Nick Kyme

I’ve recently finished reading The Hard Way, the latest paperback thriller by Lee Child. I’ll post up a review of it shortly (something I plan to do for all the books I read), but one thing that struck me about the book was how many chapters there were – over seventy in total – and how fast I got through it. To get this in perspective, I’m a fairly slow reader (I’ve still got a John Connolly knocking around from nearly a year back) but this I literally raced through, reading almost a third in one evening sitting!

I put it down to the pace and there’s a big hint as to what that was like with the number of chapters already mentioned. It was fast and fired in bursts like a machine gun triggered by Reacher himself (the hero of all Child’s thrillers).

I found it fascinating that by breaking the novel up in this way, literally ending a chapter at the end of each major scene rather than, say, resorting to a section break, I was propelled through the narrative at a rate of knots. The pacing was perfect. Breakneck in fact and had me building up such momentum that I wanted to race all the way to the end without stopping.

It got me to thinking about how important pacing is in a novel, and how the really effective pacing is that which the reader isn’t even aware of. How the quickfire opening must hook and the need for a breather mid-way through, the skill of using it to break up necessary ‘low action’ points in order to describe the more delicate intricacies of the story. It’s pretty fundamental to how a book reads and even ‘feels’.

To take one step away from the written medium, graphic novels (well, the good ones anyway) are great exponents of pacing but here there’s the extra dimension of panels to think about as well as narrative. I’d recommend any author who’s looking at getting his or her pacing right to read a few graphic novels under this kind of targeted analysis. How the panels are arranged on the page, the number, the ‘beat’ inherent in the script.

For instance, and I’m going back to my Batman appreciation here, I was flicking through The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller (a superlative example of the graphic novel and a wonderful re imagining of a classic comic book character) and the knowledge of pacing on display is nothing short of superb. Pages absolutely crammed with quick fire panels like flung batarang give way to glorious full page spreads. It’s a pretty dense story (and by that I mean there’s a heck of a lot to it) but I absolutely cantered through and ended up feeling exhausted and exhilarated at the same time by the end. Besides the fact that the story is great and the artwork is wonderful, the ‘beat’ of the narrative fires you onward like out of cannon or something. Equally good are books like Preacher, The Punisher: Welcome Back Frank and Watchmen. All are classics of the genre. All display an incredible appreciation and understanding for pace and the dramatic tension inherent in it.

If you really want to see an exercise in meta-pacing, that which crosses several books then look no further than Doomsday – The Death of Superman. I watched an insightful documentary on this very subject a few weeks ago explaining how the writers took the step of adhering to a strict formula in the number of panels presented in an ‘episode’ of the longer saga. Initially, they went for a large number of panels and as the confrontation between Doomsday and Superman came about the panels would decrease suggesting the immediacy of the impending battle, while also hinting at the immensity of it. By the last ‘episode’ in the series, when Superman and Doomsday were going toe-to-toe, culminating in the Man of Steel’s death (sorry to spoil it folks, but you know how it turns out right?) the writers were down to a full panel per page! It made for quite an impact in terms of the pacing and the book became a best seller.

When I was eighteen I took a course in Media Production, and in the second year I specialised in creative writing and for part of that specialty I studied graphic novel production. I even wrote a full graphic novel that formed part of one of my assignments. I daresay, looking back on it now, it probably wasn’t up to that much, but the training I received definitely made me aware of and gave me a strong appreciation for the balance of pacing and dramatic tension in the graphic novel form. I found it fascinating.

Obviously, the graphic novel links up both words and pictures (in most instances) in a fairly blatant way in the telling of a story but I also find that prose writing, at least for me, has a kind of cinematic quality to it as well. I imagine my scenes as if they were a movie or graphic novel. I put my characters into the panels, see the speech bubbles, feel the build up of gradually larger panels until the big, double page spread reveal at the end. I find visualising in this way very useful and from it I get lots of other ideas and it helps my narrative grow in an organic way that it might not have done where it not for this approach.

As Tuesday rolls to a close, I find myself contemplating this evening’s entertainment. Nothing too flashy on the cards tonight, I’m just going to settle down in front of the TV.

Up until a couple of week’s ago, I’d be tuning in at 9pm to CSI Miami. However, that all changed when the new season of Spooks (which is about MI5 agents and not a cheap rip off of Ghost Busters…) started and the aforementioned American show took a severe nosedive in quality.

I’ve watched pretty much every season of the spy show and I have to say that, possibly barring the excellent season one, this one is the best yet. The writers have really upped their game. It’s so good I wouldn’t miss an episode. The reason it’s so compulsive is very simple. Serialisation. Yes, I know, pretty much every season runs in a series but this particular installment has one long-running storyline. In previous seasons the story lines tended to start and finish with a given episode wrapping things up nicely for a fresh crisis in the next installment. It was still good but I didn’t feel as invested in it as I do the current season. This is such a great strategy to adopt as viewers will be hooked from episode one all the way to the end. It’s the reason massive shows like Lost, Prison Break and 24 have done so well, and why, currently, Heroes is so popular.

It worked for the seventh season of CSI, too (the Las Vegas, original and best, version). This particular show was running the risk of growing stale in its seventh year (what’s that about an itch…), plus it was facing stiff competition from its spin-offs set in Miami and New York. But as soon as the writers adopted the serialised formula it became compulsive, even unmissable. They introduced a serial killer format that the series had been crying out for and several long-running story arcs. The fact that the season was also innovative in terms of its story telling with some truly great cameos didn’t hurt either, but I’m straying off the point. Back to serialisation…

This compulsion to know what the answers are, to discover the fate of the characters I have become so invested in and spent so much of my time with led me to thinking about how this ’serialisation’ effect can be achieved in prose. Indeed, how it is readily employed by many writers, this notion of having one central story arc, throwing in subplots and dividing it into episodes which each – and he’s the crucial part – have an ‘I absolutely must find out what happens next’ cliffhanger at the end of them.

Serialisation employed in this way in the TV equivalent of the ‘page turner’ in book form. Ever bought one an entire DVD boxed set of a show of this ilk and watch five, six, seven or even all the episodes in one go? It’s the same thing.

Getting the viewer/reader to want to know more to get them hooked so they can’t put the book down/are desperate for next week’s show or immediately hit the button remote for episode two etc is such an important factor. Well, it is for me and the pulpy kind of writing that I do.

I was penning a chapter of Wyrd Dreams (short story coming soon – check out my previous posts for more details) a few days ago and I was coming to the end of what I had planned in my head. I got to a good bit, pausing to go get a coffee (it is my fuel, as I suspect it is for many) and when I came back I stopped. Purely by accident, I’d left it on a cliffhanger (it came about through I trick I use whenever I pause in my writing – either leave it mid-sentence… or leave it at a good bit, where you’re aching to write more). I’d planned out a whole extra scene, I had dialogue in my head and knew where, originally, I was going to end it. ‘This’, though, I thought to myself, ‘is so much better.’ I’ll reroute any extraneous but important information I was going to divulge in that ‘lost’ scene later on. I had my serialised episode. I had the nail biter I wanted. And what was I going to do for the next chapter? Shift focus completely. Just leave that previous scene hanging. Plant a question in the reader’s head: ‘What the hell is going to happen next?’

It’s not a new idea. Dickens was doing it for years, reading out and publishing extracts/chapters of his books – the books we see and read today – one at a time. Pick up a copy of Great Expectations and you’ll see a host of instances where Dickens leaves his story on an absolute cliffhanger.

It’s a pretty old trick, tried and tested, well used by thriller writers the world over, but not one that’s easy to master…

As divulged in a previous post, I’m working a web project in my spare time that ties in to Back from the Dead. As there were quite a few loose ends in the book (so fans have pointed out), I wanted to tell the rest of the story and provide some unique web content for the site at the same time.

Ever since it got mentioned, I’ve been thinking about all the open threads in Back form the Dead. What happened to Bane in his new role as Hive City Judge, what about Mavro and Nark, does Alicia have her baby? Well, I’m going to tell some of those stories in Wyrd Dreams a sort of short story/novella (it will depend on how long it is when I’m finished). I’ll certainly address the Alicia question. In fact, it forms the crux of the story.

I’ll be posting individual chapters or webisodes on the blog once I’ve got through a chunk and they’ll be going up periodically. Right now, I’m a couple of chapters in. Keep watching this space for further developments…

And of course, I’d be delighted with any comments on the individual chapters. It’s worth noting that this is a strictly non-official project, just something for me and the BftD fans.

Remember just over a week back? It was that fateful weekend when England lost to South Africa in the Rugby World Cup Final. Wait, wait – don’t switch off, this isn’t a post about sport. Far from it. Rather, it relates to a conversation I had, during said match, with my good buddy Paul about writing.

Now Paul is a clever chap and I’d been badgering him for a while to do some writing. Up until recently, the usual (pretty and fair and reasonable , to be honest) excuses came out relating to day jobs, free time and all other aspects generally getting in the way of literary extra-curricular activities. Well, I was pretty pleased to learn that Paul has indeed starting writing and in the true style of most initial dalliances into the written word, he’s kept it under his hat.

This revelation (and I’m getting to the point, now) led us to discuss how I go about writing and, to an extent, I’ve discussed this in an earlier post so I won’t repeat it here. It did bring up an interesting notion, though, that of the bloody-minded writer – he or she that writes no matter what, even if it’s rubbish.

I’m a first believer in getting something down on the page, even if it’s bad, is much better than nothing. I’m also an advocate of the brain ‘warming up theory’, though I don’t always subscribe to the ‘always throw out your first paragraph’ doctrine, but occasionally it’s a useful exercise.

The truth is, no writing is garbage. Well, that is to say, even refuse can become compost with a little treatment. Leaving the gardening analogy to one side, the message here is that a page of fairly suspect prose is better than a blank page. Remember: you can always go back.

It puts me in mind of an interview I did with Dan Abnett several years ago. I was asking him about his writing techniques and amongst the many pearls of wisdom he imparted, one stuck in mind in particular. He mentioned the importance in his writing of going back over what he’d done and changing a word here and there, a switch of emphasis, a tweak of dialogue until the page really sings.

I like that. All that tweaking and re-reading (aloud is best, I find, especially in the case of dialogue) is the literary gargling before belting out a passion-filled solo.

So, whether gardening or singing (to reconnect with the analogical landscape), even writing the literary equivalent of refuse is better than doing nothing, because you’ll get compost with a little work and that’s when something of substance can grow and flourish. I reckon Paul’s gargling right about now…

One of the best pieces of advice I ever got about writing was given to me by an old college friend and relayed on a piece of paper dredged from the internet. There was a whole list of literary tenets directed at the aspiring author, but the one that most stuck out for me was the first. It read simply: WRITE, READ, READ and WRITE some more. The caps were for emphasis, but it implies a lot in it’s simplicity. If you’re going to be a writer, don’t say you’re going to do it (and to coin a well known sporting phrase…) – just do it.

It’s more than that, though (the READ part of this dictate not withstanding – I’ll deal with that later). Applying a little interpretive translation, it doesn’t just say WRITE, it actually means WRITE ALL THE TIME. Laxity is the enemy of any author. It certainly dogs my heels like a frothing Hound of the Baskervilles, eyes aglow, slavering maw gaping.

I’ll admit it. I’m a bit of a part-time writer. I tend to rest on my authorial laurels and only put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard) when I know I’m working on a commissioned project. This is a bad practice. Put simply, listen to the first edict of writing – WRITE. It’s not capped up for nothing. By allowing gaps (even the less significant) in actually doing some writing you can allow your mind to slip out of the ‘authorial mode’, and once you’ve done that it’s very hard to get back into it. I had this problem after writing Back from the Dead. My next commissioned piece didn’t turn up until over a year later in the form of a short story. Boy, did I struggle. I reckon the story turned out pretty well in the end (it’s the one that featured in Invasion!) but who knows how good it would have been had I kept writing in the interim. I’ll never know. I liken it to sporting acumen. You’ll only get better if you train and, as an additional kicker, if you don’t train, you don’t only plateau you also get worse.

It’s no different with writing. Train your mind like you would your body. This is where reading comes in, too. By doing both, you’re effectively engaging in the mental push-ups necessary to keep your creative acumen sharp. Truth be told, writing anything is a boon to maintaining creative fitness. It’s one of the reasons why I plan to do more regular blog posts – at least one a day.

But this brings me on to something else. In order to fill the gaps between my novels and other written projects, I’m going to start writing a tie-in short story/novella for my first literary foray Back from the Dead on this very blog! This is part down to demand from a few fans (bless you all) and to keep my writing mojo at maximum capacity. Bear in mind, though, that this is mainly for me and it is in no way official or represent Black Library. I want to write in my spare time and this is just my way of sharing it with those who have an interest (post feedback at your leisure, of course).

I won’t go into detail here, rather I’ll save that for a later post where I can introduce the piece properly, explain how it’s going to work and maybe delve into a few thought process, too for those of you reading with a psychoanalytical bent to your personalities.