Tuesday, December 8: Mystery Masterclass
Our guest columnist today is John R. Corrigan, who teaches AP English and Mystery Literature at the Pomfret School in Pomfret, Connecticut. A native of Augusta, Maine, he received an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Texas at El Paso. John is an avid golfer, and from 2001 to 2005 was a columnist for Gold Today Magazine. He applied his love of golf to his first five novels Cut Shot (2001), Nap Hook (2004), Center Cut (2004), Bad Lie (2005), and Out of Bounds (2006). John also writes about a handicap that you don’t get on the golf course. As a child, he was diagnosed with dyslexia, an ailment that he has had to struggle long and hard with, and which provides a theme that permeates much of his writing. He is currently at work on a new series featuring a US Border Patrol agent, as well as a standalone novel set in the world of wealthy prep schools. John writes the Thursday column at Type M for Murder. Today for Criminal Brief he will share his thoughts on editing, or more specifically, what he does with a scene that seems to fall flat.
—Steve Steinbock
BREATHING LIFE INTO A DEAD-END SCENE
by John R. Corrigan
This is about showing vs. telling, about making bad writing better, and about turning nothing into something.
You and I both know we should write every day, and hopefully we do our best to accomplish that. Writer’s block is nothing more than, as poet William Stafford said, writers who can’t “lower their expectations.” If you’re going to write every day, which is a necessity for most who write novel-length fiction, you’ll face many days when you don’t have your “A game.” So how can you work through those days and those drafts that seem to go nowhere? Below, I have written 103 words of fresh copy, a would-be opening paragraph that in its current state poses few if any interesting questions, grabs the reader with all the power of a dead-fish handshake, and makes no one, including the author, want to read on. But I will work with this scene and see if I can shape it into a potentially successful opening. I invite you to go along for the ride and take whatever you feel is useful from it.
She looked out the window, and saw the boy crossing the street alone. He was too young to cross that street by himself, she thought. His mother should be there. The sun was setting at 5:25 that Thursday afternoon. The boy was no older than seven, wearing a worn winter coat, the zipper of which was broken, the right sleeve torn. She sipped her tea and continued rocking, wondering if the sleeve had been torn by bullies and thinking, again, his mother should be walking him home as she once did with Jane, before the diagnosis, and long Jane was laid to rest.
Brutal. There is only one direction this scene can go. One sure-fire way to add tension is to change the tense.
She looks out the window, and sees the boy cross the street alone. He is too young to cross that street by himself, she thinks. His mother should be there. The sun is setting at 5:25 on Thursday afternoon. The boy is no older than seven, wearing a worn winter coat, the zipper of which is broken, the right sleeve torn. She sips her tea and continues rocking, wondering if the sleeve has been torn by bullies and thinking, again, his mother should be walking him home as she once did with Jane, before the diagnosis, and long Jane was laid to rest.
The opening sentences now pose several questions—always a goal I have when starting a story or novel. But the last lines are still flat. I’ll try playing with the syntax, shortening the sentences, and adding more tension by taking liberties with fragments.
The boy is crossing the street. Alone. Head down. Tiny sneakers shuffling through the snow. From where she sits, Maggie can see his breath coming in small puffs in the cold air. Too young to cross that street by himself. Where is his mother? It is nearly dark at 5:25 Thursday afternoon. She thinks of Jane, before her diagnosis, much before all that followed. The boy is no older than seven, wearing a worn winter coat, the zipper of which is broken, the right sleeve torn. She sips her tea. Rocks slowly. Thinking. Jane? Jane? Did bullies tear the boy’s sleeve? Where is his mother? She’d been there for Jane, although it didn’t matter. The disease was the ultimate bully. Rocking slowly, the teacup begins to tremble. The realization made her stop: This boy’s mother doesn’t deserve him. The next realization was the one that made her set her teacup on the windowsill and stand. There is an empty bedroom downstairs. The rag. The ether. She will save this boy. She knows she must.
Still rough around the edges, but I can work with this. Most importantly, I want to work with this now. The old lady has come alive. She’s creepy now, and she offers me lots of questions to examine during the writing process. What was her relationship with Jane? Does she feel guilty about Jane’s death? What will she do when she gets the boy? Are the bullies only imagined? Did you notice that I never explicitly offered Maggie’s age, but rather, I gave details (including a name) that I hoped would resonate?
How far will this story go? No way to know until I really delve into it, but now the story is there. I have a character ready and able to lead me someplace interesting. Most importantly, I’ve turned nothing into something, which is the goal of every writing session.
I agree with your maxim of writing every day, but to write well one must read ten times more than one writes. In your 175 word paragraph (the last and improved one) you use the same verb (to be) nine times. We call this condition “isarrhea.” I suggest writing for a month without ever using “to be”, and notice the improvement. If you can’t supply other verbs, you haven’t read enough.
You have written 10 incomplete sentences and asked five questions. In my humble opinion, breaking the basic rules of writing won’t improve it.
John, between example 1 and 2, you switched from past tense to present. Is present tense for this scene only or the entire story?
I’ve written immediate, introductory, and even flashback scenes in present tense, but I haven’t attempted an entire story, probably because I think of Patricia Cornwell novels. (When reading her Scarpetta series, I find myself distracted by ongoing present tense.)
What are your thoughts regarding tense? Could you expand upon the thought process between examples 1 and 2? Would you craft the entire work in present tense? Thanks.
There are as many ways to tell a story as there are story-tellers. The choices that any particular writer uses to tell the story inform the tale with his particular insights and tastes, and tastes by their very nature vary over a wide spectrum of preferences.
I don’t know that eliminating the copula as an exercise is necessarily constructive. As I understand the use of the present tense as a narrative voice, it is meant to emphasize the existential quality of the story, to imbue it with immediacy. With such an aim in view, the extensive use of copulas is not only natural, it is virtually mandatory. Likewise with the use of sentence fragments, which are meant to convey impressions rather than coherent, logical observations. As such, both techniques may be essential to the story being told, because they are instrumental in how the action unfolds.
I am not a big fan of present tense narratives or sentence fragments in my own writing—although I freely admit to having used both techniques on occasion—but I found John’s description of his own writing and editorial process engaging and informative.
But as an exercise, I also reworked John’s draft paragraph, and here’s what I came up with. I do not offer it as in any way superior to John’s, but it shows how different sensibilities handle the same material.
Thanks for the feedback, everyone.
As I said (and I think Mr. Harris missed this point), this was simply an example of how experimentation can set you free and allow you to turn nothing into something. It’s not from a story or part of a novel I ever finished. The experimentation here–changing tenses, asking questions, and writing fragments–was a means to try only to breathe life into a dead-end scene. It has nothing to do with how much I read (still scratching my head at that one). The final paragraph is still a blunt object, but something interesting is starting to take shape.
Thanks for the invite. I enjoyed it.
Thanks, John. I found the evolution of the paragraphs intriguing. I’d like to hear more if you pass this way again.
Thanks for a stimulating piece, John! Any time you’d like to contribute anything else here, I’m sure I speak for all of us at CB in extending a standing invitation for you to do so.
Fun piece.
I have published only one story in present tense – “The Center of the Universe” in Seattle Noir – and that story was deliberately odd (since the main character was reality-challenged). I wrote another novellette in present tense but haven’t been able to sell it. Too weird, or maybe just not good enough.
Speaking of trying different writing styles. in my notebook I have two versions of the same story. One begins with a certain scene. The other ends with it. I’m trying to decide which works better.
Dear John Corrigan.
Fascinated to read your thought processes in the creation of the ‘sample’ paragraph. Great idea! However, I hope you won’t mind explaining your last few words of the paragraph (in the first two versions):
“…and long Jane was laid to rest.” I must be blanking on an important turn of phrase here, all I can imagine is that the poor girl died of excessive height. Please help me out? Anybody?
BTW–Nancy Pickard is keeping a journal on the process of writing her latest book. If interested, a name Google will find it. I found it interesting.
Angela,
You got me there. That is a clunker. I would rewrite it for sure if I was doing anything with the story. I’m going to check out Nancy Pickard’s site. Thanks for the tip.
Thanks, John! Great article! Thanks everybody! Great comments!