Experiment in reading aloud
Audio waves
In my last blog post, I said I was considering reading my draft young adult novel to my teenage sons – and paying them for their feedback.
I promised I’d report back on how this experiment was going.
Well, it’s going. And that alone is huge.
As I explained in my last post, my boys no longer enjoy being read to. They’re teenagers. They’d rather be doing almost anything — sleeping, playing video games, getting their teeth cleaned — than listen to me read.
So I offered to pay them, quite a lot, I might add. (No money has changed hands, yet. More on that later).
The experiment started about a month ago. To drum up interest where there was none, I created a poster announcing nightly readings of The Leaving Year, my coming-of-age novel about a teenage girl who searches for the truth about her lost fisherman father. I was sure to mention that refreshments (cookies and tea) would be served.
I put copies of the poster in places where the boys were sure to see them, including the refrigerator door and the wall behind the toilet.
Charlie, my 16-year-old, had questions: Where would this reading be? (In our living room); Who was coming? (Hopefully, you, Dad, Casey and the dog, if he chooses); What kind of cookies? (Chocolate and ginger).
At the appointed time, I set out the all-important refreshments, played soothing music that evoked the sea (There’s No Place Like Ohm) and lit candles.
It didn’t occur to me that all this relaxation might put them to sleep. In retrospect, I think it was a brilliant way to test the power of my words.
I read the first chapter. They listened and munched on cookies. They didn’t fall asleep, though my husband, Mark, couldn’t stop yawning. He’d had a rough day.
When I was done, they gave me conflicting advice. Charlie thought there was too much information about time and place – world-building — though he didn’t use the term. Casey disagreed. He liked it.
Mark thought I needed more details, including the call letters of a radio station he remembered from his youth. (My novel is set in the late 1960s in a fishing/lumber town based on Anacortes, where he grew up.)
I took Charlie’s advice and cut some superfluous detail as well as some repetition I had noticed. All in all, it was an hour well spent.
The second chapter went well, too. Based in part on their feedback, I fixed a confusing scene and pared down areas where I sensed my audience was drifting.
For the record: reading aloud is the best technique I know for finding awkward sentences, over-used words and stilted dialogue. If your tongue stumbles over something, that’s a good sign it needs to be reworded. It can also mean the reader is distracted by the dog trying to eat the cookies off the table.
Anyway . . . fast forward. I’ve read seven chapters so far. The boys like some better than others, but the good news is, they’re not bored. They want me to keep going, so long as I continue to supply baked goods.
Now about the money. Yes, I will deliver on that promise, though I did tell Casey I’d rather call it a birthday present than a bribe. He just turned 18. The younger one wants money too, of course, but he has to show his value as a listener first.
Speaking of which, I know I’d get more detailed and sophisticated feedback from a writers’ group. But I’m not writing this novel for other writers. I’m writing it for young adults between the ages of 12 and 18. Casey and Charlie aren’t enthusiastic readers, but I’m guessing they’re pretty typical, so their reactions are valid.
Sure, I’m getting some silly suggestions (Charlie wants me to work in an alien abduction). I’m getting grunts and nods in place of actual words, or the all-purpose “it sucks” (Charlie trying to get a rise out of me).
It’s all good. At least they’re coming to the table. Okay, they’re coming to the table when they’re not:
- Too busy with friends;
- Too tired;
- Too crabby
- Too (pick an excuse)
Turns out my plan for nightly readings didn’t take into account how difficult it can be for a family to sit down together for an hour or less. That said, Mark thinks these sessions have been good for family bonding. We’re in the same room, interacting, not split off and staring into our screens.
It’s been good for me as a writer, too. Seeing my sons’ engagement and hearing my words out loud has been tremendously validating. The novel is sounding better than I thought it would. And I get the sense that my boys are pleasantly surprised. After all those months and years of unpaid toil and their demands that I “get a real job,” they’re possibly realizing that I was in fact working, not just playing online Solitaire and word games behind my closed office door.
Chapter 8 is tonight. Will it be the lemon cookies or the macadamia nut/white chocolate?