Learn Writing with Uncle Jim, Volume 1

[James D Macdonald]

I promised you The Perfect Cover Letter:

Salvatore Luchese
Cell Block B
2nd Tier, #34
Ft. Leavenworth Federal Prison
Ft. Leavenworth, KS 66027

(913) 123-4567


Dear [NAMEOFEDITORSPELLEDRIGHT],

Enclosed please find the first three chapters and an outline for my 120,000 word mystery novel, Mafia Wedding.

My previous works include "Pushing Up Daisys" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, June 2001, nominated for an Edgar, 2002), and "Sleeps with the Fishes," (Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, September, 2002, reprinted in Year's Best Mystery Stories, 2002, Graham, ed., March 2003).

I am currently serving seven-to-ten for racketeering in Ft. Leavenworth Federal Prison.

This is a disposable manuscript.

Sincerely,

Salvatore "Sally the Writer" Luchese

encl: SASE


===========================================

Notes:

First NAME OF EDITOR SPELLED RIGHT. (If you can't do this, perhaps you need a new hobby.)

Second: Very briefly: length, genre, and title.

Third: Any pertinent credits. Only the most recent and most prestigious. A good sale ten years ago means that you haven't sold anything since. A bunch of 1/4 cent-a-word recently means that you aren't selling. Don't even bother mentioning self-published or e-publications unless you sold enough on your own to hit the Times Bestseller List. If all you have is one or two lower-tier mags, and they're recent, then you might list them. If you've got eight or ten lower-tier mags and they stretch back over three or four years ... better to leave the impression that you're unpublished rather than brand the Scarlet L of Loser on your forehead.

Fourth: Any special qualifications you may have for writing this book.

Fifth: Any other notes (disposable manuscript).

Your name.

INCLUDE AN SASE.

The primary purpose of a cover letter is to give the editor something with your name, address, and phone number on it that will fit in a file cabinet. The secondary purpose is to give the editor somewhere to put her coffee cup without putting a brown ring on your manuscript.

Be brief, be professional, and SPELL THE EDITOR'S NAME RIGHT.

[Illandur Stormcrow]

OK Jim,

I have a question. How much is too much?

I wrote the original outline for "Bloodborn", the first book of my series, with a single storyline that followed the protagonist alone from start to finish. It had little in the way of tension or cliffhangers. It also did not really follow the ultimate antagonist, and he needed to be introduced to add an urgency to the reader.

I love when an author shows the reader a danger to the protagonist, but leaves the character in the dark. I get all tense, sometimes even yelling at the book, "No no! Don't go in there! They are waiting for you!!!!"

I revised the outline and it went from 19 to 28 chapters.

I began writing.

In the course of writing, another storyline has emerged. It was born from the logical progression of events and was something that I really didn't imagine when I began. Regardless, its a great story in itself. It is directly relative to the protagonist's plot and will intersect with the protag's plot line from time to time throughout the series.

So now I have three storylines in this book. The thing is, there are going to be a lot more. As the series progresses, more and more sub-plots are planed. I do definitely have a plan to draw it all back together for the ultimate climax, and for each storyline I have a either a climax planned or a merger with another storyline.

But it is turning out to be a real juggling act to keep the progression natural.

Any suggestions for making sure that I am not overdoing it?

[James D Macdonald]

Make sure all the major plot threads you have in this book get tied up in this book (or at least come to a satisfying stopping point).

Other than that, if there's too much plot in your book your editor will tell you.

Too much plot and too many neat things happening are not a problem.

[AJSearle]

I feel a little better after reading what you've written about coverletters. It seemed to take me longer to write the coverletter for my novel than the novel itself and I was still worried even after I sent the query off at the beginning of this month.

But I went with short, sweet, to the point, and no added frills. I really wanted the coverletter to be one page. I'd heard two pages can be better. But then do I really want the editor spending all their time reading the coverletter when they could already be reading the sample chapters I sent?

Anyway, thanks for this section. I think I made the right decision now.

AJ

[Paul W West]

That's great for a cover letter. I wouldn't have done much more myself. However, the bigger question is, how do you write a perfect query letter? That one seems to have more people stumped than anything else. Any suggestions there?

[AJSearle]

I wrote a paragraph about what the story was (no more because I sent a synopsis), a paragraph about my qualifications, and a paragraph about my familiarity with the publisher (which I am)...in that order. What this is, who I am, and why I'm sending it to you. Those are the only things I could think of that an editor might want to know right off before reading the chapters.

AJ

[Dancre]

ok, uncle jim, i haven't published anything. i've read that newbies shouldn't tell the publisher/ agent that this is their first novel. what do you say?
kim

[James D Macdonald]

I have a question. How much is too much?

It's too much when you've allowed the outline to suck up the joy of writing the novel.

It's too much when you substitute writing the outline for writing the novel.

Outlining does not count against your two hours a day. You must do two hours of writing in addition to any time you spend outlining.

[James D Macdonald]

For the query letter (I'm talking about fiction here -- non-fiction is a whole nother area) substitute the words "May I send you" for "Enclosed please find."

If you have no prior publishing credits just omit the paragraph beginning "My previous published works include...." Silence is golden.

Remember that the work stands on its own. The reader in the bookstore won't see your brilliant letter. All that counts is the book.

Do not obsess over cover letters.

[qatz]

Having returned from my "trip" now, I'd like to catch up a bit.

Thank you for that software suggestion, Jim. It looks promising. So far I have not been able to download it from that site but I'll get it one way or another after a while.

If you have another example of a flowchart that will be interesting. I have worked with them before in other contexts, so I catch your drift or think I do.

I take your point about beta readers. Having to re-write the whole thing and needing to contend with a large but stubborn new plot that popped up not long before my East African soujourn, it will be quite a while of hard work for me to produce a finished draft.

With the proviso set out below, I'll bite the bullet on that; I know you're right. This tiger may be worth it, or at least so I hope. I am too old to think I personally am God's great gift to editors anymore, but we'll see if this one makes the grade.

Not that it's a current issue, but if this story works out it will go to a traditional publisher, as you surmise. In that vein, can I even think about the possibility of an advance next summer if all goes well? Or do I just get the dang thing done and go from there? I tried that with the second-to-last one, finishing the first draft that is, and nearly ate my lunch when it didn't go anywhere. There was so much promise there, but it had to remain unrealized due to circumstances not important here.

I can say flatly that you've been a wonderful help. Thank you for your time, and best of the season. :hat

[James D Macdonald]

Hey, qatz -- best of the season to you, too.

Writing is a performing art. We're part of the entertainment industry. As such -- the audience doesn't give us an "A" for effort. They're out there ready to throw rotten tomatoes, no matter if our heart is in the right place.

This is a demanding art; it's difficult. I won't fib to you. If writing were easy, everyone would be doing it.

<HR>

Now, y'all know that as artists we're parasites, right? If there weren't a real world where would we be? We live in the real world without contributing to it. And what we do, when times are hard, folks can do without better than they can do without food and fuel.

Now, about parasitism: y'all know what a "parasite" is, right? It's a Greek word, meaning "beside the food." Originally parasites were poets who would crash rich guys' parties, and eat all they could, and provide entertainment with their poetry and songs and witty conversation. Until they were thrown out.

So now we all know where we stand in the Great World, right?

<hr>
Merry Christmas, happy holidays, to all.

[LiamJackson]

Ah, but without the "parasitic" bard/poet, most of the worlds great deeds, both evil and benevolent, would have gone the way of sandcastles.

It's true that were I starving, I would gladly trade War and Peace for a cheeseburger. It's equally true that had I a full stomach and nothing to feed my spirit, I'd be as good as dead.

Poets, bards and writers bring rainbow hues to a black and white existence. I am proud to aspire to your ranks.

[qatz]

LJ, thank you for your thoughts!

I was wandering through Eugene one summer day years back when I stumbled onto Ken Kesey about to address a crowd of folks out behind the university athletic complex. "Helllooooo poets!" he shouted. No explanation. Hand to ear, he waited for the response, of which there was basically none. A few rowdy sorts yelled back, "Hello!" That not being what he wanted, again he called out, "Hellloooooo poets!" ... and waited. This kept on until the crowd finally got the idea and yelled back "Hellloooo poet!" "Now, you may be wondering why I insist on your calling me a poet when you know and I know I'm a writer, but not necessarily of poems," he continued. "It's the same reason I'm addressing you as poets ..." And he went on to explain that we all tap into the great well of poetry when we light that creative fire in our hearts that JFK spoke of as being the one force that can truly save the world, our idealism and compassion for others. That is our higher self, and we all can -- and should -- greet each other accordingly. He thought of it as a revolutionary act. ... So I tip my hat to you, poet.

Oh yes, and James, you'll be glad to note that I just blatantly stole your thoughts on parasitism to finish my Christmas story. Something about the highest form of praise. :hat

[James D Macdonald]

Another thought on parasitism in art: We feed off reality. Without reality there could be no art. Therefore it behooves us to be experts on reality.

Until we've become masters of this world we won't be able to make worlds of our own.

More on Realism later.

[Illandur Stormcrow]

I don't generally spend a lot of time outlining on a regular basis Jim. That is to say I don't work on my outlines daily, though I do use an outline and find them to be invaluble.

I created a really great AD&D scenario when I was in my early 20's and I have been trying to write it as a book ever since. I have about a 20,000 word attempt at beginning the project that I started and ditched about 5 years ago. It was flat and plot driven and really had no depth or character development. I found as I read over it that I really didn't care much about the characters, and I had no clue where the story was going or why. I didn't write for some time after giving up on that project. There were earlier works, a horrible novel I tried to write in my teens, some short stories (only one completed), and lots and lots of AD&D scenarios. However nothing ever really stuck with me and I never really did much with it.

About three to four months ago I sat down and wrote about 15 pages of history, character description and notes to start the series. I used the original story and world that was based on my AD&D campaign only VERY loosely (this is not a cookie cutter adventure story). There will be no elves or dwarfs wandering my world, though there is a dragon or two. I have ripped out anything that could remotely resemble the run of the mill stock fantasy world. This story is about the people, more importantly, it is about a redemption and family.

Anyway after I had the history and profiles I wrote another twenty pages or so of very skeletal outline for the first two books and part of the third. I was itching to get started so at that point I decided I had enough to work with and began writing.

Of course the outline wasn't complete by a longshot. After I had finished chapter two I realized that I needed to add a lot more tension to the storyline. I found ways to break things up like dividing up the main characters, placing one set in minor jeopardy and then shifting focus to another.

It was then that the original outline went from 19 to 28 chapters. Now that this new storyline emerged, I was forced to re-evaluate and adjust. Now the outline is for 37 chapters. Weird how it keeps growing by nine...

The whole point of mentioning all this is to say I generally don't spend hours a day outlining. I have only one project currently and the outline generally remains fairly static. I spent five hours on it yesterday, but that was because I needed to, and I only spent an hour working on chapter eight. So sue me. :P

I write as much as I can, when I can. Some day when I make my living writing, I will definitely consider working within guidelines that incorporate some of your rules Jim. For now, however, I am going to have to fly by the seat of my pants.

[James D Macdonald]

I have ripped out anything that could remotely resemble the run of the mill stock fantasy world.

I recommend you pick up a copy of <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0886778328/ref=nosim/madhousemanor" target="_new">The Tough Guide to Fantasyland</A> by Dianne Wynne Jones. Travel any distance, pay any price, to get a copy. It's got all the cliches, arranged in alphabetical order. It's also hilarious, especially if you've read entirely too many fantasy novels.

Some day when I make my living writing, I will definitely consider working within guidelines that incorporate some of your rules Jim.

Many years ago, when I was first becoming a professional writer, I had a day job. And people would say to me (word was out that I was writing), "I've always wanted to write a book, but I never had the time." And I'd think "You son of a [bleep!]. I set my alarm clock two hours early to make time to write."

For your plot problems: Put interesting people in interesting places, and things will happen. That's the Positional Chess theory of writing. You may not be the sort of writer for whom an outline is useful/necessary. The first goal is to get words on paper. The second goal is to revise the heck out of 'em.

[James D Macdonald]

Your readers have six senses. So should your characters!

[Illandur Stormcrow]

I write every day, it just isn't always two hours. Some days its five minutes, some days its four hours. It really depends on how the story is flowing for me. Most times I get bogged down trying to properly express thoughts or events. It is sometimes difficult find the words to achieve the desired result even if I have outlined the chapter. At times it takes me a bit to commit them to the page.

Some days I just do backup material, expand profiles. Some days I just write. I find if I can get about four hours free and get on a roll I can bust out a good 3000-4000 words, other days I can sit for two or three hours and only express a paragraph or two. This would explain why after three months I only have 28,000 words.

I am not particularly concerned. It will get done. I have a goal. My plan is to have the rough draft of the book done by July. Since I estimate that it will hit about 160,000 words before I am done, I suppose I should get cracking!

In any case, I do write every day, and that is a good start.

[qatz]

By what you say, Ill, you will be producing more than 6500 words per week on average from January to June. That is an average of over 1300 words per day assuming you take weekends off, but no vacations. Every other day you need to do 3000 words. Every single second day, whether you are in the groove or not. Also, the number of words you write is not so important as which words you pick and in which order. You will see, I think, that this is the difference between you and, for example, Shakespeare.

But give it a try! You have bitten off a big chunk so be prepared to spend a lot of time BIC whether you want to or not. That means, away from this website, not working on outlines or profiles or background, not reading, just writing the story. The kicker is you have to do everything else as well, including having a life, eating and sleeping! So, as Jim keeps reminding me, writing is hard. Focus on it, check back in with us once a month to let us know how you're doing, and do good. If you can accomplish a project like this, even though it's not the Midsummer's Night's Dream, you'll have done something next year. :hat

[SRHowen]

Many years ago, when I was first becoming a professional writer, I had a day job. And people would say to me (word was out that I was writing), "I've always wanted to write a book, but I never had the time." And I'd think "You son of a [bleep!]. I set my alarm clock two hours early to make time to write."

I had to laugh at this one, the more I speak to writers and those who want to be published I see stages that we all seem to go through.

This is one of them. I as well hate the, "What do you do?" My answer, "I am an author and I work as an editor." Them: "OH really, I always wanted to write a book." My thoughts about the same as James.

The worst I ever got--Woman in my car on the autobahn-- "I don't see why you haven't gotten a book published yet, it must be really easy with all the bad books out there--so yours must be pure trash."

I wanted to roll her out of the car going 150 K. :ack

Now, I smile sweetly and ask--"Who's your agent?" When they tell me they are writing a book or have always wanted to. Works well.

On the perfect query letter--short, sweet, simple. I use a different one than James--a true outline form that I've had good luck with and so have a few others.

Shawn

[LiamJackson]

I spend a lot of time on planes and in hotel rooms, often too tired to think, too wired to sleep. The act of sitting down to a laptop and spewing out words is a relief and I've come to look forward to that time. On a good night, I can write a coherent 5-6k. Most times, it's closer to 3k.

Over time, I've come to learn when it's time to back away from the story, sometimes for a day, other times lasting a month. I used to feel guilty for 'neglecting' my project, but eventually learned that I was doing both myself and the story a major favor by occasionally indulging in a degree of seperation. Doesn't mean I'm not writing 'something.' Just means I'm not working on that particular story.

Early on, I had a bad tendency to 'overwrite' pages. Now, I move along, marking the page for 'later consideration' then come back after a few hours or a day, hopefully with a fresher perspective and try the 'problem scene' again. It seems to work much better for me than sitting there drumming my head against the keyboard. (And the keyboard really appreciates it.)

Reference the dread Writers Block; when I get stuck, I throw myself a curve and add a new character. Sorta like pulling the proverbial rabbit out of a hat.

I know that it's a good possibility that the "new character" won't make it through the revision process, but many times, I find that just having a new slant of any kind will jumpstart the process, again.

If any of my aformentioned 'techniques' are considered self-defeating by the experts, I'm open to criticism and suggestions for improvement.

Thanks,

LJ

[SRHowen]

I have been known to smash keyboards--mostly went he computer does something really annoying.

Your ways of overcoming writers block (of which I don't believe in but that's my own way of overcoming it) are great.

Now when I get stuck, and need to get something done, I play a dumb mindless game for a bit. I set a timer and play collapse or something for 20 min, then go back to it.

We can look at what other writers do or have done, and boy I wish when I had started I had a resource like the Internet, (it would have saved a lot of learning time) but we have to find what works best for us. If what we are doing is not working IE to overcome writer's block, then we should try what others do. But if what you are doing works for you--go with it.

Shawn

[Illandur Stormcrow]

I know that the goal may be a tad unrealistic, but it keeps me going. I will come as close to hitting it as I can. The ultimate goal is just to have a good book to submit out there. The mid 2004 date gives me something to shoot for, even it if isn't realistic. In fact, based on my outline revisions, I suppose I should revise the draft completion date...

We'll just have to see how it goes.

[qatz]

Hi Shawn ... I threw a typewriter onto a bed once in my sister's bedroom, and it bounced through the wall ... big old heavy Royal ... never really did fix that hole right, though I tried ... then I've smashed keyboards too ... only problem is that they often smash back, makes me want to be a pacifist again ... but can you imagine the number of books that get thrown against the wall in the James D. McDonald house? From the frequency of his references to the act, there must be a whole lot of bruised books down his way. :rollin

See you later. :hat

[SRHowen]

my hubby buys keyboards when they are on sale and saves them for my next fit of--they said what about my story? Or the inevitable --^%@^(*_ :ack computer crash that ate two chapters.

Haven't had that happen since Feb when I bought the new machine--went with a pro model this time--worth every penny. But i did manage to smack the keyboard--and hurt my hand when Yahoo ate all my saved e-mails. And my agent marvels at how well I do violent scenes.:rollin

Shawn

[qatz]

I'm not so sure when I do violence how credible it is ... think I might farm it out to a really tough sort like you ... :lol

[HapiSofi]

JDM said: Many years ago, when I was first becoming a professional writer, I had a day job. And people would say to me (word was out that I was writing), "I've always wanted to write a book, but I never had the time." And I'd think "You son of a [bleep!]. I set my alarm clock two hours early to make time to write."

I can vouch for this secondhand. I've talked to people who were at a writing workshop held at a Cape Cod B&B where JDM was one of the instructors. The sound of typing started coming out of his room before six o'clock in the morning.

[Salve Ghostwalker]

Hapi said:

>>>I've talked to people who were at a writing workshop held at a Cape Cod B&B where JDM was one of the instructors. The sound of typing started coming out of his room before six o'clock in the morning. <<<

Morning writing isn't for everyone, but it's definitely something worth trying out. As Lawrence Block says in Writing the Novel: From Plot to Print, "It's better strategy to write after the morning coffee than after the post rat-race martini."

I'm not very creative much before noon, and I find that sometimes my mind is too tired if I try to write too late at night, so I write mostly just before lunch or just after dinner. It's natural to procrastinate, unless you build a strong habit of working at about the same time every day, so Jim's method is a good one to follow if you're a morning person. For many people, there is work during the day and distractions or family obligations in the evening.

I've tried setting writing time goals, but I don't feel any sense of accomplishment when I meet them. I'd rather say, I wrote 500 words, or 1,000 words than "I sat in front of a blank word processor screen for two hours."

[James D Macdonald]

I'm not so sure when I do violence how credible it is ...

First: become a keen observer of the world.

Second: Ask yourself if the violence advances the plot, reveals character, or supports theme. If it does none of those things then it doesn't belong in your book. If it does any of those things, the barest sketch will allow your readers to fill in the parts that they find necessary for their own reading experience, drawn from their own needs and memories.


You are providing folks with a blueprint for a story that they are building for themselves.

[johnbaern]

I like Jim's last tidbit about violence in a story. Much the same applies to sexual content, no?

John

[HapiSofi]

It does, yes.

Sex and violence should both be written with great care and advance planning. Choreograph it. Get all the movements and their logic straight in your head. Visualize every bit of it. Go for clarity in the writing, and avoid figurative language unless you've planned for it and there's a good reason for it.

[qatz]

Thank you Jim, hello Hapi, and pleasure as always AJ. My short short story for Christmas regarding last week's fictional journey to East Africa has at last been blogged; please click here.
www.livejournal.com/users/joebrowntdog (http://www.livejournal.com/users/joebrowntdog)
I hope you enjoy it. It has two instances of violence, one essential to character and the other important to plot and atmospherics, or something. Would appreciate it if you could review it in the context of our discussion and give your reactions.
And then the ubiquitous sex scene, which is absent here; more mystery! Extrapolating from what Jim and Hapi said, and using my own rather uneven experience, I would guess hints are better than explicitness. But one could even argue that the London vampire-ponography website, which I mentioned much earlier, could have been following that rule! :hat

[James D Macdonald]

Today I found myself reading a bit of slush. Here's some advice I want to pass along:

* Spelling counts.
* Agreement of number is important.
* Keep the tense consistent.
* You're allowed to have more than one sentence per paragraph. In fact, you're encouraged to do so.
* Dialog is one of your basic tools. Learn how to use quote marks.
* Don't make your readers guess about the antecedents of your pronouns.
* You've heard of Point of View? Pick one. Then use it.
* Not all nouns need adjectives; not all verbs need adverbs.
* Assigning emotions to inanimate objects is called the Pathetic Fallacy. First, because it's a fallacy. Second, because it's pathetic.

* SHOW, DON'T TELL!

[Lori Basiewicz]

Uncle Jim, it is funny that you posted this list. Way back when I was in a college-level Creative Writing class, one of my regular homework assignments was to critique my classmates' stories. It became routine for a group of friends to gather round while I read them aloud. Many of them were really bad and were treated with much derision. Not nice of us, I know, but human.

I have maintained contact with some of these friends throughout the years. Recently, one of them mentioned this old past-time and, knowing I'm now a professional writer, asked, "Does anyone really submit stories like those?"

[SRHowen]

I think I will use your list(with your permission) to put at the bottom of my rejection letters from the WCP--man, I get so many subs that break every one of those rules and then I get scathing e-mails about what a crock and f'd up editor I am because I don't recognize their greatness.

I'll add one more--never ever e-mail an editor and say that they owe you a response in whatever amount of time, never ever follow up a rejection with a nasty threatening e-mail--what do you think--that this will make the editor say, "Hey, I am so scared, I better publish this guy?" :ack Wrong answer.

There is enough editing that goes into anything sent to a publisher--even those subs you think are perfection personified will most likely require editing--so why be sloppy? No idea.

Shawn (Confession--I spelled my agent's name wrong in my first query letter to him--but my query was strong enough that he overlooked it--not many would)

[James D Macdonald]

"Does anyone really submit stories like those?"

As I keep telling people, "If you can write two consecutive pages of grammatical English with all the words spelled right, you're already in the top ten percent of the slush pile."

Short answer: Yes, they do.

Even shorter answer: Arrrrgh!

Notice: Publishing isn't a lottery. Yes, major publishers get thousands of manuscripts. The way they select their manuscripts for publication isn't by going into the Slush Room and pulling out three at random then sending the rest back. This is a game of skill, not a game of luck. If you send in a good (or at least competent) manuscript, odds are good that you'll get published. If you send in bad manuscripts, you won't get published no matter how many times you submit.

Now ... if in addition to having the bare bones mechanics of English prose down pat you can tell a story ... you're in the top two percent of the slush heap where the sales come from.

Trust me on this: I promise you that publishers do not have rejection slips that say "Sorry! Too well-written and original for us!" no matter how many times you hear unpublished writers say that their manuscripts were rejected for having exactly those two qualities.

The mass of unpublishable slush is:

a) Badly written,
b) Trite,
or
c) Badly written and trite.

<HR>

Addendum: For Shawn. Sure, use the list. If even one writer Takes the F'ing Hint it'll be worth it.

[Salve Ghostwalker]

>>> * You're allowed to have more than one sentence per paragraph. In fact, you're encouraged to do so. <<<

The popularity of ezines is exacerbating this problem. Shorter paragraphs are easier to read online, but writers are going overboard with single-sentence paragraphs. This writing style is propagated by declaring it as gospel.

How can a writer tell a good story if he denies himself the use of paragraphs, one of the basic building blocks of writing?

[James D Macdonald]

Next bizarre bit of writing advice:

Memorize this speech. Be able to recite it any time, anywhere, no matter what you're doing. (There will be a quiz.) Practice frequently, and aloud.

I promise you that your writing will improve if you have this bit by heart:

<blockquote>
<hr>

For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of kings;
How some have been deposed; some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;
Some poison'd by their wives: some sleeping kill'd;
All murder'd: for within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king
Keeps Death his court and there the antic sits,
Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp,
Allowing him a breath, a little scene,
To monarchize, be fear'd and kill with looks,
Infusing him with self and vain conceit,
As if this flesh which walls about our life,
Were brass impregnable, and humour'd thus
Comes at the last and with a little pin
Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!
Cover your heads and mock not flesh and blood
With solemn reverence: throw away respect,
Tradition, form and ceremonious duty,
For you have but mistook me all this while:
I live with bread like you, feel want,
Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus,
How can you say to me, I am a king?

<HR>
</Blockquote>

That's from Richard II, Act 3, scene ii, by William Shakespeare

[godlikegreg]

i've done it, i have now put down creative writing down as one of my majors when i start uni next year. now it gets serious :tongue

[Note On]

For what it's worth, I've never found "advance planning" necessary for scenes that include sex or violence.

[James D Macdonald]

Fascinating!

How do you decide where they'll go in your story, and what they'll accomplish in your plot?

[Note On]

"How do you decide where they'll go in your story, and what they'll accomplish in your plot? "

Three answers:

1. The context was how to write credible violence, not how to determine scene function. In that case, planning is, I think, of very limited value. Credibility comes mostly from a writer knowing what he or she is talking about; if you don't know much about how submarines work, you can't write a good submarine book, and if you don't know much about sex or violence, you can't write those, either. That's half of it; the other half is whether you can express things evocatively.

2. I think advance planning is overtaught--which is understandable, since it's the most plausible thing to teach. You can't go wrong telling people to measure twice and cut once. But in my case, anyway, it doesn't work. I find out where I'm going by going there--so when I see "Plan ahead!" presented on writing boards as though there's no alternative...well, there is. Advance planning (or "outlining," or whatever) is just one approach, and:

3. Different approaches work for different people. For me, too much planning (which sometimes means ANY planning) before I start a book kills my interest in it. I start with a few vague images and maybe a couple of half-baked ideas. It's worked so far.

None of this is to say that careful advance planning is wrongheaded. I just see it presented very often as though it's the only good way to work. It's not.

[Note On]

Oh, and BTW, your take on slush pile reading agrees with mine. I once believed that slush piles were only "good" or "bad" in a subjective sense--that it mostly had to do with the editor's taste. Then I read a slush pile.

Jesus Christ. There's nothing subjective about it. Most of it is barely English; issues of storytelling don't arise because we simply don't get that far. You've heard that an editor can tell within two pages, and maybe objected to the idea? That's a liberal estimate: Try one paragraph.

The one thing I'd...well, not disagree with, but expand upon, is the pathetic fallacy. As with any "don't," someone talented can make it a strength:

"I pronged a moody forkful of the fragrant eggs and b."

--P.G. Wodehouse

[qatz]

all i can say to note on, is an ex-marine sought me ought for advice on how to write the violence in the scene he was working on, and we spent much of the weekend doing that, and i humbly think i'm being helpful to him in a grisly way, and i'm an ex-hippie peacenik with Buddhist tendencies. In fact, you should see my tiger! :hat

I'll be away form the site for awhile. thanks jim.

[Note On]

Gatz, I don't think that contradicts anything I wrote, since one of you apparently knew something about violence and the other apparently knew how to express things. Sounds like a potentially productive team to me.

[LiamJackson]

"Doing violence" and "writing violence" are two different things.:grin

My own perceptions are perhaps a bit jaded and soliciting input from people like gatz, (someone who sees the world from a slightly different perspective) is one of the ways I can "adjust fire." That type of assistance, along with "honest"
critiques should, and will make me a better writer.

(provided I can control my like for commas, gerunds and passive phrases)


Thanks, Gatz. And a major thanks to Jim D.

[SRHowen]

well, I also fly by the seat of my pants when writing fiction. I don't plan--and those who are my wise readers will tell you, I hit hard when I get to a "Shawn moment" chapter. (violence or sex) Do I say OK, this guy is going to capture this guy and cut him to ribbons slowly--no, as NoteOn said, if I plan even a small amount my mind rolls over and plays dead--why oh why it says are we going through this again?

Now that is not to say I can't write with an outline (ghost writing I have done) but I prefer the no plan, let the character's take me where they will way.

Shawn

[Note On]

I sort of leapfrog through a book, writing myself into a corner, then analyzing my way out of it until I hit another corner. So I don't think I'd really call it "seat of the pants." But if I lose my spark and interest, so does the writing.

[James D Macdonald]

But if I lose my spark and interest, so does the writing.

Oh, absolutely. The readers can always tell when the writer is bored, too.

I never said (or at least, I hope I didn't) that this is the only way to write. All I can promise is that those who are following along will learn how I write, which may or may not be useful to them.

I have lots of little idiosyncracies; for example, I dislike the word cluster "and then." "And" means two events happened at the same time, "then" means they happened sequentially. "And then" means ... what? I'll change that group to "and" or "then."

As those who've been reading along know, I'm a very heavy outliner. My outlines are perhaps 3/4 the length of the finished novel. (They're very rough, they tell rather than show, they sketch out people, places, and dialog, they have things like "An exciting battle scene goes here" or "Time to tie up the Second Girlfriend Plot-thread" -- they're darn-near unreadable by anyone but me and my coauthor.) Bits of business are only suggested, and frequently change many times before the first draft. But that's just me.

Every writer has his or her own way of writing, and the more honestly and accurately he or she presents it the weirder it sounds.

[Note On]

> I never said (or at least, I hope I didn't) that this is
> the only way to write

No, not at all. I was actually responding to something HapiSofi wrote.

I don't mind "and then" on the occasions when it benefits rhythm. When it doesn't, I don't see a reason for it to exist.

"Rather" and "quite" bug me, though. They almost never mean enough to justify their existences.

[Note On]

Just went to see what Jim Sallis was up to, and found this:

webdelsol.com/f-writinglife.htm (http://webdelsol.com/f-writinglife.htm)

It seems appropriate to this thread.

[SRHowen]

If that's an outline, then my first drafts are outlines. I write a mess the first draft that maybe only me an my agent can see the potential in--but it is filled with things like DESCRIBE ROOM, RESEARCH, or what color where this guys eyes in chapter 3?

I write a 70,000 word mad dash through and in many places have the scene told in different ways many times, or offer info in many places through out the book trying for the best fit--to me it's not an outline just a brain storm first draft.

Shrug, and yup I have always said each person must find their own way and while you are trying to find what works it's best to try other's ways just in case they work for you.

and then--just kidding, I also do not like that particular phrasing.

Shawn

[reph]

Why "and then"? Because "then" is not a conjunction.

"At 5:00 A.M., the writer settled her butt in the chair. She typed 'Chapter One' and then stared out the window."

If you say "She typed 'Chapter One' and stared out the window," she could have done those things simultaneously. If you say "She typed 'Chapter One,' then stared out the window," it's ungrammatical, much like "She brushed her teeth, later took a shower."

[James D Macdonald]

Then is an adverb. In "Joe walked to the door, then turned," then modifies turned.

"She typed 'Chapter One,' then stared out the window," is perfectly grammatical; then modifies stared.


"She brushed her teeth, later took a shower," is ungrammatical since it leaves out the word "she." "She brushed her teeth, later she took a shower," while hardly graceful, is grammatically correct.

[Note On]

"She brushed her teeth, later she took a shower," while hardly graceful, is grammatically correct.

Actually, that's a comma splice. English teachers hate 'em.

I just finished MORALITY PLAY by Barry Unsworth, and he uses them constantly, to great effect.

[James D Macdonald]

Right. Better would be "She brushed her teeth; later she took a shower."

A comma splice is infinitely preferable to "and then."

[Note On]

This one from blurbs: "laugh out loud."

There's another way?

[qatz]

Oh, On, you're so right about "quite." I used to ask my Anglophile friends, what exactly does this word mean? And they'd look at me like I was crazy. "What do you mean, what does it mean?" So I'd press the point, and they'd say "Well, it means 'quite.' That's all. A sufficiency. No, that's not quite it. But you see -- it means itself. It's quite enough." And I'd say, "I see." And they'd say, "quite."

I am an advocate for using words where they're due poetically even if the grammar's not "quite" right. There may be a use for "And then" in repetition for dramatic effect ... as in "Harold looked up, and saw the mushroom cloud. And then the wind blew furiously. And then the clouds dropped down; the clouds fell from the sky."

On's comment about writing selfinto a corner is interesting.

Well, On, I do think you have a good point, as well as many bad ones, about violence. And as for the good one, it is this.

One of my violent scenes normally starts with one of my characters getting violent. That is, the character itself does that, and then I say whoah! Looks like a violent moment coming up! And the run of the mill piece of violence is short and soon over.

In fact, you may be talking about the run-of-the-mill violent scene, which is pretty minor, as opposed to the signature kind of violence which defines a story.

But any significant moment of violence, if it's important to the story, must be well thought out. Also, just because you've hit a guy or two, or know the way one piece of equipment or another works, from the Navy ship to night-vision binos, doesn't mean you know anything about either the technique or art of writing violence. Maybe so, maybe no.

For that matter, your assumption that I was not giving LJ advice on technical as well as artistic aspects of using deadly force was just wrong. You should have heard me going on and on about a certain kind of knife! I love that knife, even if I can't remember how to spell its name! And "shoot this guy ... shoot that guy ... but stab this guy"! Very important to have your syntax right when you're killing.

My main advice to LJ was that when you have a scene where your protagonist kills an important bad guy as well as two or three guards on the way in, what you are doing is composing the dance of death. This is a real dance with a terrible beauty and must be, as Jim says, sketched in, even hinted at in just the right way, but not more, so that the reader's own imagination can fill in the details. The violence is not taking place on the paper, it's in the reader's imagination.

It's also not "I slugged him, and his eyes popped out." -- Oh, really? (Yawn)

I think we're all adults here and we all presumably know how to have intimate relations with significant other people, to put it delicately, but most of us don't just describe it. If it's salacious, it's pornography, and if it's not, it's clinical, but either way it's boring. There is also a pornographic kind of violence, and it's boring. Boring, boring, boring. I am sure you can write that very well without planning, I know I can.

Just as dancing, though, is made to portray the most beautiful of human things, the beauty of a fine body in motion, making a gorgeous thing of the rising lure of sex, so the dance of death portrays the mystery and horrible beauty of life's end, the opposite of sex you could say, or the distillation of the essence of sex my weird vampiric friends in London would argue. This is, in particular, the destruction of one life by another living being contrary to every moral code. It is life in its extremity all right. It is deciding an issue with, as LJ says, extreme prejudice. It is terrifying, but it is beautiful if done in balance with the rhythms of the world. Tigers do that.

That act, to be shown at its most beautiful, must be most sparing in detail. Economy in action. Watch any beautiful dancer. Oh sure, describe the knife, enthuse about it; but the act of death itself must stand for itself as a work of art. It will have its own meaning. As the beauty of a stone is revealed by its carving, the beauty of a body is displayed by its dancing, the beauty inherent in a noble death should be shown by the killing.

And you say that needs no planning! Hah!

In fact, my conversation with LJ about his killing scene made me suggest he re-think the whole structure of the novel, and clarify aspects of theme, character, & plot, for they all are reflected in those few moments when the death takes place.
So On's seeing no need in planning because he "knows" the subject -- maybe so, but what does that mean? What does any of us really know? I have done 12 years of karate, been shot at, had friends killed, seen men die, and defeated angry trained killers just by staring them down. That doesn't mean I know anything, or On does, compared to another fellow or two I could name, but won't, in Special Ops. So On's not needing planning makes me think of our recently departed friend Ill, who is writing a 900,000 word novel, he says, with no particular planning. On seems much more professional and astute than that, but he does make what are known technically in my day job (where I performed the "role" of an assassin for two decades) as "violent" assumptions!

My particular favorite when it comes to violence, and I think the hardest part to do credibly, is ... hand to hand or, in my tiger's case, fang to neck. The world is a violent and even tragic place these days, but most humans make a botch of it. A finger to the neck can immobilize, a touch to the right pressure point causes death. And most humans do not keep their balance when doing this, so it becomes an ugly thing. Here, as elsewhere, we could learn a lot from animals. Violent death in struggles between adversaries should have a dignity borne of balance; killing should be done beautifully if it is to be done at all.

Now I really am going to be gone.

I may post one or two of my letters to LJ, just things dealing with general killer topics not the specifics of his stuff, before I get out of here. Or not. But peace be unto you.

[rtilryarms]

Off topic,

quatz, it sounds like you had a slightly more interesting Christmas than I

Mike

[qatz]

More for On before I go. That quote from PG Wodehouse is brilliant. And I was thinking, along those lines, of a particular friend when Jim made his dictum about the Pathetic Fallacy ... which is, BTW, the way I learned it too. This friend, on the contrary, would anthropomorphize nearly everything, from her dog down to her cute little car ... her explanation being,

"Well where I come from (Nepal) everyone's an animist, and if all things actually do have feelings, which we probably won't find out until the fulness of time, won't I have been rude all this time in ignoring that, just to follow a rule of English?" "And besides," she said with a flounce, "it's just a more pleasant way to talk." The woman is actually a very good writer, with a book or two up her sleeves, but probably won't get around to publishing them for a while, because she is otherwise occupied -- and having had an unpleasant experience getting a technical article published (you guessed it, I was the co-author), we has no inclination to re-join our dismal trade soon. Too bad -- she really is terrific.

[Note On]

Qatz, that was a lovely rant. You didn't really read what I wrote, but that didn't make the rant any less lovely.

However, its loveliness doesn't make it any more universally accurate than any other prescription for writing. Some things, you have to plan; others, the more you plan, the worse it gets. The amazing thing, to me, is how rarely we can predict which it's going to be, for any given scene. Sometimes the easy ones don't get there through winging it, and the important, critical, pivotal, crucial, earthshaking ones can't get there through planning. Sometimes it's the other way around.

Writing is not merely a conscious act. If it were, then yes, planning would always be of primary importance. And then everyone could be a genius, because all they'd have to do is learn project management and work their way through the PERT charts, check off the milestones, and recalculate the man-hours based on what's left in the buffer until the goal is achieved.

But this isn't project management. It's art. It's chaos and calm, Apollonian and Dionysian, fine typography and carved flesh. It's whatever works, and sometimes it's what doesn't. If planning everything works for you, then it works for you. Sometimes it works for me, too. But I do believe, for myself, that any plan that always works just means the goal is too modest.

Published fiction writers owe aspiring fiction writers better than easily definable guidelines--and we most especially owe them better than the utterly defensible ones we come up with because we sincerely want to help. Let's tell them the truth instead. The truth is, we don't know either. All we know is keep sitting your ass in the chair and keep looking at what's really in front of you; keep learning to see it better and get better at working it. All else is hubris.

[Note On]

Damn. I left out "Trust yourself" and "Aim for where you're uncertain."

[reph]

Sorry, "She typed 'Chapter One,' then stared out the window" is not grammatical, no matter how many people say it is.

Try substituting any other adverb for "then."

She typed "Chapter One," finally stared out the window.

She typed "Chapter One," soon stared out the window.

She typed "Chapter One," sleepily stared out the window.

There isn't anything special about "then" that makes it do what other adverbs can't.

[James D Macdonald]

Not to be unpleasant about it, Reph, but you're wrong.

If I draw a single line through the word "and" every time I see "and then," the sentences work better. Every time.

Unless the actions are happening simultaneously -- then I draw the line through "then." That too improves the sentence.

The word cluster "and then" is meaningless. It's an oxymoron. There's no excuse for using it.

Yes, you'll find "and then" in some of our published works. These were added by copyeditors who were, universally, wrong.

[James D Macdonald]

...of a particular friend when Jim made his dictum about the Pathetic Fallacy...

If you'd read the piece of slush I'd read just before I typed that, you'd have said the same thing.

In your friend's case, assigning emotions to inanimate objects is part of her character and upbringing. Further, it's happening in dialog, not in narration.

[James D Macdonald]

You'll notice that I'm not saying that outlines are everything, Note On. I've also mentioned how a book is like a chess game. Later on I'm going to tell folks how a short story is like a lime pie. And how a novel is like a house. How it's like the bottom of a stream. How it's like a box. How it's like a vase.

Don't get hung up on outlines. I use 'em, sometimes, for the things that outlines are good for. Other times I use positional play. When I think about a novel in progress, I see it as a shape, with volume, angles, corners and edges.

I also have a hole open up in the screen, with pictures behind it that I describe. I guess I'm in an alpha state then.

Sometimes I turn off the monitor and type, because the shapes of the words are a distraction from the writing.

All I can do to teach how to write is use analogies. Writing is the thing itself. That's why I've been stressing the BIC method.

As writers we are are defined by the act of writing. Thinking about writing, planning to write, researching, outlining, revising ... those things are not writing. Only writing is writing.

[qatz]

Hey, thanks Mike, about the story! I keep meaning to revise it more, but don't. It's one of the best short stories I've ever written, I think, or will be if I ever finish it up ... I don't write short fiction too good, so it doesn't have much competition ... and I did it all on "inspiration" and random-comments-as-they-came-up. "Today in Karnok ..."

I hate outlines. My outlines usually don't make much more sense than the story does. I have three outlines for the tiger book. The main one is 2 pages long. The tiger book is a big book. I doubt it will get to 900,000 pages though. The last book I did, actually was meant to be half a book (abt. 40,000 words), had no outlines. I just selected a theme for each chapter and wrote the chapter. Not so much rants as ravings!

Now back to On and his delightful response.

First, On, thanks for appreciating my rant! I love to rant! If they just paid the big bucks for a rant I'd be in clover. But, sadly, they arrest me for vagrancy instead.

Now as far as me reading what you wrote. I have to admit that I actually did read what you wrote. The reason this is an admission is there's always the question about whether I understood what I read, and with me you've always got to add that second question! Sadly, I may not have.

As far as I can tell, you're saying outlines are not the be all and the end all ... And that writing must have magic in it or else it's just formula. And that "heck if I know" is about the most honest answer a so-called expert can really say when asked the question about how writing really gets done. Well, I think you are absolutely true, no truer rightness has ever been spoked. And I just couldn't get outta here without saying that. Jim said, and will say again if he wants to, that he's just teaching HIS way of writing which is heavy on outlines. I agree with that approach in the context of his course, after all it's his course and he can assign its meaning, especially since he knows what he's doing and I don't, but I'm always throwing in impertinent passages that go more toward substance than structure, perhaps more than I should but I do anyway.

The truth is that Jim is being helpful to a wide spectrum of people, many of whom need to know just how a story is constructed. Like me, for example. I know all about bad writing. It's the good writing I've kind of forgotten how to do. And in order to dwell in magic, you have to know how to get there. I talk a lot about bad writing (mine). The best technical writing I did, and there's been a lot of good stuff, used a bound-in-hide formal outline (hand-done). The best piece of fiction I wrote, a 315 pp. novel, started from crazy inspiration on the first day of BIC but, as it developed, needed intricate outlining to keep the course. But those, finally just crumbled into the plot and the thing was finished as it begun -- crazily.

The way I actually plan my story, and please don't beat me up when I say this, speaking of violence, but it's true -- is I dream about it. When I either get tired of working on the story or it just isn't working for some reason, or sometimes before I've gathered up the strength to face another day of dismal failure at the keyboard, I lie back in bed and daydream about the story. I'm thinking about what the characters are going through and kind of trekking along with them. Maybe I become them. They start moving and going down the river. Aha! I say. Llahsa is upstream of the river at that point! It makes a difference to the plot. Or, aha! you have to use the guns before the knife. Or, and so on.

Without things like that happening, the scene with the official in Qinghai might never have made sense. And so on.

These things are not inspiration. They are merely going through the doors (heavy, jade-green doors, normally) that lead to inspiration. And when I get there then the writing can be beautiful, and sweet, and wise.

But that said, I can't just rant like this or I'll just produce mush for the slush. My story needs people (or animals) going places, doing things, like real life or no one's gonna read it, every. Which is my way of saying, eh, you have a point, he has a point. Everyone needs something to believe; I believe I'll have another beer.

I'm outta here. :hat

[qatz]

only one ps., reph. paying too close attention to grammar is the best way to avoid writing something meaningful. oddly, illandur thought he was a grammar whiz. i know grammar cold, and jim's got the hang of it. i might quibble with something he said, but i won't, and i don't quibble about grammar here anyway. the general rule is, jim's not wrong. if you want to pay me the big bucks to instruct you on grammar, you may. but in the meantime just listen to jim. life's too short. take it easy.

[reph]

"Not to be unpleasant about it, Reph, but you're wrong."

It seems to me that saying, flat out, "You're wrong," IS a way of being unpleasant about it.

Mr. MacDonald, you've built up so much credibility here by giving sound advice that I felt compelled to provide a second opinion on the "and then" question, for the benefit of those who might assume that "and then" must be avoided because it's among your pet peeves.

Using "then" as a conjunction happens to be one of MY pet peeves. Readers may decide for themselves after thinking about the uses of parts of speech.

[James D Macdonald]

I recognize that "and then" may be an idiomatic expression, and thus acceptable in dialog.

(Unlike "over and out" in radio comms, which is never acceptable anywhere.)

Reph, early on, back at the beginning of this thread, I quoted McIntyre's Law: "Under the right circumstances, anything I tell you may be wrong." I also said that my mutant talent was making my opinions sound like facts.

If your writer's ear tells you to use "and then," you're perfectly free to do so.

[Note On]

One of the problems with being

(1) a newcomer to an online group, and;

(2) me

is that there are group dynamics in place before I get there, and I don't bother finding out what they are (or who anybody is) before jumping in and posting opinionated stuff. So it's often not clear that I'm just going off on my own tangent, not necessarily pointing at anybody. I haven't disagreed with anything James D. has posted--but obviously something I wrote looked that way.

I assume BIC is Butt In Chair?

[James D Macdonald]

Yeah, BIC is Butt In Chair.

[Duane]

I'm finding a great deal of good advice here. Some slight differences...but expected.

I have had a good concept for a novel for some time now. However, my lack of experience keeps me from approaching the task. This forum is starting to give me enough information to get started.

Thanks to Jim and all the others for the "Good Suff"
I'll keep reading and learning!

[Note On]

> Sorry, "She typed 'Chapter One,' then stared out
> the window" is not grammatical, no matter how
> many people say it is.

I see nothing wrong with it.

On a tangent, "grammar" isn't always as clear-cut as we wish it were. For instance, this sentence:

It's raining.

What part of speech is "it?"

[reph]

The preexisting group dynamics needn't be so limiting. Every person who enters a group changes it.

Just to clarify a bit on "and then": My writer's ear isn't rooting for the phrase. Neither is my editor's mouth. I'm only cautioning against replacing it with something that makes the sentence malformed. I guess that's my grammarian's brain speaking up.

So "and then" is wordy and graceless? Fine. There's always another way. "Gloria settled her butt in the chair and typed 'Chapter One.' She stared out the window. Next, she sipped peppermint tea from a chipped blue cup. At length she changed 'One' to a numeral. She paused, changed it back, sighed, consulted a style manual, pressed Delete." A series of events, and not one "then" in the lot.

Incidentally (or not), speakers don't say "I walked to the door, then opened it." Only writers do that.

[Note On]

"I'm only cautioning against replacing it with something that makes the sentence malformed. I guess that's my grammarian's brain speaking up."

Yeah, but one person's "malformed" is another's "well-formed." From your example:

"She paused, changed it back, sighed, consulted a style manual, pressed Delete."

I like it fine; but grammatically speaking, it's not a sentence. That's one difference between fiction writing and business English: One's trying to be unambiguous, and the other's trying to be evocative.

As for writers' ears either cheering or hissing the phrase, how can anyone make that judgment without context? Writers talk about rhythm sometimes as though it's some great abstraction. It's not; it's beats and divisions of beats. Sometimes, an additional beat completes a rhythmic pattern, so the "and" makes a significant, concrete difference.

But beyond rhythmic concerns or literal parsings, there's also the fact that humans repeat words for emphasis. He's really, really nice. I want to do something extra, extra nice for him. Bad grammar, yeah, sometimes. Sloppy thinking, sure, maybe. But it's also unambiguous communication, and there's more information present than if the word hadn't been repeated. That information is: This is emphasized.

"And" and "then" may be literally redundant--but when a circle of kids leans in around the campfire, wide-eyed, and asks the storyteller, "And then!? And then!?" it means more than just "And?" or "Then?" I think that's the result of both rhythmic and emphatic functions.

Now--that doesn't mean that when "and then" occurs, it's usually for reasons of emphasis. Usually, it's probably for reasons of not having thought about it. But since we're discussing it (and since the day gig is really dead today)... I think it's got its uses.

[johnbaern]

New Rule: If a passage is (a) easily comprehensible, and (b) doesn't sound like sh!t, it is grammatically correct.

Yea? Nay? ?

John

[Note On]

Sometimes.

[qatz]

What is the one and only rule Strunk & White have that modifies all other rules of grammar? It is this -- if any rules of grammar get in the way of comprehension, modify said rules. I hope "and then" is done with now.

[johnbaern]

I think a point that needs to be made is this--

James D. McDonald is not infallible. He did, however, start this thread, which happens to be called "Learn Writing with Uncle JIM", not "Uncle Whoever".

In other words, he's taken on the role of "teacher". If people would like to question what he says, they can either (a) start their own thread, or (b) pose it in the form of a question:

"Wow, are you sure that shoving peanut butter up my nose is the ONLY way to improve my dialogue? I've often found that self-mutilation works just fine for me.

**What are your thoughts on that, Uncle Jim??**"

Any other form of feedback is merely disruptive, as James will feel the need to defend his position as teacher and win the argument whether or not he's *completely* in the right.

So please, people, respect a man's blackboard!

John

[qatz]

I got sick today, so I haven't left yet.

Jim can be and has been wrong. It's part of his "rules of the game." He is certainly not infallible. Nor is he is the teacher. This is not a class, it's a discussion. He's the facilitator, and a damn good one at that. But he's used to frank discussion. We're pretty darn courtly when it comes to that. He can say this for himself, but we don't have to watch his feelings. That is not to say we should not respect his view. We all deserve that.

He was probably wrong to just come out and tell reph she or he was wrong, and he apologized later in his usual swallowed way if I read that right. Reph was probably carrying the point too far to go on and on about things as she or he did. It may be noted that the dispute here really had more to do with word choice than grammar per se, which meant that everyone was wrong to a certain extent, except me, who refused to get involved. Yes, that "me" was intentional. But the really wrong thing was that we spent overlong on a non-issue.

Oh, speaking of wrong, John, your new rule is wrong! Pardon my saying so. The correct rule is as Strunk & White put it. But (and the "But" is intentional, thankyew) the point is that in our search for meaning we can lose it if we try too hard. When I was named the #1 English student in the nation a little while ago, I was careful to avoid tangents. I did make a few things up as I went along, but hey, nobody's perfect.

[Note On]

I figured since there wasn't an official notice anywhere, the thread title was to be interpreted loosely.

[SRHowen]

Jim said that the construct made no sense (annoyed etc.,)to him--and he explained why HE did not like it. If you want help with writing, you have to be willing to stop defending a thing you do in writing and be willing to look at other ways to do things (try them) in other ways.

It also bugs me--I do not use it. The idea to publish and have effective and affective writing is to make it the strongest possible.

as he did such and such

and then

had been

was

had had

a whole list of constructs that we use everyday, that in writing weaken the prose. Those who are published and are professional know (have learned) what things make the writing stronger.

You can take or leave the advice, but please, arguing with it is silly and unprofessional. It's the likes of which trap people into places like PA.

Say--OK, I'll try that and see if it makes MY writing stronger. Then you need to try it--and if it doesn't work for you--SAY-- OK, this doesn't work for me and move onto the next tip. That's how writing works. You find what works for you--and you do that by trying everything under the sun, until you develop your own personal style and learn to see objectively what makes your writing stronger.

Shawn

[qatz]

Well said, Shawn. There are often highly technical rules for using certain words in conjunction with certain others, and for choosing certain words rather than others to convey a concept or a thought. These rules are meant to lay a groundwork for conveying meaning in the language. There are also rules, governed more by sound and sense than the classical though evolving geometry of language, for writing effectively. These rules are meant to facilitate the conveying of power or beauty in language. They intermix, but the two are not the same.

We are concerned here with the latter more than the former. Excess focus on the first -- withal not entirely accurate on either side -- simply obscures attention to the second. It is that in which we must be most interested, else this would be a thread on grammar instead of writing commercial novels and romance.

And if it were about grammar, it would be a lot more technical than people have heretofore assumed. It is simply not sufficient to assert "this is grammatical -- this is not" ... if you can't explain in detail the grounds for your conclusion, preferably citing chapter and verse, you're not ready to play with the big boys.

But that's not what we're all about. This is about the next step up; this is about writing itself. To play this game, you already need to know the essentials, that is, how to spell and how to make a sentence. Can't play ball if you don't know what a bat is. In some cases contrary to fact, we assume that each other does start from that base. It's called respecting the other writer. Comments like Jim's about keeping off the bottom of the slush pile sufficiently provide fair warning of the consequences otherwise.

From my experience, at least, we can roam around in our personal Idahos pretty far on this thread if the ultimate topic is writing (I don't think anyone's ever been stopped from saying anything), but to obssess over points of grammar is like buying the proverbial fish her bicycle. Glad she's happy now, but surely there are more important things.

[johnbaern]

..the consensus appears to be that the launch of nitpicking, ego-driven attacks on *free* advice is the best way to foster a meaningful and educational dialogue. My bad. Forget I said anything.

John

[qatz]

p.s. -- On, you're asking a trick question. "It's" is the proper contraction for "It is" ... the subject and the object. Now get thee behind me, Satan!!

[Note On]

It's even more of a trick question than that, Qatz, because it's not one.

Unless there's a rain machine, and that's what is raining, the word "it" is not the subject of that sentence. A subject does; an object is done to.

Rather than just act mysterious about this, I'll say that "It's raining" is not, by the book, what most of us would call grammatically correct. It can't be diagrammed in a subject-verb way, because "it" does not refer to any physical object. The phrase just means "there is rain," or maybe "the weather condition is rainy." Because there is no "it" to rain, the sentence can't be broken down easily like the sentence "Bob kissed Theodore."

Beyond that, I'm not going to pretend to be a grammar expert; this tidbit was explained to me by a real one.

But I think the more you know about grammar, the more things you can do with it, just like any other aspect of writing.

[qatz]

Well, rats. You've sucked me in at last. So here are my thoughts about "and then." I am doing this not because I have any interest in the issue, but because I believe reph got the short end of the stick unfairly. My reasons follow.

This is a phrase that does not usually sound grown up. It must be handled with care. Jim obviously hates it with a visceral passion, because it sounds bad and it undoubtedly appears in bad and lazy writing. Cf. my foregoing discussion of the levels of analysis involved in how to write vs. how to write grammatically.

Jim was right that it violated a grammatical rule. It is not oxymoronic; it is redundant, at least as normally used. It would have been better for Jim to stay away from grammar, though. Redundancy wanders in a frontier land between the fields of grammar and word usage, increasingly residing in the latter. It is not really grammar any more, though it used to be. In the 1960s, redundancy was considered a grammatical error. There was a sort of Vatican Council, though, though, involving such groups as the Modern Language Association (I think) and the National Council of Teachers of English, which came to the ecumenical conclusion (I didn't approve of it at the time) that redundancy really went more to word choice than grammar, because there are exceptions to the rule. Of course, word choice is informally considered part of grammar, making distinctions even murkier.

As reph points out, "and then" contains two parts of speech which themselves are not necessarily redundant. The phrase is normally used, however as a phrase with a unitary meaning (or non-meaning), rather than two separate meaningful words. In this sense, the phrase is redundant and incorrect as a matter of word choice. It should always be avoided when used this way. Reph is technically correct that there are times when the phrase is acceptable, but they are in the way minority. The use of the phrase for stylistic purposes and when called for by the action may be examples, but the arguments you'll get from writing professionals, reph, will probably devalue your point so much that alternatives may be needed irrespective of technical validity. Do not let reality become the victim of the ideal.

Reph defends her (I am assuming for the moment that you're female, because I just like girls better) argument with the valid point that "then" is not a conjunctive. "May opened the fridge, then drank the milk" is given as a paradigm by one side ofr the other. This is a good piece of action in any story, but it is not in and of itself a sentence. Jim saved another of his more dubious repetitions with a semicolon; in this case, what is needed is another phrase. "May opened the fridge and drank the milk as she grabbed hold of the bottle" is acceptable, and so is the more clumsily worded "May opened the fridge, then drank the milk as she grabbed hold ... (etc.)" It is simply a run-on sentence full of partial clauses to say "May opened the fridge, grabbed the bottle, then drank the milk," or any combination of the above. Sounds good but it's not grammar.

This shows why grammar's overrated. I am reading Peter Matthiessen's magisterial "The Snow Leopard" now -- it won the National Book Award in about 1978. Its flow of words reminds of Moby Dick. Full of gorgeous writing, lists of things, and incomplete sentences. Grammar would ruin the beauty of the thing. Punto.

Still, I reflected that the consensus was way too strong in favor of Jim who, as I said, can and does handle himself. Reph was making a valid point, and should be given credit for that before we throw her to the lions. Her contribution was thoughtful and mostly well-reasoned, which is not a small thing, and I hope she hangs around to add to our discussion further, depite the rockiness. Welcome reph. You be brave.



I've decided Jim was wrong to attack reph for defending it with such virulence. She should have let it go as of no matter herself, but she was not wrong. The problem here was confusion between the two levels of analysis mentioned above.

[qatz]

Excellent point. But "It's raining" is a good sentence. It is passive construction, in fact idiomatic, but we don't need to go there yet. Consider the similarly passive "hablarse" in Spanish. "It is spoken." Businesses post the sign, "Se habla Espanol aqui" to indicate that (direct translation) "Spanish is spoken here." The verb imports the noun. Looked at from the English point of view, the subject is not Spanish but the implied "It." "It is Spanish which is spoken here."

This is common in English, in both mandative and passive structures. Where is the subject in "Trudy, make my lunch!" It's not Trudy. The subject is "you" (the implied you). In a passive construction, the obvious candidate is "It is hot." In Spanish, there is a direct parallel -- "Se hace calor." The "it" is not really there in a technical sense, but it's implied by the verb. The verb here is "it is" in the intransitive. The intransivitivity of the verb is the key. Instead of the rain machine dumping rain on the ground, a transitive action, "it" rains passively, a quality of things, as when you look at the sky and say "it is blue." Your expert is mistaken if he thinks an intransitive sentence can't be diagrammed. The sentence can be diagrammed easily; it is just as proper in our language as "In the beginning was the Word."

You should also think about idioms. :hat

[Note On]

"These subjects are all implied in the "It"

Right.

But they're not actually present in the sentence.

So what you're diagramming is an imaginary sentence for which this one stands, not the one I offered: "It's raining."

Diagram that one.

> It's an idiom.

Exactly. If it were strictly grammatical, in the sense in which most of us generally understand the word, then we wouldn't need to bring idioms into this.

But my purpose wasn't to argue about it and prove myself right. My purpose was to illustrate that grammar has more gray in it than a lot of us realize. I think both of us have made good points, and we can both be right--and both have different answers.

[qatz]

Wrong. The English language recognizes the "it" whether you do or not. You don't need to get to idioms to see that. Focus on intransitivity. Your larger point should be that grammar is so highly technical that few get it right -- there is always one right answer but it can be devilish finding it. Often it is more trouble in the long run than it's worth. But you're just not right as rain about the question.

ps. the diagram is _it________ _is______
___raining___

or however you do that.

Look, I'd prefer not to talk about this anymore. It has about as much importance as "what the meaning of is is."

[James D Macdonald]

It is not oxymoronic; it is redundant, at least as normally used.

qatz, I'm sorry, but I cannot bring myself to agree.

That particular word group is oxymoronic because it says that two events happened simultaneously, and that they happened in sequence.

This is trivial. I don't want to get sidetracked on it. I offered it as an example of one of my idiosyncracies, and you know what? It is one of my idiosyncracies. Call it religious on my part, if you like, to get an idea of how I feel on this question.

Another of my idiosyncracies is that I believe that grey and gray are two different colors, and that the words are pronounced differently. I once used the sentence "The clouds went from gray to grey as the sun rose behind them," and knew exactly what I meant.

I hope this doesn't get us into a huge debate about spelling and whatnot.

For another example of my mountain-sized ego: I've been known to write corrections into dictionaries.

As to grammar: Correct grammar is what native speakers of a language agree is correct grammar.

Further on grammar: A writer can indicate a great deal about a character by using particular grammatical habits in that character's dialog.

Further on that dialog: This requires that we be observant of the world around us, of the people in it, and the ways in which they talk.

Further further on dialog: Book dialog is to the spoken dialog of humans in their natural habitat as a stage whisper is to an actual whisper. Dialog as it is written in a novel is a literary convention.

Experiment: Tape-record an actual conversation. Transcribe it. Notice how much hesitation there is, how many sentence fragments you find, how wasteful and redundant (or elided and obscure) it is, and what infelicitious phrasing the natural stuff has. As novelists, our job is to write book-dialog that gives the impression of natural dialog.

[reph]

Jeez, I didn't mean to start all that. For the record, in no particular order, (1) I'm female, (2) I believe "and then" is grammatical but it sounds juvenile, (3) I had some misgivings about intruding into Mr. Macdonald's (whee, spelled it right this time) writing course, but I wanted to alert people to an incorrect use of "then" that will bother some percentage of readers, (4) "May opened the fridge, then drank the milk as she painted her toenails" is not grammatical, (5) "It's raining" is a real and diagrammable sentence whose grammatical subject is "it" (although the topic of the sentence is rain), (6) in previous posts, I didn't say half the things I felt like saying, such as that I don't agree that "and" connotes simultaneity of the actions it links, because the "then" problem was more serious.

I shall now resume my place in the woodwork.

[qatz]

Grammar is not a matter of opinion, in my view, but a set of rules. For the most part, except in relatively rare times of sea change like the Vatican Council period of the late sixties and early seventies, the rules are clear once you get to them.

However, mistakes in the English language always alter the mother tongue itself, even if only a little. If that mistake appeals to someone else who uses it, and then is picked up by other people who also like and use it, after a while it gains enough currency that it becomes the correct usage. Myriad are the cases when that's happened. This is why word nazis like myself fight over what they perceive to be incorrect use of language, because consciously or not they are out to protect the purity of the large-I idiom against pestiferous camp robbers who would steal it.

That is either unnecessary or a losing rear-guard action that is ultimately not worth making. The language lives and breathes and will continue so to do whether we like it or not. It does point out that in the long run, usage-oriented concerns like Jim's can trump more hidebound rule-oriented dicta like Reph's.

It is also worth noting that one picks one's rules based on their utility to one's argument. Thus the suspect phrase can be considered oxymoronic under once sense of the rules, but not so in another. However, oxymorons do not go to the implications or the functions of the words, but to their denotations. My Concise Oxford defines the term as an expression "in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction." The two words we've been debating for the last ten years are not apparently contradictory. Still, Jim's point is pragmatically a good one.

In fact, his last response is excellent in several ways and so is Reph's most recent contribution (I can't see it where I'm sitting but I know it's out there). That grimy feeling one gets when discussing grammar is almost worth it when it leads to useful insights about the time that everyone is heartily sick of the subject.

Jim, I can't help remarking that your idiolectical weirdness about "grey" is really remarkable! I use that spelling a lot (it's English as opposed to American, I think; at least the Oxford lists it first), but always thought it was just a variation on gray. Oxford seems to bear that out backhandedly, clearly regarding the two as the same color. I guess "different shades of grey" takes on a new meaning in your house, along with the bruised books (from getting thrown against the wall). No need to respond.

You can see why I normally refuse to engage in these matters. Besides the cruddiness, I can't shut up about them. But I concur -- let us not bloviate further regarding the meaning of the passive "it" or the active "then." Let us eschew disputation and move to the light of a new morning, unclouded by pointless haggling over trivialities. Surely we can find something else to do. Like killing people! :hat

[jpwriter]

I am certainly not as literate as everyone else that post here but I would like to point out one thing. If those that did not defend the faith were not in the fray, the grammar of the language would revert to chaos. Just as good must fight against evil to prevent chaos in the world at large. I am one of those who try to get away with what I can. Thank God for those that restrain me.:ack
Jerry

P. S. I am sure I have made grammatical mistakes in this post and am blissfully unaware of them.:tongue

[Note On]

Qatz, if you don't want to talk about it anymore, then don't. I'm fascinated by everything about writing, so I don't find any of it trivial.

I do think you're tapdancing about "it's raining." There's not just one way to look at it; even the most internally consistent and comprehensive view of grammar--which would be yours--may cohabit, in some cases, with other interesting, useful, and equally defensible approaches. Since I'm a writer, "interesting and useful" is interesting and useful. "Internally consistent" is merely internally consistent.

As you said, it's a living language--which means that by definition, there is no comprehensive set of rules. Latin is a good language for purists. English isn't. It's not done yet.

And anyway, purity and consistency are of little value to anyone but the purist and the consister. A quote that's not exactly suited to this context, but close enough:

Hemingway:

"In going where you have to go, and doing what you have to do, and seeing what you have to see, you dull and blunt the instrument you write with. But I would rather have it bent and dulled and know I had to put it on the grindstone again and hammer it into shape and put a whetstone to it, and know that I had something to write about, than to have it bright and shining and nothing to say, or smooth and well oiled in the closet, but unused."

[Mandiric]

Hello Jim et al,

First post on this board for me...I've been following this thread closely, and wanted to say THANK YOU for the pointed, articulate, and (most importantly) free lessons!

I've been writing for a year-and-a-half, and have completed one novel, one short, and two novelettes. On my latest, another short, I've been using your "chained in front of the comp for two hours" method, Jim. I've certainly increased my output (1,800 words vs my old goal of 500), though I do feel the quality is declining. But, like you said, that's what revision is for.

So...I'm really interested to hear your advice on revision. You are going to talk about revision, aren't you? I notice the thread has gotten cluttered of late. Any chance of moving on with the awesome lessons so we can get to that point, and all the other good stuff in-between?

Again, thanks Jim. This thread is an unexpected gem.

[SRHowen]

you will find when you start to sub to agents and editors the answers. If you gather rejections with no personal ones, or positive rejections (and yes there are positive rejections) then you will need to take a second look at what you do in your writing.

That goes to rewrites and what to look for. High on my list--unneeded words, extra filler words, like those uh mmm, you know, like words that fill actual speech.

Jim, on to revision? Maybe?

Shawn

[Mandiric]

Shawn,

Were you talking to me? Sorry - lots of stuff on this page!

If you were, then yes, I have been subbing; and yes, I've actually received a handwritten note from Realms of Fantasy. The editor read my entire story (9200 words - no mean accomplishment) and complimented me on it, but didn't buy it because she felt the ending was too open. But that's cool because it was the first story I've ever subbed, so I feel ahead of the game.

Anyway, revision! Yeah! Let's to it (or whatever you have lined up next, Jim).

[reph]

I pop out of the woodwork for a second to say this: Qatz, associating me with "hidebound, rule-oriented dicta" paints me as a compulsive, authoritarian figure who lurks near the discussion clutching a wooden ruler, ready to jump in and crack everyone on the knuckles for some violation that only dead people care about. Probably someone who irons her underwear and hasn't had a decent bowel movement for ten years. (Yes, that last group of words was a fragment.)

Can we please return to the main discussion and leave off taking swipes at one another?

[Duane]

I, for one, find your wit to be quite charming.

No need to hide in the woodwork. You have much to offer.

A lurker, such as myself, enjoy your posts.
Others as well...i'm sure. :)

[qatz]

I think that's a super-majority. Hi, Mandaric! Glad you could join us. Your instincts are good ones!

All grammar freaks out there, I may be starting my own board so you can continue to your heart's content away from this site your niggedly discussion of small, meaningless topics while starving children in India die. But please save up all your words of word-rage, including reactions to this post, for that eventuality. And please do not, do not clutter this thread with more observations, whether palpably inapt ones or not. It is a heinousness, sirrah -- an abomination! -- to inflict grammar essays, wrong or right, on clearly distinterested people.

I do this not because I like talking about grammar any more than before -- I do not -- but simply for the money. I've no other means of support while writing my latest, and could be evicted any time. Also, I am good at this (that being, inspiring controversy), and there may be enough people interested in the lingual proclitvities of baboons to pay my way. I doubt it, but I can't pump gas. Only Reph gets in free.

The beauty and the purity of the language is only important to the readers of language and the world soul, but writing about the rules needed to get there is high on my lists of ways to write badly. Talk about your Positional Chess gone amok.

The only conditions will be to respect others and not to let those discussions spill over into this site.

We are pretty much done with this latest episode but perhaps that offer will help weed out further dismal submissions from those who just love to talk about the language, instead of using it.

Oh yeah -- you see how pernicious this crap can be? The reason "and then" is ungrammatical is the lack of required commas inserted thusly -- "and, then," ... which frame the parenthetical time element from the conjunctive and clarify the meaning. We all missed that! Since grammar is only the handmaiden of meaning, as expressed in the one rule from Strunk cited in this whole darn thing, reference to the rules themselves can be handy before flying off into speculation. The real camp robbers, as On implies, can be grammarians just as much as their antagonists. I will consider "it" an act of terrorism to respond to this paragraph on this thread.

My own copies of S&W and the Chicago Manual may be around here somewhere, having been packed away, or not -- they may be lost -- :hat but on the new thread you will be expected to support your opinions technically, not just with nice phrases.

Now, at last, I'm leaving, and I could not have picked a more opportune time to do so.

[qatz]

Oh, Reph, I thought you were! Now I'll have to reconsider getting sweet on you. You'll note I offered you free admission in my other post.

But seriously, I can't avoid the colorful phrase now and then. I apologize for offending you and can say I really didn't mean it that way. See you ... and keep the faith. :hat

[Note On]

Nuh uh.

[qatz]

Reph, you will also note that the first one I accused of being hide-bound was myself, several posts ago. I was going to use myself as the subject of that hide-bound sentence, but decided to use you not as an insult, but an honorific. Still, I have noticed that everything I do is wrong. So, again, sorry.

Hope I see more of you later, assuming they let me back in here.

And Jerry, thanks for your immensely witty comment. !

[jpwriter]

Qatz,
My pleasure.:grin
Jerry

[James D Macdonald]

Here's to a happy, healthy, and productive new year.

[EJ]

My mother is an English teacher. This is the conversation we just had.

Me: "Mom, is this gramatically correct? She typed 'Chapter One' [comma] then looked out the window."

English Teacher Mother: "Yes."


(I wrote out comma because I said the word when telling her the sentence.)

[rtilryarms]

And then?

[James D Macdonald]

"And?" is correct. "And then?" isn't.

[James D Macdonald]

Here's the recipe for the best lime pie in the world:

Pie Shell:

Whites of 3 large fresh eggs, at room temperature
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/8 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup sugar

Heat oven to 300 F. Lightly grease a 9" pie plate.

Beat egg whites in a medium bowl on medium speed until frothy.

Add cream of tartar and salt and beat on high speed until soft peaks form when beaters are lifted.

Beat in 1/4 cup of the sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, until blended.

With mixer on low speed, sprinkle on remaining sugar and beat until blended.

Spread meringue over bottom and sides of prepared dish.

Bake until lightly browned, about 45 minutes.

Cool in dish on wire rack.

Pie filling:

6 egg yolks, slightly beaten
1/3 cup lime juice
2 and 1/2 Tablespoons grated lime rind
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons cold water
6 egg whites
1/8 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 cup granulated sugar

Beat egg yolks until thick and lemon-colored.

Add lime juice, rind, sugar, and salt, then beat mixture until throughly blended.

Cook this mixture in a double-boiler until very thick, stirring constantly.

Now add the cold water to the egg whites and beat until stiff but not dry.

Combine baking powder and remaining 1/4 cup sugar and add to beaten egg white mixture. Beat until stiff.

Fold hot lime mixture into half the egg white meringue; fill pre-baked pieshell.

Cover with remaining meringue.

Sprinkle lightly with sugar and bake 15 minutes in a moderately slow oven (325 F) or until meringue is delicately brown.

Serve cold.

<hr>

This, O dearly beloved, is a short story.

<hr>

You craft it as carefully as you can, using all your experience and skill. You use the finest ingredients, all in just proportion. At the end it looks perfect to your eye. You cool it for a day; you bring it forth to serve to your guests. But you don't know, not until you take the first slice, whether the inside jelled or if you have some runny lime-flavored egg soup.

At that point you can't go back and remake the pie. Either it works or it doesn't.

Your guests may exclaim over how good it tastes, but they won't look forward to pie next time they come to your house.

True, you can guarantee your results a bit by using potato starch or gelatin. Neither of those produces the texture and mouth-feel that you want. Practice will help, as you learn by experience what thick, very thick, soft peaks, and "but not dry" mean. Yet you'll never be sure, until you take that first slice in front of your guests, that it really worked.

In the same way, a short story either works or it doesn't. Once prepared, using all your skill, you can't go back and revise it into something that isn't lime-flavored runny glop.

Nothing at all will help if your guests don't like lime pie to start with. Some may even be allergic to eggs, or have ethical or moral issues with egg use.

<hr>

A novel is different. A novel is a wooden crate. If the crate doesn't work, you can take the boards, rearrange them, and try again. You can fill the old nail holes with Plastic Wood. You can go get more wood at the lumber yard to replace a board that isn't working out, or to fill an opening that you didn't intend. Once it's all banged into shape, then you can sand it, stain it, varnish it, put on brass handles and corners, and hang a pretty padlock from the hasp.

People who take your crate can put any number of things into it, and if some of them don't use the crate for storage, they might use it as a coffee table or a place to put a nice lamp.

Novels you can revise. First make the shape, then smooth and refine, then show to your friends.

More on this anon.

[qatz]

Okay. One more time.

Reph, who is otherwise correct, misses the "and" meaning of the conjunctive "," in denying the correctitude of the ", then" construction. Whether this is sufficient to validate the construction is open to question. It is otherwise, as I say elsewhere, an incomplete run-on sentence. The use of the second phrase as a subordinate descriptor for which "then" could conceivably be appropriate is negatoried by the clausal characteristics of the second part of the construction. A tip of the hat, most respectfully, to your mother the English teacher on this first day of days, but we are not going to solve the grammatical legitimacy of the naked "and then" anytime soon. BTW no one appeared to notice the "and then" I slipped into one of my recent discussions. It was a land mine I and suppose I should be grateful that no one stepped on it because of the world's opprobrium for such messy and indiscriminate devices.

I was in a way embarrassed that I'd dominated the discussion so much, particularly with the guy who appeared not to recognize that I was right and he was wrong about something, claiming I was pussyfooting around the issue somehow by saying "I'm right, and you're wrong," and who demanded equal time for his wrongness. I am sorry if I do not suffer fools gladly, I'll try to be better in the future.

To compensate, I did what I could to try to return the discussion to real things with various devices. And, then, nevertheless, Jim, bulldog as he is, undermined my efforts by ploughing into the New Year with his comment baldly repeating the attitude that got us in this mess to begin with. I mean, the nerve! This is not quite so sinful as the camp robber who, despite my warnings, blithely brought the topic up again for no good reason, just because he could. Call Tom Ridge!

Jim can be forgiven this time because he does not qualify the reasons for his objection. He is correct that the naked "and then" is just plain wrong as a matter of word choice in prose, but all the arguments have been made and all the positions drawn, then distinctions drawn, but I think we need not re-hash the things we've already said, whether good or ill.

May this be our best year, and may we deserve it. :hat

[qatz]

Many thanks for, as promised, your key lime pie recipe, Jim. Your discussion is beautiful and instructive. I will work on both when I return to the land of the living, and do my dishes -- two distinct challenges! I apologize to the world for further offending its sensibilities in my last post, and I welcome with huzzahs your return to key lime-itude!

:hat

[EJ]

I really love all of the analogies that you come up with. They give shape to what would otherwise be abstract concepts.

I was wanting to ask you something that the pie analogy made me think of. A lot of times, my plot ideas are amorphous, gooey blobs. Is there any real way that helps to turn a blob of goo plot into something apealing?

Oh, and I also wanted to thank you for making this topic and taking the time to help out all of the beginning writers on this message board.

I've heard a lot of horror stories about authors who are stuck up jerks who think the world revolves around them, but you and all of the other published authors on this board have proven to be very good, kind people.

[jpwriter]

James,
How can this be? What could possibly prevent a person from applying all his skill to a short story and when he discovers by whatever means that it doesn't work, going back and reworking it to make it a good story. If I were God, I could even make a failed lime pie good. As a writer, we are the God's of words. How can we be unable to fix anything we wish?
Jerry

[johnbaern]

Have you ever written a short story JP? The analogy James cited is correct.

You could theoretically start a whole new story with the same premise as the failed one, but that's pretty much all you can do once the words are on paper-- it either hits or misses. And most often you won't even be able to do that much-- frequently the premise also stinks.

..

Qatz: Your services as historian of this thread are greatly appreciated. If at any point it becomes necessary to determine who said what, who owed who an apology, and who was wrong about grammar, you analyses will surely prove invaluable.

John

[James D Macdonald]

All that you can do with a failed short story is write a new short story. The new story will be a completely new one, for all that it may resemble the other (both are made of limes and eggs and sugar).

With a failed crate, you can still take it apart and reassemble it into a new crate, and most of the lumber will be the same physical lumber (though the new crate may not resemble the old crate at all, except in its crateness).

----------

If Our Lord Himself couldn't explain the Kingdom of Heaven except by parables, how am I, a mere man, to explain writing?

(Matthew 13 xxiv-xxxiii, if you're interested.)

[James D Macdonald]

A short story is a single joke. A novel is a comedy routine.

[James D Macdonald]

There was a lumber camp far up in the hills in Vermont. All winter long the lumberjacks would cut trees, then in the spring drive them down the rivers to the sawmills in the towns below the notches.

One day a stranger came to one particular camp, and was invited in to share the men's evening meal. The air was warm inside, filled with the smells of delicious food and strong coffee. And as the evening progressed, one of the men shouted out "Fifty-seven!" and everyone laughed.

Then another man shouted out, "Twenty-two!" to great laughter and applause, another shouted "One hundred sixty-eight!" and everyone laughed even harder.

The stranger turned to the man seated beside him and asked, "What's going on? Why are the men laughing at those numbers?"

"We've all been up here so long," replied the lumberjack, "that we've all heard each others' jokes. So to save time, we gave them all numbers. Instead of telling the joke, we just say the number."

At that moment, someone shouted out "Two hundred eighty-nine!" and everyone laughed harder than ever. Men were slapping their thighs; tears were streaming down their faces.

"What happened?" asked the stranger.

"Oh," said the lumberjack, "That was a new one."

"Gee," said the stranger, "Can I try?"

"Sure."

The stranger stood up and shouted "Ninety-one!"

Silence. Everyone just looked at him.

The stranger's face turned red, he sat back down, and turned to his companion. "What happened?" he asked. "Why didn't anyone laugh?"

"It's okay," said the lumberjack. "Some people just can't tell jokes."

[SRHowen]

It can also be seen as--a short story doesn't have any extra words--each one has to be carefully chosen, there isn't much room to move them or change them. So once you hit hte end--there is not much to play with.

A novel you have many more words to play with, you can add, change and take away.

Shawn

[jpwriter]

James,
I don't believe you will ever get it through my thick skull. If I tell a joke and it flops, then (not "and then") I learn how to tell it right. It then works yet it is the same joke.
I did my best to create and rewrite to death a short story and when it was read and critiqued, it wasn't as good as I thought. I reworked the story and came up with a few brilliant ideas (with the help of a fellow writer) and it turned out to be a story my readers loved. Yet, it was the same basic story - not a new story.
If what you say is true, then either I have a new story or I didn't do it as well as I could the first time whether I thought so or not.
Jerry

[jpwriter]

Johnbaern,
My premise never stinks. I wipe after every use.
Jerry

[rtilryarms]

My Brother explains it much the same way.

He told me that in a crowd, I am the funniest person he knows. I have quick wit and a seemingly endless source of imagination and material. He tells me these nice things.

Then he says, “But as a comedian, you suck. You can’t present a joke, you have no flow and you can’t segue your way around subjects and events.”

It’s true. Put me in a crowd and I am a one-liner Gatling gun. Put me on stage and I bomb.

That’s the difference of being funny and being a professional Comedian. It looks like it is a lot like writing.

That’s why I refer to myself as a storyteller not a writer. That will only change if I decide to be a writer. I have not taken that leap.

So I just lurk and harass everyone.

Mike

[James D Macdonald]

Any analogy can be pressed too far.

Part of learning how to make this pie is learning what "until very thick" means. If it happens you get it wrong, you try again. The pie you have then isn't the same as the one that didn't work ... because this time you stirred until very thick.

[qatz]

Jerry, I know not what James may say, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.

Something like that last, mostly immortal, sentence, a short story is a short, crystalline piece of prose. The conclusion makes sense only in the context of the beginning, and a crucial if complex step taken somewhere along the way -- in maybe the space of just a few words -- to expand that context into a clarity, helped along by very disciplined prose. In a good short story, as with poesy itself bordering on prose, every word counts.

In Moby Dick, you will find the occasional word that does not count. At last report, there were two. But a novel is, as Jim very aptly says, a large space for the fictional development of color and concept. It is a space, whereas the short story is not. The short story, like the poem it tries but usually fails to emulate, is a concrete piece of art, a carved piece -- an Aleutian bear carving in fact -- or a miniature painting, all of a piece in itself, not a big hall of mirrors reflecting vast emotions. Lara in "Dr. Z" being an exemplar of the latter. When you started your first failed short you did not have the piece; the piece was everything, and you did not have it. When you got it right the second time, it was only because the piece came together for you, not because you scotch-taped the two parts of the sculpture together, but because you finally got the carving right. It may have seemed similar to the first, but it was not the same piece. It couldn't have been.

Oh, by the way, to whomever it was that lauded my history of the thread, thank you for your kudos, but that piece was not historical -- it was a devious and so far undetected way of using the two remaining disputed word constructions in dignified prose that few if any people would challenge. Hah! Back to you, James.

Oh, and this .......... "78."

[qatz]

Okay, if you don't think that's funny, how about 44?

[Note On]

Sorry... not being argumentative; I just really don't understand.

If you revise a short story, that makes it a different short story, but if you revise a novel, it's still the same novel?

[James D Macdonald]

A short story is all of one piece.

A novel is many pieces.

[jpwriter]

James and all,
James wrote:
"All that you can do with a failed short story is write a new short story. The new story will be a completely new one, for all that it may resemble the other (both are made of limes and eggs and sugar).

With a failed crate, you can still take it apart and reassemble it into a new crate, and most of the lumber will be the same physical lumber (though the new crate may not resemble the old crate at all, except in its crateness)."

Okay. And the novel isn't a new novel in much the same way the short story rewritten would be.
Sounds like an argument of semantics. Since these types of arguments are never won - one side only yields because they get worn down - nothing gets resolved.

I YIELD! UNCLE! :blackeye

Jerry

[johnbaern]

The issue here is how much actual physical prose will carry over from one version to the next. In a novel, huge chunks can be reused. With a short story, you must begin again from scratch.

John

[qatz]

James may see it differently, but I don't think he can possibly explain the thing any clearer than he has (with, ahem, an assist from moi). Why not roll the key lime taste around in your mouth a while and let the analogies sink in? All will come clear in the great by-and-by. :hat

[Salve Ghostwalker]

>>> The issue here is how much actual physical prose will carry over from one version to the next. In a novel, huge chunks can be reused. With a short story, you must begin again from scratch. <<<

The pie comparison is silly; attempts to explain the analogy border on ludicrous. A story, unlike a pie, isn't 'completely ruined' by one bad or missing ingredient. I recently read a manuscript which was excellent, except for one flaw. The writer started the story about 500-600 words too soon. Very little will be needed in the way of rewriting to fix that story. Heck, it would probably sell if the writer simply threw away the first page. Likewise, I've seen cases where the writer dropped the ball on the last page, or even in the final paragraph. Again, not much needed to fix those stories.

This whole pie thing seems to be a crude way of saying, "Write novels. Don't bother with stories." I think Mr. MacDonald's opinion is just that, an opinion, and in this case one I don't agree with. A novel, more than a story, needs a strong foundation and solid framework. A story can squeak by on a good idea or a strong character. If, somewhere around page 300, the novelist discovers he's been barking up the wrong tree the whole time, he can't slap on a Bandaid adhesive bandage and fix it.

If you believe that a story can only be 'fixed' by completely rewriting it, you're basically saying that every story problem has to have catastrophic results. You are saying that it's impossible to write a good half of a story but screw up the second half. Sometimes it's easier to rewrite a story than it is to cannabalize its good parts, but that doesn't mean that every 'failed' story needs to be competely rewritten.

In fact, that sounds like a recipe for failure. Editor #1 rejects my story. I rewrite. Editor #2 rejects my story. I rewrite. Sooner or later, anything that was good in my story is completely gone.

In a workshop, if you receive 20 crits on a story, half of them will say it just needs tweaking and half will say it needs rewriting. Several people will say it's the best manuscript they've ever read, and several will say it's the worst. Three people will point out a particular line and say they wished they'd written it. Two people will point to that same line and tell you it was clever but didn't fit the story. As writers, we have only what we have written. My advice is, be ready to cut or change anything, but don't throw out a single word carelessly, and only revise what feels wrong to you.

[reph]

looks like we need two threads.

1. Learn Writing with Uncle Jim

2. Learn Writing with Everybody Else

[James D Macdonald]

Gracious. Of course <a href="http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/stories.htm" target="_new">my opinion is my opinion</a>. What else could it be?

No one said to rewrite after an editor rejects a story. The only time you rewrite after you've decided that it's finished and it's time to start sending it around is when an editor opens his checkbook and says "I'll buy this if you make the following changes..." Otherwise once a story's done, it's done.

A story that only needed to have 500-600 words removed from its beginning (and that's closer to two or three pages than one) is one that worked pretty well. Starting a story too early is a common fault. One that lacks a conclusion, that's tougher to fix. Finding the proper conclusion is part of the art here; a perfect conclusion is one that is at once surprising and inevitable. (See notes above on what a "surprise" is.)

Yes, stories that don't work are catastrophes. Either the entire thing works or it doesn't.


"...be ready to cut or change anything, but don't throw out a single word carelessly, and only revise what feels wrong to you," is basically sound advice. Once you've done that ... if the story doesn't work put it in your desk drawer and write a different story.

(Here's some practical advice for the Stir Until Thickened part of the process: Don't use the cut-and-paste function of your wordprocessor at all. Retype the entire thing from hardcopy, making changes as you go. You'll find yourself dropping paragraphs that aren't worth the trouble of retyping, and you'll find yourself adding dialog and description that was missing. Better, smoother ways of phrasing things will occur to you.)

[Note On]

Hmm...

I think I write novels the way you suggest writing short stories.

As for re-keying from hard copy, I agree.

[SRHowen]

rewriting--what do you think of? It could be a messy topic. I can see that some people think rewriting means the whole story--the entire MS.

Not so--rewrites can be as simple as removing the first chapter, and vaaahhhhvoooom the rest of the story is perfection. That is a rewrite. You now have draft two of the novel. It can be a simple as going through and having your copy editor friend find all the typos, added or missed words. BANG draft three.

Or it can be the head on desk (after leaving many dents in said head by desk):ack rekey and scrap big chunks and rewrite almost every word from the words Chapter One.

Anything you do after you type "The End" the first time is a rewrite.

And I can attest to the rekey method--it works very very well. Each writer has their own way of dealing with rewrites. James is offering his.

In the workshops I've run, I offer my own as well. But if mine didn't work I'd try Jame's way.

I am also sure that James has a process he goes through when rewriting. A step one sort of thing. Which IMHO should always involve printing a triple spaced version of the MS and reading on paper, then re-keying. ESP if this is your first novel--things will pop out at you on paper that you do not see on the screen, ideas will come and when you rekey, as James said, you will start to type some long bit of info dump or some such and groan out loud and realize you need to scrap it.

I know this will get me blasted--I have armor skin I've been writing a long time--but this thread is about learning and trying Jame's way of doing things. Arguments that seem to pop up on BB all over the place really don't have a place here. Post another thread--My thought on Key Lime Pie--blah blah--those reading this thread wish to learn writing with James.

Come on people. How much would you pay to go to the workshop James runs? The last one I ran was in Germany, I was not the only author or editor there doing a workshop--but there were many writers from the USA that were there---how much did they spend? I can tell you, and I don't know about James, but no one ever stood up and wasted their few moments to argue instead of ask a question.

Please, let's get back on track class.

Shawn

[Note On]

I'm increasingly uncomfortable offering anything at all here, because this is the only happening forum in the Writing Novels area, but it seems to be more of a class and less of an open forum than I initially realized.

Is there a FAQ or a set of guidelines somewhere?

Thanks.

[rtilryarms]

This is just my opinion, of course.
This thread was started for the purpose of instruction. As with everything in life, there are many ways of doing things.
But this was much more helpful and informative before the semantic arguments and minutiae.

This is an open forum and any input is welcome but I would vote to open separate discussion threads to engage in heavy argument and leave this for those who want to teach and those who want to learn.

After all, JM is spending a lot of time voluntarily and he is asking nothing in return. Have you seen the volume of information?

So please do not endeavor to scare the Instructor away. Start a discussion thread.

[qatz]

I agree completely with Mike and Shawn. The set of guidelines is respect for others, and James being central to this thread it's respect for him and his method that is central. The meaning of this thread, and why it has been so successful heretofore, is not bloviating over whatever nonsense comes to your attention for the sake of creating conflict, but participating in the developing sense of the seminar with the common aim of a shared goal, that set out by Jim at the first. I recommend reading the entire thread to get a sense of that, and just to learn things too. This is not a class but a discussion, yet it must stay on task to keep its sense of purpose, and its leader is MacD. Beyond cavil there are those out there who would argue with having a sense of purpose on ideological grounds, but guess what, I don't want to hear it. :hat

[Note On]

I'm sort of baffled by the perception that I've done anything to create conflict, or to chase off an instructor--but as that does seem to be the perception, I'll doff my hat and look for a less structured forum.

[rtilryarms]

Dear Friend,

No one is saying your input is not welcome. We were just deviating from the original intent of the thread.

This makes it hard to navigate and stay on course. I only suggest opening a discussion thread to challenge or debate philosophy and/or semantics.

And i do not speak for Uncle Jim. My opinion only.

Stick around, you have very valuable input.

Mike

[qatz]

You may go or you may stay as you wish, but please try to understand what we're about and what you're saying before you say it. And this is not only you, On, so please don't take it personal. I probably just used you as a handy target because you were a handy target.

Just lately, and I think it was only the normal end of year madness which descends, like Lear's ghost, on many of us this time of year, the path of this thread seemed to veer into swampland, and we suffered an unfortunate concatenation of muck on the boots, some of it self-inflicted by ourselves, and the rest due to camp robbers. These bluejays are figments of our own imaginations and. like Harpies, descend on us when we get sloppy or obtuse or let our manners wear thin. You and others were just playing the roles, I think, of these big annoying birds swooping in and stealing our crumbs.

Now we are trying to get out of the muck this new year's day and chase off the camp robbers and get back to the path this thread started out on. A person like Salve can come in with extremely harsh opinions about lime pie, maybe she had a bad slice of it once, and remain on task. That's okay. A person like whoever it was, not just you but others, can come in with very harsh, not-well-thought-out ideas about something off-topic and just end up sounding trivial and ad hominem, and deviate the discussion for days. Or just post things below third-grade level like "Nuh uh." That's not okay. The person, let's take you for example, is undoubtedly a worthy individual, and not a big noisy bird causing trouble. The role that person is playing, though, is that of the big noisy bird. People understandably tire of that, as well as of my tedious explanations.

Watch for my new thread, where you can try to beat me up and get beat up in return to your heart's content. :hat

[HConn]

I would prefer Note sticks around.

I've been visiting family for the holidays, so I've had time to pop in and glance at short threads, but not keep up with this one. Now, having read the more than 100 posts that have appeared since I left, I don't see where James has complained about people who disagreed with him. Maybe I missed it.

Couple things:

The very early morning is a great time to work, especially if, like me, you are a night person. When I'm a little muzzy from sleep, my internal editor is still in a REM state. I get lots done at that hour. YMMV, but try it out. You may be a convert.

I don't mind "and then" too much, though I don't write it. My pet peeve is "and into" as in: "He jumped over the fence and into the garden."

"It's raining" isn't a passive construction. It's present progressive (or present participle, depending on who your teacher was).

And I will disagree with anyone who says something I disagree with, and I'll try to be polite about it. I have a lot of respect for Jim and his success, but I learn a lot by disagreeing with experts. How else will they correct me?

Besides, if our disagreements are in another thread, new arrivals will continually start new "Plotting as chess?" threads. Wouldn't it be easier and tidier for that to be here?

Jim, please let us know if something in the tone of this thread bothers you. You started it, so it's your playground.

[qatz]

I guess you had to be there, Conn. James mostly stayed out of the fray but not entirely. In fact, he caused part of it and was more argumentative -- and wronger -- than he needed to be on some parts. And at one point -- apparently you missed this -- he said something like "I hope this doesn't devolve into a huge shouting match over spelling or grammar.' And at another point he listed some of the many useful topics he wanted to address when the forum got back on track. His opinion was not unclear.

But there's enough fault to spread around. I think a lot of it was my own complex pontification concerning which, when people do not understand, they just get angry.

Even so, On and others seemed to start arguing more out of personal animus and whim than anything productive. You may prefer whatever you wish about their staying, but it is their choice whether to stay or leave. The more important thing is whether the discussion will remain mired in the muck where it was while you were gone, or not. You appear not to have much feel for that. I don't think any of us liked that, except maybe a camp robber or two.

I respect you, but I guess I can tell you what I think, and I think I am not pleased that you feel compelled to comment on what has been pretty much put behind us now by all. I would also ask you not to clutter up Jim's thread further with more useless re-hashing of dead horses -- how's that for a nasty mixed metaphor?!? Jim obviously has much more to offer us in his own words, without needless off-subject diatribe getting in the way, and I can advocate for my own interests in wanting to hear that, thank you. If you want to lend your belated voice to the ugly debate, there will be plenty of chances. But my friendly advice is, just say no to the impulse.

[johnbaern]

One can disagree, but it makes more sense to pose the issue in the form of a question (which hasn't usually been the case).

There is also a difference between good questions and bad questions. Alot of people have been not even *attempting* to understand what Jim has *meant*, and just attacking his statements on the basis of semantics.

Really it all comes down to a question of intent. Are people driven by their desire to learn? Or are they just trying to prove that they can be as big and cool and smart as ol' Jimmyboy?

People who pick semantic fights are NOT trying to learn. They are NO help to those of us who are.*

John

* (As long as they continue with the same disingenuous behavior.)

[qatz]

Thank you, John. You make some very good points. But I am uncomfortable personalizing this by further using particular people's names in the subject line. I should not have done so before. HConn certainly does not deserve being singled out. I hope you will bear with me.

I am happy and proud that Sunset Creator aka Laura, whom many of you know, has graciously given me permission to set up a new thread in her board on EZ called "Laura on Self Publishing." It will be about the English Language as told to Reph and me. I just told Reph and Lori about it -- they are in Reph's new thread "Learn Writing Without Uncle Jim" -- and hopefully they’ll approve. I am hoping that everyone who desires to follow this contro will take the effort to convene there. Laura needs the traffic, and James with the single most popular non-personals thread in EZdom does not.

Thus we can return to the preexisting understanding, sometimes contrary to fact, that everyone participating in Jim's thread knows the basics, and get on with the value of the lesson as students have been clamoring for eons.

Writing, the topic of Jim's course, is not itself the language. It is using the language. For those who wish to talk endlessly about the language, they now have the option. For those who wish to use the language, or at least talk about its use, they will again be able to get a word in sideways.

I will be setting up the thread forthwith. Donations to Laura's site will be most welcome. Those of us who remain interested in James' vastly interesting writing course, as I am, will find it here as always. (I hope this is acceptable to the powers that be, Em and Jenna.)

The standards over there will be the same as here. Respect for one another. And in view of the hostess’s sensibilities, be especially polite. You’ll have to remind me of that from time to time.

So, to anyone who's interested, see you over there. You can find it by clicking one of Sunset's recent signatures, or by following your own "recently visited sites" once you've been there. I am sure she may provide an easier way to get there if it's demanded. :hat

[johnbaern]

If I start out a particular passage in preterite perfect (had done, had gone), is it acceptable for me to waffle and throw in a few preterite indefinites (did, went)?

I realize that tense agreement is important, but all those helper verbs start to get in the way of the flow after a while. Obviously my purpose is to set off one chain of events (which occurred earlier) from the main flow without resorting to quote indentation or pagebreaks.

So what's "the deal" here? And if there's no "deal", what are your thoughts?

John

.

.

P.S. to Qatz: I'm sorry that you misunderstood my post. If you read it again, you may see that I was not singling HConn out for anything. He made a comment to which I was replying. I've reread my post and I don't believe there was any evident insinuation, but if you see something I don't please e-mail me at johnbaern@yahoo.com

[johnbaern]

Another quick one: is there any problem with using "now" to refer to a past-tense action? "I now sat at the table", for instance? I've been avoiding this one on the assumption that it was an oxymoron, but substituting "then" doesn't always sound as good.

John

[qatz]

No, John, not at all. Did not mean to imply otherwise. Actually, I was not referring to your text but to why I changed my own subject header only.

We is ready for you now if you wish to join a new grammar thread, called The English Language and located in the General Discussion area of Laura on Self Publishing and All Aspects of Writing. Or you can just visit Reph's own thread here, Learn Without the Uncle... She and a few others have a friendly discussion going there.

Despite the overtly grammatical nature of your question, there is a legitimate tie-in to word choice. As with your followup. I guess I have no more to say, therefore.

Best to you. Sorry for the recents.


:hat

[HConn]

My original response was lost partway through when my browser crashed. Here's hoping I have better luck this time.

John, you can't limit people's disagreements to questions. You have to give them the freedom to disagree in whatever way seems best to them. If things get out of hand--and frankly, nothing I've seen in this thread qualifies--then it's something for the moderator to handle. You should contact the moderator if you think someone is misbehaving.

Qatz, reading your condescending posts, especially:

I am sorry, however, that you misunderstood my post. Perhsaps if you read it you will understand it, or perhaps not.

Makes me feel sorry for you. Good luck to you.

James, thanks for the pie recipe, although I'll admit I didn't understand the analogy until you spelled it out. No one ever accused me of being a genius. Is that a genuine recipe? Have you made it yourself?

[James D Macdonald]

Is that a genuine recipe? Have you made it yourself?

Yes, it's a genuine recipe. An old family recipe, in fact. (And I have friends who Really Love it.)

I also feel, making that pie, the way I feel when writing a short story. Whether this means I'm nuts in the head I leave to others.

Perhaps it is a koan.

"Writing a short story is like making a lime pie," the Master said.

The Disciple asked, "How is making a lime pie like writing a short story? It makes no sense!"

"You are quite right," the Master replied. "It makes no sense."

[James D Macdonald]

Is there a FAQ or a set of guidelines somewhere?

Yes, real early on: Anything you say must be true, and anything you say must be helpful.

[HConn]

Thanks. I'm printing the recipe and I'll be making it for my wife.

:D

edited to add: oops, this post isn't helpful. Let me add something.

"In art, there are tears that do lie too deep for thought."
-- Louis Kronenberger

Okay. Not very helpful, but it's something.

[James D Macdonald]

Another quick one: is there any problem with using "now" to refer to a past-tense action? "I now sat at the table", for instance? I've been avoiding this one on the assumption that it was an oxymoron, but substituting "then" doesn't always sound as good.

How does ""I now sat at the table" differ from "I sat at the table"?

If' you're using that as dialog, and trying to differentiate how your different characters speak, perhaps show something about their social class, level of education, or native region, I don't see anything wrong with either phrasing.

Perhaps if we could see that sentence used in a paragraph?

Words are given meaning by the words around them.

[qatz]

HConn, I am sorry I was bad. I was trying to be helpful. See my post in Reph's thread.

[johnbaern]

For instance, off the top of my head:

"'What a day!' I thought. I was right. It had been quite a day. It all started with the Grand Wizard of Schnorkle...

...and there were a great many things I had done that day, yadda yadda shish bam boom.

NOW I sat at the table. A fly was on the wall. It made me hungry."

I'm not sure if the transition BACK to the primary stream is evident without the 'now'. In speech, this sort of phrasing, oxymoronical or not, is sometimes used.

I suppose you are right in that the "now" is not the only way to solve the problem-- the above passage could read "I sat at the table, thinking all of it over." or something to that effect. I suppose I was just looking for options.

..

If the above passage were present tense, like so: "NOW I sit at the table.", it would not be oxymoronical. "Now" would still be a fluff word, but answer me this-- if there was no good, constructive phrase to indicate a return to the primary stream, might not one fluff word be better than two or three or five?

I dunno.

John

[johnbaern]

Read this passage from Joseph Heller's Something Happened:

""
. And then, with victory palpably before me, I might decide to speak; I might decide to move in skillfully for my own attack, simulating an air of smug composure that seeks mockingly to impersonate her own.
. "No," I will say enigmatically.
. (And this will confuse her.)
. "No what?" she must ask.
. "No, you're not."
. "Not what? she is forced to inquire, timid and suspicious now. "What do you mean?"
""

Within that passage we have (a) an "and then", (b) a "superfluous" now (or is it? What do you think, Jim?), and (c) a shift from the future to the present tense with no warning or explanation.

Then again, Joseph Heller is the same guy who ticked alot of traditionalists off with his relentless circular plotting in Catch-22; and in Something Happened he sometimes employs impossibly L O N G parenthetical phrases which force you to go back and read what came before in order to continue (this annoys even me a little bit. Fortunately the atrocious ones are few and far between.).

I like both books a great deal though (I would love to write like Joseph Heller).. and I just thought that (that) passage was kind of interesting.

John

[James D Macdonald]

"'What a day!' I thought. I was right. It had been quite a day. It all started with the Grand Wizard of Schnorkle...

...and there were a great many things I had done that day, yadda yadda shish bam boom.

NOW I sat at the table. A fly was on the wall. It made me hungry."

Two thoughts came instantly to my mind: Did the readers really need the recap; and was it the fly, the wall, or table that made the narrator hungry?

Try this: Read the passage aloud without "now," then with it. Which sounds better to you?

[jpwriter]

James,
Perhaps you could do a lesson about transitions. Particularly on going to and from different time periods.
You humble servant awaits.
Jerry

[James D Macdonald]

Within that passage we have (a) an "and then", (b) a "superfluous" now (or is it? What do you think, Jim?), and (c) a shift from the future to the present tense with no warning or explanation.

I think this is thought, or interior dialog. Much is allowed in dialog. Is the narrator revealing character? I suspect he may be.

What's with the leading periods?

I also ask, how fast is the plot moving at this point? Plain, or even clumsy writing will be overlooked if the story is strong and the plot is moving.

(I blush to admit that I haven't read this particular book.)

General principle: You can do anything, anything at all, in dialog.

[reph]

"A fly was on the wall. It made me hungry."

That made me think the narrator was a frog. "With a flick of my tongue, I..."

[LiamJackson]

<<Frog...>>

Or Renfield.

[James D Macdonald]

I quit my day job around fifteen years ago.

Here's what I wish someone had told me before I did so:

First, make sure you have a year's supply of writing contracts to work on.

Second, make sure you have a year's supply of money to live on.

Third, pay down all your credit cards to zero then cancel them.

Fourth, be prepared to white-knuckle your way through life.

[rtilryarms]

Is it worth it?

[jpwriter]

James,
The real questions are these: Would you have listened to them? Could any person in your life at that time have convinced you to do other than you did?

I have just quit a job making 50K with long hours and higher stress for one making 25K with 40 hours and low stress in order to spend more time writing and learning the craft. I listened to not one naysayer.
Jerry

[James D Macdonald]

Yes, I think I would have listened. Quitting your day job isn't some wild, crazy thing to do on a whim, and it isn't something so compelling that you can't do otherwise. It's a decision to make, with full facts available, and with all sorts of opinions from people who've been down the road ahead of you to look at and evaluate for your own situation.

[johnbaern]

Did the reader need a recap? If the passage recounting the days events was particularly long, they probably would, no?

That particular passage was made up on the spot, with little to no thought wasted. But to answer the question-- I think it was the fly, and if the "it made me hungry" had been set off by a double-dash instead of in its own sentence, that would have been clear.

In Something Happened the narrator is a character, and the entirety of the narration is structured as a sort of "dialogue", I suppose. As far as the pace of the plot-- it doesn't really move. That passage is on page 140, and does not advance plot (I suppose it reveals character). At that point in the book about 3 hours have passed.

But is the book thoroughly engrossing at that point, as it is at all points? Yes.

The period leads were to provide indentation (make it easier to read). EZBoard automatically disregards the following characters-- spaces immediately after a carriage return, consecutive spaces, and any carriage returns over 2 in a row. I actually put two spaces after each period, but as you can see they were reduced to one.

..

That's a very good point about dialogue, though. I now see where I was confused-- if the narrator is *also* a character, alot of the narration also be "dialogue". Correct?

John

[James D Macdonald]

... if the narrator is *also* a character, a lot of the narration can also be "dialogue."

That's your basic First Person POV.

<HR>

&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;test

&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;test


<hr>

<pre>
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;test
</pre>

<pre>
test
</pre>

<hr>

[Duane]

Can someone please explain the use of these characters "..." in a sentence.

I use them in my e-mails to show a pause. But that's just me...you know...trying to slow the reader down.

It's showing up in the novel that i'm currently reading. In fact, a paragraph has ended this way.

I don't wish to start a grammar war here. Perhaps the answer is a simple one...or the person asking is.

[James D Macdonald]

... is called an ellipsis. (If you have more than one, they're ellipses.)

An ellipsis means that one or more words has been left out. You see those a lot in blurb quotes from reviews.

You can use an ellipsis to show a pause in dialog.

"What you must understand," George began," is that Frieda ... has not always been truthful."

(What I'm trying to show there is George pausing to think of how best to say that Frieda lies like a rug.)

You can use them at the end of a sentence to show the words trailing off (in that case you have four dots in a row, one of them being the period).

"The old farm," Joe said. "That would mean Bill and Freida...."

(Joe's voice trails off, as the horrid realization blooms in his mind.)

As long as you're consistent, use of ellipses is part of your style. Do try to keep the stage directions to a minimum, though.

Lots of your fonts have ellipsis characters [&hellip;]. Don't use 'em in your manuscript. Use three periods in a row to represent ellipses.

[HConn]

(Cross posted with Jim's more useful answer)

[Karen Ranney]

Personally, if you use elipses (elipsis?) more than once in a book, you run the risk of having your character sound inane, idiotic, helpless, and weak. (Or TSTL - too stupid to live.) Can you tell I hate them? I think they're sloppy writing, or lazy writing, which is worse. An elipsis indicates a hesitation, an inability to finish a thought. I believe it should never be used as a pacing tool.

My opinion, of course.

[Duane]

Thank you Jim.

As Johnny Carson would say, "I did not know that".

I'ts kind of you to take the time.


Duane

[HConn]

Jim, I've been meaning to tell you that I took Brust's _The Sun, the Moon and the Stars_ on my holiday vacay and read it as you recommended. It was an interesting book. As soon as I catch up with my message boards (and have a little time) I'll post my thoughts on it, such as they are.

Just wanted to let you know we're listening.

[reph]

The Chicago Manual of Style (12th ed.) says to use dashes to indicate broken speech. "Bob saw the flash and whirled around. 'Walt, Joe--you guys, did you see that--those kids--I didn't think they--where would they get shotguns?'"

Ellipsis points are used to replace omitted words. You wouldn't say "'Walt, Joe...you guys...did you see that," because you haven't left out any words of Bob's.

Style manuals state the conventions for spacing before, between, and after the dots.

[johnbaern]

I device that I use alot is a two-period ellipsis. This.. as you can see.. indicates pause. Three- or four-period ellipses.... omitted words.

John

[jpwriter]

The Chicago Manual of Style (15th ed.) apparently has changed this.
"6.90 Indicating sudden breaks. An em dash or a pair of em dashes may indicate a sudden break in thought or sentence structure or an interuption in dialogue. (Ellipsis points my also serve this purpose; see 11.45)"

"11.45 Faltering or interrupted speech. Ellipsis points may be used to suggest faltering or fragmented speech accompanied by confusion or insecurity. In the examples below, .... (For ellipsis points used to represent omitted text, see 11.51-65.)"

Jerry

[SRHowen]

LOL I use the dashes--a lot, just in case no one noticed.

The use of . . two periods is not correct. And editor would have you make them three.

Also it is "Words. . . ." or in a sentence; I saw them together . . . you know. . . . I see this incorrect so often, more than three in the middle or less than three, a space after the word before the first period in the end of sentence use, or the last two on top of each other. Word and many other programs auto correct them to be right next to each other. Turn it off--mono spaced is the key.

Shawn

[qatz]

Personally, Shawn, I go a lot by sound, and it seems to me (as with Jim's different shades of gray) that there is a slightly different meaning, that is, a different feeling, in the dash and the ellipsis. I don't know ... maybe I'm a fool ... but the main point should be, as I think we all agree, the meaning of the phrase -- whatever that may be. Part of that meaning is the non-verbal sense that the structure is meant to convey.

As you can tell, I'm a bit of a stylistic troglodyte when it comes to the construction of ellipses, but will defer to Shawn and anyone else. James, this is a situation where I just say, it's the dictionary's word against mine. Having lost both my S&W and the Chicago Manual, maybe I should spend this afternoon looking for new ones. Thanks ...

[SRHowen]

I don't disagree with you there--I use both. Was only pointing out that if you use . . . 's to please use them correctly. Same with the dashes don't let your program make them into em dashes.

Shawn

[jpwriter]

Just a point of curiosity. Wouldn't the use be put to two tests. One, will the editors let it be printed. Two, which would the readers read easiest or more clearly. (by reader I mean the ultimate end user, the book buyer)
I have been learning a lot about usage on various post lately and it (just now) (at this time) (suddenly) (dropped on me like a bombshell) (now) occurred to me to wonder if these various preferences are primarily reader driven, editor driven or writer driven.

Disclaimer: The above post is a serious question with humor injected in parentheses. Anyone that reads more into this post including, but not limited to, the disclaimer, he or she does so at his or her own risk and this poster is not responsible in any way for his or her mental or spiritual condition because of reading said post.

[qatz]

I think you are a hoot, Jerry--a real hoot--but, after all . . . that's just me.

[reph]

I'm shocked and dismayed at Chicago's new ruling on ellipses. No wonder the reviewers of the 15th edition have said some uncomplimentary things about it!

[qatz]

If it's okay for me to follow the 15th edition, Reph, it's okay for you to say "It's that edition's word against mine!" 8)

[Salve Ghostwalker]

Karen R. writes:

>>> Personally, if you use elipses (elipsis?) more than once in a book, you run the risk of having your character sound inane, idiotic, helpless, and weak. <<<

The risk? I may WANT my character to sound inane, idiotic, helpless, and weak. I don't want my main character coming off that way, but I may need a minor character to sound hesitant and unsure of himself.

Punctuation is a tool. I wouldn't use a jackhammer to remove putty from a window pane, but I would use one to remove an old cement step. The complexity and structure of the story dictates punctuation. You'd have a tough time selling a literary story which only used simple punctuation marks. Readers of literary fiction know what to do when they encounter a semicolon, ellipsis, or dash, and they don't scream when they encounter parenthesis. They expect writers to use a variety of punctuation marks.

If we, as writers, only needed periods, commas, and question marks, the other punctuation marks wouldn't exist. This goes for the exclamation mark as well. There's nothing wrong with an exclamation mark, as long as it's at the end of an exclamation. "Screw you.", "Screw you!", and "Screw ... you." have different intensities and differ in emphasis. Making that distinction is part of a writer's job description.

[Duane]

Perhaps I should take a moment to explain my presence.

I work as a mechanical design engineer. I enjoy working in this
field and have no intention of leaving it any timesoon. However, one should be prepared for plan B. The manfacturing world, in terms of job security, is less than acceptable.

Stay with me, i'm about to make some sense of this. But first I must digress a moment.

A couple of months ago I was at the beach. An elderly couple was walking past me, holding hands, as confident a couple as I have ever seen. And, for unknown reasons, triggered a thought process. That process brought me to a few conclussions.

1. One can, and should, pursue a hobby that is financially rewarding first and emotionally rewarding second. Meaning, if you cannot get some financial return from it, discard it.
(I do expect a beating for this one)

2. Pursue said hobby until you have mastered it. Now you can call it a career.

3. There are no limits as to how many careers you may pursue, provided you have capacity to learn the ones you choose.

Which brings me here. I've decided to take up writing, confident in my ability to learn. At some point in time I will master it. I don't expect that to happen overnight. In fact, I have no time constraints. My comfort zone for actual writing will occur when i'm confident that I can write ten complete sentences (an effort to avoid the "slush pile").

I'm posting this to make everyone aware of my rookie status and how reached this point.

Thanks to all for helping me to expidite the learning process.
A special thanks to Jim for being "logical."

[Note On]

I've really been trying to sit on my hands. Honest. But this is making me nuts.

Dashes and ellipses ain't the same thing, and don't serve the same functions.

A dash at the end of a line is an abrupt breaking-off, as though the speaker's attention is suddenly--

Ellipses are trail-offs, as though the speaker forgets to...

Dashes are also used parenthetically--like this--but can also replace a colon--thusly. When typing, they're indicated by the use of two hyphens, no space on either side.

Ellipses are also used to show pauses in speech...as though...someone...is realizing...something...or...exerting himself...or dying...or...anything else...that would cause...hesitation.

Dashes can also be--used to show--broken speech--as per--the Chicago Manual--but look how different--the effect is. (This would be read more as a series of break-offs than a series of trail-offs, and is not usually done. More often, it would be used to show an aside--like this aside, for instance--which you can see is clearly related to a breaking-off.)

Semicolons and dashes are probably the two that are closest in functionality, but even there, there's a difference; a semicolon can imply that what follows it is a logical conclusion of what precedes it. There's a setup/payoff implied. That doesn't necessarily happen with a dash.

Semicolons are also used for basic parsing of information when there are lots of commas, or as a "soft period."

Just as dictionaries cover denotation, but not necessarily connotation, style manuals cover basic usage, but not necessary subtleties. If the Chicago manual is truly saying don't use ellipses for pauses, it's wrong--and it's three dots when it follows a fragment, and four when it follows a sentence, but nobody even begins to care about this until you get into copy-editing. Using three where it should be four doesn't mark you as an amateur. Your editor may not even know--but your copy editor should.

[qatz]

Interesting contribution, Note On, and I think you're right. It appears the 15th edition of the Chicago Manual agrees with you (and me and a few others) regarding what you say. Time for me to go now.

[reph]

Note On and Qatz and bystanders,

The Chicago manual is mainly a guide for writing and editing books of the kind that the University of Chicago Press publishes--that is, academic nonfiction. It tells how to punctuate correctly, not how to punctuate expressively. Style in the latter sense isn't its territory.

I could say more about this issue, but--

[qatz]

[James D Macdonald]

What's with the pulsing "EZ" graphic that suddenly showed up on some (but not all) topics on the board?

[Lori Basiewicz]

It indicates a 'hot topic'.

[Note On]

It means you're a hottie.

[James D Macdonald]

It indicates a 'hot topic'.

Oh, okay. Never noticed before. What are the criteria, I wonder?

==========

ObOnTopic: I always spell out "okay" rather than use the letters "OK."

[aka eraser]

One of the criteria might be me doing the occasional walk-by while wearing my Speedo.

<eraser ducks the rotten tomatoes and scampers to safety>

:grin

[Duane]

My guess would be that it has something to do with the frequency of the replies to the topic.

Duane

[Duane]

Jim,

I have a couple of questions regarding something curious to me. Of course, you need not answer, should you find them trivial or off topic. I try to stay on topic, but....

Are you allowed in the "learn writing without uncle Jim" thread?

Wouldn't somebody be learning from you if you posted (advice)there? Because then someone would learn "with uncle Jim".

Are you really an uncle?

I had an aunt Helen once. We weren't related...everybody referred to her as "aunt Helen". I have no idea why.

Curious,
Duane

[James D Macdonald]

Are you allowed in the "learn writing without uncle Jim" thread?

I suppose technically I am, but I doubt it would be polite for me to post there.

Are you really an uncle?

Yes, and so is my brother.

[Note On]

> I doubt it would be polite for me to post there

It looked to me like a way to continue conversations that were impolite in your thread; I don't think excluding you was the intent.

[qatz]

Well, sheesh. That's what I get for arguing with the Queen. I check a random number of threads and only the ones over 25 were having that flashing thing, so it seems to be that rather than activity. Shoulda listened to Jenna when I had the chance. Oh well, you're still invited out here milady as soon as I can rent you a palace that befits your circumstance (which may require a few more ships to come in). The rest I leave in Reph's capable but not easily swayed hands . . .

[reph]

Oh, for God's sake, Uncle Jim! It wouldn't be impolite to post on the Without You thread. I opened it because people, including me, were cluttering your space with side comments. I notice that you haven't introduced any substantial new lessons here since that happened. Maybe if we all got out of your way, class would resume.

What was impolite was to say "Reph, you're wrong."

I'll go log in and, shortly after, change the name of the thread.

[James D Macdonald]

What was impolite was to say "Reph, you're wrong."

I've gone back to edit that to read "Reph, I am unable to bring myself to agree."

[reph]

Thank you.

[Paul W West]

And...? Are we going to continue this discussion or bow out to the competition?

I for one have been enjoying this immensely.

[James D Macdonald]

It's been the holidays (kids home from school) and a serious deadline (19 January).

I'll continue with Things About Writing pretty soon.

I need to go back through the back posts to see what things I've promised that I haven't talked about.

[evanaharris]

Hey, Jim, would you mind if I collected all your posts thus far, organized them into a slightly more readable format and posted them on my website (or got them ready to post on yours?) It'd be easier for people to track down things that they wanted to read.

[James D Macdonald]

Hi, Evan --

I'll be away from on-line for two or three days.

Go ahead, post anything you like. But...

Please include a link to this discussion, and to our homepage.

[MThomas2003]

I hope you don't mind if I come back to this, Uncle Jim. My New Year's resolutions have me sending out more submissions, and I'm curious about your perfect query letter. Time was, the old formula had the author putting a one-paragraph "spiel" in the query itself. I assume this has changed because more agents/editors are asking for synops and outlines. However. If the agent/editor guidelines do not specifically request a synop or outline, (or sample chapters) what do you suggest? Go back to the old one paragraph spiel within the query, or sending a synop/outline anyway? Thanks for your time.

[James D Macdonald]

If the guidelines don't specify what the editor or agent wants, write a letter (self-addressed stamped envelope included) asking if they'd like to see a synopsis, three-and-an-outline, or full text of your 100,000 word mystery/adventure story.

The most important thing is that you spell the editor's name right. The next most important thing is that you include that SASE.

If nothing is specified, I would go with a one-sentence length-and-genre description of the book.

[HConn]

Jim, did you cover Slick Tricks to Outlining? Did I miss it?

If so, don't trouble yourself providing a link. I'll go back and find it.

[qatz]

Uncle J., is it time to welcome you back, or shall we wait until after your 1/19 deadline? Q.

[sugarmuffin]

Jim,

A while back, you wrote about what to accomplish in the first chapter, including introducing the main character and setting a goal for him/her. Can you expound on that? When you say goal, are you talking about any action or are you talking about the big action -- the goal of the writer of the book as a whole?

example

Marshall has to get to the doctor to talk about his deviated septum.

or

Marshall has to become a better human being, including dealing with the issues surrounding his deviated septum.

Thanks,
Lisa

[sugarmuffin]

:o Was that a stupid question? Was I being too simplistic?

Lisa
Head Wigmaster
London Royal Opera House

[Paul W West]

I think it's a perfectly good question. It's just that "Uncle" Jim has abandoned us for a while.

[emeraldcite]

i think uncle jim has a deadline to meet.

[sugarmuffin]

I thought it was a pretty reasonable question, but with no response on a pretty active thread...I was starting to get a rash:lol

[qatz]

fine question sugar, great monniker too by the way, it's just that unk is on a tear this week; should be done soon. cant rush perfection
,,, or complexion or whatever

Eric

[James D Macdonald]

That's a good question, sugarmuffin, and one that doesn't have a simple answer.

But that's not going to stop me from trying to give you a simple answer anyway.

At first, the protagonist only needs enough of a goal to get the reader to follow along. This can be a small goal, easily accomplished. It can, for example, be our hero's attempt to get a ham sandwich.

Later on, the larger goals will appear. The character may not know what they are for dozens or hundreds of pages. Some of the goals may not be apparent until the reader has finished the book and is sitting there thinking about it. Some goals along the way may be false goals.

Nevertheless, the character needs to be doing something other than wandering aimlessly at the beginning, lest the readrer only follow along out of idle curiosity.

This isn't to say that you aren't going to be foreshadowing that big, main goal in that first chapter. Foreshadowing is part of what makes the ending you select seem so very right for your book.

The trick to foreshadowing is to put it in during the second draft, when you know how everything is going to turn out.

[qatz]

that's the old jim back. thank you, lisa. follow up!

[sugarmuffin]

Thanks for the response.

The funny thing is, so far in the first couple of pages-- which I'm not sure I'll keep -- he is actually stopping at a deli to get a cheese sandwich!

I think I mentioned this in my first post, but I have been trying to do this for a long time; been to a number of writing workshops over the years in the Boston area where I live, even one in Italy. Have a writer's mind, but I realize that I really need structure. Hearing Uncle Jim say what a first chapter should include was like an aha for me, simple as it sounds. I've written lots of bits and pieces of things, have been a paid writer and written a few technical manuals, managed other folks writing technical stuff, but the novel has eluded me.

So thanks for sharing your brainstuff and experience here, Jim, it has given me some inspiration.

Lisa

And thanks too Eric. Did you really go to that colony?

[qatz]

Thank you, Lisa. I just hang around here; Jim does the heavy lifting. The trip to the leper colony was imaginary; just a way to shift out of some old ruts into new ones. It turned out to be a short story which I have not posted. If you want to see it, feel free to contact me directly if you wish, or post on the Serious Question thread. My guess is Jim will re-start this thread in earnest soon, and I don't want to get in his way.
Best, E.

[AsianJournals]

Hello all. I have been lurking for around two weeks now and have had a great time! There are a lot of talented people here. It’s a shame there is so much in-fighting though as it detracts from the purpose of this board. It is difficult enough for a newbie to feel comfortable posting without all the intimidation and nastiness going on.

Thanks for all the great advice that is being bandied around, it is appreciated. Also, thank you to Jim for the enormous effort he is putting in.


Chris…

[James D Macdonald]

Hi, AsianJournals.

The funny thing about the Grammar Wars is this:

Grammar isn't really that important.

Once you've gotten up to a workmanlike level, when you're not actively bad, it doesn't matter all that much. If you get one of those PSAT prep books or programs, and you get to the point where you are aceing the grammar section, you're good enough.

You can get farther with excellent grammar and a plot than you can with excellent grammar alone.

Story will get you through times with no style better than style will get you through times with no story.

Your publisher will hire people with excellent grammar to fix yours, provided you've written a compelling story. Your publisher hired you to provide that story.

[James D Macdonald]

The Infamous Lime Pie Recipe was back on page 19 of this thread. I promised "More on this anon," but never got to the "anon" part.

Here's more:

The pie tastes just the same, but it looks a lot better, if you make swirls and peaks on the top layer of meringue.

And:

Viewed objectively, all you really have is a very fancy plate of scrambled eggs.


I trust I don't need to explain those two metaphors as they relate to writing your stories?

========

Show of hands: How many have done their two hours today? How many have finished a book and want to revise it?

[LiamJackson]

Two hours and counting, here. The first draft is complete, (97,000 for those interested) and I'm currently working on the revision.

The second novel is coming a bit slower, and registers an anemic 40K+.

[Paul W West]

Put me in the later category.

[qatz]

Hi, Asian Journals. Jim is exactly right about grammar; it was never that important so long as words can be comprehended. we just got off track there and it took a while to get back on. I was throwing oil on the flames to create a back-burn to stop the bleeding caused by various snakes in the grass barking up the wrong tree. Prob. wrongheaded, but hey.

Now, I come not to praise Caesar but to bury him. As for the war, It was a temporary glitch in a large thread. What I did was misconstrued by some, and most likely I went overboard in my zeal (I got a little manic so that's a definite possibility); so I apologized and took a fall. Jim also sort of apologized to Reph, Reph (despite my teasing) calmed down, Note on grumpily went along, HConn (who was appalled) mellowed out. People got sick of the dissension, everyone took a breather. We fell apart for a little while and now are coming back. Anyway, it's over and done with. I think you'll find we are much more polite, constructive and even cohesive than that episode would indicate. Glad you're here, and hang with it! Q

ps Jim, thanks for the key lime update!

[sugarmuffin]

I did my 2 hours, plus a wee bit more.

More specifically, the first 2 hours of writing I've done in several years. I have about 2 1/2 rough pages, plus some notes and a way into the first chapter (I threw out the sandwich).
Yessireebob!

I'd like to thank the academy...

Lisa

[aka eraser]

lol Lisa :D

[sugarmuffin]

This was the most terrific thread, then after all that horsesh-t hullabaloo with a bunch of folks getting their panties in a bunch, it seems like you lost interest. I don't blame you, but if you still want to share your knowledge, I'm sure there are people who check this thread frequently, as I do, and are interested in your words of wisdom.

Lisa

[James D Macdonald]

That flesh is heir to.

Shall we talk, briefly, about some of the horrible things that go wrong in a writer's life? Sure, why not. Many people won't talk about them, but let's be honest: this isn't an easy job.


First off, you can take this as true. It's easier to sell a first book than a third.

With a first book, anything can happen. It could take off and be a wild best seller. It could become a quiet back-list perennial. It could find its niche. It could develop a fan base. Anything.

Another plus for the first-time novelist: the editor doesn't have to offer a big advance. A couple thousand bucks, the book's his.

The book goes out. It sells some number of copies. This is great. Maybe it earns out, maybe it doesn't. That doesn't matter much; publishers can make profits even on books that don't earn out.

Then you turn in your second book. It too hits the stands. Now here's the problem. Your second book must do better than your first book. A rising career is good. A falling career ... isn't.

Lots of readers will give a new author a chance. Fewer readers will give an author a second chance. If someone read your book and didn't like it, the odds are they won't buy your next book, even if it's radically better. (You wanted reasons why you shouldn't publish a book that isn't quite ready? That's reason #1398.) Word of mouth can be negative, too.

So, if you're on a declining curve, that third book is going to be a really tough sell. Especially since, as a third-time author you should expect your advances to be rising.

At that point it'll be time to change publishers, and possibly to go to a pseudonym.

Right, you think that's grim? Try the Death Spiral.

The Death Spiral works like this: The big chains (and if you aren't in the big chains you aren't in the game) have this trick called Ordering To Net. That is, however many copies of a book Author A sold last time, that's how many copies of his next book they're going to order this time.

Say Fred Goodguy writes a novel, a mystery called Up Your Nose With A Rubber Hose. They print 10,000 copies, and he has a sell-through of 80%. (80% sell-through is pretty good.) That is, of those 10,000 copies, 8,000 sold.

Now Fred's new book comes out, Down Your Throat With A Motorboat. The chains saw that 8,000 copies sold last time, so they order 8,000 copies. Again, Fred has an 80% sell-through, and 6,400 sell. Fred's third book, In Your Eye With an Apple Pie gets 6,400 pre-orders, that's how many are printed, and sells 5,120. Now the big chains are only willing to preorder 5,120 copies of Fred's next proposed book, Up Your Ass With Broken Glass, so his publisher declines to exercise their option on it, and Fred's left without a career.

What can Fred do? Go to another publisher and start all over again, under the name Joe Nicefella, with The Broken Glass Affair. Fred 's fans will be wondering why Fred isn't writing any more, while others will think that Joe is just a cheap Fred imitator. And, Fred will get a first-time author's advance at his new publisher. But, on the other hand, he'll get a first printing of 10,000, and the bookstores will preorder them, in hopes that this new author will turn out to be a best seller.

[Note: if your publisher likes you, you may get a name-change and stay where you are: and the name change doesn't have to be big, just big enough to fool the major chain stores' computers. Adding a middle initial to your name has been known to work. Or, printing on the cover By Fred Goodguy Writing as Joe Nicefella.]

These thing may not happen to you. But they can, and there are writers that they have happened to. Just be prepared.

What other bad things can happen?

Your editor bought your book because she believes in it. She's presented it to the other editors and the publisher, she's been shepherding it through production... then she gets hired by another company. What happens to your book?

It's an orphan, that's what. No one to speak for it at the publisher's. No one to boost it to the sales force. It goes to the desk of some other editor who already has a full allotment of books on his desk, and who doesn't love your book as much as the original editor did. He loves his own books better. The editing it gets is more of a lick-and-a-promise than the full deal it needs and deserves.

Bad things happen. Everything is done, but it's at the minimum level. No one, particularly not the author, is happy when the book comes out.

Other bad things? Shall we talk about basket accounting?

That's where you sign a contract for a number of books, but the royalties don't start until they all earn out. If one of them is wildly popular, but another doesn't sell for beans, the popular one doesn't start putting money in your pocket until after it's paid off the dead dog's advance too.

There's more, there's worse -- the bad copyedit. Some copyeditors think that what you really wanted was a co-author.

Then there's the way books have the shelf life of yogurt. They go out, they're on the shelves, and if the readers don't pick up on 'em right away, off the shelves they come to make way for next month's books. There's a sad thing.

The natural state of a book is Out of Print.

But I'll end this story with hope, just like Pandora's box had hope in it.

There's an easy cure to the Off The Shelves in a Month problem. You want your books on the shelves for years, and you don't have what it takes to be a bestseller? (And what that takes is both to write a good book and be lucky.)

Here's how to get your book back on the shelf: Write a second book. When it's published, your publisher will rerelease and resolicit your first book at the same time as your second book. They know that having two different books by the same author shelved side by side will make the public more willing to buy either book than they would one title alone. The bookstores know this too. They're more willing to shelve three copies each of Up Your Nose with a Rubber Hose and In Your Eye with an Apple Pie than they would be to shelve six copies of either one.

That's the secret of bookstore placement, increasing sales, and a happy career: write another book.

Since you started writing another book the minute you finished your last one, there you are.

[SRHowen]

I wanted to mention the sophomore curse as well.

You write the first book, it sells, then while you are trying to edit that book and then market that book, you have to write book #2. Even if it isn't a sequel, you most likely spent years getting your first book right. Now you have a year (or less) to get book #2 done, plus you have to edit and market book one--and most likely you have not been able to quit your day job yet.

So many times book #2 is not as good as book #1 was.

The cure? As James said, start book #2 as soon as book one is done. Edit book #1 and write book #2. While you search for an agent or publisher for #1 polish #2 and start #3.

Then when book #1 sells, book #2 is done, and book #3 is being edited.

Shawn

[AnneStJohn]

I've been reading this thread for a while and am glad to see some new posts. Thanks for the candid advice and storytelling. I still have a million questions that would do well with some Uncle Jim insight. This thread is great and I am one of those who checks it daily and has become recently inspired to use the BIC method. Thank you, Uncle Jim.

Anne

[sugarmuffin]

Well, it's good to have a picture of what life looks like on the other side of...where I am now. I hope I get there. I'm going to save the info. At this point, I'm in start up mode, aka Tushie in Chair, Hands Typing.

Jeez, is that a haiku coming on? Ugh.

Today I have done about an hour so far. I'm getting better at looking at things in bits and pieces, while keeping the whole in mind but not getting overwhelmed by it. Sometimes I can even ignore the bits and pieces and simply write without looking back (which is where I need to be for the present and nearest future).

Lisa

[James D Macdonald]

Shall we mention bad contracts?

I think we shall.

Bad contracts aren't limited to the sleazy side of the street; you can find bad contracts and bad contract clauses right in the penthouse suites of publishing.

Two of the clauses most strewn with landmines are the option clause and the indemnity clause, but don't think because I've not mentioned them that other clauses, or even entire contracts, aren't writer-unfriendly.

Here's where having a canny agent is worth your while. I recall one place that sent out a standard contract to everyone -- with all the really horrid clauses on the last page. Savvy agents (and savvy writers) knew to just throw alway the last page and sign the next-to-last page. Newbies would find themselves ... in less happy circumstances.

Beware: The lawyer you pick out of your phonebook to look over a contract, unless he specializes in publishing, doesn't have a clue where the landmines are.

Nor will I attempt to list them here. Too many varients. Just because I don't mention something doesn't mean it isn't out there.

Shall we mention publishers who pay on acceptance, publishers who pay on publication, and publishers who pay on threat of lawsuit? (If you hang out in the bar with other writers, they'll tell you. They might not put it in writing -- sleazy publishers can be vindictive.)

Yeah, and slow payment? Advances are often divided into three parts: One on signing, one on acceptance, and one on publication. (Varients abound.)

That "on signing" payment can stretch out, so you may find that you can write a novel faster than a publisher can write a check, with the other payments ... sometime.


Here's a word of advice. Never start writing a book that you've sold on proposal until after you've signed the contract, and never turn in the manuscript until after the on-signing payment clears.

More later, perhaps on cheerier things.

[James D Macdonald]

Self knowledge, anyone?

Writing is a great way to get to know yourself. You've written something. You've come to The End.

Hurrah!

Now, it's time to Read What You Wrote, not what you think you wrote.

Here's something for y'all to read while I think about what direction to go with this.

<a href="http://www.sff.net/people/roger.allen/essays/mistakes.htm" target="_new">http://www.sff.net/people/roger.allen/essays/mistakes.htm</a>

[qatz]

Thank you for a superior cite, James. Q

[James D Macdonald]

When someone says something better than I can, I'm not shy about pointing others to those places.

So:

You want to know about slush?

<a href="http://scrivenerserror.blogspot.com/2004_02_01_scrivenerserror_archive.html#1075737301 99787039" target="_new">Scrivener's Error</a>

<a href="http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004641.html#004641" target="_new">Making Light</a>

<a href="http://www.salon.com/books/feature/2002/02/25/slush/" target="_new">Confessions of a Slush Reader</a>

<a href="http://www.sfwa.org/writing/myrtle2.htm" target="_new">Myrtle the Manuscript</a>

Yeah, yeah, I know; I recommended Myrtle the Manuscript before, but that was a lot of posts ago and not everyone has been reading from day one.

[HConn]

James, did I ask you about Slick Tricks for Outlining?

[emeraldcite]

just read the myrtle link. brought a tear to my eye.

[sugarmuffin]

It gave me hives.

L

[James D Macdonald]

Yes, you did ask about Slick Tricks for Outlining.

I'm trying to figure out if you mean an outline to write a book from, or an outline to send to a publisher.

I'm also re-reading the earlier posts in this thread to see what I've already talked about, and what I promised to talk about later.

I also have a whole 'nother tangent to go off on, about modelwork.

[HConn]

I'm trying to figure out if you mean an outline to write a book from, or an outline to send to a publisher.

Actually, it was something you mentioned in an earlier post as a topic you planned to cover. At least, that's how I remember it.

As you can see by my re-asking the question, I don't have a great memory.

[LiamJackson]

Jim,

If I learned nothing else from the tale of poor Myrtle, it's that I should, from this point forward, open all my queries with the line, "You've probably read all the stories you ever want to about killer sows from outer space, but mine is a little different..."

LJ

[pdr]

I've really appreciated your comments, James. If you are thinking about other aspects to discuss please may I suggest a few? I'd love to 'hear' your comments on: sagging middles, mood and tone, more of your comments on dialogue, tying up loose ends in the 'big' novel without boring explanations and on minor characters.

[AnneStJohn]

I also would like to hear more thoughts from you on dialogue. Specifically, what is your opinion of writing in accents? For example, should the Irish character say "Nae" or "Ye." Should the southern character say "Sugah" and so on? Sometimes I find it distracting or interrupting to the flow of dialogue. But should we ignore the fact that this character is speaking with a different accent? Thoughts? Thanks!

Anne

[James D Macdonald]

Dialog, yes.

Really quickly, my opinion on accents -- dialect, we call it -- is that less is more.

Once spelling out dialect was common and accepted. Take a look at Kipling's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0451523814/ref=nosim/madhousemanor target="_new">Captains Courageous</a> for example. That's also an example of how the use of dialect can fail. Kipling spoke with a strong British accent himself, and his dialect is based on his own pronunciations. If you happen to know what a Gloucester fisherman's speech sounds like you can derive Kipling's accent from his dialog. (If you try to read his dialog with an American accent, the result is totally weird.)

Nowadays use of dialect has fallen out of favor. You can get by with using a light hand -- having one character say "Sugah," for example, would probably be okay -- but try to get the feel of a dialect with word-choice and sentence rhythm. People from various parts of the country use different words for the same things: frying pan, fry pan, griddle, spider; brook, creek, stream; paper bag, paper sack. A person from one part of the South might habitually say "ink pen" rather than "pen" to mean a writing implement, since to him "pen" and "pin" have the same sound.

Here's where your reading of books being published today will pay off, and here's where having a group of beta readers who are brutally honest with their opinions is worth gold.

As with the rest of commercial writing, the master question is: Does it work? You can get away with anything if it works. Who tells you if it works? Your readers. How do they tell you? With the sound of rapidly turning pages.

[qatz]

Thanks, Jim. May I just add a countrapuntal side note that Salman Rushdie's works sound wonderful and more meaningful when read in Indian dialect?

[mrbreeze1964]

Let me start by thanking Mr. MacDonald for this great thread. It is wonderful that you are taking time to share this information with us all and I, for one, want to express my thanks.
I have read the entire board, completed each exercise and read every article. Uncle Jim your insight to the nuts and bolts of writing and your knowledge of the business side of things has helped me understand the scope of the world of writing.
I have found the genre and even the time frame that I wish to write about (Historical Thriller) and have spent the last year researching my era. I am just beginning to learn the craft of writing and plan to take many creative writing courses, as well as grammar workshops, both online and at the local colleges.
I look forward to more postings from Uncle Jim as well as the lively replies and opinions of each and every person I have seen post to this thread.

[qatz]

we are all so unused to unqualified praise, Breeze, that it may take a while for most of us to respond! Jim is more used to it than most, but he takes his time.