Category: writing

The Art of Stringing ‘Em Along

Posted on by Katie Ganshert

Readers don’t need to know nearly as much as we think they do. In fact, the opposite is often true. The less readers know, especially in the beginning, the better. Yet so many writers use the beginning of their novels to dump loads of information.

This is harmful, people. Seriously, seriously harmful.

First, it bores the reader. 
Think for a minute. Why do you read? To get caught up in a good story, right? Yet when we stop the flow of the story to fill the reader in, they’re no longer getting a story. They’re getting a biography on a character they neither know or care about yet.

Second, it’s not natural.
How do you get to know a person? How do you move from first-time acquaintances to full-out friends? Usually there’s a process. When we’re introduced to somebody for the first time, we know better than to reveal all the personal details of our past. That would be awkward. And again, boring. In order to care about somebody’s past, we have to get to know the person. And we get to know a person by what they say and do. Otherwise known as action and dialogue.

Third, it squashes all intrigue.
This is huge. Huge, huge. The biggest reason why we shouldn’t reveal too much in the beginning. Think about what keeps readers turning pages. It’s intrigue, right? That enticing unanswered question. The minute we jump in and reveal too much information is the minute we squish all the questions.

Last week, we had issues with our plumbing.

First, there was this mysterious drip coming from the ceiling in our laundry room. That drip caught my attention. I found myself thinking about it throughout the day. Visiting the laundry room more often than usual.

The next morning, the rug in our upstairs bathroom was wet. It was a mystery, because I couldn’t find a leak anywhere. You can believe my curiosity (and okay, fear) doubled. Were the two related? Where was the water coming from?

The day after that, more wetness on the bathroom floor. The leaky ceiling was worse. And get this. Another pipe in our basement, nowhere near the leaky ceiling, started dripping.

I went upstairs, got on my hands and knees, and searched everywhere. I was hooked. I was engaged. I was obsessed with finding this dang leak.

My plumbing gets it. It understands the art of stringing an audience along, bit by bit, unveiling just enough to keep a person hooked.

What an important skill to master as a writer. 

We need to know how to reveal tantalizing scents that make our readers want to take a few steps further to see what’s up ahead. And when they move forward, the scent needs to get stronger. More tantalizing.

Okay, maybe I’m mixing metaphors here. Tantalizing scents and plumbing problems probably shouldn’t go together. But you know what I mean.

Of course, there is a fine line. We can’t reveal so little that the reader gets confused. All I’m saying is, many of us error on the side of too much. And I’d take a confused reader over a bored one any day. Because at least a confused reader keeps turning those pages.

Let’s Talk: What do you think? Do you tend to reveal too much, afraid the reader won’t understand or like the character unless you explain everything? Have you mastered the art of hinting?

*Photo by missy &the universeremovetweetmeme

Handling Content Edits

Posted on by Katie Ganshert

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been working with my in-house editor on revisions for my debut novel.

You may be wondering what it’s been like.

Allow me to tell you a quick story.

After I gave birth to my son, my family came to meet our baby and asked Ryan, “How was it?”

He turned to them, looking more than a little shell-shocked, and said, “Intense.”

That’s exactly how I’d describe this. Intense.

As I’ve worked through the issues in my book, I feel like I’ve lived more inside my story than I have outside of it. I’ll come up for air and see my husband standing there and think, “Oh, right. You’re here.”

Before I signed my contract, I always loved when authors would share their experience with in-house edits, like Jody Hedlund does here. I enjoyed getting a sneak peak inside her life. To dream and anticipate when that day would come for me. So now that it is my turn (crazy, crazy), I thought I’d return the favor.

Other than intense, what exactly has my in-house editing experience looked like?

Keep in mind, every publishing house is different. And I’m sure, even within the same publishing house, authors have differing experiences. I can only share mine.

First, my editor and an outside reader read my book. Before she combined the feedback into an editorial letter, or revision memo, we discussed the major areas of concern via telephone.

It was a very casual conversation. Basically, she wanted to ask me some questions and run some ideas by me. I absolutely loved being included in the process.

After our conversation, I had some time to think about her suggestions. There was only one that I felt uncertain about, so I called my agent and she helped me process my thoughts and offered her own. One of the many, many reasons a good agent is invaluable.

A few days later, I received the revision memo.

I’d be lying if I said my heart didn’t start pounding just a wee bit faster. It turned out to be nine pages, single-spaced. A very typical length, I think. My editor started with encouragement, a lovely way to start, assuring me that she loved and believed in my story.

Then she moved on to the tough stuff. Things that needed improved.

One of the things I had going for me was a tightly written plot, which meant the overall structure of the book was solid. I attribute that to my psychotic habit of outlining.

There were, however, two big issues that needed attention:
-My main character’s arc
-The romance between my hero and heroine

I think most of you know this, but in case not, I write romance. It’s a huge part of my books. So to find out that the romance between my hero and heroine wasn’t working….

Let’s just say it wasn’t the easiest thing to swallow.

My natural inclination was to respond, “But, but….look at all this juicy tension I created. I can’t mess with that. What would Donald Maass say?”

After taking a deep breath and reading through the rest of the memo, I soon realized that:

1. She was right. Tension is good. But if that’s all there is, it makes for a shallow romance.

2. It wasn’t a lost cause.

She offered several solutions that would fix the problem without diffusing the tension, which made me excited. I could already see how much better my novel would be if I could rise to the occasion and fix what needed fixing.

So, there I was. Revision memo in my possession. All kinds of questions zipping through my head.

Which leads to our second phone call. My editor called me again and we talked for over an hour. She answered my questions, helped me brainstorm, and clarified the confusing spots.

But, that’s not all.

This is where I believe I’m incredibly lucky. This is where I sort of get this feeling of awe for my editor. She doesn’t just stop with a revision memo. She sent me my entire manuscript, with in-text notes.

I cannot tell you how incredibly valuable this has been for me as I work through my revisions. I’ve told my husband several times, “I don’t know what I’d do without these notes!” They’ve acted as a road map. Not to mention, many of the comments are downright funny.

Now here I am, two weeks later, finished (I think) with the major revisions.

So how did I do it?

Here are three tips for surviving a content edit:

Solicit the help of your family.
I asked my husband, my dad, my mom, and my aunt for help. The thing I’ve learned about revisions such as these, is it’s hard to jump in and out of the story. I needed to dive into the story and have large chunks of time to stay in the story. So my dad watched Brogan for an entire day, my aunt and grandma took him several evenings, and my husband took a father-son weekend trip to see his cousins in Wisconsin.

Tackle one issue at a time.
I focused first on their relationship. I went through with the deliberate intention of giving them points of connection. Once I got that out of the way, I switched my focus to my main character and looked for ways to make her more likable, more consistent. I continued until I crossed all the major concerns off my list.

Leave the simple stuff for the end.
As I write this post (Saturday evening), I just finished the last of the big stuff. But I’m not done. I still have to read through the manuscript, do some fine-tuning, make some secondary characters less caricature-like, add some more details to the setting, and make sure my prose don’t get too purple.  But this stuff feels much less daunting than the big stuff. Which is why I saved it for last.

When I finish, I’ll submit the story to my editor and wait anxiously to see if it needs additional revisions, or if I’ve turned in an acceptable manuscript. I’ll make sure to update you as soon as I find out!

For more information on the editorial process, check out these informative posts by my agent, Rachelle Gardner: Do Publishers Edit Books Anymore (to which I can answer a resounding YES!) and The Editorial Letter.

Let’s Talk: What, if anything, surprised you about the revision process? If you’ve gone through it, what was your experience like? Do you have any questions for me about my experience? If so, feel free to ask them in the comment section. I’ll either respond directly, or perhaps turn your question into its own blog post.removetweetmeme

Tension or Frustration?

Posted on by Katie Ganshert

There was this book I read recently that made me all kinds of frustrated. My inner growl came out. I found myself skimming through the last third of the story, rolling my eyes, muttering things like, “Come on, already!”

Which got me thinking.

As writers, we talk a lot about the importance of tension. Heck, Donald Maass says we better have it on every single page. So the question begs to be asked.

What’s the difference between tension and frustration?

Is there one?

When I think of frustrating books, two titles come to mind. Both are best-sellers.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

New Moon (the second book in the Twilight series)

These books frustrated me for the same reason. Which involved the disappearance of a beloved character for a much-too-big chunk of the story.

Yet they are incredibly popular novels and much-loved by readers. Including me. So is frustration a mute point? Should we go for it?

I don’t know….

Frustration has to be one of the most annoying emotions. And I’m not sure annoyance is something we should ever aspire to do to our readers.

Tension. Good.

Frustration. Not so good.

The first brings readers to the edge of their seats. The second makes them want to light the book on fire.

So how do we embrace the first and avoid the second?
 
Avoid drawing things out for an eternity.
Yes, we want to prolong tension. But not to the point of frustration. Sometimes, best practice involves giving the reader what they want, then hooking them with something else. 
 
Keep popular characters in the story.
Don’t make a beloved character disappear for too long. Unless absolutely necessary. But even then, you risk the wrath of your reader. 
 
Sprinkle in moments of gratification.
Sure, maybe you can’t have your hero and heroine get together until the end, but that doesn’t mean you can’t throw in some chemistry-laden tender moments between the two. There needs to be a positive correlation between frustrating moments and gratifying ones. The more frustrating a novel may be, the more gratifying moments we better include.
 
Make the ending uber satisfying.
And I do mean uber. Like ultra uber. Especially, especially, especially if our stories lend themselves to frustration. The more frustrating a novel, the more satisfying the ending better be. Because even if we frustrate our readers, they will forgive us anything in the world if we satisfy the heck out of them at the end. Just like I forgave Stephanie Meyer the minute Bella hurled through the crowded square of Volterra and catapulted herself into Edward’s stone-cold arms.
 
The book I brought up in the beginning? The ending wasn’t as satisfying as it needed to be to soothe my frustrated nerves. So it left a bad taste in my mouth. Despite the good writing and character development.
 
When I think of a team of writers who have figured out this whole tension/frustration dichotomy, my mind automatically jumps to Vampire Diaries. They are experts in magnifying the tension without causing frustration. Which is why I love the show so very much. I even wrote a post about it: Tips from Television.   
 
Let’s Talk: What do you say about frustration? Is it okay to frustrate readers? Is there a book that frustrated the heck out of you, but you still love it to pieces?

*Photo by Ellie Goff

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