What We Can Learn from Art Garfunkel

I was intrigued to read in Terry Whalin's blog "The Writing Life" that Art Garfunkel was not only an avid reader, but a meticulous record-keeper of each book he has read, according to the New Yorker article "The King of Reading" by Nick Paumgarten. Whalin suggests that this would be a good habit for writers to pick up and I couldn't agree more. Great books are a wonderful resource. Find a notebook you can use and allow yourself a page at least for each book. After each chapter write a quick summary and anything you found particularly memorable, good or bad. When you're finished you'll have a plot outline that you can study and a few examples of effective writing. If you keep it up, you'll have a notebook full of plot outlines that can help you structure your own book. I like the idea so much, I think I'll try it myself. (I put a clip of Whalin's post in the left-hand column. From there you can click to the New Yorker article, if you are interested)

Go ahead! Make a scene!

Okay, so you want to get to work? I don't blame you! Jump right in! Probably you already have a dramatic moment in mind, a crucial moment in your future book. Time to transform it into a scene! If you remember from my earlier post "The Basic Recipe" each scene has three elements: action, dialog and description. Aim for between 1 and 3 pages. Here's the breakdown:
1) Begin in the middle of the action. (The car skidding, the gun pointing, the letter crumpling in the fist, the door slamming, the phone ringing.)
2) Think like a movie producer. Zoom in from a distance and get close with your details.
3) Get the main character right into the mess. Get those feelings, impressions and thoughts down. Let them use all their senses.
4) Take a breath and set the stage. Where is this taking place? Why is the main character here?
5) Dialog. Don't say a word that doesn't either foreshadow, reveal character or give essential information.
6) More action. Finish the action you started, and if possible, get something else brewing so you can end with a hook. (the car skids to a stop...on the edge of a cliff.)

Now, remember action isn't just car chases and cliff-hangers. You romance writers know that a good deal of suspense and action can be subtle and interpersonal. Sometimes the action is as quiet as character having a life-changing thought. Use what works.

Genre is knowing which manners to mind

Two things got me thinking about genre yesterday. First, while rereading Clive Thompson's article about science fiction in Wired, I noted his observation that readers of Wired magazine wouldn't know the distinction between many genres.
(http://www.collisiondetection.net/mt/archives/2008/01/why_scifi_is_th.html) He's probably right. Readers don't need to know exactly where to shelve a book. But writers do need to know what the major genres are because publishers do. The second thing that got me thinking was a comment someone e-mailed me describing Agatha Christie's successful use of the unreliable narrator in her book, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. Another poster, an avid mystery reader, had added a good tip to Mr. Brean's plot formula. What I realize is that while people may not know the names of all the types of genres or all the conventions, they do know what to expect when they read one! Now this is a bit like taxonomy, so bear with me! On the top, you have mainstream fiction and genre fiction. Mainstream fiction is general fiction, best-seller style. It is popular, usually plot-driven, not specialized. Some people give Literary fiction its own category, others lump it in with general fiction. Literary fiction is known for allowing authors to explore style and character and be a bit experimental. Now, on the other side of the chart is Genre fiction. It is sometimes (and not always in a nice way!) referred to as "formula" fiction. In other words, there's an understanding about how the novel will unfold if it is within a genre. Some of the genres are: Romantic, Mystery, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Historical, Suspense, Horror, Western, Christian, Adventure and Young Adult. While I think absolute beginners do best to focus on one at a time, many good books blend two genres. If you are a voracious reader of any of these styles, you may have noticed that they have similarities. Those similarities are the rules of the genre that the writer followed. These rules are not arcane or top secret. Most publishers and editors have guidelines. I'll cover most of the most popular formulas in future posts. There are even rules for the genre of blogging. One of them I am at risk of breaking: brevity. So, I will break here and let you get back to your writing!

The Basic Recipe for a Book

When I set out to write my first book of fiction, I pestered every writer I knew and read many books on the subject. I learned quite a bit, but what I really wanted was...less. I didn't want to know how to become a literary genius; I just wanted to know what to put in my first draft. A recipe, if you will. This is what I wound up with:

To write a 180 page rough draft, you will need 20 chapters.
Each chapter has 3 scenes.
Each scene contains action, description and dialogue.
Each scene should be about three pages.

This gives you a general outline. Once you decide how much time each day you can devote to writing and how much you can accomplish in that time, you'll be able to do some quick math and get an estimate of when you'll be done that first draft.
As you write, you'll find some scenes and chapters are longer or shorter, and that is fine.

Simple, huh? That's just an overview--we'll be exploring each part in depth in future posts. And if any of you find the secret to literary genius, let me know.