First Draft vs. Polished

Man, I am so super embarrassed by the awfulness of my first draft. It is…terrible. I wrote Kings & Queens before reading books on craft, before knowing it would be YA, before having a great group of critters at my disposal. Wow. What pure awfulness that I never even saw in the beginning.

Originally, I had 5 scenes in chapter two, and these were scenes 3 and 5, but now they’re combined to create 4 of 4. I ended up hacking it down to the best bits and it is soooo much better. What I had before makes me cringe, it’s choppy, the dialogue is so painfully babyish and the narrative is crap. Not even craptastic. Just plain crap.

One of the things I decided to do at some point was eliminate as many be-verbs as possible. And it’s amazing how a little change like that can bring so much more life and pizazz to the prose. And it’s not even something readers notice on a conscious level. Yet, overall, it makes your work much more colorful and engrossing. I also infused more showing and decided to write with a closer Third Person narrative, so now each perspective reflects the voice of each POV character.

So, without further adieu, here are my two hacked and sacked scenes, if you care to read them and promise not to throw tomatoes, that I turned into one:

The next morning at first bell, Majesty shut her locker door and felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned and said, “Hey, Alec.” His charming grin warmed her.

Fresh from the shower, his light brown hair was still damp, and he smelled deliciously like masculine soap. She inhaled deeply to take in more of his scent as if it could infuse her with strength.

He canted, “Way up in the sky, the big birdies fly; while down in the nest, the little ones rest.”

She tilted her head and muttered, “The sun comes up, the dew goes away. “Good morning, good morning,” the little ones say.”

“Why you so glum, Brown Eyes?”

She shrugged. “What do ya mean?”

“You’re not smiling and cheery like usual.”

“I’m smiling. See?” She exhibited a faux smile.    

“Yeah…now, after the birdies pecked ya.” He flicked her nose. “You certainly don’t look like the manager of a winning team. You realize we won, right?”

“You know,” she said, rubbing the sting out of her tip, “my life doesn’t entirely revolve around baseball, ya know. Did it ever occur to you, I might have some personal problems?”

“Ohhh. Like that…The cotton pony thing?”

“Shut up!” She slapped his chest and rolled her eyes. “No, not that, you idiot! Just forget it. Saw you in the cage this morning. Troy’s suggestions have definitely made a difference.”

“Hopefully the adjustments stick.”

“They will. You’re amazing. I’m sure your little hitting slump is only temporary,” she said as they began moving towards the theater.

He huffed. “Yeah.”

Students streamed around Majesty and Alec. Thanks to the athletic director’s sensible decision to market paraphernalia, Colts shirts were plentiful, making Majesty feel less exposed wearing one of five she owned. Majesty cringed taking note of the guys. The smaller town of Megan’s Corner, which abutted Cedar Creek, didn’t have its own high school. Depending on zone, some kids came here, others attended a school in the city of Edgewood. According to the school records Majesty had looked up this morning after practice, males totaled 254. Finding them won’t be so easy. With more girls than guys, maybe Derek’s right. What are the chances they’ll find me?

“Hi, Majesty.”

“Oh hi, Hannah,” she answered as Hannah passed.

Majesty backhanded Alec’s shoulder. “She’s cute. Ask her out.”

“Heidi of the Alps? No way.” He scrunched his brow. “Bet she yodels and clog dances.”

“She does not. Cut it out…I know. I know. You gotta have a sports nut.”

“Just stop going all Aphrodite on me.”

She snickered. “Her son, Cupid’s the real romantic, ya know? Aphrodite enjoys causing havoc. If I went all Aphrodite on you, you’d be fawning at my feet, burning with desire, getting harder by the…”

“Okay! Gotcha!” The tan on his face was vanquished by pink, and his eye color, which teetered between blue and green and appeared to shift with emotional swells more reliably than any mood ring, yielded to green. “Quit matchmaking. Alright?…D’ya memorize all your lines?”

She beamed relishing her flair to beckon a blush. “Hope so, Red, but I had a hard time focusing last night.”

“That happens to me too,” he said carrying on as if she’d called him Alec. “Um, since we’re arguing, you could just storm off the stage and pretend that’s what you intended to do.”

She huffed and glanced at the Our Town poster on the bulletin board in the performing arts wing. “Sure. That’ll go over well. Mr. Hanson may renege and choose another Emily.”

“Doubt that. You’re perfect, ” he cleared his throat and added, “uh, for the part. Maybe we’ll be called on last and you can cram. We’ll figure something out…Come on, sweet goddess. Let’s get inside, or we’ll make a dramatic entrance if we’re late.”

She laughed. “Ooooo, Alec, your corniness totally turns me on.”

His cheeks went flush again. “Yeah, mock me all you want, baby, but my groaner gave you your first gut-wrench of the day.”

She smiled but started losing grasp of it once Alec opened the theater door and ushered her in with a nudge to her back. She wished she possessed the capability to enfold herself in the cozy humor like it was a thick quilt, but the wispy organza of delight blew away with a gust of anxiety.

As soon as they sat on the maroon, velvet cushions, joining about thirty fellow students, Maj felt the heat of eyes on her neck. She looked over her left shoulder to see if she was indeed being watched and found Preston Reilly staring at her. He smiled. She sneered and faced forward again. She crinkled her left cheek. That’s weird. Why would he look at me like that or pay any attention to me? He never has before. No guy does. She glanced over her shoulder again, but this time, he was so close, his golden hair feathered her cheek when she turned. She jolted.

“D’ya find the invitation to my party?” he whispered in her ear.

She nodded.

“Hope you come. Won’t be as fun without you.”
    
Some concern, jerk! Then why is this my first invite? She watched him sit back and cross his arms looking satisfied and pretty darn cute too. If you weren’t such an egomaniac, you might actually be hot.

“What’d he want?” Alec muttered.

“He actually invited me to his party this time,” she said in his ear.

“Yeah. Derek and I found his junk mail in our lockers this morning.”

“Ya goin’?”

He coughed and shook his head. “Not a chance.”

“Well, then I don’t want to go, but Derek’ll want to for sure, and you know how easily I cave.”

He gawked at her like she was crazy. Yeah, it was dumb to follow Derek around like a tagalong puppy, but it was better than nothing. “I’d ask you why you torture yourself, but I already know why.” He kissed her forehead and swept her hair out of her eyes tucking it behind her ear. “Can’t help it cause you’re madly in love with him. Want me to beat the crap out of him, or some sense into him, I should say?”

“No,” she moaned. She slumped her head on his shoulder and sighed.

“He’s been so detached and serious lately. He rarely laughs anymore.”

“Maybe your jokes just suck.”

“You know what I mean. I don’t know where his mind is.”

I do, she thought as she slouched in her chair.

After school, Majesty waited for an opportunity to use the payphone in town. When no one was in the vicinity, she ran to it and called the police.

“Police Department,” a male said. “We’re recording.”

She peered around, then hunched and shielded her mouth with her hand. “Hi, um…I was jogging in the woods last night around six-thirty and overheard two teens, who I believe attend Cedar Creek High, talking about some plan involving a church. They didn’t name any specific one, but they mentioned bullets and shooting up the place. That’s all I heard before they chased me away. I just wanted to let you know so you could warn the churches. Bye.”

“Wait a minute! Miss…”

She shivered as she hung up. I hope I did the right thing, but now I’m petrified. What if they find out I ratted? And figure out who I am? While her hand was still on the receiver, the phone rang making her jolt and shriek. Gosh! They traced it? Stupid caller ID. She gasped and did a double-take when glancing over her shoulder. “Oh no! The gas station cameras!” Cops will know who I am in five minutes. It’s fine! Stop overacting. Be cool. “He-hello.”

“Tell anyone else, anything, even the fact that we found you, and someone you love will die,” said an electronically-altered voice. “No one can stop us…least of all, you.” In the midst of his freaky, warbled laugh, she slammed down the phone.

Panic overwhelmed her. How did they find out it‘s me? Her eyes grew wide as she scanned the area. Aside from Smitty, who was changing gas prices on his sign, no one else was in eyeshot. They have to be watching me now. They must’ve followed me. She was terrified as she ran home, the long way. “Oh my gosh!” Are they going to kill me? I can’t think. I just need to find out who they are before they hurt me or anyone else. But how? Who on earth could they be?

And here’s the scene tightened up, beefed up, with me keeping just the necessary parts or conversation pieces I liked. In chapter 1, Majesty saves Jase from jumping off a building, so the scene opens up with her response to that.

Jase’s brown eyes, dull as mud, turned Majesty into organza when she said hi. Well, if he wanted more friends, he should try, um, returning gazes or replying when spoken to. She felt no itch to sweat it.

Unlike him, she didn’t mind skirting under the radar, not with killers-in-the-making on the hunt. Her neck ached from the protective slouch she’d lugged around all day.

Though her victory shirt, one of five Colts shirt she owned, screamed flamboyance with its sparkly MJ on back, she figured not wearing it would’ve beamed brighter to whomever the deadly sickos were. But thanks to the Athletic Director’s good sense to market paraphernalia, Colts shirts flooded in plenty, making her feel less self-conscious. Still,
she feared she held some other exposing tell.

According to records, males totaled 254, which included invaders from Megan’s Corner. Finding ’em won’t be easy. With more girls, what are the chances they’ll find me?

The dismissal bell rang. Finally.

Leaning against the lockers, Alec adjusted his Red Sox cap and squinted at her.

Majesty was about to snap, “What!” when a passerby said hi. “Oh, hi, Hannah.” She backhanded Alec’s chest. “She’s cute. Ask her out.”

“Heidi of the Alps? No way. Bet she yodels and clog dances.”

“She does not. Cut it out . . . I know. I know. Gotta have a sports nut.”

“Stop going all Aphrodite on me.”

“Actually, her son Cupid’s the real romantic. She enjoys causing havoc. If I went all Aphrodite on you, you’d be fawning at my feet, burning with desire, getting harder by the—”

“Kay. Gotcha.” Pink conquered the tan on his face, and his irises, which volleyed between blue and green, fell to the hue of colder oceans. “Quit matchmaking, all right?”

“For now,” she laughed. Being able to floor this rock among mere men sparked a thirst for even greater stun power. “Hey. I got my first invite to a Preston smash-n-bash today.”

“Yeah. Derek and I found his junk mail this morning. I’m not buying.”

“Then I don’t wanna go, but Derek might, and you know he kinda sorta weakens my will.”

He swept strands of her hair off her face and tucked them behind her ear. “Lovesickness. Tackles the best of us. Want me to beat some sense into him, Brown Eyes?”

“No,” she moaned.

He removed his cap and wiggled it onto her head. “Cuter on you.” He smoothed his golden brown hair but missed some wisps on top. “He’s beh…” She took care of ’em. “…um…been so detached and serious lately, rarely laughs anymore.”

“Maybe your jokes just suck.”

“You know what I mean. Don’t know where his mind is these days.”

“I do. Think fake boobs . . . Gotta go. Bye.” She one-shouldered her backpack, stuffed with books and letters of warning for every church within fifty miles.

“I can give you a lift,” Alec said, reaching for it.

She recoiled. “No! I’m good. I’ll walk. It’s gorgeous.”

“What the heck? Rob a bank?”

“No. I . . . have lots of locker crap . . . cleaned it out. It’s not heavy.”

He sneered at her and said, “Okaaay. You cool or what? You’ve been weird all day. Kinda jumpy and quiet actually. And you, quiet? With the title recapture a couple of wins away? Not like you at all.”

“I’m fine. Just tired. Need fresh air. See ya.” As she turned, faces warped like deranged clowns in a fun house mirror. She clenched her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. Though her vision reset, anxiety stuck. Her pulse raced as she jogged to the Don’t-Blink Zone.

With no one near the payphone, she darted there, kissed her Carlton Fisk keychain for luck and called police.

“Cedar Creek Police Department. Recording.”

Peering around, she hunched and shielded her mouth. “Hi. Uh, I was jogging in the woods last night around seven-thirty. I overheard two guys, who I believe go to Cedar Creek High, talking about some plan involving a church. They didn’t specify, but they mentioned guns and shooting. That’s all I heard. Just wanted you to know. Bye.”

“Wait a minute! Miss—”

She hung up and gnashed her teeth. Load off me now. But what if they learn I ratted, figure out who I am? The phone rang, making her jolt. Stupid caller ID. Casting a glance over her shoulder, she gasped and did a double-take. “Oh no. Gas station cameras.” Cops’ll know in five. It’s fine. Be cool. She jerked Alec’s cap down on her brow. “He-hello?”

“Tell anyone else, anything, even the fact that we found you, and someone you love will die,” said an electronic voice. “No one can stop us . . . least of all, you.”

During a diabolical laugh, she slammed the phone down. Aside from Smitty changing gas prices on his sign, no one appeared in eyeshot. The letters, now affixed with a death sentence, suddenly weighed like lead.

Majesty couldn’t stop shaking, as she ran home, the long way.

I know that first one was super long, so imagine if that were still in my book? Yuck. I’m so glad I learned how to spot what was most important, SHOW more than tell and kill my darlings. Have you done any major gutting like I have and seen your stuff for the horror it really is?

~ Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.

Blog Tour: So Far, So Good

I’m having a total blast on my blog tour so far. The Teen Book Scene is awesome for helping me with the start of it, for the next four weeks.

For my first visit at Rex Robot Reviews, I had to write a bio using only lines from my YA novel, Kings & Queens.This would have been so much easier with a First Person narrative because that gives you so much commentary to draw from, but mine’s in close Third.

Well, the first bio I had written, consisted of mainly thoughts, since they’re in First.  But all the posts I had written weeks ago for my blog tour are on my zapped computer, so I had to redo them.

For my next go around, I decided to do something completely different: a Q&A. It’s much, much better than what I originally had. A mock Q&A allowed my to use more chunks of dialogue to make the bio more quirky and weird like me.

I Love it!

Well, here it is, in case you missed my links all over cyberspace.

Barbie? Well, Totally Toxic. Not Malibu.
Another dreamer? Yep. I always fight for my deepest desires.
Excited? Getting more colorful by the hour.
Peculiar? Totally. And hot as fire and a bundle of laughs too.
Clothes? I don’t have the best fashion sense, but I’ve been so blinded by gorgeous face in the mirror, I didn’t stop to look. Bask in my awesomeness.
What about shoes, boots? Running shoes. Oldies. Though retired due to high mileage, they’re the comfiest things to beat around in.
Haven’t been in much trouble? Obviously.
Ever been prone to violence? I’ve thought about bashing a few brains in—today even. Never actually done it.
Where’s your sense of adventure? Ha. I’ll go half-naked…or skinny dipping in a Hawaiian lagoon.
Can I get tickets for the show, princess? Don’t count on it.
Got a secret lover or somethin’? Yeah, sure. Last night. We slept together.
You’re a sick freak, ya know that? Indeed. So weird. Gotta have a sports nut. Baseball, friendship and love…Little delights me more…Oh, and maybe one cookie. Yum.
Ya on drugs or somethin’? You’re not acting right. No. What’s right? That’s way lame.
What do you want? Everyone to love me.
Favorite thing? A lingering kiss, so amazing, so enrapturing, so perfect. The sudden closeness, the hardness of his chest and arms, the sexy scent of his skin and the taste of his mouth, all cinnamon from recently chewed Big Red or something. Mmmm.
Biggest regret? Life is so short, we never know what’s going to happen and I’ve been an idiot, wasted opportunities, didn’t take chances..I’m tired of being pitiful and listless. I wanna have fun for once. It must be freeing to be so uninhibited…so that’s what I plan to do.
See? You were nervous for nothing. You did great. Am I supposed to clap now? I forgot to bring flowers. My bad.

*  *  *

Yay!!! And today I got my first online review for Kings & Queens. I’m nervous because it’s do or die time and the only feedback I’ve really gotten is from my way-awesome critters. I know my quirky writing style isn’t for everyone and some negative reviews will likely come out, as they do for any book, but I did get a recommendation from Reagan Star at Star Shadow blog.. You can follow the hyperlink to her blog if you’d like to read it.

~ Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.

Turning Tricks

Every novelist wants to knock out a great book, one that engages readers and gets them to care about the final outcome and read beyond chapter 1. To be an exceptional storyteller, the vital thing you must master is the art of hooking. And you do that by using plenty of page-turning tricks and lures.

One of the best ways you can create a hooky work that’s so very hard to put down is to end every chapter in some dynamic fashion…even better if it’s every scene. You never want to be predictable, to always use the same kind of endings, with a banal note of foreshadowing if in First, with a dum-dum-dum moment if in Third. The same kind of downturn used consistently time after time becomes stale, moldy and barbless, even exasperating for readers. Aim to surprise, stimulate and catch readers off guard.

I was reviewing one novel on TheNextBigWriter where every chapter ended with some kind of cliffhanger, but then when the new chapter began, the perceived threat was nothing. Perception by the character, or more likely a case of cheap teasing by the author, was way overblown.

This is melodrama in its most insidious and ugly form. It’s fake. It’s stupid. And worst of all, if you’ve dished this out every chapter and we’re four chapters in, guess what, you’ve inadvertently shifted your readers to a place where they no longer believe you, and you may never gain your credibility back. Even the most unsavvy minds are no longer fooled, more over hooked or affected, by your “trick”. DO NOT fall into this rat trap. Ever. You can play the misunderstanding card once, maybe twice if it’s far removed from the first, but really, overall, mix things up.

Even if you write literary fiction or a more character-driven work, you can strengthen your plot and make your book irresistible. Here are some cool tricks and angles you can infuse in endings in order to pull readers onward in the journey you’ve mapped out for them:

§ Failure in reaching a goal. Characters generally want or need something. Your job as a writer is to pull that object of desire further away from their outstretched hands. End the scene/chapter after a failed attempt.

§ A setback or deterrent. You can land your characters in a spot that’s far worse than they were at the onset of their quest.

§ Increased jeopardy. Is the antagonist one step closer to his or her prey, someone readers care about? Nothing gets readers turning pages faster than tension or a threat to the MC or another likable character.

§ A twist. You can lead readers to believe one thing and then make a shift in the story that gets them hungry to learn more about the jarring shocker you just revealed.

§ A new direction or lead for the protagonist/antagonist to pursue. Readers are information junkies and care about the story question you presented at the beginning, so get them excited or biting nails over the new possibilities in the arc.

§ A new question. You can hint at something that will be fleshed out later. Adding another mystery into your mix of goodies will give readers more to be concerned with.

§ Something totally unusual or unexpected. Pique curiosity, and you’ll hook.

§ A cliffhanger, imagined or real. If you leave a character in a state of peril, readers will race through subsequent scenes to get back and learn the outcome.

§ A chord of doom. If characters are about to follow a dangerous path in the story or are dealing with the weight of some kind of trauma or terrorizing realization, readers will be concerned with how a character deals. If you can end with sour, dire or terrifying chord, that’s best.

§ A departure from a heated moment. If you yank readers out of a heated argument or a passionate frenzy, they’ll be dying to return and see how things get resolved. BUT if the build up and full display are equally as important as the resolution, then do NOT shut readers out by giving a mere summary in the resurface, pick up where you left off. Write the scene and end with one character dissatisfied or regretful or spurred into another course of action. You can have a goal being met yet the outcome being not what the character anticipated.

§ Big trouble: a character dying, moving into a trap, blacking out because of a car accident, fall or whatever or caught in a chase; the emergence of a new threat; someone has died or has been found dead.

§ A new obstacle to overcome.

§ An apparent use of concealment. You may want to keep something hidden and depart from a point of tension that leaves readers guessing and wondering about what happened so you can reveal those details later on in the story.

There are many ways to hook readers. The key to good execution is to give doses of forward motion with plenty of unexpected and stunning scene-ending disasters along the way to the big answer. Write on. Hook ‘em and reel ‘em in, my fellow plumers.

~Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.

Why Is Bipolar Disorder So Popular?

Every writer wants to be fresh and different to stand out from the pack in this competitive industry, but using an unhinged narrator or waffling narrative style is NOT the way to go right out of the gate. You need to have a very good grasp of Narratives and adeptness in each before you can use First and Third in one work. With First Person, voice is the most important thing. It’s not just transferring He and She to an I perspective; it’s about delving in deep and exposing an engaging character, giving readers a more intimate look. To avoid having flat and lifeless drones, you must become a master of voice.

I’ve read some unpublished works that have a few chapters in First present, then chapters in Third past inserted wherever. Or 95% of the book is Limited and a few sneak peeks go all Omni. Wait. Settle that crazy pen down, Buckaroos. This is jarring to readers. Aim for seamless, easy, functional, entertaining, readable work. If your narration jumps all over the place, it won’t be any of those things.

Everything you do as a writer needs to be deliberate and focused. Using fluctuating Narrators is not unheard of but you need to pull back the reigns a bit. Instead of looking unique, you are at risk for coming across as inept and scatterbrained, like you have no clue about perspective. That’s not the impression you want to give.

This is an example of a focused, deliberate switch: using a Third Person Frame that connects First Person Vignettes. Say you’re writing a book like The Green Mile and want to delve into the head of each character right before execution. With proper transitions, readers will know, okay, each time “Dead man walking!” is called, the story’s going to shift into First. Or you could have characters around a campfire sharing freaky real-life stories or alcoholics at an AA meeting or a couple at counselling. The Third Person Narration keeps everything tied together. It works. But just having this chapter Third, the next two First, the next three Third, plus, tense changes is very confusing and jarring. Don’t do this, please.

And then there’s the head-hopping Narrator that breaks out of its Limited shell suddenly in chapter 5, sneaking in something that’s outside the knowledge of the POV character. What? No. You can use a tightly reigned Omniscient Narrator that sticks with one character per scene and interjects commentary here and there that the focus character doesn’t know, but this type of Narrator must make its presence known in the first sentence or paragraph of the work.

I just finished Needful Things. Stephen King used an Omniscient Narrator, made it known in chapter 1, but 95 % of the time kept the focus on one scene character. You can vary the degree of intensity into heads or the focus, staying more so with one character or roving constantly. As long as you provide clear transitions and separate new perspectives with new paragraphs, you can generally keep it from being jarring. But you’ll need to go fleshy and get extremely deep and with character development so readers will care about the outcome and enage in the story.

With Needful Things, which had dozens of POVs, I struggled to finish those 800 pages because the characters were cardboard and I didn’t care. I wanted to see how it resolved, but I didn’t care about any of the characters, I didn’t care if the villain won in the end. So make the extra effort to make your characters pop off the page with engaging personalities and perspectives.

Random switches whenever you please is unfair. You make a contract with readers in chapter 1 that you’re going to tell one kind of story, and any departures from that established mode breach it.

If you’re going to do anything unusual, then you need to set patterns and keep a very rigid structure. Alternate every other chapter, for instance, or use First in chapter 1, the next two in Third. First in chapter 4, the next two in Third. Keep yourself locked in to a definite method to avoid confusing your readers. Use good transitions. Give cues that you’re about to change gears. This will demonstrate that you know what you’re doing and you’re not just flying with the wind or riding on a pogo stick, doing whatever you please.

If you really want to be weird and original, then aim for a unique concept instead. Have quirky characters. Take your plot in unexpected directions. Build in some twists. This will get far more attention and recognition than skipping around with haphazard zest ever will. If you’re all over the place, you won’t look original, you won’t look creative, you won’t look fresh-faced…just crazy and stupid. And FYI crazy people get much smaller checks. Make sure your Narration is focused and that you’re telling the story in the best way possible.

~ Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.

Novels Aren’t Like Coffee, Pools & Cigarettes

One of the best ways to engage your readers is to make your POV characters identifiable, feared or intriguing. And you do that by making motivations and desires clear, including various types of sensory impressions and giving your characters multiple facets like quirky interests or occupations, different proclivities or issues that can affect how he or she reacts like phobias, skeletons buried deep in the closet, job tension or fatigue from insomnia. Okay. Check. You’ve done that. Good. After all this great character building, does your work contain some unwanted distance? Are critters saying your work is pretty good but not engaging? Does your prose feel a bit clumsy? Filtering may be the cause.

Filtering is good for coffee, pools and cigarettes, but not novels. Yet it’s something writers do too frequently because they don’t know they shouldn’t.  But it’s something you should watch for and avoid in your work. When you use combos like she saw, she felt, she heard etc., instead of just naming the stimulus, and sometimes the reaction, it zaps a reader’s connection with the scene character. Saying what’s observed or detected with a filter creates distance and makes readers feel like they’ve been ushered outside the POV just a little bit instead of right there with it. Plus, it mucks up work with superfluous words.

Whether you’re using First, Subjective Third or Omniscience, filtering should be kept at a minimum. Here are some examples that show the difference:

She smelled burgers and bacon from Yesterday’s, which incited hunger pangs. (filtered)
The aroma of burgers and bacon from Yesterday’s incited hunger pangs. (direct)

She noticed the dogwood blossoms that settled on his black Corvette sail off and flutter to the pavement. (filtered)
Dogwood blossoms that settled on his black Corvette sailed off and fluttered to the pavement. (direct)

When she heard a window pane shatter and clink on the wood floor like crystal rainfall, she scampered for a place to hide. (filtered)
When a window pane shattered and clinked on the wood floor like crystal rainfall, she scampered for a place to hide. (direct)

To find the filtering in your work, look for noun-verb combinations like: she felt, she knew, she saw, she smelled, she heard, she tasted, etc. and could-forms like: she could feel, she could sense, etc. and rewrite them so they’re non-filtered.

In some instances, it’s effective to use a filter like this:

By the time she caught wind of his black cherry-leather cologne, her neck was in the stranglehold of a muscular arm.

She heard somewhere that filters can kill an otherwise good novel.

You can also use a filter to help set up POV.  In Omniscience, filters tend to be used more often, but once POV is established, they can be omitted. If your chosen narrator remains at a distance from all POV characters, not quite as far-removed as Objective/Dramatic nor as close as Subjective, then filtering can be used to maintain this distance throughout.

Filtering is a beginner’s mistake so it comes off as amateurish and that’s not the kind of impression you want to make. Rock on. Write on. Be direct.

~ Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.

Being Safe at Third

I find the most engaging and revealing stories are those with a focused perspective, whether they be in First Person—told from the perspective of I—or in Third Person—told from the perspective of he or she. This means that only one character owns a scene, a predetermined block of narrative.

You can write an entire story through one set of eyes, which is Third Person Limited in its most limited sense. It holds one character’s perspective for the journey, and that’s it. You can only narrate what he or she experiences and knows. Meaning, if your character wouldn’t know the name of some anatomical feature, the kind of gun that’s being aimed at him or a song from 1950, even though you do, it shouldn’t be in the narrative.

Third Person Limited can be extended to multiple viewpoints, changing per chapter or scene, but the same limited focus applies. You can use as many POVs as you want, but the more you have, the less readers will be able to identify with characters and experience the story. An example of this is Sinner by Sharon Carter Rogers, which was a fascinating concept to me with interesting characters, but I felt put off with its many perspectives. I couldn’t keep them straight or give an accurate guess now at the quantity she used, but I’m gonna go with fifteen.

Now, with Third Person, you can use various degrees of penetration. Your narrator might give a glimpse of what’s going on inside but never reveal direct thoughts like in this excerpt from the novel School Age by my friend Leslie DuBois.

* * *

Immediately after the break-up, Delia moved in with Donna Lee and her two roommates, Shannon and Sharon. She didn’t leave the couch for weeks as she wallowed in her failures. The longer she moped, the more she failed. She lost her job as a research analyst for the National Science Institute. The only thing she succeeded in was annoying and imposing upon her sister and her two roommates.

“Delia, I love you, but this has got to end,” Donna Lee said one evening as she came home from work.

Trying to block out the forthcoming nagging session, Delia rolled over on the couch and placed a pillow over her head.

“You’ve got to get yourself together. Jason was a no good creep. He’s not worth all this. You’ve gotta get over him.”

She didn’t reply. Her sister just didn’t understand. She had never been married. In fact, Delia couldn’t think of a single relationship she had ever had that lasted longer than two months. Donna Lee was a chronic dater and never got too attached to any man.

“You know what your problem is? You’ve let Jason define you for so long you can’t see yourself without him. I told you when you met him that you were too good for him and you didn’t believe me. You think because your parents didn’t want you that no one could ever want you. One charismatic grin from that trouser troll and he had you thinking that you were the most beautiful you had ever been. Well, you know what, Delia? You are beautiful. With or without him.”

She kept her head under the pillow to hide the tears that had developed from the all-too-true words of her adoptive sister. Deep down she knew Donna Lee was right. She knew she couldn’t carry on sleeping on a couch and dwelling on her pathetic life. She had to find a way to get on with her life.

* * *

Or you can use a more subjective method, also called Close Third, which filters the narration through the character’s head, not only exposing thoughts, but using the character’s attitude, personality and vocabulary to express the scene like in this excerpt from my novel Rotten Apples.

* * *

No one could have known, that in this sea of people, a stranger lurked, or at least, he preferred to be thought of as a stranger, a drifter of sorts, the kind of thug nobody’d wanna mess with. Detached…dark…mysterious…but suave when he needed or wanted to be. He loved to send a child fleeing in fright with just a beady-eyed glance. What a kick!

Westwood had been his home for little more than a month now. Just in some dive, not that he couldn’t afford nicer. He simply preferred to dwell in shadows, be somewhat inconspicuous, since he was wanted under one of his aliases and everything. He did like to step out in spiffy duds, and luckily in this crowd of Lala Land snobs, Marco DeFranco blended in.

He clapped and smiled and reacted like everyone else, but he couldn’t contain a snort when two girls stumbled in line. He’d come to this lame graduation to see his blond vixen, Jenna McCloud. The program noted she’d be giving a speech. On stage sat two blonds, a smokin’ red-head with ample hooters trying to poke through curtains of hair and a dark-haired, four-eyed nerd, the valedick-whatever.

From this distance, Marco couldn’t tell which chick was Jenna until her introduction. The second one to speak, she stepped to the podium. He groaned. Her speech resembled the first. Why didn’t they just write one speech and take a section instead of killing us with the same frickin’ blah-blah over and over again?

He squinted and studied her closely. She looked different somehow. That night at her house he’d only seen her briefly before needing to get away, and it had been over a month, but she just didn’t look the way he remembered. She definitely held more fire in his fantasies. Maybe I just need to put fear back in her eyes. Hot thing.

After the ceremony, he leaned against a palm tree, smoking a cigarette and watching her as she fluttered about at the outdoor reception. Marco yanked in a drag to pull that menthol note down to his gut.

Jenna went and took the hand of another blond. They smiled at each other. Some dude took a picture of them, their arms wrapped around each other. Marco scrutinized each one. He cursed with a wisp of smoke seeping out of his mouth. What a fool he’d been! He questioned the wrong stinking girl. He’d seen them together before, but she had been at the right house, driving the right car, but she was most definitely not Calli Rosenthal a.k.a. Jenna McCloud. How? Too many frickin’ blonds in this state, that’s why!

Marco chucked his cigarette to the ground, crushed it with the sole of his dusty Armani shoe and sped off in his latest rental.

* * *

You can narrate with an in-between style, presenting thoughts, but not filtering through personality. Sometimes you may want to withhold thoughts altogether to leave readers in the dark about motive or future plans. You can vary the level of intensity in different scenes, but don’t use Intensive for the first half of the book and then pull back for the rest. Switches needs to be less jarring and not so obvious, like an ebb and flow that readers never consciously detect. And beyond Third Person Limited, you can use Omniscience in either a Limited or Broad sense.

Limited Omniscience is a bridge between Limited and Omniscience, still keeping the main focus on one character, but perspective becomes the narrator’s, and said speaker can interject things that are not known to the focal point character.

Think of this narrator as a powerless angel, stuck to Mr. MC by assignment, privy to everything he’s experiencing and thinking and also knowing and observing things he doesn’t.  Stephen King often writes with a more focused Omniscience that bridges. In Needful Things for instance, the Narrator sticks to various townies as they deal with the sudden arrival of new store owner Leland Guant, who just happens to have the very thing everyone wants. King almost always had a  scene character in those 700 pages.

In this style, anything in the narrative should apply to the focal point character for the given scene. The focus can stay super  tight, where the narrator refrains from jumping into the POV of other characters until a scene break, at which point the narrator can then move on.

For instance, the narrator should not refer to MC’s facial changes as a witness but rather as they are experienced by the POV character. Heat rushed to his face. Not: He turned red. With any kind of Omniscience  make it clear in the very first sentence. Here’s an example:

* * *

Kicking stones and muttering under his breath as he strolled down Chestnut Street, Knee-high Johnny needed to be concerned with more than his newest nickname, like the knife-wielding man in the bushes, licking his lips and waiting for him to turn the corner. If only someone would scream in the darkness and tell him to run. If only clouds would shift to conceal the full moon and paint an omen in the sky.

A whiff of cigarette smoke stopped Johnny in his tracks. His eyes ached, stretched wide to scan the deserted street for signs of life. Puddles of light from lampposts warped in the wet pavement. Coyotes howled in the hilly surround. His stomach churned with queasiness and a shiver scurried down his spine, and not from the 1 a.m. October breeze. Come on, fool. Didn’t sneak out for nothin.

Determined to master his silly fear, Johnny gulped and took two steps but then he pivoted and dashed toward home. His speedy, little legs threatened to give way beneath him as he ran and ran, and a burn assaulted his lungs almost immediately. He could’ve sworn he heard huffing, splats, and a corduroy swoosh way behind him and then a stuttering on the pavement. He gulped and glanced over his shoulder, but no one was in pursuit. No one was there. Stupid! Stupid! Pea-brained, chicken turd. Freakin’ imagining things.

When he reached his porch, he bowled over, gasping for air and cursing himself. After straightening, he bounced and peeled paint off the wooden railing while waiting for his breathing to even out. Good enough, he slunk into the house, careful not to let the creaky door make too much noise. The snores of his parents had never sounded so pleasant.

He tiptoed all the way back to his bed and wiggled under the covers, snatching them up to his chin. They’re right! I’m such a baby, a shrimp and a chicken. Couldn’t sleep in the cave for one freakin’ night. Maybe tomorrow…Yeah. Definitely tomorrow. He had no idea why, but he couldn’t stop trembling or still his chattering teeth.

Johnny never knew that being chicken was what had saved him from the sting of a blade and the coldness of death…the fate that befell poor Sally Mae.

* * *

Click Omniscience to read more about the common pitfalls and avoidances.

Least common is Third Person Objective/Dramatic, which sees everything from a bird’s-eye view. It’s kind of like a screenplay, only revealing what a character is thinking and feeling through action and dialogue. It can freely move from character to character because it never goes internal. The narrator is a mere camera, having no extrasensory perception or X-ray vision. The danger in using an Objective Narrator is it can come across cold and it’s more difficult to make that reader/character connection. If an author has successfully pulled off this style, let me know. I’m curious to read a book in it, since it’s the complete opposite of what I do.

You can also use Omniscience that only focuses on two or three characters. Perhaps you have a YA novel that follows three girls and you want to reveal what each of them is thinking and experiencing or you have a romance and want to show the heat or internal thoughts for hero and the heroine in the same scene. Take care when you do this. Pay special attention to character development and transition. When using a blend of POVs, the key is establishing the pattern early so it doesn’t suddenly look like POV slippage in chapter 8 when the girls attend a ball game or the couple’s eating out at Olive Garden and you’re now bouncing back and forth.

Whatever you choose to use, keep your focus limited to only the characters that matter. Be consistent. I’ve read some books that switch to a clerk or a bellhop or a crow and they have no weight or importance in the story. If it’s not an important perspective to show, don’t show it. It’ll only cause confusion and frustration for your reader. As a writer, Third Person Limited, Multiple VP is my method of choice right now. I love to write in that. It gives me a lot of leeway and the structure I need.

Choose wisely, my friends, and write on.

~ Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.

Nixxing Omniscient Nightmares

I’m going to be talking about the different points of view and narratives writers can use in novels. First, we’ll start with Third Person Omniscient because I’ve noticed a trend in reading and/or critiquing the work of others on various sites, that some writers are using omniscience and using it badly.

Omniscience is where the narrator knows what everyone in the book is thinking and feeling and experiencing in any given scene. The narrator is not hemmed in by one perspective, but can show many or even none.

When you start off writing a novel, please only use this narrative style if you know what you’re doing. Many beginners mistakenly use it because they don’t understand how perspective works. When I began my first novel, I wrote willy-nilly because I didn’t know any better. Luckily, I was reading books on craft at the time and was only a few chapters in. I fixed those slips promptly.In order for readers to identify and be engrossed with your characters, scenes really should be owned by only one character. That means from the beginning to the end of a scene, Bill can’t know what Tom is thinking or see that his own face is turning red. Bill can only know what he himself sees, hears, feels, tastes, thinks, experiences. You can break this barrier without giving readers an arm’s-length or jarring sensation if and only if you use an all-seeing narrator masterfully.

Although Omniscient Narrative allows for flexibility in it’s umbrella-style relaying, keep these objections in mind:

Ø It creates distance between readers and characters because they can’t identify with one character per scene. With head popping going on, extra attention to character development and exposure is needed.

Ø It can cause confusion, especially if you don’t provide paragraph breaks or good reason for changing perspective.

Ø It went out of style with button-down shoes.

Ø It’s unpopular.

Ø It can make you seem amateurish.

Ø It can reveal too much information, robbing readers of suspense.

Ø It can be too telling, a landfill of exposition and backstory.

An Omniscient Narrative can be intriguing and fresh if used properly, not in the head-popping, random manners I keep seeing. However, your work needs to stand out from the sludge written by clueless wannabes. If you decide to use such a way of telling, you can at least avoid having your work read like just another Omniscient nightmare. Here’s how:

Ø Make it clear in the first sentence that you’re using Omniscience. Having a God-like story-teller emerge in chapter 5 out of nowhere is very jarring and confusing to readers.

Ø Use it effectively, giving smooth transitions, revealing secrets to readers the characters don’t know. You can even show a scene where there is no character.

Ø Make good use of knowledge in the past, present and future.

Ø Consider your narrator a character with personality and opinions, even if he or she is never named. If you think of your narrator this way, it will help you to stay focused.

Ø Keep the voice enthralling and consistent throughout the entire novel.

Ø Only shift to viewpoints that are important.

Ø Choose a tone, style and flavor that flows from beginning to end.

Ø Be consistent in the telling. Don’t have four chapters in one POV and the rest a mishmash of whomever.

Ø Be creative. You can have great fun with an all-knowing perspective.

Ø Unless you’re writing for children or a fantasy piece akin to The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, avoid animal perspectives. You can reveal a lot through behavior. No need to jump into Fido’s head.

Ø Show, show, show. Avoid lazy telling when story elements can be revealed through dialogue or action. Too much exposition and backstory will create drag.

Ø Have the ease of a steady cam.

If you unintentionally used Omniscience, squash any POV slips you find. Think of Bill. He can only know what he knows. He can’t know about the bomb under his chair in the movie theater unless he knew it was there to begin with or about the girl who secretly admires him or that his waitress at Friendly’s is addicted to online porn. Pick the most important POV for the scene and write it through that one pair of eyes.

If you’re using omniscience with intent, be mindful of readers and make your work as clean and unjarring as possible. Use it with flair and consistency.

I’ll talk about Third Person Limited tomorrow.

~ Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.