Some tales require thousands upon thousands of pages. Writers paint a world, a history of that world, history of the players, the players’ quests, etc.
Some tales need only a day and 100 pages. How does Jones pull this off?
She begins with a common problem of many adolescents: a summer holiday with no access to fun. Jones amplifies the common with the not-quite-so-common: protagonist Heather is stuck at a home which is also a tourist attraction. The girl yearns for the tourists to go away, and finds herself wishing on an old mound for an old story about a warlock named Wild Robert to be true.
Enter Jones’ fantasticness: the girl’s wish comes true. She made her wish on the warlock’s grave, and her wish wakes him up. He doesn’t waste time turning people into sheep, pulling old relatives out of paintings, compiling strewn garbage into nasty monsters who chase children–Wild Robert’s capable of anything, as Heather quickly learns. Only she sees him, restrains him from doing more than pranks. By the end of the day, the characters have connected, and we finally learn all of Wild Robert’s story.
The end.
Huh?
Yup. One day. One glorious, adventurous day. It’s not like Jones cut out with the final detail of Robert’s life. Rather, she ends with the promise of future adventures:
Wild Robert’s power really did end at sunset. He must be back in his mound now….Heather remembered that Wild Robert had made her promise to speak to him again tomorrow. He had known….She climbed the stairs to her little room in a corner of the old castle, smiling. Robert was full of tricks. Tomorrow she would understand him better….Heather fell asleep thinking of ways she might even rescue the treasure that was really Wild Robert’s heart….
But those days are different stories. I’m sure that if Jones had wished to return to these characters she would have, but she didn’t have to. Readers, especially Middle Grade readers, have plenty of imagination. Jones provided a place, the players, the premise. It’s all laid out. Wild Robert gave us “a day in the life.” Now it’s on the readers to imagine the rest of the life.
Don’t think that you have to provide your readers every bloody day between birth and death. If the heart of the story is in but one event, then that’s IT. You know readers can tell when a story is padded. Knock that off. Give them the adventure. Trust them to imagine more.
Jean Lee's World 