NINJA BOOK CLUB: Chapter 2 - THE SCAR

First Paragraph: Harry lay flat on his back, breathing hard as though he had been running. He had awoken from a vivid dream with his hands pressed over his face. The old scar on his forehead, which was shaped like a bolt of lightning, was burning beneath his fingers as though someone had just pressed a white-hot wire to his skin.

Welcome back to the Ninja Book Club, Esteemed Reader. Once again we are discussing one and only one chapter from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. If you have thoughts on chapter three, come back next week, but today we're looking at the very boring Chapter 2 The Scar.

This chapter is by far my least chapter in the book and if I were reading Harry Potter again just for fun, I'd skim it as fast as I could and move on to the far more interesting rest of the book. But as we're painstakingly discussing Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire chapter by chapter, I guess I'd better do some Ninja-ing:

You'll notice that for these posts I'm listing both the first and last paragraph from the chapter. I'd never do this for the Book of the Week reviews as including the last paragraph from each week's book would inevitably spoil the story. But for chapters I dig it because by reading the first and last paragraph of each chapter, we can get a sense of what happened during the chapter and how the story value changed for positive or negative.

If that sounds to you like the Ninja is channeling the great teacher, Robert McKee, you are correct. If you want to be a writer of anything (and you're here, so I'm guessing you might), you need to read Story by Robert McKee.  McKee is emphatic in his belief that every scene or series of scenes must change the value of the story. If it's a love story, every scene should bring the couple closer together or farther apart. This is a concept I have no doubt we'll be revisiting throughout these posts. 

At the beginning of Chapter 2, Harry wakes up. At the end of the chapter, he goes downstairs for breakfast. In between, he does a lot of sitting and thinking. Writers, please note, in order to pull off a chapter this boring, you really need to be J.K. Rowling and writing Book 4 of the most popular children's book series in the world. 

Chapter 2 is filled with riveting passages like this one:

Harry leapt up from the bed, hurried across the room, and sat down at his desk; he pulled a piece of parchment toward him, loaded his eagle-feather quill with ink, wrote Dear Sirius, then paused, wondering how best to phrase his problem, still marveling at the fact that he hadn’t thought of Sirius straight away. But then, perhaps it wasn’t so surprising — after all, he had only found out that Sirius was his godfather two months ago. 

There was a simple reason for Sirius’s complete absence from Harry’s life until then — Sirius had been in Azkaban, the terrifying wizard jail guarded by creatures called dementors, sightless, soul-sucking fiends who had come to search for Sirius at Hogwarts when he had escaped. Yet Sirius had been innocent — the murders for which he had been convicted had been committed by Wormtail, Voldemort’s supporter, whom nearly everybody now believed dead. Harry, Ron, and Hermione knew otherwise, however; they had come face-to-face with Wormtail only the previous year, though only Professor Dumbledore had believed their story. 

For one glorious hour, Harry had believed that he was leaving the Dursleys at last, because Sirius had offered him a home once his name had been cleared. But the chance had been snatched away from him — Wormtail had escaped before they could take him to the Ministry of Magic, and Sirius had had to flee for his life. Harry had helped him escape on the back of a hippogriff called Buckbeak, and since then, Sirius had been on the run. The home Harry might have had if Wormtail had not escaped had been haunting him all summer. It had been doubly hard to return to the Dursleys knowing that he had so nearly escaped them forever.

What!?! Who!?! Hun? Oh ***smacks lips, bats eyes, yawns*** Sorry about that, Esteemed Reader. I must've drifted off. Did I miss anything interesting? No, I thought not.

You'll remember I promised early on I wasn't always going to be Mr. Nice Ninja. Talking only about the positive qualities of a writer's work is all good and well when we're discussing a full book, but if we're going to look at this novel under the microscope, I'm going to have a hard time controlling my snark. This chapter sucks, even if it is going to be more widely read than anything I've ever written or will ever write.

The whole chapter is riddled with long-winded passages summarizing the important events from the three previous books. To be fair, the Harry Potter world is it's own unique place with a lot of rules and history the reader will be better off knowing before the tale gets going, but an exposition dump is boring no matter how great its writer.

Worse, because Rowling did it and met with success, would-be authors are sending fantasy manuscripts off to editors and agents clogged with this sort of garbage. If that's you, stop it! I may not have read your work, Esteemed Reader, but I'm going to guess you're not as good as J.K. Rowling and not even she can pull this crap without allowing her reader to lapse into a coma.

Not to be entirely negative, I will concede that Chapter 2 is a well-written exposition dump. In some ways I prefer to have it all at once and out of the way so the necessary plot summary doesn't infect later chapters. And it works because Rowling is summarizing events about stories beloved by readers and remembering them does bring a smile to one's face. So most readers will probably give Rowling a pass, but I'll bet they skim or skip Chapter 2 if it's not their first reading.

They'll probably also look the other way when Rowling does the hack's signature move and describes Harry's appearance to us by having him look in a mirror:

Harry ran his fingers over the scar again. It was still painful. He turned on the lamp beside him, scrambled out of bed, crossed the room, opened his wardrobe, and peered into the mirror on the inside of the door. A skinny boy of fourteen looked back at him, his bright green eyes puzzled under his untidy black hair. He examined the lightning-bolt scar of his reflection more closely. It looked normal, but it was still stinging.

Why, Lord? Why does this woman have a theme park devoted to her books when so many writers are unpublished?

I know why. I once stood in line at midnight with everyone else to get my book. But still...

Chapter 2 grounds us once again in Rowling's wizarding world and does its job competently, but it's by far the weakest, least interesting chapter in the book. It's telling that this chapter is not the book's first. Last week, you'll remember, Rowling dumped plenty of exposition in chapter one, but she at least had Voldemort kill a guy to hook the reader. 

Meet me here next week when we'll be discussing chapter 3 in which something actually happens and yours truly will be in a much better mood.

Last Paragraph:Yes, thought Harry, that looked all right. There was no point putting in the dream; he didn't want it to look as though he was too worried. He folded up the parchment and laid it aside on his desk, ready for when Hedwig returned. Then he got to his feet, stretched, and opened his wardrobe once more. Without glancing at his reflection, he started to get dressed before going down to breakfast.

A Pound of Flesh, No More, No Less: A Post About Editing

Note 4/8/19: A second post about editing with information not covered in this first post is now available.

Hey there, Esteemed Reader! Are you missing me? I am missing you. Not to worry, though. My sabbatical is only temporary. I shall return on July 5th with all new Book of the Week reviews as well as interviews with writers and literary agents. I've got some wonderful folks lined up and I can’t wait to share their interviews with you.

Until then, I’m afraid I need just a little more me time. I’m doing some heavy duty revisions on a novel I thought was revised (but then, I always think that, from the second draft on). I’m afraid I don’t have time to keep up with my posting until the final (please, God) draft is finished, but I wanted to drop in and say hello with a post about editing.

And I have been editing, Esteemed Reader. Oh, how I've been editing. I know that some of you may have worried I would lose my entire sabbatical to playing video games, and it’s true, I did lose some time. But I continue to support X-Box breaks for writers everywhere. There’s only so much writing and reading a person can do before he needs a time out. Hemmingway drank. I murder pixels. And I hope that stark contrast won’t tempt some of you to drink in hopes of being a better writer:)

It’s a tough job, Esteemed Reader, being a writer—but most of you already know that. There’s a reason so many lawyers drink, and there’s a reason so many of us writers lose our marbles and engage in all manner of unwholesome, destructive behavior. It’s a rough ride sometimes from inception to the feverishly jotted first draft to the barely corrected second draft to the okay-I’ll-make-some-of-the-changes-you've-suggested-even-though-my-book-was-perfect-already third draft to the-no-one-understands-the-brilliance-of-this-novel-but-me forth draft to the will-you-please-just-publish-this-already fifth draft to the I-hate-this-stupid-unpublished-book sixth draft to the this-wasn't-so-bad-after-all seventh draft to the oh-my-God-I-think-this-might-be-it eighth draft to the detached polish of a writer assured he’s done everything he can to prepare his baby for the world and then it's time to say goodbye.

But oh, Esteemed Reader, in some ways that’s the hardest part. We've been through so much, Beloved Manuscript. You've taught me so many things and in some ways I could go on editing you forever. There’s a comma out of place somewhere in your pages, I can feel it. Maybe we should do just one more polish for old time’s sake, what do you say? I’m not completely convinced about the description of the sky in chapter 8. No, I fixed that description already, but perhaps I should reconsider—oh who are we kidding, Beloved Manuscript? We both knew this day would come, I just didn't think it would be so soon. But you have readers to reach (God willing) and I have other projects to write. Ouch, you say, and ouch, Beloved Manuscript says, and that John Williams music soars and Beloved Manuscript gets into the spaceship and the pod bay doors close around his glowing, beating heart.

But before that heartwarming moment, there’s a lot of work to be done. There’s the basic stuff: grammar, punctuation, syntax, etc. I recommend taking a college course on editing if you haven’t done it already (spend the six-hundred bucks, you cheapskate, it’s an investment in your career). True, you can buy a copy of The Elements of Style, but hopefully you've already done that. Some things are best taught by instruction and supervision. Ever work a job where there wasn't someone there to train you your first few days? You want to be a professional writer? Get some professional training and experience.

I realize this advice might seem a little odd coming from me, given the alarming number of errors that have shown up in my posts over the run of this blog (please don’t let there be any in this post about editing). But we’re talking about your manuscript here, the book you want agents to represent and editors to publish and readers to buy, not the free blog you run to get to meet writers (if I ever make any money from this blog, perhaps I’ll invest in an editor). An unprofessional manuscript signals an unprofessional writer and kills your credibility. Would you expect to get a job if you showed up to the interview with your shirt un-tucked, your fly down, your face unshaven, and your hair looking like you just got out of bed? No? Then zip up your manuscript’s fly and comb its hair.

It’s true, a great candidate can still get a job if they are at least presentable but their fly is unfortunately down. I can’t imagine the agent or editor saying “this manuscript is a majestic and breathtaking work I’m certain will sell a zillion copies, but there’s a period on page 47 when there should be a question mark, so I’ll have to put it in the incinerator.” But if there are too many errors in the first 46 pages, agents and editors are far less likely to get to page 47. In the same vein, I can’t imagine one of those folks saying “this manuscript is dry and monotonous and I turned the television on while I was reading it to at least enjoy a good story, but it is one-hundred percent error free, so fire up the presses.”

One last bit of advice on the basics and then we’ll move on to the tough stuff. I have at long last learned that I cannot be trusted to edit my own work. Oh, I catch the most glaring errors, but there are always a few that slip by me. I think I've made this particular point here before, but love is blind. I’m not ashamed that I love my writing. If I didn't love it, I wouldn't do it. I’m no literary master and I concede that the greatness of a Richard Adams is likely beyond my grasp, but I love my little stories, warts and all. Most writers do. That love is essential to the craft of creation and if I don’t get caught up in my stories, I can’t rightly expect readers to.

But that same love becomes an issue in the editing stage. I may be thrilled to no end by own brilliance, but that doesn't mean Esteemed Reader is. The only way to know for sure is to ask Esteemed Reader. Get some critique partners. Get some objective readers. Get a couple good editors (another benefit to seeking out professional editing training is now you know where to find some) and get their help before you seek out an overworked editor at a publishing house.

Error correction is something you will do through every revision of Beloved Manuscript, but it’s not the most difficult part of the process. The next step is rewriting descriptions and dialogue; flushing out scenes with too little description and scaling back scenes with too much. Read your writing aloud or better yet, let someone read it to you. This too, you will be doing until the final draft and you will write “the dragon had fierce eyes and fiery breath,” then later, “the fierce-eyed dragon breathed fire,” then later, “fire curled about the dragon’s nostrils and its fierce yellow eyes gleamed,” and later still, “fire curled about the dragon’s nostrils. Its yellow eyes narrowed on the protagonist.” Finally, you’ll realize the dragon is out of place in your World War II memoir and cut the scene altogether:)

There is reworking and restructuring to be done. There are sometimes new chapters to be added. More often, there are chapters to be cut. And then there are the darlings to be killed. And I’m not talking about the stuff you cut in the third draft—the dream sequence to nowhere and the scene where two animals observe your characters only to never be revisited again. I’m not talking about the stuff you cut in draft four that you miss, but understand had to go. No. I’m talking about your heart. I’m talking about cutting out slivers of your heart and banishing them to the shelf of previous drafts never to be read for the good of the book as a whole; an amputation to save the body.

And it seems like that stuff always clings to your manuscript to the last draft. Because we play bargaining games don’t we? All right, we say, I’ll cut this scene so I can keep this one, when we know they both have to go. One darling, we plea. I’ll kill all the others, just let me keep the one. Oh Esteemed Reader, how I wish it could be so. But highlight that darling, close your eyes, and hit the delete button. It still exists in the previous draft and you can go back and read it anytime you want. If any editor or agent ever asks you to put it back in, go right ahead, but we both know they won’t. It takes courage to kill that last darling, but kill it you must. And in time, perhaps years, I promise, you’ll read your manuscript and you won’t miss the darling.

Ninja, I hear you saying, how can I hope to one day be as ruthless as you and murder every darling like Anakin Skywalker wiping out the padawans? Actually, given that I routinely post five and six page reviews of books intended for children, perhaps I’m not the person to ask. But I’ll tell you what I do anyway and maybe it will help.

I only just recently cut a scene where my protagonist wishes at a fountain. It was a beautifully described fountain and a way—however cliché—to show my protagonist’s nervousness at embarking on an adventure. The fountain even comes into play later in the story in a small way, but I raised my light saber high and showed both scenes the true power of the dark side (on a related note, I also recently watched Star Wars). Why did I do it? Did I not mention this fountain was beautifully described and that this scene came at a pivotal moment? Did I not mention that this scene was one of my most favorite scenes in the book and has survived every draft up to this moment? Did I not mention that this scene was a piece of my heart that is now incomplete?

I killed the scene because it had to die. I told it about how one day we would get our own place with rabbits and I put it down while its head was turned so an editor won’t have to do it. An editor ought not to kill my darling. It’s my darling, so I’ll do it. I killed it because when I consulted my outline and highlighted the weak points, it clearly showed me the truth of the scene’s weakness.

And that’s my advice to you, Esteemed Reader: Keep an outline. I don’t recommend outlining your story before you write it as outlining is not writing and the one book I wrote a full outline for ahead of time never got written. I’d already written a bang up outline and I knew for sure how the book ended, so there was no interest for me to write the story out in long form. I typically update my outline after I write a chapter and keep notes about where I’m planning to go and change them as necessary. My outline typically looks like this:

Chapter One: Destiny Shines a Light in the Sky

Bruce Wayne is chatting up Vickie Vale at a fundraiser at Wayne Manner. Just as Vickie convinces him to join her for a romantic evening, Bruce sees the bat signal shining in the sky. Bruce excuses himself from the party and sneaks into the batcave, where he becomes Batman. Alfred Pennyworth is furious and yells at Batman for abandoning their guests. Batman promises to make it up to him, and then drives away in his batmobile.

Chapter Two: Death Flips a Coin

Commissioner Gordan is waiting on the roof of the Gotham police station when Batman arrives. Gordan tells Batman that Two-Face has broken out of Arkham Asylum, again, and…

I won’t go on with that, but you get the idea. Each chapter may be 5 or 10 pages long, but I only need a few sentences on my outline describing the action. Having an outline like this and keeping it updated as you write is a great benefit when you write the first draft, because it provides you a road map of where you've been to get to the point in the story you’re writing now. My most recent manuscript is 315 pages long and the one before that was 867 pages. I can’t read it from the beginning every time I want to know something and even going back through it to find bits of story takes too long. But keeping a fairly detailed outline of fifteen or twenty pages allows me to view the book on the macro level.

So much of writing is done on the micro level as is editing. For this reason, I continue to update my outline as I make my revisions. And yes, I resent taking the time to do it when no one will ever read the outline but me. Yet it’s an essential tool. Because now when I look at the outline above I know that I need to cut chapter one. I could spend forever rewriting it on the micro level, but looking at the outline, it’s clear to me the story really starts in Chapter Two with Batman discovering the newest mystery. However much I may like Batman and Alfred fighting in chapter one, knowing that chapter three to chapter ten are about Batman fighting Two-Face, it’s clear I need to get to the real story sooner.

I've said it before and I’ll say it again: read Story by Robert McKee. Memorize it. And never mind that Marcus Sakey accused me of belonging to the cult of McKee. I have two copies and an audio version and I reread that book at least once a year. One of McKee’s main premises is that every scene in a story needs to change the value of the story from negative to positive, or vice versa. Therefore, when I have my outline in front of me I can evaluate the story scene by scene to see whether or not they impact the plot as a whole. If the scene doesn't do this, there’s a good chance it’s a darling that needs to be killed. Or there's information in the scene that would perhaps be better off in a better scene. Or it's time to summarize to quickly get to the next scene. You get the idea.

So when I looked at my current manuscript’s outline and I saw I had a scene where the protagonist discovers the possibility of adventure and sets off, a scene where the protagonists ponders the adventure at a fountain, and a scene where the adventure actually starts, I knew I had to cut the scene where the character does some serious sitting and thinking because it does not change the story value. On the micro level I was a fan, but on the macro level it added nothing no matter how beautifully described the fountain. Goodbye, my darling.

 Check out "Another Pound of Flesh: A Second Post about Editing"

UPDATE: This is presently the most popular post in the history of this blog, so I hate to admit this, but the book I'm referring to above is Banneker Bones and the Giant Robot Bees and a version of the fountain scene totally found its way back in during a subsequent revision. Do as I say, not as I do:) If you'd like more specifics on how I edit, you might dig this post about revision that includes a rough draft of a chapter and the revised version with commentary. 

Book of the Week: IVY’S EVER AFTER by Dawn Lairamore

Do you like fantasy and fairytales, Esteemed Reader? You do! Well then, here’s a fun one for you. Ivy’s Ever After made me feel small and tucked snug in my bed as though some parent were reading the book to me. This was, of course, not the case. I can’t imagine Mrs. Ninja putting up with my parents coming over to tuck me in and read a story at night now. But Ivy’s Ever After is a bedtime story if I ever read one and if you have younglings about in need of a good story before night night, this is one to read. And it’s fun for adults too.

Check back on Thursday when author Dawn Lairamore will be joining us to face the 7 Questions. But today, let’s talk about her wonderful book. And it is a wonderful book filled with trolls, dragons, a princess, and all manner of other classic fairytale fun. But there’s also a lot of humor and I guarantee you’ll be cracking a smile while you read if not right out laughing. The pace is tight and young readers aren’t likely to have time to lose interest, and there are many wonderful descriptions worth rereading. I’m hoping Dawn Lairamore is a writer we’re going to be hearing more from and I’m looking forward to it.

Whew. Well, that’s enough review. Let’s talk craft. You know how literary agents and editors claim they only read the first page, or in some cases just the first paragraph to decide on whether or not they’re interested in acquiring a book? Well, they do, and for more on the impatience of agents check out one of my favorite agent blogs, Janet Reid’s Query Shark. Reid doesn't even represent what I write. But she writes a mean blog and I love reading it. The shark will convince you that writers have to hook agents, editors, and readers from the first page of the book if not the first sentence. This is a challenge, to be sure. Here’s how Dawn Lairamore did it:

Ivy might have been a proper princess if her mother had lived, or her fairy godmother had seen to her upbringing instead of vanishing without a trace one winter’s night, or her father hadn’t lost his mind. But as it happened, her mother did die, her fairy godmother did vanish, and her father did lose his mind, so Ivy never really had much of a chance one way or the other.

I reread this opening at least five times and now I’ve typed it out, which proves I can at least reproduce good writing :) This opening is awe inspiring. And it’s not just a gimmick, either. Every one of these details is important to the plot. I like to imagine Dawn Lairamore as a cougar crouched low and hiding in tall grass. The unsuspecting reader happens by, opens the first page of Ivy’s Ever After, and Rarh! Lairamore pounces and drags the reader helplessly into the grass to be sucked into the story whether they were in the mood for a fairytale or not. Even The Query Shark couldn’t swim by that opening.

The reason this opening is such a masterpiece is conflict. This book is dripping conflict. You may remember we talked conflict two weeks back in Bonnie Doerr’s Island Sting. In that case, conflict was a series of obstacles to be overcome, each more exciting than the last. There’s some of that in Ivy’s Ever After as well, but the main conflict is an ever escalating situation that puts the screws to Ivy and the reader. It’s the sort of conflict Stephen King specializes in.

The initial conflict is that at age 14, the princess of Ardendale is to be locked in a tower. That’s bad news for Ivy, princess of Arendale. But wait! The tower is guarded by a dragon. That’s worse. Ivy must stay in the tower until a prince comes to slay the dragon, after which he gains her hand in marriage and the throne of Arendale. Sucks for Ivy. But wait! The prince who comes is a power hungry jerk who is arrogant. Ivy can’t stand him and would never want to marry him. Even worse, the prince is a great hunter and he has the skills to easily do away with any dragon. Even worse than that? Once king, prince jerk face plans to have Ivy and her father killed!

By the way, I have to share this passage with you, as this is by far the most plausible and clever explanation for locking a princess in a tower I have ever read:

"You see, before the dragon slaying, it had always been a bit difficult to marry off the princesses of Arendale,” Tildy said. “Not many princes were willing to journey all the way to our far-off kingdom just to find a wife, not where there were plenty of perfectly good candidates from much larger and fancier kingdoms nearby. But the chance to slay dragons and claim their treasure was an enticement only Arendale could offer. The king knew that if there were no dragons to draw suitors, the royal family could very well die out."

The great sage of story, Robert McKee recommends writers start with the question: “What is the worst thing that could happen to your character? How could this turn out to be the best thing?” It is a mistake for me to say that conflict drives a story as this is not entirely accurate, though it’s certainly what draws the reader in. What drives the story is the protagonist’s response to the conflict. Will Ivy rise to the challenge? How can Ivy fulfill the second part of McKee’s question? I’m not going to tell you, but her finding the way to do this is what will keep readers turning pages to the end.

And Ivy is a likeable character. She is no faint, proper princess—notice how those sort almost never star in their own fairytale? It’s because they’re boring and readers are unlikely to sympathize. But Ivy is plucky and courageous and unwilling to just wait in the tower for some prince to save her. She, minor spoiler, befriends the dragon who guards her tower and they plan to work together to stop the evil prince from slaying him. Without knowing anything else about her, don’t you find you like Ivy? It takes some doing to woo a dragon and it’s a pretty clever solution to her problem. Of course, this friendship is just the jumping off point for further conflict, but I’m not going to ruin the whole book for you.

And we’re out of time. Don’t forget to come back Thursday to learn more about Dawn Lairamore. And as always, if your opinion differs from mine, please let me know in the comments.

STANDARD DISCLAIMER: Book of the Week is simply the best book I happened to read in a given week. There are likely other books as good or better that I just didn’t happen to read that week. Also, all reviews here will be written to highlight a book’s positive qualities. It is my policy that if I don’t have something nice to say online, I won’t say anything at all (usually). I’ll leave you to discover the negative qualities of each week’s book on your own.

Book of the Week: THE HORSE JAR by Linda Benson

I must admit that before I became a middle grade ninja I had never read a book about a girl and her horse. I’m a boy and I’ve mostly stuck with boy books. But The Horse Jar is my third book about a girl and her horse since starting this blog. What’s amazed me is how unique each story has been and if not for my ninja duties, I might have missed all three. I’m beginning to think that a-girl-and-her-horse might be its own genre, like romance. And just as there are endless variations on the boy meets girl stories, or boy meets boy stories for you fellow Rick R. Reed fans, there appear to be endless variations on girl-and-her-horse stories. I’m not complaining, mind you. If you are a writer with a girl-and-her-horse story you think is good enough to be my Book of the Week, please email me at once. This seems to be the place for them.
First, my review: The Horse Jar is at least as good as Linda Benson’s Finding Chance, maybe better. Get to the library or online and acquire this book by any means necessary. It’s a wonderful middle-grade read for kids and adults alike. Its story is a unique parable that will lead to a great discussion for parents and kids and I’m going to save my signed copy so that if Mrs. Ninja and I one day have a daughter, I can give her this book. And no, Mom, if you’re reading this, we are not pregnant. Okie doke, that concludes the review portion of this review. Let’s talk about the book:

Meet Annie Mitchell, The Horse Jar’s protagonist. She’s a young girl who’s not afraid of hard work and knows the value of saving money. I love her already, and she loves horses. No doubt, if Annie were real, she would read and love Whirlwind and Emma’s River by Alison Hart. In fact, she’s read every book on horses at the school library, so I’ll assume she read Alison Hart's books as well.

If I may start discussing craft even earlier than usual, I had a writing professor who used to shout at us that “character = desire.” This is the same professor I told you about who claimed he wrote better sentences than Tom Clancy, and I suspect he was at least partially inebriated when he shouted this. He would have approved of Annie Mitchell, who is all desire. Annie’s one dream is to own a horse. For the first part of this book, it’s all she talks about and all she thinks about.

Fellow writers, take note. Linda Benson knows it isn’t enough to simply tell us that Annie loves horses or to have Annie sit and dream of owning a horse, although she does both of these things. Benson has to show us Annie’s want for a horse through her actions. Real desire involves sacrifice. For the first forty pages of The Horse Jar, every action Annie takes is a step toward her goal of owning a horse. She saves money from gifts and odd jobs in, you guessed it, her horse jar. In the first chapter, the first time we meet Annie, she is checking the classified ads and calling around town to see if anyone has a horse for sale for the amount of money in her jar. And at last she finds Red, an older horse available in her price range.

So Annie buys the horse, hurray for hard work and saving, right? Of course not! Her desire has not truly been tested and no real obstacles have been overcome to achieve her goal. If character = desire, than story = obstacles in the path of attaining that desire. Annie has the money for a horse, but she lives in town and one can’t simply keep a horse in the spare bedroom. A horse needs a pasture, a stable, carrots, horse chow, shoes, a saddle, and all kinds of other stuff, but above all, a horse needs a place to stay. Annie’s father is a teacher and therefore poor, which may or may not be a social comment by Benson. If it isn’t, I’ll make it for her: why the heck are our teachers so poor? We’d need fewer prisons if we took a fraction of the money we throw away on our for-profit prison system guaranteeing plenty of us will be locked up and invested it in our schools. Anywho, Mr. Mitchell can’t afford stable costs and Annie doesn’t have the money.

If I might modify my professor’s formula, I would say character = desire + choice. Faced with this obstacle, what does Annie choose to do? Does she give up on her dream of horse ownership and use her money for college or for a car as her father suggests she do? Not a chance. Annie and her best friend, Chelsi, fix up a vacant lot Annie can rent for only $25 a month with a makeshift stable and fence. Annie vows to do even more odd jobs to pay the rent and buy a saddle and a horse brush and other horse-related paraphernalia. Annie works hard and sacrifices to overcome the obstacle in the path of her desire.

So Annie gets her horse, the end, right? Nope. The story cannot end until Annie faces what Robert McKee calls the crisis decision, that moment in which her desire will be most tested. Everything must be put on the line and our protagonist’s choice in that key moment tells us everything about her and her story. Batman has conflicting desires: he wants to rid Gotham City of crime and remake it in his own image, but he wants to do it without killing anyone ever. Batman beats up criminals and saves the city, but this alone is not a story. Batman must make the crisis decision, his values must be tested in a crucible: he can kill the Joker and save Gotham, but violate his own moral code. Or he can subdue the Joker, knowing the psycho clown is destined to break out of Arkham Asylum once again and kill more Gothamites. Batman’s choice in this pivotal moment defines him as a character. Also, I love Batman.

Major Spoiler ahead. If you keep reading past this point, I am about to ruin a key portion of The Horse Jar for you. Here is the moment of crisis: Annie gets her parents to agree to help her finance the lot and makes the phone call to claim her horse; she just has to pick him up and he’s hers. But just before she can, tragedy strikes. Chelsi has a sweet little dog named Spunky who chases after the girls from the yard, runs into the street, and is hit by a car. Spunky doesn’t die, but he needs surgery Chelsi’s family cannot afford because her father was recently laid off. The surgery only costs a few hundred dollars, but they don’t have the money, and Chelsi’s father instructs the vet to put Spunky to sleep.

Annie has entered the crucible. She has the money to save Spunky, but it will mean giving up her horse. The choice she makes here will define who she is and what The Horse Jar is really about. Her heart’s greatest desire is on the line, but so is her friendship with Chelsi. Chelsi never says as much, but would you stay friends with someone who could have saved your dog and didn’t? An innocent puppy’s life hangs in the balance! This is gripping drama! This is what great fiction is all about. This choice is what takes what might otherwise be a series of events and forms them into a cohesive whole; a story.


STANDARD DISCLAIMER: Book of the Week is simply the best book I happened to read in a given week. There are likely other books as good or better that I just didn’t happen to read that week. Also, all reviews here will be written to highlight a book’s positive qualities. It is my policy that if I don’t have something nice to say online, I won’t say anything at all (usually). I’ll leave you to discover the negative qualities of each week’s book on your own.