The Hook Brings You Back…

Writers come in all shapes and forms. Some like to outline. Some let the story flow and take them where it wants to go. Some love plot-driven, fast-paced thrillers, while others enjoy a more leisurely and introspective setup to tell their stories. Writers can spend hours in heated discussions about the authors they like and dislike or the state of the publishing industry. But there is one thing all of us can agree on: we all want people to read our novels. (And if it’s not too much to ask, we’d like them to love them, too.)

Since not every human life form on the planet will love our work, the only thing we can realistically hope for is that a large group of people would be interested enough to read it all the way to the end. (And this is the tricky part.)

An element that sparks my curiosity and forces me to read the entire novel is a good hook or the “big question” (not to say that ALL the books I’ve enjoyed have had an irresistible hook.) In other words, this is not the only way to ignite and keep the reader’s interest, but it’s one way.

I recently finished reading Robert Goodrick’s A Reliable Wife. Although I’d never heard of the author and nobody had recommended the novel to me, I purchased it. I just couldn’t resist the hook. See for yourselves:


He placed a notice in a Chicago paper, an advertisement for "a reliable wife." She responded, saying that she was "a simple, honest woman." She was, of course, anything but honest, and the only simple thing about her was her single-minded determination to marry this man and then kill him, slowly and carefully, leaving her a wealthy widow.

What Catherine Land did not realize was that the enigmatic and lonely Ralph Truitt had a plan of his own.

Even if you’re not a fan of Gothic fiction or Film Noir, you can’t deny that the premise is intriguing (you may not want to read it, but the premise may still raise questions in your mind, right?) As I was paying for the book, I realized two things:

1. A good blurb on the back cover of the book is fundamental.
2. A novel should have a hook or a “big question.”

And so my adventure with A Reliable Wife began. If anything, I had to know if:

a. Catherine would succeed in killing Ralph and why she wanted to do it.
b. What was Ralph’s mysterious plan.

The question of whether she would kill him compelled me to keep reading until the bitter end (literally.) The surprising thing is that neither one of these characters (or the third important character in the book) were particularly likable to me. Yet, I kept reading. This book also made me realize the importance of backstory. This often underestimated and ostracized writing tool can add a new layer to a novel (when placed at the right time.) In the case of A Reliable Wife, there was a point where I was impatient to know more about Catherine (to understand her motivations) I have to say, though, that not understanding her behavior right away didn’t turn me off—it only propelled me to read more. When I finally reached a portion of backstory and understood who she was, I felt like my patience had paid off. I even empathized with her a little bit.

But novels with intriguing hooks don’t necessarily have to be dark. A classic book (now considered children’s literature) that also grabbed my attention because of its great hook is Daddy Long Legs by Jean Webster.

I read this book in Spanish, so the following blurb is my best effort at translating it:

Jerusha Abbot, a ward at an orphanage, demonstrates a great gift for literature. One day, a mysterious trustee of the institution decides to pay her university studies, but, in exchange, he wants to remain anonymous. The only condition is that the girl writes him periodically, telling him about her progress in her studies.

Jerusha, who only knows the elongated shadow of her benefactor, gives him the nickname Daddy Long Legs, and starts sending him fun and innocent letters. But as time passes, the tone of her letters reveals the intelligence and great sensitivity of a girl who’s turned into a woman. Daddy Long Legs continues in his role of anonymous confident, but saves a great surprise for his protégée.

Naturally, I had to know who the mysterious protector was and what surprise he had for Jerusha. I can only say, for those who haven’t read it, that I wasn’t disappointed with the resolution.

Books with “big hooks” are also common in Women’s Fiction. Here are a few examples:

Summer Affair by Elin Hilderbrand

A woman with four children and a nice, but boring husband, engages in an affair with a sensitive millionaire.

Question in my mind: Will the husband find out?

The Year of Fog by Michelle Richmond

A photographer takes her boyfriend’s six-year-old daughter for a walk in the beach. When she stops to take a picture, the girl vanishes.

Questions in my mind: What happened to the little girl? Will the protagonist find her?

Something Borrowed by Emily Giffin

A consummate good girl gets drunk on her thirtieth birthday and ends up in bed with her best friend’s fiancé.

Question in my mind: What will happen when the friend finds out?

The Pact by Jodi Picoult

Two teenagers in love agree to commit a double-suicide, but only one dies.

Questions in my mind: What happened? Why did they want to die?

YA books in the late 70’s (that my older sister bought and I devoured a decade later):


Little Darlings by Sonia Pilcer

Two teenagers of different upbringings and personalities bet which one will lose her virginity first during a summer camp. One is a tomboy and the other a flirtatious and rich girl.

Question in my mind: Who will win the bet?

Ode to Billy Joe by Herman Raucher

Based on the famous song with the same title, this novel tells Billy Joe’s story (told by his girlfriend) and explains why he jumped off the Tallahatchie River.

Question in my mind: Well, why did he kill himself?

Side comment: I hated this book’s ending.

My Conclusions:

- Not all novels need captivating hooks, and a great hook doesn’t necessarily guarantee that the novel will be good. But they do help sell books.

- A good hook may help you get the interest of an agent and/or editor.

- There is at least one genre that must have a “big question” at all times: mystery.

- Ideally, the hook should come before the novel. In other words, the hook must “hook” and inspire you, the author, too.

Have you ever bought a novel based on the hook? Were you disappointed after? Can you think of other examples of novels that carry a “big question” until the end?

Formulaic.

for•mu•la•ic
 [fawr-myuh-ley-ik]
–adjective
1. made according to a formula; composed of formulas: a formulaic plot.
2. being or constituting a formula: formulaic instructions.


A curly-haired colleague of mine was enrolled in a writing class at a local college. Early on in the semester, the instructor began to subtly patronize an oft-vilified, though proven-to-be commercially-successful genre. You know— the kind of stuff a fair contingent will always read no matter what the shape of the economy or what the latest hand-over-fist-inducing trend? Yes, friends, we’re talking about romance— or as I prefer to think of it, strong romantic elements in a more broadly-textured narrative. And as my esteemed colleague went on to describe the instructor’s disdain for allegedly tired plot lines, I shifted in my overstuffed, trendy coffeehouse seat.

At first, I couldn’t tell if I was shifting from indignation or from the heat of the fires I often feel stoked within when formulating a reply. The more she spoke, though, the more quickly I was able to deduce that it was a lovely combination of both. So the result, dear reader, has taken shape beneath my flying fingers and emerged as this Lincoln-Douglasesque rebuttal.

Curly-haired colleague confided that her instructor huffed in response regards a student’s attempt at penning yet another iteration of the favorite roast of intellectuals with a taste for highbrow writing— or, wait. People are calling it ‘literary,’ these days. Right? Or is the term, ‘upmarket?’ Difficult to keep track. Especially when you’re at your first conference and the panel of agents and editors seated before you— approximately six in number— as you float in a veritable sea of hopefuls who, like you, have worn down the whorls on their fingertips tapping out the (d)reams they will pitch later that day and you start to hear these exotic terms being bandied about.

I don’t handle category romance.

My clients are more in what you’d call the upmarket women’s fiction range.

I tend to favor more literary texts.

O—kay. So does this mean if my book has a fight scene and then a make-up scene involving heavy petting that you won’t take a look? Even if my characters use big words?

In any event, back to highbrow instructor. Curly-haired colleague goes on to tell me that her prof posed the following insufferable question to our fellow aspiring writer.

**Disclaimer: Subsequent snippets of dialogue are the product of my imagination reconstructing a scene at which I was not present. Any dissimilarity to actual events, people and places is deliberately embellished for the sake of dramatic effect though the kernel of historical— and relevant— information remains respectfully intact.**

‘Let me guess,’ highbrow instructor holds up a hand. ‘Your story starts off with a girl who can’t stand a guy but they get thrown into a situation where they’re forced to collaborate and, eventually— despite her best efforts to the contrary— she falls in love with him?’

Aspiring writer flicks at her scarf. ‘Er— yeah. Kinda.’

Highbrow instructor, eyes sharp with the gleam of an ex-romance writer who went on to pen a novel from the point of view of a perspicacious dog later hailed as a modestly-coruscating gem and a literary triumph (over whom? I’m always tempted to ask,) tosses out an expertly-timed scoff— though delivered tastefully and with a pitying, if arguably affected, grace.

So. Here was my thought after hearing the pre-emptive dismissal of aspiring writer’s kissy-kissy yarn: It sounds interesting.

Sue me! Her book sounds interesting. Never mind that my sympathies are— heavily— in aspiring writer’s camp. My point is, what is so terrible about writing a story that’s already been written? Yes, hi— there’s a reason these narratives are penned over and over, again. And yes, it’s true, there are some writers who are in it strictly for commercial gain since, ya know, everyone likes to eat and wear clothes and/or pay the mortgage or the rent. Hence, carefully measuring out a certain dosage of story elements, mixing them together in prescribed parts and watching them erupt in a reliable— if predictable— explosion is the way they roll. Then, if executed with a respect for the basic rules of style and grammar, they proceed to sell their thinly-veiled, fizzing concoctions and start all over again. And to those members of my tribe I say, ‘Power to ya’ and ‘Vaya con Dios.’

What’s hurtful, I believe, is when these formulaic plots arise not from the commercial writer’s handbook but from the deep spaces of your subconscious and, later, you’re called on it. When you write your stories without regard for What’s Been Done (or worse, What’s Not Done) and it turns out you have nothing original to say. All you have is your original voice with which to say it.

Well, friend, herein lies the rub.

The thing about originality versus templates proven to succeed— and therefore looked down upon by the refined members of the Pulitzer-collecting crowd— is that, amidst the roar of feedback and constructive criticism and trying to come out ahead with authenticity in what is, essentially, a marketplace, the highest calling is so lofty— so all-encompassing— that it almost seems the only way to nail it is to do so by mistake. It’s serendipity and timing and long hours in a vacuum invisibly honing your craft without the certainty that your words will ever see the light of the shelf under the mega-bookstore fluorescents— or the light of a portable screen— yes, but it’s also something far more primitive.

People want to read about a girl who meets a guy she can’t stand but is then thrown into a situation in which they have to get along and she falls in love with him for a very fundamental reason— and it ain’t formula.

It’s resonance.

It’s why Episode 4 endured for thirty years spawning an empire of product tie-ins that built Skywalker Ranch from nothing— and I’m still wearing the Millenium Falcon t-shirt to prove it— and why Episode 1 just sorta sucked. It isn’t formula that arises from your earnest, naked heart in the dark hours when the rest of the house is asleep and your characters are so painfully real it’s like all you’re doing is taking dictation.

It’s Jungian.

It’s the hero getting her call to adventure and being timid about responding at first but then, against all personal odds, grasping for the grail. It’s suffering in the process and meeting friends along the way, some of whom turn out to be enemies; and squaring away with villains on the high-stakes path toward the inmost cave, some of whom turn out to be allies or— better, yet, that most deliciously unsettling of archetypes— shapeshifters. It’s the drama of your protagonist discovering— in precisely the moment readers yearn for the master stroke of redemption— near-reptilian energies eye-for-an-eyeing-it within.

And that’s why people will read twice-told tales when the chips are down and when the chips are soaring, alike. Because, as writers, we have the honor of tapping into the guts of the human experience and reproducing some version of it in portable form— be it by gobbling up pulp resources or light-emitting diode ones. The makes and models may change but the journey stays the same. (And if you knew how much it cost my little, analog heart to type that assertion, you’d pat me on my little, analog head.)

Bottom line, don’t ever let anyone make you feel like the fact that you’ve got nothing new to say means you’ve got nothing to say, at all. You never know when the product of myths which have endured— and inspired— for millennia and your toddling imagination will mix it up with just the right amount of ala kazam and touch off the Next Big Thing.

Until next time, dear reader.

Your,
-Aurora

Credit where credit is due: http://www.flickr.com/photos/horiavarlan/4273968248/