Hi,
I'm a bit flummoxed by some feedback / advice that I can agree with, but am struggling to deal with! There are two aspects (although, related) to this problematic feedback; my use of words and my writing tone. I suspect that use of words will correct itself automatically once I develop a stronger tone, but...

Unlike previous edits where the problems were clearly recognisable once I had had them pointed out, I simply cannot get my head around what I am looking for this time as the examples given, though all valid, show no common theme. So, rather than do battle with and fend off stealth attacks from an invisible enemy, I want to throw a bag of flour in that general direction to outline where my assailant may be hiding and get an approximate idea of how many limbs she/he/it may be using to attack me with.

Can anybody recommend links, books or articles that can help me to get a better idea of tone? Or good examples? Or anything really?!
Thanks,
G

Forgive me if I'm wrong but I assume by writing 'tone' you mean 'voice'. Finding one's 'voice' in a novel is probably one of the hardest things to do, and if you've got past the first draft and have still not found it, I have to be honest and say I doubt you will. I have had that problem in the past and had to abandon projects because of it. It is far easier to start a new novel than edit in the missing 'voice'.



NaomiM

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To put it another way, if you read a couple of Raymond chandler crime novels, and then picked up a plain covered novel from a selection of authors, you would be able to tell immediately it if was a Raymond Chandler. A lot of Chick-lit novels have a certain 'voice' that separate them from general Woman's fiction. In it's easiest form: Children's fiction such as Enid Blyton can be distinguished from Adult fiction. Authors prose, like fine wines, are distinctive.
However, there is an awful lot of table wine out there, with no distinctive bouquet. And an awful lot of writers with both eyes on the technicalities of writing, who overlook a distinctive voice.

Hmm. Not sure.

The story has come alive for me, so it has a definite "voice" in my own head, but sometimes (apparently) comes across as the voice on page not matching what the reader is expecting. Some of this may be my fault for playing around with the characters a bit... first time around, I concentrated on what, recently I have been concentrating on who. Hopefully I can merge the two now. Either way, I have been trying to set a scene before the story to contrast with what happens later.

Methinks, perhaps, I need to sharpen the story concept in my head a bit more before redrafting?

I think it can be really helpful, even if you've got an external, 3rd person narrator, to think of them as a character. How do theysee things, think about them, describe them? Are they wry and witty, or grandiloquent and romantic, or quiet and reserved, or caustic and sharp-eyed? What are the characteristic shapes your sentences fall into? Naomi's Marlowe example is spot on - he's so strongly flavoured, and of course that's an internal, character-bound narrator, which in some ways makes it easier, but absolutely isn't essential.

There is a natural voice to the narrative, hiding in there somewhere, it's just that at the moment it's whispering. It can be particularly difficult to spot if it's a rather plain voice, retelling events neutrally. But it's still a voice: nothing's every completely neutral, any more than anything's completely objective. There's always a reason you chose one word rather than another at any given moment, and when you start thinking about those choices you should get some clues as to which direction your instincts were pointing in when you did. Then you can make it more so. You could even try re-writing a few paragraphs in as many wildly differing voices as you can think of, just to stretch your wings a bit and see what the possibilities are. You'll probably find some feel better than others, and then you can take that a bit further and see what happens.

Emma

Now that I like.

But then again...

I don't want the narrator to break the pov.

I use 3rd-party narrator because it is essential to me to be able to jump in and out of different character's heads and I reckon it would be a bit confusing if "I" had to be redefined at the start of each scene, but the events, thoughts, even descriptive words I am using are (I had previously thought) those of the character in charge of the scene.

In other words, I don't know that I actually _have_ a 3rd party narrator whose character I can jump into.

And this:

a rather plain voice, retelling events neutrally.

Is something that I have been consciously striving for as earlier writing of mine was criticised because I kept doing the literary equivalent of "breaking the fourth wall".

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PS: Yes, I am aware that there are inconsistencies in my last three posts. I will enter some form of therapy if I ever get this thing published.

I kept doing the literary equivalent of "breaking the fourth wall".

David Lodge calls this 'breaking the frame'. (See The Art of Fiction) No reason you shouldn't do it, but it's hard to do well, and so some more doctrinaire and tidy-minded how-to books and their acolytes disapprove. Since when did the fact that something's hard to do well mean we shouldn't do it?

Have you come across John Gardner's The Art of Fiction? Among other joys, he de-constructs the various possibilities of third-person narration absolutely brilliantly. I keep meaning to tweak everyone's tail by posting a selection. He's wonderfully rude about 'the pettiness and unseemly familiarity' of third-person subjective, and 'the savage sparsity' of third-person objective.

Emma


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If you're using free indirect style (aka omniscient narrator who takes on the tone of the voice of whichever character's head he's in when he's in it) I don't think you need to give your narrator a character as such. If you're spending time inside various heads, you may want to sharpen up the characterful flavour and difference of those passages, and be more neutral when you're not in anyone's. But that neutrality can still have a tone and a texture, if you really look for it.

I use 3rd-party narrator because it is essential to me to be able to jump in and out of different character's heads

I had a quick look at your extracts, and, especially on one, there is a distinctive voice, however, it is just the one voice - the narrator - who, as you say, is jumping in and out of different character's heads, thus no character is given their own voice. I think this is the problem with using a narrator, rather than writing it in the first person, or in the 3rd person from one character's pov, or from a few different povs.
There was a recent thread about authorial intrusion (authorial pov), which may be worth checking out:
http://www.writewords.org.uk/forum/65_173051.asp



- NaomiM

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The extract was your story. In the name of an unforgettable Friday. It might be worth, as a writing exercise, taking each of these characters and trying to give each of them a distinctive voice. (As Emma says: "If you're spending time inside various heads, you may want to sharpen up the characterful flavour and difference of those passages")

Thanks Naomi, the "possible opening" in fiction 1 group is closer to what I had a report on than the unforgettable friday thing, but yes.

Looking at Emma's post, I am probably still using the terms for POV incorrectly as well... so I'll do a search on these too.

From reviewing all that the various people have said about the passages in question, I have a strong suspicion that I may just be being a bit too subtle. Some of what I consider to be slapping the reader's cheeks with a wet fish while pointing desperately at the second door on the right turns out to be a bit more like a deaf-mute in a darkened room gesturing with a slight motion of his left hand (which is behind his back).

I have a strong suspicion that I may just be being a bit too subtle

This comes up all the time, and it's not (necessarily) because you're a delicate, refined and perceptive soul and they're philistines with the sensitivities of coconut fibre and discrimination to match. It's because you know what you're trying to do, what you're referring to, and why it's significant for later, and they don't.

As a rule of thumb, if it's slightly to obvious to you, a touch creaky or flashy, it'll probably be something that others will just, faintly and nicely, pick up on their radar.

Emma

you're a delicate, refined and perceptive soul

I suspect that anybody who could think that about me is in a very small minority.

Makes sense, though. Thanks,

If you stray from the accepted path of what makes readable and relatable prose, then you should expect a high proportion of your readers not to 'get it'. You then have to make the decision whether to pander to the reader's needs or to your own.


- NaomiM

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To put it in plain english, "being too subtle" is an excuse you are using to justify pandering to your own needs.
If you use Authorial pov in which to write your novel you risk alienating your potential readers because there is no inherent respect in the author - you set yourself up for a fall. Readers will empathise with the characters, and it is the characters which carry the story along, not the author - unless, of course, you have god-like status, like Terry Pratchett

To put it in plain english, "being too subtle" is an excuse you are using to justify pandering to your own needs.

- i don't agree, at least i don't think it's necessarily the case(sorry, haven't read the whole thread, so may be talking rubbish), but it's just something that's very hard to judge as the writer, i think. Unless you're hugely experienced, you probably won't be able to judge it yourself, except maybe by putting the book away for ages, then reading it more like another reader would.

Just to clarify, Poppy, the emphasis in that line was on the 'is an excuse'. Not on whether or not 'subtlety' is good or bad. Subtlty is fine, so long as it is that, and not technical/structural faults in the prose.



- NaomiM