By John Gilstrap

I enjoy speaking to crowds. I like the immediacy of it, the direct interaction with the audience. I’ve previously shared tips and insights on how to deliver more memorable presentations (memorable in a good way–not the way we remember Uncle Henny’s drunken wedding toast). Today, I want to address a specific and mostly painful corner of every author’s public speaking life: the live reading.

Personally, I don’t get the attraction of readings. As a consumer of books, I’m much more interested in learning about the author and his process than I am in hearing him give what is almost always a bad performance of words that I’m going to read for myself anyway.

Said bad performances fall into two major categories for me:

1. The dreadful, droning monotone of an author who seems somehow surprised by the words he’s projecting to either his feet or his lap. If he’s been given a microphone, he’s holding it in the hand that is also holding the book, rendering it useless. If they’re only moderately bad, they’ll be done in 10 minutes, but because Murphy rules the world, the really bad ones will mumble on for 20-25 minutes. When they’re done, the always polite bookstore audience will reward them with a golf clap.
2. The pretentious literary author who took elocution lessons from Henry Higgins himself and over-enunciates every syllable of his golden prose that may or may not tell an actual story. When he’s done, his students in the audience will reward him with cheers and a standing O.

There’s a fundamental difference between delivering a speech vs. delivering a live reading.

When I deliver a speech or teach a workshop, I get to be myself. As the subject matter expert for the duration of the gig, I deliver my information my way. The only role I play is myself.

Live readings of fiction require a level of acting which I don’t possess. I feel silly raising my voice to sound like a woman or a child. Acting and writing are related yet entirely different skill sets. Given that this is the entertainment business, nothing makes an audience more uncomfortable than an uncomfortable performer.

When the game doesn’t suit you, cheat.

Remember Kobayashi Maru? In the Star Trek universe, Star Fleet cadets are faced with an unwinnable simulation called the Kobayashi Maru test, in which the cadet has to choose between risking near certain death to rescue the crew of a fuel ship, or leaving the fuel ship crew to die. Captain James T. Kirk made history by being the first cadet ever to solve the dilemma. He did it by changing the program. He cheated because he didn’t accept the inevitability of losing. I always admired that about him.

When I am left with no choice but to read from my book, I do not, in fact, read from my book. Instead, I read an original work that is closely based on my book. That means never reading from Page One. If I did that, people in the audience who already had a book in their hand would be confused as they tried to read along, and they’d miss everything I was presenting.

My specially prepared piece is engineered to be 5 minutes long, give or take ten seconds, and it will end with a cliff hanger. The piece will include within the text all the introductory information needed to know who the characters are, and I will have excised all elements of backstory, and all unnecessary foreshadowing. It’s a stand-alone performance piece that parallels the book’s events and hopefully whets the appetites of potential readers who are on the fence about buying the book.

Because it will be the same piece every time I read for that particular book, I’ll have it largely memorized, so I’ll be able to make eye contact with the audience. Even if I can’t do the acting, I’m still communicating.

What about you folks? What are your secrets to surviving the live read-aloud?

Don’t miss the launch of Burned Bridges–the first book in my brand new thriller series!

By PJ Parrish

I love stories that take place in frozen tundras. Alien James Arness unthawed and on a rampage in The Thing From Another World. Neanderthal Timothy Hutton unthawed and seeking his god in Iceman. The Green Bay Packers vanquishing The Dallas Cowboys in the 1967 championship Ice Bowl game.

Icy climes have been the setting for some top-notch fiction. Maybe it’s the innate drama of the setting, or more likely the potential therewithin to exploit ice as a metaphor. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1920 short story “The Ice Palace” is about a southern belle who becomes engaged to a man from the North. She almost freezes to death in an ice palace at a winter carnival, which leads her to rethink the engagement. But ice stands as a metaphor for the differing attitudes of Northerners and Southerners.

Some of my favorites: Smilla’s Sense of Snow with its chilling opening at a Greenland funeral. Jo Nesbo’s The Snowman. And The Hunting Party, where Lucy Foley uses an important trope of the mystery genre: People aren’t always what they appear to be below their frozen surfaces.

And I have to add in here one of the most startling opening lines in fiction, from Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude:

Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.

Full disclosure: Several of my own books take place in the frozen wilds of my native Michigan, including a scene where a body is found frozen in a lake and a terrifying trip across the “ice bridge” between Mackinac Island and the mainland that plunges my hero Louis Kincaid in the icy depths. So when this submission came across my desk, I was predisposed to like it. Thanks for offering it up, dear writer. I’ll be back in few minutes with my comments.

OUT ON THE ICE
a horror story

Hospital Corpsman Quinn Marie Chambers sat in the snow tractor her medical emergency kit in her lap, watching the other naval personnel and Marines investigating the beached whale. A small group of native Inuits looked on and seemed nervous.

There was little for Quinn to do as long as the other members of the Emergency Response Team didn’t get hurt somehow. She shivered at the cold.

The Inuit guide they called Mac sat in the back seat. He stirred, trying to get a better view of the goings on.

Quinn sipped warm coffee from her thermos cup and watched Chief Petty Officer Selsman trudge toward the big snow tractor. She finished her cup and poured another for him.

A nasty wind ladened with heavy snow and particles of ice blew into the cab when Selsman opened the driver-side door.

Quinn handed him the cup. “Beached whale?”

“Maybe.”

“What do you mean?

“Someone put nine bullets into its head.”

“Murder?’

“Maybe. Not sure if you can actually murder a whale.”

Mac said, “This will anger Qalupalik. This is an unnatural death. This will dirty her hair.” He shook his head in resignation.

“Who the hell is Qalupalik?’ Quinn asked.

“She is—”

“—a legend. A Greenland fairy tale. She is the monster in the deep protecting sea life. It teaches children not to screw up the ocean,” Selsman said.

Mac held his chin up and crossed his arms..

“Don’t worry about it. NCIS will be here soon to investigate to see if any of our personnel are involved. If not, it’s not our problem.”

In the back seat, Mac quietly chanted an Inuit prayer for the dead whale.

The two Marines on the team high stepped through the snow and wind toward the tractor. One held his hand wrapped in a handkerchief that had blood stains on it.

Quinn scooted over to let the marine have space to sit down. She tended to the wound. “How did this happen?’

“I was digging a bullet out of the whale’s head and my knife slipped.”

“Did you get the bullet?” Chief Selsman asked.

The marine smiled. “Damn right I did. And I bagged and tagged it as well.”

“Gotta love a good marine,” Selsman said.

“You should throw that bullet back into the ocean so Qalupalik can confront the killer with it,” Mac said.

“Can’t. It’s evidence,” Selsman said, starting up the tractor’s engine.

___________________________________

First off, I like the concept here. I mean, a dead whale isn’t as sexy, crime-wise, as a dead human being. But the fact the whale has nine bullet in its head is pretty cool, but more intriguing: Why do these Marines care? So I was definitely willing to read on. Good original set-up. Haven’t read this one before.

Some other good things: The writer handles dialogue well. It’s easy to follow, clean and I like the clipped no-nonsense tone of the Marines. It feels authentic.

But. Here’s the one thing I didn’t like: The protag’s detachment. The clue is right there in the second paragraph: “There was little for Quinn to do as long as the other members of the Emergency Response Team didn’t get hurt somehow.”

She is watching. She is waiting. She is doing nothing. All the interesting action is happening apart from her. Now, here’s the problem: She is not an active part of this investigation. Her job is medical only. As the writer puts it, she can do nothing but sit there unless someone gets hurt. So right from the get-go, she is positioned as a passive character by the circumstances.

How could this have been fixed? Not sure. And it’s not up to me to rethink or rewrite someone’s story. And it’s not terrible the way it is. I just wish there was a better portal for Quinn to enter the story, grab the spotlight — and our attention. So I am going to ask the writer to step back and look for a different angle, a different perspective on this scene unfolding.

It could be something as simple as changing the order of events. Does Quinn HAVE to be sitting in the snow tractor waiting? Wouldn’t she be more interesting if basic curiosity moved her to go out and see the whale for herself? Maybe, dear writer, you entered your story a beat too late. Maybe you need to back up and have her out there on the ice with the others during the initial discovery?

What would that do to improve things? You eliminate distance and detachment. If she’s OUT THERE you can give us a description of the whale and the scene (right now we have none). If she’s OUT THERE, she can see for herself the whale’s head. Instead of you saying she is watching (passive) the marines investigate “a beached whale” you can have her OUT THERE thinking (active) “This was no beached whale. Someone had shot the whale in head.”

A couple years ago, a pygmy whale washed up on a California beach with a bullet hole in its head. True story. I will spare you the gory photos here. (here’s the link) but it would have made for a very bloody dramatic scene for Quinn to witness and describe for readers.

Quinn needs to see it. Quinn needs to feel it. Quinn needs to tell us what she is experiencing. The last place you want her to be is inside a vehicle, drinking coffee and waiting.

Make her a hero. Even if there is not yet anything heroic for her to do. You need to set her up as a potential hero. Active, not reactive.

Then, as she views this massacred whale, a marine gets cut and she finally has something to do. Maybe this then can provide contrast to her feeling of impotency, of NOT being a part of the action.

Two other problems: First, where are we? There is one reference to “Greenland fairy tale.” Does this take place in Greenland? Where exactly? Because you’re dealing with Marines, I assume we’re near Pituffik Space Base (formerly Thule Air Base). This is way up north and operated by the U.S. Space Force. It is one of the most strategically important military sites in the world.  (Hence its presence in our political news). You must find a way to establish this. It can be handled easily through Quinn’s thoughts:

They were at least twenty miles from the air base at Pituffik. There wasn’t a village or a single hut anywhere near this isolated beach. They were 750 miles from the North Pole and the nearest settlement, Qaanaaq, was more than 70 miles away.

Second problem: You really need to spice up your description. Such a fabulous setting. Such a gruesome “murder.”  Yet you don’t give us any sense of what it looks like, feels like, SMELLS like. (dead mammal on beach!). Again, we’re taking about the difference between telling and showing. Don’t tell me it’s cold; show me. Don’t tell me the Inuits “are nervous.” Show me via their actions, through her consciousness.

This is a good first draft, dear writer. With a re-positioning of Quinn and some vivid description (use all the senses!), you’ll have a stronger opening. Some quick line edits follow. My comments in blue

Hospital Corpsman Don’t open with a title. Find a way to slip in later, more artfully what she does. Her ACTIONS should do it. Quinn Marie Chambers sat in the snow tractor her medical emergency kit in her lap, watching the other naval personnel and Marines investigating the beached whale. A small group of native Inuits looked on and seemed nervous. This opening graph is passive. Why not opening with a vivid description of the corpse? Then surprise us by telling us, through Quinn’s thoughts, that it’s not a MERE beached whale.

There was little for Quinn to do as long as the other members of the Emergency Response Team didn’t get hurt somehow. She shivered at the cold. A little lazy; what does this cold FEEL like? Where is she from? Maybe this godforsaken Greenland cold feels completely different than the cold in her native WHERE? Never miss a chance to compare and contrast and to slip in a nuggest of her backstory.

The Inuit guide they called Mac sat in the back seat. He stirred, trying to get a better view of the goings on. More distancing. 

Quinn sipped warm coffee from her thermos cup and watched Chief Petty Officer Selsman trudge toward the big snow tractor. She finished her cup and poured another for him.

A nasty wind ladened with heavy snow and particles of ice I know you can do better than this. “nasty wind” is cliche. Has she been in this climate/place long or is she new here? Frame it through her experience and consciousness blew into the cab when Selsman opened the driver-side door.

Quinn handed him the cup. “Beached whale?”

“Maybe.”

“What do you mean? Again, she is passive. And you’ve deprieved the reader of SEEING THE ACTUAL SCENE! 

“Someone put nine bullets into its head.”  Bingo! This is where things get interesting. This should be like the third paragraph of your opening.

“Murder?’

“Maybe. Not sure if you can actually murder a whale.”

Mac said, “This will anger Qalupalik,” Mac said. This will dirty her hair.” He shook his head in resignation.  Great line! Let it stand there alone for a second.

“Who the hell is Qalupalik?’ Quinn asked.

“She is—”

“—a legend, Selsman said.. A Greenland fairy tale. She is the monster in the deep protecting sea life. It? teaches children not to screw up the ocean,” Selsman said.  Love how you brought in the Inuit lore.

Mac held his chin up and crossed his arms.. Not sure what you’re going for here? Anger? 

“Don’t worry about it. NCIS will be here soon to investigate to see if any of our personnel are involved. If not, it’s not our problem.” Who’s talking? And you need to start dealing with Greenland officials or at least bringing it up. Whales are both hunted AND strictly protected in Greenland. They would be obligated to immediately notify proper authorities.  

In the back seat, Mac quietly chanted an Inuit prayer for the dead whale. Unless Quinn understands Inuit, she wouldn’t have a clue what he’s chanting about. STAY IN HER POV. She can think that he seems to be chanting or singing but she can’t really know, can she? That is YOU the writer talking, not the character. Again, stay in her POV: What does it SOUND like? Don’t tell me he’s chanting; describe the sound.

The two Marines on the team high stepped through the snow First mention, btw, that there’s snow on the ground and wind toward the tractor. One held his hand wrapped in a handkerchief that had blood stains on it.

Quinn scooted over to let the marine have space to sit down. She tended to the wound. “How did this happen?’

“I was digging a bullet out of the whale’s head and my knife slipped.”

“Did you get the bullet?” Chief Selsman asked.

The marine smiled. “Damn right I did. And I bagged and tagged it as well.”

“Gotta love a good marine,” Selsman said.

“You should throw that bullet back into the ocean so Qalupalik can confront the killer with it,” Mac said.

“Can’t. It’s evidence,” Selsman said, starting up the tractor’s engine.

So, dear writer….again, thanks for submitting. I enjoyed reading this and want Quinn to claim her spotlight. And make this setting a “character” in itself. Remember what Smilla said: The Inuits have a hundred words for snow. You need more words! Would love the see your next attempt. Keep writing!

My guest today has a fresh perspective on the use of profanity in fiction. Should we? Shouldn’t we? Is there a happy medium? Please help me welcome one of the most supportive writers I know.

If you’re unfamiliar with Joy York, she grew up in Alabama but has spent much of her adult life in the Midwest, currently living with her husband, Terry, and their golden doodle, Loki, in Indiana. Inspired by a family legacy of oral storytelling, she began creating stories and adventures for her son when he was growing up. With encouragement from family and friends, she began to write them down.

Her first book, The Bloody Shoe Affair: A daring and thrilling adventure with the jailer’s daughter, a YA mystery set in the rural south in 1968, was published in 2015. It became a series, The Jailer’s Daughter’s Mysteries, when The Moonshine Murders, Book 2, was released in March 2024. Genuine Deceit: A Suspense Novel was published on Amazon in May 2021. Protective Instinct: A Thriller (World Castle Publishing) was published in January 2024.

Welcome to TKZ, Joy!

Thanks, Sue!

Whether or not to use profanity in your writing has been a much-debated subject. In recent years expletives have become much more prevalent in writing to add realism. Some more conservative thoughts are that profanity of any kind detracts from the quality of your writing and should not be used under any circumstances. Others feel it reflects poorly on your credibility.

In an article published by Nathaniel Tower, Managing Editor of Bartley Snopes, Should Writers Use Profanity? he offers some excellent guidelines. He agrees that it can add realism but using too much can lessen the quality. Context is key. It can enhance real life situations portraying rough, gritty characters and emotionally charged scenes. He cites Wolf of Wall Street as an example of liberal use of profanity to depict the “high-stakes and fast-paced atmosphere.”

It is important to consider your purpose for the use of expletives. Is it for shock value or to show explosive emotions in a scene or is it to show your character’s edgy personality? Gratuitous use can take away from your story and put your readers off. You must consider your target audience.

Most other resources agree with Tower’s assessment of when not to use profanity. Children’s books, fantasy, and academic or informational writing. Other include religious writings.

Cole Salao wrote an article for TCK Publishing, How and When to Use Swearing. He believes you can learn a lot about your characters personality, background, and mood from their choice of words. To ignore the language that would portray a gritty character would make them sound unrealistic. My interpretation is if you have a scene with a drug dealer getting ripped off by a buyer, I doubt he would say, “Please sir, give me the money you owe me before I get really mad.”

Salao’s lists some appropriate uses:

• Emotional Impact
• Swear words can be used as an enhancer. It can depict emotions like anger, frustration, and extreme joy.

Establishing Voice or Tone

• It helps define your character and adds authenticity.

Connecting With Your Audience

It can make the reader feel like the writer is having an honest, unfiltered conversation with them. It can especially work well with personal essays, memoirs, or blogs. Don’t forget the audience you are trying to reach. Beware that some cultures and regions interpret words differently.

Salao’s Tips for usage

• Use profanity intentionally. Will it fit or ruin your purpose? I love this quote he uses to explain his meaning. “Think of it as a seasoning. A little enhances the flavor, but too much can overwhelm your readers and dilute your message.”
• Less is more.
• It should be natural to your character’s personality, though using it to show them breaking a rule or making an out of character statement can make an impact.
• Check your publication guidelines.
• Sometimes using subtext instead allows the reader to fill in the blanks.
• Swearing is usually only used in non-fiction if it is a personal story, quoting accuracy, or emphasizing a point.

Ultimately, whether you decide to use profanity is up to you. If done well, it can add authenticity, emotion, and impact to your word.

I have used profanity sparingly in my two adult thrillers. In one book, I felt it was natural to the characters and situations to show heightened emotions in a scenes. In the other, it was to show contrast in personalities between characters. I received a review challenging me to not use profanity in my future books, but they gave me a very good review. Another gave me a good review but warned others in the text that there was some language. I suppose I will never know if anyone put my books down when they read the first swear word.

Have you used profanity in your books, or do you steer clear?

When self-absorbed, international bestselling author Sebastian Bartoli refuses to write the biography of the infamous, mob-connected Maximillian Fontana, the consequences turn deadly.

Check it out on Amazon.

Connect with Joy:

Website: https://www.joyyork.com

OnX @joyyorkauthor

BlueSky @JoyYorkAuthor.bsky.social

Facebook: Joy York Author

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LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/joy-york-5050aa11

I’ve written a few short stories. A couple were included in small anthologies, and in creating them, I realized they required a different technique.

I recently finished one that will be included in the Rough Country anthology I’m editing for Roand and Weatherford publishing. After I wrapped up Where the Road Forks, I remembered talking to Joe Lansdale about that idea and others a few years ago.

Joe is the accomplished and successful author of the Hap and Leonard books that eventually became a television series. Talking over sushi in Nacogdoches, Texas, I asked him about short fiction.

“I really don’t have that many ideas for short stories.”

“You’re surrounded by them.” He waved his chopsticks in the air, and it wouldn’t have surprised me if he’d snapped a fly from the air like Mr. Miagi. The slender bamboo utensils seemed to fit his hand, because Joe is an International Martial Arts Hall of Famer and even created his own style of fighting. Those experiences often show up in his work. “I can prove it. Tell me something that happened when you were a kid.”

I thought about it as a chunk of wasabi burned its way through my sinuses, making my eyes water. The shock that went through my frontal lobes gave me time to think. When I could breathe, I told him of something that happened to my older cousins way back in the late 1950s.

Sporting flattops and one slicked-back duck tail haircut, they were three of the coolest and toughest guys in their little rural community, riding motorcycles and rolling cigarettes in their T shirt sleeves. When they heard Elvis was coming to town, Tom announced to the others they were going to meet the famous singer.

Dick and Harry allowed it was something to do, and they rode their Indians to the Grand Theater where the future king of rock and roll was waiting to go on upstairs in the “green” room at the top of a second floor exterior fire escape.

The boys parked their bikes in a nearby alley and came up to the theater opposite the bright entrance. Stomping up the metal steps in their square-toed boots as if they had backstage passes, they were met at the top of the stairs by the Memphis Mafia who heard them coming up.

One of Elvis’ buddies told them they weren’t welcome.

Harry said they didn’t care and intended to say howdy to Elvis, and they tried to push past the obstacles between them and their hero.

As Tom told me. “We thought we were tough, but those boys were tougher and more experienced. They handed us our asses, and threw us back down the stairs. When we rolled to the bottom, and we dusted off, got up, and went home.”

Joe laughed and took a sip of iced tea. “There’s your short story.”

I came home thinking about it, but haven’t yet written it down. But it’s there, perking along until the day I write the first sentence, “The boys finished their Schlitz beers and decided they were going to meet Elvis Presley, come hell or high water,” or something like that.

Those stories come easier than I expected. Maybe it’s because I write mini-stories every week for my newspaper columns in The Paris News, Country World, and now for Saddlebag Disptatches magazine. They come to mind as a single sentence, and then I watched as my fingers tuype out 950 words in one sitting that will “go to press” the next day. They’re mini-short stories, a snippit of time or experience, in which I give readers a quick glimpse into the view from my own hill.

When we’re working on novels, authors create whole new fictional worlds and can revel in taking their time to describe these worlds and establish character backgrounds and settings. In a short story, we create a can of condensed soup in a sense that, if we wanted to, could sometimes expand into a novel.

I think of them as that tiny world inside a globe, those glass spheres containing a tiny piece of a mythical world. In this case, these miniature scenes don’t always have snow, unless it’s essential to the plot.

Essential to the plot. In short stories, every element, word, character, and bit of dialogue has to be informative, moving the story forward, and must relate to everything else. The logic of the narrative has to be short and concise.

To me, it’s like flipping through the pages of a novel and picking out the necessary bits and pieces to write a book report. A quick read of what could be more, but isn’t.

There’s no room for sweeping descriptions and extensive development. In my view, the author has to know the character’s entire backstory at the outset, and the setting’s history that’s revealed by bits of information dropped in a sentence or two, or as action dialogue tags.

Readers must be swept into these juicy stories with the right words, phrases, and pacing. I suppose it’s like satisfying our need for immediate satisfaction these days. In other words you have about 6,000 words to set up the story arc, very short Acts 1 and 2, before that last couple of pages in which the bombshell drops. In fact, some authors set off that climax bomb in a couple of paragraphs, or even one breathtaking sentence.

Writing short stories is an excellent way to warm up, to refill the creative basket between novels, and to achieve the personal satisfaction of a job well done.