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| Not too dissimilar to the intended cover picture for my meisterwork |
Chapter 3 was hard-going because of the subject matter, then Chapter 4 turned out slightly differently than I had imagined. Instead of a quick talky bit and the introduction of a new character, it turned out to be rather emotional and romantic. There was even a fire, and something happened that I didn't plan to happen until halfway through book two. It just made sense at the time.
This then bumped the new character into Chapter 5, which is well underway, and actually makes my book pass the gender-swapped Bechdel test. I have more than one male character and they talk to each other about something other than the main female character.
Of course, I still need to pass the actual Bechdel test, but in a book about a society that arranges weekend visits for young, dominant women in the homes of submissives, I'm obviously going to be including a lot of female characters. Chapter 6 is when we start to meet them, so there's that. More details on that when I have them, but the writing is certainly going well as of today.
Stay tuned, because after the jump we have a woman wearing leather boots and excerpt from Chapter 5. Oooo.
Here it is, a snippet of dialogue from Chapter 5, still very much unworked, containing a joke that I nicked shamelessly from Detectorists (link below, because spoilers). In my version, the scene is John's front room, where John, our hero, is sitting opposite Ms Purbright, the main female character in the story, and so far the only representative of the HGS that John has encountered. Sitting on the floor at her feet is a submissive man named Michael, who has been in her service for a long time, and who has a boot fetish that she knows very well. After a rocky start with John in previous chapters, she has invited Michael over to demonstrate how rewarding it can be to join the HGS, and while she's been explaining her relationship with Michael, she's been conducting a slow, very subtle boot tease for Michael, which has him beside himself and John riveted. She has just raised the issue of Michael's 'thing', which is something that he likes to say to every new person he meets. Even though he knows she doesn't like it when he does his 'thing', and she's confirmed verbally that she doesn't like it, she's also been egging him on for her own amusement, expressing her disapproval, but not refusing him outright. He's in a bit of a pickle, fears disapproval or punishment, but knows that this is all a game to her, and one which they are both enjoying enormously.
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| For reference, she's dressed much like this, ie perfectly normally |
“Can I do it, then?” he asked, pleading. Ms Purbright only sat back and sipped her tea, wordlessly making it clear that Michael would get no answer from her. His face betrayed the weight of the predicament she had put him in, crafted expertly from a combination or teasing, humiliation and equivocation. After a brief moment of panic, he turned to John, composed himself and said his thing.
“I won the lottery the day I met Ms Purbright.” Ms Purbright smiled, shook her head and tutted to herself. There was a pause before John realised that it was his turn to speak.
“Oh, do you mean, like, figuratively? Like meeting her was the luckiest thing that could ever happen to you?”
“No-one ever gets it!” said Michael, turning back in protest to Ms Purbright.
“I keep telling you no-one ever gets it, but you never listen to me!” She kicked him in mock indignation with her left foot before uncrossing her legs. She leant forward, with a playful smile on her face.
“You know I don’t like it,” she said smoothly. “But you do it every time, and for that, I will punish you!” She shifted in her seat and crossed her right foot over her left so that it was out of Michael’s reach again. She laughed softly to herself as she watched his hungry gaze follow the boots that were so close only moments before. John could almost taste his feeling of denial from across the room, but there was a question that was bothering him.
“I don’t understand. What is there to get?” he asked.
“I won the lottery the day I met Ms Purbright,” Michael repeated. “There’s no other way I can say it to make it easier for people to understand. I won the lottery.”
“You won the lottery? The actual lottery?”
“Yes! Finally!”
“Wow…”
Clicky link for the original scene in Detectorists: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0299ysh
Clicky clicky watchy watchy. Toby Jones is a Funny Little Man.
So yes, there you have it. That's what my writing looks like. Feedback welcome. I'd particularly like to know if the dialogue sounds okay. I can do sentences, because I went to university, but dialogue's a new one on me. Let me know if it works.
LMW
Lovely to see a snippet!
ReplyDeleteAlso, good news on progress, this is good.
Dialogue is a funny beast in my (limited) experience. And having watched the clip this is a tough little subtlety to get out. The joke works visually because you see Toby Jones's face and his incomprehension at his listener's incomprehension. You could do the same, with description, in the prose, but it slows the conversation. So you have Michael protest to Ms Purbright instead to maintain momentum. However, this allows the reader to twig early and, also, ruins the flow that makes the joke in the clip work so well. In short, it slows the delivery down too much and ruins the rhythm.
If I were rewriting this, and I'm not, then I would suggest the punishment section comes after the exchange, and thus the joke, is completed - otherwise you have to change gears twice (once going into the foot fetish denial and then again to return to the punchline). Failing that, you could re-tool the joke a little to work purely in text (try saying that conversation out loud - it's too slow, I feel, and it's laboured at the end).
Why not have Michael simply look disappointed, glance at Ms Purbright, who says nothing but moves her feet with a half smile, and then have John click that he's missed something. Maybe he could start the punchline: "what am I missing? You're being figurative, right, because..."
The frown on Michael's face was almost the complete opposite of the amused disapproval on Ms Purbright's, but it was in no way positive. "I won the lottery the day I met Ms Purbright. It's like you're not listening to me, there's no other way of saying it to make it easier to understand." It was hard to tell if he was addressing Ms Purbright or John.
A moment passed. "Oh!"
Michael almost smiled. "Yes, the actual lottery!"
"This is why I don't like it," Ms Purbright almost cooed, "And yet you do it anyway. For that: I will punish you."
Eh... this is why I don't write. But it hopefully explains what I seem unable to explain otherwise.
Bah, the point is: you write well. Looks good overall, sounds fine, I see what you did there &c. And you are writing and creating. All of which is fantastic. Thank you for sharing so nosy gits like me could get a neb stuck in!
Joanna
Julie noted. I'll let the first draft stew in its own juices for a bit, then come back and tinker with it later. This is, I understand, the Way It Works.
ReplyDeleteI think Michael is having a lot more fun than you think he's having. It's a very happy, very settled, long-term sub-dom relationship, which is what she's trying to show John. Bear in mind that I Know Something You Don't Know, and context.
Still, good to hear that my writing is good. Expect more snippets in future. And yes, my main dominant character looks a lot like that woman in the photo, except, weirdly, shorter and less attractive. Good job her character's got lots to do, say and think, instead of just relying on one pornified paragraph that can be boiled down to 'face 6, boobs 8, arse 7'
LMW
Well drawn females are always a positive, regardless of context. And I gathered Michael was having fun, I just thought he may be more exasperated, a little like Toby, with John is all. Again, this is why I don't write. I am very poor at soul. And emotion. :)
Delete