Mercy! Mercy! That Dang Nabed PERCY!

Beating My Head into the Wall

Beating My Head into the Wall

Not exactly a huge surge in interest in using “The Proven Template Technique” as a tool to meter the distribution of writing components in a chapter. By components I mean dialogue, exposition, conflict development, foreshadowing and other techniques that give balance and symmetry to the writing of a chapter. Oh well, I learned long ago that what interests Percy Goodfellow does not interest everyone and perhaps the approach was a bit esoteric for most.

One of the components I look for in a Chapter is how “Good and Evil” are treated. This conflict is something that intrigues readers and draw them to the flame of interest. To achieve this there can be an antagonist, an act of unfairness brought on by circumstances or a manifestation of both in conflict in one of the characters. I prefer the latter but most readers seem to like conflict spurred by the antagonist. However it finds its way into your chapter it needs to be there on a frequent and recurring basis. Not only that, it needs to be linked to one of the three great crises that will come in the story. In other words the conflicts build to a crisis and the crisis build on each other until the culminating one (The Climax) is reached.

In the model I am using (Game of Thrones) is a bit different. There are many different storys that start at different places and these move along, perhaps a couple coming together in the course of a book, but all designed to take place before the series of books ends. Now this doesn’t happen by accident and the components I am talking have to be consciously inserted into the story outline. Don’t expect them to somehow magically appear as you aimlessly plod along.

My challenge, when I go back and read the developmental vignettes is that they tend to follow the sequential propensities of my mind. By this I mean one vignette will be almost entirely dialogue. Another will more expository, providing backstory to the exclusion of all else. In a third I might find myself telling the reader what happened rather than leading them through the action itself. Think of these as a stool with three legs. If there is only one leg the whole structure collapses. So the writer must concurrently use all three and develop a writing technique that allows this to happen. A blend if you will, of dialogue, backstory, telling and showing (Mostly showing) that provides an emotional and sensory connection with the reader. Using my template technique the writer reads the sample prose over and over while at the same time reading their material over and over until they force their writing style to begin to acquire the fluid viscosity to carry all three in the same stream at the same time.

That is what I am trying to get across and I can see by the drop in blog interest (evidenced by views) that my attempts are feeble indeed. Well for better or worse I have no intention of changing. I don’t write this blog seeking recognition and feedback but rather as a journal to record what my thoughts were in the course of a day.