by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig
As I wrote last week, I’ve really had a time with my current story. I’ve kept moving forward with it, but wondering about the root problem with the book. There were many problems with the story (oh boy!), but I couldn’t figure out what the global story issue was.
As I was finishing another scene where I was just treading water, I finally hit on it: I’d answered all the questions I’d posed.
Not the murderer, obviously…I haven’t gotten to the end of the book. But I stated everything, up front, at the very beginning of the book.
So, I basically introduced suspect #1, stated the suspect’s motive (same with suspects 2-4) and spent the rest of the draft rehashing what I’d already told the reader.
That makes for a boring book.
And it’s extraordinary that I did this, because I’d had this same revelation several books ago and vowed never to get into this mess again.
There is a very basic, if time-consuming, fix. When I write my second draft, I’m taking out every instance where I outright gave away the motive. I’m going to hint that there is a motive and indicate that the character is a suspect through gossip, observation, etc. Then the sleuth actually gets to go talk to people and uncover motives.
That’s what sleuths do. And I’d just taken away the sleuth’s job from her. No wonder my protagonist, Myrtle’s, voice was out of whack throughout the story. Myrtle was uncomfortable with the way I was writing the book.
Of course, this entails rewriting the entire first third of the book.
I don’t think I’ve ever had quite as massive of a rewrite, but I know my plan for addressing it–not until the first draft is over. So, how do you accomplish such a feat? Just mark (I use Word’s highlighting option) the place where you started writing the book after you made your dreadful realization. So I’m marking a sentence in my book. Everything after that point is in line with my discovery–I’ll be uncovering motives of the suspects after that point.
Then I’ll rewrite the beginning of the book to reflect the change.
How to avoid getting into this mess to begin with (whatever your genre):
Ask yourself what your protagonist knows. If he or she knows too much at the beginning of the story, then you’re going to have the same problem I had—you’ll be rehashing some of the same stuff repeatedly.
Think about what information you’ve given the reader at the beginning of the story or early on. If you haven’t raised enough unanswered questions, are they going to get bored? Will they keep reading even though there’s really no answers to be found later on?
The questions posed don’t have to be as big as mine (motives for suspects). You can do the same with smaller questions: what does this character have to hide? Why are two friends now not speaking to each other? Why did Jim lose his job? What was behind Selma’s emotional outburst at dinner? Delaying answering these smaller questions increases tension and helps provide the story with some extra intrigue. And holding off revealing the answers gives the readers incentive to keep reading.
Have you ever given too much away too early in your story? How do you remind yourself not to? I’m considering a big sticky note on my laptop…
Image: MorgueFile: Alvimann
Elizabeth – Thanks for sharing what you’re learning about your story as you re-write. It is hard to figure out what the balance is between giving a suspect some backstory, etc. and telling everything too soon. I struggled with that myself in the manuscript I finished most recently. I had to hint that one suspect really disliked another (and therefore would gladly lie about that other suspect) but let my sleuth figure out why. Not easy! You give good suggestions for avoiding this.
Love it. Thanks for the advice. I guess you need to listen to Myrtle more? :)
One problem I have is I frequently leave too many questions unanswered, so this tip is good to bear in mind as I seek to avoid that.
Thanks!
That’s not something I’ve ever thought about, but it would be easy to mess up a story with too much information too soon.
I had to rewrite the last chapter of Book V of my series because my husband said I gave too much away before the very end. Took away the surprise.
It’s all good Elizabeth. And thank you for sharing.
Maria
Carradee–And you bring up a good point! Either *list* our unanswered questions on a sheet of paper/separate Word doc, or highlight them in the Word program so that later on we make sure we tie up all those loose ends.
Margot–Oh good, I’m glad I’m not the only one who suddenly starts doing this stuff after having written a bunch of other books! Yes, it’s tricky. I’ve done it a couple of different ways: had a third-party suspect say, “You know, Tracy is the one you should be talking to. While I was at the grocery store the other day, I heard her really light into Hilda. It’s kind of odd that Hilda’s turned up dead only a couple of days later.” Or you could have the suspect in question say, “Hilda? Oh sure. She’s nice enough.” And look away, as if she has something to hide. Or have the suspect come right out and say that she didn’t like the victim, but doesn’t want to talk about it (and just shut the sleuth down.) But it’s definitely harder than having each suspect say, “Okay, here’s what I hated about the murder victim.” Which is what I was basically doing. :)
Diane–Sounds like he had a great point!
Maria–Thanks so much for coming by!
Teresa–Myrtle is very bossy and can be a real pain, but she’s smart. :) I think I should definitely make sure I don’t tune her out!
I do an initial read through with my editor so we catch these mistakes early on, then when I hit the editing stage we can focus in cleaning it up rather than going back and rewriting large sections.
Glad you caught that, even if the rewrites will be difficult.
I really appreciate you sharing this revelation.
These big edits are “chainsaw” edits in my vocabulary as opposed to the “scalpel” edits.
I am so happy for you that you’ve found these now. Nice job. It is reassuring to read this post. It is reassuring to see confidence in the re-write process.
Jack
Stephen–That would probably be ideal. :)
Alex–Yes, I’m glad I caught it, too. Otherwise, there would have been a seriously boring book out on the market!
Jack–Thanks! Yes, it’s a chain-saw approach. I’ve honestly never had to rewrite that much of the beginning of a book before, but I’ve definitely rewritten whole chapters, changed the murderer, etc. Sometimes I’ve not even looked at the first draft and just rewritten from scratch. When I’ve done that, it’s interesting how many words I reuse from the first draft. Sometimes I’ll just take out large chunks of scenes, write new scenes on a separate Word doc, then weave them in. I’ve learned that I need to really, really re-read those radically changed chapters to make sure I’ve taken out all the little threads of references. But it ends up working out all right in the end. :)
great post, Elizabeth! this is something I really need to check over in the mystery I’m working on.
so..thanks!
Sandy Gardner
sgardner2@hvc.rr.com
Elizabeth, thank you for writing another wonderfully helpful post! You always talk about issues that help me with my own writing and make me feel less alone!
Thank you, love your blog! :-)
You know what’s comforting about this post? That fact that you, a multi-published author, do this too! Thanks so much for the great advice.
Sandra–Yes, we’ve got to keep our mysteries mysterious!
Karen–Oh, gosh, we all have this stuff happen. If not this issue, than something else, if not each book, then *some* books. :)
Julie–Thanks for coming by!