Chuck Wendig's Blog, page 275

Flash Fiction Challenge: Must Love Robots

Last week's challenge — "Dirty-Ass Sex Moves" — is live, live, live.

Given yesterday's big news regarding BLACKBIRDS, I figured that doing a flash fiction challenge slightly in-theme wasn't such a bad idea.

With that in mind, and given that the news is about Angry Robot Books, I figure:

Hey, let's see some flash fiction featuring one or several robots.

In any capacity. In any genre. Get creative.

Here's the tweak, though: I'm again going to give away copies of CONFESSIONS OF A FREELANCE PENMONKEY and IRREGULAR CREATURES. This time, however, I'm not giving them to my favorites but rather, those who get here and write their fiction first. The first ten entrants in the flash fiction challenge (as posted chronologically in the comments below after all comments are approved) can have their choice of either e-book in whatever format they so choose (PDF, Kindle, Nook). If you already possess both e-books, you can either let the next person down the list have your copy or pass it along instead to someone you know will want a copy.

You once again have 1000 words.

You have until next Friday (June 24th) at noon EST, but again, to qualify for the e-book, you gotta get into this challenge early and write some flash fiction featuring a robot in some capacity.

That's it. That's the deal.

Robots: it's what's for dinner.

Go forth and write, ink-slingers.

I Am The Monkey On The Back Of An Angry Robot

*whistles innocently*

Angry Robot Books is going to publish my novel, BLACKBIRDS.

I'll let that sink in.

They're also going to publish its followup, the tentatively titled: MOCKINGBIRD.

I'll let that sink in, too.

That sound? The one you hear? Not just in your ear, but in the deep squishy pockets of your mind?

Yeah. That's me. Screaming with mirth. Cackling like mad. Singing some forbidden hymn to whatever ancient gods decorated my brow with their blessed seed and let fortune favor a wee bearded penmonkey such as myself. I'm dancing. I'm grinning.

I'm lacquering my lederhosen.

BLACKBIRDS has been Out There for a good while now. It's been ping-ponging from editor to editor. It's been collecting lovely rejection after lovely rejection, all of them hinting that it deserves to find a home and will some day, but over time, with every month falling off the calendar you start to feel like, "Oh, ohhh, fuck, it's not going to happen, is it? I'm either going to have to drop it in a box somewhere or self-pub it."

So, to be picked up by Angry Robot — publisher of some, I mean, c'mon, truly astounding writers? Lauren Beukes? Matt Forbeck? Mike Shevdon? And they've also picked up fellow DMLA-ers Adam Christopher and Chris F. Holm? I'm over the moon to be lumped in with that level of talent. My goal is simply not to poop up the place. Here's a clue how much I love Angry Robot: every since they were made manifest in this plane of existence and began showing up in bookstores, I would constantly go over, pick up their books and say to whomever was standing nearby (my wife, a stranger, a pet goat): "Holy shit, this looks awesome." Every time. Great authors. Killer concepts. Incredible covers that look like nothing else on the shelves. Plus, they're incredibly author-friendly, and how can you not love an ecosystem like that?

BLACKBIRDS features a character near and dear to my heart. A character whose struggles are fundamental and human but are reflected in a paranormal condition that exemplifies some far bigger, far weirder shit: fate versus free will, life versus death, what hair dye to choose, and so forth. Miriam Black — the protagonist of these books — is deeply troubled, very angry, and a total pill. But she's funny, too, and foul-mouthed as anything. It's great, because I actually care about her. One of my earliest note files when I was conceiving this character was titled, quite simply, "Poor Miriam." Because I felt awful for the cross I'd strapped to her back and forced her to bear. I had nothing but sympathy and guilt for what I was going to do to her.

(That cross, for the record, is the ability to see how and when someone will die just by touching them. Fate and death, ever-present with naught but the contact of skin on skin.)

Good times.

So, not only does Miriam get one book, but she gets what I hoped she always would: the chance to carry her misanthropic "spit-in-the-eye-of-fate" attitude into other adventures.

Thanks to those who have supported the book all this time. Thanks to Jason Blair and Matt Forbeck for suggesting Angry Robot as a home to begin with. Thanks to Stephen Susco, my screenwriting mentor, who helped me hammer the shit out of this story way back when. Thanks to my wife, who for some reason always seemed to believe in me. And thanks to my kick-ass rock-star of an agent, Stacia Decker, who rocket-launched this through the ionosphere.

And thanks to Angry Robot. Marc Gascoigne, Lee Harris. Gentlemen. Scholars. Biblionauts.

Look for BLACKBIRDS in April/May 2012.

And MOCKINGBIRD not long after.

In Other News…

COAFPM continues to sell very well. Been out for not-quite-one-month now, and it's sold ~260 copies. Because of the slightly higher price point, it means I'm fast approaching what I've earned over four-to-five months with IRREGULAR CREATURES (but that collection has seen a boost since COAFPM's release, which is nice). Together the two have paid a couple mortgage payments, so I can't say boo to that.

IRREGULAR CREATURES has 36 four- and five-star reviews at Amazon, which is incredible. Fills me with giddy bubbles. Or maybe that's just gas. Even still, thanks all to have bought and loved the collection. Means a lot to me. I hope that more Cat-Bird will show up in the future.

COAFPM – well, I wouldn't complain if it got some more reviews over there. It's standing at three reviews at present, and would love to see more added if you've read it, enjoyed it, and have the time.

In related news: Andrew Jack interviews me over at his space.

DOUBLE DEAD is back from a first pass edit, and — holy shit! — it doesn't suck. Looking forward to getting a second major copy-edit through. Jon Oliver and Jenni Hill at Solaris/Abaddon are incredible folks to work with, and I am very pleased that DD is in such excellent hands.

I'm nabbing some secret hush-hush work at my old stomping ground, White Wolf Game Studios. Developing something pretty cool for them which is all about [REDACTED].

Still bouncing my wibbly-wobbly baby-schedule in terms of writing. Some days the word count trickles. Other days, it floods. I was able to finish a new novel — codename: POPCORN — by churning through a 9,000 word writing day last Friday, so that was exciting.

Also planning a series of novellas to release over the course of the summer. Kind of crimey, I guess? High school? Not-quite-noir? Veronica Mars, but more violent? Something like that. Interested?

And that's all she wrote, folks.

Thanks for reading.

EDIT: Today, Abaddon is also posting the first chapter of DOUBLE DEAD for those who care to read it.

#coburniscoming

The Official Terribleminds Writer's Guide To Blogging About Blogging

Blogging cannot get more useless when a blog blogs about blogging, and even worse, here I'm going to blog about some blogs that have in fact already blogged about blogging, and that's so much blogging it hurts.

Did you follow that? Me neither.

Point is, Kristen Lamb wrote that writers should not blog about writing.

Then Austin Wulf said, writers should too blog about writing.

Then Albert Berg said, good points all around but Kristen might be right, now let's everybody have a tickle.

And now, here I am.

Blogging about bloggers who have blogged about blogging.

Which is why you'll notice a trickle of treacly blood exiting my ears.

Obviously, I am a writer (duh) who frequently blogs about writing (duh) though one might not refer to this specifically as a writing blog. Thus, I feel compelled by my deranged mind to talk a little on this subject. I figure, I'll grab the snake and force him to bite his own tail and yammer about my blogging style here at Jolly Olde Terribleminds, and you can take this information and make love to it…

…or shove it instead up a donkey's corn-chute.

Your call. Please to enjoy.

First: This Blog, Right Here

I started this site over ten years ago. Probably 12, by now. Before it was WordPress it was a straight-up HTML site designed by a friend and it looked pretty cool at the time, but as new browsers hit the ground, the site refused to play well with them. So, to read the site on, say, Firefox, you had to highlight invisible text and pray to dark gods and mist the screen with bergamot oil just to read what I was saying.

It only worked on Internet Explorer, which is like saying, it only worked on a computer powered by coal.

Two years ago I switched to WordPress. I opened the site up to comments. I began tracking views and page hits and what-not. I also started blogging every damn day, seven days a week.

I don't say this to brag, only to show the growth of the blog and its readership, but: in June 2009, all month I had 922 unique guests here at the site. That number began doubling until it reached what the site had in June of 2010, which was 15,000 visitors. On June 9th of this year, the blog had 18,490 looky-loos just on that one day. Now, that was a bit extreme, admittedly, and unusual here, but even still, I've been getting 70-90k per month, and this month already I'm on track to see the biggest flock of readers yet.

So, am I doing something right? Well, that's debatable. Quantity is not quality, after all, though I should note I'm quite happy with the quality of readership here. You all seem lovely. Except that one guy in the corner fondling himself. *is handed a piece of paper* Oh. Oh. That's a mirror? Huh. Awkward.

I'm happy with the blog and its contents.

Rule One: Blog About Whatever The Fuck You'd Like

I agree with the spirit of Lamb's law, but not the letter — I do not think that blogging about writing is a bad move for writers. The spirit of her law is more that a writer should blog about all kinds of things, not just writing, and further that a writer should not feel compelled to blog about writing by dint of being a writer, and to all that, I agree. But I'm not comfortable saying a writer shouldn't blog about writing — whether just a little or all the time — if that's what what makes you happy. Because that's my ultimate law of bloggery-do: blog what you want because you want to.

Blog about: writing, editing, books, films, games, child-rearing, whisky, snake-breeding, illicit botany, wicker furniture, hookers, microphone fetishes, or the Many Ways To Murder Your Mailman.

Blog about what interests you. About things that rouse your passion, that tickle your saucer nips, that make you do a little ants-in-your-pants prancey dance. That interest and passion will translate to the blog and carry over to the readers. Don't blog about stuff because someone tells you to blog about it. Further, don't not blog about something because someone tells you not to.

(And can we just pause for a moment and talk about what a wretched turd-yawn of a word "blog" is? Why has nobody come up with a better word yet? Seriously? Internet, come together in this. Get down in the comments and come up with new words for "blogging," yeah?)

You might be saying, "But that won't garner me audience. If I'm a writer of science-fiction who blogs about knitting, that doesn't build my platform. I should be blogging about science-fiction!"

No, you should be writing science-fiction. Blog about if only if you get jazzed about doing so. See, here's the thing. A blog audience is not automatically your creative audience. Some crossover exists, but consider: 70,000 people visited this blog last month, but I did not sell 70,000 copies of any of my books. Did I sell 10%, or 7,000 copies, then? Mmmmnope. More like "less than one percent."

And I'm happy with that, for the record.

All blogging is just squawking into the void. It's free. It's a soapbox on which you stand and bark your brain-think into the world. Be yourself. Talk about what you want to talk about. Authenticity and interest will garner readers well beyond plopping out rote, formulaic posts because they are somehow "expected."

Truth is, since most people have multiple things that enflame their mental loins, you don't have to worry about having One Kind Of Blog. "This is my blog devoted to knitting vagina cozies" is far less interesting to me than, "this is my blog devoted to the shit that comes out of my head which you may or may not appreciate because as it turns out I'm a complete and complicated human."

(That again gets to the heart of Lamb's post.)

Blog in a way that appeases you first. Otherwise, the blog is just a daily lump of stress.

Rule Two: Don't Be A Dick

When you blog, don't be a dick. See also:

Don't be: an asshole, an ass-hat, a shithead, a fuckface, a scum-gargling cock-waffle, a jerk, a jerkoff, a jerk-faced jerkopolis, a douche, a douche-swab, douche-nozzle, double-douche, a doucheologist, a crap-faced stinky-butt, a bully, a prick, a sonofabitch, a bastard, a sonofabastard, a brat, a big ol' meanie, a pig, a racist, a sexist, any anything-ist, a Nazi, a homophobe, a homophone, a homonym, a homo sapiens…

… ooh, I think I got off the rails there.

Point is, don't be a dick.

Be tactful about things. Try to be nice. You don't need to be funny — just don't be dour and mean. Approach your audience with respect by not flinging boiling urine in their eyes when they come to read your work.

A slight tweak on this: you can be a bit of an asshole (Sweet Sally Struthers, I sure am) provided you do so with self-deprecation and humor in equal measure. I think. Then again, I might be wrong about that. There might exist a secret room of Wendig Haters out there plotting my demise. I'll just don my tinfoil hat here to block out their hateful frequency, and we're all good.

Rule Three: No Rule Three Exists, Please Turn Around And Go Home

You're saying, that's it?

Two goddamn rules?

Yes, that's what I'm telling you.

And you're saying, "But, this is about blogging for writers. Surely you have some specific information that will help them be better writer-blogger hybrid creatures?"

Ehhh. Well, sure. I have some caveats and corollaries. I try to avoid negativity. I don't recommend writers be reviewers all that often. Blog as part of a community, not separate from it. You can use your blog as a self-promo tool provided that's only a fraction of your content. Blog often to establish readership routine. Make a blog that's appealing to the eyes. Own your blog and your domain (remember when Blogger shit the bed a month or two back? Yeah, seriously, own your stuff).

I don't consider these hard-and-fast rules so much as they are suggestions, though. The only rules are the two noted above: blog how you want to blog, as long as you're not a big honking dickhead about it.

Q&FuckinA

I don't know why you'd have any specific questions about terribleminds, but I'm happy to answer them if you do. Same goes for suggestions you may have — the site can and should be improved from time to time (and soon as I have some, HAHAHAHA, time, I plan on attacking a laundry list of challenges here at the Ol' Bloggery-Hut). Got something to say or ask about the site or its content? Do so with my blessing.

25 Things You Should Know About Plot

Previous iterations of the "25 Things" series:

25 Things Every Writer Should Know

25 Things You Should Know About Storytelling

25 Things You Should Know About Character

And now…

1. What The Fiddly Fuck Is "Plot," Anyway?

A plot is the sequence of narrative events as witnessed by the audience.

2. The Wrong Question

Some folks will ask, incorrectly, "What's the plot?" which, were you to answer them strictly, you would begin to recite for them a litany of events, each separated by a deep breath and the words, "And then…" They probably don't want that. What they mean to ask is, "What's the story?" or, "What's this about?" Otherwise you're just telling them what happened, start to finish. In other words: snore.

3. A Good Plot Is Like A Skeleton: Critical, Yet Invisible

A plot functions like a skeleton: it is both structural and supportive. Further, it isn't entirely linear. A plot has many moving parts (sub-plots and pivot points) that act as limbs and joints. The best plots are plots we don't see, or rather, that the audience never has to think about. As soon as we think about it, it's like a needle manifests out of thin air and pops the balloon or lances that blister. Remember, we don't walk around with our skeletons on the outside of our body, which is good because, ew. What are we, ants? So don't show off your plot. Let the plot remain hidden, invisible.

4. Shit's Gotta Make Sense, Son

The biggest plot crime of them all is a plot that doesn't make a lick of goddamn sense. That's a one way ticket to plot jail. Do not pass GO. Do not collect $200 dollars. Do not drop the soap. The elegance of a great plot is that, when the events are all strung together, there exists a natural order as if this was the only way they could fit together. It's like dominoes tumbling. Your plot is not a chimera: random parts mashed together because you didn't think it through. Test the plot. Show people. Pull the pieces apart and ask, "Is there a better way?" Nonsense plots betray the potency of story.

5. The Quintessential Plot

The simplest motherfucker of a plot is this: things get worse until they get better. A straight-up escalation of conflict. It goes from "Uh-oh, that's bad," to, "Uh-oh, it's getting worse," to "Oh, holy shit, it can't get any worse," to, "I think I maybe maybe fixed it, or at least stopped it from being so totally and completely fucked." When in doubt, just know that your next step as a storyteller is to bring the pain, amp the misery, and escalate the conflict. That's what they mean by the advice, "Have a man with a gun walk through the door." You can take that literally, sure, but what it means is: the bad news just got worse.

6. In Life We Avoid Conflict, In Fiction We Seek It

Fiction is driven by characters in conflict, or, put differently, the flame of fiction grows brighter through friction. A match-tip lights only when struck; so too is the mechanism by which a gun fires a bullet. Impact. Tension. Fear. Danger. Need to know what impels your plot forward? Look to the theme of Man Versus [fill-in-the-blank]. Man versus his fellow man. Woman versus nature. Man versus himself. Woman versus an angry badger riding a unicorn. Find the essential conflict and look for events that are emblematic to that.

7. Want Versus Fear

Of course, the essence of the essential conflict — the one below all that Wo/Man versus stuff — is a character's wants versus a character's fears. Plot grows from this fecund garden. The character wants life, revenge, children, a pony — and that which he fears must stand in his way. John McClane must battle terrorists to return to his wife. Indiana Jones must put up with snakes and irritating sidekicks to uncover the artifact. I must put up with walking downstairs to make myself a gin-and-tonic. Everything that stands in a character's way — the speedbumps, roadblocks, knife-wielding monkeys, ninja clones, tornadoes, and sentient Krispy Kreme donuts sent from the future to destroy man via morbid obesity — are events in the greater narrative sequence: they are pieces of the plot.

8. Grow The Plot, Don't Build It

A plot grows within the story you're telling. A story is all the important parts swirling together: world, character, theme, mood, and of course, plot. An artificial plot is something you have to wrestle into place, a structure you have to bend and mutilate and duct tape to get it to work — it is a square peg headbutted into a circle hole, and you're the poor bastard doing all the headbutting.

9. The Tension And Recoil Of Choice And Consequence

An organic plot grows like this: characters make decisions — sometimes bad decisions, other times decisions whose risks outweigh the rewards, and other times still decisions that are just plain uncertain in their outcome — and then characters must deal with the consequences of those decisions. A character gives up a baby. Or buys a gun. Or enters the dark forest to slay Lady Gaga. Anytime a character makes a choice, the narrative branches. Events unfold because she chose a path. That's it. That's plot. Choice and consequence tighten together, ratcheting tension, creating suspense. Choice begets event.

10. Plot Is Promise

Plot offers the promise of Chekov and his gun, of Hitchcock and his bomb under the table. An event here leads to a choice there which spawns another event over there. Foreshadowing isn't just a literary technique used sparingly: it lurks in the shadow of every plot turn. Plot promises pay-off. A good plot often betrays this promise and does something different than the audience expects. That's not a bad thing. You don't owe the audience anything but your best story. But a plot can also make hay by doing exactly what you expect: show them the gun and now they want to see it fire.

11. Let Characters Do They Heavy Lifting

Characters will tell you your plot. Even better: let them run and they'll goddamn give it to you on a platter. Certainly plot can happen from an external locus of control — but you're not charting the extinction of the dinosaurs or the lifecycle of the slow loris. Plot is like Soylent Green: it's made of people. Characters say things, do things, and that creates plot. It really can be that simple. Authentic plot comes from internal emotions, not external mechanics.

12. Chart The Shortest Point Between Beginning And End

One way to be shut of the nonsensical, untenable plot is to cut through all the knots. If we are to assume that a plot is motivated by the choices and actions of characters — and we must assume that, because who else acts as prime mover? — then we can also assume that characters will take the most direct path through the story as they can. That's not to say it'll be the smartest path, but it will be forthright as the character sees it. No character creates for himself a convoluted path. Complex, perhaps. Convoluted? Never. Characters want what they want and that means they will cut as clear a path to that goal as they can. A convoluted, needlessly complex plot is just the storyteller showing off how clever he is. And no audience wants that. Around these parts, we hunt and kill the preening peacocks and wear their tail-feathers as a headdress.

13. On The Subject Of "Plot Holes"

Plot holes — where logic and good sense and comprehensible sequence fall into a sinking story-pit — happen for a handful of reasons. One, you weren't paying attention. Two, your plot is too convoluted and its untenable nature cannot sustain itself. Three, you don't know what the fuck is happening, and maybe also, you're drunk. Four, the plot is artificial, not organic, and isn't coming out naturally from what the characters need and want to do. Five, you offended Plot Jesus by not sacrificing a goat. You can't just fix a plot hole by spackling it over. It's like a busted pipe in a wall. You need to do some demo. Get in there. Rip out more than what's broken. Fill in more than what's missing.

13. If The Characters Have To Plan, So Do You

Many writers don't like to outline. Here's how you know if you should, though: if your characters are required to plan and plot something — a heist, an attack on a moon bunker, a corporate take-over — then you're a fool if you think these imaginary people have to plan but you don't. This is doubly true of genre material. A murder mystery for example lives and dies by a compelling, sensible plot. So plan the plot, for Chrissakes. This isn't improvisational dance. Take some fucking notes, will you?

14. Set Up Your Tentpoles

A big tent is propped up by tentpoles. So too is your plot. Easy way to plan without getting crazy: find those events in your plot that are critical, that must happen for the whole story to come together. "Mary Meets Gordon. Belial Betrays Satan. An Earthquake Swallows Snooki." Chart these half-dozen events. Know that you must get to them somehow.

15. The Herky Jerky Plot Shuffle Pivot Point Boogie

You've seen Freytag's Triangle. It's fine. But it doesn't tell the whole story. This is the Internet. This is the future. We have CGI. We have 3-D. Gaze upon the plot from the top-down. It isn't a linear stomp up a steep mountain. It's a zig-zagging quad ride through dunes and jungles, over rivers and across gulleys. You're a hawk over the quad-rider's shoulder — watch it jerk left, pull right, jump a log, squash a frog. More obstacles. Greater danger. Faster and faster. Every turn is a pivot point. A point when the narrative shifts, when the audience goes right and the story feints left.

16. Plot Is The Beat That Sets The Story's Rhythm

Plot comprises beats. Each action, a new beat, a new bullet point in the sequence of events. These establish rhythm. Stories are paced according to the emotions and moods they are presently attempting to evoke. Plot is the drummer. Plot keeps the sizzling beat. Like Enrique "Kiki" Garcia, of Miami Sound Machine.

17. Every Night Needs A Slow Dance

I know I said that plot, at its core, is how everything gets worse and worse and worse until it gets better. Overall, that's true. But you need to pull back from that. Release the tension. Soften the recoil. Not constantly, but periodically. Learn to embrace the false victories, the fun & games, the momentary lapses of danger. If only to mess with the heads of the audience. Which, after all, is your totally awesome job.

18. The Name Of My New Band Is "Beat Sheet Manifesto"

You can move well beyond the tentpoles. You can free-fall from the 30,000 foot view, smash into the earth, and get a macro-level micro-view of all the ants and the pill-bugs and the sprouts from seeds. What I mean is, you can track every single beat — every tiny action — that pops up in your plot. You don't need to do this before you write, but you can and should do it after. You'll see where stuff doesn't make sense. You'll see where plot holes occur. Also: wow. A Meat Beat Manifesto joke?

19. Beats Become Scenes Become Sequences Become Acts

Plot is narrative, and narrative has units of measurement: momentary beats become scenes of a single place, scenes glom together to form whole sequences of action and event, and sequences elbow one another in the giant elevator known as an "act," where the story manifests a single direction before zig-zagging to another (at which point, another act shifts). Think first in acts. Then sequences. Then scenes. And finally, beats. Again, take that 30,000 foot view, but then jump out of the plane and watch the ground come to meet you.

20. Your Sexy Mistress, The Subplot

In real life, don't cheat on your spouse or lover. Not cool, man. Not cool. As a writer, you don't cheat on your manuscript, either: while working on one script or novel, don't go porking another one behind the shed. But inside the narrative? The laws change. You need to cheat on your primary plot. Have dalliances with sub-plots — this is a side-story, or the "B-story." Lighter impact. Smaller significance. Highlights supporting characters. But the sub-plot always has the DNA of the larger plot and supports or runs parallel to the themes present. Better still is when the sub-plot affects, influences or dovetails with the larger plot.

21. Beneath Subplot, A Nougaty Layer Of Micro-Plot

Every little component of your story threatens — in a good way, like how storms threaten to give way to sun, or how a woman threatens to dress up as your favorite Farscape puppet and sex you down to galaxy-town — to spin off into its own plot. Your tale is unwittingly composed of tiny micro-plots: filaments woven together. A character needs to buy a gun but can't pass the legal check. His dog runs away. He hasn't paid his power bill. Small inciting incidents. Itty-bitty conflicts. They don't overwhelm the story, but they exist just the same, enriching the whole. A big plot is in some ways just a lot of little plots lashed together and moving in a singular direction. Like a herd of stampeding marmots.

22. Exposition Is Sand In The Story's Panties

Look at plot construction advice and you'll see a portion set aside for "exposition." Consider exposition a dirty word. It is a synonym for "info-dump," and an info-dump is when you, the storyteller, squat over the audience's mouth and expel your narrative waste into their open maw. Take the section reserved for exposition and fold it gently into the rest of the work as if you were baking a light and fluffy cake. Let information come out through action. Even better: withhold exposition as long as you can. Tantric storytelling, ladies and germs: deny the audience's expectation ejaculation until you can do so no longer.

23. On The Subject Of The "Plot Twist"

A plot twist is the kid who's too cool for school — ultimately shallow, without substance, and a total tool. It's a gimmick. Let your story be magic, not a magic trick. Not to say plot twists can't work, but they only work when they function as the only way the story could go from the get-go. Again: organic, not artificial.

24. The Ending Is The Answer To A Very Long Equation

Plot is math, except instead of numbers and variables it's characters, events, themes, and yes, variables. The ending is one such variable. An ending should feel like it's the only answer one can get when he adds up all parts of the plot. This actually isn't true: you can try on any number of endings and you likely have a whole host that can work. But there's one ending that works for you, and when it works for you, it works for them. And by "them" I don't mean the men in the flower delivery van who are watching your every move. I mean "them" as in, the audience. P.S., don't forget to wear your tinfoil hat because the flowers are listening.

25. Plot Is Only Means To An End

Speaking of ends, plot is just a tool. A means to an end. Think of it as a character- and conflict-delivery-system. Plot is conveyance. It still needs to work, still needs to come together and make sense — but plot is rarely the reason someone cares about a story. They care about characters, about the way it makes them feel, about the thing you-as-storyteller are trying to say. Note, though, that the opposite is true: plot may not make them love a story, but it can damn sure make them hate it.

* * *

If you dig on the apeshit crazy-face no-holds-barred profanity-soaked writing advice found here at terribleminds, then you may want to take a wee bitty gander-peek at: CONFESSIONS OF A FREELANCE PENMONKEY, which is available now! Buy for Kindle (US), Kindle (UK), Nook, or PDF.

It's Time To Make It Rain, Bitches

This one's pretty easy.

I just crossed the 4,000 Twitter follower mark, which is pretty cool. I mean, sure, 3,465 of them are insane Twitter robots who are trying to sell me porn, iPads, real estate, and baby formula…

…but whatever it takes to feed my manic hunger for adoration.

*gibber, howl, snargh*

As such, I want to give you a copy of CONFESSIONS OF A FREELANCE PENMONKEY.

I'm going to give away 10 copies in PDF, Kindle, or Nook format.

How it works is like this: you have 24 hours (till 4pm EST on 6/14/11) to drop a comment into the comments below. What should go into this comment, you ask?

Your favorite word of profanity, and a short description as to why that might be. I figure this is entirely reasonable, given how sodden with wretched language CONFESSIONS happens to be. One assumes that if you're not comfortable dropping some language yourself, you won't be comfortable reading through CONFESSIONS. And besides, who doesn't love a little cussin'?

At 4pm I'll come back to this post and pick my ten favorite answers. Those folks get a copy of the book.

Jump in. Get to cursing. Get creative. And please to enjoy.

Transmissions From Baby-Town: Love In The Time Of Diaper-Changing

Nobody tells you the truth. Every parent upends buckets of advice upon the new parent's head, because, not for nothing, they've accumulated knowledge both good and bad that they feel is best to share. But what they never tell you as you're building a crib or painting a nursery or buying a small desert island comprising a hundred boxes of Pampers Swaddlers is this:

"You're building the walls of your own prison. And the baby, the baby is the warden. Oh, he's a cherub-cheeked warden, all right. He's cute. Chipmunk cheeks packing love and adorability the way real chipmunks store acorns. But don't misunderstand. He'll run you ragged. He'll punish you when you least expect it. And you can't predict it. Can't understand it. Because what we got here… is a failure to communicate."

* * *

The way this kid eats and destroys our sleep, he should be a goddamn Batman villain.

The Catnap Killer. Doctor Hypnos. Mister Dozer.

The Sinister Sandboy.

* * *

Seems right now he's maybe going through a growth spurt. That's what all the Internet forums say. Of course, all the Internet forums say we're probably three days away from accidentally smothering our child with crib bumpers or improbably infecting him with some kind of Baby Smallpox. The Internet is rarely a place to find sanity, but even still: most concur that three weeks is the time of a growth spurt, but right now it just feels like the only thing that's growing is the child's propensity to be a tiny pink dictator.

(And remember, the root word of "dictator" is "dick.")

Yesterday it's like someone stuck a crank in his back and just kept on winding it.

Cranky, cranky, cranky.

Oh, the tears.

The screams.

The lobster-faced apoplexy.

He wants to eat. All the time. GIVE ME THE BOOB, tiny dictator cries. He pounds the teat the way a frothing professor pounds his lectern. He grabs for it with witch nails. He draws it close in his taloned grip.

You know he's hungry. Because he'll try to eat anything. He shark-bites his own fists. He'll gum my thumb. He'll even try to eat my beard. Which is not recommended in any of the baby books. Especially since I save food in my beard like a diligent hobo should.

It's every hour. The storm of cluster feeding.

With each lightning strike, the baby descends once more to feed.

The lone piranha must eat enough for his whole concatenation.

* * *

We're supplementing. With formula. Doctor's orders. He wasn't gaining enough weight, she said. I mean, he wasn't some tiny peanut, either, some little kewpie doll. But of course he didn't conform to somebody's magical chart that says ALL BABIES ARE LIKE THIS ALWAYS FOREVER AND EVER. Those that don't conform to the Chart of Truth must submit for re-education immediately. She scares us with the comment, "We don't want him to have a failure to thrive." A failure to thrive sounds like the next thing to, y'know, death. "This is our child: the limp weed that clings to life but never flourishes. Don't hug him too closely. He may crumble like an over-baked cookie."

With formula, he did gain weight and gain length. (And not all of it in his penis. BA-DUM-BUM. I'm here all week. Don't forget to try the swordfish. And the vodka.)

Even still, after two weeks of gaining, the doc still wants us to supplement.

Then we wonder: maybe she's a shill for the formula companies. She goes home and goes into her bedroom and rolls around on all that sweet-ass Similac money. Big Formula sends her kids to school.

You look online — remember: never a good idea — breastfeeding advocates will make it very clear that supplementing is a death sentence. That we can now expect our child to be a rubicund, languid fatty sitting on a throne made of Happy Meals, his body lubricated by the grease of French Fries, his toddler diabetes running rampant through him like a wildfire. I'm surprised nobody's linked it to autism yet. That's another fun one. In the baby world, everything causes autism. Mercury. HFCS. Plastic toys. Chinese nipples. Funny looks from Mom. Dog hair. Oaken cribs. Rain on Tuesdays.

So, we straddle worlds between breast milk and formula.

Pariahs to both.

* * *

Formula makes him gassy. Where before his poop smelled like buttered popcorn drizzled with caramel (no, really), now it smells more like, well, poop. He's gassy like an old man is gassy. After eating Brussel sprouts. And his own poop. I don't even know how the tiny human can be this gassy. I couldn't let that much air out of a balloon. Formula helps to defeat a child's protective defense. A baby's breast-fed effluence smells pleasant so we don't decide, "You know what? This kid stinks, I'm going to go throw him in a river somewhere." Formula removes that protection. It's good we don't have a river nearby.

* * *

I kid, of course. I would never throw my child in a river.

I would put him in a box labeled FREE KITTENS.

Or maybe that's not exotic enough.

FREE PANDA.

Much better.

* * *

Oh, wait — look! A website that suggests both formula and breastfeeding could cause autism.

*punches the Internet*

* * *

We are, like most parents, deeply concerned about SIDS. Everything is SIDS this, SIDS that. Everything "causes" SIDS. Don't do this. Don't do that. No crib bumpers. No toys. No crib sheet. If you don't appease the beast with the ritual sleeping configuration, it shall steal into your home at the stroke of midnight and steal thine child's breath, and it shall use the stolen breath as a perfume for his own shadowy daughters.

Or something.

Don't let him sleep in bed. Don't let him sleep in the car seat. Don't let him sleep duct-taped to the ceiling. Don't let him sleep in a lion's mouth. (Well who else is going to clean the lion's teeth?)

They say, no sleep positioners. Of course, our nurse tells us to feel free to prop him up with rolled up blankets — a no-no in SIDSlandia — and in propping him up we're stopping him from rolling over and, y'know, contracting SIDS. So in attempting to defeat the demon we are simultaneously inviting the demon into our home. SIDS if you do. SIDS if you don't.

Some people say that our baby shouldn't be able to roll over yet.

They don't know our baby. The kid is like a tumbling boulder chasing after Indiana Jones.

They say, well, then, swaddle him. Swaddle him up tight.

They still don't know our baby. Our baby is fucking Houdini. He's not supposed to be able to get his arms free? Fuck you, he can get his arms free. He flexes his body, wriggling and writhing, until finally one hand sneaks out the top like a worm popping out of an apple. And with one free it's not long before the other is free, too — a pair of Devil's hands undoing all our good work. And inviting the SIDS angel with a come-hither finger.

This is one time when the Internet actually helped lessen my fear. I decided to actually look up SIDS, and it's not what everyone seems to think it is. It's very rare. It's a diagnosis of exclusion. It also necessitates that other factors be in play beyond merely, "Oh, shit, I let my baby sleep on his tummy and OH GOD THE SHADOW MAN CAME AT NIGHT AND STOLE HIS ESSENCE."

I'm not saying you shouldn't protect against it, but it feels like I'm shouting at the tides.

* * *

We have people over who want to see him, and nine times out of ten he's in a coma when they get here. Sure. Fine. Nice. That's when he sleeps. I say to them, he's like the tigers at the zoo. You go to the zoo you want to see the tigers doing all kinds of bitchin' tiger shit. Chasing goats. Eating Himalayan explorers. Playing with a massive ball of yarn. Watching funny cat videos on the Internet.

But when you get there, all they're doing is sleeping on a rock.

B-Dub is like that. When you get here to the Baby Zoo, he's gone. Oblivious to the world.

Dull as a saucer of cold milk.

* * *

Just moments ago, his reward for a long cluster feeding session was to throw up on his mother.

I suspect this will be a theme for the next 18 years.

"Thanks for the car keys, Dad. To pay you back I stole your Laphroaig Scotch. Dude, that stuff tastes like the burned pubes of a swamp hag. Also, I threw up in the glove compartment. See ya!" VROOOM.

* * *

I say all this but the reality is, it's worth it. All the spit-up and screaming and arcs of golden urine and sleeplessness and madness. All of it does little to defeat his puckish smiles, his big eyes, his searching tiny fingers, his waggling monkey toes, his look he gets when he sleeps where he laughs like he's remembering a joke he heard ("remember when I was coming out of the womb? yeah, good times"), his discovery of his feet, his coos and burbles, his gurgles and coyote yips, his funny faces, his Daddy look where he cocks one eyebrow and looks at you like you've lost your goddamn mind, his squirms and wiggles and flails.

All of it, the sheer measure of adorability.

Like a baby seal, we cannot club him.

* * *

"I said, what we have here is a failure to communic OH MY GOD YOU ARE SO CUTE I WANT TO PINCH YOUR CHEEKS AND PUT BUTTER ON THEM AND EAT THEM UP NOM NOM NOM."

I guess we're keeping him.

Flash Fiction Challenge: Dirty-Ass Sex Moves

Last week's challenge — "DOLL HEADS" — is ready to be read when you click the link.

Sex moves with hilarious nicknames.

The Cleveland Steamer. The Glass-Bottom Boat. The Dirty Sanchez.

That's the theme of this week's flash fiction challenge.

For a mega-complete-holy-shit list, check out this link: "List Of Sex Moves."

That link is NSFW, by the by. Uhh, big time. In case you couldn't figure that out, genius.

First, it's worth reading just… y'know. Because.

"Alligator Fuckhouse."

"Grumblefoot Grabapple."

"The Leprechaun's Revenge."

C'mon. C'moooon. You can't tell me those don't sound like killer short story titles, yeah? Yeah.

That's your task. Grab one such term, use it as the title to your fiction.

For this week, let's blow out the limit the way you might blow out your orifices if you tried half of these sex moves — no limit on word count. Big or small as you like.

I don't care if the story features the sex move or even refers to it outside the move-as-title.

But, then again, now's your opportunity to write some down-and-dirty fugged-up shiznit. After all, some of the descriptions on these sex moves are hilarious and disturbing. Use those as you see fit.

Peruse the list.

Choose a sex move.

Write a story with that sex move as the title.

No limit on word count. No limit to genre. You've got one week. Return the tale by Friday, 6/17, at 12 noon EST. Post on your blog, then drop a link to the story in the comments.

Go forth and get nasty.

Blinking Neon: Thursday Vacancy

I've decided that, whenever possible, I'm going to take Thursdays off.

I know what you're saying:

"Buh-buh-buh! But I am addicted to terribleminds. Every day I come here, I nibble open an artery with my bitey teeth, and I jack your sweet-ass motherfucking bloggery straight into my main vein."

To which I respond: "Main vein is a euphemism for a penis."

And you say: "I knew that."

And I'm all like, "I bet you didn't."

And you're like, "Nuh-uh!" And then you spit up on yourself and poop your pants.

No, no, wait, that's my newborn son. Which is part of why I'm taking some Thursdays off. Except, here's the thing: I won't leave you with a vacancy of content. I just can't do that. I won't do that to you. I'm not that cruel. My swollen deception-filled ego reminds me with whispered lies that without your daily dose of terribleminds, you will perish from grief. Your heart will be torn asunder like a notebook page ripped in half by angry pinching fingers. (Just shut up and let me pretend, goddamnit.)

I am thus opening up Thursdays to others, should they choose to fill its space. I've got a couple of great guest blogs that still need to go up, so you can look for those on upcoming Thursdays.

But I'll take more. I'd love posts from other storytellers, creative types, writers, what-have-you. I don't necessarily believe that posts can or should always be about writing, though certainly that's a fine theme if you feel you've got something to bring to the table. Really, though, the floor is yours, the forum is open.

I can't offer much by way of payment, and though this site does get a fair share of looky-loos these days, I don't how how meaningful "exposure" is.

I will say you're free to cross-post.

You can definitely use the post to pimp your work.

And if you don't already have it, I'll toss you a copy of IRREGULAR CREATURES or CONFESSIONS OF A FREELANCE PENMONKEY in whatever e-book format you desire.

Also: if you're not down with a guest post, feel free on offering yourself up on the altar of sacr… I mean, the altar of interviewing. I'd love to interview some smart storytellin' folks about all kinds of shit.

On those days I don't have a guest post, I'll still charge in here and fill the void with my ceaseless jabbering and meandering waffle. Worry not, sad-faced sproglings.

So, if you're in, well, you have to let me know. Drop a note in the comments or hit me up in the contact form. Don't be shy. Creators gotta create, gotta put themselves out there. Invite yourselves. Be bold. Proactive. Waggle your genitals at the world and say, "Gaze upon my magnificence."

This is an experiment, so let's see how it goes.

Six Signs It's High Time To Give Up Writing

The saying goes, "be a fountain, not a drain."

By which they mean, "be nice, not mean, be optimistic, not pessimistic, be a shining beacon of light and positivity, not a searing enema of shadow and negativity."

Oh, I'll be a fountain, all right. I'll be a fountain of urine. In your eyeball. PSHHHH.

HA HA HA HA HA.

Sorry, a little punchy today. Sleep in this household has gone the way of the dodo, the yeti, the honest politician — it is extinct. Turns out, that only stokes the fire in my belly. It pokes the coals of madness.

And so I emerge, sleepless and enraged, full of battery acid and asparagus pee, ready to once more use your head like a football so that I may kick it through the goalposts of good clean penmonkey sense.

Everybody always wants to tell you how to be a writer. How to follow your dreams. How to follow your stinky bliss like a cracked-out beagle. Eh-eh. Nuh-uh. BZZT. Not here. Not today. Today I'm going to tell you how to quit following your dreams. How to abandon your writerly ambitions on the side of the road (like a broken freezer or a fat ugly baby) where they may very well belong. Think of me as the medical examiner, and we're going to look over your hopes and wishes and determine how precisely to determine the time of death via lividity, morbidity, and poop stench.

Trust me, I don't want to be the bearer of bad news. I hate to be the guy belching forth my septic tide, a tide that will thrash your tiny dream-boat against the black bleak rocks of reality. But, hey, fuck it, somebody has to. Last time I did a quick head count, the Internet is home to 45,691,213 writers. And you're multiplying. It's like a feral cat colony up in this motherfucker. You might be saying, "Chuck's just trying to thin the herd." Well, duh. I'm not just trying to get the dilettantes out of my way — I'm hoping maybe I get lucky and convince a few of you actually-talented-sumbitches to give up the ghost, too. C'mon. We can't all be writers.

Anyway, let's go through the signs. If any of them apply to you, please hold up the little yellow card I'm giving you — *hands out aforementioned yellow card* — and I'll attend to you with this rifle. Thanks!

You'd Much Rather Talk About Writing Than Do Actual Writing

If the words you use to talk about writing outmatch the words you use in your actual writing by, say, 100:1, then you might be one of those types. The ones who would rather play pretend instead of actually wading into battle with a pistolero belt of fountain pens and ink phials forming an 'X' across their chests.

I mean, c'mon. You know if this is you. You know it. Someone — an aunt, your mother, your colonoscopy technician — asks you, "How's the writing going?" and you can talk at length about all the things you plan on writing, but what you can't talk about is all the things you're really truly writing? Can you remember the last time you commented on a writer's blog or wrote a post about writing advice but can't remember the last time you sat down and wrote a goddamn story? This is not good. This is a bad sign.

You Spent Your Time Doing Everything But Putting Words On Paper

Let's try a test.

Here's a video game. You can play this, or you can write. No, no, let's pretend it's one or the other or I'll shoot you in the face. I just picked "video game" out of a hat, but we could be talking about any activity, really, that you'd do for pleasure: watching TV, riding a dirtbike, dicking around on Twitter, reading blogs, planning your next roleplaying game session, hunting humans for their genital pelts, manually stimulating frost giants for their icy hoarfrost seed (used as a ritual component in various magical potions), etcetera.

If you always choose the fun thing over the writing thing, that's a hash-mark. That's a check-minus. That's a Mr. Yuk sticker slapped across the face of your future. Note that I'm not saying you shouldn't sometimes choose the activity of leisure — but if you spend more time with the "fun" than with the "writing," then doesn't that suggest that writing for you fails to be any fun?

Your Production Levels Are *Poop Noise*

Or, if you'd prefer — *sad trumpet*

Or — *lone coyote howling*

Or — *Pac Man dies*

Or — *wilting erection*

Sooo, uhh, what are you writing? Yeah? Nothing? What have you finished? Oooh. Also nothing? Really. So, all that's left in your wake is a trail of manuscript corpses? Empty pages? Unfinished stories? Nothing done? Did you write anything today? Yesterday? Last week? No, no, and no? Oooh. Zoinks. This isn't looking good.

You have heard the old chestnut that writers write, right? You wouldn't say, "I'm a mountain climber" without ever actually climbing a mountain? The thing you are presumes a sense of action, of presently doing. Not "never done" or "haven't done in a long-ass time."

"I'm a porn star."

"Wow. Wow! Really? Dude. I figured you were a bit old, but hey, whatever makes somebody's grapefruit squirt. Good for you. Good for you. What was your last movie?"

"The Nine Throbbing Fists of Adonis."

"I… have not heard of that. Is it out on Blu-Ray?"

"No. Super-8."

"…when did you make that movie?"

"1971."

Yeah, see? No longer a porn star. Writers write. Yesterday. Today. Tomorrow.

That Teetering Tower Of Rejections Threatens To Crush You And Your Cats

You know by now if you're at least a little bit good. You know because someone's told you. Or because you got an acceptance on a short story or even a nice rejection. Or because in your heart you've cast aside the fog and seen into the truth of the matter: "I'm not great, but I'm good, and I can damn sure get better."

Then again, maybe you look over at the end of your desk and you see it. The rejections. All 9,000 of them. Not a single acceptance nestled in there, like a glittering brooch inside the nest of a foul diarrhea-having bird. You've sent your work to the far flung corners of the literary world — editors, agents, lit mags, Field & Stream — and it always returns with a big red stamp across it that reads, FUCK NO.

By now, just by dint of taking so many shots at the hoop one of them should have gone through the little hole. If you're having no luck, it might be time to set aside childish whims.

You Got The Wrong Idea About Writing

You think, "I really love books." Great. So go read some. I love cookies and porn, you don't see me starting up a career as "The Masturbating Pastry Chef" on PBS, do you?

You think, "Gosh, I really want to work-from-home." So stuff some envelopes. Writing isn't some pyramid scheme. You don't just come home and poop out a bestseller because you're tired of the cubicle farm.

You think, "I want to be famous someday." Writers aren't fame junkies. You want fame, go make a YouTube video where you get rammed in the balls by a charging donkey.

You think, "I want to be rich." Hahahaha. Heheheh. Ooooh. Oh. Woo. Yeah. No.

Writing is about writing. It's about telling stories. That's why you do it.

Writing Is An Endless Sisyphean Misery

If you don't like writing, stop writing.

Good goddamn I am amazed, astounded, astonished at how often I see writers bitching about writing. I don't mean bitching like, "Oh, shucks, I had a bad day," or, "Man, this story's a lot harder to write than I anticipated." But bitching like, an endless stream of complaining about the very act of putting words on paper, as if it strains them, as if it's a ceaseless misery, as if it's a colon full of fire ants.

If you hate to write, what the hell are you doing?

It's not like writing offers some myriad reward, some treasure trove of benefits. Like, you could hate working on Wall Street yet love the buckets of money that come pouring over your head. Fine. Writing ain't like that. Writing offers you one chief benefit: writing. If that is not a task you enjoy, if it's not a task that offers you a sense of long-term satisfaction (even if you don't feel immediate daily satisfaction), then nobody would judge you for not writing. It's a thankless career. Don't do it if you hate it. Why would you do that? Just be direct and eat a fistful of broken glass or something. The pain is faster and the blood is brighter.

"Hell No, We Won't Go!"

If you're over there, nodding along, saying, "Yeah, you know what? Maybe I'm not cut out for this," then good for you. Quit now. Other better dreams await you. The world needs more zookeepers, botanists, janitors, space janitors, snipers, professional video game players, cat ladies, drug mules, and porn stars. Go be one of those with a Longaberger basket full of my blessings.

If you're over there, your butthole clenching so tight it could break a broomstick, and you're growling, "You go to hell, Wendig, you go straight to Hell on the goddamn Disney monorail system," then good for you. Don't quit. Continue on this path. Be a writer. Embrace it, enjoy it, claim it as your own.

A writer's gotta go through this time and again. He's gotta walk through a series of gates over the course of his career and it's like a grabby TSA screening: sometimes they're going to lift your junk and check all your holes just to make sure you are who you say you are and that you want to continue forward to the next checkpoint. I've gone through this. You think I haven't? How can you not? Writing is a career that offers a tireless parade of moments emblazoned with self-doubt and uncertainty where you're forced to ever reevaluate who you are and why you do this. You'll often have to hold up your dream and examine it in the harsh light of day just to see how substantial it really is.

You have to look and say, "How far am I willing to go with this?"

You want to be a writer? Then commit. You want to keep riding this dream pony? Then buckle the fuck up. Because writing is about patience and perseverance and above all else, writing through the nonsense.

Because writing takes more than wanting to be a writer. Writing isn't about making money or reading writing blogs or seeing your name in print. Those things will come, but they're side effects.

Writing is about writing.

Tautological enough for you?

Stop talking about writing and write. Stop reading about writing and write. Stop dicking around with your Xbox, with Netflix, with Facebook, your penis, and write. See where I'm going with this?

Go forth. Put down 100 words. A 1000. Whatever. Write something. Finish something.

The other stuff will follow. For now, embrace the purity of the dream you've chosen and do the thing it demands that you do. Put words on paper. Tell some stories. Be awesome.

And for fuck's sake, don't stop once you start.

* * *

If you dig on the apeshit crazy-face no-holds-barred profanity-soaked writing advice found here at terribleminds, then you may want to take a wee bitty gander-peek at: CONFESSIONS OF A FREELANCE PENMONKEY, which is available now! Buy for Kindle (US), Kindle (UK), Nook, or PDF.

25 Things You Should Know About Character

Previous iterations of the "25 Things" series:

25 Things Every Writer Should Know

25 Things You Should Know About Storytelling

And now…

Here you'll find the many things I believe — at this moment! — about characters:

1. The Character As Fulcrum: All Things Rest Upon Him

Without character, you have nothing. Great plot? Robust storyworld? Potent themes? Elegant font? Matters little if your character is a dud. The punch might be delicious, but not if someone threw up in it. The character is why we come to the table. The character is our way through all those other things. We engage with stories because we relate to them: they are mirrors. Characters are the mirror-side version of "us" staring back. Twisted, warped, uncertain — but still us through and through.

2. The Cure For All That Which Ails The Audience

A great character can be the line between narrative life and story death. She's a powerful Band-Aid, a strong swaddling of gauze to staunch the bleeding. Think of the character like duct tape: she can piece the whole thing back together. I will forgive your sins of a so-so plot, of muddy themes, of a meh-ehhh-enh storyworld if you're letting me live for a while with a great character. But don't think character will close truly grievous injuries. A sucking chest wound — meaning, poor writing, asinine plot or perhaps a duller-than-two-dead-goats storyworld — will only swallow your great character into its gory depths.

3. And Yet The Character Must Be Connected

Don't believe that all those other aspects are separate from the character. The character is — or should be — bound inextricably to those other elements. The character is your vehicle through the plot. The character carries the story. Theme, mood, description: focus them through the prism of character, not vice versa. The character is the DNA in every goddamn cell of your story.

4. You Are The Dealer; The Character Is The Drug

The audience will do anything to spend time with a great character. We're junkies for it. We'll gnaw our own arms off to hang out once more with a killer character. It's why sequels and series are so popular: because we want to see where the character's going. You give us a great character, our only desire becomes to lick him like he's a hallucinogenic toad and take the crazy trip-ass ride wherever he has to go.

5. Tell Us What She Wants

It is critical to know what a character wants from the start. She may not know what she wants, but the audience must have that information. Maybe she wants: her enemies destroyed, freedom from oppression, her child returned to her, true love, the perfect falafel, a pet monkey, the ultimate wedding, a secret subterranean base on the motherfucking moon. She can want a number of things, and it's of the uttermost importance that we know what it is. How else will we know how far she's come? How else can we see the stakes that are on the table? How else will you frustrate the piss out of the audience by standing in her way?

6. Not About Likability But Rather, Livability

It doesn't matter if we "like" your character, or in the parlance of junior high whether we even "like-like" your character. It only matters that we want to live with him. We must see something that makes us want to keep on keeping on, following the character into the jaws of Hell and out through the Devil's lava-encrusted keister. For the record, the "Lava Keister" sounds like either a roller coaster or a Starbucks drink.

7. The Give-A-Fuck Factor

It is critical to smack the audience in the crotchal region with an undeniable reason to give a fuck. Ask this up front as you're crafting the story: why will the audience care about this character? You have unlimited answers to this. Look to the narratives all around us to find reasons to care. Anything can fly. We love underdog stories. We love tales of redemption (and takes of failed redemption). We love bad boys, good girls, bad girls, good boys, we want to see characters punished, exalted, triumphant, rewarded, destroyed, stymied, puzzled, wounded. We gawk at car crashes. We swoon at love.

8. Rub Up Against Remarkability

You must prove this thesis: "This character is worth the audience's time." The character must deserve her own story — or, at least, her own part within it. You prove this thesis by making the character in some way remarkable. This is why you see a lot of stories about doctors, detectives, lawyers, cowboys, bounty hunters, wizards, space rangers, superheroes… but you don't see quite so many about copier repairmen, pharmaceutical assistants, piano tuners, or ophthalmologists. The former group is remarkable in part by their roles. The latter group can be just as remarkable, however, provided you discover their noteworthiness and put it on the page or the screen. What makes one remarkable can be a secret past, a current attitude, a future triumph. It can be internal or external. Infinite options. Choose one.

9. Act Upon The World Rather Than Have The World Act Upon Him

Don't let the character be a dingleberry stuck to the ass of a toad as he floats downriver on a bumpy log. We grow weary of characters who do nothing except react to whatever the world flings at their heads. That's not to say that characters shouldn't be forced to deal with unexpected challenges and left-field conflicts — but that doesn't prevent a character from being proactive, either. Passivity fails to be interesting for long. This is why crime fiction has power: the very nature of a crime is about doing. You don't passively rob a bank, kill your lover, or run a street gang. Simply put: characters do shit.

10. Bad Decisions Are A Good Decision

Nobody ever said an active character had to be a smart character. A character can and perhaps should be badly proactive, making all the wrong moves and affecting the world with his piss-poor decisions. At some point a character needs to take control, even if it means taking control in the worst possible way. In fact…

11. This Is Why Jesus Invented Suspense

Tension is created when characters you love make bad decisions. They lie, cheat, steal. They break laws or shatter taboos. They go into the haunted house. They don't run from the serial killer. They betray a friend. Sleep with an enemy. Eat a forbidden fruit. Jack off in a mad scientist's gizmotron thus accidentally creating an army of evil baby Hitlers. Tension is when the character sets free his chickens and we know full well that those chickens will come to roost. But the chickens will come home changed. They will have knives. Prison tats. And evil wizard powers. Don't let tension wriggle free, soft and pliable, from external events. Let the character create the circumstances of suspense.

12. How You Succeed Is By Not Having Them Succeed

You as storyteller are a malevolent presence blocking the character's bliss. You must be a total asshole. Imagine that the character is an ant over here, and over there is a nugget of food, a dollop of honey, and all the ant wants is to trot his little ant-y ass over to the food so that he may dine upon it. Think of the infinite ways you can stop him from getting to that food. Flick him into the grass. Block his path with twigs, rocks, a line of dishsoap, a squeeze of lighter fluid set aflame. Be the wolf to his little piggy and huff and puff and blow his house down. Pick him up, put him in the cup-holder in your car, and drive him 100 miles in the opposite direction while taunting him with insults. The audience will hate you. But they'll keep on hungering for more. Will the ant get to the food? Won't he? Will he find his friends again? Can he overcome? Primal, simple, declarative problem. You are the villain. The character is the hero. The audience thirsts for this most fundamental conflict of storyteller versus character.

13. The Code

Just as a storyworld is beholden to certain laws, norms, and ways, so too is a character: every character has an internal compass, an invisible set of morals and beliefs that comprise their "code." The audience senses this. They know when a character betrays his own code and violates the program — it's like a glitch in the Matrix, a disturbance in the dream you've crafted. That's not to say characters can't change. They can, and do. But a heroic fireman doesn't one day save a cat from a tree and the next day decide to cook and eat a baby. Changes in a character must come out of the story, not out of thin air.

14. A B C

The law of threes. Find three beats for your character — be they physical, social, emotional — with each beat graphing a change of the character of the course of a story. Selfish boy to exiled teen to heroic man. From maiden to mother to crone. Private, Lieutenant, General. Knows everything, everything in question, knows nothing. Birth, life, death. Beginning, middle, end.

15. Boom Goes The Dynamite

Blake Snyder calls this the "Save The Cat" moment, but it needn't be that shiny and happy. Point being: every character needs a kick-ass moment, a reason why we all think, "Fuck yeah, that's why I'm behind this dude." What moment will you give your character? Why will we pump our fists and hoot for him?

16. Beware The Everyman, Fear The Chosen One

I'm boring. So are you. We don't all make compelling protagonists despite what we feel in our own heads, and so the Everyman threatens to instead become the eye-wateringly-dull-motherfucker-man, flat as a coat of cheap paint. The Chosen One — arguably the opposite of the Everyman — has, appropriately, the opposite problem: he's too interesting, a preening peacock of special preciousness. Beware either. Both can work, but know the danger. Find complexity. Seek remarkability.

17. Nobody Sees Themselves As A Supporting Character

Thus, your supporting characters shouldn't act like supporting characters. They have full lives in which they are totally invested and where they are the protagonists. They're not puppets for fiction.

18. The Main MC, DJ Protag

That said, they don't call your "main character" the MC for nothing. Your protagonist at the center of the story should still be the most compelling motherfucker in the room.

19. You Are Not Your Character, Except For When You Are

Your character is not a proxy for you. If you see Mary Sue in the mirror, put your foot through the glass and use that reflection instead. But that old chestnut — "write what you know" — applies. You take the things that have happened to you and you bring them to the character. Look for those things in your memory that affected you: fought a bear,  won a surfing competition, lost a fist-fight with Dad, eradicated an insectile alien species. Pull out the feelings. Inject them into the face, neck, guts, brain and heart of the character.

20. Fugged Up

Everybody's a little fucked up inside. Some folks more than that. No character is a saint. Find the darkness inside. Draw their imperfections to the surface like a bead of blood. You don't have to give a rat's ass about Joseph Campbell, but he was right when he said we love people for their imperfections. Same holds true for characters. We love them for their problems.

21. A Tornado Beneath A Cool Breeze

A good character is both simple and complex: simplicity on the surface eradicates any barrier to entry, and complexity beneath rewards the reader and gives the character both depth and something to do. Complexity on the surface rings hollow and threatens to be confusing: ease the audience into the character the way you'd get into a clawfoot tub full of steaming hot water — one toe at a time, baby.

22. On The Subject Of Archetypes

You can begin with an archetype — or even a stereotype — because people find comfort there. It creates a sense of intimacy even when none exists. But the archetype should be like the leg braces worn by Forrest Gump as a kid — when that kid takes off running, he blasts through the braces and leaves them behind. So too with the "type." They'll help the character stand on his own until it's time to shatter 'em when running. Oh, and for the record, Forrest Gump was a fucking awful movie. In short: worst character ever.

23. Dialogue Over Description, Action Over Rumination

Don't bludgeon us over the head with description. A line or three about the character is good enough — and it doesn't need to be purely about their physical looks. It can be about movement and body language. It can be about what people think, about what goes on in her head. But throw out a couple-few lines and get out. Dialogue is where a character is revealed. And action. What a character says and does is the sum of her being. It doesn't need to be more than that: a character says shit, then does shit, then says shit about the shit she just did. In there lurks infinite possibilities — a confluence of atoms that reveals who she is.

24. Take The Test Drive

Write the character before you write the character. Take her on adventures that don't count. Canon can go suck itself. Fuck canon. Who cares about canon? Here I say, "to Hell with the audience." This isn't for them. This is for you. Joyride the character around some flash fiction, a short script, a blog post, a page of dialogue, a poem, whatever. Test her, try her out. That sounds porny, but what I mean to say is: cut off her skin, wear it, and dance around the goddamn room. Which leads me to…

25. Get All Up In Them Guts

Know your character. Every square inch. Empathize, don't sympathize. Understand the character but don't stand with the character. Get in their skin. The closer you get, the better off you are when a story goes sideways. Any rewriting or additional work comes easy when you know which way the character's gonna jump. Know them like you know yourself; when the character does something under your watch, you know it comes justified, with purpose, with meaning, with intimate knowledge that the thing she did is the thing she was always supposed to motherfucking do. Unrelated: I really like the word "motherfucker."

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