An Example of the Experiments, 2 – Fains I

We left off in An Example of the Experiments – Fains I with a rewrite of the first paragraph, which was much better craftwise than the original and still sucked.

It was better than the original because of the solid POV, the protagonist’s situation was clearly stated, the setting and tone were much stronger, more character roles were defined, …

And still it sucked, and I knew it sucked, hence I wrote “Still needs work, though.” at the end of the post.

The real problem was I didn’t know how to fix it because I wasn’t sure of the specifics of what wasn’t working.

Much of the answer came while I worked on An Experiment in Writing – Part 8: Worthy Antagonists when I talked about developing a character’s backstory, about why the character behaves, thinks, responds, interacts, does as they do.

Give the reader only as much character background as necessary for them to understand the story.

 
Let me give you a caveat at this point: Give the reader only as much character background as necessary for them to understand the story.

Empty Sky’s Earl Pangiosi, The Inheritors’s Seth Van Gelder, look at any of the main and primary characters in my work and you’ll find lots of their background woven into the story.

It seems I do this weaving well because readers constantly comment on how real and vivid my characters are.

Back to Fains I (or “Eye.” I’m still deciding).

I realized the rewritten opening sucked because I didn’t know enough about the characters to really care about them. The shift from teenager going to the prom to elderly man on his deathbed drove the story in the correct direction and not enough.

This brings us back to An Example of the Experiments – Fains I’s First Question: Who Owns the Story?

I knew the core piece – someone dies and Tim’s involved – was solid enough to carry the story, but nothing I came up with made Tim interesting enough to me to write about him.

Readers will only be interested in your characters if you’re interested in your characters.

 
And here’s where I give you another piece: Readers will only be interested in your characters if you’re interested in your characters.

How come Tim didn’t interest me?

Because the original story was more a vignette – a long one, and still a vignette. Tim never grows, changes, transforms, transcends.

In short, he, like me, is boring and dull, and people, specifically readers, don’t stay interested in boring people (characters).

Creating an Interesting Character

…an interesting person in an interesting place doing an interesting thing.

 
Remember in An Experiment in Writing – Part 7: Inciting Incidents my offering “Give the reader an interesting person in an interesting place doing an interesting thing. If you only give one, it’s got to be incredibly strong. Two is good, three is dynamite.” (or something close to that)?

Tie that back to Relatability and the four basic ways people relate to things:

  1. they’re familiar with a place (Setting)
  2. they’re familiar with what’s happening (Plot)
  3. they’re familiar with the people involved (Character)
  4. they’re familiar with what’s being said (Language)

And add in what makes a great opening: conflict, tension, oddness (not sure if I ever mentioned “oddness” and remember, my blog is for me to a) document what I’m doing and most importantly b) learn how to do things better).

So all the above went into the non-conscious and churned.

What I came up with is, me thinks, centuries better than the original, and I’ll share the original version’s problems and the new version’s solutions starting in next Monday’s post.

Stay tuned.