Your Novel is an Argument: Four Rules Towards a Memorable Manuscript

When I was a college comp professor, the students typically grumbled about writing the final persuasive paper.  Yet, if you’re a novelist, the rules of argumentative papers can help you write a memorable manuscript. (And no works cited page required.)

Rule One: Have a Thesis

Remember that dreaded thesis statement? It’s not so daunting. Basically, what it boils down to is this: What am I trying to prove? If you’re a novelist, you should be able to answer that question before writing a single word.

You might think, I’m not trying to prove a darn thing. I’m writing a romance or a mystery to entertain. But romances and mysteries have built-in themes. All romances are saying, “Love matters. It enhances our lives.” Mysteries are telling the reader, “Justice prevails. Bad people will be eventually punished.”

Layered mysteries and romances say far more than that, but no matter what you write, a thesis statement will guide you and infuse your novel with meaning.

For instance, To Kill A Mockingbird is about the horrors of racism seen through the eyes of a child. The Great Gatsby is about the futility of chasing after empty people and the shallowness of wealth. The Alchemist is about the importance of following our inner compasses.

We all have world views and strong opinions about life. Those opinions can lead us in the direction of what we should write about in our novels and help us to sketch out our thesis statements

Rule Two: Prove the Thesis

Once you have your thesis statement, you need to offer evidence to prove it through your character’s arc. In the beginning, your character has one attitude about your thesis, and at the end, through a series of trials, he adopts another.

 The film Ladybird is about a young woman trying to escape her heated relationship with her mother and her dull hometown. Thematically, it’s trying to prove that love comes in many different forms.

We see this when a teacher compliments Lady Bird on her college essay about Sacramento, a town she wants to escape. She says that Lady Bird treats her hometown with affection and care, and Lady Bird admits, “Sure, I guess I pay attention. The teacher responds, "Don't you think maybe they are the same thing? Love and attention?"

Rule Three: Present a Strong Counter Argument

If you want to make your argument as strong as possible, you need to address what the other side has to say. Enter your antagonist. He or she can’t be one-dimensional villains because that will weaken your thesis argument.  Instead, you need to explore why the antagonist behaves the way she does.

In The Great Gatsby, we see how Daisy’s upbringing and societal forces informed her world view and why she became the weak woman that she is. We can understand her insecurities that led her to stay with Tom.

Rule Four: Avoid Tangents

Students are notorious word-count padders, and I would always say, “if it doesn’t strengthen your argument, it shouldn’t be there.”

The same with novels. All side characters need to be involved in your argument and be a variation of your theme. Every character in Pride and Prejudice contributes to the argument that social class and marriage prospects for women are hopelessly entwined but sometimes true love wins out.

For instance, Charlotte shows the readers consequences of marrying for security when she marries Mr. Collins. Jane initially loses Bingley because of her lowly station, but eventually prevails because of love.

Many novels have side-kick characters (also called allies),and frequently writers toss them into the soup so their main character has someone to talk to. But sidekicks should be more than just sounding  boards. Layered novels give those characters mini arcs of their own to strengthen the main argument.

It’s the same with scenes. Just as every section of paper needs a topic sentence, every scenes a focus and purpose. How is a scene strengthening or showing a variation of your argument? If it’s not, snip it.

If you do all this well, the reader won’t know that you’re offering an argument, yet if you provide enough evidence and are balanced in your approach, your message gets through and doesn’t feel preachy.

 Additionally, when your novel is fueled with a powerful theme, instead of a reader forgetting your work in a week, it will likely stay with them for a long while, and they’ll be eager to share their experience with others.

 PITCH DOCTOR

The Pitch: (Thanks to

Sogni

)

 Chu Uki, a 24-year-old Ph.D. in historical archaeology, arrives in Venice following a crucial lead to her ancestor—a Yuan Dynasty princess— unaware that she will soon be swept into a group of Italian cousins from a secret Venetian brotherhood as a direct descendant of its founder Marco Polo, and finds herself entangled in not one but two intellectually exhilarating treasure hunts, alternating between the years 2010 and 1290, culminating in an unexpected conclusion that hints at an extraterrestrial force poised to alter Earth’s destiny.

 Diagnosis: It’s a convention to leave out names in pitches so this could begin as, “A 24-year-old, female Ph. D…”  I got confused about the Italian cousin’s part and it’s because there’s more here than we need. What’s most important Venetian brotherhood, cousins? Descendants of Marco Polo? Likely the last. The inclusion of alternating timelines is done smoothly but I think that can be addressed in a longer description of the novel.

The fix:

A 24-year-old Ph.D. in historical archaeology is on a quest to find knowledge of her Yuan Dynasty princess ancestor when she encounters a secret brotherhood of Marco Polo descendants who lead her on a historical treasure hunt that reveal an extraterrestrial force that will forever alter the Earth’s destiny unless they are thwarted.

The pitch includes the following vital items.

Desire: Find knowledge of the princess

Inciting incident: Meeting secret brotherhood

Antagonist: Extraterrestrials.

Stakes: Earth’s destiny

The only thing missing is a character arc but with a high stakes adventure story it’s not that important to include in the pitch.

Do you have a pitch you’d like me to evaluate in the newsletter? Send me a one-sentence pitch and I’ll critique it here. Pitches can be anonymous.

Also, I offer additional writer services. See end of the newsletter for this month’s openings.

THIS WEEK IN PITCHING

Sometimes it’s really hard to find comp titles so the alternative is to use similar authors instead of specific titles:

THE IRISH GOODBYE, pitched in the spirit of J. Courtney Sullivan and Mary Beth Keane, about three sisters spending Thanksgiving at their family's Long Island shore home for the first time in many years, reckoning with a decades-old tragedy as well as the heavy secrets they're each keeping in the present.

As for the rest of the pitch, it wouldn’t pass muster with the pitch doctor (way too general!) which goes to show you that occasionally books with weak pitches can sell.

I love it when a pitch gets clever:

THE FACELESS THING WE ADORE, a queer cosmic horror, pitched as Eat Pray Lovecraft, about a heartbroken backpacker who joins a sex-fueled commune working to unleash a hungry god, and discovers she has more power than anyone bargained for, exploring emotional abuse and female rage.

Gotta admire this originality:

 LOVE YOU DON'T DIE, in which a death-obsessed woman attempts to maintain her career at a celebrity-led startup for designer funeral urns (THIS IS A THING?) while navigating identity and relationships, both platonic and romantic, as a young person in New York.

Don’t like the last part of pitch because it’s what I call a laundry list pitch, which is a list of general themes that suggests a story lacking in focus. That might not be true, but the pitch makes it seem that way.  

Love the title

FINNEGAN'S NOT AWAKE, a new cozy series about a young, down-on-her-luck English professor who returns to her quirky Texas hometown to work as a photographer and improve her strained relationship with her overly hair-sprayed mother, but when she stumbles upon a dead body in the most inconvenient place, she has to fight to protect those she loves from being wrongly accused—and from being the next target.

P.S.

In pitches I see this phrase a lot: “discovers long-buried family secrets.” I know that so many books are about this, but it’s become such a cliché in pitches and it not specific enough to be useful.

THIS WEEK IN WRITING

With the zero draft of my novel done, I’m still working on the tightening the basic beats of my novel with the help of The Virgin’s Promise, a very helpful look at the heroine’s journey which can be quite different from the hero’s journey.

 BOOKTALK

Gender issues are in the news, particularly when it comes to book deals. Who’s left out these days? Possibly  older women and men

OCTOBER SERVICE STATUS:
Pitch evaluation $20 includes a look at the re-write. (Five spots)

Development Edit/Beta Read $400: Booked. (I only do one full a month so if you want this it’s best to book in advance)  

Three Query critique spots left at $50  

One Synopsis Evaluation left $50

First 10 pages $25, (3 spots remaining) First 25 pages $50 (2 spots remaining)

Any burning writing questions? Drop in comments and I may address in future column or message me.