Category: Editing Rant

Editing Rant: Belief Coins

Erin Penn 1 Comment

Image courtesy of iosphere at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Have I talked about Belief Coins before? I don’t remember – but let’s talk about it again since clearly some people aren’t getting the message.

Too many suspension of beliefs ruins a story. A writer gets only so many coins to play for suspension of belief.

Depending on the “store” you are shopping in, some of the suspension of beliefs are on discount. For example, in the romance genre you can have love-at-first-sight (Insta love), not needing to go into work, and easy adjustments over class divides. Science fiction offers faster-than-light travel and gun battles on space stations. Thrillers allow for traveling across the globe without problems with passports, inner city traffic rush hour can be easily bypassed on side roads, and people can go without sleep or food for days (they may sit down to eat, but it is always, always interrupted). Cozy mystery, the main character can interfere with police investigations without getting arrested. Erotica gets to getting it on quickly and friends support a sexual situation without questions. 

But those Belief Coins have to be earned for the breaks with reality. Everything else needs to work without a suspension of belief. A romance where the characters go without eating? A science fiction where friends support a Insta-love sexual situation without questions? A thriller with gun fights in the middle of rush hour and the police don’t respond? A cozy mystery where a space alien is the killer? You darn well better give the reason these things are happening. Yes, you can explain them, but you don’t get to wave a magic wand and make them disappear. If you have read romances, you know how many times a sex scene ends with – “you hungry?” (and a stomach growls).

Know the tropes of your genre – these are the discounted Belief Coins. When I sit down to a werewolf romance, I expect InstaLove of true mates when they scent each other. I don’t expect an Earth vampire to end up operating a spacecraft in the middle of an alien-attacks science fiction story.

A recent erotica I read had the follow items needed for Belief Coins: two men love the same women and don’t have a problem with each other (discount coin); insta-sex (discount coin); rich men relationship with poorer women no problem for any of the parties (discount coin). Three coins is a lot, but doable, especially with the erotica branch of romances.

Things that broke the bank: (1) inter-racial. Normally this is okay since the cover advertised it. But the racial factors were ignored entirely – the two (very rich) men going after a black woman, never mentioned her color except once. Her skin color made no impact on the story. The genre of inter-racial romance still requires some sort of acknowledgement of overcoming – even the erotica version. Fetishizing the difference is one branch in the erotica tree; another branch is just acknowledging people of all colors can love each other. But in either case, it is integral to a inter-racial romance. (2) rich level. The men drop $2 million dollars without blinking. While their jobs of hotel architecture rakes in some money, it doesn’t do it at that level. Owning the hotels, sure, but not the working folk making them – even the white collar jobs.

And that last one is what really broke the bank. Their job did not match their wealth levels. Both of the men had “come from normal beginnings” and just got lucky with their jobs – by their mid-twenties. Nope – thrown out of the story. If one had come from money, okay, but not normal guys still working their way up in the world.

(Fact Check: Just looked up the window of salaries for architects – about $50,000 to $150,000 per year in 2019 with the average about $90,000. To drop $2 million without blinking, I’m thinking a person needs to have at least $50 million in the bank. Or an income of around $20 million a year.)

Even eroticas need a foot in reality. Even wizards, aliens, vampires, super spies, viking kings, and dragons need to be real in some manner.

Spend those coins wisely.

Editing Rant: Marketability

Erin Penn

Image acquired from the Interweb

When it just isn’t good enough

Just finished up on the Red Mug series of flashes; last one will post this Sunday. The first flash was the simple, normal story based on the picture. The followups all basically gelled the same day after I got the Red Mug on electronic paper. Normally I wouldn’t have put them down, but tax season had some downtime and I am practicing writing longer. Therefore I took an hour here and there to flesh things out.

Why would I normally not have continued the story? Well, it’s kind-of boring. The story is straightforward, the characters normal, and things just happen in normal order. The humor isn’t strong, and the storyline has huge jumps in time. It is not marketable as-is.

Many of my flashes have continued down paths during commutes or long drives, still more laying awake in bed or mowing the lawn. Most never get written because they don’t work.

But 5,000 words! Really, really written. All complete and bow-tied. (bouncing writer side)

That’s nice. (droll editor side)

As a slush reader, I have had to reject works of 100 K or more and feel absolutely horrible doing so, but not marketable is not marketable. Red Mug’s (and related flashes) is boring at the wide-range appeal level, has little description, and is clearly flash – needing (desperately) to expand out description, flesh out characters, and add action.

How could I workshop this story to make it into something that is marketable? (Please note, I don’t think the combined stories are worth this effort – but the skill set could be useful when looking at other stories.)

First off, right now it is a contemporary romance. What thread are in the story already available for expansion?

Third person omniscient isn’t working well (yes, it does slip on occasion – after all, first draft flash – but does mostly stick to the omniscient). As a romance, we need to dig down into the emotional development – and that means getting inside the characters’ heads more. Changing the story to either first person Jeffrey or third-person close, switching between Jeffrey and Amanda would be good. Once closer in, we have a few paths of additional development available.

Now where are cool bits to play with? Jeffrey and Amanda are a mixed race couple, they also have a significant age difference, family-style difference, and a work environment issue. Exploring how Jeffrey feels about dating a white person, and how his army family reacts is an option. Running into how Jeffrey’s mid-twenties and Amanda’s early forties plays out could be fun too. The long-distance relationship adds another aspect open to expansion. And how about how Amanda’s work is impacted by her pregnancy – both the reactions of her European counterparts and her American superiors? All of these could add thousands of words and take this from a simple story to a more complicated character development arc. Oh, and focusing on why Amanda doesn’t want love could really take the story to the next level.

Plus all of these additional bits could fill in the time jump issues between the already crafted scenes.

Still, I am better at writing genre fiction than straight contemporary. What subgenres could be added to the romance? These are more worldbuilding choices than character development or plot points. Sticking them will double description quickly and add plenty of action.

I could kick up the erotica aspect a notch or two; even the opening flash doesn’t delve deeply. At the moment the story is more “closed door” then bouncing bed.

The story could be changed to a science fiction – where the two characters work for an ore mining company and she operates the Orts Cloud while Jeffrey works in the traditional headquarters in the asteroid belt – exploring the long distant relationship against this background would make things more interesting. Location, location, location.

Another option is play with the “you are a god” aspect, changing this to an urban fantasy with Jeffrey discovering he actually is related to a god or gaining a god’s powers through no fault of his own. Maybe have Amanda gain Slavic god-like powers to his American-based aspects.

A thriller could work too – make this into a Die-Hard-style story; Jeffrey does come from an army family, though he is a nerd. During the crawl through the duct system or up an elevator shaft, the readers get exposed to Jeffrey’s and Amanda’s relationship as it develops over time. I’ll be able to keep all the already written scenes, and I don’t have to worry about the time jumps as he (or she) reminisces while going to rescue the family. Quick skeleton fix.

Maybe a mystery, with something happening at the company – people dying, getting fired, moving people around to different locations, a break-in – and have the pair solve it while falling in love.

The story could even be mixed and matched – maybe one or both of them gaining powers during the thriller of Die Hard-style, all the while, of course, never forgetting the story is actual a romance and the main plot is Amanda releasing her fear of falling in love – from Jeffrey’s first person point-of-view (POV).

The story as-is isn’t complicated enough to warrant real publication. But by adding a few “non-standard” pieces to the work, weaving in a secondary emotional development plot, and tacking on an action piece, suddenly the story becomes enough.

Am I going to do this? Nah, that was never “their” story. But they are here in my universe world, and they have a fully developed backstory, so they may show up in another tale as supporting characters where I don’t want just a generic couple with a couple of kids. These two already have had the breath of life breathed on their clay. And that is cool too.

The complete Red Mug series:
3/17/19 – Red Mug
3/24/19 – Green Cheeks
3/31/19 – Copenhagen Blue
4/7/19 – Clear Glass
4/14/19 – Gold Bands

Other Cool Blogs: Cracked 4/10/2017

Erin Penn

Image provided by the Internet hive mind via iFunny.com

James Burtoft assembled The 5 Most Disastrous Typos in Human History for Cracked.

Everything from a comma instead of a hyphen costing the American government the modern equivalent of $40 million dollars during the Civil War to changing a medical term from Patient O (as in Oh, for Outside the area being examined) to Patient Zero.

And that list doesn’t event include “A court’s decision in a Maine labor dispute hinged on the absence of an Oxford comma“ I previously mentioned in my April 11, 2017 Editing Rant.

You can see the whole article here: http://www.cracked.com/article_24628_the-5-most-disastrous-typos-in-human-history.html

Just so you know, good editing saves civilization.