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If you’d like to test your editing chops, keep your eye on this area or this area! I’ll post the pages and queries a few days before a critique so you can see how your redline compares to mine.
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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 ilos, whose page is below:
Title: Kokuzek, the never land
Genre: Novel – Fiction based on a true story
250 wordsSonia grabbed her sheet music and hurried into the living room to tell Papa she was leaving. His small frame was sunk so deeply into his favorite leather armchair, she would have missed him in the faint light had she not seen the white newspaper on his lap.
She went to the window and drew open the drapes to let the June sun flood the room. “Good morning, Papa.”
He looked up. “Good morning, child. Leaving so early? Must be the rehearsal.” His cheeriness belied the tension in his face.
“What is it, Papa?”
He didn’t answer and didn’t smile.
She didn’t need worries today, not before her concert tonight. “I know. Ilyusha declined the invitation to my concert. But Liza will come, won’t she? I want my sister there; her husband can stay home if he wants.”
Papa’s expression didn’t change, which meant he must be disturbed about something else. She waited. Would he say what it was?
He lifted the newspaper and pointed to the front page. “The war is here.” His voice was gruff.
She winced. “War? Not in Latvia.”“The Germans are at our border.” He frowned and shook his head. “I don’t want to live through another war. The Great War was bad enough. But still, I can’t see how we’ll avoid being entangled in this one as well.”
Sonia hugged her music. The Germans would never attack Latvia and fight the Red Army, would they? Latvia wasn’t a small country anymore; it was part of the Soviet Union for a year now.
It can be an intriguing start with a momentous event looming on the horizon, but I worry this opening page falls into a classic trap: It’s far too focused on delivering information at the expense of storytelling essentials.
Where are we entirely beyond, presumably, a house in Latvia? What do our surroundings look like? What does Sonia need to do at this concert? What’s at stake for her? What exactly happens if it goes well or badly?
Instead of anchoring us within a story where there’s a character trying to achieve something specific and encountering obstacles, we have heavy-handed exposition-via-dialogue. There’s precious little in the way of character agency or uniqueness on display. We just learn that war is coming.
When authors try to smush exposition into dialogue, it invariably feels fake.
Read this dialogue out loud: “Ilyusha declined the invitation to my concert. But Liza will come, won’t she? I want my sister there; her husband can stay home if he wants.”
The author is very clearly talking to the reader here and placing words in the characters’ mouth to establish a who’s who. Why would Sonia need to tell her own father that Liza is her sister, and why would she refer to Ilyusha as “her husband?”
Trust that you can contextualize characters via the narrative voice when you need to. Dialogue in novels shouldn’t be weighed down with extraneous bits of exposition or physical desription.
Instead, consider giving your protagonist a mini-quest to give the story some momentum before the main plot kicks off. Try to organize scenes around characters trying to get something they want.
Here’s my redline:
Title: Kokuzek, the never land
Genre: Novel – Fiction based on a true story [This isn’t a genre]
250 wordsSonia grabbed her sheet music and hurried into the living room to tell Papa she was leaving [Missed opportunity to weave in more specificity about where she’s going, what she needs to do, and what’s at stake in this particular day]. His small frame was sunk so deeply into his favorite leather armchair, she would have missed him in the faint light had she not seen the
whitenewspaper on his lap.She went to the window and drew open the drapes to let the June sun flood the room. [Missed opportunity to weave in sharper physical description] “Good morning, Papa.” [Flat. Missed opportunity to weave in more voice/specificity]
He looked up. “Good morning, child. Leaving so early? Must be the rehearsal.” [Clunky smushing exposition into dialogue] His cheeriness belied the tension in his face.
“What is it, Papa?”
He didn’t answer and didn’t smile.
She didn’t need worries today, not before her concert tonight. [Missed opportunity to weave in more specific stakes]. “I know. Ilyusha declined the invitation to my concert. But Liza will come, won’t she? I want my sister there; her husband can stay home if he wants.” [Extremely clunky smushing exposition into dialogue. Feels very unnatural. Why wouldn’t her father know the various relations?]
Papa’s expression didn’t change, which meant he must be disturbed about something else.
She waited.Would he say what it was? [Why doesn’t she ask?]He lifted the newspaper and pointed to the front page. “The war is here.” His voice was gruff.
She winced. “War? Not in Latvia.”[Flat and aimless dialogue]“The Germans are at our border.
” He frowned and shook his head. “I don’t want to live through another war. TheGreat War was bad enough.But still,I can’t see how we’ll avoidbeing entangled inthis one as well.”Sonia hugged her music. The Germans would never attack Latvia and fight the Red Army, would they? Latvia wasn’t a small country anymore; it was part of the Soviet Union for a year now. [Not much of a unique voice woven into this]
Thanks again to ilos!
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Art: View of Riga by Rudolf Feyler
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