Every story has its basic elements from protagonist to context to the outcome and resolution, whether good or bad. That's the start.
But not every story comes off the page, not every story can make your mind photographic or feel the lilt of its words so you get carried away by the flow of paragraphs and pages. A practiced author can make that happen but mass appeal doesn't prove art.
Beyond the page turners are those stories you never want to end because you're breathing through the sentences, rereading to sniff out the planning and placement, feeling your way steadily through the individual words to capture the minutiae necessary to make the recipe just right. The philosophy is in the details.
I'm reading such a book right now. I'm not yet halfway through East of Eden by John Steinbeck and I want to go back and read it from the start to make sure I didn't miss phrases like "the water of people", describing a crowd at the brink of riotous, righteous fervor or the making of pancakes as "little hassocks, small volcanoes formed and erupted on them until they were ready to be turned" or a man so close to remembering a far-off memory as "a little more there was to it, he dug it up and set it before his eyes in the air ahead of the horse's head". All read within a span of three pages.
The story is only an element, perhaps just a context for the author to weave in little tidbits imagined, crafted, found and stored in a separate place waiting to be carefully placed so the reader might catch a hint to pay attention exactly at that moment.
I've often skimmed passages of page-turners to get to the end. It's an art to tell a captivating story that keeps you hungry but patient enough to savor the juicy details.
But not every story comes off the page, not every story can make your mind photographic or feel the lilt of its words so you get carried away by the flow of paragraphs and pages. A practiced author can make that happen but mass appeal doesn't prove art.
Beyond the page turners are those stories you never want to end because you're breathing through the sentences, rereading to sniff out the planning and placement, feeling your way steadily through the individual words to capture the minutiae necessary to make the recipe just right. The philosophy is in the details.
I'm reading such a book right now. I'm not yet halfway through East of Eden by John Steinbeck and I want to go back and read it from the start to make sure I didn't miss phrases like "the water of people", describing a crowd at the brink of riotous, righteous fervor or the making of pancakes as "little hassocks, small volcanoes formed and erupted on them until they were ready to be turned" or a man so close to remembering a far-off memory as "a little more there was to it, he dug it up and set it before his eyes in the air ahead of the horse's head". All read within a span of three pages.
The story is only an element, perhaps just a context for the author to weave in little tidbits imagined, crafted, found and stored in a separate place waiting to be carefully placed so the reader might catch a hint to pay attention exactly at that moment.
I've often skimmed passages of page-turners to get to the end. It's an art to tell a captivating story that keeps you hungry but patient enough to savor the juicy details.