Blog 52

Hello everybody, today we have a piece titled Lone Wolf by Robert Edward Baker.

Paragraph 1

Marta clenched her fists and tramped across the dusty parking lot toward Fallen Angels Bar. Nobody from out of town would know this shack was a bar since the sign blew away in a storm three years ago. Why bother with a replacement when every boy over the age of fourteen in Angel Fire, New Mexico knew this was the best place for cheap beer and women who dressed like strippers? She stormed through the door and wrinkled her nose at the stench of stale cigarette smoke.

This is somewhat of a difficult paragraph to deconstruct because while I can see the foundations of good prose present they result in an unimpactful conclusion. The first sentence is active and makes use of both a strong verb in ‘clenched’ and a bit of effective description with ‘dusty’, so why then does this opening sentence not spark my interest? The sentence even implies conflict with Marta’s frustration or anger, so why? I know the next few sentences detract from the paragraph because they indulge in exposition that provides little value; a sign lost in a storm isn’t interesting and provides no more value than ‘rundown/ramshackle’ or one of their synonyms would and requires a whole sentence to convey. It’s main value is as a setup to the third sentence which just mentions underage boys know of it and may or may not imply them frequenting it, but that’s something the author would need to state overtly so as to spark the reader’s outrage (thus connecting them to the story via an emotional reaction.) Aside from the potential of an allusion, all the third sentence provides is the state (irrelevant as we have no connection to it as information yet) and that the bar harbors cheap beer and scantily clad women, which are likely inherent to every low quality drinking establishment. Exposition is best when reserved for something readers do not and cannot understand on their own, or for something they do not know but which will increase their interest in the narrative. The final sentence returns to the style of the first with active verbs and some description that readers can immediately latch onto, giving the story a physical presence in their minds because they likely have experienced cigarette smoke/dust before.

I’m still formulating my thoughts on the action/conflict sections of the first and last sentence, but I do think I understand why the description (being good) fails to provide the connection readers need to invest in the story. (A great description can immediately energize a story and expand the imagination and attachment, just a generic and boring description can cause the opposite.) There are two ways description achieves this: emotional reaction and theme. The emotional reaction tends to require preparation, but theme can start on the first paragraph and inspire interest. ‘Theme’ is about putting the reader in an interesting environment, surrounding them in the trappings and emotional undertones of something; it’s an undercurrent of the story and achieves investment through immersion while also surrounding them in interesting things to consider, imagine and look at. A theme is about making the readers want to experience the world/scene, but it requires recurrence and multiple different, interesting descriptions and interactions to construct effectively. And this is where the descriptions in this paragraph falter; they serve as effective descriptions, but they’re single-instance and don’t build to anything or cultivate anything like a theme or aesthetic. They don’t tell a story, they don’t fill out the story they’re inhabiting, and they don’t define it or restrict or expand it in anyway; they’re just present and thus don’t invite the reader to continue on the journey.

As for the action part, I think I’ve figured out what’s lacking (somewhat) and it’s a topic I’ve mentioned before, which is that action/conflict does not equal investment or entertainment. Marta is preforming active movements, but those actions aren’t interesting despite the conflict implied with ‘clenched’. She’s mad, walking across a parking lot and entering a bar; that’s the extent of what those sentences convey but that’s not interesting in of itself. We have no connection to these actions and there’s no indicated peril or something that invests us in Marta personally from an emotional or character standpoint. Thus this results in actions we do not care about and which do not spark interest because they don’t imply a clear enough destination that we want to see realized.

Now the question becomes how do we improve the paragraph so it does grab the reader’s interest. The answer is both simple and a little difficult because what the paragraph is ultimately lacking is the element that tells the readers they want to read more. There’s a shred of story but not enough for us/the readers to envision a conclusion, much less a conclusion they want, or fear, to see realized. So we need to infuse this paragraph with more of the story. This, unfortunately, will require significant creative liberties from my part and I will probably include a second, purely technical, edit as well.

After reading ahead I’ve learned that this first section of the story (a few introductory paragraphs) concerns Marta tracking down her cheating fiancé at the aforementioned establishment of ill-repute, so that’s what we’re going to try and highlight more of. Not too much more though, otherwise they have no reason to read the rest of the section because the conclusion would be forgone and already known.

—Marta stormed across the dusty, weathered blacktop, passing between faded parking spaces beneath the red heat of the late New Mexico day. ‘He’s at Fallen Angel’s Bar’ the words burned hot in her mind, searing with condemnation and denial. She slammed through the scuffed door and stale cigarette smoke poured out.—

Mostly what I did here (in theory) was just emphasize the story elements the author eluded too. ‘Condemnation’ and ‘Denial’ are two very powerful emotions/reactions and so carry weight/interest just by virtue of existing in the paragraph, but they give clearer definition to Marta’s emotional state, emphasizing her anger with ‘condemnation’ and indicating emotional pain as well with ‘denial’. These conflicting emotions, and their strength, make her character and the story immediately more compelling; she’s more defined and her conflict is more personal and complex while also being more clearly implied so the readers understand the story and their place in it. We know where the story’s going next, but we are not entirely sure how it will end because Marta herself is in two minds (the aforementioned ‘pain’ and ‘rage’ which make for a volatile cocktail.)

The other significant change I made was in the physical description. I tried to make it more strident by conjuring the imagery of a late red sun, but I also gave more specific description to the ‘rundown’ aesthetic instead of just saying ‘rundown’ or ‘shack’ and I had Marta interact with them slightly more. She walks between the faded parking space (giving them a place in the world in relation to her) and instead of using the generic cover-all of ‘parking lot’, I used the specific ‘blacktop’ which added further description but also opened space for the readers to fill in details; people know how blacktop feels underfoot, and that makes the scene more real to them because they fill in extra details from their own experience. The vagueness of ‘parking lot’ which could be gravel, dirt or a number of other materials, prevents this connection.

A lot of the information is still present, but it’s conveyed to the reader in a more dynamic or personal way; the bar’s name is conveyed via an intimate and emotional memory for Marta, and their location in New Mexico is attached to a striking visual and environment she ( and thus the reader) is experiencing. All of these adjustments are to connect the reader more viscerally with the story through physical and emotional interaction. Obviously, they’re still rough as I mostly just threw this together, but hopefully you can still get an inkling of what I was attempting.

Now for the technical edit. (Reposting the paragraph for ease.)

Marta clenched her fists and tramped across the dusty parking lot toward Fallen Angels Bar. Nobody from out of town would know this shack was a bar since the sign blew away in a storm three years ago. Why bother with a replacement when every boy over the age of fourteen in Angel Fire, New Mexico knew this was the best place for cheap beer and women who dressed like strippers? She stormed through the door and wrinkled her nose at the stench of stale cigarette smoke.

For the first sentence the only issue I can note is that the name ‘Fallen Angels Bar’ reads off. We may need the possessive apostrophe on ‘angels’ and the capitalization of ‘Bar’ confuses me since that reads more like a designation than part of the proper name. If it is a designation, then we’re missing a ‘the’ before ‘Fallen’.

For the second sentence we can reduce the phrase ‘Nobody from out of town’ to ‘no outsider’ saving us a few words and resulting in it reading a little bit smoother. I might also consider adding an ‘even’ between ‘would’ and ‘know’ because although unnecessary it energizes the phrase and ameliorates the weak verb of ‘would know’. After that we can invert the order of ‘storm’ so it’s more active (because we lead with the actor instead of ending with it) and cutting a word.

—No outsider would even know this shack was a bar since a storm ripped the sign off three years ago.—

I replaced ‘blew away’ with ‘ripped off’ because it’s more violent and thus more forceful and energetic, befitting of a storm tearing down signs. But unfortunately this sentence is just a little weak, it has no connection to its predecessor and only a minimal connection in of itself. Although ‘outsiders’ serves to introduce the storm, it and the ‘storm’ have no real interaction or effect on one another or the story. So I would connect it with the first sentence (forcing a link between the two at the expense of rhythm.)

—Marta clenched her fists and tramped across the dusty parking lot toward the Fallen Angels bar, not that any outsider could have recognized the shack as such since the storm ripped its sign off three years ago. There’d been no need to replace it with every boy over the age of fourteen in Angel Fire, New Mexico knowing this was the place for cheap beer and women dressed like strippers.—

I chose to use ‘there’d been no need…’ over ‘why bother’ because it’s more forceful as a statement rather than a question and (more importantly) because it builds off the rhythm of the previous sentence in a way that ‘why bother’ does not. ‘Why bother’ is disruptive because it changes tact, starting a new thought instead of following through on the old one. I can’t quite find the words I need to explain it properly so hopefully you guys are getting it regardless. I preserved the ‘women dressed like strippers’ phrase over shortening it to something like ‘scantily clad women’ or ‘tawdry women’) because ‘strippers’ is more evocative, summoning images of degradation and the fouler aspects of society in a way that ‘scantily clad’ does not.

For the final sentence I would remove ‘the stench of’ as unnecessary, but also because it distances her from the smoke because she’s interacting with its smell rather than it physically. Another element to this sentence, one I can’t fix unfortunately, is the interaction between ‘stormed’ and ‘wrinkled’. ‘Stormed’ is a powerful word, full of anger and activity. It drives the story forward with the character/action’s momentum, and then the author immediately diffuses that momentum with ‘wrinkled’ which is a softer word but also destroys Marta’s (and thus the story’s) momentum by having her stop and react in a defensive way instead of ploughing forward wrathfully. Physically this weakens the sentence by sapping it of energy, but it can also have an effect on the reader’s impression of Marta since she enters the bar and is immediately stymied by something so trivial as a scent, which diminishes her in our minds, making her seem weaker. This may or may not have been the author’s intention, but regardless it is something to consider in your own writing. (The pause I mentioned is more interpreted/implied since the sentence ends with her wrinkling her nose.)

—Marta clenched her fists and tramped across the dusty parking lot toward the Fallen Angels bar, not that any outsider could have recognized the shack as such since the storm ripped its sign off three years ago. There’d been no need to replace it with every boy over the age of fourteen in Angel Fire, New Mexico knowing this was the place for cheap beer and women dressed like strippers. She stormed through the door and wrinkled her nose at the stale cigarette smoke.—

That will be all for today.

 If you like what you’ve read, consider checking out the rest of the story or some of the author’s other work.https://www.writing.com/main/portfolio/view/robertbaker

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