In The Bestseller Code, Jodie Archer and Matthew Jockers, who have backgrounds in publishing and text-mining, worked together to create an algorithm that aims to identify novels that will become bestsellers. Each chapter of the book cracks open a bit more of the code, from character, to topics and the emotional rhythms that work in fiction. Today, we’re going to look at some aspects of style that could improve your chances of hitting the bestseller lists.
Go easy on adjectives and adverbs. Decorate your nouns and verbs sparingly and with caution. In other words, no Christmas tree sentences! Stick with the simple pine tree in its natural state. Readers don’t want “Clive observed that the elegant and beautiful Josie Matthews was sitting in her brown wingback armchair, typing carefully while humming prettily to herself.” Instead, try “Josie sat typing, humming an old tune. Her beauty was not lost on Clive.”
Readers hate an exclamation point if it really isn’t necessary. Exclamation points kill nuances in tone and can turn a tense action scene into melodrama. Not! Everything! Need! Go! Bump! And as for the irritating trend for double or triple exclamation points!!!—please, never, ever do it. The triple exclamation turns up way too often in self-published manuscripts. Remember, this is fiction, not a text to your BFF. Save the exclamation point for the rare moment you want to show volume or surprise or that something borderline in tone is indeed intended to be funny and not critical. Sometimes an exclamation point can turn a potentially cold and sarcastic remark into a more friendly and smiling comment.
Make sentences active, not passive. Why? Active sentences make active characters. Feel your response to the difference between these two characters called John. The first John is passive, in attitude and language. “John was sitting at the bar. He was given a drink by the bartender, and he was approached by a lady in a red dress. The thought struck him that he might have a chance to date her, but he waited to see.” Is John the sexy hero of a bestselling romance novel? Unlikely. Who wants to burn their way through 300 pages about a passive guy who passively lets life happen? Passivity makes for a low-energy scene. Then there’s the other John, going to a bar across the road. He does his verbs rather than having them done to him. “John pulled open the door of All Bar One, made his way through the crowd, and called to the bartender to pour him a double scotch. The lady on the barstool next to him was stunning. “That’s an amazing red dress,” he said. “Can I buy you a drink?” Readers respond to characters who are in control and to authors who are in control of the active versus the passive voice.
The ellipsis, used well, is your friend. Let your reader do some of the work. And let the ellipsis create your tone. “He was wearing that tuxedo and a six o’clock shadow. Holy moly…” Here, your reader is going to smile along with the narrator. Don’t we know, just from the pause for breath in the ellipsis that this man is very attractive to the narrator? Don’t we smile along with her, and enjoy sharing her informal reaction “Holy moly”? It creates an intimacy between the reader and the narrator to write in this way, and the “He” (perhaps John from the bar), is unaware of the effect he’s had. Compare it to: “He was wearing that tuxedo and a six o’clock shadow. She was very attracted to this look.” While the two versions communicate almost the same basic information to the reader, the first has given them some more style and tone and has likely given the reader a smile. This is the right way to use an ellipsis, but keep it sparing. It needn’t happen every page, or even every ten pages. But when it does, do it for tone and not to avoid finding the words to tell the reader something important.
Drop the formality. Bestselling writers often have journalism in their backgrounds. They know punchy prose and colloquial language. Contractions are just fine for creating a bestselling voice—“can’t” and “isn’t” sound more natural than “can not” and “is not.” And informal expressions like “okay,” and even “ugh,” are more common in bestselling books than in books that don’t sell well. Fiction is one place where you definitely want your writing to reflect how people really speak instead of how they should speak or would speak if they were being proper.
Make your opening sentence sing. It has to work hard in simple language. Here are a few examples from the book. Notice they all create an emotional response, or a hook, but none needs elaborate language or a long, complex sentence. All these opening lines come from novels that hit the New York Times bestseller list. “The secret is how to die.” (Dan Brown, The Lost Symbol.) “Who wouldn’t be skeptical when a man claimed to have spent an entire weekend with God, no less?” (William Young, The Shack). “They shoot the white girl first.” (Toni Morrison, Paradise).
If you found these tips from The Bestseller Code helpful, you can read more about the secrets of successful style in the chapter called “The Debutantes, or, Why Every Comma Matters.” Plus, enter for a chance to have your manuscript critiqued by Jodie and Matthew!
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