Be careful with the “VERBing, character(s) VERBED” sentence structure (page critique)

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Now then. Time for the Page Critique. First I’ll present the page without comment, then I’ll offer my thoughts and a redline. If you choose to offer your own thoughts, please be polite. We aim to be positive and helpful.

Random numbers were generated, and thanks to kcamp300, whose page is below.

Title: Power Failure
Genre: Memoir
First 250 words

Gathering at the base of the power pole on Fillmore Street, the evening rush-hour crowd looked up. The lineman dangled by a leather belt, head thrown back, arms splayed. Above him a canister-shaped electric transformer hung askew. His double-parked truck blocked the street. With power knocked out, electric trolleys stalled from the corner of Fillmore and Haight all the way back to San Francisco’s Marina District.

Vehicles took turns inching by the truck, honking, shooting around to avoid crashing into oncoming cars. A man brandishing a silver lunchbox toward the body, shouted, “He’s electrocuted!” A powdery faced woman shrieked, “He’s dead!” Sounds of sirens grew louder; the milling crowd went silent, listened.

The fire department’s hook-and-ladder truck got there first, followed by an ambulance and police squad car. The cops got out, directed traffic, cleared the way for a brown and tan boom truck. Linemen jingling pole-climbing gear jumped out of the back, pushed through the crowd, climbed pell-mell to the cross arm. A thumbs up told supervisors on the ground the lineman was alive. Using ropes and a sling, they lowered him to the sidewalk.

The Pacific Gas & Electric Company supervisors rushed forward; a stretcher lay on the ground, ambulance doors yawned wide open waiting to receive the victim. The lineman stood up, swayed, looked around at the crowd, batted away helping hands, refused to lie down. The men supporting him smelled liquor, rushed him to the backseat of a waiting company car. They took my father back to the PG&E yard and fired him.

I like that this memoir starts off with a very vivid image of a man dangling from a power pole in the Fillmore District, and there are some strong details here. I have just a few concerns:

While I like the reveal that the dangling lineman is the narrator’s father, I felt that it was executed a bit awkwardly in this opening. That reveal effectively changes the perspective from third person omniscient to first person, which can be very jarring for the reader, and it’s strange to me that the information is smushed into the last sentence of a paragraph rather than easing the reader in a bit more cleanly.

There are some good details, but it feels like key information kept being delivered belatedly and in a similarly smushed-in way. Rather than just cleanly introducing which precise intersection we’re at in San Francisco, that’s not revealed until the end of the first paragraph. The supervisors are only revealed to be from PG&E the second time they’re mentioned, rather than the first time. Err on the side of clear physical description that helps orient the reader the first time settings and characters are introduced.

Lastly, the memoir starts with a sentence structure that almost always results in a convoluted line. Much like the examples in this post on clearing clutter from verbs, it nearly always feels more active to replace “VERBing, character(s) VERBed” with “Characters VERBed and VERBed.”

So taking all of the above into account, I’d recommend changing:

Gathering at the base of the power pole on Fillmore Street, the evening rush-hour crowd looked up.

to

An evening rush hour crowd gathered at the base of the power pole on Fillmore and Haight Streets in San Francisco and looked up at a lineman dangling by a leather belt, head thrown back, arms splayed.

Here’s my redline:

Title: Power Failure
Genre: Memoir
First 250 words

An evening rush hour crowd gathered Gathering at the base of the power pole on Fillmore and Haight Streets in San Francisco [First establish the overall setting] the evening rush-hour crowd and looked up. at a The lineman dangled dangling by a leather belt, head thrown back, arms splayed. Above him a canister-shaped electric transformer hung askew. His double-parked truck blocked the street. With The power was knocked out, and electric trolleys were stalled from the corner of Fillmore and Haight all the way back to San Francisco’s the Marina District.

Vehicles took turns inching by the truck, honking, shooting around to avoid crashing into oncoming cars. A man brandishing brandished a silver lunchbox toward the body, and shouted, “He’s electrocuted!”

¶A powdery-faced woman shrieked, “He’s dead!”

Sounds of Sirens grew louder; The milling crowd went silent, listened.

The fire department’s hook-and-ladder truck got there first, followed by an ambulance and police squad car. The cops got out, directed traffic, cleared the way for a brown and tan boom truck. Linemen jingling pole-climbing gear jumped out of the back, pushed through the crowd, climbed pell-mell to the cross arm. One gave A a thumbs up told to the Pacific Gas & Electric Company supervisors on the ground that the lineman was alive. Using ropes and a sling, they lowered him to the sidewalk.

The Pacific Gas & Electric Company supervisors rushed forward;. A stretcher lay on the ground, ambulance doors yawned wide open waiting to receive the victim. The lineman stood up, swayed, looked around at the crowd, batted away helping hands, refused to lie down. The men supporting him smelled liquor, rushed him to the backseat of a waiting company car.

¶Theyat lineman was my father. took my father They took him back to the PG&E yard and fired him. [Very confusing and smushed-in-feeling to suddenly alter the perspective like this and reveal this is a) a first person narrative and b) that this is the narrator’s father. Guide the reader through this reveal in a clearer way]

Thanks again to kcamp300!

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Art: Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco by Colin Campbell Cooper