I started this post with a purpose. I was going to write a review of the book so far. As a publisher, like other publishers, I look at the beginning of the book and decide whether there’s enough promise to make it worth my time to read a whole manuscript.
Like most readers, I have read books that start out great then peter off into poor writing, bad character development and a plot that goes nowhere. And, books that don’t start out so great but are good enough to keep me reading until I hit the gold.
This book, Eat Pray Love isn’t the kind of book I usually read – it is however the type of movie I love to watch. And I fully intend to watch this one.
Why don’t I read these books? It’s the transition from rock bottom to whatever new state the heroine grows into. In the book, for me it takes for freaking ever for the character to let go of the whining and get on with the growing.
It’s not the writing, Elizabeth Gilbert has done a great job putting the story on the page, she did a great job of setting the scene, and I find her ‘rockbottomness’ believable. It’s the pace, I’m around 10% of the way in (by the little blue bar on my Kindle for iPod) and we haven’t yet started the journey.
When this kind of story is in a movie, they cut it to the smallest time possible because they have around 2 hours (at most for this type of movie) and they know the story is in the struggle.
So, if you are looking to write this kind of journey memoir, fictional or not, remember the reader needs to buy into the reason the character needs to change, but the story really starts when the journey starts.
This example, Neon Pilgrim, is a self published book that I happened along in Smashwords one day. It could use some editing but she keeps the “I’m in such a bad place I need to change drastically’ down to under six pages. Even hardhearted me can handle that.
How do you like your memoirs paced?
Happy writing
Perry
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