Getting back to basics

I wanted to go back to the topic I did on Sept. 23 about book dummies. In general, what we gain when making a dummy is learning how to pace out our plot so that all the action/interest isn’t clumped into a few pages of a 32+ paged book. We SEE clearly that when we physically separate out our text, even simply dividing the number of sentences equally over the total number of pages, we might realize that 5 sentences right in the middle of the book contain ALL the action. I then wonder how kids might even get there, and, why they would choose to finish the book afterward. I’m not sure I’d even make it to the action point, and I’m an adult with a supposedly longer attention span!



In the example, I wanted to show what happened when I tried this little exercise out. You will see there are 1.5 sentences included on this page, so good that there’s not many words on the page! However, there’s gasping and shivering and bowed heads and sadness…WOW, so much going on in less than 2 sentences! What one picture could capture all that?

For those of you who have the book, you know how I ended up resolving this issue. But this compartmentalization process not only can show you how you might need to “spread” the action or suspense out in some other way, but it also gives you a good way to define a focal point for each illustration.

More on this next week!