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Everything is poetry—that’s a line from Nikki Tate’s new book, Fallout, published by Orca Book Publishers. Tara’s sister killed herself by stepping in front of a bus. Tara puts a keen steel edge to her grief in the form of spoken-word poetry—the novel is part wiry narration, part poetry. The poetry stands apart from the text, both in white space that surrounds it and intense imagery. It’s like a spotlight, and readers cannot resist its pull.
Conflict is good. Conflict forces change. In story, it’s a character’s inner conflict that compels the character to face the wreckage of their lives, learn something from it, and go forward. Frodo, Harry, Katniss: they face their inner villains. It’s what makes them heroes. This self-discovery defines the good guys—bad guys just never learn.
In the backstage view, story is always a collaboration between writer and editor and it’s not always without conflict. Writers are generally good at editing their own work, but they only know what they know. An editor examines the story from a different distance—sometimes from farther out, sometimes from so painfully close that every comma seems under scrutiny. But that’s where the best work emerges. Writers do well to listen to their editors, to allow them space to do their job.
Thinking of turkey for some reason, and I remember a story about a woman who always hacked off a drumstick from the turkey before she put it in the roasting pan. When questioned, she said it was just the right way to do it, that her mother had done it that way and she did it that way and doesn’t everyone cut off a drumstick? Then her mother revealed that the only reason she cut off a drumstick was because her roasting pan was too small and the turkeys didn’t fit.
You only know what you know.
KL Denman, Christy Goerzen, Cristy Watson and Nikki Tate launched new reading last week at Kidsbooks South Surrey store. Check out these titles, all crafted for readers seeking quick, powerful fiction with accessible language and relevant themes.
KL Denman’s Stuff We All Get looks at the power of music and how it connects us. For Zack, music is light—he sees music in colours. Will he be blindsided by Jolene’s quest for the spotlight? Beautifully written. An Orca Currents book for middle school readers.
Christy Goerzen’s Farmed Out describes a very urban girl’s self-discovery at a goat farm. Laugh out loud moments—like Maddie’s new-age vegan mother communing with the livestock . An Orca Currents book for middle school readers.
Living Rough by Cristy Watson reveals the complexity of homelessness as seen through the eyes of a teenaged boy. Drawn from Cristy’s experience working with at-risk youth, Living Rough is credible and authentic. An Orca Currents book for middle school readers.
New for Nikki Tate and a new direction, Fallout speaks the language of grief and guilt as a teenaged girl struggles with her sister’s suicide. Spoken-word poetry creates intense emotional depth. Beautiful. An Orca Soundings book for readers 12 and up.
These titles are available at Kidsbooks South Surrey and at kidsbooks.com. Thanks to Maggie at Kidsbooks for hosting. Great store, Maggie. The young readers on my shopping list are going to love the titles you recommended.
At the story level, closure is a collaboration of writer and reader to create meaning. The reader observes the parts and perceives the whole–he or she reads between the lines. Closure also occurs at the editing stage, but here it is not such a good thing. You’ve probably found errors in books, on billboards–and these are edited by professionals. Even the most careful proofreader can overlook mistakes. Sometimes our eyes read the whole phrase or sentence and not each word–observing the whole while perceiving the parts.
Here are three ways to help spot errors:
- Read it aloud
- Read it on paper
- Read headings, captions and tables
Accuracy matters. Give ‘em every reason to accept your submission.
Like graphic novels, novels purpose-written for accessibility (hi-lo) demand conscious construction. These fiction powerhouses employ a similar synergy of word and image to amplify meaning.
- Characters and images are simplified toward a purpose
- Characters are easy to identify with
- Syntax is bold and direct
In Understanding Comics, Scott McCleod talks about closure: the phenomenon of observing the parts but perceiving the whole. In graphic novels, panels fracture time and space. The graphic novelist asks the reader to connect the moments. To do this, the readers must put themselves into the story and contribute their own experience.
So it is with hi-lo novels. Visually-crafted scenes contain the plot and keep it in the moment—no flashbacks, no dream sequences. These novels are really spare. Readers are pulled in and put to work, overlaying their stories with the characters’ to create the whole story.
McCleod uses the metaphor of the trapeze artist, that between panels, several times on every page, the reader is released into imagination, then caught by the next panel. When I write, I’m aware of the readers’ outstretched hands, ready to connect.
Writers collect stories from the real world to reset into fiction and it’s one of the conditions of writing that real-life conflict makes for good fiction. But to make sense of all those real-life story threads, to weave them into a lovely and functional novel, the writer needs empty time—and lots of it.
KL Denman calls it “turning the compost”, the process of sitting quietly and sifting thoughts. I’ll take Denman’s metaphor one step further: writers consume real stories like worms, and process them into a rich growing medium. Writers first put themselves into a story and find something that matters to them. They take that resonance and turn it into a character. Then the writer moves the character into new conflicts, ie, fiction. At this point there’s a necessary stepping back for the writer because now it’s about connecting the character and the reader. It’s real work, and someone’s gotta do it.
Graphic novels illustrate (really illustrate!) how a writer consciously builds pathways to meaning. These pathways pull the reader into the story. Ever put down a book because you couldn’t get into it? The language laboured, maybe, or the plot wound back on itself? Or maybe it was a perfectly crafted book, but you just couldn’t see yourself in the story. Graphic novels employ resources to create a connection 
between text and reader, like playing with perspective so that the reader views the scene from above or below, and framing the characters, both in the frame of the panel and within the frame, to show relationships. The process clears obstacles away and eases the reader in. Or a graphic novelist creates an obstacle, puts something smack in the middle of the path so that the reader must stop and look—a metaphor, a visual symbol that builds meaning.
Want to write a graphic novel or find out how they work? Pick up Scott McCleod’s book, Understanding Comics.
Graphic novels make meaning. Graphic novels pull readers into a story by using images and expressions.
Graphic novels create a unique connection between character and reader. Story, in any form or genre, depends on the reader being able to identify with the characters. Graphic novels distill characters to strokes of expression, gesture and emotion. A picture really says a thousand words.
Kathie Shoemaker, illustrator of Good-bye Marianne, calls this “writing wordless”. Graphic novels are a visual form, both in physical images and what they demand from the reader’s own imagination. In this way, writing graphic novels are a like writing plays. Interestingly, Good-bye Marianne was first published as a play.
Kathie Shoemaker, author and illustrator, offered first-hand experience at the recent BCLCIRA conference on the graphic novel.
- Story comes first. Develop your characters, setting and plot; write a brief synopsis.
- Write a script. Visualize the story panel by panel. Write a visual description for each panel. Next, write the dialogue. For example:
PANEL 1: A boy, Jacob, stoops to pat a dog huddled by an overflowing trash bin. It is night, raining. Jacob is in just a T-shirt.
JACOB: EASY, BOY. I WON’T HURT YOU.
- Draw the pictures. Using your script, draw the story panel by panel.
Kathie Shoemaker is the illustrator of forty books for children including Good-bye Marianne, the graphic novel, written by Irene Watts. Kathie teaches courses in Children’s Literature at the University of British Columbia.