|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Hello all.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Welcome to our Friday After
Hours Forum
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
I wanted to talk about pacing
tonight, because it's a complicated craft issue and a lot of books on
writing
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
merely mention it in passing
but don't go into the 'how' of it.
|
|
chatty lady
|
Mary, experiencing any smoke
from California fires???
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Not up here, chatty. I'm about
1000 miles from there.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Pacing is a real issue.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
I see both extremes in novice
manuscripts.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Either the story or narrative
tears along at breakneck speed or it crawls and the story momentum meanders
to a halt.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
But the reason pacing gets
kind of glossed over by a lot of books on writing is that it is achieved by
a combination of techniques.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
There is no 'one thing' you
can do to speed up or slow down your narrative or story.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Essentially the story or the narrative
is propelled forward by action, narrative events, or dialogue.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If you think of a person
walking along the street, they constantly see, hear, experience new things.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If you stand still, you stop
seeing new things.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If it gets foggy you may lose
the sense that you're moving forward, even if you're still walking.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If you run along that street,
you're not going to see as much, you'll be too busy paying attention to not
falling over something in front of you.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Your story or narrative is
that walk along the street.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
As action occurs and people
talk, the reader -- the walker -- keeps hearing and seeing new things,
maybe sees a distant goal getting closer.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If all of a sudden we have two
pages of description of a scene, it's as if your walker has stopped to
stare at the surroundings. You see a lot of things, but you're not moving
forward any more and it can get boring pretty quickly.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If you don't bother with any
description, if it's all action and dialogue, it's as if the reader is
running full tilt down that street, eyes fixed front so they don't stumble.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
The fog effect is what happens
when you overwrite. You use convoluted, complex, archane language that
forces your readers to parse out each sentence.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Maybe you're moving forward
but your vision is so obscured by the fog that it's really hard to tell.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Of course, you really want
that story to necessarily be like a stroll along a flat street.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
It's more fun to ride a roller
coaster. Maybe a steep one with thrills and chills, or maybe one that
doesn't have such steep slopes where you simply enjoy a slow climb and the
rush of the downward slide.
|
|
rae
|
HOw do you know when you have
the happy balance?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
At first you just don't.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Feedback is your best learning
tool. Writers who stubbornly refuse to share their work with anyone except
an editor tend to improve and grow very slowly.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Writers who workshop and pass
their work around a lot tend to grow and improve more quickly.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
At first you achieve what you
think is a balance of course. Then you listen to readers. Ask: Was it slow
anywhere?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Did you see everything as you
went along?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Well, the campfire scene went
on a really long time. Well, I didn't really see anything when he was
following Karen.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Those are nice little clues.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Maybe you need to add some
action or reduce the exposition in that campfire scene.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Maybe you need to let your POV
notice a bit more as he follows Karen
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Genreally, action increases
pace and exposition (description and internal narrative) decreases the
pace.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You increase pace by reducing
the visual action in your dialogue, you decrease the pace by adding more
visual action in dialogue.
|
|
gail
|
Would dialogue increase or
decrease pacing?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Dialogue itself can increase
the pace some if it includes action.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Dialogue without any visual
action stops the story in its tracks, becoming a talking heads scene.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Very static.
|
|
destiny8
|
My readers don't want to offend
me. How to find afrank one?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Generally it's a good idea to
find other novice writers. You all want to improve.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
And writers can genearly give
clearer comments: That character didn't seem realistic to me. The scene at
the castle seems slow.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Often, it's not that the
reader doesn't want to offend.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
They simply don't know what to
say. That's when a list of specific questions helps.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Did this scene make sense?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Did you understand why Kenny
said what he did?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
That sort of question.
|
|
pook
|
I want to recommend trying to
find or start a writer's critique group at your library for invaluable
feedback.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
That's a good place to start.
Some independent bookstores allow writers groups to meet at their store.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You can post an ad for a
critique swap in the LR Newsletter Want Ads.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Pace is not something to worry
about on the first draft.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
It's most likely going to take
you awhile before you'll even be aware of pace on draft one.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
It's something to read for on
maybe your third draft.
|
|
pook
|
critters.com is a critique group
that is well run for SF.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
And speck's 'Storycrafters' is
a good one.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Just remember...do not post
unpublished work on a critique site that does not require a password.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If you post material in public
space, it is published. No First Rights for you!
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If you let yourself worry
about too many things while writing the first draft, you'll block.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Just get the story down!
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Make major changes, focus on
the characterization so that you're happy with the characters.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
NOW worry about the pacing.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Put your manuscript aside for
a week and do something else.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Now read it. Just read it.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Pay attention to where it
seems slow, where your mind maybe starts to wander a bit.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
So it's a slow spot.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
What do you do now?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Start by asking yourself 'does
this scene need to be here?"
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If the answer is well, no, we
really don't need it' then axe it. Put in a transition instead.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
...For three days the
Brotherhood struggled over the snowy pass...
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If the answer is yes, you do
need it, when what is important in this scene? What MUST be there?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Maybe Rother has to see the
carved rune that proves his lineage. And he sees it in this scene, but it's
also full of details about their three nights camping in the pass.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
So focus on that rune...on the
first cold night, as he's out trying to find a hidden cache of firewood in
the shallow caves under a cliff, he sees the rune.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Finish that scene, transition
through the next two days ...for the next two days he plodded along behind
the monks, half frozen, the rune a burning glyph in his mind's eye...
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
and get through the scene.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
This is how you alter pacing
by altering content.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If the scene goes by too
fast.... Rother discovered the Carwyn Rune on their first night camping in
the pass. As soon as they reached the desert floor beyond...
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You do the reverse. Add those
details of stopping, battling snow, hunting for the cached firewood,
finding the rune.
|
|
quixote
|
would 'pace' depend on the
length of the story? Sustaining a fast pace too long for instance, or too
slow in a short piece?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
It can indeed quixote. In a
short story where you have a fairly starightforward dramatic arc, you might
build directly to the climax and your pace might
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
increase pretty steadily from
the start of the piece, building to the climax.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Or you might break that story
into two or three small scenes and your pace will vary within each scene.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
In a novel, you will have
frequent pace changes.
|
|
geezer
|
Can you use pacing to build the
story arc?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Absolutely. You can start slow
and build to a climax. You can start with a breakneck pace, slow down
radically, then increase to your climax.
|
|
gail
|
Can some scenes move slower,
purposefully, to build suspense in a story, a mystery for instance?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Or in horror.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You can recreate a human
experience of 'slow motion'.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You may or may not have
experienced it...in a moment of extreme stress or shock, time seems to slow
down. You see your child teetering at the top of the long flight of stairs
and it seems
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
to take him forever to fall
backward.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You look down at the huge gash
on your leg and your vision seems to zero in on that blood until that's all
you can see.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
In dark scenes, often the
sense of time is slowed way down by including lots of very specific little
details that bring the supsense level to painful heights.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
We know there's a really nasty
creature in this old mausoleum. We might notice all kinds of details as the
POV crosses the room..
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
the faint scuttle of a rat,
the distant drip of water, a chill breath of air, feather light on her
cheek. Each footstep rasps on the sandy floor and as she gets closer to the
tomb wall
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
her flashlight catches beads
of moisture on the pale marble, makes them gleam like tiny eyes.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If you've created the
expectation that this clawed monster can appear at any moment, you can
bring the suspense to excruciating heights by slowing down the pace to a
crawl.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
HP Lovecraft was particularly
good at that, by the way.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Good Halloween read, Edwardian
English et all.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Pacing is the tool you use to
adjust the tension of your story as well.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
These are the fine tuning
aspects of writing.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
They're nothing to worry about
in the first draft or two or three.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You work with them later to
bring the story into balance, so that readers simply don't have any place
to yawn, put the book aside and forget to pick it up. :-)
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Once you've added or
subtracted content..then start looking at words.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
I see a lot of scenes that
would have a nice brisk pace except they are so overwritten, the story flow
simply vanishes in a fog of words.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Taut spare prose, strong,
minimal visuals gives you a faster pace.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Lots of description and
internal narrative slows it down.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Conversation can slow down an
action scene.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Sometimes you NEED to slow
down a scene.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
A breakneck charge through the
story, end to end, is desensitizing and gets boring.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
The changes in your pace keep
the readers on their toes and engaged.
|
|
rae
|
I thought you needed the
conversation so you don't tell the story, you show it.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
I don't mean don't use
conversation. :-) But if you have an awful lot of conversation in a scene
that should move faster than it does you may
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
need to alter your
conversation so that your character speak less and more strongly.
|
|
janecj333
|
Mary, In a novel with several
subplots, each which needs to be 'seen' by the reader for continuity, it
sometimes feels like a subplot gets lost.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
And this is actually where you
can use pacing, Jane, because it is hard to keep multiple strands of
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
plot and subplot clear and
fresh in your readers' minds.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
One way to do this is to make
sure that when you look in on your subplot from the main plot, you are
making a clear pace change.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
That tends to focus the
reader, get their attention. Start that scene with something that will jog
the readers' memory so that they remenber where this subplot left off.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
These are the technical skills
you use to make what you envision work for your readers.
|
|
rae
|
would you do that on chapters as
well?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Anything I'm talking about, pace-wise,
is going to work for short work, chapters, and in the larger sense of the
novel.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Every chapter in your novel,
after all, has a dramatic arc. Not a HUGE one, but one nonetheless.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
And you can use pacing to help
create that arc.
|
|
quixote
|
short sentences? Fragments? Few.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Yes. This is at the word
level. Long, multi-clausal sentences tend to slow the pace of the scene and
reduce the tension.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Short, choppy, or very spare
sentences tend to increase the pace and add energy.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Don't overdo it!
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
YOu don't want to create the
effect of riding an iron wheeled cart down a cobble street!
|
|
gail
|
So, a slow scene may not
necessarily need revision or removal, but use it sparingly and only in
brief scenes?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Slow scenes are very
important, gail.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Otherwise you'll fatigue your readers
with a continuous breakneck pace.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
But if your novel, say, starts
with three slow, langjuid chapters, without much dramatic tension, you may
have a problem.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If your first chapter is a bit
slow as you introduce the world, but your second chaper is really strong
with a good tension level and a fast pace, you can relax again in your
third chapter and you'll
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
probably have your readers
pretty well engaged.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
But if you start your first
chapter with a pitched battle, your POV heads off into a breakneck chase
scene in two, and you have another pitched battle in three (don't laugh I
get these), your readers are panting by then!
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
And...you can do a lot of
character revelation and characer building in slower scenes.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
It's hard to learn much about
someone when they're swinging a sword. :-)
|
|
rae
|
I was told to break up these
types of scenes with humor. Is that good advice?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If it suits your story, rae.
Never do anything as a 'formula'. (You must have your POV overcome the
first obstacle in Chapter Two).
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
If humor doesn't suit the
story or you don't do humor well, it will seem forced.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Light moments will balance
scenes of violence or darkness.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
They don't have to be
humorous.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Oh by the way, yes, I just did
use one of my rare 'nevers'.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
And I meant it!
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Analyze what you read,
realizing that published does not always mean 'awfully good'.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Pay attention to how an author
scripts chapters. Notice how some are full of action and others are full of
conversations and details of the food.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Start noticing the rhythm of
that 'fast, slow, fast, slow'.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Every author has his/her own
rhythms.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
The more you notice how other writers
do things, the sooner you'll be able to consciously do that with your own
writing.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
I do work on pace in my first
drafts, but that comes from a LOT of practice. I'm probably into my third million words
by now.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
I now posses a little pacing
alarm that goes off when something is slow for too long or the action is
rushing on for too long. :-)
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
It's a useful little device.
|
|
rae
|
I write something every day, is
that good, or should I put the work aside for a few days, then come back to
it?
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Writing something every day is
very good. So is putting your work aside so that you can see it with 'new
eyes'.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Try working on more than one
project at a time. Working on something else takes your mind off that first
project
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
and you can go back to it
fresh. I always work on at least two things at the same time.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Usually it's one novel and a
couple of short stories.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Well this was a fun
discussion. I hope it helps.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Pacing is such a combination
of things that it's hard to grasp or alter at first.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
After awhile, it will become
very automatic.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
You'll simply know when a
scene is dragging or when you need to slow down.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
I'll post the transcript in
the usual place:
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Writing Craft: Forum
Transcripts.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Have a great weekend and join
me on Sunday for our casual chat.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
Same time as this...they're an
awful lot of fun.
|
|
quixote
|
it does - can you let the roof
fall in or something on those people in the mausoleum? So we can sleep
tonight
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
LOL...my protagonist already
saw an old vent with a rusted grating and escaped.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
She's safe, you can sleep now.
|
|
Mary Rosenblum
|
See you Sunday!
|