St Paddy’s Snake Bite Remedy by Eden Unger Bowditch

As today we think everything should be green as the grass is green. Why? And for whom? For none other than St Patrick. Many green-wearing fans think of him as the little buckle-shoed ginger leprechaun with pointy ears and a twinkle in his eye. Sorry folks. That’s not the story.

When we were young, my husband and I were in a band that toured and made albums and did it all with a baby in tow (he took two years off grad school!) One of our songs was inspired by a comment by a friend in the music business. He said, ‘This song reminds me of St Paddy’s Snake Bite Remedy’ and, thus, it was dubbed.

What feels like a hundred years later, I look back and wonder why I never investigated the story. Me? A lover of stories? A teller of stories? And, so, I shall do so today.

St Paddy was not Irish and, in fact, wasn’t even Christian. He never planned to go to Ireland. He was a wealthy young boy in Britain and was kidnapped. St Paddy’s move from the lap of luxury to tending sheep on a rainy Irish hillside was not by choice. But, as he sat shivering while tending his flock, he had a conversion. He heard a voice that told him what must happen. He returned to Britain, became a priest, then went back to Ireland where he lived out his days trying to bring Christianity to the natives. But what about snakes?

Well, the story goes that St. Paddy snake bite remedy was to banish snakes from the island. And, as it stands, there are no snakes in Ireland. Were there ever snakes in Ireland, you ask? Why do you want to trample upon a fabulous tale that has survived the centuries?

We are spinners of stories ourselves, are we not? And we all love a good yarn. Let’s enjoy the magic brought to us on this day. We celebrate in big or small ways- a green scarf or green socks, or bright green-died hair, pick your pleasure- let’s send a cheer to Ireland as we remember the passing of Irish patron and give a nod to St. Paddy’s snake bite remedy.

The Importance of Beginnings by: Joanna Roddy

Story beginnings have been tricky for me. When I started editing with my agent, that was one of the first and hardest things I had to work on. At one point she said, "Your main character wakes up thinking about chess. So we think he's a chess geek. Is that what you were going for?" My adventurous hero with a burning desire to travel the world with his archeologist grandpa? No. Chess geek was not what I was going for. I was just trying to get him to an important scene as quickly as possible. Back to the blank page for me.  

Something I've learned since then is that the beginning of a story has more weight than the rest of it. Your reader is trying to orient themselves to the world, to the characters, and to your voice. The first few things your character does and says DEFINE that character for your reader. 

The beginning of your story is like a resume, trying to get your reader to hire you for the job of temporary entertainer--and if that reader is an agent or editor you want to work with, then you want those pages to shine. 

As I entered a season of ruthless and wholescale editing, I noticed how the Pixar movies that my kids watch are so tightly written. Everything has a purpose: humor, plot, character, or setting, and usually several at once. In a 100 page screenplay for an audience with a notoriously short attention-span, there is no dross. And within the first few minutes, you clearly understand the main character, the world they live in, and what they want.  

Pixar screenplay writer, Michael Arndt, made a YouTube video about Pixar's approach to story beginnings. This is just packed with great ideas. Have a look if you have a few minutes.

His basic formula for the very beginning of a story:

1. Right away, introduce your character, the world they live in, and show them doing the thing they love most.

2. Show that they have a flaw, which flows out of their grand passion--some way in which they take it too far.

3. Show clouds on the horizon--some hint of the conflict or emotional challenge the character will face for the rest of the story.

He goes on to explain the rest of Act 1, by the end of which your character has a goal and has set off on the journey of the rest of the story. He summarizes: "So your story is coming out of your character's deepest desires and their darkest fears. The thing they love gets taken away from them and the world is revealed to be unfair. To put things right, they have to make the journey that is the rest of the film. And by the end of the journey, hopefully they'll not only get back what they lost but they'll be forced to fix that little flaw they had when we first met them."

Formulas can be prisons or wings, depending on how you work, but as a jumping off place, I found this advice super helpful. 

How do you start a new story? Do you use a formula or have any advice to offer? I'd love to hear!

Un-Walk-Away-Able

A woman in my book club claims she has finished every book she has ever started.  It's a personality tick of hers. She has to know what happens. It doesn't matter how bad the writing is or how uninteresting the story, she will slog through hundreds of tedious pages until she gets to the very end.

I must confess: I don't have that type of dedication. If a book doesn't grab me within the first four or five chapters—okay, sometimes even within the first one or two—I'm outta there. Often it has nothing to do with the quality of the writing. Sometimes I just don't like or connect with the main character early on. Sometimes the storyline just isn't my cup of tea. And, okay, sometimes it is the writing. Let's face it, we all have certain writing styles we like better than others.

I recently started a new release that came highly recommended by friends and had strong online reviews. But it was a genre I don't typically read—science fiction—and I really struggled through the first fifty pages or so. Several times I nearly walked away from the book altogether. Generally, I don't believe in sticking with a book you're not enjoying. Time is precious. We all have other things we could be doing—spending time with family, working on books of our own, reading something we actually do like. Why waste your time on a book that just isn't speaking to you?

As writers, I think we need to keep in mind that the first several chapters are crucial. A slow or uninteresting beginning or a story that takes too long to take off can be a deal breaker. I've heard some people describe a book by saying, "Well, it gets really good if you stick with it about ten chapters" or "about a hundred pages or so." In my mind, that's a problem. Because let's face it, many readers (and editors and agents) aren't going to hang around that long. And especially in middle grade, where attention spans can be a bit tenuous, a story needs to snag readers pretty quickly. This, of course, is the reasoning behind the often-heard advice that a book should start as close in time as possible to the main action of the plot, to avoid overly long beginnings or unnecessary tangents. Other good techniques for those early pages: start with a bang (or a shock), offer up a particularly colorful or intriguing or amusing character or voice, raise a mystery or question that compels the audience to read onward for answers. The goal is to create a story that the reader will find it very hard to walk away from.

Of course, sometimes I have to eat my own words. That book I was struggling through? Around page 65, it gets really good. Some characters come together who have wonderful interaction and chemistry, and the action picks up considerably. I flipped page after page and flew through the rest of the book.

Okay, I guess some books are worth sticking with until the end :)

At what point do you walk away from a book? And what makes you do so?

-Dawn Lairamore

photo credit: JD Hancock via photopin cc