Pace Your Story for Maximum Reader Engagement (Seven tips to keep the pages turning)

Have you ever received a rejection letter where an editor or agent said there are problems with pacing in your story? Pacing problems can be hard to analyze and fix. The whole concept seems much more abstract than, say, characterization or plot.

So what, exactly, is pacing? 

Pacing is the rhythm of a novel and the speed at which the events unfold. It’s what propels the story forward and pulls the reader through each new scene. If the pace is too fast, characters seem shallow and the story lacks depth. The reader doesn’t connect on an emotional level, which leaves her feeling unsatisfied. If the pace is too slow, the story drags and the reader becomes bored.

The trick is knowing when to speed up and when to hold back. You need speed in the opening to engage your reader and, of course, at the climax. The rest of the story needs to move along at a fast enough pace to keep the reader turning pages, with breaks to pause and reflect and feel the emotion of the characters.

Here are some elements you can use to control the pace at which your story unfolds:

• Action – Action scenes increase the pace of your story. For maximum effect, use short- to medium-length sentences and a few sharp details rather than long, descriptive passages. You also want to limit character thoughts, which can make action scenes lose their momentum. 

Shattered Haven climaxes with the villain kidnapping the hero and heroine. At the point at which he tries to kill them, here is how I initially began the scene: (I’ve changed the villain’s name for this example.) 

Blake rolled three times, grasped the shovel handle and sprang to his feet, the echo of the single shot reverberating in his ears. He had flown into action the instant Darren closed his eyes, hoping and praying that those brief moments of relaxed vigilance would give him the time he needed. It was a long shot, but he didn’t have anything to lose. He couldn’t allow Allison to be gunned down on the beach. And he wasn’t too crazy about that end for himself, either.
But Darren didn’t give him the time to implement his plan. The moment Blake was on his feet, Darren opened his eyes and jerked the gun around with a gasp. A good fifteen feet separated them, nowhere near close enough to strike. The pine that stood between them was way too small to shield him.
But before Darren could take a second shot, a low hum drifted to them across the water, the sound of an approaching power boat. 

For a scene with high action, I did an awful lot of explaining. We don’t need to hear his entire thought process, how he’s hoping the relaxed vigilance will buy him time, what his chances are, what he doesn’t want to happen, etc. Under the circumstances, he’s not going to be stopping to think about all this anyway. 

Here’s the revised version:

The instant Darren closed his eyes, Blake flew into action. He sprang sideways, crumpled to the ground and did three sloppy somersaults. Pain shot through his knee, the worst he had experienced in months. 
But he couldn't focus on that now. He grasped the shovel handle and sprang to his feet. But his bad leg buckled, twisting as he tumbled sideways. The pain intensified, a raging fire that nothing would quench. Stars filled his vision and blackness encroached. Dear God, what have I done?
Darren opened his eyes and jerked the gun around. Only about seven feet separated them. But it may as well have been fifty. He would never be able to strike before Darren took his second shot.
Then the low hum of an approaching power boat drifted to them across the water. 

In the revised version, he’s acting and feeling rather than thinking. The first passage is 165 words, and the second is 135. The second example is more streamlined, with crisper, more evocative writing and shorter sentences. 

• Dialogue – Dialogue, if well written, speeds up the pace of a story. Good, strong dialogue advances the plot, reveals character, begins or heightens conflict or creates emotional impact. If it can accomplish two or three of these purposes, that’s even better. It also needs to be free of filler words, unnecessary adverbs, and long explanations. 

Besides the words themselves, how much introspection and description is woven in helps to determine pace. In the following excerpt from Mistletoe Justice (December 2015), the heroine is at the park with her autistic son, and the hero has just approached her. The setting is peaceful and cozy, the scene somewhat relaxed, so I have bits of introspection and description woven throughout.

He sat next to her. “Thanks. How about you? Are you vacationing, or do you live here?”
“Neither. I grew up here, and my parents still live here. So Jayden and I come back and spend our weekends with them.” Maybe that was more than she should have told him. But he didn’t seem the stalker type. Jimmy Fuller could learn a thing or two from him.
“So which one is yours?”
She inclined her head toward the slide. Jayden was on his hands and knees in front of it, the momentum having toppled him forward.
“The one in the red shirt at the bottom of the slide.”
As she watched, another boy slid down and fell on top of him.
Conner cringed. “Is he all right?”
She stood and watched as the boy rolled to the side and Jayden pushed himself to his feet. He shook his hands, then patted them together, trying to get rid of the sand. The playground was mulched, but too many feet had scattered it.
“He’s all right. He’s a pretty tough little boy. Doesn’t cry much.” Doesn’t talk much, either.He approached her then, palms up, and after tucking her water bottle under her arm, she brushed off his hands. Sand bothered him. A lot of things bothered him.
When she was finished, he reached for her water bottle.
She shook her head. “What do you say?”
He stretched higher, and she repeated her question, still holding the bottle out of his reach.He dropped his arms. “Wawa, peas.”
She handed him the bottle and turned to Conner. “We need to go. Mom’s putting lunch on the table at one o’clock sharp.”
“Then you’d better not be late. Kyle and I will be here through tomorrow. Hopefully our paths will cross again.”
The smile he gave her made her stomach flip-flop. She was usually immune to charming men, no matter how good-looking. But seeing Conner play the father role had a completely unexpected effect on her. He had to be a pretty caring, unselfish guy to take on the responsibility of his sister’s kid. There were a lot of men out there who didn’t even take responsibility for their own. She knew that firsthand.

The following scene, from Hidden Identity, is much more tense and thus moves at a faster pace. After the heroine’s prints come back as belonging to a dead person, the police officer hero is pressuring her to tell him why.

She shook her head. “I can’t.”
“Did you commit a crime?” Not that she would tell him if she had. But maybe he would sense if she was lying. “Are you running from the law?”
“No.”
It was just a single word. But the conviction behind it blasted holes in the suspicions he had had since the moment someone had branded her a killer.
“Then what are you running from?” Or more likely, who?
She shook her head again. “I can’t tell you. I can’t tell anyone.”
He leaned forward and lightly touched her jean-clad leg. “Tell me what you’re afraid of. I can help.”
“No.” She crossed her arms in front of her, as if chilled. “No one can help.”
“Meagan,” he began, then stopped. That wasn’t even her name. “You faked your death. You’re living under an alias. What kind of a cop would I be if I just accepted your claim that you’re not running from the law?”
“What are you saying?”
“I think you know what I’m saying. Give me one good reason to not haul you in.”
Her eyes widened, and fear flashed in their depths. “I’m not a killer. I’ve never committed any kind of crime. I’ve never even had a speeding ticket.” Her tone turned pleading. “Please believe me.”
“I don’t have that option. As an officer of the law, I can’t just let this go. Tell me what you’re running from.”
She shook her head again, so adamantly her hair bounced against her cheeks. “He’ll kill me.”
“Who?”
“Edmund.”
“Edmund who?”
“I can’t tell you. If he ever finds out I’m alive, he’ll hunt me down. He won’t rest until I’m dead.”

This passage contains a small amount of introspection, but after the hero’s brief thought that Meagan wasn’t even her name, the dialogue is broken only by short actions.

• Narrative, introspection and description in appropriate doses – Introspection and description, especially, tend to slow the pace of a story, but these are also the elements that give it depth. If anyone says there’s not enough feeling in your story or it’s superficial, you need to slow down the pace and bring out the emotion. Keep in mind, though, that long blocks of any one thing, even if well-written, bring forward movement to a screeching halt. It’s best to break these into smaller chunks and intersperse them what with is happening at the time.

In Motive for Murder, after eight years of being gone, the heroine has come back to her childhood home, which has been ransacked, to deal with her sister’s suicide. She’s alone, so there’s no dialogue, but look at how description, narrative and introspection are woven in together, with action interspersed. 

She moved further into the room. (action) A photo frame lay face down on the end table, (description) and she reached to stand it up. (action) Priscilla stared back at her, sending an unexpected jolt coursing all the way to her toes. (description)
Jessica drew in a steadying breath. (action) She had buried the past and moved forward with her life. And she had done well. (introspection) Then she got that phone call. And now she was back. (narrative) It was hard to keep the past buried when she was surrounded by it, memories dogging her at every turn, a blond-haired princess accusing her with those crystal blue eyes. (introspection)
She picked up the frame for a closer look. (action) Priscilla had grown up to be quite pretty. She had been a chubby-cheeked thirteen-year-old when Jessica left, with a lingering childishness and an angelic innocence that fooled ninety percent of the people she met. (introspection) The woman in the photo looked neither childish nor innocent. Though she wore a pleasant half smile, her features held hardness, hinting at a life that had knocked her around and the barriers that had gone up as a result. (description/introspection)
What had happened? What could be so bad that she believed she had nothing to live for? Why does anyone take her own life? (introspection)
She set the frame back on the table and kicked a pillow aside. (action) Two bedrooms waited for her down the hall, likely in the same shape as the other rooms. (narrative) She stopped at the first open doorway, and dread washed over her. No, this was much worse. (introspection)
It was her and Priscilla’s room, frozen in time—the twin beds and their whitewashed headboards, the chest with five drawers, three of which Prissy had always managed to claim, and the mismatched vanity, which Prissy took over from day one. (description) They had always had to share a room. And Jessica had hated every minute of it. (introspection)

• Scenes that move the story forward – Each scene should be well developed, serve a purpose and have a positive or negative (not neutral) outcome for one or more of the characters. Any scenes that don’t accomplish this should be cut and possibly the events summarized. Summaries work well when time passes but not much happens or when an action or event is repeated. Summarizing events tends to speed up the pace, but major turning points and events that cause characters to grow and change should always be played out on the page. 

When I first submitted the proposal for Hidden Identity, which included three chapters and a detailed synopsis, the pace was too slow and there wasn’t enough of a sense of pressure building throughout the story. Here is a sketch of those first six scenes:

Scene 1 – Heroine, who has faked her death and is in hiding, witnesses a plane go down, rescues a senator and finds her face plastered on the news. (Note: The plane going down happens on page 3.)

Scene 2 – Hero goes to the gift store where heroine works. On the 6:00 news, the senator is interviewed and the heroine’s face is displayed. Heroine’s reaction tells the cop hero that she’s running from something.

Scene 3 – Heroine is at work alone when hero tries to get her to tell him what she’s running from. He also asks her for help on a mural for the youth room at church. (She’s an artist.)

Scene 4 – Hero discusses his concerns about the heroine with the heroine’s boss and gets info to run a background check.

Scene 5 – Heroine has a nightmare stemming from her experiences with the villain. She gets up and pulls out a picture of her mom and sister, the only one she has.

Scene 6 – Hero learns that information heroine gave her employer is false and goes to confront her. The senator comes to town looking for her to thank her, and she panics.

I won’t go into all the problems with this, but I can say the pace was much too slow for Love Inspired Suspense. Scene one had two pages of set-up before getting to the action of the plane crash. Scene two didn’t need to be played out on the page. The hero pressuring the heroine for the truth in scene three is important but that can be put into a scene where something else is happening to move the story forward. The same goes for the conversation with the heroine’s boss in scene four. In scene five, there’s lots of great backstory, but nothing really happens.   

Here is how the first six scenes were reworked:

Scene 1 – Heroine witnesses the plane go down, but the roar of the engine is in the first sentence, and the reader knows by line four that something is wrong.

Scene 2 – Hero overhears someone tell heroine that a reporter was trying to get information about her. A storm is coming so hero gives heroine a ride home and someone is inside her house. In this scene, the reader learns that the hero has seen the story air several times, and that heroine’s face has been front and center each time. This is relayed in four sentences instead of devoting an entire scene to it.

Scene 3 – Heroine has the nightmare (a much condensed version), and when she gets up, she sees someone outside her window. When the police arrive, they find that someone painted “MURDERER” on the side of her house. She’s afraid her past has followed her. 

Scene 4 – Hero goes by gift shop to talk to heroine, and someone has left a note that says, “You killed him. For this you will die.” Hero is waiting for the prints they lifted (scene 2) to come back, sure he’ll learn what the heroine is hiding.

Scene 5 – Heroine is on her bike and someone tries to hit her with their car.

Scene 6 – Hero has received a match on the prints—a woman who died three months earlier. Hero confronts her, and when he threatens to arrest her for falsifying information on her employment documents, she relents and tells him everything.

In the first version, there wasn’t enough present danger. The suspense essentially involved the heroine’s fear that her ex would find and kill her. In the revised version, someone is trying to kill her, but the heroine (and the reader) doesn’t know who. There is a sense of pressure building throughout, and each scene moves the plot forward.

• Backstory woven in in small pieces – By its very nature, backstory stops the forward movement of the current story. It’s like telling the reader, “Wait, you have to hear this other stuff before we can continue with the story.” The larger the backstory dump the more it stops the pace. On the other hand, a few sentences woven in as they pertain to the present enriches the story and deepens characterization. By the time the reader realizes you’ve digressed, you’re moving forward again. 

In Out for Justice, the heroine, a homicide detective with the county sheriff is called to the scene of a murder. Here is the hero and heroine’s first encounter:

If she was lucky, Tommy Patterson was the other officer who’d responded. At least her chances were fifty-fifty.
She swung open the door and before she could step from the car, a dark-haired, muscular figure crossed the clearing with brisk, sure steps. Alan White. She frowned. Yep, fifty-fifty. She never had been good with odds.
“Hello, Alan.” She greeted him with the same stiffness that had characterized their interactions for the past six years.
“Lexi.” The stiffness was as pronounced on his end as hers.
We know the hero and heroine have a history and that something happened six years ago. Right now, that’s all we need to know. When the heroine learns that the victim is her cousin, she is afraid that she’ll be taken off the case and begs the hero to keep the relationship a secret. Another tidbit of their past is revealed in his thoughts:
She stared up at him with those pleading green eyes, tears pooled at their lower lashes, and all his arguments dissipated, drifting away on the rain-scented breeze. Somehow, being within ten feet of Lexi always turned his will to mush. He had never been able to deny her anything.
Even her freedom.

Later, a larger chunk of backstory is revealed, but I stopped at one paragraph, four sentences long:

But she had made her choice. Six years ago. Back then, he’d had hope in his heart, a ring in his pocket and a love that he’d thought would last for eternity. And she’d decided her future would be brighter with an up-and-coming medical school student than a small-town cop.

• Openings and other hooks – We know how important it is to grab a reader on page one, but we have to continue hooking them all the way to the end. Good hooks speed up the pace, because they keep the reader turning pages to find out what happens next. Cliff hangers obviously do this, but hooks don’t have to be life-threatening. Oftentimes, the only threat is to the characters’ goals and ultimate happiness. In keeping the reader turning pages, it’s important to end scenes and especially chapters with some kind of a hook. At the end of a chapter is when the temptation to put down the book is strongest. Give readers a reason to say, “Just one more chapter.”

This is how I ended each of the first three chapters in Midnight Shadows. Each one leaves the reader with a question (I hope) that will make her want to turn the page.

Chapter 1 -
For three weeks he had avoided it.
Maybe it was time to face his demons. (Hopefully the reader will want to read further to find out what those demons are.)

Chapter 2 -
But first he had to know what he was up against. And that wouldn’t happen until he heard from Ron.
Which had better be soon. 
Or one off-duty Memphis detective was going to lose his mind. (Hopefully the reader will be anxious to find out what the hero learns from his chief.)

Chapter 3 –
Lightning flashed in the distance, casting its eerie pulsating glow. 
A fresh wave of terror crashed down on her.
Someone stood in the open doorway of her room. (This hook is life-threatening.)

• Word choice and sentence structure – The lengths of your sentences and paragraphs, as well as the words you choose, greatly affect pacing. Long, flowing sentences tend to slow the pace, and short, crisp sentences help to increase it. Anything that bores the reader kills pace, so search for any bland, vague or overly wordy sentences and rewrite or delete them. Clarity is important, too. If a reader is confused and has to reread a sentence to figure out what’s going on, it pulls her out of the story and the pace stops. 

During edits, I try to weed out any instances of passive voice, make my verbs stronger and more descriptive, and eliminate any unnecessary adverbs. When I finish final edits, I go back through the manuscript one more time to see how much I can tighten and how many words I can cut. Besides the fact that I’m usually over my word limit and have no choice, the exercise never fails to make the writing stronger. 

In the opening of Shattered Haven, there are a lot of short, crisp sentences, which help speed up the pace:

Allison Winchester lay stock still, every muscle tight with apprehension.
Something had awoken her. A noise. Different from the usual creaks and groans of the old Victorian.
But all was quiet. Was it her imagination? The remnants of a dream?

Oftentimes, scenes following tense, action-filled sequences will start at a slower pace to give the reader a bit of a breather. In Shattered Haven, after someone breaks into the heroine’s house and the hero is almost arrested for it, the second scene begins with the hero finishing his workout, which is a contrast to the fast pace of the prior scene.

Blake picked up a fifty pound dumbbell and took a seat. The only gym on Cedar Key, Cedar Cove Fitness was well-maintained and had everything he needed. And it was within walking distance of his boat. Of course, everything in Cedar Key was within walking distance of his boat.

A little later in the same scene, the hero comes in contact with the heroine, and the pace picks up with dialogue.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you. I was coming over to introduce myself, but we’ve already met.” Sort of. He still didn’t know her name.
She laid the hose on the deck and wiped her hand on her shorts before extending it. “We’ve met but haven’t been formally introduced. Allison Winchester.”
“Blake Townsend.” Of course, she already knew that. “And this is Brinks.”
“Like the security company?”
“Yeah, except in his case it’s more tongue-in-cheek. He’ll lick you to death.”
She laughed and extended her arm, palm down. After a quick sniff, Brinks slid his nose under her hand and gave a couple of pushes, encouraging a pat on the head. She complied with some much-loved scratching behind the ears.
“Have they figured who broke into your house?”

You never want your story to drag. Even when taking a scene or section at a little slower pace to deepen emotion or reveal characterization, you still need to keep the reader engaged. Getting the pacing just right from scene to scene can feel like a delicate balancing act, but mastering each of these elements will help you take control of the speed of your story, grab your reader and hold her until the very end.

So what about you? Have you ever received one of those dreaded “problems with pacing” rejection letters? Do you find pacing to be a difficult concept to grasp? Are some of these elements easier for you than others? 

Comment today to be entered in a drawing to win an autographed copy of Hidden Identity. 

Hidden Identity

When Meagan Berry is caught on camera rescuing a senator, she knows her cover's been blown. After faking her death, she's spent months keeping her identity hidden from an abusive ex-fiancé. Now he's on her trail in remote Cedar Key, Florida. Officer Hunter Kingston knows Meagan's running from something, but he can't imagine anyone wishing harm on the pretty artist. Then an intruder breaks into Meagan's house, and Hunter promises not to leave her side. But when evidence from the crime scene doesn't add up, Hunter wonders whether he should trust Meagan. Yet he will have to put his faith in this mysterious beauty if they both want to live to see another day.

Carol J. Post writes fun and fast-paced inspirational romantic suspense and lives in sunshiny central Florida. She sings and plays the piano for her church and also enjoys sailing, hiking, camping—almost anything outdoors. Her daughters and grandkids live too far away for her liking, so she now pours all that nurturing into taking care of two fat and sassy cats and one highly spoiled dog.

For fun news and contests, sign up for Carol’s newsletter at http://bit.ly/1wgjgps. You can also learn more about Carol at her website (wwwcaroljpost.com), on Facebook (www.facebook.com/caroljpost.author) and Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/caroljpost).

Nine Contest Entry Boo-boos (and how to fix them)

The RWA Golden Heart is open and the ACFW Genesis opens on Friday! Today we've invited Carol J. Post for a special  workshop-in-a-box  post to get your ready. No excuses. Time to contest! Take it away, Carol!

I used to love entering contests. I would carefully read the rules and condense them down to an easy-to-follow list that I would check, double check and triple check before sending in my entry. Then I would mark the calendar and anxiously count off the days until the finalists would be announced. In those early entries, I have to admit that I made almost every mistake imaginable.

It's been a few years since I entered a contest, but I've done quite a bit of judging. During that time, I've found that certain things keep popping up again and again. Here are my top nine.

1.    Openings that are not compelling

Openings are one of the hardest things to get right. Many editors and agents say if a story doesn't grab them on the first page (sometimes even the first paragraph), they won't read any further. Here are some ways not to start your story:

With lots of description – I've seen some beautiful description in openings, several paragraphs worth! Description is great, but is better given in smaller doses as it relates to what the characters are currently experiencing.

With the heroine in a car or on a plane, thinking about why she's going home – This involves lots of introspection, which never makes for a compelling opening.

With backstory – We'll cover the topic of backstory in more detail in number 8 below, but the opening is the worst place to give the reader backstory. The reader isn't going to care about what happened to your heroine in her past until she has become invested in her present.

With ho-hum everyday life – Normal day-to-day activities are not interesting enough to hook a reader, especially in the first scene. I've judged entries where the author hinted on page one that the heroine's life was about to change, but twenty pages later, that life-changing event still hadn't occurred.

When an opening isn't compelling, it's usually because the author has started the story in the wrong place. Sometimes I'll get to a point in an entry and say, “Here's where it gets interesting,” or, “Here's your hook.” That point may not be until page 8 or 11 or 25, but that's the opening. Find that point in your story, and start it there, working in the information you deleted later.

2.    Characters who are flat, inconsistent or just plain unlikeable

Characters must be flawed, but not so flawed as to be unlikable. In one of the first contests I entered as an unpublished writer, a judge slammed my hero, saying something to the effect of, “Your hero is a jerk. The only thing good about him is that he's rich.” That could have probably been said in a much more diplomatic way, but the fact is, she was right. It's a bit of a juggling act, creating characters with flaws but keeping them sympathetic. Even strengths can be flaws if taken to extreme. For example, a strong heroine can come across as stubborn and unbending, and a humble hero can appear insecure if he is constantly thinking he's unworthy of the heroine.

Oftentimes in contest entries, I see heroines who are well-drawn, but feel as if I don't know much about the hero beyond what he looks like. What makes your hero a unique man? What makes your heroine different from any other woman out there? Show your characters doing and saying things that reveal who they are. This is where a few interesting details can go a long way.

Another common mistake is having the hero or heroine act in ways that are inconsistent with who the author has shown them to be. I've seen quite a few heroines who are easygoing, likable and fun-loving who, when around the hero, suddenly turn into cranky biddies and get in huge tiffs over nothing. It's important to give the characters past experiences that justify their reactions and behavior in the present.

3.    Confusing or shallow point of view

Occasionally I see entries where the author hops from one point of view to another or doesn't make it clear which POV we're in, but the most common problem I see with POV is not getting deep enough. There are several “telling” phrases that pull a reader out of deep POV – she thought/saw/heard/remembered/recalled, etc. Instead of saying a character saw, heard or remembered something, eliminate those words and let the reader see/hear or remember it through that character's eyes/ears/thoughts. Another thing that deepens POV is not overusing the POV character's name. Sometimes it's necessary for clarity, especially when there is more than one female or male character, but it's good to not overdo it.

Below is an example of deep point of view taken from Out for Justice, where the heroine, a homicide detective discovers that the latest victim of a serial killer is her cousin. (Forgive me for using my own work, but it's easier.)

When she reached for the tape, her eyes met Alan’s again and she hesitated. Something wasn’t right with him. It wasn’t just the customary stiffness. Deep creases of concern marked the bridge of his nose and anguish had settled in his blue eyes. What wasn’t he telling her? “It’s someone we know, isn’t it?”
“I’m afraid it is.”
She ducked under the tape and when she straightened, Alan had stepped in front of her. He was trying to shield her.
It wasn’t necessary. She was a professional. And she wouldn’t let her personal feelings get in the way of doing her job. Right now, that job entailed performing the best investigation she could to catch this monster and bring him to justice.
Summoning strength she didn’t feel, she pushed Alan aside and moved past Shane Dalton. Not more than fifteen feet away lay a body, partially obstructed by a downed limb. Detective Vickers squatted, sitting on one heel to shoot another photo, further blocking her view. She moved  closer, longing with all her heart to run the other direction and never look back, while at the same time needing to know.
She took another step. It was definitely a woman, judging by the clothing: baby-blue silk sleepwear.
“Lexi, wait.” Alan put a restraining hand on her arm.
She shook him off. Took another step. And another.
A torso appeared. A silk-clad leg. A bare foot extending from the hem of the pajama bottoms, toenails painted hot pink.
Then Detective Vickers straightened and moved aside, offering her an unobstructed view of their newest victim. Her eyes locked onto the scene and her brain shut down. Alan said something, but the words didn’t register.
Matted auburn hair flowed over a blanket of dying leaves. Green eyes, one swollen almost shut, stared unseeing at the leafy canopy overhead. Blood had trickled from a cut on one cheek, but had long since dried. The mouth was hidden behind a piece of neatly applied duct tape, and a blackish-red ring circled the creamy white neck.
No.
Lexi shook her head. The ground seemed to tilt beneath her and she took a stumbling step backward to steady herself. A scream of protest clawed its way up her throat, followed by a wave of nausea that almost brought her to her knees.
Alan’s words finally penetrated her befuddled brain, several seconds too late.
“Lexi, it's Kayla.”

Notice, instead of, “She was sure there was something he wasn't telling her,” we have, “What wasn't he telling her?” Instead of “She saw a body not more than fifteen feet away,” we have, “Not more than fifteen feet away, lay a body...” Instead of, “She felt shocked and horrified,” we feel her shock and horror with her brain shutting down, the ground tilting, a scream of protest trying to come up her throat and a wave of nausea sweeping over her.

4.    Poor balance between dialogue, introspection and action

This area is usually judged under pacing. Having several paragraphs where characters are thinking about things instead of acting or speaking slows the story down. Too much action, with nothing about what the characters are feeling, thinking or saying can feel shallow and unsatisfying. When a manuscript has a page or two of dialogue without any movement or character thoughts and feelings, it seems as if all we have are talking heads. The key is balance, intermingling all three.

I have often suggested looking at books by favorite authors and studying the balance between action, introspection and dialogue. Differentiating between the three with a different color highlighter for each makes the exercise very visual.

5.    Too little variation in sentences

This is a problem that will garner lower scores if style is one of the areas judged. Many times, entries will have several sentences in a row that begin subject/action verb. This makes the paragraph read like, “She did this. He did this. He did that, and then she did that.” Not only does the construction need to be varied, but so does the length. Interspersing shorter sentences with longer ones makes for much more interesting reading and better flow. If there is a problem with sentences being too similar, it is often easier to spot while reading aloud.

Here is a paragraph taken from Deadly Getaway. Notice the difference in the lengths of the sentences, as well as the sentence construction. (The heroine is on a boat, fleeing from guys who have just killed an unknown man and her best friend.)

She ran toward the back and up the steps. Kenneth whatever-his-name-was was gone, probably thrown overboard. As she hurled herself through the opening, her purse strap caught on the door latch and held for a fraction of a second before snapping. The leather bag fell to the deck. The same moment, someone shouted behind her. She steeled herself against the pitching and rolling of the boat and stumbled across the deck. Another shot rang out, accompanied by a metallic ping. Pain like nothing she had experienced before stabbed through her, a red-hot poker into her shoulder.

6.    Trite, unnecessary or boring dialogue

All dialogue should be interesting and serve some purpose, such as moving the story forward or revealing character. Written conversations must sound natural and ring true to the person speaking, but they need to be much more “streamlined” than real-life conversations, which are often chit-chatty and mundane. This holds true for greetings and farewells. Although we generally wouldn't walk away from someone without some kind of verbal farewell, ending a written conversation with “See you later. Okay, bye.” is unnecessary and uninteresting.

This is a good place to mention dialogue tags. Scoring for dialogue often includes “effective use of tags.” I've seen paragraphs of dialogue, each one ending with “he said” or “she said.” People communicate with actions as well as words, and these action beats give a much clearer picture of what is going on. Other types of beats (emotion beats, setting beats, etc.) enrich the writing even further, giving insight into what the characters are feeling and seeing as they converse. Interestingly enough, sometimes writers will use great beats, but still follow them with a dialogue tag, for example, “He ran his fingers through his hair and said...” In those instances, the tag is unnecessary.

Here's an example of an excerpt from Shattered Haven rewritten using tags, then again with beats. The hero has almost gotten arrested while out searching for his escaped dog on his first night in town .

With dialogue tags:

“Now you decide to show up,” Blake said to the dog. “You almost got me arrested. No more jerky treats for you. At least till tomorrow.”
“Sorry about that,” the officer said. “We don’t get many break-ins here. In fact, we don’t get any break-ins. You were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“No problem. You were only doing your job. But I have to admit, this was my first time on this side of the handcuffs. Blake Townsend, Dallas P.D.,” he said, extending his hand.
“You’ve got to be kidding. I was arresting a cop?”
“Former cop, actually. Injured on the job. And you, milady,” he said to Allison, “deserve a big thank you for getting me out of hot water. I at least owe you dinner.”
“That won’t be necessary,” she responded. “Your words were thank you enough.”

With beats:

“Now you decide to show up. You almost got me arrested.” Still laughing, he maneuvered to his feet. Not easy with two large paws in his lap and his hands cuffed behind his back. “No more jerky treats for you. At least till tomorrow.”
Hunter stepped behind him and inserted a key into the handcuffs. “Sorry about that. We don’t get many break-ins here. In fact, we don’t get any break-ins. You were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
The stranger shot him a forgiving smile over one shoulder as the cuffs clicked open. “No problem. You were only doing your job. But I have to admit, this was my first time on this side of the handcuffs.” He clipped a leash onto the dog’s collar before extending his hand. “Blake Townsend, Dallas P.D.”
Hunter’s brows shot up again. “You’ve got to be kidding. I was arresting a cop?”
“Former cop, actually. Injured on the job.” He turned toward Allison. “And you, milady, deserve a big thank you for getting me out of hot water. I at least owe you dinner.”
The smile he gave her reached his eyes, creating fine lines at their corners. His manner was joking, but something told her he was dead serious about dinner. And she was suddenly hit with a case of teenage shyness. She reached to smooth her hair, then dropped her hand. Why bother? The first impression was already made—barefoot and bedhead. Not that it mattered.
She returned his smile with one that she hoped projected confidence. “That won’t be necessary. Your words were thank you enough.”

7.    Not planting the reader solidly in a scene from the get-go

Most people form images in their minds when reading a story. When a scene begins, “For the past two weeks...” then goes on to explain what happened over the past two weeks, the reader doesn't know where the character is now, and it's hard to form that image. When time has passed between scenes, it's often necessary to fill readers in on events that have occurred during that time, but it's best to cement them in the scene first. If that introspection is more than a short paragraph or two, intersperse it with actions the character is making in the present.

Sometimes an author will set the scene but leave out an important detail so that the reader's mental image will have to be amended later. My editor occasionally catches me on this. I'll get a comment two pages into a scene something like, “I didn't realize such-and-such until right here. Can you include this earlier?” As an example, in a book for which I turned in edits last week, the reader knows the hero is in his truck, filled with angst because the heroine has just left town, but I didn't mention the fact that he is pulling his boat until he gets to the city marina and starts to back it down the ramp. Revising to mention the boat in the first paragraph was an easy fix and gives the reader a truer picture of what is going on.

8.    Backstory not woven in seamlessly

This one is a biggie. Backstory is important. After all, it's what has made the characters the people they are today. But the reader is only interested in backstory as it relates to the present. I've seen entries where the majority of the first scene is backstory. I once heard someone give the advice to write out all the backstory, then cut it up into little pieces and insert it a sliver at a time throughout the story. The idea is to weave it in seamlessly, where it doesn't feel as if the present story comes to a screeching halt.

Here is the opening of Motive for Murder, with several backstory details woven in as they pertain to the present:

The house stood silhouetted against a cloudless sky, the landscape frozen and still under the onslaught of one of Central Florida's infrequent cold fronts.
Just like the last time she had stepped foot on the property.
Jessica Parker drew in a deep breath and threw open the car door, stopping short of dinging the shiny red Lotus sitting next to her Bug. As she stepped into the frigid night air, she pulled her coat more tightly around her, the cold outside mirroring the chill within. Eight long years, and nothing had changed. The same huge oak shadowed most of the front yard. The same potted plant waited by the front door, hiding the key to the house. And as she made her way up the cracked cement drive, she was hit with the same lack of warmth that she had always associated with home.
She squatted to tilt the pot, then heaved a sigh. The key was gone. Priscilla was still messing with her, even from beyond the grave. She straightened and walked back to her car. It had been years since she had picked a lock. But that wasn't a skill easily forgotten—like riding a bike.

On the first page, the reader learns that the heroine left home eight years ago and has not been back, that home was not a warm and happy place, that someone, likely a sister, had died, and that the heroine had, at one time, done some things that may have put her on the wrong side of the law. But none of this information (I hope) stopped the flow of the present story.

9.    Lack of compelling conflicts

Conflict is an area that is scored in virtually every contest I've entered or judged, and for good reason. If you don't have conflict, you don't have a story. Here are the most common mistakes I see:

There is no obvious external conflict and no hint at what the internal conflicts will be. Conflicts need to be laid out pretty early, because they are the core of the story. I've read 30-page entries that contain some beautiful writing but no conflict. Sometimes the hero and heroine have a relationship such that each is annoyed by the presence of the other, and every meeting ends with insults being hurled. Bickering, however, is not conflict.

The conflict stems from a misunderstanding which could be easily resolved if the characters talked. Misunderstandings can create additional conflict and add twists to the plot. But if a misunderstanding is the primary reason the hero and heroine can't be together, by the time the reader hits page 30, she'll be asking, “Why don't these people just TALK?”

The conflict is there, but it's not serious enough to sustain a whole book. Good conflicts can't be solved easily without great risk to the main characters. If a simple decision on the part of either the hero or heroine would give them their happily-ever-after, the conflict isn't strong enough. Some great conflict occurs when the hero and heroine's goals are in direct opposition to one another. For example, he wants her, but they're attorneys on opposite sides of a big case. Or she's attracted to him, but he's the CEO who just bought her company in a hostile takeover.

I hope at least one or two of these points hit home with you and will help you make your writing stronger. The Golden Heart entry deadline is just around the corner. Are you planning to enter? What is the most helpful feedback you've gotten from a contest?

Leave a comment for a chance to win a copy of Shattered Haven, Book 1 in my Cedar Key series. From now until January 15, all new subscribers to my newsletter will receive a free e-book, Deadly Getaway, the prequel to the series. (The link to sign up for the newsletter is on my web site, www.caroljpost.com. I promise I won't sell your info or spam you!)

Shattered Haven

 Allison Winchester's old Victorian house contains a valuable secret code, one that someone is dead set on uncovering. After her house is ransacked and her life is threatened, she has no choice but to accept the protection of injured ex-cop Blake Townsend. Allison never thought she'd trust a man with secrets again--and Blake is as much a mystery as the man who is stalking her. The lawman vows to shield her from the dangerous criminal. But can Blake and Allison decipher the mysterious code before their island safe haven becomes their ultimate resting place?


Winners announced in the Weekend Edition.



Bio:  Carol J. Post writes fun and face-paced inspirational romantic suspense and lives in sunshiny central Florida. She sings and plays the piano for her church and also enjoys sailing, hiking, camping—almost anything outdoors. Her daughters and grandkids live too far away for her liking, so she now pours all that nurturing into taking care of two fat and sassy cats and one highly spoiled dog.

You can find Carol on the web at www.caroljpost.com, or connect with her on facebook (www.facebook.com/caroljpost.author) or twitter (@caroljpost).