Verago

In my work-in-progress novel, Paradigm, I use jumps a lot to get rid of the boring parts that are really insignificant. (Such as a long journey to the next town, or a voyage across the sea...)

This allows my writing to flow better (I think.) and to keep the attention of its readers (I hope.).

I've read some derogatory remarks about using jumps frequently...
But because by story is mainly adventure/action/mystery, certain things need to be skipped.

Either way, I've become rather jump-friendly. So far, the book is 22 pages, single spaced, about 10,000 words. Without the jumps it'd probably be around 50 pages, and very boring.


I'm just wondering if it's okay to use jumps if it helps your story move along, or if publishers don't like them...Or if WF doesn't like them...


Thanks,
Ethanael/Verago

Destany

Hi, I'm new here and not an expert, but from a reader's perspective I can tell you that I appreciate jumps when, as you said, they leave out boring filler. But the filler doesn't have to be boring.
Who is your target audience? Have you considered leaving out the jumps and spicing up the filler with sideplots or foreshadowing?
Personally, I love to read for the sake of reading and unnecessary details make the story seem more real. But not only that, they can be entertaining even if they have nothing to do with the main plot. I don't approach a book as something to get through, and I don't like to skim or pass over simply to get through to the climax. I want to be entertained while I read, and if you focus on that, you can leave out the jumps and everyone would be satisfied.
That's just my opinion

Dan101

Somthing you could try to do, rather than doing just a regular old jump, could be to add another scene or somthing like that.

Lemme explain. If your characters, at the end of one chapter, are about to embark into horribly boring filler, then add a jump. But rather than picking up where it would leave off in the next chapter, try a transition in scenes. If there are other characters within the story, other than the ones on their journey, then write somthing about them and then, once done writing about those other characters, continue your heros' journey.

If that didnt make sense, its probably because I didnt sleep well...hahaha

__________________

Verago

Good ideas. Though, it might be hard for me to put in sub-plots as filler, because they're on a straight-forward journey to a certain place for their King. Two of them are quasi-brainwashed, so they don't really want to do anything else.

And an excellent idea, Dan; I actually did that between chapter two and chapter four.

Chapter Two: Arrives and begins training for mission.

Chapter Three: 15 years ago...Backstory that describes quite a few mysterious occurences.

Chapter Four: It's been five days since training began, ready to go on the mission; goes on the mission.

silverwriter

Jump away my friend! I do it all the time and everyone who reads my stuff likes the pacing and the deletion of the boring "the tree was tall and leafy" stuff. Jumping has always been a part of my writing style so if it's part of yours, have at it.

__________________

Ilan Bouchard

If the jumps are necessary, I don't think you have much choice. You might try filling the jumps with necessary dialogue. Rather than set a place/time to talk about something, such as a restaurant or something, just have them talk while they travel or something. Other than that and Dan's suggestion of switching to another character for a bit, I don't know what you can really do about it.
You might have to reshape your plot so there's less traveling, or, if it's necessary, make interesting things happen.

Or you could go into a montage. Whenever there's a day where they're traveling through the desert or whatnot, jump into a montage. As it's difficult to pinpoint how much time occurs during a montage, you can easily replace a skip with one of those.

And, finally, just pick up a book where there's a lot of traveling and see what the author does to remedy the jumps. The Alchemist, perhaps?

__________________
Ruthless comments encouraged!

Dan101

Yea, thats exactly the kind of thing I was suggesting ^_^.

I do that kind of thing often, mostly because my characters are widespread often times. Also, I write a lot of chapters and sections that are revolving around the evil characters aswell, so Im always transitioning between the two scenes of good and evil. Its kind of a fate thing, where the chapters keep transitioning, untill finally the two meet, and its kind of like fate if you know what I mean? ^_-

But yea, I find it to be very useful, cus I dont want to have to write about my main character running from one place to another each time he has to get somewhere important...lol

__________________

Verago

That really helped a lot; in Chapter Five, I'm going to have it from a different character's point of view, the antagonist of the main character, and the main character is actually trying to destroy the world...so I guess that makes Chapter Five's POV the protagonist's point of view.

lol.

Dan101

lol that sounds cool. I wanna check out what youre writing, it sounds like an interesting story ^_^.

Im glad I could help out at least a little, heheh.

__________________

Verago

Heh, I like to think so. ^_^
And you helped more than you realize.

RebelGoddess

I'd have to say that it depends.

In my thread on redundancy I had the same problem with skipping their long walks and sleeping every night.

As long as you vary the reader's "re-entry" into the story and make it clear what did (or didn't) occur during the jump, it should be okay.

Racheal

__________________
Writing is life.

Writers' block doesn't exist. It's actually called work avoidance procrastination.
-Jasper Fforde

Verago

Good advice...
I've been trying to do what you said, Racheal/RebelGoddess, with the re-entry, and it's working pretty well. Thanks.

Ilan: I don't really want to change any part of my plot...it's been building in my mind for four years, since I wrote my last book. I'll experiment with different things, and hope for the best. I like your idea with the montage, though. I'll try that next.

Thanks.
Ethanael.

suzakugaiden

Tolkein never jumped EVER in Lord of the Rings. Subsequently, I really prefered the movies.

Just make sure you're using jumps logically.

Verago

I'm trying to...And I really didn't like the books or the movies of LOTR.

Dan101

I liked the first and third. The second one had some cool battle scenes, but didnt catch my interest like the others.

I think jumping makes the story more interesting, honestly, assuming its done in the right way. I have jumping like a madman in my story, lol

__________________