Rachel Neumeier's Blog, page 21

Foreshadowing and Setup

Here’s a post at Jane Friedman’s blog: Key Methods for Direct and Indirect Foreshadowing in Your Story

Foreshadowing is a literary device in which future developments in a story are hinted at before they happen, presaging what’s to come. It adds dimension to stories just as shading and shadow add it to visual images: Foreshadowing can heighten suspense and tension, increase momentum, raise a story’s stakes, deepen and develop characters, and pave in key plot developments to give the story more cohesion.

I rather like this paragraph, which packs a lot into three lines. The post then goes on to discuss both direct and indirect foreshadowing. Let me see. Okay, seven categories, click through to read the more extensive discussion.

Direct statements.

This would be things like saying, “I thought everything would be simple until four assassins leaped through my window in the middle of the night.” Chapter break. Or a book with the title Everyone Dies in the End, which, by the way, I have never been able to bring myself to read in case everyone actually does die at the end, so I’d be cautious with titles like that if I were you.

Prophecy.

I’ve always sort of wanted to do a prophecy … which turns out to be not just misleading, but false. Would this be outrageously annoying, like breaking the Happily Ever After rule for Romance novels? I mean, if you have a prophecy in a fantasy novels, is it cheating if the prophecy is simply false? What do you think? Has anyone read a novel where this actually happened, and if so, did it work for you?

Chekov’s Gun.

I would say that this doesn’t include every element of the setting that is described. Sometimes setting is just setting — there to create a feeling that the world has depth and is real. But if an element of the setting is going to be important later, then it should be emphasized — subtly — but it should not come out of nowhere. The Maltese Falcon statue in Jennifer Cruisie and Bob Mayer’s Rocky Start offers a perfect example of a Chekov’s gun element and exactly how to handle that. Oh, the stirring rod in Rihasi is like that too, though the significance becomes apparent much earlier in the story. I pointed to it emphatically during the opening scene.

“Breadcrumbs”.

The example of this I like best from the linked post: clues about an estranged father and mention of the letter the protagonist wrote him that was never answered keeps his unexpected reappearance in act three from feeling like a deus ex machina. I think this is right. If something or someone is going to be important later in the story, then this item or person should be referenced earlier. Not necessarily with a LOT of emphasis, but with enough that readers are likely to notice, rather than reading straight across the reference and then going, “Wait, who?” when the person shows up.

“Echoes”.

In The Hunger Games, Katniss saves Peeta from eating poisonous berries, remembering her father’s warnings about them—an event later echoed at the end with a twist, when she gives them to Peeta so both can eat them to kill themselves together rather than turn on each other, and outfox the rules of the game.

Hmm. while this is an echo, I’m not sure I’m seeing the difference between this and “breadcrumbs.” It looks to me like an earlier reference to something so that the thing doesn’t come out of nowhere later. Maybe there’s a subtle difference I’m not seeing.

Motifs.

In The Sixth Sense, the color red indicates when the spirit world is brushing against the corporeal one.

Really? I totally missed that. Huh. Now I want to go watch the movie again and look for that. On the other hand, if you can see a movie multiple times and completely miss something … I’m just saying … that seems possibly overly subtle?

Mood, Tone, Atmosphere

Tone is important; it is even crucial. I’m not sure I’d consider it a type of foreshadowing unless it’s specific to one scene, or leads from one scene to one specific other scene. If it’s the overall tone of the story, then … it’s just tone. Or not “just.” I mean, tone really is crucial if you’re writing a cozy mystery, gothic romance, or high fantasy. But it’s not foreshadowing. Or I don’t see how.

The linked post finishes this way:

The key to finessing this powerful device is understanding what type to use, and where, to shade in the story’s depth, meaning, and nuance.

I would say: The key to effective foreshadowing (and plot set-up, which is perhaps a type of foreshadowing) is skill; and for me, part of the skill involves thinking, “Oh, gotta back up and add clouds and sunlight earlier in this scene, before we get to this point.” But a lot more is just something that appears without any deliberate thought; the back of my brain does it without conscious input. AND, not quite the same thing, but it’s absolutely astounding how often something I throw into the early part of the story for no special reason turns out to be crucial for an important scene much later in the story. That’s very definitely not conscious intent. I guess it’s the back of my brain remembering this element was back there, and realizing it could be useful right here.

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Update: Look at that, it’s February, that was fast

Okay, so I didn’t feel like I was pushing all that hard during January, and there were those stressful power outages, but of course half of Christmas Break occurs during January, so there’s that. Anyway, I’m keeping a running total of wordage, so I know that in January I wrote 80,000 words for Tano’s next book. I’m wistfully noting that if this were going to be a short book, like SUELEN, it would now be finished. In fact, if it were going to be an average book, like MARAG, it would still be finished, or nearly, because I started the month with 35,000 words already sitting here.

As it is, no. I’m going to let it go to 200,000 words or thereabouts, then trim it back to some reasonable length, because that’s just how it’s going to work this time. I do need to decide whether I’m keeping the current title or changing it, so I can start referring to it by title instead of as “Tano’s next book.” Not that that isn’t clear, but still.

Anyway, here we are, February. February is a terrible month. It’s terrible for two reasons – no, three –

A) February is the depths of winter. Though you can’t tell at the moment, which is why I forgot that for a minute. It’s 70 F today, thus turning all grassy areas into a quarter inch of mud on top of soil still frozen as hard as concrete, so that’s not great. Anyway, the dogs love that we’re going out to the Arboretum every day (and then washing 24 little feet). Joy spent an hour barking at imaginary birds in a shrub yesterday rather than running madly around, but whatever, I’m sure that was fun, for some reason.

Where was I going with this?

Oh, right. Springlike weather notwithstanding, it’s not spring. Ordinarily I love winter and enjoy snow, but we don’t have our new generator yet, so right now, not so much. We have the propane tank and the cement foundation for the generator has been poured, so we’ll get there, I suppose.

B) February is short. I don’t mind, exactly, except that I would like to declare that I’m finished with this book by the end of February, so a longer month would be nice. I admit, this is totally unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

C) My birthday is in February, and I’m long, long past the time of life where I thought cake was worth having to note the fact that I’m older. Though I suppose I should make a cake, because whatever, at least I will have an excuse to do that.

Not that I would be 20 again if you paid me. I would absolutely be 40 again, though.

Meanwhile!

My very favorite purchase of 2025 so far, and in fact this is the single item I like best that I’ve purchased for a good long time:

The Airmoto Smart Air Pump.

You know, back in the dark ages when my car did not tell me about tire pressure, I never put air in my tires and never thought about it, and I never had a flat except when I picked up a nail or something. But those days are long behind us, and now my car tells me all about the tire pressure, so I know that two of the tires are down to 30 psi and a third is flirting with 28 psi, and if that tire drops another pound, I’m going to get a low air warning.

I am absolutely sick and tired of messing with gas station air pumps. I’m tired of asking neighbors if they would mind blowing up a low tire. I’m tired of driving on tires I know are low for two months because I don’t want to deal with it and eventually I’ll need to take the car in for an oil change and they can do it. I’m REALLY tired of knowing the tires are low and we’re expecting temperatures to drop to 8 F and then probably I’ll get a low air warning. I had a slow leak last year and was putting air in that one tire every single week until finally the dealership found the leak and fixed the tire, which was an hour and a half out of my life that I’ll never get back, by the way.

I had no idea that anybody made a cordless, tiny, six-inch air pump that charges by plugging in to a normal wall socket or your cigarette lighter in your car, that comes with a tiny little hose you screw into the air compressor and then SCREW ON TO THE TIRE VALVE, so you know it’s on there and you’re not accidentally letting air OUT of the tire instead of putting air INTO the tire, which I have done. (If you’re the sort of handy person who would never do that, try not to laugh.)

Anyway, I saw an ad someplace for a teensy air compressor and I thought, Really? And went to Amazon and poked around and bought the one linked above. Yesterday, when the temperature was up and it was a nice day, I tried it out.

First, wow, the directions are awful. Not only is the print tiny, but I was like, “What are all these little pieces? Am I supposed to do something with these? There are no instructions for any of this! I kind of get the part with the controls, but what are these THINGS?” So I did what I’m sure is second nature to anybody who grew up with a smartphone, but has taken me a while to learn to do: I googled a short YouTube video showing me how to use the air pump. Oh, the things are extra valves for blowing up basketballs and bicycle tires! I can just ignore them! Well, maybe you should SAY SO in the instructions, for people like me who have no clue.

Anyway, the hose already has the right screw-on attachment for a car. You don’t have to do anything with the extra little valves and things. There’s a release button on the back of the air pump which releases the hose from its storage compartment, another detail left out of the official instructions. You then screw the hose into the compressor and then screw the other end to your tire’s valve and push buttons until the air compressor turns on. The instructions for which button to push are probably okay, though I watched that part of the video too. The itsy-bitsy air compressor worked like a charm. It puts about one pound psi into your tire per minute, which doesn’t seem a lot slower than the big compressor at the gas station. I love it already and I will never be without it.

I think the recent tech things that have made the biggest difference to my life in the past couple of years are my robot vacuum cleaner, my kitty fountain – they really love it and were not happy when the fountain turned off during the power outage – and now this teensy little air compressor.

So if you never worry about tire pressure and don’t find this an extra stressor in your life, great, but if you had no idea you could get something like the above, now you know this is a thing.

Meanwhile!

I have been poking along, very slowly reading a novel, which I started some time last year. Structurally, it was about the strangest book I’ve read for a good long time. I finally finished it, so I’ll tell you about that later this week. Maybe Friday, since I don’t think I have a post scheduled for Friday (and completely forgot to do a post last Friday, sorry!).

Also, since it’s February, I should do the next newsletter. And check to see how many more chapters I have from “Midwinter,” since eventually I will need to finish that story. Though I think it can perfectly well wait till I’ve finished a draft of Tano’s next book, whatever its title eventually turns out to be.

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Poetry Thursday: Here comes Spring

It’s working for me to look for classic poets born in whatever month. This turns out to be a pretty decent way of finding poets I’m less familiar with, who were writing long enough ago that their poems are public domain. Johannes Vilhelm Jensen was born (in January) in 1873 and died in 1950, so here we are. He was a Danish poet, as you might guess from the last line of this poem, which is certainly a great poem for this time of year:

Solstice Song

by Johannes Vilhelm Jensen

Our sun has now grown cold,
we are in winter’s hold
the days are waning.
Now, past the deepest night,
our hope burns bright –
yes, hope burns bright,
for now the sun will right,
now light will soon return, the days again are gaining.

The lovely fir tree green
betokens summer’s screen
of woods imposing.
In Christmas candlelight
like star-hosts bright,
yes, star-hosts bright,
sun’s wonder is in sight
and all the yellow flower-suns that now are dozing.

The fir-tree’s charry scent
gives air to summers spent
and each newcomer.
Cool Danish years all swing,
dance in a ring,
yes, in a ring
round an eternal spring.
Let all souls also sing of Denmark’s lovely summer!

***

Since I’ve picked spring as the theme, here’s another spring poem, this time by an English poet. This one is longer, but even though I usually try to find short-ish poems, let’s go for it. Here in the depths of winter, I’m sure we’re all in a mood to feel enthusiastic about spring!

***

Ode to the West Wind

Percy Bysshe Shelley

O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The wingèd seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

Her clarion o’er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill:

Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and Preserver; hear, O hear!

II

Thou on whose stream, ‘mid the steep sky’s commotion,
Loose clouds like Earth’s decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,

Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
On the blue surface of thine airy surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head

Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith’s height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge

Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre
Vaulted with all thy congregated might

Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: O hear!

III

Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams,

Beside a pumice isle in Baiae’s bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave’s intenser day,

All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic’s level powers

Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow grey with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: O hear!

IV

If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share

The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O Uncontrollable! If even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be

The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seemed a vision; I would ne’er have striven

As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
Oh! lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!

A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed
One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.

V

Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies

Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,

Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawakened Earth

The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

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Ridiculously indulgent broccoli quickbread

So, I’ve made this a couple of times, and I think it’s easy, good, impressive, and funny, all at the same time – an ideal party or potluck contribution, in other words. Naturally, I tweaked the recipe and I suggest you do as well, but here, take a look:

I think this looks great and also fun.

Broccoli “Cake” (actually a quick bread, definitely not a cake because that would be weird)

INGREDIENTSCOMMENTS  13 oz butter, softenedI used eight ounces of butter plus about 3 Tbsp olive oil, and frankly I think it’s worth trying with just eight ounces of butter, but I have also made this exactly as it says, with this much butter, even though that looks absolutely ridiculous.  8 eggs, room tempI have always used all eight eggs, but I bet seven would work. Or six. Not sure, though.   The way to bring eggs to room temp fast is to run the water as hot as it will go, fill a large bowl with hot water, put the eggs in the water, and wait five minutes. Since I have never in my life remembered to take eggs out of the fridge half an hour before making a cake, this is how I usually do it.   The eggs are going to provide all the lift, so they really are important and should be at room temp, no fooling.  2 1/3 C. flour   1/3 C sugar   Pinch saltThis is not NEARLY enough, and I wound up sprinkling each slice of bread with kosher salt to make up for the stupidly undersalted recipe.   Use 1 tsp salt or 1¼ kosher salt, as anybody can see that has got to be closer to appropriate.  Pinch turmericThis is for color, obviously, and you could leave it out. I think the bread will be yellow enough without a little turmeric. If you use eggs from free-range hens, the yolks are probably going to be darker yellow and you almost certainly wouldn’t need turmeric.  Pinch baking powderI can’t help but feel this is just for show. What is a pinch going to do here? Anything? I doubt it. Nevertheless, I put it in.   A pinch is 1/16 tsp, by the way. Or, I mean, it’s a pinch.  1½ lb broccoliYou don’t need a full pound and a half. I think I used about half a pound, though I didn’t weigh it. What you need is big, nice florets. If you buy crowns, with less stem, then you won’t need to buy as much by weight.   However, if you happen to have left over broccoli, that’s fine, just use it for something else.

Now, to make the bread. Cake, if you really want to call it that. Whatever you’re going to call it.

Cut the broccoli into big florets. Like, if the “head” of a floret is about two or three inches across, that’s fine. Big. Not that you can’t use smaller florets. But big is good. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil, dump in the broccoli, stir to submerge, bring the water back to a rolling boil, dump the broccoli into a colander, and rinse with cold water to cool it off.

There’s no need to be obsessive here. Has the water returned to a “rolling” boil? Probably close enough, or if you want to wait another thirty seconds, fine, probably doesn’t matter. Do you need to cool the broccoli off all the way? No, you probably don’t really need to run cold water over it at all. However, I wouldn’t just skip this step either. You want the broccoli blanched, not actually cooked, but you do need it blanched. This isn’t that much trouble, so go ahead and do it.

Heat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Beat the butter (or butter and oil) until creamy. Beat in eggs, on low, one at a time. Combine dry ingredients and add to egg mixture.

Line a normal loaf pan with parchment paper. Spray with cooking spray. Spoon in 2/3 of the batter. Line up the broccoli florets down the middle, like you are planting trees in the batter. Closely packed trees. Spoon in the rest of the batter and sort of squish it around so the broccoli florets are basically buried. It won’t matter if they show through a little.

Lower the temp to 350 degrees F, and I am here to tell you that if you forget to lower the temperature, the bread will be fine, but you may create a little smoke, thus setting off smoke alarms near the kitchen and bothering any spaniel puppies you may have hanging out nearby. Joy’s grandmother is terrified of smoke, something I’d forgotten until Joy reacted the same way. They are quietly terrified, so if we had an actual house fire, I hope some other dog will actually bark and wake us up.

Anyway, bake at 350 degrees F for 45 minutes. Probably you should turn the loaf pan around in the oven at about the 35 minute mark, but if your oven bakes REALLY EVENLY, maybe you won’t have to.

Cool for five minutes or so, turn out, cool slightly or all the way to room temperature, whatever you prefer, slice, and serve, to the admiration of all.

Because this is such a ridiculously over-the-top rich bread – 13 oz of butter! Eight eggs! I mean! – I would suggest serving it with soup or salad. I don’t mean a rich cream soup, either, or a salad heaped with chicken and cheese. I mean some light soup and a normal salad that isn’t a main course type of salad.

My guess is that people who think they hate broccoli will be fine with this bread. The broccoli flavor is perceptible, but not front-and-center.

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Voice

Here’s a post at Writer Unboxed: Dissecting Voice.

Recently, I commented that I personally like Rex Stout a lot better than Arthur Conan Doyle and that I like both Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin a lot better than Sherlock Holmes or Watson.

Thus, the way this post opened caught my eye at once:

Consider this snippet of dialogue:

“What’s her name?”

“Janet.”

“I don’t feel comfortable calling anyone by their first name, especially a woman.  Do you know her last name?”

“No, I don’t.  You’ll just have to call her Janet, I guess.

Perfectly good, serviceable stuff, right?  Clear, fairly concise, smooth.  Now look at how Rex Stout actually did it in the short story “The Cop Killer:”

“What’s her name?”

“Janet.”

“I call few men, and no women, by their first names. What’s her name?”

“That’s all I know, Janet.  It won’t bite you.”

The same information, but you can hear Nero and Archie in the second version.  That difference is voice.

Yes, it sure is, and what a great choice for this topic. The author of this post goes on:

I’ve written before about how elusive voice can be.  I’ve suggested possible places to look for it and covered some of the hallmarks of good dialogue.  Today, let’s take a deeper dive into how it can be done.

So you may want to click through to those posts as well. Meanwhile, here’s a suggestion (that I have never followed and don’t intend to) (but I think it sounds sort of neat, though):

Take all the dialogue spoken by one of your characters, put it into a single file, and read it through, all at once.  Then do the same for another character, and another.  Can you tell the difference between the characters just on the basis of their dialogue?  Remember how easy it was to distinguish Nero and Archie were in just two lines.

Doesn’t that sound like fun? Except for crying out loud, who has the time to copy and past all the dialogue for one character into a separate file? (!!!??) I’m trying to imagine spending minutes of my life … hours of my life … doing this, and all I can say is: No. But it STILL sounds like it would be sort of fun and possibly informative to read through the dialogue file once you did in fact do this.

Here’s one I’ve heard of that sound a lot more doable: Flip the book open anywhere (or scroll to a random page of text), read the dialogue, and ask yourself, can you tell who’s speaking just from what they’re saying? I can also see copying and pasting the dialogue just from two or three randomly chosen pages and trying this. Without the names on the page, can you still tell who’s speaking just from the lines of dialogue?

I basically write from the pov of whoever’s voice is clearest to me, but this does mean that sometimes I struggle to find the voice of an important secondary character.

For Marag, everyone’s voice was clear — Sinowa, Marag, Koro, all very clear. Nagaro, Sinowa’s poet cousin, emerged from the story.

For Rihasi, Rihasi’s voice was clear to me from the beginning, but Kior wanted to sound like Esau, until I paused and firmly told myself, no, look, Kior is a better-educated man, much more serious, far more ready to assume betrayal is right around the corner.

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Update: Where exactly does the time go?

All right, I know where some time goes: into taking the dogs out to run in the arboretum and then cleaning up their feet, legs, and bellies because, oops, muddier than I thought.

I took three of them on leash first to walk around the whole perimeter — this is roughly an acre and a half in area, so not huge — and just take a look at the fence all the way around. Lo, a cedar tree was leaning at about … oh … thirty degrees from the horizontal, let’s say. It hadn’t fallen entirely, but plainly that was a temporary situation, not a new and stable status quo for that tree. I mean, this was leaning right down over the fence, not inside the arboretum where I don’t really care if a tree s down in general. Three big branches and one tree were down inside, away from the fences, one practically blocking the gate, but those weren’t the problem. This tree leaning over the fence, ready to crush the fence, was the problem.

So I took the dogs out to run, brought them in, cleaned them up, and called a neighbor with a chainsaw. The tree is now in pieces on the ground, and no doubt it will eventually go into the neighbor’s wood stove.

This tree needs to come off this other tree next:

This is a big piece of an oak that has smashed into a small osage orange. I suppose I should admit that the situation is not as dramatic as it seems; that osage orange was leaning way, way over to begin with. Nevertheless, it can’t be good for it to have this oak branch completely on top of it this way, so the oak branch does need to go.

As a side note, osage oranges are hands-down the slowest-growing trees I know of. “Known for their rapid growth,” says Google’s AI overview, and I am here to tell you that the five osage orange trees here have not grown a millimeter in width in thirty years, as far as I can tell. They all look exactly the same now as when I first saw them. Perhaps they have added height. It’s hard to judge. They aren’t necessarily tall trees as far as that goes. However, I have two small ones, the size of the one shown here, and they have just been sitting there all this time as well. They are wild trees, incidentally. I don’t water them. They may not like our summer droughts. But I’m very underwhelmed by their growth rate.

Fine trees in general, of course. They are thought to have largely depended on mammoths for seed dispersal, and of course given the size of the fruits and the little interest current fauna shows in those fruits, this is highly plausible. The wood is particularly good for bows, in case you ever accidentally step through a portal and find yourself way back in the Stone Age and would like to make a bow.

Meanwhile:

Sure, of course I got a fair bit of writing done. Not much was going on this past weekend, which is just what I prefer: boring life, thank you, zero events of note. I’m maintaining a rough 3000-words-per-day average, meaning a little more on weekends to make up for shortfalls during the week. It’s not a particularly obsessive book to work on, but I’m enjoying it.

AND

We are about to enter the pass, and very (very) soon thereafter, we will descend on the northern side of the mountains and enter the startlit lands. AT LAST.

I’ve also almost finished a book that I have been reading very slowly for some time. I started it last year. I know why it’s been so slow, but now that I’m much closer to the end, I’m glad I went on with it rather than just deleting it from my Kindle app. I expect I’ll finish it fairly soon and then I’ll post about it, because it’s interesting. Most of you (well, a lot of you, anyway) will be familiar with the author, and you’ve very likely read it, so we can see what you all thought of it too!

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How many Plots?

So, I was playing with the “How many plots are there?” idea from last week, and came up with this, based on various comments and just a teensy bit of googling around using “how many plots are there?” as the search term.

***

***

I think it’s probably not especially useful to try to boil down stories the The Seven Basic Plots (or any variation on that theme). Looking at this now, I still wouldn’t say it’s necessarily useful, but (like so many other types of categorization) it’s kind of interesting. I forgot about Boy Meets Girl and then decided there was no way to separate it from other so-called “basic plots” and superimposed it over the top, but I think that could be where it belongs. Suppose you have a basic romance in which nothing much happens except Boy Meets Girl, Boy Loses Girl, Boy Gets Girl — the simplest possible plot. Doesn’t that always also include something like The Man (And Woman) Who Learn Better? Or, I mean, something besides purely Boy Meets Girl.

Boy Meets Girl strikes me as somewhat like Comedy. When I googled “seven basic plots,” sure enough, one of the top hits has this list where Comedy and Tragedy are listed as basic plots, and my reaction is still ???. How are those plots?

Let’s think of some classic Comedy or Tragedy — how about Romeo and Juliet. The plot is — what? What is the basic plot? Can you just say “Tragedy” and stop there? I don’t think so. I think that’s Boy Meets Girl (Idiot Teenager Subplot), plus Things are Not As They Seem, and then on top of that, it’s also a tragedy.

How about a comedy? Much Ado About Nothing, say. What good does it do to say it’s a comedy? It’s Boy Meets Girl, plus The Man Who Learns Better. Plus on top of that, it’s a comedy.

What is The Count of Monte Cristo? It’s Journey and Return, Man Caught in a Trap, Rebirth, Rags to Riches, The Man Who Learned Better (maybe that’s the same thing as Rebirth), Overcoming the Monster (maybe?), and even maybe A Stranger Comes to Town. It’s neither a tragedy nor a comedy. It’s a romance, but not exactly Boy Meets Girl. Except for Maximilian and Valentine, and then maybe it is. Maybe Things are Not As They Seem. There’s a lot to it.

I don’t know that it’s particularly useful to attempt to lay out plots and categorize novels, but I think I can say with assurance that statements such as “There’s only one plot: Things are not as they seem” are wrong. It’s easy to look at that diagram and pick out a plot that does not fit: Man Versus Nature. That can be an extremely straightforward plot in which everything is exactly as it seems and one hundred percent of the tension comes from elements that are right there in the open. The giant storm is exactly what it seems to be, the killing cold is exactly what it seems to be, the parched desert is exactly what it seems to be, and the question is: how does the protagonist survive. The Martian is a Man Against Nature story. Is it anything else? Return, maybe, although not Journey. The Journey happens before the story opens. Basically it’s just pure Man Against Nature.

How about We have only one story. All novels, all poetry, are built on the neverending contest in ourselves of good and evil. And it occurs to me that evil must constantly respawn, while good, while virtue, is immortal. I didn’t put “Good Versus Evil” in the Venn diagram because, like Boy Meets Girl, it’s everywhere. But Man Versus Nature is again an exception, isn’t it? Unless you define the courage (or obstinacy) to keep going as “good” and the surrender to death as “evil,” which I don’t think I do, but if you did, that might do the job of bringing that plot into the overall umbrella of “Good Versus Evil.” How does The Martian look now? Actually, in a way, the story does fit the Good Versus Evil paradigm, not because of Mark Watney’s efforts to survive, but because of the efforts of other people to save him. The frame story rather than the main story does fit with Good Versus Evil. I can imagine where a Man Versus Nature story might not have any kind of frame, and then it might still be an exception.

However, no matter how purely a Man Versus Nature story might belong to only that category, this —

I believe that there is one story in the world, and only one, that has frightened and inspired us …. Humans are caught … in a net of good and evil. I think this is the only story we have and that it occurs on all levels of feeling and intelligence. Virtue and vice were warp and woof of our first consciousness, and they will be the fabric of our last, and this despite any changes we may impose on field and river and mountain, on economy and manners. There is no other story. A man, after he has brushed off the dust and chips of his life, will have left only the hard, clean questions: Was it good or was it evil? Have I done well — or ill?

Would still be true. You could argue that the man caught in a plot Man Versus Nature plot, faced with the prospect of death, is also intrinsically faced with that question, even if that’s not what the immediate story is about.

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Poetry Thursday: Robert Burns

Robert Burns was born January 25th in 1759. We all know some of Burns’ poems, especially this one —

Auld Lang Syne

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And auld lang syne!

For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

And surely ye’ll be your pint stoup!
And surely I’ll be mine!
And we’ll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

Chorus

We twa hae run about the braes,
And pou’d the gowans fine;
But we’ve wander’d mony a weary fit,
Sin’ auld lang syne.

Chorus

We twa hae paidl’d in the burn,
Frae morning sun till dine;
But seas between us braid hae roar’d
Sin’ auld lang syne.

Chorus

And there’s a hand, my trusty fiere!
And gie’s a hand o thine!
And we’ll tak a right gude-willie-waught,
For auld lang syne.

***

And I think most of that is pretty clear even if you’re not Scots, but on the other hand, maybe not all of it. So here is a translation:

***

Days Long Ago

Should old acquaintances be forgotten
And never be remembered?
Should old acquaintances be forgotten
and days long ago.

For days long ago, my dear,
For days long ago
We’ll drink a cup of kindness yet
For days long ago!

And surely you’ll have your pint tankard
And surely I’ll have mine.
And we’ll drink a cup of kindness yet
For days long ago.

Chorus

We two have run about the hills
And pulled the daisies fine
But we’ve wandered many a weary mile
Since the days long ago.

Chorus

We two have paddled in the stream
From morning sun till dinner-time
But the broad seas have roared between us
Since the days long ago.

Chorus

And here’s my hand, my trusty friend,
And give me your hand too,
And we will take an excellent good-will drink
For the days of long ago.

***

Here’s another that’s short and needs, I think, no translation:

***

John Anderson, My Jo

John Anderson, my jo, John,
When we were first acquent;
Your locks were like the raven,
Your bonie brow was brent;
But now your brow is beld, John,
Your locks are like the snaw;
But blessings on your frosty pow,
John Anderson, my jo.

John Anderson, my jo, John,
We clamb the hill thegither;
And mony a cantie day, John,
We’ve had wi’ ane anither:
Now we maun totter down, John,
And hand in hand we’ll go,
And sleep thegither at the foot,
John Anderson, my jo.

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Lyttle Lytton 2024 Contest Winner

As you know, the Lyttle Lytton contest is a competition to write the worst possible opening line for a story. The contest judge adds:

As I explain almost every year, this is not just a “write a funny sentence” contest: one of my criteria in deciding which entries will make it onto this page is my sense that some author out there could plausibly have tried start­ing a novel this way, and not as a joke.  I’m not quite as concerned about that for the honorable mentions, but for the winner, it’s very important.  And this year’s winner… I have to admit that when I was sixteen, I could have written this, and I would have thought that it was great.  

Here is this year’s winner:

He slammed the door in my face, loud and sharp, like an acoustic lemon.Erin McCourt

Which is a great line, because yes, it is plausible that someone might use that line.

The honorable mentions are really interesting to me. Look at this:

When the Egyptians first discovered a method to preserve bodies (known as mummification), he knew this was what he wanted for himself when his time came. — Neil Gunther

This sentence plays with time in a puzzling way.  The word “first” prompts readers to expect that this is historical background.  But then, with “he knew”, we’re in the thick of the novel’s action!  So was our protagonist on hand when mummification was initially developed, as if that were a singular event, and immediately decide it was for him?  If so, why does the sentence refer to “the Egyptians” as though they were an outside group? The subtle wrongess of the language of the sentence above is the sort of thing this contest has showcased over the years.  

I love this example because this exactly the kind of awkward weirdness that does indeed appear in real sentences in real books.

Many other examples at the link, with two interesting divisions in addition to what I’d call “normal” contest entries: There’s a section for AI-generated entries, and also a section for “found” entries — sentences found in the wild, real sentences really used by real people in some publication, quoted by the person entering them in the contest. Here is one of those:

It was hot⁠—the kind of heat that makes you long for the weather to cool down. Nineteen Steps  (Millie Bobby Brown novel)
quoted by Ziva Travers

And I SWEAR I saw a sentence just like this not that long ago. I should have made a note so I could enter it in this contest, apparently.

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Should you write a prequel?

At Kill Zone Blog, a post by Sue Coletta: Should you write a prequel?

Upside of Prequels

Character depth: Write a prequel to show the origin story of a beloved character or cast to explain their motivation and how they became who they are in the original series.

World-building: Write a prequel to provide a deeper look into the world before the main events i.e., history, politics, culture, etc.

Fresh perspectives: Write a prequel to showcase lesser-known characters and their perspectives.

Well, yes, I would say that pretty well covers some of the big reasons to write prequels. There’s another, I suppose:

Author would enjoy writing it: Write a prequel because you’d just like to write it. Sue Coletta doesn’t mention author enjoyment at all, but honestly, this seems like a perfectly adequate reason. I’m thinking of Marag, of course. Why did I write that? Because someone here (I don’t remember who, sorry!) suggested it and I thought You know, that might be fun. Then a couple of scenes occurred to me. Then I wrote the first chapter, and there you go, a prequel appeared. I didn’t do it in order to showcase secondary characters. That was a result of doing it, not part of why I decided to do it.

What does Sue point to as potential problems with writing a prequel?

Downside of Prequels

Unnecessary recap: Don’t write a prequel to rehash plot points from one of the original novels or the series as a whole.

Disappointing character portrayals: Don’t write a prequel to capture the essence of an established character or cast, or you’ll risk undoing all the characterization in the series.

Quality: If you don’t believe the prequel can live up to the high standards of the series, write something else.

Does anybody ever write a prequel that covers the same plot points as one of the prior novels? Maybe they do, from a different point of view. I feel like I’ve seen that, though I can’t think of any examples offhand. I’m not sure about whether I think that’s a bad idea. I think it could be neat, at long as it’s not the villain’s pov. Which could also be neat, I guess, for someone who isn’t me and doesn’t detest villain points of view as much as I do. Antagonists are fine, though. I might enjoy seeing the same events if they looked radically different. I’m SURE I’ve heard of or read something that did that, but I just don’t remember what it was.

Disappointing character portrayals, really? You hardly need to say this. Obviously it’s always bad to do disappointing character portrayal, in a prequel or anywhere else. I don’t see why attempting to capture the essence of an established character is bad, unless you fail to capture the essence of the character. I do see why attempting to do this is bad if you fail, but it’s just as bad if the story is a sequel as it would be in a prequel. Maybe worse.

As for quality, obviously. There’s no need to say that either. I think Sue was trying too hard to get three points in order to match the three upsides.

What are some prequels I’ve particularly liked? Well, The Magician’s Nephew is a prequel novel, so that’s one. My goodness, what is up with this new cover?

What is the publisher thinking? That’s a completely ridiculous cover for this story.

Not a lot of others are occurring to me. Oh, no, I can think of one other — Golden Dream is basically a prequel novel for Little Fuzzy, even though it was written by Ardath Mayhar instead of H Beam Piper. Golden Dream does also overlap in time with the other Fuzzy books. Of course some of the Fuzzy books got Michael Whelan covers, which means they’re some of my all-time favorite novel covers. Little Fuzzy is free at least at the moment for the Kindle version, but none of the versions currently offered have the wonderful Michael Whelan cover, so honestly, I’d be looking for a used copy of the original paperback if I didn’t already have it.

Anyway, at some point, not only do I plan to go ON with the No Foreign Sky story, I also do plan to go BACK as well. I’ve had a prequel in mind from the beginning — basically similar to Little Fuzzy, of course, and similar to Golden Dream as well, except the enormously cute little species that is dying out are humans, of course, and the civilization that rescues the descendants of the long-lost human colonists are the turun. Why do I plan to write it? Basically for Reason Four: Author Enjoyment. It takes place so far in the past that there’s no character overlap, obviously. Worldbuilding, yes.

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