Anyone who's ever been around young tots has surely heard of blankies, those foul, nasty, must-bribe-in-order-to-wash-it type rags that toddlers hang on to with such grim determination. A concrete object is kind of like that--a transference object--but for your hero. Clear as mud, right?
Let's try this: a concrete object is a physical object that becomes imbued with emotional meaning during the course of the story and is a tool that allows the writer to "show" emotional progress rather than "tell" it.
A classic example can be found in the movie Citizen Cane, with the mysterious "Rosebud" that turns out to be the sled from Cane's childhood that represents all that was good and lost.
Warning: there may be mild spoilers ahead...
In Emma Jean Lazarus Fell Out Of A Tree, Lauren Tarshis makes great use of this concept. Emma Jean has a quilt left to her by her father. It is a much treasured object and when she's missing him, she has this quilt to remember him by. Tarshis doesn't overuse the emotional connection here, mentioning it only two or three times (I don't have a copy of the book at hand--I lent mine to someone). During the course of he story, Emma Jean has to wrestle with a family friend becoming closer to her mother than she is comfortable with. However, when this family friend must leave to tend to his own ill mother, in a moment of deep emotional resolve, Emma Jean sends the beloved quilt with him.
So right there is a great physical way of showing just how very much this man means to Emma Jean, without having to get all tangled up in awkward or too spot-on words.
And later in the book, when Emma Jean has been through a few more emotional growth experiences and has had to face the fact that her mom and this guy really do make each other happy, the family friend comes home. She is a bit stunned to find his mother has mended the quilt for her, blending the bright colorful fabrics of her culture with the older, faded fabrics of the original quilt, and although the new pattern is different, she finds it is pleasing all the same. Again, the author uses this physical object to show the emotional impact of trying to weave together new family relationships, as well as the conflicted feelings involved, and she is able to do it very sparingly, with clean elegant strokes because she has this wonderful object that has become so imbued with emotional impact.
Now I don't really think concrete objects can be forced. Like I said, one hasn't materialized in the Beastologist books, or the medieval France one, so I'm not going to manufacture one. But often times I think our subconscious will leave a trail of breadcrumbs for us. Perhaps you have an article or possession that's shown up in your story once, twice, maybe even three times. If so, I would take the time to examine that and see if it can't be massaged into a concrete object.
In Theodosia and the Serpents of Chaos, I found that Father was always scolding Theo about her stupid hat. He always remembered to notice when she wasn't wearing hers, but never managed to notice the important stuff. Until the end, when he is so concerned about her well being that he not only forgets about her hat, but tells her to forget about it, too.
Okay, it's no where near as powerful as Emma Jean's, but it was what showed up. What can I say? It served as a nice underscore to the lesson Theodosia was learning about her parents.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Friday, May 1, 2009
Strucutre: Where You Least Expect It
Lots of times when talking about plot or structure, some writers recoil, feeling as if such aspects of craft are merely devices, templates, if you will, for those who are not skilled enough to write a character driven book.
Obviously, I don’t hold the same opinion. But what is also true is that structure can be so integral to the story and so much a part of its very fabric, that the reader is never even aware of it. I thought I’d use a couple of picture books as examples, as people often (mistakenly) assume that something as short as picture books don’t really require structure or plots.
One aspect of structure is the concept of causality—of the events of the story building on themselves, creating a tighter and tighter spiral that the main character must deal with. [A] happens, then the character tries [this], which makes things worse, because…
There really is no better illustration of this concept than If You Give A Moose A Muffin by Laura Joffe Numeroff. (Her If You Give A Mouse A Cookie, works well to illustrate this, too.)
In the book, our protagonist gives the moose a muffin in a misguided attempt to get rid of it. But this makes things worse, because then the moose wants jam to go with it. But that makes things worse because they are so tasty he wants more and more. Until they are all gone and it’s time to go to the store, which is even worse because now he needs to borrow a sweater, then needs to mend it, and on and on in a great big rolling snowball of complications. That, my friends, is structure. It is subtle; a charming, integral element of the story, but structure, nonetheless.
A second terrific example, and perhaps my favorite, is Where The Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. That simple, less than 500 word book, encompasses the entire Hero’s Journey. Check it out:
1) The Ordinary World. Max dons his trusty wolf suit and gets into trouble
2) The Call to Adventure.Max is sent to his room, where a forest appears
3) Refusal of the Call. But Max doesn't do anything until it grows even more
4) Mentor. Whoever sent the boat...
5) Crossing the First Threshold. Max sails away in that private boat that shows up
6) Tests, Allies and Enemies. Max sails for over a year
7) Approach to the Inmost Cave. The most dangerous place in the Story World. Max arrives where those scary wild things live
8) The Ordeal. And they do their level best to scare the bejeezus out of him. But he stands up to them, see…and stares them down.
9) Seizing the sword. The hero often receives some reward for surviving. And the Wild things make him their king.—the most wild thing of all.
10) The Road Back. The hero must deal with the consequences of all that he/she has done in order to gain the reward. And now the real rumpus starts!
11) Resurrection. This is the second Ordeal, the final confrontation. Then Max, grown lonely and homesick, stands up to them and makes them stop. Not only that, he punishes them--just as he was punished.
12) Return With the Reward. Then a wiser and calmer Max arrives back in his room and found his supper waiting for him.
I just think it’s so interesting to see just how much things like three act structure or the hero’s journey are a part of our storytelling patterns, even before there was a book that talked about it as a guideline for writers. It’s important to keep in mind that the hero’s journey was recognized rather than invented, recognized after analyzing thousands of years worth of myths and legends and tales. It was merely putting a label to the way man had told stories for generations.
Now I think that it’s absolutely true that some writers don’t have to think about structure or plot in order to have it appear in their work (and I try not to hate them too much for that) but neither is plot a four-letter word. I’m just sayin’.
Edited to add:
In honor of Buy Indie Day, I'm going to my local bookstore this morning and buying a copy of Donald Maass's newest book, The Fire in Fiction, to give away in a drawing this month. All you have to do to be entered is leave a comment. How easy is that? Maass's book, Writing the Breakout Novel is one of my bibles, so I'm very excited he has a second book out.
Obviously, I don’t hold the same opinion. But what is also true is that structure can be so integral to the story and so much a part of its very fabric, that the reader is never even aware of it. I thought I’d use a couple of picture books as examples, as people often (mistakenly) assume that something as short as picture books don’t really require structure or plots.
One aspect of structure is the concept of causality—of the events of the story building on themselves, creating a tighter and tighter spiral that the main character must deal with. [A] happens, then the character tries [this], which makes things worse, because…
There really is no better illustration of this concept than If You Give A Moose A Muffin by Laura Joffe Numeroff. (Her If You Give A Mouse A Cookie, works well to illustrate this, too.)
In the book, our protagonist gives the moose a muffin in a misguided attempt to get rid of it. But this makes things worse, because then the moose wants jam to go with it. But that makes things worse because they are so tasty he wants more and more. Until they are all gone and it’s time to go to the store, which is even worse because now he needs to borrow a sweater, then needs to mend it, and on and on in a great big rolling snowball of complications. That, my friends, is structure. It is subtle; a charming, integral element of the story, but structure, nonetheless.
A second terrific example, and perhaps my favorite, is Where The Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. That simple, less than 500 word book, encompasses the entire Hero’s Journey. Check it out:
1) The Ordinary World. Max dons his trusty wolf suit and gets into trouble
2) The Call to Adventure.Max is sent to his room, where a forest appears
3) Refusal of the Call. But Max doesn't do anything until it grows even more
4) Mentor. Whoever sent the boat...
5) Crossing the First Threshold. Max sails away in that private boat that shows up
6) Tests, Allies and Enemies. Max sails for over a year
7) Approach to the Inmost Cave. The most dangerous place in the Story World. Max arrives where those scary wild things live
8) The Ordeal. And they do their level best to scare the bejeezus out of him. But he stands up to them, see…and stares them down.
9) Seizing the sword. The hero often receives some reward for surviving. And the Wild things make him their king.—the most wild thing of all.
10) The Road Back. The hero must deal with the consequences of all that he/she has done in order to gain the reward. And now the real rumpus starts!
11) Resurrection. This is the second Ordeal, the final confrontation. Then Max, grown lonely and homesick, stands up to them and makes them stop. Not only that, he punishes them--just as he was punished.
12) Return With the Reward. Then a wiser and calmer Max arrives back in his room and found his supper waiting for him.
I just think it’s so interesting to see just how much things like three act structure or the hero’s journey are a part of our storytelling patterns, even before there was a book that talked about it as a guideline for writers. It’s important to keep in mind that the hero’s journey was recognized rather than invented, recognized after analyzing thousands of years worth of myths and legends and tales. It was merely putting a label to the way man had told stories for generations.
Now I think that it’s absolutely true that some writers don’t have to think about structure or plot in order to have it appear in their work (and I try not to hate them too much for that) but neither is plot a four-letter word. I’m just sayin’.
Edited to add:
In honor of Buy Indie Day, I'm going to my local bookstore this morning and buying a copy of Donald Maass's newest book, The Fire in Fiction, to give away in a drawing this month. All you have to do to be entered is leave a comment. How easy is that? Maass's book, Writing the Breakout Novel is one of my bibles, so I'm very excited he has a second book out.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Well, that was a time sink! Albeit a fun one. At long last I created a Facebook page. And although my Facebook ignorance is astounding, I have to admit it’s a lot of fun. (For example, I had to sign up as Robin L LaFevers because they wouldn’t let me use my initials, but I also saw that J. R. R. Tolkien was allowed to use his initials…and periods, which they said I had too many of. So clearly some research is in order!) But if any of you are on there and are looking for friends, I can be found here. I think. And no, I have no idea what I'm going to do with a Facebook page, but I was tired of being the only author left on the planet who didn't have one.
I also did some cyber de-cluttering today, de-coupling myself from a lot of old yahoo groups and chat thingeys that I no longer actively participate in. Streamlining is good, it helps me focus.
I also had a great writing morning, which was a bit of a surprise, When I woke up I wasn’t feeling the writing love, at all, and thought I’d give myself a day’s break. But before I took the break, I just wanted to write down this one transition sentence so I’d remember where I was going to insert this new scene chunk. One sentence led to two, which led to my 1,000 words in about an hour. Love that. The scene was sitting in my subconscious where it had been steeping for a couple of days and just needed me to get my butt in the chair and get my head out of the way.
Kind of the story of my life, really.
I also did some cyber de-cluttering today, de-coupling myself from a lot of old yahoo groups and chat thingeys that I no longer actively participate in. Streamlining is good, it helps me focus.
I also had a great writing morning, which was a bit of a surprise, When I woke up I wasn’t feeling the writing love, at all, and thought I’d give myself a day’s break. But before I took the break, I just wanted to write down this one transition sentence so I’d remember where I was going to insert this new scene chunk. One sentence led to two, which led to my 1,000 words in about an hour. Love that. The scene was sitting in my subconscious where it had been steeping for a couple of days and just needed me to get my butt in the chair and get my head out of the way.
Kind of the story of my life, really.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
That Magpie Stage
Okay, so here's a tip: Never leave a complexly plotted book for a year and a half without leaving yourself very detailed, explicit notes. Jeez. I feel like I've been wandering for years, lost in the Labyrinth like Theseus, only I don't have Ariadne to help me. More's the pity.However, I have finally become fully emerged in the book. How can I tell? Because I am now officially in The Magpie Stage. It's that stage of writing when everything feeds the book. Wherever I turn, there's an image or the perfect word, or a glimmer of human nature, that is just exactly what I need for the book so I snatch it and quickly store it in my waiting nest. Whether it's stumbling on just the right reading material, finding the perfect resource in a most unexpected place, tripping over a website that shouldn't have anything to do with the book, and yet it turns up a perfect detail.
See? Even searching for an image of the Theseus myth turns up a wonderfully medieval picture of the myth, even though it wasn't medieval at all.
It feels like the very Universe itself is lining up to help me write this book. I adore this stage, truly. And it doesn't always last long, so I try to soak it up while I can.
In other news, I have vowed to leave at least five comments a week on other blogs. Okay, three. Five might be biting off more than I can chew. But I vow to leave three comments a week on other blogs. The thing is, I love the blogs I read and I want the bloggers to know that I'm there, reading, appreciating their efforts. So that's my new almost-May-Day-resolution.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Questions to Reveal Character
One of the things I need to know kind of early in the process of writing a book is my turning points. I write to the turning points and acts, rather than to the end. The benefits of this are that I am writing three or four smaller stories within one larger narrative, and not having one long endless slog through a never-ending middle.
It is also the way to check and be sure that the events of the story are forcing the necessary character changes so that they will have undergone a true transformation by the end of the book. Which is why I am so married to the idea that plot is character—the external plot is often the construct an author uses to effect the internal change in their characters, which is where I think the true juice of the story is.
And I know all my turning points for this medieval French book—except the first one, which comes at about the 1/4 mark in the mss. That first TP is so important! It launches the character on their external journey, or if the character is already moving along that path, it ramps up the action, increases the urgency, or throws a major kink in the works.
Or it should, anyway. Mine? Not so much.
I have a really soft turning point, which is bugging me because it should be, at the very least, the moment the two forces in the novel, the protagonist and antagonist (or antagonistic force) cross swords and agree to duel
And I got nothin’. Well, there’s something there, I’m sure of it, I just have to find it.
Which is where these questions I mentioned the other day came in so handy. They are from a workshop Michael Hague gave at the RWA National Conference a couple of years ago. He suggests that the internal journey of a character is a transformation from persona (the construct that they show the world) to their essence (their true nature). Now, I’ve looked at these questions before, and they never really clicked for the Theodosia books or the Beastologist books. Maybe because those are series and the process happens throughout the course of bookS rather than A book. But boy, the questions clicked for me with this manuscript. Which is one of the reasons I like having a collection of writing processes and approaches up my sleeve, you just never know which one will coax which story into being.
So, onto the questions. The first two are ones I already ask myself, but the way he worded them triggered something this time. I think one of the reason these questions worked for me is because they echo something I do instinctively, but give it a bit more form and cohesion.
What is my character's longing? What is their deeply held desire they’re only paying lip service to, that they’re not pursing. Now some characters are so shut down or disconnected from their selves that they don’t even have a longing. Instead they have a need, a hole inside that must be filled.
And that hole is usually caused by the answer to the next question…
What is my character’s wound? What past traumas have shaped them and profoundly altered the way they see the world?
Third question, What is my characters belief? How has my character’s wound shaped his way of seeing the world? Of seeing other people? This is the one that really helped me this time because it gave me a sense of what the scenes needed to reveal about my character.
My character’s belief is that her only value or worth is in her usefulness as a tool to her organization. In fact, she clings to the fact that she’s a tool and uses it to disconnect from her emotions, her self. If she clings to the fact that she’s a tool—separate from the needs and desires other people are subject to, then she doesn’t have to admit they are lacking in her life, that she isn’t worthy of them.
This belief is used to keep fear and terror at bay.
The fourth questions is What is your characters’ identity? Which for me was answered in the belief question. She is naught but a finely honed, fully committed tool.
And the fifth question, What is your hero’s essence? When you strip away all the roles they play and the beliefs they protect themselves with, what are they at their core?
Now I have to admit to not being certain what essence was, so I rephrased it like this:
Who would my character be if she had the courage? If she wasn’t afraid of anything? It turns out my heroine’s essence is that she is a merciful, compassionate person who is being used for the purpose of judgment and punishment.
And then of course the story is about her movement from her persona to her essence, learning to step away from being a tool for a punishment she finds she doesn’t actually believe in.
Again, this doesn’t work for all stories, this is the first one of mine that it really generated an aha! moment for. Maybe it will be helpful to you at some point.
It is also the way to check and be sure that the events of the story are forcing the necessary character changes so that they will have undergone a true transformation by the end of the book. Which is why I am so married to the idea that plot is character—the external plot is often the construct an author uses to effect the internal change in their characters, which is where I think the true juice of the story is.
And I know all my turning points for this medieval French book—except the first one, which comes at about the 1/4 mark in the mss. That first TP is so important! It launches the character on their external journey, or if the character is already moving along that path, it ramps up the action, increases the urgency, or throws a major kink in the works.
Or it should, anyway. Mine? Not so much.
I have a really soft turning point, which is bugging me because it should be, at the very least, the moment the two forces in the novel, the protagonist and antagonist (or antagonistic force) cross swords and agree to duel
And I got nothin’. Well, there’s something there, I’m sure of it, I just have to find it.
Which is where these questions I mentioned the other day came in so handy. They are from a workshop Michael Hague gave at the RWA National Conference a couple of years ago. He suggests that the internal journey of a character is a transformation from persona (the construct that they show the world) to their essence (their true nature). Now, I’ve looked at these questions before, and they never really clicked for the Theodosia books or the Beastologist books. Maybe because those are series and the process happens throughout the course of bookS rather than A book. But boy, the questions clicked for me with this manuscript. Which is one of the reasons I like having a collection of writing processes and approaches up my sleeve, you just never know which one will coax which story into being.
So, onto the questions. The first two are ones I already ask myself, but the way he worded them triggered something this time. I think one of the reason these questions worked for me is because they echo something I do instinctively, but give it a bit more form and cohesion.
What is my character's longing? What is their deeply held desire they’re only paying lip service to, that they’re not pursing. Now some characters are so shut down or disconnected from their selves that they don’t even have a longing. Instead they have a need, a hole inside that must be filled.
And that hole is usually caused by the answer to the next question…
What is my character’s wound? What past traumas have shaped them and profoundly altered the way they see the world?
Third question, What is my characters belief? How has my character’s wound shaped his way of seeing the world? Of seeing other people? This is the one that really helped me this time because it gave me a sense of what the scenes needed to reveal about my character.
My character’s belief is that her only value or worth is in her usefulness as a tool to her organization. In fact, she clings to the fact that she’s a tool and uses it to disconnect from her emotions, her self. If she clings to the fact that she’s a tool—separate from the needs and desires other people are subject to, then she doesn’t have to admit they are lacking in her life, that she isn’t worthy of them.
This belief is used to keep fear and terror at bay.
The fourth questions is What is your characters’ identity? Which for me was answered in the belief question. She is naught but a finely honed, fully committed tool.
And the fifth question, What is your hero’s essence? When you strip away all the roles they play and the beliefs they protect themselves with, what are they at their core?
Now I have to admit to not being certain what essence was, so I rephrased it like this:
Who would my character be if she had the courage? If she wasn’t afraid of anything? It turns out my heroine’s essence is that she is a merciful, compassionate person who is being used for the purpose of judgment and punishment.
And then of course the story is about her movement from her persona to her essence, learning to step away from being a tool for a punishment she finds she doesn’t actually believe in.
Again, this doesn’t work for all stories, this is the first one of mine that it really generated an aha! moment for. Maybe it will be helpful to you at some point.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Plan B
Well, I had a lovely post all typed up and ready to go, but the Alpha Smart I used to type it up can't connect to this ancient computer without lugging the stupid thing away from the wall, so that will have to wait a bit. Sorry!
However, the good news is (well, for me, not so much you) is that between the threat of jury duty looming over me and an ancient (read: s-l-o-w) computer, I've gotten tons done this week. I wonder if it was Fate's way of getting me to focus on the basics of storytelling. You know, the old, butt in the chair, pen and notebook, get off the frackin' computer kind of basics. Whatever it was, it worked.
Speaking of fracking, my buddy Katy Cooper has turned on to the wonders of Battlestar Galactica. I'm totally loving this show! And thank god it's on DVD so we can gobble them up as fast as we want. It is well written; excellently plotted and the characters are all delightfully complex and multi-dimensional.
I am also reading seven books at one time, which is a lot, even for me. A sure sign that I am deep in a book and being the world's most finicky reader. I am currently reading:
Mysteries of the Middle Ages
World Without End
New Moon
The Hallowed Hunt
Lady MacBeth
Book of Unholy Mischief
Kushiel's Justice
and have just started The Hunger Games.
Oops. That's eight.
And speaking of that...brings me to e-readers. You know, I've never thought very much of them, nor been tempted in any way to own one. I love books--real live books--way too much. However, does anyone else get reader's thumb or book lover's elbow?? The former is usually from forcing open fat paperbacks and feels like two sprained thumbs, and the latter is akin to tennis elbow from holding up books that way six pounds or more (I seem to be drawn to 500-1,000 page tomes). The physical hazards of being an avid reader have me at least pondering e-readers and wondering if they eliminate these injuries.
However, the good news is (well, for me, not so much you) is that between the threat of jury duty looming over me and an ancient (read: s-l-o-w) computer, I've gotten tons done this week. I wonder if it was Fate's way of getting me to focus on the basics of storytelling. You know, the old, butt in the chair, pen and notebook, get off the frackin' computer kind of basics. Whatever it was, it worked.
Speaking of fracking, my buddy Katy Cooper has turned on to the wonders of Battlestar Galactica. I'm totally loving this show! And thank god it's on DVD so we can gobble them up as fast as we want. It is well written; excellently plotted and the characters are all delightfully complex and multi-dimensional.
I am also reading seven books at one time, which is a lot, even for me. A sure sign that I am deep in a book and being the world's most finicky reader. I am currently reading:
Mysteries of the Middle Ages
World Without End
New Moon
The Hallowed Hunt
Lady MacBeth
Book of Unholy Mischief
Kushiel's Justice
and have just started The Hunger Games.
Oops. That's eight.
And speaking of that...brings me to e-readers. You know, I've never thought very much of them, nor been tempted in any way to own one. I love books--real live books--way too much. However, does anyone else get reader's thumb or book lover's elbow?? The former is usually from forcing open fat paperbacks and feels like two sprained thumbs, and the latter is akin to tennis elbow from holding up books that way six pounds or more (I seem to be drawn to 500-1,000 page tomes). The physical hazards of being an avid reader have me at least pondering e-readers and wondering if they eliminate these injuries.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Best Laid Plans....
Well, we're going to have to wait a bit for the show and tell (with pictures!) of my colored index card plotting because . . . wait for it . . . my frackin' iMac crashed again. Only this time it took the entire hard drive with it. I swear, I have the worst mac luck ever. I know they are supposed to have better no-fail rates than PCs, but I've sure not found that to be the case. My first iMac crashed and burned (literally) three times, and this newest one has crashed twice in less than a year. Maybe I have the wrong kind of electromagnetic field or something.
Anywhoo, I'm typing this blog post from one of my son's old computers, tucked away in a spare bedroom that is stifling (we are having 94 degree weather today my So Cal coastal community!?) and I am not even sure it can accommodate my camera's software for loading and organizing photos, so that will have to wait until I get my machine back from the shop.
Speaking of computers, I saw one of those tiny ones and boy, are they tiny. Not very usable, I think, so I guess I will shelve that idea.
In other news, I did get a lot of great work done this weekend, culling my Cast of Thousands down to only a dozen or so noble families. Again, I want to evoke the court politics and plotting of the time, not drown the reader in medieval French lineages. And I figure if I was drowning, the reader would absolutely be drowning.
I also got some great character work done using some questions from a plotting template method from Michael Hague, screenwriter extrodinaire. Which may seem somewhat contradcitory--to get character answers from looking at plotting structure--but since I think plot IS character, it actually makes a fair amount of sense. You can check out the template here, but I'll talk about the questions he discussed in his presentation in tomorrow's post. Well, if there is a post tomorrow. I also got a jury summons and may have to go in for jury duty. This might just be my lost week. Thank god it didn't happen while I was on deadline!
Anywhoo, I'm typing this blog post from one of my son's old computers, tucked away in a spare bedroom that is stifling (we are having 94 degree weather today my So Cal coastal community!?) and I am not even sure it can accommodate my camera's software for loading and organizing photos, so that will have to wait until I get my machine back from the shop.
Speaking of computers, I saw one of those tiny ones and boy, are they tiny. Not very usable, I think, so I guess I will shelve that idea.
In other news, I did get a lot of great work done this weekend, culling my Cast of Thousands down to only a dozen or so noble families. Again, I want to evoke the court politics and plotting of the time, not drown the reader in medieval French lineages. And I figure if I was drowning, the reader would absolutely be drowning.
I also got some great character work done using some questions from a plotting template method from Michael Hague, screenwriter extrodinaire. Which may seem somewhat contradcitory--to get character answers from looking at plotting structure--but since I think plot IS character, it actually makes a fair amount of sense. You can check out the template here, but I'll talk about the questions he discussed in his presentation in tomorrow's post. Well, if there is a post tomorrow. I also got a jury summons and may have to go in for jury duty. This might just be my lost week. Thank god it didn't happen while I was on deadline!
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