Writing a Killer Thriller
Page 16
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BONUS PAGES
A sample chapter, “Voice,” from Jodie Renner’s style book:
Fire up Your Fiction
An Editor’s Guide to Writing Compelling Stories
Jodie Renner
Available in paperback and e-book formats
“This book is packed with good advice on how to spot and fix weaknesses in your fiction writing. It summarizes the combined wisdom of the last century or so of fiction teachers into one handy volume.”
~ Randy Ingermanson, bestselling author of Writing Fiction for Dummies
“A handy checklist and self-editing guide that will get any fiction writer to a stronger, well-told tale.”
– James Scott Bell, bestselling author of Revision & Self-Editing, Plot & Structure, and The Art of War for Writers
Sample chapter from Fire up Your Fiction:
Chapter 11 – VOICE: THAT ELUSIVE BUT CRITICAL INGREDIENT OF COMPELLING FICTION
Voice – what is it exactly?
Literary agents and acquiring editors always say they’re looking for fiction with a compelling, unique, fresh, natural voice. Then when asked to define it, they hum and haw a bit, searching for the right words to try to capture what they mean by a voice that appeals to readers and makes them want to keep reading.
From what I’ve gathered from my varied reading and workshops, the ideal “voice” is that natural, open, appealing, charismatic tone and style that draws us in and makes us feel like we know the characters well – and want to get to know them better!
HOW CAN WE DEVELOP AN APPEALING VOICE?
These tips, a mix of advice from others and my own ideas, will be helpful to both fiction and nonfiction writers who are still in the process of finding their voice or fine-tuning it to make it more relaxed, powerful and appealing.
~ Don’t lecture your readers.
As Bruce DeSilva said in his workshop on this topic at Craftfest 2012, many aspiring authors need to first free themselves from the constraints of their more formal, correct writing background, especially if it includes graduate degrees and a lot of legal, academic or business writing. So shake yourself loose of all those constraints and find your more casual, accessible, appealing inner voice. How do you do that?
~ Write in a clear, direct way.
Forget all those long, convoluted sentences and pretentious words and learn to write in a clear, direct, accessible, casual style that evokes the senses and appeals to the emotions. Streamline your writing!
~ Write to one person.
To help develop an intimacy with your readership and a conversational tone, create or choose one single person you’re writing to, who is warm, friendly, open to your ideas, interested, and intelligent.
DeSilva suggests choosing a close friend or family member to write to, but personally, I advise against writing to someone in your inner circle, as you might end up skipping over a lot of details and points that need to be there for other readers who don’t share your background, cultural environment, and basic frames of reference.
So I suggest creating an ideal reader. Write a brief description of their age, gender, background, home and work situation, personality, and interests (which of course include reading your kind of writing!). Get to know them a bit by giving them some positive attributes that will help you feel comfortable and open with them. Then target your writing to this person. Relax and let the real you come through.
~ Read and imitate writers whose voice you really enjoy.
Don’t copy their words verbatim, of course, but immerse yourself in their story world, told in their unique voice. Read their books aloud to really internalize the rhythm of their language, the phrasing and expressions and word choices that appeal to you so much. Then of course adapt the cadence and rhythm and attitudes and vocabulary to your own situation.
~ Write a chapter in first person, then change it to third person.
One author whose voice I love is Janet Evanovich, whose spunky, quirky heroine, Stephanie Plum, narrates her story in first-person point of view. But it’s hard to write first-person well, and it can be limiting, as you’re confined to scenes where this character is present. Also, first-person isn’t always the best choice for, say, a thriller, as you want other viewpoints in there, too, notably that of the antagonist.
But try writing several pages or a chapter or two in first-person (“I”), to develop your main character’s unique voice, then just go back and rewrite them in third person (he/she), with as few other changes as possible.
~ Read your story out loud to test its authenticity and easy flow.
As DeSilva says, your writing should have the rhythm and comfortable familiarity of spoken language. If it doesn’t flow easily, go in and streamline the language to take out the convoluted sentences, clunky phrasing, and fancy-shmancy words. Or hire a trusted writer friend or reputable freelance editor to go through it for you to take out anything that sounds too formal, wordy, or erudite.
~ Write in deep point of view or close third.
This means the story is unfolding mainly through the thoughts and reactions and emotions and attitudes of your protagonist. Even descriptions of your setting should be filtered through your protagonist’s (or other viewpoint character’s) preferences, views, and mood. This ensures that your whole novel has a great, unique voice, not just the dialogue.
~ Give each character his or her own voice.
When you’re writing dialogue, each character should sound different, with their own unique speech patterns, word choices, and slang or pet expressions, based on their milieu, upbringing, education, and personality. Listen in on all kinds of conversations, both in real life and on TV and in movies.
Develop an ear for how different people speak. To improve the idiosyncratic speech of a character in your novel, try journaling in their voice, in first person. Just write freely, using lots of attitude! Eventually, you’ll get into their rhythm and find the words that seem to suit them best.
So break free from the constraints of your background, education, and any more formal work-related writing, and write the story only you can write, with your unique experiences and personality, in your own direct, open, interesting voice. Don’t hold back – reveal yourself.
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SAMPLE CHAPTER FROM CAPTIVATE YOUR READERS
Chapter 37
10 WAYS TO ADD DEPTH TO YOUR SCENES
Once you’ve gotten a first draft of your story down, it’s time to go back and reassess every scene, one at a time, to make sure it’s pulling its weight and not slowing down the story or causing the reader to lose interest.
Besides advancing the storyline, scenes should: reveal and deepen characters and their relationships; show setting details; provide any necessary background info (in a natural way, organic to the story); add tension and conflict; hint at dangers and intrigue to come; and generally enhance the overall tone and mood of your story.
Remember that every scene needs conflict and a change.
To bring your characters and story to life, heighten reader engagement, and pick up the pace, try to make your scenes do double or even triple duty—but subtly is almost always best.
For example, a scene with dialogue should have several layers: the words being spoken; the viewpoint character’s real thoughts, opinions, emotions, and intentions; the other speaker’s tone, word choice, attitude, body language, and facial expressions; and the outward actions, reactions, and attitudes of both.
Here are ten key ways you can intensify your writing and enhance the experience for readers:
1. When introducing new characters, remember to show, rather than tell.
Reveal their personality, motives, goals, fears, and modus operandi not by telling the readers about them or their background, but by their actions, words, body language, facial expressions, tone, and attitude. If it’s a viewpoint character, show their thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations. Also, show characters’ reactions to each other. Th
en let the readers draw their own conclusions about the characters and their true intentions.
2. Don’t write neutral descriptions.
Enhance your descriptions of the setting and other characters by filtering them through the mood, attitude, and reactions of the POV character for the scene. This not only gives the readers a visual image of whatever the character is looking at, but helps with character development. We learn more about the character’s personality and what is driving / motivating him by his observations of his surroundings and others around him. And add in other sensory reactions – sounds, smells, even tastes and tactile sensations.
3. Show contradictory feelings.
Use close point of view to deepen characterization of the protagonist and other POV characters by showing inner conflict, doubt, or indecision, or by contrasting their words and outward reactions with their true inner feelings.
4. Make dialogue do double-duty.
Dialogue should not only convey information, but also reveal character and personality and advance the storyline. Dialogue action tags like “He rubbed his eyes,” or “She paced the floor,” which can replace “he said” and “she said,” tell us both who’s speaking and what they’re doing, as well as often providing info on how they’re feeling and reacting. For example:
Chris stood up and ran his hand through his hair. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Jesse set his coffee down, determined to stay calm. “Hey, man, relax. I told you about it last week. Don’t you remember?”
5. Show subtext during dialogue. A couple might be arguing heatedly about something fairly trivial, when inside one or both are really angry or resentful about deeper problems, which you can hint at by inner reactions, or which can come out at the end of the scene or later.
6. Drop in hints but hold back info to foreshadow and add intrigue. Introduce suspense or heighten anticipation through the use of hints and innuendos, or snippets/fragments of critical information.
7. Show character sensations and reactions. Show sexual tension between love interests by revealing heightened sensory perceptions and physical reactions. Be sure to show the inner reactions and often-conflicted feelings of your POV character.
8. Show brief flashbacks to reveal character secrets and fears, little by little.
9. Deepen connections between characters by having them discover similar values and goals, and showing these through dialogue, tone, body language, actions, etc.
10. Increase conflict between characters by showing opposing goals and values, through dialogue, body language, tone of voice, facial expressions, etc.
How the experts do it:
Here’s an example of a brief scene with lots of intriguing info subtly embedded in it, presented in a natural, casual way, organic to the character and the situation:
On page 2 of Purple Cane Road, James Lee Burke is introducing his main character, Dave Robicheaux, as well as the local executioner, Val Carmouche, (Robicheaux is narrating, in first person.):
That was when I was in uniform at NOPD and was still enamored with Jim Beam straight up and a long-neck Jax on the side.
One night he found me at a table by myself at Provost’s and sat down without being asked.
[...]
“Being a cop is a trade-off, isn’t it?” Vachel said. [...] “You spend a lot of time alone?”
“Not so much.”
“I think it goes with the job. I was a state trooper once.” His eyes, which were as gray as his starched shirt, drifted to the shot glass in front of me and the rings my beer mug had left on the tabletop. “A drinking man goes home to a lot of echoes. The way a stone sounds in a dry well. No offense meant, Mr. Robicheaux. Can I buy you a round?”
As a first-time reader of Burke, I found out quite a bit about his main character through this very brief scene, including that Dave was in the NOPD, had at least somewhat of a drinking problem, and was probably lonely. I’m definitely intrigued and want to read more.