face before.” Here’s exactly such a passage from Val McDermid’s splendid A Place of Execution:

End of Chapter 11

The door to the caravan burst open and Grundy stood in the framed doorway, his face the bloodless grey of the Scardale crags. “They’ve found a body,” he said.

Chapter 12

Peter Crowther’s body was huddled in the lee of a dry-stone wall three miles due south of Scardale as the crow flies. It was curled in on itself in a fetal crouch, knees tucked up to the chin. The overnight frost that had turned the roads treacherous had given it a sugar coating of hoar.

Action/Reaction Transition: When you have a juicy action scene it can be very effective to break at just after the action peak and open next chapter with a character-focused reaction: Here is the end of our chapter 17, an ambush where Chief Flowers gets shot.

“Clear! We’re clear! Get the ambulance in here now!”
Louis’s heart was finally slowing but he still had to blink to clear his head. Joe was kneeling by Flowers, and from somewhere down the dirt road sirens wailed.
He heard a whimper and looked down at Danny Dancer. The bastard was crying. Curled up like a baby and crying.

 Chapter 18

How could he have been so stupid? He knew that anyone who showed an abnormal interest in a crime scene was someone who needed to be treated with suspicion.
Yet he had allowed Flowers, who was blind to the idea that anyone on his island could be a cold-blooded murderer, walk into a crazy man’s line of fire.

At beginning of Chapter 18, an hour has elapsed and Louis is waiting in the hospital as Flowers lays dying. We chose this transition because the “quiet” moment of Chapter 18 provides relief for the reader after the tension of the ambush, much like letting you catch your breath after the steep drop of a roller coaster. It’s all about pacing.

Descriptive Transition: This is another way to alter your pacing. Say you had a explaining-the-case chapter with heavy dialogue between investigators. It’s often effective then to go from staccato to legato and open the next chapter with a descriptive passage. And yes, you can use weather — in moderation!  It is also a good way of telling your readers where we are. I’m of the mind that description transitions should only be used early in your story because they can slow things down too much once your plot-engine gets really chugging. UNLESS, like Joe Moore, you are globe-hopping, and then a well-honed location description can be a sturdy bridge. Here’s Elaine Viets in Murder With Reservations, opening chapter 3 with a description that also slips in some protag’s backstory:

Helen grew up in St. Louis, where houses were redbrick boxes with forest green shutters. To her, the Coronado Tropic Apartments were wrapped in romance. The Art Deco building was painted a wildly impractical white and trimmed an exotic turquoise. The Corondado had sensuous curves. Palm trees whispered to purple waterfalls of bougainvillea. 

Echo Transition: This is a nifty little device wherein you end a chapter stressing a certain word then use that word again as your bridge to the next. It’s like a grace note in music. Lee Child is a master of this and here’s the end of his chapter 6:

“You have to do something.”
“I will do something. Believe it,” Reacher said. “You don’t throw my friends out of helicopters and live to tell the tale.”
Neagley said, “No, I want you to do something else.”
“Like what?”
“I want you to put the old unit back together.”

 Chapter 7

The old unit. It had been a typical Army intervention. About three years after the need for it had become blindingly obvious to everyone else, the Pentagon had started to think about it.

The Parallel Transition: This can be really cool but if you whiff on it, it just looks like you’re showing off. This is used when you are shifting POV’s. It is conscious repetition of an idea, image or symbol between two chapters. Like the Echo Transition, it creates an almost musical connection in the reader’s mind, like a good hook in pop music. And it doesn’t always come at the end/beginning of chapters. Here’s the first paragraph of Chapter 1 of our thriller A Killing Song. We are in the killer’s POV in Paris as he watches his next victim:

He couldn’t take his eyes off her. The last rays of the setting sun slanted through the stained glass window over her head, bathing her in a rainbow. He knew it was just a trick of light, that the ancient glass makers added copper oxide to make the green, cobalt to make the blue, and real gold to make the red. He knew all of this. But still, she was beautiful.

Here is the opening of chapter 2, from the protagonist’s POV as he watches his sister dancing in a Miami Beach nightclub:

I couldn’t take my eyes off of her. Maybe it was because I hadn’t seen her in two years and in that time she had passed through the looking glass that separates girls from women. Whatever it was, Mandy was beautiful and I couldn’t stop staring.

This was a calculated thing for us because the book’s theme is partly about the two men whose lives spiral out of control and the fine line between violence that is driven inward and outward. (And yes, we mixed first and third POV but that’s a different post for another day.)

Two last thoughts about building bridges. First, transitions are just a tool, a part of your writer’s technique, and as such you can learn to use them with flair and confidence. Study writers you admire. Go grab a book and open to the blank spots between chapters. Then analyze how the writer has moved through time and space, how he has bridged the gaps between his chapters. You’ll find that most of the time, the best writers adhere to the golden rule: KISS. They keep it simple, stupid. Which leads me to my last thought:

 Don’t over-think this. Resist the urge to build this:

When all you need is this:

Your first job as storyteller is to just keep the reader moving between your islands. You don’t want them to stop and admire turrets, filigree and gargoyles. More often than not, a sturdy little span is the best way across.

First Page Critique – A Rose to Love

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Here is today’s first page critique – ‘A Rose to Love’

My comments and feedback follow.


    “So, what’s she like?” Will asked as he took a sugar packet and stirred it into his coffee. They were sitting in a booth in the Coffee House next door to their private detective agency.
    Jesse, tapping on his laptop keyboard, barely looked up. “What’s who like?”
    “You know.” Will narrowed his eyes and leaned forward in the booth. “The woman who’s moving into the apartment upstairs. What’s her name again? And doesn’t she move in today?”
    Jesse took a sip of his coffee before replying. “Guinevere Russo and yes. She should be here any time now.”
    “So, what’s she like?” Will raised his eyebrows meaningfully.
    “I don’t know. I haven’t met her. I only did a background check on her.”
    “I thought that was the whole point of a background check.” Will had learned long ago to never doubt Jesse’s thoroughness. Because of his expertise, their clientele included several lawyers, various businesses and even the police departments in and around Chicago. Not only was Jesse expert at background checks, he was amazing at finding people who didn’t want to be found. 
    Jesse sighed and looked up from his laptop. “Yes, but sometimes, even with the best and deepest background checks, there are surprises.” In their detective agency, Jesse handled the ‘cyber-investigations’ and Will did the more ‘hands-on’ field work. His expertise was in noticing details about people and at crime scenes. They were a good team. Jesse helped Will to become more savvy on the Internet and Will got Jesse out of the office for surveillance work, on-site crime scene investigation, and other jobs that required two sets of eyes.  
    “Nah, you’re too good.” Will dismissed Jesse’s reservations. The man even did some work for the FBI and CIA. Will doubted there would be too many surprises. His partner was just very cautious. “So, is she pretty?”
    Jesse’s eyes widened and then he frowned. Will couldn’t tell if he had touched a nerve or if the man was distracted by whatever he was doing on his laptop. He tapped at his computer some more before replying. “No, she’s not pretty, not like Hollywood pretty. She’s …” He looked up at the ceiling then back at his laptop. “She’s beautiful, but that doesn’t mean much.”
    In all the years he had known Jesse, Will had never heard him describe a woman as beautiful. This should be interesting. 


         My comments:


    First of all, I’m proceeding on the assumption (based on both the title and this first page) that this is a work of romantic suspense. 

    My initial feeling, reading this first page, was that it was the start of a pretty clear (and possibly all too predictable) ‘set-up’ for a romance. Although I thought the style worked well – the sentences are lucid and the back story introduced succinctly and successfully – there wasn’t much in the way of real suspense. Not enough at least to get me intrigued from the get go. The fact that Jesse was a background checker extraordinaire who had never described a woman as beautiful wasn’t quite enough – at least for me. 

    The strength of this as a first page, however, is definitely in the writing style (I liked the fact it was clear and cleanly written). However, I needed more ambiguity and tension to feel compelled by the story. To me this page read more like a romance and less like a mystery/thriller/suspense novel. The fact that Will and Jesse own a private detective agency suggests that this book will involve both romance and suspense – so I think a first page needs to balance both elements to succeed. I also was a little confused as to why they felt the need to do a thorough tenant background check on the person  moving into the upstairs apartment – sounded like overkill unless there’s something more to the story than on the page. 

    It could be that the author needs to start the book off at a different point in time – perhaps when Jesse first sees Guinevere Russo and suspects there’s something that the background check missed. We need something that shocks, disrupts or at least throws us off guard as readers. We need to be shown, not told, that there’s something intriguing as well as beautiful about the new tenant upstairs. As Jim is always saying, the explanations can come later…

    BTW- One little nitpicking quibble – Coffee House should only be capitalized if this is actually its name – otherwise just coffee house… 

    So TKZers what’s your feedback on this as a first page?

    Supercharge your NaNoWriMo Novel With One, Simple Exercise

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    NaNoWriMo is in the air! The crisp bite of the breeze, the

    vibrations of leaves in trees, the upward tick in sales of books about how to write a novel in a month—can the sound of keyboards clacking like Flamenco dancers on Red Bull be far behind?

    Yes, it’s time once again for National Novel Writing Month. Each November, writers around the world commit to writing a 50,000 word novel in one month (an average of 1,666.6667 words a day). It’s a blast, a communal expression of the love of writing fiction. And a kick in the pants to produce the words and not sit around Starbucks all day talking about writing a novel someday.
    I’ve written before on how to get ready for NaNoWriMo. Today, I want to offer a simple exercise that will keep you from merely producing scenes without any coherence, which is the big challenge in this hard-charging contest. (I also commend to you an excellent post by Lisa Cron over at Writer Unboxed).
    I call this exercise “Because…”
    It has two parts. First, you hone your basic plot into a single sentence. Then, you add a “because” clause which explains what’s at stake.
    Your plot sentence consists of an adjective, a noun and a verb clause (the action). Thus:
    Gone With the Wind is about a Southern belle who has to fight to save her home during the Civil War.
    Die Hardis about a New York cop who has to save a building full of people from a gang of ruthless terrorists.
    Casablancais about an American cafe owner in French occupied territory during WWII, who has to battle Nazis and lost love and a corrupt police captain.
    Every plot can be rendered in this fashion, and it’s important that you know this much about yours.
    Now, once you have that, add a “because” sentence that explains what the stakes are. Don’t worry about the form of the sentence, just pack into it the reasons the Lead character in your novel has to succeed. Turn it into a paragraph if you want to. It’s all for you.
    Gone With the Wind is about a southern belle who has to fight to save her home during the Civil War….because if she loses it, she’ll be dependent on others for her existence and will never be a woman of strength or substance.
    Die Hard is about a New York cop who has to save a building full of people from a gang of ruthless terrorists….because if he loses, his ex-wife will die along with the other hostages, and he will have failed in his most essential cop duty, saving people from bad guys.
    Casablancais about an American cafe owner in French occupied territory during WWII, who has to battle Nazis and lost love and a corrupt police captain….because if he loses, the war effort will be harmed (the Nazis will win) and he’ll have destroyed the lives of several people around him. And also if he loses, he’ll have become a wretched individual with no concern about others, sadly drinking himself to death, having lost whatever ideals he once held.
    Believe me, this little exercise is going to pay big dividends for you. During NaNo, if you start to feel lost, simply go back to this controlling premise and think up fresh scenes for the Lead character, which scenes involve him taking steps to solve the main problem.
    Let’s say we’ve started writing Casablanca and we come to the point where Rick sees Ilsa in his cafe for the first time. What a great scene we’ve written! They look at each other, and Rick’s heart pounds with a mix of love and hate, desire and the pain of betrayal. Now what?
    We brainstorm some scenes. What could happen next?
    – Rick punches Ilsa’s husband, Victor Laszlo, in the face, and a big fight ensues
    – Rick throws a drink in Ilsa’s face, and Laszlo socks Rick
    – Ilsa runs out into the night and Rick chases after her
    – Rick gets drunk and waits for her to show up
    After some reflection, we decide on the last one. Gives us an opportunity for Rick to remember what happened in Paris. Then Ilsa comes in. We envision Ilsa falling into Rick’s arms….no, not enough conflict….how about she tries to explain what happened in Paris and Rick basically calls her a whore….ooh, that sounds right, because our premise tells us the novel is partly about whether Rick will end up as a wretched human being….
    And so on throughout the month of November.
    So who’s up for NaNoWriMo 2013?
    ***

    In honor of NaNoWriMo, my Knockout Novel program is being offered at a special price ($10 off). I highly recommend Knockout for both planning and editing, so it’s perfect pre- and post-NaNo…and on any project at any stage. I use it in tandem with Scrivener for my own books. 

    To She or Not to She

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    By Elaine Viets

        11849505-men-at-work-sign-illustration

    When I was growing up, men were men and he meant everyone, men and women both. Not any more, bud. Now we want gender neutral writing.
        Too bad English lacks a pronoun that includes men and women both.
        I believe words have power, and using he to mean both sexes disenfranchises women. I weasel around the dilemma by using they. That works, most of the time.  When it doesn’t, I alternate between using he and she, giving separate but equal treatment to the sexes.
        I’ve tried to sneak in their as a singular pronoun, but my publisher’s copyeditors put the kabosh on that. Copyeditors put the “cop” in editing, issuing citations for breaking the rules.

    pens

    Recently, my copyeditor friend Les Weatherford addressed that issue. Most of this blog is stolen from Les.
        Les doesn’t like the term sexist. That word “seems a bit harsh, a bit accusatory.” Here are Les’s thoughts on what he calls “a significant hitch in the English language.”
        Consider this example: The president said success depended on everyone working as hard as ______ could.

    menatwork
        How do you fill in that blank? “You can’t use it,” Les said. “That doesn’t refer to people. They? Grammatically incorrect. The subject of the clause is the singular.”
        He proposes these options:
        “Recast the sentence to make the clause plural: The president said success depended on everyone working as hard as they could. But the emphasis shifts from the individual to the group, which may not be the president’s intent.
        “Use two pronouns: The president said success depended on everyone working as hard as he or she could. That reads fine in a single sentence, but  becomes cumbersome when repeated over long passages.
        “Follow the rule that many of us were taught in grade school: He equals he or she: The president said success depended on everyone working as hard as he could. Problem: Sexist.” Er, not gender-neutral.
        “Be creative: The president said success depended on everyone working as hard as s/he could. Problem: It’s ugly. Says one writer: ‘That’s just god-awful. It might even imply some sort of gender-reassignment surgery has occurred.’

    christine
        “Rules were made to be broken. Go with the flow: The president said success depended on everyone working as hard as they could. Problem: singular subject, plural pronoun. Purists will beat you to a pulp.
        “Persuade the academic authorities to come up with a neuter pronoun. Here is the sentence as it would be written with a pronoun set proposed in 1975 by Christine Elverson: The president said success depended on everyone working as hard as ey could.” Yeah, ey and eir. Look like typos, don’t they?
        “Problem:  Elverson proposed ey nearly four decades ago. When was the last time you used it in a sentence?” Never!
        Les popped the question to writers and editors. He read their responses and came to this conclusion:
        “The storytellers like their. Most formal writers prefer he or she or she or he but acknowledge that their probably is going to win and that they can live with that. The universal he hangs on with one vote. Nobody suggested creating a set of neuter pronouns.”pens2
        Les believes “their and they eventually will win. Only the people who say ‘It is I’ will stick to the universal he, and they are dying off day by day.”
        Thank you for your research, Les. You’ve proved Les is more.
        TMZ readers and writers, where are you on this issue?

    First Page Critique: PHV

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    Nancy J. Cohen

    Today we have the privilege of reading the first page of “PHV.” My critique follows.

    “I want out.”

    I squared my shoulders and said it louder, “I’m finished. I want out of the firm.” I repeated it three times.

    Silence. Then a loud honk from behind let me know the light had turned green. I hit the gas and made the short sprint to the next stoplight. Usually the downtown traffic made me crazy.

    However, today I was in no hurry. Today, I planned on telling my dad that I quit. He and the firm could do their deals without me mopping up after billionaire clients and their obnoxious offspring. I was done being his cleaner.

    I made a quick right turn the wrong way into an alley and pulled into a trash strewn vacant lot. The garage attached to our office building had been under construction for three months and I’d made a deal with the owner to park here. So far, all he had charged me was getting a nephew out of a marijuana jackpot. Given the price of parking in Dallas, that was cheap.

    Practicing my speech one more time in the side view mirror, I grabbed my briefcase and picked my way through the beer bottles and burger wrappers to a hidden door leading to the garage elevator. I’d already ruined on pair of heels in this mess and had no desire to do it again.

    Thankfully, the elevator was still running. The construction supervisor told me that until we were out of dutch with the city, it was technically closed down, but they used it anyway. He’d slipped me a maintenance key. The price? One DUI. Again, to avoid walking around the block to the front door, it was well worth a couple of phone calls. I was used to barter. It’s what I did.
     
    The elevator doors slid open at three where my office was located. Since I wasn’t on the letterhead at dad’s law firm; I insisted on being separate from the sixth floor suite. Plus, I didn’t like it up there with the Texas hair and two-thousand dollar boots. I did my best work when I could blend into the background.

    To my surprise, the upper floors of the garage were silent. I heard none of the usual jackhammers, concrete saws, and swearing that had greeted me since the building inspector had threatened to condemn the structure. What I did see was the ass end of a black Suburban parked by the landing and I heard voices coming down the stairwell. Something was wrong here. I hadn’t seen a non-construction vehicle on my floor in weeks. Ducking under the plastic chain with the “Out of Order” sign dangling from it, I crossed the short hallway to a window overlooking the front of the building.

    MY CRITIQUE FOLLOWS

     
    “I want out.” GOOD OPENING LINE. I AM WONDERING WHAT IT IS HE WANTS TO ESCAPE. 

    I squared my shoulders and said it louder, “I’m finished. I want out of the firm.” I repeated it three times. DON’T KNOW THAT THE LAST LINE IS NECESSARY. WE GET THE POINT. 

    Silence. Then a loud honk from behind let me know the light had turned green. I hit the gas and made the short sprint to the next stoplight. Usually the downtown traffic made me crazy.  

    OOPS, I HAD NO IDEA HE WAS SITTING IN TRAFFIC. HE MAY HAVE BEEN TALKING ON THE PHONE OR IN HIS OFFICE. MAYBE ESTABLISH LOCATION RIGHT AWAY BY SAYING HIS FOOT PRESSED HARDER ON THE BRAKES IN THE SECOND PARAGRAPH? 

    However, today I was in no hurry. Today, I planned on telling my dad that I quit. He and the firm could do their deals without me mopping up after billionaire clients and their obnoxious offspring. I was done being his cleaner. 

    OH, SO HE’S TALKING TO HIMSELF? MAYBE MENTION HE’S PRACTICING HIS SPEECH. 

    CHANGE LINES TO: I pressed my foot harder on the brake and said it louder for practice: “I’m finished. I want out of the firm.” 

    CLEANER HAS ANOTHER CONNOTATION FOR ME. IF YOU WATCH NIKITA, THAT’S THE NAME FOR THE ASSASSINS WHO DISSOLVE BODIES IN ACID. THEY CLEAN UP FOR THE FIRM, TOO, BUT A DIFFERENT KIND. 

    I made a quick right turn the wrong way into an alley and pulled into a trash strewn vacant lot. The garage attached to our office building had been under construction for three months and I’d made a deal with the owner to park here. So far, all he had charged me was getting a nephew out of a marijuana jackpot. Given the price of parking in Dallas, that was cheap. 

    Practicing my speech one more time in the side view mirror, I grabbed my briefcase and picked my way through the beer bottles and burger wrappers to a hidden door leading to the garage elevator. HE’S LOOKING IN THE SIDE VIEW MIRROR AT THE SAME TIME AS HE’S PICKING HIS WAY TO THE DOOR? WATCH YOUR GRAMMAR. I’d already ruined on pair of heels in this mess and had no desire to do it again. HEELS? IT’S A WOMAN? CAN YOU INDICATE THIS SOONER, LIKE WHEN SHE PRESSES ON THE BRAKES? 

    Thankfully, the elevator was still running. The construction supervisor told me that until we were out of dutch THIS MUST BE SLANG BUT I’M NOT SURE WHAT IT MEANS with the city, it was technically closed down, but they used it anyway. He’d slipped me a maintenance key. The price? One DUI. Again, to avoid walking around the block to the front door, it was well worth a couple of phone calls. I was used to barter. It’s what I did.  
     
    The elevator doors slid open at three where my office was located. Since I wasn’t on the letterhead at dad’s law firm; COMMA INSTEAD OF SEMI-COLON I insisted on being separate from the sixth floor suite. Plus, I didn’t like it up there with the Texas hair and two-thousand dollar boots REFERRING TO MEN OR WOMEN HERE?. I did my best work when I could blend into the background. 

    To my surprise, the upper floors of the garage were silent. GOOD FORESHADOWING I heard none of the usual jackhammers, concrete saws, and swearing that had greeted me since the building inspector had threatened to condemn the structure. What I did see was the ass end of a black Suburban parked by the landing INSERT COMMA and I heard voices coming down the stairwell.
     
    NEW PARAGRAPH. Something was wrong here. I hadn’t seen a non-construction vehicle on my floor in weeks. Ducking under the plastic chain with the “Out of Order” sign dangling from it, I crossed the short hallway to a window overlooking the front of the building. AGAIN, WATCH YOUR “ING” PHRASES. TECHNICALLY, HE’S DUCKNG WHILE CROSSING THE HALLWAY. YOU COULD CORRECT THIS BY ADDING THE WORD “AFTER” BEFORE DUCKING. 

    NOT SURE OF HER LOCATION HERE. SHE’S STILL IN THE GARAGE? IF SO, WHY IS THERE A WINDOW? MAYBE IT’S BECAUSE I LIVE IN FLORIDA, BUT OUR ABOVE-GROUND GARAGES DON’T HAVE WINDOWS. OPEN AIR SPACES , YES. 
     
    MORE COMMENTS:

    This story is intriguing in that something is wrong when the narrator arrives at work. I think you’d raise suspense by having the story start there. Like this: 

    Something was wrong. I hadn’t seen a non-construction vehicle on my garage floor in weeks. So what was that black Suburban doing parked by the landing? Nor did I hear the usual jackhammers or concrete saws that had greeted me ever since the building inspector threatened to condemn the structure.

    With some tightening, this could come across as a lot more suspenseful. I’d also prefer a hint of something more about this person other than she plans to quit her father’s firm. That can be rather clichéd. Maybe tell us what she’d rather be doing with her life. I don’t get much of a sense of her personality. It’s a good start, though!
     
    NOTE: I am away on a research trip and will not be able to respond to comments. Thanks in advance for your replies.
     

    TKZ-recommended Indie Publishing Resources List Posted, Dictionary of Vintage Crime Terms

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    In case you missed it: We’ve posted the list of TKZ-recommended Indie Publishing Resources as a link in the sidebar (“Indie Publishing Resources We Love”). The list, which was requested by readers during a Reader Friday discussion, includes indie publishing resources that have actually been used by members of the TKZ community. If you would like to add to the list or make corrections, please leave a comment in the list document, or in the Comments following this blog post. Thanks!

    Found Treasures: Dictionary of 19th-century Crime Terms

    “The Secret Language of Crime” is a delightful dictionary of vintage crime lingo. Written in 1859 by the Police Chief of New York City, the dictionary contains priceless words that cast a spell from the past: “barnacles” for handcuffs; “beau-traps” for fortune hunters;  “cheese” as a command to be quiet and listen. 

    You can read more about resources for vintage words over at The New York Times. Take a look at the dictionary and tell us, which word do you think should be resurrected for modern use? My vote goes to “ambidexter,” for someone who befriends both sides of an issue. We could use some more ambidexters in Congress this week!



    Phrasing for Immediacy and Power

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    I’m excited to announce that editor and award-winning author, Jodie Renner, is joining TKZ. Jodie has made numerous guest appearances here, sharing her wealth of knowledge and experience with everyone. She will be a terrific addition to our team. We look forward to seeing Jodie’s posts as she alternates with Clare on Mondays. Welcome to the Zone, Jodie. – Joe Moore

    Thanks so much, Joe! I’m honored to join such a talented, articulate group of writers here on The Kill Zone! – Jodie Renner

    BTW, for any of you authors interested in techniques for adding tension, suspense and intrigue to your novels, I have two articles on this topic in the latest two issues of Suspense Magazine.

    * * *

    State Cause Before Effect, Stimulus before Response

    by Jodie Renner

    Have you ever been engrossed in a novel, reading along, when you hit a blip that made you go “huh?” or “why?” for a nanosecond? Then you had to reread the sentence to figure out what’s going on?

    Often, it’s because actions are written in a jumbled-up or reversed order, rather than the order they occurred. Do this too often, and your readers will start getting annoyed.

    For example:
    John pulled the Mercedes up and Karen got her brand-new shoes soaking wet when she quickly opened the door and stepped right into a puddle.

    First the reader reads: “John pulled the Mercedes up and Karen got her brand-new shoes soaking wet” and goes “Huh?”, then reads the rest and is subliminally irritated that he had to reformulate his original thought-image.

    Better: John pulled the Mercedes up and Karen quickly opened the door and stepped out — right into a puddle. Her brand new shoes were soaking wet.

    In my blog post here last Wed. on bringing your characters to life by showing their reactions and emotions, I discussed showing immediate, visceral reactions before the delayed, reasoned ones. In other words, showing character reactions in the order they occur, starting with the emotional reaction and automatic reflex, which should occur immediately after the stimulus, just like it does in real life, not with a delay to explain anything.

    Along the same vein, when showing actions and reactions in your fiction, it’s important to pay attention to the syntax of the sentence.

    In general, state the cause before the effect, the action before the reaction, the stimulus before the response.

    This way, the ideas flow more naturally and smoothly, and readers don’t have to skip back in the sentence to figure out what’s going on, which confuses them momentarily and jolts them out of the story.

    As Ingermanson and Economy say in Writing Fiction for Dummies, “Here’s a critical rule: Always get the time sequence correct and always put the cause before the effect.”

    Similarly, Dwight V. Swain discusses this same issue when he talks about “motivation-reaction units” in his excellent book, Techniques of the Selling Writer.

    Here are some “before and after” examples, disguised, from my fiction editing. The “after” examples are just one or two of many possibilities.

    ~ State little actions in the order they occur:

    Before: David yelled out in pain when the door slammed on his fingers.

    After: The door slammed on David’s fingers and he yelled out in pain.

    Or: The door slammed on David’s fingers. He leaped back and yelled out in pain.

    Before: She pulled her arm away when the man tried to grab her.

    After: The man tried to grab her, but she pulled her arm away.

    Or: The man tried to grab her arm, but she pulled away.

    ~ Describe physically sequential actions in the order they occurred:

    Before: Jake walked the five hundred yards over to the police station and left his car in front of the restaurant.

    After: Jake left his car in front of the restaurant and walked the five hundred yards over to the police station.

    Before: Rushing to escape the flames, he turned towards the fire escape as soon as he’d left the room.

    After: Rushing to escape the flames, he ran out of the room towards the fire escape.

    Before: Boyd jumped out of the car as he reached the parking lot and ran into the building.

    After: Boyd drove into the parking lot, jumped out of the car, and ran into the building.

    As I said, if you don’t write the actions in the order they occurred, it causes momentary confusion for the reader. Do that enough and they start getting subliminally annoyed.

    ~ Watch those “ing” verbs:

    Also, avoid using the way-too-common “ing” verbs (gerunds) for actions that occur one after the other. Verbs ending in -ing imply simultaneous action, where often, there is none:

    Before: She slammed the car door, running up the sidewalk.

    After: She slammed the car door, then ran up the sidewalk.

    Before: He took out his keys, starting the car.

    After: He took out his keys and started the car.

    In the “before” examples above, the –ing verbs imply that the actions occurred at the same time, which is impossible — she can’t run up the sidewalk as she’s slamming the door. He can’t start the car while he’s taking out his keys.

    Here are a few more disguised examples from my editing:

    Before: He disappeared for fifteen years, coming back better dressed and full of stories.

    After: He disappeared for fifteen years, then came back better dressed and full of stories

    Before: Sarah stood up and stretched, ambling over to the trash can, tossing her empty coffee cup into it.

    After: Sarah stood up and stretched, then ambled over to the trash can and tossed her empty coffee cup into it.

    ~ But break the “stimulus before response” rule occasionally for effect:

    To add more suspense and intrigue, show a character’s reaction to something shocking before describing what she is reacting to. This way, you’ll have a moment of suspense between the horrified reaction and the revelation of what’s being seen. Also, it may take a paragraph or more to describe what she’s seeing, so her reaction would be delayed, which can be a bit anticlimactic.

    Example:
    “…the beam of her flashlight scanned the floor ahead. She stopped and gasped in horror.
    Calvin lay on the concrete, his eyes starting unseeing at the ceiling. Blood spattered the floor around him. His throat had been cut from ear to ear.”

    Look through your WIP and see if there are places where you’ve put the cart before the horse. To avoid reader confusion and possible annoyance, it’s almost always best to describe events in the order they happened.

    Jodie Renner is a freelance fiction editor and the award-winning author of three craft-of-writing guides in her series An Editor’s Guide to Writing Compelling Fiction: Captivate Your Readers, Fire up Your Fiction, and Writing a Killer Thriller. She has also published two clickable time-saving e-resources to date: Quick Clicks: Spelling List and Quick Clicks: Word Usage. You can find Jodie at www.JodieRenner.com, her blog, http://jodierennerediting.blogspot.com/, and on Facebook Twitter.

    The State of Self-Publishing at This Moment in Time

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    Today’s post is brought to you by a “Happy Birthday.” On this day in 2004, the print version of Write Great

    Fiction: Plot & Structure was published by Writer’s Digest Books. I wanted it to be practical and immediately useful, the kind of book I was looking for when I was learning how to write. It was my desire to deliver writers from what I call “The Big Lie,” that good fiction writing technique cannot be learned. Bosh. Piffle. Hooey.

    I still get emails and tweets each week from authors who give the book an esteemed place in their fictional development.
    For this I am truly grateful. So thanks for allowing me a moment to toot a birthday horn and let loose a balloon. Now on to today’s subject
    •••
    We know some things about self-publishing that we didn’t know a few years ago.
    First of all, we have to define the epochs. Yes, self-publishing has epochs.
    There were the early years, which archaeologists call the Konrathian Period. Here you will find those who jumped in early and eagerly as the Kindle was taking off (late 2007 to 2010). Etched in the fossil record you’ll find names like Mr. Konrath himself, Amanda Hocking, John Locke, TKZ emeritus Boyd Morrison and many others. The period is marked by some staggering sales of 99¢ novels. Also by wild and sometimes intemperate remarks about the demise and dastardliness of traditional publishing.
    Barry Eisler ushered in the next epoch, the Lower Entrepreneurial. This was in early 2011 when Barry turned down a cool half a mil from St. Martin’s Press in order to self-publish his next John Rain thrillers. At the time I called this “The Eisler Sanction” because here was a legit and well-paid traditional author taking a businesslike look at the future and deciding to go indie. It was the sort of risk entrepreneurs take in new and untested markets. Thus, a little more intentionality had evolved out of the rough-and-tumble Konrathian.
    Over the last year or so we have entered what I call the Mature Entrepreneurial. The risks and rewards are more evident now. A certain reality has set in. We have track records that help us assess the relative merits of traditional versus indie publishing. For example, some of the risks of going straight into self-publishing:
    1. Foregoing an advance (even at the lower rates now being offered by publishers. “15k is the new 50k,” an agent told me recently).
    2. Missing out on the chance that a traditionally published novel or series might be that “one in a hundred thousand” that breaks out into huge sales and makes a “star.”
    3. Not having behind you a team that does things very well: edit, design, get books into bookstores.
    4. Getting lost in the Sargasso of mediocrity that is the digital book world.
    However, rewards look like this:
    1. Author as master of own destiny.
    2. Not roped to a single brand.
    3. Books published as soon as the author deems them ready.
    4. Royalty structure more favorable.
    But what about actual money? During the Late Konrathian and into the Lower Entrepreneurial, dollar signs sparkled in the eyes of many new writers. Dreams of scoring big with one or two books, or maybe a series of shorts, danced like a temptress in scribal heads.
    Reality has a more temperate message: Self-publishing is a volume business, and the product has to be quality. And it takes time, lots of time, to grow a customer base.
    Gee, just like any business! Imagine that!
    Also, for more and more writers, it’s not just a money game. In a recent interview at Huffington Post, Eisler says:
    Then, there’s the issue of happiness. I wouldn’t divorce money from happiness. Most people would be happy making more money than less. But my happiness quotient wasn’t driven entirely by financial considerations.
    Because of my personality and business experience, I found it very frustrating to have to entrust business decisions to people whose thinking, work process and conclusions I didn’t necessarily agree with or respect. I’ve had publishers make terrible business decisions for my books. I found it painful and frustrating to have to live with those decisions. I find it much more satisfying to be responsible for and in charge of those decisions.
    So where are we with self-publishing at this moment in time? It continues to evolve, of course. But every month we have more and more data and testimony about methods and results. Which puts us on the brink of a new epoch, The Vocational, wherein writers wisely choose their path based on what they feel called to, where they feel happiest, where their writing can flourish according to their own definition of success. 
    Which is what it should come down to, after all. Not someone else’s definition of success, but your own.
    Define it. Write it down. Then go for it.

    NOTE: I’m in travel mode today. Mix it up in the comments and I’ll get to them when I can. Talk about where you are in your publishing journey. What does the landscape look like to you?