Ever wonder what makes a book a bonafide page-turner? God knows I have. I pick up a book for a bit of pleasure reading and all of the sudden I’m in the story, oblivious to deadlines, ringing phones, and my overloaded washer’s current attempt to escape. Nothing else matters beyond What Happens Next and I’m useless until I finish the story. How did this happen? How was my attention captured so completely? Instead of reading the book, it felt more like I was living the story. Did the writer cast a spell over me? No, but it’s likely the writer used a technique called “Deep P.O.V.” P. O. V. is the story’s point of view, the perspective of the narrator. That can be the unseen, omniscient third person narrator (like God is telling the story); first person narration (e.g. “Call me Ishmael”) or, if the author is very good and ambitious, second person narrator (second person is very in-your-face and tricky to sustain unless the writer is incredibly skilled like Margaret Atwood, Jay McInerney, or Robert Penn Warren). The voice of the narrator telling the story acts as a buffer between the reader and characters so the less you can hear of the narrator’s voice,…
My mom used to divide her library into sections. Lots of space was dedicated to fiction and the sturdiest shelves held her coffee-table sized books on the movies. But one special part of the library was devoted to chronicles of everyday life, virtually all of them written by women. Some also wrote Kid Lit. or humor like Jean Kerr and Judith Viorst while others wrote novels or plays but every book on that shelf was what I called a “Domestic Chronicle”; an account of everyday life. If those books sounded boring, they weren’t. All of them were clear-eyed observations on a fascinating, multi-faceted worlds. usually recorded with dry wit. These books had a remarkable effect on the reader. Novels might be read for excitement or entertainment and non-fiction for excitement or knowledge but domestic chronicles could appease the soul. So my question is, where are the books of this genre today? According to my mom, the best writer in this genre was Gladys Taber, author of the Stillmeadow series. In book after book, Ms. Taber recorded life at her New England farmhouse, Stillmeadow. She was not a farmer or a New England Yankee from birth so her stories deal with…
It’s no secret that I love to tell stories. The fact is when I’m out with friends I sometimes have to shut myself up; if I don’t, I’ll dominate the conversation with stories and they won’t be my friends anymore. But, as much as I love reeling off anecdotes, I’m not that sure I can tell one well. For that, I need the crew at Arc Stories. Arc Stories is a group of top-notch raconteurs who help amateurs (like me) tell the stories of their lives. I’ve been envious of every person they ever put behind a microphone and for years I’ve been working up the nerve to pitch a story to them. I finally sent in an idea this fall and got a call back from one of the coaches. Send me the full story, he said. Writing isn’t that easy for me, especially when the material is personal. I wrote, rewrote and rewrote my tale, choking up when some memories came back. Once I dried my eyes, I sent it off, wondering what the coach would think of my draft. He thought it needed work. My mentor was extremely kind and polite but he pointed out a big…
Have you ever seen an abused or neglected pet? A creature that nobody loved? They huddle at the corners of our towns and houses, too frightened to approach us for help. Have you watched them with their matted coats and terrified eyes, keeping their distance on unsteady feet? If you have, you’ve seen Ada Smith, the narrator of The War That Saved My Life. Of course Ada isn’t a dog or a horse; she’s a girl, somewhere around ten. Ada doesn’t know what age she is because she doesn’t know her birthday. Ada doesn’t know how to read, or write, or even walk very well. She has a club foot and is never allowed to leave her Mam’s one-room London flat. Ada’s only real connection to the world outside is her little brother, Jaime. When Mam says Jaime’s being sent to the country because Hitler is going to bomb London, Ada decides to follow her brother. In the process, she becomes one of the few English children who could thank Germany for starting a war. Over 800,000 children were evacuated from England’s city centers during “Operation Pied Piper“. Some of them were relocated overseas but the majority were resettled in…