INSIDE THAT GREAT COVER, PART THREE

INSIDE THAT GREAT COVER
Part Three
By Lynde Lakes

In part one and two, we reviewed some of the important features that belong in our great cover. Remember, if you can reorder the scenes without changing the story then it wasn’t laid out right in the first place. In story with good development, the author can’t move the incidents around because the situation would change and the reactions would play differently. Now let’s look closer at what else needs to be between the pages of that great cover:

THE GREAT PREMISE: The premise is the theory behind the changes forced upon our characters because of the core conflict of the story. It is the story truth, based upon human nature, where the author believes that if he drops the character into a certain series of conflicts, he/she will change in a given manner. A premise may go against a moral or a theme.

The premise might be Alcoholism leads to control. This is ridiculous because alcoholism leads to a person who is out of control.

LOVE AND THE PREMISE. Love is the emotion that makes the world go around, either the existence of it or the absence of it. The only kind of love story worth writing about a powerful love, whether filial, brotherly, romantic, lustful, obsessive, etc. Your premise about obsessive love can lead to several conclusions: obsessive love leads to suicide or obsessive love leads to happiness etc. Your premise is yours alone; it is your truth, your vision in the world you created

Premise of COWBOY LIES: Put a cowboy, a baby and a woman with amnesia together, and the closeness and danger will make even the distrusting heart grow fonder. It is also that love wins, and control is not all bad. By controlling the situation, Matt is able to save his baby. Even though the story takes place on a cattle ranch, it is not a “how to” for ranching. Yet, every reference to ranching leads to that final scene.

Now to prove the premise: Every tense moment shows how Molly and Matt make mistakes but that no misstep or interference from others can corrupt the closeness that develops between them; and through almost losing their lives, they learn to forgive and achieve the balance needed for their love to survive.

THEME: A recurring fictional idea, aspects of the human existence tested or explored in the course of the novel. The theme and premise are NOT intended to teach a moral lesson. In COWBOY LIES, the theme is control. If a moral lesson develops from this theme, great, but it is not its function.

MORAL: A moral is what a story teaches. Like: Good cowboys don’t have to come in last. Control pushes people away. Sometimes a cowboy/FBI agent must lie to save lives. Alcohol kills. Crime doesn't Pay. If a story has a moral, it is probably a happy coincidence.


Matt Ryan's premise: CONTROL SAVES LIVES. If he believes the statement, then to keep Molly and her baby safe, he must control everything and everyone every minute. But such rigid control will probably force loved ones to resist and try to escape him and perhaps get killed in the process which is the opposite of his goal.

Types of Premises: chain reaction, opposing-forces, situational.

Chain reaction: Something happens to the character that sets off a series of events, leading to the climax and resolution. Finding the location of Matt’s daughter and kidnapping her, leads him to break every rule in the book, which ultimately leads to the resolution of the story. Good or bad.

Opposing forces: Control Defeats Love…or Love Destroys Control.

Situational Premise: Situation affects all the characters.

Questions to ask yourself: Was my premise proven? Are there any superfluous complications? Any ironies and surprises? Do characters grow and develop? Is the story worth writing? If we move forward via a causal chain of events, one situation will lead to another and eventually to a resolution.

It is common to have more than one premise to story. For instance a plot and subplot. Subplot must have a major impact on the main story.

Understanding the premise is simple: It tells what the story is about and what happens to the characters at the end. In good story, the author will economically prove the premise. And the premise will be worth proving.

Nothing works without strong characters and solid character development, ironies, and a STRONG NARRATIVE VOICE: (Something most of us have to work on.)


COWBOY LIES:

An image of blood-splattered walls shook her. Nothing felt right—nothing felt familiar—nothing jogged memories. Even her own name sounded strange to her ears, if it was her name. Molly Ryan? That mellow name didn’t fit the fire blazing in her gut, and that scared the hell out of her. Married. Was she really married?
She’d begged to stay at the hospital. She had felt safe there and had grown to trust Dr. De La Fuente during the months of treatment. That is, until he released her to this cowpoke in tight blue jeans and told her to trust this stranger. How could she trust this Stetson-wearing hunk of testosterone? He was pacing next to the fireplace like a fenced-in wild stallion. The initial shock of learning that she somehow may have shackled herself to this hard-edged cowboy slid closer to full-fledged panic. Did he expect her to share his bedroom tonight?
Lamplight reflected and magnified the shadow on the wall of his feral, agitated movements. Did he resent that she had been thrust on him in this bewildered condition? Would he turn that barely contained anger on her? She shivered, fighting an urge to bolt. “I can’t be married to you. Nothing seems right!”
He paused, and his piercing gaze locked with hers—the intensity sent chills along her nerve endings. “You’re gonna have to trust me on this one, Molly,” he drawled. “We’re hitched.”

CONCLUSION: We have goal, conflict, action, disaster and resolution painted majestically on the landscape of our imagination with passion and a desire to share the workings of our minds with those who might enjoy the escape into our world.
Writing is a glorious challenge and learning the tools is only the first step. Next, we have to practice and practice and hope each day our accomplishments grow and blossom. If it were easy, we would all be on bestseller lists and agents would be begging to represent us. In the meantime, we will help each other along the way and flower as human beings. The best part about writing is the journey and the friends you discover along the way. Aloha to all of you, Lynde