boogieshoes | meta on recs: story mechanics (Reply)

Story Mechanics: Rec Meta 2

In this post of recommendation meta, I'm going to look at story mechanics. For myself as a reader, 'story mechanics' means something mildly different than it might as a writer(1). As a writer, I think of 'story mechanics' as: grammar and spelling, punctuation, sentence structure, paragraph structure, and basic structure of the scene progression. What I mean on that last point is how the tale itself is told - is it a linear telling, where the story starts at the beginning, and progresses to the end? Does it start near the end, jump back to the beginning, and go on through? Does it follow a parallel story construction, with alternating scenes? When I'm writing, those things are important to me as the story foundation - I think of the story like building a house, and those things are all important on a basic, need-to-have level.

But when I'm reading, I'm looking at the end product, and the things I'd think of first while writing are the last things I'm going to see and be hit with. The first things I'm going to see are house's cleanliness, it's furnishings, it's draperies and paint and layout. This is why I'm structuring this series the way I am - I'm trying to show the writer the things the readers notice first. Hence, last time, I spoke about Visual Presentation - This is akin to getting a house-buyer in the door with a clean house that has plenty of light and an inviting atmosphere. As a reader, things that fall under 'Story Mechanics' that I look for are grammar, spelling, punctuation, tense, complete sentences, and the right words vs the almost right words. These are the furnishings and draperies, the floor rugs and lamps - if they're not laid out correctly, organized to help with the flow throughout the story, it's going to read as clunky and inept, if it's readable at all.

Let's take these in order:

Grammar, Spelling, and Punctuation: the Big Three

You'll notice that the list I look at as a reader starts the same as the one I look at as a writer. This shouldn't be surprising; grammar, spelling, and proper punctuation are the major barrier to reading here, even as they are the foundation to a good story. You can have a bad story with these three, but you can't have a good story without them!

There are a ton of resources and guides out there for help with these items, so I'm going to hit just a couple of points that tend to drive most readers bonkers.

First: Whether you use British English or that Quaint American Style, be consistent in your spelling choices. For example, if you spell 'honor' with the British u - 'honour' - use also 'colour', and 'realise'. Be aware that some spelling choices are more invisible than others. I'm not sure of the last time I was 'smacked between the eyes' with the difference between 'realize' (American) and 'realise' (British), but I always notice 'color' vs 'colour'. This may be in part because of my mental ear - when I read, I 'hear' the narrative and character voices in my head, and that extra 'u' always makes things 'sound' different to me.

BUT: If your narrative - the non-dialog part of the story - is first-person, or tight-third to one character, match your spelling and phrasing to the character's nationality. It seems incredibly picky, but you can really screw up a story if, for example, all-American Jim Ellison is thinking in British spellings and British phrasings. Most people won't realise why this bothers them, but it's because people think in the same language they speak. Which is to say, if you're an American character, the chances of you mentally spelling or picturing the word with the British spellings are going to be slim to none(2). This is why American readers complain when British-authored fanfics of American shows are liberally sprinkled with Britishisms into the narrative (as opposed to the dialog), and vice versa. It 'sounds wrong' in the readers' heads.

Second: With regards to punctuation, be absolutely sure you know the rules before you break them. Most people don't recommend breaking them at all, but there may be specific instances when you feel you need to punctuate a certain way that is not otherwise correct. In this day and age of the internet, there are many opportunities for more informal writing styles to show up in a story. You may be constructing a character's blog posts, for example, and that character doesn't punctuate or capitalize properly as a matter of habit. Take for example, my own writing style. This is a snippet of text from a locked post a bit back:

finally got the nerve to weigh myself on the scale today - i backslid to 245. i think. that's what the scale says, and my recent junk food intake would support that, except that my size 20 jeans are still getting looser every day. so i'm not sure exactly what's up, but it looks like i'm going to be going back to severe watchdog the diet mode.

in other news, tree pollen butt-sechs season in louisiana has the added benefit of the tree pollen being on steroids, and fucking like bunnies.

-bs

Notice how I don't capitalize anything? I'm very informal in most of my writing. As a matter of fact, I've got a nice little bit of arthritis in my hands, and I'm trying to avoid carpal-tunnel syndrome with all four extremities fighting tooth and nail. Added to that, I still remember when unneccessary capitals seriously added to bandwidth problems. So, when I'm being informal, I very rarely capitalize unless I need to do so to avoid confusion. Yet when I'm writing stories, and this series which I expect to be read by a large number of people, and certainly reports and official commentary at work, I capitalize correctly. Short version: Don't make your readers go through hoops to figure out what you're trying to say. If you have a person speaking in a thick accent, or writing in l33tspeak or lolspeak, the better part of valor is to write whatever it is in regular English, and describe the accent in the narrative. Your readers will thank you for it.

Tense

Tense is one of those things that can be very tricky. Whatever tense you use, BE CONSISTENT. Don't mix tenses. On a personal note, I don't read anything in present tense, unless it's a dream sequence or other short embedded section. I cannot handle it for long pieces. This is, in some sense, unfortunate, because

synecdochic writes almost entirely in present tense, so I'm probably never going to read one of her works, which are many, lengthy, and plotty. While there's serious debate going on over the merits of past vs present tense, my preferred tense is past tense. Present tense tends to make me feel dreamy and foggy while reading, and not in a good way, which is why I'll probably never manage to make it through

synecdochic 's stories - sorry syn.

Complete Sentences

Many people will hammer on run-on sentences, but when you're reading, run-ons aren't as visible as incomplete sentences. I once had a physics text book that featured an entire paragraph's worth of introductory phrase. Needless to say, I WAS NOT HAPPY. Make sure your sentences feature a clear subject and a clear verb and that the two agree. This also goes under the category of making your reader work to understand what you're saying: Don't do it. The less time the reader spends on interpreting your writing, the more they can enjoy it instead.

Lightning and the Lightning Bug

Mark Twain once wrote that the difference between the right word and the almost right word is like the difference between lightning and the lightning bug. 'Lightning bug' word choices are not necessarily incorrect so much as not right in tone and scope, or imagery. I'm going to give you two samples to show you what I mean. The first is from Arrivals, by KT.

I was reading this story with an eye towards recommending it on

crack_van, because it starts out really well:

"Have you seen my Ma?" the small voice asked.
Looking down … and down … and down, Blossom finally found the source of the voice. There on the step below her, in the middle of a thriving saloon on a Friday afternoon, was a small boy of about five or six, his thick unruly raven black hair fell over dark eyes that gazed up at her.

These first two paragraphs set the scene well, and give a good premonition as to what will happen in the immediate future. The 'hook' is very good. However, half a page later is this sentence:

The two boys stared at [Josiah] with undigested fear, clutching on to each other for dear life.

This ruined the whole thing for me - 'undigested' is not an incorrect word choice here. It's an adjective, and is similar enough in meaning that it might be appropriate to the context - except it's not. The imagery it provides is of two little boys who have eaten too much and are afraid their dinners are going to come back up, not two kids who are afraid of a man who fits all the parameters of past abusers. And it makes me laugh - which is pretty obviously not what the author intended. 'Indescribable' would have been a much better choice.

The next example is not so obvious, and is from The Date by Estee.  This example takes a little bit of set-up, and the only way I can really explain this is to spoil the story a bit for those who haven't read it. It's a clever little story in the Little Britches: ATF AU, with the A plot being Chris going on a date that turns into the date from hell, while the B plot is Vin (mis)-learning about adult dates and sex and pregnancy. As you might expect, Estee takes every opportunity to stick in phrasal references to pregnancy in the story, which for the most part works very well. Until you get to this part, which occurs (chronologically) just after Vin has had a talk with Chris about whether or not he's going to have sex on his date :

           Chris had just left on his date. The boys were in the den watching television.

           Having seen Chris’ pregnant look as he exited his room, Buck had tried to find out what was up. Chris
           appeared to be about to tell him when all of a sudden an odd expression came overLarabee's face and he
           closed his mouth. Shaking his head, he’d clapped Buck on the shoulder and simply said they’d talk later.

Again, 'pregnant look' is not an incorrect phrase in terms of style, tone, or meaning. In fact, in this example it could be argued that 'pregnant look' is a very good choice. Except that 'pregnant look' gives a visual of a roundly pregnant Chris Larabee (which, um, no, I'm pretty sure you can't make me believe that). The phrase the author wants to hearken back to is 'pregnant pause', which is laudable, but it fails to make the grade. Let me re-write this section to show what I mean:

            After Chris left, the boys settled down in the den to watch television. Buck sat in the recliner and tried to
            puzzle out what was bothering Chris this evening. Or was it something Vin said? He had seen the boy
            follow Chris into his room to watch him get ready. The odd expression on Larabee's face when he'd exited
            the bedroom might have meant anything or nothing, and Buck had felt a familiar prickle of tension run up his
            back.

             "What's up Stud?" he'd asked softly.

             Chris had opened and closed his mouth a couple of times before he managed to end the pregnant pause
             with a clap on Buck's shoulder. "I need to get going; we'll talk later."

The first thing you'll notice is that I really had to re-work the section to get the phrase I wanted to use - 'pregnant pause' - into the piece. But this allowed me to set up the phrase so that it was an expected use. This is important. When you're using theme phrases like this, you may need to create a bit of foreshadowing, so the phrase itself doesn't come across as just randomly inserted. Part of the problem with Estee's original piece is that she failed to do this, and it's especially jarring since the unexpected phrase - 'pregnant look' - is also unusual.

It's a small thing, but it can throw people out of the story quickly.

So, to sum up: Don't make your readers work any harder than you absolutely have to. There are a number of things can be cleverly done when done right; these things will also sink your story when done wrong. There is no need to try to be clever if you don't want to - some of the simplest stories are also the most powerful.

(1) And remember, I'm an engineer, not a literature major, so my terminology may be different than the 'correct' terms - just go with me here, and ask questions if you need to.

(2) However, note that in the previous sentence, I just spelled the word 'realise' with the British 's' instead of an American 'z' - and I am definitly American born and bred. I have been known to fool people into thinking I'm Canadian, if they've only seen me type, and not heard my verbal pronunciation.