Reader – Writer – Friday, The Sacrifice Fly

Posted on by

Allow me to use a sports analogy for today’s post. And, if you suffered through watching football games all day yesterday, let me apologize and reassure you that today’s analogy is from baseball.

A sacrifice fly occurs when a batter hits a fly-ball to the outfield or foul territory that allows a runner to score. If the ball is caught by the outfielder, the batter is out, but he has sacrificed his opportunity for a hit (and his batting average) in exchange for the greater good of his team scoring a run.

Now to the writing side of the analogy: If you travel to a relative’s house for a holiday, or have family or friends for an extended stay at your house, it may be difficult to disappear for an hour or two to get in some daily writing. If grandkids are involved, you may need to coral the wild mustangs to prevent chaos and property damage, and that may require constant supervision. That’s the sacrifice.

Now, the greater good: Maybe you’ve discovered some ways to advance your writing, even if you can’t physically write. Has cousin Clifford given you an idea for a new character? Has Uncle Harold inspired a new villain? Has the travel (if you traveled) inspired a new setting? Has a particular dinner dish given you an idea for how to poison a character? You get the idea. These new ideas to advance your writing are the greater good.

So, the questions:

  • What ways have you devised for advancing your writing when you can’t write?
  • What ideas come to mind now for hitting a sacrifice fly for your writing?
  • How do you record your ideas until you are back in your writing space?

True Crime Thursday – Assault with a Deadly Turkey

Posted on by

by Debbie Burke

@burke_writer

True Crime Thursday always falls on Thanksgiving Day. That gives me a great opportunity to search out crimes related to the holiday.

Here are the top six crimes committed on/around Thanksgiving:

  1. Domestic violence – Long-simmering family tensions, often combined with alcohol, can turn violent, like this case of a woman who stabbed her half-brother with a two-tined carving fork.
  2. Speeding and traffic offenses – Although the period between Christmas and New Year’s sees the most traffic, Thanksgiving comes in second with an estimated 55 million travelers on the road.
  3. Driving while under the influence – Binge drinking often starts on the appropriately named “Blackout Wednesday” and continues over the four-day weekend.
  4. Theft – Retail thefts and thefts from vehicles spike during the holidays but cargo theft also rises. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving is a particularly busy day for thieves because truck drivers often leave loads unattended while they go home for the holiday.
  5. Disorderly conduct – While most of us are eating the bird, some are flipping the bird, which could mean a charge of disorderly conduct in Texas.
  6. Vandalism – This crime category includes egging cars and houses, graffiti, breaking windows, stealing or destroying decorations, and other low-grade mischief most commonly committed by juveniles. Kids, please stay home and have another piece of pie instead.

In case your turkey doesn’t thaw in time to cook, here’s a great alternate use for a frozen bird:

In 2008 in North Carolina, a man stole money from a gas station then assaulted a woman while trying to jack her car. A Good Samaritan grabbed a frozen turkey from the woman’s groceries and clobbered the attacker on the head several times. The attacker fled with the woman’s car and crashed into several vehicles. He was later arrested, treated at a hospital for serious head injuries, and charged with numerous felonies.

To wrap up on a positive note, here’s a photo of volunteers working to ensure a Happy Thanksgiving for service members during the annual Turkey Drop at Fort Lewis McChord Air Force base in Washington.

Annual Volunteer Turkey Drop
Photo credit: Joint Base Lewis McChord

Hope your Thanksgiving is crime-free!

TKZers: What are you thankful for?

I give thanks for TKZ’s community that generously shares their knowledge to help other writers!

 

A Very Happy Thanksgiving

Posted on by

A Very Happy Thanksgiving
Terry Odell

Thanksgiving turkeyTomorrow is Thanksgiving. In our household, most of the traditions have revolved around the food. For us, this year will be different. Not quite as different as the pandemic made it, but our son is going to spend the holiday with his girlfriend’s family. Daughter #1 lives in Northern Ireland and she’ll do her own thing with friends there. She’s been teaching them a lot about our traditions. Daughter #2 opted to go back to school in North Carolina for her doctorate (two masters degrees weren’t enough, apparently), and will be celebrating with her husband’s kids and their kids, who live nearby.

Which leaves me, the Hubster, and our son-in-law. What will we do? What we do any year there aren’t enough people around. We eat out. The food’s great (it’s our backup plan restaurant), there’s no prep or cleanup. No leftovers, either, but we can work around that. We’re leaving the country in ten days, so that’s all right with us. Some “off” years, I’ve picked up a turkey on the ‘day after Thanksgiving sales’ and cooked that just to have it. Not this year, I don’t think.

If you are cooking the traditional bird, here’s a turkey tip from my chef brother that’s served us well for decades. No matter your “recipe” for the bird (unless you deep fry), start the cooking at 450 degrees (or 425 if it’s 16 pounds or more). After 30 minutes, lower the temp to 350 (or 325). Continue to cycle the temp up and down like that every 30 minutes. This moves the juices up and down inside the turkey, and even the leftovers are juicy.

A tradition of ours is listening to “Alice’s Restaurant.”

And here’s an interesting article – Arlo Guthrie’s thoughts on the 50 year anniversary tour of Alice’s Restaurant.

We’re in the midst of some tough times. Let’s hope for peace on this day of giving thanks. We should all take a moment to find something to give thanks for.

Cover image of Deadly Relations by Terry OdellAvailable Now
Deadly Relations.
Nothing Ever Happens in Mapleton … Until it Does
Gordon Hepler, Mapleton, Colorado’s Police Chief, is called away from a quiet Sunday with his wife to an emergency situation at the home he’s planning to sell. A man has chained himself to the front porch, threatening to set off an explosive.

Terry Odell is an award-winning author of Mystery and Romantic Suspense, although she prefers to think of them all as “Mysteries with Relationships.”

Dead Right – Guest Post by Dr. Betty Kuffel

Posted on by

by Debbie Burke

@burke_writer

Dr. Betty Kuffel

In 2004, a small plane carrying Dr. Betty Kuffel, her husband, and their dog crashed into a remote, snowy Idaho mountain, leaving her leg crushed and dangling with bones exposed.

Where most people would be consumed by helpless panic, Betty stayed calm.

With her husband trapped in the inverted cockpit and the frightened dog circling the wreckage, Betty eased herself through the broken windshield to the icy ground.

She used the radio headset and wires to align her multiple fractures and tied the wires to hold the leg in place.

Yeah, she set her own broken leg.

Yeah, she’s Superwoman.

(Happy ending—all were rescued and survived.)

This example is one of many reasons why Betty has been my trusted medical advisor, critique partner, and dear friend for 30 years. Today, I’m happy to welcome her to TKZ with her guest post entitled:

Death and Dying for Authors

I had a plan for killing someone in one of my novels and wanted to make the death look natural with no discernible cause even with detailed postmortem forensics. To validate my plan, I called a forensic pathologist friend and said, “Dale, I want to kill someone, and I need your help.” He laughed, listened to my scenario, and confirmed my plan was correct. The cause of death would be indeterminate.

Writing accurate medical scenes is as important in fiction as it is in nonfiction. You can’t “just make it up” and make it believable. Research may save you from deadly reviews. Some experts may initially be taken aback by your questions but, in my experience, they love to help.

My background is ER medicine, wilderness hiking, climbing, dog sled racing and flying, which provided personal exposure to gruesome injuries and medical emergencies. Writing some scenes is easy because I’ve observed emotional reactions of patients and families affected by a heart attack, severe trauma from violence, gunshot wounds, and even bear mauling victims. But many writers may not have that firsthand experience.

Understanding “normal” body functions as a baseline is a great help to writers when designing a health-related scene.

First, identify your goal. Are you looking for a health challenge for your character to make him unique, a chronic disease perhaps? Or does your storyline require something acute, painful, or disfiguring? Or is this a climactic scene of violence and death?

To write the end, you need the beginning.

Basics of Life:  Average adult vital signs are a blood pressure of 120/80, heart rate of 70 beats per minute, respiratory rate of 15 times per minute, and temperature 98.6 F. Blood volume: 5 liters for about a 150-pound person. At a heartrate of 70/minute with a stroke volume of 70 ml (volume pumped with each beat) = 4,900 ml ~ 5 liters. This means the entire blood volume is pumped each minute.

Basics of Death: There is wide variation in vital signs with normal activity. With smart watches and wrist exercise monitors, most writers know exercise or stress change the baseline measurements. Running up a flight of stairs will spike both heart rate and blood pressure, but they normalize with a few minutes of rest. What if they don’t normalize? How long will it take to die without oxygen, or to bleed out? You need to know some details to write an accurate life and death scenario.

Having norms in mind for comparison, you are ready to alter them to your character’s detriment and your scene’s enhancement.

It’s time to create a crisis involving (A) the airway, (B) breathing, (C) cardiac function or (N) Neuro/Brain function.

Anyone who has taken a CPR class knows these ABCs. Interruption of airway, breathing or heart function can create a crisis. Brain injury can maim or kill. So, what do you need in your scene?

A Few ABC Scenarios

Airway and Breathing:

Airway obstruction using a ligature around the neck takes moments to interrupt blood flow to the brain and cause loss of consciousness: if not released, it causes death. It’s silent and fast. A shoelace, cable ties, fish line or luxurious silk scarf will do.

The scene can start calmly but quickly change to deadly, requiring immediate interventions to save a life. During a romantic candlelight dinner in an elegant restaurant, choking causes chaos in public and brings paramedics to the scene. Is it an unexpected aspiration of a bite of steak that occludes the airway? Or did the perpetrator know about the victim’s deadly allergy to penicillin and slipped it into their food, causing death from airway swelling and hypotension?

A penicillin-sensitive person who has intercourse with someone who has taken penicillin can result in anaphylaxis and death. The lover with that knowledge can turn a romantic interlude into murder.

Drug overdoses, sedatives (ex. Valium, Ativan, Xanax) and opiates (ex. heroin, fentanyl, morphine, oxycodone), slow respiratory rate, leading to unconsciousness, airway compromise, and death. The drug Narcan (naloxone) can be given as a nasal spray or injected, reversing opioid effects within minutes. So, from unconsciousness and near death, a victim can become alert and fighting medics.

However, Narcan does not reverse the effects of sedatives.

Rapid breathing of 40 times a minute or more can be caused by a collapsed lung, chronic lung disease with failure, asthma, fright and panic attacks. All have unique causes and need interventions to control the symptoms. Some are scary but not fatal. Others are life threatening. Symptoms with impending death include rapid breathing with gasping, holding the chest or throat, being unable to speak. Skin may be mottled and bluish followed by unconsciousness.

Blood Pressure

Lowering blood pressure is an easy way to cause loss of consciousness due to reduced blood flow to the brain. Without reversal this will be fatal.

Hemorrhagic shock can result from a stabbing or gunshot wound. How long will it take to bleed out?

Hemorrhagic shock is determined by volume lost. A blood donation is Class I shock. Class II is 750-1500 ml and is initially treated with high volume IV saline, but as loss progresses fluids and blood must be pumped in. Class IV occurs when 40% of blood is lost. Unless blood loss is stopped and high-volume blood is transfused, loss of consciousness occurs. The pulse becomes rapid, then fades as the blood pressure drops into the 70s. The skin pales, pupils dilate, and the heart stops.

Here’s another way to reduce blood pressure:

The victim takes an erectile dysfunction drug like Cialis and the killer slips a few nitroglycerin tablets into his wine. He loses consciousness during intercourse because this deadly combination results in irreversible low blood pressure, shock and death. Who would know but the perpetrator?

Heart Function

A cardiac arrest means the heart stopped beating. This can result for many reasons. It is not a “cause of death.” Even young healthy athletes drop dead, but the most common cause of sudden death is narrowing of the coronary arteries that supply the heart muscle with oxygenated blood.

Heart muscle cells become unstable with lack of adequate oxygenated blood. The irritability results in loss of an organized rhythm and no contractions to pump the blood. CPR with external compressions of the chest and rapid use of an AED (Automated External Defibrillator) can save lives which is why AEDs are available in public venues like malls, airplanes, and football fields.

Cardiac arrest is the most likely scenario to result in death or brain injury due to lack of oxygen.

What does sudden death look like?

No matter what the cause–a blow to the chest or a heart attack from cholesterol narrowing of a heart artery–when the heart stops, symptom onset is abrupt and often follows this pattern: Slump, fall, with rapid total muscle relaxation; a generalized seizure due to lack of brain oxygen; mouth and eyes may be partially open; no pulse; no breathing; skin, pale, then lips and nailbeds turn blue; no movement; pupils dilate widely, fish-eyes.

Rapid Ways to Kill

A few drugs that work rapidly are easily available in medical facilities, veterinary clinics, and ambulances: Succinylcholine is a paralytic. Potassium intravenous stops the heart. Nitroglycerine overdose under the tongue drops blood pressure. Intravenous insulin overdose results in unconsciousness and death.

Drug or alcohol intoxication and exposure to cold that causes hypothermia hasten death.

Strangulation with hands or a ligature is close, personal, fast and quiet.

Slashing through neck vessels and trachea results in airway interruption and rapid hemorrhagic death.

Ways to do research:

Interview experts such as physicians and even morticians.

Google reputable sites such as universities and NIH.

Consider going on ambulance and police ride-alongs for firsthand information.

Summary:

A writer doesn’t need to include too many details or the story risks sounding like a textbook. Choose the means of death, then incorporate enough information to be accurate but not overwhelming. 

~~~

Betty, you “killed it “with that comprehensive overview. Thanks for sharing your extensive knowledge! 

~~~

TKZers: Does this post help you write about dying and death? Will the information alter how you commit fictional crimes?

~~~

Dr. Betty Kuffel is a retired ER physician who lives in Montana. Medical and wilderness experiences, flying, dog sled racing in Alaska, and surviving a plane crash in the mountains of Idaho fuel her writing. She writes across genres, including a medical thriller series and True Crime.

BettyKuffel.com

Something To Do …

Posted on by

This season of Thanksgiving calls to mind a quote by the 18th-century Scottish writer Alexander Chalmers:

“The three grand essentials of happiness are something to do, someone to love, and something to hope for.”

For those of us who write, we can be grateful that the “something to do” part of that is pretty well covered.

* * *

Every now and then, a friend will stop by our home and venture into my office. They’re usually surprised at what they find there. Books are standing or lying on bookshelves in some kind of semi-organized chaos, and the three-door closet is covered with Post-it notes I’m using to plot my next book.

The desk is a riot of papers, laptops, to-do lists, notes, and more books. Whiteboards lean against walls that are covered with pictures and papers, and the back of the office door has more lists taped to it.

Invariably, someone will ask, “How do you get everything done?” The answer is simple: I don’t.

One of life’s greatest blessings is, I think, to have more to do than one can possibly get done. I’m happy to tell the story I’m working on as well as I can, aware that there are many more in the future. I’m like a kid in a magnificent toy store, captivated by the puzzle I’m trying to put together and excited by the endless supply of new and shiny artifacts yet to be tackled. I am so grateful, and I’m reminded of another wonderful and timely quote, this one by a 13th-century theologian:

“If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.” –Meister Eckhart.

* * *

So, TKZers: Happy Thanksgiving and thank you for all the wisdom shared here over the past year!

Do you have more to do than you can ever accomplish? What things in your writing life are you grateful for?

I’ll be traveling today, but I’ll check in whenever I can to respond to comments.

* * *

 

Private pilot Cassie Deakin has something to do: find the culprits who assaulted her beloved uncle. But can she accomplish her mission before she becomes the next victim?  Buy it here.

How to Make Sentences Sing

Posted on by

by James Scott Bell
@jamesscottbell

Edmund Burke, the eighteenth century member of Parliament known for his rousing speeches, regarded every word in a sentence as “the feet upon which the sentence walks.” He said that to alter a word—exchange it for a shorter or longer one, or give it a different position—would change the whole course of the sentence.

I thought about that recently while reading a thriller. It was good on the plot and character levels (which are, of course, absolutely essential). It started off like gangbusters, and carried me through the first three chapters.

But as it went on, I found myself without that feeling of compulsion to keep reading, as one has with the best fiction experiences. I wasn’t in a rush to turn the page. Naturally, as a writer and teacher of writing, I paused to ask myself why.

The answer came to me almost immediately. The sentences were all merely functional. They were like Dutch furniture. They did their job, but nothing more. I’ve quoted this many times, but it’s worth repeating. John D. MacDonald, writing about what he looks for in an author (including himself), said, “I want him to have a bit of magic in his prose style, a bit of unobtrusive poetry. I want to have words and phrases that really sing.”

Is that something worth going for? I think it is. MacDonald rose to the top of the mass market heap in the 1950s in part because his writing was a cut above what one critic called the “machine-like efficiency” of his contemporaries.

So let’s have a look at things you can do to make some of your sentences sing.

Rearrange

Consider this as the first line of a novel:

The small boys came to the hanging early.

Okay, fine. It works. But what if we did it the way Ken Follett does it in The Pillars of the Earth: 

The small boys came early to the hanging.

Feel the difference? On a subconscious level, it elevates the effect. Hanging is the most vivid word, and putting at the end gives the sentence snap and verve. A novel with sentences like that can mean the difference between a good read and an unforgettable one.

Overwrite And Cut

When I get to an intense emotional moment, I like to pause and start a text doc and write a page-long sentence. I just go, putting down everything I can think of without pausing to edit. As an example, here’s an actual sentence from John Fante’s classic Ask the Dust, in the voice of a young writer named Arturo Bandini in 1930s Los Angeles.

A day and another day and the day before, and the library with the big boys in the shelves, old Dreiser, old Mencken, all the boys down there, and I went to see them, Hya Dreiser, Hya Mencken, Hya hya: there’s a place for me, too, and it begins with B, in the B shelf, Arturo Bandini, make way for Arturo Bandini, his slot for his book, and I sat at the table and just looked at the place where my book would be, right there close to Arnold Bennett, not much that Arnold Bennett, but I’d be there to sort of bolster up the Bs, old Arturo Bandini, one of the boys, until some girl came along, some scent of perfume through the fiction room, some click of high heels to break up the monotony of my fame.

Write something like that, and keep going. Then you rest a bit, come back to it, and choose the best parts. It might just be one sentence, but it will be gold and will make your book glitter.

Cutting Adverbs

Sometimes a sentence sings best when it’s lean. Which brings us to the subject of adverbs.

Stephen King said, “The road to hell is paved with adverbs.”

In Stein on Writing, Sol Stein advises cutting all the adverbs in a manuscript, then readmitting only “the necessary few after careful testing.”

That’s good advice, and not hard to follow. Do a search for –ly words and see if you can’t cut the adverb or find a stronger verb.

Be especially (!) vigilant with dialogue tags. Elmore Leonard (who is quoted much too often these days, he said solemnly) called using an adverb to modify said a “mortal sin.” Perhaps a venial sin. I’m not a Robespierre about this, sending all adverbs to the guillotine. But do make them state their case before you “sentence” them.

Resonance at the End

The last sentences of your book are the most important of all. They may be the ones that get the reader to order another of your books immediately, as opposed to ho-humming and finding something else to read.

One of the most famous ending sentences in American Lit is from the short story that put William Saroyan on the map. “The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze” was published in 1934, the height of the Depression. It’s the story of young writer who is starving to death. He walks the streets, looking for work, but there’s nothing for him. He’s down to one penny. He returns to his room, becomes drowsy and nauseous. He falls on his bed, thinking he should give the penny to a child, for a child could buy any number of things with a penny. The story ends:

Then swiftly, neatly, with the grace of the young man on the trapeze, he was gone from his body. For an eternal moment he was all things at once—the bird, the fish, the rodent, the reptile, and man. An ocean of print undulated endlessly and darkly before him. The city burned. The herded crowd rioted. The earth circled away, and knowing that he did so, he turned his lost face to the empty sky and became dreamless, unalive, perfect.

That one word—unalive—is not in the dictionary. But who cares? It’s meaning is obvious. Saroyan could have written dead, but that wouldn’t have any zing. And the word perfect at the end is so surprising given the context that it leaves us pondering, feeling, perhaps even weeping. In other words, there’s resonance, that final, haunting note hanging in the air after the music stops.

Man, oh man, that’s worth reaching for.

Brother Gilstrap has written about the importance of last lines. His favorite is from To Kill a Mockingbird:

He turned out the light and went into Jem’s room. He would be there all night, and he would be there when Jem waked up in the morning.

Another resonant ending is from The Catcher in the Rye:

It’s funny. Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody.

And this, from my favorite Bosch, Lost Light:

I leaned forward and raised her tiny fists and held them against my closed eyes. In that moment I knew all the mysteries were solved. That I was home. That I was saved.

My advice is to write your last few sentences several times. Each time, say them out loud. How do they sound? How do they make you feel? Go for the heart. Teach them to sing.

Discuss!

“Can’t Put the Book Down”

Posted on by

Last weekend I once again had the privilege of being a panelist at Orycon, our local science fiction convention, and, among other things, moderated panels on writing and pacing your story. Creating a compelling story and keeping a reader turning the pages, to the point of missing sleep to read through to the end, are goals I believe all of us here at TKZ share.

Today’s Words of Wisdom considers three tools to help achieve those twin goals of creating a compelling story that is a page-turner. First off, Joe Moore looks at when and how to actual slow the pacing down. Then, Jordan Dane gives advice on managing narrative drive. Finally, Elaine Viets shares tips on creating cliffhangers.

Slow things down when you want to place emphasis on a particular event. In doing so, the reader naturally senses that the slower pace means there’s a great deal of importance in the information being imparted. And in many respects, the character(s) should sense it, too.

Another reason to slow the pacing is to give your readers a chance to catch their breath after an action or dramatic chapter or scene. Even on a real rollercoaster ride, there are moments when the car must climb to a higher level in order to take the thrill seeker back down the next exciting portion of the attraction. You may want to slow the pacing after a dramatic event so the reader has a break and the plot can start the process of building to the next peak of excitement or emotion. After all, an amusement ride that only goes up or down, or worse, stays level, would be either boring or frantic. The same goes for your story.

Another reason to slow the pace is to deal with emotions. Perhaps it’s a romantic love scene or one of deep internal reflection. Neither one would be appropriate if written with the same rapid-fire pacing of a car chase or shootout.

You might also want to slow the pacing during scenes of extreme drama. In real life, we often hear of a witness or victim of an accident describing it as if time slowed to a crawl and everything seemed to move in slow motion. The same technique can be used to describe a dramatic event in your book. Slow down and concentrate on each detail to enhance the drama.

What you want to avoid is to slow the scene beyond reason. One mistake new writers make is to slow the pacing of a dramatic scene, then somewhere in the middle throw in a flashback or a recalling of a previous event in the character’s life. In the middle of a head-on collision, no one stops to ponder a memory from childhood. Slow things down for a reason. The best reason is to enhance the drama.

A big element in controlling pacing is narration. Narrative always slows things down. It can be used quite effectively to do so or it can become boring and cumbersome. The former is always the choice.

When you intentionally slow the pace of your story, it doesn’t mean that you want to stretch out every action in every scene. It means that you want to take the time to embrace each detail and make it move the story forward. This involves skill, instinct and craft. Leave in the important stuff and delete the rest.

Joe Moore—March 18, 2015

Each author strives to create a compelling narrative drive (whether they understand what the term means or not) because they want readers eager to turn the page. That means the author MUST manipulate the world and the characters into the optimal story that involves mystery, suspense and intriguing relationships. This covers all genres of writing.

The author controls what is revealed to the reader and parses it out in the most optimal way by their judgement. They make choices on when to reveal things and how they are to be doled out. Natural born story tellers know how to do this instinctively.

The author is in control of EVERYTHING. He or she manipulates the reader with a titillating story and how that story is shared and how it affects the character relationships. Nothing should come as a surprise to the author.

To create MYSTERY elements, the author is guarded about what to share with the reader and when to share it. There’s misdirection with red herrings or through unreliable narrators, for example.

To create SUSPENSE, the author can have the reader follow along and reveal what they want the reader to know as the main characters discover things. This builds on suspense elements.

To give the reader an INSIDER VIEW, the author may reveal things to the reader that the characters don’t know. Let the readers play God from afar and watch the play that is told in the story.

KEEP A READER CURIOUS and/or WORRIED – Readers are naturally curious folks. Give them something to uncover. A wise author will let a reader’s minds be piqued by carefully placed clues. Or an author might make readers worry for the characters they’ve grown fond of. Make readers care and escalate the danger for the characters. Again, this post might sound geared for crime fiction, but it can apply to any genre. The threat does not have to involve life or death. It can involve the heart or the emotional survival of a family enduring a tragedy or a stigma.

WHAT KILLS NARRATIVE DRIVE
1.) Backstory dumps and long boring expositions can kill a strong page turner.
2.) When one scene doesn’t lead to a cause and effect, the plot may drift without cohesion. The reader gets lost in the amble. Actions must have consequences for the reader to want to come along for the ride.
3.) Cheating at mystery elements, where the author creates intrigue, but the outcome is a let down or a head fake for the reader. That’s when a reader will throw a book against a wall and may never buy an author again.
4.) Cheap surprises without build up is the same type of disappointment. Don’t pull a killer or a bad actor or a story element from thin air to end the book.
5.) No coincidences. An author might get away with a coincidence in the first few pages of a story, but a coincidence should never end the book. Major No-No.

HOW TO FIX A FAULTY NARRATIVE DRIVE:
I believe that each scene in a book should be like a mini-story. It should have a compelling beginning, a journey through the scene with purpose, and an ending that foreshadows what’s to come to create a page turner. Each scene should move the plot forward by 1-3 plot points, making that scene impossible to delete without toppling your story (like the wood block-building game of Jenga.)

I endeavor to build as many of these scenes as possible, even with scenes that build on a relationship as a subplot. The subplot should have a journey through the book as well.

Jordan Dane—October 3, 2019

Cliffhangers are the hooks that make your readers keep turning the pages, pulling them into the next scene or chapter. Most cliffhangers come at the end of the chapter. If your readers are hooked, they’ll continue reading.

Here are some tips for good cliffhangers:

A cliffhanger should catch your readers by surprise.

Something unexpected has to happen: Someone threatens to jump off a bridge. Their car goes into a skid on a snowy curve. A door opens unexpectedly. Then, bam! The chapter ends.

Darkest Evening, Ann Cleeves’ new Vera Stanhope novel, has a perfect cliffhanger chapter ending. Vera follows a killer, who gets her alone and strangles her. I’ve edited out the killer’s name in this section, but you get the idea.

“As Vera began to lose consciousness, she thought that this was her fault. . . it was her pride again, making her think she was indestructible.

“Then the world went blank.”

I couldn’t wait to turn the page and see what happened to Vera. Not to mention the killer.

Someone unexpected arrives. A crook, an innocent person, a cop, just in time. This person is a surprise. They abruptly break up the scene.

Someone leaves.

A bride suddenly leaves the groom standing at the altar. A couple is fighting, and he walks out on her. She suddenly quits her job.

Sometimes, the cliffhanger is a new piece of information.

Your character learns something. She’s not married legally to her husband after all because he never divorced his first wife.

Or, he’s not the son of the man he called father: the DNA test proved it.

Your character notices something. The detective sees the scratches around the door lock and realizes the house had been broken into. A wife finds lipstick on her husband’s shirt – scarlet lipstick. She never wears that color.

Your character figures something out. She finally understands the key to the puzzle the dead man left behind. He finally knows why his dead father wanted him to listen to the CD he left in his desk drawer.

Your character decides something. She’s going to leave her abusive husband. He’s going to rob the store to get enough money to feed his family.

She’s going back to school.

Elaine Viets—May 14, 2020

***

  1. How much do you think about slowing your story’s pacing when writing or editing? Do you have a favorite technique?
  2. What does narrative drive mean to you? How important is it to you?
  3. Do you use cliff-hangers? If so, what sort and when?

***

Empowered: Agent, the first book in my Empowered series, is currently free at all major ebook retailers.

The world says those possessing superpowers are either heroes or villains. But what if you’re both? Mathilda Brandt isn’t the angry, out-of-control teenager she was before she got out of jail. She’s hungry for a chance at a normal life, but when a gang threatens her sisters, she has no choice but to use her illegal superpower to protect them. A secretive government agency gives her a choice: go back to prison for life, or infiltrate a notorious super-villain group in order to stop a psychotic Empowered. To save her city, her family, and herself, Mat must become the last thing she ever wanted to be again: a criminal.

Thanksgiving Appetizers

Posted on by

Thanksgiving is next week. I thought about saving this topic until next Friday, but then a more appropriate topic would have been Post-Turkey Tryptophan Stupor.

Canada celebrates Thanksgiving on the second Monday of October (10-9-23). So, if you are Canadian, you can title this post “Thanksgiving After-Dinner Toasts.”

Our family celebrates Thanksgiving by gathering in a big circle to ask the blessing on the meal. Before the prayer, we go around the circle and each person tells something s/he is thankful for.

So, today, in this time of tumult, chaos, and conflict, I thought it would be a good idea to gather the Kill Zone family in a big cyber circle and ask each of us to:

  1. Reflect on something good in our reading/writing/publishing/marketing life. If you see fit, please share it with the rest of us so we can celebrate with you.
  2. Or, if you prefer to share a recipe for your favorite Thanksgiving appetizer, that would be great, too.

May your Thanksgiving be filled with family, gratitude, and joy!

Plot Your Story Using the Feynman Learning Technique

Posted on by

A great way to understand and retain a subject is through the Feynman Learning Technique. Regardless of topic, the technique leverages the power of teaching for better learning of timeless ideas. It’s also used for new work, like clearly understanding the plot in your story.

It’s said you don’t really know something until you can build it. It’s also said you don’t really understand a concept until you can teach it to others. This is where the Feynman Technique shines.

The Feynman Learning Technique is a proven method for learning and understanding concepts by teaching them to others, as if you were explaining the subject to a beginner such as a sixth grader. It’s designed to help learners (future teachers) truly understand and retain information, rather than simply memorizing it for a test, then swirling significant stuff down the drain of post-exam obscurity.

This learning and teaching technique is named after Richard Feynman, an American theoretical physicist who won a Nobel Prize in 1965. Mr. Feynman was nicknamed “The Great Explainer” for his phenomenal ability to understand complex subjects and break them down into simple terms and explain them in a way that a sixth grader could grasp.

Think about the plot in your current work in progress. Or take any plot in a past work. Or maybe an idea for a story you have floating in your mind. Would you, off the tip of your tongue, be able to explain it to a kid and have them immediately get what you’re about? Using the Feynman Technique might make this easier.

There are five key steps in Feynman. They’re actually quite simple when you think them through. In logical order, they are:

Step 1: Selecting the topic. For a story this would be genre and the general plot line.

Step 2: Breaking it down. This would be the arch, chapters, scenes, characters, key dialogue, mood, and theme.

Step 3: Explain it simply: As brief as possible, what happens to the characters.

Step 4: Fill in the knowledge gaps. What you’ve left out that’s important.

Step 5: Refine and simplify: What the bare bones is that a sixth grader would get.

The Feynman Technique goes beyond learning an existing topic. It opens a window into a different way of thinking that allows you to tear ideas apart and reconstruct them from the ground up. It also allows you to supercharge your learning from others.

You’re probably wondering about a real-world application of the Feynman Technique. I certainly was when I first discovered this imagination and knowledge enhancement tool. So, for this exercise let’s look at using Feynman to explain the plots of four highly successful stories — The Firm by John Grisham, The Stand by Stephen King, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by J.K. Rowling, and To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.

I’ve read these four books, but that was quite some time ago. Today, I wouldn’t be able to concisely explain their plots to a sixth grader, and I don’t have time to reread them in order to write this blog post. So, I’ve done what I’ve done so often in the past year, and please don’t judge me harshly for it. I’ve turned to my research assistant, Chat GPT, and gave it some prompts.

Q — Using the Feynman Learning Technique, please explain the plot of John Grisham’s book The Firm to me, assuming I’m a sixth grader.

A — Sure, let’s break down the plot of “The Firm” by John Grisham for you, imagining you’re a sixth-grader:

Meet Mitch: Okay, so there’s this guy named Mitch. He’s super smart, just finished law school, and gets a job at a fancy law firm. Imagine Mitch as the hero of our story.

Exciting Job, Shady Secrets: Mitch is excited because his new job pays a lot and seems perfect. But guess what? The law firm has some secrets. It’s doing things that aren’t so good, like working with some really bad people.

Big Problem for Mitch: Mitch finds out about these secrets, and it becomes a big problem. The FBI, like the police but for really big crimes, wants Mitch to help them catch the bad guys at the law firm. Now, Mitch has to decide what to do.

Hard Choices: Imagine Mitch feeling like he’s in a tough spot. If he helps the FBI, he could be in danger from the bad people at the law firm. But if he doesn’t help, he might be in trouble with the law.

Adventure and Danger: So, Mitch starts doing some detective work of his own, trying to gather evidence against the bad guys. It’s like a big adventure with lots of danger and excitement.

Smart Moves: Mitch is really smart, so he comes up with clever plans to outsmart the bad guys and the FBI. It’s like a game of chess where he has to think ahead to stay safe.

Happy Ending: In the end, Mitch figures everything out and helps the good guys catch the bad ones. He’s a hero, and things get better. But Mitch also learns that sometimes doing the right thing is tough.

So, that’s “The Firm” in a nutshell. Mitch, the smart lawyer, gets caught up in a tricky situation with a not-so-good law firm, but he uses his brains to make things right in the end. Pretty exciting, huh?

Q — Using the Feynman Learning Technique, please explain the plot of Steven King’s book The Stand to me as if I’m a sixth grader.

A — Certainly! Let’s break down the plot of Stephen King’s “The Stand” for you, imagining you’re a sixth-grader:

The World Changes: Imagine a world where something really bad happens. A super contagious sickness spreads, and a lot of people get really sick. It’s like a big sneeze, but way scarier.

Meet the Good and Bad Guys: In this world, there are good people and bad people. The good folks, like a guy named Stu and a lady named Fran, try to survive and help others. But there’s also a really mean guy named Randall Flagg who wants to take over.

The Journey Begins: Stu, Fran, and some other good people go on a journey. They’re like a team of superheroes trying to find a safe place where they can start over and be safe from the sickness and the mean Randall Flagg.

Superpowers and Challenges: Along the way, some people discover they have special powers. It’s like having superhero abilities. They face challenges, like finding food and avoiding the mean guys who want to make trouble.

The Big Showdown: Eventually, the good guys and the bad guys have a big showdown. It’s like the final battle between superheroes and villains. Who will win?

Starting Over: After all the excitement, the story shows what happens when the good guys try to build a new, better world. It’s like hitting the reset button after a big adventure.

Happy and Sad Moments: There are happy moments when the good guys succeed, but also sad moments when they lose friends. It’s like a rollercoaster of emotions.

The End and New Beginnings: In the end, the story wraps up, and you see how the characters’ lives change. It’s like finishing a really good book and feeling both satisfied and a bit sad that it’s over.

So, “The Stand” is like an epic adventure with good guys, bad guys, superpowers, and a lot of ups and downs. It’s about survival, friendship, and starting fresh in a world that’s been turned upside down. Pretty cool, right?

Q — Using the Feynman Learning Technique, please explain the plot of J K Rowling’s book Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone as if I were a sixth grader.

A — Absolutely! Let’s break down the plot of J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” for you, as if you were a sixth-grader:

The Ordinary Kid: Meet Harry Potter, a regular kid who lives with his not-so-nice aunt, uncle, and cousin. He doesn’t know he’s special yet.

Mysterious Letters: One day, Harry starts getting these super mysterious letters, but his family won’t let him read them. It’s like a big secret.

Hagrid and Hogwarts: A giant man named Hagrid shows up on Harry’s birthday and tells him he’s a wizard! Hagrid takes Harry to a magical school called Hogwarts, where he’ll learn all about magic and make new friends.

Magical Classes and Friends: At Hogwarts, Harry takes cool classes like Potions, Charms, and Flying on broomsticks. He becomes friends with Ron and Hermione, and together they have all sorts of magical adventures.

The Philosopher’s Stone: There’s this super special thing called the Philosopher’s Stone that can make you live forever. Harry, Ron, and Hermione find out that someone is trying to steal it, and they want to stop them.

House Points and Quidditch: At Hogwarts, students earn points for their houses by doing good things and lose them for breaking rules. Harry also plays Quidditch, a magical sport on broomsticks, and it’s a big deal.

Facing Danger: Harry discovers that the bad guy who wants the Sorcerer’s Stone is really dangerous. With Ron and Hermione, he faces challenges and puzzles to reach the stone before it falls into the wrong hands.

The Final Confrontation: In the end, Harry faces the bad guy, who’s trying to use the stone for something very dark. It’s like the big boss battle in a video game.

Victory and Celebration: Harry and his friends manage to save the day! There’s a big celebration at Hogwarts, and they earn a bunch of house points for being heroes.

Back to Normal… Almost: After all the excitement, Harry goes back to live with his aunt and uncle for the summer, but now he knows he’s part of this amazing magical world.

So, “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” is about an ordinary kid discovering he’s a wizard, making friends, learning magic at Hogwarts, and facing danger to protect something really important. It’s a magical adventure full of friendship and bravery! Cool, right?

Q —  Using the Feynman Learning Technique, please explain the plot of Harper Lee’s book titled To Kill a Mockingbird as if I were a sixth grader.

A — Certainly! Let’s break down the plot of Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” for you, imagining you’re a sixth-grader:

Meet Scout and Jem: The story is about a girl named Scout and her brother Jem. They live in a small town called Maycomb in the southern United States during the 1930s.

Mystery Neighbor Boo Radley: There’s a mysterious neighbor named Boo Radley who never comes out of his house. Scout, Jem, and their friend Dill are curious about Boo and make up stories about him.

Dad is a Lawyer: Scout and Jem’s dad, Atticus Finch, is a lawyer. He’s a really good guy and tries to teach his kids about fairness and kindness.

Tom Robinson’s Trial: Atticus defends a man named Tom Robinson, who is unfairly accused of a crime he didn’t commit. The trial is a big deal in the town, and it shows how people can be unfair because of prejudice.

Learning about Racism: As Scout and Jem grow up, they learn about racism and the unfair treatment of people based on the color of their skin. It’s a tough lesson for them.

Boo Radley’s Surprise: Boo Radley, the mysterious neighbor, turns out to be kind and helps Scout and Jem when they’re in trouble. It’s a surprise because he’s not what they expected.

The Mockingbird Lesson :Atticus tells Scout and Jem that it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird because they are harmless and bring joy. The mockingbird becomes a symbol for innocent and good-hearted people.

Understanding Empathy: Through the experiences with Boo Radley and the trial, Scout and Jem learn about empathy—putting themselves in others’ shoes to understand their feelings.

Growing Up and Lessons Learned: The story is about growing up, facing challenges, and learning important life lessons. Scout and Jem become wiser and more understanding as they go through these experiences.

Final Lessons of Justice: The book teaches about justice, fairness, and the importance of standing up for what’s right, even when it’s hard.

So, “To Kill a Mockingbird” is a story about two kids growing up in the 1930s South, learning about racism, empathy, and justice, and discovering that sometimes people aren’t what they seem. It’s a powerful story with important lessons about understanding and standing up for what’s right. Cool, huh?

Monroeville, Alabama – August 31, 2001 – A photo of the author Harper Lee, who wrote “To Kill a Mockingbird.” Photo is at the house where she spends half the year. Monroeville is where Lee was born and raised. Tribune Photo by Terrence Antonio James.

Kill Zoners — What do you think of the Feynman Learning Technique? Have you ever used it? Do you see the value in plotting with it or at least clarifying your plot? And who is brave enough to take one of their stories—old, current, or forthcoming—and write out an explanation of the plot to a sixth grader?

Traditional Publishing is Alive and Thriving and Different

Posted on by

By John Gilstrap

There’s a buzz about the internet that the traditional publishing market is dying, and that the most reliable route to authorial success is through some form of self publishing. In my experience, the rumors are in large measure perpetuated by people and bots who stand to make money from frustrated authors who want to see their words in print and are willing to pay for editing and publishing “services” that suck cash and provide no guarantees.

The argument as I hear it.

The days of Maxwell Perkins and like minded star makers are long gone. No publisher (herein after synonymous with “traditional publisher”) is willing to develop young talent. Either the manuscript arrives at the transom fully formed and ready to publish, or it will be rejected.

Agents are no longer taking on new clients. Instead, they concentrate on their current stable of authors, who make sure that the doors to the publishing industry are closed to newcomers.

The entire industry is prejudiced against (depending on the perpetuator of the rumors) white people, people of color, men, women, gays, straight people, old people or young people, and about any other demographic slice that has chosen to feel oppressed on any given day.

For those authors who have found the magic string to pull to gain access to an agent and then on to a publisher, disappointment awaits. Either the selected publisher will pay too much for a book that doesn’t earn out, thus dooming the author to a painfully short career, or they will pay a mere pittance that will have no meaningful impact on the author’s finances.

And oh, the financial abuse! For every book sold, the publisher keeps as much as 90%, and of the paltry 10% given to the author, one-fifth of the amount goes to the author’s agent. When Amazon will let an author keep 70% (?) of the cover price, who would even consider a real publisher?

The evidence is plain and clear: Advances are shrinking for everyone, and the Big Five are getting smaller every day. Clearly, that’s the sign of the industry’s impending death.

One would be a fool to even consider offering their book to a publisher.

Reality as I see it.

First, a brief reminder of where I come from: I sold my first novel, Nathan’s Run, in 1995. By the time it hit the stands, I had already sold pub rights to my second book, At All Costs. Both were sold for astonishing seven-figure advances and neither earned out. Not even close. Since then, there’ve been 26 more books, with at least two more under contract.

The Max Perkins editing model died long before I joined the publishing scene, and I’ve been around since the days when query letters were sent in envelopes that contained an SASE, and manuscripts were shipped via FedEx at something like $25 a pop. That’s when I learned that only bad news came in the SASE. Good news came via phone call. Even then, the burden lay with the writer to submit a near perfect manuscript to agents who requested to see a sample. Then, as today, the easiest answer to a newbie trying to enter the entertainment business, the easiest answer was/is no. Who would want to establish a long-term relationship with someone unprofessional enough to submit flawed work as their first impression?

Then and now, overworked editors depend on agents to serve as gatekeepers at two important levels. First, there’s the quality of the writing. Without a good story that is well told, there’s no good product to mold into a better product. (There’s never been hope for ill-conceived or poorly written stories).

Second, agents make sure that excellent manuscripts go only to editors who are looking for that kind of story. When a trusted agent tells an editor, “I’m giving you a 24-hour exclusive on this story before I submit it wide,” all other work gets shoved aside for the editor to read and make an offer (or not). Publishing continues to be a relationship business.

When a manuscript is accepted by a publisher, editing is less about wordsmithing than it is about project management. Once everyone is happy with the story, the editor champions that manuscript all the way through the cover design, marketing and publicity efforts. For the record, no author in the history of the world has been pleased with their books’ marketing or publicity plans.

NOTE: First novels are in large measure author auditions. Authors who work to promote their own works, make speeches and show an active interest in the advancement of their own career will see their publicity budgets grow with time.

Now, as then, agents and editors are starving for new talent, and champing at the bit to take on new authors. The crippling problem now that didn’t exist in my early days, is email. Back in the day (Good Lord, I can hear my old man voice), the sheer inconvenience and expense of submitting via mail served as a form of natural selection. And before that–as recently as the 1980s–a new draft meant retyping the entire manuscript. Talk about a barrier to entry!

Now, each agenting day reopens the valve for a tsunami of under-cooked, ill-conceived and poorly-executed submissions overloading their email boxes. I’m talking really awful, terrible drek. New authors demonstrate a shocking lack of respect for these professionals’ time. As always, the easiest answer is no. A yes has to be earned.

But according to the interwebs, nobody needs an agent anyway. There are plenty of resources they can pay to publish their terrible work on ebook platforms.

The nightmare of huge advances

I’m not going to pad the truth here. When HarperCollins and Warner Books recognized the magnitude by which they’d overestimated the marketability of Nathan’s Run and At All Costs, my career took took a kick to the doo-dads. But I got to keep the money. Let’s call that a silver lining.

And I kept writing, churning out character-driven thrillers. I was able to build on the various starred reviews of those first books, and I found publishers who were willing to hang in there because I was willing to take advances that hovered around 2% of the news-making paydays. Audiences grew, and as they did, so did the advances.

Nowadays, I won’t take an advance that I can’t earn out within 8 weeks of publication. That frees up lots of cash to be used in promotion and marketing. Over time, as a backlist grows, it acts as a kind of annuity, rendering the advance as more of a symbolic payment.

Many aspects of the good old days never made sense.

All corners of the entertainment business are driven by significant egos, all of which need stroking. Big name editors are stroked by their own imprints, authors with book tours and big advances. The huge names in this industry never earn back their advances because much of their value lies in being among the authors published by the publishing house. Ninety-nine percent of book tours lose money for the publisher, but the loss is justified by the bragging rights.

Or, so it has been for generations.

I think the most critical element in the slow implosion of the Big Five is the fact that they are now owned and run by people who don’t particularly like books or publishing. Once acquired by mega companies, publishers become another profit center among dozens of other profit centers whose profit margins are much higher than that which is possible in the book biz. The last couple of years has seen countless big-name editors released and replaced by lesser editors who demand lower paychecks. Publicity, distribution and copy editing are routinely sourced out to freelancers who have no emotional tie to the companies who hire them or the authors they edit.

The stage is set for great things.

The ossification of the Big Five is creating tremendous opportunities for new authors and new publishers that exist because they like the business of producing books. My own publisher, Kensington, remains privately owned and thriving. Newcomers like Blackstone and Source Books are making great strides in taking on new and orphaned authors and turning profits at the same time. New publishing companies are opening their doors every week, it seems.

But with new opportunities comes a shift in the author-publisher paradigm. It’s expected now that authors understand that they are small business owners and therefore responsible for a solid percentage of their book’s success in the marketplace. Writing is becoming more of a team endeavor.