Later:
"I sank my hands in pearls up to the wrists.
The chest, filled near to the top with pearls ready to be assembled into jewelry, overflowed. Pearls scattered across the table top and rolled onto the floor. I dug my hands deeper, rooting down among the cool, heavy spheres. I pulled my cupped hands upward and scooped them out. More spilled and clattered, a rain of beauty.
Seen through glazed, unfocused eyes the pearls were alike, a simple mass of beads.
Seen close and clearly, they were individuals. Some were as tiny as a baby’s tears. Some as large as hummingbird’s eggs. Some glared pure white, some glowed pinkish grey, some shone blue or gold or green. It took a good, loving eye to see each one’s charm alone. It took cool discernment, too, and a hard mind for price to choose what each might do, where each might go.
That would be for tomorrow. Tonight was for glory. Tonight was for dribbling them through my fingers like water. Tonight was scooping them again and again through my cupped hands, splashing them over my naked flesh like handfuls of water, pouring them over my head in a moonlit cascade, letting them run into my mouth in a stream to fill it up and overflow it and run out again, shining over my throat and breasts...
I woke.
The sea surged around the Hyacinth and bobbed her up and down to no avail. We had no wind. We were dying of hunger and thirst and there was no help for it."
See? Now THIS I would keep reading. I just wrote this, but it has no story to go with it.
Monday, January 10, 2011
Suspense Gimmicks that Work on Me
In a really boring mystery I don't otherwise like, here are things that will keep me reading:
A PLOT THAT KEEPS MOVING
Beautiful setting
Beautiful clothing
Pregnant character who may give birth by the end of the book.
Beautiful animals who may reappear
Romantic interest
Awful character who may get comeuppance by the end of the book.
Wealth, money being spent in abundance
Theatrical or public event to be performed by the end
Is there anyone else who reads books they don't like, just to find out what happens? In my case, whatever vicarious, escapist satisfaction I get from the premise or scenery or themes TRANSCENDS bad writing, bad plotting, etc. I'm pathetic enough to admit that my soul has deficiencies, possibly analogous to nutritional deficiencies. I meet these needs through books.
Based on what I WILL read about in the face of boring or distasteful writing, I can conclude that I have unhealthy fascinations with wealth, beauty, vengeance, romance, and adulation.
I'm not a romance reader ordinarily but I will sit through one if I'm rooting for the couple, or I like the lady's outfits. I will hang around to enjoy a wealth fantasy.
How can I use this in my own writing?
Have the pregnant character give birth onstage during the opening. Oh, wait--that was a season-ender for Ugly Betty.
Have the characters find treasure and reveal it as a public spectacle following a dramatic rescue. Oh, wait--Tom Sawyer!
These strategies won't work if readers aren't invested to some extent. I must've cared about that pregnant character and hated that villain. The writing must've been good on some level for that to be the case.
Puzzles: I stuck through the end of Da Vinci Code because of the brain teasers. It was also a treasure hunt, although a different kind of treasure hunt. The characters raced from exotic location to exotic location, one step ahead of various groups of bad guys. I didn't care about that, but I did think I knew the solution and I wanted to be vindicated.
There's hope for me. I can transcend my own bad writing, if I can exploit human nature effectively enough. I need to convince the reader that whatever turns them on--THEM--is waiting on the next page.
A PLOT THAT KEEPS MOVING
Beautiful setting
Beautiful clothing
Pregnant character who may give birth by the end of the book.
Beautiful animals who may reappear
Romantic interest
Awful character who may get comeuppance by the end of the book.
Wealth, money being spent in abundance
Theatrical or public event to be performed by the end
Is there anyone else who reads books they don't like, just to find out what happens? In my case, whatever vicarious, escapist satisfaction I get from the premise or scenery or themes TRANSCENDS bad writing, bad plotting, etc. I'm pathetic enough to admit that my soul has deficiencies, possibly analogous to nutritional deficiencies. I meet these needs through books.
Based on what I WILL read about in the face of boring or distasteful writing, I can conclude that I have unhealthy fascinations with wealth, beauty, vengeance, romance, and adulation.
I'm not a romance reader ordinarily but I will sit through one if I'm rooting for the couple, or I like the lady's outfits. I will hang around to enjoy a wealth fantasy.
How can I use this in my own writing?
Have the pregnant character give birth onstage during the opening. Oh, wait--that was a season-ender for Ugly Betty.
Have the characters find treasure and reveal it as a public spectacle following a dramatic rescue. Oh, wait--Tom Sawyer!
These strategies won't work if readers aren't invested to some extent. I must've cared about that pregnant character and hated that villain. The writing must've been good on some level for that to be the case.
Puzzles: I stuck through the end of Da Vinci Code because of the brain teasers. It was also a treasure hunt, although a different kind of treasure hunt. The characters raced from exotic location to exotic location, one step ahead of various groups of bad guys. I didn't care about that, but I did think I knew the solution and I wanted to be vindicated.
There's hope for me. I can transcend my own bad writing, if I can exploit human nature effectively enough. I need to convince the reader that whatever turns them on--THEM--is waiting on the next page.
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