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Details in Fiction

In order to do your job well of transporting your readers to another world, your writing has to give them the feeling that they have entered an actual three-dimensional space. Details can make all the difference. Take for example this bit of description from a New York City scene in my soon-to-be-published novel "Love, Sex, and Understanding the Universe:"
 "Some fifteen minutes later, taxis honking impatiently, a siren wailing from a nearby street, we stood outside the cafe with our hands stubbornly in our pockets, a Milky Way wrapper swirling in the dust and wind at our feet."

I could have just said that they stood on the sidewalk, but instead, their body language brings a picture - complete with emotions - to mind. I could have just said that the street was full of city sounds, but the details about the sounds bring the scene more to life, giving the reader the impression that this really happened. I could have mentioned "a bit of trash," but the fact that my character noticed what the trash was tells you he was trying not to focus on what was really happening between him and the other guy (it's an emotional scene), and that there was enough time for him to have noticed.

In an earlier scene, my character is getting a ride in a Volkswagen Bug and I have my character tell the reader, "I ran my thumb along the textured squares of the vinyl seat." Have you ever been in an older model Volkswagen Bug? Didn't reading that line just bring it all back to you what those seats felt like, looked like? Doesn't this bit of movement also show some sense of nervousness and contemplation on the character's part?

In one of the opening scenes, my character tells the reader "I looked out the window, past my faded cowboy and Indian curtains, and watched the soft December snow falling." In my first draft, I just had him looking out the window and seeing the snow. I added the curtains to give detail. At first, I thought, there are probably curtains on the window, so let me show that. Then I asked myself what kind of curtains. He's 12 years old here so I emphasize with the curtains his move from childhood towards adolescence, which is relevant to the scene.

With all the examples, the details aren't just thrown in there to bring the scene alive, each one of them also serves some other purpose to the story.

So, tell us what kind of soda your detective is drinking, and whether the can is dented, or not cold enough, or if it tastes too sweet or has gone flat - but only if it adds to character development or gives us a clue to who done it. Maybe the fact that it's not cold means that someone must have put it in the fringe after the beautiful heiress was murdered, and that must mean that the pool boy was lying about where he was at the time of the murder because he was the only one who had a key to the cabana and..... but the detective doesn't put all that together until Chapter 12, though the savvy reader realizes....

Today is a Good Day to Write

Why today is a good day to write:
1) Because then tonight you can walk under the stars and feel like you accomplished something.
2) Because tomorrow you'll wish you had.
3) Because it's better than washing the car/mowing the lawn/sorting through your sock drawer.
4) Because I said so.
5) Because you're mother said so.
6) Because you know you want to.
7) Because procrastination (aka sloth) is one of the 7 deadly sins.
8) Because you promised yourself you would.
9) Because yesterday is already too late.
10) Why not?
11) If not now, when?
12) Because then you're characters will stop screaming at you - at least for a little bit.
13) Because you call yourself a writer.
14) Because you can't wait to see what happens next (admit it, you really aren't in control of your plot).
15) Because your English teacher in the 8th grade would be so proud.
16) Because that cheese cake you have planned for dessert will taste so much better if you do.
17) Because.....
oh sorry, I have to go write, write now!

Lessons in Blogging

I wrote my first blog post, On Starting a Blog, 38 days ago. It basically says, I have no idea what I'm doing, but here goes. It was pathetic, and I'm tempted to remove it.  I'm going to leave it up though, because it's quaint and pretty typical of a lot of blogs. This will be my 35th post, and I have learned a few things. Though I am sure I have much more to learn, I'd like to share some of my new found knowledge - much of which has come from my reactions to looking at other people's blogs.
Here's my advice based on what I've figured out over the last weeks.
Do not write a post like my first one. Telling people you don't know what you're doing is going to make them look elsewhere really quickly. If you've made the same mistake I did, forgive yourself, and then figure out what you are doing, and do it with confidence.
Blog readers are looking for original thought, so avoid a lot of re-posting of what others have written, or solely posting videos, photos, etc from other places (that's works a lot better on Facebook - though I'm a strong proponent of original thought of Facebook too). In my blog I convey my way of looking at various aspects of the craft of writing and associated topics, giving my twists on the subject. If you really like grooming dogs there is probably already lots of info on the internet about that, and one might think there is nothing new to say, but if you can write about it in a fresh way, sharing your own examples; adding your own humor, or seriousness, or wackiness; posting some engaging photos to illustrate what you're saying; and maybe even explaining the trade a bit more clearly than others have, you will have an engaging blog for those interested in the subject and maybe a few other people as well.
If you are weird, intelligent, awesome, funny or deep, go ahead and say weird, intelligent, awesome, funny or deep stuff, and we'll get the picture in a much more interesting, entertaining way, than if you just were to go on and on about how weird, intelligent, awesome, funny or deep you are - and chances are you'll have readers coming back for more.
Happy blogging, and please share what you have learned.

Food and Fiction

We all have to eat, generally about three times a day. Even fictional characters have to eat. Even zombies have to eat. My point is, unless you've created a fantasy world where eating is excluded from the picture, food is going to come into your novel, so you might as well make it work for you.
Give this some thought. Answers to the questions of what your characters eat, where they eat, and with whom they eat, are all great for developing characters, and relationships between characters, and can provide settings, and possibly even plot and conflict. Does that blind date take place at a cheap Chinese buffet and result in food poisoning? Does the rich sister insist the poor sister meet her at an upscale steakhouse, then run out leaving the tab unpaid after a call from her husband's mistress?
Maybe the role food plays in your book is simple and subtle. In the classic movie Repo Man, the main character opens the cupboard and takes out a can marked only "Food," opens it, and eats with a spoon.
Maybe food is a basic backdrop to your story as in the Japanese comedy, Tampopo, which has at its center a noodle restaurant.
In my novel, "Love, Sex, and Understanding the Universe" food and eating play many roles, for example, the characters often meet in coffee shops, lemon cake is the only sweet thing one character ever eats, and another character has college classmates teach her recipes from the various countries of their origins, and then there's the strawberries dipped in sugar at midnight scene.
Food is less relevant in my second novel but I had lots of fun with a scene involving two women eating doughnuts at a truck stop and another scene with a woman enjoying a mango while sitting in shallow waves on a Caribbean beach.  
Food offers so many opportunities in fiction, it would be a shame to not take advantage of this readily available tool. Food fight? T.V dinners? The mood at a fast-food joint during off hours? Hot dogs burning on a grill while the parents fight over who takes out the trash? Pink cotton candy stuck in her hair while she cries on a Ferris wheel? A snow cone on a hot day in his favorite flavor changes everything for John Doe? I'm sure you'll come up with something tasty.

Finding Space to Write

Finding space to write is not usually about physical space, it's about mental space. Clearing a space in one's mind where the clutter of all else does not get in the way. One can find time to write and still not have space to write. You can get away from your family/friends/responsibilities and amusements physically, but they call all still be there mentally.
The trick is to find other things to give up in order to have plenty of quality time with family and friends, thereby freeing up mental space that's taken up by guilt over this issue, and then put writing not after responsibilities and amusements, but on the top of the list of responsibilities and amusements.
Finding things to give up may include: not adopting  another new puppy (but he's soo cute! yeah, yeah I know), rethinking if you really need to iron t-shirts, and saying no to helping with the fundraiser for your cousin's step-son's boy scout camping trip. Perhaps polish your silver tea set only once a month instead of once a week? You know it's true; there are things you could give up. So what if the neighbors make fun of you if your car has some dust on it, or you loose track of what your high school friends are talking about on Facebook? Certainly, watching reruns of the Big Bang theory could be replaced by reading a story to your six year old.
Okay, so you feel good about the time you're spending with family and close friends. Now you have to face the fact that writing is a major responsibility of yours, not something that takes you away from your responsibilities (silly idea!). And yes, go on, admit it to yourself, even though writing is a responsibility it is not a chore; it's an amusement. You like writing (otherwise just give it up already!), it amuses you, and revitalizes you, and makes you feel alive and accomplished. Really, is bingo at church this much fun? Does watching DVDs give you this much pleasure? Angry birds? You've got to be kidding me - or yourself.
One more thing, if you're just getting started with writing seriously, it's probably a good thing you're reading stuff - like this blog - about writing, but at some point your're going to have to ween yourself off of what can easily morph into a handy little procrastinating technique of considering reading about writing almost as good as actually writing. If you're a writer, it isn't, unless as I said, your just starting out, then yes there's a lot to be learned from others. If you're one of those who should have weened yourself some time ago - you know who your are! - then close down all internet sites, and pull up your word program, and let the fun begin!

What Inspires Your Characters?

In order to move your plot along, you have to have your character decide to do something. You've created conflict, so there are problems, to build suspense there are more problems. Something has to change, something has to bring the story to its climax.
While it may be tempting to make events beyond your character's control bring about the resounding crescendo of your novel, readers are much more enamored by a story if the struggling protagonist actually does something that makes all the difference. This is where your character needs inspiration. Generally, this is in the form of a catalyst - something new introduced to the story that awakens the lead.  It may be hitting rock bottom as a result of an especially catastrophic event. Just like what inspires alcoholics to go to AA, the situation gets so bad for your character that they are forced to recognize that something has to be done.
Your character may be woken up by something another character does or says at just the right moment - a slap on the face during a wedding by a grandmother who has always been only kind, a statement by a co-worker that makes the character realize that her impression of who she is, is far from how others see her. It may be that a new person or relationship in their life makes your character realize things can't go on the way they have been.
Perhaps it's something subtle like a glace in the mirror at a friend's house or the way a fish struggles on the end of the hook during a camping trip.
Inspiration can come in the form of a long-repressed memory coming to the surface, or a silly poem, or the look on a dog's face.
Your plot, theme, setting, and characters will all guide you toward the best choice for your book. Just make sure your readers feel it as intensely as you do.

The Fiction Of Love

The Fiction of Love

Love is not fiction, but love makes good fiction. Readers want to be moved; they want to leave the mundane of their life when their life does not leave the mundane. Of course one of the most assured ways to get your readers there is by writing about love. Perhaps what inspires us the most in life is love, wallowing in it when you have it, looking for it when you want it, recovering from it when it's gone. Everyone can relate and almost every story, no matter the genre, at least taps into this theme. One need not write a romance to write about love.
Love is also especially useful for creating the necessary page-turning, can't put it down, that keeps readers hungry for your books. Will he find love? Will she ever get that guy? Will he ever finally get a divorce and be with the one he truly loves? Will they ever stop fighting and enjoy their love? Will she ever tell her co-worker she loves her? Will love heal the pain of his past? etc.
One of the best vehicles for using love to create suspense is the friends/coworkers/neighbors who just can't quite seem to ever get it that they are in love. The reader figures it out early on but the characters, or one of the characters, is clueless. There is flirtation that is not recognized or acknowledged by those involved. There are excuses to get together that they believe are innocent. There is fluttery stomachs and nervous laughter that are written off as a reaction to the burrito at lunch and being over-tired. When will those two ever see what we see? When will they finally figure it out? Will they both figure it out at the same time? Will they ever stop laughing at their friends when they try to clue them in? Oh, we can't wait for the moment when they finally fall into each other's arms. But every time it seems there is a glimmer of recognition, they look away and start talking about their kids' baseball game, or suddenly notice that it's pouring rain and run into their separate cars.
Love is also good as a backdrop to other storylines. Love causes characters to make that fatal mistake that messes up their best-laid plans to become stockbrokers, or to rob a convenience store, or finally do right by their long-lost child. The loss of love drives characters to commit gruesome murders, or to become overly involved in their children's lives, or debauchery, or world travel.
Yep, love is a writer's best friend... or wait, is it really just friendship, or the beginning of a torrid romance?

If You Can't Write What You Should, Write What You Can.

I was too scattered today to write a coherent blog. Too scattered today to gather clear sentences before they flew away. But born of this is a new writing philosophy for me - if you can't write what you should, write what you can. Prose would not come, so here is a new poem.

Little Bits of Me

Little bits of me lie scattered

and exhausted across the surface of his couch.

More bits can be found in the pieces of his tattered pillow,

freshly combed from my hair,

now littering his bathroom floor.

Bits of me teeter on the drain in his tub.

Others linger on the jagged edges

of an unfinished slice of watermelon.

A fan lazily sails more bits

around the hallowed space over his still warm bed.

There are the bits too

that reflect on a life fractured

in the smooth surface of his mirror.

It's lovely really,

the way he breaks me down into these bits,

but this time he forgot

to put me back together again.

Reaching out for wholeness this morning,

I found only the scattered bits that were him.

Was there something I forgot to do?

Ah, no worry,

we can straighten out the bits next time.

Some pieces just did not want to waken from the dream;

parts of us refused to be sorted back

into the everyday of functionality.

Fun with Editing

Fun with Editing

I hear people say it all the time, they hate editing. I, however, don't share this dread.
In first drafts, we write what inspiration thrusts upon us as quickly as possible, getting it all down as it flows into our heads from where ever ideas come from. Everyone agrees that trying to edit in this stage stagnates creativity. So we tear through our keyboards, throwing the words on the page in a frenzy. This apparently, for most people, is where the fun stops. But for me that's where new fun begins.
When we're writing that quickly, what our leading man says to the bad guy at that cliff hanging moment has comes to us in a flash of genius, and before we have a chance to think Oh, that's good! we're already on to what Mr. Badnews says next to stymie our guy's hopes, and on it goes. There is no time to find perfect words, no time to weed out the irrelevant, no chance for using setting in dialogue, or picking up on the nuances of what the characters are thinking and feeling. All that fun stuff comes in the editing process.
The first draft may be where the meat of the story is laid out, but editing is the accouterments that make a story extra special yummy. Lot's of stuff needs to be filled in, fleshed out and fluffed  up. But editing isn't just cementing up the gaps in what's still a skeleton of a tale, it's also taking away. Usually lots of taking away. There is the deleting of redundant sentences or even whole paragraphs; there is the trimming of run-on sentences, and the fine tuning overly-wordy narrative. There is the reworking of awkward sounding phrases (for example "overly-worldly narrative" - which I was going to rewrite but thought I'd leave to make my point). All this is an art into itself.
Finding that perfect word that makes the idea come through like a bright light challenges our writing skills. Paring down dialogue, and adding details of body language, until the scene feels perfectly real and as intense or loving or angry as your characters actually feel is so much a part of what great writing is about. I love this process, because when I'm done I have this wonderful finished product; I've solved the puzzle of how to make it all come together.  Editing isn't just irritating busy work; it's a huge part of the craft of writing. And if you're like me, there's always lots and lots of editing that needs to be done before your first draft is the great story you envisioned as you wrote it.

Using Humor in Dramatic Fiction

Using Humor in Dramatic Fiction.

I saw the movie Winter's Bone with my mother some time ago. We were quite impressed by the movie but it was super intense and my mother said, "There just wasn't any comic relief."
I had never thought about the role comic relief plays in dramatic stories before. However, I realized that I had been using it all along in my writing and that most dramatic fiction does too. Like a lot of things in life, we act out of instinct or perhaps in reaction to things we've picked up on subconsciously.
My novel "Love, Sex, and Understanding the Universe" is a dramatic tale of a man struggling to be himself in a world that doesn't want to have to accept who he is. After hearing me read many passages from my book, a fellow writer's group member said to me once, "I really enjoy your humor."
I especially appreciated the compliment as the humor in my book, despite being pervasive, is quite subtle. I was glad to see that I was successful in getting it across.
The humor is needed in my book; it's necessary to break up the tension, to prevent the reader from getting bogged down in the character's problems. As my novel is written in the first person, the humor is really that of my main character, Jim. Accordingly, the humor in his narrative also serves to gain the reader's empathy and allegiance. Everyone likes a good chuckle, and if Jim, despite all his problems, can get a little comic relief from the drama in his life, perhaps so can we when the going gets tough.

What's So Great About E-Publishing.

What's So Great About E-Publishing.

I first started writing the short-story that ended up becoming my novel "Love, Sex, and Understanding the Universe," in 1989. No, that's not a type-o. Yep, 1989, and I started writing it as a novel in 1995. My final edit (there where tons of edits) was done around the turn of the century. Then around 2007 - after sitting in a drawer all those years - there was an "Oh, yeah, I guess there's going to be one more edit." And yep, my book has been sitting around now, again, - for about 3 years.
My point is this: I never published it in all those years. Why? Because when I was done writing it the first time around, there was no e-publishing, and well it's taken me this long - since e-publishing started up - to get the idea firmly in my head that e-publishing is an established, successful, legitimate, and respectable way to go.
But why didn't I try to go the usual old-tymey route of hard cover publishing? Because I knew my book had a limited audience; I knew it wouldn't be mainstream enough for traditional publishers. After all, those guys can only afford to publish books that are going to have - I think the number is something like - a godzillion, sales. This was a shame, because I knew there were people out there who would really appreciate my novel - just not a godzillion - and they'd never get to read it.
So what's so great about e-publishing? E-publishing works for books that will attract any size audience. That means there is now all kinds of groovy stuff out there that in pre-e-publishing times never would have seen the light of day. In fact, back in the old days, most people - not me of course - didn't even bother to write books that couldn't get published traditionally. But now they are! And now "Love, Sex, and Understanding the Universe," gets to be out there for any and all who will appreciate it, to enjoy! Cool, huh? I think so.

Writing Sex Scenes

Writing Sex Scenes.

Lots of people say they dread writing sex scenes. I find it not so challenging myself, though reading sex scenes out loud can be a bit unnerving - especially if I'm not too familiar with my audience. It helps though, that the feedback has been very positive.

Here's Harrie's Helpful Hints:

It depends a lot on what type of story you are writing, who your projected readers are, and what importance the scene has in the story. Adjust accordingly.
In my novels, love and sex are pretty paramount to the plot and theme so I tend to get a bit more in detail and don't worry so much about telling the reader too much. However, in some scenes, the sex is way more important than in others. Usually, when I show more detail it's because I want to show the love that's developing between my characters, or I want to show how deviant, or drunk, or confused, or...whatever, my character is.
Gratuitous sex is ugly in any book that hasn't set out to be erotica or pornography, so make sure there is a point to your details.
Many sex scenes work really well with just some titillating foreplay, a glimpse of the more deep breathing stuff, and then the cigarette smoking, or rolling over and going to sleep, or entangled sleeping in one another's arms, or the awkward avoiding of the wet spot. However, if your book is one where sex is important, you don't want to cheat your readers out of some of the good stuff. I find it best though to leave readers wishing for just a little more.
Avoid a play-by-play sports announcer recount. Better to show the total-abandon looks on their faces, and the anguished cries, than an in-depth explanation of the techniques being applied - unless you're writing a training manual.
Mostly though, I implore you not to describe a totally vanilla, missionary-scene quickie, with a lot of whispering of sweet nothings, between pressed sheets, and expect your readers to buy this as the most awesome sex your characters' have ever had - I hate that.