As of right now, this is the starting point of Syphon Stones: Amethyst. When I finish the book and have it edited that can change, but this is draft one. I’m aiming for finished, not perfect. Hell, I’m not even aiming for good. As I said yesterday, my favorite writing quote is always ringing in my head: “You can’t edit a blank page.”
I tried to set this up so you can read through the first time and skip the italicized notes I add to the end of some paragraphs. Read through a second time and pay attention to the comments as I’ll break down why I chose to write that section the way I did.
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(in an earlier draft, there were 20k words of the main character walking down a long dusty road all by herself. She did more internal monologue-ing than a newly graduated actor. There were lots of flashbacks, lots of details about the few possessions she owned [which usually changed each time mentioned] . A later draft started with her entering the new city and trying to survive for several weeks while dealing with homelessness and the stress of being in a city larger than she’s ever experienced before. She eventually got sick, which is where this passage starts. When reading through the original beginnings I realized I was pretty bored with the story until this. So! Third beginning, not necessarily the last one though.)
There was incense burning somewhere nearby. The second thing she noticed was the scratchy, stiff fabric under her face. Without opening her eyes, she knew she wasn’t lying in a puddle of vomit on a street corner in the second ring. She was in a room, lying on a mat on the ground. Thankfully the light in the room was dim. If it were any brighter the throbbing pulse inside her head might have cracked her skull. Several tall robed people stood by the doorway, whispering to each other. They noticed she was awake when Lys tried to sit up and nearly fell over.
(I wanted to rely on the MC’s senses to open this passage. I could have stated everything from the narrator’s POV but doing so would have ruined how abnormal she feels about the situation even though you’ve never met her before. There’s a hint of location outside the room- “a street corner in the second ring.” Still, you don’t even know her name yet. The rest is pretty rough and I want to edit it already. I’ll give more details to the robed people, her fear of them, and the location beyond on a floor in a room with incense burning.)
The priest, the same one she’d met the day before, was the first to reach her. He put a gentle hand on Lys’ shoulder and pushed her back gently. That much motion made her head spin and she swallowed against the urge to get sick again.
(first intro of her name-Lys. I’ve had some readers ask if her name was pronounced “Lies”, which it isn’t. Imagine saying “List” but without the T. I need to figure out how to clarify that for readers. Lys mentions that she met yesterday, adds a bit of history between the characters. If I said they’d known each other for years it would create a very different relationship than a newly created one.)
“You have a very high fever,” he told her. The candle light reflected off his bald head. Were all the priests bald? He was bald-bald, not hair-cropped-very-short-bald. Bald-bald.
(this is only in here because I thought it was funny. Also it shows Lys’ ignorance about the priests, the fact that there are more of them, and that the room is candle- lit.)
He didn’t notice her internal ramblings. “You are safe. We are going to help you get better. Master Jay-Kit is on his way here.”
(If Lys weren’t delirious she’d probably be curious to know if she was dying. Clearly she doesn’t care. She’s got some priests who are willing to help her.)
“Who’s that?” Lys managed. It felt like someone took Father’s pickax to her throat. And her neighbor’s pickax. And every other pickax in Saami. Every piece of metal got a turn at her throat.
(This is a slight glimpse into Lys’ past. She appears to come from a town made entirely of pickaxes, which isn’t technically far from the truth.)
“She is the Master Healer for the second ring. She will heal you.”
(First proof that this world has magic. As good as Mom’s homemade chicken noodle soup is, it’s not going to heal a sickness with the same absolution that the priest is speaking about the Master’s healing.)
The roaring pain in her head wasn’t enough to keep her still. “No.” She shifted on the mat, pulling away from the priest’s hands and sat up. “No healer. No magic.” She blinked rapidly against a too-shifting world. “No- magic. No.”
(Blind fear of magic even though she’s sick as hell. She’s willing to get up and try to run away to get away from them even though she doesn’t have anywhere to run to. Being this sick out on the streets means she’ll probably die instead. That’s how desperate she is to stay away from magic. But why?)
Someone else knelt beside the priest. “Girl, if you don’ let the Master heal you, yah either going to end up dead or wishing you was.” This voice was solid ground under a weakly rooted tree. But when the tree wants to move, it does.
(We all know that Southern Momma who isn’t afraid to be blunt as hell to get her point across. This person [all we know is her gender, not her career, physical description, etc.] is dedicated to them :p)
“No.”
“Do you know other words besides no?” Lys couldn’t focus enough to see them clearly.
She squinted in the dim light. The movements made more pain shoot through her head. “Yes.”
(Lys shows some personality! So far readers don’t have anything really to connect themselves to her, so I tried some sassy humor to make them care enough to keep reading for a few more pages. That means I have those pages to make more connections between Lys and the reader. If I don’t, they’ll put the book down and never read another word. No pressure for me at allll.)
It made the priest smile – at least, she thought it did, or that was a weird reflection on his head. The wall was blissfully solid against her hands as she reached for it and pushed onto her feet. She nearly pitched forward into a statue of a…cat? when more hands grabbed her. More voices. Some said to put her back down, some said let her walk out if she was so foolish. How many people were there? So many hands gripped at her arms and shoulders.
(shows Lys is worse than she really notices. Also, why are there so many people caring for a single person? Seems slightly overkill unless they know something and the reader doesn’t.)
A loud groan pulled itself from her stomach. There was nothing left to come up but the muscles around her middle cramped.
The owners of the hands made a decision and she ended up back on the mat. “No magic,” she whispered.
Their talk cut off mid-argument. Another shadowy person entered the room, clothed in a light green robe with a hood so deep Lys couldn’t see their face. The only thing clear in her suddenly watering eyes was the green stone set into a broad band at their hairline. The candle light danced on its many surfaces like the gem was full of fire.
(The Master appears! We know they’re the healer for the second ring even if we don’t know what that means exactly yet. The hood adds some mystery, as does the green stone. Is it for show? Does it do anything?)
“No.” Lys didn’t know if she managed to say it out loud or if it was only in her head.
Manyhands held Lys down. The Master knelt next to her and pressed a hand to her forehead. Lys realized how hot she was, how every other person to touch her made sure to do so only where fabric separated their hands from her skin. Their touch on her face felt like ice. The coolness pulled away.
Their voice wasn’t as cold as their skin. “It’s not a shared sickness.” Every hand on Lys loosened until they felt her try and twist away.
(A literal sigh of relief for them. Clearly a contagious illness is a big deal. Since the Healer knows Lys won’t get anyone else sick everyone is more willing to let her be an idiot who refuses to be healed.)
The voice talked to her next. “Did you eat or drink something recently that could have been contaminated? For example, meat not cooked all the way through? Rainwater that hasn’t been boiled?”
No magic, she begged. But she nodded her head. “Water.”
The Master pulled their hood off to show a beautiful olive-skinned woman with eyes so richly brown they looked almost red. Lys squeezed her eyes shut. “No magic.” Father would be so disappointed to find her on her back at the mercy of someone like this. “Please. Please.”
(dun dun dunnnn. What’s the Master going to do? Why is she “othered” in Lys’ mind? Why is Lys begging for her life from someone who only showed up to help her?)
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This is only the first 900 or so words of chapter one. There are another thousand-ish, as I like to try a minimum of 2k per chapter to keep things moving. The added advantage of this is that if I have a really short section I need to add extra drama to, I can make an unexpected chapter break.
So! There’s the simplified breakdown of slowly building a fantasy world, the main character, and hints of the overarching plot. If I were to do this without the sickness it would lessen the tension of the scene and therefore be quite boring. If a scene in anything – book, movie, short story, etc – lacks tension, you’ll lose readers.
What makes it difficult is you can’t just maintain the same tension throughout the work because readers will get used to it. Think about that insane airport runway scneen in the Fast and Furious movie. It became ridiculous when the plane was STILL on the ground despite traveling at like 90 for 15 minutes. The lack of increased tension (the end of the runway maybe?) made me glance at my watch, wondering when it would be over. I don’t want watch-glancers. I want readers who finish my book in an afternoon because they can’t put it down!
