Writing Tense

Writing tense doesn’t refer to how tense a writer may feel when writing, but is instead about the tense the story is written in. There are a few no-no’s about this that writers, especially new writers, should be aware of.  

It doesn’t occur often, but occasionally a client sends me a manuscript written in a moment-by-moment manner, as the story is supposed to be happening. Example: Mary walks into the room and looks around. She sees the vase has been moved and puts it back into its proper place. Mary then walks to the sofa and adjusts one of the pillows.

Sorry, but this is not a novel—it’s stage directions for a play. And this is never ever how a novel should read. An acquaintance shared that an agent told him his manuscript would never be considered as long as it’s written in this manner. His is a compelling story (based on the few chapters he let me read); but until he revises it, it will stay a file on his computer and an unfulfilled dream, unless he self-publishes it as is, which is not a good idea.

A client who wrote her novel this way approached me initially for a critique (developmental evaluation). Among other creative and technical suggestions, I advised her to revise the entire manuscript so it was in the proper tense and so that proper editing could be done. Yes, I could have rewritten it for her as part of developmental editing services instead of a critique, but that would have taken a good deal of time and expense; plus, she learned a great deal from the revision experience. Her book has an agent’s interest, which would not have happened otherwise.    

I ask you to consider why people read novels (and non-fiction) of any genre—it’s so they are taken into a mental/emotional space different from the one they're in. They want to sit back and let the story be a movie in their minds. A novel written in present tense (action as it happens) does something specific: it requires the reader to work. It's akin to asking a viewer to watch a movie on the screen and act out the parts of the characters at the same time, rather than sit back, watch, think, and feel. 

This writing style (and a few others) does something specific: It takes readers out of the reading experience they expect to have. This is not something readers appreciate. Readers prefer not to be reminded they're reading. They want the story to engage them, yes, but not in this way. A balance has to happen with writing—what's good for the writer and what's good for the reader. If only the writer is satisfied, this does not bode well for the book or the writer.

Anything that takes readers out of the reading experience is best avoided (writing style, typos, seriously misused punctuation, junk words, extraneous scenes and dialogue, etc.). You do have to trust your head-and-heart alignment about your writing, but you also benefit from paying attention to readers' responses to it, which includes responses from a developmental editor, whose primary concern is or should be to help you make your book the best it can be.

One client wrote a short story as part of a collective and did use as-it’s-happening narrative in that one instance. But we handled this in a specific way: We made it a news-type story delivered by a narrator, which was integral to the story, and is akin to listening to an announcer on the radio. Had it not been crafted this way, it wouldn’t have worked and would have contrasted with the other stories in the book that were written in the proper tense. It’s one thing to do this in a way that works for a short story and another for a lengthier novel. You don’t want to wear readers out while reading, if they’ll stick with it, that is.

I say this because I'm not just a developmental editor. I'm also an avid reader of many fiction and non-fiction genres. If the way a fiction or non-fiction book is written (which includes memoirs) annoys me, I won’t read it (it’s different, of course, if I’m wearing my editor cap). I’ve been trying to slog through a book someone gifted me with that annoys me no end to read. Nearly every sentence—and this is not an exaggeration—starts with a gerund or a participle. There are other annoying factors, but this one really stymies my ability to get through the book to learn what the author meant to convey. (Example: Understanding a choice had to be made Mary walked to the window and looked out. Realizing the choice wouldn’t be easy she stared out the window, yet saw nothing. Walking to the door she put her hand on the knob and paused. Turning the knob she walked out; her decision made. Knowing what she had to do, she dialed Mike’s phone number. Hearing him answer after the first ring, she hesitated.) Perhaps you can see how tedious it becomes to read something written in this way. And, sadly, it seems it could be a good book (based on the relatively few pages I’ve managed to read), if only an editor had advised the writer properly.

Let’s get back to writing tense. It’s also important that you don’t change tense in narrative, something I have seen a few writers do. (Example: Mary walked into the room and looked around. She sees the vase has been moved and puts it back into its proper place.) You can shift tense in dialogue because people do speak in past, present, and future tense; but you have to stick to one tense—the right tense—in narrative. Now, relax and write tense well.

I wish you the best with your writing and progress.

Need a Book Doctor or an incentive to write or complete your manuscript? Let Joyce L. Shafer be your writing coach, developmental editor, or provide a critique. Details about her services at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/

Characters and Dialogue

A novel, and even a memoir, will have characters and dialogue. You want to make sure dialogue is easy to read, sounds natural, and does what it’s meant to.

Good character development in fiction includes making characters’ voices so distinctive that readers can tell who’s talking without attributes. I’m not saying that’s required or suggested (see an example at the end), just that it’s a good ideal to keep in mind. What I mean by “voice” is what a character says and how s/he says it. How do you accomplish this, you ask? Know your characters well.

A character’s voice will be influenced by education or lack of it; their past and current place in society; region where they grew up; prejudices; and desires for themselves and their lives. What drives a character will drive their thoughts, feelings, words, and actions. Fictional characters, just as real people, are molded by the environment where they grew up and currently find themselves in. This is colored by personal and indoctrinated beliefs and personal intentions, as well as the vernacular and familiar sayings they heard while growing up and may still hear or use. Yet, even if a number of your characters grew up in the same area, culture, or even home, they will still each have a distinctive voice when they think, speak, or write. Each character’s attitude is as unique and distinctive as each real person’s is.

Once you get the voice down for each character, you then need to focus on dialogue that goes on between characters. Dialogue is a great way to provide information to other characters (and readers) rather than use exposition/narrative to do this. Dialogue needs to move everything and everyone forward and must never drag characters, plot, and pace down.

Dialogue reveals the relationship between characters: Good, bad, or indifferent. Dialogue makes characters come to life on the pages so it must be realistic and come across as natural for each character. This is where dialogue can get tricky. You see, it has to sound natural, but cannot mimic the way people actually speak with all their um’s, uh’s, oh’s, wow’s, okay’s, and so forth (junk words), especially at the starts of dialogue sentences. This is how people speak, but it makes dialogue in novels clunky, tedious, and tiresome.  

Real people may start and stop when they speak, but fictional characters should be allowed minimal opportunity (or reason) to do that. Dialogue that mimics the way many people speak would wear a reader out, not to mention use up page space (in an annoying way) and drag plot and character development, and pace, way down. That’s not good. The exception is if you have a character that is a teen or from a social culture that, like, you know, like, uses a lot of, you know, words like, you know, “like” and “you know.”

Along with giving each character a distinctive voice and making all dialogue sound natural, you need to be certain that ALL dialogue reveals more about what a character is thinking, feeling, and doing as well as moves the plot forward. It must also convey what’s happening in a particular scene and only that scene, but must always relate to the plot (no scene should be included that doesn’t relate to plot and/or character development in some significant way). Dialogue lets you build tension, as needed. If any dialogue does not fulfill these functions, you need to either rewrite it or delete it.

Even with characters’ distinctive voices, what they say needs to be succinct, and fit their personality. A character that is an adventurous type or thrill-seeker is not going to speak the same way a shy character or one who has a deep feeling of duty and responsibility will. It’s also important to realize that people don’t always say precisely what they feel or mean. Often, people speak in subtext, that is, in a roundabout manner, rather than directly to the point. Subtext dialogue demonstrates what is actually going on between two or more characters. You’ve seen this before: A man and woman snipe at each other for pages and pages, the tension builds, and then they kiss, go on a date, or hop into the sack. Despite what their dialogue included, feelings of love or lust were building under the surface of what they said. Of course, it could be apathy or rage that’s building through subtext. The thing to remember with subtext is that you want to demonstrate it through what is said and not through attributions, also known as tag lines (e.g., he said with anger/she said with great passion).

When it comes to attributions/tag lines the simpler the better. Words like said, asked, answered, and replied do something remarkable and wonderful in a novel: They disappear for readers so that only what’s said or asked registers in their minds. You can use other words like moaned, groaned, shouted, sneered, and so forth if they truly add to the dialogue moment. Just know they’ll draw attention to themselves, which means that for even a brief moment (maybe longer), you’ll pull readers out of the reading experience—out of the movie in their minds—in order to focus on how you want them to hear what was said and interpret mood. It’s better if you use words and actions (things characters do while they speak so they aren’t taking heads on a page) that convey mood.

Dialogue may also lead you to deal with dialect. There’s a school of thought that you should indicate dialect then avoid using phonetic and misspelled words afterwards so that writing and reading it is not tedious. And yet we have success stories like Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn written entirely in dialect. And, which Harry Potter fan can imagine Hagrid speaking without dialect. It’s recommended that you suggest dialect rather than use it throughout the manuscript, but use your best judgment about this. If done well, and you feel it’s important for the story, it will add to the story in the way you intend. If you intend to submit to agents, they’ll let you know if they believe it works or not (but listen to your gut—again, imagine if Rowling’s agent had said to get rid of Hagrid’s dialect or if Huck Finn spoke like a well-educated lad). If you decide to use dialect throughout, create a list for yourself so that each time you use words, you’re consistent with the misspellings, and manners of speech.

One more thing about dialogue: Avoid overuse of characters’ names, both in dialogue and in attributions. Make it clear initially who is speaking and use names only if truly needed. You don’t want dialogue to read as follows:

“Hi, Mark. How’s it going today?” Sally said.

“Hi, Sally. It’s going well,” Mark replied.

“Have you had lunch yet, Mark?” Sally asked.
“No, Sally. I haven’t, but I was thinking about it,” Mark answered.

Better:

“Hi, Mark. How’s it going today?” Sally said.

“It’s going well.”

“Have you had lunch yet?”

“No, but I was thinking about it.”

Or:

“Hi, Mark. How’s it going today?”

“Hi, Sally. It’s going well.”

“Have you had lunch yet?”

“No, but I was thinking about it.”

These are not examples of stimulating dialogue, but they get the point across. Because of the way the first sentence or first two sentences are set up, you have no problem tracking who’s speaking. And keep in mind what I said: no talking heads. Even though these examples don’t provide actions for the characters, give them some actions, even small ones, while they speak. Sally might pause and shuffle her feet or fiddle with her hair or pick up something of Mark’s and put it back before or after she asks if he’s had lunch. Mark might lean back in his chair when Sally first speaks to him or before he answers her.

Have fun with your characters and what they say as they and you move your story from one moment and scene to the next and the plot forward to its rewarding conclusion.

I wish you the best with your writing and progress.

Need a Book Doctor or an incentive to write or complete your manuscript? Let Joyce L. Shafer be your writing coach, developmental editor, or provide a critique. Details about her services at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/

The Importance of Setting in a Fiction or Nonfiction Book

Setting is integral to story, just as the characters and plot/theme are. Setting is about balance: you don’t want to give too little description and you don’t want to overdo it.

Setting is where the story and each scene take place, which you know. But do you grasp that setting can set the tone and mood readers experience, and can reveal and or trigger characters’ moods? You want to give enough (not too much) description for each scene to set the appearance, atmosphere, and mood for readers so they are clear enough in their own minds about the general or specific image you intend for them to have. It may help to create a list or essay description for your scenes (like a character sketch) and keep these handy so you stay consistent throughout the scenes and story.

Give places texture through description. Here’s an example from a James Lee Burke novel:  

“They drove back onto the four-lane and crossed the bridge over the wide sweep of the Atchafalaya River. From the bridge’s apex, Morgan City looked like a Caribbean port, with its palm-dotted streets, red-tiled roofs, biscuit-colored stucco buildings, and shotgun houses fronted by ceiling-high windows and ventilated green shutters.”

As I said, it doesn’t have to be overdone, just give readers something that helps them form an adequate image in their minds and sets mood and atmosphere—and gives them a sense of place.

Here’s another example from a James Lee Burke novel that puts “place” to where his main character lives: 

“I drove home at 5 p.m. and parked my pickup truck under the porte cochere attached to the shotgun house where Molly and I live in what is called the historical district of New Iberia. Our home is a modest one compared to the Victorian and antebellum structures that define most of East Main, but nonetheless it is a beautiful old place, built of cypress and oak, long and square in shape, like a boxcar, with high ceilings and windows, a small gallery and peaked tin roof, and ventilated green shutters that you can latch over the glass during hurricane season.

The flower beds are planted with azaleas, lilies, hibiscus, philodendron, and rosebushes in the sun and caladiums and hydrangeas in the shade. The yard is over an acre in size and covered with pecan trees, slash pine, and live oaks. The back of the property slopes down to the Teche, and late at night barges and tugboats with green and red running lights drone heavily through the drawbridge at Burke Street on their way to Morgan City. At early dawn there is often ground fog in the trees and on the bayou, and inside it you can sometimes hear a gator flopping or ducks wimpling the shallows.”

You want to make the inner and outer landscapes in your story as real as possible for readers. You want readers to feel as if they’ve been there, to feel connection to the story through location. They want to feel this, too. If you intend to or are writing a series with the same character or characters, you will have to describe some settings (and character descriptions) in each book, when appropriate, but with only enough information to give adequate description to new readers and refresh memories for those who follow the series.

A character’s scene setting can influence or reveal something about his or her internal landscape, as well. How you do this is more important than what you use to do it with. Here’s an example from an Elizabeth George novel (British—so spellings of some words are different):

            She parked the Mini with one of its front tyres on the kerb and went to see what the Breakwater had to offer. Not much, she discovered, a fact that other diners must have been aware of, because although it was the dinner hour, she found herself alone in the restaurant. She chose a table near the door in the hope of catching an errant sea breeze should one fortuitously decide to blow. She plucked the laminated menu from its upright position next to a vase of plastic carnations. After using it to fan herself for a minute, she gave it a look-over and decided that the Mega-Meal was not for her despite its bargain price (£5.50 for port sausage, bacon, tomato, eggs, mushrooms, steak, frankfurter, kidney, hamburger, lamb chops, and chips). She settled on the restaurant’s declared specialty: buck rarebit. She placed her order with a teenaged waitress sporting an impressive blemish precisely in the middle of her chin, and a moment later she saw that the Breakwater Restaurant was going to provide her with its own form of one-stop shopping.  [My note: She found a current newspaper with an article she needed to read on the front page.]

Look at the extraordinary amount of information revealed in that paragraph. You get a sense of so many things: what a traditional or culture-based meal might include; approximate time of day; either she’s a poor car parker or didn’t bother about parking better on this occasion (has a lot on her mind, perhaps; but if she does this often, you have a sense of what kind of ride her Mini is and its condition); she picked a place to eat that obviously is not a local favorite (is her choice because of location, unfamiliarity with the area, that’s she’s on a tight budget, is a spendthrift?); it’s hot as heck—she sat by the window, hoping for a breeze; the description of the menu (laminated) and the plastic carnations give visual images and an indication about what kind of place this is (service and food quality); she finds something there she needs other than just something to eat: a current newspaper. Of course, if you read this particular novel or the series it’s part of, you know the answers to the questions in parentheses; but you can see how much information is provided by setting the scene, even in one paragraph.

Always give readers a physical location to “land” in (including an address with a made-up numeral; though, a numeral isn’t always needed, as in the Burke example). You can boost sense of place if you use street names and highway names and their numbers—to make the story more realistic for readers. For example, Rex Stout placed the house of his orchid-growing detective, Nero Wolfe, at an address on West 35^th Street in Manhattan. The number part of the address, if real, would be in the Hudson River, but even though some readers may be aware of this (or not), they can identify with the surroundings or look up the street on a map so they get a sense of the neighborhood and where it fits in the layout of Manhattan. You may also have to make up brick-and-mortar businesses, etc., but keep these as realistically located as possible, if you’re using a real location.

How you handle setting matters because clarity is imperative. Everything you write creates a sequence of scenes in the minds of readers—they are experiencing a number of things simultaneously, so you must present them with information in a proper, reliable order. It’s mind-boggling as a reader (and as a developmental editor) to approach a scene and have the terrain alter from the original image the writer created in your mind as you move through the scene. One client didn’t have a particular scene setting clear in his mind, so just kept adding what he thought would be interesting or challenging for the characters in the scene (I was utterly confused about what the setting was supposed to look like, which I explained to the client). This kind of disorganized, willy-nilly scene creation makes readers (and editors) feel as though they were plucked from a stable environment and dropped into an altered reality. Unless your novel is about altered realities, don’t do this to readers; and if it is, make sure you do this with skill and clarity. Also don’t have what characters need appear out of thin air. Say a character needs a hammer. Unless you’ve set up where the character gets the hammer from, don’t have one appear in his or her hand from nowhere (unless your character is a magician or wizard). Everything has to be logical, even in Science Fiction and Fantasy.

One thing you might do is take photos of exact locations or locations that resemble ones you wish to create or use in your story, including exterior and interior photos (get permission, if needed—but notes can always be made without permission). This way, you have references you can pull from for descriptions and how scenes unfold when the terrain is important to the scene. (Most businesses won’t mind if you give them good promotion in your novel, but they will mind if you don’t—so make one up, if it plays a negative role in the story.)

You want settings to be as clear and real as possible for readers so you maintain the integrity of the story and readers’ ability to follow and connect with the story, scene by scene.

I wish you the best with your writing, process, and progress.

Joyce Shafer

“Editor, Joyce Shafer. What can I say? Simply put, no Joyce, no book. Part editor, part coach, part teacher, Joyce was absolutely phenomenal throughout the entire editing process. Working with Joyce was like taking a graduate course in writing with your all-time favorite teacher and you were the only student. I just can't say enough good things. Allow me a shameless plug for her services. ~ Eric Berbig, Author of The People’s Will

Work with Joyce L. Shafer as your writing coach or developmental editor. Details about her services, including The Chapter-by-Chapter Get-Your-Book-Written Writer’s Incentive Coaching at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/

Don’t Put the Cart before the Horse with Your Manuscript

A writer, especially a new writer, is understandably excited and eager to get his/her manuscript to an agent for consideration or self-published. But, it’s imperative you submit writing that shows an agent there’s reason to be interested in you as a promising writer, or make certain it’s ready to self-publish.

As a writer, you are attached to your manuscript—your baby. I get that. As someone who provides services for writers, I get attached too . . . because I care deeply about assisting clients to have better experiences as writers, with their first and subsequent manuscripts.

If you, for whatever reason, don’t use the services of an editor, please let up to three people read through your manuscript and give feedback, before you send it to an agent or self-publish it. If this is something you don’t choose to do, or if you do, read your manuscript aloud to yourself—and not at a rapid pace, before you let anyone else read it. You will catch things you didn’t see before and you’ll also hear how it will sound in the minds of readers.

I’m not saying this because it’s what I do, but because it’s a fact: one thing every writer, especially a new writer, needs is a developmental editor s/he trusts. Here’s why—and it’s something from The Creative Penn I wish I’d written:

“My manuscript came back covered in red ink/littered with Track Changes. I’m really upset by the comments. How do I cope with the difficulty of being edited?

Okay, here’s the sad fact: If your editor is not returning a manuscript covered in red ink/littered with Track Changes, you need a new editor. That’s our job. Our number one goal is to make your work look brilliant. We aren’t judging you, we aren’t trying to make you look bad, and we certainly aren’t saying your writing isn’t fabulous. We’re saying: “Hey, good manuscript—here are the things you can/should do to make it even better.” Because that’s what you’re paying us to do.

It’s hard to divorce yourself from the emotional element of producing this creative work, and to begin to view your novel as a product (I know—I used the ‘P’ word) rather than the flesh of your flesh. The editing process, however, is a great place to start doing that.  Take a deep breath, recognize that all writers go through this pain, and try to listen objectively to what your editor is saying about your work.”

There are best-selling authors who do a number of revisions before they ever submit a manuscript to their publisher. Some do as many as ten revisions (some do more) before they even consider it submission-ready. And there are those like best-seller Elizabeth George who do all the preparation first, before ever starting the draft. George explained that when the manuscript for her first novel came back from her publisher, it was accompanied by forty or so pages of notes, and nearly all of them addressed character development. So she focused on improving her skill with this. Her second novel came back with around thirty pages of notes that mostly focused on developing setting; so she worked to improve that. She then created a system that allowed her to develop these (and all the scenes) prior to writing the draft because, she said, she wanted to avoid having that level of major revision, as much as possible, ever again. When she submitted her third novel, it was accepted as it was. She’d done the work beforehand and it paid off. (All writers have one or more people read what they’ve written before they send it to an agent, publisher, or self-publish it—or they should.)

Note: No matter how ready you or your editor feels your manuscript is for an agent to consider it, even if the agent loves what you’ve written, s/he may still make suggestions. And if a publisher picks you up as a writer, the editor assigned to you may make suggestions as well. It’s a fact of life in the industry.

After providing services to new writers for going on two decades, I can tell what level of skill and knowledge of the craft the writer has and can then base my recommendations on this. I do what I do not only to show them how to improve their manuscript but also to assist them to improve as a writer, which is what proper guidance should accomplish. Not all writers want this. They prefer to write and let their editor fix and polish what they wrote, a service that can, at times, border on ghost writing for the editor.

If you’ve yet to experience a revision, it’s a process of clearing out what doesn’t belong, filling in any gaps in plot and or character (or content for non-fiction) development, tightening the writing as needed, clearing up the technical matters (spelling, punctuation, etc.), possibly reorganizing the structure, and doing this until everything flows from start to finish. Sending your manuscript to an agent or self-publishing it before you are certain it ALL works is a disservice to you as a writer and the time, energy, and effort you put into your manuscript so far. It’s also a disservice to readers.

Okay, I understand that editing costs, especially developmental editing; and the cost is always a result of the level of service the editor has to provide. The better skilled the writer is the less time involved for the editor. But your editor can, will, or should be able to tell you when your manuscript is ready for either self-publishing or submission to an agent.

Too often, new writers believe they can make one revision to their work, based on their editor’s suggestions from that first viewing, and then deem the manuscript done—in final form—ready to go to an agent or be self-published. This may or may not be the case; it often isn’t. More often than not, one revision just gets the manuscript closer to where it deserves to go.

One of my clients made my suggested revisions, but did not send it to me to check it or to a proofreader before she put it into print. Not only are there major typos (and formatting issues), but some of my notes were left in, as well. This is something that can and should be avoided. Let’s face it: typos happen even in best-sellers, but some things should never be included in your final product, especially your editor’s notes to you.

One of the best things you can do for yourself and your manuscript is find a developmental editor you trust—whose services clearly demonstrate benefit to you as a writer and your work—and then listen to what s/he advises. If you work with an editor you trust, then also trust him or her to advise you as to when your manuscript is ready to go. I’m not saying don’t trust your instincts, but don’t send your submission to an agent or put the manuscript into print before it’s truly ready. You don’t want to overwork a manuscript, but it is never a good or wise idea to be in a rush with it either. Make your manuscript the best you can before you move it forward.

I wish you the best with your writing, process, and progress.

Joyce Shafer

“Editor, Joyce Shafer. What can I say? Simply put, no Joyce, no book. Part editor, part coach, part teacher, Joyce was absolutely phenomenal throughout the entire editing process. Working with Joyce was like taking a graduate course in writing with your all-time favorite teacher and you were the only student. I just can't say enough good things. Allow me a shameless plug for her services at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/ ~ Eric Berbig, Author of The People’s Will

Work with Joyce L. Shafer as your writing coach or developmental editor. Details about her services, including The Chapter-by-Chapter Get-Your-Book-Written Writer’s Incentive Coaching at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/

The Importance of Suspense in a Novel

What makes suspense work in a novel? There’s quite a lot to know about this, but here are some highlights.

Every story benefits from some level of suspense. Plot relies on it. For suspense to work well, readers have to care about or be curious about what will happen to one or more characters. This means that as important as plot and suspense are, characters are equally so because plot and suspense reveal the characters for who they really are and characters propel the plot forward, based on what they say or don’t and the actions they take or don’t. Suspense, as with anything, should never be used to fill space. It must be relevant to the story and relevant for the characters, based on their role in the story.

Readers may believe they know the characters you’ve created for them and will rely on them to be true to themselves, if you’ve developed them well, but readers still anticipate the feeling of suspense as they wonder what a character will say or do in certain circumstances. Think of it like baseball: as exciting as it is when the batter hits the ball, the real suspense happens in the moments that immediately follow the sound of the crack, when leather meets wood.

Suspense arises as a result of some form of conflict. Conflict in plot development works best when it shows up then builds, whether just in a particular scene or throughout the novel (though, every scene must contribute to the overall plot and character development). This may involve some form of danger, but it can also be an inner experience for a character as well.

Suspense is about risk, whether it’s between one or more characters or within the character. Suspense can be anything from a character in a darkened room becoming aware there is something or someone breathing heavily on the other side of the door, or how a character will perform in a personal challenge such as facing a job interview panel or facing an angry lion that needs to be re-captured, or the ten-year-old boy working up courage to confront a bully. It can include any resistance a character feels—toward themselves, one or more others, or life events. Resistance is often about characters facing their worst enemy—themselves, in whatever circumstance they find themselves in.  

Here’s the main purpose for suspense: to keep readers reading the book and not wanting to put it down. But, suspense and conflict do not have to come from one dastardly event occurring right after another, like Dominoes falling. Suspense has all to do with the structure of the novel. Relevant and even life-changing events, wrapped in their own form of suspense, must happen as part of a logical sequence of events. You’ve done a good job with suspense when readers care about what’s going to happen and don’t want to stop turning pages, or if they must stop reading, they’re eager to return to the book as soon as possible. You can use and build suspense in many ways; however, you don’t want to overdo this or it will slow plot momentum. Worse, it will become obvious to readers that you’re more interested in distracting them from less than stellar plot and character development than making sure the story engages them.  

Other forms of suspense include seeking something significant, big discoveries that are made, time running out, physical attacks, as well as emotional or spiritual attacks. Something as simple as an envelope with a significant message inside received but unopened and forgotten about or an important fax that falls under a nearby piece of furniture creates suspense. There’s something there a character needs to know about—readers know about it—but the character is operating in the dark. This creates a promise to readers: at some point, the character will either discover or be impacted by this.

Suspense must happen organically within plot development; and three of many ways to do this involves the use of clues, false clues, and red herrings. “A clue is a mistake by another name,” said the character James Hathaway in the PBS series Inspector Lewis). Clues provide information to a character (and to readers). These can include tangible objects such as fingerprints, or a button torn from a garment during a struggle and later pried from the clenched hand of the victim, or a circled listing in a newspaper. A false clue can be used on a character by another character (a character lies to the private investigator), which is learned by the P.I. later in the story. You can also use what’s called a red herring, which is an event or statement that misleads characters (and readers); but this must be logical and have relevance to the story. A red herring keeps readers from figuring out what’s really going on sooner than you wish to reveal what is going on.

I wish you the best with your writing, process, and progress.

Joyce Shafer

“Editor, Joyce Shafer. What can I say? Simply put, no Joyce, no book. Part editor, part coach, part teacher, Joyce was absolutely phenomenal throughout the entire editing process. Working with Joyce was like taking a graduate course in writing with your all-time favorite teacher and you were the only student. I just can't say enough good things. Allow me a shameless plug for her services at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/ ~ Eric Berbig, Author of The People’s Will

Work with Joyce L. Shafer as your writing coach or developmental editor. Details about her services, including Critiques and The Chapter-by-Chapter Get-Your-Book-Written Writer’s Incentive Coaching at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/

The Importance of Plot in a Novel

What makes plot development work in a novel? There’s quite a lot to know about this, but here are some high-points. 

A strong novel writer causes readers to feel they experience a slice of someone else’s (one or more characters) “real” life. Even Science Fiction and Fantasy must accomplish this in their own ways. Readers want to relate to characters in novels, whether that’s just for one novel or in a series that involves the same main characters throughout. It’s up to you as a writer to create this for readers. You do this through plot and character development.

Your job as a writer is to make readers forget they’re reading. The way to accomplish this is to create a movie in the minds of readers through all the ways that make a story one told well and is readable. A well-developed plot uses characters developed well and all five physical senses (and sometimes the sixth sense).

A strong writer makes every effort to show rather than tell. This is done by providing settings, scenes, and characters readers can easily visualize in their minds and relate to, but through only as much exposition as is actually needed. It’s better to more often merge exposition with what characters say and do than provide it solely or primarily through narrative. Too much narrative can easily become tedious to contemporary readers.

Cause readers to feel the tension created by what happens through events large and small, and between one or more characters. Readers expect to feel something when they read. As a writer, it’s up to you to make this the smoothest experience for readers as possible. This means you must remove anything (or strive to) such as typos, misspelled words, wrong or extra words, or any scene that detracts from the reader’s experience, even if you absolutely love it.

PLOT

The plot needs to follow a logical and believable path. Again, even in Science Fiction or Fantasy, there are enough elements included that allow readers to relate to what’s happening as possible. What a plot should never be is a story filled with action scenes you add characters to, like refrigerator magnets stuck on to fill up space. Nothing should ever be included on a page of a novel that doesn’t belong there, that doesn’t move plot and character development forward. Plot is and should be about the characters—what they say and do as they contend with events when they happen and as a result of them. As best-selling author Elizabeth George said, “You never want to give readers characters in search of a plot.”

Events should influence characters, and characters should influence events. As part of plot, readers expect characters to do certain things: Face challenges, make decisions—wrong or right, and learn and evolve (or devolve) in some way. At the end of each scene, ask yourself what changed about the characters and the plot as a result of the scene. If nothing changed, you either need to rewrite the scene so that something does change, even if it’s a small shift, or delete the scene entirely. No page filler allowed. Story is meant to be like a thread you pull on a sweater and you watch what it unravels. You want the thread to be clean and even—no knots or anything that doesn’t belong there that will jam up the flow. Plot develops as a series of events that follow an original event—like a lit match placed to a fuse.

Plot involves conflict, and conflict comes in many forms, not just drastic ones. Conflict is the result of what is said and done by characters in the story, as a result of weather and nature, and by any number of initiators. But whatever is said or done or happens, one thing should always lead to the next, in a logical way, just as it does in life. Again, nothing should ever be included just to fill the page or create more length for the novel. Everything on every page must contribute to plot and character development.

“Story is about mastering the art, not second-guessing the marketplace.” – Robert McKee

I wish you the best with your writing, process, and progress.

Joyce Shafer

“Editor, Joyce Shafer. What can I say? Simply put, no Joyce, no book. Part editor, part coach, part teacher, Joyce was absolutely phenomenal throughout the entire editing process. Working with Joyce was like taking a graduate course in writing with your all-time favorite teacher and you were the only student. I just can't say enough good things. Allow me a shameless plug for her services at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/~ Eric Berbig, Author of The People’s Will

Work with Joyce L. Shafer as your writing coach or developmental editor, or get a thorough manuscript critique. Details about her services, including The Chapter-by-Chapter Get-Your-Book-Written Writer’s Incentive Coaching at http://editmybookandmore.weebly.com/