Group Scene AGAIN
Why do I do this to myself? I was checking out the scene I'm taking to critique and this is what I see:
Glyssa and Camellia go to the starship Nuada's Sword (sentient, so it counts as a person) THREE
They meet a courier with a recording from the excavation of Lugh's Spear (comes and goes FOUR and back to THREE)
They watch a viz recording from Lugh's spear showing the hero, another man and hear a narrator. SIX
The viz ends. SIX TO THREE.
Laev (Camellia's HeartMate) comes in, so does Dani Eve Elder, who lives and works on the Ship. THREE TO FIVE, with mentions of the Captain.
T'Ash scries the Ship holding a young fox kit, a cat hisses offstage. FIVE TO EIGHT.
Glyssa leaves to go to T'Ash's. EIGHT TO ONE
She meets Danith D'Ash and the fox kit, Glyssa's new Fam. ONE TO THREE TO TWO at the end of the scene.
I can keep track of this. My steeped-in-Celta fans can probably do the same. Mentor can (but will howl at the group scene). The rest of my critique group (esp. the guy) not so much.
I like this scene, but I know it must be cut, giving me a headache. I can delete Dani Eve and summarize the conversation about the telecommunications satellite (Laev needs to be there). I can probably get Glyssa alone in the landing bay when T'Ash calls...still.
I am not sure what I need to do to stop this rampant group-scene tendency of mine, except concentrate harder when I am working.
Thank you for listening to me vent...and those were the people on and off-stage, there was another paragraph that was completely lovely and listed a chain of names that, again, observant fans would know, but no one else. It must also be cut...
May you not entangle yourself in any problems today.
Robin
posted by FantasyAuthor RobinDOwens | 12:30 AM
5 Comments:
You know, you've said twice how your fans would be able to follow and understand. Who are you writing to if not your fans????? I say if it makes sense to you, if you feel it says what you need to say in the way you want to say it, then leave it alone. If you are pleased, I promise your fans will be pleased.
Ah, thanks! I try to be hopeful that I'll pick up new people with each book, and one thing that turns me off as a reader is a bunch of people I don't know or a bunch of names. :) But I anticipate putting the "as is" scenes on my new website that is under construction...
Robin
Fully agree with Donna!
A new reader of your books would take it on the stride, as everything would be a first off.
Please give us credit, in a crowded party situation you can't keep only two or three involved in fear that we'll get lost!
If readers can keep all the crazy characters straight in Game of Thrones, I don't see why it should be an issue for your books. That author gives a reader character overload, big time!
When I picked up my first "Heart" book, I think it was the third in the series. I was nosing around in Borders, and just happened across your books. I started reading it, realized it was a book that I would like, and purchased it. It was after I got back to my hotel. and was on chapter six, that I realized that I just had to go back and get the first two books. Not because I couldn't follow the storyline, but because I was curious about the other characters and wanted to know more about their stories. So I went back to the bookstore and ended up buying all three of the first books in this series, and read them in order.
But even if I hadn't, I could have followed the storyline in that initial book I picked up, and still enjoyed it. I've done that with other authors. Started in the middle of a series, gotten drawn in - wanting to know more about the secondary characters in a story - and gone back and bought earlier books. So, don't over think it. Do what feels right to you, and the story will be better for it.
Pat, you have a point. Again, I tend to think about NEW readers, I'm sure my fans can follow.
And I must admit that I can be an impatient reader myself (no, I don't read George R.R. Martin,though I've met him several times, or at least I don't read Game of Thrones, I've read other of his works). If I run into a scene with too many people that I'm supposed to know, and I don't, I can get irritated.
So I try to keep what I write below the irritation level of what I read.
Robin
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