{"id":1186,"date":"2020-08-26T08:52:55","date_gmt":"2020-08-26T12:52:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/?p=1186"},"modified":"2020-08-26T08:53:50","modified_gmt":"2020-08-26T12:53:50","slug":"1186","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/2020\/08\/26\/1186\/","title":{"rendered":"Down With Length, Up With Thrills"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Before I start the post, tomorrow evening I\u2019ll be speaking and answering questions on Zoom about A Ceiling Made of Eggshells<\/em>, hosted by Belmont Books. I\u2019ll also be happy to take questions about writing and any of my books. Bookplate signed books will be available. Here\u2019s the link: https:\/\/www.belmontbooks.com\/event\/virtual-gail-carson-levine<\/a>. You need to register to participate\u2013it\u2019s free. I\u2019d love to see some of you in the little boxes!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On December 23, 2019 Alyce wrote, My book has a kidnapping plot, but it\u2019s nearly 100k words. I\u2019m trying to make it shorter and up the tension. Do you have any ideas?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three of you weighed in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Katie W.: What I would do is look at each chapter individually and examine what happens in each chapter. If you write a single sentence summary of each one, you can see where stuff does or doesn\u2019t happen. This makes it shorter by removing the boring stuff, so you solve both problems at the same time. If that doesn\u2019t help, I would take a look at subplots, backstory, and exposition, looking for places that are too long or too boring. Either way, the goal is to remove excess that\u2019s slowing down the plot and extending the word count.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Erica: If it has a kidnapping plot, then you probably have a time limit. In those situations, tension can be added by putting a countdown at the top of each chapter, something like \u201cChapter 11: 25 hours left\u201d. Although it makes your story marginally longer, it does increase the tension.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

future_famous_author: And even if stuff is happening, like the scene isn\u2019t boring, it can still be excess. I\u2019m sure there are plenty of scenes in my WIP that don\u2019t matter to the plot but are still fun to read and write. Things about what the reader needs to know, what pieces are necessary to reach the end, and take out anything that isn\u2019t helping you to reach the climax and THE END.
Also, that\u2019s a lot of words!!! My WIP right now only has 30K, and it\u2019s the most I\u2019ve ever gotten!!! I tend to get tired of stories before I\u2019m even a fourth of the way done, but it sure sounds like you\u2019re just in the revising and editing stages! Nice work!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

These are terrific! I agree about taking the book apart and examining each scene. And time pressure is a great way to increase reader worry. And, of course, writing so many pages, whether or not they are too many, is an achievement. Congratulations!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was a brief but thrilling bidding war over Ella Enchanted<\/em> at the start of my writing career. In the end, the advance turned out to be the same from the two publishers, but one wanted me to cut a third of the book and the other, HarperCollins, said nothing about that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I went with HarperCollins. But before I did, I thought about what I might cut, and I decided the book could do without the elves\u2013no night in their forest, no Agulen pottery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With HarperCollins, happily, I kept the elves\u2013but I cut a third of the book anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was inexperienced, and I didn\u2019t realize how much could be stripped off just by snipping here and trimming there. Nowadays, my revision process always involves a lot of deleting. No major amputations may be required, though hundreds of pages wind up on the cutting room floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So we can start there. I\u2019ve said before (and I didn\u2019t make this up) that the strongest parts of speech in English are nouns and verbs, and the weakest are adjectives and adverbs. We can scrutinize each sentence for culprits. As an example, in my last sentence, the verb is scrutinize<\/em>. Instead of scrutinize<\/em>, I could have written look closely at<\/em>\u2013three words instead of one and the result has lost power. Especially, we should question words that emphasize, like very<\/em>, and ones that dilute, like almost<\/em> and slightly<\/em>. I\u2019m often guilty of very<\/em>, but usually we don\u2019t need it. Pretty<\/em> is just as intense as very pretty<\/em>, and if we want to turn up the volume, we can use stunning<\/em> or gorgeous<\/em>\u2013or one of the many synonyms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I took a little side journey in thinking about the question and found this fascinating article about readability: https:\/\/contently.com\/2015\/01\/28\/this-surprising-reading-level-analysis-will-change-the-way-you-write\/<\/a>. I\u2019d take the readability gauges cited with a grain of salt, though. The level seems to depend greatly on number of three-syllable words, and many of those are easy. Terrific<\/em> has three syllables, for example, and I wouldn’t call it a hard word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can also check for repetition. I think it was Christie V Powell who mentioned in a recent comment that we should watch out for scenes that accomplish the same plot objective as other scenes. More than one isn\u2019t necessary and can go. But it must be saved somewhere else!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can check for repetition at the sentence level, too. Whenever I\u2019ve done this, I\u2019ve been astonished at how often I say exactly the same thing twice in entirely different words, so I fool myself. One sentence should be nixed. (I save even these.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As some of you know, I\u2019ve been reading from my books every day on Facebook. So far, I\u2019ve read Ella<\/em>, The Two Princesses of Bamarre<\/em>, and Writing Magic<\/em>. Last week, I started The Lost Kingdom of Bamarre<\/em>. Except for Lost Kingdom<\/em>, these are books I wrote a long time ago, and I\u2019ve noticed how my writing has changed. There\u2019s a scene in Fairest<\/em> in which Aza observes zhamM, who is a judge in the gnomish courts, decide a case. As I read, I thought, What do I need this for? It adds nothing to moving the plot forward.<\/em> I don\u2019t remember if my editor wanted me to ditch the chapter. If she did, I must have refused. Its only virtue is that it does a little world-building (and it\u2019s somewhat interesting), but it comes late in the book when the world is established.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Please learn from what I say, not what I did. Beware of self-indulgence!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scenes should develop our characters, advance our plot, and build the story\u2019s world (mostly at the beginning). Best of all is when one scene does more than one of these. Keeping that in mind as we revise will naturally heighten tension.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next week, I\u2019m going to start revising the first draft of my novel about the Trojan War, which is roughly three hundred pages long. When I wrote it, as a pantser, I was finding my way, not sure what I would need. Now that I\u2019m done, I know. That perspective will guide my revisions. If a scene doesn\u2019t do anything, I\u2019ll kill it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But sometimes increasing tension adds words. When we reveal our MC\u2019s worries, the reader will worry too\u2013and won\u2019t mind the length. When we paint a scene in rich detail, the pressure will mount. Say our MC has to descend a cliff, and we show her experimentally toss a stick ahead of her and see it break into bits. The reader will be silently screaming, Watch out!<\/em> as she puts a leg over the edge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Below are the first four paragraphs of Charles Dickens\u2019 A Christmas Carol<\/em>. When I read the novella a few years ago, I was amazed at how wordy it is. Your job is to shorten this part. If you feel like posting what you come up with here, I’d love to see it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge’s name was good upon ‘Change for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for. You will, therefore, permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did. How could it be otherwise? Scrooge and he were partners for I don’t know how many years. Scrooge was his sole executor, his sole[12] administrator, his sole assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, and sole mourner. And even Scrooge was not so dreadfully cut up by the sad event, but that he was an excellent man of business on the very day of the funeral, and solemnised it with an undoubted bargain.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The mention of Marley’s funeral brings me back to the point I started from. There is no doubt that Marley was dead. This must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate. If we were not perfectly convinced that Hamlet’s Father died before the play began, there would be nothing more remarkable in his taking a stroll at night, in an easterly wind, upon his own ramparts, than there would be in any other middle-aged gentleman rashly turning out after dark in a breezy spot\u2014say St. Paul’s Church-yard, for instance\u2014literally to astonish his son’s weak mind.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Some of Dickens\u2019 novels were serialized before they came out in book form. He had to produce thirty-two pages each month, which may have made a habit out of the prolixity (look it up, if you don\u2019t know it\u2013a great word!) we see here. The first four paragraphs, in my opinion, don\u2019t do much in terms of plot and just a little in the way of character development. If you\u2019ve never read the story and aren\u2019t in the mood, you can read a plot summary on Wikipedia. Write your own first scene that does develop Scrooge\u2019s character and begins the action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 In Greek mythology, Hercules, in a fit of madness, murders his sons. To atone, he undertakes twelve labors. If you don\u2019t know the myth well, you can google the twelve labors of Hercules. In my opinion, twelve is too many! Write the story condensing to the ones you think are the most important.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Have fun, and save what you write!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Before I start the post, tomorrow evening I\u2019ll be speaking and answering questions on Zoom about A Ceiling Made of Eggshells, hosted by Belmont Books. I\u2019ll also be happy to take questions about writing and any of my books. Bookplate signed books will be available. Here\u2019s the link: https:\/\/www.belmontbooks.com\/event\/virtual-gail-carson-levine. You need to register to participate\u2013it\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[303,235],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1186"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1186"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1186\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1188,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1186\/revisions\/1188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}