Sequels, a blog article by Jessica P. Morrell

Scenes are the bricks or building blocks of fiction. They’re based on conflict and change. Each scene moves the story forward (or sometimes backward). They happen in real time, blow-by-blow, often sizzle with excitement and contain twists and surprises, and readers lean in close, wondering how each scene will resolve.

Sequels are the transitions that happen after the scenes. Sequels are focused on the aftermath and ramifications of a scene. When especially intense scenes happen, especially if a scene ends in disaster, setback, or failure, characters need a chance to sort through their emotions and thoughts. Often what comes first in a sequel is the POV character’s raw feelings like anger or despair. As in real life, once the character calms down, he or she is able to more objectively understand what has happened. From this understanding the character reaches a decision or new goal.  Sequels are important for shaping characters and motivations.  Thus the structure for sequels are emotion, ruminating, decision or goal.

For example, a couple who just started dating go out for dinner, drink more than they planned to and end up in bed together. Or perhaps they confess too much, reveal too much.  What takes place during the dinner or in the bedroom is unplanned and a game changer. The next day comes tough realizations and decisions. Does one of them back off the relationship? Is one scared by the depths of his/her feelings? Do they realize that they’ve made a big mistake?  

Or a scene can take place at a funeral. Often while at a funeral  characters might feel numb, or overcome by grief, or are desperately struggling to keep it together.  Afterward, in the sequel a character or characters have an opportunity to sort through their emotions Will they feel regret, relief, or anger? What will these feelings lead to? If someone was murdered this could lead to revenge. If someone died too young, perhaps the mourner wants to take more risks in life so then boldly asserts him or herself. Which then leads to a new scene.

Not every scene needs a sequel, especially near the climax or in fast-paced genres like thrillers. Typically stories that feature a lot of emotional risk such as romances or coming-of-age stories will contain more sequels. While sequels often feature analysis of what just happened, it’s important that it’s just not a rerun of the past events. Somehow the sequel must also be externalized. This means the character cannot sit around weeping or thinking alone in a scene—put the sequel into action. The character can call a friend or start working furiously, struggling to brush away unwanted emotions. It’s also important that sequels don’t go on too long. If you’re story feels too slow, make sure if every sequel is needed or if they can be tightened.

Sequels can also be about the physical impact of the scene—perhaps your character needs to bind a wound or force her breathing and heart rate back to normal. Horror stories use sequels to milk the suspense and fright factor. The character can call a friend or realize she’s in danger and start packing, madly tossing clothes and items into a suitcase. A private investigator can call in for backup and strategizing on taking down the bad guy. 

Without sequels fiction is a series of actions wham bam zipping around. Thus sequels help pacing, space out the action, add pauses in the action. It also helps with the buildup and easing off of tension. Sequels are also a great place to slip in back story via thoughts or flashbacks. Remember too that as in real life, we come to know characters better when they fail and pick themselves up again. This picking up and dusting off occurs in sequels. 

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Jessica Page Morrell is surrounded by writers. She is the author of  Voices from the Street published by Gray Sunshine, Between the Lines: Master The Subtle Elements Of Fiction Writing published by Writer's Digest Books, and Writing Out the Storm, Collectors Press. Additionally in July 2008 Bullies, Bastards & Bitches: How to Write the Bad Guys in Fiction was published by Writer's Digest Books; Dear Bad Writer, How to Avoid the Rejection Pile was published in 2009 by Tarcher-Penguin.

Authors Road Interview with Audrey Niffenegger

 

One of the highlights of our time in the Windy City, Chicago, was a visit with Audrey Niffenegger. A successful novelist with a popular film adapted from her work, The Time Traveler's Wife, Audrey is also a graphic novelist, artist and professor in the MFA program of the Columbia College Chicago. But in addition, we were fascinated to learn that in the course of her research for her second novel, Her Fearful Symmetry, she also became a tour guide in London's historic Highgate Cemetery, and that one of her works, Raven Girl, is being adapted by the Royal Opera House into a ballet premiering this year.

In this informative interview, Audrey talks of her start as a writer, her development in graphic arts, and how her professional life brought both these mediums together. She closes this interview with a few of her favorite examples of "book art," and how our separate art genres are melding to form something new and dynamic. We are sure you will find it as fascinating, relevant and instructive as we did. 

And last, we wish you all a Most Happy New Year!   

 The Authors Road

On finding a story's ruby slippers by Hallie Ephron (http://www.hallieephron.com)

So what do ruby slippers have to do with writing a novel?  Think of it as a plot device -- like Hitchcock's MacGuffin -- something that represents both the protagonist's and the antagonist's goals. It's the thing that they are each willing to do almost anything to obtain or protect or destroy.

In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy wants to get home; she needs the ruby sipper (though she doesn't realize it) to get there. The with wants the magic powers that the ruby slippers contain, but she has to kill Dorothy to get them. Single object; competing goals

Each time I develop a plot, I try to find the story's "ruby slippers" -- a single object that either embodies (Dorothy's ruby slippers) or represents (Katniss Everdeen's mockingjay pin) what both the villain and the hero will risk their lives to obtain or protect. Sometimes it's easy to identify -- priceless diamond necklace, or an inheritance, or an incriminating photograph that both the hero and the villain want. Sometimes it's an object that symbolizes a goal, the way Katniss Everdeen's mockingjay pin represents freedom and the survival of her people. 

In Never Tell a Lie, the "ruby slippers" are Ivy's unborn baby. In my new novel coming out in April, There Was an Old Woman, it's a house. I'm still trying to find the ruby slippers in the novel I have underway, but so far it looks like it's a ring. I'm thinking maybe the setting should have a few rubies in it.

BIO

 

Hallie Ephron tries to keep her readers up nights. Never Tell a Lie (starred PW review) was adapted for film. In There Was an Old Woman, a woman returns her childhood home, only to find a hoarder's nightmare; her elderly neighbor may hold the clue to how it got that way. 

Authors Road Interviews Haki Madhubuti

Like several of the writers we’ve had the great fortune to interview, Haki Madhubuti found his voice in the social, cultural, political, artistic and civil rights turbulence of the 1960s. Born in Little Rock, Arkansas and growing up in Detroit under his given name, Don L. Lee, he discovered answers to his many questions at the local library through the leading black writers of his day. It is also the time when he began writing poetry and essays. His life led him to enlist in the Army, followed by college, and in 1967, an historic gathering in a Chicago basement with two other poets. That meeting resulted in the launch of Third World Press, which today ranks as the largest independent black-owned publishing house in the nation. In 1972, he changed his name to Haki Madhubuti, Swahili words meaning “just” or “justice,” and “accurate and dependable.” He continued his writing and earned his M.F.A. from the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop in 1984. During the subsequent five decades he has been recognized with numerous  honors,  founded several schools, taught at several universities, lectured in almost every state, and become one of the most prolific black writers in America. We met with Dr. Madhubuti at his  offices in South Chicago. He took the time to show us around his extensive personal library, art collection, and the many awards and honors he’s received in his illustrious career before sitting down with us to share his remarkable stories. We are very pleased to bring his interview with you.   The Authors Road
Thanks for . . .	. . . joining us . . .	. . . on the road!

Finding the Right Critique Group

by Bill Johnson

As office manager of Willamette Writers, a non-profit writers group, I often get calls asking about critique groups. I advise people to think of them as coming in four types:

Support
Light Critique
Heavy Critique
&
Wise Reader

Support groups generally offer encouragement in writing or marketing, and little or no critique. Some support groups also operate as social networks, and might involve eating a meal together or meeting at a restaurant.

Light Critique groups could have a format for critique, like a time limit to respond; or limits on the person responding; or a requirement that a critique start and end with a positive comment, etc. This is something a group works out. A group might have a moderator to make sure the guidelines are followed.

Heavy Critique
This is generally for writers who are published or who are interested in mainstream publishing. People read something and offer a no-holds barred critique. The author takes it in and does what they want with what is offered.

Wise Reader
Orson Scott Card developed this idea, that an author can give a spouse or friend guidelines for how to respond to a manuscript (for example, when someone started skipping pages or lost interest). A good resource for getting good feedback from casual readers.

Where to Meet

Some people meet at a home; others meet at a Starbucks (some do close at 6 pm); some people meet at a local restaurant (3-6 is often a quiet time for a restaurant, and they appreciate people coming in; this is also a typical Happy Hour time for lower costs for food). A few groups sign up to meet at the WW Writing House.

What to Look For

I advise people to try 2-3 groups to find a group that offers the right fit and personalities. Cynthia Whitcomb belongs to both a support and critique group to meet her needs.

Some people call the office and want to join a critique group (or be mentored by) New York Times best-selling authors. Those kind of people are generally protective of their time.

Finding a group that works for you could take some time and effort, but the rewards can be worth it. Even a group with prickly personalities that don't accept feedback on their work might offer you the feedback you need. Just don't get 'stuck' in a group that doesn't work for you.

Good luck.

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Bill Johnson is the author of A Story is a Promise & The Spirit of Storytelling, available on Amazon Kindle for $2.99 and on Smashwords.

These Are the Best of Times, R.S. Gompertz

 

Author, No Roads Lead to Rome and The Expat’s Pajamas: Barcelona

 

Instructor: Every Trick in the Book to Optimize your Presence on Amazon

 

 

This is the greatest time ever to be an author.

 

I played guitar in garage bands back when I was an awkward teen hiding under a mountain of hair and amplifiers. In those post-Motown, pre-Madonna dark ages, the notion of recording a demo tape or cutting an album was the smoky stuff of fantasy. Even if you were able produce a demo, you had to be of royal birth to get it listened to by anyone of influence.

 

Now, of course, any talented kid with a smart phone can record a tune. A singer/songwriter with 1000 fans can make a living. More “next big things” come from YouTube than from the traditional talent factories.

 

The artists have taken over the asylum.

 

Writing and publishing have followed a similar path. Writers, like indie rock bands, have access to sophisticated publishing, printing, distribution, and marketing channels. We can print, tweet, blog, Kindle, Nook, and Facebook.  The tools at our disposal are truly groundbreaking.

 

The potential to be heard and read is greater than ever. A productive writer with 10,000 readers and an expanding back catalogue can bang out a modest living.

 

As a kid, I woke each morning to the staccato rant of my father’s Royal typewriter as he banged out novels and tore through sheets of eraser-worn onion skin paper. Long before word processors, my father struggled like Sisyphus to push his paragraphs up Rewrite Mountain and send his queries into the void. Then he waited months for rejection letters from agents, magazines, and book publishers. Hope, faith, and the occasional nibble kept him typing.

 

Writers now have more pathways to reach people and earn money than ever before. In writing as in music the industry has turned upside down. The tools have become cheap and the means of distribution democratized.

 

What hasn’t changed is the need for talent and good marketing. But the balance has tipped in our favor and that’s a nice place to be.

 

Conveying a Character's Journey on the First Page of a Novel

by Bill Johnson

I teach that a story creates movement and the movement transport an audience. In many of the unpublished novels I read, I'm often 40 pages into a manuscript before I have any idea of a main character's journey. In some cases, I have to read to the end of a novel to understand that journey. This puts me (and readers) in the unfortunate position of needing to keep track of all the details about a character while I wait for some sense of purpose to become apparent. This makes reading a novel work.

Lolly Winston's novel Good Grief has a structure that clearly conveys the stages of grief that a young woman goes through when her husband dies and leaves her a widow. This external framework communicates that the novel has a clearly defined beginning, middle, and end. From its opening lines, the story has a destination.

Each stage of the main character's journey is divided into sections. The chapters in Part One are about denial, oreoes, anger, depression, escrow, and ashes. Each chapter that follows is about the main character's journey in dealing with her grief over her husband's death. The title, Good Grief, speaks to the narrator learning that there can be good grief (which revolves around passing through the stages of grief) and bad grief (getting stuck on the journey).

A review of the opening of Good Grief conveys how a main character's journey is set out.

The opening line:

How can I be a Widow?

The answer to this question comes in the opening paragraphs as the narrator sits in a grief support group. In a few paragraphs, the narrator explains why she's in the group.

My name is Sophie and I've joined the grief group because...well, because I sort of did a crazy thing. I drove my Honda through our garage door.

What's important about these lines is they show the narrator is not only in grief, she's being overwhelmed by grief. What set up the garage accident was an irrational thought that she needed to get into the house quickly to tell her husband something. Except he's deceased. She's in denial.

Continuing in a few paragraphs:

Maybe later I'll tell the group how I dream about Ethan every night. That he's still alive in the eastern standard time zone and if I fly to New York, I can see him for another three hours.

The narrator tries to deal with her grief by going back to work, but she quickly finds herself overwhelmed. In the past, when she felt overwhelmed, she called her husband. The chapter ends with these lines.

The cursor on my computer screen pulses impatiently, and the red voice mail light on my phone flashes. My stomach growls and my head throbs. But I can't call my husband. Because, here's the thing: I am a widow.

She has started to come out of her denial about her husband's death. The first chapter is a clearly defined journey on her journey through grief.

Each chapter continues that journey until the narrator has passed through good grief to being whole again.

Highly recommended for writers who want to learn about structure from reading a well-written novel.

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A fourth edition of Bill Johnson's writing workbook, A Story is a Promise & The Spirit of Storytelling, is now available for $2.99 from Amazon Kindle, http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004V020N0

Bill is teaching a workshop on narrative tension at the Willamette Writers conference on Sunday, August 5th. Info: http//www.willamettewriters.com/wwc/3/