Elements of Fiction: Tone

Photo by Nicolas Marino

Tone is the overall mood of your story. Moods can change from scene to scene, but the tone lasts through the whole book.
Take, for example, the insanely popular book Twilight. Even though there’s a spattering of action-packed scenes, the majority are romance. The tone is romantic rather than supernatural.

Picture yourself holding the published, hardbound copy of your book, with your name across the bottom.
What is the overall tone? If a prospective reader glanced at it, what would they assume?

Now flip the book over.
What do the critics say about it? Do they proclaim it as an insightful classic or a heart-pounding action ride?

Open up your book. Go to the appendix where there’s an interview with the author (you!). One of the questions you were asked was, “Why did you write this book?”
How did you respond?

Step 1: Tone
Decide what you want the tone of your story to be. It is going to be light-hearted, thought-provoking, dark, or romantic?
This will provide the basis for everything you right. If you’re attempting to write a light-hearted picture book, it most likely will not include the death of a friend.
Everything you write will orbit around this theme. Do not be afraid to change it if you need to. Nothing is set in stone.

Step 2: Direction
Make up critic reviews for your published book. They must be good. You are, after all, writing the ideal reviews of your perfected final draft.
This exercise let’s you know what you want your book to end up like. It’s easier to get somewhere if you know where you’re going.

Step 3: Purpose
Why did you write your book?
Think carefully on this one.
Did you write it to entertain? Inform? Warn?
While it’s good know where you’re going, it’s just as necessary to know the reason behind the journey.

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Showing not Telling: Infodumps

At one point or another, you have to explain some aspects of your book. Even if the character knows exactly what’s going on, the reader might not. Put simply, an infodump is a large chunk of necessary information that bores the reader to death. I don’t know about you, but when I come across blocky paragraphs describing the scenery, my eyes tend to skim.
So how do we present crucial information by showing instead of telling?

Dialogue
One of the best ways to present facts is through characters talking to each other. But even this can be botched if the dialogue if nothing more than an infodump with quotations. Let’s compare;

Infodump
The alchemist selected a jar, filled to the brim with mercury. Mercury is a silver metal with a high density. It’s a liquid at room temperature, but exists in the solid cinnabar. Cinnabar is a powdery, red mineral that’s extremely poisonous when inhaled. Mercury was once thought to cause longevity. It is toxic and has been known to cause insanity. It was this material that the alchemist chose to work with.

Infodump with Quotations
The alchemist selected a jar, filled to the brim with mercury. He turned to his apprentice and explained, “This is mercury. Mercury is a silver metal with a high density. It’s a liquid at room temperature, but exists in the solid cinnabar. Cinnabar is a powdery, red mineral that’s extremely poisonous when inhaled. It is toxic and has been known to cause insanity.”

Face it; the second’s not much better. If you choose to do dialogue, make it a conversation;

Conversation
The alchemist selected a jar, filled to the brim with a silvery liquid. The apprentice craned his neck to see. “What’s that?”
The alchemist grunted and held the jar out for the apprentice’s inspection. “This, boy, is mercury.”
“And, uh, what exactly is it for?”
“Some believe it has the power to make you immortal.”
The apprentice’s eyes widened.
“Of course,” snapped the alchemist. “That’s utter rubbish. Far too many emperors have died because of that supposition. Everlasting life indeed. Mercury will kill you, boy. If it doesn’t drive you insane first.”
The apprentice looked warily as the sloshing metal. “Right. Well then, is there anything else we can use for the recipe…a substitute maybe?”
The alchemist laughed. “Closest thing you’ll get is cinnabar. But that’s got mercury in it anyway. Highly toxic. Take a whiff of that stuff and you’re a goner."

Thoughts
This only works if you’re using first person or third person omniscience POV. A character’s thoughts can be a powerful tool.

Before:
The day was bitterly cold. A crisp wind blew garbage across the street. Everyone was inside, enjoying the warmth of a fire. The entire sky was coated in white snow-clouds and it was only a matter of time before a blizzard hit. Even the queen’s palace was suffering from the icy weather, with servants scraping away at the frost-coated windows so the queen could enjoy looking outside.

After:
I marched down the slushy street, my woolen cloak wrapped tightly against the crisp winter wind. I was the only one outside. Every other sane person was indoors, tucked in a quilt by a blazing fire. But not me, I had a job to do. I groaned inwardly and kicked at a pile of frozen garbage. Blast this weather. I glanced up at the leaden sky blanketed with snow clouds. We’d have a blizzard before the month was out, for sure.
Another gust of wind sent me hurrying down the road again. I passed the queen’s palace and snickered at the poor, frozen guard on duty. The Queen didn’t much care about other people’s discomfort, evident by the army of servants scraping frost off the palace’s two-hundred-and-ten windows. Poor suckers. What was even the point of it? So that the queen could look outside and see the empty street?

Actions
The way characters behave can strengthen both Dialogue and Thoughts, and make a strong support on its own.

The alchemist selected a jar, filled to the brim with a silvery liquid. The apprentice craned his neck to see. [This reveals that the apprentice is curious and new to the alchemy experience] “What’s that?”
The alchemist grunted [Not the friendliest guy] and held the jar out for the apprentice’s inspection. “This, boy, is mercury.”
“And, uh, what exactly is it for?”
“Some believe it has the power to make you immortal.”
The apprentice’s eyes widened. [He’s naïve to believe such a myth]
“Of course,” snapped the alchemist. “That’s utter rubbish. Far too many emperors have died because of that supposition. Everlasting life indeed. Mercury will kill you, boy. If it doesn’t drive you insane first.”
The apprentice looked warily as the sloshing metal. [Now he’s nervous] “Right. Well then, is there anything else we can use for the recipe…a substitute maybe?”
The alchemist laughed. [He’s got a strange sense of humor] “Closest thing you’ll get is cinnabar. But that’s got mercury in it anyway. Highly toxic. Take a whiff of that stuff and you’re a goner.”

The apprentice’s reactions give us a clear definition of who he is without having to say, “The new apprentice didn’t know anything about alchemy and was incredibly gullible.”

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Guest Post: Janice Hardy on "Trail Blazing"

We’ve all read stories where clues were so seamlessly dropped in along the way that until the big secret was revealed, we never even realized they were there. But when we finally did, all the pieces of the story fell into place and we were awed by the skill in which that bread trail had been left. Those writers made it look easy, as if they knew from page one what clue went where and how it would all come together in the end.
I’m sure there are bound to be a few writers out that who really can write that way, but for most of us, those clues are either planned ahead of time, inserted after the fact, or happy accidents. Sometimes, (heck, probably most times) a combination of all three.

Planning the Trail
Some clues we know about in the planning stage of the novel. Those details that came to us as we were brainstorming and writing our outlines or making our notes. Important clues we work hard to build a scene around. Often these are the things our protag’s will discover down the line in some fashion and a critical plot twist may even hinge on them. They’re important, which is why we know about them from the start.

Stumbling Upon the Trail
Then there are those details that just kinda happen, and it isn’t until after that we realize that throwaway detail could be so much more. A bit of backstory or internalization that suddenly has greater meaning, an off-hand setting element that becomes the perfect hiding place for a long lost secret. The types of details that lurk in our brains and leak onto the page, and somehow, always seems to be better than the stuff we actively think up.

Marking the Trail
Last, there are those details that we go back and add in once we’ve figure out how the story unfolds. The purposeful red herrings, the hidden clues, the telling off-hand remark. Each detail is inserted at just the right spot so the reader can follow that trail, even if they don’t realize they’re following it.

Keeping the Trail Clean
No matter what type of writer you are (outliner or pantser), odds are you’re going to go back at some point and edit. Doing an edit pass for clues, hints, and foreshadowing isn’t a bad idea, especially if you’re not one of those mystery writers who think of these things naturally. (I think mystery writers are born with this skill) If you’re not sure where to leave those bread crumbs, try asking…

When do I want the reader to start suspecting things?
Sometimes you’ll want a surprise, other times you’ll want the tension of trying to figure it out to help pull your story along.

When does my protagonist start to figure it out?
Readers often spot things long before characters, but if it’s too obvious, then your character might look dumb if they haven’t figured it out yet. Make sure you have a good balance between reader hints and character hints. If your protag needs to know something by page 45, leave enough clues before then so the realization feels plausible.

Are there any slow/weak spots that could use some freshening up?
Weak spots in need of help could be opportunities to create a scene that links back or foreshadows another. Would adding in a layer of mystery help?

Do the characters encounter anything thematically or metaphorically linked to the thing?
You know how someone can say something and make you think of something different? Your brain picks up on it because there’s some link between the two things. You can do the same thing with your characters. Something they’ve heard or experienced might be the perfect trigger for a memory or realization in a later scene. Or, you can go back and add something that can make this happen.

Trails are made by folks wandering back and forth over them, so it makes sense that a good plot trail might take looking at from both ends of your novel. Knowing where a plot or subplot ends up makes it a lot easier to figure out where it starts. The more you wander that trail, the more you learn about it and the more you can share with those starting down it for the first time.


About Blue Fire

Part fugitive, part hero, fifteen-year-old Nya is barely staying ahead of the Duke of Baseer’s trackers. Wanted for a crime she didn’t mean to commit, she risks capture to protect every Taker she can find, determined to prevent the Duke from using them in his fiendish experiments. But resolve isn’t enough to protect any of them, and Nya soon realizes that the only way to keep them all out of the Duke’s clutches is to flee Geveg. Unfortunately, the Duke’s best tracker has other ideas.
Nya finds herself trapped in the last place she ever wanted to be, forced to trust the last people she ever thought she could. More is at stake than just the people of Geveg, and the closer she gets to uncovering the Duke’s plan, the more she discovers how critical she is to his victory. To save Geveg, she just might have to save Baseer—if she doesn’t destroy it first.

Buy it here.

About Janice Hardy
A long-time fantasy reader, Janice Hardy always wondered about the darker side of healing. For her fantasy trilogy THE HEALING WARS, she tapped into her own dark side to create a world where healing was dangerous, and those with the best intentions often made the worst choices.
Her books include THE SHIFTER, and BLUE FIRE from Balzer+Bray/Harper Collins. She lives in Georgia with her husband, three cats and one very nervous freshwater eel.

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How to Write Magic

Magic will make or break your book. There is no in-between. How you handle magic can mean the difference between an epic and just-another-fantasy-book.

Know Your Limits
Magic must have limits. Your characters can’t snap their fingers and have everything they want appear from thin air.
The other day I was critiquing a friend’s rough draft. A battle occurs between the magical bad guys and the relatively unarmed good guys. The bad guys were hurling everything they had; sending shockwaves through people, shaking the ground, uprooting slabs of cobblestone street and flinging it through the air, ect. Then, out of the blue, one of them turns a good guy into dust.
What?
If the antagonists had that power all along, why didn’t they use it? Turning your enemy into a pile of dust sounds a tad more effective than a shockwave.
Decide where your book’s magic is limited. J. K. Rowling created several rules for her own writing, such as “magic cannot bring dead people back to life” and “whatever you conjure out of thin air won’t last”.

Counteract
“But for heaven’s sake − you’re wizards! You can do magic! Surely you can sort out − well − anything!”
“…The trouble is, the other side can do magic too...”
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Where there is light, there is darkness. Your protag can’t be wandering around with invincible magical powers.
Either the villain has magic too, or the protag’s magic comes at a price. Or both.

Supernatural Villain
If you’ve got a magical antagonist on your hands, you’ll probably end up writing an epic final battle. The battle should never be won because of magic. It’s not about who’s got the stronger firepower, it’s about good triumphing over evil. The main character should win because of a clever plan or an oversight on the villain’s part.

Supernatural Problems
Nothing gets handed to your character with no strings attached, least of all magic. Your character should make mistakes and possibly get hurt because of it.
Take the classic example of Frodo and the ring of power. It’s not just a cool ring that can make you invisible, it’s an evil artifact that slowly poisons and manipulates you.
If your character has a power, it doesn’t have to kill them. But it should weaken them or occasionally backfire.


Believable Magic
I think I’ve mentioned this before, but your magic must be believable. If a modern day kid starts seeing fairies, he’s gonna think that he’s gone crazy. Normal people wouldn’t think, “I can see fairies! Magic is so cool!”
In Alice in Wonderland, Alice thinks the whole thing’s a dream from start to finish, which is exactly what a sane person would think.

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Writing Contest: The Winner!

"Exit Scene" by spyroteknik

The winner of the "Exit Scene" writing contest is...

#2 by Dawn Stone!
Congratulations to and a big 'thank you' to the participants and voters!

The brightness frightened him. James covered his eyes, protecting them from the radiating sunlight that peered through the large window overlooking the city. He had made it. James was a survivor. With a quick glance, he could make out figures that seem to be a daughter, grasping onto her father, looking at the same beautiful city everyone had grown to love. Nothing much has changed, James thought. Half the population was dead, missing, gone, but James survived. He took steps toward the railing, filled with curiosity. The sky, still ashy disappointed James. He had assumed everything would be completely different. He had been unconscious for some time, and he was still unsure of the date. He approached a hooded figure, who was closest to him.
“Uh,” James wasn’t sure what to ask or even if this stranger was the person who could answer all his questions. “Why are we here?” He finally asked.
“No one knows why we’re here.” The stranger replied, and continued on their way. Where was his family? His baby, Jessica, or his wife. He shuddered at the thought, that they may not have survived, but all he knew was that despite the other survivors, he was still so alone.
James wandered throughout what reminded him of the viewing deck of the Empire State building. Impossible, he thought. Manhattan had already been wiped out. Everyone there, had been so easily killed, he recollected of the news report he had seen…a while ago.
“Excuse me—” James tried. “Miss—” Another try. “Can you—” Countless attempts began to frustrate him. Everyone seemed to preoccupied to help, or to care.
“Someone help me find my family!” He finally screamed. This caught the attention of many, who of which quickly turned to gaze at this maniac. Who dared to yell here? It was forbidden.
“Hey, you.”
James spun around to find a female, about his age, staring back at him.
“Miss, can you he—”
“Shh. Did you just wake up?” She interrupted. He didn’t know what she meant, but he took a wild guess and nodded. “How’d you get here? You should be in room 313 then.”
“I’m looking for my family!” He pleaded. “Please, help me find them. My daughter, she must be so scared.” The woman didn’t reply. She merely grabbed onto his arm, and lead him to room 313. “What are you doing?! I’m looking for my family!” James resisted, but this woman was much stronger than him. It was almost like she wasn’t human.
“You need to be quiet! You’ll get me in trouble too,” She insisted.
“In trouble? By who?”
“Look, you just woke up, but just do what I say,” She ordered.
They finally reached room 313. There wasn’t anything special about it. Just a room, with lots of empty chairs. The woman left him there, to sit in one of the hundred empty seats in the room. James sat there waiting, more irritated than ever.
“Welcome,” He heard as the lights turned down. “To your new home.”

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