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Hi folks, I'm spending the month of January chewing on novel craft. This week I'm going to talk about transitions. Transitions are about leaving one chapter behind and picking up the thread of the story in the next chapter. Chapters are a convention for ease of reading, but they are more for the novelist. Chapters help you present your story. It's a huge piece of how you keep your reader hooked and longing for more. The way writers keep readers engaged is by devising provocative transitions between chapters. These transitions grab readers attention, plunge them into new action, and ensure complete satisfaction during the reading experience. You might find that some of this transition talk helps you in transitions in your life.
Transitions are about how one chapter ends and the next one begins. Instead of trying to tie everything up in a chapter. You must think of a chapter transitions as a dynamic phase, smack dab in the middle of the action, the epiphany, and/or the relationships. Transitions are not neat things all wrapped up in bows. A good end transition launches you toward the next chapter. Be prepare to leap in the middle of the mystery. Raise a big question and then just cut off the chapter. Journey toward something audacious but don't arrive, cut off just before that. Stop trying to end things in easy way, Complication, surprise, and turmoil? This is the true stuff of transition.
Now that you have ended the last chapter in a compelling way, it's time to turn the page to the next chapter. You have primed your reader if they had to put the book away until tomorrow. They will be thinking about the chapter all day. They must see that next page. So how do you get that next chapter going. Some transitions are easier than others. If the next chapter is in the same time frame. The next step is logical. It's usually about dialogue and a twist. It's the the transitions that require a jump that are harder, mainly because it causes the writer to leap. My recommendation, don't get bogged down with time, but launch immediately into the heart of what is important in your story. It might be musing from your main character. It might be at the next point in time that stuff is going down. The important thing is not being trapped in the minutia of time change, setting change, and interior thoughts. Cut to what is most interesting, upsetting, or exciting.
Last, it's important transitions build satisfaction, but that does not mean complacency. It's important that readers feel like they are on a journey. Transitions keep your story from being a series of episodes. They are glue for the overreaching arc. How? Stories need to going somewhere just like our lives need to be going somewhere. We are all looking for a point, even if the point is there is no point. Powerful transitions illuminate.They make the reader feel that this journey is worthwhile. Readers inhabit stories that are nimble, like a mountain goat leaping from one peak to the next--a glorious and amazing sight. Good transitions are fearless, seamless, thoughtful, and thrilling. They make for one satisfying read.
That's a teaspoon of transition chat. I hope something resonates with you. I will continue my novel craft series next week.
Here is a doodle. Veg.
Now for the quote for your pocket:
A lot of people resist transition and therefore never allow themselves to enjoy who they are. Embrace the change, no matter what it is; once you do, you can learn about the new world you're in and take advantage of it. Nikki Giovanni
It's not enough to just leave an extra blank line or have a chapter break to transition between scenes.
http://scotteagan.blogspot.com/2015/04/transitions-between-chapters-not-just.html
This is a time of transitions here on the TeachingAuthors blog. Laura announced on Friday that she is leaving our team. Even though she'd signed on as a temporary sub, I'd hoped we'd be able to convince her to continue as a regular. Unfortunately, other pressing demands are tugging at her. But I do hope she'll keep us in mind if circumstances change. J
Meanwhile, we wish her the best. At least we'll all be able to keep tabs on Laura over at her own blog.
In two weeks, we'll also be saying farewell to long-time
TeachingAuthor, Jill Esbaum. I'm VERY sad to see Jill go,
L but she's leaving for a new, exciting adventure. I hope she'll share a little about it in her final post here. Of course, we wish her all the best, too. We're SO going to miss you, Jill!
 |
| We're going to really miss the wise and wonderful, Jill Esbaum! |
But the news isn't all doom and gloom! I'm happy to announce that
Mary Ann Rodman will be returning to the team! Hurrah! You can watch for her posts here every third Monday.
 |
| Mary Ann's BACK! YIPPEE! |
Finally, I'm excited to report that a new
TeachingAuthor will be joining the team in October. But I'm going to keep you in suspense about the new TA's identity a little while longer.
JI WILL tell you though, that we'll be sponsoring another great book giveaway this month! Be sure to see April's post this Friday for details.
Happy writing, all.
Carmela
Sometimes you need to give your reader a hint when time elapses between scenes.
http://ingridsnotes.wordpress.com/2014/07/28/transitions-in-time/
Transitions help the reader switch from one idea/setting/time/person to another.
https://writingcenter.unc.edu/handouts/transitions/
by Deren Hansen
In a world where the only constant is change, how can you say what something really is? We like to think of our adult selves as relatively fixed. At a physiological level, however, the ongoing processes of cellular senescence and regeneration mean that roughly every seven years we get completely new bodies. Are we really still the same person?
Questions like that keep philosophers gainfully employed but they also bedevil other fields. Accountants, being eminently practical, have a simple solution: they close the books. While originally a concrete activity involving physical accounting books the phrase now refers to the end of one accounting period and the beginning of another. By creating accounting periods, it becomes possible to say exactly what the balances were at that point without the distraction of pending transactions.
Closing the books, in accounting and beyond, has two advantages: first, it enables us to take stock of our situation and assess our progress toward our objectives; second, it allows us to start with a new baseline uncluttered by the uncertainties that accumulated during the last period.
The beauty of the notion of closing the books for writers is that we’re greeted with a blank page when we open the new book. Some people find blank pages terrifying to the point of immobility: what should they put where? But filling blank pages is what we’re all about. How will you fill yours?
Deren Hansen is the author of the Dunlith Hill Writers Guides. Learn more at dunlithhill.com.
Antsyness
Many of my friends and students, and including myself, are finding ourselves in a transition period. You’ve cleaned and cleared out a ton of old beliefs, and other past garbage/roles that didn’t suit you, so naturally, you will feel like a different you. A different you usually translates, on the smaller scale, into a growing dislike for your current clothes, the pattern on your couch or even your haircolor. On a larger scale, you might be looking at who you hang out with, the career you chose, or the place you live. There’s an antsyness afoot!
Following antsyness can be a panic/now what? phase. This is a time of screaming at God and your Guides and the feeling you are standing over a cliff with no parachute. Not a fun place to be. But, it can also be an exciting time of exploration.
We all want to get there fast
I think we are being asked to explore what we want instead by making baby steps forward into our new world.
We’re not being asked to rush forward blindly.
Sarah, my 15+ beagle girl, is a great teacher. At this point, she’s very blind and has some balance issues but tends to zip around the house very fast bumping into walls, furniture and other things. It’s tough to listen to and it has to hurts. “Slow it down,” I tell her. “Go slow around the corners. Feel the furniture around you. There’s no need to rush. You’ll get there.”
Recognize True Guidance
I was looking through all my notebooks the other day. I have tons and tons of diaries/notebooks I keep for future writing. Diaries are great for keeping track of good ideas and guidance you receive when asking for help. The best guidance, meaning the truest and most helpful to me, was not when I sat down in meditation, but the isolated ideas or thoughts that came through in the course of the day. I’d be standing over the sink doing the dreaded dishwashing and I’d hear some great insight on my current dilemma as I reached for more soap. It’s easy to trust it’s not your own thoughts bombarding you when your mind is focused on something as banal as dishwashing.
I’d also have some whispers from my heart that when were reoccurring were very accurate. My first thought to go back to school came as a whisper. It grew until it was a gnawing push. Then it felt like such a strong drive that if I didn’t sign up for this program I’m in, I’d feel a deep sadness and regret.
Don’t Go Backwards
Going backwards to the old roles or where it didn’t fit at this point in the transition can be super-tempting, even if it was very uncomfortable. The past at least has dirt underneath your feet you can trust and know vs. a path you aren’t sure will be there. If you head that way you are going to feel it, usually physically (headaches, stomachaches, etc.) If you do press forward on the old path, you will also feel a deeper sense of antsiness. You feel ”the crankiness.” There’s a complete lack of patience or tolerance for what you dealt with before when you handled it with a smoldering, inner repression. Now you can’t do that one thing you really didn’t want to do. Your inner wise self will sabotage circumstances so you can’t. You may even get in trouble telling people what you really think as it just comes tumbling out with thought. Just recognize this stage when you are in it, to avoid further new damage.
And always go back to what I told Sarah, “Go slow around the corners. Feel the furniture around you. There’s no need to rush. You’ll get there.”
Our job as writers is to keep readers reading. Beyond that, we want to make them forget they are reading so that they feel like they are in the story, that they have a stake in the outcome. That's easiest to do in scenes, which consist primarily of action and dialogue with some internalizations and description sprinkled in. But narrative is often useful or even necessary, despite the bad rap it gets from the oh-so-often-repeated "show don't tell" rule we all throw around.
Narrative lets us do some things faster than we can in scene, in ways we can't do in action or dialogue. We can use it to:
- Create mood and tone
- Describe characters
- Build a setting for the story
- Provide emotional context for the scene or coming scenes
- Fill in necessary background information
- Cue the reader to understand character reaction or decisions
- Foreshadow future events
It's true though, that narrative can add distance between the reader and the story, so it's critical to get in and get out. Narrative has a different rhythm than action, dialogue, or even introspective. It's a slower rhythm, a more leisurely rhythm closer to a lullaby than to the pounding drum of running feet or tense conversation. And the moment the reader's brain gets lulled into a slower rhythm, that's the moment they can start thinking about checking email or deciding what to make for dinner. Making shorter paragraphs can help, but our eyes can skim a paragraph very quickly to see something that ends up looking like blah, blah, blah pretty tree, blah, blah lovely sky, blah blah, went to fifth grade with him, blah, blah most popular boy, blah blah and too blah. Time to close the book.
To keep the reader from getting lulled right out of the story, there's a school of thought that says we should have no more than two paragraphs of narrative before we interrupt it with something more active. But switching from one element of fiction to another is often the most dangerous moment in fiction, the one where we risk jarring the reader out of the story into confusion, or force them to reread something to catch what they missed. The moment they are doing that, they aren't reading forward and we risk losing them to the lure of the refrigerator or the television, or the thousands of other things competing for their time at any given moment. Moving smoothly in and out of the switch requires a good transition.
Transitions are bridges that help keep the reader on the path of the story. They should be short and smooth, and there are many different types that connect different elements of a story:
- Between times or moments
- Between locations or settings
- Between characters (POV shifts)
- Between stimulus and reaction
- Between scenes and sequels
- Between moods, tones, emotional shifts, or significant changes of pace
Transitional words and phrases describe the shift using references to time passing, location shifting, etc. Common transition phrases include:
- A month later
- After the confrontation
- After dinner
- Afterwards
- As the moon came out
- As the rain stopped
- At the same time
- At one o'clock
- At school the next day
- At the appointment
- At the same time
- At the summer solstice
- By noon
- By the time that
- For three days
- In the morning
- In the second year
- It took two weeks to
- Later that afternoon
- Meanwhile
- On the way to
- On the first day of school
- That night
- The next meeting
- The next morning
- The next week
- Two weeks later
- Weeks passed
- When dinner was over
- When it was time for the date
- When the moon came up
- When the police arrived
- When the rain stopped
- When they got
Fall can be wrapped up in one word: transition. Transition from hot weather to cold, lush foliage to bare limbs, long days to short.
Arguably we’re in constant transition as the Earth circles the sun, yet winter and summer somehow feel like destinations, as concrete as Breckinridge or the Bahamas. Spring and fall are the journeys between.
Transitions are exciting. They spark the imagination. Hopes and fears flare as vividly as the leaves of a sugar maple a week past the autumnal equinox.
Everything is certain at the extremes of the year. We are guaranteed sweltering heat and humidity in July, ice, snow, and bitter wind in January. But in spring and fall, each day is a question. Will it be T-shirt or sweatshirt weather? Will I need my sunglasses, umbrella, scarf—or all three? Will today bring green buds to the trees, or will those same leaves, now brittle and brown, finally fall?
This fall seems to be full of transitions in my personal life, as well. My supervisor is retiring, and I wonder who will replace her. (I’m not applying for her position, but I’m on the interview committee.) I’m hoping to adopt a dog soon; it’s been four months since Carly died. But when and how will I find the right companion?
I’m struggling with transitions in my writing, too. This summer I finished a major revision of a “new” project, and now I’m waiting to find out if my editor wants it. It’s hard shifting gears to work on something else. I’m free; I can do anything. The possibilities are tantalizing yet also overwhelming.
But today, I put aside my hopes and fears for a while to journey around town and enjoy the fall splendor. To appreciate the “getting there” without worrying about where “there” is.
2 Comments on Fall Journey, last added: 9/24/2011
I’ve spent some time today reading a terrific little book of writing instruction for both the beginning and experienced writer. The book’s been around for a long while.
After some thought, I have some questions regarding how certain aspects of writing discussed in the book are handled by today’s editors. I’d like to address one aspect in particular.
Transitions
In Brandon Rotal’s Little Red Writing Book the subject of transitions placed near the beginning. Rotal goes through the four types of transitions: contrast, illustration, continuation, and conclusion. All writers use transitions. They’re a necessary step in moving an essay, article, or story from start to finish.
Regardless of transition’s importance, in much of today’s editorial preference, specific transition words are currently discouraged. I’ve read recent articles written about the overuse of “however”, “though”, “therefore”, “but, etc. I’ve been told by various other writers to limit my use of such traffic signals in my writing.
Two important questions arise for me. How do transitions happen without initial trigger words? Does a writer’s style dictate use of transition words?
New Transitions
Whether a writer has fifteen years freelance experience or a mere few months, small considerations such as transitions can make or break an acceptance in today’s competitive market. If former transition words are no longer received favorably, something else must take their place.
Let’s start with the contrast transitions. If “however,” “but,” “on the other hand”, etc. doesn’t cut it anymore, there are ways to shift thoughts. After all, the brain does it all day long.
For instance: Rather than say “However, we couldn’t move the fallen tree without more industrial power,” create a substitute. Try something like “Moving the fallen tree would require more industrial power than we possessed.”
The meaning remains the same. The sentence is stronger. The traditional transition was eliminated.
“Nevertheless” can be left behind for “Notwithstanding.” It isn’t used as often. The key is to refrain from using it often. Of course, the writer doesn’t have to use any trigger words.
Example: “Nevertheless, the fallen tree would take more resources to remove than we had available.” becomes “Without bringing in additional resources from outside, we couldn’t move the fallen tree.”
The latter transition takes one less word and doesn’t use trigger words.
Using Style Transitions
As seen above, the writer uses a shift of thought to bring about transition in subject direction. Transitions don’t have to be abrupt and jarring. The writer can slide through them without breaking for turns.
For example: “While writing this piece I’ve had to think up more unusual transitions than I’ve taken time for in many weeks. Normally, I don’t sit and ponder the use of traditional transition words. I could get stuck in each sentence, if I allowed myself that luxury.
Instead, I try to ignore the existence of traditional transition words. I think of them as unnecessary descriptors and work to leave them out of my writing. It’s difficult, especially when a person has to change a total perception of proper writing style.”
New Version: “As I write this I have to create many new transitions. To eliminate the difficulty, I try to ignore the existence of traditional transitions. Shifting thought allows the writer to say as much in a more fluid way. If I think of transition words as unnecessary descriptors, my writing flows with strength and clarity.
The second version says the same thing as the first. The difference is length and flow. Personally, I like it better than the first one. In the end, that’s all that matters. If it works better, the likelihood of an editor liking it, too, increases, which is the final writer�
When to use Narrative and when to use Scenes
Join us on Facebook for a discussion of scenes.
This is the great Show-Don’t-Tell debate. When should you take the time in a story to present a fully developed scene?
To understand this, let’s look at options.
Scene. First, is the fully developed scene that we discussed in SCENE 2.
Narrative summary. For a narrative summary, you leave out many of the details and just briefly tell events. This feels like someone just giving you highlights and may not include all the elements of a scene. It’s just getting you from scene to scene, while making sure you don’t miss anything important. It’s TELLING. So, don’t use it often. But when you want to compress the time line, skip briefly over events or speed up things, use a narrative summary.
Transitions. Another section of text might be a quick transition. It may have action, dialogue, thought or emotion, but it’s purpose is to get you from point A to point B. Often it’s narrative summary, but it can be much shorter. For example, you might start a follow-up scene like this: “Later, she went. . . “ Later is the transition and it’s a single word.
Narrative summary and transition are important in moving a story forward. Well-developed scenes, though, are the meat of the story and where you’ll camp. You need all of these in your tool box, but you need to know when to pull out which.
About ten years ago, I worked as an aide in the writing center at our local high school. My coworker and I helped students with composition, proofreading, revisions, and anything else they needed to polish their assignments. The English teachers supplied us with helpful handouts.
After I worked there for one school year, the program lost its budget, I lost my job, and the students lost the opportunity to sign up for individual help beyond their teachers’ limited time.
Since then, I’ve held a variety of jobs: freelance writer, editor, and proofreader; speaker; author in residence; managing editor for an educational publishing company; English instructor at a nearby college. I’ve hung onto the handouts I used in that high school writing center all these years. From time to time, I still refer to them.
What do the paragraphs above have in common? All three begin with transitions. A transitions handout I saved from that high school job lists examples of some of the most common types:
- Transitions for time or sequence (finally, later, next, first, second, third, etc.)
- Transitions for connecting ideas already stated (besides, likewise, for instance, furthermore, for example, in addition)
- Transitions for showing cause and effect (therefore, thus, consequently, as a result)
- Transitions for comparing and contrasting ideas (otherwise, on the other hand, however, nevertheless)
- Transitions for describing spatial relationships (above, below, beyond, nearby, across from, in the distance)
For the past few weeks, I’ve been thinking a lot about transitions. In writing, transitions perform the valuable function of locating a reader in time and space. In life, transitions can be times of great upheaval that make us long for an anchor, a safe harbor, a retreat, a way to help us locate ourselves.
Our older son has finished his first year of college and is home for the summer. In a few months, he and two friends will move into their own apartment. Our younger son is about to graduate from high school and itching to plunge into his own version of college independence. My husband and I find ourselves in a home we bought eighteen years ago (!) in a suburban school district where we hoped our kids would get a good education. When both boys head off to college in fall, our home will be too big for us. I’m itching, too, to make a transition into something more suitable for two with room for occasional visitors. We want peace and quiet, more room to garden, a smaller house on a larger plot of land.
At the same time, I’m in the middle of a short-term transition, the gap between semesters in my teaching job. I always plan to use this time to clear out, clean up, and prepare for the next semester's courses. Bu
Take advantage of every moment your protagonist crosses from one symbolic place to another. Every threshold has the potential to alert the reader, audience that the character is transitioning from the known to the unknown = creates excitement, expectancy, and an element of fear of the unknown in both the character and the reader.
The use of crossing a threshold is especially effective when the character moves from the Beginning (1/4) to the Middle (1/2). After the scene that represents the End of the Beginning, the character crosses over into the Middle. This is a big moment and often comes as the character leaves her world over everyday ordinary for the exotic world of the unknown.
Another symbolic moment is when the character leaves the Middle and moves into the End (1/4). You will likely find other thresholds or transition to take advantage of in your story.
This moment of crossing over the threshold deserves a emphasis with the use of pacing and introduction of authentic details and "showing" (not telling) the character's emotional anticipation of the moment of crossing, the actual sensations as it happens, and possibly the reaction when the action is complete and the character understands there is no turning back.
The character will likely be confronted with Threshold Guardians, but for now, go through your manuscript and locate any sections that could constitute a threshold. Rewrite that section to give it the significance it deserves.
For more on Crossing the Threshold:
Recent plot consultation:
Literary Fiction
Many POVs
Question:Does my story have too many scenes?
Answer:(We did not get to the end of his story during our session so I cannot answer the question.)
My comment however is to do what you can to make the scenes feel linked.
The tighter the story, the easier for the reader to follow. Every element of every scene contributes to the scene that follows and to the overall story itself.
Link scenes through the use of:
- Cause and effect
- The transitions you create using:
Thematic significance of the overall story
Similar themes in the scenes to be linked
Similar authentic details in scenes to be linked
Also, be clear about the structure you're going for and be consistent. This is especially true for the POV. Each time there is a change in POV, you risk the reader putting down the book.
We connect to one character and resist and resent leaving that POV. Moving into another can be off-putting.
Be careful and make sure the first line in every POV switch is compelling in order to pull the reader immediately into the next character and not feel like they are missing the character they were just connected to.
Emily Butler-Smith, a staff developer with the TCRWP led an interesting session on classroom management structures at the July Writing Institute. At first, I’m pretty happy with the routines and procedures I’ve established (and honed) over the past few years. However, I truly believe you can always get ideas from others, so I [...]
One question I often field in my capacity as OUP’s editor for American dictionaries is, “What’s the longest word in the dictionary?” I don’t hear it as often as “How do I get a new word in the dictionary?” but it still comes up from time to time. My stock answer isn’t very interesting: “It depends on what counts as a ‘word,’ and it depends on the dictionary.” That answer doesn’t satisfy most people, since the follow-up question is typically something like, “No, really, is it antidisestablishmentarianism or supercalifragilisticexpialidocious?” Those two specimens are the “usual suspects” that get hauled out in discussions of the longest word in English, perhaps because most of us have been familiar with them since grade school. But there are many other worthy candidates for the “longest word” mantle.
(more…)
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Wow! This an amazing post chocked full of helpful tips. I love your list of transition words.
I finally discovered how narrative could help transition quickly to the next scene rather than a lengthy, wordy scene to get to the next important scene in my last revision. It's one of the things I struggle with too. Especially narrative description. At least I hope I figured it out.
Hey, Natalie!
It's funny how things click sometimes all of a sudden isn't it? I was thinking about this because my transitions can be a little jarring sometimes and I wanted to sink it into my head that there were many ways to smooth them out. :D
Hope it helps
Wow, wow, and WOW! What a great post! This is one for the ole' bookmark, for sure. Achilles heel...um, too many to list. I myself am a constant work in progress, and thanks to amazing posts like this, I have plenty of material to learn from!
Thank you so much, Julie! Hopefully, that's how we all get better. I love that we can help each other by sharing what we learn along the way. I loved your post on HEIST SOCIETY for that reason. So many great reminders. You read with such clarity!
Hugs,
Martina
Wonderful post. Thanks for the examples as well! I've tweeted this one proudly.
Glad you liked it, Gwen, and thanks for tweeting :D
Tons of stuff to chew on here! Thanks!! Um...wow--only TWO paragraphs of narration? That seems awfully short to me. I start feeling antsy if my own narration goes on longer than a page, however. But I think I have places that are longer than a page, so perhaps I should be tightening and slashing a bit. :D I think as far as reading narration, it depend on how interesting the author has made the section, too. Some narration is totally boring, while others sing.
LOL! I have to admit, it isn't a rule I follow hard and fast. And absolutely, I agree with you. There are some writers whose narrative makes me want to sink in and drift in their prose, and I would follow them anywhere. Those are usually the writers who have me from the first word, and I'll reread their books over and over, and always find something a astonishing and almost sinfully good in them. The authors who have plain vanilla narrative, no matter how sparkling their dialogue or premise, usually end up being a first date only read. It doesn't mean I don't think they are good books, it's just that the narrative is what calls me back. Weird, right?