If I say a book is “bread & butter,” it’s the highest compliment I can give it. Bread – yummy bread – whether it’s whole wheat or white, a sandwich, roll, or even a pancake – it’s the foundation, the vehicle for something even more delightful – butter. What can I say about butter? Who doesn’t love butter? It’s salty, it’s sweet, it’s creamy, and it’s heaven to the taste buds. It doesn’t matter if it is made out of milk, corn oil, or even soy; it’s butter!
Now that we all want bread and butter, back to books! The story is the bread: the plot, the characters, the dialogue, the foundation. The butter is the words: the language, the adjectives, the metaphors. The story provides the reader a reason to keep reading, while the words paint a picture for the reader to not only see the story, but to feel it, to taste the words.
Can a story exist by itself? Of course. Can words? Obviously. Would you eat a piece of bread by itself? Sure. It might be a little dry, but manageable. Would you eat a spoonful of butter by itself though? Probably not – too rich. It needs the bread – something to soak into, something to pile up on, something that allows it to glide right into your mouth. The butter of the story is more than just pretty words though; it’s the way those words are strung together. The true butter of a story is a perfectly constructed sentence that makes you close your eyes and holds your breath, taste the words on your tongue, while a picture materializes behind your eyes. That’s butter.
A great book or piece of writing has both: bread and butter. If an author can capture both, I will devour and savor every word until the end and then crave more. And that is my bread and butter theory on books.
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