Expanding Your Story

A Little Acorn of a Tale

I’m currently revising a novel that has gone from 300 words when I lost it about 12 years ago. It seems that the characters do not mention in that small piece felt the need to make an entrance. What was a short literary piece became the prologue – yes prologue, not chapter – to a story that grew to 136k words.

At this point if you’re a new writer you’ll slap yourself on the back for a great sense of achievement. That’s a lot of words – a great big book to send out of the world. If you’re slightly more experienced, you’ll say, “Do I really need all these words?”

That’s the critical point of writing. You’ll have heard the old saying Less is more. Or to put it more succinctly: Purpose. Why have you written this part? What does it mean to the story? To the character? To the reader? Is it telling them something that they need to know – perhaps a clue for an aha later down the line?

Don’t waste the reader’s time. The information you gather in your story should do one of the following:

• Give the setting, time, and place

• Let them know the genre.

• Give the reader some flow of the story

• Set the tone within the first paragraph.

• Lay out the dilemma and conflict in the story

• Give some backstory

“Do I really need all these words?”

Sometimes your prologue or first chapter will have a different timeline. In which case your blurb should have given the reader a head’s up about this.

Five hundred years ago, a fierce battle between …

Now in present day, conflict continues through two families…

That way, readers will not be confused by a story that jumps from the 16th century to the 21st.

The purpose of your content is to keep the reader informed or entertained. You will always need backstory but how it’s presented is critical. You do not want to give the reader and avalanche of information in one go. I call it the This is because huff puff and then but then section. You can intersperse information by giving it to other characters in dialogue.

Rather than narrative: Ola’s daughter drowned in Lake Mercy so she had always refused his invitation to go sailing there, you could try:

“Did you know Ola’s daughter drowned in Lake Mercy?”

“No, I didn’t. My god, No wonder she always refuses my invitations to go sailing there!”

The first thing I look at is the nucleus of my story. What is it about?

Or if you want to have suspenseful setting, the narrative version is going to be more effective. Just keep it tight and relevant. Narrative without action can become boring. There’s only so much you can say about the trees before you show the reader a shadow lurking between them or remember that this is the reputed Headless Horseman’s hideout or the secret route to Aladdin’s cave. Could that glow in the distance be where the spaceship landed? A portal to another world? Where the vampires arise from sleep?

So these are the elements I need to apply in my own writing, purpose, purpose, purpose. The first thing I look at is the nucleus of my story. What is it about? A woman who has a burning task and must find a way to succeed in her mission. Her conflict and dilemma are that she suffers amnesia and is relying on feelings rather than knowledge. Additional elements are a reluctant hero, 20 additional husbands with whom she must sleep on a rota, all with amnesia, and being on an isolated island.

It’s an erotic tale so that’s also an element of balance. 

The elements I need to highlight in my story are mystery, romance, danger, conflict, competition, sacrifice, and madness. It’s an erotic tale so that’s also an element of balance.

I’ve cut out several graphic chapters, chunks of dialogue, and given some characters a greater profile. I’ve used them to explain things that the reader might ask. To show the characters of other readers, and to give clues about the background. I’m trying to create a jigsaw where all the pieces flow together, if put in the right order. However, this is a twisty tale, and it’s archaic, so I have to stay true to their language and their setting.

These are all the things I need to encapsulate. It means that anything which is superfluous has to go. And go it will.