I know that last month in my post on why a writer might want to hire a developmental editor I said I’d start with pacing, but instead I’m starting with a writing concept that I don’t see talked about much in writing books or webinars but which, if you understand it and get it right, has the power to instantly make your story feel more immediate and engaging to the reader—and that something is called narrative distance.
Narrative distance is related to the common (and good) advice to “show, don’t tell,” which is a note I consistently make in the margins of manuscripts I’m editing. In fact, it may be the key factor, the thing that will make the whole concept click for you.
I recently posted a writing prompt about roads in which I mentioned that I have lived by a number of busy roads and have therefore seen and heard a lot of accidents. (You can read that post here.) I want to illustrate what narrative distance is using one of those incidents.
What Happened to Sadie?
Growing up, every summer an old lady down the cul-de-sac named Mrs. Wagner had her three grandchildren visit her. Bobby, Mikey, and Missy(?) lived in Arizona. They were tall and tan and always wore sweatshirts in the evening because what felt hot to us Michiganders felt cold to them. As it got toward midsummer, my sister, Alison, and I would start to look down the road more often, maybe ride our bikes by Mrs. Wagner’s low brick ranch, looking for evidence that the grandchildren had come.
There was a feeling of rising anticipation because most of the other houses on the cul-de-sac were owned and operated by old people. The Moores, the Waits, the Lesperances, the Spauldings, the Wards, the Hewitts, the Straneys—all of their children were grown up and gone. The Trahans at the other end of the cul-de-sac had kids—two boys—but they were rich and had a pool and a very tall privacy fence and kept to themselves.
While these neighbors were usually nice to us (with the exception of the Waits, who once yelled at me from the porch for picking up sticks from the very edge of their property because I was “making a mess”) they were not great playmates. So when Alison or I caught a glimpse of one of the Wagner grandchildren on a bike, we were out the door and our parents wouldn’t see us again except for meals and bedtime for an entire week.
Now, before I go on to the rest of my story, I want to point out that everything I have put on the page thus far has been telling. Every single word of every single sentence. Were I setting this scene in fiction, I would do it very differently, but that’s a subject for another post, which we’ll get to by and by.
Anyway, once Bobby, Mikey, and Jenny(?) arrived, the real fun could begin. We wrote and put on plays. We made up new games. We carried out elaborate Toad Olympics events and ceremonies with unamused amphibian athletes. We doused a tennis ball in gasoline, lit it on fire, and played twilight roller hockey in the street. This is what children did when there were no cell phones and no internet. And except for one kid—a friend of one of the Trahan boys, who occasionally came out of their private backyard to play when the Wagner grandkids were visiting—lighting his shoe on fire and perhaps someone falling out of a tree, no one got too badly hurt.
No one, that is, except Sadie.
I was the first one of our group to meet Sadie. I was walking my dog, Sydney, around the very large block when another dog emerged from someone’s yard and began walking along with us. I was probably only 8 or 9 years old and I didn’t know what to do about this turn of events, but I liked animals and dogs in particular, and perhaps somewhere in the back of my mind I envisioned getting home with Sydney and this dog following us inside and then I would have two dogs, which is, of course, better than one dog.
In hindsight, I should have turned around and went up to the door of the house from whose yard the dog had appeared and asked them if their dog was loose on the street. Maybe I didn’t do this because, in my kid brain, I figured that if these people were irresponsible enough to lose a dog they didn’t deserve to have it and it would be better off as my pet. (Eventually, the dog I was walking at that very moment, as well as the two other dogs I have had in my adult life, would all wander off at one point or another and be returned by kind and thoughtful neighbors who were better people than I was at age 8 or 9.)
Regardless, I kept walking and the dog kept jauntily walking alongside. There were no sidewalks in this neighborhood, just asphalt roads with narrow gravel shoulders, then the yards began. I turned right down another road and the dog followed. And then we got to Pine Road, which was busier than the others I’d been on. I walked on the shoulder with my fluffy little white mutt and this taller, houndlike dog followed us there, catching up, moving slightly ahead, weaving back and forth in an undulating track, sometimes on the grass to my right, sometimes in the road itself. Like a wavelength illustration turned on its side.
And, of course, at the peak of one of these waves, the dog was hit by a car.
I saw one of its back legs get caught under the front passenger side tire, heard it cry out in surprise and pain (a sound I can never forget), locked eyes with it. The car barreled on. It didn’t stop. It didn’t even hesitate. And the dog limped off the road toward me.
I ran with Sydney through the bushes and to my house to get a grown-up because grown-ups know what to do in any situation. I breathlessly told one of my parents (probably my mom, but I don’t really remember) what had happened and rushed back out to grab the dog so we could get it help.
But the dog was gone.
I was devastated, wracked with guilt because if I hadn’t come along with my dog, that other dog might not have wandered out to the street. If I hadn’t kept walking, it wouldn’t have followed me. Why hadn’t I thought about the fact that Pine Road was so busy? Why hadn’t I turned around? Why hadn’t I knocked on that door? I had a part in all this, and now that poor injured dog was limping around somewhere, utterly confused and in terrible pain.
I felt sick. I kept seeing that dog getting hit by that car in my mind, over and over again, rehashing every bad decision (or nondecision) I had made along the way. I stayed inside, even though it was a beautiful summer day and the Wagner grandchildren were just down the street. I couldn’t play. I didn’t deserve to have fun.
I’m not sure how much longer it was before my older sister ran in and told me that they had found a dog. An injured dog. It was over in Mrs. Wagner’s yard. She ran to get me because I knew about dogs. She thought I would know what to do.
I rushed from my room and down the street and there it was, the dog I’d seen hit by a car. I told Alison, Bobby, Mikey, and Jessie(?) my story, then instructed them to get a bowl of water for the dog. I ran back to my house to get some dog treats and rawhide chews. Then I looked closely at the dog’s tags. There was no nametag, no phone number or address. But there was a license and a rabies vaccination tag. Maybe somehow we could contact the veterinarian who’d administered the vaccine or maybe Animal Control would be able to look up the license number and they could call the owner.
Remember, this is the late 1980s. There’s no Google. Pets were not microchipped. Still, Mrs. Wagner made it happen. With a string of random numbers and the yellow pages, somehow that woman found the owner—who called the brother who was dogsitting for them. As I think about it now, I don’t know how this all worked. Because if the dog’s owners were on vacation, how would the vet know where to reach them? Remember—no cell phones.
While all of this was going on, we kids talked about what we thought the dog’s name was or what we would call her. I said, “She looks like a Sadie.” When the negligent dogsitter arrived to pick her up and take her to the vet we asked what her name was.
I kid you not: it was Sadie.
And thus ended the saga of the dog who took an ill-fated walk with me that day. I can only assume that she healed and lived out the rest of her dog days under tighter security. And that that brother was never asked to dogsit again.
Great story. But what does any of this have to do with narrative distance???
Okay. Here’s where this intersects with writing, and with narrative distance specifically.
I want you to consider several views of the story I just told you. First, my perspective on the events described when I was seeing it firsthand, as a child watching a dog get hit by a car. Second, the perspective of my mom as I related events in a state of high anxiety and dragged her out to get directly involved immediately after the event. Third, the perspective of my sister and the the Wagner grandkids as I relayed the story to them down the cul-de-sac perhaps an hour or two after it happened and the dog had been found. Fourth, from your own perspective when I relayed the story to you some 35 years later.
The further away we get in time and distance from the actual event, the less immediacy and the more narrative distance.
Witnessing an event firsthand is more immediate than being told about it later, right? Now, while the story I told you above was hopefully interesting, I doubt many of you felt an adrenaline rush. I doubt you felt true fear, guilt, regret, or helplessness. I doubt you felt at a loss for what to do next. I doubt you felt much of anything beyond, “What a dumb child Erin was.” I don’t think I have to tell you that that is not the emotional involvement or response we want from our readers.
If we want readers to be highly engaged, we have to close the gap between them and the events being relayed in our stories.
So, how would I close the gap for you in this case? Well, I’d remove certain words right off the bat. Some words naturally increase narrative distance because they separate you from the immediate scene. I saw, she realized, they doubted, I wondered, I started thinking, he couldn’t allow himself to admit… All of these kinds of phrases add distance.
Here’s an example from the story I told you above:
I saw one of its back legs get caught under the front passenger side tire, [I] heard it cry out in surprise and pain…
What would happen if I rewrote this sentence without those italicized words?
One of its back legs got caught under the front passenger side tire and it cried out in surprise and pain…
Instantly, you are closer to the action, because you’re not watching me watch the event; you’re watching the event itself.
But I’m still telling you this story. We’ll talk more about showing in a later post, but since it is so tied to narrative distance, let’s look at an even more active and involved way to write this same information, drawing the reader in closer yet:
One moment, the dog was trotting happily down the hot roadbed beside me. In the next, the screech of rubber on asphalt rang out, comingled with an unearthly yowl as the dog’s leg was yanked beneath the tire.
In this example, not only is nothing is filtered through my eyes as the child who witnessed the event—putting you one step closer to the action—but I’ve also replaced the rather pedestrian and inactive “got caught under” with the much more visually interesting and active “was yanked beneath.” I’ve added a more specific sound that everyone has heard (the sound of a screeching tire) which immediately elicits an adrenaline bump when we hear it in real life. And I’ve juxtaposed that common and well-known sound with one I hope most people haven’t heard very often, that of an animal crying out in pain.
But I don’t use the word pain at all. I don’t tell you the thing that was felt. Instead, the narrative’s quick turn from trotting happily to being yanked under a car brings to mind the way we have already felt fear and confusion at a sudden dangerous turn we’ve experienced in real life. The writer is essentially borrowing the reader’s memory of pain or fear related to a car accident—whether experienced firsthand, witnessed, or even narrowly missed—and attaching it to our tendency to care for innocent animals in order to get the desired effect. The words on the page don’t so much elicit that reaction as remind the reader of a physical and emotional response they have already had.
But that really only works if we can put someone right in the action and not filter the experience through words that distance us from the event (I saw, I realized, etc.).
Another example. Let’s take a whole paragraph of telling you a story about something that happened 35 years ago and turn it into good storytelling.
Before:
I was the first one of our group to meet Sadie. I was walking my dog, Sydney, around the very large block when another dog emerged from someone’s yard and began walking along with us. I was probably only 8 or 9 years old and I didn’t know what to do about this turn of events, but I liked animals and dogs in particular, and perhaps somewhere in the back of my mind I envisioned getting home with Sydney and this dog following us inside and then I would have two dogs, which is, of course, better than one dog.
After:
I was the first one of our group to meet Sadie.
It was already hot by mid-morning when I parted the long white fur at Sydney’s throat and clicked the tan leash to her collar. Normally I walked her around the cul-de-sac, maybe tacking on the cul-de-sac just south, but I was feeling adventurous.
I headed north on Pine Road, keeping Sydney on a short leash on my right, hugging the gravel shoulder as cars zipped by on my left. It wasn’t the best place for a nine-year-old kid to walk a dog, but nine-year-old kids don’t always make the best decisions.
Traffic was lighter on Nebobish, and by the time we turned onto Orchard, any concern I’d had for car-related injury evaporated. If a car turned down this road, it would be driving slowly. Plenty of time to get back over to the side and let them by.
Lost in thought, I didn’t notice at first that a long-legged hound had joined me and my scruffy white mutt. I stopped and surveyed the houses around me. No kids in the yards, no adults washing a car or working on a project in a garage. Where had this animal come from? It had tags, so it belonged to someone.
Someone who had left a gate open or a door. Someone who hadn’t noticed that their pet was gone. Someone who was negligent and didn’t deserve to have a dog.
Sydney and I started walking again and the dog followed. Clearly it wanted to be with me. Clearly it could see that I would be a more suitable owner. Clearly my parents would see this as well.
I turned west on Charles Street, heading for Pine. Heading for home.
Analysis:
First off, the obvious. The showing in this case is longer than the telling. It isn’t always. But when you’re moving from a story that was summarized to a story that is unfolding before you as a narrative, it will almost always be longer. Because you’re setting a scene. And in this case, you’re also putting into place clues and warnings that trouble is coming.
Did anyone notice the foreshadowing of danger? It was hot, I was feeling adventurous, and the first leg of my walk was along Pine Road, a busy street with no sidewalk where I had to keep my dog on a short leash and make sure my body was between her and the cars whizzing down the street.
And where am I heading at the end? To that very road with an unleashed dog that isn’t mine and would be unlikely to obey any commands I might give it. My guard is down because I’m on a street with no traffic and a low speed limit. On top of that, it’s a hound, and if you know anything about that group of dogs you know that they kind of do whatever they want to do and they tend to zigzag around as they track smells.
So in the narrative version, I’m setting everyone up for trouble. I’m allowing the reader to start anticipating what might come next. Already the early stages of fear will be creeping in—the feeling that we know what bad might happen but we hope that maybe the writer is just setting us up for a fake-out. When we get to the actual accident, we’re already primed to feel the stuff the writer wants us to feel.
But the minute we add words that distance us—I didn’t know what to do or In my mind I envisioned—we’re stuck in someone’s head rather than in the action.
Readers don’t want to read about someone thinking about what they are doing. They want to be the person doing it. So get out of your character’s head and think of your reader being in there, seeing everything firsthand instead of secondhand.
This is even easier to do in third person POV than in first person, which is more naturally inside the character’s head.
Instead of this:
She realized that if she was ever going to get over seeing that dog get hit by that car, she’d have to find the dog and make sure it was going to be okay.
Try writing this:
If she was ever going to get over that dog getting hit by that car, she’d have to find it and make sure it was going to be okay.
Get rid of her realizing it. The rest of the sentence is what she realized, so the reader knows when they read that that the character is realizing it.
Get rid of her seeing the accident. The accident happened and it’s what she saw, not the act of seeing it, that she needs to get over.
There are other ways you can shorten this sentence and make it more active, immediate, and evocative. But just getting rid of those two distancing words helps tremendously.
Once you start looking for things like this in your manuscript, you’ll see them everywhere. Try doing a search for a word like realized. I’m betting that in most cases you can chop that part out of the sentence and it will still say the same thing but in a more immediate, involve-the-reader-in-the-action sort of way. Same thing with I saw and he looked. A constant offender? Sentences like this:
She looked out the window and saw that the landscaper had planted the crabapple tree in the wrong place.
She looked and she saw? No way! That’s crazy!
Come on, now. Why can’t the sentence be just…
The landscaper had planted the crabapple tree in the wrong place.
Or if she must be looking out a window…
Through the window she could see that the landscaper had planted the crabapple tree in the wrong place.
Or perhaps this:
She glanced out the window and stopped herself from swearing in front of her children. The landscaper had planted the crabapple tree in the wrong place.
She not just seeing it then; she’s reacting to it in a way that tells us something about her character. She wants to swear because she’s so annoyed. But she restrains herself in front of her kids. That last pair of sentences works so much harder than the first one, doesn’t it? It allows the reader to feel her exasperation.
In a first draft you might be tempted to include the “positive” side of the information (that she wanted to swear but stopped herself). But in revision, that’s the sort of thing that should be removed. The “negative” action of stopping herself from doing something implies the “positive” action of wanting to do it or almost doing it. All you need is the negative in this case.
I hope that the examples I’ve given in this post help illustrate the concept of closing the distance between the reader and the action in the book. It’s all about removing the words that put us just in a character’s head instead of in a character’s immediate surroundings.
Getting narrative distance right will help you see where you could be showing rather than telling. It also removes needless words that bulk up a manuscript and slow the pacing. So it really helps you solve two common problems at once.
What do you think? Have you ever considered this particular aspect of storytelling before? Is this something you have felt while reading or writing but couldn’t describe? Has an editor pointed this out in your work?
I’d love to hear from you! Join in the discussion in the comments! And if you know a writer who might benefit from this post, please share it with them!