CONTENTMENT COTTAGE

WELCOME! In the midst of each life's chaos exists a place of calm and sunshine. I call mine Contentment Cottage. It is the place where I write my stories and find the peace of God. I've posted my "Ice Pick" reviews and will continue to add some of what I call my "Ice Crystals": poems, articles, essays, fillers, and recipes.

Friday, October 27, 2006

THE ICE PICK

Building Fiction: How to Develop Plot and Structure, by Jesse Lee Kercheval. Cincinnati: Story Press, 1997. ISBN 1-8849120-28-9. $16.99.

Whatever kind of fiction you write--or want to write--short shorts (anything up to 1500 words), short stories (up to 50 pages), novellas (50 to 150 pages), novels (150 to 1000 pages, but averaging 300 to 450), novels-in-stories (collections of short stories centering on one character, family, town, etc. or sharing a common theme or subject), or experimental fiction, this book has something to offer you.

The first part discusses the usual elements of structure: openings, viewpoint, characters, conflict, and endings, as well as ways of finding ideas and how to revise your work.

Kercheval divides story openings into three types: "into the pot, already boiling," the "calm before the story," and "opening statements to the jury," which are thematic statements, such as "Jones has been in love all his life." She explains the advantages and risks inherent in each method.

In the chapter on viewpoint, Kercheval discusses how to play around with varying points of view to figure out which is right for your current story project and which character will best serve as your narrator.

Dialogue and dialect are covered in the excellent chapter on characterization, which includes many hints on how to develop your characters by external description (without overdoing it), and through internal revelation using the characters’ own thoughts, memories, dreams, and imaginings.

"When editors send back a short story or reject a novel, nine times out of ten they will say the ending didn’t work for them." Kercheval discusses the use of symbolic objects, meaningful gestures, and rites of passage (a death, a marriage, the birth of a child, a homecoming, or a leavetaking) to sum up or resolve your story’s conflict and make its ending satisfying.

I found the chapter on revision very helpful. It contains both macro and micro revision checklists and offers solutions to common problems.

The second part of the book discusses the different kinds of fiction--the advantages and disadvantages of novels versus short stories, short stories versus novellas, etc.--and what may be right for the kind of story you are trying to tell.

The index is very good, and there are end of chapter exercises to help you get your feet wet. Some of them are fun, and all of them lead you back to your own writing.

{Published in GPIC, the Oklahoma Science Fiction Writers Newsletter, Aug. 1999. Reprinted in SF & Fantasy Workshop Newsletter, Dec. 2000.}

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1 Comments:

Blogger Diana said...

Too true! But for those stories and novels that ARE read in their entirety, most are apparently rejected because of their ending. If an ending is flat or unsatisfying, leaves loose ends hanging or things poorly explained (or completely unexplained), or uses a deus ex machina, is stupid, or is just plain incredible because of circumstance or character motivation, you sometimes feel like throwing the book across the room.

4:19 PM  

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