Taking Criticism

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by James Scott Bell
@jamesscottbell

Recently, I was the subject of a silent auction at a writers conference. The item was a detailed critique of the first 3k words of a novel. The winner sent me her pages and I spent considerable time with comments, suggested edits, and ways to improve.

You never know how someone will take constructive criticism. In my email, I told her not to get discouraged, and that early on in my career I had a brilliant editor who was known for his lengthy, single-spaced editorial letters. Whenever I got one of these I placed it, unopened, on the corner of my desk, and circled around it for a couple of days. I knew there would be ample work to do.

And every time I did the work I came out a better writer.

So when I didn’t hear back from this writer, I wondered if I’d discouraged her. I was about to write her a follow-up email when hers arrived. It read:

Thank you so much for your encouraging words. Your notes throughout provide me with so much I can improve upon. I will keep at it! I am so thankful for you. Thank you for your time spent!

I wrote back and told her, “Now that is the response of a true writer.” Because to my mind, a true writer wants to get better and sees criticism not as an assault but as an ally. That’s the value of a trusted editor or beta reader (see Brother Gilstrap’s recent post and my comment therein).

Of course, not all criticism is constructive; indeed, these days, it’s likely not criticism at all—it’s an eruption of bile directed at the author for some insular and dyspeptic reason. These diatribes are not offered to help a writer, but rather to make the writer feel like this:

I’ve never learned anything from a nasty, negative review. So I don’t read them. (I’ll read good reviews from time to time as a little shot in the arm, perhaps not the best metaphor these days, but there you are.)

Writers worth their salt (an idiom that goes back to how ancient Roman soldiers were paid) seek feedback on a manuscript. Not just to catch obvious errors, which we all make, but to spotlight areas for improvement. It’s up to the author what to do with those notes.

A few suggestions:

1. Find good feedbackers. We’ve talked about editors and beta readers a lot here at TKZ. How to find the good ones is a matter of research, trial, and culling. There are many experienced freelance editors out there. Check their background and client lists. I’ve heard good things about Reedsy. Try gathering some beta readers and cull the list to settle on one or two of the best. When you have those, shoot them some moolah for future critiques.

2. Be objective. To the extent you can, look at the suggestions as if you were a disinterested third party. Some things are worth fighting for, but not if you have a chip on your shoulder.

3. Listen, but remain true to your vision. There’s a famous story about Bennett Cerf, a legendary editor for Random House, suggesting edits to Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. She took a puff on her cigarette and said, “You would not cut zee Bible, would you?” No shrinking violet, Ayn. She won, and Atlas Shrugged still sells tens of thousands of copies a year. When you reach that level, maybe you can say the same thing. Until then, listen, assess, use what is helpful while, at the same time, keep the vision of your book intact.

You’re in this to write books not just for yourself, but in hopes of connecting with readers and turning those readers into fans. If you want to write just for yourself or, heaven forfend, let AI write for you, and throw stuff out there to see if anything sticks, well, it’s not illegal, just ill informed, ill fated, and will probably make most readers ill, too.

But if you want to keep getting better at your craft, form a plan to get helpful criticism. And ignore angry people with a shoe in their hand.

Agree or disagree? Have at it in the comments.

Progress and Practice

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Progress and practice are essential to both improving our writing and succeeding in the sense of completing work and putting it out into the world, be it as a submission to an agent or publisher, or an indie-published work. But how do you break down the elements of progress and measure it? How do you restart your practice of writing when you’ve stalled out?

Today’s Words of Wisdom has you covered with excerpts of posts by Clare Langley-Hawthorne, Debbie Burke and James Scott Bell. The original posts are of course date-linked at the bottom of their respective excerpts.

A few weeks ago I spotted an article in the New York Times entitled ‘Micro-Progress and the Magic of Just Getting Started’ (you can read it here) and realized it was tailor made for us writers (especially after I’d seen a number of posts on my writing groups about writers writers feeling overwhelmed about their projects).

The idea of ‘micro-progress’ is simple: For any task you have to complete, break it down to the smallest possible units of progress and attack them one at a time.

In many ways, it’s an obvious concept. But what caught my eye, was the fact that studies had shown that micro-progress (or establishing micro-goals) can actually trick the brain into increasing dopamine levels, providing satisfaction and happiness. Sounds like the perfect plan for anyone facing the daunting prospect of completing a novel:)

Online I was seeing posts from people who felt overwhelmed by revisions, who were despairing that their novel had run aground mid way through, or who were experiencing chronic writer’s block and desperate for advice. In all of these situations, focusing on ‘micro-progress’ seemed a useful place to start.

The concept of ‘micro-progress’ has also helped me. I currently have a number of projects out on submission and a couple of ones with my agent – so it was time to start a new WIP. I faced a dilemma though – I had the first 50 pages of a YA novel that I’ve been noodling over (actually driving myself insane over is probably more apt) and yet I was concerned it still wasn’t quite ‘there yet’. I struggled with whether I really knew what the book was about (despite a synopsis and outline, mind you). So I decided it was best to put it aside and start a completely new project – yet at the back of my mind I still couldn’t quite let the old project completely die. Enter ‘Micro-Progress’!

I decided to use the advice in the NYT article and tackle both projects but with a different mindset. For the brand new WIP I’d sit down and get started in the usual way. I have the synopsis and outline so it was time to face the blank page and get writing. I’d focus on this everyday except Friday – when I’d allow myself to tackle the old project but with a ‘micro-progress’ approach. I’d just take it scene by scene in Scrivener and see what happened – without placing too much pressure on myself. The regular WIP could progress in the usual fashion – but for this one I’d be happy setting smaller, more manageable goals to see how it would all come together. In this way a ‘micro-progress’ mindset helped overcome my confidence issues as well my concerns about abandoning the project all together.

A ‘micro-progress’ mindset could be helpful in almost all our writing as it focuses on the smaller more manageable steps that can be taken. The evidence also seems to demonstrate that this approach can stimulate our brains, enabling us to continue, progress and feel a sense of achievement and satisfaction – rather than becoming overwhelmed by the totality of the task ahead. But I guess the key question is – TKZers – what do you think about ‘micro-progress’?

Clare Langley-Hawthorne—February 26, 2018

By now, you’re wondering if I’ll ever get to the point of this post.

This is it.

Writing has never been a profession that delivers immediate gratification.

Measuring one’s writing progress is tough to quantify. In a regular job, a paycheck every week or two proves the worker’s worth and skills.

In writing, months and years may go by without a “paycheck.”

Even when your career reaches a point where you receive advances and royalties, the income probably won’t support you in the style you’d like to become accustomed to.

If you can’t measure your writing progress in a tangible monetary way, how do you know if you’re improving?

Your best yardstick is yourself.

Look back at what you wrote six months ago, a year, five years, or 20 years ago. Have your skills improved? Have you learned new craft techniques?

Did a class or workshop change the way you create characters, or handle action scenes, or infuse emotion into your stories? Has your pacing improved? Did you head-hop in the past but now you’ve finally mastered point of view (POV)?

Do readers and other writers notice improvement in your work?

Do you waste less time floundering around trying to find a story? Do you have more focus and better concentration when you write? Do you feel more confident about showing your writing to others?

Do you have goals? Have you achieved some of them? Then do you set higher goals?

Writing is a ladder without end. No one knows everything about writing. We all need to work continuously to improve our craft, master more complicated skills, and produce more words.

Debbie Burke—May 23, 2023

My keyboard was getting cold. So I had to go back and re-establish some disciplines. Here they are:

  1. Plan the next day’s writing the night before

At night, when I’m always too spent to produce more, I take just a few minutes to think about what I’ll write tomorrow. Hemingway famously said he’d leave off writing midsentence, so he could take off running the next day.

So I think about the scene I’m going to write next. I give it some structure brainstorming: Objective, Obstacles, Outcome.

Then I’ll write one sentence. Just one. And that’s where I start when morning comes. Which brings me to tip #2:

  1. Sleep

We all know that good, restorative sleep makes a big difference in our daily lives. We also know sleep problems are rife, especially in the anxiety-inducing world we live in.

That’s why there’s a boom in sleep products. The most common ingredient is melatonin. I like to manage my melatonin naturally. I try to get ten to fifteen minutes of sunlight between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. (good for Vitamin D, too). I also try to keep off the blue light of phone and computer and TV screens before bed. If I do some computer or watch some TV, I wear yellow-tint glasses. This renders color movies or shows a bit, well, yellowish. But I can live—and sleep—with that.

Now here’s JSB’s secret tip for a good night’s sleep: Quercetin. I pop an 800mg tab half an hour before I hit the pillow. I no longer wake up in the middle of the night.

And here is an added benefit: Quercetin is an ionophore. That means it’s a molecule that helps your cells absorb good things, like zinc. Another ionophore is hydroxychloroquine. Remember the suppression of HCQ at the beginning of Covid? Don’t get me started on the political and medical malpractice of that. HCQ, like quercetien, helps the cells absorb zinc which, along with D, is the Praetorian Guard of the immune system.

Thus the adage “An apple a day keeps the doctor away.” Apples are a great source of quercetin. That’s why all those apple-egg-meat eating farmers never got sick.

  1. Write first thing in the morning

Well, second thing. First thing is make the coffee. Mrs. B and I spend devotional time together, so I get up earlier and knock out a Nifty 250 (or 350 if I’m going good) before she joins me in the living room. I sometimes do this on my laptop. I used to do it on my beloved AlphaSmart. But Alphie is showing his age lately, so I invested in a very cool Macally wireless keyboard that has a slot for your phone or tablet. I write my words in Google Docs.

Getting a 250 or 350 jump on the day makes hitting the quota so much easier.

I’ll sometimes do some morning pages to get the engine started. This often results in a new idea for a story. [Note: I don’t count morning pages in my quota, unless I end up using some of them in a project.]

James Scott Bell—October 15, 2023

***

  1. Have you tried breaking down a task into the smallest possible unit as Clare described? Any advice to add on doing so?
  2. How do you measure your progress as a writer?
  3. If you’ve ever stopped writing or been stalled out, how have you restarted your practice of writing?

Reader Friday-Name That Tune!

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Fridays are fun around here at TKZ. We talk about writing, marketing tips and tricks—but wait! Yes, we can cover those writing topics and more on Fridays, but let’s have a bit of fun.

Today we’re going to indulge in some nostalgia.

What was your favorite music when you were a teenager? Tell us the genre and the artist(s) you couldn’t get enough of. Did your parents approve, or did you have to be an undercover listener? Has your choice of tunes changed now that you’re a *grown-up*?

I’ll start:  My parents introduced me to Andy Williams, Frank Sinatra, The Ames Brothers and the like. My friends introduced me to Creedence, the Monkees, and the Eagles—for covert listening, of course.

I liked all of it then . . . but now? I’d listen to that second group of artists every day and twice on Sundays.

Okay, your turn–what’s your fave music from back in the day? And how about your characters–are they music lovers? What tunes do they gravitate to?

And thanks for playing Name That Tune!

 

 

The First Mystery Story

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Reni, Guido; Susanna and the Elders; Glynn Vivian Art Gallery; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/susanna-and-the-elders-227206

By Elaine Viets

Sex, violence, perjury, crooked judges, blackmail – and police procedural techniques still used today. All these are in the first detective story.

So which one is it?

Some say the first detective story was Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” way back in 1841. Wilkie Collins generally gets credit for the first detective novel, “The Moonstone,” in 1868. And others claim Metta Victoria Fuller wrote the first American detective novel, “The Dead Letter,” in 1866. After that, scholars slug it out until we get to the undisputed champion, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and his detective, Sherlock Holmes, in 1887.

But I agree with M.T. Logan that the first detective story was published several thousand years earlier. It’s the story of Susanna and the Elders. If you’re Catholic or Greek Orthodox, Susannah is in the Book of Daniel and is considered divinely inspired. For Protestants and many other religions, the story is part of the Apocrypha, the books that didn’t quite make the cut.

Detail from Susanna and Elders by Tintoretto

Susanna was a young married Jewish woman, living in Babylon. She was God-fearing and good-looking. Susanna liked to walk in her husband’s orchard, and two old pervs – excuse me, two highly respected judges – liked to watch. They fell madly in lust with her, and conspired “when they might find her alone,” as the Good Book says. The old creeps lucked out.

On a hot day, Susanna decided to take a bath in the orchard. The two old men hid themselves and watched as she told her maids, “Bring me oil, and washing balls, and shut the doors of the orchard, that I may wash me.” As soon as the maids brought the things for Susanna’s bath, they shut the doors and left. Nobody knew that the two old degenerates were lurking in the orchard.

Once the doors were shut, the horny old coots cornered Susanna, and said she’d better have sex with them, or they would lie and say “that a young man was with thee, and therefore thou didst send away thy maids.”

Susanna realized she was damned if she did and damned if she didn’t, but she’d be damned if she’d have sex with those two creeps. “It is better for me to fall into your hands without doing it, then to sin in the sight of the Lord,” she said.

Susanna and Elders by Anthony van Dyck

Susanna screamed and the old blackmailers screamed, and there was a trial. The judges testified falsely against Susanna, claiming she was with a young stud under a tree, and they’d tried to stop this terrible sin of adultery. The young man got away, but the judges caught Susanna. “The multitude believed them, as being the elders, and the judges of the people, they condemned her to death.”
This was long before #MeToo, and while adultery was a sin for both sexes, it was a bigger sin for women. The patriarchs didn’t want free-range women begetting someone’s child.
Susanna called out to God, “I have done none of these things, which these men have maliciously forged against me.”
In stepped young Daniel, who said, “I am clear of the blood of this woman.”
He lectured the crowd for condemning Susanna “without examination or knowledge of the truth.”
He then conducted his investigation the way all good modern police officers do. He separated the two judges.
He asked the first judge under what tree did he see Susanna doing the wild thing with the young hunk. The judge said, “under a mastic tree.” That tree is where chewing gum comes from.
The second judge claimed Susanna did the deed under a holm tree, a type of oak.

Holm tree

The two lying judges had convicted themselves “by their own mouth.” They were killed.
So there you have it – a detective story with a victim, two villains, and a hero who knew how to search for the truth.

Note: Today’s blog is a repeat. I’ll stop by when I can. — Elaine

The Star Does All The Good Stuff

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By John Gilstrap

About 25 years ago (and at least that many books ago), I was in Hollywood at the Warner Brothers lot, writing a script for a film called Young Men And Fire, which I foolishly thought would be an adaptation of the wonderful Norman McLean book of the same name, but turned out to be something different.

My boss at the time was Len Amato, then a producer for Baltimore/Spring Creek Pictures, and more recently president of HBO Films. Len was a great guy to work for–very patient and a solid mentor to young and inexperienced screenwriters. I remember turning in a scene I’d written in the script that had some really cool, innovative stuff going on. If I recall properly, it was about secondary characters doing the cool stuff to rescue the lead character, who would be listed as the “star” of the picture. Len read it, said some complimentary things, then smacked me with one of the great lightbulb moments of my writing career:

“John, remember that the star gets to do all the cool stuff.”

Extrapolating out, this means that the star (main character) should own every scene in which he or she is present. Because they’re the ones driving the story, they should also be the ones driving their scenes.

I was reminded of Len Amato’s mentorship a week or so ago, when my editor at Kensington, the wonderful Michaela Hamilton, sent me her editorial letter on the manuscript for Scorched Earth, the next Jonathan Grave thriller, due out next spring. In it, I presented scenes where the bad guys were setting up their bad guy stuff in active ways, while Jonathan and his team spent most of the first third of the book researching databases and connecting dots. They really don’t do much of anything. If Scorched Earth were a mystery, then the quiet sleuthing would be fine.

But my fans are not looking for a mystery from me. They’re looking for a thriller, and in thrillers, the main character (the star) makes things happen. Plots points are revealed kinetically, the results of the star’s actions.

I’d forgotten Len Amato’s Dictum.

And heres’ the thing: While I was and still am very proud of the story, I knew something was wrong with it. I told my wife that the story’s heartbeat didn’t seem quite right. For the life of me, though, I couldn’t see what was wrong.

But Michaela Hamilton did. This is the wonder of a long relationship with a fantastic editor. Once she showed my how in the first act, Jonathan processes and acts on information that is provided to him, rather than hunting down and finding the information himself.

Well, crap. I don’t mean to sound un-humble, but it’s been decades since I’ve been compelled to a massive rewrite of a manuscript because of editorial input. More than a few of my books have required no change at all beyond copy edits.

At their face, the changes I’m making affect only the first act. In reality, because my plots are tightly woven and fairly intricate, there’s no such thing as a first act change that doesn’t have impact on some scene or line of dialogue later in the book.

It’s my own fault. I’ve been wildly distracted by various life events in the past 12 months, and in retrospect, I tried to get away with a shortcut that didn’t work. I didn’t do it intentionally, but if I’d been 100% mentally in the game, I’d be on to my next project by now, not causing stress for myself and the entire production team by stopping forward progress and working backwards to fix a problem that never should have existed.

I think it’s important to understand that every observation made by my editor–and the changes they triggered–were all presented as merely suggestions. They were willing to publish the book exactly as I had written it, but “maybe it would be better if . . .”

There’s no maybe about it. I’ve given myself two weeks to make the changes.

The Semi-Colon Is Dead;
Long Live The Dash?

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By PJ Parrish

Aldus Manutius - Wikipedia

See this guy at left? The one that looks like the kind of guy who would correct the grammar in your Facebook “I luv wiener dogs” post?

This is Aldus Manutius. He was an Italian printer who founded the Aldine Press, and he devoted most of his life to publishing rare texts. His flaming desire to preserve Greek manuscripts marked him as a great innovator of his age. He also introduced a small, portable book format, which revolutionized personal reading habits and probably led to the modern paperback. So I guess I should thank him for that since that’s where my humble beginnings in this business lie.

He also is credited as the father of the semicolon. For which I can’t forgive him.

If you’ve read my posts here on the beauty of apt punctuation, you know how passionate I can be about some things. I really dislike exclamation marks, for instance. I’ll excuse one or two in really hot action scenes, like “You’re gonna die really ugly, Butkiss!” Or in moments of intense emotion in a Stephen King novel, like “Don’t go in the basement!”  But usually, I side with F. Scott Fitzgerald who famously said using exclamation marks is “like laughing at your own joke.”

Unnecessary Apostrophes

And don’t get me going on the rampant misuse of the humble apostrophe. Shaw called them “uncouth bacilli,” so his writings are peppered with stuff like didnt, wont and aint. Today, most people can’t or won’t be bothered to learn how to punctuate with the apostrophe. It’s like, banana’s out there! (sic)

But then there’s the semicolon. I was an English major, so I know in my brain what the thing is supposed to do: create a pause between two related independent clauses. As in: My dog Archie, sleeping at my side, just passed gas; he ran out of the room faster than I could so I got the blame when the husband came in. But in my heart, I hate them. And I really hate them in novels.

Thankfully, the semicolon is on the wane. According to a study from the Babbel, the online language-learning platform: “Semicolon usage in British English books has fallen by nearly 50% in the past two decades.”

But The Thing has been dying a slow death for a long time now. A study of semicolon use in U.S. publishing from 1920 to 2019 noted a dramatic slide. Newspapers, magazines, and fiction and nonfiction books all soured on the semicolon, though nonfiction after 2000 did see an uptick from the depths.

Uptick…probably had something to do with lawyers.

The Babbel study set off a predictably anal reaction in the British press. The Independent lamented: “Our best punctuation mark is dying out; people need to learn how to use it.” The Financial Times whined: “Semicolons bring the drama; that’s why I love them.” Gawd, loosen your bun, Wilma. Only The Spectator had the sense to write a wry obit: “The semicolon had its moment; that moment is over.”

I’m not alone in my distaste for The Things. George Orwell called them “an uncessary stop.” Cormac McCarthy called its useage “Idiocy.” Even Edgar Allen Poe called for the dash to replace it. (Yeah! Go, Eddie!)

Here’s a passage from Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway. Find the semicolons and then you tell me if they work.

Having lived in Westminster—how many years now? Over twenty—one feels even in the midst of traffic, or waking at night, Clarissa was positive, a particular hush, or solemnity; an indescribable pause; a suspense (but that might be her heart, affected, they said, by influenza) before Big Ben strikes. There! Out it boomed. First a warning, musical; then the hour, irrevocable.

It’s argued that the semicolon between the “warning, musical” and “the hour, irrevocable” achieves an “indescribable pause,” as Woolf puts it. Would a full stop have worked better? Would periods (the likely choice of modern writers) been less fussy? And the ultimate question: Who am I to quibble with Virginia Woolf?

I dunno. To me, a semicolon in fiction just never feels right. It feels pretentious and archaic. To you, or other writers, it can feel…useful, even lending a certain gravitas. Martin Luther King used them with magnificent ease. Ditto Twain, Chandler, Rushdie.

The best quote I found about this comes from Abraham Lincoln, no less. He wrote, in 1864:

“I have a great respect for the semi-colon; it’s a very useful little chap.” But then he adds the kicker: “With educated people, I suppose, punctuation is a matter of rule; with me it is a matter of feeling.”

Indeed. Fiction is about finding your way around the placement of words, sentences and phrases. It is all about feeling your way, feeling period. If it weren’t, you and I would be writing legal briefs. So, okay….go forth, crime dogs, and semicolonize. If it feels good, do it. I’ll just look the other way.

 

The Backwards Law for Writers

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I stumbled across the subject of The Backwards Law by accident—a happy accident that led me to The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck. Excellent book that I devoured in two sittings.

The Backwards Law proposes the more we pursue something, the less satisfied we become. For writers, the constant pursuit of “more” causes us to feel horrible about where we are and what we’ve achieved. The harder we try, the less likely we are to succeed.

On the surface, it seems like the opposite of perseverance, doesn’t it? But it’s not. The Backwards Law goes much deeper than that.

Think of it this way:

  • Trying too hard to be creative or write something brilliant often leads to writer’s block, self-doubt, and a feeling of being disconnected from the work.
  • Only focusing on the end result—recognition, success, publication—causes unnecessary anxiety and pressure.
  • The fear of making mistakes or writing poorly will paralyze a writer and often will lead to abandoning the WIP.

“Wanting a positive experience is a negative experience; accepting a negative experience is a positive experience.” Mark Manson – The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck.

Alan Watts, the philosopher who coined the phrase, describes The Backwards Law as being in a lake. If you relax and put your head back, you’ll float. But the more you struggle and flail to try to stay afloat, the more you will sink.

Often our search for “more” has the opposite effect. It shines a spotlight on what we lack.

Life Examples

  • The more we cling to a loved one, the more they will feel suffocated and in need of space.
  • The more we obsess about accumulating money, the more poor and unworthy we will feel.
  • The more we pursue trying to feel happier all the time, the more we will reinforce this idea that we are fundamentally lacking and irreparable.

Do you even know what you want?

Sure, selling millions of copies of your book sounds great, but is that why you wrote it? Or maybe, you can’t define what you’re chasing. You just want more.

“Two reasons that you don’t really know what you want. Number one: you have it. Number two: you don’t know yourself, because you never can. The Godhead is never an object of its own knowledge, just as a knife doesn’t cut itself, fire doesn’t burn itself, light doesn’t illuminate itself.” ~ Alan Watts

In The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson tells the story of a talented young guitarist who was kicked out of his band in 1983, after they had just been signed by a record label. No warning. No reason given. No discussion. They woke him up and handed him a bus ticket.

After much self-pity on the ride home to LA, the guitarist vowed to start a new group that would be so successful, his old band would seethe with jealously. And so, with only that thought in mind, he worked tirelessly to find the best musicians. He wrote dozens of songs. Practiced day and night. Revenge became his muse.

Within two years, a record label signed his new band. One year later, their first record went gold. The guitarist’s name? Dave Mustaine, lead guitarist in the heavy metal band Megadeath, which went on to sell over 25 million albums and tour the world many times. Mustaine is considered one of the most influential musicians in the history of heavy metal music.

Sounds like the story has a happy ending, right?

Not quite.

The band who kicked him out was Metallica, which has sold over 180 million albums worldwide and is considered by many to be one of the greatest rock bands of all time.

Because of Metallica’s fame, Mustaine considered himself a failure. Despite all he’d accomplished, in his mind, he would always be the guy who got kicked out of Metallica and nothing more. Whether he realized it or not, Mustaine used Metallica’s success and popularity as his life-defining measuring stick. Even after all of Megadeath’s success, he could never be happy, because he based his self-worth and music career on something he had no control over.

This story perfectly illustrates The Backwards Law in action.

Accept imperfection and you’ll feel perfect. Accept loneliness and you’ll feel content alone. Accepting a negative experience is a positive experience. But fighting a negative experience means you’ll suffer twice.

  • When we stop trying to be happy, we’ll be happy because there’s nothing we need beyond what is.
  • When we stop trying to be rich or massively successful, we’ll live in abundance because we’re content with what we have and anything on top of that is a bonus.

Thus, the only way to have what we want is not to want it. And that’s what The Backwards Law teaches us.

Being aware of the workings of The Backwards Law doesn’t mean that we should never set goals, never have ambitions, or never chase our dreams. Rather, The Backwards Law teaches us not to be fooled by the idea that the pursuit of happiness (whatever that looks like to you) leads to happiness. When in fact, the opposite is true. And with that knowledge, we’re able to enter the blissful state of enjoying the journey.

“The mystery of life is not a problem to be solved but a reality to be experienced.” ~ Alan Watts

How do we get what we want without trying?

Depends on what we want. If we strive to write the best damn book we can, the following tips should help.

Mindful Writing: Practice mindfulness while writing. It’ll help you become more aware of your thoughts and feelings without judgment, allowing you to be more present in the moment.

Step Away: It’s okay to step away from the WIP to clear your head. Go for a walk. Take a shower. Read a book. Exercise. I do this all the time when I’m working out a plot issue. Nine times out of ten, the answer reveals itself as soon as I stop thinking about it.

Accept Imperfection: Give yourself permission to make mistakes in early drafts. It’ll allow you to experiment and explore different ideas without fear.

Stay Present: Enjoy the journey of bringing your idea to life. Have fun with your characters. Revel in that perfect sentence or paragraph you wrote yesterday, then continue on.

The Backwards Law for writers is about shifting from a place of striving and pressure to a place of flow and acceptance. 

By letting go of the need to control the outcome and embrace the process, we’ll unlock creativity and produce more authentic and fulfilling work.

Have you heard of The Backwards Law? It’s as true for writing as it is for life.

In Search of the Penny Drop

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by James Scott Bell
@jamesscottbell

Mutoscope at Disneyland

In the good old days (you know, before virtual reality, smartphones, TikTok, and even TV and radio) the kids loved to go to penny arcades. So named because almost everything in them cost a penny, they provided brief respite and entertainment from the drudgery of life. 

For that one copper coin you could play games—like the claw-grabbing-a-toy game—or get your fortune told. 

Most popular were Kinetoscopes and Mutoscopes. The former were short silent films, the latter a series of flipping photographs that told a short story. When you first looked into these machines you saw only one image. When your penny dropped you turned a crank and the “show” started. 

Which is where we get the concept of the “penny drop” in mystery fiction. It is that moment where something happens that triggers or points to the final solution. It’s that last bit that allows the sleuth to connect the dots. 

We see it in all classic mysteries, from Holmes to Poirot, Father Brown to Miss Marple, Columbo to Jessica Fletcher.

In my own thrillers, there is usually a mystery at the heart of things. Which means I need that penny drop. It is often the last thing I find. In my personal Scrivener template, I have a penultimate card labeled “Penny Drop” where I scribble notes as I go along. I’ll include memos sent by the Boys in the Basement when I first wake up.

When you nail the penny drop, it’s one of the most satisfying moments of the whole process.

Here is a description of the penny drop from Tom Sawyer’s excellent Fiction Writing Demystified (Note: Sawyer was showrunner for Murder, She Wrote.)

[T]he penny drops for the sleuth at the instant he or she hears, sees, tastes, smells touches or otherwise experiences something which—when combined (usually mentally) with a fact or facts gleaned earlier—tells the detective that till now, everyone in the show has been following false leads. Suddenly, the protagonist has it FIGURED OUT—if not all of it, most of it—and is off and running in the direction of the “Gotcha” scene, leaving the other characters, and the viewers, mystified as to what has been put together, how it has been accomplished, and where he or she plans to go with it.

And here is the #1 most important rule (there, I said it) of all:

[I]t’s important, even if the  penny drop is prompted for the protagonist by some lucky accident or coincidence, that most of the other elements of the equation are earned—the result of his or her doing.

Put that down on a Sticky Note and paste it where you can see it, or better yet burn it into your writer’s memory bank.

Now, mystery writers are all over the map when it comes to the who done it part. Some like to write a discovery draft to find out. Others, me included, like to start with the who and the motive, giving me a “shadow story” that helps create the plot. 

Whatever your approach, you’re going to need the right penny drop. How to find it?

1. Don’t settle on the first thing that comes to mind. It may be the right solution, but allow others to bubble up and audition. In my Romeo WIP, I seriously considered at least six possible drops. I woke up one morning with a seventh in my mind, and that’s the one I chose.

2. Create a visual of all the main characters and look at them from time to time. I use two things for this: A Scapple (a Scrivener app that lets you create mind maps and connection); and a Scrivener corkboard with character photos (since you’re not publishing these, you can use Google images, which is my preferred method. It’s no secret many writers create their own images with AI).

3. Consider all the senses. As Sawyer points out, not every penny drop is visual. There’s sound (see Chesterton’s Father Brown story “The Queer Feet”), smell, taste, touch. Agatha Christie used every one of these at one time or another. 

Of course, not every book has a traditional mystery involved. But I contend page-turning fiction always has mystery elements that keep the reader wondering, Why is this happening? What’s going to happen next? How can the character possibly survive (physically, psychologically, or professionally)?

Instead of solving a murder, you can use the penny drop as a “big reveal” that explains all the happenings to the main character (as in Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca) or to the readers themselves (Gone Girl).

It has been announced that the U.S. Mint will soon stop making pennies. I’ll miss them. I used to spend mine on Bazooka bubble gum, with its comics featuring Bazooka Joe. Will it now be a nickel for your thoughts? There’s inflation for you.

Here at TKZ, your thoughts are free, so go ahead and share them!

Child Psych

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One of my oldest friends, Steve Knagg (a former newspaper columnist), is a guitar-picking son of a gun. In the late 1980s and 90s, he and I traveled across the country to our state and national conferences and events, and played in hospitality rooms to mostly entertain ourselves, and hopefully, others.

That was back in the days when Southwest Arlines flew with only a few dozen passengers, even at peak times. Once, he and I boarded with our guitars and found there were only six other seats filled. We’d been in the bar earlier, so we went to the back, and after the plane took off, took out our guitars and started playing.

The flight attendant came by. “Y’all can’t be doing that. You’re disturbing the other passengers.”

I glanced down the aisle. “We’re providing entertainment.”

“I’d like for you to provide silence.”

Steve spoke up. “We’ll quit playing if you’ll give us free drinks.”

She came back with a dozen bottles of Wild Turkey and we put away our instruments. I think that was the most we were ever paid for our performances.

I haven’t played in over twenty-five years, but he still picks a little, and a couple of weeks ago, we started talking about how we learned. My limited abilities came from lessons when I was in junior high school. To a kid who loved The Monkees, the idea of being a famous musician was appealing, but after learning the basic chords, I abandoned the classes because I didn’t like to practice.

After that, I tinkered with my old Stella, and like other kids of our era, my friends and I formed a garage band that was…terrible. We had three songs, and I’m sure they were like fingernails on a blackboard to anyone over eighteen. One of my female cousins asked us to play at her fifteenth birthday, and we went through our repertoire five times before my uncle came into the living room, unplugged the microphone, and took it with him.

We weren’t surprised. The year before, we played In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida on the record player so many times he took the LP off the spindle, opened the door, and flung it like a frisbee into the yard. He was very clear on what he liked, or disliked.

Steve, on the other hand. learned to play in a different way. One day his dad bought a cheap guitar and without saying a word to his three sons, leaned it up in the corner of the living room where it gathered dust for a year or two. Then one day, after listening to Bob Dylan albums, Steve wiped the dust off and asked a friend to teach him some chords.

He showed considerable aptitude and eventually taught his younger brother to play. That brother became an engineer at Skunkworks, but could have made a career out of playing in professional bands. He’s one of the best pickers I’ve ever known.

I asked Steve once what he would have done if his dad came in with the guitar and said, “Here, learn to play this.”

“I wouldn’t have done it.”

Typical kid reaction, and I should have learned from it, since I took child psychology classes as part of my degree in education. Which leads me to today’s post. Our oldest daughter, Chelsea (AKA the Redhead in my newspaper columns), is now a high school librarian and suffers the same stubbornness. If I tell her to read a book that caught my attention, she won’t do it. She loves me, but there’s some unconscious quirk that kicks in and she can’t help but dig in her heels.

Her twelve-year-old daughter, Riley, inherited the same stubbornness, but I didn’t know it until a couple of weeks ago when the Bride and I took the whole crew down to the Texas coast. Riley suffers from the same affliction I’ve carried all my life, the need to have books close by. It makes my heart happy to see she brings a backpack full of books everywhere she goes.

Interestingly, she prefers not to read on electronic devices, stating that she likes the feel and smell of books.

Ahhhhh.

Now that she’s graduated to chapter books, I really want her to read one that I discovered when I was in the seventh grade. Let’s pause here to understand The Spooky Thing was hysterical to a boy in 1967. William O. Steele was a favorite back then, and I have most of those books on my nostalgia shelf. Sorry about the blurry image, but it was the best I could find online.

So I made the mistake of telling Riley I wanted her to read the book, and described the plot and how funny I thought it was. The Redhead cut her eyes at me and gave her head a small warning shake. It was too late. The sixth-grader shut me down and left the untouched book in the kitchen table.

When she went outside to swim with her brother and cousins, the Redhead caught me. “She won’t read it now. You should have just put it somewhere she could see it and maybe she’d pick it up.”

“This isn’t like when I was a kid and adults were the enemy. It’s a good book.”

“Never trust anyone over twenty-one. I know, Dad, you’ve told us those stories, but she’s like I am, and you’re her granddad. Remember what you say when you’re teaching a writing class. Show, don’t tell.”

“So what should I have done?”

“Put it somewhere where she’d see it and maybe she would have picked it up and thumbed through the pages. But it looks old, the protagonists are boys, and she likes girl heroes the most.” She shrugged. “And besides, I don’t think the cover would ever catch her interest.”

“I like the artwork.”

“Of course you do, but she reads graphic novels. She’s used to Calvin and Hobbs artwork, too, as well as Garfield. Now she reads things like School for Good and Evil, and Big Nate, and The Diary of a Wimpy Kid. Her new favorite is the Sherlock Society.”

“Never heard of those.”

“She just read The Thief of Always.”

“Okay, I see where the graphics are better, but she reads Clive Barker and not my own stuff?”

“She doesn’t know him, but she’ll get there with your books, because she sees them on the shelf behind your desk all the time. She asked me the other day if she would like The Rock Hole, but don’t suggest it. Let her find the books in her own time.”

I sighed, realizing I should have remembered Steve’s dad and the guitar, and left The Spooky Thing out with all the other kid books in what we call “the kid’s room,” and crossed my fingers.

So with that knowledge, my next project is to collect all my old childhood favorites and put them on a shelf where the grandcritters can see them. Maybe our future readers will find something of interest, and they can enjoy the books that led me to become a dedicated reader, and eventually a writer.

I should have listened harder in Child Psych 101, but then again, that was a long time ago and I didn’t want anyone, especially professions, to tell me what to do.

Reader Friday-Happy 2nd of July!

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And you thought this would be a 4th of July post!

Well, technically, that’s what it is. Here’s the deal . . .

Reading up on the history of our country’s birth pangs, I discovered that our independence was actually declared by those dusty forefathers of ours—not on the 4th—but on the 2nd of July. I probably should have learned this in middle school (and probably did), but somehow it was not saved in my internal hard drive, aka, brain.

We celebrate our independence on July 4th, the day the Declaration of Independence was adopted and signed.

 

All that to ask you TKZers:  What is your favorite part of celebrating the 4th (or 2nd) of July?