Monthly Archives: June 2017

Writing Lessons From Ireland

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JSB at the River Boyne

by James Scott Bell
@jamesscottbell

The Bells were a turbulent Scottish clan that stopped throwing rocks at their enemies long enough to move to Ulster during the great Scot migration of the 1600s. After several generations in Ireland, one of us, William Bell of County Armagh, decided to give America a whirl, landing in Philadelphia in the mid-1700s. From this line your humble correspondent emerged in the far-off land known as Los Angeles.

A couple of weeks ago I went with my wife and daughter to Ireland, to see what I could see. I thought I’d share a bit about the trip, and how it relates to writing.

Take Risks

Since we really wanted to get to know the place, we decided to rent a car and drive around the island.

Which meant driving on the left side of the road.

Do you know how hard that is for an American? Especially on these twisting former bridle paths they have the temerity to call roads. My wife was constantly saying, “Too close!” as I consistently veered toward the shoulder. That’s because I was trying not to get hit by the oncoming vehicles, several of which were TOUR BUSES. These behemoths didn’t even slow down and took up every bit of space between lane line and whatever was on the other side: stone wall, grass, dirt, the occasional cow. Driving in Ireland feels like a 300-pound man going cave spelunking. I survived the ordeal through a combination of quick reflexes and sheer terror.

Which is how writing should feel sometimes, yes? If you’re never a bit scared of what you’re writing you’re not going far enough. And just like these automotive jaunts brought us to a new and wonderful location, so too will your risky writing take you to story stuff you would have missed otherwise.

Observe Intentionally

My favorite part about a research trip is walking around, listening, seeing, drinking it all in. Speaking of which, the pubs were a delight. Like at the wonderful Sin é in Cork. Here’s a bit of it:

Our barman, Tony, welcomed us with a big Irish smile and was more than happy to offer some tips on seeing Ireland. “Don’t do just the tourist stops. Stop in the little towns and villages and walk around during the day. Then go to the pubs.”

So when we walked around, I looked around. Some of the things I noticed:

Irish eyes really do smile. I saw some of the most gorgeous eyes on the lasses, and dancing eyes on the lads. There’s an old saying that a fellow has “the map of Ireland on his face,” and it holds true. There’s a distinctive Irish look, especially on the men—the kind of face you can imagine with a pipe, regaling you with a story about the banshee or the little people.

I found something else to be true: the Irish love to talk. There were a couple of occasions when we needed to get on the road. But an inn keeper here and a villager there kept up with friendly gab. We’d probably still be in Ireland if, on our last morning there, I hadn’t grabbed old Aidan’s hand (“I worked thirty-five years for Aer Lingus. Then was in Mozambique and oh, that was somethin’ all right …”) and said, “Thanks, but we’ve gotta run.”

We Americans always gotta run, which is the source of some amusement to the Irish.

Lesson: Lap up the sights, sounds, and smells on your research trips—and especially listen to the people.

Find the Gold in the Obstacles

My favorite encounter occurred by way of an inconvenience. Our rental car started acting funny, and the key card had a “low battery” warning. Luckily we were near the Kerry airport and went in for a word with the Hertz man. Who was not in his trailer. (Kerry airport is about the size of an elementary school playground.) So I went next door to see the Avis man, who told us the Hertz man should be back “in a bit.” It was more like three bits, but he finally arrived.

The Hertz man made a call and told us, “Go out the exit there and turn left and go to the top of the hill. Turn left again and go until you see a shop on the right. On the other side of the shop you’ll see a sign for Tom Murphy’s place. He’ll fix you up.”

Dutifully, we followed the directions and pulled into a dirt yard full of haphazard cars, piles of old tires, and a couple of trailers from a 1959 surplus sale.

No one was in either trailer. Then from an old house next door came the biggest Irishman I’ve ever seen. Think Hagrid from Harry Potter, only with a haircut. He also had the thickest Irish brogue this side of Barry Fitzgerald. And he talked fast. So after replacing the key battery and test driving the car he rat-a-tatted, “No worries about the motor andlikethatyasee? If there’s somethin’ wrong with the motor ye’ll see a yellow light andlikethat, yaknow? But if ya don’t see it it’s no worries andlikethat, okay?”

Okay! I wasn’t about to argue with the man.

Which is to say, the best part about research for me is finding something unexpected and delightful, which often happens when you meet an obstacle and are forced to push through it.

Times Are Always Tight For Poets

In Galway, we strolled along Shop Street, known for its (shockingly) shops. We really wanted to see the much-touted buskers, but I have to say the fare was, this day, disappointing. Several single acts (guitar, sax), and one fairly good trio. I was hoping for somebody like Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins. Now that’s a busker.

Anyway, toward the end of the street, we came upon a poet, with his little table and typewriter, offering to write a poem about anything upon request. Saw no one take him up on it, and then it began to spit rain. The poet had to gather up his things and run for cover.

Lesson: write poetry for fun, not profit, and bring an umbrella.

Serendipity

There is much more I could tell you about the trip, but I fear I’d end up like that friend who comes to dinner with 500 slides of his visit to Sri Lanka. Instead, I’ll leave you with one of those happy occurrences that come when you least expect it. It’s a title.

That car I told you about? Well, it went fritzy (yasee?) in the tiny car park in Galway (tiny car parks are all they have in Ireland. One false turn and you scrape off your side-view mirror). The car would not start. So I called Hertz, who called roadside assistance, who sent out a couple of fellas who arrived about forty minutes later. One was a squat, bald bloke who looked a bit like Michael Chiklis. He was chatty and charming, asked where I was from. I said, “Los Angeles,” and he said, “Oh, posh! Beverly Hills and all that!” I merely smiled, as I wanted him to get to work.

The other fellow was a tall red-headed lad in a rugby shirt. He was the serious one, told the chatty fellow to pop open the bonnet and try starting the car. It chugga-chugged but didn’t turn over. Rugby Lad fiddled with something and told the guy to try it again. It started. They stopped and started it one more time.

“Should be all right now,” Rugby Lad said. And with a wave and a smile from the jolly bald fellow, they were off.

I summoned my wife and daughter, who were waiting at a nearby restaurant. When they joined me my wife asked what had been the matter. I told her it was something about the injection system.

“Do you know what to do if it happens again?” my wife sensibly asked.

“Well,” I said, “I saw where he jiggled.”

To which my daughter, sitting in the back of the car, said, “Out of context, that sounds really strange.”

We laughed. But I did have my title: I Saw Where He Jiggled: My Trip to Ireland.

And … it’s good to be home!

So what’s a serendipitous event that occurred during one of your trips, research or otherwise?

First Page Critique: SOME KIND OF DEAD

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Photo by Marks Polakovs. All rights reserved.

Welcome, Anon du jour, welcome to The Kill Zone! Thank you for submitting Some Kind of Dead, your masterpiece in progress (and I mean that sincerely) to our First Page Critique:

Some Kind of Dead

By the time the dark blue BMW made a second pass past the bar, Andy Weber pegged them for amateurs. Unlocking the door he had just secured, he ducked back into the bar, keyed the alarm pad and then grabbed the cut-down Remington 870 that Gus kept below the register. Cops called it a “street sweeper” for good reason. Checking through the window for the car, he slipped outside and stood in the dark shadow of the doorway. As the sedan slowly rounded the corner at the far end of the block to make a third pass, Andy was ready for them.

The car drew even with the front door. Two mini-mag machine pistols began to emerge from the open back window on the driver’s side and Andy started unloading on the slowly moving car. First, the driver, to immobilize the vehicle, then the two passengers in the rear…one, two, three, and it was over just like that. The dead driver’s foot had jammed the accelerator. The Beemer, accelerating rapidly, entered the intersection against the light, right in the path of a fast moving gasoline tanker. The truck driver tried to avoid the car but he overcorrected and jackknifed the trailer, slamming into the BMW.” The tanker wasn’t as lucky. After hitting the car, it slid sideways through the intersection. The driver could see what was coming and jumped out, rolling to a stop. The tanker turned over, exploding in a ball of flame, engulfing three cars in the fireball. The driver stood, dazed, in the middle of the intersection.

Andy, satisfied that no one else was coming for him, picked up the ejected shells and returned the street sweeper to its rightful place under the bar. Resetting the alarm, he locked up and started off down the street, away from the carnage he just created. Tomorrow he would have to remember  to clean the shotgun and pay Gus for the three shells he used. “Amateurs”, he whispered to himself as he walked down the street.

 

This is simply terrific, Anon. I am predisposed to to love this anyway,, given that it sits solidly in my favorite literary genre — crime noir — but even after looking at it as critically as I could I found very, very little here with which to quibble. You draw the reader right in, hold their interest, create the proper dark mood and have the requisite mayhem and explosion which readers these days tend to expect right from the…well, from the first page. It reminds me of the paperback crime novels that I cut my reading teeth on back in the 1950s and which I read to this day. That said, I have a few things to mention in the hopes of making a terrific opening page a perfect one:

1) First paragraph:

— Let’s get everything parallel in the first sentence. The car goes around the block and Andy pegs “them” for amateurs. Who is them? Let’s change that to “By the time the dark blue BMW made a second pass past the bar, Andy Weber pegged its occupants for amateurs.”

— Wow, those guys really were amateurs. I know grade school cub scouts who could pull off  a better ambush than they attempted. I’m puzzled as to why they didn’t shoot Andy on the second pass. I assume they didn’t see him, even though he saw them. How about showing that to your readers like so (there are many different ways to this): “By the time the dark blue BMW made a second pass past the bar, Andy Weber pegged its occupants (see above) for amateurs.Gus’s doorway was the perfect place for observing without being observed. Andy had been able to clock the car’s occupants as they played two games of urban ring-around-the-rosy without their having a clue that he was watching. Unlocking the door…”

2) Second paragraph:

— Let’s break up that compound sentence. Like so: “Two mini-mag machine pistols began to emerge from the open back window on the driver’s side. Andy stepped quickly out of the shadows, unloading on the slowly moving car.”

— …“ against the light, right in the path…” How about “…against the light, into the path…” instead?

— “The driver could see what was coming and jumped out, rolling to a stop.” I generally think of cars, rather than people, rolling to a stop (or when I’m driving, rolling through a stop).  I’d suggest this: “The driver could see what was coming and jumped out. He hit the ground and rolled until he ran out of blacktop.” Or something like that. There are a few different ways to write it.

3) Third paragraph:

Andy, satisfied that no one else was coming for him, picked up the ejected shells and returned the street sweeper to its rightful place under the bar. Resetting the alarm, he locked up and started off down the street, away from the carnage he just created. Tomorrow he would have to remember  to clean the shotgun and pay Gus for the three shells he used. “Amateurs”, he whispered to himself as he walked down the street.

You use the word “street” three times in the same short paragraph. Let’s eliminated the first and third ones. For the first, call the street sweeper a shotgun; as for the third: when Andy whispers “Amateurs” we already know he’s walking down the street because you just told us. You could end that paragraph with “Amateurs,” he whispered.”  (see below) and it would be just fine.

4) There are also a couple of typos:

Second paragraph: “ The car rolled twice, and came to rest on what was left of its tires.”  I suggest striking the comma in the sentence “ between “twice” and “and.”

Third paragraph, last sentence: Let’s stick that comma after “Amateurs” after the ‘s’ and before the final quotation mark.

Thank you again, Anon, for submitting this first page of SOME KIND OF DEAD. I sincerely cannot wait to see what follows. I will now sit back,  attempt to stay uncharacteristically quiet, and let our TKZ audience hold forth.

 

Can Writing for Amazon Kindle Worlds Be Right For You? Guest Post: Elle James

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Jordan Dane

@JordanDane

I’m on deadline and in a crunch, but I am honored to have my dear friend, Elle James (aka Myla Jackson for a sexier read), as a guest at TKZ. She’s a USA Today & New York Times Bestselling author best known for her suspenseful military romances. She writes for Harlequin Intrigue, Romantic Suspense, and Nocture, as well as having her own successful indie projects. This woman is busy, but always generous with her time to support other authors. As a former member of the Army and Air Force Reserves, Elle has traveled across the United States and to Germany, managed a full-time job until she eventually quit to write full time. Ask her about what it takes to raise very large exotic birds in the Texas hill country. Take it away, Elle.

Is Kindle World right for you? If you are not familiar with Kindle Worlds, the stories are basically fanfiction you can get paid for. An author agrees to open his/her world, allowing other authors to write in that world and they split the profit.

So, why not just write in your own world and skip the splitting of profits gig? Keep it all to yourself. Here’s why you might want to dip your toe or pen into the Kindle Worlds of other authors.

You can write a crossover from the author’s Kindle World into your own series or world. What that buys you is a door into that author’s readership. The readers who love that author will buy books by other authors knowing they will catch glimpses of their favorite characters in those books. If they like the new author, they will find more of the new author’s books to read. It’s a cross-promotional effort that could expand your reader base.

I’ve written in two other authors’ Kindle Worlds for that very reason. Their stories were Military Romance and Military Romantic Suspense. The crossover made sense. The assumption is that their readers will like my books because they are in the same genre.

I expanded my reader base and now I have my own Kindle World. The beauty of Kindle Worlds is that you don’t have to stick to the same genre. Other authors from other genres can write in your world. An author might pick up readers who typically read other genres than what the author writes. But a good story is a good story and the readers might look for more of that author’s stories.

Writing in a Kindle World is not for every author, but if you’re still building your audience, you might give it a try. Brotherhood Protectors Kindle World is a Military Romantic Suspense genre. Authors writing in my world include young adult, thriller, contemporary romance, military romance and more genres. I hope they all pick up new readers because of their experience writing in my world. I invite you to write in mine! If you are interested, contact me through my website. I’d love to include you in an organized launch.

You can visit my Brotherhood Protectors Kindle World page on my website to see the books already written in my Kindle World or visit my Brotherhood Protectors Kindle World on Amazon to find out how you can participate in my Kindle World. Or read some of the books in my kindle world to get a flavor for what other authors have done. You can get them Here on Amazon. You can also read my original Brotherhood Protectors series. I’d love to have you join the Brotherhood Protectors Kindle World!

DISCUSSION:

1.) Would you consider writing for one of the Amazon Kindle Worlds?

2.) What experiences have you had writing shorter projects between novel length books? Did that experience of writing shorter, allow you the flexibility to try other genres?

3.) What genres have you attempted and enjoyed?

Jordan here: I wanted to add a couple of comments. Amazon Kindle Worlds sets the price for your project, depending on its length. You can write whatever length you have time for, between projects. HERE is a link for the details behind Amazon KWs and samples of their boiler plate agreements and exhibits.

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First Page Critique: The Last White Rose

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Photo by Laura Benedict.

 

Cheery good day, TKZers! It’s time for a critique of an anonymous author’s work. The Last White Rose is an excerpt from a novel that appears to be a modern gothic with both horror and romantic elements. But it might be a thriller.  I’m anxious to know what you think.

 

THE LAST WHITE ROSE

Epigraph

In my dream, I see my own green eyes, filled with terror and tears.I fall to my knees, submitting to the command of invincible blue eyes raging with white fire.His face twists into something else, something evil. He is ending my life. I wake with a strident scream… and stare into the same blue eyes.

Chapter One

Stonington, Connecticut

He was elusive, a ghost I needed to catch. The stranger whose face I’d never seen lurked around town, maintaining enough distance to mask his features in shadow. I saw his face for the first time in late July after the annual Blessing of the Fleet. His bold gaze burned into mine from the opposite side of Water Street. The highland band, piping loud and marching through the center, drew the post-ceremony procession to a close, granting me an unobstructed view.

A shiver slid through me despite the stifling summer heat.

He was magnificent. The kind of man you’d never find living in small-town New England. Imposing height and broad, muscled shoulders defined his stature. He wore jeans and a faded indigo tee shirt that exposed cut biceps and forearms. Sun-streaked, dark blond hair in a classic front wave and a commanding jawline framed his handsome, smirking face.

“Parade’s over,” someone shouted.

Even so, Jess and I held our advantageous spot at the curb. My best friend soaked in the late morning sun, sipping her raspberry lemon mimosa, watching me stare at him.

She elbowed me. “Who’s he and why are you staring at each other? Wait—Ellie, is he…”

My eyes skipped to Jess to deliver a dirty look. When I refocused across the street, he was gone. “The guy who followed me home the other night. Yes, I think so. There’s no one else as tall. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe he’s just staying nearby.”

“And maybe you should say something to someone.”

“Not until I’m certain. Paranoia is my sister’s thing, not mine. Besides, aren’t you always saying I should be more open to meeting new people?”

“You do need to get out of your artsy little head. Just be careful.”

I struggled, trying to reconcile his presence in town and the sense that he watched me. After all, it was summertime. Stonington was a historically rich town, the only one in Connecticut to face the open Atlantic waters, so it attracted countless visitors. It was common to see strangers around town. Drunken tourists wandered the streets at night, unaware most businesses closed before ten. It was a colonial fishing town, and outsiders came from far and wide to work for the commercial fleet. It wasn’t the first time a man from one of the crews or a tourist had looked my way, I reasoned.

Then I saw him again.

The next day after the last of my noisy day-campers had gone, I locked the art studio door and headed for the fishing pier to sketch. It was either that or listen to another of Jess’s lectures. She’d go on about how I wallowed in self-imposed loneliness, and how it left her alone to test the waters in the pool of dateable men. The pool was small—blue plastic toddler swimming pool small—and I didn’t need to dip a toe to know there was nothing left in it for me.

The pier was a respite from my grandmother and sister’s intrusiveness as well. Gran and Isobel were all I had, and they meant well. Trysts with my art kept me sane, human.

I looked out over the harbor and spotted Neptune trudging her way in. The sailboats beyond paled in her presence. I don’t know what it was about the old girl, but I loved that fishing boat. Her emerald green hull had become chalky over time, and the once black and white hoists and booms were covered in rust, but she was still glorious against the backdrop of the sea. I lost myself in the sketch at once.

Photo by Laura Benedict

 

Dear Anonymous Author of The Last White Rose:

What a pleasure it was to critique this novel opening. There’s so much to work with here: you’ve obviously read a great deal of fiction and have a practiced hand in basic mechanics. Your grammar and sentence structure are strong, and even your barely-mentioned characters are vivid and distinctive. You also know how to structure a scene, which is no small feat, and your first person POV is flawless.

I like the Connecticut setting. It gives the story an immediate New England gothic feel. Gothic is one of my most beloved genres, so I’m particular.

Jess and Ellie have good chemistry. Jess is a lot of fun, though she falls down a bit on the best friend front. (More on that later.) These cracked me up: “My best friend soaked in the late morning sun, sipping her raspberry lemon mimosa, watching me stare at him.” And “She’d go on about how I wallowed in self-imposed loneliness, and how it left her alone to test the waters in the pool of dateable men. The pool was small—blue plastic toddler swimming pool small—and I didn’t need to dip a toe to know there was nothing left in it for me.”

And the scene with the Neptune was completely charming and nicely visualized. I could picture the boat “trudging” its way in. Your descriptions are—for the most part—very nicely done.

Please, dear Anonymous Author, read all of the above twice, because I know that, like most writers, you will forget it immediately as you read my criticisms and suggestions.

 

Here we go:

I’m not sure what sort of novel this is, and that distresses me. It contains gothic and demonic elements and is set in an old New England town. But there’s some romance as well. I need a few more hints. Does our heroine feel strangely attracted to the giant hot guy stalking her? Or is there some menace in the town that he might be connected to? The strong emphasis on the stalking makes me think it’s trying to be a thriller, but the stalker’s attractiveness makes me wonder if he’s a demi-god or paranormal beast or demon. Another mystery is that we don’t know if he’s the guy in the epigraph or not.

There’s a phrase that I learned from my mother-in-law very early in my marriage: “too much of a muchness.” That’s what you have in this opening section. You need to take a breath. Don’t try to tell us everything in 672 words, and definitely only tell us things once. Readers are smart. This section has too many repeated actions, too much stalking, and way too many characters. It’s important to mention or introduce all of your significant characters in the first thirty pages of a novel, but if you try to do it in the first three, your reader is going to be very confused. Fortunately, you can look at this as an embarrassment of riches because you can use much of this detail in other parts of the novel.

It’s also important for you to balance the light and dark. You can have both.

The last thing I want to address is your heroine, Ellie. Good heroines can be tough to write. Sidekicks get to be fun, villains get to be fun. Heroines can be a bit dull. Thoughts on Ellie below.

 

Epigraph

This is a dream: check.

I’m a bit confused as to how Ellie’s seeing her eyes in one line, then is falling to her knees in the next. Is she watching herself? Or is she experiencing it? Just clarify. Even if it’s a dream, it has to have its own dream physics and dream logic.

Perhaps reframe it so we know she is watching it as a scene, wondering at her own complicity.

“Strident” is awkward. As is “invincible blue eyes raging with white fire.” There’s an awful lot happening in those eyes all at once.

“He is ending my life.” Simple and to the point, but “ending” feels a bit tame since she’s about to be devoured/murdered by what appears to be a demon.

Clarify the last line and be specific:

“I wake, screaming, to find those same blue eyes—now watchful and worried (or laughing and scornful, etc)—gazing into mine.”

Chapter One

First paragraph:

The opening lines are confusing. He’s a ghostly elusive guy that has been skulking around the shadows for…some period of time. Months? Weeks? Two days? Then in the next sentence she gets to the immediate scene: “I saw his face for the first time…”

Instead, get right into it.

We’re prepped by the epigraph for scary and dubious. Give us something new at the top of chapter one. I’d much rather read: “The first time I saw Jeremy Porter’s* handsome face, he was smirking at me from the opposite side of Water Street.” Something straightforward adds a bit of levity, and keeps the story from being so frontloaded with ominosity (technically not a word, but ominousness is clumsy). I confess that I’ve been guilty of over-ominosity myself, so I know whereof I speak. He seems more condescending than threatening. If you want to make him threatening, change “smirking” to “staring.”

*Don’t be afraid to name the guy. We know he has a name. As Ellie’s telling the story, she already knows his name because she’s telling it in the past tense. As it is, it’s cheap suspense. If the story were all in present tense/present action, then we wouldn’t find out his name until she learns it. But the cat’s already out of the bag.

By making the opening of Chapter One just another in a series of stalking incidents, you’ve taken away the power of the epigraph, which could be very compelling. The epigraph hints that she dreams of a man who might be a demon, but she wakes to find him watching her in real life. My assumption is that she becomes romantically involved with sexy stalker guy during the course of the novel…? But we still don’t know if epigraph guy and stalker guy are the same.

The epigraph has already set your tone. Let it rest. We get it.

“He was magnificent.”

Our guy is obviously a gorgeous, eye feast of a man, and the word “magnificent” is striking. I kind of imagine him as a blond Gaston, from Beauty and the Beast. Is he unreal in his perfection? Some small flaw would make him more believable—unless you’re going for supernatural perfection.

Let’s break it down:

Why would we never find someone like him living in small-town New England? Where would we see a man like him? Hollywood? The cover of a magazine or romance novel?

Imposing height—how tall? Ellie says: “There’s no one else as tall.” What does that mean? Significantly taller than everyone else in town? Wilt Chamberlain tall? If so, someone would have surely noticed him by now. A man that tall would be a very poor skulker.

Instead of using an indefinite phrase like “defined his stature,” let’s see him through Ellie’s editorial filters:

“I’d never seen a man so tall in real life, at least not one with shoulders so broad that they made me wonder for a moment if he had to have his dress shirts specially made. But he wasn’t wearing a dress shirt. His taut, cut biceps emerged from the sleeves of a beautifully faded black tee that just reached the waist of his indigo jeans. And his black motorcycle boots looked comfortably worn. Most women I knew would pay a fortune to have their stylist give them highlights like the ones that seemed to flow naturally through the waves of his dark blond hair. His jaw was strong and commanding, reminding me of paintings I’d seen of ancient Roman centurions on my last trip to the Louvre.

“Parade’s over,” someone behind me shouted.

I startled, and felt my face flush. The slow smile of the man I came to know as Jeremy Porter told me he’d caught me staring.”

Then you can go on and have her interact with Jess. But let’s have some more urgency and concern in their exchange. Is Jess implying Ellie should call the authorities? Who is the “someone” of whom she speaks? Be specific.

In this next section, we get a lot of new characters introduced: noisy day-campers, dateable men, Gran and Isobel, an anthropomorphized fishing boat, drunken tourists, sailors. It’s overwhelming.

And, suddenly, skulking sexy guy appears again.

What is this book about? Right now I’m just reading stalking scenes, and I’m feeling fearful that they will just go on and on…

Three scenes (including the epigraph, if it is the same guy), three appearances. Actually four, because we learn he followed her home on some other night (super alarming to have a giant follow you home!). We have no resolution of his parade appearance in Chapter One before the pier scene. He has now let her see his face, and he’s still obviously stalking her. Please give Ellie some spunk. She seems incredibly unaffected by his stalking—her friend acts alarmed but then apparently lets her go home and go about her business and go to work the next day without any further investigation of the guy. It’s one thing that Ellie’s not paranoid. It’s quite another to make her seem not very bright. And I think she is bright.

Your opening chapter has to do more than establish the tone, and Chapter One tells us little more than that Ellie is living in a historic small town and is being stalked by a hot guy. It’s an ominous situation, but she’s reacting in a way that’s not credible. And we still don’t know if this is a romance, a thriller, or a paranormal story. Give us better clues.

My first suggestion would be to work on the epigraph and just let it set the tone. Then in your opening chapter, have Ellie confront hot stalker guy after the parade. It will make her the real protagonist rather than a woman who seems to be setting herself up as a victim. I love the sketching scene on the pier, but it’s too much with what you have already. Save the setting and scene—maybe it happens after they’ve actually met.

Having her confront the guy right off puts us immediately into the story, and will surprise the reader. Even if he is our villain, he will be put momentarily off-balance. Ellie and the hot guy instantly become equals, and thus more interesting adversaries. Or a more interesting couple. Therefore it becomes a more compelling story. Be bold.

That’s my two cents. I think this story could go far.

Chatter over, TKZ friends and bloggers. What say you?

 

 

 

Write That Caption! New Yorker Cartoon Contest

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Purchased from Shutterstock by KL

How did I manage to miss this elegant little contest/game–The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest–which offers a new way for writers to procrastinate and waste precious writing time? The New Yorker cartoons were a cherished element of my childhood reading experience (I confess I skipped reading the articles until I was well into high school years).

Check out the weekly New Yorker cartoon (by clicking this link) and tell us what caption you’d write for it. Here’s my entry for the caption:

“My doctor says it’s an off-label use for energy drink withdrawal.”

Yours?

A Nuance of Understanding That Can Change Your Writing Career

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by Larry Brooks

Today I am waxing enthusiastic about what might end up being the most important step in the development of your story. Because right here, at the concept and premise stage, is where many writers come up short.

Most writers begin a draft with a vision for concept and premise in mind. Others don’t, using the draft itself as the search-mechanism to find concept and premise, then retrofitting it into the story in subsequent drafts. The common mistake is to forget to do just that, leaving the story without a clear and compelling concept and premise at its core.

Concept, as it relates to premise, is the vision for the entire story… at the idea level.

Weak story ideas easily account for half or more of story rejection, or at least, when it comes to explaining why they don’t resonate. I was talking to a writing-guru type friend recently, and he suggested this issue resides at the core of as much as 80 percent of story failures.

If you don’t get this right, if you don’t make it as strong as it can possibly be through an understanding of this nuance, then you are already putting your story at risk no matter how well you write it.

Concept and premise are the first things agents and editors look for in a story, over and above characterizations and writing voice. The nuance is this: concept and premise are different things. Superman is a concept. The plot of each story, which includes the villain and the threat they represent, is the premise… one unique dramatic arc for each Superman movie, TV episode and comic book edition.  One concept has birthed 13 major films and at least six television series alone.

One concept. An alien child crashed on earth, is raised by human parents, and ends up with powers we consider super, which he uses to fight evil and save us, time and time again.  Notice this is not premise (which is synonymous with plot in the context of this understanding).

Not every story needs to be “high concept.”

But the presence of something conceptual – which is the very essence of concept – adds strength to any story.

Concept and premise are different essences, yet one (concept) feeds into the other (premise). One of the most common shortfalls of rejected stories is when a premise doesn’t promise something conceptual to the story, when it’s all plot with nothing fresh or freshly respun, or worse, where there is nothing inherently interesting or provocative at its core.

An Example

I was teaching this at a workshop recently. I asked people to toss out a concept, old or new, for the purpose of seeing whether it met the criteria for concept (which I had presented first, but have not yet revealed here; I do this to see if, upon reading this example, you might quickly and intuitive see how and why it lacks “concept” at the level required to carry an entire novel).steals a woman’s ashes on the way to a funeral.”

“Someone steals a woman’s ashes on the way to a funeral.”

We talked about this one for a long time.

The Definition of Concept

A concept is the presence of something conceptual at the heart of the story’s essence.

A concept is a central idea or notion that creates context for a story – often for a number of stories, not just your story – built from it.

A concept becomes a contextual framework for a story, without defining the story itself.

It is an arena, a landscape, a stage upon which a story will unfold.

It can be a proposition, a notion, a situation or a condition.

It can be a time or place, or a culture or a speculative imagining.

It can even be a character, if even before the premise itself surfaces there is something conceptual about that character.

Concepts are a matter of degree.  Every story has a concept, the issue then becomes this: how does it contribute toward the reading experience?

Those stolen ashes?  That idea is more suited to a scene in the Part 1 setup of a a novel, something that starts a sequence of events.  But the real concept would be why someone did that, toward what end. And at that level, the criteria shown below would still need to apply.

The Criteria for Concept

It is inherently, before character or plot, interesting, fascinating, provocative, challenging, engaging, even terrifying.

High concepts depart from the norm, they exist at the extreme edge of imagination and possibility.

Not all stories are high concept. Stories about real people in real situations also benefit from something that creates a compelling context for the story.

Concepts promise a vicarious ride for the reader. Taking them somewhere, or placing them into situations that are not possible, realistic or something tense or horrific, something they would not choose to experience in real life.  But will love experiencing vicariously in your story.

A concept can define the story world itself, create its rules and boundaries and physics, thus becoming a story landscape. (Example: a story set on the moon… that’s conceptual in its own right.)

In summary, a concept is simply the compelling contextual heart of the story built from it. It imbues the story atmosphere with a given presence.

It does not include a hero… unless the hero is, by definition, a conceptual creation (examples: Superman, Sherlock Holmes, a ghost, someone born with certain powers or gifts, a real person from history, etc.). A story is then built around that hero leveraging the hero’s conceptual nature.

All of this is a matter of degree.  Do those stolen ashed meet these criteria? Perhaps. Could they crack open a killer story? Maybe that, too. But would that pitch – “someone steals a woman’s ashes on the way to a funeral” – offered in an elevator to an agent, motivate the agent to his the STOP button and hear the entire story

Doubtful. Because a concept is not a tease or a piece of setup. Rather, it is an OMG notion that becomes the contextual foundation of the entire story itself.

It might be helpful to consider what a story without a vivid concept would sound like in a pitch: two people fall in love after their divorce. Period. End of pitch.

And the agent says, “next!”

It’s not a bad story if you can pull it off – the writer of such a story would intend to plumb the depths of characters on both sides of the divorce proposition – but there’s nothing unique or provocative beyond the notion of divorce itself. Which is all too familiar, and therefore not all that strong a concept. If you could bring something contextually fresh to it – like, two people who both want to murder their ex fall in love – then the story has even more upside.

When we read that agents and editors are looking for something fresh and new, concept is what they mean.

When a concept is familiar and proven – which is the case in romance and mystery genres especially – then fresh and new becomes the job of premise and character, as well as voice and narrative strategy.

Concept is genre-driven.

Literary fiction and some romance and mysteries aren’t necessarily driven by concept (however, the sub-genres of romance – paranormal, historical, time travel, erotica, etc. – are totally concept-dependent). Other genres, such as fantasy and science fiction and historical, are totally driven by and dependent upon concept.

If your concept is weak or too familiar within these genres, you have substantially handicapped your story already.

Examples of Criteria-Compliant Concepts

“Snakes on a plane.” (a proposition)

“The world will end in three days.” (a situation/proposition)

“Two morticians fall in love.” (an arena)

“What if you could go back in time and find your true love?” (a proposition)

“What if the world’s largest spiritual belief system is based upon a lie, one that its church has been protecting for 2000 years?” (a speculative proposition)

“What if a child is sent to earth from another planet, is raised by human parents and grows up with extraordinary super powers?” (a proposition, leading to one of the most iconic characters is all of entertainment)

“What if a jealous lover returned from the dead to prevent his surviving lover from moving on with her life?” (a situation)

“What if a paranormally gifted child is sent to a secret school for children just like him?” (a paranormal proposition)

“A story set in Germany as the wall falls.” (a historical landscape)

“A story set in the deep South in the sixties focusing on racial tensions and norms.”  (a cultural arena)

These cover a breadth of genres, a few of them from iconic modern classics in their own right.

Notice than NONE of these are plots. Each is a framework for a plot. For any number of plots, in fact. The are conceptual.

Just remember: concept is not premise.

This one differentiation can make or break your career.  By way of analogy… concept is the idea to go to college and major in architecture. Premise is actually what happens when you do that, with a fresh and dramatic twist.  Different levels of meaning, with different criteria almost entirely.

Concept, when it works, becomes the reason why your premise will compel readers. Because it is compelling. Fascinating. Intellectually engaging. Emotionally rich. Imbued with dramatic potential. It infuses the premise with something contextually rich, even before you add characters and a plot.

Can you differentiate the concept from the premise in your story?  If not, then this becomes an opportunity to take your story to the next level.

Final thought on this, for now.

Thrillers are one of the most fertile genres for concept. Great thrillers are just that – great – often because of the concept.

Series heroes – Jack Reacher, James Bond, Tom Cruise in the Mission Impossible stories – become their own concept. People come to the story for Jack Reacher, rather than the specific plot idea on the back cover.  As authors trying to establish a thriller series, this is a critical nuance to understand.

Mysteries, however, are more challenging at the conceptual level. Given that, the creation of a conceptually fresh hero is the key, and then giving her or him something highly vicarious and emotionally-resonant to do.

Of course, this implies the need to grasp the difference between a mystery and a thriller, which is obvious once you get it, less-so before that ah-hah! moment arrives.

Have fun with that one here… I’ll chime in with that difference if it doesn’t emerge clearly in the thread. I have a feeling it will.

When Cold Cases Kill: Guest Post By Meg Gardiner

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JSB: I am on a research trip and will only have sketchy, if any, internet access today. So I’ve asked Meg Gardiner if she would step in for me. Meg is an Edgar Award winner whose new novel, UNSUB, is getting rave reviews. Like this one: 

“Outstanding series launch… Taut pacing and sympathetic characters play against a terrifying villain, who will crawl beneath your skin and trouble your sleep. Thriller fans will eagerly await the sequel.” — Publishers Weekly, starred review

Plus, it’s just been announced that CBS is going to adapt UNSUB as a TV series!  

UNSUB releases June 27, but you can pre-order at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or Indiebound.

Welcome, Meg!

UNSUB is about a legendary killer and the young cop who hunts him. In my thriller, the UNSUB—an unknown subject in a criminal investigation—starts killing again after twenty years, and Caitlin Hendrix must decipher his coded plan before he drags more innocents to the abyss.

The novel was sparked by the unsolved case that has haunted California for decades, and me since childhood: the Zodiac. That infamous UNSUB shot and stabbed seven people in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Zodiac sent dozens of messages to the police and media, including cryptograms that have never been broken. The terror wrought by the killings still lingers today.

I grew up in California, spooked by the knowledge that the Zodiac could strike at any time. Today, I’m spooked by the thought that the killer hasn’t been caught. The Zodiac could still be out there.

And, being a thriller writer, spooky thoughts lead me to spooky ideas. What if a terrifying cold case turned hot again? What if a killer who’d disappeared—as the Zodiac did—resumed killing decades later?

I turned that unnerving idea, that they-never-caught-him fear, into this novel.

In UNSUB, Bay Area sheriff’s detective Caitlin Hendrix is pulled into the chilling world of the serial killer known as the Prophet. This UNSUB posed his victims in garish crime scene displays, and marked their bodies with the ancient sign for Mercury. He’s given Caitlin nightmares since she was a small girl. Her father, Mack, was the lead detective on the original case. The investigation shattered Mack emotionally and tore his family apart.

To write the novel, I had to create the killer’s secret world. I delved into codes, puzzles, astrology, poetry, ancient symbolism—and 21st century hacking. The Prophet is a master of mind games. To stop him, Caitlin must do what her father couldn’t. She must decipher both the Prophet’s old, taunting messages and his strange new rhymes. What do the crime scene tableaus signify? What does the Mercury sign mean? And what is the Prophet’s end game?

Readers ask if I write to exorcise my demons. I don’t. As a writer, I take what frightens me and try to turn it into gripping fiction. I put my demons on the page, and turn them loose for readers to experience in the most exciting and suspenseful ways I can create.

UNSUB is a psychological thrill ride. Enjoy it.

But, if it gets you thinking about what’s out there, don’t turn off the lights.

Reader Friday: How many unpublished and half-finished books do you have?

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An author friend of mine loves telling the story about when her mother found her sitting in front of her pot belly stove burning old manuscripts she had stashed “under her bed.” When asked why, she told her mom that she didn’t want ANYONE publishing them posthumously. She thought they were THAT bad. What about you?

How many unpublished and half-finished books do you have?

 

First Page Critique: Like Hell

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Critiqued by Elaine Viets

Thank you to another brave soul who gave us this intriguing first page, called Like Hell. This seems to be a mystery with paranormal elements. Let’s start with the first page, then my comments for AA – our Anonymous Author – and then yours, TKZ readers.

Alyssa lay facedown in a pool of blood that wasn’t hers. The weight of a stranger’s body crushed her, smothered her. She tried to tamp down her panic, but she was drowning in his blood. It bubbled in her nose and mouth, soaked through her clothing. The metallic taste of it gagged her, but she didn’t dare move.

The shooter was still here, his boots echoing in the university library. Someone whimpered, and received a burst of gunfire in response. He talked in a steady stream, in a language Alyssa didn’t understand. She had no idea who he was speaking to.
The thud of his boots approached and Alyssa held her breath. He kicked her ankle and she choked back a cry. With a grunt, he fired another shot into the poor stranger who had tried to shield her when the shooting started.

Somehow she didn’t scream. The shooter maintained his monologue as he paced the room. A door slammed, then … silence. Alyssa felt hot, sick, as she battled the gorge rising in her throat.

The door slammed against the wall with a loud crack and she nearly screamed. Heavy steps, running straight at her. Suddenly, the body sailed off her, striking the wall with a thud. Impossible. The dead man had to weigh at least 250 pounds.
Alyssa opened her eyes. This man was much smaller than the one who’d shielded her, but he hauled her up with ease. Panic flashed in his blue eyes. He seized her face and jerked her head to the side.

“Where are you hit?” he demanded, as his fingers crawled over her scalp, searching for a wound.

“It’s … not …” Alyssa swayed and he caught her. “It’s not my blood,” she whispered against his chest.

Footsteps thundered into the room. Alyssa clutched the stranger and squeezed her eyes shut.

Bullets struck him in the back. She heard them thud, felt their impact, though he barely flinched.
He roared something incomprehensible. Alyssa glanced at him just before he peeled her off him. His blue irises were replaced with flames.

Stunned, she fell as he pivoted. Black wings erupted from his back, protecting her as he screamed at the shooter in his own language.”

The shooter shrieked. Babbled.

Something crashed against the wall. Her protector cursed. He turned and hauled her up again. His wings closed around them an instant before the room exploded.

Elaine’s Comments: You’re off to a sizzling start, AA, and I’d like to see more of this novel. But I’m itching to change the very first line. Try, “Alyssa lay face down in a pool of blood.” Extra words – “that wasn’t hers” — are distracting, and you tell us whose blood it is a few paragraphs later, when Alyssa tells the creature who saved her, “It’s not my blood.”

The “black wings erupting from his back,” and “blue irises were replaced with flames” are intriguing details: Is Alyssa’s savior an angel or a devil? He’s definitely supernatural. The last line is vivid – I want to know more about who – or what – saved Alyssa and why.

But here’s the major problem with an otherwise good beginning: Alyssa is too sketchy. Give us a few more details. This is a university library. Is Alyssa a teacher, a student, a scholar or a librarian? How old is she? What does Alyssa look like? These vital questions can be answered with a few phrases.

Also, tell us where we are: Is the university library in New York, the Midwest, another country? A word or two will solve that unnecessary mystery.

There’s a stray pronoun that needs to be rounded up and branded in this pair of sentences: “Someone whimpered, and received a burst of gunfire in response. He talked in a steady stream, in a language Alyssa didn’t understand.” Make that “He talked” into “The shooter talked.”

I’d find another way to phrase this sentence about the gorge in her throat: “Alyssa felt hot, sick, as she battled the gorge rising in her throat.” Technically, “gorge” means “throat,” and Merriam-Webster says, “‘Gorge’ is often used with ‘rise’ to indicate revulsion accompanied by a sensation of constriction – ‘my gorge rises at the sight of blood.'”

You might also want to combine these two sentences into one paragraph: “Footsteps thundered into the room. Alyssa clutched the stranger and squeezed her eyes shut. Bullets struck him in the back. She heard them thud, felt their impact, though he barely flinched.”

These are small complaints, AA, and can be easily fixed. You’ve done an excellent job of building tension when the shooter comes back and kicks Alyssa to make sure she’s dead.

I have one technical question about this sentence: “With a grunt, he fired another shot into the poor stranger who had tried to shield her when the shooting started.”
What kind of weapon was the shooter using? I’m not a Kestrel Ballistics expert, but many bullets can go right through that stranger’s body. Why wasn’t Alyssa hit and hurt?

Keep writing, AA. Hope this sells like hell.

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Fire and Ashes, the second Angela Richman Death Investigator mystery, will be published July 25. Pre-order the ebook for $3.99 here.