Marian Allen's Blog, page 477

This One's For Jane

Today is Q in the A-to-Z Blog Challenge, and who or what could I choose but Quentin Collins? Any Dark Shadows fans out there? Raise your hands. Don't be shy. Yeah, a bunch!

I got hooked on Dark Shadows in high school and didn't grow out of it when I went to college. In fact, the summer I worked on campus, I cut a deal to get off half an hour early and work half a day on Saturday so I could watch the show.

Dark Shadows, in case you don't know, was a soap opera–or, as the pundits enjoyed calling it, a spook opera–featuring mystery and the paranormal. Barnabas was a vampire, Angelique (say it with me, DS fans: AngeLIQUE!!!!) was a witch, and Quentin was a werewolf. Also a drunkard and a womanizer, but never mind that. Wikipedia has a comprehensive article about the dear boy, and is also where I ganked the picture. If that isn't enough for you, there's a Collinwood.net with much more about the show. And if that's not enough, here's a video for you, featuring David Selby as the Q-man.

Be warned: it gotses dead people in it.

Loved that show. No question.

WRITING PROMPT: Pick a theme song for your main character. If possible, let it communicate something unexpected about him/her, as Quentin's Theme is all about nostalgia and romance and loneliness while he's being all scary and stuff.

MA

Posts and Prompts

In that order. Every day, I post whatever I'm going to post, then I make up a prompt based on the post. Some people have been kind enough to tell me they like it; they say it inspires them to realize that everything contains the germ of a story.

My cat is by my shoulder, purring loudly. Current cat theory is that cats purr 1) when happy 2) when secure 3) when having needs/desires fulfilled 4) when uncertain, in order to reassure themselves 5) in order to reassure the animal/person they're with.

WRITING PROMPT: A human being suddenly gains the ability–indeed, the compulsion–to purr under any or all of the above circumstances.

MA

p.s. It's Tuesday, so I'm posting at Fatal Foodies on the subject of Man Bites Fish! It's about piranha.

Oedipus Rex by Tom Lehrer

…Er, I mean by Sophocles, of course. But those of us exposed to Dr. Lehrer's version in our impressionable youth (I'm talking to you, Jane and Kathie) will always find this song running through our heads whenever we hear the title of Sophocles' immortal tragedy. For those of you who have never heard this song, prepare to have your lives changed forever.

Wasn't that uplifting and culturally enriching?

WRITING PROMPT: Write a theme song for your latest work or work-in-progress. If you have none, write a theme song for a famous story which has no theme song. The exercise will encourage you to isolate the main point or emotion of the work. Unlike Dr. Lehrer, please endeavor to isolate the point or emotion which is SUPPOSED to be the main one.

MA

Oedipus Rex by Tom Leher

…Er, I mean by Sophocles, of course. But those of us exposed to Dr. Leher's version in our impressionable youth (I'm talking to you, Jane and Kathie) will always find this song running through our heads whenever we hear the title of Sophocles' immortal tragedy. For those of you who have never heard this song, prepare to have your lives changed forever.

Wasn't that uplifting and culturally enriching?

WRITING PROMPT: Write a theme song for your latest work or work-in-progress. If you have none, write a theme song for a famous story which has no theme song. The exercise will encourage you to isolate the main point or emotion of the work. Unlike Dr. Leher, please endeavor to isolate the point or emotion which is SUPPOSED to be the main one.

MA

Sample Sunday – Sunlight Like Honey

"Sunlight Like Honey" is one of the stories in my collection THE KING OF CHEROKEE CREEK. The stories are mostly literary (which does NOT mean "nothing happens in them", by the way), with a maybe-fantasy to begin and a definite fantasy to end. "Sunlight Like Honey" is the story I wrote after my grandfather died. Cosmo fans will be glad to know that Cosmo appears in this story.

Excerpt from Sunlight Like Honey:

The bivouac tent went up just as advertised. So far, so good. Bethany unfolded the sleeping bag and wrestled it into the tent. It barely fit–it was like stuffing a sock, toe-first, into the short end of an envelope.

She was sweating and swearing by the time she finished. In a minute, she would circle the cabin and rinse off in the creek. Now, she slumped next to the tent, knees up, arms draped over them, gazing at the empty cabin, wiping salty rivulets from her face with the backs of her hands. By evening, this spot would be in the shade and the porch would be bathed in yellow light. She and Impaw had spent many a summer evening on that porch, watching fireflies rise out of the shadows.

Birdsong and bee-buzz surrounded her, and the luxurious whisper of wind in the trees. A long way away, a duck raised hell with a bunch of other ducks.

This time last month, she and Impaw had been here gathering morels and wild onions. They had cooked a mushroom feast on the wood stove and had made dandelion salad with oil and vinegar and salt and pepper, had toasted each other with sassafrass tea sweetened with wild honey. This is livin', Impaw had said. Just last month.

A flash of brightness caught her eye. She looked up and blinked. Cosmo squatted on the edge of the rise behind and above the cabin, staring at her, his shaved head shining in the sun, the metal in his face piercings glinting like cartoon sparkles. The long, gray, lightweight coat that he called a duster hung open, pooling around his scruffy brown boots.

What's he doing here? He was an intruder, just a coffee house acquaintance, not even a classmate or a certified friend. He was uninvited, unexpected, unnecessary, but she raised a hand and waved for him to come down.

He disappeared into the woods. Not long after, heralded by snapping twigs and a growled, "That was my eye, Mr. Tree," he joined her in the clearing.. He was in long sleeves and jeans under the duster, so the only tattoo that showed was the blue and red snake around his neck. Silver studs lined the rims of his ears and ornamented his nose, eyebrows and lower lip." Hey, B."

"Hey, Cosmo. You stalking me, man?"

"Needed a laugh. When you said you were coming out here to camp, I had to check it out."

"How'd I do?"

"Looked like all three Stooges at once. It was great." His grin said he knew she wasn't in the mood for jokes, but that she'd been damn funny, anyway.

Excerpts from all the stories are linked from here.

Buy it for the Kindle at Amazon.

Buy it for the Nook at Barnes and Noble.

Buy it in other electronic formats at Smashwords.

WRITING PROMPT: How would you have a character who has never camped before prepare for camping?

MA

Night On Fire

Calm down, this isn't about my love life. NIGHT ON FIRE is a book by Douglas Corleone (no relation). Here's what Douglas has to say about the book and about himself:

In NIGHT ON FIRE, hotshot Honolulu defense lawyer Kevin Corvelli narrowly escapes a deadly arson fire at a popular Hawaiian beach resort only to land the prime suspect – a stunning but troubled young bride charged with murdering her husband and ten others – as a client.

DOUGLAS CORLEONE is the author of the Kevin Corvelli crime series published by St. Martin's Minotaur. His debut novel ONE MAN'S PARADISE won the Minotaur Books/Mystery Writers of America First Crime Novel Award. A practicing attorney, Douglas divides his time between New York and Hawaii. NIGHT ON FIRE is his second novel. You can visit him at www.DouglasCorleone.com.

Douglas has kindly agreed to tell us how to bring courtroom scenes to life. Take it away, Douglas!

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Breathing Life into Courtroom Scenes

You love Law & Order but will use any excuse you can to get out of jury duty. Why? Because real-life trials are generally boring. Viewers may become rapt by high-profile trials featuring such defendants as O.J. Simpson and Scott Peterson, but I'd wager very few members of the general public would be interested in sitting down with the thousands of pages of transcript from either trial. Yet today's legal thrillers are as compelling as ever, because contemporary authors know how to breathe life into their courtroom scenes.

How is this accomplished?

As with any great fiction, you start with dynamic characters. An author of legal thrillers must be skilled not only in story-telling but in persuasion. The author must convince his readers that his lawyer-protagonist can persuade a jury, even in the face of mountains of evidence against his client. The lawyer-protagonist must also be a skilled investigator. Certainly a lawyer may retain the services of a professional investigator, but today's lawyer-protagonists must also get their hands dirty. They must seek evidence and interview witnesses at their own peril. And they must face a formidable adversary across the aisle. In real life, bad lawyers are difficult to watch; in fiction, bad lawyers can devastate a story.

Of course, lawyers aren't the only players in a criminal or civil trial. The judge plays a significant role in steering the case and quite often affects the outcome in ways jurors never realize. The judge's rulings on what evidence is admissible at trial can mean the difference between guilty and not guilty, between a verdict for the plaintiff and a finding for the defense. Authors of legal thrillers should spend time developing the judge's character, not just as a referee, but as a person with a past, and perhaps an agenda. Same with every witness who takes the stand at trial. Not every witness tells the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Many witnesses lie, and trials are more riveting because of it.

The author of legal thrillers must also know how to edit. The author alone decides which parts of the trial the reader experiences, and which parts are conducted off-screen. In real-life, some witnesses take the stand for days or even weeks at a time. In fiction, a direct or cross-examination that lasts more than a few pages can easily put a reader to sleep.

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NIGHT ON FIRE is available in hardcover from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or your friendly neighborhood indie bookseller.

WRITING PROMPT: Your main character had to go to court. Why? Good lawyer or poor lawyer?

MA

My Lies, My Truths

[image error]Holly Jahangiri, fellow A-to-Z Challenge participant and fellow Blog Book Tour student, awarded all A-to-Z-Challengers a Creative Liar — er, Writer — award yesterday.

We are to thank her (Thank you), link to her and tell six outrageous lies and one truth about oneself OR six truths and one outrageous lie. We're also supposed to nominate others and pass the award on, but the madness stops here.

The Bishop of Indiana wrote to me, promising to pray for me because of my misguided politics.
When I visited England, I showed a Russian the way to Buckingham Palace.
I went into anaphylactic shock after taking Aleve.
I taught myself to drive a stick shift on the way to the grocery the first time I drove a stick shift.
My middle name is Elbereth.
The first book I ever bought for myself was an encyclopedic dictionary.
I used to play trumpet in the school band.

Can you detect the one lie — or the one truth?

WRITING PROMPT: Write a character who lies a lot but occasionally tells the truth. What consequences does that have for him/her? For those around him/her?

MA

Landings, Happy Ones

If I were going to post about an aviator on L day of the April A-to-Z Challenge, one would put one's money on Lindbergh. But yesterday we laid to rest Al, #4 daughter's 19-year-old cat, and the chorus to "Amelia Earhart's Last Flight" has been running in my head.

There's a beautiful, beautiful field

Far away in a land that is fair.

Happy landings to you, Amelia Earhart.

Farewell, First Lady of the Air.

Earhart, in case you don't know, was sometimes called "the Lady Lindy".  This Amelia Earhart site tells her story better than I could. And this song tells the story of her final, fatal, flight.

It's an oddly comforting song. And it comforts me oddly to think of Al swapping stories with Amelia and going for plane rides with the wind blowing through his long black fur.

Happy landings.

WRITING PROMPT: Have a character lose a beloved animal. What consoles or comforts him/her?

MA

p.s. Since it's the 14th, I'm also posting at Echelon Explorations on the subject of Law in a Strange Land.

Kid Stuff

The Young Authors ceremony in which I took part Monday was part of a school book fair and fun fair, which included face painting and a petting zoo. There were rabbits and a miniature collie and these little beauties. I had to snap a picture for my mother, who loves goats. I promised the human kids I wouldn't put their pictures on the interwebs but, when I asked the baby goats if being on line made them nervous, they said, "Bah!" So here is their picture. Aren't they coot?

Naturally, I've been singing Mairzy Doats ever since. If you don't know why, read this Wiki.

WRITING PROMPT: Have a character encounter a barnyard animal in an unexpected place. Make your character responsible for the animal's care, long-term or short-term.

MA

Judging, Glad I Didn't Have To

I was privileged to be invited to give some remarks at a Young Author's Red Carpet Ceremony at the local intermediate school last night. Before the ceremony, I had a chance to read some of the stories, which had been bound into books.

Earlier in the year, I had been invited to be one of the judges, an honor I declined.

As a writer who has submitted many stories, suffered the agony of rejections (which I now call "returns") and acceptances (which I now call "when can I expect the check"), I didn't have the heart to sit in judgment on the work of aspiring young writers.

But I could do the speech I was requested to give: five minutes or so about how I got started, what the writing life is like, and encouragement. I told them:

When I was very little, I thought all the books had already been written. When my mother told me people still wrote books all the time and got paid for it, that was all I ever wanted to do.
Writing is always hard: You make the book the best you can and, when you believe it's perfect, you submit it. Most of the time, it gets sent back and you never know why. Most of the time, the reason is NOT that it's a bad book; there are lots of reason any particular judge or editor passes on any particular story. And being asked to do edits doesn't mean the story isn't good, just that it can be made even better.
Writing is always fun. Writing the story is a joy. Seeing your work, with your name on it, out in the world where other people can read it and enjoy it never gets old.

The speech seemed to strike home. The kids and parents all listened, and I saw a lot of nods and smiles.

Joy. It's what writing is all about.

WRITING PROMPT: Outline a brief speech about what writing has meant and does mean to you.

MA

p.s. I'm posting today at Fatal Foodies on the subject of jum-jills, with recipe.