First page critique of IMPERFECT JUSTICE

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By Joe Moore

I had an author approach me at ThrillerFest to say how much he enjoyed visiting and reading TKZ. He also asked if I would post the first page of his WIP for a Kill Zone critique. So here we go.

“Oh God.”

I stood for a moment in shock not only from the horrific scene, but the fact that I had verbally reacted. I never express my thoughts in words, but what I saw would crack the resolve of even the strongest individual.

My usual response is to smile and say nothing, or more likely, release a torrent of smartass comments. I guess I use humor to release the pressure of stressful of situations, but in this case I couldn’t think of anything even the slightest bit ironic, or remotely funny.

I felt the bile rising in my throat, and grit my teeth to maintain some measure of composure. I knew I should call for help, but when I pressed the transmit button on my shoulder mounted microphone, the words wouldn’t come out. It was as if I couldn’t force air through my vocal cords. I swallowed hard and shoved my emotions as far as I could below the surface, but it didn’t help and my vision blurred as mist began to form in the corner of my eyes.

I hadn’t actually expected a body to be here. The last few calls like this had been mistaken identity. Some moron saw a pile of clothes next to a dumpster and assumed it was a dead body. I had no reason to think that this situation would be any different, but when I turned the corner to the address given to me by the police dispatcher, there was the bloody mess. Instead of seeing a homeless person sipping on a bottle of cheap wine, there was a body with an ear to ear gash across her throat.

Along the edge of the cut, a stain of blood traveled down the front, and left dark streaks on her once tan blouse. On the ground, the twin headlight beams of my cruiser sparkled off the surface of pools of blood on each side of her. Since the blood hadn’t yet dried, that meant one thing, this had just happened.

The first thing I would do is delete everything after “Oh God.” down to the paragraph that starts with “I hadn’t actually expected a body . . .” All the stuff about how the cop normally reacts is unimportant. What we want to know is how he reacts now. We can learn all the other info later if it’s really important.

I would have liked to read the cop’s radio chatter inserted right after the “Oh God” reporting the discovery of a body. If he believes the murder was just committed, shouldn’t he approach with gun drawn in case the killer is still there? Shouldn’t he call for backup?

This piece starts off a bit too soft for me. Raise the excitement with dialog, actions, reactions. Those elements will tell us so much more about the character than exposition. Let him tell the dispatcher that this one is REAL, not one of the previous false alarms. It may be routine for a cop to discover a murder victim, but it’s not for the reader. Outside of a funeral home, most people have never even seen a dead body. Pull the reader into the scene and explain the inner thoughts later. Overall, this first page needs a shot of literary adrenalin but I’d be interested in reading on a few more pages.

What do you think? Is opening with the discovery of a dead body unique or cliché? Would you like to see more action and reaction? Would you read on?

Open Tuesdays

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image It’s time for another Open Tuesday while our blogmate, Kathryn Lilley, is on medical hiatus. Bring us your questions, comments and discussions. If you have a question about writing, publishing or any other related topic, ask away in our comments section. We’ll do our best to get you an answer.

And don’t forget you can download a copy of FRESH KILLS, Tales from the Kill Zone to your Kindle or PC today.

On the Road

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Apologies for the brevity of this post but my family and I are on the first week of a two month long holiday across the National Parks of the American West. We have done Sequoia, Kings Canyon and Yosemite so far. Off to Death Valley today…but all this roughing it (I am by no means the camping type) reminds me of the lengths to which some people will go in the name of book research. While I have been down the Orinoco most of my research involves strolling the streets of London or hanging out at the British Museum…hardly onerous! But what about you? How far have you gone in the name of research? What would you or wouldn’t you do?

– Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Before You Submit

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James Scott Bell

The May/June issue of Writer’s Digest has a sidebar from YA editor Anica Morse Rissi, wherein she gives nine things you can do to elevate your manuscript before submission.

The list is right on, not only for getting a manuscript ready to submit to agents or editors, but also if you’re considering self-publishing. So I’m going to give you the tips with my own commentary on them.

1. Revise, revise, revise.

As the author of a whole book on the revision process, I’m not going to quibble with this one. You can, however, become “revision obsessed” and spend way too long on a project. In my book I give a process for getting over that, but you can just as well come up with one of your own, so long as you eventually send your work out. Not too soon, but not too late, either.

2. Start with conflict and tension.

This is perhaps the most important tip of all. Some of our highest traffic here at TKZ has come from posts on what to do — and what not to do — on first pages, as well as the numerous first page critiques we’ve done. Search those out in the archives. Now, conflict or tension does not have to be “big.” It can really be any sort of disturbance to the Lead’s ordinary world.

3. Don’t start with backstory.

An obvious corollary to #2. Backstory is best when it is delayed, although little sprinkles can be added to the first pages for depth. Just make the action primary up front.

4. Give the readers something to wonder about.

Mystery, unanswered questions, portents, threats. All good at the beginning and, indeed, throughout—so long as you are prepared to give satisfactory answers (unless you write for Lost, of course, then you can just keep on raising questions).

5. Avoid explaining too much, too soon.

A corollary to #4. My rule for the opening is act first, explain later. Readers do not need to know everything you do about the setting and characters at the start. They will wait a long time if there’s something dynamic and disturbing going on at the beginning.

6. Make sure your story has plot arc and emotional arc.

This is another way of saying that you need to give us the stakes inside the character, as well as outside. One way to do this is via internal conflict, which is the battle between two strong but opposing desires in the character. In High Noon, the town marshal must battle his desire to do his duty as a lawman versus his desire to keep his new Quaker bride (the producers raise the stakes nicely by having the Quaker bride look exactly like Grace Kelly).

7. Read your dialogue out loud.

This is a great practice. You hear it differently than you read it. An alternative (my own preference) is to have Word read it back to me in speech mode. Either way, you’ll catch things to change every time.

8. Use adjectives, adverbs and dialogue tags sparingly.

As far as adverbs, do a search for LY words and kill as many of those pests as you can. For dialogue tags, use said and asked as your defaults, and only when needed to figure out who’s speaking. Resist the urge to use things like he growled or he expostulated.

9. Make sure your details matter.

All details, and I mean every one in your manuscript, should do “double duty.” Not just describe, but describe in a way that sets the tone you desire. Details can characterize, foreshadow and carry motifs. In other words, don’t waste them.

To these fine suggestions, I would also add the following (from my chapter on “The Polish”)—go over each chapter and see how much you can cut from the beginning and the end. You’ll be amazed at how much faster your chapters grab, and how you’ll be left with a feeling of momentum after each scene.

So what other things do you do before you submit?

NOTE: I’ll be conducting a series of webinars for Writer’s Digest this month. The first is on novel structure. Would love to have you drop in!

First Page

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When my book, UPSIDE DOWN was nominated for the first ITW Award in Phoenix, John Gilstrap was seated at my table, along with our agent, Anne Hawkins. I wish I could be seated at his table tonight. As I wrote him, I feel like Robert DeNiro in WISE GUYS when he was waiting in that diner to talk to Joe Peschi just after he became a “made” man. My fingers are crossed for Gilstrap’s NO MERCY winning an ITW award tonight.



And now to the first page, a resubmission of an earlier first page, which was critiqued a few weeks ago:

THE BULLET’S NAME

Boone, NC 1937

Jasper Green was in the middle of a sentence when, from beneath the thin plywood table, the heavy Colt in Jack Longbow’s hand responded to the positive pressure on its trigger sending a forty-five caliber hardball erupting through the surface of the table, exploding the bottle of whiskey, and entering just below Green’s lip, painting the pine-board wall behind him with his brains.

A split-second after the gun’s slide cycled another round into the chamber, Longbow spun in his chair and swept the room, ready to pull the trigger if Green had backup.

Longbow stopped the gun’s motion at the bartender and measured the threat the negress represented. Eyes wide open, her small hands flying into the air with fingers spread, she responded to the weapon’s unblinking eye by urinating on the floor.

Behind Longbow, Green’s gun, no longer being gripped by a living hand, was taken by gravity to the floor.

The corpse farted.

Longbow swung the gun and almost shot it through its still heart.

As though propelled by the issuing gas, Green toppled onto the floor, the open wounds dribbling a crimson molasses.

With his left hand Longbow lifted his Panama from the table by its crown and inspected it for blood spatter before perching it atop his head. Springing the safety up, Longbow slipped the auto into its holster under the seersucker jacket.



Thoughts?

#1 Paid in Kindle Books

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by John Gilstrap

A couple of weeks ago, I posted our marketing strategy for Hostage Zero which included a limited time free giveaway of the ebook version of No Mercy in all e-formats. In principle, it seemed like a good idea: We’d let people have a risk-free peek at the first book in the series, and with luck, they’d have whetted appetities for the second installment.

Well, apparently the strategy worked. Within hours, No Mercy shot to #1 on the free-book Kindle list, where it stayed for its entire free-book run. The attention brought some very hot reviews to the amazon.com No Mercy page, and sparked some favorable cyber word-of-mouth. That’s all good, but free is free. Then a funny thing happened.

When the free-book status expired on July 5, No Mercy stayed at the #1 slot, only this time in the PAID Kindle Store, outselling Stieg Larsson’s Tattoo series books. I told myself it must be an anomaly. After a couple of hours, I figured it would slip off the list. Only it didn’t. The book stayed at #1 for over two days. As I write this, 4:37 on July 8, it’s still at #3 in the Kindle Store.

It gets better. Hostage Zero–my new release–is currently at #61 and climbing (falling?) in the Kindle Store. Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol is #62.

All of this is very cool, but I have no idea what it means in the larger sense. Hopefully, the trend will contine and my books will become one of those word-of-mouth sensations that sets the world on fire; but it’s also possible that this is a brief flash–fun for a while, but ultimately not a big deal.

It’s not at all clear to me whether the ups and downs of the ebook market has any effect on the paper-book market. When a Kindle reader calls her Luddite Aunt Betty to say that she just read this amazing book, Aunt Betty will need to be able to find that book in the local bookstore in order to share the experience. I venture to guess that No Mercy will be a hard find this far after its initial publication. Can a runaway ebook prompt a bricks-and-mortar bookseller to restock a title? I guess we’ll see.

Hell, I don’t even know how much I make off the sale of an ebook.

Whatever this is that is happening, though, is very, very exciting.

The Virtual Water Cooler

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by Michelle Gagnon

The other night I found myself debating the merits and pitfalls of social networking with a group of friends. As always, people seem to fall into one of two camps: there’s the group that thinks Facebook and its ilk are slowly destroying the social fabric, ensnaring people into shadow lives that are only experienced virtually. On the other side are people who think that social networking sites have made it much easier to connect and stay in touch with people, improving their daily existence.

The subject initially came up because of an event I attended recently. “Pop up Magazine” is a one-night only live magazine produced in San Francisco. Like a print mag, it’s divided into “Shorts,” “Features,” etc. For me the most fascinating “feature” of the night was an interview with a former Guantanamo Bay prison guard. Apparently after he was discharged, his stance on things that had happened during his stationing there shifted. The soldier made it a mission to seek out former prisoners and apologize to them- and to find them, he used Facebook. The woman interviewing him asked, “Why Facebook?” And he looked at her as thought she’d asked why he considered using the telephone to call home. Apparently there are numerous FB groups subscribed to by both former guards and prisoners where they interact, swap stories, and try to find common ground.

I found that absolutely fascinating.

Now, I understand the argument against these networking sites. There’s something terribly depressing about seeing a couple tapping away at their various electronic devices in complete silence during dinner- as I witnessed the other night at a restaurant. But for some of us, the social networking tools have filled a void. Could we live without them? Absolutely. But I would miss my virtual water cooler.

Of course, I’m a bit of a rare case. I spend most of my day alone, in total silence. I work best under those circumstances-and I’m not someone who minds being alone. But aside from the UPS guy, without Facebook, my day would be devoid of most social contact.

Maybe that’s not a bad thing (although it does lend itself to bouncing a ball against a wall for hours on end, or typing the same sentence over and over…)

I love the little breaks spent chatting with people online. I get a kick out of what people post up there (within limits- I have no interest in knowing about your pet’s digestive problems, for example, or what you just scratched). The day after the final episode of LOST aired, I spent a almost embarrassingly significant chunk of my day discussing it with people. Maybe if I worked in an office, I wouldn’t need that. But having contact with the outside world, even if it’s only virtual, is a good thing for me.

I’ve always been terrible about staying in touch. But through these sites, I’ve been able to reconnect with friends from elementary school, high school, college, and my time in New York. (And one of those people volunteered to be a beta reader, providing some of the best insights into my latest manuscript).
My mother just set up a reunion with her college roommates, people she hadn’t seen in decades, via Facebook.

And of course, what would I do without my daily Kill Zone fix? I’ve made acquaintances across the world. Engaged in debate with people I probably would never have met otherwise. I’ve spent my entire adult life living in cities where chatting with strangers is a rare occurrence. But the online networking sites remove that wall, and suddenly I find myself discussing Nora Ephron’s send-up of THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO with people in Tulsa, Akron, and Tokyo.

So…virtual water coolers: yea or nay?

The Return of Payne Harrison

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By Joe Moore

Back in the 1980s, I was a huge fan of techno-thrillers. I loved Tom Clancy, Larry Bond, Dale Brown, Stephen Coonts and others, many of whom are still around and made the transition out of the Cold War into today’s military oriented thrillers. In 1989, a friend recommended STORMING INTREPID, and I quickly payne-harrison became a fan of a new writer by the name of Payne Harrison. Now we’ve all heard the cliché about a book being so good that you can’t put it down. That was the truth with STORMING INTREPID, the story of the U.S. using the space shuttle to deploy the Star Wars defense system and  how the Soviets manage to hijack the space craft. It was an intricate plot with a great deal of in-depth info on the technical side of things. Outrageous and totally fun.

Harrison landed on the New York Times bestseller list and followed up INTREPID with THUNDER OF EREBUS, a military thriller set in Antarctica, BLACK CIPHER, and FORBIDDEN SUMMIT. I read them all and eagerly waited for the next.

But a strange thing happed on the way to thriller #5. Harrison disappeared off the literary scene. I didn’t think much of it until one day many years later when I was going through my books looking for a particular novel and noticed all of Harrison’s books on my shelf. I realized it have been quite a long time since his last. I did an Internet search for his name and came up with very little info except notes about his previous books. Every so often, I would repeat the search with the same results. Thirteen years went by and I assumed the worst: perhaps Payne Harrison was no longer with us. After all, why would a bestselling author just disappear and quite writing thrillers?

eurostorm Then a couple of weeks ago, an Amazon promo pinged in my inbox promoting the return of Payne Harrison and his new thriller, EUROSTORM. I put in my advance order and eagerly waited for the notice that it shipped. The book arrived last Friday, and I finished it over the 4th of July weekend.

Despite the 13 years absence, he has not missed a beat. The style, voice, and plotting are exactly as he left off. Reading the book was like running into an old friend after a long time apart. And EUROSTORM is like a thriller on steroids. There’s his usual huge cast of characters, impeccable research, slingshot pacing, and heart-stopping, cliffhanger chapter endings.

EUROSTORM involves deadly engineered viruses, terror and bloodshed on the Bullet Train from England to France, the reanimation of the Third Reich hierarchy after they were frozen decades ago, and the coming together of French and U.K. military assault teams with a big helping hand from a Chicago detective to stop a diabolical plan to murder millions in the name of the new Fourth Reich.

EUROSTORM is not perfect as no book ever is. In order to cover an immense amount of territory involving dozens of characters, Harrison must utilize omniscient third person POV. The camera is always at a distance so it’s hard to really “feel” for most of the characters. But this technique won’t stop you from rooting for the good guys and wishing nasty stuff on the baddies.

If you enjoy extremely fast-paced thrillers that cover a huge amount of ground and information while keeping you on the edge of your barstool, read EUROSTORM by Payne Harrison. I only hope I don’t have to wait another 13 years for his next one.

How about you? Have you ever had to wait what seemed like forever to read the next book by a favorite author? How long did you wait, and was it worth it?

Open Tuesdays

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image It’s time for another Open Tuesday while our blogmate, Kathryn Lilley, is on medical hiatus. Bring us your questions, comments and discussions. If you have a question about writing, publishing or any other related topic, ask away in our comments section. We’ll do our best to get you an answer.

And don’t forget you can download a copy of FRESH KILLS, Tales from the Kill Zone to your Kindle or PC today.

It must be love, Ebook love..

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You’ll have to bear with me as this is my first effort blogging on the iPad and it feels rather weird – but I have to get used to it as my family and I are embarking on a two month camping odyssey taking in most of the national parks in the Western United States. Tomorrow we head to Sequoia National Park and then Yosemite to start things off. Although I hope to be blogging from the road, there will be a few Mondays where we will be of the grid – but I am hopeful that my trusty iPad will keep me on track. Let’s just call it an adventure.

The one thing I do know for sure is that I am now an official ebook convert. I have to confess I initially viewed ebooks with trepidation. I was fully wedded to my paper book world – until now. Yes, it’s official I’m in love…okay and perhaps just a little addicted to my iPad.

It’s been only a couple of weeks and I have already amassed over 30 iBooks, 5 kindle ebooks and 28 Barnes and Noble ebooks. Now most of these are freebies I admit but still, it’s getting to be a bit of an addiction – believe me I am trying to be restrained! I just can’t help myself. I have also found myself trolling through the free ebook titles on all the sites – hey, you just never know when I might want to read that historical western or that paranormal erotica… Interestingly enough my major worry with ebooks used to be how to differentiate between the legitimate versus the self published but now I am actually browsing I find it is easy to see the distinction ( call me a snob but I haven’t downloaded any books from smash words as yet). To me the fact that publishers are giving me the chance to read titles like John’s No Mercy is great marketing and already I can see how free ebook samples can lure new readers in.

I also love how I get to carry a mini library wherever I go. On a recent flight I could keep my kids entertained with a variety of Beatrix Potter books complete with illustrations and it felt reassuring to know that I could read a number of other books in an instant if they wanted me too. In the past I have been weighed down by all the books I have had to carry.

Okay so enough of the love fest – what excites me is how technology has reinvigorated my love of books and, even more importantly, my children are just as excited as me. The reading experience has not been lost at all – just made a teeny bit cooler. So what piece of technology has done the same for you? Do you remember the thrill of the Walkman or watching your first VHS movie? What technology do you think will help reignite the passion for reading?