Reading Critically For Writers

An inherent part of writing well is reading well. It’s not enough to simply take good books and read them and love them to pieces – we do lots of this already. Honing our skills as writers depends on how much we write and how well we read.

Writers grow by switching on the critical eye and analyzing why particular books worked. Book reviewers often summarize the important elements of the story and judge whether or not the story worked for them overall. Literary analysis is more dissecting the text looking for themes and meaning and reflections of the author’s troubled love life.

Writers, however, can benefit from looking into the seemingly simplest elements, the tiny threads that weave together and form the entire tapestry. We first learn to speak by listening to others and imitating vocal patterns. We learn to write by imitating what we read, and we learn to write better by reading more effectively.

Here are some things to look for as you read:

• What scenes of the story read faster than others? What parts make you turn the page without thinking and what parts give you the opportunity to stifle a yawn? Look for sources of tension or conflict, especially if either is steadily rising. Look for points in the story where characters move the plot, or the plot moves the characters.
• Sentence flow carries a narrative. Follow how the author played with sentence length in both slower and faster scenes. Study their techniques in speeding up or easing back on the speed of the narrative. When were longer sentences used? How about shorter? What effect did it generate?
• Look at the dialogue on its own, without any surrounding action or tags. Just the dialogue. Can the characters be told apart by certain nuances with speaking patterns, idiosyncrasies, or colloquialisms?
• How are the surroundings described? What sorts of things does the environment reveal without ever directly telling the reader? Clothes, food, building materials, and even character? How does this indirectly reveal the setting? The time and place?
• With a particular scene that carries a very thick, defining atmosphere or mood, look for colors and sensations. Look for word choices that carry a subliminal effect, the way the narrator or characters regard their surroundings. Even easily overlooked signs such as body language can make an impact.
• Study how the five senses are utilized, as well as how creatively the author approached using the senses. If the author used any clichés, then in what way? Were the clichés redone with a fresh take? Used in an unexpected manner?
• How did each chapter or scene or section carry the rising action? What moved the story from point A to B and how did the characters reflect this?
• If the story had multiple points of view, how did each point of view differ? What was the tone of the language used? How did the various points of view carry their weight in the story? How did those characters impact the plot?
• Why did you like a particular character? What made them appealing or rounder? What sorts of qualities gave them dimension? What scenes really elevated them from the page and turned them into real people?
• Why did you not like a particular character? What had you expected out of them? Where did they fail to deliver?
• What are the subplots? How are the subplots developing beneath the central plot? By the end of the story, how were the subplots solved?
• How did the author tie off the ending? Were all your questions answered? Did you throw the book at the wall or cradle it gently to your bosom? How did the beginning and the end tie together? What was your lasting impression of the book?

There are a ton of other questions to ask as writers read, but getting started is key. As the critical eye develops, asking these questions will become a natural part of reading and it becomes easier to see more and more of the threads that compromise the story.

The biggest problem I’ve had so far is that the critical eye doesn’t seem to have an off button!

Make Your Reader Hold Their Breath

From this post, number two reads like this:

When your character trips and stumbles and stops to question themselves, the readers will hold their breath.

So, you’ve got your story arc (or something that remotely resembles some sort of an albeit questionable arc). Maybe you’ve outlined, maybe you’ve jotted down some rough notes, maybe you’ve got the whole damn detailed and coherent synopsis, or maybe it’s all still stewing in your head. Whatever the case may be, cool. This is a good step.

What about your character arc?

First of all, what is a character arc? It runs in tandem with your rising action, and it’s also referred to as character growth/change. Whatever your character is missing in the opening, they obtain it by the end. Your character at the beginning of the story will not be the same character by the climax of your story. This is good. Static characters that are impervious to change won’t resonate with your reader.

Maybe this sounds a bit daunting, but don’t worry: characters tend to take on lives of their own. As soon as you drop them in the story, your character should come alive. Don’t try to control them. They’ll resist. And if they do, let them. They’re real people, and I know this sounds hippie-ish, but treat your characters like real people. If you’re having trouble caring about them, then stop and remember that they’re real people. Make sure you understand their conflicts, their desires, and how these things will be revved up by your story arc.

But the journey from the beginning to the end can’t be easy-peasy. If resolutions and answers are coming to your character without any form of trial or struggles, rethink the story arc. You’re not challenging your character.

How does someone challenge their character?

Bad example:

Cindy wanted a candy cane off the tree. So, she reached up and grabbed a candy cane.

Good example:

Cindy wanted a candy cane off the tree. Pools of lava bubbled at her feet, and she had no shoes. A bottomless mote with a ravenous alligator encircled the tree, and she didn’t know how to swim. The presents were actually bombs in disguise, and she could make out the sound of ticking. She crumbled to her knees and stared at her plastic-wrapped goal, gleaming against the pine needles.

Replace Cindy with your character, replace the pools of lava and the alligator and the bombs with trials, and the candy cane with your character’s goal. Challenge your character. Bring them to the very edge of their abilities and make them teeter and sweat and hesitate.

The despair, the questioning of oneself, the doubt, it’s all part of the growing process. “I’m scared, I don’t know if I can do this” makes the reader think “Try, just try, come on and become awesome.” When a character has worked so hard, earning our respect (in one way or another, no matter how simple or twisted), and they fall, the reader urges that character to get back up and come out wiser and stronger. The reader wants the character to be challenged and to earn their goal, and every trip and stumble along the way is part of that process. And when you come to one of these moments, don’t cheat your character or the reader.

Bad example:

Cindy crumbled to her knees and stared at her plastic-wrapped goal. It was hopeless. Oh, but wait, she had learned how to make a hang glider out of twigs and palm fronds, so she set to work and flew over the traps and plucked the candy cane from the tree.

Good example:

Cindy walked the entire perimeter four times. Her feet burned from the scalding rock. The air was thin in her lungs. She pulled at her hair and stole glances of the path back home. It was hopeless. She couldn’t do this on her own. Maybe the candy cane wasn’t meant for her at all, and maybe the mocking of the kids who had doubted her would wear off after some time. After all, there was nothing she could do.

Unless…

This adds to the relatable human element of a character, and it’s in these moments that we see the character arc shine through. Even if your main character is the antagonist, readers need that connectable human element – it will make a fan out of your readers, make them bite their nails and turn the page to find out what happens next.

(Also, find part one here!)