The Road to Rejection is Paved with Bad Beginnings

April 15, 2008 — Pat Bertram

The metaphor in the title of this article might be a cliché, but it is true. The number one reason for agents and editors to reject a manuscript is a poor beginning for the simple reason that if the beginning is bad, they read no further.

So what is a good beginning? I can tell you that it must be interesting; it must hook the reader; it should introduce the main character and the basic conflict; it must pertain to the story and not be tacked on simply to attract attention; it should not contain any adverbs; it should not contain any backstory; and it should be well written without being unintentionally funny, such as a character who thinks to himself — who else would he think to? But I can’t tell you how to write a good beginning, and after reading Hooked by Les Edgerton, I am even less equipped to tell you than before I read it. The problem is that I was not moved by even one of the first lines or first paragraphs that he held up as stellar examples of good beginnings. In fact, as constant a reader as I am, I was so unimpressed by every single one of them that I did not add any of the novels to my reading list. This does not mean I think they were bad beginnings, only that they didn’t move me.

Since I can’t tell you how to write a good beginning, I will tell you some of Edgerton’s red flags that keep agents and editors from reading further:

Opening with a dream. Understandable why they would hate that beginning; I do, and I’m sure you do too. Talk about a cliché! The only thing worse is having your character wake up at the end of the book and discovering the entire story was a dream. Makes me feel cheated.

A character waking up to an alarm clock or a radio announcement of a major event. This tells the agent or editor that your book will be filled with tedious details. If your book is filled with the tedious details of day-to-day living, it would be a good idea to get rid of them. If it isn’t filled with such details, it would be a good idea to write an opening that better reflects your writing.

Too little dialogue. If there is no dialogue on the first page, editors and agents will generally pass because it is a sign of densely written prose, which no longer sells well.

Opening with dialogue. The only time this is acceptable is if the speakers are immediately identified. If we don’t know who the people are, why would anyone care what they are saying? I know I don’t. This goes double for rumination. Nothing is more boring than a character who sits around “thinking to himself.”

Other than that, you will have to find your own way to a good beginning, as will I, and hope that whatever beginning we write will be so great it cannot be ignored.

 

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The Most Wasted Day of All is That on Which We Have Not Laughed

April 13, 2008 — Pat Bertram

The first half of a novel comes slowly for me. Some writers can sit down and let the story whoosh out of them, but I have to think of everything, to create everything, to draw in words the images I want readers to see. I castigate myself at times for writing so slowly, but if I finished the book quickly, I’d simply be adding one more unpublished novel to the world. And do we really need that?

So many books seem to be written as a way for writers and then later their readers to kill time. (Odd, how time such an ambiguous villain that we try to kill it while wishing we had more of it.) Perhaps books were always a way of wasting time. I came across this quote the other day: “Most of today’s books have an air of having been written in one day from books read the night before.” I can see you nodding your head in agreement. The interesting thing about this comment is that Nicolas-Sebastien Chamfort wrote it in the eighteenth century. (I don’t know who he is, either, other than that during the French revolution, he was an outspoken writer who botched his suicide. He died in 1794; his last words were, “And so I leave this world, where the heart must either break or turn to lead.”)

I try to write most days, but life tends to get in the way. Is it better to write or is it better to watch a movie with a friend? The friend, of course. And I know Chamfort would agree. He also said, “The most wasted day of all is that on which we have not laughed.”

But I am never far from my work-in-progress. As I watched the movie, Krippendorf’s Tribe, I found myself taking notes on all the things I would have to include in my apocalyptic novel to make my new society believable: rituals, games, dancing, stories. So I covered all the bases: I was with my friend, I laughed, I worked. Not bad for a night spent not writing.

Other nights when I can’t write, I edit. I know we’re told not to edit before we’ve written the entire novel, but if the first pages aren’t quite right, they niggle at me and keep me from continuing. But the words do add up, and by the second half of the novel, I know the characters, I have the story firmly entrenched in my mind, and sometimes, just sometimes . . . whoosh!

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How Do You Create Characters That Readers Will Fall In Love With?

April 7, 2008 — Pat Bertram

The main reason editors give for rejecting my work (when they give a reason) is that they didn’t fall in love with my characters as they had hoped. This puzzles me because I have never fallen in love with any character I have read. I’ve liked some, found some interesting, but love? No.

I know what makes good characters — their strengths, their vulnerabilities, their flaws — but are these the things that make us love them? All I know is that I don’t like characters that have purposely been given flaws; they seem contrived and clichéd, like the boozing cop or the mother who can’t communicate with her teen-ager. Such purposeful flaws remind me of the Persian flaw. Supposedly, the Persian carpet makers put a flaw in every carpet because only God can be perfect; what that says to me is that they thought they were so perfect that they had to try to be imperfect, but such arrogance in itself is a flaw so they weren’t perfect after all.

I always wondered about that flaw in the carpet. I think the flaw come first and the rationale second. Can’t you just see the carpet maker in his stall at the bazaar telling an aggressive haggler, “No, ma’am, I can’t bring the price down any further. A flaw? What flaw? Oh, that. It’s not a flaw, it was put there on purpose because . . . because . . .only God is perfect. Yes, that’s it.”

But I digress.

I do know that interesting characters make interesting stories, not the other way around. And how you make characters interesting is to make them come alive by giving them traits that are a bit more exaggerated than real life. Who wants to read about a character who sits around watching television all the time, or who repeatedly has the same tiresome argument with their child, or who can’t resolve their problems? We deal with that every day. We don’t need to read about it. On the other hand, if the traits are too idealized, characters come across as comic book silly.

So how do you create characters that readers will fall in love with? I don’t know. Sometimes while writing this blog I can figure out the answer to a question that’s troubling me, but not today. Sorry. I’ll let you know when I do figure it out.

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On Writing: The Mythic Journey and Answering the Call to Adventure

March 28, 2008 — Pat Bertram

I have reached the point in my work-in-progress where the hero Chip has chosen not to enter the place of safety, preferring freedom to security, and he won’t be succumbing to the lure of safety until the third time it is offered. (Three is a very mythical number if mythicism can be said to have degrees.) Now that Chip is mostly alone in the world, however, I’m not quite certain what to do with him. For him to become willing to give up his freedom, he has to undergo many ordeals, and the dangers need to escalate. I know I can create these situations, but they should have an underlying feeling of cohesiveness, otherwise they will appear as a series of unrelated incidents that go nowhere. After my last blog post and the realization that my work-in-progress is starting to follow the mythic journey template, I thought I’d check the template to see if it offers a solution.

The mythic journey begins in the ordinary world, which is the way my work-in-progress begins.

The second stage in the format is the call to adventure. I suppose the ending of the world qualifies; you can’t find anything more unsettling and disturbing than that. The choice to enter the place of safety is another call to adventure, for Chip doesn’t know what will await him, but it’s also the antithesis of the call to adventure in that he is being called to safety not danger.

The third stage is the refusal of the call. The refusal is supposed to show the hero’s fear, his need to be cajoled, the riskiness of the adventure. But if the call isn’t dangerous, does Chip’s refusal to enter the safety zone qualify for the third step? He is confronting the great unknown, so perhaps his choosing freedom and danger isn’t as noble as I think it is. Perhaps he is choosing the known over the unknown. Either way, he prefers to stay where he is.

Traditionally, the hero cannot achieve his or her full potential without accepting the call and the risks that come with it. Choosing to accept the call does not guarantee the hero’s success, for the road is long and treacherous. But for Chip, refusing the call is the long and treacherous time. Still, in the mythic world, opposites often lead in the same direction, so I will presume the lessons learned are the same.

Many influences come into play to get the hero to answer the call, such as a change in circumstance and offenses against the natural order of things. These Chip will have, and they will help him redefine his objectives. Readers also like to see the hero’s reluctance overcome, and the stiffer the reluctance, the more they enjoy seeing it worn down. Perhaps that’s my answer. Maybe I need to have readers hoping Chip will opt for safety, make them an accomplice in his choice so they will have a stake during the other nine stages of the journey. To do this, I will need a character that stands in for the reader, which means Chip can’t go it alone.

This brings us to the next stage of the mythic journey: the meeting with the mentor. A mentor helps prepare the hero for the coming adventure, giving him advice and gifts. A mentor would certainly give this part the cohesiveness it lacks, and it would also give life to what would otherwise be simply a string of ordeals.

So there it is, the solution to my problem: a mentor.

A nice irony: in my mythic journey as a writer, I always hoped to find a mentor, one who would help me overcome the problems I encounter. Who would have thought I’d find this mentor in my own blog?

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On Writing: Flashing Back to Flashbacks

March 25, 2008 — Pat Bertram

In my post on finding a beginning to a novel, I mentioned as an aside that if you have many flashbacks in your book, you should move the story backward in order present those scenes as they happened chronologically. It’s good advice — my advice on writing is the distillation of the hundreds of writing manuals I have read coupled with my own experience as an unpublished novelist — but reading the comments people left on my blog made me wonder where I really stand.

I do think that ideally a story should begin at the beginning and go to the end with few backtracks. Telling it chronologically gives the story impetus, making us want to read further in order to find out what is going to happen. But the ideal way of telling a story is not always the most practical way.

If I have any reservations about my novel More Deaths Than One, they come from its five long flashbacks. Two flashbacks are told as stories. Scheherazade-like, the hero seduces the heroine with the stories so, as in all elements of a good novel, they do double duty. Two other flashbacks introduce the hero when he was younger and introduce a friend who is murdered. The fifth, I’m embarrassed to admit, is there simply because I like the story it told, though it did introduce a minor character. (And the heroine asked for a story. What can I say? She was insatiable.)

Originally I wrote the book in three parts: present, past, then present again. That didn’t work — the past was so boring it slowed the pace, even though much of it was important. Then I tried using a prologue. That didn’t work either; it seemed as if it were there merely as a hook and not an integral part of the story. So I began the novel in the present and added flashbacks as needed. I don’t know if it works, but right now it’s the only way I know to tell the story.

In my other books, I let the characters tell each other their life stories. It’s a cheat, really, a means of making the past seem more immediate, but at least the characters get to know each other at the same time the reader does. The flashbacks in my work-in-progress are true flashbacks, momentary musings by the hero. I do not plan to write any scenes in the past. I want this one to have as much forward movement as possible to mask its real character — an allegory. (I mean, really, an allegory? Who reads allegories?)

As a reader, I prefer anything that keeps my attention. Often, flashbacks disturb the flow of the story, making me aware of the construct. In the minutes it takes for me to get into the flow of the back-story, I lose interest. But I admit, I have become something of a philistine and no longer admire writing solely for its artistic and intellectual achievements.

That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.

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Finding a Beginning to a Novel

March 20, 2008 — Pat Bertram

The search engine terms that bring most visitors to my blog are “the origin of the grim reaper” and “the moving finger writes,” but occasionally people come looking for something specific about writing. Lately, it seems, people are wondering how to find the beginning of a novel.

A character’s life, like any life, starts with either a gleam in the parents’ eyes or a birth, depending on your religious and political beliefs. And all stories, taken to their logical conclusion, end in death. Somewhere in that spectrum is the story you want to tell, and since all stories are about change, the novel should begin as close to the moment of change as possible.

The one exception to this rule is that if your story will need flashbacks, you should move the beginning further back on the spectrum in order to show these scenes as they are happening. Flashbacks, no matter how interesting, stop the flow of a story; because they are in the past, readers have no stake in their outcome. Making your flashbacks part of the present gives them an immediacy they would not otherwise have.

Most new writers (and many professionals who should know better) begin with a weather report, long passages of description to set the scene, or even the character’s ancestry. If you feel comfortable starting one of these ways, do so, but keep in mind it is only a temporary construct until you figure out where you are going with your story. As you write, you will find ways of inserting the necessary information elsewhere in the book, and will be able to delete it from the beginning of your novel. Despite what you might think, readers do not need to know who your character is before you begin the tale. They need to be thrust into the story so that they can find out for themselves who your character is.

So, start your novel with something happening, with a moment of potential drama, with a conversation. Many books begin with violence, which is a sure way of catching readers’ interest. At the very least, they will find it more exciting than a weather report or a description of your extraterrestrial world. And so will you. The more excited you are about the story you are writing, the easier it will be for you to write. Because, as you will find out, beginning a novel is simple; finishing it is an entirely different matter.

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Can the Setting Be a Character in the Story?

March 13, 2008 — Pat Bertram

The setting of a book should not be static, a mere backdrop for the story, but should have personality, emotions, strengths, weaknesses, scars, and moods. At least that’s what books on writing tell us.

In my previous novels, I tried to make the settings necessary to the stories, to show how they couldn’t have happened anywhere else in exactly the same way. Because my stories all take place in Colorado, by the very fact of geography, mountains play a part if only to shadow the humans living at their foot.

My current work in progress is different in that the world changes constantly. The mountains are always there giving my hero a reference point, but cities change to plains and plains change to seas. My hero has to try to come to terms with his constantly changing environment, which creates most of the conflict for the first part of the story. Because of this, I’m wondering if I can turn the environment into a character. It would certainly make the first part stronger because during much of it the hero is alone. It would give the book an entirely new dimension. And it would be a challenge for me.

Despite its changeability, though, the environment doesn’t want anything, so I’m not certain it can be a character. Doesn’t a character have to be dynamic with its own wants and needs? Even if it is possible for an environment to be a character, can I create one that has wants and needs without my anthropomorphizing it? Maybe the environment, like my hero, wants to be left alone. Maybe, the environment, also like my hero, stoically endures what is happening to it. But how would I show this from only my hero’s point of view?

I remember discussions in literature classes about those very things, and I didn’t get it. No matter how dramatic a setting was and how much it influenced the characters, it still always seemed to me to be static. Yet here I am, trying to put something more into my setting than perhaps needs to be there.

The only thing to do, I suppose, is keep all this in the back of my mind as I am writing, and if I can make the setting more alive, do so. If not, leave well enough alone. The story is already developing too many depths for what was supposed to be a silly little tale.

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Describing a Character the Easy Way

March 12, 2008 — Pat Bertram

The tendency today is for authors to keep character descriptions in a novel short and focused by using brand names, and some books on writing recommend doing so. Obviously, a character who wears named designer suits or dresses is different from one who wears discount store clothing. And a character who eats a certain boxed cereal is different from one who eats plain old oatmeal. (Another recommendation is to describe characters by comparing them to celebrities, which, in a way, is the same thing — a celebrity is a name brand person.)

Most readers, perhaps, can more easily identify with a character who uses the same brands they do, and such descriptions give the book immediacy, but it seems to me like blatant advertising. Brand names have so encroached on our lives that we no longer realize we’ve become walking billboards. Even worse, we pay for the privilege of donating our personal space to the major corporations for free advertising.

But that doesn’t mean I have to embrace the trend in my writing. Sometimes there is no getting around a brand name. Saying a character put a Band-Aid on a cut has a completely different connotation than saying the character put a bandage on the cut. (For me, bandage summons a vision of gauze wrapped around an arm with the ends tied in a knot.) And I once used the phrase “Popsicle colors” to describe northern Wisconsin in the autumn. (If you’ve ever been there when the leaves are changing color, you will know how apt that description is.) Outside of that, I don’t think I’ve ever used brand names.

So, like writers of fantasy, science fiction and historical novels, I have to fall back on the old-fashioned way of describing and defining a character — by the colors they prefer, the style of clothing they wear and, most importantly, their actions. In the end, these descriptions are more enduring than brand names. Brand names, however entrenched, do become defunct, which would make our books passé, and us along with it. This perhaps defeats the purpose of writing. After all, don’t we all harbor the unrealistic dream of future generations reading our immortal works?

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Filling the Needs of the Story

March 11, 2008 — Pat Bertram

Almost all novels tell the same basic story: a character wants something and someone or something prevents that character from achieving his goal. While telling the story, many authors throw in incident after incident to fill out the book. After a while, these incidents seem incidental, as if they are simply filling space and not filling the needs of the story.

Writing instructors and how-to-get-published books remind authors to hook readers with a great beginning. The hook should be captivating, but that’s not the end of it; the rest of the book needs to be rewarding, too. If the author fills the book with insignificant incidents, readers feel as if they are wasting their time.

I am concerned that my current work in progress is becoming a series of incidents that go nowhere. My hero keeps reacting to the world changing around him, but he isn’t proactive. He wants to be left alone, to be free, but that is a passive goal. I keep thinking he should be acting, planning, taking charge, but what can he do when each day, each hour the world is different?

Eventually, of course, he will take charge of his destiny when he escapes the human zoo, but first I have to get him there. His world needs to become so threatening that he will give up freedom for safety, but it hasn’t reached that point yet. And the only way I know to reach that point is for him to continue reacting to the changes around him. And to do that, I need to keep adding incidents. Round and round it goes.

These incidents serve the needs of the theme, they serve the needs of the story, and they serve my needs as a writer by allowing me to stretch my imagination, but I don’t know if they are significant enough to offset the hero’s lack of resolve to do something. I would hate to have future readers finish the book simply because they don’t want to waste the time they invested.

In the end, I suppose, I need to concentrate on the flow. If the story flows smoothly, then everything else will fall into place, seeming as right and as inexorable as the sun rising in the east. And if by chance an incident disrupts the flow, I can edit it out later. Or perhaps I can have the sun rising in the west. Hmm. Could be interesting. I wonder how my hero would react to that?

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Words Yipping at My Heels

March 9, 2008 — Pat Bertram

I just finished taking a look at two thrillers, both big, slick, well-touted works. Although they had interesting plots, there were so many point-of-view characters and so many incidents that the stories never seemed to go anywhere. I finally got tired of the words yip-yip-yipping at me and closed the books.

Ahh. Silence.

Three-hundred-page manuscripts used to be common, but the size of books grew along with the influence of corporate booksellers. Not only did large books make people think they were getting more for their money, they were well suited for mass displays. As with other merchandise, perception of worth apparently supersedes true value.

Big books are divided into short chapters and those chapters divided into smaller and smaller segments that make the book easy to put down and pick up at odd intervals for attention-challenged readers, but those small segments make it hard for a reader who wishes to identify with a character and be pulled into another reality.

Some books don’t lose anything by being big and thick. Although toward the end I did get a trifle tired of Stephen King’s Duma Key, he managed to keep my attention all the way through. No mean feat. But most big books today can do with some serious editing to better focus the plot and give some depth to the characters and stop that incessant yipping.

One of the more enjoyable books I read recently was a mere two hundred and sixty pages, but it didn’t seem like a short book. The character’s plight engaged my interest, and I didn’t keep flipping pages in an effort to finish the book quickly.

I used to feel guilty that my own books were only about three hundred pages long; obviously something is wrong with me if other writers can churn out words by the hundreds of thousands. But I want my words to signify something, to be worth the time it takes to dig them out of my psyche. And I want my characters to be more than mere types. I don’t know if I will ever become the writer I wish to be, but I know one thing: I won’t be creating overblown, yippy works; the words come too hard. Besides, I would rather readers complain that my books are too short than slam them shut to get a bit of silence.

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