Day 276 of the 365 Days of Blogging

The author, Dane F. Baylis

LIKE A SUMPTUOUS FEAST, SUBLIME MUSIC, OR GREAT SEX, THE BEST PLOT HAPPENS OVER TIME

THE READER SHOULD ALWAYS HUNGER FOR MORE!

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Yesterday we looked at why backstory should be presented sparingly. Too much presented too soon and you will inevitably lose today's overstimulated audience. They are bombarded with image after image, all day long, most of this goes right through their mind without even pausing. Only those details that are delivered as part of the action will get their attention.

 

It is the same with plot. If you lay out the major conflict, in full detail, in the first chapter, what's left for your audience? What will compel them to keep reading? What will make them want to buy more of your work? What do you think keeps authors from starving to death at their keyboards?

 

What was it about Jason Charles Bourne, the Lead from Robert Ludlum's wildly successful, BOURNE, trilogy that pulled readers, and later movie goers, into those stories? You start with a man found floating in the middle of the Mediterranean with no knowledge of how he got there. Some very disturbing hints are given, but a myriad of questions are left unanswered. Ludlum provided the answers, a little at the time, and insured that they only instigated further questions. Even the endings of the books left questions unaddressed, and therefore you were presented with the basis for the next book. By the time you begin to see the meaning of the backstory, as it comes to light in dribs and drabs, you are hooked. You are on that same quest that Bourne was on. You, like he, must discover the answers.

 

This is the secret to good fiction writing. Plot should happen over time and with only enough revealed to cause the audience to ask the next question. Often, a competent writer will start a chapter with a twist or new level of tension and end it with the answer. But a great writer never leaves you with all the facts, an answer should be the lead in to the next question.

 

Yes, just another helpful hint from your Uncle Dane.

 

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Meanwhile...live, love, write. A little bit here, a little bit there. Ah, is that a villain on the next page?

 

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Tomorrow,

 

Dane F. Baylis

Author.