As I mentioned late yesterday, I sent off my Clarion West application. I had to write a three page synopsis to go along with chapter 1. It was hard but I actually just got some good advice from Jason Black(http://www.plottopunctuation.com/) about synopsis writing. He spoke at a PNWA event just last week and he gave good advice about only including the skull and spine of my story in the synopsis, not even the skeleton of the plot, just the spine.
A funny thing happened though, while I was working on it. Some of the suggestions from Donald Maas's 'Writing the Breakout Novel' came to me. I started amping up the stakes for some of the later plot stumbling blocks. Rather than just coming to Basal Mount uneventfully, they come to find the castle under siege. Right away I start having visions of Jael and Jacob cutting their way in to safety, with the giant who brought them there creating a distraction and/or fighting with them. (Haven't decided on that). That gives the Castellan a more concrete reason to prevent Jacob from going up the mountain. It also gives the Rider Council a reason to distrust the warning brought by the Storm King...ah but I'm getting ahead of myself. The point is, I'm going to do more than just increase the pacing with this draft. I'm going to try to ratchet up the intensity and the stakes for some of the later events. I'm really glad I wrote this synopsis after I decided to change the pacing. That's something to remember for future drafts and future novels.
I also got some feedback on my revised, faster-paced chapters. Feedback has been good, on the whole. I think I'm improving with each revision. I still think I need feedback based on the novel as a whole, rather than just one or two chapters at a time.
A funny thing happened though, while I was working on it. Some of the suggestions from Donald Maas's 'Writing the Breakout Novel' came to me. I started amping up the stakes for some of the later plot stumbling blocks. Rather than just coming to Basal Mount uneventfully, they come to find the castle under siege. Right away I start having visions of Jael and Jacob cutting their way in to safety, with the giant who brought them there creating a distraction and/or fighting with them. (Haven't decided on that). That gives the Castellan a more concrete reason to prevent Jacob from going up the mountain. It also gives the Rider Council a reason to distrust the warning brought by the Storm King...ah but I'm getting ahead of myself. The point is, I'm going to do more than just increase the pacing with this draft. I'm going to try to ratchet up the intensity and the stakes for some of the later events. I'm really glad I wrote this synopsis after I decided to change the pacing. That's something to remember for future drafts and future novels.
I also got some feedback on my revised, faster-paced chapters. Feedback has been good, on the whole. I think I'm improving with each revision. I still think I need feedback based on the novel as a whole, rather than just one or two chapters at a time.
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