As I look forward to the new year, I realize that I'm
thinking of you quite a lot.
You who, just as I do, sit with a keyboard and inject bits and pieces of our minds into blank pages. And then there’s the
rewriting. Ah, well, nothing’s perfect.
You who will send your prologues and first chapters for a
good “flogging”—I admire your work, talent, and guts. You’ve become the
lifeblood of FtQ, and I’m ever grateful. I look forward to a year of you and
me working together on your writing.
You who contribute to the floggings with your insights and
opinions. The worth of the help you give becomes immense the instant one
writer gains an insight from what you say, and many do here at FtQ.
You, the few dozen who will read my novels over the coming
year and discover some good reads. Let me thank you in advance.
You who will help with my upcoming Kickstarter project—I
want to publish two unique new games (one is “Scrabble on steroids”) and my wife and I will
soon be launching a Kickstarter effort to raise the money. Stay tuned. There’s
fun ahead.
To each and every one of you, may you grow and succeed as a
writer in 2013.
Just 2 floggings left! Submissions invited: If you’d like a fresh look at your opening chapter or
prologue, please email your submission to me re the directions at the bottom of
this post. Otherwise you’ll have to endure me pontificating about something or
simply blathering.
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.
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 or 17 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.
A word about the line-editing in these posts: it’s “one-pass” editing, and I don’t try to address everything, which is why I appreciate the comments from the FtQ tribe. In a paid edit, I go through each manuscript three times.
Storytelling Checklist
Before you rip into today’s submission, consider this list of 6 vital storytelling ingredients from my book, Flogging the Quill, Crafting a Novel that Sells. While it's not a requirement that all of these elements must be on the first page, they can be, and I think you have the best chance of hooking a reader if they are.
Evaluate the submission—and your own first page—in terms of whether or not it includes each of these ingredients, and how well it executes them. The one vital ingredient not listed is professional-caliber writing because that is a must for every page, a given.
Story questions
Tension (in the reader, not just the characters)
Voice
Clarity
Scene-setting
Character
Frankie has sent a revision of the first
chapter of The Musubi Murder. The first round is here.
I scanned the Campus
Dining Center, spotted a vacant chair between Mercedes Yamashiro and a man I
sort of recognized, and beelined over. I felt relieved that I wouldn’t have to
make conversation with strangers. In fact, I probably wouldn’t have to talk
much at all.
“Professor Molly!” Mercedes’ bob glowed
burgundy under the fluorescent lights as she leaned toward me. I poked my head
forward to catch her kiss, then smiled at the familiar-looking man as I sat
down. He grinned back. His crisp aloha shirt, crimson with a yellow taro leaf
print, set off his dark eyes to pleasing effect. I realized I was staring, and quickly
glanced away.
“I don’t see our guest of honor,” I said. “I’m
doing the lei greeting.” I was feeling a little nervous about planting a kiss
on The Most Hated Man in Hawaii.
“Jimmy is staying at
my place,” Mercedes said. “You know. The Cloudforest,” she elaborated, apparently
for my benefit, even though I knew her bed and breakfast well, having stayed there
myself.
She lowered her
voice to a whisper that only a few tables around us could hear. “I’m kind of
worried. I went over this morning and knocked on his door to see if he wanted
to drive up with me but there was no answer so I thought he had already left. But
when I got here? No Jimmy.”
“He might have stopped to check on the
Hanohano,” said the man. He had a pleasant (snip)
Closer, but . . .
I think getting the
reference to “the most hated man” on the first page is a big help, but it still
wasn’t enough for me. I think that if you added something like “He would die
before he missed this.” could do the job for this reader.
However, the rest of the
chapter is mostly set-up exposition. And there’s no murder. For my money, if a
story is a murder mystery, something related to the murder really ought to be
in the first chapter, and not very long after the first page is turned. I think
this story starts too early. Good writing, though, so I’m sure you can do it.
Notes:
I scanned the Campus
Dining Center, spotted a vacant chair between Mercedes Yamashiro and a man I
sort of recognized, and beelined over. I felt relieved that I wouldn’t have to
make conversation with strangers. In fact, I probably wouldn’t have to talk
much at all.
“Professor Molly!” Mercedes’ bob glowed
burgundy under the fluorescent lights as she leaned toward me. I poked my
head forward to catch her kiss, then smiled at the familiar-looking man as I
sat down. He grinned back. His crisp aloha shirt, crimson with a yellow taro
leaf print, set off his dark eyes to pleasing effect. I realized I was staring, and quickly glanced away.
Unless
Mercedes’s hair is a significant factor in the story, neither that nor the fluorescent
lights add anything—and take up valuable story real estate. Is an aloha shirt
ever crisp? I think of them as soft and full and comfortable.
“I don’t see our guest of honor,” I said. “I’m
doing the lei greeting.” I was feeling a little nervous about planting a kiss
on The Most Hated Man in Hawaii.
“Jimmy is staying at
my place,” Mercedes said. “You know. The Cloudforest,” she elaborated, apparently
for my benefit, even though I knew her bed and breakfast well, having stayed there
myself.I
don’t really see the need for her to mention something Molly already knows. I
would just cut this and make it the beginning of the next paragraph.
She lowered her
voice to a whisper that only a few tables around us could hear. “I’m kind of
worried. I went over this morning and knocked on his door to see if he wanted
to drive up with me but there was no answer so I thought he had already left. But
when I got here? No Jimmy.”
“He might have stopped to check on the
Hanohano,” said the man. He had a pleasant (snip) this is where something needs to happen or
be said to increase the potential stakes to suggest a murder in the offing. This sentence is a detour from the interesting stuff created by the preceding two paragraphs.
The best gift writers can give to readers is something to think about. And the best gift I have to offer is a book to stimulate new thought on what can be done about gun violence.
We the Enemy dramatizes a way to motivate gun and ammo manufacturers to actively support controlling or eliminating access to lethal firearms, yet not abrogate "2nd Amendment rights."
And it offers a self-defense alternative to lethal weapons that could work to defend innocents from attackers.
Email me for a free ebook copy--for Kindle or .epub readers--of We the Enemy.
Jake Eldar’s and Miriam Schaffer’s names may kill them.
Neither knows the other exists…until the Israeli
intelligence agency Mossad uses their identities in an operation to assassinate
a high-ranking Hezbollah commander in Doha, Qatar.
Now Hezbollah plans to kill them both.
When Jake’s wife is murdered in a botched hit meant for him,
he and Miriam try desperately to outrun and outfight their pursuers while
shielding Jake's young daughter from the killers on their trail.
Hezbollah, however, has a fallback plan: hundreds of people
will die if Jake and Miriam survive.
Just 2 weeks of flog material left! Submissions invited: If you’d like a fresh look at your opening chapter or
prologue, please email your submission to me re the directions at the bottom of
this post. Otherwise you’ll have to endure me pontificating about something or
simply blathering.
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.
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 or 17 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.
A word about the line-editing in these posts: it’s “one-pass” editing, and I don’t try to address everything, which is why I appreciate the comments from the FtQ tribe. In a paid edit, I go through each manuscript three times.
Storytelling Checklist
Before you rip into today’s submission, consider this list of 6 vital storytelling ingredients from my book, Flogging the Quill, Crafting a Novel that Sells. While it's not a requirement that all of these elements must be on the first page, they can be, and I think you have the best chance of hooking a reader if they are.
Evaluate the submission—and your own first page—in terms of whether or not it includes each of these ingredients, and how well it executes them. The one vital ingredient not listed is professional-caliber writing because that is a must for every page, a given.
Story questions
Tension (in the reader, not just the characters)
Voice
Clarity
Scene-setting
Character
Carolyn
has sent the first chapter of Asphalt
Masquerade.
Five
badges circled the body, faces hidden beneath the cowls of their overcoats,
their lamps flickering like fairy-lights in the rain, and from her perch on the
eighth story balcony Cherie Lenoir plucked a crimson feather from her mask and
sent it floating with a kiss. She watched the badges dance, kneel and rise and
whisper, pair off and group again far away from the mess. She wondered if they
could see his insides past his guts in the dirt. She could, long ago before she
cast her instincts aside and fell to follow. Sirens echoed in the distance.
They were not for him. She rubbed her wrists absently. The rain washed the
glitter from her skin and the blood from the street, and when the black van
arrived, the living scattered and so did she.
Cherie’s
apartment was nestled in the middle of the Dale. Questionable ladies and
gentlemen cozied up to the red brick faces, then slipped down the concrete
alleys. The fire escapes were more likely to kill tenants than fires were,
which occurred, like clockwork, right around the time rent came due. The north
end was where she danced, and the South Hill was where she cleaned, and
sometimes, on the east end near River Park, Cherie found a quiet bench on which
to read and watch for the sign to don her mask and enter a boarded-up
delicatessen. Tonight, she boiled water for tea and waited for the call.
She
answered on the first ring.
“Rupert’s dead.”
Yes
The voice is strong and
clear (except for one sentence), the narrative does a nice job of creating mood
and raising story questions. I found my self wanting to know more about this
mysterious person. While you can’t see immediate jeopardy directly ahead, there
are plenty of clues that there will be. Notes:
Five
badges circled the body, faces hidden beneath the cowls of their overcoats,
their lamps flickering like fairy-lights in the rain, and from her perch on the
eighth story balcony Cherie Lenoir plucked a crimson feather from her mask and
sent it floating with a kiss. She watched the badges dance, kneel and rise and
whisper, pair off and group again far away from the mess. Added a paragraph break to add a little
breathing room for the reader’s eye.
She
wondered if they could see his insides past his guts in the dirt. She could,
long ago before she cast her instincts aside and fell to follow. Sirens echoed
in the distance. They were not for him. She rubbed her wrists absently. The
rain washed the glitter from her skin and the blood from the street, and when
the black van arrived, the living scattered and so did she. I’ve read the
sentence about casting her instincts aside several times and can’t make any
sense of it—a clarity issue that took me right out of the story.
Cherie’s
apartment was nestled in the middle of the Dale. Questionable ladies and
gentlemen cozied up to the red brick faces, then slipped down the concrete
alleys. The fire escapes were more likely to kill tenants than fires were,
which occurred, like clockwork, right around the time rent came due. The north
end was where she danced, and the South Hill was where she cleaned, and
sometimes, on the east end near River Park, Cherie found a quiet bench on which
to read and watch for the sign to don her mask and enter a boarded-up
delicatessen. Tonight, she boiled water for tea and waited for the call. While the detail
about the fire escapes do add color, it seems extraneous on a page where we
need to engage with the story far more than the environment.
She
answered on the first ring.
“Rupert’s dead.” It
was Brook. I added the speaker’s name—why not? The narrative reveals it several
paragraphs later, but readers don’t really like to have that kind of thing
withheld unless there’s a story reason. There wasn’t here. The line about
Rupert being dead is a strong story question raiser.
Submissions invited: If
you’d like a fresh look at your opening chapter or prologue, please email your
submission to me re the directions at the bottom of this post.
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.
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 or 17 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.
A word about the line-editing in these posts: it’s “one-pass” editing, and I don’t try to address everything, which is why I appreciate the comments from the FtQ tribe. In a paid edit, I go through each manuscript three times.
Storytelling Checklist
Before you rip into today’s submission, consider this list of 6 vital storytelling ingredients from my book, Flogging the Quill, Crafting a Novel that Sells. While it's not a requirement that all of these elements must be on the first page, they can be, and I think you have the best chance of hooking a reader if they are.
Evaluate the submission—and your own first page—in terms of whether or not it includes each of these ingredients, and how well it executes them. The one vital ingredient not listed is professional-caliber writing because that is a must for every page, a given.
Story questions
Tension (in the reader, not just the characters)
Voice
Clarity
Scene-setting
Character
Kerry has sent the prologue andfirst chapter of Out
of Control.
Prologue:
The tall man climbed the final steps to the sixth
floor of the tenement, surprised to find his breathing elevated. He paused at
the top of the concrete stairway to catch his breath.
The stairwell corners were stained dark, the harsh
ammonia smell of stale urine overpowering. He moved outside onto the landing
and studied the graffiti-daubed walls, their rough concrete surface no barrier
to aerosol paint. ‘You don’t spell
‘bollocks’ with an ‘X’,’ he said to no one.
An eroded sign in the stairwell pointed left, and he
strode along the ill-lit balcony with caution. ‘What a way to live.’ To his left, the flats with front doors
and windows, one brightly painted and well tended, the others peeling paint, panes
cracked or boarded. To his right, the balcony opened to the air. The gap
between floors supported by regularly spaced and crumbling concrete columns. Rusted
metal railings spanned the gaps between the columns, but offered dubious protection
against a headlong plummet to the rubbish-strewn courtyard below.
Keeping clear of the railings, the man continued his
search. A gust of wind blew rubbish in eddies around his feet. He shivered
against the cold and turned up the collar on his leather jacket.
Chapter
1:
An old Ford Escort
belched acrid blue smoke. Not for the first time that day, the children moved
the makeshift wicket from the middle of the road to allow the car to pass. They
waited impatiently on the pavement, their dirty faces wrinkled against the
fumes. Upon reaching a downhill stretch, the car gathered speed and turned left
into Broad Avenue, which was neither broad nor lined with trees. They resumed
their game after shouting obscenities at the hapless driver. The car could
still be heard long after it had disappeared from view, the engine note loud in
the early evening stillness.
Cricket pitch
restored, their T20 World Cup final resumed. The right-handed batter prepared
to face the wrath of the Indian and Pakistani pace-men once more. She took a
leg stump guard and squinted. The setting sun only partially obscured by the
bowlers’ left shoulder. She nodded, “C’mon then, five to win off the last over,
lets ‘ave all you’ got!”
The bowler,
‘Wasim’, wiped his nose with the back of his hand and returned to his bowling
mark, some fifteen paces back. He gripped the tennis ball firmly in a grubby
fist, kicked an empty crisp packet out of his path, and then turned to face his
tormentor.
Bloody girls’ got it coming, Wasim moved
into his run-up, increasing pace as he approached the point of delivery. His
bowling arm described a big circle, elbow locked and extended, brushing close
to his right ear, just as his big brother had taught him. He released the ball
and (snip)
Nope
There’s plenty of scene-setting description, too
much of it for this reader. While it is specifics and details that create
reality in fiction, there’s no need to give a photographically complete
snapshot of a setting. For example, in the prologue, all of the description
from “To his left . . .” really isn’t necessary.
And then there’s the lack of tension. There’s
none whatsoever for this reader in the prologue opening. If, for example, we
were to get into the head of the tall man and know more about his mission or
its possible consequences, it might help. In fact, we never learn that in the
prologue because the tall man ends up being killed.
While the flavor of the chapter opening is nice,
it doesn’t seem to relate to the prologue. What happens in the chapter is that
the ball is hit into a supposedly deserted house’s yard. The kids see something
inside the house that scares them (blood everywhere), and a parent investigates,
then calls the police. However, we don’t know what has been seen or how it
relates to the story—or what the story is about.
I think this narrative starts way too soon. All
the detail and buildup in the first chapter doesn’t create real suspense, and
the reader is left disappointed. There’s a story question, but it’s not
accompanied by any reason to care, or enough of a hint of what’s going on. I
suggest looking at dropping the prologue and starting the story later.
Can you imagine a way to get gun and ammunition manufacturers to welcome gun control? To support it? Well, I can, and I laid it out in my novel, We the Enemy.
Email me for a free ebook copy--for Kindle or .epub readers--of We the Enemy. The reason? I hope you'll help spread this thought tool for addressing the need for action to do something about gun violence..
Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC’s Hardball program, said that the other day when discussing gun violence. He said it in regard to help there is for us when someone with a gun attacks--basically, hope the police get there soon enough.
My novel, We the Enemy, offers a self-defense alternative to lethal weapons that could work to defend innocents from attackers.
Email me for a free ebook copy--for Kindle or .epub readers--of We the Enemy. The reason? I hope you'll help spread this thought tool for addressing ways to do defend ourselves from all kinds of violence.
Tori is managing. London is under twenty metres of
snow, almost everybody has died or been airlifted south, and the only animals
around are rats. But she's doing fine. Really.
Her apartment is luxurious, if short on
amenities. Fellow survivors are her friends. But with no long-term future, Tori
dreams of finding a way to make the two-thousand-mile journey south to a warm
climate.
Enter Morgan, a disturbingly hot cage fighter
from a tougher, meaner world where it's a mistake to trust people. He's on the
run from the gang he used to work with. And he has a snowmobile.
This is a series set during The Wars of the Roses period. With its murderous dynastic feuding between the rival Houses of York
and Lancaster, it is perhaps the most fascinating of the entire medieval period in
England. Having lost the Hundred Years War, the English nobility turned on each
other in a bitter struggle for the crown, resulting in a spate of beheadings,
battles, murders and gangland-style politics that lasted some thirty years
until the final triumph of the Tudor dynasty.
In light of the tragedy in Connecticut, I'm offering free ebook copies of We the Enemy. The reason? It is a thought tool for addressing the need for action to do something about gun violence. Yes, it is an "issues" novel. And people who read it think differently about the issues it addresses.
Just email me and tell me which kind to send. Reviews are here, but there's no need to buy the book, just email me for a copy. Specify if for Kindle or .epub (Nook, etc.).
I know it's hopeless, but I--we--have to try. All I ask is that you pass it on.
There won't be a critique today--the news from the school shooting in Connecticut is just too overwhelming.
A similar, though less deadly, school shooting years ago led to my writing of a novel that addresses gun violence issues, We the Enemy.
Free ebook
I'm offering a free ebook copy--for Kindle or .epub readers--of We the Enemy. The reason? It is a tool to use to address the need for action to do something about gun violence. Yes, it is an "issues" novel. And people who read it think differently about the issues it addresses.
Just email me and tell me which kind to send. Reviews are here, but don't buy the book, just email me for a copy.
’Tis the season to be gifting with books. As you know, I occasionally flog my books here, and I will again. But I thought it would be fun to create a “Holiday Bookshelf” where FtQ readers could flog their books here on FtQ. I realize it's a little late, but still . . .
You're invited to present your published novel--ebook or print--here on the “Holiday Bookshelf.” Just send me a cover image and a 100-word blurb about your novel plus the link to wherever you would like to send folks to either find out more about your book or to buy it.
Requirements for placement on the Holiday Bookshelf:
1. That your novel is currently published and available. It can be an eBook or a hard copy, or both.
2. You send a book-cover graphic. It would be nice if you sized it at 72 ppi and 100 pixels in width, but I can resize it if you don't have the capability.
3. A 100-word description of your book. Anything longer than that will be rejected. This is an exercise in discipline.
4. A link: the web address/URL of the web page to which you would like readers to go.
5. Your name
6. Include in the email your permission for the image and description to be posted on FtQ.
Understand that, unless I'm acquainted with a book, I'll have to make clear that I don't have an opinion or role in any of the books offered by writers.
So, in an email that includes “Holiday Bookshelf” in the SUBJECT, send me attachments that include the above elements and I'll look at it for inclusion. I'm pretty open, but I reserve the right to not post things I find objectionable. I anticipate posting batches as they come in over the next couple of weeks.