Tag / pace

by Gerald Hornsby

DAY 18 – #MonthOfBlogging #June2024 #MonthOfWriting

SAGGY MIDDLES

This is a blog post for novel and novella writers.

It’s quite easy to keep a reader engaged in your flash fiction or short story, with their limited range of characters and plots.

But what about when you want to extend your range a little, and write longer stories? It’s easy, right? Just add a few more characters, another plotline or two, maybe another location, and Bob’s your uncle.

Take it from me – it’s really not that simple. Don’t ask me how I know.

And there is a danger that in the middle of the wordcount (say, 30,000 words for a novel), you end up waffling. What’s waffling? 

Waffle – to speak or write at length in a vague or trivial manner.

How this manifests is that your story is roaming around, not really getting anywhere. Characters appear, say something, do something, and then disappear again without having had any significant effect on the story. That, on a number of occasions, has been my story.

If you, too, find yourself in this awful situation, what can you do?

CHANGE SOMETHING.

Have your main character break a limb, take up a new hobby, lose the love of his life. Just when you think it’s all done, and all the ends are tied up nice and neat, CHANGE SOMETHING. PIVOT. What’s the worst thing that can happen? The hero has vanquished his arch-enemy. He has grabbed the girl. She has kissed him (because he’s not an over-aggressive jerk, he’s your hero). Then have him (or her) contract a rare a virulent disease. Have a sink-hole open up and take her away. Have a random plane land on them, miraculously killing him but saving her, thus making her the NEW hero of the story. Ha haaa! Got you there, readers! But that’s, at least, more interesting.

You can also ‘design out’ the saggy middle, from the start of writing. Shout out to my favourite ‘thing’, Save The Cat https://savethecat.com/ Since I began using this, I NEVER have a saggy middle (in my story!). The StC structure ‘designs out’ sags by setting out a beat-by-beat plan for the story, ensuring that you write in the highs and lows, the changes of pace, the tension and the conflict as you begin to plan your story.

SAVE THE CAT FOR THE WIN!

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by Gerald Hornsby

DAY 13 – #MonthOfBlogging #June2024 #MonthOfWriting

PACING

Do you remember that song by Bucks Fizz called “Making Your Mind up”? For American readers, Bucks Fizz was a British bubblegum pop band in the early 1980s, and they performed “Making Your Mind Up” at the Eurovision Song Contest.

For American readers, the Eurovision Song Contest was … well, never mind. 

Anyway, part of the lyric was “You gotta speed it up / And then you gotta slow it down …” And it was as if they were creating a guide to writing pace. With a hip wiggle. So, from the master poets of Bucks Fizz and their songwriters, what can we learn, other than fat old men in their 60s look ridiculous doing a hip wiggle?

We can learn that pacing is important, and that sometimes, you need to use longer, more languid sentences to allow the reader to catch their breath. Sometimes you need shorter sentences. Short sentences ramp up tension, get the reader’s heart racing, get them to rush through the words in order to discover the story. So here’s a tip: speed it up, then slow it down, then speed it up again. Just for fun!

Why is this important?

Look at these sentences (from Gary Provost):

This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety.

Now read this:

Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use sentences of medium length. And sometimes, when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals—sounds that say listen to this, it is important.

Pacing is also important from a wider perspective, especially when writing a novel. Imagine reading a book which starts with an explosion, continues through a car chase, then a gun battle, then a fight scene in a dungeon, then another explosion, then another car chase…

Crazy, huh? I feel exhausted just reading the description.

In every longer story, you need highs and lows, action and introspection, loud chapters and quiet. Which is why I use the Save The Cat plot design in my novels. https://savethecat.com/ It guides the storytelling process, through those changes in pace in thousands of novels (including all of mine!), plays and films.

It helps you include turning and plot points in your novel, it includes the All Is Lost and Dark Night of the Soul moments. It gives the story a rhythm and a sequence, which has been proven to be a winner amongst readers and viewers time and time again. I can fully recommend it!

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