Writing a Page-Turner

This was my MFA graduation lecture delivered in 2014, and I stand by it today. Nothing I’ve learned since then has changed my mind about any of this.

Are you ready for a walk on the wild side? We’re now leaving the familiar turf of what is commonly known as literary fiction--the kind that gets published in online magazines, chapbooks, or by boutique publishers--to focus on the bigger world of page-turners. So what do we mean by the term? A page-turner, according to national best-selling crime novelist and scholar James W. Hall, is a “book you can’t put down, that you want to read in a gulp. One that keeps you up all night. Gripping. Edge of your seat. Mesmerizing. Fast-paced. Spellbinding. A roller-coaster thrill ride. Unputdownable.” [i]

In order to be a page-turner, first and foremost a novel must be entertaining. It must make readers care about what happens to the fascinating characters involved in our stirring story. It must be written clearly, simply, and sincerely. It must move swiftly, arouse our emotions, and feature lifelike, passionate characters who act, and speak, like real people--characters readers can empathize with easily. A page-turner must captivate readers with a great opening sentence, paragraph, page, and chapter. The plot must be driven by a dramatic question; that is, a specific question about how things will turn out that serves as a device for engaging the reader’s curiosity and draws them forward through seeming endless complications to a satisfying finish.[ii]

Do any come to mind? How about The Godfather, Jaws, The Firm, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Hunt for Red October, The Da Vinci Code, The Exorcist, The Dead Zone, The Bridges of Madison County, Gone With The Wind, Peyton Place, and Valley of the Dolls? They should because they are the top dozen best-selling novels of all time. To be popular, it’s painfully obvious that, first and foremost, a novel must be entertaining. Okay, perhaps you’re thinking, but if they’re that popular, how can they be any good?

Time for a brief digression to discuss the difference between art and entertainment. Or put another way, mainstream fiction (which is what best-sellers are) and literary fiction.

According to the dean of New York’s Gotham Writers Workshop, Alexander Steele, mainstream fiction is “geared for a broader audience” than literary fiction, which appeals to a “somewhat elite readership” and has “some aspiration of being considered ‘art.’”[iii]

Let’s take a closer look at this distinction, which some might argue makes little or no difference. The word novel itself is derived from the Latin word novus for “new.” Novel means striking, original, or unusual. It also means something entertaining that is popular for a short period of time--hence the popular novel. Art, on the other hand, is defined as works appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. Just because something is “striking, original, or unusual” does not necessarily mean that it lacks “beauty or emotional power.” So being popular alone is not enough to disqualify a novel from being considered art.

Of course, there is good art and bad art--and it’s all a matter of opinion. And labeling. The term “literary fiction,” by the way, is usually applied only to post-WWI fiction. Anything from an earlier period is simply considered “literature.”[iv] It also must be noted that all these bookish terms are really about commerce, marketing, knowing where to put books on bookstore shelves to be sold--rather than the opinions of an elite readership.

Some would argue that in mainstream fiction the conflict “will be presented in a way that’s more apparent and less nuanced than it would be in strict literary fiction. This distinction makes most mainstream fiction easier to read and accessible to a wider range of readers.”[v] To this elitist argument, I would say that anything which increases readership is a plus. This inclusive tradition goes all the way back to Shakespeare, when the clowns and rude jokes delighted the groundlings while the complex Elizabethan poetry of the same play delighted the more elite members of the audience. I object to elbowing out everyone who doesn’t share the pretensions and trappings of High Culture. Besides, as Ernest Hemingway’s work proves beyond doubt, it’s possible to write fiction that resonates on many levels.

Some believe, “The style of prose is emphasized in literary fiction, whereas a writer of mainstream fiction will often forego stylistic writing in order to get to the meat of the story.”[vi] To me, while style and ideas are extremely important, story comes first. I believe the novelist’s foremost task is to tell a good story.

While mainstream fiction is “‘transparent” (readers can see through the text to escape into the story itself), literary writers want the reader to notice the writing itself.”[vii] Personally, I have no problems with this at all--unless “the writing prevents the reader from escaping into the story.”[viii] To me, this is the mark of failure and must be avoided at all costs.

Steele contends that “both types of fiction are equally valid, with plenty of readers in both camps to prove it…. A literary work should keep readers entranced and turning pages well past bedtime, and an entertainment work will be all the more entertaining if it has some real insight and resonance…. The same elements of craft apply. And, really, when it comes to fiction--good is good.”[ix]

CHARACTERIZATION

In writing a page-turner, everything starts with it. Even if we do everything else right, if we fail to create compelling characters, our book is not going to be a page-turner. In fact, our book is probably one that only a mother could love. Characterization is that crucial. What’s To Kill A Mockingbird without Scout Finch? Gone With The Wind without Scarlett O’Hara? The Godfather without Michael Corelone?

Our characters must seem like living, breathing people. And they must want something. “Desire is a driving force of human nature and, applied to characters, it creates a stream of momentum to drive a story forward.”[x]

Let’s talk about Scarlett O’Hara, as does Jim Hall in his insightful 2012 book, Hit Lit: Cracking The Code of the 20th Century’s Biggest Bestsellers. While reading year-by-year lists of bestsellers, Hall decided to put together a course in popular fiction, starting with Gone With The Wind. He’d seen the movie, but had never read Margaret Mitchell’s 1936 novel (30 million copies sold). Hall, whose teaching specialty is postmodern fiction, reports being mesmerized by it and feeling like a kid again. Suddenly it seemed obvious to him that “when millions of readers, whether they are formally educated or not, have expressed their separate opinions by buying and delighting in a particular novel, there is some larger wisdom at work. Thus, it seemed self-evident to ask one simple question: What is it about this or that enormously popular book that inspires such widespread fervor and devotion?”[xi]

To answer the question Hall and his graduate writing students at Florida International University reverse-engineered the novels on our list seeking common features among them. And what emerged is that they’re all page-turners of the highest order.

Hall was astonished by how deeply Scarlett O’Hara had moved him. Millions of other readers also have found it easy to empathize with Scarlett, even though she is self-centered, spoiled, and insecure: “She meant what she said, for she could never long endure any conversation of which she was not the chief subject. But she smiled when she spoke, consciously deepening her dimple and fluttering her bristly black lashes as swiftly as butterflies’ wings. The boys were enchanted, as she had intended them to be, and they hastened to apologize for boring her.”[xii]

As all characters must, Scarlett begins by wanting something--to marry her neighbor  Ashley Wilkes. What produces such a strong emotional reader response is the intensity of her desire and determination, which enables her to overcome many complications and difficulties. All the books on our list are populated by characters who in this way are similar to Scarlett.

In The Godfather, for instance, Michael Corleone also wants something intensely--to protect his father, the Don, from further attempts on his life by rival gangsters. The only way to do this, Michael believes, is by assassinating them. Thus, good and evil are blurred--something novelist Mario Puzo continually does throughout the book. The task of killing of killing both “The Turk” and a corrupt cop named McCluskey falls to Michael because up to now, he’s been a “civilian,” meaning not a gangster and therefore not considered dangerous by his father’s enemies.

As a war hero, Michael is more than up to the complicated and difficult task of killing his enemies when they least expect it. However, he will be forever changed by this act. Instead of being destined for public office, as his father would’ve preferred, Michael now will inherit the mantle of the Corleone crime family. Looking ahead to after the killing, Michael asks Clemenza how bad it will be. This allows Puzo--like Michael a WWII veteran--to draw an analogy from the war era to justify murder and gang warfare:

“Very bad,” Clemenza said. “It means an all-out war with the Tattaglia Family against the Corleone Family. If we let them push us around on the little things they wanta take over everything. You gotta stop them at the beginning. Like they shoulda stopped Hitler at Munich, they should never let him get away with that, they were just asking for big trouble when they let him get away with that.”[xiii]

It is Michael, not Hitler, who is the enemy of American society. But even though he is a stone cold killer and likely worse, the reader continues to identify with Michael, because he also is the bravest, most intelligent, and most capable character on stage--and therefore a highly dynamic character.

STYLE

Style may be understood as the result of various technical choices made by the writer. Our page-turners are all written in a clear, simple, and sincere style: “Sometimes he wondered if he was going crazy. Like now. He had meant to give the dog a burst from the ammonia Flit gun, drive it back into the barn so he could leave his business card in the crack of the screen door. Come back some other time and make a sale. Now look. Look at this mess. Couldn’t very well leave his card now, could he?” [xiv]  That’s from Stephen King’s The Dead Zone (1979).

This is a well-written paragraph that can be easily understood by any reader. A dog has apparently been maimed or killed, foiling the salesman’s strategy. We don’t know much about the story yet, but we know it really moves. On closer examination, we discover that it consists of a series of short- and medium-length sentences, and fragments that speed up the scene. Each sentence is tightly focused and follows stair-step construction, meaning one leads directly to the next. The first sentence, “Sometimes he wondered if he was going crazy,” is an abstract general statement. It’s immediately followed by a concrete specific example--“Like now.” There are few distractions, little description, and limited transitions. This is a page-turning style.

Style and voice are often used interchangeably when discussing fiction, and the voice of a story is the voice of the narrator. Often, the protagonist is also a first-person narrator. But not in our page-turners. Of the dozen on our list, only two--To Kill A Mockingbird (1960) and The Bridges of Madison County--are told in first-person. Most are told in third-person in order to show the story’s events from different perspectives.

Just as style and voice are closely related, so are voice and dialogue, where the characters literally speak: “Sonny jotted something down. ‘I think we’ve got it.’ (Tessio tells Michael:) ‘In the restaurant, wait a bit before you excuse yourself. No, better still, ask permission to go. But when you come again, don’t waste any time. In the head, two shots apiece, and out as fast as our legs can travel.’”[xv]

In this excerpt from Mario Puzo’s The Godfather (1969, 12 million copies sold), the dialogue is “pared down, an abbreviated copy of real-life conversation that snaps and crackles with tension.”[xvi] Like the preceding example from The Dead Zone, it’s broken up into fragments and spare sentences. There is little or no extraneous information. It is rapid-fire, swift and captivating, and invigorates the scene.

OPENING

These days, as we all know, a great opening sentence, paragraph, page, and chapter are all that stand between our baby and the shark-infested waters of rejection. So what to do?

National best-selling author Sena Jeter Naslund advises that, “Particularity, which bespeaks originality or uniqueness, is much to be desired in any opening. It is possible to engage a reader’s (or an editor’s) attention by excelling stylistically or by creating compelling content, but ideally one should do both, simultaneously. Having an interesting title, not a generic label … is a springboard or catapult into the story, while the first paragraphs are the beginning of a path which the reader decides to follow or not to follow.”[xvii]

All of our page-turners have memorable titles that catapult us into the story. Gone With The Wind, To Kill A Mockingbird, Valley of the Dolls, The Hunt for Red October. These are puzzling, poetic, evocative titles that pose questions.

Let’s look at opening sentences: “The great fish moved silently through the night water, propelled by short sweeps of its crescent tail. The mouth was open just enough to permit a rush of water over the gills…. The eyes were sightless in the black, and the other senses transmitted nothing extraordinary to the small primitive brain.”[xviii] That, of course is from Peter Benchley’s Jaws (1974, 9 million copies sold).

Here’s one perhaps not so instantly recognizable, yet still powerful: “The blaze of sun wrung pops of sweat from the old man’s brow, yet he cupped his hand around the glass of sweet tea as if to warm them. He could not shake the premonition. It clung to his back like chill wet leaves.”[xix] Only three sentences, but sentences with strong verbs, specific sensual details, and a powerful concluding simile. From William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist (1971, 11.1 million copies sold).

Here’s another opening that relies on figurative language, including extended metaphor, to create both mood and a sense of place: “Indian summer is like a woman. Ripe, hotly passionate, but fickle, she comes and goes as she pleases so one is never sure where she will come at all, nor how long she will stay…. One year, early in October, Indian summer came to a town called Peyton Place. Like a laughing, lovely woman, Indian summer came and spread herself over the countryside and made everything hurtfully beautiful to the eye.”[xx] Obviously that’s from Grace [Muh-TAL-yuss] Metalious’ Peyton Place (1956, 10.6 million copies sold).

And finally here’s how the number one best-selling novel of all time begins: “Louvre Museum, Paris. 10:46 p.m. Renowned curator Jacques Sauniere staggered through the vaulted archway of the museum’s Grand Gallery. He lunged for the nearest painting he could see, a Caravaggio. Grabbing the gilded frame, the seventy-six-year-old man heaved the masterpiece toward himself until it tore from the wall and Sauniere collapsed backward in a heap beneath the canvas…. The curator lay a moment, gasping for breath, taking stock. I am alive.”[xxi] That’s from Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code (2003, 81 million copies sold).

Sales figures alone do not necessarily make this the best of openings, but it’s full of action verbs like staggered, lunged, grabbing, heaved, tore, collapsed, and gasped that give it vividness and pace. And as an added benefit, the setting is the Louvre, in Paris.

PLACE AND TIME

Place in a story means a specific location where the action happens. Some of our page-turners begin by creating a sense of place. They give readers who’ve just parachuted into the brave new world of our book a map and, perhaps an encyclopedia as well, that teaches them everything they need to know about the setting.[xxii]

Place affects the action in a story. Tom Clancy’s The Hunt For Red October (1984, 6 million copies sold) begins with a description: “The water was coated with bilge oil of numberless ships, filth that would not evaporate in the low temperatures and that left a black ring on the rocky walls of the fjord as though from the bath of a slovenly giant.”[xxiii] The wonderfully gross details in this excerpt conclude with a humorous simile that suggests the scale of menace posed by the Soviet’s new super sub.

Place, or setting, can affect the emotional landscape of a story. John Grisham’s The Firm (1991) is set in Memphis, but the place that really matters is the law firm of Bendidni, Lambert & Locke, where a recent Harvard grad named Mitch McDeere is being interviewed by senior partners. Right away we’re tipped off that this mysterious tax firm’s hires are vetted by ex-CIA agents; and that they’ve never hired an unmarried lawyer, or a black one, and that the only woman--who didn’t work out--was killed in a car wreck. Mitch is suspicious enough to hire a private eye to investigate the odd goings on at the firm, where the lawyers keep dying.

Time also is integral to place, as context.

The Civil War and slavery form the backdrop for Gone With The Wind’s epic story. In To Kill A Mockingbird, it’s racial politics and class warfare. In The Da Vinci Code, the context involves challenges to the fundamental values of Western art and the Catholic church. In The Hunt for Red October, two superpowers play saber-rattling games in the Atlantic Ocean. And in The Exorcist, the antagonist is Satan himself. .”[xxiv]

DRAMATIC QUESTION

In the beginning, our novel must capture the reader’s interest. But once readers are attracted, we face the even bigger problem of continuing to hold their interest and attention over several hundred more pages when every distraction, however small, threatens to capsize the whole enterprise. How? The plot of every page-turner must be driven by a dramatic question. Plot is what happens in the story. The dramatic question is why.

Hall offers a few examples: “Will the shark come back for a second bite? Will Scarlett ever marry Ashley? Will that faithless priest be able to save the little girl from the clutches of Satan? Will Jack Ryan locate the rogue Russian sub commander and thwart his mission?”[xxv]

Jacqueline Susann’s Valley of the Dolls (1966, 30 million copies sold) focuses on the lives of three women who become fast friends. One of them, Anne Welles, is warned by her mother that there is no such thing as love “except in cheap movies and novels.”[xxvi] Facing a suffocating future with a fiancé she doesn’t love, Anne heads for the big city. Over the next twenty years, she and the other two embark on careers that bring them to the heights of fame. The dramatic question is, will they find love and happiness in the big city? The answer is no--  all self-destruct due to drug-abuse and mistreatment by men.

In The Dead Zone, the dramatic question is how will former schoolteacher Johnny Smith come to terms with amazing new psychic powers which allow him to see into the lives of anyone he touches? After a five-year coma after a car accident, Johnny sees people's futures and pasts when he touches them. Following a disturbing handshake with a politician named Stillson, Johnny concludes that the only certain way to avoid a terrible future is to assassinate him. He fails, but his target’s political career is destroyed when Stillson uses a young child as a human shield.

In To Kill A Mockingbird (14 million copies sold) the dramatic question is whether Scout and Jem can maintain faith in the human capacity for good despite numerous incidents that expose the evil side of human nature. Atticus Finch defends an innocent black man accused of raping a white woman. Despite the accused’s conviction by an all-white racist jury, the alleged victim’s vengeful father attacks Jem and Scout. They’re saved by Boo Radley, who stabs him to death. “Scout is determined to hold onto the freedom and independence of childhood,” Hall says, “and we can’t help but root for her although we know her wish is doomed (as) she’s yanked viciously from her youth and forced to confront the worst that human nature has to offer: racial hatred, incest, murder.”[xxvii]

According to Elmore Leonard, the plot is like real life, if you skip the boring parts. While our story must seem lifelike, we definitely want to skip the boring parts. The best way to do that is to put our characters in a tough spot and keep them there. “Beginning with a character in crisis is a great way to hook readers, but to keep reeling them in, we must make the character’s situation steadily get worse.[xxviii]  This is what happens in The Firm, where the dramatic question--“What will success do to Mitch and Abby McDeere?”--turns into, “Will Mitch and Abby survive?”

Having captured readers’ interest with the dramatic question, John Grisham (whose books incidentally have sold over 250 million copies[xxix]) keeps them interested by ratcheting up the suspense. McDeere and PI Eddie Lomax are in such fear of danger that they must meet secretly in a park. “You think you’re being followed all the time,” Lomax says. “You tell me to be careful and watch my rear because they, whoever they are, may be following me. You’ve got five lawyers in that firm who’ve died under very suspicious circumstances, and you act like you may be next. Yeah, I’d say you got problems. Big problems.”[xxx] Twenty pages and a few weeks later, Lomax is murdered.

DENOUEMENT

Current top-selling thriller writer Lee Childs believes that, “As novelists, we should ask or imply a question at the beginning of the story, and then we should delay the answer…. The reader learns to chase, and the momentum becomes unstoppable.… Someone killed someone else: who? You’ll find out at the end of the book. Something weird is happening: what? You’ll find out at the end of the book. Something has to be stopped: how? You’ll find out at the end of the book.”[xxxi]

Denouement is the answer to the dramatic question.

As rising action reaches the climax, our protagonist must learn something life-changing from a choice he makes. That will bring us to the denouement, where the strands of the plot are drawn together and matters are explained or resolved. This most satisfying kind of resolution is when the story ends in a way that is “both inevitable and unexpected.”[xxxii] 

In The Firm, once Mitch discovers exactly how the Mafia uses the firm to commit crimes, he chooses a complex way to blow the whistle. This ends the firm, but also means Mitch and his loved ones must start a new life in hiding. In The Hunt for Red October, after a long, exciting hi-tech chase, Captain Ramius defeats the Soviet military by the decidedly low-tech tactic of ramming. In Jaws, after being harpooned by Quint, the great white shark leaps onto the stern and the boat starts sinking. Quint drowns. Floating on a seat cushion, Brody spots the shark and prepares to die. But the shark succumbs to its wounds and Brody survives.

CONCLUSION

To sum up, in order to be a page-turner, first and foremost a novel must be entertaining. It must make readers care about what happens to the fascinating characters involved in our stirring story. It must be written clearly, simply, and sincerely. It must move swiftly, arouse our emotions, and feature lifelike, passionate characters who act, and speak, like real people--characters readers can empathize with easily. A page-turner must hook readers with a great opening sentence, paragraph, page, and chapter. The plot must be driven by a dramatic question that draws readers forward through seeming endless complications to a satisfying finish.

Thank you for your attention. Any questions or comments?

Notes

[i] Hall 220

[ii] Hall 1

[iii] Gotham Writers’ Workshop: Writing Fiction 5

[iv] Rosenfeld 52

[v] “Literary And Mainstream Novels: What's The Difference?”

[vi]“Literary And Mainstream Novels: What's The Difference?”

[vii] Writer’s Relief

[viii] Writer’s Relief

[ix] Gotham Writers’ Workshop Writing Fiction 5

[x] Gotham Writers’ Workshop Writing Fiction 25, 28, 29

[xi] Hall xiv, 220

[xii] Gone With The Wind 8

[xiii] The Godfather 119

[xiv] The Dead Zone 8

[xv] The Godfather 136

[xvi] Page 73-75

[xvii] Naslund

[xviii] Jaws 1

[xix] The Exorcist 1

[xx] Peyton Place 1

[xxi] The Da Vinci Code 1

[xxii] House

[xxiii] The Hunt for Red October 1-2

[xxiv] Hall 53-69, 220

[xxv]Hall 9

[xxvi] Valley of the Dolls 9

[xxvii] Hall 15

[xxviii] “Tip of the Week: Avoid A Sagging Middle”

[xxix] Wikipedia

[xxx] The Firm 191

[xxxi] Child

[xxxii] James 5 Feb. 2011

[xxxii]Wikipedia

[xxxii]Wikipedia