This article cannot be reprinted without permission from the author. For permission, please email writers_saddle@yahoo.ca.
SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF
By Wenda DottridgeThe story goes something like this. Margaret Atwood, or Margaret Laurence, or some other brilliant writer, is at a dinner party.
She is asked by the man seated next to her, “What do you do?”
She replies, “I’m a writer.”
“ Really? When I retire I’m going become a writer.”
She asks, “What do you do?”
“I’m a neurosurgeon.”
She replies, “How interesting. I always thought that when I retire, I’d take up brain surgery.”
Since starting my first novel over four years ago, I have often wondered if taking up brain surgery would have been a simpler task. It seems crafting fiction requires more than desire. It takes a great deal of knowledge and skill to do it well, and the razor edge between writing fiction and writing good fiction is fine indeed. I poured out two manuscripts in seven months of disciplined daily writing. After completing the first I belatedly discovered what I label The Big Stuff. Pointof- View (POV), show-don’t-tell, scene and sequel, GMC (Goal, Motivation & Conflict), and manuscript formatting. With these tools I produced a serviceable second manuscript. Finalled in three contests. Got a personal rejection from my target editor.
It was around this time that a whole new world of writing opened up for me. I call it The Small Stuff. The stuff that doesn’t make into short newsletter articles and the stuff most contest judges haven’t yet learned. While I grappled with my third manuscript, The Small Stuff paralyzed me for weeks and sometimes months at a time while I figured out how to take this new knowledge down to the molecular level; to the words. I’m going to share a list with you now, with a disclaimer. Like a molecule that is a building block for bigger things, each word in your manuscript that is piece of the Small Stuff puzzle is also a world unto itself. It takes time, sometimes a career, to understand let alone master some of these concepts. But if some, or all, of these elements are added to your writing, in imperfect or impeccable fashion, your writing will be stronger.
Small Stuff #1 - Deep Point-of-View
What? Basic 3rd person won’t do? There’s more? It isn’t enough to show the story through a character’s eyes. The story must be lived through your viewpoint character’s heart and soul. Every person views the world in a unique way; a way shaped by gender, age, family history, social history, and general character. Think attitude. Make your viewpoint characters opinionated. When a red car arrives with a tall blonde woman at the wheel, does your character notice the convertible or the bimbo? Does your character focus on the totally hot low profile wheels or the bottleblonde hairstyle that Jennifer Aniston wears on, like, reruns?
An exercise I do (and hardly anyone notices I’m doing it) is monitoring my reactions to stimuli around me. I’ve discovered that I have an opinion on just about everything: That screaming child is a brat. I wish I were that well dressed. I’m glad I don’t have to drive a rusty car, like that. I hate waiting but to look cool and calm, I’ll pretend I don’t. How does your viewpoint character respond to the world around her?
Small Stuff #2 - Motivating Stimulus and Character Reaction Unit
If you can stomach it, digest Dwight Swain’s Techniques of the Selling Writer. Most especially learn to write using Character Reaction Units. I have two notes on my bulletin board over my desk that I refer to while writing. Frequently. One says:
- Motivating Stimulus
- Character Reactiona) Feeling—visceral, outside of control, instant.
b) Action—somewhat controlled.
c) Speech—absolute control.In a scene a character reaction unit might look like this:
A) In the dim light, she turned to see Mike’s pale face, his lips bracketed in grim lines. (Motivating Stimulus)
B) (Character Reaction)
1) Her heart stuttered, and then thudded rapidly in her chest.
2) She stood.
3) “Olivia?” She choked the word out.Now do this over and over again. But make each Character Reaction Unit fresh. Easy, right?
Small Stuff #3 - Scene Goals
Jack Bickman. Scene and Structure. Take as many years as you need to work through his book. It’s worth it in the end. Lately, the buzz is all about GMC, which comes from The Writer’s Saddle February 2005 6 Deb Dixon’s seminal GMC: Goal, Motivation& Conflict. You need to read her book. But be warned. It’s about the BIG stuff—the global picture. All the charts and worksheets in the world won’t help you unless you can bring it down to a word-by-word unit (it’s called a scene)— the small stuff.
Every word on the page must contribute to a character’s scene goal, whatever that goal may be. And every character in a scene should have his/her own goal. Which produces conflict. The other note on my bulletin board says:“ Did the character reach his/her scene goal? Why? Why not?” To that I’ve added, “What are the goals of every character in this scene?”
Each character must have a goal, even if she is a grocery clerk tapping her foot while the heroine digs for change (clerk’s goal=serve the next customer, heroine’s goal=find the extra $.75 she needs to afford baby formula). Without a goal, that character is wasting your page space. Opposing or incompatible character goals add up to conflict. And conflict is always a good thing in fiction.
Small Stuff #4 - Character Arc
This is one of those topics that is bandied about all over the place so maybe it doesn’t belong in my list. Suffice to say, your manuscript needs character arcs. Editors expect them, and contests miss them because they only accept fewer than three chapters. At its simplest, what do your characters learn by the end of the story? At its most complex, read Homer and copy what he does with Odysseus. If you’re not fond of Greek literature, there is always Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. The problem with the Vogler’s Cole’s notes version of mythical structure is that he makes it BIG stuff. Remember to keep it small. Each word contributes to a goal. Achieving—or not achieving— each goal forces your characters to grow and change. (See Bickman’s Scene and Structure.) Ta da. You’ve got a character arc.
Small Stuff #5 - Why, and then Why?
The adage, your characters can do anything, so long as they are well motivated is true. But if you front-load all your character’s motivation so the reader knows why your character must achieve her goal, what keeps your reader turning pages? Build suspense by withholding true motivation.
I call it the two whys. The first why makes the character’s actions plausible. The second why makes the character’s actions psychologically true. Let’s say your character’s goal is to open a women’s shelter. First why? She’s a social worker and sees the need for one every day in her work. Second why? She fled an abusive relationship and is still in hiding from the jealous lover who vowed to kill her rather than see her with another man. The second why forms a subtext throughout your manuscript and should always be present, but it does not need to be spelled out until after your reader’s husband has kicked her out of bed to finish the book in another room.
Small Stuff #6 - Annoying Writing
Passive sentences. Overuse of was. Boring verbs (went, walked, sat, etc.) Repeated words for no obvious literary reason. Adverbs. Eyeballs roaming around another character’s body parts (“His eyes touched her….”) Ewww!. Floating hands (“…his hand reached for her….”) All by itself?
To keep me grounded, I keep Strunk & White’s The Elements of Style handy. This small tome is weighty in the ways that matter. If you don’t believe me, read EB White’s Charlotte’s Web and see if you spot any annoying writing. Bet you don’t.
That’s it for my list of the little things that make a big difference. Next time you sit at your computer, remember you’re engaged in an exercise as delicate and intricate as neurosurgery. Sweat the small stuff!
©Wenda Dottridge 2005
