Learn Writing with Uncle Jim, Volume 1

[James D Macdonald]

It strikes me that there's a need for a thread on the art and craft of writing commercial novels.

To that end, I'd like to start that discussion. I plan to put down my thoughts on the elements of professional-quality fiction. I'll answer questions, and go where ever the discussion leads. I'll do some notes on the business of writing too.

Here are my qualifications for starting this topic:

My bibliography (http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/biblio.htm)

A workshop (http://www.sff.net/paradise/) I help teach every year.

My mutant talent is to make my opinions sound like facts.

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

I have two basic rules: everything that's said should be true, and everything should be helpful.

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

There's one other thing that needs to be said, McIntyre's First Law: Under the right circumstances anything I tell you can be wrong.

[James D Macdonald]

Okay, and after that pompous lead off, let me say that I'm not going to be talking about novels at all. I'm going to be talking about romances.

Not romances in the Fabio-on-the-cover paperbacks, not the Romance section at Borders, not Harlequin (though there'll be things useful in that genre). Not category romance, or genre romance.

I'm talking about romance in literary theory.

A novel is: A book length work of realistic prose fiction.

A romance is: A book length prose narrative treating imaginary characters involved in events remote in time or place and usually heroic, adventurous, or mysterious.

The thing that the two have in common are that they're book length (call it 50,000 words and up), prose (that is, not poetry or drama), and fiction (some people have said that fiction is when the author tells his own lies; non-fiction is when he tells someone else's lies).

The realism issue, then, is the core of the difference between a novel and a romance. The "realistic" books are the mainest of mainstream; they are the literary works.

The vast majority of the things you find in bookstores labeled "novels" are actually romances. That means:


1) imaginary characters

2) events remote in time or place

3) usually heroic, adventurous, or mysterious

More on all of this later.

I'll try to drop by to talk more after I finish my work every day (except when I'm out of town).

[marky48]

I'm looking forward to learning much from your presentations. Like Murphy, I'm sure the McIntyre-effect will show up from somewhere.

[James D Macdonald]

So what do I mean by "finish my work"?

I'm a full-time writer. My sole source of income for the last fifteen years or so has been writing or writing-related. By "my work" I mean ten pages of original prose fiction every day.

That isn't so bad, really. It's only about 2,500 words. It's only two hours or so.

I know, as I write it, that most of it will be changed, moved, or deleted in the revision process. That doesn't bother me. The revision and rewriting and such takes place in another part of my day.

Back before I went full time, I used to hear from people "I've always wanted to be a writer, but I never had the time."

In those days I used to set my alarm clock for two hours early, to make the time. I'd get up at four in the morning to write. If you're a writer, writing is what you do.

So, here's the next bit of advice. This is what my friend Rosemary Edghill calls the "KISS method." (Others call it the "BIC method," for Butt In Chair.)

Pick two hours a day. It doesn't matter which two hours, but make them two hours that you can do every day.

For that two hours, you will sit in front of your typewriter or computer. You will have no distractions. You will write, or you will stare at the blank screen. There will be no other options.

Writing letters does not count. Reading does not count. Doing research does not count. Revising does not count. You will write new stuff, or you will stare at the screen.

No TV in the room. No radio going. No internet. Fill the page or go mad.

Two hours. Every day.

Your body will rebel. You'll get headaches. You'll get colds. You aren't allowed a choice. You will sit in front of that screen even if your head is throbbing.

Some days you will begin writing in a white-hot passion. You'll look up at the clock and discover that three hours have gone by.

You don't get to only do one hour the next day. You still have to do two hours.

Your mind will rebel. You'll want to clean the toilet, change the cat box, mow the lawn. But you won't, because there are no excuses. No, you don't get to reschedule for "later." Two hours, on schedule.

[SRHowen]

I agree with everything except the music part--I listen to music and each story has its own music. Then again I don't have trouble with BIC--I need to get out of it once and awhile.

When writing something new I do 5,000 to 10,000 words a day.

To me the writing is easy--the revisions is where I want to clean the cat box--hey I'd even clean the bathrooms at a football game during playoffs than edit. (When it gets to the almost last draft--and you've read the dang thing about 50 times)

So let me ask you this, when in the revision stage of a ms do you write something new for 2 hrs or just spend days and hrs revising?

Shawn

[James D Macdonald]

So let me ask you this, when in the revision stage of a ms do you write something new for 2 hrs or just spend days and hrs revising?

Well, it varies. I usually have three projects going at any time, in various stages of finished.

For revisions I take the manuscript (printout) and red pencils and go somewhere entirely different than my normal workspace (sometimes the kitchen, but my favorite is a nice little French coffeeshop down the road a bit) and scribble. After I've done two hours of writing, there's a solid 22 more hours in the day for revising other material.

One trick to revision -- is to read the work aloud. Where you stumble, the reader will stumble. You'll notice different things, too, when you're reading aloud. You're using a different part of your brain than you are when reading silently.

We're not at revision yet, though. First we need the text.

Did I mention that you need to make multiple backups of all your material if you're working on a computer?

I'll give you a minute to make a backup of whatever you wrote today.

See you when you've done.

[James D Macdonald]

BTW, I didn't say "no music," I said "no radio." Radios have announcers, disk jockeys, the news, weather ... things that will break your concentration, take you out of that place where the creative things happen.

I like music myself for writing ... I prefer requiems, but maybe I'm just strange.

Whatever helps you get into the state you need to be in....

But there's a warning coming.

Don't couple destructive things with you writing. If you light up a cigarette when you start writing, if you quit smoking you'll find you can't write any more.

Same with drinking booze. Same with eating bon-bons. Coupling bad habits with writing will mean that you'll never be able to shed the bad habits.

One of the popular images of writers is of the guy with a bottle of whisky beside the typewriter.

It probably won't make you a better writer, or even make you a writer at all. It will rot your liver and empty your bank account.

[SRHowen]

with the red pencils and highlighters--cept my fav place is the back patio.

Another thing to add to the reading out-loud is to read it into a tape recorder and play it back. And a trick I am sure you know, but others might not--read your stuff backward, you find typos that way.

Shawn

[SRHowen]

on backups--I think I did mention on another thread--that I use one disk per day (3.5) so I have a Mon. disk, a Tues. disk, etc. And my Corel WP backs up automatically every 3 min. Once a week I back up my entire writing folder to CD

Shawn

[emeraldcite]

so, if i move the captain morgan's under the desk, i should be ok?

:rollin

but seriously, i agree with the bic method. nothing has made my writing life easier than just sitting in that old, orange swivel chair i bought from goodwill and writing. writing whatever, but writing all the same. it's the only way. you can't be a writer by thinking up good ideas. you have to write all the time about good ideas, or even bad ones (you never know if they'll be any good)

[SRHowen]

to write, check out Writer's Digest once a month they have a list of daily writing prompts. Who knows what will come from one of them. You can sign up for their newsletter and the prompts come in your e-mail at the start of the month.

Shawn

[James D Macdonald]

I'm going to move in some of my posts from other threads now. Be right back....

[James D Macdonald]

There are twenty-five simple steps to becoming a published author.

Here are the steps:

1. Black ink on white paper.
2. Place your name and address in the top left-hand corner of the first page.
3. Place the title and byline, centered, half-way down the first page.
4. Put a running head (your name, the title, and a page number) in the top right hand corner of every page.
5. Your pages should have one-inch margins.
6. Doublespace your text.
7. Use Courier 10 or Courier 12 only.
8. Type on one side of the paper only.
9. Continue until you reach "The End."
10. Rewrite.
11. Rewrite.
12.....21. Revise
22. Obtain the guidelines for a market that accepts material similar to what you have finished.
23. Follow the guidelines scrupulously when you submit your material.
24. While you are waiting for your rejection slip, start again back at step 1 for your next work.
25. When the rejection slip arrives, send the manuscript to the next market on your list, that same day.

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

Watt-Evans' Law: There is no idea so brilliant that a sufficiently ham-handed writer can't make an unreadable story out of it.

Feist's Corollary to Watt-Evans' Law: There is no idea so stupid that a sufficiently talented writer can't make a readable story out of it.

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

Yog's Law: Money flows toward the writer.

[James D Macdonald]

Q. Why was the little drop of ink crying?

A. His daddy was in the pen and he didn't know how long the sentence was....

<hr>


I write under several different names, including my own.

One reason is to differentiate the genres you're working in. If you write manly action and sweet romance, you might pick a Manly Action name for one, and a Sweet Romance name for the other, just so your fans won't get confused when they pick up a book by their favorite author and discover that it's far different from what they expected.

If you're prolific, you might write under various names to avoid competing with yourself.

I do share a name with some other writers. That's one reason I use my middle initial -- to differentiate me from them.

When you're picking a name, don't pick anything that's difficult to spell or embarassing to say. Anything else is pretty much okay.

[James D Macdonald]

How many pages in a chapter?

This is as close to a meaningless question as you can get. It's like "How many letters in a word?" or "How many words in a sentence?"

I've seen novels with chapters ranging from a fraction of a page to the entire book being one long chapter.

Listen: Words are symbols for ideas or concepts. Sentences are made of words. Sentences convey thoughts through the relationships among the words. (A fraction of a word may be a sentence.)

Paragraphs are made of sentences. The paragraph is the smallest unit of meaning in a novel. The meaning comes from the relationships among the sentences. (A fraction of a sentence may be a paragraph.)

Scenes are made out of paragraphs. There are no fractional paragraphs. The meaning of the scene comes from the relationships among the paragraphs that make up the scene.

Chapters are made out of scenes. There are no fractional scenes. The meaning of the chapter comes from the relationships among the scenes.

How many pages in a chapter? How many scenes do you have, how long are they, and how do they relate to one another? At the point where one scene doesn't relate to the one that follows, put a chapter break.

The reader's mind can hold only a limited number of things at once. The reader's interest keeps moving. You should strive to make the source of information be the same as the source of interest.

And that's how long a chapter is.

[Irene Keyes]

James,

Thanks for the postings -- very interesting.

Could you talk a bit about pacing? I read Jack Bickham's Scene and Structure recently and found the distinction between scene and "sequel" interesting. (Have you read it?) Simply put, he says that too much scene can make the story too fast-paced, and too much sequel (or reflection etc between scenes) can bog the story down.

I've tried using this idea as a guide and have found it helps some, but I still find my story flying along too quickly, as if I'm skating the surface.

Do you have any insights along these lines?

[James D Macdonald]

Pace is a function of detail. To slow down a scene, make it more detailed. To speed it up, remove detail.

We're beginning to get into the place where "art" lives, knowing where when and to what extent you'll need to vary your pace.

You will need to vary your pace, for several reasons: one is to give your readers breathing space, to give them time to assimilate what just happened, and to anticipate what will come.

A second reason to vary the pace is so that the audience will know when they've come to a fast part -- they'll have something to compare it to.

A third reason to vary pace is so that the audience doesn't get bored. Poor things, they're easily bored. A bored reader lays your book aside, meaning to pick it up again later, and never does. (Note: the readers can always, always tell if you're bored.)

Okay ... you're doing a set up ups-and-downs, like walking a trail through the foothills toward the mountain. (I kinda like that description -- many small climaxes, rewarding the reader along the road, but the main climax frequently in sight, first at a distance, then closer.)

To answer your specific question, I've not read Bickham's book.

[Jamesaritchie]

I disagree with the "no radio" part. I almost always have a radio going as I write, and it's almost always on a talk radio station. I can listen and write at the same time.

In fact, I often listen to Old Time Radio as I write. The old radio programs such as "Gunsmoke," "Fibber McGee & Molly," "The Jack Benny Show," "Mystery Theatre," and a dozen others. I also have a TV in my office, and I can watch it as I write, as well. Though there's seldom anything on worth watching. But I do watch two or three shows a week while writing.

Try a radio or a TV. If it interferes with your writing, get rid of it. If it doesn't, then keep it and enjoy. Same with the internet. If it's a problem, get rid of it. If it isn't, keep it and enjoy. If you lack enough discipline to work with a radio or TV in your office, you probably don;t have the discipline to be a writer.

As for novel/romance. A novel is a novel, realistic or not. Subject matter may make a novel a "romance," but it's still a novel, which is nothing more than an extended work of fictional prose. I'd even go so far as to say that most of the best literary works fit into the category of "romance," rather than mainstream.

Two hours of writing each day is a Good Thing, and just about anyone can find this much time, though if you want weekends off, take them off. And I never have seen the sense of staring at a blank screen or sheet of paper for two hours. All this teaches is how to stare at a blank screen or sheet of paper for two hours. It can even make a wannabe writer go to any lengths to avoid the computer altogether. Barring the rare bout of writer's block, I don't actually know a successful writer who has had to spend two hours a day, day after day, staring at a blank screen, certainly not at the beginning of their career, though too many recommend it for others. No matter how much they whine and complain, just about every successful writer I've know couldn't wait to get to the computer/typewriter/notebook.

And I have much better, far more productive things to do with two hours than to use them staring at a blank screen.

"Opening a vein" to get the words right is fine, but writing should be an enjoyable, pleasurable process. If it isn't, many other things are. I greatly enjoy the writing process. If I didn't, I wouldn't write. The money is nice, and I've made a good bit, but there's a million ways to make money, so why not find one you enjoy? You need to enjoy writing, and, again, barring bouts of writer's block (which I still think is a myth) it strikes me as highly odd to spend hours doing anything you don't enjoy. I'm willing to endure a headache or a stff neck if a deadline looms, but if it doesn't I'm not going to sit at the computer until these maladies hit.

If you have to force yourself to write, if you actually find yourself staring at a blank screen for two hours a day, day after day, for heaven's sake, find somethinge else to do.

As for revising work, revise as you need to revise. Some writers need to revise almost endlessly, some need only moderate revisions, some need almost no revision at all. The same is true for individual works or fiction. Trust your judgement of the work, and never revise just because some book or person says you should. There's no law against getting it right the first time, and I've found the better my first drafts are, the better my final draft will be.

[James D Macdonald]

Well, James, if working with a radio on works for you, it works for you. It's not exactly what I'd recommend to new writers; first they should figure out what level of distraction they can handle. I could probably write in the middle of a construction zone -- but I wouldn't suggest that as an ideal place to set up one's desk. I'd say start with mimimum distractions. Folks can always add some distractions if they find that they either can handle them or need them to be productive. (I still wouldn't recommend adding cigarettes and booze, even if they can handle them and they make 'em more productive.)

As far as two hours staring at a blank screen, few if any writers are going to be doing that. We'll fill the screen. Those who find themselves staring at a blank screen hour after hour might rethink the question of whether a career in commercial fiction is for them at that point in their lives.

As far as revision goes, I can produce publishable first draft. By the time I'd been doing this for a while, I'd learned to avoid unprofitable plot threads, I'd learned what works and what doesn't down at the noun-and-verb level -- I've learned to discard thousands of word choices without thinking about them.

Still, revision is vital. Revision means, literally, "looking again." Even if what you say, on looking again, is "Hey, pretty good."

On occasion I've submitted those publishable first drafts. More than once, after the story's come out, I found myself wishing that I had revised a couple of times.

Later on today I'm going to be reading some slush manuscripts for a major publisher. I promise you, whole heaps of 'em will go on the left-hand pile due to insufficient revision. Few if any will go there due to too much revision.

Before closing today's episode: Another advantage of blocking out a regular time for writing is that it becomes your time when no one will ask you to drive the kids to soccer practice or go shopping "because you aren't doing anything."

[marky48]

I'm suspicious of any claim of the lack of problems in any process involving work. They're endless from my experience in three trades. I work with C-Span on and only contentrate on the writing a specific times that I set. My house is quiet, that helps, but I'd just as soon be out in the willies where it's really quiet. Maybe some other time. I revise many times whether it's a story, a research paper or any other written document. Never smoke, and never drink and work.

[emeraldcite]

7. Use Courier 10 or Courier 12 only

i thought courier is more for screenplays.

i use times for my novel. the difference between using times 12 and courier 10 is about 100 pages in my novel. i'm at about 290 pages (88,000 words give or take) with times new roman, but in courier it's at 390 pages.

in the academic world, people are more in tune with times new roman.

what does everyone else use?

[aka eraser]

Times new roman 12 here. Sometimes even 13 if my eyes are misbehaving more than usual.

[marky48]

em, I'm in the academic world too, although not at your level. I am in lockstep with you on this. Courier 10-12 is for screenplays, I only have two, but those were the guidelines I followed. All of my academic work is 12 pt.TNR. All three of my books were, and everything in the future will be too.

[James D Macdonald]

I'm not talking about academic work, or about screenplays, poetry, or anything other than commercial fiction. What you use on-screen when you're composing is up to you; if you like 8-point PostCrypt, go for it.

However, when you print out your book to submit to a commercial publisher, you shall print it out in 10 or 12 point Courier.

But ... for the revision process, printing the work in some format and typeface that you haven't used before can be useful for seeing the words rather than your memory of the words. There's a place to print out a reading copy in double column Times New Roman single spaced and justified if you want.

Just don't submit it that way.

[SRHowen]

is that it is a mono spaced font--what does that mean? That each letter, number, punctuation, etc., takes up the same amount of space.

They (publishers) need to know how many pages your book is going to take up and they base it on mono spacing. On that subject, word count...

Don't use your word processors word count feature. Do a character count, including spaces, and then divide by five--as with the mono-spaced-font this gives them a true idea of the length (the space it will take up)

Shawn

[James D Macdonald]

There are all kinds of ways to come up with wordcount. One of them is to take five pages at random from your manuscript, count all the words on them, divide by five, then multiply by the total number of pages in your work.

===

Next time ... how to tell where your story starts.

[XThe NavigatorX]

James...

Being a midlist author, do you find the amount of money you earn each year stays about the same, or is it going up due to the trickling in of multiple royalties and/or larger advances?

Do you plateau at a certain level?

[marky48]

What does it cost you to submit? And how many? I avoid printing entire manuscripts at all. Unless it's a proposal and they won't accept a disk. That can be really expensive. An still unpructive unless you've reached standing level of acceptance somewhere. Book rate is cheap but still, the print costs and all.

[CWGranny]

I recently polled children's book editors (for a course I am writing) and almost across the board they said either Times New Roman or Courier was equally fine for submissions -- some liked Times a bit better (mostly the younger editors), one liked Courier a bit better -- none of them were inflexible about it. All said PLEASE nothing ever but 12 pt font.

So...for writers of children's novels or YA -- in an email poll of 20 editors -- they don't care between Times New Roman or Courier -- but ONLY 12 pt.

I'll assume adult publishers are different (as they are about most things) and bow to James superior knowledge...but since this is something I actually asked folks about, I thought I would butt in.

Gran

[marky48]

I only use 12. 10 for footnotes though.

[XThe NavigatorX]

The dog went to the supermarket

The dog went to the supermarket

courier 10 pt is still bigger than Times 12 pt. If you submit something in Courier 12, you're wasting paper.

[marky48]

That's right. That is also why 10 is used for screenplays where time and space coordination are crucial.

[CWGranny]

I was just reporting was the editors told me they want.
I try to make editors happy -- they ask so little:lol
And they specifically said nothing less than 12 pt and that was with courier in the discussion.

Gran

[James D Macdonald]

A complex question, Navigator: Income does go up year by year, but you do top out in the mid-to-high five figures for advances (at least I do, in mid-list SF). There's a constant churn below that, as the backlist ebbs and flows, some things go out of print, some are reprinted.

On a tangent off that ... how to keep your books in print. I know there's a lot of talk about how books go out of print after varying alarmingly-short periods. To keep your book in print, write another book. When it comes out, your backlist will get reprinted alongside it.

As to what it costs to submit: the price of paper plus postage. Follow the publishers' guidelines. Some want three-and-an-outline, some want a full manuscript. Follow the guidelines explicitly.

[James D Macdonald]

So, where does your story begin?

One way to find your beginning is this: first, write your book. Now go through it to find its start.

Here's how to recognize the start: it's the point where you can no longer summarize everything that went before in a single sentence:

Nothing that Ceclia had seen at the Academy could have prepared her for the first sight of Crymble Manor.

"The appropriations bill is dead on arrival," Senator O'Connor said.

The day after the world ended, Bill got into his pickup truck and drove into town.

Another way to say this is: it's the point where the characters can't decide, To heck with this and order out for pizza. The one-way door has blown shut and they can't get back into the theatre.

Later on, as you gain experience, you can get better at avoiding false starts ("Hesitation marks," we call 'em).

Here's how I figure out where to start my story: I figure out the climax -- something that's really big, cinematic, satisfying, full of action and movement. I take the characters who are there, and back 'em off to some point before that climax, then try to get them to it.

Sometimes -- a lot of the time -- those characters never get to the climax I started with. (There's one climax I've been using for years as a starting point. One day I will get there.)

So here's another way to figure out where to start your story: Put interesting characters in an interesting place, then let them do interesting things. (What's interesting? That's the art, isn't it. Your readers will tell you what's interesting by the sound of rapidly turning pages.)

If the first two chapters of your book are backstory and exposition, and the movement of the plot starts in chapter three, the opening of your book is chapter three. Delete the first two chapters.

====

Plots start when movement starts. This movement can be physical, or it can be psychological, but it is movement. The human eye instinctivly follows a moving object. It will follow the fastest moving object if several are present. So ... make your plot move, and eyes will follow it.

A chess game doesn't start until the first piece or pawn moves.

[keithwriter]

James - first of all, thanks for sharing your insights.

Second, I'm curious about a statement you made in another thread:

Me, I start with an outline.
My outlines are about 75% of the length of the finished book.
Where I start -- is with a climactic scene. I form it in my mind.
So you're saying that for, say, a 200-page novel, you'd start with a 150-page outline?

If so, what is the nature of the outline? Is the text in the outline publication-quality prose, or just lengthy notes-to-self and brainstorming?

And when you say you "start" with that, it's hard for me to picture - surely it must take quite a while to physically write all that stuff - I'd suspect weeks or even months. Or am I misinterpreting?

I'd be very interested in you elaborating on that process. I too am using an outline on my first novel attempt, but my outline is only a 2-pager. In addition I have 20-odd pages of brainstorming and research, but I found that too unmanageable; hence I went with a short outline so I could "see" the whole book at a glance.

Thanks again.

-keith

[James D Macdonald]

My outlines aren't submission-quality prose (though some bits do make it all the way through without change).

They most closely resemble a guy telling his buddy about a neat movie he saw the night before -- bits of memorable dialog, descriptions, but most important the order of the scenes.

Often at this stage I have nonce-names for characters (sometimes they're named for their function in the story: "Bestpal" or "Cannonfodder"). Sometimes the author is a character: The author looked up from couch where he sat taking notes. "Just keep talking, guys," he said. "I'll fix it in the rewrite."

I see novels as having shape. There has to be a pleasing, balanced shape, with all the parts connected, the corners neat, and overall easy to look at.

Try drawing a picture of your book, showing the flow of scenes and chapters. In a bit I might go into my theory of the novel as architecture.

[James D Macdonald]

Typing a hundred fifty page outline runs me about two or three weeks.

After that, bashing it around to make it into something worth playing with, then writing from the outline into a finished novel -- that can take some time.

[keithwriter]

Interesting! I too write informal brainstorming notes to myself, and sometimes when I don't want to lose momentum while working on the actual draft, I'll write notes like <improve this to make it half as long and twice as funny>, when I think that the idea is sound, but know that the execution is lacking.

I also tag a lot of the "fussy bits" to clean up later, rather than losing momentum by figuring out every last detail. Things like what model of car a character is driving, how long they've worked somewhere, etc. "Tony got into his XXXCARNAME, and said through the open window, "I've been working for you XXXYEARS - how long is it going to take before you trust me?"

Later I do a search for <bracketed comments> and instances of XX, and then do the requisite cleanup. That helps me maintain consistency.

Another question: do you write sequentially, or do you sometimes skip from one scene or chapter to another, based on what you're in the mood to write?

Thanks for the valuable insight!

-keith

[James D Macdonald]

Right you are, Keith. When you're writing, don't slow down.

Yes, you will do research ... you'll need to know exactly what kind of car your guy is driving, but during the outline/first draft stage isn't when I do it.

I'll research a bunch before, and after during rewrite and revision. The rule in the middle is "don't slow down."

Now ...

On movement, and on art.

The way to tell the difference between the real world and art is that art has borders. Pictures have frames, stages have curtains, books have covers. You have to provide the illusion that your created world extends beyond its covers, but you aren't going to need to create that outside world. We'll talk about tricks for doing that later.

I'm going to talk about chess games instead. Chess games are like novels.


I'm going to recommend a book, too: Logical Chess: Move by Move (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0713484640/ref=nosim/madhousemanor/). I'm quite serious about saying y'all should get a copy, read it, play the sample games, understand it. First off, even if nothing else happens, your chess game will improve.


The other thing is this: chess games happen on a board. The board has an edge, a limit. Therefore, it is art.

Now as it happens, there are only three things that can possibly happen in a chess game. White may win, Black may win, or there could be a stalemate. Exactly how those things happen is where the interest comes -- everyone knows before the game starts what the range of possible outcomes is. The good guys win, the bad guys win, or we're returned to status quo antes.

The game doesn't start until the first move is made. In the same way, the story doesn't start until the first character acts.

Your pieces are your major characters. Your pawns are your minor characters.

The way you win the game -- no one can foresee how the game is going to go. Not even the greatest chessmaster can see twenty moves in advance. What the chessmaster does is put pieces in useful places. The chessmaster knows that a knight is most useful on QB3 and KB3. So that's where the chessmaster puts them. (This is called "Playing Positional Chess," and that's sometimes what I call my style of plotting a book. As in, "Why did you have Fred slip a gun into his pocket before he left the house?" "I'm playing positional chess.")

If you have put the pieces in their strongest positions, surprising combinations will appear as if by magic later on. The game will play itself; the book will write itself.

If you get a chess set where one side is Army and one side is Navy, you have a technothriller. If you get a chess set where one side is Spacemen and the other is Alien Monsters, you have a space opera. If you have a chess set where one side is modern college professors and the other is faculty wives, you have mainstream.

The moves are the same.

Really, trust me, get the Logical Chess. Look at it at an angle; it's a writing book.

[James D Macdonald]

Well, now, what to put in the opening?

We're going to stick with the chess game metaphor for a while here. In the opening you're trying to put yourself into a strong position for going into the midgame (where the exciting action and the exciting combinations occur), and you do this mostly by getting your pieces off the back rank as quickly as possible. The pieces are your major characters. Get them out there, and get them doing things.

Don't neglect your pawns -- your minor characters. You should cherish your minor characters. They'll save your life. If you have a selection of minor characters you can pull them out to solve problems later in the book.

Now, what to put in that first chapter? (Recall that if your readers don't finish the first chapter they'll never get to chapter two.)

To answer the question of what goes into chapter one, I'm going to grab the first stanzas from a bunch of Anglo-Scots folk ballads (http://www.childballads.com/). These were the popular songs of earlier times, cooked by the folk process so that only the important and memorable parts remain, they're entertaining, and they tell stories.

Okay:

Young Johnny rode out on a May morning
With his buckles and his bridles ringing,
And as he rode by the castle walls
He heard a fair maid singing.

====

The king sits in Dumferlin town
Drinking the blood-red wine.
"Oh where will I get a good skipper
To sail this ship of mine?"

====

There were three brothers in merry Scotland
In merry Scotland there were three
And they cast lots which of them should go
Should go, should go,
For to turn pirate all on the salt sea.

====

Okay, what do those have in common?

A person, a place, and a problem. Action and movement. Often a time of year or a time of day.

These are not bad things to get into the first chapter. If you can get 'em onto the first page, even better.

Updated to add: See also, Folksongs Are Your Friends (http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/006448.html)

[marky48]

"On a blustery March morning in the year 1630, a great ship was riding restlessly at anchor in the Solent, near the Isle of Wight." From Albion's Seed.

I'm onboard.

[reph]

"In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters."

Okay, it's three sentences, not one, but it's got a setting, a time, and, ahem, a strong major character. I say it has that sense of "what's next?" that one strives for.

[James D Macdonald]

I didn't say one sentence, let alone the first one ... the first chapter is good enough. (You see young, inexperienced writers trying to get everything into the first sentence. This more often than not gives you an opening sentence that looks like a runner-up in the Bulwer-Lytton contest (http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/).

But ... do give your readers a reward for reading the first page, a reason to turn the page, then ... you have chance.

There's a reason publishers ask for three-and-an-outline. That small sample will give them an idea of whether you can give readers a reason to start your book, and an idea of whether you know where you're going.

Think with your reader's mind for a moment. When you go to a bookstore, how do you act when you're trying to decide if you want to buy a book by someone you've never heard of?

Go to a bookstore. Hang around. Watch the readers. They are your readers. How do they approach unfamiliar books? Look at the cover... flip a few pages...

Yeah, a few pages. Sometimes just the first page. Grim, right?

You hear lots of folks condemning editors who make decisions based on the first page. Remember what position editors have in the grand scheme of publishing: They are the readers' advocates.

[marky48]

Well it works in nonfiction, but no one wants to stumble into a cliche beartrap. I have to push off somehow. Leave it to Cal State to come up with that though. It's fitting.

[James D Macdonald]

Over a decade ago, I was doing feature articles for a weekly newspaper. A novelist's techniques work equally well for non-fiction -- if you don't create interest and reward the reader for going along, you don't have readers. In both fiction and non-fiction part of the art is in finding and revealing the telling details. The biggest difference is where those details come from, the imagination or research.

Recall also that fiction should be true (for certain values of "true"). The best lies contain the most truth.

[marky48]

I think that's true. Feature stories have structure and certain information is placed accordingly. That's newswriting 101, and beyond; profiles, any story really.

That's why I like Gore Vidal's work. It's extremly difficult to determine when he's putting one over on you. I think that's what you're saying here.

[James D Macdonald]

We're still talking about first chapters here.

Before I start, how many of y'all went and got a copy of Logical Chess Move by Move? I reccoed that back on page two of this discussion. Go order a copy now. I'll wait.

I'm serious, guys. I'm going to be recommending other books as I go. I'm doing this because I think it'll help you. I know these are the books that helped me.

My next suggestion is also going to be work: Take your favorite novel.

Now, retype the first chapter. Do this with your writer's eye, not your reader's eye. Think about the lengths of the sentences, the lengths of the paragraphs, the sounds of the words. Think about the order of the scenes. Notice the dialog. How are the dialog tags rendered? Where is the point of view?

The point of this exercise is this: Have you ever gone to an art museum and seen the art students sitting there with their easels and oils, copying the great masters? The point isn't to turn them into plagairists, or to make them expert forgers. The point is to get the feeling into their hands and arms of how to make the brush strokes that create a particular illusion on canvas. Writing is no less a physical skill than painting. The words are your paints, the sentences your brush strokes. Following a master, asking yourself, always, why. Why did he or she choose this word rather than another? Why was this scene from this particular point of view? Why did the scene end there?

Writing is an art. Everything is there because the artist (that's you!) chose to put it there. The surface meaning, the deeper themes, those are your choice.

I can hear you saying, "Yeah, right, Uncle Jim. You say 'Retype a chapter,' but I bet you never did that."

Wrong-o, my friends. I did just that (I did more -- I retyped entire books). You can find some of them here (http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/lit.htm), the ones that I still had on disk to convert to HTML and which were in public domain.

At the very worst your typing skills will improve, and that's nothing to sneeze at.

Assignments: Get a copy of Logical Chess Move By Move, and work through the problems. Get a novel that you personally really admire, and retype the first chapter.

More discussion on openings later.

[keithwriter]

VERY cool advice. Okay, okay, I'll buy the chess book.

And I've NEVER heard the "type somebody else's first chapter" idea before, but it makes a LOT of sense. I'm a professional musician, and just as the art students Jim mentioned copy works of visual art, musicians learn some essential vocabulary by copying verbatim the playing of the masters - this has gone on from Mozart to Marsalis.

While it sounds like a grueling exercise, it also sounds like a GREAT idea.

Thanks!


-keith

[marky48]

Right, that's how I learned the trumpet. I didn't compose Herb Alpert's music. I copied, rehearsed and eventually performed it in public.

[rtilryarms]

Edited because the joke was too stupid even for me

[marky48]

Careful Mike, some of us here actually can do what we say.

[James D Macdonald]

From Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/railton/projects/rissetto/offense.html) by Samuel Clemens:


There are nineteen rules governing literary art in domain of romantic fiction -- some say twenty-two. In "Deerslayer," Cooper violated eighteen of them. These eighteen require:


1. That a tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere. But the "Deerslayer" tale accomplishes nothing and arrives in air.

2. They require that the episodes in a tale shall be necessary parts of the tale, and shall help to develop it. But as the "Deerslayer" tale is not a tale, and accomplishes nothing and arrives nowhere, the episodes have no rightful place in the work, since there was nothing for them to develop.

3. They require that the personages in a tale shall be alive, except in the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the corpses from the others. But this detail has often been overlooked in the "Deerslayer" tale.

4. They require that the personages in a tale, both dead and alive, shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there. But this detail also has been overlooked in the "Deerslayer" tale.

5. The require that when the personages of a tale deal in conversation, the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject at hand, and be interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the people cannot think of anything more to say. But this requirement has been ignored from the beginning of the "Deerslayer" tale to the end of it.

6. They require that when the author describes the character of a personage in the tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage shall justify said description. But this law gets little or no attention in the "Deerslayer" tale, as Natty Bumppo's case will amply prove.

7. They require that when a personage talks like an illustrated, gilt-edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven- dollar Friendship's Offering in the beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel in the end of it. But this rule is flung down and danced upon in the "Deerslayer" tale.

8. They require that crass stupidities shall not be played upon the reader as "the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest," by either the author or the people in the tale. But this rule is persistently violated in the "Deerslayer" tale.

9. They require that the personages of a tale shall confine themselves to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and reasonable. But these rules are not respected in the "Deerslayer" tale.

10. They require that the author shall make the reader feel a deep interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad ones. But the reader of the "Deerslayer" tale dislikes the good people in it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned together.

11. They require that the characters in a tale shall be so clearly defined that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given emergency. But in the "Deerslayer" tale, this rule is vacated.

In addition to these large rules, there are some little ones. These require that the author shall:


12. Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it.

13. Use the right word, not its second cousin.

14. Eschew surplusage.

15. Not omit necessary details.

16. Avoid slovenliness of form.

17. Use good grammar.

18. Employ a simple and straightforward style.

Even these seven are coldly and persistently violated in the "Deerslayer" tale.



The entire essay is worth reading.

To balance it, remember that Fenimore Cooper is still in print, and recently had (yet another) major motion picture made from one of his works (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104691/).

BTW, and apropos of nothing, Sam "Mark Twain" Clemens is frequently cited by the vanity presses and PoD publishers as a well-known author who self-published. It's true, he did. What they fail to mention is that he went bankrupt doing it, and had to go on the lecture circuit to pay off his debts.

[marky48]

And they've obviously never seen Ken Burns' film either where that is well illustrated.

[rtilryarms]

surplusage? Is that really a word?
Can you like maybe somehow try to give us some kind of a layman's definition or perhaps even an example so that we might understand what in the world this strange word might possible mean?

[James D Macdonald]

A part of standard English since the 15th century, "surplusage" is excessive or nonessential matter; or material introduced into a legal pleading which is not necessary or relevant to the case.

What Twain is trying to get across with this rule, "eschew surplusage," is illustrated by your reaction. More plainly speaking, eschew surplusage means speak plainly.

[pdr]

I'm really enjoying this James and everyone else. Thank you for a great refresher course.
I was interested to note there was a controversy over font. I always teach my writing students that Courier is the only font to use for the American markets because that's what American editors taught me when I first started selling short stories and articles to the States. I had 'severe' comments from some editors because I was using Times New Roman!

[James D Macdonald]

You're quite right, PDR. You will never be wrong if you use Courier.

[emeraldcite]

dammit. i hate courier

but, i shall use it nonetheless....didn't know my book was going to be so long....lol

[emeraldcite]

snip, snip here, and a snip snip there...in the merry ole land o oz

[James D Macdonald]

Paper is cheap.

Recall the reasons for the double-spaced lines, the one-inch margins, and the large mono-spaced font. A human being with a sharp blue pencil will go through and make all kinds of hand notes on the pages. Another human being with a sharp red pencil will go through and make other marks. The process of editing is messy handwork, and requires room.

[James D Macdonald]

So, how's everyone coming? Did you do your two hours yesterday? Ready for today?

One thing about being a professional writer: it means you have homework every day for the rest of your life.

You'll also need to read, in addition to writing. You'll read things in two ways: First, for information. Second, for technique.

You will stop reading like ordinary folks do, when you start reading like a writer. You'll be looking at what worked, what didn't, and how the effects were carried out.

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

Shall we talk about Plot and Story?

I'll just give some aphorisms here. First, from a friend of mine who's one of the most perceptive and talented editors I know:

"Plot is a literary convention. Story is a force of nature."

Plot is the sequential arrangement of consequential actions. This happened, then that happened because of this.

These arrangements are not random. They are a result of the artist's choices. "But it really happened that way!" is no excuse in fiction. As an artist you are not only required to make things happen, you are obliged to have them make sense. Nor can you throw in just anything at any point. You have to avoid digressions. Every word must support the theme, reveal character, or advance the plot. Better words do two of those things. The best words do all three.

Recall that sailing ship a bit upthread, ready to get underway? Think of the elements that advance your plot as sails. Each one properly rigged on its mast and yard adds to the speed of your voyage and the beauty of the overall design of the ship.

Elements that don't belong in the plot -- however diverting they may be on their own -- are like taking those same sails and trailing them over the side in the water. They slow the ship, make it look slovenly, and perhaps put it in danger of capsizing.

Story, now, is the wind that drives those sails. Story is simple. "Who are those guys?" "How do I get home?" "Who am I?" "I saw something neat." "What makes us human?" "Am I normal?"

With story we're back around the campfires thousands of years ago, telling each other who's sleeping with who, what the king's up to, what's up in the next camp over. The fire casts shadows out in the dark, the shadows of monsters and demons and gods. We tell stories about them too. Those shadows are, however, the shadows of humans.

All stories are about people.

[James D Macdonald]

"You can get farther with beautiful prose and a plot than you can with beautiful prose alone."

"Plot will get you through times with no prose better than prose will get you thorugh times with no plot."

"I am a professional writer. I tell lies to strangers for money."

"One Damn Thing After Another is a perfectly good plot."

"Anything that doesn't add to the story takes away from it."

[marky48]

I boiled down a chapter into a four-page paper for a history class by jettisoning much of the detail necessary in a book lengh story to the essence of it.

[Betty Kruk]

James MacDonald, how do you have so much time to post and answer posts? Your name is more frequent than any other; sounds as though you have quite a background in writing; you make your living that way. How do you find the time to appear on so many boards?
Just curious....:D

[emeraldcite]

he has several trained monkeys that type for him.

[marky48]

I mean, with all those aliases....

[James D Macdonald]

Hi, Betty.

a) I type fast.
b) I don't sleep.

[James D Macdonald]

It might seem like I'm slagging off prose. I'm not. Beautiful prose is a wonderful thing. It is a necessary thing.

"The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and the lightning bug," as Mark Twain said.

Words are your tools. You must make them your friends. If you aren't the sort of person who can regularly ace the It Pays to Increase Your Word Power feature in Readers Digest every month -- become that sort of person.

At the very minimum I expect you to have the following books in your office:

Miriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0877798095/ref=nosim/madhousemanor)

The Chicago Manual of Style (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0226104036/ref=nosim/madhousemanor)

Roget's International Thesaurus (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060935448/ref=nosim/madhousemanor)
and

The Elements of Style (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/020530902X/ref=nosim/madhousemanor)

There are other useful references, which I may mention later. These you must have, and must use.

The words themselves, the nouns and verbs ... they're the polish with 000 steel wool. They're the hand-rubbed oil stain. They're the carnuba wax buffed with chamois. But if you don't have a solid piece of woodwork to start with, all the finish in the world won't make a piece of furniture.

Yes, I'll be talking about prose, including some of my idiosyncratic pet peeves. There, their, and they're are three different words, with three different meanings. Similarly, two, too, and to. Its and it's mean different things, as do farther and further. You are expected to be expert.

If what exactly I mean by "noun" and "verb" (not to mention "adverb," "adjective," and "conjunction") is obscure to you ... go right now to your local bookstore and pick up some of the test-preparation study books for high school students, and work through the sections on English. It's okay, no shame, but you've got to be good with words.

If you can put together two consecutive pages of grammatical English with standard spelling, you'll be ahead of 90% of the people in the slush pile.

==========

Another note: Yes, William Strunk did self-publish the first edition of his Elements of Style, as the PoD and vanity presses are fond of pointing out. You have to remember that it happened in the days before the invention of the Xerox machine -- Strunk printed up copies of his class notes to hand out to his students, so that they wouldn't have to copy it all down by hand as he lectured.

[rtilryarms]

I except your word usage notes accept they do not apply to me. In effect, these rules do not affect my writings at all. Allot of other people, though, will learn alot from this. A lot won’t.

I would rather have someone write incorrectly and to censor them than to censure them. After all we have freedom of speech.
James illicits good thought on this so we learn and won’t write elicitly.
I write as that so don’t look at me like I’m wrong.

[marky48]

Look, James is spot on in what he says. Many so-called writers I've seen, especially at vanity sites and others fail the test above. That's why slushpiles are difficult to get out of.

The shear volume of the dazed and confused constitutes long odds of one crawling out of the pit of ignorance because the majority refuse to learn and claim to have the right to write. They also have the right to be judged for the untrained amateurs they are. Because it shows.

[Karen Ranney]

I personally feel that beautiful prose should be invisible, just as a writer/author should be invisible. The story is more important than its creator. If the reader has to struggle to read something because of purple prose, improper grammar or self-indulgent phrasing, you've jerked him out of the story. That's why I write - to tell a story.

[James D Macdonald]

Which leads very nicely into the next topic: Characters.

Plot isn't the whole of your novel. Plot is more like the ropes and poles that hold up the big top where the circus is going to be held. Plot provides structure, but it isn't the novel.

Nor is story the novel: story is the space inside that big top where the show is going to happen.

No, your novel is in the characters: the bareback riders, the ringmaster, the trapeze artists, the lion tamers. A novel is about people, without the people it's an empty tent.

(And you were wondering where I was going to come down on the plot-generated vice character-generated novels.)

When you are coming up with characters, I beg you make them interesting. Interesting people doing interesting things in interesting places make your novel interesting.

You need to develop characters so that they serve a purpose other than Keeping The Front Cover and Back Cover Apart. Two rules for that: Every character thinks that he's the main character in the story, and Every character thinks that he's the good guy. While you are writing the character (from the main character, to the most minor of minor characters) you're in his head, and those two things are true while you're writing from his point of view (POV).

We beat up our characters. We make them miserable. Writing is about a lot of things; being kind to your characters isn't one of them.

Generally speaking, you need at least two characters in a story; otherwise dialog is very hard to do. How many characters you can handle is a measure of your skill level and the needs of your book. Characters all serve a function in the book. If two characters are serving the same function, make them into one character.

Now, I'm going to add two more characters to your story. These have to be characters, though y'all might not have thought of them so.

First is the author. You are a character in your story. Cast yourself. Then stay in character. Are you a lecturer? Are you a genial host? Are you a salesman? Are you a stranger here yourself?

Second is the reader. You have to cast the reader. Picture the reader. Is she a teenage girl living in suburbia? Is she a sophisticated urban professional? Is he a business traveler looking for something to read in the airport? The reader is why you're doing this. He's a character. See him. Make him consistent.

If you want to imagine you and your reader sitting in your living room (or some other location) while you tell the story, that can work. Just be consistent! We are building a dream, here, creating an illusion. Inconsistencies are illusion killers. Don't let your reader see you palming a card.

[marky48]

In my screenplays I'm the narrator, but I don't chime in very often in voice over. In the novel I started I'm the lead looking back on the story. Authors are always in the story at some level. I think that's inherent.

[James D Macdonald]

More on Characters, and a little reward for having borne with me so far. A story. (http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/l_author.htm)

[marky48]

I recognize that pea-coated man.

[James D Macdonald]

Good morning, everyone! Coffee all brewed? Ready for another day in the word mines?

Let's talk very briefly about those characters. We have to put them into conflict, else nothing much is going to happen.

In the chess games, it's white vs. black, because if you didn't have that conflict, you wouldn't have a game.

There're all kinds of conflicts we can use. Man vs. nature, man vs. fate, good vs. evil. Revenge may be a lousy motive out here in reality, but it's powered many novels.

Let me mention one of my favorites.

Anyone can do good vs. evil. The audience knows who to cheer for. The author knows who's going to win. This can get boring, for everyone. (Important safety tip: Your readers can always tell when you're bored.)

If you want to make your characters sweat, and keep your readers guessing, make the conflict good vs. good. Love of family vs. love of country. Search for truth vs. charity and forgiveness. Faith vs. reason. You get the idea.

All that's visible on the surface in your novel is the plot and the characters. The themes, the stories, the conflicts -- those are hidden. You know them; you're the author. You make them consistent throughout, and the reader will believe the plot and believe in the characters, at least until the book is finished. That's the art and the skill. And that's where lots and lots of unpublished/unpublishable writers fall down.

[James D Macdonald]

Another thing about the characters: they don't know they're in a novel.

(Generally speaking, the characters in art don't know they're in art. That's why the lights are turned down and the audience is quiet in theatres: so the characters won't realize they're on a stage. That's why characters in the movies don't look at the camera. (Have you noticed how distracting it is, in amateur film, when an actor's eyes focus on the camera?)

Well ... you can have the characters notice they're in a book or on film or on stage (it's called "Breaking the Fourth Wall"), but this is generally done for comic effect. "Bromosel looked at the huge wad of pages in the reader's right hand. It was going to be a long epic." (Bored of the Rings) or pretty much any of the Police Squad shows.

One thing you don't want to do is have a character say something that'll remind the reader that he's just a reader: don't have one character say to another, "You're talking like the villain in a sleazy detective novel," lest the reader say "Wait a minute! He is the villain in a sleazy detective novel!" This can break the illusion. Illusions are fragile things. The chapters you've spent building the illusion will be wasted; it's not entirely certain that you'll be able to get that willing-suspension-of-disbelief back.

[marky48]

Excellent lesson James. Lack of conflict is the reason good news is perceived as undereported. Looking at the camera is the ultimate sin in film. I spent four consecutive years working in film and television, and it was a constant battle, especially without lines to look authentic; stay busy, natural and most of all, believable.

Many newbies looked like the night of the living dead in scenes. Stiff, lockstep movements and in some cases even waving at the camera and mugging for it. Right before the director had them ejected from the set.

I remember one time in a film Richard Benjamin was directing "Pentagon Wars" and I got up from the table at an upscale Washington D.C. restaurant, and walked out of the shot. "Cut! Why did he leave," RB yells at the 1 st. AD. (Directors don't talk to the help directly, usually)I stood there dumbfounded.

"No motivation," he said. In essence, I forgot to act. He wanted a look from me. I spotted a friend, showed it and went to visit. It's harder than it looks.

Out here in LA LA land they don't suffer fools long. I suspect it's the same in literature.

[James D Macdonald]

The number one lesson to learn about commercial fiction is: We are part of the entertainment industry!

[FM St George]

quite enjoying this thread and just wanted to give thanks for your most valuable input here...

many thanks!

[jpwriter]

James,
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp I have been enjoying the lessons and advice. I started writing on August 2, of this year and have a lot to learn. My goal is to become a published author within six years and be making high five figures within nine years. I have broken down what I will need to learn and use into these basic areas:
1. Create and write stories in volume, starting with shorts and moving to novels. This includes rewrites and polishing.
2. Become proficient in language skills, grammar, punctuation and sentence structure.
3. Learn to use the elements of fiction: Characterization, setting, conflict, plot and so on bringing my writing to a higher level with each work.
4. Marketing and presentation. This includes marketing to Agents, Editors, Publishers and the public.
5. Submission to the correct markets in increasing volume.
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp I am working on each of the above simultaneously with more time on the earlier items than the later at this point.
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Is there anything you suggest that I should add to the list? Do you have any other comments?
Thanks,
Jerry

[James D Macdonald]

Hi, Jerry --

I've recommended some books and some exercises already ... I'm quite serious about those. Get the books, do the exercises. Develop the habits.

I'll be recommending more books and more exercises as time goes on. Please trust me enough to play along. I can't give you a publishing contract, but I can take you where they grow.

More advice, just for you? Sure:

You've put down timeframes and dollar amounts in your goals. I've seen people do this before; I've even seen 'em figure which year they were going to win what major award. That's counterproductive. Just concentrate on the day, and on the current project. Let the future take care of itself.

Have a life. Go to interesting places, do interesting things. Observe people. You have to be the best observer around. No matter what you're doing, part of your brain should be turning the scene into descriptive prose.

Read widely. Take classes just for the heck of it. You can't know too much.

Consider joining a writers' workshop. Look for one that has at least one or two people with legitimate publishing credits in it. If workshops aren't for you, they aren't for you, but give 'em a try. You'll need a set of trusted friends who'll read your work and give you their honest opinions. No matter how much those opinions may hurt, thank your friends cheerfully and sincerely.

Make every story you write be the best one it can be. Submit them to places likely to buy them (paying markets only). Send 'em out 'til Hell won't have 'em.

[HConn]

I'm surprised no one else has commented on this. If they have I missed it.

Maybe I'm the only one who was struck by it.

By "my work" I mean ten pages of original prose fiction every day.

That isn't so bad, really. It's only about 2,500 words. It's only two hours or so.

*Boggle* at the idea of writing ten pages in two hours.

At first.

James, when I read that, I was astonished to hear you were that productive. I work for about two hours every day, and I do three to four pages in that time. I've never been able to do better than that.

But when I started to break it down, I realized that 2.5K words in two hours is slightly less than 21 words a minute (we don't need much more precision than that). Writing four pages in that time is slightly more than eight words a minute, and writing only three pages is slightly more than six.

I thought to myself, six words a minute? What the hell am I doing with my time?

That night I examined the way I work. I was working on a scene, and I wrote a single sentence. Just a nothing, people-enter-the-room sentence. Then I highlighted it and hit alt-t, w.

That sentence contained 20 words. And I thought. That's all I'll write for the next three minutes.

That was not a happy thought.

I mulled it over (I'm not very bright and think slowly) and tonight I decided that I would try for a sentence a minute. Not all my sentences are 20 words (most are much shorter), but surely that was a pace that my lame typing skills and struggling imagination could manage.

I set my watch on my desktop and worked in ten-minute blocks (roughly). In the first block I wrote 182 words. Eighteen words a minute! Most of the later blocks were not as productive, and one was more productive, but they were all respectable. I admit to making lemonade and turning over laundry between the blocks, but it was still a great session.

I expect to struggle with it more tomorrow, but you've really opened my eyes about this. Frankly, I hadn't even thought to examine my word-a-minute productivity before.

Maybe I should work on my typing skills, too.

Thanks a ton.

Harry

[SRHowen]

A fun way to work on typing skills-- Yahoo Typing Shark (http://games.yahoo.com/games/downloads/tps.html) But watch out it can get addictive.

As far as speed goes. That's a matter, or some of it anyway, (I'd say a lot of it) of making a habit out writing. Sit and write, edit later to get the most out of each day. Then go back the next day and spend no more than a few hours ( a set amount of time, James suggests 2hrs, I do 4) editing what came the day before.

If you become very prolific then you won't get through what you wrote the day before in the alloted time, but you will catch up when the actual writing is done.

My latest finished novel--90,000 words (first draft) in 32 days. I take one day a week off--so that was actually 28 days. So the average was 3200 some words a day. I was also editing book one in that time, working on the magazine, and working on an earlier project that I am changing POV on.

Every writer writes differently. You can try what works for others, but you have to find your own way of doing things.

I only sleep about 4 hrs a night and type close to 120 WPM--that helps. I don't fret over my work. I work, write, edit(not the book I am currently working on) a bit, play some silly game, work, write, edit(not the book I am currently working on getting finished)

I am often up at 2 am yet writing and have to stop or I would fall asleep in the keyboard.

This is not for everyone.

But the thing you must do is park butt in chair and develop a writing habit. Not every one can do 3,000+ words a day, not everyone can do 2,500 in two hours--many writers only do a few pages a day--

Does this mean you are wrong? Not at all--you have to find what works for you.

Set a goal per day and work your way up. As with any habit you will get better as your mind says --OK butt in chair--muse will now engage.

James is referring to his "work."

You have to find what "your work" habit is. Choose a word limit per day--you can waste a lot of time doing non-writing things while sitting at your desk. The word limit works better for most people.

Say I will write x number of words today and every day for 2 weeks then I will write an increase of x number of words for the next two weeks--etc and so on, you will be surprised at how soon you can write a huge block of text in 2 hrs. But no one will start out with 2,500 words in 2 hrs.

Shawn
Shawn

[marky48]

I can say I thought James pumped out a large chunk on a daily basis, but I think this mathematical analysis of how is in the same category as how long is a chapter? As long as it takes. Who cares? Books are written two to three pages or more at a time. In the end, the ones that made the cut constitute a book. That's how long a book is and how long it takes.

[James D Macdonald]

There are no right or wrong answers. The only thing you'll know if you listen carefully to what I tell you here is how I work, and what works for me.

Still, there's that professional attitude. If you're a professional writer, writing is your job. Treat it that way. Sure, it's a job you love, one that you'd do even if they weren't paying you for it, but it's a job.

You can get the sweatshirt (http://www.cafepress.com/viableparadi.263026) and wear it proudly.

Now, some other fun things before we start today's nattering.

Here's the Turkey City Lexicon (http://www.critters.org/turkeycity.html). We can't talk about -- some would say we can't think about -- things for which we don't have the words. These are some words that you might find helpful in thinking about your writing.

Here's something even more fun: The Sobering Saga of Myrtle the Manuscript (http://www.sfwa.org/writing/myrtle2.htm). If you ever wanted to know the truth of what happens in a publisher's office, this story tells the truth. It's about short stories, rather than novels, but it's still Pretty Darn True.

Myrtle tells the story from the editor's point of view. If you want to Really True Truth about writing a novel from the novelist's point of view, I recommend you get a copy of The Unstrung Harp; or, Mr. Earbrass Writes a Novel by Edward Gorey. Here it is as a single volume (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0151004358/ref=nosim/madhousemanor), or as part of a collection (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0399504338/ref=nosim/madhousemanor).

The Unstrung Harp is very funny, and devastatingly accurate.

<hr>

Now, today's discussion. Let's say that you have a full novel all done. Three hundred some-odd pages of typescript in standard manuscript format (http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~mslee/format.html). What do you do now?

Now is the time to put it into pleasing shape. This is what I call Agricultural Work. This is where you prune and transplant, and fertilize the book. Look at the end. Is everything that happens at the end properly foreshadowed in the beginning? Look at the beginning. Does everything that you planted there have a payoff at the end?

You remember Chekov's saying that a gun that's hanging on the wall in the first act must be fired in the last act. Here's where you hang the gun on the wall. Here too is where you make sure the gun goes off.

I see my novels as having form, like a building. They are a space. The walls go all the way to the ceilings, the walls meet at corners, the roof is in place and pitched to shed the rain, the doors swing easily, the floors are level, and there are plants to mask the ugly place where the foundation meets the lawn (in addition to the pure aesthetic pleasure that those pretty flowers give.

You're looking for balance here. You may need to move scenes, shed scenes, write new scenes. Characters may appear or vanish in this part of the rewriting.

To make a statue of an elephant, take a block of marble and carve away everything that doesn't look like an elephant. The first draft, the thing you vomited out at the rate of ten pages a day, is the block of marble. Now you are cutting away everything that doesn't look like a novel.

As you gain skill and experience, the marble will arrive at this later stage more closely rough-cut than it did the first few times you try. Still you will get to know revision. Revision means, literally, "looking again." Look again at all the parts of your book, from basic plot through character, action, theme, story, text, subtext. You are the master of this world you are creating.

The readers are counting on you for one thing: they are trusting you to find the one perfect ending for this novel. (That's why the Choose Your Own Adventure books flopped -- they were a novelty, not a novel. Not all endings are as good as others. You, the artist, choose one.)

The readers expect to be surprised by the inevitable. This sounds like a tall order. It is. There are a couple of cheap tricks I can teach you, but try for the real thing.

(Cheap trick number one: Start a story arc. Before it reaches its climax, start a second story arc. When that second story arc reaches its climax, substitute the climax for the first story arc. This sounds silly, but it really works. For an example, see Chaucer's The Miller's Tale (http://www.luminarium.org/medlit/miller.htm).)

Okay, before I end today, one more rule of thumb: Unless you're writing War and Peace or the Bible, try to have all your characters on stage and moving by page one hundred.

[marky48]

I've reformatted my wisp-like start on a novel in the fashion standard for that venue. I suspect though, based on my experiences here that the story of myrtle will enrage many of the newbies here. They will be insulted by the truth, and accuse the professionals of dreamkilling. They'd be wrong.

[evanaharris]

making high five figures within nine years

This isn't exactly relavant to the thread-but maybe someone could clear this up for me. Does five figures mean five numbers (10000)? or does it mean five zeros (100000)?

By the way, james, I'm really enjoying this. Keep it up, and publish it on your website when it's done.

[marky48]

For a fictional account of my latest nonfiction book I highly recommend "Arnudel." Kenneth Roberts' diary "I wanted to write" is fascinating day-to-day account of his writing career. It's only available at libraries, unless abebooks has a copy.

www.amazon.com/exec/obido...ce&s=books (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0892723645/qid=1069799645/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-8535027-1448766?v=glance&s=books)

[marky48]

I interpret the phrase to mean 99,999 as the upper end. All of the numbers are meaningless from the poster's perspective.

[evanaharris]

I interpret the phrase to mean 99,999 as the upper end. All of the numbers are meaningless from the poster's perspective.


yeah, after thinking it over for a couple of minutes, that's what I arrived at, too.

I agree that it's meaningless, i just wanted to clear up my confusion...

[jpwriter]

James,

[James D Macdonald]

Well, that was succinct.

[HapiSofi]

In the years since Myrtle the Manuscript first hit the net, I've seen far more newbies who were soberly encouraged by reading it. What they need is solid, reliable information about what to expect, and how to interpret the reactions they get. MtM's good for that.

Anyone who's enraged by it was probably a dip to start with.

[jpwriter]

James,
I already have all but one of the books you recommended already. The one I didn't have I will be getting soon, The Chicago Manual of Style.
I haven't been doing the exercizes yet. I have been busy polishing two stories for a contest deadline.
I will play along though.
As to goal setting. I am 56 and have had two careers. I was trained early as a goal setter and it works for me. I usually succeed in surpassing my goals, then set new ones. I do not micromanage my goals. I set them and then get busy on the current project. That project may be 1000 words before I quit or to finish the story. I don't look at the clock while I am doing it.
Have a life. At 56 years old, it is a work in progress.
Read widely. I started reading at 5 and have read, I am sure, over 5,000 books in my life, fiction , non-fiction, all genres and even Travis McGee!
No classes yet but I am part of a critiquing group I BSed them into making me a member when one dropped out. Several are published, one works for The Austin Statesman as a staff writer, at least one has a masters in writing of some type (I forgot what the exact name of th degree) These people can tear you a new ass, that is for sure but it is valuable stuff.
Workshops are out for now. I work 60 to 70 hours per week, take care of a disabled wife and write, study writing and polish stories. (I don't sleep either and type fairly fast)
I make every story the best I can and then after a bit more study, which I mostly do at work, I do more rewriting.
My wife is my "first reader" and I have 3 more fairly competent readers I use. (I read Steven King's "On Writing")

Here is the book list I currently have other than my many dictionaries and reference books: Steven King's "On Writing"; Strunk & White "Elements of Style; Series by Writers Digest called Elements of Fiction Writing (6Books);"Writing Fiction" by Burroway; "Immediate Fiction" by Jerry Cleaver; 2004 Novel & Short Story Writer's Market;"The First Five Pages" by Noah Lukeman". I also subscribe to the Writer's Digest magazine. I also have a loose leaf binder full of articles and info I have printed off the net.
Well, got to go. Have a story to work on.
Jerry

[marky48]

I thoroughly enjoyed it myself, but for once I was striving to be diplomatic. I hear you.

I don't know what the gentleman meant by that. The whole repsonse is open to interpretation? Fill in the blank?

[Reuben Colburn]

Happy Thanksgiving all. I've been banned from the board. Too many good answers I guess.

[James D Macdonald]

Kinda a gallimaufry today:

Plots. Please try to avoid the Idiot Plot. An Idiot Plot is one that only works because all the characters involved are idiots. If the only reason something happens or doesn't happen is because otherwise it would be a very short book, come up with some other explanation.

Let me give you an example of an idiot plot, this time from the movies. How many of y'all have seen Tears of the Sun with Bruce Willis? Our boy Bruce plays Lt. Waters, a Navy SEAL who is sent into Nigeria to rescue an American doctor during a civil war. The doctor refuses to leave without taking her patients with her. What stops Lt. Waters from calling his boss on the aircraft carrier on his satelite phone and saying "Give me three CH-46s at the LZ"? Nothing other than that if he did it, the movie would have been only about twenty minutes long. That's an idiot plot.

What stops the characters in your novel, on seeing mysterious lights in the house next door, from calling 9-1-1? Motivate them. Eliminate "because I'm the author and I say so" as a reason things happen.

Sometimes, though, you'll have to have characters behave in basically stupid ways. You have two choices there: either build their characters to show that they're stupid people (reading stories about stupid people isn't terribly enjoyable, at least for me, but maybe there's a market), or get the action going so fast that the readers don't have a moment to say, "Hey, wait a minute! Why don't they just go to the bus station and buy a ticket?"

Next thought: On plots. Plots are simple things, like a piece of string is simple, but they are complex, like a three-strand four lay Turk's Head (http://members.tripod.com/~cubclub/turk1t.html) made with that same piece of string is complex. When you're thinking about plot, and about the shape of your book, consider the classical unities.

These come from Greek drama, and are unity of time, unity of place, and unity of action. In a Greek play (formal as sonnet, those things were), all the action takes place in twenty-four hours (that's unity of time), it all takes place in one location (e.g. the square in front of the temple -- that's unity of place), and everything that happens deals directly with the climax (that's unity of action, and it's a darn good idea, chums).

Your novel probably won't take place in just one location in twenty-four hours. Still, it's probably a good idea to use the minimum number of locations, and the minimum time. If your character flies off to Miami to learn something he could have just as conveniently learned in New York, leave him in New York. If a whole chunk of your novel can be replaced with the words "What with this and that some five years passed," you may have to refine the focus of your book or replace that part of the novel with a chapter break or a line break.

Let us take for an example The Lord of the Rings. The time covered is almost exactly one year, and an action-packed year it is. Yet it starts in the Shire and it ends in the Shire. The hobbits are center stage on the first page, and they're center stage on the last page. You could do worse than to follow this template.


Let me give you another aphorism: The oldest engines pull the heaviest freight. If you were going to write a modern literary novel, you might consider taking The Trojan Women (http://classics.mit.edu/Euripides/troj_women.html), and setting it among the Mormons of Mesa, Arizona, one afternoon in August, 1965. Vietnam is just ramping up. It's hot.

You've done your research on time and place and modes of speech ... and off you go.

By the time you've done the book won't resemble the original at all; you'll have something totally your own. Yet it will have a structure, and the structure will be sound, and your readers will appreciate it.

====

Other random thoughts: On words.

Beware the word "Somehow." You can use it in dialog when the character doesn't know, but you should avoid it in narrative. "Somehow" means the author doesn't know either. This is bad. The reader is trusting you to know what's going on and to guide him to the climax of the book. "Somehow" makes the reader look at you askance and ask "What's the matter with this guy?" It's as if he were following a guide through trackless wilderness, when the guide suddenly gets a puzzled expression on his face and says "Beats the heck out of me."

Example: Our hero is trying to sneak into a warehouse. The door is sliding shut. Then the narrative: Somehow the door failed to close all the way. What? Why didn't it close? Figure this out, author, and come back when you know. Did a mouse get jammed in the gears? Either come up with something reasonable, or give the guy a different way into the warehouse. If you do nothing else, delete the word "somehow." You still have the same action, but without the moment of doubt.

Next: Choose only necessary detail. You aren't constructing a full world. You're giving your reader a blueprint with which he'll construct his own world, which will be consistent with his own needs and experiences. If the room the reader imagines and the room you imagine differ, what of it? Give the reader three points and he'll do the rest. Just be consistent, and choose the important things. If it's necessary that there be a clock in the room, mention it. If it doesn't matter whether there's a clock, don't mention it. The reader may put one there, or not put one there, and it won't matter to the story. The room will be the right room for him.

Readers assume that everything you mention is important. They'll hold those things in their heads. Give them a payoff for everything you mention, a reward for their effort. You can't keep writing checks against your literary account without adding literary capital.

On sentences: There were and It was are weak openings. Not all sentences need to be strong: contrast and rhythm demand that sentence strength vary. Nevertheless, be aware of this fact, and use it as a tool. You are the author. All the words are yours. Be conscious of what you're doing.

Anything that doesn't add to your story subtracts from it. You know what you're doing with your tale; later on students and critics may come by and try to guess, but you know.

Take charge. This is your world, you are the master. Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha!

[James D Macdonald]

Hiya, Jerry --

When's your contest deadline? Deadlines are good things. They concentrate the mind wonderfully.

By "Have a life," I mean don't spend all your time in your room writing. Writers need to get out of the house, talk to people, observe the world. No one can create new worlds until he masters this one.

By "classes," I don't mean writing classes. Those can be good or bad experiences. I don't necessarily think they're required. By classes, I mean things like going to a local college and taking a course in Classical Mechanics, or Origami, or First Aid. Everything, everywhere, fits into your mind, ready to come out when a story needs it. Writers are generalists.

Did I ever mention my Quick Slick Research Method?

When you're getting set to write a story set in a particular time or place, you need to become an Instant Expert on the subject. Here's what you do. Go to the Children's Room in your local library and read a couple of recent kids' books on the subject. That'll get you up to speed, give you an idea of the shape of the material you'll need, and an introduction to the terms and people.

Now go to the adult section, and start reading the adult books on the subject. Start with the big survey books. The Oxford Book of _____ for example. Read only the chapters you need. It's easy to get distracted. Take notes.

Then go to the specialty books. Read the parts that you need (and you will know which parts those are from your previous reading), paying attention to the footnotes (the footnotes are where learned professors float their crackpot theories, or bitch about other learned professors -- footnotes are great fun). Take more notes.

You are now sufficiently an expert on your subject to write your novel. When you've got a decent draft of your novel, take it to someone who genuinely is an expert on the subject to read it and comment on it. Many academics are lonely folks, only too eager to talk with you. Cops and firefighters and emergency nurses love to talk with writers. Coroners will make time in their day to read your book and comment on it. Honest. You'll mention them in the acknowledgements in the front of the book and that's all the reward they want.

On Writer's Digest: this is the Brides Magazine of writing. It's a great mag when you're getting started and planning the wedding. It isn't so good on telling you what to do after the wedding when you wake up the next morning beside some fat guy who snores, smells of sweat, and has stubble all over his chin.

Everyone has a subscription to Writer's Digest once. It's time to reevaluate your career if you renew your subscription. Think about the old maid with the lifetime subscription to Brides Magazine. Yeah, it's like that.

One other thing about Writer's Digest: If an agent advertises there, cross that agent off your list.

[SRHowen]

One thing you should discover about Writer's Digest is that once you get to the agent/publisher stage of writing--the magazine will seem useless. You won't feel the need to pour over it to find what "they" did to get that agent or publisher or to land that book contract.

Same with a lot of how to books--once you reach the stage that they are trying to pitch--they no longer have much value. And no I am not talking about reference books, like Stunk and White of the Chicago Manual of Style--you need these all the way through.

Another good one is, Grammar for Dummies. Simple to understand for the grammar impaired. read it and then Stunk and White will make a whole lot more sense. Even if you majored in English and Creative Writing it's a great book.

Shawn

[James D Macdonald]

A very short post today. Holidays, kids home from school, you know....

First, a Trick for Analysing your Writing:

Take ten or twenty consecutive pages, and tape them, side by side, to the wall of your livingroom.

Go stand on the other side of the room.

Are all the pages big grey blocks of text? If so, perhaps you need to break things up with dialog, with paragraphs of varying length, with line breaks. All short paragraphs and dialog? Your reader won't have a chance to catch his breath and assimilate what you've just said. Your text should be varied, just as your story varies. The rhythm of your story will be apparent across the room. Big grey blocks = boring. All jagged = tiring.

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

Next thing: Two books for you to read, over the weekend. They're novels, but you'll find lessons on writing in them if you care to dig those lessons out.

First, The Sun, the Moon, and the Stars (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0312860390/ref=nosim/madhousemanor) by Steven Brust.

Second, Misery (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0451169522/ref=nosim/madhousemanor) by Stephen King.

Of the two I recommend the Brust more highly. You can buy copies, get 'em from your library, interlibrary loan, whatever.

(Please note, too, that Brust's book is still in print, even though it was first published in 1987.)

[James D Macdonald]

Is everyone so stunned that they don't have anything to say?

[Deejay816]

Hi, James - I just started reading this thread yesterday and you have some really great info. here. I am really curious as to why you have recommended Misery - would you explain your reasoning please?

Deejay

[HConn]

I've been posting links to this thread at a couple of other message boards. And my library doesn't have the Brust book handy. That will take a week or so.

[reph]

"Is everyone so stunned that they don't have anything to say?"

James, I'm still recovering from those revelations about how prolific you are. "Stunned" is the word, all right.

[James D Macdonald]

Why did I recco Misery?

This is all In My Opinion, of course, but books are about something other than the surface plot. What I think this one is about is the relationship between the author and the reader.

The author is the reader's slave, the reader's captive. The reader has control of what we write. The reader also takes away parts of us.

Observe the long descriptions of how the author has to play fair with the reader, and provide beliveable explanations for the events in the novel. The reader will withdraw her approval if we fail to satisfy her, if we fail to make her believe. The discussion, with examples, of how the fictional author makes the fictional "biggest fan" believe that Misery didn't really die at the end of the previous book is brilliant. And it works through the choices the author has to make, why some lines are right, and why some lines are wrong.

I enjoy looking at the why of a thing. If I know why, I can often figure out what needs to happen in some other specific case by looking behind the surface.

The descriptions of what it feels like to be writing (the "hole in the page") resemble what writing seems like to me.

The clues that this is meant to be a writing manual include the long digression on why Corrasible Bond (do they even still make that stuff?) is dreadfully wrong for writing a novel.

So, aside from the action/adventure/thriller surface of this novel, read it as a parable of the creative process as it pertains to writers and their readers (who are we without our readers?) and I think you'll find lessons that can improve your own writing.

All I can really say is that I found it useful.

-----

Reph, not a day goes by when I don't think "Gee, if only I got serious about this I could be really productive." But yeah, we are prolific. That's what it takes to average two novels and two short stories a year, and that's what it takes (at least, that's what it takes me) to make a living doing this.

[James D Macdonald]

Reprinted from elsewhere on this board:


Your readers can always tell when you're bored.

Writing is a lousy make-money-fast scheme. If you aren't doing it at least a little bit for love, I can point to a lot of things that will bring you more money for less work.

Next: Observe this diagram (http://www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/score/actbank/tvenn.htm).

The area labeled "A" is what fascinates you; what you might write about. The area labeled "B" is what fascinates everyone else, that they want to read about. The area labeled "C" is what's marketable.

You can't guess this in advance.

Take, for example, Maureen F. McHugh. She was fascinated by Chinese people, gay guys, and subways. She wrote China Mountain Zhang (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0312860986/ref=nosim/madhousemanor). This was her first novel, and it was picked out of the slush pile. It was published, remains in print, and led her to a career in mainstream literary novels.

The books you're seeing now as the Hot New Releases were bought two years ago. The trend as to who's buying what has already moved on. Write what's going to be on the shelf two years from now, not what's on the shelf today.

[Deejay816]

What a great explanation of Misery - I like your notion of the writer being slave to the reader and the idea of suspending disbelief by making the correct choices.

One I've always recommended because I think King is poking a bit of fun at writers who claim to have no control over what they write (it just happens - the muse, or whatever one calls it, simply takes over) is The Dark Half - not great literature by any means and I may be reading more into it than King intended, but I don't think so.

Deejay

[James D Macdonald]

King is an interesting writer. He's one of the full-blown Calvinist writers; Calvinism tends toward horror. (Once, when asked why he wrote horror, King replied "What makes you think I have a choice?")

(An example of ur-horror, that passionately American genre, is Johnathan Edwards' "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." (http://www.jonathanedwards.com/sermons/Warnings/sinners.htm) People traveled for miles to hear Edwards preach. When he spoke people would weep, or fall to the floor senseless. That's more than a good sermon: that's entertainment.)

King is also, if memory serves, one of the few writers who has taught English at every level in the American educational system. That's more than a need for money -- that's a love of teaching. I expect that on some level everything he's written is meant to be didactic.

IMHO, however, when he's remembered, King will be remembered for his short works.

Oh, yes, his On Writing (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743455967/ref=nosim/madhousemanor/) is highly recommended.

[James D Macdonald]

Elsewhere at the Water Cooler (http://p197.ezboard.com/fabsolutewritefrm11.showMessageRange?topicID=28.to pic&start=1&stop=20), I find a reference to this essay: How Lucky Can You Get? (http://www.pw.org/content/how_lucky_can_you_get_what_can_happen_after_you_si gn_contract) by whiney Usenet troll M. J. Rose. (See? I can be snarky.)

Okay, guys, go read the article, all the way down to What’s the Problem?

M. J. lacks the publishing experience to figure out the answer to her own question. Y'see, I know exactly what happened to "Carl P." He had Golden Word Syndrome.

His first book was publishable, or would be, with editing. Perhaps a lot of editing. The editor liked the voice, or the story, or some aspect of what was a deeply-flawed but correctable work.

"Carl P" got the contract. The editing process started. Then Carl decided that his words were golden. He refused to participate in the editing process, he vetoed the editor's suggestions, he wouldn't make the changes that would turn his manuscript into a commercial novel, his ego was too big to allow him to listen to a mere editorial assistant. He bought a "STET Dammit!" rubber stamp.

Read the little tale that M. J. tells with that in mind. Makes sense now, doesn't it? The editor's actions aren't inexplicable and unmotivated any more, eh?

Carl P's book was printed as unedited slush, with predictable results.

I recently had a chat with a New York editor who had bought a first novel out of the slush pile. The book was interesting, the story moved right along, the voice was unique -- and it fell apart in the last quarter. The author had no clue how to end a novel for all that he'd started brilliantly.

Where most editors write revision letters, this editor wrote a revision novella.

"What will you do," I asked, "if the author won't make the changes?"

"Put a cheap cover on it," the editor replied.

Here endeth the lesson.

[Karen Ranney]

The Golden Word Syndrome. Great title. I used to call it the Princess and the Pea Syndrome, as in "Not me. Not my words. Edit? Heaven forbids!"

The hardest thing about writing is the EDITOR'S REVISION LETTER. All caps for a reason. Here is where you take a deep breath and squint at the second page for a while. You don't want to really read it, you're only trying to get a flavor of it at first. Then, you see how many pages are in this letter. Less than 6? Okay. More? Oh God, they want me to rewrite the bloody thing. Then, after a day or so, you have the courage to read the first paragraph, which is always the "You're a glorious, wonderful, brilliant writer, one of our most talented authors" paragraph which precedes the paragraph that begins with: "We think the book is marvelous but can only be made better with the following changes."

The first inclination is anger. Then depression sets in. After you've wallowed in that a few days, you get down to work and make the changes, realizing as you do so that you don't know everything, that the editor is right, and the book is better.

I've never known one author who accepts the process easily, but if you want to be published, you suck it up and do the work. It's what makes professionals - and survivors - of us.

The easy part is the writing, frankly.

[James D Macdonald]

Hi, Karen --

Just wanted to say that you've been saying good, true, and useful things on this board. And I'm honored that you're posting here ... I love a good romance, but darned if I can write one.

[Karen Ranney]

What an honor to be honored! I normally don't post anywhere, but I've just finished a new book and I'm in contract negotiations. Either I have to start a new book (and I've given myself a week off) or otherwise occupy myself while all of that is happening. I do NOT want to indulge in a blue funk along the lines of: I just KNOW I can't write, and I'm brain dead, and all the people who ever read one of my books is an idiot, and I've been fooling people all this time, and one day they'll find out, and I can't think of a plot or characters and they'll never give me another contract and my sell throughs suck and my print runs are going to be lowered and I didn't place high enough on the bestseller list and...you get the drift.

I think your writing "seminar" is great. It's all wonderful advice. I had to laugh about the taping the pages to the wall. I do the same thing, but print preview in Word, select six pages and squint at the screen. Same method in determining how to eliminate the big chunks of prose, though.

Oh, and a romance is only a story about a relationship, and all good books are about relationships.

[HConn]

James, from:

www.sff.net/paradise/plottricks.htm (http://www.sff.net/paradise/plottricks.htm)

If you have one plot presented three ways, you have three plots. If you have three plots presented one way, you have one plot. (I stole this principle from Jim Macdonald's lecture on how to really generate plots, which is much better than my lecture on stupid plot tricks.)

Would you explain this a bit, please? Or is it a subject for a later post? :)

[semmett]

Jim et al,
I saw some comments on how to format a manuscript but I had one specific question around dialog. This is how I have been formatting my dialog thus far:
"Blah blah blah" he said
[blank line]
"Blah blah blah" she said. She then went onto do something else that was interesting here.

Can anybody tell me if this is correct or not?

By the way I have found this thread very interesting - THANKS!

Regards,
Simon

[SRHowen]

you are missing end punctuation.

"Blah, blah, blah," he said.
blank line
"Blah, blah, blah, she said.

Not to be rude--and I really am not being so--but look at an already published book and pay attention the punctuation.

Shawn

[James D Macdonald]

First, the formatting thing:

The only blank lines in your story will be where you expect linebreaks, and those will have a centered # in them, thusly:

<font face="courier">

<PRE>
"But why are you telling me all this?" Jane asked. She

passed a trembling hand across her brow.

#

Next morning, Paul awoke to find his refrigerator had gone

off in the middle of the night. Again.

</PRE>
</FONT>

As you can see, you indent the beginning of each paragraph (and each time a new character speaks, it's a new paragraph).

Let's try your example:

<font face="courier">

<PRE>
"Blah blah blah," he said.

"Blah blah blah," she replied. She then went on to do

something else that was interesting here.

</PRE>
</FONT>

Notice that you end the quoted words with punctuation, either a comma, an explanation point, a question mark, or something else. The comma stands for a period.

I will comment here that "said" is a totally invisible word, and far preferable to all the "said-bookism" synonyms you'll find out there: he bellowed, he shouted, he rasped, he gritted, he snarled, he yelled, he demurred, he apologized, he extemporized, he welded, he [some verb that is not said].

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

Now on the subject of plots and such:

Many years ago I studied magic. Back when I was six years old, one Halloween night, the firefighters had a Halloween party at the firehouse. I went with my parents. They had a magician! I decided rigth then that I was going to be a magician when I grew up.

I got pretty good at it, if I say so myself. I made money in high school putting on magic shows, doing kids parties and such. It was fun. (It's all the entertainment business!)

Along the way I ran into a book called <A HREF="http://used.addall.com/SuperRare/submitRare.cgi?author=bruce+elliott&title=magic+as+a+hobby&keyword=&isbn=&order=PRICE&ordering=ASC&dispCurr=USD&binding=Any+Binding&min=&max=&timeout=20&match=Y&StoreAbebooks=on&StoreAlibris=on&StoreAntiqbook=on&StoreBiblio=on&StoreBibliology=on&StoreBiblion=on&StoreBibliophile=on&StoreBibliopoly=on&StoreBooksandcollectibles=on&StoreChapitre=on&StoreElephantbooks=on&StoreHalf=on&StoreILAB=on&StoreMaremagnum=on&StorePowells=on&StoreStrandbooks=on" target="new">Magic As A Hobby</A> by Bruce Elliott. In there, I found a line that's stuck with me, that I've found to be absolutely true: "If you know a thousand ways of finding a selected card and only one way of revealing it, to the audience you only know one trick. If you know one way of finding a selected card and a thousand ways of revealing it, to the audience you know a thousand tricks."

I've shifted my focus over the years from magic to writing (a kind of magic all its own -- genuine thought transference!) but that lesson stuck with me.

Up above, I suggested using the plot of The Trojan Women, transported to Mesa, Arizona, in 1965. Suppose you wrote that book. Then suppose you put the plot of The Trojan Women into a novel set in feudal Japan. Then you did another novel with the plot of The Trojan Women, this one set in upper-class Westchester in 2003. Then you used The Trojan Women for a novel set among in the biker bars of Long Beach, California, in 1990.

To the readers those would be very different novels.

A bit upstream Karen commented that all novels are about relationships. I'll generalize that a bit: All novels are about people. Write about people, folks. The rest all follows.

From this you can further derive: You must become an expert on people. You have to learn to see through the eyes of others. You have to understand yourself very well, then you have to understand them.

Now, to reward you: <a href="http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/tricks1.htp" target="_new">A magic trick</a>.

[EJ]

I just joined this message board tonight and have read through this entire thread. There is a lot of very useful information in here.

One thing I was wondering though, is about the narrative of the story. Which is best? For the narrative to be a dry report on things or for it to reflect a bit of the author's personality?

This scene for example:

Kassady gave J.B. a look of disgust.

or

Kassady gave J.B. a look much like that which one would give a nasty, mutant insect before squishing it.

[reph]

Raymond Chandler did pretty well with sentences of the "nasty mutant insect" type. You could do worse than to write like Raymond Chandler.

I had a bit of a hard time, though, with "that which one" in the middle.

Probably the real answer is that it depends on where you are in your narrative. In the middle of a frenzied action scene, for example, you wouldn't want to intrude by entering the room and holding up a nasty mutant insect. That would take the reader's mind off the characters.

[EJ]

Yeah, I couldn't think of how to phrase that as I wrote it. I'm half alseep at the moment. I probably should have written it as: "Kassady looked at J.B. as if he were a nasty, mutant insect in need of squishing." Or something along those lines.

I do tend to write like that, but never in a hectic action scene, or in a very dramatic scene. I use it mainly because I find "just the facts" narrative all the to be a little boring.

On the other hand, constant, colorful descriptions can be annoying. I think, when carefully peppered into the story at certain moments, that they can add a lot to the story. Especially moments that aren't supposed to be very fast.

[James D Macdonald]

That's part of casting the author as a character. It doesn't really matter, provided you are consistent throughout the work.

After that, the test is does it work for you?

[Done it Duncan]

Hey James, that's a nice trick. Took me three times to figure it out.

[pdr]

Don't you find the writers' magazines helpful in that you can read the interviews with other novelists and find comfort that they struggle with certain writing problems too? I enjoy my 'Writing Magazine' (UK) and 'Writer's Digest' (USA) for the news about markets, the publishers' and agents' comments and the interviews. There's always something new to learn surely!
Happy Writing

[HapiSofi]

Great stuff, Jim. Do please continue.

[Dancre]

hey, uncle jim,
i wanted to say i'm really get alot out of this thread. please don't stop. i really liked the post where you said tape your story on the wall and see if theres alot of narration. never thought of that. and lets see, write two hours aday, so if i start at 6pm on monday, i can still see monday night football. works for me!! oh, and i have to ask you, were you Maryssong on cacoethes scribendi's bb?
thanks
kim

[James D Macdonald]

Hiya, Kim --

No, I've never been on scribendi's bb (and I go by my real name wherever I go -- I'm me, I stand behind my opinions).

Hi, Hapi. Good to see you here. Chime in any time you like.

===========

What shall we talk about tonight?

How about endings?

Books have beginnings, middles, and ends.

If your book doesn't have an end, your readers will be left unsatisfied, as if the chocolate cake they were promised for desert was snatched away from them at the last minute.

I've talked about chess games as a metaphor for the novel. All chess games end. Either with a checkmate, a stalemate, a draw, or a resignation.

Of these, only the checkmate is of interest. We want that checkmate ending to our books. When the reader puts our book down, he should say "I didn't see that coming, but by golly that was the absolutely right ending."

("What do we do if we're planning a sequel? What if this is one book in a series? What then, Uncle Jim?" I can hear you asking.

"My children," I reply, "the book must have an end anyway. You can leave room for more stories in the same world, with the same characters, but this story is finished. Suppose your reader is a sailor, a thousand miles away from shore, six months before he'll get home, and this is the only book on board his ship. Do you want to frustrate that poor swabbie, leave him hanging? No! Give him a conclusion, a satisfying conclusion.")

How to tell you've reached the end of your story:

The characters suddenly don't know what to do next. They wander around. One of them orders out for pizza.

A novel is not life: In life there are always loose ends; the story never really finishes. This is art: Here all the plot threads are gathered together. Sure, you can leave little things lying around ready to pick up in another book, but you can't leave major plot-arcs unresolved. The reader won't stand for it; he will throw your book against the wall; he won't buy your next book. Here's the game: You win if the reader buys your next book.

Do not leave your reader in any doubt that you've come to the end of the story! Imagine a play ... where the audience didn't know to start applauding, when to rise to their feet, when to throw bouquets on the stage. The playwright gives the audience clues that This Is It. If nothing else, when the lights come up, and the whole cast walks on stage and takes their bows, the audience knows This Play is Over, and it's time to go home.

So ... signal that it's the end. Coming to the last page isn't enough. I've run into books where I've been frustrated because the last page wasn't the end of the story. Do not do likewise.

Bad endings: There are three classic errors. One is getting into a land war in Asia. But the other two, almost as deadly are ending your book thusly:

1) It was only a dream.
2) ...and they were all run over by a truck.

Yes, yes, I know. <a href="http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/People/rgs/alice-table.html" target="_new">Alice in Wonderland</a> ends with "Oh, I've had such a curious dream!" That book has many other virtues, and the ending is in fact perfect for that book. The danger with using the "it was only a dream" ending with your book is that the reader has been worried about these characters all the way along, he's been hoping for them, fearing for them, and now, suddenly, you've told him that it didn't matter. Yes, it's all a fiction, yet our readers have laughed genuine laughs, shed genuine tears, actually checked to makes sure the windows were all locked, all over our creations. Don't remind him that you just made it up. One of the little fictions of our fictions is that we don't tell them that it's fiction.

The "...and they were all run over by a truck" ending has the element of arbitrariness to it; the author has gotten tired of these toys so he throws them away. Possibly the author didn't know how to end the story, and this presented a convenient way to do it after about three hundred pages. Again, the reader has gotten to care about the characters (at least we hope so, and if the reader is still following along at this point we know he does), and will be upset, perhaps angered, that someone he likes dies for no good reason other than the author said so.

Okay, okay, you're trying to make a point that life is random, brutish, and short, that we all die, and that existence is meaningless. Make your point some other way; this one has already been done.

What both of these endings have in common: The characters' actions didn't matter. That's disrespectful to your readers. Readers can tell when they're being dissed.

[James D Macdonald]

Since HConn brought up the Evil Overlord Plot Generator, here's <a href="http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/000290.html" target="_new">a lot more about it.</a>

[evanaharris]

Since HConn brought up the Evil Overlord Plot Generator, here's a lot more about it.

That really is an excellent way to brainstorm. Personally, I love taking something like that and working off of it. I find that I usually change so much when I actually get down to writing it, that it's hardly recognizable for its source material.

[James D Macdonald]

I'm going to recycle a bit right now, from <a href="http://p197.ezboard.com/fabsolutewritefrm3.showMessage?topicID=263.topic" target="_new">another thread here.</a>

In that thread, HConn mentioned <a href="http://www.scriptsecrets.net/articles/magnify.htm" target="_new">this site</a>.

The following was my reply there.

(I'm thinking that after this I might blather on a bit about Point of View (POV), but that's for another post.)

<BLOCKQUOTE>
Quote:
<HR>

Well, books aren't movies (for all that they're both part of the entertainment industry). They're different art forms, both of which need to appeal to a mass audience. Yet, you can learn from them. I'm a big believer in finding lessons about writing in all sorts of non-writing or peripherally-writing places.

From where I sit, ideas are vastly overrated. One of the things you'll get sick of when y'all become Famous Big Name Writers (or obscure, small time writers like me) is the guy who comes up to you and says, "I"ve got a great idea for a book! You write it and we'll split the money!"

Ideas. I've got lots of my own, thanks. Aphorisms: Watt-Evans' Law: "There is no idea so stupid that a sufficiently talented writer can't make it into an entertaining story." Feist's Collorary to Watt-Evans' Law: "There is no idea so brilliant that a sufficiently ham-handed writer can't make an unreadable story out of it."

The Pump Up The Volume method (what this fellow calls "Magnification") can work, if you're the sort of person it works for. It won't give you <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0767812158/ref=nosim/madhousemanor target="new">sex, lies, and videotape</a> for all that it might give you an <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/ B00000G3PA/ref=nosim/madhousemanor target="new">Armageddon</a>.

Films play games with higher stakes than novels, at least in the terms of cash outlay. For a movie maker, the special effects budget may constrain the storyline. For me as a novelist, it costs exactly the same for me to type <FONT FACE=COURIER>"Fred lit a cigarette"</font> as it costs me to type <FONT FACE=COURIER>"The world ended with an earth-shattering Kaboom."</font>

Study the story-telling caracteristics of allied artforms, yes. Remember that what you personally are doing is writing a novel.

You want an example of plot, pure plot, driving a work? Try <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0000648Y0/ref=nosim/madhousemanor target="new">Sweeney Todd In Concert</a>. This performance has no sets, minimal costuming, minimal props, minimal movement. Yet the plot itself, expressed through the characters, pushs us right along. Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, has lots of narrative juice. This particular story has been consistently finding an audience for the last 160 years. When you analyse the themes, you'll find classical roots. I really recommend this particular performance of this particular work. Look at is as an example of Plot At Work.

(Oh, incidentally, <a href="http://www.findology.com/partner/rt.php?q=John%20Q" target="_new">John Q</a> sucked.)

</blockquote>

[Karen Ranney]

Endings - one of my favorite pet peeves.

In any genre , and let's face it, we live in a world of sub-specialization - there's an implied theme. Segue here – I write because I have to. It’s a bonus that people want to read it. I write in a genre that’s popular, which means that it’s entertainment, pure and simple. I personally want to enlighten, teach, amuse, and touch the hearts and souls of those people who read my books. But anything and everything I say is generated from the viewpoint of a genre writer. (If I wrote “literary fiction” my print runs would be a quarter what they are now.)

When a reader buys a book, he does so based on a particular genre or theme. The reader immediately has a certain set of expectations. Mystery = crime/detective/solution. You can vary within that theme, but if you do not meet those expectations, you will irritate the heck out of the reader.

Never make the reader mad at you. (You can make him angry at the characters, the situation, life, etc., but don’t make him mad at YOU.)

Case in point - A very popular author wrote a book using Old English dialect. Have you ever tried to read Old English? Pullllease. Now, she was lauded for having the courage to do something different, and wasn't she smart, etc., etc., but this little rose was annoyed. I refused to buy anything else by that writer. Why? The book didn't deliver what it promised. Instead, I got a 400 page headache. Plus, I felt stupid.

Never make a reader feel stupid.

You might feel better, a literati editor might congratulate herself/himself on the fact that they haven't wasted that Radcliffe/Harvard education, but you will irritate the reader, and the moral of this story is to sell books.

My second case in point is Susan Isaacs. Now, I used to love her writing...until I read that ghastly book where she KILLS off the main character on the last page. Huh? I've invested my time, energy, and emotion in this person and she's dead?????? Huh?

Never make a reader mad. At you. See above.

I didn't buy another Isaac book for years and years. Why? Because the entire book had been focused on two characters and their struggle to reconcile. I had ached for them, yelled at them, invested part of myself into the story. Then, Isaacs killed her off. Maybe she did it to prove that she could. I don’t know, but I never forgave her for it. To this day when I read Isaacs, I have a certain detachment. I refuse to buy into her characters wholeheartedly. She might kill one again.

The beginning and the middle must match the end, and the end has to deliver the payoff. Mystery - crime solved. Romance - Happy ever after.

Make a reader cry, laugh, be startled and even shocked. Thrill them, sadden them, but always deliver what you've promised.

FWIW - Karen

[James D Macdonald]

Sing it, sister!

I personally want to enlighten, teach, amuse, and touch the hearts and souls of those people who read my books.

So do I. So does everyone. But you know what? If they've thrown your book across the room you aren't going to enlighten, teach, amuse or anything else those readers.

Same as if they put down your book after the first chapter, meaning to pick it up again later, and never do.

You've made a deal with your reader: Give me a couple bucks and a couple hours, and I'll show you a good time. The reader wants you to succeed. The reader is willing to help you out. Just don't give the reader the idea that he's put more thought into the story than you did.

Who was it, Sam Goldwyn, who said "If you want to send a message, call Western Union"? Same with your book. Sure, you can put a message in it. That isn't the reason someone will read your book. Put your message on a different level. On the main level, put this: A story, fully satisfying.

Good point about the detective story. The reader wants you to play fair with him, including putting all the clues on the page, so the reader can solve it right along with the detective. Imagine if you read a mystery where it turned out the killer was some guy you'd never heard of, who'd played no part in the book. It wasn't the jealous boyfriend, the butler, the old school chum, or the dishonest stock broker ... it was some random guy, and the cops find him because he confessed after being arrested for some unrelated crime somewhere around page 300.

Or suppose, on the last page, the police inspector says, "Well, beats heck out of me who did it ... put this one in the Cold Cases file. I've got enough other crimes to work on." That's not going to be too satisfying either.

You made a deal with your reader. You have to carry out your part.

Soon ... POV!

[jpwriter]

Karen,
I read your post with interest. I noticed you mentioned your are a genre writer so I went to your web site. It looks like Historical Romance to me. I am going to get the first book in the series and see what I think. I have read one Historical Romance in my life. Zemindar by Valerie Fitzgerald. I got curious and did an internet search. This book was published in 1983 and is apparently the only book she has published, at least under that name. I loved reading Zemindar. If your work is in any way like hers, I will love it too. I find it odd -- in all the thousands of books I have read that I have only read one historical romance, especially since I was so impressed with it. Got some catch up to do!
I am a novice writer and haven't discovered which genre I want to write in. I love most genres and mainstream fiction equally. I do have an idea for a historical novel I have put notes down on but am not ready to start a novel yet. I am still writing short stories while learning the craft.
By the way. I hate being made stupid as well.
Jerry

[James D Macdonald]

Before we start POV, let's look at yet another list of <a href="http://elmoreleonard.com/archives/010elrules.htm" target="_new">rules for writing,</a> this time from <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/external-search?tag=madhousemanor&keyword=elmore+leonard&mode=books" target="_new">Elmore Leonard</a>.

Mr. Leonard is a noted stylist; widely published, well respected, best-selling. Pray notice when he says that the word for "said" is "said." He also comments on the author intruding in the book. He has other things of great interest.

What we're going to look at today is this bit: "If I write in scenes and always from the point of view of a particular character -- the one whose view best brings the scene to life -- I'm able to concentrate on the voices of the characters telling you who they are and how they feel about what they see and what's going on, and I'm nowhere in sight."


So.

The Point of View is the pair of eyes that is observing the scene. Those eyes, belonging to a character, are your camera. Those ears, belonging to a character, are the microphones that pick up the dialog in the scene.

You may or may not tell your readers what the chacter is thinking. You must tell your readers what one particular character is seeing and hearing.

If the character is not in the room for part of the scene, the readers will not see that part of the scene. Therefore you must either:

a) use a different viewpoint character for that scene, or
b) break the scene into two scenes, with a different viewpoint character in each.

Who should be your viewpoint character? Answer: the character who can best see or describe the scene; the most interesting view of the scene, "the one whose view best brings the scene to life."

How can you tell which one's view best brings the scene to life?

Experience. Reading other authors and asking yourself "Why that character? Why that scene?" Writing your own works, and experimenting with the characters and the scenes. You will eventually get the experience to choose a viewpoint and stick with it in each scene.

Your viewpoint character does not need to be your main character, or even a major character. Remember when I told you to cherish your minor characters? This is one of the places where they can come in handy: they're great viewpoints.

You can go through an entire novel without ever seeing even one scene from the point of view of the protagonist.

If a scene isn't working for you, before your try the other two general-purpose scene-fixes (to wit: shortening the scene or cutting it entirely), try this: rewrite the scene from the point of view of a different character.

What the character sees (that is, what he notices) will depend on the character. You remember Holmes saying to Watson, "You see, but you do not observe"? The same thing is true for your viewpoint characters. Each one of them will filter what they hear, what they see, and consequently what they convey to the reader.

Let us imagine a wedding reception. How would it be described by: a) the grooms' father (a military man), b) the groom's ex-girlfriend (an interior decorator), c) the bride, d) a criminal who is there on business, e) a cop who is there as a guest, f) one of the musicians, or g) the preacher?

Each one of them will see different details as important. Each one of them will hear the conversations differently even if they report them word-for-word. Each of them is more likely to stand in one place than another.

How can you keep close point of view? Try this: Write the scene in first-person as told by your viewpoint character. Then recast the scene in the revision stage to third person.

Readers will notice if you change point of view in the middle of a scene! They will be either annoyed, confused, or lost. Writers have a hard time noticing POV shifts -- this is because they are always looking through their own eyes, and know where they are. This leads to the "head story." A head story is one that's in the author's head, not on the page.

Alas, the only story the reader gets is the one on the page.

In slush I have seen writers change viewpoints as often as three times in one paragraph. This is the sort of thing that gets manuscripts slipped back into return envelopes with one of those little one-page photocopied notes that writers hate to get.

Another viewpoint is the one I call "John Ford's Camera." This is the viewpoint that just sort-of hangs there. It's the Eye of God.

The viewpoint character then is the Author. You. In this case you must be very aware that you, the writer, are a character and maintain scrupulous consistency throughout. (True, you can turn to your audience and address them as "Gentle Reader," though this is seldom seen these days outside of humor, but be ready for the heavy downside too: you are never allowed to use another viewpoint if you're already using your own, and the reader may come to dislike your character.)

-----------

Now comes that point of today's ramblings where I throw out little pearls of wisdom.

Here's one: Say one of your characters is the world's greatest political orator. Do not, under penalty of having your book flung across the room by your readers, attempt to reproduce that orator's speeches. Unless you personally are the world's greatest orator, anything you write will fall short of the reader's expectation. (Same rule applies if your character is the world's greatest poet, greatest preacher, greatest writer, greatest anything. Don't try to provide samples.)

What you do is this: Show people's reactions to the character when he's doing his thing. Don't reproduce the sermon, show the congregation falling to the floor weeping.

[Debra Lauman]

Hi James,

Could you expound a little on omniscient POV? I don't really have a specific question about it. Just curious.

Though I've written (yet-unpublished) novels from a single character's or narrator's POV, I do enjoy both writing and reading novels with multiple POV characters (ie. "Pigs in Heaven" by Kingsolver, and "Celestial Navigation" by Anne Tyler, to name two of many). My one published novel has multiple POV characters, as well as what I believe would be considered the omniscient POV here and there.

I recently read an article in Writer Magazine about an author (I'll have to find the magazine to recall the woman's name or the names of her books), but she's known for "dipping into" various characters' minds and doing so within scenes, as opposed to a single POV within each scene. And I believe John Grisham -- at least in "The Brethren" -- does the same to some extent. That one, I've read. In my opinion, this CAN work in some cases and if handled verrry carefully.

Your opinion?

Deb Lauman
Author of "I. Joseph Kellerman"
www.debralauman.com (http://www.debralauman.com)

[James D Macdonald]

A better reply in a bit, Debra, but here's a principle:

In writing, you can do absolutely anything if it works.

The "if it works" part is the tough bit. Try, read it carefully, be honest with yourself. Get the reactions from your first readers.

Think of your novel as a video game. Every time you try something, if it works, you get some number of points. If it doesn't work, you lose that same number of points. The fancier and more difficult the thing you try, the more points associated with it.

You'll start the game with a certain number of points. How many depends on the reader -- if he's read and enjoyed a previous work by you, you'll get more points than if he's never heard of you before. If you're writing in a genre he likes, you'll get more points than if you aren't exactly what he was looking for, but he was bored and there you were.

You've got some points, though, or the cover never gets opened.

Now you start adding and subtracting points for "things that work."

If your score ever goes down to zero, it's Bzzzzt! Game over! and the reader throws the book across the room (or, more demurely, puts it down and doesn't pick it back up).

If you want to use omniscent narrator, find an author you like who uses it, read his book critically to see the technique, then go and do likewise.

A sufficiently vigorous story will overcome many rough patches.

=======

Aphorism: Style is what you can't help doing.

[Debra Lauman]

Thanks, James. Looking forward to what comes next. (Meaning, your next post.)

Now I'm off to see if I can find that magazine, so I can get the name of that author, so I can get on with reading at least one of her books. (I just posted in another thread about the value of reading books to improve one's writing. I'm a believer, for sure!)

Deb Lauman
Author of "I. Joseph Kellerman"
www.debralauman.com (http://www.debralauman.com)

[Paul W West]

I agree with your discussion on POV. I learned about it a long time ago from Dean Koontz's book "How to Write Bestselling Fiction". It was a great primer for me.

My question is, why do so many best-selling authors get away with writing scenes where they switch POV repeatedly? I have to believe it's because there is more to their stories than the mechanics, such as obediance to the POV rule. Their stories must be great enough that such infractions are forgivable.

Which leads me to the conclusion; we need to craft wonderful stories first and foremost.

[Karen Ranney]

Just FYI - To answer an earlier comment, I am currently published in historical fiction as Karen Ranney, which just happens to be my real name. My other stuff is not under Ranney, but we'll leave that for later...

About POV

My first four books were absolute disasters. I didn't know anything about anything. I head hopped all over the place, sometimes on the same page. Shoot, sometimes in the same paragraph. They were ghastly mistakes, but you know why each and every book worked?

I was unbelievably passionate about what I was writing. I cried over the keyboard, I sobbed aloud. I laughed, I screamed. There is so much raw energy in those books and that's why they succeeded. Passion can replace technique any day. People won't care if you've made mistakes if you entertain them.

Along the way I've learned a great deal and I am much more adept. I work in third person omniscient viewpoint, which is how - and this is the easiest way I can describe it - I get the hell out of the way.

There's nothing more jarring to me to know that the author is there, preaching, describing, telling. Let the people talk. I don't care about the author. I've always maintained that the book is more important than the author and I believe that wholeheartedly.

[James D Macdonald]

Paul, could you point to such a scene? I think we could get a better handle on the whole question if we had something concrete to analyse.

[Paul W West]

Well, I can't exactly copy some scenes here to analyze, but in most of the scenes written by Marry Higgins Clark, Richard Paul Evans, Nicholas Sparks, to name a few, where they write in third person, they seem to head hop all over the place, almost every paragraph is in a different POV from the previous one. Maybe they call it omnisciant, but to me, that's jarring and confusing too.

[James D Macdonald]

I'll try to make it to the library tomorrow to find a Mary Higgins Clark book. Then we'll see if we can find a scene to discuss.

Meanwhile, this bit from <a href="http://www.sfsite.com/fsf/depts/rk0307.htm" target="_new">an article by Rob Killheffer</a> seems pertinent:

<blockquote>
Quote:
<HR>
It’s television’s fault. Television and movies. Visual media. In so many of these indie publications the narrative point of view slides around like a hot rock on ice, and observations intrude without any clear viewpoint at all. Consider this, from Thoughtmaster: “a skeletal face…whose shifting features left the viewer confused.” What viewer? Or this: “The voice was surprisingly strong from such a diaphanous figure.” Surprising to whom? Surely not to the only other person in the scene, who knows the speaker well.

These writers’ imaginations have been shaped by visual storytelling, in which there’s always an implied viewpoint — that of the audience, the camera, the peeping lens. They conceive their scenes as if they’re presented on a screen, and when they commit their prose, the camera remains, lurking outside the frame.

There’s no other explanation for scene shifts like those in Exile. As Jeff Friedrick and his pal Carl leave the bar where they’ve met, we’re told: “At the bar, a man turned his head and watched them go. He was tall, and a brief flare of light revealed reddish hair. Before the spotlight moved on, odd points of light deep in green eyes gave the impression of motion.…” Gave the impression to whom? The viewing protocols of film and television help us make sense of it: The two men who have been the focus of the scene get up and head for the door, and the camera pans aside to settle on this watcher. His reddish hair is “revealed” to us, the audience. We’re the ones who receive the “impression of motion.” It’s as if, in these moments, the authors are not crafting prose but working out a screenplay. I recall the oldest and most basic advice offered to the aspiring writer: Read! Read! And read some more! If you want to write a novel, don’t draw your skills from the big — or the small — screen.
<HR>
</blockquote>

The whole article is worth reading.

One of the points about point of view is that you don't need to tell the readers who your point of view character is, so long as you know who he is, and you remain consistent. Your readers are subconsciously constructing a world under your direction. If your blueprint doesn't make the unseen parts line up, the reader will disbelieve.

[evanaharris]

Would you care to touch on some of your ideas on "positional chess plotting"? I've ordered a copy of the book, but it's not due for another week.

It seems like the point is: give each of your main characters as many opportunities as possible to change the story (game); or something similar...

[HConn]

James, if you want a book title where the POV really jumps around, look for _Swan Song_ by Robert McCammon. When I read Paul's post, I immediately thought of that book.

[Debra Lauman]

Thanks, HConn. I was looking for a book with shifting POV to see how the author handles it. I'll have to look for that one. Do you think it's handled well?

Deb Lauman
Author of "I. Joseph Kellerman"
www.debralauman.com (http://www.debralauman.com)

[James D Macdonald]

Alas, my library didn't have a copy of Swan Song. Instead, I got a copy of <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0671867113/ref=nosim/madhousemanor" target="_new">Moonlight Becomes You</A> by Mary Higgins Clark.

Here's the last scene from Chapter 34:

<BLOCKQUOTE>
<HR>
At six-thirty, dressed for dinner, they sat on the back porch, sipping cocktails and looking out at Narragansett Bay.

"You look great, Mom," Neil said with affection.

"Your mother's always been a pretty woman, and all the tender loving care she's received from me over the last forty-three years has only enhanced her beauty," his father said. Noticing the bemused expression on their faces, he added, "What are you two smiling at?"

"You know full well I've also waited on you hand and foot, dear," Dolores Stephens replied.

"Neil, are you still seeing that girl you brought up here in August?" his father asked.

"Who was that?" Neil wondered momentarily. "Oh, Gina. No, as a matter of fact, I'm not." It seemed the right time to ask about Maggie. "There is someone I've been seeing who's visiting her stepmother in Newport for a couple of weeks. Her name is Maggie Holloway; unfortunately she left New York before I got her phone number here."

"What's the stepmother's name?" his mother asked.

"I don't know her last name, but her first name is unusual. Finnuala. It's Celtic, I believe."

"That sounds familiar," Dolores Stephens said slowly, searching her memory. "Does it to you, Robert?"

"I don't think so. No, that's a new one on me," he told her.

"Isn't it funny. I feel as though I've heard that name recently," Dolores mused. "Oh, well, maybe it will come to me."

The phone rang. Dolores got up to answer it.

"Now no long conversations," Robert Stephens warned his wife. "We've got to leave in ten minutes."

The call, however, was for him. "It's Laura Arlington," Dolores Stephens said as she handed the portable phone to her husband. "She sounds terribly upset."

Robert Stephens listened for a minute before speaking, his voice consoling. "Laura, you're going to get yourself sick over this. My son, Neil, is in town. I've spoken to him about you, and he will go over everything with you in the morning. Now promise me you'll calm yourself down.

<HR>
</BLOCKQUOTE>

It seems to me that the POV is <a href="http://www.livejournal.com/~jonquils/2112.html" target="_new">3rd person</a> <a href="http://www.sla.purdue.edu/academic/engl/theory/narratology/terms/omniscient.html" target="_new">omniscient</a>. We'll talk more about it in a bit, perhaps look at the whole chapter.

In each case, we know exactly whose eyes we are looking through, to whom things "seemed" or who "noticed" what.

I will comment that the last line is a great chapter close.

More anon; right now I'm off to have Movie Night at my house.

[HConn]

Debra, I did not think it was done well. I found it very hard to read.

I read it before I knew anything about writing or POV, so I didn't know why it was so confusing, but it was.

[James D Macdonald]

Is this all sounding too much like high school English class?

Regardless ... onward!

[EJ]

Nah. To sound like a high school English class there would have to be lots and lots of nattering on about gerunds and past participles and such.

[James D Macdonald]

Black = narrator, or undefined POV.
<FONT COLOR="red">Red = Robert Stephens' POV</font>
<FONT COLOR="green">Green = Neil Stephens' POV</FONT>
<FONT COLOR="blue">Blue = Dolores Stephens' POV</FONT>


<BLOCKQUOTE>
<HR>

At six-thirty, dressed for dinner, they sat on the back porch, sipping cocktails and looking out at Narragansett Bay.

<FONT COLOR="green">"You look great, Mom," Neil said with affection.</FONT>

<FONT COLOR="red">"Your mother's always been a pretty woman, and all the tender loving care she's received from me over the last forty-three years has only enhanced her beauty," his father said. Noticing the bemused expression on their faces, he added, "What are you two smiling at?"</FONT>

"You know full well I've also waited on you hand and foot, dear," Dolores Stephens replied.

<FONT COLOR="green"> "Neil, are you still seeing that girl you brought up here in August?" his father asked.</FONT>

<FONT COLOR="green">"Who was that?" Neil wondered momentarily. "Oh, Gina. No, as a matter of fact, I'm not." It seemed the right time to ask about Maggie. "There is someone I've been seeing who's visiting her stepmother in Newport for a couple of weeks. Her name is Maggie Holloway; unfortunately she left New York before I got her phone number here."</FONT>

<FONT COLOR="green">"What's the stepmother's name?" his mother asked.</FONT>

"I don't know her last name, but her first name is unusual. Finnuala. It's Celtic, I believe."

<FONT COLOR="blue">"That sounds familiar," Dolores Stephens said slowly, searching her memory. "Does it to you, Robert?"</FONT>

"I don't think so. No, that's a new one on me," he told her.

"Isn't it funny. I feel as though I've heard that name recently," Dolores mused. "Oh, well, maybe it will come to me."

The phone rang. Dolores got up to answer it.

"Now no long conversations," Robert Stephens warned his wife. "We've got to leave in ten minutes."

<FONT COLOR="red">The call, however, was for him. "It's Laura Arlington," Dolores Stephens said as she handed the portable phone to her husband. "She sounds terribly upset."</FONT>

Robert Stephens listened for a minute before speaking, his voice consoling. "Laura, you're going to get yourself sick over this. My son, Neil, is in town. I've spoken to him about you, and he will go over everything with you in the morning. Now promise me you'll calm yourself down.

<HR>
</BLOCKQUOTE>

Most of the undefined/narrator paragraphs are probably from Neil's POV.


The 3rd Omniscient POV is a very easy POV to write. Since the author knows everything it's a natural viewpoint. It is gratifying to the author's ego to stand in center stage.

This section, however, points up some of the difficulties of 3rd Omniscient: the author can come between the reader and the story (not a big problem in this book; it has lots of story), and the shifting POV can destroy unity thus confusing the reader.

A couple of minor infelicities:

You look great, Mom," Neil said with affection, verges on a Tom Swiftie: "I love hotdogs," Mandy said with relish, or "My headache is gone," Tom said absentmindedly.

Dolores mused is a said-bookism.

Neither of those things are wrong; they have to be watched lest unintentional humor be added to the stew.

Next post, I'm going to try to rewrite this scene from Neil's POV. (Neil is a major character.) Then I'll try again, from Dolores' POV (Dolores is a minor character.)

[James D Macdonald]

From Neil's POV:

<BLOCKQUOTE>
<HR>
At six-thirty, dressed for dinner, they sat on the back porch, sipping cocktails and looking out at Narragansett Bay.

"You look great, Mom," Neil said.

"Your mother's always been a pretty woman, and all the tender loving care she's received from me over the last forty-three years has only enhanced her beauty," his father said. H
e paused. "What are you two smiling at?"

"You know full well I've also waited on you hand and foot, dear," Dolores Stephens replied.

"Neil, are you still seeing that girl you brought up here in August?" his father asked.

"Who was that?" Neil wondered momentarily. "Oh, Gina. No, as a matter of fact, I'm not." It seemed the right time to ask about Maggie. "There is someone I've been seeing who's visiting her stepmother in Newport for a couple of weeks. Her name is Maggie Holloway; unfortunately she left New York before I got her phone number here."

"What's the stepmother's name?" his mother asked.

"I don't know her last name, but her first name is unusual. Finnuala. It's Celtic, I believe."

"That sounds familiar," Dolores Stephens said. "Does it to you, Robert?"

"I don't think so. No, that's a new one on me," he told her.

"Isn't it funny. I feel as though I've heard that name recently," Dolores said. "Oh, well, maybe it will come to me."

The phone rang. Dolores got up to answer it.

"Now no long conversations," Robert Stephens warned his wife. "We've got to leave in ten minutes."

The call, however, was for Robert. "It's Laura Arlington," Dolores Stephens said as she handed the portable phone to her husband. "She sounds terribly upset."

Robert Stephens listened for a minute before speaking, his voice consoling. "Laura, you're going to get yourself sick over this. My son, Neil, is in town. I've spoken to him about you, and he will go over everything with you in the morning. Now promise me you'll calm yourself down.

<HR>
</BLOCKQUOTE>

[reph]

Uncle Jim, couldn't "Neil, are you still seeing that girl..." be from anybody's point of view?

[James D Macdonald]

I'm assigning it to Neil because of the "his father" marker.

[evanaharris]

Ick...I don't like 3rd person omniscient...At least not Mary Higgins Clark's version of it...

Though come to think of it, I can't think of an instance where it's been used and I liked it...It always comes off sophomoric.

[HConn]

Amazing what you can accomplish with a delete key.

[James D Macdonald]

Before plunging back into Point of View, let me natter on a bit about Positional Chess Plotting.

What this means, to me, is that when I start a book I have a general idea of what I'd like to do with it (checkmate the other guy!), but I'm vague on the exact path that'll take me to that goal.

I know how I want the book to end, yet all the steps in between the start of chapter one and "The End" are as much a mystery to me as they are to my characters. The major characters are the pieces. The minor characters are the pawns.

I do know some things -- the size of the area I'm working in (be it a single room in a single night, or half a galaxy over a span of a millennium) -- and the characters I'll be playing with.

From experience, I know that it's best to get the characters out, early, moving. That they need to control the whole of the game board.

I know, from experience, where each kind of character is strongest. I try to put him there. It may not be obvious at the time why I'm moving a character to some location, but I know if he's there he can be active, and control part of the story.

I know to place my characters so that they guard and support each other. Then, later, when plot starts to twist, my characters are where they need to be. It's almost magical. This is how I arrive at the state where the book writes itself.

Then, as the story drives forward, suddenly the exact way in which I'll arrive at the conclusion becomes apparent, and it will be both surprising (because it's only now been revealed to the characters as it was only now revealed to the author) and at the same time inevitable, the "right" conclusion, since the characters had been heading to the places they needed to be since they were introduced.

This is a rather sloppy description of what I hope will become clear as you play through some chess games, noticing how the master moves, what he knows, what he doesn't know, and what he does because he knows it's the right move even though _why_ it's the right move isn't obvious to anyone at that time.

Let me give you the first three moves, with Chernev's commentary, from one of the games in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0713484640/ref=nosim/madhousemanor" target="_new">Logical Chess Move By Move</a>. This one is an example of King's Gambit Declined. White is Blackburne, Black is Blanchard, the game was played in London, 1891. Please follow this with a chessboard in front of you.

<blockquote>

1. P-K4

Values were constant in many fields of endeavor, at the time this game was played.

Stories began, "Once upon a time."

Tic-tac-toe players put a cross in the center square.

Checker masters started with 11-15.

Chess masters opened with 1. P-K4.

Despite the researches of the scientists, these remain good beginnings.

1. . . . P-K4

Black opens lines for two of his pieces and establishes equilibrium in the center.

2. P-KB4

An offer of a Pawn to induce Black to surrender the center.

Accepting the gift enables White to continue with 3. P-Q4, and dominate the center with his Pawns. In addition, the opening of the Bishop file will offer White the opportunity of directing his attack at the vulnerable point KB7. This is a tender spot whether Black's King stays at home or castles.

2. . . . B-B4

Probably the safest way to decline the gambit:
a) The Bishop bears down on the center and controls an excellent diagonal.
b) The Bishop supplements the Pawn's attack on Q5 and prevents White from moving his Pawn to Q4.
c) The Bishop's presence at B4, overlooking KKt8, forbids White from castling in a hurry.

3. Kt-QB3

White avoids 3. PxP, as the reply (coming like a shot, probably) Q-R5ch 4. P-Kt3 (even worse is 4. K-K2, QxKP mate), QxKPch wins a Rook for Black.

White's actual move is not as energetic as 3. Kt-KB3, but Blackburne was trying to lure his opponent into playing 3. . . . BxKt 4. RxB, Q-R5ch 5. P-Kt3, QxRP when 6. R-Kt2 followed by 7. PxP gives White a fine game.

3. . . . Kt-QB3

A simple retort to the dubious invitation.

Black continues mustering his forces out on the field of action. In the fight for control of the center, his Knight does its share by exerting pressure on the squares K4 and Q5.

</blockquote>

This is a short game, just 18 moves. Please play it out to its astounding conclusion. It perfectly illustrates my theory about positional play in plotting.

Sometimes I'll do things in my first drafts for no other reason than to have stuff to play with later on. I might put the hero, Dick Steeljaw, on the same train as the villain, Rotten Robert, and both of them carrying identical carpetbags.

If nothing comes of it by the end of the story, the carpetbags (and indeed the train trip) can be deleted in the next draft. But if some interaction follows, with surprising results, the effect can seem magical.

(A note on names. In first drafts I often name my characters for their functions in the plot. The hero's buddy may be named "Buddy," while a minor viewpoint character may be named "Walkon" or "Cannon Fodder." Global Search-and-Destroy with a wordprocessor makes giving them all reasonable names easy in a subsequent draft, and makes keeping them straight easy in an early draft.)

[James D Macdonald]

Back to POV.

Here's that scene from Moonlight Becomes You, this time from Dolores' POV:

<BLOCKQUOTE>
<HR>

At six-thirty, dressed for dinner, they sat on the back porch, sipping cocktails and looking out at Narragansett Bay.

"You look great, Mom," Neil said as he air-kissed her cheek.

"Your mother's always been a pretty woman, and all the tender loving care she's received from me over the last forty-three years has only enhanced her beauty," her husband said. "What are you two smiling at?" he added a moment later.

"You know full well I've also waited on you hand and foot, dear," Dolores Stephens replied.

"Neil, are you still seeing that girl you brought up here in August?" Robert asked.

"Who? Oh, Gina. No, as a matter of fact, I'm not. There is someone I've been seeing," he continued, "who's visiting her stepmother in Newport for a couple of weeks. The girl's name is Maggie Holloway; unfortunately she left New York before I got her phone number here."

"What's the stepmother's name?" Dolores asked.

"I don't know her last name, but her first name is unusual. Finnuala. It's Celtic, I believe."

"That sounds familiar," Dolores Stephens said slowly, searching her memory. Something she'd read in the paper a week or two ago niggled at her. "Does it to you, Robert?"

"I don't think so. No, that's a new one on me," he told her.

"Isn't it funny. I feel as though I've heard that name recently," Dolores continued. "Oh, well, maybe it will come to me."

The phone rang. Dolores picked up the portable.

"Now no long conversations," Robert Stephens said. "We've got to leave in ten minutes."

The call, however, wasn't for Dolores. She nearly didn't recognized Laura Arlinton. The woman was talking too fast, repeating, "Robert, please? Is Robert there?"

"It's Laura," Dolores Stephens said as she got up to hand the phone to her husband. "She sounds terribly upset."

Robert Stephens took the phone, "This is Mr. Stephens," he said. A long pause followed. Then: "Laura, you're going to get yourself sick over this. My son, Neil, is in town. I've spoken to him about you, and he will go over everything with you in the morning. Now promise me you'll calm yourself down.

<HR>
</BLOCKQUOTE>

The main emphasis has gone from the new girlfriend, Maggie, (in the Neil's POV version) to Laura and the phone call (in the Dolores POV version.)

In the original Omniscient 3rd POV, the reader is left off-balance. This might be a deliberate choice -- we're about half-way through the book, where the reader is meant to be off-balance. This is a thriller, a mystery, and a romance, all at once. We're transitioning from the opening to the middle. In the opening, the writer opens up possibilities. In the middle the themes are balanced, strengthened, and simplified. We're going to start radically cutting down on possible directions the plot could go.

[LiamJackson]

Speaking of third person omniscient ("tpo"), many critics openly express a dislike for the style. In my humble opinion, that particular voice can add strong touches of drama when needed. I agree that it would be tempting to go overboard with "tpo" but I really don't understand what seems to be near universal disdain for it among this latest generation of critics. Maybe I'm just weird.

Any thoughts? (other than "that guy is just weird?")

[James D Macdonald]

To sound like a high school English class there would have to be lots and lots of nattering on about gerunds and past participles and such.

English is a frightfully difficult language. The grammar consists of exceptions papered over with idioms, the pronunciation makes you wish we'd just stuck to ideograms instead of pretending that we're in a phonetic system (The tough coughed as he ploughed the dough ... I ask you!), and depending on how you look at it English either has just two tenses, or thirty-three. The line between nouns and verbs is porous. English is graced with a vocabularly larger than that of the next two languages combined: As James Nichols put it, "We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and riffle their pockets for new vocabulary."

Speaking English badly is easy. Speaking it well ... brother, you have a lifetime's work cut out for you.

If you slept through high school English, now's the time to make up those classes. Get a study book, work through the exercises. At the same time, read lots of novels by acknowledged master stylists. Some of it will rub off.

Oh, yes, and <a href="http:// http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0192813897/ref=nosim/madhousemanor" target="_new">Fowler's Modern English Usage Dictionary</a> (get the 2nd edition -- do not get any of the abominable recent editions) is a wonder and a delight. Read it, learn it, love it, live it.

[James D Macdonald]

Any thoughts? (other than "that guy is just weird?")

You're just weird. Sorry about that.

Otherwise: Third Person Omniscient is easy to do badly. I think we've already mentioned that it can come between the reader and the story; an additional layer of filtering. It can also become the author showing off, and no one likes a show-off.

Third Person Omniscient is a POV that's often attempted by new writers, since it maps easily to the way they look at their own story. An author can look into anyone's head at any time he pleases. He can go anywhere, do anything.

This is why he shouldn't. Because if something is too easy, the reader can cease to care.

Suppose we're in Third Person Omniscient, and we're in a murder mystery. The reader can become annoyed with the author, because the author knows whodunnit, and isn't telling. Remember above when we said, "Don't annoy the reader, and particularly don't get him annoyed with the author"?

That is where the skill comes in. Using Third Omniscent means you're facing a curveball. Even the best batters can miss curveballs.

[HapiSofi]

H. W. Fowler, A Dictionary of Modern English Usage. Get the first edition, or the second edition that was edited by Gower. Third edition is Right Out.

Get a second stylebook to go with it, because Fowler is quirky. His theory is dead solid -- none better -- but he can be odd on the specifics.

ESL handbooks make surprisingly effective stylebooks.

[EJ]

To sound like a high school English class there would have to be lots and lots of nattering on about gerunds and past participles and such.

English is a frightfully difficult language. The grammar consists of exceptions papered over with idioms, the pronunciation makes you wish we'd just stuck to ideograms instead of pretending that we're in a phonetic system (The tough coughed as he ploughed the dough ... I ask you!), and depending on how you look at it English either has just two tenses, or thirty-three. The line between nouns and verbs is porous. English is graced with a vocabularly larger than that of the next two languages combined: As James Nichols put it, "We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and riffle their pockets for new vocabulary."

Didn't mean to sound like I was putting down HS English classes, they just always annoyed me because we went over the exact same things every year.

I have always been very quick to pick up the rules of speach (I was correctly using the word I at the same age that my brother was speaking of himself in the third person and my sister was calling herself "me") and the constant repitition annoyed me.

[James D Macdonald]

Didn't mean to sound like I was putting down HS English classes, they just always annoyed me because we went over the exact same things every year.

I'm not responding to you directly, EJ -- I'm just sayin'.

If you're capable of writing two consecutive pages of grammatical English prose with standard spelling, you're already in the top ten percent of the slush heap.

Writing isn't a lottery -- the talk about the "odds" is misleading -- it's a game of skill. If you write total trash, no matter how many manuscripts you send in you won't get picked. If you write Really Good Stuff, the only thing that'll keep it from being published is if you don't submit it.

[Dancre]

i have to agree, writing 3rd omniscient pov gets on my nerves! when i read tolkien's lord of the rings trilogy, it drove me crazy because i couldn't get close to the characters! it seemed as if there were too many holes in the story. when the group was in lothlorien legolas and grimli became friends. well how? did they have boys night out, go to a strip club and get drunk? sit around, watch football and belch? what! i have to agree sometimes omniscient pov can alienate the reader and a writer has to have great talent to pull it off. i admire anyone who can do it. (and yes, yes, i know, that's how they wrote in those days. but it doesn't mean i have to like it.)
kim

[LiamJackson]

James and Dancre: Points well taken.

Dancre, perhaps you just mentioned the single most important reason (LOTR) that I'm fond of the PoV.

Now, having stated that I like that PoV, I should also mention that I've tried to write from that perspective and quickly gave it up. I couldn't reconcil "knowing" and "keeping the reader in suspense."

That's one "curve ball" that I wish I had the knack for hitting.

Thanks.

[HapiSofi]

I'm sorry, this isn't about POV or plot, but there's a bit in that Mary Higgins Clark scene that drives me straight up the wall:

"Your mother's always been a pretty woman, and all the tender loving care she's received from me over the last forty-three years has only enhanced her beauty," his father said. He paused. "What are you two smiling at?"

"You know full well I've also waited on you hand and foot, dear," Dolores Stephens replied.

Does anyone in the world talk like that? Mr. Stephens' line only works if he's a flaming mariposa going for comic effect (no disrespect intended toward flaming mariposas, who are some of the modern masters of baroque language), or this family's idiolect is heavy on sarcasm and theatricality, or he's an intolerably pompous windbag.

He pauses after saying it, which fits with the theory that he's talking that way for humorous effect; but his wife's response implies that either she doesn't think he's trying to be funny, or she's incapable of noticing that he is. We therefore have to assume he's speaking seriously.

His wife's reply is as problematic as his, in its quieter way. "You know full well" is middlin' archaic English. You don't really hear that phrase used these days by people who don't read a lot of fantasy. "I've waited on you hand and foot" is also odd. It's been a while since the social consensus has been comfortable with the idea that a wife should do that for her husband. "I've waited on you hand and foot" therefore ought to mean "I've done/had to do more for you than I should have."

My other hypothesis, based on his line about the "tender loving care" he's bestowed on his wife, and her reply about waiting on him hand and foot, is that this respectable-looking middle-aged couple is engaged in a serious long-term D/s relationship.

I doubt it, though. I think what's happening here is that Mary Higgins Clark is trying to jam several bits of initial exposition into the dialogue without regard for the way it makes her characters sound.

[HConn]

I know, from experience, where each kind of character is strongest. I try to put him there.

James, I'm the first to admit that I'm no chess player. I understand most of what you're talking about, but I can't apply it when I'm actually playing the game. I stink.

So maybe I'm missing something here, but I don't understand what you mean by moving characters to the place where they're strongest. I had understood that a protagonist should be shoved into a situation where he is not strongest. He should be thrown outside his comfort zone. The cop that is suspected of a crime and pursued by his own department. The high-powered CEO who loses everything. The dedicated humdrum family man who discovers his wife is having an affair.

And so on. But if you don't mean something like "comfort zone" when you say place where they're strongest, I have to admit I don't know what you mean.

[pdr]

James, I'm really enjoying the p.o.v. discussion. Thank you for provoking it! Isn't third omniscient a handful? I did not enjoy the Mary Higgins Clark extract at all because it was, for me, the sort of story that needs the reader to identify with one character and the t.o.v. frustrated that. But t.o.v. is perfect for 'The Lord of the Rings' as the story covers a vast expanse of space, time and characters and the story needs one voice to hold it together. Surely that's what t.o.v. is, the voice a writer needs to whip the reader through time and space as in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' - 'Meanwhile on the other side of the galaxy...' or carry the reader through stories of epic mythic proportion with a huge cast of characters.
Someone asked about why the first p.o.v or third limited p.o.v. are de rigour for writers today. Is it because we are expected to try and understand ourselves and others through our emotions and motivations and to do that in a novel the reader has to be inside a character's head? Inside a character means 1st person or limited 3rd for the writer.
What do you think of the 2nd p.o.v. where the writing is all 'You get up knowing today is not a good day. You haven't slept well...' etc.

[James D Macdonald]

The cop that is suspected of a crime and pursued by his own department.

He may not be in his "comfort zone," but he's been moved to where he is active, has choices, and can have others act upon him.

He's been moved off the back row.

[EJ]

I think the meaning with the chess analogy is that the piece must be moved to the spot where it is strongest for that particular game. Sometimes, the strongest place for a piece is a place where it is sure to be captured and help cause an opening. It's not what's best for the piece, but is what is best for the game as a whole.

[James D Macdonald]

It's not what's best for the piece, but is what is best for the game as a whole.

Sure, those sacrifices and combinations that get people to gasp when they see 'em, and have the little (!) annotation when the game is written down.

[HConn]

But the characters don't care about the game as a whole. They just don't want to be ruined.

I understand "being moved off the back row" but I don't understand having your characters move to their strongest positions. Could I get a non-chess analogy for that one?

[James D Macdonald]

But the characters don't care about the game as a whole.

Nor do the characters care about the book as a whole. The author, on the other hand, does. Just as a chessmaster will move and perhaps sacrifice his pieces, an author will move and perhaps sacrifice his characters.

Rather than their strongest positions, how about putting the characters into their most interesting situations? This is "interesting" as in the curse, "May you live in interesting times."

[EJ]

I'm really liking this chess analogy you have going. I'm a bad chess player, but that fact is actually helping me to understand the concept more and how it applies to my writing.

The queen is the most versatile piece, and, to me, represents the main character. There are three very basic ways to play your queen. You can under play her, over play her, or play her so that she interacts with the other pieces (both minor and major) to bring about a satisfying conclusion to the game.

In an actual chess game, I usually under play my queen. She is my most powerful piece and I was afraid of loosing her and not being able to get her back.

In my writing, I tend toward the opposite, though I have gotten a lot better about this. My major characters would passively support the queen while she did all of the work and had everything happen to her.

Ideally, you'd want the queen working in harmony with the major pieces and pawns in order to protect the king (which would likely represent an idea/theme/goal that the character stands for) and to checkmate the other side's king.

[Dancre]

hi liam,
i find that interesting that you like omniscient pov and you have a hard time writing in it. i have no problems writing omn. pov, i could get away with it but i hate it! i write all my first drafts in omn. pov then rewrite them into 3rd.

[LiamJackson]

Hiya Dancer.

When attemtping to write in the Om voice, I constantly and inadvertently reveal information that the character should have no way of knowing, or simply shouldn't know.

The writing goes smoothest for me when I kick back and allow events to unfold through the characters senses.

And thanks for the greeting!

[James D Macdonald]

It's entirely possible to change POV in the course of revision. If a story doesn't work as third person omniscient, rewrite it as first person and see if it's better. You can do versions in third person limited, then rewrite it as third person dramatic. You can rewrite scenes from one character's point of view, and if that doesn't work, rewrite from a different character's point of view.

For example, our first published short story, <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060267992/ref=nosim/madhousemanor/" target="_new">"Bad Blood,"</a> was written in first draft in third person omniscient, then rewritten in first person. That's the form it sold in. (To the very first market we sent it to, thankyouverymuch.)

[EJ]

Okay, I've always been told that third person limited is when you only go into the thoughts and feelings of one character throughout the entire story and don't go into the mind of anyone else.

What is it when you change viewpoints throughout the story, but when going to a different person's pov, you do a scene change thing?

Like, if you do a dramatic scene between two characters from the pov of one, and then the aftermath from the pov of the other?

[James D Macdonald]

If you change POV with every scene change, you can still be in third-person limited.

Right then, points of view:

First person. "I"

The narrator can be the main character, a major character who also observes the main character, or a minor character who serves only as a reporter.

The narrator may or may not be reliable. (<A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0425173895/ref=nosim/madhousemanor target="_new">The Murder of Roger Akroyd</a> is a classic unreliable narrator.)

The narrator is limited to what that one person knows.

Can you have more than one first-person narrator? Sure. <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0553212478/ref=nosim/madhousemanor target="_new">Frankenstein</a> has three first-person narrators, in a nested story.

One thing you can do with first person is create dramatic irony -- the reader knows something that the character doesn't. (An excellent example of this: there's a military museum in Danbury, CT. They have a diorama there, showing off the M3 halftrack. The diorama shows a couple of soldiers, one on a halftrack, the other on foot, having a conversation. The caption on the base of this model is "Relax, buddy, the war's nearly over." The irony is this: they're next to a roadsign that reads Bastogne 25 Km.)

First person can create immediacy and realism. It can also fail by falling into a love-fest for the author.

====

Second person: You did this, then you do that. Seldom seen outside of "choose your own adventures." If you happen to be a master stylist with a genius for this sort of thing, go for it. Elsewise, try to stay out of second person.

====

Third person:

You have your choice here: you can do with third person omniscient (the narrator knows everything, can drop into anyone's thoughts), third person limited (the narrator can only listen in to one person's thoughts), or third person dramatic (the narrator is an audience at a play, and can't hear anyone's thoughts).

Third person dramatic is the fastest moving POV, and is really good for action scenes.

There's nothing that says you can't mix 'n match between scenes or between chapters.

I personally dislike the third person omniscent -- since it's easy to do badly. If you are using third omniscient, make sure that the smallest unit in any given person's head is the paragraph. Treat thoughts like dialog that way. And put up markers so the reader will know whose head you're in. Confusing the reader is a bad plan.

[LiamJackson]

What are some examples of "successful" pov switches within a gien text? (read 'successful' as not confusing, smooth transanction, etc...) Examaple: 3rd limited to 3rd Om..(not saying it's a good example, but rather an example.

[James D Macdonald]

Having beaten POV into the ground (short, take-home lesson: chose the one that's best for your story) shall we turn to Slick Quick Tricks for Outlining?

Oh, and show of hands: how many of y'all did your two hours of writing today? How many of you have retyped the first chapter from your favorite novel?

[evanaharris]

Outlining sounds good...I've been writing like a madman recently, doing major revisions to my book...so yes, two hours a day...three, four sometimes... No to the first chapter...Gonna get to that eventually...

[James D Macdonald]

I may be away for a few days, so I'll leave you with an aphorism:

Never explain anything to your readers before they care about it.

[qatz]

the only two fonts i would never consider using unless some publisher made me do it (or, in this case, i don't know how the software works) are courier and times. when i started as a writer i can't remember what i used, times maybe because i had a total of three choices. then i became a lawyer and had to use courier because my secretary said everyone did. then i switched jobs and they used times new roman over there, as everyone in those huge government offices did. then, i went to work for myself and realized at last, after millions of words written, that i didn't have to use the fonts everyone else did. i didn't use courier any more because it is ugly and i didn't use times new roman any more because it is pretentious. i normally write in arial or helvetica and use benguiat for chapter titles. after several hundred thousand more words, i like what i get. now you guys are debating whether courier is mandatory, or maybe times new roman can be used. well, you're the pros, but tell me why it matters.

[James D Macdonald]

If your work is going to be published, the editor needs to work on it without distraction, and needs to be able to estimate the finished length of the piece as it'll be printed.

That's why courier ten is the preferred typeface (along with all the double-spaced lines and the one-inch margins).

Editors live by their eyes -- that's why sans-serif fonts are right out.

[EJ]

As you are writing it, you can write it however you want. Heck, you could fiddle with a font making program and use one that looks like large orange crayon if you really want.

But once you have it written, you need to hit control a to highlight the entire thing, then change the size and font before showing it around to people.

[James D Macdonald]

A <a href="http://scrivenerserror.blogspot.com/2003_12_01_scrivenerserror_archive.html#1070992140 06983999" target="_new">fine article</a> (and not merely because he quotes me).

[HConn]

I like Courier. :\

[evanaharris]

I like Courier.

Me too. Fonts weren't meant to be pretty. They were meant to be readable. And Courier is as readable as it gets.

[HConn]

I'll take that a step further, ev, and say readability is beauty (when it comes to fonts.)

[qatz]

thanks guys for your cogent advice. i personally find arial much more readable than courier, which is why the latter is ugly, but jim macD makes a very persuasive case for its being the industry standard. as for those that just like courier better, your opinion noted. hey, it's a free country!

[qatz]

re: high-style romances

are you saying that dracula is not a novel? is it not a type of novel?dracula

[qatz]

jim DmcD, every so often you can't resist throwing in a note about self-publishing. probably the greatest self-publisher and self-promoter was Walter Whitman who had an alter ego and penname "walt," probably also our greatest american poet ever. me and rw emerson can't both be wrong. but there was a little kicker ... he was a genius. always helps to be a genius. and homer didn't have a publisher at all, or even write his stuff down, but that old genius thing kicked in for him too. i guess they're the exceptions that prove your rules. i hope Sunshine Creator will be another one, on the level of perspiration rather than inspiration.

i tried to start a thread on conventional publishing vs. self publishing taking off from your discussions with her, but it was lost somewhere in cyberspace due probably to my newbie-ist tendencies. which brings up another question, i wrote about my writing misadventures and some of my concerns that i don't know where to post -- here (i love this thread! thanks jim!) or elsewhere. it's mostly directed to jim et al, in the spirit of this sort of exchange. maybe it should go to newbies but i'd rather it not get lost. thoughts?

:hat
thanks, eric

[qatz]

you got an absolute constertutional write to use bad grammar word choyz spelling etc if its what yew really wanta dew. but you gotta walk thet lonesome valley, ain't nobody else kin walk it for you, you gotta walk it by yourself.

good to read from you!

[PixelFish]

I'll take that a step further, ev, and say readability is beauty (when it comes to fonts.)

Hear, hear. As a graphic designer, I'm pretty picky about my fonts, and there's a lot that goes into designing them, but readability is usually the number one thing to keep in mind. (There are several cardinal sins in using fonts inappropriately, and anything that interferes with readability is usually high on the list, second only to the atrocity of the all-caps script font.)

Qatz: Courier and Times are chosen over sans-serif fonts like Helvetica and Arial, because the serifs create a stronger word-shape while still drawing the eye easily along. When humans look at words, and read speedily, they often don't look at letters or words invididually, but as blocks or shapes. Their eyes recognise the shape and process it, rather than stringing all the letters together and going, "C-A-T = cat." The serifs create linear flow along the baseline, ascenders, and x-height, and thus keep the eye progressing neatly across a line of text.


Courier is preferred over Times, because Courier is a mono-space font, and can better give the publisher a proper idea of the text size.

[qatz]

okay pixel, i give up. i'm convinced. take pity on me (TPOM).

about pov, of which i found the discussion fascinating, i finally got around to reading "the alchemist" and just love what coehlo does with a limited third pov concerning the shepherd, his hero. whenever the shepherd moves out of range coehlo shifts gracefully to the pov of someone else who happens to still be in scene, with a break in the text, and then back again. i used to hate omn.pov because though it worked for the classics it just seemed boring now. i wrote something with the pov hopping all over and the agent i sent it to sent it back by return mail, saying, be omnisicent (you fool)! lately i've been noticing the shift toward first pov and thinking, aha now you're catching up to me, fell publishable writers! so i wrote out the first draft of my last piece in first and boy was it quick and easy. a sort of MacDonald's (not you jim, the burger) of writing. very passionate but withal full of garbage. plenty of vomit in the true sense of the word. now i'm working with limited tpov and a main character who is not only a highly efficient killer, but an inhuman one at that. and you're supposed to like him! well, takes all kinds.

btw i think those who dissed higgins clark so bad on her word choice may have been missing her apparent attempt, and not a bad one, to portray a certain class of a certain age. that stilted kind of language is not used in 30-something hangouts, but it may be found on newport beach or the hamptons, or even santa fe.

jim, i really look forward to your thoughts on outlines. you didn't mention them at first, then casually say yours, hashed out in the first few weeks, are 75% !!! of the length of the eventual book. pardon my asking, but are you nuts? an outline that long is the book, sans a little description. could we get back to the skeletal stage a little more?

you seem to be saying your outlines are more in the nature of 3D topographic maps, charting the rise and fall of subplots like foothills in the gradual climb to the mountains of climax etc. without an eventual end in mind, the positional playing up near the front may lose momentum and stall out. but TPOM! these book things seem to spring fully formed from your forehead like Greek monsters! for those of us who lack your last fifteen years, could you be a bit more detailed, and slow down, about the creative process?

finally, and speaking of which, your discussion of plot seemed a little glossy to me. it was mainly "you need to get one!" or "plots move things along!" or some combination, but nothing much in depth except your rec of Sweeny Todd in Concert, which i'll try to track down. but think of your explanation of steven king's book -- how helpful was that? -- and see, i most humbly request, if there's more you can add along that line to this point.

i'll be posting a little intro piece on me for explanation soon. sorry i'm so long winded. am i putting off bic over my tiger book? maybe.

[James D Macdonald]

Most of the examples usually given of sucessful self-publishing date from before WWII (when the whole face of publishing was very different), in the nineteenth century, or before.

Even then, most of the self-publishing apologists don't mention that Mark Twain went bankrupt self publishing, that Dickens lost money on A Christmas Carol, and that for every famous success there are thousands of others who sank without a trace.

Self-publishing these days works for: a) when the book will be sold face-to-face anyway (e.g. poetry anthologies sold by the poet at readings), or b) specialized non-fiction (town or regional histories; how-to books).

Yes, lightning may strike. No, it probably won't. Remember that in addition to writing a brilliant book, you need to be art director, designer, printer, salesforce, and warehouse. Those last things are non-trivial; professionals make money doing them all, and you'll be going head-to-head against professionals. Do you have the time and money? Will you break even? How big a gambler are you?

There' nothing wrong with self-publishing. I've done it myself. Sunset Creator, in other threads here, is doing it right now, and all I can do is cheer.

There is something wrong with vanity publishing. It's like self-publishing, only with an anchor tied to your leg.

More on other items as we go along. Lots of things have been brought up; I'll try to get to them all.

[James D Macdonald]

No, taxinomically, Dracula isn't a novel. It's a romance. A novel is a book-length work of realistic prose fiction. Dracula flunks the Realistic test.

(Other than that -- it was an epistolary romance. That is, it was presented as a set of letters, diary entries, and so on. It was also high-tech and up-to-the minute, set it its own present day -- parts of it were transcripts of that cutting edge technology, the dictaphone.)

[qatz]

i agree that Drac was a romance. one could go on and on about that! but not a romantic novel, as romantic fiction? i see your main distinction ... plausibility ... but isn't it just that, if one is willing to suspend disbelief for a second, that makes Drac such a great book? and what brings out the horror? isn't the most famous radio show of all time War of the Worlds, and for just that reason?

i thought you were going to be gone a few days. or is this one of your minions speaking? anyway, i will post something else if you have time to read it.

thanks unc.

eric

[qatz]

comments from the benighted

i can slop out reams of material but i have to revise it to death for it to be any good, at least in the fictional realm and often in technical writing too. why is that? well, lessee.

when i was 9 i came up with a copy of the Ur Leaves edited by Malcolm Cowley and was completely blown away. i knew then i was going to be a writer and, because my genius was just then peaking, i figured i’d be a darn good one too. this was before 1960.

i turned out to be pretty darn smart and my writing was pretty darn good after all. i was chosen as the number 1 high school english student in the nation by one group. this was in the late sixties, i think (see below). this ruined me as a writer. i got lazy.

ram dass said if you remember the sixties, you weren’t there. some people think ken kesey said that but i knew kesey, got to hang around out at his farm sometimes, and he didn’t say that. but if you go back to the saying, i’ve just proved i don’t know nothin’.

be right back.

:hat

[qatz]

... i crashed the junior prom one night because i didn’t have a date or anything else to do. i think i was just collecting literary material. i really felt out of place. i left soon after that. pretty much the story of my life with the opposite sex back then.

i feel sort of the same way here. wondering if i’m just intruding where i’m not wanted and spouting pontifical nonsense articulated by a loser which people endure in the pretty well-founded hope that i’ll just drift off after a while to some apparently greener pasture, hoping to distract myself from the knowledge that in the long run, i’m all dead. not to mention unpublishable. i won’t actually admit to that label until i am dead but if i don’t get some income fairly soon it may not be all that long to wait.

... about laziness, i went to an excellent college and about the only things of substance i accomplished were, i wrote a lot, i read a lot, and i did a lot of dope. how is the dope of substance? just in terms of volume. i did not work hard on my writing, i figured i was already there. i won a couple of prizes. i shared one of the prizes with a classmate who (i thought) wrote in a pedestrian way about boring topics. he really worked hard on his writing. kept at it. scott turow. the difference between inspiration and perspiration.

later in the seventies i went to home to plant trees and law school instead of the iowa writer's workshp, and my fate was sealed, my seat was failed, and my feet were sailed. the great tillie olsen lamented my choice, and she was right. but there was some kind of practical imperative making me do what i did -- can't remember what it was. maybe i just lost my nerve. maybe my friends in jail just needed help too much. maybe i thought i could always go back again. this having even read the original Thos. Wolfe; anyway, a big mistake in the long run. you roll the dice, you takes yer chances ... i made a million dollars, i lost a million dollars. what a career choice.

[qatz]

now, though, after a train wreck (a real one along with figurative ones too), my life has been completely disordered and through the chaos i perceive a chance to return to my roots. i am reasonably optimistic about my latest book, a non-kids-book non-glossy story with an unlikeable tiger as the hero, which i will make plausible “somehow.” it's the result of some serious but very strange writing i was doing this summer with my mainstream minister friend – something was wrong with the picture there. when that book finished, i threw it away and let him go back to his flock. no, i wasn’t priestnapping him. Even so, this tiger’s much more respectable literarily. though he does kill.

by the way, did you know there's a british website on erotic vampire writing? oddly, though, or perhaps not oddly enough, the stories remind of porno movies. i would comment further, but regular words seem so puny after that.

and no, i’m not a deviant. i’m pretty mainstream really. i want to be talking about the quiet center at the root of things – peter matthissen, paulo coehlo, tenzin gyatso. my last several books have been exercises in tonal breath control, on the way to get there. for various reasons, their being trash not always at the top of the list, they weren’t saleable.

((notes ... 1. one of robert stone’s successful books (he was starting on it when i was his student) is a well-thought-out and crafted interpretation of a classic Indian epic poem (i think the ramhaparada) in a war-torn central american country. 2. along the same lines, one of my failed books was a hastily-done and not-very-well-thought-out interpretation of wolfram’s “parzifal” based in part on the diary of cabeza de baca, a very early spanish explorer of florida and points west in north america. 3. this was written mostly between 5 and 7 am. my main accomplishment was getting up! though once i got my coffee and reached the easy chair it almost worked well as a routine, my mind was too groggy to concentrate, and having a fulltime job is death to creative juices; i’m sorry, if you want me to write in a construction site, take the hammer out of my hand.))

anyway, i would like to write full-time from now on. (he gets to the point at last!) (what point?) (well, you know, whatever.) you can imagine how helpful i am finding this thread. who out there can help? and no, i don’t mean psychiatric help, i already know i’m crazy. i will have another novel draft at some soon point, and am interested in making money to live by (now there’s a title – “money to live by”) in the near future doing something literate and useful. are there any other leads anyone can give me so i can actually make money in fiction down the road, and put bread on the table in the meantime?

ps.&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp

sadly, my kind of book (leaving talent out of it) is more like “jude the obscure” than “the matrix.” yes, i know everything i just implied.

ah well, that's it for me.
:hat

[jpwriter]

Jim,
I have heard from others that 12 pt courier is preferred. If editors live by their eyes, wouldn't 12 pt be easier for them to read. Is there another reason for 10 pt courier that I don't know other than saving paper.
Jerry:smokin

[James D Macdonald]

Courier 10 and Courier 12 are equally acceptable.

(I thought I was going to be away -- turned out I wasn't.)

[James D Macdonald]

a classmate who (i thought) wrote in a pedestrian way about boring topics. he really worked hard on his writing. kept at it. scott turow. the difference between inspiration and perspiration.

Way, way, way upstream I said something to the effect of "revise, revise, revise."

And rewrite.

Once you have the first draft, or a strong outline, anyway, you have the equivalent of a potter's ball of wet clay. Sure, there's a vase in there somewhere, but all you have at first is the clay.

I'll get practical about how to outline, and how to revise (at least a scheme that works for me), but first, before anything else, you have to have the raw material.

A story in your head doesn't count. What counts is what's on paper. Yeah, it's going to be dreadful. That's okay, I give you permission to be dreadful. The revision process will take care of the dread.

[qatz]

thanks jim. but i have to say one last time, a pox on all courier troglodytes! i wasted a whole day in the caverns of font hell, just to see what it would look like. courier 10 looked teeny and unreadable, courier 12 looked dull and space-wasteful, and both of them caused my wordperfect9 all sorts of indigestion. now, it was not the butler who did it, it was the g. ... d. ... fonts! now i'm not the kind of one who believes in gremlins residing in computers -- i go more for the large brownish cockroach theory -- but there, i guess, you have it.

don't worry, everyone; i understand i'll be stuck in courier (for times is even worse; my old law partner insisted on times; could that be why we broke up?) till the end of the universe if not longer; you need not berate me any more, or supply wise avuncular (what is the female form of avuncular?) advice as may be. i'm consigned to my fate, and if i remember right that was the same thing i've been hearing for lo these many decades, so its about time it sunk in. obviously i can live with reality as it is, but what i'm grousing about is the loss of the ability to look at a document and see the way it'll be printed, which is what it comes down to. i guess i've already lost that what with kerning and all, but loss of freedom is a bitter pill.

again, thanks for all the advice.
:hat

[Dancre]

hi uncle jim,
i'm glad you're going to discuss outlines. i love 'em! i can't write a story without them. they are my steering wheel. but i do admire those who can write by the seat of their pants. i tried that once, but became frustrated and ran back to my trusty outline. i can't wait to see what you say. hey, what's your opinion on character profiles? once again, i can't write without them. what info do you put in yours? and do you use one for minor characters as well as major ones?
kim

[HConn]

... but what i'm grousing about is the loss of the ability to look at a document and see the way it'll be printed...

I don't understand what you mean. Courier New is a true type font. It should print exactly as it looks on screen.

[SRHowen]

what it will look like in book form. The idea of font--well, your ms is not "what you see is what you get." It is a working document. Font etc. will be up to the publisher.

And really folks, once you start using Courier New--it will be normal to you. I used Times for years, then switched to Courier--at first I hated it and fund it almost unreadable, now when I see Times( or other fonts) they look wrong.

Shawn

[PixelFish]

I bet it's easier to make copy edits on a monospaced (Courier) manuscript. More room to mark it up with a red pen and all that. No confusion about lines that run between letters that were too closely kerned by the writer's word processing program.

[qatz]

thanks all. i am definitely resigned to courier, just could not resist one last crabbing. thanks again to all you writers for checkin' out my ravings.
:hat

[EJ]

I don't know why, but I've always had trouble with outlines. I never really know what I'm going to write until I start writing it and my mind tends to go blank on me when attempting an outline.

When I was in high school, there were times when we had to do essays and we had to turn in an outline. I'd always write the essay first, then the outline.

[qatz]

i have a strong inclination the same way, AJ. but in my (technical and nontechnical) experience writing (and you can see nearly everything i write is long) is usually so much better if it's organized before hand. i dont know if any of my novel drafts were really outlined first, it seems so deadly, and where do ideas come from? not roman numeral II. but in a long story, i think you need to have a sense of where you're going, at least in part, before you go there. otherwise there's too much danger of mush. my last "book" i slopped out sans outline this summer and though it cohered in its own way, it was useless as a book. 12 chapters, each with its own idea, but no clearly defined markers, and little progressive plot. it slithered all over the ground between fiction and nonfiction. and don't even start on POV.

right now i'm really working on where my tiger hero is gonna end up ... the start's no problem compared to that ... and the end-up involves numerous plot choices on the way, some of them really surprising and substantively determinative. so they can't be avoided natalie-goldberg style. an outline seems needed.

in general, i'm looking forward to what jim will say! :hat

[HConn]

Lots of people (not saying it's anyone here specifically) who say they can't outline have a strict idea of what outlining entails. They usually think it means writing out a document with the whole capital A small a roman numeral 1 etc, with each step indented.

Outlining is the term for any description of a story that isn't an attempt to create the piece of fiction itself. It's essentially a first draft, without any reader-friendly prose.

Some people just dump their outline into the word document they write the novel in, deleting as they go. That makes me nuts. I like to have it printed out on the desk so I can note changes as I go.


:)

[SRHowen]

Outline---well, ummm, I don't. Not at all. My first draft is a rough draft of the story. Running very close to what final product will be--no idea where I am going with it till I get there. I outline afterwards.

Shawn

[sugarmuffin]

Hi, I'm new. Well, not new as in just born (my 17 month-old daughter is much, much newer) but new to this website. I was wondering if Jim - and other folks - used writing software to help with outlining, story development, etc.

I've done a lot of technical writing (manuals), poetry, attended writing workshops, and some other stuff, but every time I go for the novel, which is what I've always wanted most, I get stuck after a few pages. This has been going on for well, um, probably more than 15 years. I think the whole task feels so enormous I get overwhelmed before I go any distance. It's like I can sprint but I can't run the marathon. I actually get sick. But I am going to try yet again.

So anyway, I thought I would try some software to help me look at a little piece at a time (like bird by bird) and then I might not get bogged down by the big picture. If anyone is using anything they like, I would appreciate the info.

Thanks,

Lisa

I wish that writing was a procrastination task for everything else I have to do.

[James D Macdonald]

I'll write more on outlining and the shape of a plot in a bit (have to shovel the $#&^@ driveway first).

The quick answer on outline/plot generation/novel-writing software is that every kind I've tried has gotten between me and the story. The only "writing software" I use is a wordprocessor.

Two things that do prove useful (which I've used, at least) are a deck of file cards (sixty-nine cents for a hundred at the grocery store) and flowcharts (written on the back of a Chinese restaurant placemat is a good place to do 'em: about the right size, and hot-and-sour soup helps clarify the mind).

More anon.

[qatz]

hi, lisa. glad you're here, i think this is the right place for you. these guys are really helpful. read the whole string and hang around!

:hat

[James D Macdonald]

Right, then.

The first thing about plotting is this: the reader's interest is always either rising or falling. It never stays at a constant level.

You want the reader's interest to rise over the general length of your book, peaking at the climax. Therefore, your book should start at a fairly low level -- just sufficient for reader to pick it up, and turn the page.

Each individual chapter will rise in interest, to its end. (You may also consider the cliffhanger in this context -- it at once provides closure for the current chapter, and provides a reason for the reader to start the next chapter (to find out what happened next), even though the next chapter starts at a lower level of interest.)

The next chapter will start at a slightly lower level of interest than the preceeding chapter's close, but rise to a higher level at its end than the end of the previous chapter.

You do not want to have your biggest, bestest, most special scene as your opening. The remainder of the book will be an anticlimax. Your strongest scene goes at the end of the book. Your second strongest goes at the half-way point. Your third strongest goes at the 3/4 point.

The source of information in the book and the source of interest should be the same things.

Your readers can only think of one thing at a time (the poor dears). It is vital that you don't confuse them.

Your first scene, your first page, your first paragraph: a) seizes attention, and b) starts with a low level of interest. This seems contradictory, but... remember what you are doing to your readers. You are creating an auto-hypnotic suggestible state in them, in which the page opens up and pictures and sounds show in their heads. This state is fragile, and must be rebuilt constantly.

On confusing the reader: If you have confused the reader, he will stop reading, or will not understand the next thing that happens in your book. Therefore... you must be clear enough so that the slowest reader in your proposed audience (recall that you cast your audience as one of the characters in your book) will be able to follow it, while at the same time having enough going on that the quicker readers won't become bored.

So:

Basic structure of your book:

1. Catch the reader's attention. Do this on page one. There are cheap ways of doing this: Sex and violence come at once to mind. The danger of using cheap tricks is a) you may come to rely on cheap tricks, and thus become a cheap author, and b) the reader may say "That's a cheap trick," and put your book back on the shelf." The game is to a) get the reader to pick up this book from the shelf and take it to the cash register, and b) have the same reader go to the bookstore specifically to buy your next book. Your page one gives you goal (a), the rest of the book gives you goal (b).

2. The introduction. The remainder of chapter one, tells the reader what sort of book he's in ... a cosy mystery, a sex-and-shopping romance, a gothic thriller, a literary exploration of angst ... whatever. This is where you introduce yourself to the readers, and get them to become the audience you want them to be. Are you the detached observer? The helpful lecturer? The comedian? Are they the crowd at a NASCAR track or the crowd at the Pimlico? Interest begins here. Ideally interest starts on page one, near the top, but it's permissible for interest to show up on page one near the bottom. This is chapter one's purpose.

3. You get your theme rolling. The theme will run throughout the book, but you state it here, at the beginning. Recall that I've said that every word must advance the plot, reveal character, or support the theme? Now is the time to state the theme. The Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Splendid Virtues are great themes, and just about simple enough. Theme is both simple, and necessary. If the plot is the engine pulling the train, theme is the track that the plot runs on. You can't get theme going too soon. You can also be fairly bald in stating your theme.

4. The plot starts. Life continues; it's been going on for a while in all your characters, and will presumably continue (except for the ones who die in the course of your book) for some time afterward. But plot, that great literary convention, starts now. Imagine a firedoor in a theatre. Your main character steps through that firedoor, the wind blows it closed behind him. Now he has to do new and different things. Status quo is no longer available.

<blockquote>
A word on "plot" right now. Plot is merely a set of consequentially related events. Of which the word "consequential" is the important one. "The king died, then the queen died" is not a plot. "The king died, then the queen died of a broken heart" is a plot.
</blockquote>

5. The setup. We're in the early chapters now, and we're giving the readers the preliminary sets of tools and information. The setup may be quite long ... Moby-Dick is around 400 pages of setup, followed by 50 pages of action.

6. Tell your readers what to expect. Readers hate surprises. Bring in the detective, tell the readers that he will solve the crime. Whatever. Just make sure it's clear what's going to happen by the end of the book, and have this out there by the middle of the book at the latest.

7. Now comes the action, the running of your plot. In most books this is the longest, most complicated part of the story.

8. The climax. This is what you've been aiming for; it rewards the readers for staying with you the whole time. You can get quite complex here, with multiple can-you-top-this? climaxes, reverses, twists, and anything that your devious little heart can devise.

9. The bowknot. Tie off all the loose ends. This is the very last chapter, it tells the readers "the story's over, folks!" so they won't turn the last page and wonder why there's no printing on it. This is brief.

That should give you the overall shape of your book, seen from a distance. I see them as actual physical shapes and spaces. How you see them may differ, but the whole of it will be there... though you may not know all the details until the second or third drafts.

Now ... on using filecards.

Take a stack of filecards. Number them (I use upper left-hand corner) 1, 2, 3, ... and so on. These are chapters. They're major divisions. They're scenes. They're whatever you want them to be. You may have only two at first, 1 and 2, the opening scene and the climatic scene, only a sentence on each. It's okay, doesn't matter.

You can ignore dialog at this point. You can ignore setting. Now, between these cards, put other cards, numbered 1.1, 1.2, ... 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 ... 57.1... 62.19. You put intervening scenes on these. Things that must happen after one event but before another.

Between 3.2 and 3.3, if you think of something that has to go there, put 3.2.1, 3.2.2 ... and so on. To any level you want.

You are answering questions here: What happens next, and what does the reader need to know so he won't be confused?

Never tell the reader anything before he cares!

Too much outlining will take the fun out of the writing. After you're happy with the overall shape of your plot, that you've got the characters entering, doing things, and leaving, now's the time to type up a strong outline.

A strong outline will be dozens (if not scores) of pages long, and will resemble you telling a friend about a book that you read. You'll include the major scenes, and sparkling bits of description, you'll start to fill in dialog.

From this, write your novel.

After the writing of the novel, comes the revision. This is the smoothing, the sanding, the staining, the waxing, and the polishing of this thing you've sculpted.

Here you do the Agricultural Work. If you have something in your climax, you need to make sure it was properly planted in the beginning. If you have something in the begining that didn't sprout by the end, you need to root it out.

If, at any point you become stuck on what to do next, remember this motto: "Listen! I'm going to tell you something cool!"

[Sunset Creator]

Jim- Wow...that's the word that first comes to mind. Not only did you give information, the key points...but you took the time to lay it all out and explain it...you no doubt deserve credit for helping so many people...I being one of them. Thank you :)

[HapiSofi]

This just gets better and better. I particularly like the part about what happens when you confuse the reader, and how you shouldn't ever explain something to the readers before they care about it. That's brilliant.

I believe I've heard the bit about "And now, I'm going to tell you something really cool" attributed to Steven Brust, who attributed it to Gene Wolfe.

I'm afraid I disagree with you about the reader's interest level. I can't imagine giving writers permission to start a book at a low interest level. The way I'd say it is that there are lots of different kinds of interest. Early on, "Who is this?" and "How's this work?" interest are good. Toward the end, "My god, are they going to survive this?" interest is more appropriate. But no matter what, there should always be some kind of interest, and a sense of urgency about turning that next page.

[James D Macdonald]

I believe I've heard the bit about "And now, I'm going to tell you something really cool" attributed to Steven Brust, who attributed it to Gene Wolfe.

That's Brust I'm quoting.

(I have a little Emma Frost the White Queen action figure on my desk, with a little comic balloon above her head that says "Write your book... NOW!")

More on "interest level" later. I may be using a personal shorthand here -- "interest" and "attention" are different things. I'll expand on this.

Also, I don't have a Grand Theory of Everything worked out. My writing this series of posts is helping me clarify how I think about these things.

[James D Macdonald]

Interest takes many forms.

Tension. Plot development. Conversation. Logic problems.

People's minds wander. You have to substitute in various forms of interest to keep that interest growing.

[qatz]

aw, jim, no Grand Theory yet? and i thought you were God, like Eric Clapton. Well, leave it to S. Hawking for the time being... interest level -- sofi, i think there needs to be a hook at the front to catch the reader's interest, my first book started with howitzers blowing the bank doors off a bank in Montreal, but surely you don't want to put the climax up front. will be interesting to see what jim says. thanks, jim, for a superb post.

:hat

[PixelFish]

You do not want to have your biggest, bestest, most special scene as your opening. The remainder of the book will be an anticlimax.

This must be why I didn't think Snowcrash (the example that sprang immediately to mind) was all that and a bag of chips--the first scene is too strong comparatively speaking. I read that scene, and was totally blown away by it, but nothing had the visceral impact that the first scene had, and the rest of the book was something of a letdown. As for the ending, the storyline just sorta petered out. (Most of my acquaintances, or those who have also read Snowcrash, reported similar reactions. A WTF? moment as we turned the page, looking for the rest of the story.)

----

BTW, I've been a good little writer this week--I've gotten something written everyday, even if not in mass quantities. I think I've been following unconciously the "listen up, I'm going to tell you something cool" mantra. But for me, when I get stuck, I refer to the outline and proceed to the next clear picture I have in my brain and work things out from there. If a bit of dialogue sticks out, I type it down. If a description or an action springs to mind, I hurry up and get it out before it starts to turn into moldy toast. (Moldy toast is what happens if I don't get something down right away. It never comes out as crisp and as interesting the second or third go-round, and then I have to go and re-bake the idea to get it to work right.)

Your advice is proving rather helpful, and your presence is certainly spurring me on. I have no idea if you're going to make any posts asking us if we got our word count or bum-to-seat/fingers-to-keyboard ratios in today, so I have to make sure I have something to report. :)

[keithwriter]

More great stuff, Jim - thanks!

I don't really get the whole "theme" thing, though - I guess I just don't think that way. I couldn't tell you the theme of any of my favorite books. By that I mean, I've never put down a book and said, "Ah, the theme of that one was man's inhumanity to man," or anything like that. Do you? For example, what is the theme of Silence of the Lambs? Or Moby Dick? I'm not saying this to be argumentative; I'm simply curious as to how you pick out a book's theme, because I simply don't break books down that way in my mind.

Also, you say to state it early. But how? Can you give an example?

I wouldn't be surprised if my stories have themes, which are probably obvious to those who look for them. But I can't say I consciously try to create or communicate one. I'm just trying to tell a story, which can have all sorts of inherent unspoken messages.

Anyway, all these are questions, not arguments. You look at this aspect of writing differently, but I'm eager to explore this idea.

Thanks again for this tremendous tutorial!

-keith

[qatz]

i think you, jim, mentioned earlier that theme is one of those must-be-there things, but that it should be subterranean rather than explicit. there is clearly a great grand theme in moby, but i don't remember melville just saying it. yet now you're saying say it explicitly up near the front. i guess i share keith's confusion on that spot a little.

pix -- thanks for the update on your writing! where'd you find your cool picture?

[PixelFish]

Qatz: The picture under my username? That's a picture I painted digitally.

[James D Macdonald]

Recall that this series of posts is on writing, not on analysing or criticizing someone else's book.

Yes, the critics will try to figure out your theme. They may be right, they may be wrong. However, you, the author, will be right whenever you state what the theme of your book is because you are the author. When you are revising, you will know what to strengthen, what to cut, and what to leave alone based on how relevant it is to the theme.

Take, for example, our own book (I can speak authoratively on this, being the author) <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0812517040/ref=nosim/madhousemanor target="_new">The Price of the Stars</A>.

The theme, stated explicitly in the <a href="http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/POTSEXPT.HTM" target="_new">prologue</a>, is "Family Matters," or "Blood is thicker than water," with a strong undercurrent of "Planned Revenge."

(If I were writing the book today, I'd have folded the Prologue into Chapter One, since I've learned that many (most?) readers skip prologues.)

A term y'all may not know is quadrigia. That's a four-horse chariot, with the horses all side by side. If any of the horses is stronger, or faster, or slower, than the others, the chariot won't run straight. It takes a skillful charioteer to drive one.

"Quadrigia" was also a medieval term for a theory of sermon construction. The four horses of this quadrigia were the literal, allegorical, moral and spiritual (or mystical) senses. The sermon had to function on all four of those levels, simultaneously, and equally. If any one were faster, slower, stronger, or weaker, the sermon would run off-course.

I'm a believer in hidden structures. You can do worse than to have your novel function on those four levels, simultaneously. Remember, to stand out from the slush, your novel has to have more, and be better, than 98% of the other manuscripts that are piled on the editor's desk. Adding levels of meaning, layers of discourse, a structure, will make your novel stand out.

Writing is a skill. It is an art. Some people can do it unconsiously, but I can't. I'm the calculating, analytical kind of author. So far it's stood me in good stead.

(The book we're quoting from here was continuosly in print for a decade.)

Here's the first page:

<blockquote>
[i]

[James D Macdonald]

On the naming of names, and finding my own meaning.

Nothing happens by accident in a book. The author chooses each word, each image.

Let me explain what the words mean in the brief excerpt above:

First, night. This is the dark night of the soul, the time when the powers of evil are exaulted.

Now... Waycross. On the allegorical level, this book is a refutation of the Manichean heresy. Yes, this is a Christian book. Wanna make something out of it? The name is all the clue you need: Waycross is the Way of the Cross. That's my spiritual level.

Innish-Kyl is taken from an Irish song, the Inniskillen Dragoons:

A handsome young maiden of fame and renown,
A gentleman's daughter of Monihan town,
As she rode by the barracks, this beautiful maid,
She stood in her coach to see dragoons on parade.

<Blockquote>
Fare thee well, Inniskillen, fare thee well for a while
All thy bright borders of Erin's green isle
When the wars they are over we'll return in full bloom
And you'll all welcome home the Inniskillen Dragoons.
</blockquote>

Do I expect the readers to know this? Of course not. It's sufficient that I know it. It'll be a structure for me. (We'll return to this location "when the wars are over," and the main character is a "maiden of fame and renown.")

Beka is Rebecca, a Biblical character. Rosselin is Rosslyn Chapel. Metadi is a contraction of Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin.

These provide meaning for me. If there is meaning for the author, the reader will know that meaning exists.

Claw Hard means to struggle.

Cashel and Raffa sound like cash and raffish, temptation and frivolity that have been left behind.

Thus I define my book, and so start in. The rest of the scene is from the standard furniture of science fiction, subgenre space opera.

[James D Macdonald]

i see your main distinction ... plausibility ... but isn't it just that, if one is willing to suspend disbelief for a second, that makes Drac such a great book?

Not plausibility, but realism. All fiction needs to be plausible, lest the read say "Oh, come on!" and throw the book against the wall. (That's another reason why you can't use real life straight in fiction. Real life doesn't have to make sense ... fiction does.)

[James D Macdonald]

hey, what's your opinion on character profiles? once again, i can't write without them. what info do you put in yours? and do you use one for minor characters as well as major ones?

Age, description, eye color, and any details that I learn about the character in the course of writing the book.

Yes, I do them for minor characters as well. This is because the minor character doesn't know he's minor. To the minor character, the story is about him, and he's the good guy.

(Y'all know what a hero is, right? It's someone who's made the "hero's journey." That is, someone who has gone to the realm of the dead and returned. See Odysseus for example. While the term has expanded to mean protagonist, consider making it literally true that your hero has gone on that journey. (You can do this in symbolic terms.) This will resonate with your readers who are, after all, the products of thousands of years of western culture, whether they know it or not.)

[James D Macdonald]

When I was in high school, there were times when we had to do essays and we had to turn in an outline. I'd always write the essay first, then the outline.

This can work, too, for your full-length fiction, as a tool for finding plot-arcs that don't go anywhere, loose ends, not-fully-justified actions, and other plot-related bobbles.

[James D Macdonald]

every time I go for the novel, which is what I've always wanted most, I get stuck after a few pages.

I give you permission to write scenes out of order. Later on, you can move 'em around with your wordprocessor. (In the old days, authors would literally cut-and-paste whole chunks of prose. It got messy.)

I also give you permission to write badly. So long as your fingers are moving on the keys, you can write utter tripe. It's okay. You're going to revise it anyway, right?

What I don't give you permission to do is not write. When the Muse comes to your house, she expects to find you sitting in your chair in front of your typewriter. If you aren't there, she'll just go on to the next author on her list, rather than go looking for you.

Make time, every day, and during that time be at your keyboard. There is no substitute for the BIC (Butt In Chair) method.

[HapiSofi]

Sometimes you have a piece of writing that feels like it says what you want, or like it says part of what you want to say, but it doesn't come out to the proper end, or it's missing some point or conclusion it ought to have but which you somehow can't identify.

At those moments, it can be very useful to take the piece of writing and reduce it to a paragraph-by-paragraph descriptive outine. Where a paragraph continues and elaborates a point begun in an earlier paragraph, indent that entry in the descriptive listing.

Make sure your descriptive listings actually describe what's in the paragraphs. If you can't make them do it, you have a problem with your paragraphs.

If you can't tell the specific thing a paragraph is saying or doing, it's a bad paragraph, and should be deleted. Take any essential factbits that were in it and redistribute them into other paragraphs where they're appropriate. If you can't find appropriate paragraphs, either those factbits weren't essential after all and should be deleted, or you need to write the paragraphs in which those essential factbits are essential components.

When your outline is done, study it until you see what needs fixing. Proceed from there.

[aes23]

I have a specific, nit-picky question. How do you manage all different versions of your novel at any given point in time? Do you date each file in a specific directory, etc.?

Especially if you are not sure which version you like better yet.

[James D Macdonald]

I work with the current version in hardcopy, and the hardcopy version is the official one.

My wordprocessor allows me to sort files by date, so I know which is the most recent one I've fooled with.

<hr>

Another note on fonts -- for reading copies, sometimes I'll print out the novel in some font and size that I'm not used to -- Times New Roman double column justified singlespace, for example, to get a look at the text with a fresh eye.

[Illandur Stormcrow]

I have a question.

Are prologues really death to an unpublished writer? I have a prelude that begins my book. Its not forty pages of dry backstory and history, it is a scene. A scene that takes place about 50 years before the main protagonist's story begins in chapter one, but provides some insight on what is to come.

Is that so wrong?

[James D Macdonald]

Are prologues death to an unpublished writer? No. Bad writing is death to an unpublished writer.

You merely have to remember that many of your readers are going to skip the prologue and go straight to chapter one.

If your prologue, or prelude, is vital to the story, call it Chapter One, and have Chapter Two start fifty years later.

Regardless of your decision, the first page of your prologue, prelude, or first chapter has to reward the reader enough to lead him/her to turn the page with rising interest. Even if they're just following along out of idle curiosity, at least they're following.

<HR>

A note on editors. Editors are not the enemy. What they are is readers' advocates. Think of them as a class of super-readers. Evading the editors is tantamount to evading your readers; a foolish course to take.

The great mass of readers out there in bookstores and libraries are relying on editors to do two things: a) guarantee that someone other than the author's mom liked the book, and b) the book was fully formed and polished before it arrived on the shelves.

Just as no one reader will like every kind of book, editors are not a monolithic block. You have to find the fit between your work and the right editor. This can be frustrating; the frustration level can come down a bit by choosing your markets carefully. (I've seen astounding things in the slush heaps at major publishers, things that made you wonder, "Hmmm.... is this guy going through Writers' Market alphabetically and it was just our turn?" because he should know that a house that publishes adult novels isn't going to be looking for a children's spelling book.) Send your stories to places likely to buy them! (Yes, it does pay you to read books that come out from a publisher you're considering.)

(Another note: a cover letter won't sell your novel, but it can certainly sink your novel. A cover letter that contains the words, "I think you'll find my book far better than the kind of trash you usually print" isn't going to make you any friends.)

(A personal note here: When I read slush, I take the cover letter and put it on the bottom of the stack of paper, unread. I don't want to go in prejudiced in any way. If I'm still reading at the point where I hit the cover letter, then I read it, and pass the story up the line.)

(Later, I'll give you an example of A Perfect Cover Letter.)

<hr>

Take home lesson: Editors are readers. They are your audience. Anything I say about readers, you can substitute the word "editor." Anything I say about editors, you can substitute the word "reader."

[Illandur Stormcrow]

Bad writing huh? Damn, I am so screwed! ;)

Thanks Jim. You pretty much confirmed my suspicions on this topic. I have considered changing it to "Chapter One", but it really isn't. Honestly I think it will grab the reader, if they don't just skip it.

[HapiSofi]

Ilandur, you've just been told that readers frequently skip prologues. Believe it. Now think: if the readers automatically skip past the prologue, it's not going to grab them no matter how well-written it is.

The sad truth is, most prologues can be cut entirely without detriment to the book, and cutting them often improves it. There aren't many plots that actually need to include a scene that takes place decades before the main action. If you really truly do need that scene, do something like having a character narrate it as a story at some point in the book.

Here's a basic rule of exposition: Never tell the reader something before he or she wants to know about it.

Here's another rule: Reader are interested in setups and backstories because there's a story happening inside them.

Here's a third rule: Start with the story. Then continue with the story. Add in worldbuilding, backstory, setup, etc., only insofar as it's needed in service of the ongoing story.

How does this affect prologues? Because the only way your prologue is going to grab the readers is if the story kicks off right then and there. If you get the readers involved in this episode, and then instead of going on with it you hand them a fiffty-year gap in the narrative, they're going to justly feel misused. And if you don't kick off your story in the prologue, you're almost certainly explaining a bunch of stuff before the readers are interested in hearing about it.

Look, you asked, so I'm telling you: You are committing an error. Kill the prologue. Strip out any essential material that was in it and redistribute it within the main narrative.

[Illandur Stormcrow]

I hear you, I have heard it a lot.

This prelude is a good story in its own right, and it relates directly to the rest of the story. It just doesn't involve the protagonist, but rather his ancestors. I really can't see a way to "sprinkle it in" (I have heard that a lot too). Its not just an info dump, its a scene. It wouldn't work as a flashback because the characters involved aren't dealt with directly until far later in the series.

I don't skip prologues personally. I will skip a preface if it is just information about the writer or his approach to the book, and not the story. However, if the prologue is part of the story then I read it without fail. So I don't know that I buy the "common knowledge" approach that the bulk of readers don't read them.

[James D Macdonald]

If the characters involved in the prologue aren't dealt with until far later in the series, maybe this is the first chapter from a different book. Try this: Drop the prologue, and see if any of your beta readers say "Hmmm... seems like there's something missing."

On the series: write each book as if it were the only book you'll ever write, as if the others don't exist and never will. Sure, they can all be part of a bigger universe, but give each book a beginning, a middle, and an end that's all its own, and is fully satisfying.

These are things I've learned by experience, by getting it wrong and learning better.

[qatz]

I personally think Sofi's giving you some really good advice, Crow. Start the story where the story starts and back into the background stuff later on. If it is important to the story or characters, you will find a way. If not, it wasn't worth it.


It's been a pleasure. See you later.

:hat

[HConn]

Ill, I have conflicting ideas on your prolog. The first good idea is to cut it and see if anything substantive is lost. If not, save that scene in a little folder for possible use in another story.

The second is to simply cross out the word "prolog" and write in "Chapter one." That's what I did.

The last is that you should do exactly what you want to do. Follow your instincts and make your own mistakes (if that's what it is). In the end, your own instincts and tastes are all you have going for you, and I think you should hone them as best you can.

Of course, I haven't seen your work, so I don't know what would be best. But trust yourself.

[Illandur Stormcrow]

Sad,

It's so damn sad, but its true. I pulled down a dozen of my favorite books off the shelf and about seven of them have a prologue. All of which I have read. So prologues DO get published. But...

Last night a buddy of mine came over and checked out my work for the first time. What was the first thing he did? Flipped to Chapter One.

:ack

I guess it depends on the reader. I am making the prelude chapter one.

[qatz]

Okay, Jim. This is where I start using caps and try to act more respectable. I am wondering if you would like to expound on your discussion of characterization in the context of research, backgrounding details, "cultural" content, and description. I could use more along these lines and having read the string up to this point, I am hopeful you will think this apt or might work it into your preexisting plans, in your usual accomodating way.

For example, in your Christian book you gave the first page or so. I was impressed by the absolutely solid research for your thematic structure. As applied to character?

I have the early part of the tiger book in very rough draft. It has some literary and perhaps commercial merit. I need an honest beta-reader. An accomplished writer such as Sofi or James would be perfect, someone I can trust, or a volunteer or whom you think. SC, you're busy with your own stuff, and this is just way too bloody for you now, so please don't even think about it. Tigers can be tough -- very, very tough. :ack
The genre is mainstream, Robert Stone updated. Think also, French Connection and Buddhist mysticism. :smokin

Appropos of outlines, this. As someone said, the initial writing and outlining have to go hand in hand for organizationally challenged people like me. The outlining step is crucial for me to know what it is I'm writing about, though. So ...

In what I call my broken-mirror style of writing, there's one scene fragment here, one fragment there, the arrangement dictated by dramatic pacing, and pretty soon they all add up to a (supposedly) coherent whole. It's taking Jim's index cards, shuffling them, and playing card tricks with them. This can also lead into traditional scenes. My tiger book is mostly traditional, but has at least one large part (I realized today on the park bench outside the Lourve) that better lends itself to broken-mirror treatment.

With that thought, today I started two parallel outlines, one chronological (in the sense of following placement in the text< not necessarily temporally) and the other logical. The logical outline is the whole story in detail, put down in sensible blocks. This would be Jim's heavy outline, or a version of it. The chrono part of the outline just says what has been or will be written down. When things get complex later on, it's good to have these two skeletons to compare with each other so you know what's on one body that needs be said on the other.

There is a third outline, also mentioned by Jim, the three-dimensional topographic outline that shows plot development and tension, which might best be done by computer program. At some point the first two outlines may pale in comparison to the complexity of the story itself, or just get outpaced, and then maybe only the high-tech one can really do. At this point the instinct of the writer would seem to have to take over and finish the thing up in good form. A good ending, however minimal it might be, is essential to a good story. It is also, in my experience the hardest thing to do. But a strong story can lead to a strong ending, by its very nature. The interlocking widening gyres.

That's what I came up with on the bench. Jim? :hat

[James D Macdonald]

I have the early part of the tiger book in very rough draft. It has some literary and perhaps commercial merit. I need an honest beta-reader.

No, qatz, at this point you don't need a beta reader. At this point you need a finished draft.

Don't wear out your beta readers. They are gold. Give them the best, most polished version you can.

I mentioned, briefly, using a flowchart. I didn't go into it in great detail, but I think it might be a direction you might explore. Here's an <a href="http://www.cpuinc.net/~rcjhicks/" target="_new">example</a> of a flowchart on a written source. See also <a href="http://www.technologyevaluation.com/request/main_edge.asp" target="_new">http://www.technologyevaluation.com/request/main_edge.asp</a> for a freebie.

[Illandur Stormcrow]

That is VERY interesting James.

I am a programmer by trade (for the moment) but for some reason I never considered using a flow chart to plot the progression of my stories.

I'll have to try that.

[Dancre]

another thought on outlines: when i started my second novel, i wrote a basic idea of what i wanted to do. then moved onto a basic ah-it'll-do outline and i started my story. but then it just didn't feel right, like you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink, feeling. so i made another outline and found myself adding a new character, (i made the new character the bad guy). then i got stuck AGAIN! I found myself just going in circles. so i made ANOTHER outline and low and behold! the new bad guy said, i don't want to be the bad guy, make me the good guy! so i reversed the two roles, making my original good guy the villian, and the once villian a good guy. i gave my new good guy more responsibilities and now, i think everyone is happy. (at least i hope, i'd hate to see my characters go on strike again.:teeth )

you know, i saw a documentary of dickens on PBS the other night. it was really interesting, and the documentary gave some of dickens writing hints. he would act out his stories as he wrote them and make up voices for all his characters. (his daughter actually saw him standing in front of a mirror acting out a character, then he'd run back to his study, scribble some words, then come back to the mirror.) it was really cool, because he got so lost in his stories, that he believed they were real, forcing the reader to believe they were real. and the doc. also said the same thing about minor characters, don't let them think they're minor. let them think they're major. in the story scrooge tiny tim has only one line, yet he's the most popular character. good points, uncle jim.
kim