How To Write A Compelling Transition Scene
Recently, a young writer told me he had written a novel, and he had only written twelve-thousand words. It was a complete novel, with a complicated plot and vast journeys and lots of characters.
Well, okay. I have my doubts. Story-telling is not just about saying that so-and-so did this, said that, did that, said this, went here, went there, etc...That's basically the kind of story a tax auditor tells when he looks over your 1040. Story-telling is not the same as an auditor's report!
Well, okay. I have my doubts. Story-telling is not just about saying that so-and-so did this, said that, did that, said this, went here, went there, etc...That's basically the kind of story a tax auditor tells when he looks over your 1040. Story-telling is not the same as an auditor's report!
As authors, we know that our readers are co-creators in our work. We also must be aware that the version of the universe we've drummed up takes time for a reader to re-create in his or her own mind. This is true not only in fantasy literature, where there actually may be a whole new universe to imagine, but also of a single scene. A key scene is a universe unto itself. This means we can't just report on actions. We have to paint a scene using words, so that the reader can take the details we give them, and add a thousand other details on their own, to create something compelling.
I've had the flu for the last four or five days, so I'm probably not writing at 100% of capacity. So bear with me. I will try to illustrate what I am talking about by writing a simple little transition scene, one that may fit between two more meaningful scenes. Then I'll see if I can turn it into something more compelling. And I do this to show my young writer friends that sometimes, at certain moments, more is better. Pretend this little scene is one of those moments.
She jumped off the horse, and looked around, and then went into the palace.
Okay, I just got a girl or a woman from a horse to the inside of a palace. Mission accomplished. This may not be so bad. In fact, this may be exactly what I need, and nothing more. But let's say, for whatever reason, I want my reader to see this unfold. I still want it to be a transition between major events, but I want to establish a tone that will follow this character into the next scene. I want to give the reader a sense of where this scene came from, the present thoughts and perceptions of the character, and then I want to transition the tone of this scene into next one. I will need much more than the short description above.
Where The Scene Came From
Above, we start with the clause, she jumped off the horse. This clause should most often connect us to the most recent scene that involves this character (note: all rules are made to be broken). Also, most people don't jump from horses.
I'll take a gander at giving this clause a more real-time feel:
Without any reins or stirrups she was unable to direct the spooked and frantic horse, or to make it stop. When the horse passed the palace steps, she slid her left leg over its back, dangled briefly from its neck, then tumbled onto the street.
I just came up with that, so it's definitely not perfect. But it's much better than she jumped off the horse. Hopefully, now, the reader can infer that something strange is afoot. We have a girl riding a scared horse, and the horse is clearly not equipped for riding.
We have a more vivid scene now. Whatever is going on, it's probably something strange, or scary, or sad, etc...
The Present Moment
She looked around. That's all she did? In a sense, yes, that's all she did. And depending on what you want from the scene, maybe that's all she needs to do. But for my purposes I want to draw readers into this girl's present moment. If they can become her for a moment, the next scene inside the palace will be much more impactful. Now, what to do with the clause, she looked around...
When she opened her eyes, her head throbbed, and a trickle of blood dripped down her brow past her ear and onto the street. She gazed up at the gray sky, then over at the gray buildings. The sound of the horse's hooves faded down the street and around a corner.
She turned over to push herself off the street, but a sudden shock of pain shot from her left leg into her whole body. She gasped, and gripped her mouth hard with both hands to keep from screaming. When the shock faded into a terrible throbbing, she stood up, supporting herself with her good leg.
A few steps away was a wall that followed the stairs upward, and she limped toward it. Soon, she gazed up the steps at the large black door. All was quiet in the streets. The shutters and doors of the palace and all the houses, were closed
She could imagine few things more eerie than an empty city.
Where Is This Going?
Did I really need all of this buildup? For my purposes, yes! Now I just need her to go inside the palace:
She took the steps as fast as she could, leaning hard on the wall for support. From her head wound, the blood trickled down her face and dripped onto her dress, but she paid no mind to it. She focused on the great door that seemed to grow larger as she approached. Finally she gazed up at it, dark and forbidding, studded with iron pins around the edges. The handle was cold in her hand, and as she pulled at it, the hinges screeched and the whole contraption groaned.
Soon, she limped through the doorway and disappeared into the darkness.
To My Young Writer Friends
Do you see why you're not going to write a fully complex story with a complicated plot and many characters and settings in twelve-thousand words?Read the best works of your genre, and see what makes them great, and you're going to see that I'm not too far off the mark. There are a thousand things that make a great novel, and I wish to heck I knew them all. But like all writers, we have to learn these things as we go, and hopefully before our days are done, we'll learn enough of them to write a laudable work of fiction that stands the test of time.
I'm going to go now, and take some extra strength Nyquil, and curl up in my bed. Happy writing to you all.