The Toolbox – what goes Around the Words
Choosing the words… picking which shapes to fit around your prose gems to really show them off, and when not to try as hard… It means juggling paragraphs, “said” tags, adjectives, punctuation, and yet still managing to be creative in the middle of it all. No wonder that, no matter how ready we are to write something, the biggest parts are probably still the actual writing and rewriting to get the words themselves into place.
(The Unified Writing Field Theory — searchings and findings on what makes stories work)
More, the devil’s in the details, so this is the final acid test to our skill: Do we come off as more wannabes that have fun ideas but whose words don’t quite “have it”? Or do we make that reader think “Not a bad line… okay… keeps moving… yeah, fun moment and… yeah… oh she needs to DIE—” until we’ve earned his trust enough to turn that page?
Honestly I think half the would-be authors who don’t pull it off are the ones who fail the Resume Test: give the reader some reasons to like you, but know it only takes one reason for him to put the paper down and go with somebody more reliable. One failed word, one aspect of weakness than runs on too long, and it can all be over.
–Bad blogger! Writers already know that, there’s no point in my reminding you all about how many things can go wrong, especially when dwelling on it can just freeze us all up. Besides, you’ve probably already learned the tools, and now you’re focusing on your sense of what makes your writing sing, with the precision slowly coming with practice, right? Good. That’s probably how it has to be.
Still, there’s no reason to let your options unsettle you. The more we all get familiar with what the structures for those words can really do, the more we can let them line the writing up in a better way, and maybe even make it come out easier.
Mind you, these will only be the highlights. For the real bible to most of this—yes, I’m going to say it—be sure you have Strunk & White’s The Elements of Style handy. (And if that sounds too nitpicky, consider that this is the same E. B. White that wrote Charlotte’s Web. They get it.)
Now: let’s say you have enough ideas in your head to start a scene. Whether it’s from planning or from trusting that your mind is open, you think you can give the scene a direction of suspense or fun or whichever it is. (In fact, I think “suspense” is a good model for working with any kind of scene; you can use the same kinds of hints and buildup even about whether a great pleasure or an ordinary thing is going to turn out a little better or worse. Anticipation is good for anything.) You have your characters, and the kind of things that might happen, and you’re ready to describe it all.
Now what’s the pace for it? Is this part of the scene the time to capture how your hero’s fingers notice the feel of the design in the coffee cup… or is the only important thing that you touch base by saying he “got to work eager and freshly caffeinated”?
Think of both what pace to start the scene at, and whether it’s best for the story to change speeds in midscene; maybe starting at a quick summary and slowing down when something important shows up, or after some details you run on a bit longer at a faster pace to stew over the consequences. Also, how much does your style depend on you mostly staying at one pace or another? (Hopefully if you love details, that means you also know how to reach the next thing before you bog down, or your fast-paced style includes enough twists that you don’t end the fun too soon.)
Actually, there are “pacing” questions about every level of writing, from chapters to syllables. For every kind of point we could add in to amplify or clarify something, there are options of trimming more away if you think those words are starting to distract the reader from the story, whether it’s an unneeded scene or one overly fancy word. Any seasoned writer knows much of the work is streamlining the words from how they first came out—even taking a whole scene they slaved over and replacing it with one mention in another scene that the thing happened.
“Stories fly like birds. Their wings are built with strong muscles and bones where they need them, but their bones are hollow wherever they can save weight. Build your bird right.”
(To be continued – paragraphs, tags, sentences, and other fun things)
Click on pen to
