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Of Course I’m Right.  I’m the Good Guy

08 Wednesday May 2024

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“Nobody thinks they’re evil or bad, they think they are doing the right thing”.  Andrew McCarthy, 1962. 

This is a famous quote for writing and storytelling.  It’s been paraphrased and repeated by lots of people, even villains in stories.  I’ve also seen people take lots of exceptions with this quote.  People have gotten very angry with this sentiment.  

It’s a great conversation piece.  Philosophically, it gets the brain juices flowing about the nature of good and evil.  What is the mindset of someone who does evil things, or even what an “evil” thing may be.  I, and really anybody, could go on about this at length.  As philosophically, sociologically, and psychologically speaking this has so many meanings and implications it’s literally still a hot topic for debate.

What I want to talk about today in regards to writing is the antagonist of your story.  What might this mean?  Does this mean that your antagonist is the hero of their story?  That is possible, but it’s only relevant if you’re telling the story from the antagonist’s perspective.  Of course, then the antagonist would be the protagonist, wouldn’t they?

Oops!  Looks like things have gotten muddled, doesn’t it?

Okay.  Enough of the philosophical gymnastics.  Let us, you and I, get down to the brass tacks of the matter.

I’ll try to make this as simple as possible.  When it comes to crafting a story, what I believe the quote means is that the antagonist has their own motivation.  Also, you, as the storyteller, have to know the role the antagonist plays in the story.  When you know the role of your antagonist it can help you find their motivation.  Let’s go over a few examples.

First, let’s look at Stephen King’s It.  Obviously, Pennywise is the antagonist.  What can we define his role as?  I think It can easily fit into the ‘monster’ role.  Okay.  So, what does that mean for its motivations?  Monster’s are forces of nature, they act on instinct, with one desire overwriting everything else.  Most of the time, this amounts to killing and eating indiscriminately.   Grendel from Beowulf is another example of a monster.  

Next, let’s look at Professor James Moriarte from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.  What is his role (other than being a Dark Mirror for Sherlock)?  He would be a ‘mastermind’.  He’s smart, thinking one, two, three, and even four steps, sometimes ten steps, ahead of those around him.  He has no compunctions about hurting people, directly or indirectly.  What are his motivations?  Usually, masterminds are worried about making as much money as possible (sometimes it’s to prove they are smarter than everyone else), because they are the antagonists of the story, the means by which they do this is usually through underhanded, immoral, and illegal means.  Unlike the monster, who will strike, stalk, kill, and hunt anything in its path bringing it into conflict with the protagonist(s); the meeting between a mastermind antagonist and a protagonist is usually, at least for the first time, completely coincidental.  The protagonist might not even know they’ve met the mastermind antagonist.  The reason the two of them have come into conflict is because of the difference in morals.  The antagonist wants to be rich/outsmart people and is willing to break the laws of man and nature to do so.  The protagonist, meanwhile, is an upholder of said laws.  Thus, the conflict is inevitable.  For more examples of masterminds check out almost any of the James Bond villains.

Lastly, I’d like to talk about Moff Gideon from the show The Mandolorian.  If we look at his behavior throughout the series, one thing becomes readily apparent, he is in the role of dominator.  A dominator is the type of person that wants to, as the name suggests, control things.  The dominator will lie, cheat, double-deal, and kill to get their way.  They are all about their way.  They want to control a group (like a gang, cult, or similar organization), a town/city/nation/galaxy usually outside of whatever actual government is in charge.  The dominator wants control because they are the only way the group will prosper, or order maintained, or only they have the correct vision of the future, and they don’t care how many rules/laws they have to break or how many people have to die for that prosperity/order/vision of the future.  For another example of a dominator, look at Magneto from the X-Men franchise.

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I’m not here to give you an exhaustive list.  The point of the post, and the quote it started with, is that your antagonists aren’t just villains, they should be just as much people as your protagonist(s).  

Until next time, be yourself, be well, write yourself, write well.

Life is for the Living   

22 Wednesday Nov 2023

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Let me forgive myself for the stories that are not perfect,

for the scenes rushed through and the plot points fumbled,

and the language less than it ought to be,

and the phrases that make me wince,

even though no one notices but me.

Let me forgive myself for the stories I didn’t write,

didn’t finish, or didn’t let anyone see-

because I was living my life, or saving my life,

because I was falling in love, or falling out of love,

because I had run out of words, or room, or time,

let me forgive myself for all those stories

that live inside me

and not on the page.

Let me forgive myself for my failures, but also

for all those times when I tallied my shortcomings

instead of celebrating each small success.

Let me celebrate now:

not the life that I dreamed of, but the life that I have,

not the stories that I dreamed of, but the stories that I’ve made,

not the writer I imagined I’d one day be, but the writer that I am.

And then let me keep working

                                                      – Terri Windling

Someone I respect posted this a while ago, and I’ve wanted to include it here for some time.  I’ve read it dozens of times since seeing it.  I look at it as a sort of Serenity Prayer for writers.

Writing is largely a solitary endeavor, and as such it is far too easy to be penned in (pun intended) by our own minds.  We are our harshest critics after all, and that means not only of our work, but of ourselves.  Seeing the promotions and the successes of others in our chosen profession can make us jealous, envious, mad, and depressed if we let it.  

In The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck, Mark Manson mentions that we’re constantly bombard in today’s wired world of success stories, of once in a lifetime winners, of instant stardom, of perfect bodies and perfect lives.  Because of this, we can feel like we’re behind, not on schedule, and failures.  He also points out that this is a false narrative.  There are plenty of people failing or just “getting by” every day that we’re not hearing about.  So, it’s pointless to compare ourselves to other people.

Instead, I would like us to take a moment to re-read Terri Windling’s advice.  Go ahead.  I’ll do it with you.

There are going to be times, because of want or wane, that we will not be able to write.  That the stories on the page must stop so that the story of us can reach the end of a chapter, or the beginning of a new one.  And that’s okay.  Really.  Honest.  The story of the suffering, or starving, artist sounds romantic, until it’s you who’s suffering or starving.  

I’m not telling you to quit.  I would never do that.  But if there are times when you can’t, well, that’s how life goes sometimes.  And, again, that’s okay.  It may be a day, a week, a month, a year, maybe even a couple years, but take the time to live, take the time to take care of yourself.  I promise the words, the characters, the stories will all be waiting for you when you come back.  You might even find you’ve become a better writer too.

Take care of yourself, and be well.  

Constraints of Medium

29 Saturday Jul 2023

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I’d like to think that this isn’t just a writing advice blog, but a storytelling advice blog.  In that vein, I want to talk about a movie called, Slayers from 2022.  

If you watch the trailer for the movie, and/or read the synopsis for the movie, it sounds pretty rad.  A bunch of popular social influencers get invited to a pharmaceutical company’s owner’s house to talk about a branding deal.  Unfortunately for the influencers, the owners are vampires that want to turn the influencers, and use their platforms to promote their agenda. Unfortunately for the vampires, a grizzled, experienced vampire slayer is on their trail and is planning on taking them out.  

Doesn’t that sound like a pretty good action movie?  It’s not the stuff of legends, but it’s a fun movie for a Friday night with friends and popcorn.  

They’ve got a good cast.  Thomas Jane plays the vampire slayer, walking the line of paranoid conspiracy theorist and war veteran to a tee.  Abigail Breslin brings her own snarkiness to the lines of the vapid influencer she plays.  And Malin Akerman brings her brand of sexy to the role of vampire matriarch.  

If you decide to watch the movie, there’s a lot of fun stuff to admire.  Flashbacks on Thomas Jane’s character show the fall of a good man, and help to flesh things out.  Cut away scenes of animated sepia toned photographs gives us a quick look into vampire history.  Interjections by Jane’s character narrating the poor decisions of the influencers and nods to video game high score screens, all add together to give the film some pop.  

Sounds like a good movie, you might be saying to yourself.  

Unfortunately for movie-goers, it is pretty bad.  If you ask my wife, and I have to agree with her, I like some pretty bad movies.  I wanted to like this movie, but I just couldn’t bring myself to.  Many others agree, and are pretty vocal about it.  

I would like to point out that this is not a movie review, but a storytelling review.  So, what makes the storytelling so bad?  It’s the plain and simple fact that they are trying to do too much.  There are a few other things, like inconsistency, but the main problem is, they’re trying to shove too much into the medium they’re using.  

Since this is a storytelling review, let’s use more traditional storytelling terms.  For the purposes of this review, we’re going to look at Slayers as a short story.  Movies, like short stories, are meant to be consumed in one sitting, and are shorter (relatively), than the novel equivalent, a season of a television show.  

Like short stories, movies have to have a solid idea of what they want to accomplish.  Clearly, the writers and director wanted to make a fun movie, something reminiscent of the old 1980’s classics.  However, they also tried to pack in new lore for vampires as well, and they also added too many flashbacks, which take away from the present action, not only taking away the tension of the current situation, but bloating the story with excessive information.

Let me explain what I mean about how the tension is cut and the story becomes bloated.  As I mentioned, we get several flashbacks on Thomas Jane’s character’s background.  We get about a five minute long one that shows his daughter dying, and a clean shaven pre-slayer Slayer not being able to save her.  We also get a two to three minute flashback that’s the opening to a crime documentary show that Jane’s character hosted, a man with a beard and steely determination to find his daughter’s killer, and we see the shades of the grizzled, unkempt slayer peeking through.  This sounds cool, and it looks cool in the movie, mainly due to Jane’s commitment to the role.  However, in a later scene, where Slayer is talking to one of the influencers that got away, he explains how his daughter died, and about working on a crime show to find her killers that was ultimately being paid for by the vampires that killed her.  The line is given clearly and with feeling, and explains Slayer’s motivation in about two seconds.  

If the writers were going to have several scenes where Slayer maps things out with the influencers, and the audience, about himself and the vampire conspiracy they’re wrapped up in, then why have the flashbacks?  I mean, more stellar acting from Thomas Jane is always awesome, but the flashbacks are unneeded.  For one thing, Slayer’s clearly unkempt appearance, abrasive social skills, and cluttered RV, are all, mostly visual, shorthand for character expansion for Slayer.  The line with his motivation, given to illustrate how twisted this “family” of vampires is, is enough to nail down the character firmly in the film.  

Let’s be honest with ourselves, there’s only two reasons someone lives off the grid hunting monsters; one, they’re batshit insane, or two, they have a tragic backstory involving said monsters.  As people who are watching this type of movie, as fans of this type of movie, we know this.  There’s no reason to bloat the movie with unnecessary flashbacks to shove the fact down our throat.

Which brings us to the second thing that led to information bloat, the vampires.  There are numerous reasons horror movies are so easy to churn out.  One of the reasons is the permanent place monsters inhabit in the public psyche.  If you go up to someone who isn’t a horror fan and ask them what a vampire is and how you kill it; they could answer you.  That’s why you pick vampires, or werewolves, or a ghost, or a slasher.  As soon as you say that word your audience will know what’s happening and what’s going on.  However, the writers of Slayers decided to bring in lore about how only a vampire’s spirit is immortal and has to transfer to another body to survive.  Also, master vampires, older, more powerful vampires, have to be killed by someone in their bloodline.  All of this is explained by cutting away from the tension of the house and the obvious trap the influencers are in, to the grimy RV with Slayer and one of the influencers.  It also takes up precious time that could have focused on killing more vampires, or vampires toying with the influencers.  

Watching the film, it’s clear that the writers and director had a cool idea and a cool vision for a film.  Had they stuck making a fun, bloody vampire movie, it would have worked a lot better.  However, at some point they decided they wanted to put a spin on vampires, their own mark on the lore.  Which made the movie stumble, and threw off the timing.  Adding this to the flashbacks that, while good (not just the acting, but the cinematography is spot on), only serve to take time away from the current situation, the current danger, the current tragedy, and make the movie feel that much more choppy and cut-up, and the thrilling narrative of the story begins to unravel.  

Here’s the takeaway, know the constraints of the medium you’re using.  For short stories, make sure you know what you want to accomplish and stay focused.  

Be yourself, be well.  Write yourself, write well. 

A Year in Review

04 Tuesday Jan 2022

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Well, here we are.  Another year behind us.  Another NaNoWriMo in the history books.  We’ve all had some times these past three hundred and sixty-five days.  We’ve lost some people, some things, some beliefs, some ideas.

Firstly, I hope everyone got through things relatively unscathed, and if you didn’t…Let’s just say, good thoughts and wishes to you.

I do want to use the last couple of years to illustrate my point this new year.  We got through it.  We made it to the end.  We finished.

There is an underrated significance in finishing in the writing community, I feel.  There is no trainer pushing us to write every day as in sports.  There is no cheering crowd to push us along the path, handing out encouragement and drinks as we reach the halfway point.  There isn’t even a finishing line to cross when we complete a novel, though there is a finishing line.  If we’re lucky we have that special someone in our lives that congratulates us when we’re done, and if we don’t, well, there’s even less fanfare.

And even then, the process of writing isn’t “finished”, what with the editing and re-writing, and the trying to get published, and then the editing and re-writing.  Of course, there’s the strategy of having more than one project going at a time, which can make it difficult to focus on one, or feel like you’re done with anything, hard.

But there is a significance in finishing.  In knowing that you’ve come to an end.  I want you to know that that half-finished novel, the barely started short story, that “completed” one hundred and fifty pages of NaNoWriMo, I want you to finish it.  I want to know how it ends.  I’m cheering you on.

Ours is a solitary job, calling, journey, and ending, so I’ve found it’s fun to have a ritual for the ending of a story.  Like James Cann’s character in the movie version of Misery, who has a cigarette at the end of a novel.  Sometimes I’ll buy myself a book, sometimes a new pen or notebook, most of the time I just have a soda and sit in silence for however long it takes me to drink it.  It doesn’t have to be a big thing.  I would balk to even call it a celebration.  What I would call it is an acknowledgement of being done, of finishing.

All things, good, bad, indifferent, come to an end.  Shouldn’t your stories be one of them?

Until next time: Write yourself, write well.  Be yourself, be well.

Hello World!  Part III 

22 Wednesday Sep 2021

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Hello World!  Part III

Here we are, the last way to introduce your world to your readers.  It is not so much a technique as it is a writing style.  The third-person omniscient narrator. 

You will find plenty examples of this type of writing in epic fantasy novels (J.R.R. Tolkien, and Sarah Douglass are good examples) and space operas in the science fiction genres (forgive me for not naming names, but I’m not familiar with this type of sci-fi enough to recommend).  The techniques for introducing the world to the readers are rather straight forward, but bear mentioning because that’s what this is all about. 

The first technique is sweeping, extravagant description.  I would like to point out that description is a big part of writing, and appears in every story no matter what the point of view.  In first-person point of view and third person limited point of view, the descriptions are confined to what the main character can see and what they would notice, adding to the characterization of the character.  For instance, the hardnosed detective is going to notice quite different things than the college student who just discovered magic is real.  With third person omniscient narration a good place to start thinking about descriptions is the bird’s eye view, the long-distance view.  This p.o.v. isn’t anchored to one, singular spot or person, but sees everything.  It is also not anchored to one spot in time either, so these sweeping, extravagant descriptions, can start with how something might have looked in the past, or how it will look in the future before settling on the present and coming down to what the characters in the story are doing.  In looking at the world from above, from different times (past and present), a writer can freely introduce a reader to the world.

Another technique of the third-person omniscient narrator is switching to different characters.  Being everywhere and all-knowing, the narrator can focus in on several different characters to show how different pieces of the story fit together or operator in synch (or at least tandem) with other parts.  Again, this opens up the world of the story for the reader.  If one of the characters you follow is upper class, and another is poor, it shows two different versions of the world in which the story is taking place.  Every new character that a third person omniscient narrator follows shows off another facet of the world of the story. 

I would like to state that each of these narration styles that I’ve mentioned in the past three posts have their strengths and weaknesses.  The obvious weakness for the first-person point of view and third person limited is the fact that if the main character isn’t there then they can’t know about something that happened, but then that can be strength in the adding-suspense-part of the story.  Where as third person omniscient narration can seem detached from the story, and authors run the risk of inserting their own voice and opinions into the voice of the narrator. 

Ultimately, you should pick the type of narration that works for you and your story.  Play around with each, experiment, and it’s okay if the choice changes throughout your writing life, or even from story to story.

Be yourself, be well.  Write yourself, write well.

In Good Company

26 Thursday Sep 2019

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I like villains.

Everyone who knows me just let out a collective, and sarcastic, ‘nooooo’.

Let me explain. I like complex characters. I like characters with layers. Characters who, if you get to know them, would be nice/interesting/kind people, if it weren’t for that homicidal streak/drug problem/superiority complex/emotional distance.

You hear it all the time, so-and-so is a one-dimensional character; or, so-and-so is a Mary Sue/Gary Stue.

To clarify: one-dimensional characters are exactly what they look like and nothing more. Horror movies (mainly from the 1970’s through mid-1990’s) are loaded with one-dimensional characters: the jock, the nerd, the cool kid/popular one/rich one, the criminal, the emo/goth/psycho one, the airhead, the innocent one/virgin. A Mary Sue (for a female character)/Gary Stue (for a male character) is someone who’s just great. They’re smart, good looking, kind, athletic, in short, they’re good at everything including being a human being.

Here are the problems with one-dimensional characters. One, they’re unrelatable. I’m sure there are those of you out there who know a jock. You might be thinking: Why wouldn’t the jock I know relate to the jock character? Well, and here’s the second reason one-dimensional characters are bad, because people, real people, are more than one thing. That jock you know could also be a father, a loving husband, a klutz, have a great sense of humor, they could write poetry. That air-head could be a great and selfless friend, a good cook, have a wonderful singing voice. The third problem with one-dimensional characters is that by boiling characters/people down to one thing you make your audience care about them less. Why should I care if the jock dies in a horror movie? But if Billy, the boy dedicated to his girlfriend, who lives with his grandmother, who happens to be on the football team dies I would care more. For instance, who’s going to tell his grandmother, and who’s going to take care of her now?

Mary Sues and Gary Stues have the same problems, but for the opposite reason. Mary and Gary are just too much of everything. They’re unrelatable because no one can be that many things. When was the last time you met someone who was good at everything? And a great person? They’re unrelatable because your readers can’t see themselves rising to the occasion and stepping into their shoes. It’s also hard to care about these characters because it’s hard to put them in danger. That locked door? I’ll pick the lock. That file we need from the computer? I hacked it. The killer is almost on us. Them? I doubled back and tricked/trapped them, we’re good now. There’s no rising action and climax, for the audience, because they know that Mary/Gary will definitely get out of it. This also renders the other characters in the story obsolete, giving them the role baggage or witnesses, just there to slow down Mary/Gary or to see how great they are.

The thing to do then is give your characters depth. Sometimes this means giving them a flaw or two. Sometimes this means letting your audience get to know them. Sprinkle in information about them and their lives outside of the story in the story. Mostly this means giving them more personality.

A couple movies you could watch that take the ideas of stereotypical roles (the jock, the criminal, the nerd, the emo/goth/psycho chick, the airhead, the innocent) and turn them on their heads are The Breakfast Club and The Faculty. In one the stereotypes are thrown together in a detention scenario and throughout the day we learn more about them, giving them depth. In the other the horrific crisis that the group goes through forces them to change and adapt. Plus, both are fun movies.

Another thing you can do is people watch. When you see someone assign them the one-dimension (jock, nerd, airhead, etc.), and try to identify what about them made you pick that. Then give them a backstory. Give them depth. Why do they look sad? Did their favorite team just lose, or did they just go through a breakup? Of all the sports, why are they into water polo? Were they the star of their high school water polo team, or was their father/mother a famous water polo player and that’s how they feel close to them? Of all the teams, why are they into that one? Is it the hometown team, or is that the team their grandfather worked for as a groundskeeper for their entire life?

Put simply, the way to stop writing one-dimensional characters is, instead of asking ‘What are they?’ you ask ‘Who are they?’.

Remember: write yourself, write well; be yourself, be well.

A Brief History of Literature

20 Friday Jul 2018

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Let’s talk about your literary history. What books make up the foundation of your writing?

This is one of my favorite exercises from my studies in writing. It makes us look back so we can move forward. (Philosophical, huh?)

Here’s mine:

My literary history starts with Dr. Seuss and Stephen King. These are the stories I remember from my childhood.

I have the fondest memories of Dr. Seuss books. The art is simple enough that, as a kid, I thought I could draw like that. The stories were short, holding my young attention span. The words are like an amusement park for my mouth. They are the first stories that I remember having fun listening to and reading. I’ve taken them with me my entire life, even into my education and writing. It was my education, learning to look at stories critically, that opened my eyes on just how deep Dr. Seuss stories are. Despite the easy art style and the ridiculous rhyming, the Seuss stories are mainly theme based, and quite hefty themes at that. Who can forget his story based on discrimination and racial equality? The Sneetches. What about the one about personal responsibility? The Cat in the Hat. And the one about fear of the unknown? There’s a Wocket in my Pocket (my favorite). Dr. Seuss taught me that it’s fun to read, and that stories are a powerful medium for communicating.

This next part is not a joke. My mother read Stephen King to me and my sister as bedtime stories. I was ten or twelve, my sister seven or nine. We would snuggle up close to mom in bed, dad would be out plowing the roads on midnight-turn, and she would read Thinner and The Tommyknockers to us. My sister would be asleep within a page or two, but I would listen to mom’s voice until she would inevitably drift off with the book in her hands. These are some of the best memories I have of my mother. When I started reading novels myself I started with Stephen King; I think to have something to talk about with her. However, Stephen King has stuck with me, and I still read his work today. One of the take-aways, the biggest I think, I got from Stephen King is that protagonists don’t have to be “good guys.” In Thinner the protagonist is a victim of a gypsy curse, and through the book we sympathize with him, but he’s hardly a good guy. He was driving the car that killed the gypsy’s wife, and when he gets the cure for the curse he feeds it to his wife. This is all without mentioning he’s a lawyer. In Tommyknockers the protagonist is just in the wrong place at the wrong time. He doesn’t even really care about the town, he just cares that his best friend has been taken over by aliens. In The Dark Tower Series Roland the gunslinger is the protagonist, but he’s hardly a moral compass. True, he’s better than the Man in Black, or the Red King, but he lets a kid fall to his death rather than save him, and his backstory shows numerous times he’s sacrificed friends for his quest (which even he doesn’t know what it truly is). I know this doesn’t come off as shocking or revelatory in the age of the anti-hero, but when I came across this in my teens it had an impact.

The last thing that makes up the foundation of my literary history is a quote from an interview. (And yes, I can’t remember who said it. I even spent an hour Googling derivations of the quote and several authors, but I couldn’t find it.) The gist of the quote is this: no one wants to read a story where everything goes right; it’s not interesting. The quote is a response to a question about why the author puts his characters through so much trouble and pain. For anyone who has read the work I have out there you’ll know that I beat the crap out of my characters both physically and emotionally. When I sit down with a story, one of the first things I do is figure out if a character is going to live at the end. If the answer is yes then I figure out how much damage I can inflict on them and still have it believable that they’re alive on the last page. Again, for those of you who have read my work, you’ll know that making it to the last page alive takes its own toll on the characters.

So, that’s my foundation. This is my foundation, because despite what else may change about my writing, or my views on story, I can’t seem to shake these three things. 1) Above all stories should be fun to read, with a deeper meaning if you’re so inclined to look. 2) Protagonist doesn’t mean good guy. 3) Things are not going to be easy.

The point of the exercise is to look at your writing and figure out what’s consistently there and why it is. Once you’ve identified the consistencies and where they come from, once you’re aware of you, you can start actively using these things in your stories. The things shift from happenstance to tools.

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well.

Resolving to be Resolute

29 Monday Jan 2018

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It’s that time of year again. The beginning!

I’m sure there have been many a resolution made. About your writing. About your health. About your personal life.

I’m going to be honest with you: I don’t believe in New Year’s resolutions. I believe that if people want to change they will, they don’t need to wait for a new year to begin. You can make yourself new anytime you want by committing to change. Studies agree with me. Several have been done, and something like 85% of New Year’s resolutions are forgotten/abandoned by mid-February, if not sooner.

So, if you’ve made resolutions about your writing, I’m sorry. Some of you are probably already struggling to keep up with the changes to routine/style/genre. It can be rough. It will continue to be rough. And I’m sorry for that. Seriously.

I’ve been in the same boat. When I graduated college (the first time), I said I was a writer. I’d taken classes. I’d gotten a degree. I had the verbiage: I am a writer. I also had bills: I had to eat; I had to have a place to live; I needed a job to get money to pay for that, and I needed a car to get to the job, and car insurance on top of that.

Life getting in the way of life.

I wrote when I could, but most days I was tired, or happy to have some time to myself. Writing became a footnote in my life.

Then, I met my wife—she wasn’t my wife at the time, we were just dating. I told her I was a writer, that it was my passion, and showed her some of my work. She liked it, thought it was good. I was happy to share my work. But…

Life got in the way of life, and, to be honest, I was out of the habit of writing so there was more than a little slacking off.

Decisions were made, and something miraculous and horrifying happened. My wife (still a girlfriend) and I moved in together. Every day when she got home she’d ask me what I’d done, expecting to hear about my writing. But…Life and slacking.

After a couple months she did something that I sorely needed. She yelled at me. She asked me why I wasn’t writing. She accused me of not being a writer, and said if I wanted to be a writer then I needed to FUCKING write.

I was hurt at first. Having her yell at me from, what I felt was, out of the blue was a tad scary. What hurt the most, and was eye opening, was that she was right.

Writers write, and if I wanted to be a writer then I needed to write. It was a dose of tough love, but I needed it.

So, with that in mind…

All you aspiring writers out there! FUCKING WRITE!

I want you to write. I love hearing stories, and I want to hear yours. If no one else does, at the very least I do.

I’ve said this before (and I’ll probably say it again), only you can tell your story the way you can tell it. So, tell it! If you want to write, you have to write. No one else is going to do it for you. And why would you want someone else to write your story?

This has been your dose of tough love.

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well

The Ides of NaNoWriMo

15 Wednesday Nov 2017

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Oh, holy hell! Has it been a year already?

Hey, all!

So, we’re back in November. Right, smack in the middle of National Novel Writing Month. It’s that time of year, just this one month, that dedicated to writing a novel.

It may be evident already, but I’m not participating in NaNoWriMo this year. Let me tell you, last year’s project is still kicking my ass. Based on my wife’s editing so far, I may have to take out an entire character. (Sigh.) On top of that, I’m in the middle of a project anyway. And there’s life.

We’re not here to talk about me though. I want to talk about you. NaNoWriMo is for you. It’s for the people who need that extra push, or that initial excuse, to write a novel. If having an entire month dedicated to it isn’t enough then…

Come on! What are you waiting for?

Believe you me, it’s not going to get easier to write a novel. It may get harder though. Life keeps going, work keeps going, the world won’t stop turning. You honestly just have to sit down and do it. The people out there that love this sort of thing have given you a perfect excuse to do it. Try it for a month and if don’t like it, return it for a money back guarantee.

I’ll let you in on a secret, you might not like it. It might be that’s what’s stopping you. You’re afraid to tell your friends and family, ‘I’m writing a novel for NaNoWriMo.’ You’re afraid, because what if you don’t like it? What if you don’t get close to finishing? What will you say if/when the ask how it’s going?

Here’s your permission, and if anyone says anything to you about it you send them to me: You don’t have to like it. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to finish. It’s okay. Not everyone can be writers. Just like not everyone can be surgeons, or electricians, or welders. Maybe you’re not a writer.

The thing is though, you’ll never know if you don’t try. So, if you’ve been thinking about writing a novel, if you’ve felt like you’ve got a novel inside you, then you owe it to yourself to try.

That’s all anyone can ask of you.

Until next time: Try to be yourself. Try to be well. Try to

Ventriloquism, Learn to Throw Your Voice. Fool Your Friends. Fun at Parties

16 Monday Oct 2017

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Howdy! Howdy! Howdy!

I like ventriloquism. This probably stems from growing up with the Muppet Show and a steady diet of Sesame Street. There are numerous, talented, ventriloquist out there, but the one I’m going to reference is Jeff Dunham. He should be easy for you to find (he’s very popular now). (If you get a chance look for Nina Conte too.)

Jeff Dunham is popular (go ahead and google him, take a look at his act), but the main reason I want to talk about him, is because during his act he has multiple puppets (“friends”) that he brings on stage. There’s Walter, the old man; Bubba Jay, the hillbilly; Peanut, the weirdo; and Jose Jalapeno on a stick, the pepper on a stick. Mr. Dunham is popular because he’s good at throwing his voice and because he has so many interesting and funny characters. You’d be hard pressed to confuse Walter with Bubba Jay, or Peanut with Jose. At some point in the act, he even has Peanut and Jose out together. It’s very fun to watch.

Now, you might be saying: I thought this was a writing blog, why are you talking about ventriloquists? (You might also be thinking: I hate when he writes like it’s his readers talking to him. That is a different subject for a different post.)

The reason I’m bring up ventriloquists is because I’d like to continue the discussion on character. Specifically, I’d like to talk about character voice.

The best analog I can find for writing a character and finding its voice is ventriloquism. Think about it. We all know it’s the ventriloquist making the puppet move, making the puppet talk, all the dialogue is the ventriloquist’s. The point is though, at some point, and this might only be for an instant, we forget that and accept the puppet as a separate character.

It’s the same for writing. We know it’s the writer making the character do things. We know it’s the writer making the character say things. All the dialogue is the writer’s. The art, the magic, of storytelling is making the characters feel real.

To make the characters feel real we have to keep in mind three questions. 1) How does your character talk? Do they take the ‘g’ off the end of ‘-ing’ words? Making ‘making’ into ‘makin’? Or changing ‘changing’ into ‘changin’? Do they st-st-stutt-tt-tter? Do they not use contractions? The point: Can we identify the character by what they say? 2) How does your character think? This can be an extension of talk, especially in first person stories when readers can get the character’s thoughts first hand. It can also mean their actions. Is Joey the action orientated type, jumping into a situation without thinking about it? Or is Joey the sit back and overthink type? Or is Joey a coward? These characteristics stuff the character, making them stick out from the background (and can be great ways of foreshadowing how they’re going to react in a situation; also gives them something to overcome later in the story—or not—whatever’s more dramatic). 3) How does your character sound? Are they sarcastic, entitled, mean, sincere. This is a combination of several things. If your character acts to help people and tries their best, then they will sound sincere when they talk and think. If your character acts to help people for the glory and does their best to prove they’re the best, they will sound cocky and entitled. If your character acts to help people for a reward and does their best to show they’re worth the price, then they will sound jaded, possibly cold.

See how this works?

I do have some writing advice from one of my writing mentors. He has a very strict policy of not writing from the first person perspective unless he can clearly hear the character’s voice. It’s a good rule. If the main character’s voice is clear in your head, it will be clear (with some work) on the page, and keep the character easily identifiable.

I’d like to give you a real world example involving character voices. Everyone familiar with Veronica Roth? She wrote Divergent, Insurgent, and Allegiant. Disclaimer: I only read Divergent. The following example is from my wife’s reading of the whole series. So, apparently, in the third book Ms. Roth goes back and forth between two characters to tell the story. Chapter one in character one’s voice; chapter two in character two’s voice; chapter three in character one’s voice…and so on. It took my wife two years (three?) to finish the book. She would start it, get frustrated with it, and put it down again. She had to force herself (her words) to finish the book. She had several complaints about the book, but the number one complaint, the complaint I heard about multiple times a day until she was done with the novel, was character voices. She couldn’t tell who she was following in a chapter because the two characters sounded so alike to her. There were several exclamations during the reading of the book, when she thought it was from the first character’s point of view, and then someone would call the character by name and she realized it was from the second character’s point of view. She didn’t like the book, and not only that, it brought the whole series down for her. So, a cool idea [telling the story from two differing perspectives] turned into a gimmick, and not a good one (again, her words).

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well.