Fiction Consultations with John Mauk

Fiction writing is ballet on a tightrope. We must manage gravity and grace at each moment. No writer should go it alone. I’m willing and ready to help. As a reader, teacher, editor, and reviewer, I’ve noticed three primary issues that can make revision more productive:

1) Tension: Great stories, in any genre, rely on a singular tension, one that is established immediately (or very early). It is the force that brings all other elements (imagery, description, prose, dialog, staging, history) along with it. I understand that singular tension in two different ways: as a function of the characters’ purpose or the characters’ desire. When that tension is palpable from the start, the story moves and carries readers with it.

2) Scenes: Fiction is all about the crucial scenes—not the information but the action that occurs in the narrative present. All writers need help intensifying their scenes. That often means minimizing exposition and maximizing the real-time situations that define characters’ lives. The better the scenes, the better the story.

3) Subtext: Subtext is the subtle current of thought beneath the text itself. Subtext allows readers to enter the text, grapple with it, make meaning within it. Subtext is the roaring silence between words, beneath sentences. For writers, it’s often the most challenging element to cultivate. But it need not be mind-boggling. It’s often simply a matter of strategic omission—carving out statements or passages that do too much work, that say too much.

As a consultant, I will consider these three elements. Of course, there are more issues: concerns about setting, syntax, narrator placement, and so on, but the above three issues will drive my approach. I’ll offer scene-by-scene comments. I’ll say what makes me hope, wonder, worry, and cheer. I’ll offer suggestions for intensifying and attenuating. Also, I’ll say what the story is doing best because we all need affirmation. I look forward to reading whatever you might send.