Stream of consciousness is a variation of what is called ‘interior monologue’.  If interior monologue is the presentation of a character’s thoughts completely  and logically without intervention by the narrator, stream of consciousness attempts to represent a character’s feelings and thoughts in a jumbled way, as if the reader were directly connected to the consciousness of the character.  This jumbled presentation tends to violate conventional rules of  logic, grammar and syntax.  In many cases it makes the prose more difficult to read and understand.

James Joyce’s Ulysses is largely written in stream of consciousness, and here is an excerpt from Episode 13: Nausicaa:

Better not stick here all night like a limpet. This weather makes you dull. Must be getting on for nine by the light. Go home. Too late for Leah, Lily of Killarney. No. Might be still up. Call to the hospital to see. Hope she’s over. Long day I’ve had. Martha, the bath, funeral, house of Keyes, museum with those goddesses, Dedalus’ song. Then that bawler in Barney Kiernan’s. Got my own back there. Drunken ranters what I said about his God made him wince. Mistake to hit back. Or? No. Ought to go home and laugh at themselves. Always want to be swilling in company. Afraid to be alone like a child of two. Suppose he hit me. Look at it other way round. Not so bad then. Perhaps not to hurt he meant. Three cheers for Israel. Three cheers for the sister-in-law he hawked about, three fangs in her mouth. Same style of beauty. Particularly nice old party for a cup of tea. The sister of the wife of the wild man of Borneo has just come to town. Imagine that in the early morning at close range. Everyone to his taste as Morris said when he kissed the cow. But Dignam’s put the boots on it. Houses of mourning so depressing because you never know. Anyhow she wants the money. Must call to those Scottish Widows as I promised. Strange name. Takes it for granted we’re going to pop off first. That widow on Monday was it outside Cramer’s that looked at me. Buried the poor husband but progressing favourably on the premium. Her widow’s mite. Well? What do you expect her to do? Must wheedle her way along. Widower I hate to see. Looks so forlorn. Poor man O’Connor wife and five children poisoned by mussels here. The sewage. Hopeless. Some good matronly woman in a porkpie hat to mother him. Take him in tow, platter face and a large apron. Ladies’ grey flannelette bloomers, three shillings a pair, astonishing bargain. Plain and loved, loved for ever, they say. Ugly: no woman thinks she is. Love, lie and be handsome for tomorrow we die. See him sometimes walking about trying to find out who played the trick. U. p: up. Fate that is. He, not me. Also a shop often noticed. Curse seems to dog it. Dreamt last night? Wait. Something confused. She had red slippers on. Turkish. Wore the breeches. Suppose she does? Would I like her in pyjamas? Damned hard to answer. Nannetti’s gone. Mailboat. Near Holyhead by now. Must nail that ad of Keyes’s. Work Hynes and Crawford. Petticoats for Molly. She has something to put in them. What’s that? Might be money.

The above paragraph is taken out of context, which makes it difficult to understand, and yet, there are so many seemingly random references in this paragraph to other characters, places, things and past events that I, for one, have to wonder about the effectiveness of this style of writing.  Certainly, it takes a creative genius (as Joyce undoubtedly was) to write a paragraph – let alone a whole novel – like  this.  But, I can’t help but wonder whether Joyce’s genius is fully appreciated by most well educated readers.  In other words, did Joyce try to take well educated readers to too high a level of sophistication?  For me, it’s a little bit like one of Heston Blumenthal’s exotic recipes: do I really appreciate the delicate concoction of carefully prepared foam that tops one of his desserts?

When I’m writing about a character’s thoughts, I try to keep the description of his/her thoughts clear, focused on what’s important, and brief.  Here is an excerpt from Sin & Contrition.  LaMarr has gone to Cleveland to console the family of his friend, Mason, who was killed in Vietnam:

With the help of the custodian, who looked up Mason’s name in the register, he found the grave.  It was in an open area punctuated by dozens of headstones.  Mason’s headstone was small: it said only ‘Mason Bailey DeWitt’, and in numerals there were his birth and death dates.  Nothing more.  LaMarr gazed at the stone, lost in recollections.  I hope you’re OK now, Mason.  You were a good friend, and you deserved something more.  He stood, and looked once more at the headstone and grave.  Good bye, Mason.  He found a taxi to take him to the central bus station for the rest of his leave in Pittsburgh.  He reflected: What a terrible waste!  His sister sitting there crying on the couch.  Two little ones trying to understand.  His mother lost, and Mason gone.  I guess I’m like the little ones.  I don’t understand, either.

There is an article in the on-line version of The Week – as far as I can tell undated – written by a novelist called Robert Twigger called “Nine Follies to Avoid When Writing Your First Novel.  This caught my eye, and I’d like to comment on them and grade myself, on how well I followed Mr. Twigger’s advice in writing my first novel (not that I had ever heard of Mr. Twigger when I  wrote Fishing in Foreign Seas.)

1 The folly of the unattractive narrator.  Mr. Twigger says that the reader should like the voice of the narrator.  The reader will assume that the author is the narrator, but s/he doesn’t know the author, so s/he should like the voice of the author.  In Fishing in Foreign Seas, the narrator is the adult daughter, Elena, of the principle characters, Jamie and Caterina; Elena is a best-selling author, and I think she tells the story in an un-biased, interesting way.  Mr. Twigger says about the narrator’s voice, “Be likeable, be fascinating, be evil if you like – but don’t be deeply unattractive.”  I think he’s right.

2. The folly of ‘plot’ first.  Mr. Twigger says that when one starts with a plot first, events tend to be contrived and therefore less credible.  He suggests that you leave plot or structure to the last.  When I started writing Fishing in Foreign Seas, I had no idea what was going to happen, and I just let the novel ‘flow’.  But my subsequent novels have had more of a planned structure: generally, what’s going to happen, who the characters are, and what the ‘message’ is.  I don’t see how you can get to where you’re going if you don’t have a plan.

3. The folly of facts before relationships.  Twigger says that the world is about relationships, not facts.  I think he’s right.  Fishing in Foreign Seas is about relationships: some important, some less so; some are productive, some are destructive.

4. The folly of not being heartfelt.  Mr. Twigger says that the characters have to care about what happens.  He says, “You can’t write about the weather and the state of the nation if your main character has a hang up about sex. Sex is his thing, his heartfelt concern, so get that out in the open. Even a clever scene well done will feel thin and containing too much information if it is not heartfelt, if the character doesn’t care that much.”  I agree, and I think that the characters in Fishing in Foreign Seas care quite a lot about what happens.

5. The folly of not leaving things out.  The point is that many writers feel that they have to research something about which they have neither knowledge nor interest just to complete the story.  I think this is a fair point.  While it is not autobiographical, Fishing in Foreign Seas contains events with which I’m quite familiar.  But my forthcoming fourth novel is set in Afghanistan and Iran.  I’ve been to neither country.  But I have a keen interest in both countries, so that doing the necessary extensive research was a pleasure.

6. The folly of excessive detail.  This is a frequent concern for any writer.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, I try to include just enough detail to make the situation or the scene credible.  Probably in Fishing in Foreign Seas, I’ve included too much detail, but I think I’ve become more skilled at including only enough essential detail to hold the reader’s attention.

7. The folly of mistaking linked events for real plot.  Twigger says,”The situation you put the characters in – the world, if you like – must exert sufficient pressure on them to give you something to write about.”  I think  this is a very good point.  The characters in Fishing in Foreign Seas  are under quite a bit of pressure.  He also says (somewhat sarcastically), “One damn thing after another, tied up neatly, is usually called ‘the plot’.

8. The folly of proposals.  He says, “It’s tempting to try to get a deal before you do the hard work but it’s the writing equivalent of a 110 per cent mortgage. You’ll have to write a cracking proposal as well as the first few chapters and it will take as long as the book to do this. You will have to do the book anyway, you will have to solve the problems some time – so why not now?”  I agree.  I’ve never tried to sell a book before I’ve finished it.  Before I’ve finished  it, how do I know what I’m selling?

9. The folly of not having an agent.  Mr. Twigger says, “In Naples a lowly thug stands with his hand over a post box – you pay him to remove his hand so you can post your letter. Many writers feel the same way about agents. Don’t. Getting your novel accepted is a process of serially convincing people. The first person is an agent. They don’t have to be famous. In fact a young gun going all out beats an old lag who thinks life’s a drag anytime. But you need to have convinced one person after your mother that your work deserves a readership of millions.”  OK.  I agree, but I haven’t had any luck with agents.  I’ve had a lot of sales and marketing training so it’s not that I don’t know how to sell.  I’ve written to sixty-some agents in the UK and the US on four occasions.  I’ve followed their suggested formats.  I think what I  send them looks pretty tempting.  But no luck.

It’s often important, I think, to build up the level of suspense in a novel.  When the reader doesn’t know what’s going to happen, s/he will tend to want to read more, and will become more emotionally involved.  That emotional involvement usually means that the reader derives greater enjoyment from the book.

On the one hand, when the reader can predict exactly what’s going to happen, s/he will probably judge the book to be ‘boring’.  And, on the other hand, if the author uses too many devices to heighten suspense, or puts too many  twists and turns in the plot, the book (and the author) lose credibility.

Life is unpredictable.  We all know that.  So having some surprises in a book we read seems natural.  We all enjoy a good surprise, and a bad surprise can be quite stimulating, particularly if it isn’t real, and it’s happening to someone else (not us).

What kind of surprises could there be?  There are romantic surprises: will he or won’t he get the girl?  Court room surprises: will she or won’t she be acquitted?  There are business surprises: will it succeed or fail?  Sports surprises: does he or does he not win the medal?  And I’m sure you can think of at least a dozen other categories of surprises.

Another point to bear in mind is that surprises  don’t have to be binary: yes or no; win or lose.  Sometimes a surprise will come completely out of ‘left field’.  For example, you’ve been reading about Michael and Claire, who’ve just started dating.  The author leads you to wonder whether Michael and Claire will become a couple.  Sometimes you think ‘yes’ and at other times ‘no’. All of a sudden, Michael’s cousin, Jack, enters the picture, and sweeps Claire off her feet.  Then, you wonder what Michael is going to do.  Will he brood?  Will he try to punish Claire in some way? Or will he become the best man at the wedding?

So what are some of the devices an author can use to heighten suspense?

• the structure of the plot can lead to uncertainty in the reader’s mind.  For example, in a murder mystery not enough evidence comes out that we know George is guilty.  Besides, there’s some evidence that Norman might be the guilty one.
• what the characters do or say about an issue can influence our thinking.  What would you think if Norman hid a piece of evidence?
• it’s not just the principal characters who influence things.  Suppose Margaret tells the police that she saw George do it, but you suddenly learn that Margaret and Norman have been having an affair.
• mistakes can be made.  This is a device used frequently in operas.  For example in Il Trovatoreby Guiseppe Verdi, Count di Luna orders the  execution of Manrico who is his rival for the love of Leonora.  The Count finds out too late that Manrico was actually his brother.
• miscommunications can take place
• places can be different than what they seem at first
• times and relationships  can be confused
• and so on

I don’t know whether you have been watching Montalbano, the Italian series about the Sicilian detective Montalbano.  It’s currently running on BBC4 with English subtitles.  Montalbano is a very handsome, macho, detective who has an absolutely lucious girlfriend, and he always ‘gets his man’ because of his brilliance and his intuition.  My wife and I enjoy watching it.  I like the girlfriend.  My wife likes Montalbano and being able to watch a program in Italian.  We are both amused by the Sicilian culture on display: stupid Carabinieri (Italian police), for example.  But neither of us can follow the plot.  It has so many nuanced twists and turns that, unless you’re a professional crime detective watcher, it’s not worth following.

In Fishing in Foreign Seas there are over 100 footnotes.  Nearly all of these footnotes deal with the technology of steam turbine-generators.  At the time, I felt that if Jamie (the principal male character) was going to be deeply involved in a $300 million negotiation for two of the largest, most powerful machines ever built, I should not leave readers in the dark.

The good news is that non-technical people who have read Fishing in Foreign Seas tell me that they had no trouble understanding the issues.  The bad news is that they feel there were too many footnotes, and that some were unnecessary and distracting.  Point taken.

This raises a question: should there be any footnotes in a novel?  In the novels I have written since Fishing in Foreign Seas (one published – Sin & Contrition; one about to be published – Bitter Charity; and one roughly half finished) I have reduced the number of footnotes to one or two.  Several of these stories involve characters speaking in a language other that English sometimes.  In these cases, I change font when the character is speaking in Arabic, rather than English.  And when this first happens, I insert a footnote which reads: “this font is used whenever the words spoken, read or thought are in Arabic rather than English.”

One might ask: is this really necessary?  Can’t the reader recognise that when character A (who speaks English and Arabic) is speaking to character P (who speaks only Arabic) that the conversation must be taking place in Arabic?  Yes, the reader might recognise this, but having a distinctive font is a clear reminder of differences in not only language, but also of differences is culture and values.

Sometimes a character will  use a word which is common in (Arabic), but which would not be used in English.  For example, a character might say, “Aleesha was wearing a hijab.”  Since the average reader might not know what a hijab is, I could put a footnote which says: “a headscarf commonly worn by Muslim women”.  The trouble with this, of course, is that it distracts the reader’s eye to the bottom of the page.  So what I would typically do in this case is to write:

Abdullah remarked, “Aleesha was wearing a hijab.” (a headscarf commonly worn by Muslim women)  

In this way, the word ‘hijab’ is briefly explained, without distracting the reader, and from the structure of the sentence, it is clearly not something that Abdullah said, but rather an explanation that the author has added.  The addition by the author becomes particularly obvious if what Abdullah says (in Arabic), within the quotes, is in a different font than the rest of the line.

So, I try to minimise the number of footnotes.  If I were writing Fishing in Foreign Seas again, I would dramatically reduce the number of footnotes, probably by including an appendix which explains the technical vocabulary.

(For more information about my novels, see www.williampeace.net.)

Life can be surprising, with both welcome and unwelcome surprises.  And it can be predictable, featuring both desirable and unfortunate outcomes.  It seems to me that when we are reading fiction, we expect to encounter both the predictable and the surprising.  In fact, we rather enjoy reading about surprises in other people’s lives – even unwelcome ones – because it makes the reading more interesting, and because the unfortunate event(s) aren’t happening to us.  As a writer, I try to minimise predictability to keep the reader interested.  But if events become too unpredictable, the narrative loses its credibility and the reader’s interest.  So, I believe that, as in life, the narrative should have a mixture of predictable and surprising events, where the predictable isn’t just routine, and the surprising isn’t unbelievable.

Here are some examples from Fishing in Foreign Seas regarding the relationship between John (the main male character, Jamie’s younger brother) and Michele, John’s girlfriend.  John is a fancier of the  ladies, and he is somewhat mesmerised by Caterina, Jamie’s fiance.  But, at the same time, he is a bit shy about his first contact with a lady.  During a dinner dance on New Year’ Eve, there is this exchange between Caterina and John:

<“John, there’s a girl over there who’s got her eyes on you.”

“Where?”

“The girl with brown hair in the yellow dress at that table there to my left.”

“I think she’s watching you.”

“No she isn’t, John.”

“Well, maybe you’re right.”

“Why don’t you ask her to dance?  She is quite pretty.”

“No, I don’t think so – I don’t know her.”

“It doesn’t matter!  Go on, John, ask her to dance!”

Reluctantly, he took her back to their table, and disappeared across the dance floor.  A few minutes later, she saw that John was dancing with the girl in the yellow dress and they seemed to be having an animated conversation.>

That’s all reasonably predictable.  But later in the evening (in Philadelphia), this is what happens:

On the way home, after continued prodding from his mother, John confessed: “Her name is Michele, she’s French, her father works at the French consulate, and she’s a nurse at Pennsylvania Hospital.”

That’s a bit of s surprise!

Some months later, Caterina and Michele are sharing a room in Jamie and John’s family house.  Look at the differences in the attitudes of the two women (one Sicilian, the other Parisian) to their bodies:

Michele proceeded to strip herself naked, tossing the clothes on her bed, picked up a towel and disappeared into the bathroom.  When she returned, she toweled herself at the foot of Caterina’s bed and began to make conversation.

Caterina was unnerved.  ‘I’ve got to keep my eyes on her face,’ she thought, ‘why doesn’t she get dressed?  Hasn’t she any modesty?’

Michele was oblivious; she continued to talk about her work in the hospital, while carefully drying her under arms and her bottom.  Finally, she went to her suitcase, took out some underwear and proceeded to put it on, by now explaining to Caterina why none of the nurses liked a particular orthopedic surgeon.

Caterina had seen pictures in fashion magazines of underwear like Michele put on, but it had never occurred to her to buy anything like it for herself.  ‘It’s too provocative!’ she thought.  A yellow thong and push-up bra, both decorated with white lacy panels.

“You going to take a shower?” Michele inquired.

“Yes, I think I will.”  She got up, and took off her blue blazer, matching trousers, silk blouse, and her tights.  She put the trousers, blazer and blouse on hangers in the closet.  Picking out a fresh set of white underwear, she went to take a shower, her towel under her arm.

Michele eyed Caterina as she returned from the bathroom in her clean white underwear.

This is fairly predictable.

Several years later, John, who is still together with Michele, but unmarried, is suddenly diagnosed with bone cancer, and part of his left leg is removed.  This is the conversation between John and Caterina in John’s hospital room:

“What is it, John?” Caterina asked.

“Nothing.”

“John!  What is it?”

“Have you seen Michele?”

“No.  When did you last see her?”

“It was a couple days ago.  I called to tell her I was having the operation.”  He looked at Caterina with sad intensity.  “I haven’t seen her since.”

“Doesn’t she work in this hospital?”

“Yeah, she works in the operating theater.”

“You didn’t see her when you went in . . . ?”

“No, I was out like a light.”

“And she hasn’t called . . . or . . . ?”

“No.”  They looked at each other – dismay on both faces.

“Strange, very strange,” she said.

John’s cancer and the sudden disappearance of Michele are certainly surprises.  Caterina tracks Michele down in the hospital.  This is the conversation between them:

“Michele, I need to talk to you for a minute.”  Michele put down her magazine and stared at Caterina defensively.

“I’m on duty.”
“Come with me for a minute.”  Caterina took her arm and pulled her to her feet.  At seven pm, the corridor was deserted.

“What do you want?” Michele asked in a surly tone.

“It’s not what I want.  It’s what John wants.  He wants to see you!”

Michele’s mouth opened as if to say something; then she looked away, her lips trembling.  She tried to turn away, but Caterina took her arm again, restraining her.

“Tell me!“ Caterina demanded softly.

“He’s a cripple!  . . . I can’t. . . .  No, he’s a cripple,” Michele began to sob.

“He’s not a cripple!  He’s lost a leg.  In a month or so he’ll be walking again.  He needs you, Michele.”

Michele shuddered.  “A cripple,” she said softly.  The tears were coming profusely now.

Caterina retained her grip on Michele, looking into her face but saying nothing.

“My uncle . . .” Michele faltered

“Yes, what about your uncle?”

“He lost a leg in a bombing when he was fighting in Algeria.  . . . He used to come up behind me when I was studying. . . . I could hear his wooden leg on the floor.”  Her eyes were squeezed shut and she held her trembling hands out in front of herself in a defensive gesture.  “He touched my hair . . . and he reached around and . . . he touched me!”  She covered her face with her hands and sobbed.  Caterina put her arms around Michele and hugged her until she was quiet.  They stood motionless for a time.

“Michele, John loves you.  He is not your uncle.”

As Michele looked at Caterina, apparently without seeing her; her pager sounded.  She disengaged herself and looked at it.  “I have to go,” she said.

Then, there is one more surprise when John has just won an election as a US Congressman from Pennsylvania.  He and Michele have not seen each other for about a month. While John, his campaign staff, family and friends are celcbrating his victory in a hotel ballroom early in the morning.  Here is what happens:

Jamie saw her first, and he nudged Caterina.  From across the room, a solitary figure in a blue and white striped uniform and wearing white pointed cap was slowly approaching John.  Her demeanor was reserved yet determined.  It was Michele.  She stood slightly behind him and to his left, waiting patiently for him to notice her.  The two men to whom John was talking kept glancing at her until John turned to see who they were looking at.

“Oh, Michele . . . “ he said.  The two men moved away.

“Congratulations, John,” she said, nervously clasping and unclasping her hands.  “You did very well!”

He said eagerly: “It’s great to see you, Michele.”

At that, she dissolved and the tears started.  “Oh, John, I’ve been so stupid. . . . So very stupid.  . . . . Will you forgive me?”  She stood looking at him, her cap slightly awry, dark streaks of mascara on her cheeks, her hands at her sides and an expression of pure sorrow on her face.  John leaned forward on his crutches and embraced her.

“I’m so sorry, John, I’m so sorry!” she said softly.

“I love you, Michele!”

She began to weep in earnest: “I don’t know why. . . . I don’t deserve it.”

(For more information about my novels, see www.williampeace.net.)

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While there is no means of finding an exact count, it has been estimated that there are at least a quarter of a million words in the  English language.  The largest dictionary has over 400,000 entries, but should all of these entries be classified as words?  Many words are considered obsolete or archaic.  There are words like ‘hotdog’ that are combinations of two words, where the combined words have a different meaning than either of the elemental  words.  It is thought that about half the words in the English language are nouns and about 15% are verbs.  This leaves plenty of space for adjectives and adverbs.  But how many words does the average person know?  It has been estimated that the vocabulary of the average English-speaking college graduate is 20,000 to 25,000 words.  Professor David Crystal (linguist, author, academic) has estimated that a more accurate estimate is 60,000 active words and 75,000 passive words.  Estimates of Shakespeare’s vocabulary range from 18,000 to 25,000, depending on what one considers a word.

No matter what word count one adopts, it is fair to say that the writer has plenty of ammunition from which to choose.  Why is it then that we encounter so many cliches in writing?  How about:

• He swept her off her feet
• It was love at first sight
• She quickly recovered herself
• The dinner was well served and very tasty
• There was a silver moon in the sky
• He played a good game of tennis
• etc.

While I can’t say that I am immune to the disease of cliches, I try hard to work around the traps that they represent.  Why traps?  They are traps because they are easy to fall into, and they add no value for the reader: they are vague, uninformative, and any emotive element they may have had at one time is long since washed out.

On my writing table beside me is my Oxford Thesaurus of English, and it rescues me whenever a cliche threatens, or I feel: that’s not the right word; it’s close, but it’s not right.  To avoid cliche, one has to be more specific.  Rather than say, “He swept her off her feet”, it would be more informative to say something like: “She was captivated by his languorous, baritone voice.”  ‘Beautiful’  is a word that I try not to use: it is so overused that it is hopelessly vague.  Depending on the situation in which ‘beautiful’ would otherwise be used, I might use ‘glamourous’ or ‘stunning’ or ‘beguiling’.

My thesaurus has a useful wordfinder, I can find onomatopoetic words like ‘judder’ (a rapid, forceful vibration) and ‘whoosh’ (the rushing sound of fast movement).  One can find foreign words and phrases like ‘al dente’ when one is writing about pasta, or ‘faux pas’ (socially embarrassing blunder), for which the equivalent English phrase is awkward.  And then, there’s the main section of the wordfinder where one can find a particular colour, or bird, or name for a district of a city, or card game, or . . .

One should try to choose words that convey specific meaning, are evocative, without being contrived, and without (hopefully) leaving the reader to think “I wonder what that word means”.

Some of us like happy endings in the novels we read.  Others prefer an inconclusive ending, where the reader can invent his/her own ending.  Sometimes we are stimulated by a message the author has given us: about life, or about being human.  I have to confess that, when I’m writing, I prefer to write happy endings – probably because I’m an optimist about life.  Fishing in Foreign Seas has a happy ending.  There’s plenty of trouble stored up before the ending.  Jamie, the principal character, loses a huge order.  His wife, Caterina, hates where they are living, is furious at her husband for being tempted by his PA, and her sex life isn’t working well.  Moreover, they have a Down’s Syndrome child.

With Sin & Contrition, it wasn’t really possible to write a happy ending.  Instead, I gave each of the six characters a chance to have a final say.  Some of them come off rather well; others less so.  The message is that all of us are actually sinners.  The extent to which we are forgiven (and forgive ourselves) depends on the extent to which we admit our mistakes and try, conscientiously, not to repeat them.

Recently, I’ve taken the view that the ending of a chapter is important, too.  In the post about Beginnings, I made the point that the writer must try to intrigue the reader with the first few sentences.  If one assumes that most readers pause their reading at the end of a chapter, I think it’s a good idea to leave the reader uncertain about what will happen next.  S/he therefore has an incentive to pick the book up sooner – rather than later – to find out what happened.  I’m not a fan of any particular soap opera, but it seems to be a universal technique that the viewer is presented with a twist in the plot at the end of  an episode, and the viewer hears, “Tune in next Tuesday to find out how Sally copes with . . . ”  Of course, if the author presented the reader with this kind of a teaser at the end of every chapter, the reader would begin to feel that the story is too contrived.  So, I’m only suggesting that the writer give a thought about how to bring a chapter to conclusion in a way that keeps the reader’s interest.

For example, here is the conclusion of Chapter 9 of Fishing in Foreign Seas.  Valerie is a sales engineer who works for Jamie.  She has just turned in the big bid, and she invites him for a drink.

Valerie was interesting company.  She talked about her family, what she did during the summers as a teenager, and she had some funny stories about her friends.  On her second drink, she told him about her ex-boyfriend.  Apparently, he had been very ‘fit’ (read ‘sexy’), but he had tried to manage her life, and she had dumped him.

“I prefer a more mature man who’ll give me some space, and rather likes having a woman with a strong libido around.”  She looked at him meaningfully.

“Yes, I see,” he said, vaguely, and asked the waiter for the check.

“How about I buy you dinner?  After all, this was supposed to be my drink,” she suggested.

“I have to get home, and get my beauty sleep, ready for Arizona Electric at seven tomorrow.”

“OK.”  She paused.  “Do you like Margaritas?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Well, I make a great Margarita!  Next time at my place.” 

Does Valerie get Jamie to her place?  You’ll have to read more to find out.

I think it’s very important to catch the reader’s interest at the very outset of a novel, so, in my opinion, the first page of the first chapter should not be an ‘introduction’ to the novel.  I believe it should plunge the reader right into the action, so that by the end of the first page, s/he is emotionally and intellectually involved.

For example, here are the first three sentences of chapter one which appear on the screen of a Kindle reader on the Amazon website.  (I have no idea what the book is.):

“The churchyard was peaceful in the summer afternoon.  Twigs and branches lay strewn across the gravel path, torn from the trees by the gales which had swept the country in that stormy June of 1545.  In London, we had escaped lightly, only a few chimney-pots gone, but the winds had wreaked havoc in the north.”

There is a similar beginning on the screens of Kindles on advertising posters in the London underground.  The first sentences are about a river and how the river is the beginning.

Do these beginnings engage your interest?  Mildly, perhaps.  By way of contrast, here is the beginning of the first chapter of Fishing in Foreign Seas:

“The phone on Mary Beth’s desk rang.  She picked it up, and cocking her head to one side, put the instrument between her blonde hair and her ear.  “Sales and marketing, Mary Beth speaking. . . .  Oh, hi, Eddie what are you up to?” with a sassy smile.  “I’m sure it must be more exciting than that in St Louis! . . .  Who, me?  I’m just a good little girl!” feigning a priggish face for Jamie’s benefit.  Jamie started to grin.

‘There’s a lot of information in this brief paragraph.  There are three characters: Mary Beth, Eddie and Jamie.  We know that Mary Beth is blonde, she alternates between being sassy and priggish, and claims to be a ‘good little girl’.  We know that Eddie is in St. Louis, and that he has apparently told Mary Beth it’s not particularly exciting there.  Then there’s Jamie, who grins when Mary Beth pretends to be priggish.  Hmm.  Wouldn’t the reader like to know more about these characters?

Then there’s this opening paragraph of Sin & Contrition:

“‘It’s hard to tell’,LaMarr thought, ‘what angle I should fire the shot.  Can’t see the road.  Not really sure how far it is.  Maybe about like this.’  He drew back the small leather patch which was attached to the arms of the slingshot by strong rubber bands, and extending his left arm upwards at an angle, he released the shot.  He could not see it, but he heard the marble pass through the leaves of the trees overhead.  He waited, listening for the marble to strike.”

Something strange is going on here.  LaMarr is using a slingshot to shoot marbles up through the trees, apparently trying to hit a road which he can’t see.  Why is he doing that?  Wouldn’t the reader like to know?

But, I think that a new chapter should similarly engage the reader’s interest.  If the reader sets the book aside at the end of a chapter, and picks it up at the beginning of a new chapter, s/he will want to be drawn into the situation right away.  Consider this opening paragraph of chapter two of Fishing in Foreign Seas:

“He saw her across the bar-lounge of the Teatro Massimo in Palermo.  She was the most incredibly beautiful woman he had ever seen.  She was tall – about 5 feet 9, he guessed, with jet black hair down to her waist, but gathered by a blue ribbon at the nape of her neck.  She was wearing a white pleated linen dress, belted at the waist to emphasize her slim figure.  She was sipping champagne and surveying the crowd around her.  He had to meet her, even if he made an idiot of himself because he didn’t speak a word of Italian.”

This passage prompts the questions in the reader’s mind: will he meet her?  will he make an idiot of himself?

Or this from the beginning of chapter two of Sin & Contrition:

“Ellen Weybridge was lounging against the headboard of her queen-sized bed, a pillow behind her.  Her friend, Josie, was sprawled, carelessly, on the bed to her left, while Bettina, the third girl in this close-knit trio, sat cross-legged at the foot of the bed.  All three thirteen-year-olds, classmates at Dorseyville Middle School, were similarly dressed in jeans and sports T-shirts.”

Why are they there?  What are they up to?

This is a follow-up on my post regarding sex.

A lady friend of mine (probably in her sixties) told me she was put off by the chapter in Sin & Contrition which is entitled Finding Out. This chapter deals with teenagers discovering sex, and their reactions to their discoveries.  There are various reactions: disgust, fascination, bravado, feeling left out, etc.  While she didn’t say so, I think what put my friend off were the descriptions of three boys discovering heterosexuality, and of one boy achieving sexual maturity.  She said, “It was just too much.  I had been through some of that with my sons, and I didn’t want to be reminded of it.”  Naturally, I didn’t ask her about her experience with her sons, but evidently it wasn’t good.

In thinking about this feedback, I’ve had several thoughts.  First of all, I didn’t intend to offend any one’s sensibilities.  I had been through what I wrote about (many years ago), and there’s nothing exaggerated in any way.  I remember it clearly, and I remember feeling much as LaMarr is reported as feeling.  In retrospect, it’s neither good nor bad; it’s just part of growing up.

My second thought was, ‘maybe I should have made it less explicit’.  (What happens is pretty clear.)  But it’s not erotic.  Some readers might consider it ‘disgusting’, but on this basis, lots of body functions would be so labeled.  The problem with making it less explicit, is that it loses its emotional impact.  LaMarr experiences his first ejaculation.  He sees it; the reader sees it.  He reacts emotionally, and the reader has an opportunity to empathise.  If it is written in such a way that what he sees is vague, it becomes more difficult for the reader to share his feelings.

As I said in the previous post, I don’t believe in explicitness about events that please or feel good to a character.  With a little hinting, we know what he or she is feeling.  But for strange or painful events, I think it is harder for us to tune into what the character is feeling.  We have a natural tendency to deny difficult or hurtful things.  So for these events, I may feel the need to be explicit. 

The battle scene in Sin & Contrition in which Mason is killed and LaMarr lies weeping over his friend’s body is  another example.

(For more information about my novels, see www.williampeace.net.)