← The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
Stage Directions, Opening and How to Avoid Them
00:35:28
Books with Hooks, Bianca, Carly and Cece
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- [00:00]
Bianca Murray
Would you like to do some good in the world while also standing in line to win amazing literary prizes? Of course you would. I'm hosting a fundraiser for a cause that's close to my heart Literacy in South Africa. There are a host of amazing literary prizes up for grabs if you donate to this wonderful cause. They include two books with hook slots where you'll join us on the show, as well as developmental edits, coaching packages, manuscript critiques and so much more being offered by industry experts Lydia Hilger, Rebecca, Faith Heyman, Trevor Brooks, Nicole Mayer, Christina Boyd, Hannah Arnayer, Lisa Rivers, Elizabeth Held, Karen Geiger and Alexandra Kakken. To learn more about the cause as well as the prizes and our brilliant and generous sponsors, head to Biancamarae.com and look for the fundraiser tab. Entries close at 8am Eastern Time on 10 April, after which the lucky winners will be announced. It's Beta Reader match up time again, where you can be matched up with those writing in the same genre and or time zone so they can critique your work as you critique theirs. Your manuscript doesn't have to be complete to sign up for this 3,000 word evaluation. This particular matchup will be open to registrations from now until the 4th of May, with the matchup emails going out on the 5th of May because my new novel, A Most Puzzling Murder, pubs in early June and will be keeping me very busy. This will be the last matchup until the Please spread the word even if you aren't signing up this time. The more writers we have registered, the better the matchups will be, which means you'll be paying it forward to your fellow authors and hopefully they'll do the same when the time comes for you to register. For more information, head to Biancamurrae.com and go to the Beta Reader Matchup page. Hi there and welcome to our show, the Shit no one tells you about Writing. I'm Bianca Murray and I'm joined by Carly Waters and CeCe Leera from PS Literary Agency. Hi everyone, welcome back to another Books with hooks. As per usual, we are diving straight in. Karlie, will you please kick us off?
- [02:20]
Carly Waters
Dear Carly, I'm seeking representation for my crime adventure mystery novel Death on the South. Coal, I hope you will find time to read my manuscript Death on The South, a 71,000 word novel which combines the calculated suspense of a murder mystery with the surging adrenaline rush of an outdoor thriller that will appeal to fans of breathless by Amy McCulloch. World Weary Detective Chief Inspector Douglas McFarlane is plucked by helicopter from a much Needed hiking holiday in the Scottish Highlands and 24 hours later is dropped off on Mount Everest to investigate the suspicious death of an upper class influencer. In the course of his investigation, he is injured at the highest camp in the world and flown to safety. While recuperating from his injuries, McFarlane sifts the evidence uncovered by his team, including Detective Sergeant Kaira Patel and the forensic pathologist, Dr. Helen Connolly. The case uncovers the shady world of a minor grifter in a history of abuse in a boarding school. While conflict, his narcissistic boss leads to an internal investigation of leaked secrets. Along the way, Detective Chief Inspector McFarlane finds a new job and a new romance. I have been a professional scientist for several decades and have written several hundred scientific papers and two professional books on microbiology. Death on the South Call is my first novel. Thanks for your consideration. I shall look forward to hearing from you. Paul Levitt.
- [03:44]
Bianca Murray
Thank you, Carly. Okay, what was the word count there? And what was your take on that?
- [03:48]
Carly Waters
All right, this one came in at 243 words. So we'll start at the top. I don't know what south coal means. It's like south, like as in the directional south. And then col, like C O, L, like sometimes col is short for colonel so I wasn't sure. I don't know. Or a cole is a location. I don't really know what this title means and it could just be me because I do not know anything about hiking in the Scottish Highlands or Mount Everest, and that could be beyond me. And maybe the person who is receiving this knows what that means, but I do not. It is also not capitalized. So we always suggest with titles that they are in all caps. That way they stand out and they're very clear to us, you know, what we are looking at and what we are reading. It also helps titles become memorable. And again, as we're scanning, that is the first thing that jumps out to us. So it's very, very important. 71,000 words. It's not like overly short. I guess I would call something short, maybe like 65,000 words. I think in this category it sounds like it's moving really fast at 71,000 words. So I think, you know, I'm not concerned at all with that. I think we probably need another comp. I would probably actually suggest a TV show or movie comp in this instance. I didn't look up your comp in terms of timeline if it was kind of older or newer. So I will assume that you did your research and it is from the last five years. But I would definitely suggest a movie comp, a thriller movie comp. I think that could really help here in terms of making it really fresh and punchy and cinematic. Okay. In terms of the body paragraph, I think the entire story is this bit that says the case uncovers the shady world of a minor grifter and a history of abuse in a boarding school, while conflict with his narcissistic boss leads to an internal investigation of bleak secrets. To me, like, that seems like the whole story. So I don't think you need a lot of the surrounding materials, you know, above and below this. I think, like, that's what we have to figure out is again, why was this detective called to do this? I think you can probably keep the bit about, you know, being taken by helicopter on his holiday and you have the suspicious death of a bracket upper class influencer and bracket. I don't know why the brackets around that. I don't know if you're planning on giving that person a name. And just for the sake of this educational platform, you just decided to just kind of like leave that as a placeholder. I found that kind of interesting. I don't know, it's standing out to me, I guess, because it's in brackets. So I'm just trying to figure out, you know, again, is that a placeholder? I'm assuming that it probably is, yeah. So I don't know. I feel like that piece seems really interesting to me. Like the. The minor grifter history, abuse in the boarding school piece. The thing that I definitely think has to go is along the way, Detective Chief Inspector McFarlane finds a new job and a new romance, because that makes it seem like everything's tidy at the end. And I know the ending. So why am I reading the book? Right, you want to give me a reason to want to read the book, to want to know what happens if you tell me everything's fine in the end, after introducing a really dangerous adventure story, you know, then I'm kind of like, okay, why? Why do I need to read this book? So you definitely want to leave us on more of a cliffhanger here, which is again why we need to focus on the drama at the boarding school, which is again, I don't want to misspeak about what your book is about, but to me it seems like that is what the book is about and definitely what we should be focusing on. In terms of the bio, I would suggest that you either name the lab you work at or the university that you work at. Or name maybe the largest publication you've been published in. Like, I know, in Biology. It could be like Nature Magazine again, if you. You know what I mean? Like, I think that could really help. It's pretty vague, and again, could be intentional. Again, for this platform, you don't want to tell us where you work. That's perfectly okay. But for the sake of querying, you would want to give some context to the agent about where you work. Anything about you would be useful here. Again, because talking about Scotland, we're also talking about Mount Everest. You know, do you. Do you live in either of those locations? Do you have experience in either of those locations? Has your research taken you to these locations and therefore you know about them? So those would be some things I would probably suggest there. And you have a bit of word count to play with. As I said, it wasn't too long of a query letter. That would be my advice.
- [07:52]
Bianca Murray
Thank you, Carly. Okay, we're handing it across to cece.
- [07:56]
CeCe Lira
Yeah, just building off what Carly said, because I think she made some really great points. When I first read this, I was like, the plot points feel disconnected. I don't understand how the suspicious death and then his later injury have to do with the world he uncovers, except for the fact that he uncovers them while recovering from the injury. But, like, I don't understand the causality there. So I almost feel like that first half of the paragraph should go, like, I don't actually think we need to know about the helicopter or dropping off. I mean, we obviously don't know how much we need to know because we don't know your whole story. But if the bulk of the book is as. As Carly suggested, the shady world of a minor grifter and a history of abuse in a boarding school, which, yes, sounds very compelling, then. Then focus on that. You know, we don't need the movement of him, like, being helicoptered to one place and then being rescued into safety. And then the names of the people who. Who are investigating with him. You know, Sergeant Tell and. And Dr. Helen. Like, we just don't need all this information. I would actually expand on that investigation if it is indeed the bulk of the book. And I would also, and this is really important, show a link between this investigation, shady world of a minor grifter, and a history of abuse in a boarding school, and the link between the conflict with his narcissistic boss that leads to an internal investigation. You know, perhaps the internal investigation leads to him getting, you know, reassigned in the case. Right when he was about to crack it. And then, you know, because of internal corruption, the bad guy might, might, might get away with it. And so he needs to pretend to his boss that he's okay with things that his boss are doing when really he's not. Like, I just need, you know, a link between these two things because it's just really, really important in storytelling. A common mistake I see in query letters is two plot points that are happening at the same time, but I don't see a relationship between them. And that actually signals to agents that you haven't honored the dominoes tipping over effect that we expect in storytelling. If that is your intention, if that's your vision, that's okay, because you get to do whatever you want in your story. But oftentimes when I talk to writers, they tell me, no, there is causality. I just didn't show it in the query letter. And if that's you, I would really recommend you do that because it will elevate your story and it will signal to agents who are reading this that this is following those story beats that we expect.
- [10:17]
Carly Waters
Yeah. Just one thing to chime in there. I want to know, like, if the boss has something over him, there has to be something in this kind of tangled web of secrets where the boss is lording this over him. So then he has to do this, and then he has to go rogue because he's trying to escape from getting off the beaten path of finding what the. What the true story here is in terms of the shady world. So I think there's this leaked secrets bit. I think there's a lot more to it. And I think you have to kind of explain where the power struggle is, because I also think that would be quite.
- [10:46]
Bianca Murray
I have a question. Do you not think that this author, in terms of using Detective Inspector Kra Patel and Helen Donnelly, is not having a nod to the diversity of the book that we've also. It's not just male characters that we've got a diverse cast and we've got strong female characters. I'm wondering if that's the kind of vibe I'm getting there and if that's what they're trying to do. It's clearly not working. And you don't think it should be there.
- [11:13]
Carly Waters
That's what I thought as well. I made that leap in that assumption as well, which, you know, seems really interesting. I want to know, you know, why these people are on his team and what they have to kind of do with solving it. I guess I was a little bit confused by, you know, the last line again, which I said we had to cut, which was, you know, then he finds a new job and finds a new romance. So then I'm like, okay, what do all these people have to do with each other? Not to say that he has to enter a romantic relationship with anybody he works with, but I'm just trying to figure out, like, how these people are all in relation to each other, how they became this team, and why they need each other. Because I think what Cece is talking about, like, how are these things all connected? I guess. And again, we don't have to necessarily go into detail in the query letter to go that deep. But, yeah, I'd be curious about how the. How this team came to be working together, because in a book, you chose these characters specifically, and you chose them for a reason. So there's a reason you put these group of people together, which Bianca's suggesting, you know, could be for many reasons.
- [12:13]
Bianca Murray
Okay, thank you. All right, so, Kali, will you give us a summary of those opening pages?
- [12:19]
CeCe Lira
Yes.
- [12:19]
Carly Waters
So we start with a prologue. We are on a hike. I'm just trying to figure out if it names where the hike is. But, you know, we can make assumptions based on the query letter, obviously, but we are on a hike. Somebody is up in the mountains. There's the Milky Way. We understand that it's a very remote location, you know, that this person is out on a hike. They're in a tent. They're just sleeping on the ground. And then an intruder comes in, opens the tent, demands money from the person who is sleeping. It's a little unclear if this person who is in the sleeping bag is alive or not. I would leave that up to discussion. But this person's yelling at them, opens the bag that they're traveling with, shakes it all out, you know, tries to find the money, sees the snacks, finds these dollar bills and multiple denominations. And then we know that there is a knife. And then the light in the tent goes out. Now we are in chapter one called Beginning. Our main character, Douglas McFarlane, is on a hike. He is answering his phone. His boss has been trying to get a hold of him. He has been on this, you know, remote hike again, which we know from the query letter. And his boss is trying to get.
- [13:27]
CeCe Lira
A hold of him.
- [13:28]
Carly Waters
He's missed, like, 20 calls. And so he says, we got to pick you up. You got a job to do. They say they're going to take him from Scotland to London and get him to Nepal, because he explains, there's been a suspicious death of A British citizen on Mount Everest. Again, putting the pieces together. This is what happened potentially in the prologue. He gets picked up by the Scottish police, who then bring him in and they have a bit of a conversation about the people that they know in the community and they get him to. Yeah, the helicopter and that's it.
- [14:00]
Bianca Murray
Wow, that's a lot happening in five opening pages. So the question begs is, what do we think of the prologue?
- [14:07]
Carly Waters
You know, it's a good question. I wrote my notes are, it's well written and I don't hate it, but are we starting in the right place, which, like copy paste for any prologue or any episode, we probably say a version of the same thing. You know, as I kind of alluded to in my summary, there's nothing that we're not learning here that we don't kind of know in the query letter, which to me suggests that the jacket copy can do all of this. So if the jacket copy sets the tone, should we just let the story tell itself? I probably think so. But it is well written. So again, who am I to say that this, you know, in the grand scheme of things isn't going to work? But I never suggest kind of relying on the strength of a prologue to carry you through, because again, if an agent requests materials, you have to submit your prologue because it is part of your opening pages, such as you did here, which you kind of understand that I just felt like. And then calling Chapter One beginning. I don't know, could we come up with a better title? Do we need chapter titles? Can we just call it Chapter One? I was just, it seemed a bit kind of on the nose for me. Okay. And then getting to the pages, I think the biggest thing that's missing here, and like Bianca alluded to this, is there's a whole lot jam packed in these opening pages and it's very, it was very interesting. The biggest thing that I think was missing is his interiority. Like, is he not curious about why his boss is calling? Why did he need this getaway, this vacation so badly if he presumably has a really important job and, and he wanted two weeks hiking in the Scottish Highlands to just get away? As somebody who just came back from 10 days vacation, I understand sometimes we gotta get away. So like, again, why did he need to be unplugged so badly? And what are the repercussions of working in a job where you're on demand all the time and, you know, maybe you do need to be, you know, got ahold of. And maybe he could be thinking like oh, why wasn't my satellite phone working? You know, if, again, if he was that important and needed to be found so bad, he probably would have also had a satellite phone, not just a cell phone. Anyway, I digress. So I want to know the interiority of how he feels about his boss trying to track him down because. And the dialogue goes, I'm on a hiking vacation, sir, as you know, trying to keep off the grid for a couple of weeks. I've been trying to reach you since this morning. Don't you check your voicemails? McFarlane held the phone away from his ear, presuming that his boss is kind of yelling at him. But that was the opportunity there to kind of get at, you know, it was you I was getting away from, you asshole. Or like, whatever the. You know, whatever that interiority is. Or he thought to himself, it was nice not to hear that goddamn voice in his ear for the past two weeks. You know, like, what is the. What's the energy? Is he not curious about why his boss is calling or frustrated or annoyed or. That's the kind of energy I'm trying to explain that we're missing here. That's the big piece. Because I think the writing's good, I think the dialogue's good. I think the energy is good. But he spends more time talking about other characters than kind of going into his own psyche. So I think we need more about him to understand why all of this is such a mystery. Because to us right now, there is no mystery. It's just, there's a dude getting picked up, getting called back in to do his job. I don't see the mystery. There is no mystery. Like, this guy's just doing his job, right? So then we got. We have to figure out what's the relationship, what's the power play, you know, Again, we know from the query letter that it's not a great relationship between him and his boss. So there's just a lot to be kind of discovered and unraveled. But I think it's a good. It's a good foundation. I think the story seems really interesting.
- [17:26]
Bianca Murray
Thank you, Carly. Okay, Cece handing it across to you.
- [17:29]
CeCe Lira
Now, I thought that was a brilliant analysis on Carly's part. I agree with absolutely everything. I'll read the first paragraph to highlight a few other things so that we're not just repeating ourselves. Douglas McFarlane shrugged off his backpack, leaned it against the wall of the campsite office, and pulled out his phone, period. As soon as he got a signal, the phone rang, period. He stabbed at the keypad when he saw his boss's name on the screen. Period. I read the period. So, you know, it's three sentences. Notice that all these three sentences are purely describing movement. I call this a stage direction beginning opener, if you will. It's just stage directions. I feel very strongly about this, and this is obviously a matter of taste, because everything in storytelling is this. Do not have your first line be a stage direction. Don't do it. You're not writing a screenplay. You are writing a book. Okay? A novel. In this case. You want your first line to have interiority, and if you don't want it to be interiority, you certainly don't want it to be stage directions. We do not connect with stage directions. Our brains do not imprint with stage directions. It is boring just being very honest here. It's boring. You don't want to begin with boring. You want to begin with interesting. So I wouldn't have this be the first line, and I would certainly not have all lines of that paragraph be stage directions. It is super subjective, like all things, as I said. But, hey, that's my take. I think that you have the foundation for interiority in place because you have a scene where there's a disruption. He gets a call, and his vacation is interrupted. You have another instance in which he's Referred to as VIP by. By 1 of the detectives or police officers. And so there's an opportunity for us to go inside his psyche and find out if that tickles his ego or if that makes him feel uncomfortable or if it's the first time someone has called him a VIP if he's always wanted someone to call him a VIP like, there's just so much opportunity here. You have the foundation. You have the. The nuts and bolts, but you're not fully leveraging the foundation you've created. And I think you should. I think that the interiority here could be way, way deeper. And I did mark the moments, and our substack supporters will be able to see that. Another thing that I would make sure you have are curiosity seats. You know, we're not getting curiosity seeds, and so I do think we need that as well.
- [19:58]
Bianca Murray
Thank you, Cece. Okay, before we hand it across to Cici to hear her query letter, let's hear a word from our sponsors. Okay, Cece, diving back in, let's hear your query letter.
- [20:12]
CeCe Lira
Dear Carly Waters, Cece Lira, and Bianca Murray. My contemporary YA novel, Shadowboys, 60,000 words, is Dear Evan Hansen meets a MeToo story set in Y2K. I am reaching out because you support writers who are neurodivergent. CC's interest in books that expose what's hidden in plain sight with a social justice justice angle and Carly's love of reading stories about social issues and family. By the way, thank you so much for the podcast. It's invaluable. 17 year old autistic band geek Jack Murray has one goal for senior year 2001 get noticed. His surefire plan includes painting his 1967 Plymouth Barracuda vibrant purple and switching out his entire wardrobe for designer clothes he secretly bought at the thrift store. But everything changes for Jack when Ben Newsome, captain of the basketball team and prom king frontrunner, comments on Jack's new outfits and gives him the nickname Sweater Vest. Jack is over the moon. And then Ben does something unexpected. He invites Jack to his Halloween house party. Being in Ben's orbit skyrockets Jack's popularity and people start noticing him. For the first time in Jack's life, he feels seen. That is, until Jack's best friend accuses Ben of sexual assault. Unwilling to believe that his new friend, a guy who has done so much for him, could possibly do something so terrible, Jack ignores the signs until the night when Ben attacks him too. As friends pressure him to speak out, Jack must decide if he will stay silent, live with the shame of what he survived, or tell the world what Ben did and face public exposure he might never escape. Like my main character, I have Autism Spectrum Disorder and I'm a survivor of sexual assault with one in nine girls and one in 20 boys under the age of 18 experiencing sexual abuse or assault and only 310 out of every 1,000 sexual assaults reported. I wrote this novel to explore heavier themes in a way that makes it accessible for young readers and to show victims that speaking up is empowering and can help with healing. This book is for fans of the character's journey in Darius the Great Is not okay. The themes of Speak and the coming of age story of Jagged Little Pill, the novel I am an active SCBWI member. My 2021 Webtoon Canvas Award nominated digital comic Parrish has over 1.5 million views and over 25,000 subscribers. I was a professional actor as a child and still do select projects, Trigger warnings, sexual assault, Teen suicide attempt. I appreciate your consideration. Warm regards, Jacob Reynolds.
- [22:55]
Bianca Murray
Thank you so much. Cece. Okay, powerful query letter. How many words is that clocking in it?
- [23:01]
CeCe Lira
This one came in at 409 words. So from the top. This is such a minor thing, but but the second sentence in the plot paragraph reads, but everything changes for Jack. I would remove the but it's not in opposition to anything right now because we hear about his plan in the previous sentence. So it's again, super minor. If you don't want to change, that's fine. But it would just make this run a little bit more smoothly, I believe, because we have when everything changes down the line, which is when he becomes popular. I also have to say, and this says so much about me and my own high school experience, which, which I was not popular in high school. When I read the line gives him the nickname sweater vest, I was like, oh, no, they're making fun of him because I thought that was a bad thing. You know, like being called sweater vest. But apparently, like, Jack is over the moon because that's the line we get about being called sweater vest. So see, I know nothing, guys. I know nothing about being popular. I do think that the protagonist's journey is presented very clearly, right? Like story wise. I do think he did a really good job of being like, here are the story beats with causality, with dominoes tipping over. Like, I can see it. I do think that there's something missing, though. We have the line that reads that Jack must decide what to do.
- [24:21]
Bianca Murray
Right?
- [24:22]
CeCe Lira
People are pressuring him. He needs to decide what to do. It would be story wise, quite useful and quite compelling to add a ticking time clock that adds pressure, that adds, like culminating in an event. And I don't know what that event could be because I don't know your story, but, like, there's going to be a, you know, prom night or something. And for some reason, the reason needs to make sense when it comes to prom night. Jack must decide by then or else. Dun, dun, dun. You know, I feel like if you were to add that ticking time pressure, it would really, really elevate the story and just make it even more curiosity inducing. It's clearly a really powerful novel and I really do appreciate the stats that you added towards the end. You know, a lot of authors would have begun their query letter with these stats because these are important stats in our world. But hey, here's the reality. The stats would not make us curious. They would make us feel empathy. They would make us feel concerned for the world. They would remind us of the dumpster fire planet we live in. But if you start with the story, a story that is curiosity inducing, like you did, and then you add the stats, you're just highlighting the importance of this book. And I really, really appreciated that, that.
- [25:29]
Bianca Murray
Thank you so much, CeCe okay, Carly, your thoughts?
- [25:33]
Carly Waters
Okay, so I really like the title Shadow Boys. I think that's an awesome title. I didn't do any research to see if there's another book or movie or anything out there like it, but love that title. I think it's great. Okay, so I think the paragraph, the surefire plan, includes painting his car. I think the first half of that has to go. I don't know. It felt, like, a little bit familiar to me. I think that you were trying to come up with, like, an interesting entry point into explaining his personality. But I don't know if we need the car part. I think the. Unless the car is, like, this character that is, like, massively important, and it seems like, you know, we're not in the opening pages. It does seem like the car obviously plays a role. So, yeah, unless the car plays, like, a real big role in the book. I would probably just focus on the way that he kind of wants to switch out the clothing. Probably. But even still, you could just like, again, if you want to simplify it, you could say something, you know, just to the effect of this character feels invisible. And then Ben Newsome, the captain, prom king, front runner again, you could simplify that as well. You know, gives him the nickname. He's over the moon. Right. So I think you just gotta, like, chop out that first half and simplify that quite a bit. I think that would help you. And then you could even just start with, you know, once his popularity skyrockets, I almost feel like that's the start of the story, because I think what to me feels so familiar is like a misfit teen. I'll be honest with you. You know, we've. We've seen this movie. We've. We've read this book. We've seen this television show, the Misfit Teen. So I think that maybe they could start with, you know, when so and so character again, give him a little bit of description, befriends a popular kid, and his popularity begins to skyrocket. For the first time, he feels seen. That is, until Jack's best friend accuses Ben of sexual assault. I almost think that could be your opening line. And then we don't need a lot of the explainer that feels overly familiar, that an agent will think, like, what's unique about this? Right? We want to give them what is the most unique part of this teen high school drama story. And I think, to me, that's probably a better starting point, because I definitely think we're starting at. We're just Focusing on the wrong things with the car, in my opinion. Another thing that I was curious about. And, like, I just want to be clear, like, assault is assault, point blank, doesn't matter. But there's no mention of gender when we talk about the best friend. And so I just think sometimes I could just add some layers here so we can kind of figure out, you know, what the interrelational piece, how that's all coming into play. You might have intentionally left that out just to kind of leave us, like, doesn't matter if it's female or male that was assaulted. I agree assault is assault, but from a character development point of view, I don't know. I just think some of the layers could be added here in that capacity. So I'll leave that note with you to do what you want with. But, yeah, I mean, overall, just thank you for sharing this with us. And we're just so glad that you feel like we're a safe place to explore some of these more serious topics. And, yeah, we're just. We're really grateful that you have shared this with us. Us. And then in terms of the last comps, you have comps at the beginning and the end, so I don't think we need comps in both places. So I think you got to figure out what's more important. I think your dear Evan Hansen meets me, too. Said Y2K is stronger than the bottom pieces because Speak is quite a bit older now. I don't. I want to say it's almost 15, if not 20 years old. Now. I don't want to misspeak, but I think Speak is a seminal text in this category, but it is quite old. And then Jagged Little Pill, the novel again, if it's that important, then should it be with the comps at the top? So I'll leave all those notes with you. Thank you. To Jacob.
- [29:04]
Bianca Murray
Thank you, Carly. Okay, Cece, will you tell us what's in the opening pages?
- [29:08]
CeCe Lira
Okay, so we have the protagonist driving to school. Through interiority, we learned that he is wearing new clothes and has social goals for himself. So suddenly, a voice speaks from the back seat of the car, and he didn't know there was anyone in the car with him. He finds out it's his best friend who actually slept in the car. They chat. He gives his best friend his packed lunch. His friend looks at his clothes and says, well, I don't think that's you. They chat about their families. The bell rings, and they go to school.
- [29:39]
Bianca Murray
Okay, thank you. All right, so now the question we Always ask, is he starting in the right place with the. This?
- [29:46]
CeCe Lira
No, categorically, no. I'll get to why in a second. I do always think that when it comes to starting in the right place or not, so they're starting in the right place and then they're starting in the right way. You can choose the right place, but if you don't execute it in the right way, it doesn't matter because the. The result won't be achieved. But sometimes it's also possible that we, as agents and, you know, as people reading books, can misdiagnose the not starting in the right place situation. Because depending on what the writer wants to accomplish, they can make the wrong place quote, unquote, work if they change certain elements of it, thus making it the right place. So I'll start with the elements and then I'll say, you know why I don't think this is the right place as it stands. So first we have the protagonist driving to school, and we have a focus on movements, on things that are happening. On description. The description is very strong, so great job. But we don't have interiority. We don't have deep psychological acuity. A story about a high school misfit who's about to go on the journey he's about to go in. It's not just interiority. We need deep interiority and psychological acuity. So that's missing here. Examples, we have him looking in the mirror at his, like, new look, and nothing, nothing about how he feels. Does he feel like a fraud? Does he feel like an imposter? Does he, you know, wonder how this other guy who does look like the popular kid who does look like he looks now, how long he takes to get ready in the morning because it took him so long. Does he think he were a fraud? Is he comparing himself to someone else? Like, we need to dig deeper. That's just one example. Again, there are many, many more. We just need more deep interiority. The second thing is this. Every strong opening scene has a disruption. The disruption that I see here is his friend is in the backseat and he didn't know. No, two things on that. One, if there's someone in the back seat of your car, aren't you going to be freaked out a little? Like, not even a little, a lot. Like, there's no fear, there's no visceral moment of panic. There's no shock. We get interiority before we get emotion. I don't actually think we get emotion on the fact that his friend is there. Like, it's all very factual and level headed. And it doesn't actually feel like a disruption. It's a disruption in name only. And that doesn't work. The other thing is, in order for disruption to work, it's not just any disruption that matters. It has to be a disruption that either reveals greater depth of the existing power dynamics or a disruption that changes power dynamics, or both. You can also have both. And we don't have that here. Why? Because we don't have power imbalance. Like his best friend is. He's comfortable around his best friend. He's himself. There's no part of him that's withholding anything. There's a part of him that's withholding things in a kind and empathetic way, but not in a this actually matters to the story in his curiosity inducing sort of way. So I don't think it's the right place. I think the right place would have power imbalance because you would, you would need that. I think that there's missed opportunities too to further the relationships. You know, like you, you have a protagonist who clearly in many ways has more than his best friend. Like he's sharing his lunch, he doesn't have the heart to tell him certain things. And I just needed more details on his relationships to be able to really feel that with him and also his relationship with himself. We do know about his social goals, but we don't know deep down like what his fantasy life looks like. You know, is there a person he has a crush on? Is there a club he really wants to be a part of? Is he thinking about the adults he knows in his life? And clearly the ones who used to be popular in high school are the successful ones and that's what he wants out of his world. Is it because he reads books and he's always reading books about, you know, close knit group of friends and he only has one friend who yes, he likes, but he wants, wants a group. I guess I just wanted more specificity and more texture when it comes to his social goals. Anyway, this is all to say my take, no, you're not starting in the right place. This place is designed to give us context on the backstory and it's doing that really well. But context on the backstory is not the job of the opening pages. The job of the opening pages is to make us feel story forward curiosity, meaning curiosity about what's going to happen next.
- [33:54]
Carly Waters
Text.
- [33:55]
CeCe Lira
He's too safe. He's too safe. In these pages. There's no power imbalance, no real disruption, no shift in dynamics or expectations. So it's just too comfortable a position for a start of a novel, especially a novel about a misfit. So I'd rewrite the beginning, change the location, or if you're set on this location, if you love it, then you have to also change the elements that are in it right now.
- [34:18]
Bianca Murray
Thank you, Cece. Okay, Carly, your thoughts?
- [34:21]
Carly Waters
Yeah. So my main notes were I really liked the energy of this and I liked the banter between the friends. So I think there was a lot to like here. But I felt like I was reading something that was for the reader, AKA me, as opposed to what I think would have naturally, potentially have happened, which makes me think, again, it's a lot of setup, it's a lot of explaining the relationship. It's a lot of factual information. And I just didn't really feel like we were in a seen enough. Like, to me, I agree with Cece. He should have jumped out of his seat when he felt like, you know, there was somebody in the back seat. And I can't remember if he was actively driving at that point or whether he was parked. But, like, if you were driving, then, like, did you swerve? Did you accidentally hit your indicator? Or you're like, you know, did you freak out? I just felt like it was very obvious that again, if we were thinking about the cinematically, like we were just kind of panning on this one moment and. Or just kind of like a close up on this one moment as opposed to getting some more movement, whether again, they park and they walk into school together or does somebody cut them off in the parking lot. Then again, like, I'm saying cliche things, but you're the writer, you think of more interesting things than what I'm suggesting. But, like, where is the drama in this moment? It's very comfortable. It's very settled in. And I just feel like, again, this is the entry point to the novel. Like, this is your moment to kind of to shine and hook us and get us turning the pages. And I just felt like, again, I liked the energy, but it was a very comfortable scene that we were in and I just felt like we. We needed something else. There just wasn't enough happening for me.
- [35:58]
Bianca Murray
Okay, thank you to Carly and Cece for that. Remember, if you want to submit for books with hooks, you go to our website, the Shit About Writing, go to the Books with Hooks tab and you can submit there. Thank you so much, much, Carly and Cece. And please join us next week for our author interview.
- [36:14]
Carly Waters
A reminder that this is an unscripted program and our conversations have been edited and condensed and is not a full picture of our feedback or conversation directly with each author. As always, refer back to our written notes for the Folsom picture. Carly Waters and Cece Lira are agents at PS Literate Agency, but their work on this podcast is not affiliated with the agency and the views expressed by Carly and Cece on this podcast are solely that of them as podcast co hosts and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, policies or position of PS Literary Agency. A reminder about all the ways that you can support us as a show. Rate us five stars on Apple Podcasts. Tell your writing friends about us. We'd love to help as many writers as possible and follow us on our Substack newsletter. Get our stacked newsletter on a weekly basis. Bonus videos, articles, essays, advice and more. You can find it@the shitaboutwriting.substack.com that's that's.
- [37:04]
Bianca Murray
The shitaboutwriting.substack.Com and that's it for today's episode. I hope you'll join us for next week's show. In the meantime, keep at it. Remember, it just takes one yes Would you like to do some good in the world while also standing in line to win amazing literary prizes? Of course you would. I'm hosting a fundraiser for a cause that's close to my heart Literacy in South Africa. There are a host of amazing literary prizes up for grabs if you donate to this wonderful cause. They include two books with hook slots where you'll join us on the show, as well as developmental edits, coaching packages, manuscript critiques, and so much more being offered by industry experts Lydia Hilger, Rebecca Faith Heyman, Trevor Brooks, Nicole Mayer, Christina Boyd, Hannah Ornea, Lisa Rivers, Elizabeth Held, Karen Geiger, and Alexandra Kakin. To learn more about the cause as well as the prizes and our brilliant and generous sponsors, head to Biancamarae.com and look for the fundraiser tab. Entries close at 8am Eastern Time on 10 April, after which the lucky winners will be announced. It's beta reader matchup time again, where you can be matched up with those writing in the same genre and or time zone so they can critique your work as you critique theirs. Your manuscript doesn't have to be complete to sign up for this 3,000 word evaluation. This particular matchup will be open to registrations from now until the 4th of May, with the matchup emails going out on the 5th of May because my new novel, A Most Puzzling Murder, pubs in early June and will be keeping me very busy. This will be the last matchup until the fall. Please spread the word even if you aren't signing up this time. The more writers we have registered, the better the matchups will be, which means you'll be paying it forward to your fellow authors, and hopefully they'll do the same when the time comes for you to register. For more information, head to Biancamurrae.com and go to the Beta Reader Matchup page.