Flogometer for Ana—would you turn the page?

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Update. I have a post up about "voice" at Writer Unboxed that's kinda fun.

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A new review of The Vampire Kitty-cat Chronicles is up on Vampires.com. Here’s a portion; I hope you’ll visit the site, it’s quite nice:

When I picked this book up I expected a cute children’s book, but instead got a perfectly executed adult novel that had many incredibly cute moments, mixed in with lots of bloody ones. Ray Rhamey’s quick wit and clever sense of humor is just what the vampire world of fiction needs. There were many times when this book made me laugh out loud, and let me tell you, very few books can manage that. Rhamey mastered what so many authors attempt but fail miserably at. If I were you I’d definitely pick up The Vampire Kitty-cat Chronicles.

BuzzBlast contest a-comin’. Prizes will include gear (t-shirts, mugs) from the world of Patch and signed copies of The Vampire Kitty-cat Chronicles. As soon as my store is up and the website complete, which should be within a week or so, I’ll launch a weekly buzz-builder contest to get you to help spread the word about my novel. No purchase necessary, and everybody will have a chance to win. Watch for it!

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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). Directions for submissions are below.

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.

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Ana’s first 16 lines from her first try at a novel:

Leo stood watching snowflakes dance in the darkness outside. He purposefully concentrated on the tiny specks of white to avoid looking at the reflection. Soft click of the door made him turn. An unassuming grey-suited man acknowledged his presence with a nod, before following his gaze towards a pool of finely shredded paper on the floor. Aircon fan hummed, occasionally lifting a few scraps of paper into the air. Those reminded Leo of tiny snowflakes and for a moment he thought that the body was covered with a light dusting of snow. The gray man walked towards the once Head of Natural Resources Committee, now lying face down in the pile, and checked his pulse.

‘The chief is dead,’ he looked around the room, taking in the shredded documents dumped on the floor, ‘You here alone?’

‘Yes. I called you straight away.’

‘You did right,’ the man studied Leo’s face, ‘Any thoughts?’

‘I don’t know. Harp—’

‘I say heart attack. I’ll do everything that needs to be done. You’re free to go.’

Leo nodded and hurried towards the door, straining not to look at the corpse.

‘Congressman Clark?’

Another close one
The story questions were nearly enough to get me to turn the page, but there were craft issues that suggested to my cranky editor’s eye that the writing, while good, still needs work that the story questions weren’t powerful enough to overcome. Lots of promise, though. Notes:

Leo stood watching snowflakes dance in the darkness outside. He purposefully concentrated on the tiny specks of white to avoid looking at the reflection. The Soft click of the office door made him turn. An unassuming grey-suited man acknowledged his presence with a nod before following his gaze towards a pool of finely shredded paper on the floor. The aircon fan hummed, occasionally lifting a few scraps of paper into the air. Those reminded Leo of tiny snowflakes and for a moment he thought that the Senator’s body was covered with a light dusting of snow. The gray man walked towards the once Head of Natural Resources Committee, now lying face down in the pile, and checked his pulse. (The missing articles at the fronts of a couple of sentences made the narrative feel choppy to me, and threw off the rhythm of the sentences. I added “office” just to help set the scene a little better, and “Senator’s” because letting the reader know that an important government official lay there dead seems like a way to raise the stakes and tension. The line about avoiding the reflection doesn’t really work because the reader doesn’t know what’s in it that needs to be avoided. Changing it to something such as to avoid the body reflected by the glass or some such would help give it meaning. Also, suggesting that for a moment he thought the body was covered with snow doesn’t seem credible since he knows that it’s paper. To make it so, simply change it to something like for a moment it seemed as though. . .)

‘The chief is dead,’ he looked around the room, taking in the shredded documents dumped on the floor, ‘You here alone?’

‘Yes. I called you straight away.’

‘You did right,’ the man studied Leo’s face, ‘Any thoughts?’

‘I don’t know. Harp—’

‘I say heart attack. I’ll do everything that needs to be done. You’re free to go.’

Leo nodded and hurried towards the door, straining not to look at the corpse.

‘Congressman Clark?’

Another suggestion. Trim down the long first paragraph if possible (I think the part about Head of Natural Resources Committee could wait until later) and add to the last sentence this from the next page, also said by the gray man:

Not a word of this. We’ll be in touch.’ The man got his phone, ‘I need a team of sweepers.”

I think that adds to the mystery and thus the tension. A good scene and a good start.

Comments, please?

For what it’s worth.

Ray

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Public floggings available. If I can post it here,

Submitting to the Flogometer:

1. Email your 1st chapter or prologue plus 1st chapter as an attachment (.doc or .rtf preferred, .docx okay) and I'll critique the first page.
2. Please format with double spacing, 12-point font Times New Roman font, 1-inch margins.
3. Please include in your email permission to post it on FtQ.
4. And, optionally, permission to use it as an example in a book if that's okay.
5. If you’re in a hurry, I’ve done “private floggings,” $50 for a first chapter.
6. If you rewrite while you wait you turn, it’s okay with me to update the submission.

ARCHIVES

© 2010 Ray Rhamey

Comments

[jon]

Ana @12:32 PM:

Hah! Coincidentally, I was just this morning reading a book on science-fiction world development in which the author was talking about creating your languages, and giving examples of how languages other than English do things.

One of the examples he gave was Russian, which, among other distinctions, doesn't use articles. That bit flashed through my head when I encountered the missing "The"s, but the rest was written so generally well that I figured it was a native-speaker inconsistently applying a style for effect.

For a second-language writing sample, this is quite impressive; you'll figure the rest out as you go.

Good luck!
-j

[Ana]

Indeed, Russian has no articles and plenty of adverbs (and adverbs for adverbs). It’s as longwinded and flowery as English is concise and to-the-point.

Ana

[Jami G.]

Ana,

Your skill with written English is better than 90% of the native speakers. :) So keep at it. You have a great attitude, and with determination, you can learn the specifics of grammar.

Jami G.

[Ana]

Thank you, Jami. It means a lot to hear that.

[Christine H]

I was confused by the first paragraph.

"to avoid looking at the reflection." Reflection of what?

"Aircon fan hummed." Is that a brand of fan? Is it a little oscillating fan, or a central air conditioning fan?

Are we in an office building or a home? I'm not sure.

He thought the body was covered with snow. Really? Perhaps you mean, "It seemed the body was covered with snow."

Okay, I just skimmed up the comments a little (I didn't read them all) and realized that you are a Russian speaker and that English is your second language. Congratulations! This is very good, much better than I could do in French, which is the only foreign language I've studied.

My father is Hungarian, and there are no gender specific pronouns ("he" or "she") in Hungarian. Everyone is "it." So he is constantly confusing those and I am familiar with how hard these small things are.

Keep working on it! Good job!

[Katherine]

I've having trouble emailing Ray. I've tried two times, and got 'unable to deliver' messages both times. I'd like to update my piece befor eit's flogged. Does anyone have any suggestions, or know what to do??

[Ray Rhamey]

Katherine, there must be a glitch somewhere, because I'm receiving email. Try ray @ editorrr.com again. An alternative is ray @ ftqpress.com

[Trip Volpe]

Ana, despite the issues that Ray and others have mentioned here, I honestly never would have guessed this piece was written by a non-native speaker of English. So congrats! You are awesome. Writing convincing fiction in another language seems to me like a pretty good indicator that you've just about mastered it.

I don't have much to say that others haven't covered already, but I would just like to mention that I thought the overall selection of images -- snow, window, paper, air conditioning hum -- was quite effective at creating a "quiet office after hours" sort of atmosphere, which is already slightly creepy. Adding a corpse to that setting readily builds a feeling of intrigue and danger.

Christine H. mentioned the "Aircon hum," wondering if it was a brand name. I'm not sure, but my first impression was of the sort of casual abbreviation that suggests a "twenty minutes into the future" kind of setting. Is this the case? If so, I think it's a very nice touch. :-)

Doug said: "I don't get why the anonymous man asked Leo if he had any thoughts and then cut Leo off when he started to offer one."

I think it worked fairly well to reveal something about the relationship between (Congressman?) Leo and the gray-suited man (Harp?). His request for ideas was only perfunctory -- just polite emptiness. He continued speaking as though Leo hadn't even said anything. So we get an idea that Leo is subordinate, which is immediately reinforced when he is casually dismissed.

On that note, is Leo the "Congressman Clark" of the last sentence? If so, that definitely makes the power dynamic more interesting, but it would help if it were clearer. "Harp" is also ambiguous. A better sense of who's who in this scene would definitely make it more compelling.

[Ana]

Thanks again on all the suggestions! I can now see the problems with a new pair of eyes, so to speak, and I already know of some other places further in the story that need work.

Ray, you are a star. And may I say, that Flogging the Quill, the book, is also a great help.

[Ray Rhamey]

Ana,you may indeed say that. And I want to give a shout-out to all constructive criticism and suggestions FtQians have given. Thanks. (FtQians? FtQites? Any suggestions?)