Friday Fun and Flogometer for Susan—would you turn the page?

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Chapter 21 Like mother, like daughter?

. Vampire Kitty-cat Chronicles

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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.

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Susan’s opening lines from a memoir:

I tried the doorknob but it only jiggled. Perhaps my roommate Na Wei had returned and locked it from the inside. But after knocking loudly on the door several times, all I heard were crickets chirping outside the screened hall window.

Great. My key and wallet were inside my dorm room and I was locked out on a Saturday night, half a world from home, isolated on a mountain campus where I hardly knew anyone. Although I had studied at this university several years back, I had just returned a few weeks ago to start graduate school and recognized few faces on campus.

Moments earlier I had been on the hall phone with my friend Jean, who had also recently moved to Hong Kong. I knew I could stay at her apartment, a forty minute bus ride north. And I wouldn’t have thought twice about going outside in typical Hong Kong indoor attire: rubber slippers, an oversized t-shirt, and short gym shorts. This was no time for propriety, but it was a moot point. I didn’t even have fifty cents for the bus ride.

My watch read eleven o’clock, which meant Na Wei, a computer science PhD student from Beijing, wouldn’t return until the next morning. She spent most nights with her boyfriend, a gaunt engineering student from Fujian province, and never came back to our room this late. It was pointless to think about locating her. Even if I had known how to find her, I would have felt awkward barging in on them this late.

No, but. . . Memoires are tough for me to evaluate. While I believe they need to evoke the same kind of tension and what-happens-next feeling that good fiction does, I know that it could be more difficult when you’re not making things up. And, while I’m not absolutely certain that agents require that level of “hook,” if I were I one I would, especially if the memoir is not by a celebrity with built-in interest.

I hope you folks will weigh in on that. It seems to me that, for a bookstore or Amazon look-inside browser, the first page still needs to compel a turn of the page. I’ve also read in posts by agents that the key to a successful memoir is not the telling of what happens to you, but why the telling of what happens to you matters to me. What is the story about, in those terms, rather than just your personal history? What about your personal history will I find both entertaining and meaningful to life?

Those are daunting questions for any narrative to answer, which makes a memoir as tough a “sell” to a reader as any other kind of book-length fiction. Susan has been here before with other openings for this story, and she’s sure giving it a terrific try. Notes:

I tried the doorknob, but it only jiggled. Perhaps my roommate Na Wei had returned and locked it from the inside. But after knocking loudly on the door several times, all I heard were crickets chirping outside the screened hall window. (Little nits: try to avoid the repetition of “but” so close together. And “knocking loudly” is trying to get an adverb to do the job of good description that it can’t—it’s only a sign of a weak verb. Is there a stronger one you can use, such as “banged” or “hammered?”)

Great. My key and wallet were inside my dorm room and I was locked out on a Saturday night, half a world from home, isolated on a mountain campus where I hardly knew anyone. Although I had studied at this university several years back, I had just returned a few weeks ago to start graduate school and recognized few faces on campus. (While that last sentence may be key to the history, it is definitely not key to the drama of the event. The first sentence is just fine for introducing story tension, and then the second sentence deflates it with a snippet of backstory. Add that in later if you must, but it isn’t helping here.)

Moments earlier I had been on the hall phone with my friend Jean, who had also recently moved to Hong Kong. I knew I could stay at her apartment, a forty-minute bus ride north. And I wouldn’t have thought twice about going outside in typical Hong Kong indoor attire: rubber slippers, an oversized t-shirt, and short gym shorts. This was no time for propriety, but it was a moot point. I didn’t even have fifty cents for the bus ride. (There’s a potential logic flaw here—is the hall phone out of sight of her room? It doesn’t seem likely—are they on the same hallway? If her apartment is visible from the hall phone, and she was on it moments before, wouldn’t she have seen her roommate enter the room? Other than that, a nice way to describe herself and to increase the tension by eliminating one possible escape route.)

My watch read eleven o’clock, which meant Na Wei, a computer science PhD student from Beijing, wouldn’t return until the next morning. She spent most nights with her boyfriend, a gaunt engineering student from Fujian province, and never came back to our room this late. It was pointless to think about locating her. Even if I had known how to find her, I would have felt awkward barging in on them this late. Once again, detail is included that isn’t necessary or helpful in terms of story. The only thing that matters now is that her means of dealing with her predicament have been narrowed once more. This is detail that can wait until we meet Na Wei, if we ever do. Still, the problem she faces here isn’t, so far, terribly threatening—more inconvenient and frustrating. Is there, in reality, any danger to her if she has to spend the night in the hallway? True to good storytelling, Susan has raised a desire for her character (and you need to think of this as a character, not you), and thrown roadblocks in the way. But the stakes seem very low. If you can, increase the stakes here.)

I really would appreciate your thoughts on whether or not the demands we make on a memoir, as readers, should be any different for a memoir by a non-celebrity. Your input could help guide Susan.

Comments, please?

For what it’s worth. Ray

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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.

© 2010 Ray Rhamey

Comments

[Doug]

I'm neither a memoir reader nor a memoir writer, so my thoughts might not be particularly relevant.

I think that a memoir has permission to use some techniques that are generally avoided for fiction, such as directly addressing the reader and point-of-view violations that result from what you know now vs. what you knew then (as long as it's clear that's what you're doing).

Getting locked out is inconvenient, but it's not compelling on its own; pretty much all of us have found ourselves inconveniently locked out at some time. I assume that it's just the start of a more interesting story. I (personally) would find it more intriguing if there was an introduction to the story that gave us a clue as to why this incident was important in your life. For example (and I'm making this up):
- If things had gone right--if they'd gone according to my plan--I wouldn't have met Steve.

Ray's already covered much of the writing issues. I agree that there's room for tightening this up.

We spend a lot of time in past-perfect backstory, and I don't think it's contributing much on this page. I'd rather see some forward motion: you tried to go into your dorm room, you found the door locked, maybe Na Wei was inside, you banged on the door, all you heard were crickets, your key and wallet were inside, Na Wei was probably with her boyfriend for the night and you didn't know where to find her, you didn't know anybody else on campus, and you didn't have the bus fare to go stay at Jean's.

I'd also advise a little more active voice rather than passive voice. Instead of
- My key and wallet were inside my dorm room and I was locked out on a Saturday night, half a world from home, isolated on a mountain campus where I hardly knew anyone.
maybe something like:
- I needed to get into the room, if only to get my key and wallet which were inside. Who could I turn to on a Saturday night? I hardly knew anyone at this isolated mountain campus half a world from home.

Something that grates on me a little bit is the formality of "I had" rather than "I'd".

There's a little bit of repetition of wording: "Hong Kong" appears twice in three sentences, "student from" appears twice in consecutive sentences, and "this late" ends two sentences almost in a row.

So my advice would be to add a brief introduction that lets us know why this story is significant, and to tighten up the writing with less backstory and more active verbs.

[Tamara]

I think the addition of stronger emotion would help the opening -- is the protagonist's mood ebbing up from annoyance into full-scale panic attack? Is this the last straw of a difficult week? Is she angry? Does she suspect someone else of juicy ulterior motives for locking the door?

Because it is a memoir, the writer has the luxury of jumping around in time in order to give foreshadowing.

For example:

The night __ happened/started, the trigger event was a seemingly harmless expedition for overnight shelter...

[Kim]

I love memoirs but I have to admit this beginning didn't grab me. Getting locked out just doesn't feel that worrying, especially when the narrator is inside a presumably safe campus dorm. Surely someone would lend her fifty cents to catch a bus? Or she could just stay put on a common space couch? Or call security and get them to open the door?

Now, if the back of the book has made clear that the roommate was murdered and there's a dead body behind the door--well, that's entirely different and I can see how this bit is indispensible.

It's just hard to say, not knowing where this story is going--and maybe that's the problem. As is, this beginning doesn't steer me anywhere I feel impelled to go.

[David Greer]

A celebrity can get away with an opening like this because his or her name has already made the sale, but an unknown will really have to land the reader with that first page--and I'm talking life and death, both barrels primed--or the reader will give the book a pass. Surely, more compelling events spurned the author to pen the memoir. Why not lead with one of those?