Question about scene and sequel

Shauna asks--

A lot of my scenes don't have sequels or incorporate that material into the last couple of paragraphs. Perhaps I don't understand the power of the scene-sequel combo; to me it seems to interrupt and slow the action to have a chunk of introspection, discussion, and decisionmaking after every scene. What's your take on structuring a book as a series of scenes and sequels?

--

I agree with you, actually! Often a sequel does slow the action, and I don't think all scenes, or all characters, or all books, need sequels. They seem best suited with a more contemplative character who faces a problem that he/she thinks thinking or deciding will help resolve (whether he/she is right or not). Sequels probably don't work as well (at least in the first half of the book) with a character who always defaults to action instead of contemplation. Some writers say a sequel CAN be action, but to me, that just means more, uh, action, thus scene, not sequel.

As for putting the sequel at the end of the scene-- I prefer important scenes especially to end on conflict, and the trouble with sequel is it tends to be more resolution of conflict (she figures out what she's going to do, for example). Conflict is what causes anxiety in the reader, and thus, page turning.

But there's a way to fix that rather easily while adding a sequel-- put the sequel not at the end of Scene A, but at the beginning of the next scene (even better if the next scene starts a new chapter). That way Scene A can end with conflict (a dilemma without a solution yet), and the reader is impelled to turn the page to see what happens-- and then is treated to a bit of the POV character's contemplation in Scene B.

As with all "rules," sequel only works when it works, and when it doesn't, try something else. :)

Alicia

One More Opening, This One A Competent Miss

Never again. Never ever again. Pauline tugged her knees to her chest and buried her face in the pillow. The stench of the alley still stung her nose, even though she had fled Melbourne hours ago. But here she was safe, at least until they found her.
###
Brrrrrzzzzz. Brzz. Brzz. Brrrrzzzzzzzz. Sadhu rolled over and looked at the bedside clock. Two-fifteen. Who in the world would be ringing the doorbell at this ungodly hour?


First Impressions

Oh, dear. Sometimes we just have to call them like we see them, and so I'll have to call this one a competent miss.

The writing is clear and lucid. Point of view is deftly handled, the sentences are mostly clean, and we get a sense of a crisis unfolding. The writer of these sentences has a good grasp of the writing process, based on what we can see from this snippet.

But the opening fails all the same. It's far too jarring -- we get this great, tense, brief first paragraph, and then we cut away before we've really had a chance to bond with this character or explore the premise.

And there is one fairly large point of confusion for me, anyway, in the second paragraph. There's this buzzing noise, and then the guy rolls over in his bed and looks at the clock. Am I the only one thinking, at this point, that the buzzing is coming from that clock -- the alarm clock? It confused me when we started talking about doorbells, and I had to reformulate the opening of the paragraph to conform with the end of the paragraph.

Who are we supposed to care about here? Pauline or Sadhu? The author needs to decide this basic question and then write the opening with the answer in mind.

There are a couple of other small nits -- stench still stung creates an alliteration that doesn't read comfortably to me. I'm not crazy about the phonetic representation of the buzzer, either, because it looks overdone to my eyes. And why are we starting with the buzzer? Do we really care about Dadhu sleeping and rolling over and all that? Why not just start with him opening the door? And why are we starting with the moment Pauline becomes safe? Isn't danger more interesting?

But the big problem, and it's big enough to undercut all the strengths in this opening, is the switch in povs. Job One on every first page is to build that reader bond. Give them something to care about, someone to care about, and let them sink comfortably into your fictive world.

Theresa

Question about strengths and weaknesses

Frances asks:

How do you create well-rounded characters most effectively? I constantly read articles about giving (or identifying) the strengths and weaknesses of your characters—and other than picking off a list of "character traits" the traits (and flaws) I think my character might possess, I never know how to answer this question best. I was curious if there was a writing exercise in which you could "identify the strength and weakness" of your protagonist without looking at a list of traits or answering questions like: "how do you take your coffee? What color are your eyes?"

---

Actually, I wrote an article about this once... let me see if I can find it. BTW, there are a lot of character-oriented articles in the archive of my website:

Alicia's Writer's Corner website

Here you go--

Don't think of strengths and weaknesses as two separate types of traits-- they are closely related, at least in heroic characters. (As for me, my strengths and weaknesses are usually completely incompatible, but no one is writing a novel about me!)

The heroic flaw is what opens the protagonist up to real trouble-- what causes him (and it generally WAS a him in the past :) to seek out trouble or fail to resolve it expeditiously. But here's the clever part-- the heroic flaw was often the other side of the heroic strength: "That which makes him great brings him down." (I'm paraphrasing, maybe bowdlerizing, Aristotle here!) This is so elegant, so classy, so inspiring, that even today novels can be transformed by that equation.

Aristotle used Oedipus as a model (and let me just say, both the play and A's analysis are as brilliant now as ever before-- Oedipus is, in fact, not only a nearly perfectly plotted story, but the first great detective fiction!). He and I sort of disagree about Oedipus's heroic flaw (we have a lot of arguments about this, me and Aristotle , and he usually ends up conceding I have a point), but we're in the same ball park. Aristotle attributed Oedipus's downfall to the heroic flaw of "hubris"-- overweening pride, or what one of my college freshmen called "stuck-on-himselfness". And I have to admit, Oedipus did think he was something special. He even early on admits that yes, maybe his admirers are correct, and he really is just as smart as any god.

Well, you know what the gods do to guys like that. Give them boils. :)

They didn't give Oedipus boils, but they did sort of ruin his day. He was just too proud of his intellect, Aristotle said, and it made him take chances he should never take.

Well, I yield to none in my admiration of The Big A, but I think he sort of missed the mark himself there-- I'm making a pun of sorts there! He called the flaw "hamartia," an archery term that means "missing the mark". (Talk about hubris.... here I am, giving Aristotle an A for effort and a B- for evidence. :) I think Oedipus's heroic flaw was curiosity-- his need to find the truth. (Actually, his hubris was based on his belief that he above all was uniquely qualified to find the truth, because he was the Riddle Solver.)


Notice that truth-seeking/curiosity is a STRENGTH. It's so much a central strength to Oedipus that it earned him a throne and a wife (by his solving the riddle of the sphinx) and so of course he cherishes it in himself.

But because it is so central to who he is, he can't just give it up. He can't stop being curious and seeking the truth. In fact, even though Tiresias, the blind prophet, warns him, ""You don't want to know the truth," Oedipus keeps seeking the truth. And it's that truth-- not the
defiance of the gods-- that brings him down, because what he learns is terrible.

You can see that his central strength/heroic flaw is what ends up making trouble for him.

Now Hamlet also has a central strength-- deliberateness. Analysis. He is very good at thinking things through. He takes his time and does research. He's a student, a scholar. He likes to reason everything out. He doesn't act without due consideration.

A very good strength. But... look what happens because he has to gather evidence, do research, think things through-- people keep DYING. If he would have been impulsive and thoughtless and as soon as Dad asked him to get revenge, killed Claudius, well, all those other deaths would never have happened. It's his very deliberateness, his need for analysis, that doomed them all. That is, none of this trouble would have happened if he didn't have this particular central strength/heroic flaw.

We need flaws. Only by being flawed can we find room to grow. (So flawed is GOOD. :) A perfect protagonist is an unlikeable protagonist.

Let me tell you what happens when you endow your protagonist too generously:

I was once critiquing a manuscript for a writer who assured me I'd adore the hero. He was everything a man should be: Handsome but humble, tough but sensitive, wealthy but egalitarian, serious but humorous, elegant yet simple.... When there was a problem, he instantly solved it. When there was a hurt, he instantly fixed it. He was a famous writer who had his own rock band but composed classical music on the side, and on Sunday he preached a dynamic sermon (in both English and Spanish) to the church he founded down among the homeless and displaced. Needless to say, women fell at his feet and begged for his attention. There was nothing-- nothing-- that the plot could throw at him that he couldn't handle with aplomb. Everyone had to love him.

I hated him.

Call me envious, spiteful, inferior. But I thought he came across as a sanctimonious, smug prig. Not to mention that anyone with so many exceptional qualities and such huge success in the world doesn't need my sympathy/empathy/caring/identification. In fact, he made me feel
inadequate and unpolished. :)

Surely I'm not the only reader who sees someone this perfect, this lofty, and thinks right off -- so when does he get killed and the real hero arrive?

The other problem is-- with perfect characters who have strengths with no corresponding flaw, it's hard to plot, because whatever trouble comes up, they can handle. (They never CREATE trouble, of course! They're too good for that.) There's no conflict because we know the author would never let any real harm come to this perfect creation.

And fiction is all about change, but why would he bother to change?

Where's the need to change? He's perfect as is. He doesn't need love or self-knowledge or a new attitude. He doesn't need anything.

That's why imperfect, incomplete characters are more interesting. First, we imperfect readers can identify with them. But, in terms of structure, the imperfect protagonist makes the three-dimensional story possible. The character moving through the external plot is a story of only two dimensions. The internal story, the process of psychological or emotional or life change, provides the depth that takes this story into three dimensions.

So if you've been told your story or character is "flat", here's how you can add depth– give that protagonist an internal plot. And that requires room for growth. Imperfection, incompleteness. A heroic flaw. Nope, not an unheroic flaw. (Oh, she can also be crabby in morning and have PMS, but her main flaw should be a heroic one, or we'll assume she deserves her downfall! :)

This will help you individualize your plot because you'll figure out how this particular person with this particular combo of strength/flaw will respond to each plot event. After all, we generally have a default response-- we lead with our strength. If I'm called upon to make a decision and I'm intuitive, I'll naturally use my intuition to make this decision. If instead I'm deliberate, I'll deliberate about it, just like Hamlet, before deciding. So early in the book, the protagonist will be using that strength to respond to the plot events, and that will make the book go off in a direction driven not by custom or cliche, but by this character.

So think about that-- what is your character's central, defining strength, and what problems is that going to cause?

Alicia

Theresa said:
And when I say bad, I mean bad enough to make you wonder how delusional the writer must be to think this should ever be shown to another human being. And is he delusional enough to come after you with a slingshot when you reject him?

I call this "The American Idol" effect. I was watching the early season, where dozens of singers who are worse than I am (and I can't sing, but at least I know it) stand in line overnight for a chance to audition. Now some just want to meet the celebrities and get on camera, and they figure the worse they are, the better. But others actually seem to think they "sing like an angel!" when they sing like a hound dog (one without rhythm). And almost always, they are shocked to be summarily bounced, and they protest that their family and friends LOVE their singing.

So anyway, I was watching, and I mentioned how delusional they seemed, and the dh said, "Aren't writers the same way? They think they're great writers, and they're terrible, but they don't know it?"

Hmmm. That's kinda true. I mean, we all (probably) think we're pretty darned good, maybe not James Joyce but a whole lot more readable.

What if we're WRONG??? How will we know?

And what if we're right? How will we know?

Boy, there's nothing more calculated to cause writer's block, I think.

Can we really judge our own work? I don't know. I know that I chortle and weep and marvel at my most self-indulgent prose-- I mean, really, the more self-indulgent, the more I like it. And I'm a pretty good judge of other's work (we all devoutly hope :), so... I'm right about mine, right? Maybe not. Maybe what I like most about it (you know, the alliteration in that line, and the very clever and personally meaningful villain name, and the total power of that blindness motif) is too precious, too obvious, too in-jokey to work for most anyone else.

And I'm always amazed at how so many terrific writers (by my measure) apologize for their work, denigrate it, call it bad names. Don't they know they're good?

Somehow it seems like we're never truly confident about our work... once we get pretty good at it, our standards just get higher and higher, and we think we fall short.

Anyway, it's a puzzle. How do you know you're writing well? CAN you know? Yeah, if you recently won the National Book Award, you probably have accepted your greatness, but short of that, how do you know? Feedback from others? How do you know whose judgment to trust?

It's not enough to say, "I'll know when I get published," because we know good stuff gets rejected and not-so-good accepted, and anyway, you have to improve and be pretty good to get to the point of submitting.

So... how do you judge yourselves?

I overheard a couple pre-teen girls in my family reading their stories to each other last Christmas, and one was very pleased with her writing, and one was mad at herself ("This is so bad!"). The latter (in my judgment) was better than the former, and yet the latter didn't think so.

Anyone? How do you come to an objective view of your own work? Can you tell when one piece you've written works and why, and why another doesn't work?
Alicia

Same Question, Different View

Question: Because it is something I am incredibly sensitive about (grammar and punctuation) how much does that influence you when passing on a project? It has to, of course, but if something isn't too bad but the story is phenomenal, would you still go for it?

I've been mulling on this question ever since Susan posted it, and I see it caught Alicia's attention, too. There is a tipping point where the poor quality of the writing will outweigh the strength of the story. I keep trying to figure out whether I can quantify that point -- is it so many errors per page? are some errors more egregious than others? -- and I'm afraid that there's no simple way to explain this. There's no formula.

But there are a few common factors that come up over and over again. I thought I might share these.

First, I want to point out that because we edit genre stories for a house that accepts unagented submissions, we see a lot of bad writing. And when I say bad, I mean bad enough to make you wonder how delusional the writer must be to think this should ever be shown to another human being. And is he delusional enough to come after you with a slingshot when you reject him?

But the vast majority of stuff we read is workmanlike. It's good (but not great), moderately well-executed prose with a straight-up-the-middle story. Maybe it's a standard subgenre idea, but the prose is better than average, or maybe it's an idea that breaks a lot of rules but the writing is weak. Maybe it's a riff on whatever the trend of the moment is, in which case the story is probably formed around the trend (rarely the hallmark of a good idea) and the writing is probably competent but not dazzling.

Here's a factor that the writer can't control: our current needs, which fluctuate as we acquire other projects. I can tell you that for one of our acquisitions goals, we're having an enormously difficult time finding projects that meet our standards. And for that reason, in that particular group, we might be willing to work more with a writer who has a great story idea, solid vocabulary/dramatic presentation skills, and an abundance of technical errors. (No I won't tell you which goal I'm talking about. I want all people submitting to us to think they must submit the cleanest manuscript possible, regardless of story type and target line.)

Grammar and other technical errors are important because they represent time in my life. I expect to spend a certain amount of time per manuscript on story, character, setting, theme -- the big picture stuff -- and a certain amount of time per manuscript on the nitty gritty stuff like scene structure, dialogue tags, grammar errors, sequencing issues, and the like. I'm not looking for flawless manuscripts because, frankly, it would be easier to find the rainbow's end.

If a manuscript is clean and the writerly elements work well, but the story needs an overhaul, I'll generally give the writer another shot. I'll send a revision letter and see if they can take direction and produce solid results in a professional manner. Though a revision letter does take some time -- say, two or three hours to read the manuscript and an hour for the revision letter itself, depending -- this is time well spent if it results in a project we can acquire.

By contrast, let me tell you a story about a manuscript I once edited. (Note to my writers: this was not any of you. This was something from a while back. None of you should read anything into this.)

This manuscript had been acquired by an editor that suddenly left her house, and there were some workflow issues that resulted in me being hired to do the line edits. House management was eager to avoid going back to the writer for revisions, so I was working solo to do some cleanup.

The story was above average, unusual in all the right ways, even compelling in places. The writer used diverse word choices and had a knack for building drama in scenes. But the technical aspects were disastrous. Every single paragraph contained at least one, and sometimes as many as a dozen, punctuation errors. Bad ones, too, like semicolons dropped into the middle of prepositional phrases. Real head-scratchers. Even though the copyeditor would normally tackle those, they interfered with comprehension so much that I had no choice but to clean it up as I went, just as a first step toward trying to figure out what the hell to do with all that garbled word-glop. Even after my work, the copyeditor complained bitterly about this manuscript, too -- complaints which ceased instantly once the initial condition of that manuscript was disclosed.

It took me more than forty hours to fix that manuscript, and it was fewer than 300 pages.

So. Forty-plus hours of my life on good story/bad execution, versus three or four hours on good execution/problematic story.

There are two aspects to "writing quality" -- one is the technical stuff like commas and verb tenses, and the other is the writerly stuff like word choices and the ability to get tension into the sentences and paragraphs. If you get the writerly stuff down, I'm less offended by the technical errors, as long as they're not overwhelming. And of course, fictive grammar rules vary slightly from house to house, so we tend to be forgiving of things like final serial commas that don't conform with our particular set of rules. (Consistency is important there -- we will interpret consistency as a sign of deliberate choice rather than a sign of ignorance.)

But, you know, I just can't help wondering why any writer would be willing to risk publication on something like grammar. Doesn't a strong story deserve strong presentation? Why would you take yourself out of the running for something as simple as grammar? And yes, it is simple. Even if you don't understand it at the moment, it's certainly something you can learn. It's not like differential equations here. You don't need any special new knowledge base to learn grammar. All you really need are some study tools and the will to learn.

Theresa

Special Note to Dave: I read a mere 150 pages yesterday. Go ahead! Call me a slacker! :D

What if it's a great story? Part 1

Susan in comments:

Question: Because it is something I am incredibly sensitive about (grammar and punctuation) how much does that influence you when passing on a project? It has to, of course, but if something isn't too bad but the story is phenomenal, would you still go for it?

Susan, good question! I got one of my own: What's a great story? (And eventually I'll probably meander into answering your question.)

Seems to me there are three possible "greats" which we'd be overjoyed to see in one manuscript. So here's Part 1, or Part A, anyway.

A) A great story idea. Hollywood-style "high concepts" might fall under this, and notice it's entirely possible -- in Hollywood-- to sell a great idea and little else, because the idea can be given to another writer and turned into a screenplay. "Treatments," I think, are often handled that way; it's understood that the sort of person who comes up with flashy, compelling ideas isn't necessarily the sort of person who can write well. It helps to secure a big-name actor's interest. You've got a great idea and Jude Law, you've probably got a sale (heck, you can get rid of the great idea then, and I'll still go to the movie :).

You'll see these great ideas in publishing too, but there usually isn't enough money in publishing to hire a writer to finish an idea, and also the idea-generator is often far more sensitive than the film counterpart and doesn't want any other writer messing with her idea. (Or it could be that Hollywood is better at soothing wounded writer feelings with $.)

Often it's the publisher staff-- editing or marketing-- that comes up with the great idea and then chooses a reliable writer or group of writers to develop the idea. This is often done as "work for hire," and the publisher owns the idea and the copyright, and no one in the mix makes Hollywood-style money. (And Jude Law doesn't come to the release party, alas.)

So what if you have a "great idea" and don't think you have the skills to develop it well? This happens frequently, because the sort of person who comes up with great ideas isn't necessarily a great or even good writer-- two different skills. I have read manuscripts that actually hurt me because the idea was wonderful but the story was lamely told and the mechanics were excruciating. It seemed like a lost opportunity.

So know your strengths. If you're getting rejections like, "What a great idea! However...." realize you're an idea-person. And do what they do in Hollywood-- devise a "treatment" for the idea and find someone to write it for you.

(Oh, yeah, you could learn to write better, and I think that's better longterm... but if this great idea has an expiration date, as so many great ideas do, a writerly education could take way too long.)

It's possible to write up a treatment, get a Hollywood agent, and sell the idea, and let the producer hire a writer. Somehow I suspect that's more difficult than I make it sound, especially that "get a Hollywood agent" part. But there's another book somewhere in this office (spent 10 minutes looking for it, and didn't find it, but I did find a couple other books I meant to read last year): Writing Treatments that Sell, by Atchity and Wong, and that might help more than I can. (My suggestion is more useful, perhaps-- Get Jude Law involved. The movie might not be made, but think of the hours of discussion....:)

Where was I? Oh, yeah. A great idea.
Or if this is a book and not a film (and there are some ideas which are "just book"), consider a collaborator. Just as inventors often have to unite with engineers to get their invention to work, great-idea generators might benefit from a collaboration with an experienced but not flashy writing craftsperson. Now this should not be undertaken lightly. There are a lot of legal issues involved, and there are many different variations of collaboration, and all these should probably be hammered out ahead of time. There was a book a few years ago called A Marriage of Minds by the McGoldricks, that deals with a lot of these issues. (I collaborated on a book with a friend, and we were quoted in the book. I don't think we were very form-fitting collaborators, as we have exactly the same strengths... we're both writers, not idea-generators.)

(Have you ever gone to a party and when someone asks, "What do you do?" you modestly allow that you're a novelist, and the asker says, "Oh! That's great! Hey, I have a great idea-- how about I tell you about it, you write it up, and we'll split the royalties?" And you're thinking, sounds like I do all the work, and it's even more disheartening to hear the idea and learn it's not great at all, just some trite thing about how he got divorced and went skiing and met his soulmate up there on the mountain.)

It does take a surrender of ego to realize that you are not always the best person to develop a great idea and go looking for help. But it also takes the craftsperson a surrender of ego to realize... maybe I'm just a craftsperson, great at carpentry but not design. Could be a marriage made in heaven, if both collaborators respect the other's contribution.

But at least the great idea could achieve successful fruition, even if you're not the whole tree. :)

Other parts to come, but I gotta get some paid work done first!

Opening sentences-- Keri

Thank you again to our contributors. Please let us know if you have contributed an opening and now don't think this sort of deconstruction would be helpful to you so we can take it out of the queue- and it would be great if you could let us know -before- we spend the time working on it. :)

Keri, hope this is helpful to you, because it's already done!

Keri posted:
The last time I went on a hayride I had hay in places I could only see with a mirror. And don't even get me started on the rashes. I refused to go through that itching experience again. But then Jared bumped me in the arm and smiled as he walked toward the hay were Barbara, the biggest floozy in town, patted a space at her side.

I survived the dead grass last time, I could do it again. Tucking my shirt in, I headed that way.

A hayride promises an active scene-- that's a good example of a setting choice that invites action.

Okay, again, tense issues for me. Since most writers are writing in "literary past"-- that is, the convention is that narratives are told in the past tense-- a -real- past event-- something that happens before the time of the story-- needs more marking than just past tense. So "the last time" is one indication of "pastness," but then we have "I had hay in places I could see only with a mirror." How can you make clear (and it won't take much) that she didn't have hay in places when she WENT on the hayride, but as a result of the hayride?

Try "I ended up with hay in places..." to show that the hay-in-places is in a different time than the "went on hayride". Then "the rashes the next day" will also show that you're talking about the results of the hayride, not the hayride itself.


I refused to go through that itching experience again.

Any idea what I'm going to say next? :) It's that word "refused," because -- keeping in mind that you're in literary past here-- the refusing could be after the first hayride, or in the minute before she actually accepted. I suspect you mean:
After that, I refused

That is, the "After that" is that marker of a past event before the time of the scene.

Now "itching experience" stopped me. I guess "itchy experience" sounds more colloquial. Also "itching," being a participal, indicates a contemporaneous action... so what's the experience? The hayride? Or the aftermath of the hayride? Itch-producing experience, awkward as it is, probably most closely represents the hayride. So I don't know exactly how to fix that, other than to be direct-- "After that, I refused to go on hayrides." Or "After that, I spared my delicate places by refusing ..."

But then Jared bumped me in the arm and smiled as he walked toward the hay were Barbara, the biggest floozy in town, patted a space at her side.

I like the way this sets up a conflict between her former awowal and her current desire.

Bumped me in the arm and smiled as he walked toward-- watch your blocking there. "As" implies that all these happened at the same time, but if he's walking away from her, can she see him smiling? And "bumped me" doesn't make clear what body part does the bumping. I mean, you can bump with your hip (but unless he's as tall as Shaq, his hip probably can't bump her arm, can it? :), or you can bump with your elbow. Or? Not a big deal, except that the reader wants to visualize the action.
toward the hay were Barbara, the biggest floozy in town, patted a space at her side.

Toward the hay or haywagon? And see if you can sneak in more physical info -- patted the seat at her side? Patted the floor by her side? Watch for generic words-- space, time, thing, people-- and see about replacing them with sharper, more meaningful terms.

I survived the dead grass last time, I could do it again. Tucking my shirt in, I headed that way.

Just a little point here-- think about putting something in front of "last time," like "that last time," something that makes it clearer that she is referring to the last time mentioned in the first paragraph.

And again,, participles indicate simultaneous action, so "Tucking my shirt in" sounds like it's happening while she's heading that way. That's fine, as long as you don't mean "I tucked my shirt in and headed that way," which indicates sequential action.

One more thought-- "that way" is a bit unrevealing. Towards the wagon? Towards Jared?

Now I'm thinking this is a historical, because the hayride is a major form of entertainment apparently, and then of course there's the word "floozy". But the narrator tucks her "shirt" in. Hmm. Most women wore "blouses" in the past, but I am getting the sense of a tomboyish type who might wear men's clothes. And that's a very subtle way to convey that character aspect!
Alicia

A Few Meandering Thoughts

I read a bit over four hundred manuscript pages today.

That's not a particularly large number for me. I can double that number in a single day if I'm really cooking. I've never yet hit that magical thousand-page mark, but it has been within reach plenty of times.

Four hundred pages is a good, steady pace on a day when I don't have a lot of production or scheduling or other balls in the air. Four hundred pages is 30 or so short partials with synopses and cover letters. Or one full novel. Or a couple of long novellas. No editing, just reading.

Four hundred pages barely puts a dent in my inbox. Four thousand pages, now that might be noticeable. Forty thousand might get me caught up, for the moment. But four hundred? Bah.

How many pages of raw work would you all say you read over the course of a year? Count your pages. Your critique partner's pages. Classmates, online groups, any pages that are not finished, published pages. Do you get above ten thousand? I'm not trying to be all "my dad's bigger than your dad" here, but I do want to illustrate a point.

There were some comments made behind the scenes recently to the effect that Alicia and I are hypersensitive to very fine nuances in prose. Thank you. I assume it was intended to be a compliment because, after all, it means I'm good at my job.

When you read as much as we do, and when so many of those pages are raw pages which we are charged with fixing, it becomes almost automatic to notice certain things. Verb density. Sentence structures. Word choices that undercut or enhance or lie like dead fish on the page. Experience teaches us that if we spot these things in the first few lines of a text, we'll find them all over the manuscript.

And, to be truthful, you don't even have to look hard to spot these things, both the good and the bad. A trained eye sees them as quickly and easily as a hot pink Hummer parked in a driveway.

Of course, we also want to evaluate your characters and plot and conflicts. But, you know, we usually have to read more than three lines to do that. And the problem is, as we're reading enough to get to the point where we can make some judgments about your characters and plots and conflicts, we have to read through the hot pink Hummers. And the banana yellow Cadillacs. And the flawless silver Bentleys with upholstery that smells like money.

The funny thing about doing all these openings here on the blog is that I've become very conscious of how quickly my eye absorbs things from the page. When I'm writing a post about an opening, breaking it down for you all, I feel like I'm dropping down to a very slow pace so that I can record the impressions and judgments which are typically formed instantaneously.

In other words, I don't pick up a fresh submission and read the first page with any conscious intent of decoding the sentences. It just happens. It's almost intuitive.

Do I read a submission the same way I write about openings here? Yes and no. Yes, because these posts are representative of the things I notice. And no, because I don't stop reading to consciously think, "Oh, great use of comparative language there!" Or, "Aw, gee, too bad about the present participles." I just read until I reach the point where I may stop reading because I've read enough.

This is also why I usually have two sections in every post about openings, the first impressions and the fine breakdown. I want to give the experience both ways, the fast way where we read all at once and form judgments, and the precise way where our minds are in the background ticking off points as we go. Alicia's presentation is different, but you know, we're doing basically the same thing.

I don't know if it's at all useful to explain this, but maybe it will add some perspective.

Theresa

A comment about Pride and Prejudice's opening scene

Green Knight says:
Instead of a slightly distant, continuous narrative, she (Austen) condenses a bit, gives us the conversation in all its detailed glory, and pulls out again with narrative when we have seen enough and any further real-time observations would be repetitive.

Good point-- a Austen-ite friend of mine (and writer) Kate Moore observes that Austen presents a conversation when it shows people in conflict, and when they agree, she just summarizes. I think that's a good way to keep dialogue important to the plot, and important to the movement of the scene. I've remembered that whenever I encounter (or write) dialogue of the "Hi, how are you?" variety. Move on; nothing happening here!

Alicia