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Welcome to The Verb!
 "Rollin',
rollin', rollin'! Keep them doggies movin'!"
Sorry, that little ditty pops into my head whenever I think about this
next element on my list. It'll go away in a minute.
I hope.
Pace, of course, is the tempo of your story, the beat beneath the scene.
You have a pace, I have a pace, all God's creatures have a pace. And
where you decide to begin your story, when you let your characters
appear, what they say, what they do—all these goodies reveal your pace
as a storyteller. It's your timing.
Structurally, you have an immediate pace, which flows through every
scene, and an overall pace, which runs throughout the story. When you
use long, fluid sentences, you exude a relaxed, cerebral tone that
subliminally tells your readers, Slow down, look at this because it's
important. When you use short, snappy sentences, you exude an
energetic, breathless tone that says, Buckle up, it's gonna be a
bumpy ride!
And readers are perfectly willing to adjust to your pace as long as it
remains in time.
But sometimes writers aren't in touch with their natural pace, and
that's when their story suffers. The scenes drag, the dialogue meanders
and the purpose of the tale is lost, or confused. Rather than
a "fast read," the manuscript is labeled "hard to get into."
How do you know if you've lost your natural pace? Nothing is
happening.
Share your manuscript with readers. Ask them where their eyes glaze
over, where they yawn or fidget, which parts they completely skip
over—and guess what? You'll find those areas are the same ones you dread
rewriting. You know something's wrong. You see it. You feel it. But you
don't know what to do about it. You've lost your beat.
And here are
the main beat killers:
1.
Starting the story too soon. This can get you off to a bad start by
slowing your precious first chapter to a crawl. Your characters may be
going through the motions, giving the appearance of being busy, but
their actions aren't leading up to anything.
 Tip
Readers want to see conflict
from the get-go.
2.
Spending too much time in the past. Memories (flashbacks) and
biographical info (backstory) add depth and texture if served in small
doses. But when they go on for pages, they overshadow the current story.
Tip
Focus on the character's present in the first draft.
In
subsequent drafts you'll find, if you listen closely, perfect spots to
insert the past.
3.
Spending too much time on descriptions. It's a gifted writer who can
wax eloquent about a thing or a milieu. But unless it's the main
character, it doesn't deserve a whole chapter. Besides, if you describe
every little thing, your readers' imaginations won't have any work to
do.
Tip
Rather than stop the action for descriptions,
find ways to insert descriptions into the action.
4. And the
biggie: Characters thinking, pondering, gazing, wondering,
analyzing, etc.
Tip
Um... don't do this. Just don't.
You'll notice
that in all these instances your characters are standing still. Idling.
No movement. No beat. And when your characters aren't moving with
purpose, your story is not moving with purpose. So the timing is
off.
This also applies
to characters who move too quickly, although we don't see many of those. There are
the occasional manuscripts with pure dialogue, dizzy transitions and mad
dashes through highly dramatic scenes. He checked his mail, killed
his wife, and left. (Whoa! Back up! He did what?) But those are few
and far between. I guess the very nature of the novel causes most
writers to slow down, to stop and smell the roses. And that's a good
thing as long as nobody falls asleep in the rosebush.
As you can
see, Pace isn’t so much about speed as it is about stamina. Hitting the
right stride. Maintaining a steady, captivating beat from the first page
to the last. As long as readers are engaged in your story, it will
always be a fast read.
Keep them doggies
movin'!
Elizabeth Guy
Editor
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