Dear Ally, How Do You Write a Book

by Ally Carter

  This is one of those things that is pretty much going to boil down to voice. Some authors can write detailed and elaborate descriptions that paint such an amazing picture that we feel like we’re there, looking at that sunset or smile or … doorknob. Some authors can go into the same level of detail and it’s just a doorknob. And boring. So, so boring.

  So how much detail is the right amount of detail? Well, however much you need. How do you know how much you need? I suppose it depends on how many of those details are relevant to the character or the plot. For example, if one of your characters is left-handed and you later find out that the murderer wielded the knife with her left hand, then that’s a detail that will need to make an appearance at some point. Otherwise, maybe her left-handedness isn’t that important and shouldn’t be belabored.

  Your job as the writer isn’t to tell us everything you know. It’s not to supply a list of all the contents of a room or exactly what every character is wearing at every moment. Your job is to describe things in a way that makes the reader see and (most importantly) feel a particular way.

  For some writers (and some voices), that might mean a lot of detail. For others, it might mean very sparse descriptions. What matters is finding the voice and style that works for you. And you find that by writing.

  DEAR CARRIE RYAN,

  You have a rich, lyrical voice that really paints a picture. How do you find the balance between narrative/description and action/pacing?

  What a great compliment—thank you! I’ve learned that if I’m bored writing it, I assume the reader will be bored reading it. So when I get bored, I make something happen. I throw a wrench into my character’s plans, or give them an unexpected twist. (One time I even blew something up.) Anything to force the characters to react, which will almost necessarily carry the story forward.

  Sometimes it can be easy for me to get carried away in descriptions, and I’ve decided that’s okay! I allow myself to dig in as much as I want during a first draft because a lot of the time, that’s how I’m discovering and understanding the world. It’s in revisions that I worry more about pacing—trimming description where it bogs down the story rather than enhancing it. This is one area where it’s really useful to have beta readers. It can be scary to show your unedited work to someone else, but often it’s the best way to gauge whether you’re getting across what you want to.

  Ooh. Show, Don’t Tell—maybe my favorite piece of classic writing advice. And one of the things that is maybe the most difficult (and the most important) for new writers to understand.

  As I’ve said elsewhere in this book, the very first things that I ever wrote were screenplays. They were really bad and pretty boring, but I learned so much from writing them, not the least of which is “Show, Don’t Tell.”

  I think one of the reasons that a lot of new writers are confused by Show, Don’t Tell is because they don’t really understand what it means. It may be easier to understand if we look at your story like a screenplay.

  Imagine a script that says this:

  MAGGIE comes into the room and nearly stumbles over a body. She looks down at the floor and gasps as she realizes the dead man is her soon-to-be ex-husband, who has been stabbed with the letter opener he gave her when she stopped modeling and decided to go back to law school. Maggie screams, then runs away.

  Okay. So maybe that’s how some authors might introduce a new character in their book. That’s fine. But it’s also a bad case of Telling. I know because if that were a screenplay and that screenplay were made into a movie, the camera would actually see this:

  A beautiful woman comes into the room and nearly stumbles over a dead man with something sticking out of his chest. She gasps, then runs away.

  Do you see the difference?

  Show, Don’t Tell means that you can tell the reader all about Maggie and her husband and that she used to be a model and is a lawyer now. But maybe it would be more interesting to show those things instead?

  Personally, I think it would be way more fun to see one of the homicide detectives recognize Maggie and ask if she used to be a model. I’d like to hear them question her about her divorce and why a pretty lady like her would want to read all those thick books.

  I want characters. I want dialogue. I want action.

  In short, I don’t want all the interesting stuff dumped in my lap.

  Show, Don’t Tell also applies to what our characters are feeling. There’s nothing that annoys me more than reading something like:

  Julia was so furious she slammed the door.

  Really? Julia was furious? I never would have guessed since happy people slam doors so frequently. (That’s me being sarcastic, by the way.)

  I didn’t need to be told Julia was furious—the door slamming was enough for me.

  There may very well be times in your book where telling is a quick and efficient way of letting your reader know exactly what’s going on, but try to keep this in mind. And when in doubt, think of it like a movie. If a camera were watching this scene, would it see the character’s emotions? Would it catch the important pieces of backstory? Would it be able to follow the action? Or is all of that information taking place entirely within the character’s (or the author’s) head?

  Your goal is always to make sure it also ends up on the page.

  Well, first you cry. Then you will probably need ice cream. And maybe pizza. And you’ll definitely want the option of breaking something. Then you’ll want to talk to a good friend or family member and sleep for at least ten hours.

  After that, maybe step away from the project for a few days just to make sure that you really are using the wrong POV. (It may just be a case of the mid-book crazies—we all get them.) Then come back and reread what you have with fresh eyes. If you still think you’re in the wrong POV, you have two options.

  You can try to edit your current document, changing the POV along the way. Or you can start with a blank page, using what you have so far as a blueprint, taking the dialogue and story beats that you like but basically starting from scratch. I know both options sound like a lot of work, but believe me, POV is important enough that it’s worth it. I promise!

  A better way of phrasing this question might be “How do you rewrite action scenes?” because I never, ever get them right on the first try.

  Some authors do some very elaborate planning for action scenes. They’ll map out the path of the car chase. They’ll have friends stage a fight so that they can keep track of who has a knife and in what hand and where the grenade rolled off to.

  Sometimes we’ll consult real experts in weapons or hand-to-hand combat, which is incredibly helpful in terms of making sure the scene you write is logical and … well … possible.

  All this research is a good thing to do if you find that helpful.

  For me, the most helpful thing is often thinking about the setting for the scene itself. When I think about action scenes that I’ve seen in movies, they can all start to run together, right? I mean, I don’t really remember one fight from another. All the car chases start to look the same. But a car chase that happens underground in a subway tunnel (The Italian Job), that I remember. A fight that happens on top of a moving train with a helicopter inches away (Mission: Impossible)—yeah, that stuck with me, too.

  So research. Plan. Visualize. Think about things you’ve never seen. But most important, don’t forget that none of this will matter if we don’t care about the characters in the fight and if there isn’t anything at stake.

  DEAR SARAH REES BRENNAN,

  How do you write action scenes?

  I actually really love writing action scenes! I didn’t always, since I’d think about it in terms of “blocking” for a movie:Where is everybody? Where are they standing? What are they doing? What moves are they making? I signed up for fencing class so I could work out that kind of thing, and got my butt kicked by a sword-wielding eight-year-old. That’s all an important part of writing action scenes, but how I learned to love action scenes w
as the trick of writing them for me—thinking about how action scenes are a fun, dynamic way to showcase a character. Who are they protecting? What kind of weapon are they using? (Expertly wielding a broadsword? Wildly throwing a toaster?) How do they fight—ferociously, or without conviction? What do they say—are they witty, or do they just occasionally holler, “Duck”? If they were hurt, who would run to them? You can show someone’s true character by showing who they are when they’re in trouble.

  DEAR ALEX LONDON,

  How do you write action scenes?

  I play them out like a movie in my head, then try to describe what I see as clearly as possible, picking the exciting details just like a director would choose which shots to use. Sometimes that’s a close-up; sometimes it’s an epic aerial shot. I also tend to listen to video game soundtracks when I write, which helps in the actiony parts, too.

  I think a lot of people think of tension as being tied to plot. And it is—don’t get me wrong. But I’d argue that it’s just as much (and maybe more) about characters. And POV.

  Think about it this way:

  Action is having a bomb go off.

  Tension happens when your reader knows the bomb is there and cares about whether or not the bomb might hurt a character we love—maybe stop them from achieving a goal that we’re invested in.

  And don’t forget, tension also isn’t just about big, external, physical risks. (Will the bridge collapse? Can she get out of the burning house? Who is the killer?) There’s a billion-dollar industry built on romantic tension: Will he ever say “I love you”? Will she leave her awful fiancé and run away with the man who loves her for who she really is?

  Tension is conflict. And conflict is gold.

  It’s a sense of being unsure or anxious or worried. It’s a feeling of wanting a thing—anything—and having serious doubts about whether or not it will happen. It’s being concerned about whether or not the characters you care about will be okay.

  So you want to have great tension in your story? Start with a great character and then give us a whole lot of reasons to worry about whether or not they’ll actually get their happy ending.

  I think it can be a great idea if it fits with your voice and the type of book you’re writing. It’s never really fit with something that I’ve done, but that doesn’t mean I won’t do it in the future.

  In a way, conclusions are my favorite thing to write. After all, the end is in sight (which is a great feeling!). You’ve been writing for a long time, slowly narrowing down all the ways that your story can go, eliminating possibilities until you reach the point where there are only a few ways the story can turn out.

  And then I inevitably proceed to pick the wrong way. Always. Every time. As a result, endings are almost always the part of the story that I have to work on the hardest during draft number two.

  For example, the sixth (and final) Gallagher Girls book, United We Spy, had a totally different ending right up until the very last draft. I’d figured out an ending in the storyboarding stage, and I just kept writing it and writing it and writing it, but no amount of rewriting ever made it … right.

  I knew it. My editor knew it (but didn’t know how to say it). Eventually we got on the phone, and I (kind of flippantly) said, “I wish I could just do [X]!” There was a long pause on the phone, and then she said, “Uh … why can’t you?”

  At the end of a book, there are a lot of possibilities. Even if we know, generally, how things are going to turn out, there are still a lot of ways to accomplish it. I had picked a way, and I kept trying to make it fit even though the book had gone in a different direction. (See? I told you I wasn’t any good at outlining.)

  Do I regret writing that wrong ending? Nope. Not in the least. Because that was how I found the right ending.

  Just remember that a right ending will do three very different but very important jobs.

  First, an ending must wrap up all the central questions that the book has asked (unless the book is part of a series, in which case some bigger, overarching questions might remain). You’ve got to tie up all the loose ends, see your character either gain—or lose—their goal, and give us a hint of what that character’s life is going to be like from now on.

  Second, your ending needs to pay off—which means it has to meet whatever expectations our readers might not even know they have.

  Basically, can you imagine the final Harry Potter book if Voldemort had gotten pneumonia and died before the Battle of Hogwarts? What if he’d been hit by another wizard during the fighting and died before Harry even showed up? No. That series was always going to end with Harry and Voldemort duking it out. Always. It had to. Because any other ending would feel like a rip-off. Whether we realized it or not, we’d been promised a Harry vs. Voldemort showdown, and we got it.

  Twist endings are great. Surprises are good. But not if the “twist” doesn’t include whatever it is the story has been building toward from the beginning.

  It’s Katniss vs. President Snow. It’s Black Panther vs. Killmonger. It’s Mia Thermopolis deciding that, yes, she’s going to be a princess.

  In a way, the good ending is the ending that’s inevitable. (Which is why good twists are so great and so hard—it was inevitable! We just didn’t know it at the time.)

  That’s what was wrong with the original ending of United We Spy. There was a big dramatic showdown at the climax, but it wasn’t a showdown between my heroine and the longtime villain of the series. Drafting Me thought that would be a cool twist. But Drafting Me was wrong, and what I ended up with was an ending that didn’t pay off.

  Once I reminded myself who the ultimate villain was and changed things so that the climax centered on a conflict with her, then everything worked brilliantly.

  An ending’s third job is probably its most important. People don’t just remember how books end; ultimately, they remember how a book’s ending made them feel.

  Sometimes that means giving the reader what they want. Sometimes it means giving them something they didn’t even know they wanted. Sometimes it means breaking their heart.

  Whatever the case, when a person finishes a book and wants more, it’s not because they want to read that book again. It’s because they want to feel that way again. That is the ultimate goal.

  Ooh, titles …

  When I started writing a book about a girl who went to an elite boarding school for spies, the phrase I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You popped into my head, and I knew I’d found my title. Just like that. Just that quickly. And for one brief moment I thought titles were so easy.

  I was wrong.

  I was very, very wrong.

  Now here we are, about a dozen titles later, and all of them were the result of hours upon hours of work and research and worry.

  What kind of work? Well, that depends what you’re going for, I guess.

  For example, it became evident early on that the titles for each Gallagher Girls book would be a play on a common phrase or idiom. Which means that I spent approximately nine billion hours online, looking up idioms and sayings and phrases and trying to think of ways to twist them into something clever. For every title, there are probably fifty (or 150) on a list of possible titles that didn’t make the cut.

  (Personally, I’m a little bitter that Not if I Save You First won out over such gems as Wild Moose Chase and All’s Bear in Love and War.)

  But not every title will (or should) be a twist on an idiom. Sometimes a great title is a line from the book itself. Sometimes it’s a description of the character or the name of a place. Maybe it’s a single word that summarizes the essence of the story. Or maybe it’s a short word or phrase that is so tied to the story in your mind that that is how you automatically refer to it.

  If you’re hoping to write a series someday, then it’s important to think about not just what the title of the first book will be but also about what the titles are going to look like for all future books. They should sound like they go together, so thi
nk about what cadence, style, and voice the titles themselves have.

  For example, when I was writing my Embassy Row series, as soon as we settled on the title All Fall Down for book one (because it was a line in the book itself), it became clear that we were going for phrases people know from nursery rhymes. It was immediately obvious to me that the next two titles in the series should be See How They Run and Take the Key and Lock Her Up.

  The key thing to remember is this: Titles are important. And titles are also hard. If you haven’t come up with a great title off the top of your head, then it’s okay to just call your book Untitled Radioactive Hamster Book for now and come back to it later. The key right now is to get your book written.

  In my life, I’ve met dozens of people who’ve told me that they’re going to write a book someday—that they’ve got the perfect idea. That they’ll do it just as soon as they have the time. I don’t know for a fact, but I wouldn’t be surprised if every last one of them is still talking about writing.

  Folks, talk is cheap. Talk is easy. Talk is something you can do without ever running the risk that you might mess it up.

  The number of people who talk about writing compared to the number of people who have actually written a first draft is staggering. But there’s no way to have a career in this business if you don’t move to that second group.

  I know it’s scary. But you can do it.

  Remember that your opening sentence matters, but it can be rewritten.

  Filler scenes are scenes you shouldn’t even mess with, and voice is something you’ll figure out over time. When you’re worried about showing versus telling, you just have to imagine your book is a movie and write down only what the camera sees.

  Just make sure something is always at stake—that there’s something your characters want or need and have to earn themselves, and you should have plenty of conflict (gas in the tank) to get you to The End.