The Secret Grove Pt. 5

This should be my last post about Secret Grove, at least for a while. This is where I compare my novel, “First Monday Park,” against the genre to determine how conventional my ideas are and whether it has traditional appeal.

Child Protagonists: Yes. My protagonists are ages 8 through 12, so according to trade wisdom my target audience is 6 to 10. However, the vocabulary is a bit much for 6 and I don’t believe the limit is 10. My hope is that anyone who has been ages 8 through 12 will be able to identify with the characters and enjoy the narrative.

Orphaned or Child of a Single Parent: No. My kids don’t get to blame lack of parents, or even lack of loving parents, for their problems. Critiques of “First Monday” from my English instructors so far have been something along the lines of, “Lovely prose, smart characters, but what is their problem? What will they have to overcome?” They want me to make the parents abusive, or some other obvious, ugly flaw. I would rather highlight more subtle, common problems that we acquire as children and carry into adulthood; self-identity, finding the balance of individuality and acceptance from peers, etc.

Entrance to a Fantastic World: Yes. I’m still trying to decide exactly how fantastic it is and how I am going to fill some potential plot holes in this regard, but they definitely go to another world and it is totes awesome.

Through a portal: Yes. The book spends a pretty long time on our side, actually. It’s one of the weaknesses of the narrative, but I don’ think it drags when you read it. Maybe I’m wrong.

Travel Buddies: Yep. There are no fewer than five. I’m writing in 3^rd person with close psychic distance and rotating character point of view, so every child is a protagonist one chapter and supporting cast in the remaining four. Other writers have strong objections to this idea. They don’t like the idea of switching characters at all, saying that every reader will inevitably pick a favorite and be disappointed that the entire narrative is not related from their point of view. Decide which character is the most interesting, they tell me, and make that one the protagonist.

I think this is bad advice. I’m attempting to have wide appeal, and selecting a protagonist means isolating a gender. This is not an insurmountable obstacle, of course. Girls love Harry Potter and guys root for Katniss Everdeen, but my reasoning goes beyond gender. I cannot pick the most interesting character because they are all interesting. They have their own challenges, and help one another through them using their unique strengths and personalities. My goal with multiple protagonists is to point out that we are all stars in our own narratives, and also co-stars, supporting cast, and “person sitting on bench” in other people’s narratives.

As for the high number of protagonists, well, that’s hard. I want mixed genders and I want friends, not just family. Eliminating one character would throw off the group dynamic, making it unlikely that any of the kids would be friends. Joyce Carol Oats commands young writers to “kill your darlings” when needed, and this may be one of those times, but I’m going to try to get away with it first.

Guides: Yes. Haven’t figured out exactly how many guides, or how long they stick around, but there will be some guiding happening.

The Ultimate Evil: Yes, but I want two villains, one obvious and one subtle. I’d rather not stray into spoiler territory just yet.

Prophecy: No. At this point in literature I think prophecies are a crutch. We need to come up with other ways for children to be impactful and relevant.

Allegory: Gosh, I hope not after last week’s harangue. Still, Lewis was both critical and one of the worst offenders, so I make no promises.

Time Discrepancies: No. Again, I was tough on this trope earlier so it would be inconsistent for me to use it. Note that I have not two but four loving parents, so how am I going to explain five missing children for an extended period? How indeed?

“First Monday Park” has six of ten conventions of the genre. It isn’t the definitive Secret Grove, neither would I venture to say it is the perfect one. However, I think I hit the most important elements and bypass those that are deemed necessary plot hole fillers.

Here I go to work on it some more.