Being Seventeen - Comments

@ jaxprog
Thanks for the comment! You made some really good suggestions.

Three great positive qualities in regards to your prose:
1) Great characters. You know them. You know how role play them.
2) You a good sense of dialog. Good pacing and rhythm.
3) Main character Andie pretty much takes the lead in the scenes

The following are opportunities:

Think for a moment. Why is Andie in this story? What does Andie desire? What is motivating Andie? I ask you these questions because character drives plot. A story must have an overall story goal and Andie being the main character must drive the plot to meet that goal. Otherwise your story will be like reading Andie’s daily diary.

Dear diary, Today, I united with my mother and some strange family. I went to school. Christie and I shared a cigarette. My grandparents past away. Mason invited me over to his place. And on and on with no end in sight.

It’s a day and in the life of Andie. A whole string of scenes that don’t follow a plot.

Once you determine what Andie desires and wants, your next step is to determine... What’s going to prevent her from obtaining her goal? Who or what is going to stand in her way? Who or what is going tempt her and lead her astray from her goal, desire and need?

I offer suggestions based on the characters you have written to date. You can come up with whatever you desire and use these suggestions as structural examples:

Story Goal: To get Michael Ray to ask her (Andie) to the prom
Andie’s Internal Goal: To be accepted for who she is unconditionally.
The antagonist: Christie. She also likes Michael Ray and there is just no way that, Michael is taking Andie to the prom. He’s going to ask me. I’ll see to it!
The Inciting Event: The prom is announced and the date is set. Christie sees Andie and Michael spending time together and the time they spend together is quality time.

Look at what you have here. Two best friends who rival for a boy’s affections. The conflict of gaining Michael’s attention plus the conflict that threatens the fracture a friendship. It’s epic! If there is no plot and there is no conflict, then there is no story.

Let’s look at another angle. A controversial theme.

Story Goal: To keep an affair alive and well with Mason and hidden and out of sight
Andie’s internal goal: To find out what real love is and means
Antagonists: Damon finds out that Andie has been seeing Mason. He uses this knowledge to extort Andie to get what he wants. The more Andie gives the more Damon continues to raise the stakes.
Inciting Event: A careless moment in time. Mason kisses Andie. Damon sees it.

Let’s look at one more angle a variation in theme of the previous two.

Story Goal: Making a decision. Choosing between Michael Ray and Mason.
Andie’s Internal Goal: Peace of mind and stability.
Antagonist: Andie herself. She is her own worst enemy, creating problems for herself.

This kind of structure gets complex because Andie plays the role of both the protagonist and antagonist. She strives to determine who to choose but sabotages herself in doing so. The conflict is four ways: Michael Ray vs. Mason (equally vice versa), Andie vs. Michael Ray and Andie vs. Mason. Andie vs Andie. If the two men are competing for the same girl that creates conflicts. If Andie has to choose between the two and feels pressure from both Michael Ray and Mason, that creates conflict.

The key to this kind of story is focusing on how Andie is dealing with two men competing for her attention as opposed to all the antics and shenanigans the guys pull on each other to win her over. Why? Because character drives plot. If Andie is the main character then she is the one to deliver the goal, not the two guys. It’s about what she goes through to make decision with these two men to arrive at a conclusion.

Inciting Event: One of the two guys sees the other hitting on Andie and Andie being receptive to the flirts. Its game on!

A cool exercise to come up with conflict is the “but - therefore – then” exercise. Janice Hardy describes on her website, Fiction University, that the creators of South Park use this exercise to brainstorm stories for their cartoon episodes.

It works likes this…

Andie talks to Michael Ray, but Christie flirts with Michael Ray. Therefore Andie decides to approach Michael sometime later alone, but Christie is always seen with Michael. Therefore Andie calls Michael on the phone and invites him to go swimming, but Michael reveals he already has a date with Christie on the same day. Therefore Andie seizes the moment when Michael is really by himself and throws herself on him kissing him all over, then he finally pays attention to her.

You see the pattern? Goal and conflict… goal and conflict and then resolution. Each “but” is a goal and each “therefore” is a conflict against that goal. Each goal and conflict pair is a scene. All these scenes are linked via cause and effect creating an overall plot and story.

Now you may be thinking all of this sounds nifty but what about all the things I have written about in regards to Andie. For example: it’s all about her being age 17. Her mother past away. Her grandparents past away. She is mourning the loss of these important people in her life. All my work and ideas.

Then my answer is… it gets all included in your plot and with Andie striving to resolve the story goal. You use back story to convey this information. However you must be careful how you reveal all this information. A story’s worse enemy is called the dreaded info-dump.
An info-dump will bore your reader to the point that she or he will simply put your story and down and never return back to it again.

So what is an info-dump exactly? A writer creates an info-dump for the sole purpose to get the reader to understand what is going on and/or happening so the reader does not miss out on what you think is important at that moment in the story. An info-dump stops the reader’s flow (and distracts) in order to absorb the information you think they should or need to know.

Let’s look at an info dump in you story:

My dad did. Thinking about my dad before school would be a very bad idea….. …..My dad died when I was almost 17. I was in the car with him when it happened. We had just picked up dinner and were heading home. My dad started singing along with the oldies station, making me laugh. He was always good at that. I was watching dad make funny faces as he sang along.
I looked up and screamed. Our light was green, but a semi was coming through the intersection when his light was red. My dad never had time to stop. Being in the backseat saved my life, they say. However, I didn’t escape without scars both physical and mental. I have a long scar on my head, luckily most of it is covered by my hair…...
This is all back story implemented as an info-dump. You stop the flow of the story from, “Does no one respect privacy around here” and then resume at, “I quickly grabbed my bag and went downstairs”. Remove the info-dump form the scene and look what happens to Andie. She heading downstairs, bag in hand, naked. She never got dressed.

So how do you reveal this? I will say this, you are on the right track. You are allowing Andie to reveal this information to the reader via internalization, which is great. But instead of revealing it all it once, reveal it over the course of the story in short bits and pieces and doing so from Andie’s point of view, so that again she is showing the reader via internalization. Make the reader earn this information. The only way they are going to find out is by turning the pages of your story. Otherwise, why read if you just tell it all at once.

Your backstory is rich in content. Spread the wealth over the course of the story.

Consider the following suggestion and spot another info-dump that I will omit from the start of your prose.

My life changed the day my bedroom door allowed a pounding awakening. I heard yelling and the pounding continued. “Andie, get up”!

I gripped the bed linens and narrowed my eyes. “Five more minutes. That’s all I want. Just five minutes.”

Damon opened the door and marched inside.

My grip tightened. I sat up keeping myself covered. I pointed at him and motioned toward the door. “You! Out! Right now!”

Damon smirked. “Get up.”

“Leave and I will get up”

Damon tilted forward and looked me in eyes.

I recognized that expression. His face, sneaky and pervy.

He smiled.

“You little sneaky random creeper.” I shouted, “Get out!”

Damon laughed. “I’ll be back in five minutes.” He turned to leave. “If you aren’t up, I’ll drag you out.”

The hell, you will, “Get out!”

I looked around and grabbed whatever mix of clothes lay nearest. Maybe that dress. I held it up. No, too big. It would swallow my petite figure. I dropped the dress and picked up sweatshirt and jeans. That’ll do. I slid into my jeans and zipped them up.

The door behind me opened.

I’m going to kill him.

“Glad you are up. Christie’s downstairs”.

Damon again. That little shit. I kept my back toward him, “Does no one respect any privacy around here?”

He laughed and walked back out again.

I pulled my sweatshirt over my head and finished. Time to go. I grabbed my bag and skipped every other step down the stairs. Thank God, Damon and mom were already gone. I definitely didn’t want parental feedback about being late again. I dashed outside, shoving the house door close and hastened toward Christie’s car. I threw my bag in the back and got in. “Sorry, I overslept.”

“Yeah, Damon told me”. Christie turned on the stereo and backed the car into the street. I stared out the window and I remembered being in the car with my dad. My stare turned into a trance and I let the music wash my thoughts away.

That’s how you apply back story in your prose. Bits and pieces. Also, notice that I didn’t mention that Andie was 5’4” but rather petite. Let the reader imagine that Andie is 5’4”. I can reveal Andie’s straight black hair and blue eyes when another character, such as Michael Ray or Mason makes note of it when they see her.

And look how I introduce Andie’s father. Getting in the car with Christie, triggers a memory that has had huge impact on Andie, because Andie was in the car with her father when he died and she almost died too. But you don’t reveal all of this at once.

What this is called is foreshadowing. By introducing that she had a dad, I can come back again in the story later and reveal more about her dad such as him being dead. You continue to foreshadow building on the previous one. It gets reader wondering and the only way to find out more is to keep reading.

I have given you a lot to absorb. I’ll stop here.

Keep writing and developing this story. What you have now are disconnected scenes that really represent ideas. It’s time to give those ideas structure.

Have fun! Peace!