Looooong Openings

[NOIRTRASH]

You saw the movie, THE DIRTY DOZEN, with Lee Marvin and Charles Bronson. I'm reading the 600 page novel. Readers warned its slow going for 100 pages or so, and it is. Youll know every time Reisman shit his diaper and sucked his thumb before the band of killers get the first finger up their ass or their balls cupped by a cold hand at the training camp. Readers warn the suicide mission lasts a whole paragraph or so. They salute the flag, hop aboard an airplane, and depart for hell.

Eighty percent of the book is changing the hearts and minds of animals from bad neighborhoods.

WTF

My latest story opens with a gal devoured by a crocodile during a midnight swim with her honey at a natural spring they sneaked in to after drugs and drinking and dancing and fucking. The honey leaves to pee, and the croc grabs the girl off the beach. The whole scene speaks volumes.

 

[lovecraft68]

Stephen King got like this after awhile.

I had sworn off him after Insomnia -which was the cure for said disease-but then he and Peter Straub came out with the sequel to their co-written book The Talisman called Black House so I picked it up.

It was obvious King had the opening and 100 pages in he was still describing the damn town, every character in it, who is sleeping with who, who has a drug issue, who is a creepy weirdo who is...

I gave it to my daughter and told her when she finished it to give me the gist of it. She said she didn't get much further than I did.

 

[jomar]

Yeah, I quit reading Michener because he took 20 pages to describe a cup of coffee.

 

[lovecraft68]

Anne Rice is another out of control author editors apparently fear. Her Mayfair Witches books were decent(except for the ridiculous ending), but goddamn the details and inanities in the family history which was an info dump covering a couple hundred pages.

 

[legerdemer]

As I recall, in Dickens' time writers got paid by the word. Have we returned to that model?

 

[lovecraft68]

As I recall, in Dickens' time writers got paid by the word. Have we returned to that model?

I wish, I'd make a killing!

 

[Carnevil9]

Sounds like Jules Verne. I remember page after page of nothing but descriptions of fish outside the window of the submarine.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

As I recall, in Dickens' time writers got paid by the word. Have we returned to that model?

In Dickens' time readers had fewer means to observe the world, and after movies came along the writing changed.

 

[TxRad]

In Dickens' time readers had fewer means to observe the world, and after movies came along the writing changed.

Did it? Writing has always been about a movie in the mind. The good writing anyway.

 

[lovecraft68]

Did it? Writing has always been about a movie in the mind. The good writing anyway.

I think his point is you could get away with more in writing back before everyone knew what everything was. You could make shit up and people took your word for it. Now with google everyone is an expert and looking to prove you wrong about everything.

 

[Ewobbit]

Truthfully, I figure that's why I write as I do. Olden days of yore, there was character and scene setting before the action commenced. Granted, most of it was actually written to be performed as plays since the majority of people couldn't actually read...

But... I'm not sure it's fair to compare movies with books. Or pre-movie plays either. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so it's probably fair to say that the first frame of a movie is worth one or two pages since we get to see a bunch.

 

[sr71plt]

Yeah, I quit reading Michener because he took 20 pages to describe a cup of coffee.

It got to be a little worse than this with Michener. The first 230 pages of Alaska was lopped off by the editors and published as Journey.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

Truthfully, I figure that's why I write as I do. Olden days of yore, there was character and scene setting before the action commenced. Granted, most of it was actually written to be performed as plays since the majority of people couldn't actually read...

But... I'm not sure it's fair to compare movies with books. Or pre-movie plays either. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so it's probably fair to say that the first frame of a movie is worth one or two pages since we get to see a bunch.

There was an expression common during the Civil War (when Dickens was popular). The expression was WE'VE SEEN THE ELEPHANT. It applied to unexperienced knowledge. Its what TEX said moments after his first sex with a female.

 

[TxRad]

There was an expression common during the Civil War (when Dickens was popular). The expression was WE'VE SEEN THE ELEPHANT. It applied to unexperienced knowledge. Its what TEX said moments after his first sex with a female.

Actually, it's "I've seen the elephant" and it was taken to have meanings of despair and depression. Having seen too much and it was all bad. Originally penned in the "Texan Expedition to Santa Fe" around 1844. It comes from an English expression of "Seeing the Lions".

Same old JBJ, if ya can't convince em, confuse the issue.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

Lion TEX.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

I'm reading BROWNS REQUIEM by James Ellroy. Its his first book. Readers don't care for it much but Ellroy learned fast, and book #2 CLANDESTINE is much better. BROWNS REQUIEM is tedious where it needs to sprint. Ellroy loitered where nuthin was happening and fled from interesting scenes.

I don't know why writers wanna loiter.

 

[HandsInTheDark]

I don't know why writers wanna loiter.

Done right, it builds suspense. The best example I've seen, maybe not your cup of tea but I'm a fan, is Tolkein's Lord of the Rings. Yeah, the plot could have been written in a third as many words, but making the reader stop and smell the flowers gets them more invested in the background and setting and makes them hungry for the next plot changing event.

Most common critique of my stories: you rushed the last chapter. They're right. When I see how it's going to end, I just want to get there and post, and the readers can tell when I start sprinting. It costs me in ratings. If I can learn to slow down as I approach the ending, I'll own my readers.