Hello, writers.
NaNoWriMo is underway, and nine doughty regulars and irregulars are shooting for 50,000 words in November. (The numbers beside some monickers are word counts reported by the writers as of November 10 or, in some cases, as of November 3.)
jabney 17,036
boofdah
Pompatus
Debby
WiseFerret not quite 7000
Kimball Cross
ferg 14,554
Deejay Lyn 19,432
le sequoit 8400
Good luck to all!
I’m still at work on this revision of my middle grade fantasy. I’ve just finished a pass through the manuscript in which I make sure everything is fully set up, and I’m now working on a pass in which I make sure every scene is necessary.
Making sure everything is set up
Basically, whatever happens in a novel has to have been building throughout the novel up to the point where it happens. If a Callow Youth is going to risk his/her life to save his/her Stout Companion (or vice versa) then there have to have been earlier moments that convinced us that
1. the CY cared enough about the SC for this to happen and/or
2. the CY is the kind of person that would risk his/her life to save somebody
If CY and SC suddenly look at each other and realize that they are in love, the reader has to have had at least a suspicion of it beforehand.
Otherwise, the moment, when it comes, lacks impact, and may not be believable.
You don’t need whole big galumphing scenes to set up a future act or revelation. A light touch, a mention of something here and there, an occasional gesture or comment, is fine. But you do need more than one place where you set up what’s coming. Once is not enough--your readers can't read your mind and have other things on theirs.
Making sure every scene is necessary
The first half of my novel was full of scenes that I thought were sweet, funny, clever, or just painted something about my fantasy world very clearly.
What they didn’t do was advance the plot.
I’m giving myself a choice with these scenes. I can change them so that they do serve the plot—for example, by setting something up that’s going to matter later. Or I can delete them.
Harsh, no? But I still had the fun of writing them.
(I know some people will disagree strongly with the need to delete such scenes. I disagree strongly with it myself. That is why we are writers and not editors.)
Both of these concerns—making sure everything is set up and making sure every scene serves the plot—are things you probably shouldn’t be thinking about at all while you’re drafting.
When you’re drafting, it’s full steam ahead. BIC! HOK! TAM!
(Butt in chair, hands on keyboard, typing away madly.)
Tonight’s challenge.
Here’s the scene:
A Callow Youth and his/her Stout Companion are cornered at the edge of a cliff. By, I don’t know, soldiers, dragons, Solicitresses. The point is someone’s on to them, and there they are, our hero/ine/s, with their backs to the wall, only there’s no wall. And precious little floor.
The CY and the SC are outnumbered, outgunned, outsworded and out-onioned. And they can’t fly.
Fortunately! A bunch of giant eagles swoop in, pick them up, and fly them to safety. Whew! Deus ex Tolkien rides again.
Now then. Write a brief, earlier scene in which you set up something –anything—that makes the later swooping-in-of-eagles possible. In an actual novel, you’d need to do this several times in several diffferent places, but for now, just give us one conversation/scene/description where you create a context for the future rescue.
Remember that a brief mention of something is enough—the whole scene doesn’t have to be devoted to the set-up.
Try to limit yourself to 100 words.
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