Grounding the Reader – First Page Critique

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 Today’s first page critique is for a piece entitled Eyes in the Ashes. By now, you all know the drill, and my comments follow:
    Layla blinked, unable to see.  She strained trying to see something, anything in the pitch-black darkness.  She groaned. Her head hurt, much worse than a hangover ever had and the pain throbbed in time with her heartbeat.  She ran her fingers over her face, her eyes.  Her eyelashes fluttered against her fingertips.  They were open, nothing covered her face, but something sticky was all over it.  She tried to think. The last thing she remembered – walking out of the back room of the art studio. She’d heard someone in the outer room and when she walked out caught a movement out of the corner of her eye, someone grabbed her and then…. Nothing. 
She couldn’t remember. She must have blacked out.  She waved her hand in front of her face.  Why can’t I see?  I can’t be blind. She tried to sit up but something tangled around her body, some sort of soft, smooth material. A sheet?   She struggled to loosen it and sat up.  The movement sent her head  spinning. She groaned, pulled her legs up and dropped her head to her knees.  “Oh God” she whimpered and the sound echoed all around her.  
“h h h hello”  she whispered.
    Her voice echoed back to her.  Something rustled behind her and from nearby came a high pitched squeak.  She drew in a startled breath and shuddered. A horrible stench stung her nose and throat. She grabbed the cloth and covered her mouth, trying not to gag. Noises all around her now, squeaking, fluttering , scratching.  She struggled to her feet, swayed when they sank into the mushy ground. Something cold and wet crept between her toes.   
    She grimaced and stumbled forward, one foot at time, dragging the sheet with her like a security blanket.  She held one hand out in front of her, groping, searching, hoping to find something solid to touch.   Her throat stung and she took shallow breaths as she shuffled forward.           
    “Don’t pass out, don’t pass out”.


My comments:


I liked the visceral sense of foreboding that this first page evoked, and the author has created a situation that is both compelling and scary. I must confess, however, to finding myself a little ‘ungrounded’ at times in the scene. 


First off, I found the phrase that her eyes “were open, nothing covered her face, but something sticky was all over it”, awkward. I started thinking about how her eyelashes could flutter if they were sticky which made me question whether her eyes had sticky stuff over them or not (which is making the reader work too hard!).  Then, having discovered this stuff all over her face, why didn’t she try and work out what it was? (I was imaging all sorts of horrible stuff…) But instead she immediately starts thinking back to what had happened at the art studio. As a reader, I confess I wanted to get a stronger sense of the horror and panic she must be feeling. 


Two paragraphs later, when the horrible stench ‘stung her nose and throat’,  I wondered how she hadn’t noticed this immediately (had there not been a stench before then?) When the cold and wet seeped between her toes, I realized I had no idea whether she was clothed or not and, given I assumed she was clothed when she was attacked, wondered how she could notice the softness of the sheet around her but not the state of her undress  (or at least the fact that she didn’t have any shoes and socks on)?  This is when I think the author needed to think through the sensory experiences depicted and make sure they were consistent and well-grounded so that, even though the reader is as unsure as the protagonist about what has happened, we feel like we have enough information to keep reading without getting confused. 


I would also have expected her to scream or yell rather than whisper ‘hello’ (I certainly would panic in this situation!) but I was willing to go along with this reaction until I learned more about her as a character. On a more pedantic note, the sentence at the end of the first paragraph: “She’d heard someone in the outer room and when she walked out caught a movement out of the corner of her eye, someone grabbed her and then…. Nothing.”  is awkwardly phrased (and grammatically incorrect – is something missing perhaps?).  I think the author needed to proof read this page a little more closely. (For another example, the word ‘stung’ is used twice which is repetitive for one page).


Otherwise, I was intrigued. I would probably keep reading but I would want to be a little more firmly grounded, in terms of her sensory experiences and location, to feel fully engaged in the story.


What do you think? 

The Case of the Thin Man and the Soft Opening

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Here is today’s first page:
The thin man bent down and scooped up a handful of burnt red sand from a beach that no longer existed. He let the coarse bits spill from his palm and into a small glass vial, a calm smile spreading across his wrinkled face.
The man crouched in silence as he capped the vial, looking out over the horizon of the Galapagos archipelago as the sun set across them, orange tendrils stretching out between the clouds.
“It’s hard to believe that such a magnificent place as this is now virtually wiped off the face of the earth,” he said, still looking out into the distance.
He spun around a moment later when no reply came, cocking his head to the side. “Don’t you think, Agent Ward?”
Agent Eli Ward turned his attention toward the man and nodded in agreement. “Certainly,” he replied, tugging at the neck of his stuffy crimson uniform. Though it was near sunset and the air smelled of oncoming rain, the weather was muggy.
“That it is…” the man pondered, inserting the vial into a round slot in the large metal box beside him. The box held several other vials, all filled with different sorts of minerals. “Things sure are different  in our day and age, aren’t they? Not as simple anymore.”
Eli withheld his reply and glanced at the device on his wrist, tapping at its glowing display. It was slightly larger than a deck of cards, secured to him with an elastic band. “Dr. Vanderbilt, we’re on a tight schedule, I must insist…”
“Yes, I know, I know,” Vanderbilt replied in disappointment. He pushed himself to a stand, closing the lid on his collection of vials. He lugged the box up with a small grunt and came alongside Eli.
Eli tapped the display a couple times more. “Alright,” he said. “I think we’re ready. Let me see yours.”
Vanderbilt held his arm out to Eli, who took it. The device on Vanderbilt’s wrist was smaller than that of Eli’s, about the size of a digital watch. Since it received commands remotely from Eli’s device . . .
***
We start off without knowing who Vanderbilt is. He is called “The thin man” (a designation that should be reserved only for William Powell). But Vanderbilt’s identity is revealed a few paragraphs in. So why is it kept a mystery for six paragraphs? There’s no need for this.
Unless you want to create an ongoing mystery about who someone is, use their name up front. This is especially crucial for this piece, because we are not in a close POV. We are looking at this scene through objective and distant lenses. It would be much better if we were deep inside either Vanderbilt’s or Eli’s head throughout.
But I’m confused as to who the main character is supposed to be. The first four paragraphs make it seem this scene belongs to “the thin man.” But since he would not think of himself as “the thin man,” we’re either in an omniscient POV or with another character.
The only other character is Eli. But since he was not paying attention to the thin man, he can’t have observed what was going on in the first four paragraphs.
We are therefore in omniscient POV by default. Omniscient POV is not much in style anymore, save for epic length historical or speculative fiction. In what I am assuming is a thriller, it’s virtually non-existent. For good reason: Readers of a thriller get invested in it in direct proportion to their care for a character in trouble.
Every time a reader starts a novel, he’s asking (subconsciously) Who am I supposed to follow? And why?
We don’t get answers to those questions here.
This is also what I call a “Here we are in sunny Spain” opening. That is, it feels as if it’s mainly for set-up. Information is being given to us unnaturally. For example, this bit of dialogue:
“It’s hard to believe that such a magnificent place as this is now virtually wiped off the face of the earth”
This doesn’t sound like what the characters would really say to each other. It’s the kind of thing each character already knows. Dialogue such as this is the author feeding information to the reader, and true characterization suffers.
So here are my suggestions:
1. Whoever is the main character in this scene, use close 3d Person POV throughout. Everything from inside that one character’s head.
2. Cut these two lines of dialogue and adjust accordingly:
“It’s hard to believe that such a magnificent place as this is now virtually wiped off the face of the earth”
“Things sure are different  in our day and age, aren’t they? Not as simple anymore.”
  
Other thoughts?
***
(Commercial)
Pretty good is no longer good enough, whether one wants to be published traditionally or make a buck self-publishing. For writers interested in a 2 day intensive workshop designed to get your fiction to the next level and beyond, I’m coming to Austin, Nashville and Cincinnati this year. Details may be found here. 

First Page Critique: ROAD TO ARRAY

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By now, we all know the drill.  First, the submission in its entirety (the italics are mine), and then I’ll see you on the other side:

Daniel watched the rain drops rolling down the windshield. The drizzle had quickly become a downpour, but he couldn’t use the wipers, couldn’t risk the burr of the engine.  The car’s lights were out, and the Crown Victoria hidden in the alleyway where no one could spot it.
“Rick.”
He whispered instinctively, then remembered that this time they weren’t using the communication wires. Rick had argued the situation was dicey enough without a guard pointing out the tiny earpiece and microphone. Daniel shifted in his seat. He should have insisted. Not that it would have made a difference. He was a rookie on his first major assignment. Rick had been on the force for a decade.  His partner made a decision, and that was that.
Daniel glanced at his watch again. Rick was ten minutes late, which wasn’t very long in this weather, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.
“Ah dammit.” Before he changed his mind, he rushed out the door. He was drenched in an instant. 
            Removing the gun from his shoulder holster, he pointed the Browning .38 at the ground as he slid alongside the apartment building. He and Rick had scouted the area earlier, but he peeked at the entrance again from around the corner. He saw no one. He would have welcomed some security on the place, even a sniper on the roof, to ease the queasy feeling forming in his gut.

My first thought in reading this is that I’ve seen it before—a hundred different times in a hundred different cop shows.  I realize even as I write the comment that it’s a tad unfair criticism, because at one level, we’ve all seen elements of every story before.  In this case, though, there’s not much to differentiate it.  A stronger narrative voice would have helped.  Some distinctive action would have helped, too.

When we did this critique exercise last year, I believe it was either Jim Bell or Joe Moore who verbalized something that I had always felt, but had never quite put my finger on: It is always, always, always a mistake to start a story with a weather report.  That first paragraph is arguably the most valuable slice of real estate in any book, and I hate to see it squandered with rolling raindrops.

In his haste to bring readers into action, this author neglected to give us a sense of the stakes.  Weather is not tension.  It’s barely even atmosphere.  By placing a barrier of non-communication between the two characters in this scene, the author robbed himself and his readers of an opportunity to care about the characters.

The issue of the “communication wires” bothers me at several levels, beginning with the phrase, communication wires.  I’m not a cop so I don’t know their lingo, but that phrase strikes me as not-legit.  I was an emergency responder for many years, though, and I know my way around assault operations, and I have heartburn with “a rookie on his first major assignment” getting to make decisions regarding something as essential as the communication protocol.  As the senior team member, Daniel is responsible for everything that happens on this op, and he comes off as a real toad when he tries to palm that responsibility off on the new guy.
 
How, exactly, does one whisper instinctively?  Is that really something we’re born with?  I think you might have been going for reflexively, but even that’s not quite right.  Even more importantly (certainly for Rick), ten minutes is a freaking eternity when an op is in motion.  What could Daniel possibly have on his calendar that was more important than pulling his partner out of a jam?  (This, by the way, is why communication protocols exist.)

If Daniel preferred to have additional security, why didn’t he call for it?  Just because Rick ran off without a radio doesn’t mean that Daniel didn’t have one either.  And if firepower is the thing he’s worried about, why the hell is he advancing on the apartment with only a “Browning .38” (whatever that is)?  Surely, he’s got some higher-caliber toys in the trunk of his Crown Victoria, and if he doesn’t there should be a reason.

I’m sorry to say that this piece really didn’t resonate with me.  It read as research-by-television series, and it just didn’t work.  Not knowing what lies ahead in the story, I will venture a guess that this part of the story might be better told from Rick’s point of view.  Assuming that he’s having a bad day on the other side of Daniel’s suspicions, I propose that Rick’s world view might be more interesting.

Setting the Stage: A Writing Exercise

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by Michelle Gagnon

For a change of pace today, I thought we could tackle a writing exercise. One of the things that’s struck me during our critiques lately is that I’m not alone in sometimes neglecting to include enough descriptive prose to set the stage for my stories. In fact it’s such a weakness of mine, I rarely add much detail in first drafts. I get the plot and dialogue in place, then go back during the editing process to flesh everything out. In all honesty, scenery description is my least favorite part of the craft of writing. 

For one, remembering to include all five senses is always a struggle; I have a terrible sense of smell, and have to remind myself that my characters might not. Also, describing anything from a basic room to a crowd scene is rife with pitfalls; there isn’t a writer alive who hasn’t caught themselves typing out a trite cliche about the shape of the moon, or something similar.


So when my book is set somewhere specific, I rely heavily on photographs. The corkboard behind my desk is always layered with photos representing nearly every scene in the manuscript. I find that looking at them triggers sense memories, especially if I’m writing about somewhere I’ve been. I remember how streets in Paris are always wet in the morning, having been freshly washed by maintenance crews just before dawn. Or how the light in Central Park shifts dramatically season by season, or how the air in South America just tastes different (maybe my sense of taste is stronger, to compensate for that lack of smell).


Below I’ve pasted three photos. Pick any one and describe it in a paragraph, or use it as the jumping off point for a scene. Take care to avoid overused metaphors: “The sea was dark as slate,” for example, or, “The sky was as blue as a robin’s egg.” 


Bonne chance!

Balancing Multiple Projects

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Things used to be simple when I wrote for Kensington. I had to turn in one book a year. Easy, right? I wrote my Bad Hair Day mysteries and nothing else. It wasn’t until the publisher turned down my option book that I started writing in other genres to see what would sell.

Now it’s years later, and I’m still seeking a home for my two new mystery series. Meanwhile, Wild Rose Press picked up my romances, and I am preparing to launch a new paranormal series. Then Five Star published my tenth Marla Shore mystery. So years after I thought this series was dead, I’m writing it again. Before starting the eleventh book, I completed the first three books in my romance series. So those are all done, except for the edits, page proofs, and promotion.

And herein comes the juggling act. I am attempting to move forward with Bad Hair Day mystery #11, but I keep having to halt work on this project to do page proofs and revisions for the Drift Lords series, not to mention planning the promotional campaign for the series launch and taking time off to go to the Malice conference.

Meanwhile, those two completed mysteries linger in the back of my mind. Should I continue submitting them to small press or self-publish? If the latter, should I publish them as stand-alones or as the first books in new series?

Before deciding on these titles—and we’re still waiting for responses—I would like to self-publish my deceased father’s book. He hitchhiked across the U.S. in 1929 and his story includes some fascinating adventures. So my projects include:

1. The Drift Lords series from The Wild Rose Press
2. A new Bad Hair Day mystery
3. The possibility of self-publishing three titles
4. The possibility of one of my other mysteries selling in the interim

Never before have we had so many options. It’s an exciting time but it’s also all consuming. Who has free time when we can publish our entire body of works, and then when we have to spend hours on the social networks promoting them?

Do you find that your writing production has increased with the advent of new technologies? How are you balancing your writing projects, promotional efforts, and private life?

Bringing them in the door

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As we’ve discussed many times here at TKZ, our first job as writers is drawing the reader in. Today’s first-page sample accomplished that goal for me. I’ll let you read it, then finish with my thoughts.  
THE SAHARA INTERCEPT

El Al has this silly rule requiring passengers to travel unarmed. I always thought the best way to stop a hijacker was to blow his head off. Thus, I arrived at Ben Gurion International Airport, the site of the nineteen seventy-three Lod massacre, disarmed, without my little Walthers PPK pistol, like the one Double-O Seven carries. He would have found a way, but I’m no James Bond.

I didn’t anticipate any danger in Israel, but it never hurts to practice situational awareness. Not paranoia, just attention to details, in other words — watch my back — a good way to stay alive. For the last two years, it’s worked. I’m still breathing.
Counter surveillance is an art. The most important thing is to be able to blend in, keep a low profile. Don’t project an image someone will remember. I dressed as an ordinary tourist: tan pants, light blue polo shirt, and clean socks. 

The key is to appear confident and natural, like you belong. I cleared customs and immigration and strode into the hustle and bustle of the main lobby, resolute in my ability to spot any imminent threat. 

“Mister Ross Brannan?”

A slim well-groomed young woman with raven hair and deep penetrating green eyes stood before me: hand on hip, dressed in a neat crisp-pressed olive-green army uniform, her black beret worn at a jaunty angle, her self-assured smile and attitude enhanced by the nine-millimeter Uzi automatic carbine slung over her shoulder.

“That’s me.” How did she pick me out? Expectations can blind you if you simply concentrate on preconceived notions. You may miss a threat that may be real and near. I should have spotted her first.
 

“Shalom, welcome to Israel. My name is Tamara Alon. I am your escort.” The way she said escort, was both sexy and suggestive.”

“Thanks.” Tamara seemed pleasant enough and not bad looking, not bad at all — matter of fact she was hot. “Say how did you know who I was?”

“I was shown your picture.” Her eyes sparkled. “So I looked for a cowboy from the movies.”
 *   *   *

The humor here works well for me. First-person narrators are tricky to handle, but I like the way this page quickly establishes the main character as an Inspector Clouseau-type. He sees himself as James Bond, but in reality he’s a bit of a bumbler.

I do have a small nit is with the first paragraph. The lengthy sentence with its many commas was a bit of a stumbling block for this reader; I think it would help to use numeric 1973 instead of spelling out the year. I also tripped over the first Double-O Seven reference, and had to reread the sentence that starts “He would have found a way” for clarity.)
I was a bit thrown by the use of italics. The italics, used to show internal thoughts, are interspersed with non-italicized, omniscient pronouncements (“Expectations can blind you if you simply concentrate on preconceived notions. You may miss a threat that may be real and near.”). In this case, I would suggest removing these two non-italicized sentences, leaving only the narrator’s chagrined reaction.

I think it’s unnecessary to italicize the word “escort,” because you provide the inflection in the next sentence. If you both italicize and explain, it’s overkill. (It also is humorous to imagine, as this reader was by now, that the woman’s inflection was only in the narrator’s mind, not intended by her.) Remove the end quote from the end of that paragraph.

This is a personal preference, but I always bridle at “raven” hair and “sparkling” eyes.  They’re a bit cliche. You’ve already established that she has penetrating green eyes, so you probably don’t need the sparkle. Also, I’m no gun expert (paging Miller and Gilstrap here), but I would check to make sure exactly which weapon an IDF escort would carry. And I’d work in an IDF reference, for Israel Defense Forces, where you say “army.” The more specific your references are in your manuscript, the more authentic it will seem to the reader.


In the second-to-last paragraph, your narrator’s reaction between “Thanks” and “Say, how did you know…” is a bit distracting, and doesn’t add anything new to Tamara’s description.  Right now your character is thinking about the fact that he’s been ID’d, not whether Tamara is hot or not. As a general rule, try to keep every paragraph tightly focused on a single action or reaction.

Those are all minor nits, though. Overall, I’m drawn in by this page. It’s refreshing to have a hard-boiled main character taken down a notch on the first page. 

What do you all think?


Today’s Critique

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Today’s first page critique is entitled: DEAD ON THE VINE. My comments follow, but overall I think today’s piece raises issues specifically dealing with voice, setting and tone…more on that after the piece:


            Chief TR Henderson tried to maintain an appearance of competence and dignity as he approached the conference table for the meeting, but the chair groaned when he sat down, and Commissioner Dale Kirkpatrick flashed him the stink eye. Splendid. He was still at the top of her Stink List.
            “You’re late.” Commissioner Rick Petit didn’t bother looking up from his notes.
            “My apologies,” TR replied. “I stopped to help a disabled on Second Ave.” The smell of coffee and croissants called to him, but he resisted. Instead, he tried getting comfortable on the metal folding chair. It wasn’t going to happen. The commissioners all sat in padded chairs, forming a firing squad on the other side of a conference table the size of Rhode Island, and they stuck their mammoth chief of police in a folding chair. Classy.
            Kirkpatrick maintained her narrow-eyed glare, now directed at the fresh spot of motor oil on TR’s shirt.
He couldn’t be more delighted with the attention.
            Petit finally looked up. “Thanks for coming. You know this isn’t easy for any of us.”
            TR nodded.
            “The drug problem is growing worse.” Petit glanced at his notes before continuing. “We want to know what you’re doing about it.”
            Simple enough question. “Officer Mendoza is—”
            “What are you doing about it?” Kirkpatrick demanded.
            “I put my best officer on it,” he responded. “Mendoza’s got fifteen years of experience dealing with—”
            “That’s great,” Petit said, “but what’s he doing now? When’s he going to arrest Lester Rowley?”
            TR sat back and fought to keep a smile from cracking. “We have no proof that Lester Rowley has anything to do with the drug trade at the high school.”

My comments:
Overall, this first page didn’t grab me. I found the tone a little inconsistent and the humor unsure of itself. The use of ‘stink eye’ and ‘stink list’ and asides like ‘classy’ are, I assume, designed to create a slightly smart-arse/wise guy tone but I didn’t really get that – instead it seemed a bit juvenile given the caliber of the men in the room (all police commissioners). I also didn’t really understand where we were – it sounds like a board room, with coffee, croissants and a massive conference table – yet all the commissioners are in comfy chairs and TR gets a metal folding chair (? really? I couldn’t picture this) and it was a metal chair that groaned when he sat down in it (which seems a very un-metallic word – wouldn’t it squeak, clang or grind?). 


The dialogue also seems unsure of itself – why does Petit say “You know this isn’t easy for any of us”? Surely a drug problem at a high school is hardly an overwhelming issue and also why does TR fight to keep a smile from cracking when he says there’s no proof Lester Rowley has anything to do with the drug trade? Again, as a reader I am unsure whether this is supposed to be serious, slightly tongue-in-cheek or what. So far the author’s voice and tone aren’t clear to me. Nor is the setting (apart from a generic conference room that I couldn’t really picture). I need to be able to visualize the setting as well as the characters not merely be told that the Chief of police tried to ‘maintain an appearance of competence and dignity’ – how? What did he do? Did he straighten his jacket, look wisely over his glasses?? I had a hard time picturing him or the other commissioners in the room.


Though this first page had references to some kind of ongoing issue between TR and  Commissioner Dale Kirkpatrick I don’t get a sufficient sense of tension to care – nor am I really compelled to read on as yet. In short, I think this first page needs a clearer voice and tone, a stronger sense of place and character and a big dose of drama and tension. At the moment it feels too uncertain and too passive to be compelling.


What do you think?

I Am Going to Let the Readers Decide

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It’s being said all over the place that the new “gatekeepers” in publishing are the readers. Because of self-publishing, and new initiatives by traditional publishers to go direct to readers via revamped websites, that certainly seems to be the case.
So I have decided to put it to the test by letting readers decide if a new idea of mine will become a series.
About a year ago my son laughingly offered me an idea. He loves to make up titles and concepts, just for fun. “Hey Pop,” he said, “how about a thriller about a nun who is secretly a vigilante? She knows martial arts, and can kick butt when necessary?”
I looked at him quizzically, and then he gave me the (you’ll pardon the expression) kicker: “You can call it FORCE OF HABIT.”
I cracked up. So did he. But he stopped when I said, “I think I’ll do it.”
“I was only kidding,” he said.
“It’s a great concept,” I said. “Original, great title, and I think I can do something with it.”
What I did was start to write it. On the side, as I had traditional contracts to fulfill. But as I played with this story, I got pulled more and more into it.
My martial arts nun I named Sister Justicia Marie (or Sister J, as she’s known by those close to her). I thought up her backstory. She is a former child star who grew up into a drug-using actress who then hit bottom. That’s when she turned her life over to God and entered into the sacred life.
But during her time before the cameras, she studied martial arts (particularly for a Steven Seagal film she was in) and those skills have not left her.
And as I like to dig into themes in my books, I thought this raised a most intriguing question: could a devout nun actually justify violence if it was in the course of doing good, like stopping violent criminals?
When a cop asks her the same question, I heard her say this about the criminal element: “They are the knuckles. I am the ruler.”
I started adding a cast of characters. And then I thought of plotlines, and the idea of a series started to unfold. These would be in novelette form, around 15k words each. I think that’s a good pulp fiction value for the reading dollar.
I even went so far as to commission a talented young artist to do a series logo for me, a nun issuing a flying kick. And then the pitch:
When a nun is viciously attacked, Sister Justicia Marie takes it upon herself to find out what happened. The cops don’t like that. Neither does her Mother Superior at St. Cecelia’s school. But when a couple of hoods try to stick up a liquor store and Sister J brings them down, something is unleashed inside her, something that will either confirm her calling . . . or destroy it.
So now here it is. For KINDLE and NOOK, the first of the Rogue Nuns series featuring Sister Justicia Marie:

Here is my request: I’m asking you, the, readers to decide if the series will go on. By reading FORCE OF HABIT, and offering reviews, you will help me make the decision whether to continue.  
In this case, you are indeed the gatekeepers and the decision makers. So let me hear from you. Thanks!

Bread Crumbs Through the Tale

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We have for our consideration the first page of a tale entitled “The Acolyte,” and if this opening is any indication the rest of the book is going to be a good one. I like being tugged — take that any way you want — and the opening sentences of “The Acolyte” tugged me in:
“No TV,” the stone-faced boy blocking the oak double doors said. “No cameras.” To Moran he looked seventeen or eighteen, nearly a man. The boy glared down the granite steps of the church at the television news crews on the old brick sidewalk. Three cameramen, three on-air reporters.
“It’s going to rain soon,” one of the cameramen said.
“Hey, tough s**t,” the boy said. (edited by blogger)
Slender, about five-nine, he was wearing a stiff white shirt with a polka-dot tie and a navy blue suit, the pants a little too short, Moran thought. The television people knew who he was. He flicked his hands at them and they stepped farther back, out of the path of a few approaching mourners.
Moran, maybe an inch or two shorter than the boy, in his late thirties, followed the mourners around a gray mound of lingering April snow and up the granite steps. “I don’t have a camera,” he said. “Just a notebook. I’m from the Portland Pilot. I’ll just sit in the back where I won’t disturb anyone. All right?”
The boy stared at him. “What’s your name?”
“Jake Moran,” the reporter told him, starting quickly around him through the open doors. “Thanks.”
Moran shivered, feeling the cold dampness inside the stone church, remembering to genuflect before edging into a worn mahogany pew. He had never covered a funeral mass before. He watched the rows of pews in front of him becoming full, writing a rough head count on a fresh page of his reporter’s notebook as the organist played a muted hymn, close to eighty people now. Soon he heard the priest’s voice, a cool monotone echoing off the granite walls. “Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace. Amen.”
The reporter watched him lift his bowed head and open his eyes. Gradually, showing a little dramatic flair. Looking young for a priest, probably younger than forty, with reddish hair and a boyish freckled face.



The author begins dropping breadcrumbs from the first sentence, leading the reader right down the path of the story. There’s tension from the getgo. Why are no TV or cameras allowed? Who is the bossy little punk guarding the doors to the church? In the immortal words of Loretta Castorini, “Who died?!” Why do people care? The author makes me what to know the answers. Additionally, I want to follow the trail of breadcrumbs into the church. Once I’m in there, I can practically smell the incense and the burning candles, hear the faint echo of the priest’s voice a millisecond or so behind what he’s saying. The author reveals just enough to give the reader a picture, but lets the reader fill in some blanks and thus become involved in the story process. Even the (technically incorrect) use of sentence fragments works, and works well.

At some point, I’d like to see more of “The Acolyte.” I have a feeling that at some point down the road, sooner rather than later, I will. Nice work.

The Sin of Squandered Drama

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Today’s subject for the First Page Critique is untitled. Here it is in its original form with bold face added by me. I’ll see you on the other side of the piece:


Malcolm was pinned down and under heavy fire. He’d walked into the ambush and blamed himself. His instincts should have recognized the telltale signs of a trap.
He was situated halfway up a small hill. Rounds were flying past him, striking trees and small shrubs. Whizzing so close to his head that he could feel the air pass.

Malcolm didn’t know the location of the rest of his unit. They were mostly rookies. As soon as the fighting began, they had scattered in chaos. Likely, they were already casualties. If the hostiles were to shift their position, then he would be next.

His opponents were positioned along a ledge uphill from him. Their position was fortified and they were throwing everything they had down at him. He wasn’t going to last long.

Malcolm didn’t want to be in this fight. He abhorred fighting, yet somehow he was convinced that this fight was okay. A part of him resisted, yet the old warrior was all to willing to take part.

He pushed down these anxious feelings and assessed his options. Going straight up the hill would be suicide. There was even less cover in front of him.
With covering fire, it might be possible for him to surmount the hill. If his teams members were smart, they would work themselves around the other side of the ledge in order to relieve his position. Malcolm wasn’t counting on this.

There were clearings to his right and left, which would give the shooters an easy target. He’d be picked off like a duck at a carnival game.
Maybe it was the stress of the situation, the old warrior back in his element, but his mind recalled past events that he had deliberately buried away. A face appeared. A face he once respected but now loathed.

Battle hardened, wrinkle lines deeply engrained, a bald head with liver spots and tufts of white hair sticking out from the side. The face spoke in a heavy Israeli accent, “Sometimes you need to go backwards to go forwards.” Typical Israeli philosophy.


This entry commits what I consider to be the most egregious sin of an author: It squanders drama through lots of telling and very little showing. Here it is again, mostly paragraph by paragraph, but this time, my thoughts are in bold.


Malcolm was pinned down and under heavy fire. He’d walked into the ambush and blamed himself. His instincts should have recognized the telltale signs of a trap.


An opening paragraph with this kind of action provides abundant opportunity for some very specific descriptions. Don’t tell me that he was pinned down, show me the splintering rocks and let me hear the whip crack of rounds passing close by. Better still, filter all that description through Malcolm’s emotions.

You tell us that Malcolm missed telltale signs, yet there’s no indication of what those signs were. Moreover, I question the relevance of such thoughts when he’s being pummeled by ammunition.

For this kind of scene to work well, I believe that the reader should have some level of investment in the character as a human being. Where is his rage? Where is his fear of never seeing his family again? Where is his commitment to win at all costs, or his temptation to surrender?


He was situated halfway up a small hill. Rounds were flying past him, striking trees and small shrubs. Whizzing so close to his head that he could feel the air pass.


Another sin: Passive voice. “Rounds were flying” is weak action. Constructed this way, rounds might as well be humming birds, accompanied by a Disney soundtrack.


Malcolm didn’t know the location of the rest of his unit. They were mostly rookies. As soon as the fighting began, they had scattered in chaos. Likely, they were already casualties. If the hostiles were to shift their position, then he would be next.


Right now, I’m thinking that Malcolm is a bit of a turd. If he’s lost control of his men, why isn’t he hurrying to bring order to the chaos. That kind of panic is what allows tine well-trained units to obliterate much larger forces. Malcolm should know this, I assume, because the unit is “his.”


His opponents were positioned along a ledge uphill from him. Their position was fortified and they were throwing everything they had down at him. He wasn’t going to last long.


His “opponents”? Now we’re in a football game? In Malcolm’s mind, those bad guys should be Hadjis, Krauts, Gooks–something far less friendly and respectful than opponent. Even OpFor–opposing force–would be a step in the right direction. Also, “everything they had” has no meaning. Are we talking mortars? Flame throwers? Boiling Oil? Monty Python cows?

I’ll stop the line-by-line critique at this point becomes it becomes repetitive. Suffice to say that writing action sequences is tricky. For the choreography to work in the reader’s mind, the description needs to be concise and precise without slowing the action. They also require a point of view through which the reader can experience the action. It’s hard to do, and I feel that this piece needs a second pass.