So, I spent Tuesday morning and early afternoon at a workshop in Bridgeport, CT led by international thriller writer, Steve Berry. For those of you who have been following me for any length of time, you may have picked up that Steve is one of my favorite authors. For the genre, I would say he is the top of my list. It was nice to know someone besides me and my parents thought Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol was horrible. Steve said you could read it as what not to do in writing a novel. So, I've decided to recap what Steve lectured about and a few interesting answers to some questions from the Q&A session.
Story Structure (the 6 Cs)
A story can be broken up into essentially 3 Acts. Acts 1 and 3 compose roughly 5% each of the novel while Act 2 comprises the remainly 90%. Additionally, each has a set of Cs of structure one must follow.
Act 1 has Character, Conflict and Crucible. Obviously, you need to introduce your characters in the first part of the novel, including the antagonist. This will come into play more when we discuss Point of View but there should be 2-5 characters that you introduce at this point in time. You also need to introduce the main conflict for the story in the first act. It's even better if you introduce the conflict as early as you can. One way to do this, Steve suggested, is to start the story as close to the end point as possible. Finally, you need to have the crucible. This is more difficult to work out. It's the thing that makes your character (even your antagonist) act a way they would not normally act. It's basically, if I understand correctly, their motivation.
Act 2 has Complications. This where the meat of things happen. You also start weaving subplots in during this part of the novel. It's important that the subplots tie into the main plot. Just throwing a romance in for no good reason (or for filler words) is pointles. If it doesn't tie to the main plot, and resolve by the end of Act 2, then you need to either lose it or find some way to tie it in. Try not to have too many subplots. Two or three is more than sufficient.
Act 3 has the Crisis and the Conclusion. The crisis is the high point of the drama. The bad guy and the good guy are facing off and shit is about to hit the fan. Generally speaking, this should happen at the beginning of Act 3. And finally, you have the conclusion. Keep the 'duhs' to yourself. You need to end the story, not just let it sit there. Wrap it up.
Point of View
There are mainly two general points of view novels are told in; first person and third person. First person is far more difficult than one might imagine. Believe, I've done it and I much prefer third person.
First person can have the charactere either actively participating in the story be more passive. But since I don't write often in first person, there isn't much else to say.
Far more common, is third person (or omniscient). There are four types of third person narration; none, one, some and all. No narrator is generally done where there is only dialog and sees rather difficult to pull off. The moment you have the need for some kind of description, then you are no longer in no narrator. The second type of narration is one narrator. This is much like first person in that it's only shown through one character's perspective and can be difficult. Of course, it can be done and may be better for some types of novels than others. The most popular and used type of narration is some (or multiple) narrators. This usually is 3-5 characters and you guessed it, they happen to be the characters you introduced in Act 1. The last type of narration or point of view is all where you are in every character's head. I wouldn't recommend it and neither would Steve.
A few other things to remember regarding point of view. Throw away POVs are lazy writing. These are characters who you toss in for no other purpose than to show them getting killed off. Just don't do it.
Another interesting POV thing is psychic distance, how far away from the character the reader is. This is a completely new ocncept that I learned at the workshop. You want to be as close to the character as possible beause that keeps the point of view tight and there's less chance of accidental head hopping. So keeping things as s/he or I (depending on first or third) does this for you. One way to establish POV in a chapter is to start the chapter with the character's name and use s/he the rest of the chapter. Call other characters by name the whole time. You can throw in the POV character's name as a reminder if it's needed but only if it's really needed.
Dialog
Dialog is far more important than one might think. It helps to advance the plot, provide comic relief, maintain suspense/tension and/or illustrate character development. You want dialog (and every scene in fact) to do at least two of these things. Try not to use dialog as a giant info dump. There are plenty of ways to get the informmation out rather than a big long conversation. The best kind of dialog to use is oblique. It doesnn't have many direct questions and answers or yes and no or even hello or goodbye. I'm trying to do this as I revise my own manuscripts and it's kind of difficult. But, like anything, if you keep at it, it gets easier.
There are a few other things one needs to know about dialog; tags versus beats. Beats indicate movement and can come either before or after dialog and remind the reader who is about to speak. A tag is "said". And as much as it pains me to say this (no pun intended), use said 99.9% of the time. Occasionally you can toss in asked. But generally, avoid other qualifiers. Don't use exclamation points. That's just lazy writing. You can show the reader how the character is speaking with a beat.
The 10 Rules of Writing
1. There are no rules as long as it works
2. Don't bore the reader
3. Don't confuse the reader
4. Don't get caught writing
5. Don't lie to the reader
6. Don't annoy the reader
7. Writing is rewriting
8. Shorter is always better
9. Story never takes a vacation
10. Must tell a good story
Here a few questions I'd asked him that I thought had some interesting answers.
Q: Do you work on more than one project at a time.
A: I'm actively writing one and plotting two more. So there's always 3 stories in my head.
Q: Do you write daily and if so, how often?
A: I write four to five hours a day, usually in the morning. I spend the afternoons working on the business of writing.
Q: Do you ever wish you could write another genre?
A: I'd love to write historical fiction but moving between genres (unless it's a completely different audience) will make you lose your audience.
So that is everything I've learned from Steve. He's a delightful guy and I'm ready to implement his knowledge in my own writing.
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