The Extra Voice

Author Sherry Harris is a good friend (and editing client) of mine. Recently, she mentioned how my prior edits continue to influence her to this day, and we realized it might be helpful for Sherry to share some of my past comments/concerns in case any of you have the same writing issues. So I invited her to be our guest blogger today. Take it away, Sherry!

— Barb Goffman

 

The Extra Voice

by Sherry Harris

All writers have voices in their head, but I have an extra one. It's Barb Goffman's. She edited twelve of my thirteen published books, one that isn't published, and all the short stories I've written. So, trust me, when I'm writing, Barb is right there with me. Below are some of the things she's saying:

Not enough sleuthing – What, Barb? I write mysteries; of course there's sleuthing. But apparently, in every third book or so, there isn't! I get distracted by a relationship or a subplot and forget the main point of the book--that my protagonist has a mystery to solve. Here's a comment Barb made when she edited Rum and Choke: "I've already mentioned this, but to flesh it out, a large majority of the book (at least it felt like a large majority) involved Chloe helping Ann search for the treasure. The rest of the book had a lot of subplots, and sleuthing into Enrique's murder felt like one of them. Obviously, that's a problem."

Are you writing a travelogue? – Apparently, I was. In an early book, I sent Sarah from her little town of Ellington, which is about fifteen miles northwest of Boston, to the North End of Boston. I love Boston. I love the North End. It took Sarah two pages to make it from the T by the Government Center in Boston to the North End, which is about a ten-minute walk. In the original version I waxed on about the history of Faneuil Hall and its famous golden grasshopper weather vane. Sarah stopped at the Holocaust Memorial and at Union Oyster House. She padded across the cobblestone street and went by Mike's Pastries before she arrived at her destination. In the final version of the book, her walk was one paragraph, as much as it pained me to delete so much detail about my beloved Boston. Sigh, Barb was right. Now when I'm waxing on about something in a first draft, it gets axed by the second one.

She needs to react – I'm reacting to this voice. Both of my series have female protagonists, and this bit of advice has made a huge difference in my writing. Find a dead body? You need a reaction. Someone say something startling? Your protagonist has to think something or say something or make an expression that gives away their thoughts to the reader. This seemingly simple statement is key to writing a book with more emotional depth. Now, it drives me nuts when I read a book where the characters don't react.

Slow down – but the pace...  It's one of those rules of writing to slow down the fast-paced (action) scenes and speed up the slow ones. While my logical brain knows that, apparently my writing brain forgets it. BTW, reactions work in the fast scenes too.

Make it a full scene – all too often when I'm writing early drafts I jump to the next scene and start it with a line that summarizes something that happened since the last scene. It's fine to do it if what happened isn't anything important. However, in the book I just wrote, I found myself hearing Barb's voice telling me that the summary deserved its own scene. She was right. Again. 

When was the last time she ate? – I don't know. If your protagonist has kids or a pet, you can add fed/took care of them to the above. Ah, yes, meals. My protagonists can apparently go days without eating. And it's not that each meal needs to be a scene (see paragraph on description above), but characters can grab something as they go out the door, or stop for something, or it can be a scene if something important happens.

I could probably write ten more pages of examples of things Barb's voice is saying. Like, why is your character doing something, or why is that scene in there–just because the writing is pretty doesn't mean it has a place in the story. Thanks, Barb. Sigh. But if you have to have an extra voice in your head, I hope it's Barb's! 

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Sherry Harris (https://sherryharrisauthor.com) is the Agatha Award-nominated author of the Sarah Winston Garage Sale mystery series and the Chloe Jackson Sea Glass Saloon mysteries. She's published short stories in Edgar Allan Cozy, The Beat of Black Wings: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of Joni Mitchell, Black Cat Weekly, Three Strikes--You're Dead, and Scattered, Smothered, Covered & Chunked: Crime Fiction Inspired by Waffle House. Sherry is a past president of Sisters in Crime and a member of Mystery Writers of America.

To __, or not to ___.

My computer just developed a strange glitch.  It stopped letting me type the letter that lives right after A, and ahead of C .  It’s the second letter in that thing we learn in grade school (often sung in an cloying little ditty) that I can’t name, since the word includes the letter that my computer no longer allows.  This has resulted in moments of frustration, and creative resilience, since I need to write around the impediment. 

It's not too much to ask, I think, to have access to all the letters at the tip of my fingers.  We are accustomed to this handy array, and hardly need some censorious technical quirk to interfere with the free flow of expression.  Though here I am, tethered to the need to come up with endless workarounds that I hope make sense, and with luck, still demonstrate a facility with the language. 

If you’re still wondering which letter is now out of reach, it's also the name of a stinging insect.  Think of a creature with orange stripes that zings around flowers and often lands on your egg and croissant sandwich when you’re having an outdoor, early morning repast.  I’ve come to deeply respect the utility of this letter, and wonder if the whole experience wasn’t instigated to alert my attention to its value in written discourse. 

You don’t know what you’re missing till it’s gone.   If you want to know what it’s like to live without sight, put an opaque cloth across your eyes for an hour or two.  Try walking around with one leg pulled up at the knee.  Or try writing the expression, “With one hand tied….” without that crucial letter.   Or refer to the most significant rock group in history, whose name also gives indirect reference to a common insect. 

I’m grateful the computer didn’t rule out the letter E, which that famous word game (which kicks off with an S and has two of the omitted letters in the middle) tells us is the most common.  Indispensable.  As is true of the other vowels.  Losing S would also pose a major hurdle. Try making a plural without an S.

When I write an email, spell check is now an ally, rather than a nagging, and often presumptuous, irritant.  I write a word with the missing letter, and it often offers up the correct version.  This works, though not always.  I can also scope out older documents for the word I want, copy it, and paste it in.  This also works, though I would need a longer lifespan to compose a decent amount of text. 

When writing a Word document, I would love to go to the thesaurus function to find an alternative, yet can’t write the word I’m trying to replace.  So I just mutter, “This is all such _ullshit.”

I’ve scoured Microsoft and Lenovo help screens hoping to find a quick fix, for naught.  Try asking, “Why can’t I type the letter…?” Oh, yeah.  I can’t type it.  My Apple devices, the iPad and iPhone, have no such restrictions.  This could also provide a workaround, though I can’t type nearly as fast with the two fingers scientists claim gave us an evolutionary advantage.  Good for flipping coins and catching a ride on the highway. 

I’ve determined that the world could go on without this mislaid letter, though in a very diminished state.  We would discover new creative powers, and perhaps accomplish unexpected works of art.  Yet at the end of the day, having exhausted ourselves dodging and weaving around this lexicographical curse, how satisfied would you feel saying, “I’m so tired, I just want to fall into that piece of furniture uniquely configured to facilitate sleep.”