Recently, the preparation of the new 101 book was very unsmooth, revised more than 15 times, and the beginning of 25,000 words was killed by the editor's sentence, on the grounds that there was too much foreshadowing and the rhythm was delayed. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

The editor's original words are like this: What you think the reader expects is not an expectation, the protagonist's life and death are a matter of life, who still reads when he dies? Can the protagonist enter the sect, nonsense, every Xianxia book is a king and a hegemon in the end, how can there be a fall at the beginning?

What the reader wants to see is the process of overcoming difficulties, what are the wishes of the protagonist, what means are there to achieve them, what golden fingers, how many girls, how many enemies?

Now that the protagonist is going to be born and enter the sect, then you want the protagonist to defeat a few competitors and win the quota by his own ability.

After learning from the pain, 101 also admitted that this manuscript always felt unpleasant to read, and he didn't know what was wrong.

It turns out that the problem lies in the sense of rhythm, which leads to the plot not being compact and protracted, so readers, at least old readers like editors, are not very interested in reading.

Why is it a matter of rhythm?

Let's start with what is rhythm?

Rhythm is all about the writing skills of cutting, arranging, and showcasing the plot.

In the old concept of writing, it is the beginning and the end, which plots belong to the beginning of conflict, which are developmental and brewing, which are twists, and which are resolutions.

Judging from the plot I originally conceived, I set the protagonist to be snatched away by the demon cultivator, and when he flew to the sect, he encountered danger, the protagonist fell into the abyss and saved a girl who was traveling with him, and then the two were rescued by the demon cultivator, and then they went up the mountain and began to test their qualifications.

In the middle of this process, there is an introduction to the environment, the origin of the protagonist, the dialogue between the two demon cultivators, and the dialogue with the protagonist, and even in the qualification test, the protagonist also has eye contact with the girl, and there is a conflict with a competitor, and even several ancestors fought in order to snatch the disciples.

I wrote 25,000 words, and I still think this foreshadowing is good, how full the characters are, the living environment of the Demon Gate is bad, the main characters are introduced, the girls and enemies are all paved, and you can cultivate and develop later.

But why does it always feel unpleasant to read? Why do you always feel that a lot of plots are entangled, every scene is incredibly complicated, there are so many characters in it, there are so many psychological activities of the protagonist, and the story is like a mess of paste, mixed together and not flowing?

After repeated comparative analysis and careful consideration of the editor's comments, 101 finally broke through this rhythm, and now I will share it with you.

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It turns out that the rhythm of the story has its own internal rules, which is caused by the reader's reading expectations, if the reader reads it with relish, it is a good rhythm, and if the reader is irritable and can't read it at all, it is a bad rhythm.

Taking 101's novel as an example, in order to show the hardships of the Demon Gate, 101 arranged a lot of adventures in front of him, and in order to pave the way for the characters, they were all explained at the beginning.

I read it to my family, and they all said that it was very interesting, because they had never read Xianxia novels and belonged to pure white readers, so even if the story was loose and procrastinated, their reading interest was to see freshness.

But old readers like editors, they have seen too much about the life and death of the protagonist, and what they can't enter the sect, even if they write flowers, they will not be surprised, they pay attention to the grasp of the rhythm of the story, and whether they can tell a story smoothly.

Therefore, here is the first insight about rhythm with you - "Whether the rhythm is good or not varies according to the reader's experience, interest is a good rhythm, and boredom is a bad rhythm." Old readers are less tolerant, while new readers are more tolerant. ”

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Now, going back to the example of 101, let's dive in and see if we can find a good rhythm that the vast majority of readers will recognize.

First of all, let's look at the essence of the story, it is a character, encountering a difficulty, thwarting his wishes, because the reader substitutes the character, so I want to see how he overcomes the difficulty, so I start to read down.

So the story of 101, shortened down to one sentence, is that the protagonist was captured by Demon Xiu, and he wanted to live, so he tried his best to survive.

Some friends are about to ask, then the plot you designed, the protagonist falls under the cliff, isn't it dangerous? Saving the girl is a harvest! Isn't the portrayal of the demon cultivator also to create a dangerous atmosphere?

Well, this is a misunderstanding, 101 was trapped in it before it crawled out.

It turns out that according to film theory, there is a syllogism, that is, the first 15 minutes explain the characters and the background of the story, 15-60 minutes are the main conflict development, and the rest of the time is the climax and conclusion.

So in a novel, the first three or five chapters are the first 15 minutes of the movie, at this time, try to explain as quickly as possible who the protagonist is, what environment he is in, what troubles he encounters, etc., which belongs to the beginning of the story.

At this time, the protagonist is in a passive state, and the reader's reading psychology is also passive, passively accepting various settings and various information, and the protagonist is either blank and without pressure, or facing a crisis, but has not yet the ability to fight back.

So the shorter the process, the better, as soon as possible to enter the main development stage of the plot, at this time the protagonist is faced with a variety of choices, he has a certain understanding of the crisis, and also has a certain ability to fight back, firmly in the dominant position, the reader reads as if following the protagonist on an adventure and solving difficulties, and the sense of pleasure is very strong.

Looking back at the example of 101, "the protagonist was captured by the demon cultivator", "the protagonist's wish is to live".

Well, the reader's reading expectation is to see how the protagonist survives through personal efforts. That's what the editor's comment says.

But what 101 writes is to let the protagonist experience other adventures, which is equivalent to saying that the first wish has not been carried out and is delayed by other circumstances, then the reader's expectations will be delayed.

A friend asked, but in order to add a twist to the novel, accidents will be inserted from time to time!

101 believes that the mystery lies in the fact that—

1. The beginning is a 15-minute theory, the faster the better, not suitable for complicated things, so as not to bored the reader;

2. Unless the plot twist is strongly related to the protagonist's wishes, that is, tell everyone in advance what will be the benefit of the protagonist of this adventure after it is done, and whether it is closer to the goal. For example, if the sect proposes a test, go to the bottom of the cliff and climb up again, and you will be accepted. That's a strong correlation. Otherwise, it will be very uncomfortable to fall down accidentally, even if you get the baby.

Take the game as an example, for example, we try to play a new game, after accepting the character control, origin, and game characteristics, etc., after 15 minutes of starting, the first goal below is to enter the sect, but the game control is not open to the player, but to play the animation, ah, you fell into the cliff, you saved a girl after some effort.

The animation continues, and you meet a few monks talking, and they are fighting, and you are watching from the sidelines, and you are very envious......

After a lot of verbosity, this is when the control of the game is handed over to you.

But in another way, the first goal is to enter the sect, and the game pops up a prompt box - there are two ways to enter the sect, enter the cliff trial, or wait for the qualification test.

Let the player choose which one to go, and this is the same as the protagonist's dominance in his hands.

Therefore, here is a summary of the second insight of 101: "The opening 15-minute theory, the plot is strongly related, and the protagonist is dominant, which is the consideration criterion for arranging the plot".

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Finally, let's talk about the scene description problem, if we follow the 15-minute theory, in fact, we can't explain much in the first few chapters.

In the case of 101, it is necessary to cut down the cliff jumping, save the little girl, dialogue between demon cultivators, fight with the ancestors, make enemies with others, and so on.

All the supporting characters are bokehed, they are all group portraits, only the main character is in the center of the stage, and the spotlight is always on him. In each scene, there are only 1-2 prominent supporting characters at most.

This is the "three" law of online texts, in each scene, there are up to three people, and the others are blurred.

So the adjusted story structure became-"The protagonist was captured by the demon cultivator", "The protagonist's wish is to survive", "The protagonist passed the qualification test and survived".

"The new challenge is to become a disciple", "The protagonist needs to complete the cliff jumping task", "The protagonist completes the cliff jumping task, becomes a personal disciple, and saves a girl by the way"

……

The rhythm of the story goes on in a "wish-challenge" cycle one by one, concise and clear.

Wait until the story unfolds more than 200,000 words, at this time, in order to set up some big climaxes, you can carry out more complex foreshadowing, such as multiple lines, such as multiple characters in a scene, because at that time, readers have already deeply entered the story, and various settings, characters, and environments are also relatively familiar, which is easy to accept complex plots.

But at the beginning of the story, the reader's desire is very simple and straightforward, they see that the protagonist is being thwarted, and they want to see what happens next.

This desire is so urgent that any superfluous plot added to it will make the reader feel bored, and if they are bored with a chapter or two, they will abandon the book!

Therefore, the control of the rhythm is the most important at the beginning, and when the story unfolds and ends, it must also be done without dragging the mud and water, and always closely following the protagonist's wishes and conflicts.

101 summarizes some elements of rhythm control:

1. The flow of the story comes first at any time, and the description cannot be allowed to stagnate the story.

2. Setting, information, and interpretation analogies are compressed within 10%.

3. A scene should stay in no more than two chapters, usually one chapter (3000 words).

4. An event, such as the next dungeon, the sect competition, it is best to end within chapters 5-10, and if the dungeon is too complicated, you can set up some rest points in the middle, interspersed with other plots, and you can't fight all the time.

5. Mental activities and dialogues should be moderate, too much or too little is not good.

6. Montage is a good way to omit trivial episodes such as dressing, eating, walking, going to the toilet, sleeping, etc. (101 used to make jokes, writing that when the protagonist leaves home, he must write a sentence to lock the door)

7. The cultivation process, although it is a characteristic display, but what the reader wants to see is how to use this characteristic ability to seek personal benefits, so the description of cultivation should not be excessive, unless it is written very interestingly, otherwise not too much, generally only half a chapter, at most one chapter is enough. But the first skill cultivation, breaking through the realm needs to be focused on.

8. Bubble girls are embellishments, unless it is an emotional novel like Zhu Xian, it should not occupy too much space.

9. Every time you write a paragraph, find an old book friend to read it, see where it is too procrastinating, where it is too brief, whether the connection is smooth, and many times, the sense of rhythm is in making mistakes and correcting them, to find their own feelings.

At this point, the perception of rhythm is shared here, if there is any omission, please advise.

Personally, I feel that the fast-paced reading materials are - "Bosom Friend" (I strongly recommend that you learn from it, a small story of a few thousand words can have more twists, the characters still have a certain emotion, and the plot flows very quickly)

In addition, Tomato and Potato books, especially Tomato, have the best sense of rhythm in his books.

The rest is that everyone understands and practices more.

Rhythm is one of the most difficult writing skills to master, and it certainly has certain internal rules, but more importantly, it is controlled by experience and feeling.