I’ve been writing seriously for a few years now—was writing
in a semi-serious fashion (or, at least, in a manner I felt to be serious)—for a
number of years prior to that. My focus,
for most of that time, has been on short stories, prose and comic, in order to
learn how to write. Looking back over
these past handful of years, I can definitely see an improvement in, coupled
with a new way of looking at, my writing.
I’ve met with some success with these short stories. Now, I want to level up. That, to me, means writing a novel.
While I’ve been focused on short stories, I have also been
working toward writing novels. They’re a
totally different beast and require a new approach and a new set of tools. Over the years, I’ve started five
novels. Three of these died around the
100-page mark of the manuscript, for multiple reasons. At the end of March, 2014, I finally finished
an initial draft of a YA novel, roughly 82,000 words. In retrospect, I realize the premise relies a
bit too heavily on the visual aspect of the characters and would work better in
a format more attuned to that, i.e. television or film, so it remains unrevised
on the hard drive, but a testament to the fact that I can do this. This allowed me to start a second novel, an
expansion of a short story I wrote a few years back, “The Call of the Sea.” I really enjoyed expanding that, adding new
characters and plot twists, and fleshing out the idea I had, initially. Almost a year after completing “Masques,”
(the YA novel mentioned earlier), I finished the first draft of Call of the Sea. The manuscript came in at around 115,000
words, and I look forward to revising it and sending it off to publishers
sometime in the near future.
But first, I find myself debating about what a novel should
be and whether I can find my voice before I hack Call of the Sea into kindling, to put it back together in an
engaging narrative.
Each narrative form has certain strengths and weaknesses. Short stories can delineate a specific idea
with a hard punch to the gut that is a singular collaboration between reader
and author, while films can expand on those ideas utilizing all of our senses
to elicit an emotional response in the audience, and novels are able to delve
deeply into ideas and characters, revealing truths and horrors, among other
things, that we may never have considered before, or never considered in just
that way. (these are obviously reductive
and simplistic characterizations meant only to demonstrate that there are differences
between narrative media/formats)
Novels, by dint of their length and the readership’s ability
to translate the words on the page into images in their minds, are able to dig
more deeply into characters than other narrative forms (though television is
now moving toward that, with much of its more acclaimed fare, in recent
years). The strength of novels, for most
people, is this excavation of the interiority of character. It is what makes a novel a novel, in the
minds of many readers and authors. I
have seen myriad arguments against novels that do not explore this aspect
deeply enough, questioning why something so plot heavy is not, instead, created
as a film or television show (two media looked down upon by snobbish
readers). And this is an area where I
feel I struggle, with my writing.
This raises a question: is this the only way to write a novel? The idea that one must adhere to this
unwritten rule feels wrong to me. Could
that be a result of my feeling inadequate in properly fleshing out my characters,
in this way? That is certainly legitimate
argument. But it doesn’t end the
discussion.
I started seriously thinking about this interiority of
character—a phrase I’d read, and heard mentioned, many times before—this past
winter, as I read Rick Moody’s wonderful novel, The Ice Storm. He manages to reveal this interiority of
character through his evocative prose, and it was really a joy to read and experience. It also, for the first time, really got me
thinking about how I should approach the revising of Call of the Sea, as well as the writing of the next novel.
Then I read William Gibson’s The Peripheral. This is the first Gibson novel I’ve read, and
it was great. Something I noticed,
though, was how short and quick his chapters were—only a few pages each, some
of which were less than a page—and how dominated by dialogue they are. It was an entirely different approach to the
novel that not only did not flatten his characters, but also did not lessen my
enjoyment of the narrative. (yes, I know
I have read many of these two—and it’s not a binary matter, except for my own
argument—but I’ve never really thought deeply about it before)
Reading these two novel so closely together, raises the
question of what—to my mind—a novel is, or even has to be. Must I dig deeply into the interiority of my
characters through colorful, and insightful, metaphors and anecdotes? Or, can I seek out my writing voice, in
novels, without burdening myself with these unwritten rules?
It’s funny. I wrote
this as an exercise, a way to get my thoughts (unformed, at best) out, in order
to reach a definite conclusion about how to attack the next novel, and the
revision of Call of the Sea. When I started, I had an idea where I would
land—leaning toward the William Gibson model briefly stated above. Now, roughly an hour later, I find myself tipping
back, ever so slightly, toward the former.
Both approaches, along with myriad others I haven’t fully considered
here, are valid. Obviously.
The problem for me, as I see it, is that if I go with the
easier path, I am allowing myself to become stagnant, even as I want to be moving
forward. I understand I have so much
more to learn about writing—lots of known unknowns, or known unknowns, or is
that unknown unknowns?—and I know that if I do not keep working to elevate my
game, it will all be an exercise in futility.
So, where do I go from here?
I’ve got a science fiction idea I want to pursue. I think that’s the next big project. Write the first draft of that novel, paying attention
to how I’m writing, as I go along. Focus
on the interiority of my characters, to the best of my ability (knowing that a
first draft is a s&*t draft and can be fixed in subsequent revisions), and
complete that. Then, with the experience—and,
hopefully, the insights gleaned from that—go back to novel #2, Call of the Sea, and apply what I learn
to the revision of that novel. From
there, who knows?
Thanks for letting me ramble.
-chris
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