by James L. Rubart, @jameslrubart
Have you ever started a novel, put it down after a few chapters, then never picked it up again? I know some of you slog through every book you pick up, but if you’re like me, there are too many novels and too little time to waste on stories that don’t grab your wrist and yank you back into the tale.
So what can we do to make sure our stories have yanking power?
- Remember that the most stunning prose in the world doesn’t matter much. Or, put another way, readers don’t care as much about the exquisiteness of words as we do. Actually, that’s putting it mildly. (The majority of) Readers don’t give a fig about a beautifully crafted sentence if the story is boring! Put another way, if you went to a movie and the lighting was stunning, the cinematography was sublime, but there was no story, would you sit through the film, or ask for your money back? Great plot and great characters are what keeps us turning pages.
- Which brings us to point two. What readers care about (in order) are, Great story. Great characters. Great theme. Great setting/mood. In the perfect novel all these elements are firing on all cylinders. But if you had to choose, the order above is how you’d set up your dominoes. There are a lot of thrillers and suspense novels (and TV shows and movies) out there that are little more than a great plot with cliché characters that are selling strong. Not many novels (or movies or TV shows) with stunning settings and a great theme (and little else) that are selling well.
- Wittiness and humor surprise and delight us in the best of ways. So, interject some into your stories. “But I don’t write humor, Jim!” No worries. You don’t have to. I’m not talking about a major shift in the way you write. But there’s a reason many movies have the funny side kick. A splash of humor can lighten your story in a way that gives it flavoring enough to rise above the pack. (Yes, I think I did mix metaphors there, thanks for noticing.)
- Make your protagonist want something. Really want something. I know you know this one, but I’m still surprised by the number of manuscripts I look at where the hero or heroine’s desires are mundane. The strength of your protags desire, juxtaposed against the challenges they have to face to get it, are what gives your story the zest it needs to be unputdownable.
- A little salt goes a long way. Back in the summer of 2010 I was at Thrillerfest in New York listening to a panel of authors talk about research. One of them mused that they only use about two percent of their research in any given novel. The rest of the panel nodded in agreement. Two percent! Yep. Meaning you’re going to leave out a lot of cool stuff that truly is cool, but will bog the reader down. Elmore Leonard has list of ten writing rules and his tenth nails this idea. “Try to leave out the parts readers tend to skip.” Exactly.
I have three more tips I’d love to share with you, but remember, always leave the audience wanting more.
Hmmmm … I think I just bumped myself up to six.
How Do You Stand Up for Yourself When It Means Losing Everything?
Allison Moore is making it. Barely. The Seattle architecture firm she started with her best friend is struggling, but at least they’re free from the games played by the corporate world. She’s gotten over her divorce. And while her dad’s recent passing is tough, their relationship had never been easy.
Then the bomb drops. Her dad was living a secret life and left her mom in massive debt.
As Allison scrambles to help her mom find a way out, she’s given a journal, anonymously, during a visit to her favorite coffee shop. The pressure to rescue her mom mounts, and Allison pours her fears and heartache into the journal.
But then the unexplainable happens. The words in the journal, her words, begin to disappear. And new ones fill the empty spaces—words that force her to look at everything she knows about herself in a new light.
Ignoring those words could cost her everything . . . but so could embracing them.
James L. Rubart is 28 years old, but lives trapped inside an older man’s body. He thinks he’s still young enough to water ski like a madman and dirt bike with his two grown sons. He’s the best-selling, Christy BOOK of the YEAR, CAROL, INSPY, and RT Book Reviews award winning author of ten novels and loves to send readers on journeys they’ll remember months after they finish one of his stories. He’s also a branding expert, audiobook narrator, co-host of the Novel Marketing podcast, and co-founder with his son, Taylor, of the Rubart Writing Academy. He lives with his amazing wife on a small lake in Washington state.