A Novel within a Series of Stories

By The Word Process on Feb 19, 2010

When our book club discussed Elizabeth Strout’s OLIVE KITTERIDGE, the talk centered on whether the eponymous character, Olive Kitteridge, was likeable, whether her marriage was healthy, whether she abused her child and whether she was really a good teacher and member of her community. Roughly half the members liked Kitteridge; half did not.

What is interesting about the book is its unusual construction; OLIVE KITTERIDGE is a novel within a series of short stories. The author has said that she thought Olive, who appears in each of the 13 stories, could best be presented in an episodic manner. The format does give Strout the ability to show Olive from different points of view and in different situations. The character burns through.

But perhaps as a consequence, the stories themselves blend together and were often confused by  book club members. They present a uniformly dark view of small town America.  Strout’s Cosby, Maine is riddled with suicide, murder, hostage taking, arson and infidelity. Its residents are hard to distinguish from one another. Even their names are similar: Harmon, Coulson, Houlton and Harwood. If Olive is the focal point, they are the blurry background. Strout seems to be saying that difficult Olive is OK, the others aren’t.

In using multiple stories to tell a story, Strout set up a difficult task for herself. This an interesting read for writers and those who are interested in the craft of writing.

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The Economy of Dickens

By The Word Process on Feb 16, 2010

Charles Dickens may be one of the most wordy authors in the English language in the sense that he was prolific, creating something like 20 novels, four short story collections and nine volumes of nonfiction, poetry and plays. He wrote a lot of words. But interestingly, allowing for Victorian style, his prose was economical. Here is the first graph of A CHRISTMAS CAROL:

“Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it; and Scrooge’s name was good upon ‘Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.”

This is pretty succinct even for a writer today. And its brevity – specifically its brevity – tells the reader a lot: Not only was Marley dead but Scrooge was sure he was dead. The world at large had also signed off on him: the church, the state, the tradesman and the person who had been hired to mourn his passing. Marley was gone – and forever. He could not possibly appear anywhere on earth, which is exactly what he does later.

These few sentences tell us something about Marley in that he had no grieving family and friends. They tell us something about Scrooge. He was a respected man of business. Good upon ‘change means that he had good credit.

They also foreshadow what is to come. Marley being dead as a door nail hints at his appearance as a door knocker later in the book.

Dickens doesn’t muck it up with extraneous detail. Nowhere in the book does he tell us anything about the circumstances of Marley’s death, what he died of or where. Dickens does tell us when, Christmas Eve seven years earlier. He has a reason for that; the book takes place significantly on the anniversary of Marley’s death. What Dickens chooses to say about Marley is that the world regarded him as interchangeable with Scrooge, often mistaking Scrooge for him. And doesn’t that reveal a lot about Marley? His life was similar, if not identical, to Scrooge’s.  `Nuff said.

There is a lesson in this for would-be writers. Think about what you are choosing to include in your writing. And have a reason for every word you use.

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Exclusivity versus Multiple Submissions

By The Word Process on Feb 12, 2010

We recently wrote a query letter for a client. When we sent it to her, we explained that she could send it exclusively to a single literary agent or submit it to multiple agents.

The next day she e-mailed to say that she had sent her query to almost 90 agents. So much for exclusivity!

She is a business woman and probably reasoned that if she has to compete for business so should literary agents. We have some sympathy with that point of view. Having to apply to agents one by one is a ridiculously slow process. An agent may take weeks before fishing out that one query and reading it. There is no guarantee it will be read at all. If the answer is a rejection, the author has to go through the process all over again – and again. When years of hard work are at stake, it can be a long and excruciating wait for a conclusive answer.

But exclusivity has its place. Obviously, if the author really wants a certain literary agent to represent him, he should offer his work to that agent alone. Agents justify the request for exclusivity on the grounds that they have to invest considerable effort and time in reading whole manuscripts. Presumably then, a manuscript that is presented exclusively will get more of that effort and time. And the author may get points for choosing a single agent.

When you are faced with this choice, think about the book you have written and which route may best benefit it. Mass market books might fare better with a mass agent approach, while something like literary fiction, with low sales expectations, might best be offered up on an exclusive silver platter. Marketing your book begins here. As close to impossible as publication is, you want to give it your very best shot.

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A Query Letter Should be a Tease

By The Word Process on Feb 10, 2010

After writing numerous query letters on behalf of our clients, here are some conclusions we have reached about what works:

1) A query should titillate agents, rather than leave them sated. Give them just enough to provoke interest and make them hungry to learn more.

2) Unless the book is non fiction and steeped in some knowledge you and only you have, the query letter should be about the book, not the author. Who you are doesn’t matter. What you have to sell does.

3) It should be somewhat cocky. Tell them what you’ve got and end with an expectation rather than a plea. (“I look forward to hearing from you.”)

4) Have a reason for contacting this agent (so the agent doesn’t think you’ve sent query letters to every agent in the book) EG: “Because you represented xxxxx (a book like yours) I thought this might be your kind of novel.”

5) If you are querying by e mail, always include a SASE or you’ll never hear back. If the agent accepts e mail, query that way. (Shorter time hearing back)

6) It doesn’t hurt to compare your book to books that have sold well: (eg: “Madman is a character-driven thriller in the tradition of Frederick Forsyth’s The Day of the Jackal and, more recently, Daniel Silva’s The Mark of the Assassin.”)

7) A query should never be longer than one page.

These are our thoughts as writers and editors on query letters, and here is a recently posted top ten list of query dos and don’ts from literary agent Rachelle Gardner: http://bit.ly/ahkKur.

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Why We Love Writers

By The Word Process on Feb 5, 2010

Rounding out a memorial Week of Salinger, there is this which reminds us why writers are special.

“‘Are you a poet?’ he asked.
‘A poet?’ Nicholson said. ‘Lord, no. Alas, no. Why do you ask?’
‘I don’t know. Poets are always taking the weather so personally. They’re always sticking their emotions in things that have no emotions.’ “
— J.D. Salinger (Nine Stories)

On the other hand, as we in the mid-Atlantic region anticipate the rapidly approaching  SNOW STORM OF THE CENTURY, it occurs to us that this winter has made poets of us all.

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You Loved the Book, Do You Want to Know the Author?

By The Word Process on Feb 3, 2010

“What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn’t happen much, though.” — J.D. Salinger (The Catcher in the Rye)

If you loved Catcher, would you have wanted to ring or text J.D.Salinger? Given his reclusive life, it is a safe bet, he was not open to hearing from fans.

The operative word in the above quote is wish. Holden Caulfield fantasized about being the friend of the few authors he admired. He did not really expect to meet them or get to know them. One senses that if he did, it would be a disappointment.

Since every reader brings a different emotional background to the page, it is unlikely that the book being read is the same as the book that was written. An author who seems like a soul mate, is likely someone else all together.

Authors are more aware of this gap than readers – and are sometimes hurt by it.  Maybe Salinger was one of them.

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Salinger on Reading to Write

By The Word Process on Feb 2, 2010

We probably have a somewhat nuanced view since we work with writers, but it does seem like everybody is writing these days and nobody’s reading. For sure, the number of people reading books is shrinking. And who really reads all these blogs and other material that is posted on the Net?

The author J.D. Salinger, who died last week, was already missing a certain kind of reader in 1963 when he wrote:

“If there is an amateur reader still left in the world–or anybody who just reads and runs–I ask him or her, with untellable affection and gratitude, to split the dedication of this book four ways with my wife and children.”
— J.D. Salinger (Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction)

If readers were rare 50 years ago, today they are probably on the verge of extinction. There are so many new, electronic ways to fill time, including it seems word processing or…writing. But Salinger also reminds us how integral reading is to the act of writing.

“If only you’d remember before ever you sit down to write that you’ve been a reader long before you were ever a writer. You simply fix that fact in your mind, then sit very still and ask yourself, as a reader, what piece of writing in all the world Buddy Glass would most want to read if he had his heart’s choice. The next step is terrible, but so simple I can hardly believe it as I write it. You just sit down shamelessly and write the thing yourself. I won’t even underline that. It’s too important to be underlined.”
— J.D. Salinger (Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction)

(Note that Salinger does not substitute formatting for using his words – “too important to be underlined.” But that is another blog for another day.)

A fair number of the writers who come to us have never been readers. We sometimes wonder how much better their work would be if they were.

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The Power of a Pronoun

By The Word Process on Jan 29, 2010

We are struck by the use of one word in Hilary Mantel’s Booker-winning Wolf Hall. Wolf Hall is Mantel’s take on Thomas Cromwell, counselor to Henry VIII and one of England’s historical villains. Mantel has said that she was interested in Cromwell because while the public part of his life is well documented, his first 30 years and private life are obscure. As she explains in the video below, she sets out to bring him to life in Wolf Hall.

One way Mantel animates Cromwell is with the use of a two-letter pronoun. She calls him by name only when she absolutely has to for the sake of the narrative. Instead, she almost always refers to him as he. This does a couple of interesting things.

For one, it places the reader firmly inside his head. By making him less of a discrete character, the reader can occupy the space behind his eyes. And since he – as Mantel pictures him – is the soul of a reasonable man, the reader reasons right along with him. This is a slippery path since as he becomes more powerful, he is increasingly responsible for the deaths of other people.

Often, the reader is often unsure whether he is he or refers to some other character. This confusion, we think, makes a point. That is because he utterly defines the man as someone who got to the height of power from nowhere by taking on the coloration of the tapestry. Thus, a two-letter word serves as a whole string of adjectives. He is self-effacing, discreet, pleasant, smart, ambitious, kindly, calculating, efficient, competent, shape-shifting, slippery, political, and more.

Ah-ooo for Wolf Hall.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHpFHfhJqJ0&feature=related]

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Words, Words, Words

By The Word Process on Jan 27, 2010

Why do writers overwrite? Which is to say, why do they/we use too many words. In our ten years of working with writers, we have made some observations. As follows:

1) Often, it is part of the process. It is necessary for some people to use lots and lots of words to establish what they are trying to say. This is the tossing the paint against the well approach and hopefully, this writer understands that revision is a necessary part of the process too.

2) A lot of writers do not trust the reader. Got to get over this. It helps to define and establish the reader in your mind. If you can do that, you can make the reader gentle and smart enough to pick up meaning in places where you have removed extraneous words. Anybody who belongs to a book club knows that no two people read the same passage in the same way anyway so over explaining for the reader’s benefit is a pure waste of words

3) Sometimes, writers are self-conscious. The subject matter can be close to a writer’s bone and so the writer throws up a screen of words. This is where you, the writer, ask yourself some hard questions about your honesty and intent. You may want to get a second opinion from an astute reader.

Next time, you come across a passage in a book where a writer has used too many words, ask yourself why. It is one way in which the writer reveals her/himself.

There are so many reasons to read.

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At Publishing Houses, Editors are Dinosaurs

By The Word Process on Jan 26, 2010

The sad part is that you can no longer rely on publishers to do this kind of line editing.  Time was when a reputable publisher who bought your book then went through it in exacting detail, suggesting broad changes as well as line edits.  Some writers fought with the editor at the publishing house over those suggested changes, but most – like me – were grateful for the attention and grateful to be the recipient of the special skills good editors possessed.

Authors complain the number of publishers who take the time to do that today are….. “really very, very, very few.”

Linda Cashdan

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