D.B. Jackson's Blog, page 67

Today in Boston’s History: Fenway

Usually my “Boston’s History” posts relate to the pre-Revolutionary era, the period that serves as the backdrop for the Thieftaker books and stories.  But today marks a very special occasion in the history of the city, one that I could not ignore, even though it has nothing to do with Thieftaker or the Revolution.  Exactly one hundred years ago today, on April 20, 1912, Fenway Park opened with the Boston Red Sox playing the New York Highlanders.  The Sox won the game 7-6, beginning their march toward a World Series Championship.

The Sox were led that season by future Hall-of-Famers Tris Speaker and Smokey Joe Wood, and were managed by their first baseman, Jake Stahl.  Speaker had what was for him a typical season, batting .383, slugging .567, and scoring 136 runs.  He was out-performed only by Detroit’s Ty Cobb, whose offensive prowess wasn’t enough to propel the Tigers even to a .500 season.  They finished thirty-six and a half games behind Boston.  Wood was even more impressive than Speaker.  He won 34 games and lost five, had an earned run average of 1.91, and struck out 258 hitters.  He pitched ten shutouts and thirty-five complete games — totals that seem utterly alien today, when starting pitchers are nursed through seven innings, and bullpens are stocked with millionaire relief specialists.

The Red Sox finished their first year in Fenway with a record of 105 and 47.  The closest team to them, the Washington Senators, finished at 91 and 61, fourteen games back.  Most satisfying to Boston fans, the Highlanders, who a year later would become the Yankees, finished dead last in the American League with a record of 50 and 102.  They were fifty-five games out of first.  Adding to New York’s humiliation, the Red Sox went on to beat the New York Giants four games to three in a tight World Series that also saw one tie game.

Now, this might seem like an odd tribute, given that I am a New Yorker, born and raised, and given that I root for the Yankees.  But here’s the thing.  I may root against the Red Sox at the top of my lungs; I may say nasty things about Dustin Pedroia and David Ortiz; I may give no small amount of grief to my Red Sox-rooting friends.  But the Red Sox-Yankee rivalry is good for sports, it’s good for baseball.  Without the Red Sox, baseball for me would be bland and meaningless.

And without Fenway Park, the Red Sox would not be the same franchise.  Fenway is a gem, a shining emerald in the midst of a wonderful, beautiful city.  It is probably the best place in the world to watch a baseball game.  It is redolent with tradition, with history, with tales of heroism and all-too-human futility.  Tris Speaker and Smokey Joe roamed this field.  So did Babe Ruth.  So did Lefty Grove and Jimmy Foxx, Ted Williams and Dom DiMaggio, not to mention the villains of my youth — Carl Yastrzemski and Luis Tiant, Carlton Fisk and Fred Lynn, Jim Rice and Dewey Evans.

Sure, I hate the Red Sox.  I have to.  But I love baseball, and the truth is you can’t love baseball without loving the Red Sox-Yankee rivalry; you can’t love baseball without loving Fenway.

Tonight, the Red Sox will mark the stadium’s centennial by hosting the Yankees.  Of course.  I’ll root for my team.  But I will do so with a healthy dose of admiration and even love for the venue.

Happy Birthday to the Green Monster.  Long may baseballs careen off your sides onto the soft grass below.

Writing Exercise: Character and Voice

Developing our writing voice for a story or a character can be incredibly difficult; it can also be quite rewarding when we get it right.  The key for me is stepping out of “myself” and forcing myself into the psyche of my character.  I want to feel her emotions, I want to consider the world as she would, not as I would.

And so part of writing with an effective voice comes simply from knowing my characters as thoroughly as possible — and this could be a post on it’s own.  Very briefly, I spend a good deal of time developing backstory for my characters, sometimes simply in bullet form — facts relevant to who and what they are, what they look like, what they do for a living, what religion they follow, etc. — and sometimes in more detail, using short fiction to bring depth and richness to their pasts.

Part of writing also is an act of empathy — and again, I can write more on this in future posts.  Basically, I would argue that the same traits that make me a good husband, a good father, a good friend, also make me a good writer.  I listen well, I am good at seeing the world and experiencing emotions as others would.  This helps me understand what the people I love are going through at any particular moment.  And it helps me understand how my characters ought to react to the stuff I put them through in the pages of my books.

There are writing exercises that can help in this regard, and I’d like to tell you about one of these today.  This exercise actually has two parts to it, both of them designed to force you out of yourself and into the thoughts, emotions and perceptions of your character.

PART I:  Write a scene in which a character of your own choosing (a new character, a character from your current work in progress, a character from an older work who you haven’t thought about in some time) meets the real you.  Yes, that’s right:  I want you to write about yourself.  But I want you to do it in first person (I, me, my), from the point of view of a fictional character.  Have that person observe you, interact with you, maybe even not like you (!) in a setting of your choice.  The key though is to be thoroughly in that other character’s first person point of view, NOT in your own point of view.  Your character should be experiencing you. The scene doesn’t have to be long — a few pages should do — but it should force you to start telling a story.

PART II:  Once your have finished writing that scene from your character’s point of view, you should then write a second scene, a follow-up to that first one perhaps, in which you now write from your own point of view, but in third person (s/he, her/him, hers/his).  The point of this is to observe this character you have created and begin to see her or him the way your other characters will, and perhaps as your reader will as well.  Again, the scene doesn’t have to be long, and it doesn’t have to be something you sell elsewhere.  This is for you, to help you develop you character and refine your voice.  Of course, if it does turn into something you can sell, all the better.

Best of luck with the exercise.  And, as always, keep writing!!

The Great Debate: Plotting Versus Pantsing

No doubt you’ve heard this discussion before.  Some writers rely on advanced plotting when writing their books.  They outline in advance of actually writing the book, sometimes plot point by plot point, sometimes chapter by chapter, sometimes even line by line.  These writers will tell you that without this sort of preparatory work, their books meander, and both the writing and the revising is excruciating.

Others will tell you, with just as much passion, that they are dedicated seat-of-the-pants writers, or “pantsers” as they are affectionately known.  These writers will tell you that an outline robs their writing of spontaneity and keeps their creative juices from flowing.  They will say that they write “organically,” meaning that their plotting and character work seems to happen in the moment, sprouting from their imaginations.

Both sets of writers — plotters and pantsers — are sure that their methods are the best, and that they couldn’t possibly write any other way.  And often aspiring writers will find themselves wondering which approach they ought to take.  So allow me to weigh in.

First, let me say this:  Each writer has to find his or her own way.  Between the extremes of no advanced plotting whatsoever and outlining down to the most minute detail, lies a broad spectrum of possible approaches.  Each one of us should find the place in that spectrum where he or she feels most comfortable, regardless of what others are doing.   As I am fond of saying, there is no single right way to do any of this, and what works for me (or for anyone else) might not work for you.  Find the approach that feels best and use it.

Second, that spectrum I mentioned really does provide a myriad of possible approaches.  I think there are few writers out there who are pure pantsers or pure plotters.  Most people follow a path that combines elements of both.  These days I consider myself a plotter.  I like to outline at least a little bit, usually on a chapter by chapter basis, without getting into the minutia of individual scenes.  Which means that I still do a lot of my plotting on the fly, or, if you will, by the seat of my pants.  This also means that I also see my work as deeply “organic.”  By the same token, even the most dedicated pantsers I know tend to have some sense of where their narrative is headed before they sit down to write.

And third, the term “organic” means different things to different people.  I believe that on some level ALL writing is organic.  Maybe all art is organic.  Because even those who outline extensively have that creative spark at some point in the process, be it in the crafting of prose, or the generation of that first outline.  Creation itself is an organic act. Don’t let anyone tell you that you have to be a pantser in order to write organically.  It’s not true.

Finally, allow me to say this:  I think that for aspiring writers especially, some level of plot outlining makes sense.  Writing is difficult.  Piecing together a novel-length work is a challenge for any writer, experienced or not.  I have written novels with lots of outlining and I’ve written them with almost none.  I got away from outlining for a while but have come back to it, not because my plots have gotten more complicated — they haven’t.  I have come back to it because, in my experience, my novels are better — leaner, tighter, more coherent, better written — when I take the time to do some planning in advance.

That’s just my experience, of course.  As the expression goes, your mileage may vary…

The Grass Is Always Greener In Another Part of the Bookstore…

I’ve played guitar since I was fourteen years old, and I still enjoy it.  But when I am listening to a rock and roll song that really gets me going, I don’t play air-guitar.  No, I pretend to play the drums.  A friend of mine — my old music partner actually — used to say that all guitar players secretly want to be drummers, and all drummers actually want to play guitar.  And you can tell this because guitarists play air-drums and drummers play air-guitar.  I’ve never done a scientific study to check this, but anecdotally, it’s true.

I don’t know if there is a similar paradox in the writing world.  I don’t know if mystery writers secretly want to write fantasy or if writers of Westerns are dying to try their hands at science fiction (though I suppose there is a bit of anecdotal evidence for some sort of Western/SF nexus), but I am finding that I have certain patterns in my writing ambitions that mirror my air-drum playing.

I have written nearly a dozen epic fantasies, and now I’m writing historical urban fantasy.  But I have to admit that the projects that are exciting me most these days are a couple of contemporary fantasies.  Now maybe that’s just a perverse impulse — I want to write the stuff that I haven’t yet sold, and that I don’t have to write because it’s under contract.  But that’s a lot like playing air-drums when I put down my guitar.

I also want to write a couple of other things — a futuristic political thriller.  Yeah, I know:  Where’d that come from?  But there it is.  I even have one outlined — first chapter is written.  I haven’t done anything with it in a couple of years, but it’s there, lurking in my imagination, waiting it’s turn.  I want to write a book about baseball.  Fiction or non-fiction?  I have no idea.  But I want to write about baseball.  Bizarre.

How about you?  What secret literary ambitions do you harbor?  And when you’re listening to music which instrument do you “air-play”…?

Writing Tip: What to do with All Those Rules

You've heard the rules before:  Don't write in first person.  Don't write in present tense.  Don't start your book or story with dialogue.  Don't use adverbs.  Don't use said-bookisms.  Don't switch point of view from one character to another in the middle of a scene.  And the list goes on.

Some of those rules I have focused on in past posts.  Some of them I ignore on a regular basis.  All of us can point of examples of successful books or stories that have violated one or more of them.  So what is the aspiring writer to make of these decrees from on high?

The brief and somewhat glib answer is that the aspiring writer should write her book as she wants to and worry about the rules later.  We all have to be true to our creative visions, and worrying too much about arbitrary rules created by people who enjoy the luxury of having already enjoyed some success is bound to constrain our work.

As you might imagine, the longer, more nuanced answer is somewhat less simple than this.  The fact is, some of those rules reflect very strong trends in the contemporary market.  Any author, aspiring or established, who violates them does so at his or her own risk.  "Bad writing" is a highly subjective thing, but on some of these matters the violation of the rules is viewed, fairly or unfairly, as "bad writing."

So which ones can a writer bend, and which ones should she follow?  Well let's take them one at a time.

"Don't write in first person." This is a pretty antiquated one.  First person narrative has become a staple of urban fantasy, and has long been quite common in noir style mysteries.  First person point of view is less common in mainstream "literary" fiction, which may explain the rule itself:  It is a symptom of a larger bias against genre fiction.  This rule you can pretty much ignore at your leisure.

"Don't write in present tense." This is similar to the first person rule, but it is a bit more prevalent.  The fact is, many readers are turned off by present tense, and many editors, genre and otherwise, have a bias against it.  Several years back, writing as David B. Coe, I wrote a short story in first person present tense.  An editor contacted me about it to ask why I had made that choice.  When I explained it, making clear that I had a specific artistic purpose in mind, she bought the story on the spot.  And maybe that's the point.  If you're writing in present tense just to be different, it's going to come off as gimmicky, and it could keep an editor from buying the book or story (or keep an agent from choosing to represent you).  If, on the other hand, that present tense voice is integral to the story, by all means use it.  One more data point:  All three of Suzanne Collins' HUNGER GAMES books were written in first person present tense.  She seems to have done all right with them.

"Don't start your book or story with dialogue." I heard this one years ago, and my response to it today, is exactly the same as my response then:  Why the hell not?  If that's how the story starts — if the story works that way, by all means do it.  Next.

"Don't use adverbs." This rule, I believe, is rooted in sound advice, but has been taken to illogical extremes.  The problem with adverbs is that they tend to weaken our prose and our descriptions; they become crutches that replace "showing" with "telling."  Take these examples:

Daniel picked up the knife quickly.  "Don't come near me!" he said menacingly.  "I mean it!  I'll kill you!"

Daniel snatched the knife from the table.  "Don't come near me!" he said, in a voice like cold steel.  "I mean it!  I'll kill you!"

The dialogue is the same, but the description in the second version is far more evocative.  Instead of telling you how Daniel acted and spoke using adverbs, I have shown you how he acted and spoke using stronger prose.  the problem with adverbs is that they seem to do the work for us, but really they cheat our readers and our characters.  Do you have to get rid of every adverb?  Do you need to do a universal search of your manuscript and remove all the words ending in "ly"?  Of course not.  There are great books out there that have adverbs in them.  But they don't have many.  And that's the key.  Use adverbs sparingly and you'll be fine.  (See what I did there…?)

"Don't use said-bookisms." Yes, this one is important, and it's one you should follow as much as possible.  For more on said-bookisms, go back and read this post, titled "Writing Tips:  Said-Bookisms, the Obscrue Sin that Can Doom a Manuscript." It explains what said-bookisms are and how to eliminate them from your writing.  Once upon a time, said-bookisms were everywhere.  Styles have changed and the market has changed with them.  Using said-bookisms now can keep you from selling your book or story.

"Don't switch point of view from one character to another in the middle of a scene." Like the said-bookisms rule, this one represents a change in styles and market preferences from just ten or fifteen years ago.  Once referred to as "omniscient point of view," this is now called "head-hopping," and it is another flaw that can keep your work from selling.  Go back and read this post — "Writing Tips: Point of View and Voice, part I — Overview" –  for more information.  The bottom line is this:  If you want to switch point of view from one character to another, you need to start a new chapter, or at least a new chapter section.  Doing so in the middle of a scene, without a visual clue for your reader, is now frowned upon.

There are other "rules" of course, and perhaps I'll deal with those in future posts.  For now let's talk about these.

And as always, keep writing!

Flash Writing Tip: Accepting Criticism from an Editor

I'm here at Marcon, and it's late.  I've had a full day — a long drive, a panel, a signing; I'm ready to go to sleep.

But today's panel was on "How To Be Edited," and since I was the moderator, I wound up giving the topic a good deal of thought.  The other panelists had lots of good things to say, which I won't attempt to repeat here.  But the bottom line is this:  When you get comments from an editor, or even from a Beta Reader — a friend who has read your story or book manuscript at your request — you need to take those comments seriously.  I would never say that even the most inexperienced of aspiring writers needs to follow every suggestion from every reader.  I remember my editor, who has been in the business way, way longer than I, telling me in his revision letter on my very first book, "This is your book, David.  In the end what you do with it is your choice."

That is sound advice.  But the fact remains that we can learn a lot from those who read our work.  Most of us are imperfect editors of our own work; even the most experienced writer still has to work to create the necessary distance to self-edit effectively. [And I will talk about creating that distance in another post.]  That's why outside readers can be so helpful.  And that's why, when an outside reader, particularly an experienced professional editor, identifies potential problems with our work, we need to take those criticisms seriously.  I have written a lot of books, and I feel pretty comfortable standing up for myself in conversations with my editor.  But still, I usually accept at least ninety percent of the changes he suggests.  Because he knows a lot about the business and about writing, and because he is not nearly as close to my work as I am.  He can see flaws to which I am blind.

So trust your Beta Readers. Trust your editor.  Remember that a reliable reader has the same goals you do:  He or she wants to see you produce the best work possible.  So take those critiques to heart.  Be true to your creative vision, but don't be so wedded to your wording and your original choices that you can't recognize valuable constructive criticism when it's offered to you.

And, of course, keep writing.

Marcon This Weekend

I am looking forward to Marcon, which takes place in Columbus, Ohio this coming weekend.  I am a special literary guest at the con — or rather, David B. Coe is, and since he and I are truly inseparable, I'll be a special literary guest, too.  I will be there with my wonderful friend, Faith Hunter, and my equally wonderful agent, Lucienne Diver.  If you are in the area and can come by, please do.  We'll be signing books, doing readings and speaking on panels.  And when we're not doing those things, we'll probably be in the bar…

New Story Is Out!!

The newest Ethan Kaille story is out and available for all to read.  "A Memory of Freedom," which is about Ethan's first job as a thieftaker — the beginning of his new career after he had served 14 years laboring on a sugar plantation for his role in a mutiny — has been published at Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show.  It is the lead story for the current issue of IGMS.

Here is the artwork that accompanies the story:

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I hope that you'll visit the IGMS site and check out the story.  Yes, you do need to subscribe to access the entire piece, but the e-zine is reasonably priced and publishes some terrific stories (besides mine) throughout the year.

Preparations For THIEFTAKER Release, #1

Last day of March.  On Tuesday of this coming week, April 3, we will be exactly 13 weeks away from the July 3 release of THIEFTAKER.  I'm sure that sounds far away to you, but I have been waiting for this for a long, long time, and to me it's getting tantalizingly close.  I'm starting to plan a signing tour through the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.  I'm working up plans for a blog tour.  I'm sending out review copies and getting the book on the radar of friends, colleagues, booksellers, and critics.  I'm having postcards made — I should have them in time for Marcon next weekend.  I'm also working on having Thieftaker t-shirts made.  I hope to be selling them (and giving away a few) later this spring.

In short, that July 3 release date (perfect, by the way, for a story that takes place on the eve of the American Revolution) is the professional focus of my entire year.  I have an Ethan Kaille short story coming out in Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show in another week or two.  I have a second Thieftaker story scheduled to appear on the TOR.COM website in the weeks leading up to the book release.  I have yet another Thieftaker story under consideration — hopefully it will be published later this year.  And I plan to release at least one or two others on the D.B. Jackson website in the next couple of months.

So while that release date seems a long way off, things are starting to happen around here.  I hope that you'll check the website and this blog regularly.  And I hope you'll pay special attention to the author appearances page on the website.  It's going to be a fun spring and summer.

A Spring Morning

This morning I took a bit of time away from the computer and the rewrites I'm working on, and hiked down into a place called Shakerag Hollow.  Shakerag, so named because once upon a time, you could go down there at night, shake a white rag, and the moonshiners would emerge from hiding to sell you their wares, is a beautiful wooded cove not far from here.  This time of year it is carpeted with wildflowers — Downy Phlox and Dwarf Larkspur, Rue Anemone and Bloodroot, Trout Lily and Dutchman's Britches, Celandine Poppy and Wild Geranium, May Apple, Jack-in-the-Pulpit, and several different species of wild violet, and, of course, the trillium — Southern Red, Large-Flowered, and Sweet Betsy (also known as Purple Toadshade).

Each year during the early spring, when I need a break from my normal gym routine, and a bit of time away from my computer, I will put my macro lens on my camera, hike down into the hollow, and take pictures of the blooms.  With the travel I've done this month, I hadn't gotten down into Shakerag, and I missed a good many of the flowers I usually see.  But this morning I finally laced on my hiking books and spent the morning happily snapping away.

It was warm and just breezy enough to be annoying — even the lightest breeze can make the flowers bob and dance, which, in turn, makes it difficult to get good photos.  But still, I managed to get some good photos.  I also heard some early spring migrants in the trees overhead — Parula, Black-and-white, and Black-throated Green Warblers, Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, and a few others.

All in all, a lovely morning.