Between them, Jane Eastgate and Sally Cummings, the directors of Editorial Consultants Ltd, have clocked up more years than the RNA is celebrating this year!  With such a wealth of experience behind them, they are well qualified to help authors achieve the all-important X-factor.

The key to success, they stressed, is a good story. 

With a background in the Readers’ Digest and women’s magazines, they are used to breaking down stories into structure, pace, sub-plots and characters, and they approached the topic of how to aim for the X-factor by considering the ingredients vital in any good story.

The first thing that the reader sees is the title of the book.  This is the hook for the book and it must not deter the reader.

Too much back story and detail in the first chapter breaks the flow of the story.  The writer should trust the reader. Essential back story could be trickled in – not delivered in one great chunk.

The writer should let his/her own voice come through.  This won’t happen if he/she tries to imitate anyone else.

Many invaluable points were made about the characters.  It isn’t essential for your readers to like or empathise with your characters, but they have to be interested in them. And peripheral characters, too, are important.  The writer should keep track of them, and not hesitate to remind readers about them, if necessary. 

The dialogue given to a character should fit that particular character and be written in a different tone from the narrative.  This led Jane and Sally into the area of dialogue, and they suggested that the writer treat dialogue as if it were a scene – perhaps reading it aloud with the help of a friend. 
Writing dialect makes a book difficult to read, and should be avoided where possible.  Speech tags, for example, could indicate the use of a dialect.  Where it’s essential to use dialect, the writer should try to keep it to a lesser character.

It should be clear who is speaking at all times, and writers should try to avoid using too many adverbs - the dialogue itself should contain the necessary information.

The final point on dialogue was that the dialogue should not be allowed to meander aimlessly on – there should be a narrative purpose behind every part of it.

Sally and Jane then discussed the matter of presentation.  A typescript should be perfect before it is sent out.  Bad grammar and punctuation burst the bubble of a story, and the same is true of inconsistent punctuation.

At the heart of a good story is the plot.  The plot should be strong enough to sustain the length of the novel, and should be well researched and free from anachronisms.

The lively and interesting talk was concluded with Jane and Sally stressing that there is no such thing as a right or wrong way to write – write what comes from the heart. The X-Factor is you, the writer.  Put everything you can into what you’re doing and be as good as you can be!

Written by Liz Harris