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Do Characters Change?

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I suppose we enjoy seeing characters whom we like change for the better, and characters we don’t like fail to change and thereby suffer punishment.  Although, likeable characters with   defect, and who are unable to correct the defect, can earn our sympathy.  And then there are characters whom we dislike initially, but who win our sympathy through an act of kindness or a change of heart.   I think it’s fair to say that, as a general rule, a reader likes to see characters change: after all, this is what makes them interesting.  But, if a character changes too much, to quickly, or in completely unexpected ways, that character can lose credibility and may seem contrived.

As I look back at my novels, and think about how the characters changed during the story, I see some interesting points.  Fishing in Foreign Seas was my first novel – a kind of experiment.  It is a romance and a business challenge.  To me, with benefit of hindsight, the characters are somewhat stereotypical, and they don’t change much.  Rather, they learn and grow from the challenges with which they are presented.

Sin & Contrition, my second novel is a kind of morality tale about six characters, friends from the age of 13.  They are quite different characters, from different backgrounds.  As a result of the temptations each of them faces, a few of them change their values and priorities quite significantly; some do not change much (and probably earn the reader’s condemnation).

The next two novels, Efraim’s Eye and The Iranian Scorpion are thrillers.  In both cases, the hero and the villain do not change much at all, but in each case, the key supporting character changes almost beyond recognition.  In Efraim’s Eye, the key supporting character is Naomi, who starts out as a naïve, adorable nomad, and by the end of the book, she has become a pragmatic, tough-minded woman.  In The Iranian Scorpion, Rustam is the key supporting character.  When we first meet him, he is a frightened, insecure, Afghan boy of 15 with sexual fantasies. By the end, he is a confident, secure, married man with a pregnant wife.  How did these changes occur?  Each of these characters underwent a hammering in the forge of real life, and each of them had the mettle to emerge stronger.

My fifth novel, Sable Shadow and The Presence, is told in the first person by a character who is seeking his identity, and it follows his changes from early childhood to middle age.  In a sense, this is a story about the how’s and why’s of character change.

Hidden Battlefields should be published in about six weeks.  It is a sequel to The Iranian Scorpion, but each of the four main characters struggles with an internal conflict, the resolution of which changes his or her life quite dramatically.  This is a novel about what causes us to change, and how it comes about.  By contrast, the two main evil characters, do not change much at all.  You can probably guess what happens to them!

Review: Favors and Lies

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I decided to buy and read a copy of Mark Gilleo’s novel, Favours and Lies, because it received an award at a recent book festival. (One always wants to understand what other successful writers are doing.)

The brief biography at the back of the book says: “Mark Gilleo holds a graduate degree in international business from the University of South Carolina and an undergraduate degree in business form George Mason University. He enjoys traveling, hiking and biking. He speaks Japanese. A fourth-generation Washingtonian, he currently resides in the DC area. His first two novels, Love thy Neighbor and the national best seller Sweat were recognised as finalist and semi-finalist, respectively, in the William Faulkner-Wisdom creative writing competition.”

facephoto-150x150

This photo appears on his website.

Favours and Lies concerns Dan Lord, a private investigator with a law degree and a selected list of clients. He works in the DC area on ‘the blurred line between right and wrong’. When his brother’s widowed sister-in-law, Vicky, and her son, Conner, die under very strange circumstances, Dan takes a particular interest. Vicky dies in an apparent suicide and Conner dies of what seems like a drug overdose. Neither of these deaths make sense to Dan. Then the detective who was investigating the deaths of mother and son is killed, as is the son’s girlfriend. Dan finds that the records of several key phone calls have disappeared, and Dan engages a computer wizard to find out what happened to the phone call on-line records. There is a secretive company, the address and phone number of which are unlisted. There is a high class madam, a Russian intelligence officer, a medical doctor, a barber, a martial arts trainer an assistant district attorney, a night club owner, with whom Dan exchanges favors and lies in order to find the killers of his relatives. Some of these people end up dead; Dan, nearly so on several occasions. Toward the conclusion of the novel, we learn the reason for Conner’s death, and of the illegal conspiracy which lay behind it. The motivation for Conner’s death and those responsible is quite a shocking surprise. Fortunately, the favors given to Dan by those friends who remain alive are repaid.

Favors and Lies is a fast-moving book, which is difficult to put down: one wants to find out what happens next. The characters are distinctive and interesting, but they are ‘on stage’ for such short periods, in many cases, and described in terms of their appearance and history more than in terms of their values. One feels little empathy for many of them, the exceptions being Dan and Detective Wallace. The dialogue is clipped and punchy, fully in keeping with a fast-moving detective thriller. The locations of the various scenes are described is such detail that one senses the author’s pride in his familiarity with the streets of the US capital. There is some technology on which the plot for Favors and Lies depends, but it is pretty much understandable. For me – a very literal-minded person – the difficulty I have with Favors and Lies is the credibility of the plot, taken as a rapid-fire whole. But, in the genre of gripping, no-holds-barred detective stories, there are few better.

 

Penny Vincenzi

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There was a full page article on the June 16 issue of The Daily Telegraph about Penny Vincenzi.  It was written by Byrony Gordon, who covers women’s issues for the Telegraph.  She says that “Penny Vincenzi’s books are an epic saga containing family secrets, romance and seriously strong women. ”  I’ve read one of Vincenzi’s novels (there are 17) and I would agree with this characterization.

Penny Vincenzi

One particular quote in the article caught my eye.  After saying that it takes her about a year to write a book and she never plots anything out, Gordon quotes Vincenzi, “I haven’t the faintest idea what is going to happen, ever.  I just get the kernel of the idea, which in this case was supposing a company was about to go under, and then the characters wander in.  I never have any idea what is going to happen at the end.  I truly don’t, which is why they are so long.”

Does she ever get writer’s block?
“Oh no,” she says with a shake of her head.  “I have a friend who does books, too, and he was party to a rather intense conversation about writing.  Someone asked, ‘What do you do when you get writer’s block?’ and he said, ‘I’m not clever enough to get writer’s block!’  I do think there’s an element of: ‘Oh, it’s my art, you can’t cut that bit out because  that’s the core’ .  I don’t agonise.  I do have terrible days when I realise I have gone down a completely blind alley and I’ve got to come back.  The only cure is to press the delete button, I’m afraid.  I once deleted 20,000 words and I felt much better after that.”

One has to admire this about Vincenzi: she has an extraordinary talent to write in what sounds like a stream-of-consciousness mode while at the same time having a keen awareness of what her readers like.  She is a successful writer and it works for her.

What caught my eye about this article was the contrast with my style.  I, too, take about a year to write a book, but I do a lot of charity work and my books are shorter than hers.  I write about 8 pages a week; she writes at least twice as much.  Part of the difference is that I do agonise, and I do a lot of editing in multiple stages.  For me, a novel has to be credible, and since I write ‘modern. real-world novels’, I spend plenty of time on research.  For example, I’m currently writing a novel which is partly set in north west Africa, and I want it to be accurate.  I also do quite a bit of planning: novel outline, chapter outlines, character portraits, and with my more recent novels: what’s the point of this novel?  what’s its message?  what would I like the reader to take away?  This message is, for me, the central nervous system of the novel.  The characters, the events all have to support this core sense.  If there is no core sense, the novel is just entertainment, but, of course, it can be delicious entertainment.

As to writer’s block, I would call it a barrier, rather than a blockage.  There are times, particularly in starting a new situation, when I’m unsure how to proceed.  I’ve learned that what’s necessary for me is to sit here and think about it.  An idea will present itself.  I’ll reject it.  Not good enough.  How about this?  I takes patience and perseverance, and sometimes – I agree with Vincenzi – it means starting over.

So, in a way, I envy the free-flowing style of Vincenzi, particularly when I’m trying to write something that engages our ideas, our emotions, our senses and our instincts all at once.  But the free-flowing style would not be me.

 

 

Literary Criticism

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Many (most?) authors think about literary criticism.  We tend, after all, to be surrounded with it.  Some we like.  Some we don’t like, particularly criticism which we feel is unfair, or doesn’t understand what we are trying to achieve.  Ultimately, the challenge that criticism (fair or unfair, understanding or oblivious) offers those of us who write is to try to see the criticism from the critic’s point of view, and to take away at least something of value.

I think it’s interesting to compare criticism with creativity.  In a sense, they are opposite sides of the same coin.  Both activities involve the creative impulse.  The creative person (or author) produces something, and the critic evaluates it.  They are interdependent activities it the sense that creating without evaluation may produce rubbish, while the critic depends on the author to produce something.  As to which comes first (the chicken or the egg), I think that the creative impulse produces something and its existence calls the critic into being.  Both the critic and the author speak the language of creativity, but their philosophies in the use of the language are quite different.  The author uses the language to produce something which s/he sees as having value, while the critic’s urge is to find or evaluate that value.  I think it is fair to say that that both the author and the critic could benefit from having some of the skills of the other.  Certainly, authors could profit from having some of the critic’s ability to think about what is valuable.  And critics would be more effective if they had more understanding of and familiarity with the creative process.

What makes all of this quite interesting is that there are no objective standards for what ‘good’ is for a writer or a critic.  There are no tests to pass or qualifications to earn to be considered a ‘good writer’ or a ‘good critic’.  ‘Good literary critics’ tend to be ‘prominent’ or ‘recognised’ – whatever that means – and ‘good writers’ are viewed similarly.

One of the difficulties which authors have with literary criticism is: on what basis is my work being judged?  Is that a meaningful basis for my particular work? Critics seem to emphasise particular criteria as they evaluate a work.  For example:

  • Is the plot interesting and credible?
  • Are the characters truly human (or not)?
  • Is the setting believable or realistic?
  • What about the author’s use of language?
  • What about spelling, grammar and syntax?  (I read recently that a novel without any punctuation was awarded a major prize in the UK. Imagine what a nightmare that would be for the reader.)
  • What is the intended audience for this work?
  • Will this piece of work make money?  (Critics associated with main stream publishers put much emphasis on this.)
  • If we look at this piece of work from a philosophical, religious, ethical, sociological point of view, what do we find?
  • What ‘school of literature’ (if any) does this writer represent?

There are also various ‘schools’ of criticism, such as:

  • Reader Response Criticism: how and why will the reader (what sort of reader?) see this novel?
  • New or Formal Criticism which treats the work as a stand-alone entity, without reference to the author, the reader or historical context
  • Feminine Criticism: it’s all about gender or lack of gender: the text reflects a particular view of men or women?
  • Marxist Criticism: focuses on economic issue, capitalism and the plight of the poor
  • Historical Criticism: analyses the work from the perspective of history
  • Psychoanalytic Criticism: views the work through the lens of psychology
  • Authorial Criticism: to know the work one must know the author

So . . . Might it not be better of the author and the critic could actually discuss a critical point of view before it is published, not with the purpose of  ‘watering down’ or changing the criticism, but with gaining a clearer perspective of each other’s understanding and intentions?

Kurt Vonnegut

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Kurt Vonnegut, in his book, Bagombo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction, listed eight rules for writing a short story.  While I would probably adopt a different set of eight rules, I think Vonnegut’s rules are quite interesting:

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.

For me, the important parts of this rule are: “total stranger” and “time wasted”.  One never knows who will decide to read a book that one has written, and it’s important that whoever decides to read it feels that it is time well spent.  This suggests that the onknown reader got something out of the story: enjoyment, new knowledge, new ideas . . .

2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.

This is essential!

3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.

A character with no desires is not human and therefore not very attractive or interesting.

4. Start as close to the end as possible.

For a short story, this certainly makes sense.  I’m not sure this holds true for a novel.  One example that springs to mind is Emily Bronté’s Wuthering Heights in which the characters are young children at the beginning.  The Russian novelist, Tolstoy, didn’t believe in this, nor did Sholokov.  However, the rule, it seems to me, is useful in that it encourages one not to included unnecessary material.

5. Every sentence must do one of two things-reveal character or advance the action.

It depends, I think, on what one means by “advance the action”.  A short story, by its very nature has to be tightly told.  In a novel, there is more latitude for scene- and context-setting.  I would argue that setting the scene and establishing the context are important in advancing the action, so long as they hold the reader’s interest.

6. Be a Sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them-in order that the reader may see what they are made of.

I’m not sure one has to be a Sadist, but it certainly shows the reader what a character is made of when tragedy strikes.  I good example is the principal character Henry in Sable Shadow and The Presence.

7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.

I sense a slight conflict between this rule and rule number 1.  The one person for whom we write is a total stranger?  For me, the second sentence in this rule makes sense: one has to have focus in one’s writing, otherwise, it pleases no one.

8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To hell with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.

I think this applies to a short story more than to a novel, but I’m not sure that Hemingway would have agreed with this.  His short stories often have surprising endings.

Love

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Love is a very complex human emotion. It comes in many forms.  Here are some examples from my novels:

 

From Fishing in Foreign Seas:  (Jamie and Caterina are on a sightseeing excursion to Erice, Sicily.  This is the kind of love that young people dream of; where two people fit together perfectly.)

He looked into a narrow gorge which was covered on the near side with vines and seemed to stretch down into infinity. “Yes, I see what you mean.  I can’t even make out what’s at the bottom.”

she pleaded.  She took a step backward and held out her hands to him.

He crossed over to her.  “The railing is quite strong.  You wouldn’t fall over,” he assured her.

She looked at him, her lips compressed: “I am afraid of heights.  When I get near a place like this, I am afraid I throw myself over.”

“But you’re not going to do that!”

“I know, but I still get the feeling. . . .  As if some demon inside of me will take control . . . and throw me over.”
“But you don’t have any demons inside,” he protested.

“I know of one,” she confessed.  Her eyes were misty: “. . . it is called ‘self-doubt’.”

He stared at her in utter amazement, then he felt her vulnerability, and he drew her close to him.  “Let’s get a bite to eat,” he suggested.

They sat at a table in an almost-deserted patisserie.  She would look at him for a moment and then she would look around her.  The corners of her mouth were turned down and her head was inclined to one side.

“Caterina . . .”  She looked at him, her face full of disappointment in herself.  He took her hands: “I love you!”

She took a deep breath, not believing what she heard.  Then the dam burst inside her.  “Oh, Jamie, I love you so much!  I never believed I could love anyone like this!”  Her face was streaming with tears.

“You beautiful, wild, wonderful girl!”  He got up and hugged her.  “. . . Do you suppose they have any champagne here?”

She wiped her eyes with a napkin.  “I doubt it, but they probably have some prosecco – which might be good.”

Jamie got up, ordered a bottle of prosecco and pointed out some assorted sweets to the waitress.  She came to their table carrying an unopened bottle and the tray of sweets; then she showed them the bottle.

Caterina frowned.  “Haven’t you got anything better than that?”

“Yes, Miss, we have champagne.”

“What champagne is it?”

“We have one bottle of Moet in the refrigerator.”

“Excellent!  We’d like that, please!”

They sat gazing at each other while the waitress went for the champagne.  “Jamie, are you sure you love me?”

“Yes, I love you because you’re clever, you have a sense of humor, you’re a little wild, because you’re the part of me that’s missing, you’re beautiful, and because you’re a bit lonely!”

Wordlessly, she got up from the table, knelt down and hugged him.

 

From Sin & Contrition: (Where Josie is swept off here feet by Dr. Bill Thompson, and while they love each other, there’s a major obstacle.)

Josie and Dr. Thompson were lying naked in her bed that Sunday evening.  He was nuzzling her breasts.

“Bill, have you ever been married?”

He looked up at her suddenly: “Why do you ask, my love?”

“Because I want to know.”

Dr. Thompson rolled over onto his back.  “I was married once – it didn’t work out too well.”

“When was that?”

“About eight years ago.”

“Did you get a divorce?”

“She doesn’t want to give me one.”

“It’s possible to get one in Pennsylvania, even if one person objects.”

“I know, but I haven’t had any reason to – until now.”

“What do you mean?”

“I love you, Josie.”

It was the first time he had said it, and she felt elation.  “I love you, Bill. . . . Would you get a divorce for me?”

“It’s complicated, Josie.  There are kids involved.”

“There are kids?”

“Yeah, four kids.”

Josie began to feel a knot in her stomach.  “How old are they?”

“Seven, five, four and two.”

“And you’re still living with your wife and the children?”

“Well, yeah, but it’s not what you’re thinking.  I’m just staying for the children.”

“Do you and your wife still have sex?”

“No. . . . Now, Josie, you’ve just got to be patient with me.  We’ll work something out.”

 

Josie slept very little that night.  She kept turning over in her mind her questions: could they work something out?  That would be absolutely heaven!  Could she convince him to spend more time with her?  If he got a divorce, could she handle four kids – even part time?  She thought so.

Finally, and reluctantly, she decided to do a little investigating.

 

From Efraim’s Eye: (Paul confesses his affection for Naomi, knowing perhaps that their relationship is not meant to be.)

The wind rattled the green canvas awning that covered the roof restaurant.  They were sitting side-by-side so that they could look out to sea.  A waiter had cleared away their breakfast plates of fruit and pastries.  Naomi was sipping her coffee pensively.  She turned slightly to face him.  “Do you love me, Paul?”

Unprepared as he was for that question, Paul knew that there could be only one answer.  “Yes, yes, of course I love you.”

Naomi’s head tilted, and her gaze fell to the table cloth.  Uncertainly, she asked, “Why do you love me?”

Instinctively, Paul knew that his answer must not include the word ‘beautiful’ or one of its synonyms.  He said, “You’re a very sweet idealist, Naomi.  You are a woman with great talents as a linguist, as a musician, and in dealing with people.  But for me, best of all, is your joie de vie.  Life is a great, pleasing adventure for you, and it’s delightful to be with you.”

For some moments, Naomi gazed at him, apparently repeating his words in her mind.  She asked, “So you think I’m a sweet, talented, adventurous woman?”  She pronounced the word ‘woman’ awkwardly, as if it were a term unfamiliar to her.

He smiled.  “For a four word summary, that will do.”

Paul knew the answer to the reciprocal question.  She loved him as a daughter loves, and he had awakened her latent brilliance as a lover.  But, for her part, she had wanted to know whether she, herself, was a person who could be loved.

She took his hand in hers, and they sat, quietly gazing out to sea, each lost for some time in his or her own sunny thoughts.

 

From The Iranian Scorpion: (Robert invites Kate to come to Dubai with him; they are lovers, but actually they are friends.)

“Kate, James has proposed that I come to Dubai for a couple of weeks R & R. Would you like to come along?”

“But what would I do in Dubai?”

“Well, you could lie on the beach, or by the pool, in your bikini.”

“I don’t have a bikini.”

“Well, you can wear your designer one-piece, then.”

“What else is there?”

“Well, we would be staying at the five-star Jumeirah Hotel.”

“I am sick of hotels.”

“We could stay in one of their tropical garden residences.”

“What else?”

“We could go shopping in the Mall of the Emirates.”

“I hate shopping malls.”

“Well, there are some nice little shops in the hotel.”
”What else is there?”

“Well, I see that Beyoncé is playing at one of the clubs.”

“I don’t like Beyoncé.”

“How about Randy Travis?”

“What else?”

“I see that the Amala restaurant has fresh oysters.”

Kate made a face.

“They also have fresh Maine lobster.”

“What else, Rob?”

“Well, there are a couple of new positions we could try.”

She looked away.

“Are you not coming then, Kate?” When he moved to look at her face, he saw that she was giggling.

“Of course I’m coming!”

 

And this from Sable Shadow and The Presence: (Henry reflects on his relationship with Suzannne.)

After that, we just couldn’t get enough of each other.  We didn’t move in together, but we might as well have.  I kept some of my business clothes at Suzanne’s place, and she kept some of hers at my apartment.  That way, we could always have dinner together, make love, sleep and have breakfast together.  My world revolved around Suzanne, and hers around me.  Anybody else was superfluous.  While we were at work, we spoke to each other two or three times a day.

I was really in love for the first time in my life: I would have done absolutely anything for Suzanne.  The miracle of it was that she felt the same about me.  It didn’t seem possible that anyone could love me so much.  This one, magical woman had wiped away all my self-doubts and my Angst.

Noah

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My wife and I went to see the film Noah on Saturday.  I’m sure we were both a bit sceptical about it, having seen some of the reviews beforehand.  Most of the reviews seemed to focus on whether or not the film was faithful to the Bible story, and whether of not this faithfulness (or lack of it) mattered.

Since both of us tend to view the Bible story of Noah as a rather charming fairy tale (which does not add to or subtract from our religious beliefs), we weren’t particularly concerned about the faithfulness issue.

Certainly, the cinematography in the film is spectacular: thousands of animals, thousands of sinful people, an absolutely gigantic ark, a colossal storming of the ark, a horrendous flood, etc.  And the acting seemed credible enough.

Neither of us particularly liked the Watchers: giants assembled from what looked like huge pieces of cold lava, who were apparently sent by the Creator to see what the human race was up to.  For me, the Watchers seemed to clash with the rest of the characters and scenery in the film, all of which seemed quite natural.  In fact, I thought: why include them at all?  The Creator could certainly see for himself what the human race was up to: mostly no good.

The other point that didn’t work for me was that Noah believed his mission from the Creator was to save only the animals: that he and his family would die, too.  I suppose, ingrained in my mind, is the notion that the point of the fairy tale is that God destroyed the wicked people, but He started again with Noah’s family.  In the film, only the oldest of Noah’s sons, Shem, has a wife.  Ham tries to take a wife, but Noah prevents it, and Japheth is too young.  The film character of Noah believes that he must kill the child of Shem’s pregnant wife in order that mankind will eventually die out (as he believes the Creator wishes).  Certainly, this adds some excitement to the plot.  The other bit of excitement is that the king of the evil-doers manages to get onto the ark and avoid the flood. This leads to some arguments, soul-searching and fighting.

I found myself thinking about the evolution of the art of film-making as compared to the art of writing novels.  Noah, it seems to me, is representative of modern films in two respects: the use of technology in cinematography to produce visual effects that were beyond the comprehension of film makers thirty years ago; and, the exposure of raw and profound human emotion.  By way of comparison, I’m watching Sea Devils, a mediocre-at-best, 1953 film starring Rock Hudson and Yvonne De Carlo, set in the Napoleonic era.  There are no special effects and, by today’s standards, the acting is pretty wooden.  Even the feelings of betrayal of a lover are expressed with only a few words and a pout.  In a film today, feelings of betrayal would be compounded with other issues and expressed with violence and shouting.

As to the art of writing (and publishing) novels, the technological changes have been in the evolution of the e-book and in print-on-demand publishing.  Neither of these technologies existed thirty years ago.  And, it seems to me, writers are mining more complex human emotions, and are presenting them more graphically than ever before.

Recent Award

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Sable Shadow and The Presence just received its sixth literary award: Reader’s Choice Awards 2014: Honourable Mention, Memoir/ Autobiography/Biography.  I am grateful for the recognition, but I’m not sure Sable Shadow and The Presence fits into the Memoir/Autobiography/Biography category.  As fiction, it isn’t an autobiography, and while my dictionary doesn’t say so, I think that, in common usage, the subject of a memoir or biography is a real person, living or dead.  Any way, thank you, Reader’s Choice.

Four of the awards were presented in Hollywood on the 22nd of March.  If Hollywood were a bit less than a 10 hour flight away, I might have gone to receive the awards.  I tried to call on family members in the vicinity of Hollywood to attend on my behalf, without success.  If someone had been able to attend for me, and if they wanted to know what to say in the way of an acceptance speech, I would have given them the gist of my acceptance at the London Book Festival (fifth award – runner-up – general fiction), which was:

When I started to write Sable Shadow and The Presence, I had in mind writing it in the first person (as a fictional autobiography) – something I had never done before.  I also wanted the story to be about a person, who, as a child, hears voices that he eventually attributes to representatives of God and the devil.  I wrote about four chapters and sent them to a friend of mine who is very well educated, a reader of quality literature and quite direct in his views on matters of interest.  He sent me an email a couple of weeks later in which he said: “Boring!”

I had to admit that I saw his point, and I, too, was struggling with the book.  I put it aside, and I wrote The Iranian Scorpion.  But, I still felt that, hidden in the basic idea, was a good book.  By the time The Iranian Scorpion was finished, I had some new ideas to add to the abandoned manuscript.  I wanted to say some things about existentialism, human identity, tragedy, religion and relationships.  So, I developed a new outline, re-wrote the first four chapters and finished the novel.  It was edited and published.  I decided to give the printer’s proof copy to my friend Peter, who had thought that my aborted attempt was ‘Boring!”‘.  About three days later, I got an email from him in which he said: “Congratulations Bill!  An outstanding achievement!  I couldn’t put it down, meals no meals, I swallowed the book in two days. Your prose has become self assured. you dominate it, rather  than being dominated by it.  The research, as ever is superb, and also completely open to being understood by the layman. . . . You have certainly managed to recreate  life as it is lived – even to the pertinent introduction of the meta-physical element – though a bit wobbly in spots, it stands solid, protected by Sartre. . . . I like it and feel close to it – I guess that’s one of the reasons why I think it such a  remarkable creation.  Your progressive development of style, skills and plot makes my mouth water for the goodies to come.Thank you from me, but really from all your readers.”

In London, I said I wanted to thank Peter for his two critiques, but, in particular, for the first critique.  And I thanked the London Book Festival for their selection.

Time

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How does one manage the passage of time in a novel?

In our lives, time can pass extremely slowly, or seem to escape us in a blur of action.  For me, and perhaps for many of us, time can seem to pass with excruciating slowness when I am in physical or mental pain.  Conversely, time seems to literally fly away, when I am engaged in a pleasing pastime.

By contrast, for the reader, the passage of time is more linear: time seems to pass at the rate at which s/he reads.  It can therefore be quite important to give the reader a more variable sense of time.  If time in the novel moves at the same rate as the reader’s eye scans the page, the reader will begin to sense that something is wrong.  This is true even if time in the novel passes at a constant multiple of the reader’s real time: for example of one minute of the reader’s real time is always equal to an hour of time in the novel.

So how can one achieve the sense of the variable passage of time?  In one case, it seems to me that the writer must recognise and write for situations where real time for the reader is the same as time in the story.  One can do this by using short sentences, and by mentioning only the essential sense of what is happening.  For example, see the passage below from Efraim’s Eye where, over a period of seconds, the terrorist is spotted, and his plot is foiled:

 

“My God!” Naomi exclaimed, “There’s Efraim!”

“Where?”

“He’s on top of the glass enclosure, and he’s doing something up there!”

There was, indeed, a man in jeans and a green T-shirt on the enclosure, but he was bent over, arranging something.

“Are you sure it’s him?”

“Yes, it’s him!  I’m sure!”

Paul thrust the remains of his hot dog at Naomi and began to run toward the van.  He noticed two men sitting in the front seat, but he ignored them, and leapt up onto the bonnet.  With another leap, he was on the roof of the van.  Swinging to his left, he saw the green T-shirt man, bent over and preoccupied with what he was arranging, less than ten feet away.  There was a gap of about five feet between the van and the enclosure, which was about two feet higher.  Paul gathered himself and sprang.  He landed awkwardly and fell forward against the man.  The man turned to see who or what had struck him, and tried to recover his balance at the same time.  Desperately, Paul got his feet under him and pushed.  This sudden momentum was transferred to the green T-shirt man, who lost his balance, and, arms flailing in the air, toppled over the edge of the enclosure opposite the van.  There was a loud howl of pain as he struck one of the stone bollards.

Immediately, Paul turned his attention to the shaped charges which had been arranged neatly – each crescent charge seemed to be embracing a cable.

“Detonate!” screamed the green T-shirt man.

Paul scanned the array and spotted the links which closed the charges into a non-recoiling string.

There was another high pitched scream: “Detonate!”

Paul uncoupled the links, holding one end down with his bandaged left hand while his right hand manipulated the clasp.  With his right hand, he began to pull one end of the string.  The charges were heavy.

“Where is the button?”  Was the shouted question from the van.

Paul dragged the first four charges over the edge of the enclosure.

“On     my       seat!” came the agonised reply.

Paul kicked at two remaining charges which were still on the enclosure.  With a rattle, they were dragged over the edge by the gravitational pull of the first four.

“No!  No!”  A desperate scream from below.  Paul began to turn away.  He was struck by a tremendous shock wave.  He hurtled forward, struck the edge of the van roof, and landed, arms outstretched, on the pavement.  There was nothingness.

 

The other situation in which time in the novel can approach real time for the reader is when characters are interacting in an emotional (rather than physical) way.  I think it’s important for the reader to get a sense of what the character is feeling, simultaneously with what s/he is saying.  (There could be conflicts between the words and the feelings.)  Where this kind of conflict, or hidden agenda is present, I like to intersperse what the character says – in plain text – with what s/he is thinking – in italics.

In other cases, there could be a gap of a year or more in the story, and nothing of significant interest occurs during the gap.  Rather than give a recitation of what happened during that period, it is sufficient to begin a paragraph with: “Four years later . . . .”

The other aspect of managing the passage of time is the trade off between setting the scene, and extending the apparent passage of time.  Sometimes it can be essential to describe the situation or the setting in some detail, but in doing so, we lengthen the reader’s perception of the passage of time, and risk losing his/her attention.  I probably have a tendency to set the scene fairly clearly, in the interest of conveying to the reader a sense that ‘this is real’.  When I do that, I try to be careful about using interesting language and phrases.

 

 

The Plot

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I was thinking, the other day, about the process of developing a plot for a novel.   When I looked up the subject up on the Internet, I found all sorts of rules which struck me as simplistic.  These rules covered such things as structuring a novel like a three act play, with a beginning, a middle and an end.  The plot should have lots of action to keep the reader interested, and it should have a central character with whom the reader relates, and who has difficulty achieving his/her objectives. Also, it was pointed out that the tension should steadily increase.

All my novels started with an idea, rather than a plot.  Four of my five published novels started with a central character in mind, and in each case he starts out quite well toward his objective, but, at some point, disaster strikes.  He is able, by the end of the novel to recover from the disaster – more or less.  In the fifth novel, Sin and Contrition, there are six central characters who react in different ways to different human temptations. I, as the author, interview each of them as they reach advanced years, and ask them about how they have lived their lives.

There is the classical structure of a plot involving a central character: she/he:

  1. Is challenged
  2. Refuses the challenge
  3. Accepts the challenge
  4. Goes through the adventure
  5. Fails to meet the challenge
  6. Succeeds!

I have never actually written down a plot.  Rather the details of the plot tend to develop as the writing progresses.  Usually, I’ll write an outline of each chapter before beginning it, but I don’t stick religiously to the outline.  What happens for me is that the characters, themselves, tend to steer both the plot and the action which takes place in each chapter.  Not infrequently, when I wake up early in the morning, I’ll have a new idea about the evolution of the plot and its supporting action.  So, for me, developing a plot is an organic process.

More recently, I have begun to pay considerable attention to the ‘message’ or the point of the story.  For me, a ‘message’ is an idea: philosophical, spiritual, or social.  It shouldn’t be obvious; it may be controversial, but at least it should engage the reader at a different level than the story itself. The message tends to affect the action in the plot, and the characters themselves.

Some of my ‘rules’ about a plot are:

  • It has to be credible.  I’ve never tried to write science fiction or fantasy, but even in those genres, it seems to me that if the author steps outside the bounds of what the reader can believe, the reader is lost.  Credibility is a multi-dimensional measure: it applies to characters, to the setting and to the action.
  • Action is important, but it doesn’t have to be non-stop or physical action, only.  Action can involve emotional, intellectual or spiritual tension, as well.  In fact, physical action without an emotional response, may strike the reader as dry.
  • Characters need to have balance.  Good guys have to have defects and bad girls should have redeeming features.  We can relate to people’s redeeming features or to their defects.  All good or all bad characters do not exist in the real world.
  • Elapsed time is another vital dimension.  If events unfold too quickly they lose credibility; too slowly, and the reader may lose interest.  There are various devices one can use to slow down the pace of events: scene setting, inserting a new action that is minor but relevant, inserting a flash back, etc.

In looking over the rules on the Internet, there is one item worth adding: “Every scene and every chapter must keep the protagonist off-balance – things may get better for him/her, or worse, but they need to be constantly changing.”  (This from The Writer’s Workshop.)  This is a good point.  The reader is living vicariously through each page; if nothing’s changing, why read on?