The Black Book of Secrets

In Higgins's the Black Book of Secrets we have a narrative structure composed of three separate narrators. A brilliant decision that works well to keep the reader enthused with the story. As with many published books it is a masterclass in the ways of doing things right.

As Higgins writes in the blurb:

I came across Joe Zabbidou's Black Book of Secrets and Ludlow Fitch's memoirs in a rather curious manner. They were tightly rolled and concealed within the hollow of a wooden leg. When I unrolled them the pages were brittle and water-stained, and much was illegible. The fragments are reproduced here exactly as they were written. As for the parts that were missing, what could I do but draw upon my imagination to fill the gaps?

I pieced the story together as I thought best. I do not claim to be its author, merely the person who has tried to reveal it to the world.

So it is that we have:

1. Fragments from the Memoirs of Ludlow Fitch - 1st person pov, past tense
   
   When I opened my eyes I knew that nothing in my miserable life prior to that moment could possibly be as bad as what was about to happen. I was lying on the cold earthen floor of a basement room lit by a single candle, no more than an hour's burning left. Instruments of a medical nature hung from hooks in the beams. Dark stains on the floor suggested blood. But it was the chair against the opposite wall that fully confirmed my suspicions. Thick leather straps attached to the arms and the legs were there for one purpose only: to hold down an unwilling patient. Ma and Pa were standing over me.
   
   
2. Narrative purportedly to have been made up by Higgins to fill out the gaps in the memoirs - 3rd person pov, past tense
   
   It was not easy to describe Joe Zabbidou accurately. His age was impossible to determine. He was neither stout nor thin, but perhaps narrow. And he was tall, which was a distinct disadvantage in Pagus Parvus. The village dated from times when people were at least six inches shorter and all dwellings were built accordingly. In fact, the place had been constructed during the years of the 'Great Wood Shortage'. The king at the time issued a decree that every effort must be made to save wood, with the result that doors and windows were made smaller and narrower than was usual and ceilings were particularly low.
   
   
3. Extracts from the Black Book of Secrets consisting of confessions - 1st person pov, present and past tense
   
   My name is Obadiah Strang and I have a terrible secret. It haunts my every waking hour, and at night when I finally manage to sleep it takes over my dreams.
   
   I might only be a humble gravedigger but I am proud of it. I have never cheated anyone: they get six feet, no more, no less. I have always led a simple life. I need very little and I ask for nothing. I was a contented man until some months ago when I fell foul of my landlord, Jeremiah Ratchet.
   

Higgins has used a different voice, particularly for each of the confessions, and their use breaks up the narrative structure to give a different view and feel. It works, maintaining (for the moment at least) my interest. Each has varying levels of info dumpage (check out the 2nd style)

The Proactive Protagonist

In response to Solvejg's post over on the Maggot Farm: I've been thinking about the awful bit of dirge I've been writing recently for the Fiction module of NAW - it's not dirge really, I quite like the opening chapter (I should do, I've been trawling over it since June), I'm just having trouble keeping at it, since I've already made up my mind that I have more interesting projects I wish to work on as soon as the Fiction module is done (I guess I'm not ready to invest too heavily in Second Fist at this time).

So what is my point today? Well...

Solvejg's been talking about protagonists needing to be motivated (thanks Solvey, I do need to get back to McKee's story sooner than later) and it brought up the problem that readers of Second Fist's synopsis had with the whole story:

1. I'd decided to make Jackson Fisk the protagonist - I'd had the original idea for the story with him in mind (wielding two spirits in his fists that turn him into a sort of spiritually/demonically super human)
2. The story is told, alternately, by two other characters in first person point of views - i. Kitty (who wants Jackson to solve a big problem for her); ii. Raziel (who wants to capture Jackson and use him to... well, to stop Kitty, really

Sounds fairly straight forward doesn't it?

I need a single protagonist to garner reader empathy/sympathy/identification. The story isn't so much an ensemble cast list, despite the main three characters (now: Jackson, Kitty and Raziel) all suffering psycholigically in a similar way and their pasts, their choices, their futures all based around the same single theme: life moves ever onward, and no matter how hard you try to recapture what your life was like, you can't.

So, what's the problem?

I've chosen Jackson as the protagonist, yet we never get his pov. We begin the first chapter with Kitty, then move onto Raziel, and through him we meet Jackson. Also, Jackson is very passive throughout the whole story, and, as I realised in a response to one of my fellow students, he's the Mcguffin of the plot - his abilities are what everyone seeks to use to their advantage. I can't have him as the protagonist because he's only ever responding to the needs of others, and is, for the most part, borne upon melancholy for things that have happened previously.

With that in mind, I need to bring the story more to bear upon Kitty. She's really the driving force, making all the decisions.

It was also, thanks to the remarks of a fellow student:

How and why would people / spirits do this? What need would it fulfil generally? And what does it say about the place of humanity in the universe (which is what stories about the supernatural are ultimately about)

that I realised I really need to reassess the purpose of the story as a whole, change the direction and really elaborate on the people and their motivation (their humanity) rather than what was originally and action-led horror-cum-fantasy story with a passive protagonist. Certainly, it makes more sense to have at least one pov character as the protagonist!

Chicken and Egg

Everything is building again - only three weeks off from completing my screenplay module and I find myself deep in the midst of writing for different projects again - this is a GOOD thing, for what is a writer with nothing to write? A hack probably.

I've been developing an idea I started before the screenplay module finished, and it's been going nice and slowly (a good way to really develop ideas whilst playing around with pov, tense, strategy, etc), but having written one chapter, focusing immediately upon the protag, I needed something else to frame it. I still wasn't happy about the structure of the chapter and what I'd chosen to expose the reader to - too much info probably, stuff that could be revealed later and provide an "ahhh, I get it" moment.

So, I turned my attention to another chapter, one to slot before the protag visitation - and one on which I could hang some extra tension. The problem with the protag chapter is that he doesn't know what is going on in the wider world (having been in prison will do that), and in order, I believe, for the reader to really pick up on the suspense of what is coming (dramatic irony) I required another opening (just as I had done when I was working on my contemporary fiction novel - Spoiling Virtue - adding a chapter before the opening, then a chapter before that, until I found myself miles away from what the story was really about).

Spoiling Virtue I dropped because Salley Vickers had advised me to avoid child abuse stories for at least 10 years - interesting.

Anyhoo, in starting to develop a new chapter I got to thinking about chickens and eggs (and not just because my stomach was growling). Writing the opening to a novel and/or screenplay is very much a chicken and egg situation. You've got to start somewhere and yet your original opening might not necessarily be the right place to start. And just as the evolution of the clucking family meant they actually circumnavigated the question entirely, so too does the writer, for your original opening might end up being the midpoint, the ending, an incidental scene, or cut from the work entirely - as long as one isn't too precious about one's work - the process should be free flowing and ready for evolution.

I'd written quite a great piece - my best yet - and my wife liked it. Yay! Only, I got back to it the next day to find that it wasn't what I'd thought it was. I was shocked, dismayed. I was still writing awful prose...

They ran the next red, slid across the sweaty tarmac and tore away into the night. With the road to themselves and the town’s breath heavy on their necks they didn’t look back. In their wake they left a labyrinth of roundabouts and diversion signs surrounding the central precinct. Within that perimeter the town’s hub lay open like a ruptured wound; picked clean of community and hospitality.

His foot was to the floor as they fled the overhang of long-empty office-blocks and neglected tenements, stripping away the humidity as they accelerated. She gripped the fabric of his jeans in a hand whose nails had been bitten to the quick, finding her seatbelt little comfort, while the tangle of her hair whipped and flailed about her face. They fled together as if fearful the decay that had taken root in the land might poison them with the corruption of its concrete heart.

Stonework and steel gave way to the stillness of open meadow and rolling hills. Yet their speed didn’t relent. And out to the west beyond the thirsty hedgerows and oases of trees, beyond the wilted fields of oilseed rape and a glimpse of a night-owl or prowling fox, a steady stream of lights hastened up and down the motorway in whites and reds.

I mean, okay, it's... fine, but it's not brilliant, and I want to be brilliant. What to do? I stared at it in disbelief - the boost I'd received from the FeverPitch competition's positive feedback hadn't lasted long. I was stumped - immediate Writer's Block. No amount of knowing my characters was going to save me this time!

But then, I picked up one of the books on "how to write" that I'd got from the library in order to do my pedagogic review (part of my NAW professional development module) - yes, I know, how awful that a writer needs to use a how to book to break him out of a tough spot (let's hope none of you point out that I refer to Dramatica too).

Anyhoo, the first few pages, strangely, and wonderfully enough, cover writing things in different pov's. It suggested that I try rewriting something that I'd written in one pov, in another. The above extract is 3rd person, so, I tried 1st. And... the difference a change of head makes! I think what really opened it up for me was that by changing everything to 1st person I allowed my mind to let go its usual restraints and to free itself of my usual uniformity. Suddenly I let in some feeling... some emotion. SHOCK HORROR. See how this new extract has much more punch to it, and how it draws you in in a way the original version doesn't:

We ran the next red, slid across the sweaty tarmac and tore away into the night. The road was ours and though the town’s breath was heavy on our necks we didn’t look back. Behind us the central precinct sprawled like a ruptured wound; picked clean of community and hospitality. And at its concrete heart where the darkness swelled and a poison had taken root, the land had begun to die.

His foot was to the floor as he ratcheted up through the screaming gears, stripping the humidity from our faces. Before I could blink he had freed us from the overhang of long-empty office-blocks and neglected tenements. It was as if we could breathe again. Though I couldn’t calm the jangle of my nerves. My seatbelt was no comfort against our speed and I found myself clutching at the leg of his jeans, only able to hold my grip because I’d developed the unpleasant habit of biting my nails to the quick. With my other hand I battled against the tangle of my hair as it whipped and flailed about my face. Time was I’d have forced him to pull over until I’d preened it tightly beneath a headscarf and secured the bow beneath my chin. Time was he’d have let me.

Stonework and steel gave way to the stillness of open meadow and rolling hills, yet our speed wouldn’t relent. The broiled scent of tarmac was on the air, the kind of smell you only get before a storm, though the sky was free of clouds. Beneath the diamond glitter of stars this drought refused to yield. Out to the west, beyond the thirsty hedgerows and oases of trees, beyond the wilted fields of oilseed rape and the miracle glimpse of a night-owl or prowling fox – it could have been either – I could see the two lanes of lights that hastened up and down the motorway in whites and reds, like a procession of paired children with lanterns

Multiple POV's

So, still reading Crace's The Pesthouse - I'm only reading it of a night whilst sweating it out in a hot bath... you didn't want to know that!

And I came across an interesting way in which Crace conducts his two lead characters. As I predicted previously, when Crace made it quite clear he was giving us a future reference the female lead wouldn't know yet, she'd see the male lead again... and she does, as the story heads towards the dying days of the second act.

Up until this point we stick with the female lead, Mags. Note, it's the male, Pigeon, who was kidnapped for manual labour, and so it is him who'd we, the reader, would be more worried about as we stay with Mags's story. Crace builds in this two-level suspense. Underlying all of Mags's trials we, knowing full well that we will meet up with Pigeon again, worry about where and when, and how he is.

We follow her story, right up until the point where she meets with someone directly related with Pigeon - the man who kidnapped him and stole his one-of-a-kind coat (don't worry, it's not Joseph and that darn Technicolour dreamponcho). And there, with the badguy starting to cause murder and mayhem, and just when Mags's has been put into danger...

We leave Mags's and join Pigeon. We start a new chapter, open with a brief paragraph on the now, and then leap back to that night when he and Mags were split - note that we don't have the time and possibly not the inclination to go into as much depth on Pigeon's time as we did on Mags, so it is fairly condensed. Crace provides the right information to give the flavour of the characters Pigeon is with.

Once we are brought back up to speed with the now, Crace pulls Mags into view with Pigeon and merge their tales again.