Too much narrative?

[Renee Stevens]

A few people have given me answers on this. Most saying to add more dialogue, etc, but it hasn't seemed to fix my problem. I thought I would put this out for all of the writers to see what they think and maybe this thread could help others that have the same problem. I sent a story to a publisher last year and it was rejected, but only because the publisher said it had "too much narrative". If it hadn't been for that the rest of the letter makes it sound like they would have accepted it. My question to everyone is:

 

What do you think is considered too much narrative and how would you fix it? Once I finish Deliberate Encounters and another one in the works I plan to revisit the story in question to try once more to get it published. Any thoughts are welcome!

[Nephylim]

Personally I really can't see what they mean. What is 'too much narrative'? There are many books, published included who have relatvely little dialogue and a lot of description and narrative - Thomas Hardy comes to mind. I would suggest that perhaps it is not a fault in the story but the personal tates of the pubslisher you sent it to. Publishing is a very subjecive buiseness. Many of the best known authors had their work rejected over and over. Send it to four or five publishers and see what comes back

 

 

[J_Ross]

I generally fall on the 'too much dialogue' side of the fence when it comes to writing, but most probably because it's what I like to READ. I like to see the characters interacting in real time, I like to get to know them that way, through their actions, and spoken mannerisms and the way they interact together. I'm going to agree with Nephylim in that it could just be personal preference, and if that's the case, I'd suggest finding other books, heavy on the narrative and sending your manuscript out to their publishers, or possibly better yet, their literary agents. Find agents that represent the same kind of material that you write and see what turns up.

 

And if you continue to get the same comments, I'd recommend reading it over and trying to find those 'details' that don't add to the plot. This is me just spitting back things that I've picked up (but have yet to master...at all), but in my personal experience, I sometimes get carried away, adding useless details, writing useless scenes with pages of dialogue and those pages are generally cut when I find out that they've added nothing to the story. I haven't moved the plot forward, there's been no character developement, and I can't even call it comic relief? It goes.

 

Also, and you've probably already done this, but actively seeking out constructive criticism has helped me in the past. I take most of the comments, emails, and reviews I receive seriously....for the most part. Those that contain CONSTRUCTIVE criticism anyway. It's really helped me grow and learn actually. Idk if you've posted the story in question online... I'm assuming not, but you could find a few friends and let 'em go crazy with that red pen, and give you notes.

 

Anyway, best of luck with it!!! I'm rootin' for ya.

[Sara Alva]

I had a bit of an overly-narrative tendency until my lovely beta Anyta kicked it out of me . I think what the publisher is asking for is also a sign of the times, because when I went through some old books to try to get a handle on what I was doing, I saw a lot more narrative in there than I see in newer ones. People are accustomed to the way TV presents stories now, and we want to be "shown" and not told things.

 

After Anyta pointed areas in my early chapters that contained too much narrative, I started to get a feel for what she was talking about. Now as I edit I basically look for any place where the author's voice becomes too dominant. I'm writing in 3rd person limited, so I try, as much as possible, to keep all the story in my MCs perspective and not mine.

 

Hope that helps a little

[YaP]

Personally I really can't see what they mean. What is 'too much narrative'? There are many books, published included who have relatvely little dialogue and a lot of description and narrative - Thomas Hardy comes to mind. I would suggest that perhaps it is not a fault in the story but the personal tates of the pubslisher you sent it to. Publishing is a very subjecive buiseness. Many of the best known authors had their work rejected over and over. Send it to four or five publishers and see what comes back

 

 

 

I agree.. i think "too much narrative" is a very subjective/personal thing. Its part of an authors style to be more or less narrative / dialog based / ... Some rather famous authors are VERY narrative (e.g. Hermann Hesse.. well, of couse i would name a German ).

The hard part about getting published is probably finding the right publisher !?

[JamesSavik]

It's all a matter of style. Narrative sets the mood, anchors the setting and performs a hundred other functions that dialogue alone can only handle awkwardly.

 

There's a time and place for everything. It's up to the author to find the proper balance.

 

Narrative allows you to set the most natural balance between showing and telling.

[Renee Stevens]

Personally I really can't see what they mean. What is 'too much narrative'? There are many books, published included who have relatvely little dialogue and a lot of description and narrative - Thomas Hardy comes to mind. I would suggest that perhaps it is not a fault in the story but the personal tates of the pubslisher you sent it to. Publishing is a very subjecive buiseness. Many of the best known authors had their work rejected over and over. Send it to four or five publishers and see what comes back

 

 

 

Hey Nephy!

 

Thanks so much for replying to my question!!! From what I can understand from what the publisher sent me, the characters voices aren't coming through the story like they should. I mean, I do really like the story and am proud of it, but looking at it now it doesn't flow as well as it should. I'm not too bummed out though because it was my first attempt at publication. Even if I do send it to multiple other publishers, I want it to be the best story I can possibly make it and at least now I know one of the things I can work on with it.

[Renee Stevens]

I generally fall on the 'too much dialogue' side of the fence when it comes to writing, but most probably because it's what I like to READ. I like to see the characters interacting in real time, I like to get to know them that way, through their actions, and spoken mannerisms and the way they interact together. I'm going to agree with Nephylim in that it could just be personal preference, and if that's the case, I'd suggest finding other books, heavy on the narrative and sending your manuscript out to their publishers, or possibly better yet, their literary agents. Find agents that represent the same kind of material that you write and see what turns up.

 

And if you continue to get the same comments, I'd recommend reading it over and trying to find those 'details' that don't add to the plot. This is me just spitting back things that I've picked up (but have yet to master...at all), but in my personal experience, I sometimes get carried away, adding useless details, writing useless scenes with pages of dialogue and those pages are generally cut when I find out that they've added nothing to the story. I haven't moved the plot forward, there's been no character developement, and I can't even call it comic relief? It goes.

 

Also, and you've probably already done this, but actively seeking out constructive criticism has helped me in the past. I take most of the comments, emails, and reviews I receive seriously....for the most part. Those that contain CONSTRUCTIVE criticism anyway. It's really helped me grow and learn actually. Idk if you've posted the story in question online... I'm assuming not, but you could find a few friends and let 'em go crazy with that red pen, and give you notes.

 

Anyway, best of luck with it!!! I'm rootin' for ya.

 

Hey J.Ross!

 

Thanks for posting! I know what you mean about the dialogue thing, it's hard to find a good balance but it also all depends on writing style. Granted I haven't sent it out to multiple publishers yet, but after getting the email from the one publisher when I started to look it over I could see where it could be better, but still not sure it fixed that issue, lol... If I can just get the character's voice into the narrative it will be great! I've read some other books from the publisher and there's a lot of narrative, but it's more character narrative, not author narrative. If that makes any sense at all.

 

While I'm revising I am finding spots that really don't need to be there to move the plot along but also finding places that can be expanded to make the story even better as a whole. When I sent the story in I wasn't entirely sure that it was completely "ready" though I could hope so I'm actually glad to know of something that I can work on with it. I was just curious how other author's saw my issue and how they'd fix it, lol. Whether or not they've ever read a story they wrote and been able to say "that's me telling the story rather than the characters". The publishers advice was good, it's just a matter of figuring out how to incorporate it better. They told me to "trust my characters to tell the story rather than me as the author telling the story." It makes sense when I think about it, it's just harder to do than to read!

 

I had a couple of beta readers take a look at it before I sent it and they all thought it was good. After hearing from the publisher I had a couple new people read it as well as one of them that had read it in the first place. The majority of them have said that either A) They can't see it or they can see it but aren't sure how to explain it. *sigh* You've offered a lot of good advice and I want to thank you for giving me some insight on things that you notice with your own writing. It tells me other things to look at in mine that I may not always catch!

[Renee Stevens]

I had a bit of an overly-narrative tendency until my lovely beta Anyta kicked it out of me . I think what the publisher is asking for is also a sign of the times, because when I went through some old books to try to get a handle on what I was doing, I saw a lot more narrative in there than I see in newer ones. People are accustomed to the way TV presents stories now, and we want to be "shown" and not told things.

 

After Anyta pointed areas in my early chapters that contained too much narrative, I started to get a feel for what she was talking about. Now as I edit I basically look for any place where the author's voice becomes too dominant. I'm writing in 3rd person limited, so I try, as much as possible, to keep all the story in my MCs perspective and not mine.

 

Hope that helps a little

 

That helps a lot! It sounds like exactly what the publisher was talking about, my voice coming through as the author rather than the characters voices! Maybe I need to steal Anyta so that she can kick it out of me! Hmmmmm... *Runs through GA calling* "Anyta!" lol... I definitely need to learn to spot those instances that are too much "author voice" and not "Character voice"... Thanks!!!!

[Renee Stevens]

I agree.. i think "too much narrative" is a very subjective/personal thing. Its part of an authors style to be more or less narrative / dialog based / ... Some rather famous authors are VERY narrative (e.g. Hermann Hesse.. well, of couse i would name a German ).

The hard part about getting published is probably finding the right publisher !?

 

The way I'm understanding it is that it's not so much the narrative itself, it's more the "type" of narrative. For one example, and I still don't know that I've got it right, but I had a flashback in my first chapter that actually would have worked really well as a prologue. It showed the scene rather than just the main character looking back at his life. I don't know if that helped me or not, but guess I'll find out eventually. Granted, finding a publisher isn't easy either, but I'm thinking once I get this narrative issue under control it will be accepted. If not, I'll start sending elsewhere and if nothing still happens with it then I'll start posting it online. Thank you so much for your response!

[Renee Stevens]

It's all a matter of style. Narrative sets the mood, anchors the setting and performs a hundred other functions that dialogue alone can only handle awkwardly.

 

There's a time and place for everything. It's up to the author to find the proper balance.

 

Narrative allows you to set the most natural balance between showing and telling.

 

Exactly! I couldn't have said it any better myself. I guess though what I am learning as that I have to watch the type of narrative I use. I've got to figure out how to tell what comes through as "my" voice and what comes through as my "characters" voices... In the end I'm sure that this is going to help me grow as a writer and that's always a good thing, right? There are so many things in the story that I know I couldn't express through simple dialogue and it needs the narrative, I just need the narrative to "sound" right.

[Tipdin]

Gosh, amount of narration and dialogue are completely subjective. A story may dictate what it wants, or a writer may want to create a style or 'mood' by using more of one and less of the other.

 

As long as the narration and dialogue are interesting, it doesn't seem like there would be a problem.

[Renee Stevens]

Gosh, amount of narration and dialogue are completely subjective. A story may dictate what it wants, or a writer may want to create a style or 'mood' by using more of one and less of the other.

 

As long as the narration and dialogue are interesting, it doesn't seem like there would be a problem.

 

You would think so, as long as it flows and works well together it should work. But then you hear something that makes you rethink it and go back and then what you thought flowed really well seems blocks and too robotic... At least in my experience so far with this, lol. I guess it just keeps going back to that whole "type" of narrator thing. Thanks for answering!

[AnytaSunday]

 

KingdombytheSea, on 07 February 2011 - 10:58 AM, said:

 

I had a bit of an overly-narrative tendency until my lovely beta Anyta kicked it out of me . I think what the publisher is asking for is also a sign of the times, because when I went through some old books to try to get a handle on what I was doing, I saw a lot more narrative in there than I see in newer ones. People are accustomed to the way TV presents stories now, and we want to be "shown" and not told things.

 

After Anyta pointed areas in my early chapters that contained too much narrative, I started to get a feel for what she was talking about. Now as I edit I basically look for any place where the author's voice becomes too dominant. I'm writing in 3rd person limited, so I try, as much as possible, to keep all the story in my MCs perspective and not mine.

 

Hope that helps a little

 

 

That helps a lot! It sounds like exactly what the publisher was talking about, my voice coming through as the author rather than the characters voices! Maybe I need to steal Anyta so that she can kick it out of me! Hmmmmm... *Runs through GA calling* "Anyta!" lol... I definitely need to learn to spot those instances that are too much "author voice" and not "Character voice"... Thanks!!!!

 

hehehe!

 

Sea, you've taken this on board sooo well, I think you are well able to spot them now. You could beta too!!!

 

Renee--wish I could help out, but at the moment I've a full plate. Maybe see if Sea could take a look? Seriously, I may have helped out in a few earlier chappies, but now the chapters come to me and I have little to do, lol!

But all the best for publishing. It's good you are getting feedback for the work you've submitted--most ppl don't get anything but a standard rejection form. (How do I know, 'cause in the last year I've had over a hundred, LOL).

 

[Renee Stevens]

 

 

 

hehehe!

 

Sea, you've taken this on board sooo well, I think you are well able to spot them now. You could beta too!!!

 

Renee--wish I could help out, but at the moment I've a full plate. Maybe see if Sea could take a look? Seriously, I may have helped out in a few earlier chappies, but now the chapters come to me and I have little to do, lol!

But all the best for publishing. It's good you are getting feedback for the work you've submitted--most ppl don't get anything but a standard rejection form. (How do I know, 'cause in the last year I've had over a hundred, LOL).

 

 

Hey Anyta!

 

I've already contacted Sea and so we're all good there. She will be one of the three beta's helping me throughout the revising of the story, and I am so grateful to have her as well as my other wonderful beta readers.

 

As for the publishing, thank you so much! I was really surprised when I got the letter and it told me what they saw wrong with the story. I was expecting a lot more wrong with it, so hopefully that's all it was and when I send it back in it's not rejected for an entirely different reason. If that happens then I have a couple other publishers in mind. If it's still not accepted then I will very probably begin to post it online. Only time will tell!

 

Good luck to you too!!!

 

~Hugs

[Sara Alva]

Hey Anyta!

 

I've already contacted Sea and so we're all good there. She will be one of the three beta's helping me throughout the revising of the story, and I am so grateful to have her as well as my other wonderful beta readers.

 

 

My first official beta job. I'm psyched!

[Renee Stevens]

My first official beta job. I'm psyched!

 

And I am just as psyched to have you on board!!!