Seeking Advice On Editing a Novel and Infanticide. Killing Babies?

[Grit]

Premise: A troubled young man is given the power to manipulate reality by an ascendent (Telekinetic) in the hopes that he can divert the fast approaching apocalypse. The book is more about his struggles with power and using it properly then it is about physical evil.

The first thirty-seven pages are all about building character. They deal with the Main Character's (John) life from birth up to the day he receives his powers. How his parents died (very short), his upbringing with a strict military foster father and the conflict they have, then his first love (the girl is a central character) and his first heart break. The beginning explains his anger, something he struggles with throughout the story.

Every reader had a different stance on the beginning. Quite a few male readers found it to be slow. Two guys I know stopped reading during the first thirty-seven pages. However, many of my female readers thought it was well-paced and integral.

I'm seriously considering just cutting the upbringing and starting the story when John meets his first love, which would erase about twenty of those pages.

So, in your opinion is it wrong to have exposition that doesn't drive the plot forward? Many books have it. In this day and age when instant excitement and gratification is always a click away, is it wise? Thirty-seven pages isn't much and it amounts to one-tenth the book. I just don't know, which is why I'm asking all of y'all.

Please comment with your thoughts.

[hillwalker]

10% of a book devoted to exposition isn't perhaps that much - but if it's all at the start of the novel then it's a recipe for rejection by most potential publishers. Readers expect something to happen on page 1 - 'now' - something to grab their attention and make them want to care about what's about to happen next and so continue reading. Publishers know this so will reject anything they realise won't sell.

Background information about your MC has to be drip-fed almost imperceptibly into the plot. Once the reader realises they are being given an information dump instead of a story most will give up reading. Maybe it's to do with the fact that so many contemporary readers have been brought up on the movies rather than on epic novels. But that's not a bad thing if it makes us leaner writers or story-tellers.

Good luck.

H

[AuntShecky]

You actually have friends (plural) willing to read thirty-seven of your pages? Count your blessings, man.

[Grit]

Thanks for the input.

Yes Auntie I am blessed with wonderful friends. I love them.

I'm still undecided after going over the story all afternoon.

It's not purely exposition but a bunch of flash scenes throughout his life. Still, I feel like I should murder them pages.

It's never easy.

[islandclimber]

If they are flash scenes, little vignettes from across a lifetime...I wouldn't "murder them pages." Why not just split apart the scenes? Add them at different spots throughout your narrative. As Hill said, "drip-fed almost imperceptibly into the plot." Almost like infinitesimal intermissions... It's a fairly common and effective technique to have exposition and character-building occur almost at-random throughout a text.

[Grit]

Yes I read that earlier when doing some research about exposition in books. It's a good idea, absolutely.

Kind of a nice compromise between just killing them and leaving them in the beginning.

Thanks!

[F.E. Michael]

"Murder your darlings", I'd say spread the ashes of them like Hill mentions, drip-feeding. Probably good to keep it across your first half or at least have the details of the past out by your second big conflict (if you have one). I am a "mlae perspective", and even though too much gooey backstory can bog me, I need it to tap me on the shoulder along my reading so I can keep connected. If I end up reading a book about some faceless nobody I lose interest, unless I am jealous of him and put MYSELF in his place. That's probably my own little personal development issue, though... haha.