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In looking at version 5, it might as well be version one, because the approach is exactly the same: someone we can neither see nor hear is talking about something for which we have no context:
quote:Beka hated waiting, as an apprentice blacksmith in the capital she should be working.
Here, we're told what someone we know nothing about is waiting for something unknown, and dislikes it. Hardly a "Hurray moment." She's doing this waiting in an unknown place, for unknown reasons.
We're told she's an apprentice blacksmith with an unknown amount of experience, in an unknown field. Does she work in a shop that makes nails, horseshoes, railing parts, or what? No way to know. She works in the capital, but capitol of what? Where are we in time and space? And she's how old? And, if she should be working, why isn't she?
You know all this. Everyone in the story knows. Shouldn't the reader know? She is, after all, our avatar. - - - - My point is that I could say pretty much the same thing about every version, because in every one of them, you the author, are explaining. The protagonist isn't living the scene. In fact, she never comes on stage. You're there, front and center, talking about her.
But if it's her story, and the camera is rolling, why don't I know what has her attention, and why? Why am I not learning what's going on, who she is as a person, and what part of the scene is meaningful to her. Why isn't she alive?
Suppose you began with her walking into the place. She, like you and I, would have a reason to look around and notice the things that matter to her, and her decision making. It might be where to sit, who to look for, or what to worry about. If I know what matters to her and why, plus her resources, I'll think about what she should do/say next, and care. Presented as a historical record of events, I have no reason to care. Presented without context, I have no reason to read.
You and I live our lives as a linked series of cause and effect. Something drives us to act. And what it is, and how important it is, determines what we do.
And having noticed, decided, and then acted, we know what we expect/hope to face next. And so the sequence repeats...and repeats... From waking till sleep.
We call that life. How can our protagonist seem alive if she lives in someone else's words on what she said and did? Why would we care if she succeeds or fails if we don't know what she defines as success?
Films seldom open with a narrator alone on stage explaining things, because the result may be something like, Plan 9 from Outer Space, possibly the worst film ever made. Why open a novel that way? Like film we have actors who are quite capable of carrying the story for us, and doing it a lot more realistically.
But in this, when she does act, we know what she does and says, but not her view of the situation, or even why she's moved to act. In version five, she knows who threw the metal because she knows who's there with her. But for story purpose, and dramatic purpose, you withhold that information because you're thinking visually, and talking about you visualize happening to her.
If you told it in her viewpoint, knowing who was tossing things at her, she would be speculating on why, and how she should react. In your version the man appears angry, and the reader is expected to think he is, so you can surprise them with him smiling. But in her viewpoint she knows he's kidding from the start. So you're being dishonest to the reader, and shaping events for appearance, not life. You're trying to "jazz up" the scene to add apparent drama where there is none, for effect. But your reader isn't stupid. They will see it, and react to it. So since you're going to make her life hell, why not let her live the story, as herself, and on her terms? You get to dictate the events she must react to. But stick to that, and make us know her and care for her because of the way she faces life, not how well she follows your script.
It's a very different approach, one that's emotion, not fact-based. It's character-centric, not author-centric. Do that and instead of being informed, the reader will be placed into that tiny slice of time in which she lives, and moved forward moment-by-moment, facing and resolving her problems, not being informed of them. And that's the difference between telling and showing—a simple word: viewpoint.
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