“Hey look! I’m a writer!” Syndrome

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And we’re back. Hopefully everyone had a good weekend! Let’s start this week with a quick pop quiz:

Q: What is wrong with this sentence?

“The golden sun rose as a burning orb from the emerald green that carpeted the horizon into the azure blue sky.”

A: Well, perhaps there are a couple of things wrong, but the main one I’d hope people caught is the purple prose.

Again, like much of what I talk about on this blog, purple prose is a term that’s relatively well known in the writing community, but for those who don’t know, I believe this man (calling himself Bob Dole interestingly…) might have put it best, “I’d say that purple prose is a passage that is so needlessly ornate and wordy that it takes away from the meaning of the passage.”

I think anyone who’s read enough has probably come across at least one example of purple prose. The sun can’t rise, it’s a golden orb lifting magnificently. A woman can’t have red hair, she has hair the color of a burning ember that flows like torrents over her shoulders.

Now, of course, we’re writers, we want to describe things vividly. After all, it’s a good thing to help readers see what we’re seeing while writing. But as our good friend Bob says, “The more wordy the passage gets, the harder it is to get the point across.” And that’s always a bad thing. I might be old fashioned, but isn’t part of being a good writer, I don’t know, writing things that people understand? Sometimes you can get away with borderline purple prose, but more often than not, it just obscures what you’re talking about in the first place.

Think about it, if the sun is a golden orb, rather than “the sun” and your main character’s eyes are “emerald orbs” rather than green eyes (people writing purple prose have an odd attachment to the word “orb” for some reason I find more than often) all of a sudden, the readers is having to work to keep track of what orbs are floating where and what they’re supposed to represent.

“But don’t we want the reader to think about our story?” someone may be asking. The keyword there is “story”. Having a reader engage with your story, having them want to read more, is a good thing. Having a reader confused with what you’re saying is the exact opposite. No one wants to be focusing on trying to understand the wording when they should be focusing on the characters and plot. And, truly, which is easier for you to understand/picture? Her green eyes, or her emerald orbs? At least for me, the first I’m picturing, well, green eyes, and the second I’m picturing her holding glass balls that are dark green. It doesn’t make for a powerful image. It makes for an overly poetic, confusing one.

Maybe you agree with me, maybe you don’t, but having just read a book for review where my main complaint is that the language takes away from an otherwise touching story, I feel completely safe in saying that purple prose not only obscures what the author is trying to say, but it makes it look like they really don’t know what they’re doing.

And thus, that is why I almost always personally refer to purple prose as “Hey look! I’m a writer!” Syndrome. Though this is one thing I never had a problem with in my early writing (unlike all the other problems I’ve more than willing to admit to) it seems far too often that people who have just started writing feel the need to prove they’re a real writer, and so what do they do? Prove that they are amazing wordsmiths of course. Anyone can write about someone’s green eyes, real writers obviously can embellish to the point where the person reading will weep picturing the detailed world they have created. That’s how they prove they’re a real writer. Right?

Now, if you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know exactly how I feel about this idea that there are “real” writers and, I don’t know, fake writers(?) but purple prose nearly always seems like an extension of that idea, at least to me. You might be new to writing, but you are a “real” writer, dagnabit, and a good, nay, great one at that. Look how skillfully you craft descriptive words. All those fake writers out there can’t do that.

I don’t know first hand, but I imagine that that isn’t even a conscious thought. You aren’t sitting at your computer or there with a pen thinking, “I’ll show them all. I’m a writer!” but from what I’ve seen, that is the motivation for “Hey look! I’m a writer!” Syndrome. And that’s why it has the exact opposite effect. It doesn’t make you look like a good (or “real” writer) it makes you look like someone who has no idea what they’re doing trying too hard. If you look at the definition of “prose” (courtesy of Wikipedia), “Prose is the most typical form of language, applying ordinary grammatical structure and natural flow of speech rather than rhythmic structure (as in traditional poetry).”

What I want to focus on there is “natural flow of speech.” I don’t know about anyone else out there, but I have never heard any of my friends refer to eyes as X orbs (X=chocolate, emerald, cerulean, lilac, etc.) I’ve never heard someone talk about the golden orb rising into an azure sky.

Of course, as writers we have some leeway when it comes to discriptive language, I’m not saying to be bland with your writing either, but still, being a good writer isn’t about obscuring your story with flamboyant prose. It’s about making the normal interesting. A good writer is someone who can maintain a rhythm in their writing that not only reads well, but is completely natural. A good writer can produce beautiful, beautiful prose to the point where casual readers don’t even notice how good it really is.

And so, please, new or established writers, resist the urge try to prove something with your writing and don’t throw so many frills on your prose that it’s hard to even keep straight what you’re talking about. It doesn’t make you look like a good writer, it makes you look like a bad writer who’s trying too hard.

Especially if you’re sending me a book to review, because I will call you out on it.

Mary Sues

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All right, here’s a controversial topic around the writing community. Speaking about Twilight yesterday got one of my friends talking about what a Mary Sue Bella is.

Most people who have hung around a writing community for any amount of time have heard of Mary Sues (especially Fan Fiction sites). For those who haven’t, as TV Tropes puts it, “Mary Sue is a derogatory term…[used] to describe a particular type of character. This much everyone can agree on. What that character type is, exactly, differs wildly from circle to circle, and often from person to person” (if interested you can read the entire article here, but standard TV Trope warning: it’s addictive).

Still, for not having a set definition, there’s plenty of talk about Mary Sues in literary circles. You can find “litmus tests” to see if characters you are writing are straying too close to Mary-Sue Territory (like the ones here and here) and it seems that just about everyone can agree that writing a Mary Sue is a bad thing.

In my favorite haunts, the NaNoWriMo forums, you often find threads similar to this:

“Now I know there are tests and quizzes on the net for this kind of thing, but I’d like your opinions.

“Her name is XXXX. She’s an auntie to a two month old boy ; loves him more than anything, just like she did her brother before a hoarde of zombies killed him (her brother). She’s in love with one of the guys in her renegade, although she has issues with being close to him as she is afraid she will lose him like she lost her brother. She tried to kill herself because she was depressed after her brothers death. She’s an orphan (her parents were turned into zombies and she killed them) and she’s seventeen. She has brown hair, is a little over average height (just enough for it to be noticeable and look a little odd, not quite enough to make her look like a freak), has blue eyes and her weapon of choice is a .45 pistol and a wooden broom handle. ”

Now, of course it’s nearly impossible to tell someone if their character is a Mary Sue (or at least Sue-like) from a list of characteristics (after all it really tends not to be the character, but how you use them), but going back to TV Tropes:

“The prototypical Mary Sue is an original female character in a fanfic who obviously serves as an idealized version of the author mainly for the purpose of Wish Fulfillment. She’s exotically beautiful, often having an unusual hair or eye color, and has a similarly cool and exotic name. She’s exceptionally talented in an implausibly wide variety of areas, and may possess skills that are rare or nonexistent in the canon setting. She also lacks any realistic, or at least story-relevant, character flaws — either that or her “flaws” are obviously meant to be endearing.

“She has an unusual and dramatic Back Story. The canon protagonists are all overwhelmed with admiration for her beauty, wit, courage and other virtues, and are quick to adopt her as one of their True Companions, even characters who are usually antisocial and untrusting; if any character doesn’t love her, that character gets an extremely unsympathetic portrayal. She has some sort of especially close relationship to the author’s favorite canon character — their love interest, illegitimate child, never-before-mentioned sister, etc. Other than that, the canon characters are quickly reduced to awestruck cheerleaders, watching from the sidelines as Mary Sue outstrips them in their areas of expertise and solves problems that have stymied them for the entire series. (See Common Mary Sue Traits for more details on any of these clichés.)”

There’s of course some wiggle room on these traits, but the general consensus seems to be summed up in this NaNoWriMo forum post:

“I’m not personally opposed to Sue-like characters (many beloved characters, from James Kirk to Harry Potter, score high on the litmus test), but they have to be done carefully not to be off-putting.”

And what did all this Mary Sue talk lead me to think about? Editing of course. While I assure everyone that I will never name names about books I have worked on (1. It’s unprofessional 2. It’s just rude) the main character of a recent book I was contracted on has slowly left me feeling like she’s more and more Sueish. On one of the above litmus tests she scores about a 54 (most likely stemming from a combination of “tragic back story” “unbelievably beautiful/all men want her” and “mouthpiece for authors beliefs”) which is marked as: “36-55 points: Mary-Sue. Your character needs some work in order to be believable. But despair not; you should still be able to salvage her with a little effort. Don’t give up.” A couple more points and you’re into Uber-Sue territory.

Now, this particular character is definitely not inherently unlikable as some characters I have heard discribed as Sueish are. It took about half the story before I started getting especially annoyed with her. And I’m definitely not attacking the author. Believe me, if someone dug out that first novel I wrote in high school, one of the characters would score at least that high on a Mary Sue test. I would be the first to admit to the new-author trap that is Mary Sue creation. I think, like many problems in novels, Mary Sues fade as you write more and more. When you start out, your Main Character (MC) is your baby, your perfect creation. It makes sense that people like her, and those that don’t are jealous. She’s just that awesome. More characters you write, the less you’re going to attach yourself so completely to one MC and fall into the “Wish Fulfillment” trap.

In this certain novel, however, the main unlikability of the MC is the fact that the work is so black and white around her. All the male characters are only interested in sleeping with her (or at least want to sleep with her on top of being her friend), the female characters are either “good” characters, and completely enthralled with her or “bad” characters who don’t like her because they’re jealous. There is even a line that goes along the lines of “I didn’t believe he wasn’t attracted to me” after the first male character ever says he isn’t. While there are times this line could work–in first person, it’s possible that the character is just really vain. That’s a completely valid personality flaw–in this case, though, it’s probably a completely truthful observation because, well, every male character is attracted to her. And she wouldn’t be as awful to be vain. Not like she has flaws. This man even then goes on to say she’s beautiful in pretty much the same breath.

In the same vein, when Miss Sue goes off on one of the many tirades she does on topics the author obviously finds important, the other characters either completely agree with her–even though they have no reason to as far as their upbringing/personal beliefs/etc.–meet her rather valid, thought out points with something along the lines of “uh, I never thought of that” or “uh, you’re wrong, just because, uh, you’re wrong,” or they’re just bad, bigoted people you aren’t supposed to like in the first place. And this happens over and over and over again.

And in essence, that final point makes for my definition of a Mary Sue. A Mary Sue–while often has many of the traits listed in the TV Tropes–is ultimately a character that bends the story around them. It doesn’t matter what other characters would realistically do, they react to the Mary Sue because that’s obviously the way all characters would react to her. She’s perfect and beautiful and…perfect. No matter how she acts, people have to love her. If they don’t, it’s because they’re jealous of how perfect she is. Things that happen to her in the story happen because she’s who she is. There’s no random happenstance, no logical progression, just “Oh, another guy. He’s going to want to get with her. No, it doesn’t matter he’s married. No, nothing will stop her amazing awesomeness.”

And that’s what’s annoying about them. As nice as it might be for an author to be able to write a character they wish they were, or someone who is able to say everything they’ve ever wanted to say, they’re at best boring to read about and more often just annoying. Even agreeing with at least a good share of this Sue’s points, I don’t want to hear them, especially not when it’s another tirade at another character that is so obviously unenlightened that they need this character to yell at them and change their entire way of thinking.

It’s not impossible to get a book published with a Mary Sue for a main character. It’s not even impossible to have a best seller with a MC Mary Sue (cough, Bella Swan, cough). It just isn’t interesting to read. Give me a character that has flaws, give me a character that has things happen to her just because she’s in the wrong place at the wrong time, heck, give me a character that lectures, but against competent debate partners. To me, those are all preferable to a perfect character and a black and white world.

I Can’t Believe It’s Not Fanfic

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While editing recently, I was reminded of a phenomenon I saw relatively often while working in acquisitions, the “original fiction” fanfic.

For those not familiar with the concept, fanfic (short for fan fiction) is a work of fiction (unsurprisingly) that a fan (shockingly) of a story writes using the characters and/or setting of another writer’s universe rather than their own original creations. For example, a fan of Harry Potter might write a story using Harry, Ron, and Hermione that either makes sense in the canonical universe, or as an alternate reality. Alternatively, they could use the setting (Hogwarts, etc.) and write a story with their own original characters in that world.

I have absolutely nothing against fanfics. They’re actually partially how I got into writing (my friend had me help with her Harry Potter Fanfic back in High School). What is a little annoying, however, is the “original fiction” that really is a thinly disguised fanfic.

As fanfics use other authors’ characters and/or worlds, people, for the most part, realize that fanfics are not going to be published anywhere other than the several fan sites out there that cater to them (silly things like copyrights get in the way of traditional publishing). This doesn’t stop people, however, from changing a couple of names and submitting “original” stories that readers aren’t supposed to notice are strangely similar to popular books already out there.

Like The Big Bang‘s Sheldon would say to margarine, “I have no difficulty believing you are not butter” us in acquisitions tend to have very little difficulty picking out which stories are thinly disguised fan fiction.

As I have said before (twice) it’s very rare to have completely original idea/plot. etc. in fiction of any kind. Tell someone the basics of your story and they’ll more than likely be able to name something else that has at least some sort of vague similarity. That isn’t what I’m talking about when I talk about I Can’t Believe It’s Not Fan Fiction. I’m talking about stories that seem to have taken characters and simply changed the names from the original story, or have even lifted what seem to be full scenes from other books/movies. Often times the authors realize that their stories come from these sources as fanfics of sorts (or at least admit to having been heavily inspired by X work) but still it seems many, many I Can’t Believe It’s Not Fanfics still find their way out into the publishing world – as true fanfics (hopefully) never would – and stumble across acquisitions desks all over (if they aren’t simply self published to start with).

Since Twilight became popular (or whatever the series name is, is it just Twilight? The Twilight Series?) I have seen more than my share of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Twilight stories. To be clear, I’m not counting the many, many Twilight parodies out there. Satire/parody is its own category. No, these submissions/editing projects are completely serious novels that seem to have lifted  barely veiled characters and scenes out of the series, and are calling it their own. Now, I admit I have never read Twilight (tried a page and just couldn’t bring myself to keep reading…) but it is popular enough that even I have been able to pick out which books are I Can’t Believe It’s Not Twilight. One went so far as to name the main character Annabella who went by, wait for it, Ella (I suppose they just barely managed to stop themselves before calling her Bella). Another (not with Ella/Bella) had a scene at the end where Main Human Female Character (MHFC) gets bitten by an evil vampire intent on killing her because of Main Masculine Vampire Character (MMVC)’s attachment to her, and MMVC is forced to suck the poison (vampires have poison?) out of her to keep her from becoming a vampire herself. Or to keep him from having to turn her into a vampire to keep her from dying. I forget which. Now, anyway, I’m only basing this on having seen the movie once, but isn’t that vampire poison thing pretty much exactly how Twilight ends? With sparkly vampire not letting pathologically co-dependent girl become a vampire from evil vampire’s poison? (For whatever reason, though it seems like a logical way to get Miss Pathologically Co-dependent to be a vampire with Mr. Sparkles without him having to bite her.)

Anyway, I don’t know about other acquisitions editors/lit agents, but if the story is already published, I see no reason to publish something that’s the same story with names changed, no matter how popular the original is. In fact, the original story being popular might actually be worse for I Can’t Believe It’s Not Fanfics. It means that I would be publishing something that people who have never even read the original would more than likely know is a rip off of another story. Not just a small fan base.

Do you want to write I Can’t Believe It’s Not Fanfics? Do it. Don’t take this as me saying you shouldn’t. In my opinion, anything that keeps you writing is a good thing. After all, the more you write, the better you get, and the more likely it is for you to keep writing. Just, if you’re writing I Can’t Believe It’s Not Fanfic, please be honest with yourself. I’ve done it, I completely admit I have, but I don’t expect anyone to read it and not see the similarities between it and the original. Something you’ve read or seen may have spoken to you, perhaps just one scene that you really like. Fine. Use it. Just admit it to yourself when you’re taking it, because more than likely, someone’s going to call you out when you do.

[X] Types of Plot

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Not too long ago, I touched on the idea of “Accidental Plagiarism” that is, the experience of writing something that seems original and then finding out that there’s something already out there that seems to have stolen the idea straight out of your head. It’s more common than I’m sure any writer would like, but it’s understandable. The more you read, the more you realize that there really seem to be no original ideas out there. That idea of having ancient gods live in the modern world? It might have popped into your head from seemingly nowhere, but if you look into it, American Gods, Gods Behaving Badly, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul, mention it to a couple of people and the list of people who have used the same idea goes on and on.

Perhaps one of the best examples of this phenomenon I’ve recently seen comes from this thread in the NaNoWriMo forums (yes, yes, I’m always there, I know). A poster stated:

“So, I had this idea pop in my head. Where it came from, I have no idea. The very depths of my brain I guess. Anywho, I saw this scene, and a story fell into place. A world where Death is a man. He knows exactly who is going to die, when, where, why, etc…. If he touches someone, they will die… One day, walking down an alley or street, a door bangs open in front of him and a girl tumbles out… She looks at him, and that’s it, he falls in love. The problem, he can’t touch her or she will die.”

I have no doubt that the idea did pop organically into the poster’s head, but what does that sound like? The forum helped with that:

“Family Guy actually does a joke version of that [“Death Lives” for those who care] Death is in love with a pet shop owner, and actually ends up touching and killing her at the end.”

“Sort of like “Pushing Daisies.” The guy there can bring people back to life with one touch, but then they die again the next time he touches them. He brings the girl he was in love with back to life, but can’t touch her ever again or she’ll die irreversibly. They have a really cute romance with kissing through plastic wrap and stuff since they can’t touch skin to skin.”

“Isn’t that what “Meet Joe Black” was sort of about? I’ve heard the movie described kind of like that.” / “Yup, and “Meet Joe Black” is based off an old black-and-white by the name of “Death Takes a Holliday[sic]“.”

“Have you ever read “On a Pale Horse?” It’s not exactly the same idea, but it is about the person of Death and he does fall in love.”

It hardly means the original poster shouldn’t write their story, but obviously the idea that popped into her head also popped into a lot of other people’s heads at one point or another. And, as I pointed out in the forum, all stories that use the “can’t touch the thing you love” plot tie even further back to the Ancient Greek King Midas myth. The newer stories might not have the greed factor (turning things into gold) but it is still the idea of a life where touching something will destroy it.

These shared “out of nowhere” ideas are so common that Carl Jung came up with the idea of a Collective Unconscious, which has been described as, “a universal library of human knowledge.” Simply, it’s the idea that there are some ideas so innate in us that the mere fact of being human means it shouldn’t be at all surprising when you have the same ideas as others.

Whether or not you’re willing to subscribe to Jung’s theory, people at least seem to agree that there are certain similarities you can break down all stories we tell into. The Reduced Shakespeare Company, for example, in their performance “Complete Hollywood [Abridged]” says that all movies are one of three general plots:

1. Boy Meets Girl
2. Coming of Age
3. The Jesus Story

They then go on to take examples from the audience and break them down into one of the three (in a very amusing fashion. I got to see them when they were at The Kennedy Center).

Of course, as with any theory, there are plenty of suggestions about the “right” way to break down stories.

Foster-Harris, in The Basic Patterns of Plot also breaks stories into three categories:

1. “Type A, happy ending” (the central character makes an “illogical” sacrifice for the sake of another).
2. “Type B, unhappy ending”(the central character does what seems logically “right” and thus fails to make the needed sacrifice).
3. “Type C, the literary plot” (the central character’s decision doesn’t matter as much as fate [such as often seen in Ancient Greek plays])

Another suggestion is “The Seven Basic Plots”

1. man vs. nature
2. man vs. man
3. man vs. the environment
4. man vs. technology
5. man vs. the supernatural
6. man vs. self
7. man vs. god

Ronald Tobias, in 20 Master Plots, has twenty :

1. Quest
2. Adventure
3. Pursuit
4. Rescue
5. Escape
6. Revenge
7. Riddle
8. Rivalry
9. Underdog
10. Temptation
11. Metamorphosis
12. Transformation
13. Maturation
14. Love
15. Forbidden Love
16. Sacrifice
17. Discovery
18. Wretched Excess
19. Ascension
20. Descension

And, because twenty sometimes isn’t enough, Georges Polti gives us thirty-six in The Thirty-Six Dramatic Situations:

1. Supplication (Supplicant must beg something from a Power)
2. Deliverance
3. Crime Pursued by Vengeance
4. Vengeance taken for kindred upon kindred
5. Pursuit
6. Disaster
7. Falling Prey to Cruelty of Misfortune
8. Revolt
9. Daring Enterprise
10. Abduction
11. The Enigma (a temptation or a riddle)
12. Obtaining
13. Enmity of Kinsmen
14. Rivalry of Kinsmen
15. Murderous Adultery
16. Madness
17. Fatal Imprudence
18. Involuntary Crimes of Love
19. Slaying of an Unrecognized Kinsman
20. Self-Sacrificing for an Ideal
21. Self-Sacrifice for Kindred
22. All Sacrificed for Passion
23. Necessity of Sacrificing Loved One(s)
24. Rivalry of Superior and Inferior
25. Adultery
26. Crimes of Love
27. Discovery of the Dishonor of Loved One(s)
28. Obstacles to Love
29. An Enemy Loved
30. Ambition
31. Conflict with a God
32. Mistaken Jealousy
33. Erroneous Judgement
34. Remorse
35. Recovery of a Lost One
36. Loss of Loved One(s)

You can argue about the exact types of plot, or even if it’s possible to classify all plots under any amount of categories, but assuming you can (I believe you could with all my novels/short stories) it really shouldn’t be surprising that true originality seems to be all but impossible. Death falling in love? It could be 15 from the 20 (Forbidden Love) 28 of 36 (Obstacles to Love) 5 of 7 (man vs. the supernatural) or any of the 3 depending on how the author writes the story. And so, once again, it seems that struggling for originality seems futile. Does that mean we should stop trying and write the same story over and over again? Of course not. It just means it’s that much more important to know that it isn’t the plot that will make the story special, it’s how you tell the story.

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“Real” Writers

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All right, here’s an interesting topic (once again brought up by the NaNoWriMo forums. Seriously guys, if you want to be a novelist, check them out): What makes you a “Real” Writer?

To be completely honest, I’ve always disliked this question, like there’s some criteria you have to hit as a writer before you have the right to call yourself one. Thus, I fully admit I bristled when I came across this “pep talk” from a user on the NaNoWriMo forums. For me personally, it would have been hard not to with the first paragraph starting:

“A word of warning: this is a pep talk…aimed at people who like to think of themselves as serious writers, not for people who are doing Nano casually…This is for people who think they’re “real writers”, but are stuck.”

All right, I can understand the writer of this post is trying to make a point, and has obviously dealt with the personal issue about whether he/she is a “real” writer (which he/she states later in the post: “I began to wonder whether writing was “my thing.” Whether I was actually a “real writer”, or had just pretended to be one all these years“) but honestly, what does that even mean? Apparently (according to this poster) I’m “snarky” since, my answer to “What makes a ‘real’ writer” has always been “To be someone who writes.” (His/Her first point on answers he/she’s heard about what makes a real writer is: “The snarky answer is that if you write words, you’re a real writer”).

Our poster goes on to give a couple of different suggestions he/she has heard (other than just writing making you a writer) about what makes a “real” writer:

1. If people read what you write, you’re a real writer.
2. If you make money on your writing, you’re a real writer.
3. If you feed yourself and pay your bills with the money from writing, you’re a real writer.

Before coming to the conclusion, “Being a real writer isn’t about just having fun, and it’s not about having a hobby. Nor is it about making writing your financial support. Because for a real writer, writing is more than all of those things. It’s more important than fun, or a hobby, or your material survival. For a real writer, writing is not just something fun or cool to do when you feel like it, nor is it just your livelihood…Being a real writer is about writing when it’s NOT fun. Being a real writer is about WORKING on your writing anyway, whether you feel like it or not. Because it’s that important to you, and if you don’t, you’ll go crazy. You must write. It’s WHAT YOU DO.”

Again, I realize (or at least think) that the poster is trying to be inspirational. He/She had a crisis of confidence about being a writer, and realized that he/she was one because he/she was willing to power through and still write, dagnabit. I also completely understand his/her comment about the compulsion to write. I do feel a little crazy when I don’t have time to write, but then again, writing is how I relax. Without it, I get sort of antsy. There isn’t any sort of “struggling for my art” when I write. I write when it is fun, when it makes me happy, and then set it aside when inspiration doesn’t come (which, luckily, doesn’t happen often).

Does that mean I’m not a “real” writer? The fact that I have fun writing? That I don’t struggle for my art? Well, if I’m not, then I have a good few people to tell to put down things I’ve written and give refunds to since none of it was written by a “real” writer.

If it helps our poster with his/her writer block, all right he/she can believe that. However, I maintain my earlier point: If you write, you’re a writer. I don’t care if you make millions off your writing, or if you just have a couple short stories you scribbled between classes in high school you’ve never shown anyone. You can call yourself a “real” writer as far as I’m concerned. You’ve written, and consider yourself a writer. Done.

Perhaps that is my biggest peeve with the “real” writer debate. It seems to imply that being a writer is to be in some special club. The laypeople who don’t reach the specific criteria of being a “real” writer aren’t allowed to use the term, after all, they would sully it. Make it less special. Whether or not the poster means it this way, the argument seems inherently elitist. The fact someone who has written something for fun once in their life calls themselves a writer doesn’t make my being a writer any less, I don’t know what they’d suggest, important(?) than it is if they don’t. I’m not sure what mythos there is around being A Writer, but it’s just something we do, for fun or profit or anything else. To consider being A Writer as something that needs to be protected from your commonplace “a writer” suggests that part of the reason to be A Writer is prestige. And that’s odd to me. Do we need some external validation that what we do is special to want to write? And, in that case, can you be a “real” writer if you’re writing, in part, to feel special? Seems like it isn’t that internal motivation the poster was talking about earlier.

If you need to feel like a “real” writer to have the motivation to write, ok. Motivation is nearly always a good thing. But don’t tell people they aren’t “real” just because they don’t match up to whatever criteria you have in your head that you use to justify why you are a “real” writer. At best it’s elitist and at worst just plain insulting.

And so, I’m back to my “snarky”, completely serious definition of being a writer. You write? You consider yourself a writer? You’re a “real” writer.

Writing Prompts

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Happy Super Bowl Sunday, everyone. Hopefully everyone’s doing something fun today. And, I admit, while I’m going to a party later, I am bringing my notebook along with me (darn inspiration after a week-long writer’s block…) So, for all the other writers out there looking for some non-football inspiration, we have today’s post on Writing Prompts.

Now, there’s a reason I’ve never taken a true creative writing course. I can’t stand writing prompts. For me, if I didn’t think of the idea organically, I just can’t write about it. Or I can, but it sounds awful. I have the sneaking suspicion I would do very poorly in a class that required me to write a certain type of story off a certain prompt.

That doesn’t mean, however, that I don’t sometimes need some inspiration after a dry spell. I’m lucky in that I almost always have some idea bouncing around my head, but every once in a while I really want to write, but can’t think of anything I want to write about.

As I’m sure most people know, there are plenty of writing prompt generators out there, like this or this or… But I don’t think I’ve ever actually been inspired to write a story based on any sort of set prompt. Maybe I just don’t want to write a story about a dog saving the world or an evil hairdresser (the second would probably come out a little too close to Sweeney Todd anyway…) So, what to do?

Prompts like that may work for some people (I assume they do, since I’m not sure why’d they exist otherwise) but I tend to find my inspiration from different sources:

1. What ifs: These are always fun. What if zombies were an endangered species protected by law? What if a high school student was accidentally elected president? What if, we’re all the dream of an eight year old girl, who lives in Slough? Similar to regular prompts, but at least I feel like they leave much more room for originality. And even if you don’t want to consider the exact what if, they give you a place to start and let your mind wander. You can come up with them yourself, a movie/show you’re watching can bring one up, or you can go to places like the NaNoWriMo “Adopt a Hypothetical” Thread, where other writers drop ideas off when they have too many “What ifs” and not enough time/plot.

2. Pictures: Rather than just general prompts (“You wake up one day and find out the world is black and white. Write that story.”) I find some pictures help give me more ideas, that often seem more original than something another prompt might (insert comment about a picture being worth 1,000 words and all that). Though it wasn’t entirely inspired by a picture, the first scene from a book I am currently shopping around, The Copper Witch (excerpt here if you like), came from looking at this painting. Go ahead, read that excerpt, I’ll wait. … See how the main character is positioned for her portrait? Yeah, they’re staging some version of that painting (sorry for spoiling it those who didn’t actually go and read. I promise I understand. Your time is precious).

For prompt sites, if you don’t just want to click around google image searches hoping to find something interesting, this is one of my favorite, because it also gives interesting pictures with the actual “prompts” and I find those more inspiring (I mean, look at this picture. How couldn’t there be a story there?)

3. Song Lyrics: Perhaps my favorite in terms of generating random ideas. While you don’t want to quote actual song lyrics in a book (can get into nasty, nasty copyright infringement suits that way) I’ve always found lines to be a good for inspiration. My other novel, The Bleeding Crowd, is a good example. The plot and characters weren’t inspired by a song lyric, but the title was inspired by the song “Easy to be Hard” from the musical Hair, and that shaped how the two main characters related to each other and their political causes.

I don’t actually know if there is a site that lists song lyrics as novel prompts, but by listening to whatever music you prefer, it’s possible to pick out your own lyrics you find inspiring and start a list that can give inspiration when you come to a writing roadblock.

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Inner Filters

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Today’s Twitter question comes from @MustardSeedRisk (a journal you can find here: http://themustardseedrisk.com/) reading:

“@JessicaDall Q: What is the best mindset to avoid ‘filtering’?”

Now, there are a couple of different ways filtering can be used when talking about writing. First, there’s the idea of your character filtering everything that’s happening before it gets to the reader, which of course makes for slow (most of the time weak) writing, for example:

“She saw the ball falling through the air. She heard the window shatter…”

Rather than:

“The ball fell through the air. The window shattered…”

Since MustardSeedRisk asked about mindset, however, I’m going to venture to guess that they’re asking about inner filters, or feeling the need to filter yourself before you even actually write a scene, character, or entire story for one reason or another.

There are plenty of reasons to feel the need to filter your writing. You might not feel comfortable writing certain sorts of scenes; something might feel too personal to put out there, or you might be much too aware that if you get this [novel/short story/play/etc.] published/produced you’re going to have your sweet conservative grandmother reading/seeing it. With how personal writing can be, it makes complete sense that it isn’t always the most comfortable idea, writing those things down when you’re intending for other people to read it.

Now, inner filters are not always a bad thing. In the same way having a filter when out with people can keep you from losing friends, some level of filter keeps a controversial book from just being insulting. Filters become bad, however, when they keep you from actually writing a story that could be great if you could just get yourself to put it on paper.

So how can you get past those filters? Everyone has their own way of breaking through, but I can offer some suggestions.

1. Decide if the scene/character is actually necessary: Of course, this only works when it’s a part of a story that’s keeping you from writing, not the story itself, but if you have a half-finished story sitting somewhere lost on your computer or in notebooks and you just can’t finish it because it’s gotten to a point where you aren’t comfortable writing it, figure out if the scene/character you’re avoiding is actually needed. For example, my reference to Sexy Discretion Shots earlier. I’ve never written erotica, and I’m not especially comfortable writing in-depth sex scenes, so there’s no reason for me to stop writing just because I’ve come to a place where a sex scene might be called for. Just like there’s no need to put a random sex scene in a story that doesn’t call for it, there’s no need to be graphic about what’s happening if you don’t want to be. After all, if you aren’t comfortable writing about it, it probably isn’t going to be very good anyway. It’s possible to do the lead up then “fade to black” coming back in after a scene you aren’t comfortable with ends. Aren’t comfortable about having a character tortured? If it isn’t absolutely necessary, jump it. Aren’t comfortable with the language a character uses? If it isn’t necessary, cut it. Simple as that.

2. Pretend you’re only writing for yourself: Ok, you’ve looked back, and it’s completely necessary for your character to swear up a storm based on how you’ve characterized him. You’re ok with that, but you don’t want your friends/parents/children/etc. to know that you even know those words. Pretend, at least for the time being, that you’re only writing for yourself. Your eventual plan may be to publish, but for now, it’s just you and the paper. Just because something’s written doesn’t mean it has to be read. I have written stories that I only finished because I didn’t actually consider other people reading them. It was only after going back and rereading and editing that I even considered the possibility of it getting out there. If you are able to write something without worrying about other people seeing it, you’ll be able to finish the story before thinking about things you might want to change. And it’s possible at that point you won’t want to change it any more.

3. Remember you can always use a pen name: This goes back to the earlier point, if you’re filtering yourself because you have the fear of someone else reading it, you can always publish under a pseudonym. Tell those you don’t mind reading it the name, for everyone else, it can just be a book by John Doe. It’s completely under your control.

4. Have someone else look over it: Sometimes filtering comes from worrying about doing a touchy topic incorrectly more than having someone read the story in general. Perhaps you’re filtering out a character who you originally imagined as bisexual because you don’t want to be insulting, or someone with autism since all you know about that is from Rainman. That sort of filter can be good in some ways. There are certain things that people far to often over do. Just because a character is homosexual does not mean that he thinks, “Girlfriend, those shoes are fabulous,” or she only wants to wear flannel. Just because a character is clinically depressed doesn’t mean that they are automatically goth and just because a character is goth doesn’t mean they’re clinically depressed. If you aren’t comfortable with writing a character because they are X or have Y, it doesn’t mean you should completely filter yourself, it means you should have someone help you with that character. As a whole, people who are attempting to filter certain controversial topics , and push through anyway, are much more likely to end up with insulting characters since that unfilterable thing becomes all that character is. A person with a disorder isn’t their disorder, someone’s sexuality only affects with whom they have sex. If you feel a filter is affecting how you can write a character who is X or has Y, find someone to talk to and pick their brain before forcing yourself forward. Once you’re more comfortable with the topic, the filter should become less of a problem.

5. Ask yourself if this is something you really want to write: So you’ve done everything else. You’ve talked to someone with X and know how to not be insulting, you’ve determined this scene is completely necessary to the plot, you’re writing for yourself so you don’t have to worry about what other people think, and…You’re still filtering yourself. And it’s really hurting the story. At this point, you really just have to ask if this is a story you are ready and willing to write. Perhaps it’s a great story, it just isn’t something you’re comfortable with. Decide if it might not be better to just put it aside. It doesn’t have to be forever, just until you’re more comfortable with it. After all, not being comfortable with your own story and characters just makes everything sound forced anyway. You won’t have a great story if everything you write sounds forced and stilted, no matter how amazing and timely the plot. Sometimes forcing writing just isn’t worth it.

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A Wizard Did It

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Happy February, everyone. To start off this month, we have part two of Tia Kalla’s question. For those who haven’t read yesterday’s post, Tia (@tiakall) tweeted me the question:

“@JessicaDall Any good advice for plothole/ending problem solving?”

Since we ended January talking about plot holes, today we’ll be talking about tricky endings.

Now, I completely understand why Tia grouped these two concepts into one question. Where plot holes are a problem with something integral to the story, ending problems are just what they sound like…problems when you get to the all important climax and conclusion (or denouement, if you want to be fancy) of your story.

Unlike a plot hole, where you have a character/situation that doesn’t make sense or is in someway against the rules of your universe/personality of your character, what you generally find with ending problems are that you’ve written the rest of the story in a way that makes it so you can’t find a way to solve the problem you have spent the entire story building up.

For example, your Main Character is caught in the Big Baddy’s secret hideout with all his/her friends locked up and no way out. Now, if your Main Character is James Bond, they’ll figure out some crazy escape that works. Far too often, though, authors find themselves flailing trying to figure out just how they’re going to write their way out of the mess they’ve gotten themselves into.

And this is where you have to be careful not to fall into the most dreaded ending fix. The Deus Ex Machina.

What, you ask, is a Deus Ex Machina? A latin phrase that translates to something like “God out of the machine” my dear friend Wikipedia defines it “as  a plot device whereby a seemingly unsolvable problem is suddenly and abruptly solved with the contrived and unexpected intervention of some new event, character, ability, or object.”

From what I remember of Drama 101 in college, Deus Ex Machinas (yeah, yeah dei ex machina, but Latin plurals are crazy) abound in the Ancient Greek Playwright, Euripides’, plays, such as an example in the play Medea, where perhaps the original “hell hath no fury” woman has slaughtered her infant sons in revenge for her husband, Jason (of Argonaut fame) leaving her for another woman. Children freshly killed, Jason comes to punish (read: kill) Medea for her crime and has her there, just about as defenseless as possible, dead sons nearby, ready to pop her head off. Escape seems impossible for poor (read: completely insane) Medea, so how is Euripides going to write himself out of this? Is he going to let her die?

Spoiler Alert: No, that would just be completely understandable for the plot. He wants Medea to live. And so the chariot of the Sun God, Helios, comes down on stage (by mechanical means) and pulls her out of her predicament. Quite literally, a God in a machine saving Medea and solving Euripides’ plot problem.

Now, I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen a modern-day book which uses Deus Ex Machina quite so literally as Euripides (does anyone have an example of God coming down in a chariot and fixing everything at the last minute?) but that doesn’t mean that seemingly unsolvable problems aren’t “suddenly and abruptly solved with the contrived and unexpected intervention of some new event, character, ability, or object” in modern-day works.

Perhaps the most blatant of these moments are in situations where one of the main characters “suddenly” finds out that they had some power that has long been dormant that they only find out about just as everything seems hopeless. Often times this is found in stories with “Mary Sue” characters. Though Mary Sues are a controversial and a poorly defined occurence in fiction (which I’ll get into at some point in a later blog post) the overly-idealized Sueish character often find some magical way to save the day when all seems lost because of their perfect selves.

Like one of the suggestions for fixing plot holes in yesterday’s post stated, you should not to throw in things that are going to be important to the plot too late in. If you’re going to have something that is important come in later, try to touch on it before that exact point where it’s needed. Even if it isn’t a fix-all, knowing that the main character has the ability to jump tall buildings in a single bound when threatened is better than having it just suddenly happen at the climax of the story.

And that’s what makes Deus Ex Machinas so annoying. They feel like a cop out. You’ve spent however long reading a novel, or sat for however long in a theatre, have invested yourself in the plot and story, and just when you’re supposed to get the pay off – see how it all comes together – you find that there’s a proverbial “get out of jail free” card that makes the rest of the story not mean much. If the main character could have used their super-awesome teleporting skills right at the beginning, you wouldn’t have needed the entire middle of the story where they’re struggling through. So why did you have to read that part at all? If the wizard could have sent out that spell that just traveled halfway around the world to kill the Big Baddy, why the heck didn’t he?

So how do you avoid a Deus Ex Machina situation?

Like other general plot holes, it can help to outline before hand, or put in something that makes it so they aren’t saved at the possible last second by something that makes the rest of the book useless… But, truly, the most important thing in avoiding Deus Ex Machina is to spend some time thinking about your characters, thinking about how they would react to any given situation (when they don’t have a hope of lightning striking down the Big Baddy, or God dropping down), and not to worry about making your story “more exciting” by building up the danger they’re facing to the point where there’s simply no way they can get out of it without said lightening bolt from the heavens. Even with a little less danger, if you’re able to stay within the logic of your story, and have your characters stay, well, in character, it’s going to be a much more interesting, much better story than it would be by saving them by something out of nowhere that leaves the reader wondering what the point was if that’s the end.

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The Ever-Dreaded Plotholes

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Today’s post comes from a seemingly simple question from Tia Kalla (@tiakall):

“@JessicaDall Any good advice for plothole/ending problem solving?”

Of course, I’d bet all of us writers wish that were simple, after all, it’s never fun to finish a story, get halfway through editing, and then find out that what the second half of your plot hinges on actually makes no sense. Sadly, there’s very rarely an easy fix, just some that are easier than others. And so for today, we will focus on plot holes, and I’ll attempt to tackle all those sticky ending problems tomorrow.

For those who don’t know exactly what a plot hole is, wikipedia puts it:

“A plot hole, or plothole, is a gap or inconsistency in a storyline that goes against the flow of logic established by the story’s plot, or constitutes a blatant omission of relevant information regarding the plot. These include such things as unlikely behaviour or actions of characters, illogical or impossible events, events happening for no apparent reason, or statements/events that contradict earlier events in the storyline.”

Reader or writer, I think we’ve all been there. Even if you’ve never seen a book in your life, you’ve probably experienced plot holes. You’ll find them in movies all the time. Cracked.com even came up with a list of eight movies left with gaping plot holes.

For example, Back to the Future:

“Marty McFly goes back in time, helps his parents get together, invents rock and roll…and everyone promptly forgets he was ever there the minute he leaves.

Nobody notices that a famous clothing brand is later named after him, nobody notices that Chuck Berry releases a song that sounds pretty similar to the one he played at the big dance, and most importantly, nobody bats an eyelid when his Mom has a kid who looks exactly like him.”

Or Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban:

“At the end of another wondrous wizarding adventure, Harry uses a magical time-travel necklace to go back and save himself and his godfather from the evil dementors… The movie treats time travel like this urgent thing: “We’ve made it to the past! Now we’ve only got a few minutes to go back and stop the dementors!” No you don’t, you have as much time as you need. It’s f**king time travel. If you mess up, just go back and try again.”

Now, I’m sure every writer and/or reader had come across something in a story that seems out of nowhere, or completely out of character (I know I had to change a scene in a story when my editor pointed out that it didn’t make sense to have an otherwise cautious character agree to drive home with someone who might have had a few too many). But what’s awful about true plot holes are that they’re essential to your story. Had that car ride been the start of the story (a story about dealing with a drunk driving death, perhaps) or an essential part of the plot (it leads to a car chase that absolutely has to be there) it would have been a lot more difficult to get around it than having her take a taxi home for the night (which she does).

So just how, exactly, do you get around those annoying plot holes?

1. Acknowledge/Joke about the plot hole: One of the easiest ways to get around a plot hole is to simply acknowledge that, yes, it is a plot hole. For example:

“Wow, lucky this charm we’ve needed was right here where we just happened to be walking in a forest where we’d be lucky to ever find each other if separated.”

“Yeah, what are the odds?”

Not an ideal fix, but it’s better than just leaving it there for other people to pick apart. Personally, I believe this fix works best when a plot hole comes from someone acting illogically.

“Why the heck would you go and talk to that guy?”

2. Go back and change something that’s less important to make the plot hole make sense: For example, using my example of the cautious character getting in a car with someone who may or may not be safe to drive, put in somewhere much earlier that she’s very cautious, except when she’s drunk. That way, it would be easy to say she got drunk at the party and thus wasn’t her normal self. It’s easier to change than trying to rework just how you’re going to start your plot without her in the car and you have the plot hole taken care of.

What you do want to be careful of with this fix, however, is not to throw in the fact too late. Then it seems like a blatant attempt to fix something at the last minute. For example, in a book I was editing a while back there was a painfully obvious “oh, I need to move the plot along” moment that just made for bad writing. It seemed to go something like:

[Author is writing] Hmm, I need to have Generic Love Interest (GLI) jump in to this river and save Heroine who is suddenly going to turn into a Damsel in Distress long enough to have them meet and fall in love. But how can I do that? I’ve shown up until now that she is a completely competent woman who wouldn’t need anyone to save her. Oh! I got it.

Heroine: I know we’ve been on this boat for half a day, but just so you know, I can’t swim!

GLI: Oh, really?

Heroine: Yeah, I sure hope… AH! I just fell overboard, you need to save me since, like I just said I can’t swim!

It’s good the author was trying to fill in a plot hole, but if it’s important that the Heroine of your story can’t swim for that scene, don’t mention it three seconds before she falls in. Add it in earlier, take a little more time to edit and put it in earlier. A couple of references that maybe she’s afraid of water. Heck, even when they first get in the boat, make her uncomfortable. That way you have some precedent for when she falls overboard.

3. Outline: This might be most useful for keeping plot holes from happening int the first place, but outlining can also be a useful editing tool. Write down everything important that happens. Write down all the things that make those important things happen. It won’t take as much time as completely trying to rewrite and it will help you pinpoint where you’ll be able to make changes that will either allow you to make your plot holes make sense, or change them entirely. Is there a minor character you forgot about who could make the plot point work? Add them in so the plot hole makes sense.

4. Total Rewrite: And, of course, the most dreaded of the fixes for plot holes. Completely rewriting the story from however early you need to to get rid of the plot hole. Just considering it is enough to make the writer in you die a little inside, isn’t it? You’ve spent X amount of time writing your sixty, seventy, eighty-thousand word baby (562,000 if you’re Ayn Rand. Yep, that’s how long Atlas Shrugged is) you’ve finally made it through a complete draft, and now you’re basically going to have to start over. Still, if you can’t find any other fix (and you aren’t willing to just ignore it and hope no one very catches on – a fool’s dream) a rewrite could be your best bet. And sometimes it works out for the better. Now that you know exactly what you want to do with your story, and know your characters so well, the second time writing the same story might turn out amazingly better than you ever thought it could be just by going through and editing it.

And so, those are my suggestions for fixing plot holes (at least how I would do/have done it). If anyone has any other ideas, feel free to comment or email me (jesskdall(a)gmail.com) and I’ll add your ideas in as help for other writers.

To all: May your fixes be easy and your plot holes few.

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What’s in a Name?

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Today’s blog post comes from us courtesy of Roxanne St. Claire (@roxannestclaire), a fellow Twitterling (I’m not sure if that’s something we call people on Twitter, but I like the term, and thus it is what I call people on Twitter all the same.

In under 140 characters Roxanne wrote:

“Sometimes just changing a character’s name changes everything. Just did that and heroine feels so much more “right” now.”

Right away, at least for me, that made complete sense. There are some writers out there who can write an entire story with their characters being X and Y before filling in the names. I, personally, can’t. A name means a lot to my characters. Often times, a story idea comes from the name, rather than fitting the name into a completed story. I don’t know, maybe that comes from my not much caring for outlines, but all the same.

Take, for example, Willow. One of the main characters in my novel Grey Areas. To me, she has always been Willow. I’m not quite sure where the name came from at the time (perhaps it’s just that I like plant names. Thinking about it, the Main Character in The Bleeding Crowd is Dahlia…) but from the moment I started writing, she was Willow. From that name, an entire back story came out that her parents had been hippies. Hence the plant names. (And the fact that her middle name became Belladonna). For The Bleeding Crowd, the names are even more set. Dahlia comes from a mother who loves plant names. The twins are Audrey and Zoe (A and Z for the two ends of the alphabet). All the men have biblical names (Benjamin, Jude, Abraham…)

But, ok, those all have plot reasons behind them. It would be a little odd to have all characters in X group have names that start with one letter and stray from that. In those cases, of course names matter. But what about just any old character? Does it really matter if a character is named Jill or Jane?

Of course, to quote Shakespeare, “That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet” (Romeo and Juliet (II, ii)). Would it really have mattered to the story if Romeo had been named Sam? Or Bill?

Perhaps not. If you wrote the characters exactly the same, perhaps it wouldn’t matter if the play were “Bill and Juliet” but then, the name Bill just brings up a different connotation there, doesn’t it? The 1989 movie Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure just wouldn’t have sounds the same if it had been “William and Theodore’s Excellent Adventure” now would it?

To quote the great philosophers, the writers of The Simpsons:

Lisa – “A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.”
Bart – “Not if they were called ‘Stink Blossoms’.”

Perhaps a rose would still smell like a rose even if it were called something else. But what would someone’s first reaction be if you were trying to give them a Stink Blossom for Valentine’s Day? I doubt many people would want to even try smelling something that says it stinks in the name. And for those who did, you can’t discount the idea of the mind playing tricks. Something along the lines of the placebo effect. You tell someone something’s going to smell bad, less likely they’re going to accept that it smells good.

Personally, I think the same thing happens to a lot of writers. There’s a picture in our heads associated with names. Take Agnes for example. What’s the first thing you picture? Unless you know someone else named Agnes, it’s probably an older woman. Now Laquisha, or Vinnie. There are some names that are just associated with stereotypes – either because they are most common in one group than another, it’s a name used a lot in media referring to one type of person, or because they have been used as a negative “catch-all” for a group of people (such as someone insultingly referring to a hispanic man as ‘Jose’). There’s such a strong mental connection to some names that it doesn’t only affect how a reader sees the character, but it starts morphing even us writers’ ideas about our characters.

And, so were’ back to Roxanne’s point, “Changing a character’s name changes everything.” It’s probably why it can take so long to find a perfect name for one character, and why you couldn’t change another’s name no matter how much a publisher or agent pushes you to. It’s just the character’s name. It’s how you see them. It’s who they grow to be.

And so, a rose might still smell like a rose, but it wouldn’t be what we expect it to be. And that changes everything.

(If you’re struggling to name someone or something in your story, naming sites around the web can help you find something that seems to “fit.” I made a handy list of a small fraction of these sites available here to help point anyone looking in the right direction.)

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