“Bait and Switch” (deconstruction): A “Criteria-Driven” Story from Square One

First… my apologies for being slow in getting this deconstruction up to full speed.  I hope to pick up the pace next week. I’ve been thinking about it — a lot — and one thing keeps bubbling to the surface as I juggle parts and plot point and protagonistic proclivities.  And that one thing, I’ve […]

Deconstructing “Bait and Switch”: The Double-Barbed Opening Hook

The second in a series of posts that expose and analyze the architecture of this novel. A little business first. Donna Lodge sent me a link to an interview with Kathryn Stockett (author of “The Help”), and it’s fascinating, scary and encouraging (writing often brings us a collision between those experiences).  “The Help” was rejected […]

Deconstructing “Bait and Switch”: Concept and Voice

(Quick note… check out the new posting on the Peer Review Page HERE, a novel partial by J Fairfield Perry.) From Notion to Idea to Story: An Author’s Personal Account Even though I’m deconstructing my own novel this time around, my approach won’t differ (much) from that taken with other deconstructions here on Storyfix.  That […]

Deconstruction of a Novel: “Bait and Switch”

“Bait and Switch” was published in 2004 by Signet (a Penguin-Putnam imprint) in 2004.  This is what it looked like:   It didn’t sell all that well, but that assessment is, of course, relative.  In today’s self-publishing market, 60,000 copies would be considered a home run.  But it wasn’t self-published (indeed, it was from a “Big-6” […]