A Vaudeville for Novelists: Does narrative nonfiction provide a place to start?

Narrative nonfiction, I’ve learned, may be the midlist of our times.  For aspiring novelists, this genre provides the kind of security book marketers long for.   What is narrative nonfiction?  Think “The Right Stuff” or “In Cold Blood” or (for a contemporary example) “The Perfect Storm.”  Peter Rubie’s masterful “The Elements of Narrative Nonfiction,” provides wonderful guidance on this genre.

These book are (mostly) true stories that are told as if they were novels, with the familiar arc of a character’s life being set of balance, a series of challenges, a climax and a resolution.  They are built around real events and the facts that matter, and it is the selection and ordering of the facts that provide the drama.  There may also be quotes (as available or, especially for historical events, constructed) and even thoughts of some characters, where it can be justified.  Respecting the line between being true to the story and just making things up is one of the challenges.  No author wants to be the next notorious fraud.

Readers like narrative nonfiction because they believe that they are getting truth and facts.  It is a good use of their time to see a real, rather than imagined, bit of an unfamiliar aspect of life.  They still crave story, but the boundaries imposed by this genre reduce the risks of time and money.

Publishers and booksellers can more easily predict sales for nonfiction.  The categories are clear and have the kind of a track record that only bestselling authors can give them in fiction.  And the marketing is much easier since the potential buyers are readily identified.  The midlist (perhaps the most important training ground for the next generation of bestselling novelists) has evaporated because common business practices — risk management, quarterly (monthly) planning and accountability — have bent publishing out of shape.  Narrative nonfiction is an adaptation to this new environment.

In a way, this is good for writers, too.  Narrative nonfiction forces authors to research, construct and observe in a disciplined way that can enhance their fiction writing.  This genre provides a market where editors can be more trusting and less apt to meddle with the prose since audiences are more forgiving and there is less pressure to produce a bestseller.

I’ve written both fiction and nonfiction, so this seems like a natural for me.  Give me a topic that is rich enough, and I’m confident that I can create a book that fits in this genre.  My challenge is finding a topic that has a natural hook for audiences and hasn’t been done before.  It would also be good if it didn’t require world travel and lawyers to nail down the facts.  And it is essential that I have the bona fides to convince a publisher that I am the right person to write the book.  (Some topics I’d love to write about await the sudden conferring of advanced degrees or my having a track record that makes editors throw caution to the wind.)

So the hunt is on.  As I work on my extensive projects list (see my last entry), I’m jotting down notes on potential “can’t miss” books in narrative nonfiction.  Some of the more compelling prospects, I’ve found, have already been written by someone else.  Some of them are bait for lawsuits.  A few are starting to speak to me.  Eventually, I’ll try this out.

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Special Events — The heart of storytelling

I love verbs and I’m suspicious of nouns.  So it’s not surprising that what really attracts me to any kind of a story is what happens. And what keeps me turning the pages or glued to the screen is anticipation of what happens next.

Sure, I’ll come back to a book or a TV show or a movie because the character or actor interests me.  But, in most cases, I’m interested enough to give them another try because they have paid off in memorable events.  In other words, I trust them because of their actions.  So story building, essentially, depends on generating good events.  Without a doubt, they need to connect in some logical fashion and it would be nice if the characters involved are sympathetic, but if nothing interesting happens, forget about it.

So where to events come from?  What makes a good event?  How many events do you need?  What makes a good collection of events?

In fiction, events come from everywhere — experiences, dreams, imagination.  They may emerge unexpectedly from seat-of-the-pants writing or they may be collected from many sources into lists.  The lists may be random or they may be aggregated around a core idea or feeling.  The core idea of “Peter’s Shell” was turning “The Cask of Amontillado” (imprisonment) up-side down (freedom).  The core feeling of “Waverley” was loneliness.

The first event of “The Cask of Amontillado” is the protagonist tricking Fortunato into coming with him.  Note that the protagonist does something.

Whichever way events are generated, many of them will be weak or useless.  I take a list, either derived from my pages of text or created as a list, and strike out anything that doesn’t interest me.  (The ones that interest me might not interest others, but I have little hope that they will interest others if they don’t engage me.)  Among those that are struck out will be some events that are needed for the story.  Maybe.  It is amazing how many times things that seem to be needed really aren’t.  Writing the story without these events usually works since readers have the ability to fill in what they need.  Some of these events may simply convey some needed facts.  The facts can often find their ways into the story by other means.  In any case, I put question marks next to these events as reminders.

The verbs — good, strong, active verbs — are at the heart of why these events interest me.  (“Trick” is a great verb.)  Can any of these events be made more interesting?  Often, yes.  I go through the list and try and push things to the limit.  In one story, a scene where a character chastised another became one where she demanded he sign a separation agreement.  Finding ways to push to the limits is not hard.  Accepting what comes out is.  It usually “messes up the story,” requiring a lot of rewriting.  It always makes things harder on the characters.  When I am being diligent, I will write the scene in the full-on way before I decide to reject it or go with it, no matter what he consequences.  In most cases, it makes for a better story.

Besides going to the limit, there are other things that can make an event more interesting.  The protagonist in “The Cask of Amontillado” uses reverse psychology at every turn.  His ironic attitude enlivens every event.  Images (such as the tinkling bells of Fortunato’s motley) can also make a scene irresistible.

So now you have a list of events with great verbs that go to the extreme, have attitude and are filled with memorable images.  They need to go into the right order, an order that will make sense, reduce confusion and build.  You may find yourself with too many or two few events, depending on what you are trying to create.  (A good rule of thumb is one event, on average, every three to four pages.  One event may occur in more than one location, especially in a screenplay.  A short story may have fewer event because there may be more narrative set up.  Flash fiction will probably have extremely compressed events, with a high average for the wordcount.)

The best circumstance is too many events.  Looking for further cuts is usually a good idea.  Not much needs to be done in a case where bigger is not a problem (e.g., turning a short story into a novella).  When length is pretty much fixed, as with a screenplay, working backward is one good technique to identify unnecessary events.  The toughest part of having too many events is letting go of those you love but don’t need to tell the story.

I’m more likely to have too few events.   Working backward, asking questions about the characters and getting other folks to read what I have can help me come up with more.  If I’m lucky, the list itself will suggest holes to fill.  If all else fails, simply working on the rewrite, telling the story from start to finish, will get my imagination going.  Each new event, of course, needs to be challenged.  It won’t help to fill gaps or pad the text with dull and mediocre scenes.

There are times when the idea or feeling for the story is too slight.  In these cases, it is best to put the work aside.  Sometime in the future, you may discover that the events really have a different focus, one that is stronger.  Or it may be that the events find their ways into other works over time.  But some events, scenes, sequences and draft books should simply be abandoned.

Almost there now.  The final question is what makes a good collection of events?  Having interesting scenes that all belong to the story and flow together is more than a good start.  But there is a danger that the sum may be less than the parts.  It may not add up to a compelling story.  Here’s where the tools of plotting, looking for motivations and architectures of acts and story design can come in handy.  Everyone from Aristotle to Robert McKee have written about construction of obligatory scenes, the climax, inciting incidents, points of ritual death, pinches, etc., etc.  If all this is a mystery to you and you’re interested, I’m happy to add references, but there is lots of help out there.

Events, however, get you most of the way.  They can provide the go/no go for people with not enough time to write.  (And I don’t know any writers who do have enough time to write.)  The characters we love — in fiction, in history and in our lives — are memorable because of events.  Arthur pulls a sword from a stone.  Hannibal crosses the Alps with elephants.  Your child is born.  We reference people by names, associations (works for, is cousin of) and physical descriptions.  But the most powerful reference is he/she is the one who did an interesting act.  This is at the core of storytelling.

My doings:  I had a book proposal turned down and four contest entries have failed to even final.  Oddly, I’m not discouraged.  Within an hour the editor who turned down the book asked if I would be interested in collaborating with another author.  (I would.)  One contest returned the best feedback I’ve gotten on my fiction.  Clear and actionable.  The other had two apoplectic judges’ sheets from non-pros that trashed the work, but the one from the pro said:

“Great job!  Entertaining read, & a fresh, topical (identity theft, child pornography) spin for the plot.  A computer dude for a hero–fresh!” and “Wonderful style, very readable & very fitting with the sub-genre.  Some wonderful turns of phrase.  I felt fully immersed in the story as I was reading.”  She gave a score of 149 out of a possible 150 points and said to “get this puppy out to agents.”

I’ll be doing that later today.

No sheets yet from the other two entries.  We’ll see.

Finishing the First Draft of a Novel

If you are the typical mystery writer or JK Rowling, you write the ending first.  Finishing a novel is all about cutting and pasting the last few pages onto the manuscript and then printing it out.  But even if you are a “seat of the pants” writer, many elements may be fixed.

I’m not giving anything away by saying that, because Lucky Numbers is a love story.  Somewhere, the heroine will go through ritual death, feeling she has totally messed up the objectives she’s had (including finding love).  But the couple will get together and profess their undying love within the last few pages.  The bad guy will get his come-uppings.

Does this make my job easier?  No.  Not at all.  If I just do a paint-by-numbers (no pun intended), I’ll be bored and so will the reader.  And, yet, I can’t go too far off the mark.

How do I, as a writer, with the end of the journey in sight, keep engaged?

First, I give myself permission to go off track.  Whatever is written can be cut or rewritten.  So, within limits, I can pretend I don’t have limits. (Get it?)

Second (and this may be a corollary to the first), I give my characters permission to do whatever they want to.  If the bad guy wants to run away and avoid facing the good guy, he can try.  (But the good guy may go after him.)  If the heroine feels neglected or angry, so be it.  If the hero makes a wrong turn on the way to the rescue because he trusts his GPS system, that’s tough.  I expect and hope for surprises, even if they end up in the bit bucket.

Third, every scene must have emotion.  This has been true throughout.  I don’t know how you can engage your reader emotionally if you, the writer, aren’t.  But the words flow too easily when you know what is coming next.  I have had to come to a full stop repeatedly as I’ve been writing the last few scenes.  This writing in stops and starts is a bit like being on a restricted diet.  I feel like I am tempting writer’s block every time I wrench myself away from the keyboard, but I’m convinced that it is the right thing to do.

I’ve also made a point in these last few chapter of walking away from the day’s work mid-scene or even mid-paragraph.  That way, I don’t go at it cold the next day.  And one more thing on finishing this up.  As much as I want to rush to the end, I also want to slow down.  I’ve come to like the characters.  I’m reluctant to say goodbye to them.  And, even though I’ll have them in rewrite, they’ll never again be as fresh and alive to me.

Notes on what else is up.

I just finished the last pages of the galley for my nonfiction book, Innovation Passport.  Blurbs are on About Peter Andrews page.  Galleys have to be about the most tedious thing in the world.  Reading for those typos, poor phrases and inconsistencies for the fifth or sixth time.  Negotiating one more time with my coauthor.  Seeing pieces that could be better (but it’s too late).

Blurbs, on the other hand, are fun.  By definition, they are all positive, so it’s like asking folks for compliments you can put in print.  Even better (for me), several people said nice things beyond the quotable blurbs.  And the time so many people dedicated to the reading and evaluation really humbles me.  I am immensely grateful.

Drama has gone down the tubes.  I have been totally rejected by four consecutive festivals.  (And the readings I’ve had with my two drama groups have made me want to apologize to the actors.)

On the other hand, I’ve sold another short story, one of my favorites, Peter’s Shell.  This puts me into double digits in my current foray into SF and fantasy.  In fact, with a bit of tuning, I’ve been able to sell almost everything I have written in recent times.  It puts the pressure on to finish some material that has been yelling at me from the sidelines.  Art Nerds is now on my to-do list.

Finally, an unexpected consequence of using a dictation program.  For my current work, I’ve had to edit out, “oof! ouch! hey!” and other expletives.  No.  I am not writing for DC Comics.  The problem is that the smaller cat, Kyoko, has decided that my dictation is an invitation to get close.  In the middle of a paragraph, she’ll jump into my lap (oof!).  Unpredictably, the claws will come out (ouch!).  Or she’ll decide to poke me with sharp paws (hey!).  All this is dutifully captured by MacSpeech, in one form or another.  Now it is not as bad as when I failed to turn the mic off when I got a call from a salesman, but it is pretty weird all the same.