Tone – Joseph Carrabis, Author Blog

Throughlines

a recurring character/setting/element anchoring the reader in the story that keeps the reader interested

I use throughlines in my own writing and mentioned them previously in Using One-Line Summaries to Write Better Stories and Writing Mentoring.

Recent conversations demonstrated confusion; some people thought a throughline is the same as a plot line, some thought a throughline was an expanded TOC (Table-of-Contents), some thought…

I appreciate the confusion.

I also appreciate Einstein’s “If you can’t explain it to a six year old, you don’t understand it yourself.”

Therefore, I’m either about to explain throughlines to a six-year old or demonstrate I don’t understand it myself.

Let me know which I achieve.

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Tag…Again… (chapter 2)

Remember The Witch [[Tag/The Apple/The Seed??]] and Tag?

Remember my mentioning it was working itself into a novella or novel?

Remember my asking for title suggestions?

I’m working on turning it into a novella. Perhaps even a novellette. Maybe a novelina. It could still end up a novel and I doubt it at present. So far it’s a mystery of some kind (not the length, the story).

The anticeding event (discussed in The Witch [[Tag/The Apple/The Seed??]]) is now told in backstory. I’m much happier with the story’s doing this time around and also recognize it’s not finished yet. One thing throwing me is how short each chapter is (at least in this writing), basically a single scene and nothing more. This chapter is an example.

Read Tag Chapter 1

And, as always, happy to have your input.

Tag – Chapter 2

The witch’s hand climbed the lone black oak’s trunk like a strangely shaped, five-legged insect. Cartilage, sinews, and ligaments trailed from the wrist where Eric’s axe severed it from the witch’s arm. A moment earlier it held Julia tight as the witch pulled Julia into the oak’s dark bole, her den, but the sudden rain weakened her and Eric struck. The hand fell against the tree and it climbed towards the bole.

Tag…Again… (chapter 1)

Remember The Witch [[Tag/The Apple/The Seed??]] and Tag?

Remember my mentioning it was working itself into a novella or novel?

Remember my asking for title suggestions?

We’ll see…

And, as always, happy to have your input.

Tag – Chapter 1

Father Patreo looked up from his small cottage’s workbench. Well-soled boots crunched dry earth as someone came up the lane to his cottage. Male. Heavy. Healthy heavy, not sickly heavy. Most visitors to his cottage came sickly. A horse clomped coming from the opposite direction closely followed by squeaking cart wheels.

Them Doore Girls – Narration

Tim Curry invited me to take part in a Hallowe’en podcast with several other authors, each of us reading something we felt fit the season.

Hallowe’en is celebratory to me and mine, and I didn’t think that’s what Tim had in mind.

I have written horror, though.

No, not written horribly (okay, maybe, and I’m getting better (I hope)), and not quite of horrible things (although some of my work is dark, I’ll grant you), so that set me off on a search.

I came up with two things. The first, shared last week, is a concatenation of two chapters in The Shaman, each of which deals with a succubatic kind of creature, Ellewomen. That post is, strangely enough, entitled “The Ellewomen.”

This one, Them Doore Girls, is from a horror story first published in Haunts 1992 and again in my self-published Tales Told Round Celestial Campfires 2016.

FYI, the sound quality is wanting. I find it best through headphones.

Enjoy!

The Ellewomen

Tim Curry invited me to take part in a Hallowe’en podcast with several other authors, each of us reading something we felt fit the season.

Hallowe’en is celebratory to me and mine, and I didn’t think that’s what Tim had in mind.

I have written horror, though.

No, not written horribly (okay, maybe, and I’m getting better (I hope)), and not quite of horrible things (although some of my work is dark, I’ll grant you), so that set me off on a search.

I came up with two things. The first, presented here, is a concatenation of two chapters in The Shaman, each of which deals with a succubatic kind of creature, Ellewomen.

Enjoy!