Writing

Mama Mia: Inspiration from Unlikely Sources

Author: November 8, 2017 0 Comments

The brain is a curious thing. As writers, we all know that lightning-bolt moment when an idea hits us. Sometimes it’s while consuming some other bit of art—a movie, or book, or TV show. We see a plot thread, or a scene that doesn’t go where we want it to go, or just a story we wish we could have come up with. In order to steal it, you have to rub off the serial number and round off the edges, and in doing so it becomes something wholly unique, wholly yours.

I don’t know about other writers, but I am less in control of this process than I’d like, because my brain serves up ideas at the oddest moments. For example, during a performance of the Broadway musical Mama Mia!

Not My Idea

I didn’t want to see Mama Mia!, my wife, The Duchess, did. This was a long time ago. I’d been struggling with a novel at the time; I’d started it a bunch of times, wallowed in tens of thousands of words that didn’t really work or gel into anything solid. The Duchess decided we had to go see the show, and so we went, and I’ll admit to being a little bored; ABBA songs are not my jam, and the story seemed a bit thin. I mean, people were having a great time, it just wasn’t for me.

So, my mind wandered. And the basic plot of Mama Mia! (a young woman invites three men who could possibly be her father to her wedding in hopes of figuring out which one is her Dad) seeped in there, and suddenly, in the middle of the performance I realized the story I was writing wasn’t about the characters I’d been focused on, but the family behind them.

The first line of the book came to me right there while the actors cavorted on the stage in their glorious 1970s disco threads: This is a story about my father. And then, I thought, after that first line there would never be a direct mention of the father at all! CLEVER.

I wrote that book. And it didn’t work. That happens sometimes; sometimes the flash of exciting inspiration doesn’t lead to a great novel.

I revised the book a few times, and finally, about ten years later, I figured it out, and it might get published someday, we’ll see. The first line is no long this is a story about my father, so it’ll be interesting to see if anyone recognizes it.

So there you go: Sometimes all you need is some disco music. Although the fact that you could bring your alcoholic beverages back to your seat might have had something to do with it, also.

General, ideas, Writing

Don’t Write Every Day

Author: November 6, 2017 0 Comments

“Writers write, every day” is one of those things you’ll hear a lot when you’re coming up as a writer. It’s one of those easy bits of advice that every single writer seems to throw around, implying that if you ever let a 24-hour period go by without putting some words down, your writing ability shrinks like some sort of role-playing character attribute afflicted by a mysterious roll of the die.

This is bullshit.

You know what? If you don’t feel like writing today, don’t. I guarantee you it won’t have any ill effects.

Making Writing a Chore

Look, as with most common advice in the writing world, there’s a kernel of goodness in the “write every day” scold. You do need to commit to writing if you’re going to finish everything, and getting words down on paper or pixel requires discipline. Boiling that down to the one size fits all admonishment that “writers write every day” takes the complex issue of how you can get work done and turns it into a flashy bit of pithy advice. In my experience, the pithier the advice, the less useful it is.

Only you know your schedule. Only you know the state of your mental exhaustion. Only you know whether you’re inspired or not tonight. And if you’re exhausted, or uninspired, there is absolutely no reason you shouldn’t take a day off and go play some video games, or read someone else’s writing. Plenty of famous, successful writers take time off from writing, sometimes going a very long time between projects. When it comes to your writing schedule, you do you.

Of course, if you always give yourself permission to do something else, you will fall into the trap this pithy advice is designed to prevent: You’ll never get anything done. The point though, is that you have to figure out how to defend against that. Maybe making yourself sit down and write every day works for you. Maybe it doesn’t. It’s up to you.

For some, the whole “writers writer every day” thing is more about identifying as a writer and less about actually creating great stories. If forcing yourself to write every day without fail works for you, great. If it doesn’t, don’t fret. You’re still a real writer.

career, General, Writing

Surprise Yourself

Author: November 3, 2017 0 Comments

One mistake a lot of writers make is to forget to look at their work like a reader. Writing requires a certain mind-frame, a distancing from your subject matter. You have to be a sort of dispassionate god of your fictional universe, moving chess pieces around and casually destroying villages and slaughtering populations, putting your hero in jail or murdering their wives.

But you can take that distance too far and get lost in your own references, your own cleverness, your own intricate technique. And you can get too attached to the plot you think you’re writing, and ignore the fact that it’s not working and getting less and less interesting, because you’re thinking too much like a writer, impressed with how you’re solving plot problems that a reader would never even see.

If you’re finding the book to be a bit of a struggle, if you’re less and less excited about what you’re doing, it’s time to step back and think more like a reader—and surprise yourself with a plot move that even you weren’t expecting.

When I was a very, very young novelist I wrote a sci-fi novel—the first novel I sold, technically (there was a contract, but the company went out of business before it could publish)—and I got bogged down halfway through, uncertain of where I was going. So I suddenly had the main character arrive at a planet where magic appeared to work in a standard sort of epic fantasy setting. And it was delirious and insane, but it got me super excited about how to tie everything together, and that’s what led me to finish the novel.

The Crazy Ivan

This sort of out-of-left-field plot device is a bomb that blows up your narrative, of course. You were writing a police procedural thriller, and suddenly vampires show up and start tearing people apart. You were working on an epic fantasy about a religious war in a universe where the gods are alive and involved like the old myths, and suddenly it’s revealed as a holographic illusion that’s contracted a computer virus. All your careful plans, ruined.

But ruined in an exciting way, because for a moment you’re just as amazed and stunned as the reader would be—and that’s powerful. You get a glimpse of what it would be like to actually read your novel without any idea of what’s coming.

And, sure, it’s probably disaster. Those kinds of crazy swerves can destroy the clockwork of your universe, undermine characters, and generally sow nothing but chaos. But if your story isn’t working anyway, why not? Throw some magic into a hard-sci fi world, and see what happens.

Or get really, really drunk. That sometimes works too.

Novels, plot, Writing

Suck It Up

Author: November 1, 2017 0 Comments

There aren’t a lot of rules when it comes to actually writing a story or novel (I would say that, wouldn’t I, considering that’s the title of my book?). Writing a story can be accomplished in an infinite number of ways, and there are endless strategies for fixing up plots, fleshing out characters, and stringing ideas together into great concepts. There’s simply no right way to write.

There are, however, some rules that do apply to the writing life in general. One that came to mind recently was this: If you ask for feedback on a story or idea, you have to take that feedback like a grownup.

Sucking It Up

I was out with a fellow writer the other day, enjoying a few beers and chatting. The subject of his WIP came up. He’s usually a bit cagey about what he’s working on, but he smiled and asked me if he could lay out his concept for the book. I was happy to hear it, and then he asked me what I thought, and I told him: It was a great idea with a lot of potential, but the story he’d described to me was flabby. It was a series of incidents without a central conflict for the character. The incidents themselves were interesting, but it didn’t hold together as a story.

My friend didn’t like that. He didn’t complain or punch me in the nose, but he got a little … grumpy. It became obvious that he hadn’t been looking for real feedback, he’d just wanted a pat on the back. He wanted me to say wow, that’s great stuff! and move on.

And that’s bullshit. Look, if you ask someone to listen to your ideas, you have to accept the fact that just about everyone will give you at least a kernel of negative feedback. It’s human nature—what I sometimes call Challenge, Accepted! Syndrome. We all want to prove our smarts, so when you tell us your idea or give us a manuscript to read, we’ll look for stuff to critique.

It’s annoying, sometimes, and often not helpful. But it’s the way it is, and as a writer if you ask someone for feedback you cannot then complain about the quality or tone of that feedback. You have to just smile, say thanks for your thoughts, and grouse privately about it. And, very likely, slowly come to realize that there was some real truth in that negative feedback and start the sad work of dealing with it.

These moments are, after all, why beer was invented in the first place. Order another round and then get back to work.

General, Writing

Doing NaNoWriMo? Don’t Look Back

Author: October 30, 2017 0 Comments

So, it’s once again National Novel Writing Month. I’ve never personally attempted NaNoWriMo; my personal best for writing an entire novel is about three months, but that was back in my youth when my brain was more plastic and I had more of it, and also not coincidentally back before I had the Internet and enough money in the budget for decent whiskey. These days I’m not sure I have enough of either to write a book in a month.

That doesn’t mean I have no advice for you if you’re attempting NaNoWriMo yourself. Because that’s sort of what I do these days: I write novels, I wrote about other people’s novels, and I write about how to write novels. So here’s my advice for anyone attempting NaNoWriMo this year: Don’t look back.

Head Down, Hands on Keyboard

That means don’t revise. Don’t reconsider. Don’t think too hard. The NaNoWriMo train only goes in one direction: Forward.

The moment you start to wonder if the scene you just wrote matches up with what you wrote two weeks ago, you’re lost, bub. If you’re going to end the month on THE END and 50,000 words, you’ve got to just keep writing. Get to the end. Place scene after scene until you have a plot.

Because that’s what revision is for—that’s what National Novel Editing Month is for. Your NaNoWriMo book might be a hot mess, but if it’s recognizably a book you win The Internet and get to go back and spend the next month (or year, or years) fixing it up and making it into something great. But to get there you can’t get bogged down in details like, Does my story make sense?, or, Do my characters read like real people instead of Internet contraptions? Those kinds of questions will kill your forward momentum and leave you with 20,000 words that filter through your fingers like sand.

Plus, that sort of writing is fun. Even if you’re an inveterate Plotter, just saying yippee-kay-yay, motherfuckers and tapping away at the keyboard while giggling like a Batman supervillain is invigorating. No, it doesn’t always mean great writing, but it does give you a chance at finishing your novel.

Although I’d keep the cursing and giggling to a minimum if you’re writing in a public space, he said from no personal experience whatsoever.

General, NaNoWriMo, Novels, Writing

That Magic Moment

Author: October 27, 2017 0 Comments

When you’re just starting out in this writing business, it’s not uncommon to imagine certain goals that will make you or break you. You know, events that, if they come to pass, will put you on a certain level and free you from the grunt work (and possibly your day job).

The goal posts move, of course. It’s sensible enough to imagine that selling a novel, or getting a positive review from a famous source, or some other event will set you up. And this does certainly happen to some folks, but for the vast majority of writers that moment doesn’t come too often. Or, better said, it comes, but it’s never as big as you think it will be.

Small Victories

When I was a kid, like a lot of writers I thought if I sold a novel I’d quit my job and become a full-time novelist, investing my money in cool sweaters, pipes, and leather-bound copies of classic literature. And when I sold my first novel I got $1,000 and a kick in the ass, in that order, as an advance, so no, I didn’t quit my job.

I used to think that if I sold a movie option on a novel, it would just be a matter of time before I was rich and entering my Truman Capote phase in life, hob-nobbing with famous folks and sitting in bathtubs filled with gold coins, as one does. Guess what? I’ve sold five movie options on my books and not only have none of them turned into actual movies, none of them actually changed my life.

And so it goes—just about every moment I thought would suddenly and dramatically change my career has … not done so. The key lesson is simple: It’s not about sudden, magical moments that change everything, it’s a cumulative effect. Every success pushes you a little further along.

Of course, some writers do get the half-million dollar advance, or have their books made into movies starring Tom Cruise. And yes, those things can change lives and careers. But the point is there are more increments on the scale than zero and 100. What happens in your career today might only be a 5, but every positive number adds to your total.

All this reminds me: There’s no shame in buying your favorite author a drink. Just sayin’.

career, Writing

Keeping Right in Sight

Author: October 25, 2017 0 Comments

I’m a shaggy, ragged, disorganized Pantser of a writer, usually. I like to take a red-hot idea, still glowing from the forge and dive in, making a mess. If a draft gets to a point where it’s clearly going somewhere but I’ve lost my through-line, I’m happy to step back and apply some serious Plantsing to the story, but my preferred way to write a novel is to just dive in without any prep or research. Like they say in the movies, if there are any problems we can fix them in post.

What this means is simple: The joy of the first draft is that you don’t have to get it right. You just have to keep right on the map.

A Room with a View of Right

Some writers are perfectionists, of course; some don’t even start writing words until they’ve planned out every detail. And bully for them, but I’ll never be that, no matter how attractive it is in theory sometimes (usually when I’m halfway through a fifth of bourbon and weeping openly over my keyboard because I just realized even I don’t understand my plot any more). And you know what? It’s okay to realize in the middle of a first draft that you’ve made some serious errors, and nothing is quite right with it. Because you can fix it all later.

The key though is to keep right in sight. There is a point where a story is so screwed up, filled with bad writing and poor plot decisions (and possibly a lot of notes that say [FILL IN LATER]) where you’re better off just giving up on a draft. That point is different for every writer, and it’s kind of a personal thing you have to figure out for yourself. Just know it does happen.

Short of that, though, you don’t need anything close to good in a first draft. You just need to be able to see good from the hole you’re digging. As long as you can, you can eventually map out a route to it.

Sometimes this will involve cutting thirteen chapters and introducing a new character. Sometimes it just requires line-by-line adjustments to eliminate references. And it almost always requires liquor. If you don’t indulge in substances, friendo, I don’t know how you write novels. I really don’t.

Novels, plot, Writing

Characters: The Forgotten

Author: October 23, 2017 0 Comments

Writing a first draft is always fun; in a recent conversation with Lee Child, he told me that he loved starting a first draft because he hadn’t screwed anything up yet—the book might still be great! While most writers put pressure on ourselves to get it right the first time, first drafts offer a lot of flexibility. Whatever doesn’t work you can revise, remove, or replace, after all, and no one ever has to see your tortured, confused, meandering first effort, unless, of course, you become incredibly famous, at which point you won’t mind showing off your genius process for writing novels.

But first drafts can also get a little messy. I generally produce pretty clean first drafts; if things go off the rails in a first draft for me, I usually don’t even finish the attempt, and if I finish the draft revision is generally just cleanup. As clean as my drafts usually are I still sometimes get into trouble, most frequently with that dreaded writing boogie man, the forgotten character.

Who Were You, Again?

This happened to me very recently. I started a new novel, and seeded in five main characters connected in a group. At around the 30,000 word mark, I suddenly had a realization: I hadn’t mentioned one of those five characters in several chapters. This meant that for weeks of work time, I’d completely forgotten that this character is in the novel.

Now, this can be a sign that your character shouldn’t be in the novel. After all, if you, the creator and miniature god of your fictional universe, can’t keep a character in your head, there’s probably a reason. I wrote an article for Writer’s Digest (“Kill Your Darlings”) about dealing with characters who might not need to be there, and one technique I mentioned is combining characters, which might be just what this book needs.

On the other hand, the characters are in a group, and I worry that thinning that group down too much might make it less believable. So, for the moment, I’ve decided to keep the character in there by the simple expedient of mentioning his name every now and then and giving him meaningless dialog to chime in with. This way, he’s still there, and if I find a use for him later, great! And if I don’t, I can eliminate him secure in the knowledge that he has no purpose anyway.

Of course what I really should be worried about are the real people in my life that no one else seems to see or hear. But that can wait until this book is done.

characters, Writing

The Unexpected Journey

Author: October 20, 2017 0 Comments

Life’s funny. When I was younger, I never imagined I’d someday be a Contributing Editor at Writer’s Digest Magazine with a book on writing coming out (Writing Without Rules, natch) and a solid freelance writing career going. There was also a time when I didn’t see myself as a science fiction guy, and yet seven of my nine published novels are SFF.

On the other hand, I also never saw myself married and living with five cats. Make of that what you will.

FIVE GODDAMN CATS

The point is, your writing career may not go exactly as you imagine. When I sold my first novel, Lifers, I thought it was the first step in a very literary career; I saw myself as writing a series of realistic novels with subtle genre twists. When the book got reviewed by The New York Times I thought that was the next step. And then literally nothing much happened until I sold the sci-fi cyberpunk novel The Electric Church that I didn’t even tell my agent about until it had sold.

Every time I thought I knew where my career was going—or where it should go—I’ve been pretty much wrong. I’m at a point where I’ve stopped trying to guess—I just follow my opportunities combined with my imagination and passion, and hope that the combination of the two leads to something interesting. There’s just no point any more of trying to figure out whether a certain book will sell, or some kind of master plan for literary domination. I’m just along for the ride.

It can be frustrating to realize you’re at the mercy of forces. Forces like the market, which may or may not be buying what you’re writing. Forces like your agent or editors, who may or may not like your latest project. Forces like the fact that you need to make a living and therefore take writing jobs you might not have ever imagined yourself taking—which in turn lead to unforeseen moments of grace.

So, just write, submit, revise, and say yes to opportunities. No other strategy makes any sense.

I’d also suggest “drink heavily” as a way of blunting the horror that is writing for a living, but that seems like something y’all will figure out on your own.

career, General, Writing

Bad Ideas: Speaking in Speeches

Author: October 13, 2017 0 Comments

Everyone loves a good dramatic speech. Whether it’s the hero taking a stand against one final act of evil or humiliation, or the villain declaring his hatred for humanity on a grand scale, or even a supporting character suddenly making their case for their very existence in a story, a speech can be a powerful moment. There’s a reason, after all, that even people who’ve never read Hamlet can quote the beginning of his most famous soliloquy—because speeches kick ass.

Which is why it’s tempting to basically make your story a series of impassioned speeches by your characters. This temptation is supported by a lot of current pop-culture, as there are several TV shows on the air right now where characters basically communicate through lengthy, impassioned speeches. The folks on these shows and in these types of stories stop on a dime and launch into eloquent, frequently well-written speeches defining their worldview, or justifying an odd life decision, or just dragging another character on the carpet for bad behavior. It can be thrilling.

It’s also very bad writing.

Bringing a Gun to a Knife Fight

Speeches are powerful because of their inherent drama; in real life people rarely make lengthy speeches aside from the boring kind made at events. If someone in real life stood up in a crowded place and made a five-minute speech about why they love you, or hate you, or why they’re about to drive into the desert and leave everything behind, it’s a powerful, unexpected moment.

Like all powerful moments, you’ve got to meter your usage of them. Building up to a powerful speech for a character over the course of chapters and thousands and thousands of words? That’s effective. Having characters pause every three pages to make a speech? That’s lazy, and every time you do so you take away some of the power of the speech. Eventually, as we see on TV, speechifying becomes so familiar it becomes the new normal, and at that point the Speech as writing technique has no power left. It’s just characters interacting in stilted, unrealistic ways.

This rule isn’t limited to speeches—any writing technique can be overused. Right now speechifying has a certain currency because it retains its power while also being overused in hit TV shows and books, so it’s tempting. But bad writing is bad writing even if it’s currently having a Moment.

On the other hand, I kind of just made a speech against speeches, didn’t I? Goddammit.

General, Writing