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Expert Advice from Jennifer Madsen |
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EXPERT ADVICE ARTICLES BY JENNIFER MADSEN
Printed in RT BOOK REVIEWS BOOKclub Magazine
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Category: MOTIVATION
MARINATING YOUR NOVEL -- OR, HOW TO ADD COLOR AND DEPTH TO THE STORYIn Texas we like to marinate things. We marinate our fresh gulf fish in teriyaki, our chicken in Worcestershire and our beef in special-ingredient sauces. I haven't spent a lot of time standing over the barbeque pit lately, but I have been marinating something: my novel. The steeping of my words -- after getting my freelance editor's comments -- has helped give my novel flavor and life.
I've put together a comparison of the opening scene's original draft and the revised version. As I'm working through the remainder of my novel, I'll most likely get discouraged and question my writing ability. But I think it's important to see how far I've come, to remember what is possible when I view my manuscript through someone else's eyes.
I know many aspiring authors don't have their own editor before they publish, so I think you might find some of my editor's comments helpful and applicable to your own manuscripts. Perhaps seeing how I made changes in my original opening pages will allow you to look at your own writing in a new light.
For instance, in my editor's original story notes, she wrote: "Fill the characters out more. Shake in more adjectives and adverbs. Paint your scenery in more detail. Give dimension and depth. Let your readers visualize in their heads what you see in yours."
The last comment changed my story. Read on to see how.
ORIGINAL OPENING
Saturday morning found me 30 feet above the ground hanging from the side of a cliff. Soul searching? Nope. Rescue mission? Maybe, depending on how long my arms held out.
"Ack, my beginning needs a hook." That was my first thought when I sat down to rewrite this section, even though I'd already written it about 15 different ways. I realized I needed to give more information about the "me" mentioned. If readers don't know who the narrator is, how can they care about her? It took several weeks, not to mention 50 e-mails to my editor, to get my heroine under control.
In revising my manuscript, I realized I had written her from the start as if she'd already made her transition from career-driven woman to God-seeking woman. Also, where are they and why? When I related every location, action and spoken word to who my character is and who she will become, the story began to click. Here's how it reads now.
REVISED OPENING
I'm going to slap her.
I mean, I'm all for a productive Saturday. Usually I'm up at the crack of dawn, eat two, sometimes three, meals at my desk, putting in a full day's work before other people are done sleeping until noon. The only thing I manage to sneak in for myself is a pedicure. It's very important to pamper the toes that spend 80 hours in Jimmy Choos.
However, this particular Saturday, I'm hanging 30 feet off the ground, clinging to the side of a cliff. Soul searching? Nope. Rescue mission? Maybe, depending on how long my arms hold out.
It's just me, Alivia Less, letting my best friend of 20 years force physical exertion upon me. I made one comment about enjoying my post-car accident physical therapy and suddenly she's all over me to get out more. I'm too into my work, she says. I personally think she's too into torture. Not to mention extortion. She knows I can't say no to a challenge.
Two weeks ago she made me Rollerblade. Before that she convinced me biking through the countryside would be relaxing. On the way over here I saw a brochure for skydiving in her backseat. Lord, help me. Today's fun activity is climbing
a big rock in the state park right off the interstate. I've never climbed anything in my life, unless you count the corporate ladder. From college graduate to creative director in six years wasn't as punishing as this.
Have you ever written something, then sat back and thought, "Wow"? It's exciting when the scene works out on paper exactly as you plan in your head, isn't it? Even now, working on the column, I'm still amazed at how much more powerful the revised paragraphs are than the original.
Then I turned my attention to painting poor Alivia hanging from the cliff, literally and figuratively at the end of her rope. So
I asked myself: What does that look, sound and feel like? What does her reaction to her situation reveal about her? Then I deleted the random food references that were in an early draft. Seems I had gotten carried away with cake.
ORIGINAL PARAGRAPHS
"Rachel!" I shouted up to my best friend -- wait, make that ex-best friend -- "I'm stuck!" She cleared the top of the cliff 15 minutes ago and just left me hanging.
OK, I must admit that is not the most vivid image. Thankfully, I can edit. (Wow, did I just say that?) Here's how it looks revamped, with more color, more sound and more visual.
REVISED PARAGRAPHS
"Rachel!" I shouted up to her, my now ex-best friend, "I'm stuck!"
She cleared the top of the rock 15 minutes ago, leaving me hanging. Dangling really, with a bit of flailing mixed in every time a stiff autumn wind gusted out of
the east, spinning me around until my back smacked the rock. It knocked the breath out of my lungs with an audible "oomph." Sore didn't even begin to describe what I was going to feel tomorrow.
I sucked my breath back in as I thrashed around trying to face the mountain. Halfway up this crumbling pile of rocks, scraped and bruised, I wasn't giving up. I've never quit anything in my life. I succeed. It's what I do, at all costs. However, with sheer exhaustion pulsing through every ounce of me, the remaining 10 feet of rocky incline wasn't exactly going to be a piece of cake.
"Rachel!" I shouted again.
You've probably noticed most of my revisions result in my scene expanding to put in more visualizations. But that isn't always the case. For the next section, less really is more. When I first wrote the book, one idea morphed into another, and everyone I knew had a funny quip for me. Indulgent writer that I am, I included it all. As the revisions rolled around, I uncovered tangled side stories, unimportant information and characters that had to go. Pilates was casualty No. 1.
ORIGINAL PARAGRAPHS
A shadowed figure appeared 10 feet above me lit from behind by a glorious morning sun. "You can do this!
I thought you've been going to Pilates. You should be able to lift your own body weight by now, you don't weigh that much."
Pilates. That's what I tell people. Really, I've been hitting the coffee bar two blocks from my office extra hard and sneaking paperwork down there with me. But I won't tell if you don't.
Rachel clapped her hands together, mock cheerleader style. "Come on, let's go girl!"
REVISED PARAGRAPHS
A shadowed figure appeared above me, lit from behind by the bright morning sun. "You can do this!" Rachel said a bit too chipper. Her enthusiasm actually
did make me want to scale up this cliff. The sooner I hit the top, the sooner I can smack her.
She clapped her hands together, mock cheerleader style. "Girl, come on!"
Getting from my original draft to the version you've just read actually entailed about 10 rewrites. I continued editing this section even as I wrote this column. You might think catching editing fever would be a good thing. You'd be wrong. It's causing me how-will-I-know-I'm-done-anxiety, because, in a few weeks, I'll be submitting this first section to a New York literary agent. Lord, help me. |
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