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.}

THE ICE PICK

Scene and Structure, by Jack M. Bickham. Cincinnati, Writer’s Digest Books, 1999. Paperback ed. (The Elements of Fiction Writing) Includes index and appendices. ISBN 0-89879-906-6. $12.00.

Unlike most how-to-write books, this one emphasizes the actual framework of story writing, answering the "how do you get there from here?" and "what do I do next?" kinds of tactical planning questions.

If you want to learn how to construct a short story or a novel, this book can tell you how to build it scene by scene with clarity, flow, logic, readability, and rhythm.

Bickham explains basics like starting and ending a story, deciding how long the individual scenes and the story itself should be and whether or not to include subplots, plus more advanced concepts such as: linking your scenes through transition and sequel, handling scenes started by non-viewpoint characters, flashbacks, and all-dialogue or all-action scenes.

He teaches fiction’s classic structural patterns and says that a thorough understanding and use of them "frees the writer from having to worry about the wrong things, and allows her to concentrate her imagination on characters and events rather than on such stuff as transitions and moving characters around, when to begin or open a chapter, whether there ought to be a flashback, and so on."

You probably noticed the use of the word "her" in the above quotation. Bickham used feminine pronouns throughout the book to refer to writers and masculine pronouns to refer to readers, a quirk that I found very distracting (I kept looking back to see whom he was referring to) and very annoying (as if women were the only ones who had writing problems).

That fairly minor complaint aside, this book is a treasure. It shows how cause and effect underlie the structure of fiction and how you can use this to create everything from your story’s master plot to all of your individual scenes through statements of your character’s goal(s), introduction and development of conflicts, and the tactical disasters (for your character) that should end each scene and drive your story forward.

There are chapters on using tricks to control the pace of your story, how to fix common errors in scenes, and plotting. He even has a chapter on chapter structure, covering such things as how long a chapter should be and whether or not chapters should coincide with scenes.

He gives you ideas, like using 3x5 cards to keep track of your character’s goal in each scene and using colored pencils to help you maintain control over complicated scenes.

The index is excellent, and appendices contain excerpts from published works showing what is explained in the text. This is not an easy book, but I highly recommend it for serious writers.

{Published in GPIC, the Oklahoma Science Fiction Writers Newsletter. May 1999. Reprinted in SF & Fantasy Workshop Newsletter, Nov. 2004.}