Flogometer for Dave: would you keep reading?

---

The Flogometer challenge: can you craft a first page that compels me to turn to the next page? Caveat: Please keep in mind that this is entirely subjective.

Note: all the Flogometer posts are here.

What's a first page in publishingland? In a properly formatted novel manuscript (double-spaced, 1-inch margins, 12-point type, etc.) there should be about 16 lines on the first page (first pages of chapters/prologues start about 1/3 of the way down the page).

Some homework. Before sending your novel's opening, you might want to read these two FtQ posts: Story as River and Kitty-cats in Action. That'll tell you where I'm coming from, and might prompt a little rethinking of your narrative.

---

Dave's first 16 lines:

The large red dragonflies reversed, zipped forward, and finally hovered outside the hagwon window. Paul Taylor stared at the sexually conjoined insects, their wings a furious blur, wondering what it'd be like to fly and fuck at the same time. Probably a bit more fun than filling out student evaluations, a bi-monthly task that again needed completing. He glanced at the unmolested pile of one hundred and fifty or so papers on his desk, each one representing an individual human being whose young mind he was supposedly dedicated to nurturing.

'Arse,' he muttered.

At least it was Saturday on Planet Andong. Tonight was Popcorn's inaugural Evening of Culture, plus he had tomorrow off, a heady combination that was helping make his latest five-hour stint on the educational conveyor belt a bit more bearable. He inhaled slowly, looking round at his Dolly co-workers. A teacher's guide engrossed Helen while Colleen was taking a rare break from her grammar tomes to glue an elephant photo onto an animal collage. Susan, his supervisor who held down two other jobs, was busy colouring in a bar chart that illustrated never, sometimes, often, and always. Not once did the felt-tip pen sneak outside the borders. Everything neat and tidy. Dollies rarely did 'zany' but in the spirit of international harmony he decided to see if any of them could be tempted by a big night out.

Despite nice writing, the page was unturned

Interesting voice, potentially interesting world, nothing interesting (to me) happening. Dave is setting up his world and scene and characters, but I didn't find myself wanting to know what happens next. Basically, it's a lack of interesting story questions. About the only ones raise are how Paul was going to grade the papers and whether or not his colleagues would go for a night out. Tension there isn't, compelling it wasn't, for me. Some notes:

The large rRed dragonflies reversed, zipped forward, and finally hovered outside the hagwon window. Paul Taylor stared at the sexually conjoined insects, their wings a furious blur, wondering what it'd be like to fly and fuck at the same time. Probably a bit more fun than filling out student evaluations, a bi-monthly task that again needed completing. He glanced at the unmolested pile of one hundred and fifty or so papers on his desk, each one representing an individual human being whose young mind he was supposedly dedicated to nurturing. ("large" is a relative term, and with no reference, it's essentially meaningless. Relate it to something we can visualize, and it can work, i.e. "the size of hummingbirds" or "six-inch" or something like that. This paragraph, perhaps the most key in terms of hooking a reader's interest, offers only a teacher's lack of interest in grading papers. A very small hook, if one at all, for my eyes.)

'Arse,' he muttered.

At least it was Saturday on Planet Andong. Tonight was Popcorn's inaugural Evening of Culture, plus he had tomorrow off, a heady combination that was helping make his latest five-hour stint on the educational conveyor belt a bit more bearable. He inhaled slowly, looking round at his Dolly co-workers. A teacher's guide engrossed Helen while Colleen was taking a rare break from her grammar tomes to glue an elephant photo onto an animal collage. Susan, his supervisor who held down two other jobs, was busy colouring in a bar chart that illustrated never, sometimes, often, and always. Not once did the felt-tip pen sneak outside the borders. Everything neat and tidy. Dollies rarely did 'zany' but in the spirit of international harmony he decided to see if any of them could be tempted by a big night out. (Introducing characters who are interacting with the protagonist in some way makes sense, especially if that contributes to story. Here, we're just being told about people who aren't doing anything very interesting. This paragraph is, essentially, tension-free, a problem on the first page of your manuscript when you need to compel the reader to want to know what happens next.)

I skimmed the rest of the chapter, and it seems to be following this teacher for 24 pages as he teaches his students. In terms of tension level in my mind, we remained pretty much flatlined. I'm thinking that this is an extreme case of "throat-clearing," and I advise Dave to look ahead for the spot where something happens to the teacher that has life-changing impact and start very near to that point. Unless lessons to small children are vital to the plot, this chapter doesn't do much to create story. The writing, however, was very good, and I didn't spot much in the way of craft issues.

Comments, anyone?

For what it's worth,

Ray

---

Donations go to the cost of hosting FtQ.

---

Public floggings available. If I can post it here,

1. send 1st chapter or prologue as an attachment (cutting and pasting and reformatting from an email is a time-consuming pain) and I'll critique the first couple of pages.
2. Please include in your email permission to post it on FtQ.
3. And, optionally, permission to use it as an example in a book if that's okay.
4. If you're in a hurry, I've done "private floggings," $50 for a first chapter.
5. If you rewrite while you wait you turn, it's okay with me to update the submission.

ARCHIVES .

© 2008 Ray Rhamey

Comments

[Jon]

Wow, lots of stuff to assimilate here in the world-building.

Overall, I don't think I'd read on, but I could see a version of this in which I would.

The "probably a bit more fun..." line felt a little gratuitous. I love me a good "fuck" here and there, but as a transition between bugs and papers it doesn't quite work... of -course- it'd be more fun, to the point of not even being worth asking oneself. Which left me with the gratuitous feeling.

"large red" is vague and adjective over-prone. If they're an important feature of the world or scene, maybe describe them better?

what's he been wanting to do instead of grading the papers? that's where your hook is, I think.

You might consider instead of starting with a don't-want, starting with a want. (Instead of Paul "not wanting" to do the evals, have him "wanting" to do something else (specific) instead of the evals.

"Saturday on Planet Andong" felt a bit clumsy to me; given the fact that he's teaching there, he's probably been there a while. Would you think "At least it's Saturday on Planet Earth?" I wouldn't, at least...

...and then we have the Great Confusing ImmersionDump of 2008. Popcorn? Dolly? (I assume the Dollies are androids of some sort, but if they're so simple that they're into coloring and gluing, how are they complex enough to supervise?

I guess this could work, if the following paragraphs made everything clearer, but I think I'd rather be slowly immersed in the world's strangenesses rather than thrown in at the deep end.

If he had a Want that was being blocked by his surroundings (say, he wanted more than a "date" with a Dolly, but they're famously and frustratingly incurious about sex despite being anatomically correct, and he has these papers to take care of, and maybe one or two more things...) I could see this working for me quite nicely, but as-is it didn't quite do it for me.

Good luck!

-j

[Kamila Miller]

I would have read on, but if it was just to follow the teacher on a regular day I probably would have stopped. Now if he had a problem student he was trying to help, especially if that student was someone who was in desperate trouble (deeper than the teacher realizes from the start) or maybe go the other direction and the student is a threat to life and limb, that would be something I'd love to read about.

BTW, I didn't get that this was an alien world. I figured futuristic near a swamp or something, because I have large red dragonflies on my property so that's what I pictured in my mind. Mainly, though, I was lost as to what a Dollie was.

Oh, and when I googled red dragonflies I found out that they're all male. Weird, huh? http://www.geocities.com/indianodonata/red_dragonflies.htm

[Sheila]

I liked the voice here, and the insightful description of his co-workers. Who can't relate to being mind-numbingly bored at work? It's fun to take that common feeling and put it in a totally new world.

Things that didn't work for me include what Ray pointed out - there is no tension or even anything interesting going on here. I think it is possible to hook people into a uniquely crafted world, but eventually something interesting has to happen to this person. And we need a taste of that early on. Kamila's examples are the kind of thing that would compel me to read on.

I liked Jon's suggestion of changing the "don't want" feelings of the protag to "want" feelings because that would tell us more about the character and the world while not sacrificing his overall sense of boredom with his job.

I read the last paragraph a few times and I still felt puzzled. Often this is fine because as you read further, then things become clear. But I can't read further, so I'm left wondering: Is Popcorn a person? A place? Are Dollies robots? Another species? Do you mean "interspecies" or "interplanetary" relations rather than "international?"

Keep at it!