The Oxford Dictionary of literary terms defines narration as the process of relating a series of events. narration is the slowest pace of the first four writing modes, sometimes used in scenes to temporarily slow the pace from dramatic action. While exploring the details of important information the reader needs to know. It's also used in sequels where the viewpoint character reviews what's happened. Typically, characters in SQL go through four steps. First, an emotional reaction to what's happened.
Second, a quandary about how to handle this new situation. Third, reaching a decision and fourth, taking the first small step or large step towards action, forming a bridge to the next scene. One thing to watch out for when using narration is not to get too wordy and try to keep it interesting to your reader. I'll be using the opening paragraph so the touch of love as an example of narration. The book opens in sequel with my hero Scott as narrator here's the passage. By the time he got to Queen Charlotte city, Scott thoroughly regretted his decision to take the ferry, he could have flown.
He realized by now that he should have taken the jet from Vancouver to the Queen Charlotte islands. Instead, he had taken one ferry to Vancouver Island and another to Queen Charlotte, thinking that it would be better for the baby. That was before he discovered that Robin Scott Alexander was subject to violent attacks of seasickness. Incredible that he and this baby could share blood, yet take to the sea so differently. Sitting in the aft passenger lounge Scott crooned the baby Robin howl back at him. Scott made rocking motions with his arms in hopes of enticing the unhappy infant into silence, perhaps even into sleep.
During all his own years at sea, Scott had secretly believe that seasickness was psychological a physical symptom of fear. Yet here he was saddled with a two month old bundle of screaming whimpering agonies, and a 26 hour ferry trip psychological. He had always tried to be patient with a seasick crew members, but he vowed in future to be more sympathetic. My goal when I wrote this passage was to make the reader curious about my hero, my setting and his relationship with the baby in his arms. I started in narrative mode because I wanted to give the reader insight into my viewpoint character. He's the hero after all, and I wanted to give my reader information about the situation and the setting as well.
For more about narrative mode, I highly recommend jack becomes book writing and selling your novel. In the next video, we'll look at the description mode of discourse. Thanks for watching.