Announcement: There is action on my new novels. The publisher renamed the series--they are still working on the name. I provided suggestions as did one of my prepub readers. Now the individual books will be given single names: Leora, Leila, Russia, Lumiere', China, Sveta, and Klava--at least these are some of the suggestions. They are also working on a single theme for the covers. I'll keep you updated.
Introduction: I wrote the novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon. This was my 21st novel and through this blog, I gave you the entire novel in installments that included commentary on the writing. In the commentary, in addition to other general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the way I built the scenes. You can look back through this blog and read the entire novel beginning with http://www.pilotlion.blogspot.com/2010/10/new-novel-part-3-girl-and-demon.html.
I'm using this novel as an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel published. I'll keep you informed along the way.
The four plus one basic rules I employ when writing:
1. Don't confuse your readers.
2. Entertain your readers.
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don't show (or tell) everything.
5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing.
All novels have five discrete parts:
1. The initial scene (the beginning)
2. The rising action
3. The climax
4. The falling action
5. The dénouement
The theme statement of my newest novel, Valeska, is this: An agent of the organization becomes involved with a vampire girl during a mission, she becomes dependent on the agent, and she is redeemed.
Here is my proposed cover for Valeska:
Look at my rules three through five:
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don't show (or tell) everything.
5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing.
These three rules relate directly to the imagination of the reader. The first is all about setting and scene. You set your reader in the writing (time, place, etc.) and then you work to hold them in the world of your novel. This setting and holding is referred to as grounding. It means that the world you have invented is at least as real as the real world to your readers--at least for a short while. When a reader really says they could not put down a book, that's what they mean. The novel was so engaging, they did not want to return to the real world.
This grounding is all about imagination. Grounding is a very important and necessary part of writing. It shouldn't be something haphazard and unthought out. Their a many purposes in grounding, but a adept writing uses grounding to engage the imagination of his or her readers. For example, from my new vampire novel:
Late autumn 2014 Gdańsk, Poland
A
full moon hung above midnight Gdańsk. The
dark medieval streets were wet and filthy.
Puddles ringed with oily rainbows covered the cracked cobblestones. The moon shown in each of the puddles,
reflected as a milky glow that was grimed with the floating sheen. The scent of saltwater and rotting fish rose
with the night time tide, an unavoidable stench this close to the waterfront. At street level, the night was utterly dark. The very few modern lights along the
crumbling cobblestone avenue shared little illumination with the ancient
alleyways that pierced the darkened buildings on either side of the
street.
George
Mardling stepped gingerly to the alley beside an old shop and glanced down
it. His eyes were already well adjusted
to the dark. Still he flipped the night
vision goggle over his left eye and scanned the alley. It was clear.
The
late fall night was cold--George wore a suit and over it a black overcoat. He had a dark felt fedora on his head. That helped conceal the night vision
goggle. The night vision equipment was
very modern and compact. The
organization had issued it to the field last month. The point was to get a lot of night visibility
out of a very small package—it worked well, but the battery life was limited.
George
was a tall and thin man. He liked to
think his physique was like a body builders’, but he knew he was too thin. He also knew his face looked too young and
too serious. More like a student or a
professor than an agent. That was
probably good for the organization.
George
carried a Beretta nine millimeter in his jacket and a Beretta nine millimeter
kurz in his waistband, he hadn’t unholstered either weapon—yet. According to headquarters, his target wasn’t
supposed to be armed. According to his
orders, this wasn’t an attack or an arrest—he was making a reconnaissance, a
surveillance with a contact. If he could
identify the mark, all the better.
Usually,
George worked in a team--he was alone this time. His partner was busy, and this was supposed
to be a simple intelligence gathering mission—hardly a mission. George moved across the storefront. It was an old toy store, but the building
wasn’t on his target list either. He stepped
carefully and quietly toward the next alley.
If the mark wasn’t in the first alley, he should be in the second—that was
what their intell said. George glanced
down this alley and caught a slight movement—he noted a flare in his night
vision goggle, obviously a human being.
George eased into the alley. He
saw something else move as well. The
moment George stepped around the corner, something in his field of view moved
very quickly. It seemed like an animal,
but it didn’t flare much in the infrared—not enough for a person or an
animal. Perhaps it was just a blowing
piece of scrap. He stood a little
straighter, puzzled, there was almost no air movement on the street or in the
alley.
These beginning paragraphs from the initial scene are all grounding. They have only been through my editing, so I won't vouch for their pure effectivity. I'll know better when I get some feedback from my prepub readers. The point of all this is to ground the reader and get them excited about the book. The language isn't flowery, it is strongly description. The purpose of such description is to get the reader to see world of George Mardling. The purpose is to draw the reader in and hold them in the writing This is accomplished by appealing to the imagination to grasp the reader's mind and heart.
More tomorrow.
For more information, you can visit my author site http://www.ldalford.com/, and my individual novel websites:
http://www.aegyptnovel.com/
http://www.centurionnovel.com
http://www.thesecondmission.com/
http://www.theendofhonor.com/
http://www.thefoxshonor.com
http://www.aseasonofhonor.com
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