1: I'm curious about is their a rule of thumb of why titling chapters are important? Are they important? Do you believe people really care about a title to each chapter? Is a certain length required to title a chapter - lets say three pages vs. twenty-five?
2: Please fix this sentence grammatically for me.
<The question was--was Pawaqa taking the princess back to her lair or delivering her to someone else.>
I can't find how this should properly break. It feels like a colon, but not sure.
3: Someone exclaiming a question. Proper rule should be? "Why?" or "why!" or "Why?!" which is it.
4: Can quotes be between sentences or does that require a new paragraph.
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy get in here!" and watched as he slowly dragged himself in.
Is this valid or does it have to be broken up.
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy get in here!"
quote: 1: I'm curious about is their a rule of thumb of why titling chapters are important? Are they important? Do you believe people really care about a title to each chapter? Is a certain length required to title a chapter - lets say three pages vs. twenty-five?
I like to title chapters because it helps me find things when I'm editing. I may not know that a certain event happened in chapter 18, but I have a much better chance of identifying its location by chapter title. I actually could care less if they're there when it gets published or not.
quote: 2: Please fix this sentence grammatically for me.
<The question was--was Pawaqa taking the princess back to her lair or delivering her to someone else.>
I can't find how this should properly break. It feels like a colon, but not sure.
Hmm. I'd put a colon after the first was. But, really, I'd rephrase it. The two was's right next to each other--it's just awkward.
quote: 3: Someone exclaiming a question. Proper rule should be? "Why?" or "why!" or "Why?!" which is it.
I'd probably stay safe and just use a question mark. I've seen known authors get away with the combined punctuation, but I'm not sure I'd try it.
quote: 4: Can quotes be between sentences or does that require a new paragraph.
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy get in here!" and watched as he slowly dragged himself in.
Is this valid or does it have to be broken up.
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy get in here!"
She watched as he slowly dragged himself in.
There's nothing gramatically wrong with the first, but I'd use the second. Except you don't need a paragraph break.
posted
Let's try this again.. first time the system ate the first half of the message.
quote:1: I'm curious about is their a rule of thumb of why titling chapters are important? Are they important? Do you believe people really care about a title to each chapter? Is a certain length required to title a chapter - lets say three pages vs. twenty-five?
Far as I've ever seen, there is no rule. There was a time when chapters always had names which gave away the action for that chapter. Then it petered down to numbers alone, or none. Now named chapters are making a comeback. Personally I find the descriptive chapter names irritating.
quote:2: Please fix this sentence grammatically for me.
The question was--was Pawaqa taking the princess back to her lair or delivering her to someone else.
I can't find how this should properly break. It feels like a colon, but not sure.
Colons tend to throw the reader out of the story, so should be used with caution, and [almost] never in dialog. Depending on the surrounding prose, I might rephrase that as
quote:The question was whether Pawaqa was taking the princess back to her lair, or delivering her to someone else.
But I'd have to see the whole paragraph to really know if that works.
As a general rule, if you have to use a hammer to get everything to fit in a single sentence (or paragraph), it needs to be broken up.
quote:3: Someone exclaiming a question. Proper rule should be? "Why?" or "why!" or "Why?!" which is it.
Whichever one is how they said it. Those are all different inflections. Witness:
"What!" "What?" "What?!"
Betcha you heard all three of them differently in your mind's ear.
quote:4: Can quotes be between sentences or does that require a new paragraph.
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy get in here!" and watched as he slowly dragged himself in.
Is this valid or does it have to be broken up.
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy get in here!"
She watched as he slowly dragged himself in.
That's another "it depends".
Regardless, you need a comma after Tommy, unless it's someone yelling a full stream of words with no pauses (like a recruit answering the drill sergeant: "SIR YES SIR!") But normally the addressee (I can't think of the proper word for it at the moment) is set off by a comma.
At any rate, back to your question:
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy, get in here!" and watched as he slowly dragged himself in.
is NOT the same as
Jenny went to the door and called out, "Tommy, get in here!"
She watched as he slowly dragged himself in.
When written all as one piece, it makes the pacing all one stream of action -- Tommy obeys more or less immediately, if with reluctance (shown by how he "dragged himself in").
The second, because it makes a purposeful break, also breaks up the pacing, and implies that there was a distinct beat where Tommy stood there looking for a moment before he decided to obey.
So the difference is that the first implies "yeah yeah I'm coming" while the second implies Tommy had more resistance to obeying.
Remember that punctuation and paragraph breaks aren't there solely to comply with the rules of grammar. They also serve to regulate pacing for the reader, and the effect can be quite dramatic without changing a single word of your narrative.
[This message has been edited by Reziac (edited January 09, 2011).]
posted
I see a lot of concern about rules in your questions, but I don't think that (in relation to these specific issues particularly) there are really 'rules'. For example.
1. Whatever you do, your publisher may ask you to change it, but is unlikely to reject your manuscript simply because a chapter title is present or lacking.
2. Actually, it may be completely fine as is, depending on the voice and style of the piece.
3. I've also heard that exclamation marks tend to be overused and strong prose usually doesn't need them at all. Then again, something written for a younger audience who are used to strong cues may be different again.
4. The exclamation mark in [in here!" and] implicitly ends a sentence, so the issue may be different than what you're asking?
Ultimately, I think the 'rules' are conventions and all come down to reading. If we read a lot in our genre, we see what the conventions are. If we read widely, we see what conventions other genres use, and by implication, what a reader may conclude if we mix them up a bit. Not everyone on this board reads in the exact genre that you're writing, so I'd expect we'd all come up with a different answer to your questions.
posted
1. I like chapter titles, so long as they don't give away everything. I once read a book that had the chapter title "Captured" and a few chapters later "The Escape." If they feel right use them, if numbers would fit use those. I've seen some that don't have any thing indicating a new chapter except the page break and the words starting low on the page.
2. I'd go with a colon. "The question was: was Pawaqa (nice name by the way) taking the princess . . ." It's true that they aren't used much in fiction, but I don't think it's really that big a deal. An em dash might work too.
3. I find the ?! thing to be ugly, it's fit for comics. I think the situation should show that they are exclaiming.
posted
I haven't yet used chapter titles in anything. I like when some writers use them, especially if they are amusing or interesting. I've stayed away from it because mine would probably all be sarcastic, and I haven't started a novel yet that would work with that kind of tone. Maybe my next one though. The idea floating around is more humorous than anything I've written yet. Posts: 116 | Registered: Sep 2010
| IP: Logged |
posted
Use chapter titles if you want to, or if they aid in the storytelling somehow.
If you don't care or don't want to, then just straight numbers is perfectly fine as a default.
I have one completed novel with chapter titles, where in keeping with the YA voice of the piece they're all kind of sarcastic or jokes about what happens in that chapter. I like that in the middle grade/YA stuff I read.
Other stuff I'll defer to grammar experts, but I'd say you're close on your own which is great. You might want to just get one of the books on editing that you can consult as a standard in this sort of situation (I like Self-Editing for Fiction Writers, but it might not be detailed enough.)
I think you have already gotten some good advice but I'll add my two even though I'm tempted to copy PB. On two of them anyway.
Your first question:
I must add though this font, the size and my eyesight combined to play a trick on me. I thought it said Tilting chapters. I had no idea what writing term that was so I clicked on on it to see. Oh...duh.
Anyway back to One: Titling chapters is up to you. Some books add humor--the M.Y.T.H. series--by use of chapter titles. Some writers explain what happens in the chapter by using titles. As at least one person said already. Many books have no chapter titles. In eight or so novels, I think I have only titled my chapters in the first book. Could be one more but no more than two. I just didn't feel the need to do that in the other novels. I'm thinking about naming the chapters in "Bright Lights And Chaos" . I would have to go back and do that once the novel is all the way done but I can do that if I decided to take the time and bother.
Question number two: This is one I have no opinion on. Maybe I should say my knowledge of grammar isn't large enough for me to say. And you have probably received good advice by now anyway.
Question Three: In this case I like to use Why?! since I have seen it done in published books but I have also been told that is amateurish therefore don't do it. (Shoulder Shrug) I have no idea what editors think of it.
Question Four: This one I'm not sure about, I have seen it both ways in recently published books. I would have said use the broken up method but it could be one of those things that are a-changing. Or that editors will let slip by. But in either case it's probably best to do it the correct way which you probably know by now.
posted
Point 1 - I possess hundreds of books with numerical chapters. Chapter titles are most definitely optional.
Point 2 - "The question was--was Pawaqa taking the princess back to her lair or delivering her to someone else."
Strictly there is no need for any punctuation where you have the double dash, so I'd rewrite this without two "was"s in a row, like so:
"The question was whether Pawaqa was taking the princess back to her lair, or was delivering her to someone else."
Point 3 - to some extent it depends on what you want to emphasise, but I certainly would NOT leave out the question mark. Add an exclamation mark if you feel it's necessary.
Point 4 - the broken up version reads far, far better to me, particularly as it emphasises teh delay in his response. Conflating usually implies rapidity.
posted
Kinda why I left it alone. That, and the statement w made about not knowing what a colon felt like. I just wasn't going there. Posts: 365 | Registered: Aug 2010
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
W
