In the last post, I talked about how learning the definition of a scene, and then really gaining an understanding of that definition, gave me better control over, and perspective on, my larger writing projects. Today I’m going to talk about what makes a scene good.
Even after I learned how to write a scene that fulfils the definition of scene, that is it develops character or propels the plot forward, I still struggled to write so that every single scene in my book was better than the scene before it. Once I learned how to make scenes strong, it made my manuscripts much better.
The key for me now, when approaching a scene, is to clearly understand my objective for that scene. Of course, the essence of the objective for all scenes is to develop character or propel plot (sick of hearing that yet?), but for each scene, it helps to start with a more specific goal. And that is why, in my opinion, you’ll have a much better chance of creating a strong scene if you start with a plan–a scene level outline or summary in whatever format works best for you.
Some writers have an intuitive grasp of scene already, and discover the objective of their scenes as they go. I used to operate that way. The problem is, when you start a scene without an objective, not all of the elements of the scene will match the objective, which requires a lot of rewriting to fix. I’ve spent years working backward like this, writing a scene, realizing what the objective was, and then having to rewrite it entirely because the scene I wrote didn’t match the objective well enough–the setting was wrong, or the timing was wrong, or it started in the wrong place.
Consider our example from yesterday of the game of golf where one character reveals his intention to blackmail the other. If I started writing this scene without that objective in mind, it might start as a friendly game of golf. The whole mood would convey a friendly game of golf. Perhaps there would be a bunch of friendly dialog in the beginning. It might be rather boring. Then around the eighth hole Character A would tell Character B about the photos. As I’m writing I’ll realize, oh he’s going to blackmail him, and the scene would develop from there. But it would have a bunch of front-end material unrelated to the objective, and somewhat boring to the reader.
Imagine instead if I knew what I wanted the scene to do, and I started it with this line “When we got to the eighth hole, he showed me the photos” then went from there, weaving the scene around the revelation and the resulting dialog as the characters struggle against each other’s wills. That makes for a much more immediate, punchy, engaging scene.
This brings me to the next important element to crafting a strong scene: tension.
All stories need tension. Tension is the beating heart of fiction, keeping the reader turning pages. At every moment during a scene, the reader needs to be asking, “what will happen next?” If the reader stops asking that question, you’ve lost their interest.
The trick I learned about weaving tension into a scene, about ten years into my writing journey, was that tension can come from unlikely sources. It doesn’t have to be the main plotline creating the tension in each and every scene. Of course, it’s best if you can tie everything together. But consider this example: in the golf story, say you have a scene before the golf scene, where the main character is meeting his wife for lunch before the game. Since our POV character doesn’t know about the blackmail yet, it can’t be the source of tension in this prior scene. So you need another source of tension to keep the reader reading.
It doesn’t have to be related to the blackmail. Perhaps the entire time he’s lunching with his wife, he’s also secretly flirting with the waitress, and the source of tension for the reader is wondering if his wife will find out. The trick is just to keep the scene engaging.
Once you have your objective and you have your source of tension, you have to actually write the darn thing. The final thing that can make the difference between a weak scene and a scene so good that the reader forgets they are reading a book is: detail.
It’s a cliche because it’s true: the devil is in the details.
Back to my writing teacher, Laurel Leigh, for a moment: The first class I took with her was a workshop class, which meant that every week one poor soul submitted a piece of writing for the rest of us to tear apart. In each class, after a brief period of instruction, the feeding frenzy would begin. After we had all beaten the poor writer senseless with feedback, it was Laurel’s turn. She would get up and tell us exactly what wasn’t working in the piece and why it wasn’t working. And every single time, we all went, “ohhhhh.” I learned as much from what she said about other student’s writing as I did from her comments on my own.
When it was my turn, after I was good and bloodied by the class, Laurel stood up and said, “Here’s what’s going to happen. Selah, I want you to go out to the hall for a few minutes. When you come back, the class is going to demonstrate what’s wrong with your scene.”
I’m sure you can imagine what an eternity I spend in that hallway.
The scene I had written was of two main characters having a conversation in a sailor’s tavern on a distant planet. Besides some brief physical description of the bar and the waitress occasionally refilling their beers, it was basically two talking heads.
I walked back into the room to find my scene come to life. Two students were reading off the “script” of the main characters, and the other students were sitting in pairs or groups, talking like sailors in a tavern. One student was waitressing, another sat alone, drunk, hollering for more ale. They pulled off a brilliant improvisation, and Laurel drove her point home: A scene is more than talking heads. It’s everything happening around the main action of the characters.
So when writing a scene, here’s what you need to do: first, fully imagine the scene. It can be in your head, or on paper, or even on a voice recorder. Imagine every distinct detail, not just what your characters are doing, but what is happening around them. How is the wind moving through the trees above the golf game? Is there a group of rowdy kids also playing golf that day, their noise cutting into the blackmail conversation? What are the sounds and smells and tastes and sights surrounding the focus of the scene?
Now, if you cram your scene full of all these details, it will overwhelm the reader and slow the pace. So the next job of the writer is to pick the key details that reveal what you want the reader to see.
Once again, turn to your favorite books for help with this. You’ll notice that really great authors can convey several paragraph’s worth of information in a single sentence. The key is choice of details.
So that’s scene, in a nutshell. Objective, tension, and detail. Go forth and write scenes that shine.
Tomorrow: 101 TIWIK #5: The Four Narrative Modes: A Quick and Dirty Introduction
This post is part of a series of 101 Things I Wish I’d Known Before I Wrote My First Book. Start reading the series at the beginning.
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