Themes, Threads, Platforms: Axis of Ads

Putting your best props forward can get some readers interested in your story, as in letting it be known that your main character smokes a certain brand, or is addicted to marinated Omaha steaks on the grill, or drinks Miller Bock, etc., and so it goes.  Putting it out there can draw attention to your story. So never back off use of such brand names in your story, even if the bad guy is the one who likes to chug Pabst Blue Ribbon.

Even more attention-getting for your novel or story are the thematic issues, the threads you pull from beginning to end of tale, and your platform or platforms if you wish to call them as such.  To be honest, there is typically a major theme or platform *issue of some sort that is your chief thread, but more often than not in a novel, you will have sub-categories of theme.  Some novels can have manay threads being pulled at once.

Each such thematic issue, be it as simple as a love interest for your lead character or as complex as the human condtion...what the flesh is heir to, is of interest to readers. When we set out to describe our books on to synopsize the action, we typically concentrate on WHAT happens rather than the deeper questons. In most descripts we get the WHEN, that crucial bit about the time period. One way or another it is made clear. We're always treated to the WHO of the story--whose story is it anyway.  This is elemental for a book description that goes forth to entice readers into the setting, that other elemental: WHERE. So yes, all of these are crucial when discussing your book for the purpose of gaining readership. Let's recap:  Who, Where, When, What happens (plot in brief).  But there remains the other two journalistic questions:  Why?  and yes, How?

The why and the how of your story is going to deal with these threads, these themes your characters wrestle with.  Why should we care about the story?  Why should fictional characers care?  Why is it important?  Beyond why lies the How?  How could it be?  How could it happen?  How could we sit idlely by and allow it to happen?  How is it in our control, and how is it out of our control?

If karma plays a part in your story, can you use the term and the concept to entice people into reading?  Fate?  The inevitabilty of human interaction that leads to tragedy?  Tragedy and tragic failure and tragic characters - these bigger picture issues?  Perhaps we can't hope to cram them into the single paragraph or two required of a back flap on a book cover, but are there ways to utilize them in talking about our books to maximize reader curiosity that might lead to more purchases and thus more readers?

I have certainly not restrained myself from talking about the How and the Why in discussing my novels online whenever I find the opportunity to do so. I believe most readers are fascinated by the larger issues underpinning the dramatic and episodic elements of your novel.

It is for this reason that in discussing my Childen of Salem, for instance, on Twitter, Facebook, even Youtube, I am often asking the reader about their interest in a layered tale of human triumph as well as tragedy.  In my Titanic 2012, I speak of the curse on the ship, the plague, the tragic end which was planned at some point and no accident when men have their backs to the wall. I have no qualms about calling my Inpsector Alastair Ransom a tragic hero as he is precisely that, and his own powerful, strong character traits for which we ambivalently love him and hate him will be his undoing.

Of human bondage - loved it as a title but what about as a theme or platform? Heir to flesh, heir to failure and ultimately death.  When is death not with us? The heroic facing death heroically, stoically, or less than firmly?  Loss of a loved one?  Reactions of characters to tragic loss... all part and parcel of the bundled package tied round by the various threads of the novel.

Do we stay at the superficial level of the basic outline of story, lamely depicting four hundred pages in a matter of sentences that only state the obvious surface happenings of a who, a what, a when, and a where only to lob off the how and the why and the wherefores?

Okay, okay....there's little room for such in a synopsis the size of an envelope, I know. I even had to cut out the word 'ecumenical' before the word 'spy' in my descript of Children of Salem which might've helped with the how and the why of Jeremiah Wakely's going into the village to spy on his former neighbors, and why he held a grudge against them in the first place....but there's the limit of space and speed.

However in other venues, 'ecumenical' can and perhaps should be returned to the discussion as who else speaks of 'ecumenical spies' running about in his/her book but I?  It makes the book unique. It behooves me to find venues to speak in more detail about the various 'platforms', issues, threads, and themes found in the novel, to cast a wide, wide net across the landscape of the ebook world.  And so I do not hesitate to do blogs and speak of issues of interest to my featured characters in my various series of books or stand-alones.  Witchcraft may be a word that 'begets' readers to the novel, but Religious Intolerance may also be a word that 'begets' other readers to open the pages of the book, as might the practice of Excommunication and Shunning as in The Scarlet Letter.  The closeness of the book to Scarlet Letter, as Hawthorne's great grandfather figures as a character in my book and a quite flawed one at that. What of interrogation techniques in an American Colony called Massachusettes?  Or what was considered a jail aboard the Titanic in 1912?  What other cargo than passengers was aboard Titanic?

There can be an endless list of discussion points plucked from your novel which you can take to facebook, twitter, and other social media and chat groups such as a history forum.

Food for thought.  If it gives you ideas, so be it; then I have done my job as I see it!

Please do leave a comment or question!
Rob Walker
http://www.robertwalkerbooks.com/