The Craft of Writing

Put Your Best Prose Forward

Jane Toombs and Janet Lane Walters

The last word of the story has been typed. As the author, feeling a rush of accomplishment, you're ready to send the manuscript to an editor or an agent. Or are you? A final check will make sure the prose shines bright enough to spark the agent or editor into enthusiasm for your project.

You may be fortunate enough to have a critique partner or a group who can point out the flaws. What if you don't have these resources? This was our primary reason for writing Becoming Your Own Critique Partner from Zumaya Books. Summarizing our entire book into a single chapter is impossible, but here are a number of steps you can take to make sure you've put your best prose forward.

The reader's interest must be captured from the first word. This interest must be held through the middle to the end. But if the opening chapter doesn't intrigue the editor, agent or reader, a meaty middle or a dynamic ending won't matter. Here are some ways to check the first chapter to make sure of that interest.

1. Do you have your main character or characters in trouble of some kind right away, or make it clear one or both might be headed for trouble? You'd better!

Does this mean you have to have a slam-bang opening with action galore? Not really. A sense of danger or a hint of a problem will pull the reader into the story. Be warned, though: If the opening is too exciting, keeping up the pace may prove impossible. Here's an example of an opening with a promise of something to come.

"A flash of lightning brightened the sleeping chamber. Ash woke with a start and burrowed into the pillows. The scent of trouble rode the air currents that threaded through the open window slats."

Here's an opening that begins with a mixture of mystery and excitement.

"He floated in darkness, the tiny flame of his awareness the only light in the Stygian gloom. The flame flickered, fading, he had no will to keep it aglow. As he drifted closer to the dark shore of no return, a beam of blue energy seared across the blackness. Drawn to the power, his life force flared anew, growing as it fed on the surging fountain of energy."

2. Do you have a lot of backstory at the beginning? Take it out and drop it in later in dribs and drabs when necessary. Just not a chunk of it in Chapter 2, or you may stop the action cold. Never do that.

Often writers use backstory as their way of learning who their characters are and how they react. This information is needed by the author, but not the reader. Readers don't need to know much about a main character's past right away. Only when some such information affects the present action does the writer need to drop that tidbit into the story.

For example: when Mary was three, she was locked in a closet by her older brother. If nothing in the present story makes this incident from the past have an effect on what's happening to her now, there's no reason to mention this. But if Mary has to hide in a dark place during the story, how she reacts may be governed by the incident from her past. Then and there the reader needs to know.

Another example: The main character in Under The Shadow wakes injured on a California beach during gold-rush days. He doesn't know who he is, where he is, or how he got there. So he has no past. Neither he, nor the reader learns anything about his past until an injury halfway through the book restores his memory. So there is no back story at all until that point. Even then, a flashback shows (not tells) where he came from. Then he's immediately thrust into action with no huge chunk of back history dropped in.

3. Is it clear where and when the action is taking place? That is, do readers know by the second page where in the world (or galaxy) they are? If not a contemporary story, do they know what year it is? See that you tell them in some way where and when they are. Do remember that just mentioning a local landmark is not telling a reader from another part of the country or world where the story is set. Of course if you use the Empire State Building that is enough of a landmark so most readers will recognize where they are. Is it day or night? Hot or cold? Indoors or out? Readers need to know.

One way of letting the reader know where or when is to state it at the opening of the chapter. For example. "Dover England, August 1811." This will show where and when, but there are other ways of weaving the place and time into the story.

"The sun rose above the distant hills. The August day promised to be a scorcher. Once again she had come to the Dover docks. For a moment, she felt a chill and wished she'd worn a pelisse."

This example shows much of the same information as given in the dateline but draws the reader into the story.

"The palace of the wizards rose on the horizon. The setting sun colored the crystal spheres in iridescent rainbows."

Here the sample shows we are in a different world and the time is evening.

"Andrea Sullivan skirted a small stand of pine and stopped, staring at strangely familiar ivy-covered ruins dead ahead. She'd never set foot in Gatineau Park before — or Quebec Province for that matter — but Sherri's long ago description of the McKenzie King ruins had proved to be marvelously accurate."

In the above example Canada is not mentioned, but the reader picks up the clue from "Quebec Province." Since no date is mentioned, the reader assumes it's contemporary, which is well established as the chapter goes on.

4. Do you have talking heads? Readers need to see characters in some kind of surroundings and performing actions that give clues to their nature. Be sure they do.

Long passages of dialogue with no action or sense of place are fine in a movie or a play. In those forms there are visual components. In a book the writer needs to show the reader who is speaking, show where they are, and by their actions give a hint to the kind of person they are.

5. Are you positive of the meanings of all your words? Have you loaded the chapter with ing words, ly adverbs and too many adjectives? If so, rewrite without them. Are you sure you know the difference between words such as affect and effect? Are you positive it's means it is and its is a possessive? Are you sure you haven't mistyped a word, such as loin for lion?

Using ing words, or adverbs and adjectives isn't wrong but they can muddy the prose or throw your words into a whirlpool pattern. Do vary your sentence structure. Try not to fall into a predictable pattern such as the one below.

Example: "Standing on the pier, she stared at the rushing waves....