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Post by quinning on Aug 5, 2016 20:21:49 GMT -5
I am working on editing my first (possibly publishable) novel.
I have to get my characters from one city to another and it's historical-ish, so they'd travel by horseback. The problem is, do I actually need to write in the actual travel? Is it okay to just have them switch locations, maybe mentioning "we'll leave in the morning" at the end of one chapter and having them in the new city the next morning?
I'm not sure that anything of note really needs to happen on the trip, though I guess I could come up with something if you guys think I need to show the travel...
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Post by Pru Freda on Aug 6, 2016 7:28:30 GMT -5
If nothing of note happens on the journey, then I don't see that you have to write it. A sentence or paragraph letting the reader know of the change of scene should cover it nicely.
After an uncomfortable journey through less than inspiring countryside they arrived in Smalltown late the next morning/afternoon/evening.
That sort of thing.
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Post by sheilawrites on Aug 6, 2016 8:16:07 GMT -5
Yeah, like Lynda said. A quick summary just to clue the reader in that the journey happened and the destination reached.
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Post by Daniel on Aug 6, 2016 9:26:51 GMT -5
I agree with the above. If nothing remarkable happens during the travel, a quick reference to it is sufficient. However, if you want to use that journey to reveal character or move the plot forward somehow, writing the scene where that happens makes sense.
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Post by carlos on Aug 6, 2016 11:49:50 GMT -5
I tend to over-write transitions, as if I was afraid the reader couldn't get across the room without my help. It is all wasted effort that will have to be edited out. I remind myself of 'jump-cuts' in the movies, where nobody explains exactly how the characters got from Aunt Suzy's kitchen to the moon--trusting the viewer to make the necessary connections.
This seems quite natural to us now--but as a boy (back in the 40's of the last century) my grandmother (born in 1872) told me "When movies first came in we had to learn how to watch them."
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Post by quinning on Aug 6, 2016 12:46:22 GMT -5
Thanks guys! That's what I was hoping you all would say. I really couldn't think of any plot moving info that could be revealed on the trip there.
Carlos - It never occurred to me that onyone would have to LEARN to watch movies. How intriguing!
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