The Warehouse Test

“You don’t write about the horrors of war. No. You write about a kid’s burnt socks lying in the road.” 
― Richard Price

As we discussed in the last post, so much of writing comes down to details. Which details, where, why now, how to work them in. So let’s talk about “The Warehouse Test”, and if anyone else tries to tell you they came up with that fancy and memorable name, please set them straight. As you can find out from asking many of my authors, that pithy name is MINE!

So what do I mean by the Warehouse Test? Simply this: pretend your book is printed out (or if you’re a hands-on reviser maybe it already is because you go after things with a red pen). Now pretend that one scene, or one page, or one conversation, or maybe even one paragraph, gets separated from the book. Maybe that one conversation is on its own page and it fluttered down to the floor. Now pretend your mother picked it up and read it. (Or, you know, not your mother if you write THAT sort of book.)

And here’s the test part: if that were to happen, would your mother know where that scene was taking place?

Let’s use this conversation as a demo:

“Hey, did you go to the store today?” Theo asked.
Jane sighed. “Of course I didn’t. Didn’t you hear about my day? Or weren’t you listening?”
Theo rolled his eyes. “You always say I don’t listen, but you just weren’t clear if you went straight home after work.” 

Pretend you picked up just this conversation off of the floor. Would you know where this conversation was taking place? And the answer is, emphatically, NO. It could be happening in a warehouse (hence the name!). It could be happening at the bottom of the ocean. It could be happening in the backyard. Or it could just be a phone call with an omniscient narrator. The readers just don’t know. 

But what if I change the conversation to this?

“Hey,” Theo said, dumping his lunch box and keys on the counter. “Did you go to the store today?”
Jane put her phone down on the kitchen table to glare at him. “Of course I didn’t. Didn’t you hear about my day? Or weren’t you listening?” She shoved the chair back angrily and stood up.
Theo eyed her nervously before turning and opening the fridge. “You always say I don’t listen, but you just weren’t clear if you went straight home after work.” 

In this second version, the readers know exactly where this conversation is happening, and the details here that connect the characters to the setting also help set the emotion. Often what tends to happen in novels, especially in first drafts, is authors will preface conversations (for example) by telling the readers where the characters are, and then just leave the characters and the readers there, assuming the readers will remember. But the readers want and need more like that second conversation. This is a place to use some extra words so that they stay engaged.

After all, and I’ll drum this drum all day, writing is different from all other mediums. Art we see, music we hear, movies we watch. But the only visual component in most novels is the actual printed words on the page, so authors need to work extra hard to fill in the gaps. And seeing is the gap. The readers need to SEE what’s on the page. They need to read the words and be able to see the scene in front of them. And if they can’t see it, it stops being as real to them. And that brings us straight back to the quote at the top of the essay.