Flogging the Quill

A technique named desire

Before you get to the meat of this post, I wanted to let you know that,  Kathleen Bolton and Therese Walsh, a couple of writers who blog on "the craft and business of genre fiction" at Writer Unboxed, are publishing a two-part interview with yours truly, beginning Friday, February 23. For what it's worth.

---

An American Olympic skater was knocked down when a competitor fell in a race. The American slid blades-first into the side barrier, on her back, clearly out of the race.

But even before she'd stopped slamming into the barrier she was scrambling to regain her feet.  The instant she was upright on the ice, her entire focus went down the track. The intensity in her eyes and the set of her mouth was almost palpable, even on a television screen.  She took off, her desire still powerful, her determination everything, and my heart and admiration went out to her. I was rooting for her. And respecting her. And liking her.

If you can get a reader feeling that way about your character, you're on your way to compelling storytelling. So how do you do that?

With desire.

Last week I noted that screenwriting guru Robert McKee says that a story's inciting incident is an event that radically upsets the balance of forces in the character's life. But to what end?

In his book, Story, he goes on to say that the character must react to the event, otherwise there would be no story. But react with what?

A desire. A goal.

In McKee's approach, the desire is for the character to put their life back into balance. Now, of course a character doesn't think, "Dang, my life is out of balance. My desire is to regain my balance." No, the desire would be a specific goal, such as to get my children back from the kidnappers.

Is that right, then? A desire? Another craft instruction book tells us that fiction is about trouble. And we've all heard the cliché: get your character up a tree and throw rocks at him until he figures out how to get down.

But the "trouble" model is a passive one. Oh, there should be trouble, but it needs to come up as a result of what characters do. Because they have a desire. Because they take risks in trying to achieve their desire.

It's this pursuit of a desire that creates the "rooting factor" that draws readers into a story, that gives them something to identify and empathize with. Just as I did that Olympic skater.

The strive is the thing. Without it, your sleek vehicle of a novel has no fuel in its tank. One of my editing clients was a good writer. He'd done his research well, the language was good. He'd created a pleasant, likeable character. Smart. Pretty. Decent.

But the character just drifted through her life, reacting to things, never initiating much, not striving for anything. There was no tension. Nothing compelling me to turn the page. My recommendation was to create a strong inciting incident at the front of the story, to knock the character far out of her happy life.

Why isn't a happy story good enough? Why is it a good idea to trouble our characters, knock them down, and then keep knocking them down as they struggle? Why does that make them more compelling, more watchable?

Because, as human beings, we struggle too. In our ordinary lives, we may struggle with things small or large, but struggle we must. We understand how a character feels who has been knocked down. And here's the thing that a novel can do that lifts it from being a mere entertainment: show us something about how to be a human being.

Learning to be a human being has a lifelong learning curve, and we can use all the help we can get because there aren't many good instruction books. Although fiction, novels can be instruction books on the truths of being a human being.

Fiction models behavior for us, teaches us what (in the writer's imagination) works, and what doesn't work. We like to see characters desire and yearn and attempt because it helps us understand what, maybe, what we can do in our own lives.

In thinking about my first novel after coming across McKee's idea of creating a desire in a character, I thought I'd failed to do that in my main protagonist: it seemed to me that he mostly reacted to events.

But then I'd realized that, unwittingly, I'd done one of the things McKee talks about: created an unconscious desire. My character's inciting event really pulled the rug out from under his life but, on the surface, he seemed satisfied with the way things were. He just wanted, it seemed, to keep on doing his work. But unconsciously, it was the opposite.

My job as a writer is to learn to do it wittingly.

McKee says that a story is more powerful if a character has both a conscious desire and an unconscious desire that works in opposition to the conscious desire.

This is heady stuff for a simple guy like me, but I think I see how it can work. For example, let's say a man's wife is kidnapped and a ransom is demanded. His surface desire is to rescue her. That's what society, his friends, his peers, and he himself expects. Standard thriller stuff, you've seen it a thousand times.

But what if he hates his wife? Then his unconscious desire, the one that can't be admitted out loud, is to somehow lose her.

In my novel, darned if my protagonist's unconscious desire didn't affect what he did, and what happened when he pursued conscious goals that came up. Eventually, his conscious goal came to be the same as the unconscious one, and he grew.

Checklist for your work in progress:

• Does it contain an inciting incident that throws your protagonist's life severely out of balance? (By the way, your antagonist needs an inciting incident, too, such as the opposition of the protagonist.)
• Does the event create a conscious desire in your character?
• Does your reader know about it?
• Does your character immediately take action, take a risk to achieve a goal that springs from the inciting event?
• Optional: does it create an unconscious, contrary desire?

These are the elements that not only create the engine that will drive your story, they create the fuel. The horsepower of that engine, and its power to affect the reader, depends on:

• how severely your character's life is thrown for a loop, i.e., how damaging are the consequences?
• the difficulty of achieving the desire that is aroused
• the size of the risks she must take to recover.

How does your story measure up?

Questions? Comments?

Ray

Free edit in exchange for posting permission. You send a sample that you have questions about and of which you'd like an edit. I won't post it without your permission. Please attach samples as documents to your email.

ARCHIVES .

© 2006 Ray Rhamey

Your inciting incident-what, when, how

In surfing around the Net the other day I came across a couple of mentions of "inciting incident." One writer said to make it happen at the opening of your story, the other said to have it occur as soon as possible after the story opens. I think that's mostly right, but not altogether.

What is an "inciting incident?" Robert McKee, in his excellent book, Story, defines it this way:

An event that radically upsets the balance of forces in the protagonist's life.

Another way to look at it is to key in on the word "incite."

An event that incites (provokes) a desire in the protagonist that he must satisfy.

Here's another one:

An event that forces a character to take action in pursuit of a goal.

McKee would argue that a protagonist's desire is to bring her life back into balance. That makes sense to me, but it seems abstract. Specifically, what is the nature of an inciting incident?

It can be negative (and, it seems, usually is).

• The banker's children are kidnapped.
• An innocent woman is accused of a hideous crime.
• A young mother is fired from her job.

The event can be positive, too, but so hugely positive that it unbalances things and has negative results.

• A grocery clerk wins the lottery.
• A secretary is promoted over her boss.
• A battered woman escapes to a shelter.
• A man in a happy relationship is smitten by a beautiful woman.

To provide some even more specific examples, here are inciting events from a couple of my novels:

A federal agent's child is killed by his wife, and then she commits suicide. This happens in front of him, and he's helpless to stop it, even though he shoots his wife (whom he loves) in an attempt to stop her.

The love of a woman's life is murdered during a happy outing into a city park -- and it wouldn't have happened if she hadn't been teasing him.

I think McKee's notion that the inciting event throws a protagonist's life out of balance is a good one. Anything out of balance is bound to create tension, and conflict. The main result of the event, to create a desire in the character, to regain balance, is the fuel that fires the engine of your story.

In McKee's scheme of things, your protagonist must have a powerful desire. He must then attempt to satisfy it. But his attempt is frustrated. He fails to achieve it because of something the antagonist does (preferably), or perhaps something he fails to do, or some other story element.

Your story picks up momentum and tension at this point because the character has to try again and, because of the nature of his failure and his desire, has to take a risk. A risk with negative consequences. Yep, he fails again. The negative consequences raise the stakes. He has to try again, and this time take an even greater risk. With greater consequences. He fails again. And so on.

For example, in an historical novel, let's say the daughter of a king is sent to live with the neighboring king in the age-old tradition of fostering. This upsets the balance of her happy life at home, but the consequences are potentially positive, and she makes no effort to change things. This isn't an inciting incident because, even though the balance of her life is disturbed, there's no jeopardy attached.

Then, on the journey to the neighboring kingdom, her party is attacked. She is taken and sold as a slave to another kingdom. Now that's an inciting incident. Her desire is to return to the freedom and comfort of the life she knew, and there's the risk of being beaten, raped, or killed if she tries to escape. But try she must, because her life as a slave is a horror to her.

You can write the story from there.

When must the inciting event occur? Well, there's no unbalance created unless the reader has some idea of the life the protagonist currently knows. If you can find a way to make it happen within a paragraph or two of the opening of your story, I think that's a smart thing to do. However, it can happen much later -- but only if there are other story elements that propel the reader along the stream of your narrative.

McKee cites the film Rocky as an example of a delayed inciting incident. He figures the inciting event is where Rocky is invited to fight the world champion. But that doesn't happen until a half hour into the film. Until then, the story that keeps the audience involved is the developing love story between Rocky and Adrian.

Wherever the incident occurs, what precedes it must have tension, must be raising story questions that keep the reader involved. It can't just be exposition that lays out the protagonist's life.

In my current WIP, the bridging conflict (a term used by agent Donald Maass to describe the lower-level tension-makers that you use to draw a reader along until you get to the big conflict) that gets us to the inciting event is a disagreement and a wager between a man and a woman who love each other deeply. The disagreement and wager are playful, but the consequences turn out to be horrendous. But still, there's conflict. Here's the narrative (note: subject to change without notice):

Although the occasional muttering madman in Central Park can be irritating, after walking New York City's reeking streets Graeme and I are willing to risk an encounter in exchange for a cleansing breath of nature. We stroll onto the park's trampled lawn and meander past stands of trees bright green with new spring leaves, although images of polished marble and welded metal still flicker through my mind. I say, "I thought the Met's new sculpture exhibit was excellent."

(The opening sentence is intended to foreshadow danger ahead.)

Graeme shrugs. "Perhaps. But there's little else of excellence to see from. . ." He gestures at the people who trudge through the park. ". . . their sorry race."

While I am not a lover of our unskilled cousins, I wince inwardly at the unfairness of the life-long bias against the lessi that Graeme has inherited from his father. The contrary side of my nature rears its head. "There is plenty of good in them, and you know it."

(Conflict rises.)

"I do not." He surveys the people around us. There are dozens, for it's a sunny day. "See their colors. Is there kindness or good will anywhere?"

I look, and he's right. The auras around their heads created by lledrith, the living energy that streams from our bodies and brains, writhe with the nasty burgundy of hostility, the bilious color of lies, the ash-violet of depression, and the bruised red of violence. That, of course, only serves to rally my resistance. "Perhaps not here, not now, but there are kind-hearted lessi."

Graeme gets the grin that I love so, the way it paints his face with mischief. Behind that lives a little-boy-lost, wide-eyed wonder at the immensity of life that makes me want to wrap my arms around him. Though he's a decade my senior, our hearts are not a minute apart. After more than a hundred fifty years together, we know that we are One, that rarest of blends that has a chance of lasting for the long centuries.

He makes an exaggerated moue and says, "A wager?"

I pick up the gauntlet. "Yes." I point down a curving walk. "We'll go that way, and we'll find a worthy lessi."

"The stakes?"

I run my hands over my breasts and down my belly.

Oh, that smile of his. He says, "It's a bet."

(Story questions: who will win the bet? How? What will happen as a consequence?)

That innocent wager, which raises the question of who will win, along with the foreshadowing mention of madmen in the park will, I hope, take the reader to the inciting event -- Graeme's murder in the park, which utterly undoes the balance of Ailia's life.

Next: why? Why the inciting incident? Why "desire?" These aren't just "rules," they're necessities.

Have any questions?

For what it's worth.

Ray

Free edit in exchange for posting permission. You send a sample that you have questions about and of which you'd like an edit. I won't post it without your permission. Please attach samples as documents to your email.

ARCHIVES .

© 2006 Ray Rhamey

How to show, when to tell

In a recent edit, I pointed out some instances where I felt the author was telling versus showing. I included examples of ways to show what had been told.

She wrote to me and said, "I'm not sure I know how to 'show' rather than 'tell.'"

That's not hard to understand. After all, we use that mode all the time in conversations with friends.

"I was really surprised."
"I was so pissed."
"I was incredibly happy."

And it works. As a matter of fact, there are times in a novel when telling is the right thing to do. It's when you need to summarize an event because to create a scene for it would be the wrong thing to do in terms of pace, tension, etc. A common example is when you've shown an event in an earlier scene and then come to a place where your character needs to pass along what happened. Rather than drag your reader through the whole thing, blow by blow, you just write something such as:

April told May how June had told Julie where to shove her opinion.

That's a necessary and effective use of telling.

There are other times when it's the best thing to do. For example, when what needs to happen is so mundane that to waste words on it is to waste words. In one of my novels a character is talking on his cell phone. When he finishes with the conversation, I could have shown this:

Jake pressed the little blue phone on his cell-phone keypad to end the call.

Truly, that wasn't needed at all, and smacks of overwriting. What I really did:

Jake ended the call.

The reader can easily imagine ending a call with a cell phone if they've ever used one, and even if they haven't used one, they've seen it on television.

So what's so bad about telling in a novel? You "tell" a story, right? Not really. In a novel you dramatize. You need to do what I call "writing for effect;" you craft words that create an effect in the reader's mind. You can only do that through showing.

The effect your readers want is for what they read to trigger in them the sights and sounds and smells of what's happening in the story. They don't want approximations, they don't want a report, they want to experience the story's reality.

You spot telling by looking for simple declarative sentences that tell the reader something. The verb "was" is often a signpost of a telling statement.

Showing is using behavior (action, speech, thoughts) to illustrate or dramatize what the character is feeling/doing.

Here are some looks at telling versus showing that come from actual samples.

The scene: Anna is beat from a long, bad day at work, and she's spent hours at the hospital with her father, who has been unconscious for days. You want to give the reader Anna's physical and emotional condition.

Telling: Anna was physically and mentally exhausted.

Sure, you get information. You have an intellectual understanding of her condition. But you have no feeling for what Anna feels like, do you? To show that Anna is physically and mentally exhausted, you could do something like this:

Showing: All Anna wanted to do was crawl into bed and go to sleep. But first she would cry. She didn't think she could be calm and composed for another minute.

The scene continues: Anna's father suddenly wakes and thrashes around wildly, gasping, making monitors go wild. You want to give the reader Anna's reaction.

Telling: Anna was frightened.

Showing: Oh, God, what was happening? "Dad?" Why didn't he respond? "Nurse, do something!"

As you go through your manuscript, whenever you come across a "was-type" declarative sentence that simply delivers information rather than shows behavior, you probably have an instance of telling.

Your task then is to visualize the character in that state or situation. See the movie. As the author, you can also "hear" thoughts. Then show the reader the thinking or speaking or movement that illustrates what the reader needs to know.

Another example, one that deals with the use of adverbs.

Telling: He was furious when he stabbed the man.

OR

Telling: He stabbed the man furiously.

I believe that the use of adverbs is merely a form of telling. Adverbs are approximations, mere stand-ins for action. As a result, they rarely give the reader much of an experience.

Showing: He plunged the dagger into the man's chest again and again and again, screaming "Die!" each time the blade stabbed into flesh.

One more example, this from one of my novels. The character has been working for hours under the Texas sun. I needed to let the reader know how he felt.

Telling: Jesse was very hot.

(Pause while I put my finger down my throat.)

Showing: Jesse felt like an overcooked chicken, his meat damn near ready to fall off his bones.

Another thing I often see is where a writer does a good job of showing, but then feels compelled to add a (telling) explanation. An example from a recent edit:

He wrenched her from the quicksand with a last huge pull and fell back onto the ground, panting as if he'd just won a wrestling match, temporarily drained by the supreme effort.

For my money, "temporarily drained by the supreme effort" has already been shown by his panting and the effort he put into the rescue, so it's redundant and repetitive. I would delete it.

Boiled down to essentials:

• Telling is dispensing information.
• Showing is evoking experience.

Ask yourself which your narrative is doing.

Have any questions?

Do you have something from your own work that you suspect is telling but you don't know how to show? Tell me about it and I'll see if I can help (I would probably want to post examples I deal with.).

For what it's worth.

Ray

Free edit in exchange for posting permission. You send a sample that you have questions about and of which you'd like an edit. I won't post it without your permission. Please attach samples as documents to your email.

ARCHIVES .

© 2006 Ray Rhamey

Edit: timing and telling diminish a scene with potential

Susie sent the following opening to the first chapter of her novel.

Elaine quietly entered her father's hospital room. It was getting late. She was physically and emotionally exhausted. Approaching the bedside, she took his hand, very aware of the beeping monitors and the sound of the ventilator.

"Good night Daddy," she softly said, "I'll be back as soon as I can in the morning. I want to talk to your doctor before he leaves. George and Aunt Dianna will be in to see you as well. Get some rest, ok?"

To her surprise, he lightly squeezed her hand. He was looking at her. She smiled, "Do you know who I am?"

He paused, then gave her hand another weak squeeze. This was the first response she had gotten from him. Elaine was ecstatic. She smiled to encourage him.

"Do you know where you are?" There was no response. "Daddy you're in the hospital, you're sick. The doctors are going to make you well again."

A flash of comprehension entered Robert's eyes, like beacon shining into the murkiness of his fogged mind. He opened his eyes wide, a look of desperation on his face.

"What do you want? What is it? What's wrong?" Elaine said, looking desperately for the nurse call button. Robert's monitors beeped faster. A nurse hurried in and began checking his vitals.

"What's happening?" she asked the nurse.

"Your father seems to be agitated. You should let him rest," the nurse replied.

"I was talking to him. He can hear me," Elaine said, excitedly. "He squeezed my hand."

Suddenly, with what seemed like a great amount of effort, Robert lifted his arms and head trying to sit up. He fell back onto the pillow clutching Elaine's hand tighter. She searched her father's face. His brow was furrowed as his eyes pleaded for something.

"Daddy?"

The word escaped her lips. All the monitors and beepers were going wild. Elaine was frightened. The nurse called for help. Instantly there were people running into the room from the desk outside. She was told to leave as a nurse took her arm, forcefully pulling her toward the door.

"What's happening?" Elaine pleaded.

She heard one of the people in the room say, "He's crashing."

My thoughts: The writing is "clean," meaning not a lot of edits were needed, though I saw some tightening opportunities here and there.

Shortcomings are on the storytelling side. To my eye, they involve "telling" rather than showing in a number of places, and a reliance on adverbs. I was also not happy with references to "people" doing things where, in a hospital, I'm pretty sure they would be either doctors or nurses, and the lack of specificity seemed to sap meaning for me.

Notes on the sample as is:

Elaine quietly entered her father's hospital room. It was getting late. (Not much meaning here. Late at night? Late morning? Late afternoon? Why not give a time? Maybe relate it to her day -- she'd had a full day at the office and now five hours at the hospital, waiting.) She was physically and emotionally exhausted. (This is "telling." You need to portray her exhaustion so we can feel it. For example: All she wanted to do was crawl into bed. And cry. She didn't think she could be calm and composed for another minute.) Approaching the bedside, She took his hand, very aware of the beeping monitors and the sound of the ventilator. ("very" is a weak word, and I wonder if this couldn't be more evocative and yet still evoke her awareness. For example, "A beeping monitor and the hiss of the ventilator sounded loud in the room.)

"Good night Daddy," she softly said, "I'll be back as soon as I can in the morning. (Adverbs are the weaker way to go in description. Look for verbs that describe. Here, it seems like a whisper would be appropriate.) I want to talk to your doctor before he leaves. George and Aunt Dianna will be in to see you as well. Get some rest, ok?"

To her surprise, he lightly squeezed her hand. He was looking at her. (She should have already seen this. What was he doing when she entered? Eyes shut? Open but looking up? If his looking at her is a change, you need to clue us in, i.e. He opened his eyes and looked at her. By they way, try to avoid "was" and "-ing" verbs instead of simple past tense. They're mushier.)  She smiled, "Do you know who I am?"

He paused, then gave her hand another weak squeeze. This was the first response she had gotten from him. Elaine was ecstatic. (More "telling." Can't joy fill her heart, or excitement rush into her mind, or something?) She smiled to encourage him.

"Do you know where you are?" There was no response. "Daddy you're in the hospital, you're sick. The doctors are going to make you well again."

A flash of comprehension entered Robert's eyes, (Point of view: she can't know what his "flash" was. Technically, should be something like "flash of comprehension seemed to enter Robert's eyes…) like a beacon shining into the murkiness of his fogged mind. (point of view: she can't know whether his mind is fogged or lucid.)  He opened his eyes wide, a look of desperation on his face.

"What do you want?  What is it?  What's wrong?" (Three of these questions seems too much. I'd delete the first one, since his look was of desperation.) Elaine said, looking desperately for the nurse call button. (Another adverb, and a repetition of "desperate" from the previous paragraph. Use action, such as "She scrambled to find the nurse call button.") Robert's monitors beeped faster. A nurse hurried in and began checking his vitals.

"What's happening?" she asked the nurse.

"Your father seems to be agitated. You should let him rest." the nurse replied.

"I was talking to him. He can hear me," Elaine said, excitedly. (again, try to avoid adverbs, even if it takes longer to say. For example. Realizing that she had gotten louder with excitement, she lowered her voice and said, "He squeezed…etc.") "He squeezed my hand."

Suddenly, with what seemed like a great  amount of effort, Robert lifted his arms and head trying to sit up. He fell back onto the pillow clutching Elaine's hand tighter. She searched her father's face. His brow was furrowed as his eyes pleaded for something. Monitors and beepers were going wild.

"Daddy?"

The word escaped her lips. All the monitors and beepers were going wild. Elaine was frightened. (more telling. You could illustrate her emotion with internal monologue. For example: Oh, God, what was happening? "Daddy?" Why didn't he respond?) The nurse called for help. (how does she do this? Yell? (seems unlikely) Press a button? Step into the hall and call for someone? Show us.) Instantly there were people (Just "people?" Specifics help the reader. How about another nurse, followed by a doctor.) running into the room from the desk outside. She was told to leave as a nurse took her arm, forcefully pulling her toward the door. (I think this would be stronger without the "as" construction. And why not use dialogue? For example: A nurse took her arm and pulled her toward the door. "You've got to leave now.")

"What's happening?" Elaine pleaded.

She heard one of the people (Once again, be specific. She heard the doctor say, "He's…etc.") in the room say, "He's crashing."

This has potential to be a dramatic scene, and the protagonist's feelings about what causes him to "crash" have bearing on the later narrative. However, I didn't feel that entering a room was a terribly engaging opening.

Instead, what if the first sentence was:

After days of unconsciousness, her father opened his eyes and looked at her.

For me, something like that raises story questions immediately. Why was he unconscious? Will he be okay?

Then the scene could be set from within her point of view. For example, for a next paragraph, here's a thought starter:

The beeping monitor, the wheezing of the ventilator, the hospital smell of medicine vanished and Elaine gripped his hand. Joy brought tears to her eyes and a break in her voice when she said, "Do you know who I am?"

Anyway, those are some thoughts. Good luck, Susie.

For what it's worth.

Ray

Free edit in exchange for posting permission. You send a sample that you have questions about and of which you'd like an edit. I won't post it without your permission.

ARCHIVES .

© 2006 Ray Rhamey