S. Evan Townsend's Blog, page 109

Movie Review: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

WARNING: Spoilers ahead.
I was about to go see The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug in the theater when it left town.  At first I wasn't going to bother because I was so disappointed by An Unexpected Journey.  But friends kept saying it was better and worth seeing.  But I didn't and had to wait for it to come out on Netflix.  I watched it last night.
I believe that as an entertainer (writer, movie director, singer, whatever) you want to leave your audience wanting more.  For example, in The Empire Strikes Back, you didn't want the asteroid-dodging space chase to end.  You didn't want the speeder bike chase through the Endor Moon forest to end in Return of the Jedi.  And you wanted more when they did end.  Lucas did this beautifully in the first three Star Wars movies (first as in when released, not first as in order they take place).  Yes, sometimes his climatic battles dragged on a bit (especially in Jedi) but he managed to keep them interesting with dazzling special effects.  Lucas seemed to have forgotten this when he made the three prequels.  I remember going from "Oh, that's cool" to "when is this going to end" with the interminable battle sequences of Episodes I, II, and III.  I wonder if because CGI is so much easier and cheaper than live-action or model/bluescreen effects, Lucas was able to make the scenes go on and on when before he couldn't afford to.
And this is the problem that both Hobbit movies suffer.  The chase/fight scenes go on forever.  For instance, as they are escaping the elves' lair and being attacked by orcs and Legolas and that chick elf were fighting the orcs, it started out fun and exciting, but as the sequence went on and on, it started getting boring.  Yes, Legolas shooting orcs with his bow while standing on dawarves in barrels was marginally cool.  But by then I was starting not to care.
Please, Mr. Jackson, just because you can film it, doesn't mean you have to film it.  Please leave us wanting more, not less.  Do not hammer us with your CGI brilliance.  You did this in Lord of the Rings (moslty), why are you not doing this in The Hobbit?
Oh, and an elf/dwarf romance?  Puleeese.
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug has it's brilliant parts.  But they are interrupted by long, never-ending battles.  The film could have been amazing (despite the violence done to Tolkien's original work).  But it is merely okay.

Not Paying Attention

All through your childhood and even into adult life, people were always telling you to "pay attention."  In school, in our jobs, in our daily tasks were are admonished to "pay attention."  And, yes, there are many situation where paying attention is a good thing.  I wish more people sitting behind the wheel of the car they are driving would pay more attention.

But sometimes, not paying attention can yield results.

My middle son is home from college for summer break.  He turned on the television.  I was in another room where I couldn't see the TV, but I could hear.  He started watching King of the Hill .  Now, I have watched nearly every episode of this show starting it's second season (I had to be talked into watching it).  That's 12 seasons and I've seen most of the first season in reruns (and my kids watching the show on Netflix streaming).  I liked King of the Hill and was sad when the show's run ended.

And every time I watched King of the Hill, I saw Stephen Root's name in the credits.  But I never thought about whose voice he provided.  And I like Stephen Root; he's a very good character actor and I've seen him a a lot of television shows and movies.

So my is watching King of the Hill and I'm not paying attention to it except I can hear it.  I hear Hank HIll, Boomhauer, Dale, and Bill.  And I'm really not listening but for the first time ever, I realize that Stephan Root does the voice of Bill Dauterive because I'm hearing Stephen Root, not seeing Bill Dauterive.  Once I disconnected the image from the voice, I could hear the voice of Stephen Root.

And I got thinking about it.  I specifically remember when I had the idea that turned into Hammer of Thor .  I won't bore you with the details but suffice it to say, I wasn't paying attention to what I was doing but I was thinking about taking my idea of about Adepts into World War II (I'd already written a short story in the Adept universe).

Why do we have our best ideas in the shower?  Because most of us shower on automatic pilot so our mind wanders, is free to grab bits from here, bits from there, and through gray matter alchemy, come up with a new idea.  We need to give our minds time to . . .wander.  We need to spend time not paying attention.  We need time not on task.  We need to not be on Facebook, Twitter, blogging, writing, reading, or doing our day jobs.  We are creative and we are often creative when we aren't trying to be.

So spend some time not paying attention.  You might be amazed at what you learn, or what you think up.

Character Driven Fiction

The other night I was lying in bed thinking about my current work in progress and in a series of ADD bounces* from one subject to the other I ended up thinking about the 1972 movie The Poseidon Adventure .  And I started thinking about the character played by
If you haven't seen the movie, it's about a ocean passenger liner that is capsized by a huge wave (they may have called it a "tidal wave") and an intrepid group of passengers that try to escape, lead by a priest played by Gene Hackman.  The priest is a bit of an iconoclast, arguing that you can pray all you want to God but you'd better be ready to help yourself, first.  When I was 12 years old watching this movie I didn't care.  I didn't want to listen to this priest argue theology.  I wanted to get to the fun, excitement, adventure, and a 19-year-old 
You may have a grand adventure in mind but no one will care if they don't care about the characters.  Without unique, flawed, descriptive characters you don't have a story.  You might have characters stuck in a capsized passenger liner, but no one will care unless they can sympathize and relate to the characters.  Your characters and their interaction with the environment, circumstances, and other characters must be what your story is about.  Oh, sure, they manage to escape the capsized ocean liner but you're writing a novel, not a travelogue.

Even your villains need to be fully thought out.  Someone once recommended asking "What do your villain's friends like about him or her."  She doesn't have friends?  Then you don't have a character you have a cardboard cut-out.

You hero needs a flaw (or ten) to overcome, insecurities, and a history.  Your villain needs good qualities (to overcome), flaws to exploit, insecurities, and a history.

Now, if your hero speaks to a bartender to order a whiskey I don't expect the bartender to be a fully developed character (I call those "NPCs" from my role-playing game days).  But he could have a unique manner of speaking or a limp or be surly or like to tell jokes.

It's characters that drive your story.  Yes, they might have a grand adventure, but no one will care about the adventure if they don't care about the characters.

*My WIP is a western/fantasy mash-up, and that reminded me of my friend, Judith Ann McDowell's latest book, a pure western.  And I remembered she was talking about a character named Stella who was a nasty prostitute and I was thinking I wished she'd named her something else because I like the name "Stella," I think it's pretty, like , the actress who was quite pretty in the movie The Poseidon Adventure playing a prostitute who married a cop.  And that's how my mind works.

Flash Fiction Friday: The Pharmacist.

I've started today to start a new tradition: Flash Fiction Friday.  Every Friday I will strive to post a quick little flash fiction piece, something new, maybe something old.  We'll see.

Today's story is entitled "The Pharmacist."

"I need a fix, man," the skinny white guy standing before the counter whined.Smith looked over the customer with his black eyes.  "You've maxed out your allotment.""No, man, that was last week; I got five more hours on Monday.""I loaned you ten hours last week, you owe me five.""I paid you for those hours.  I paid you black-market rates.""Yes, you did.  And I'm being audited today.  Your connection, namely me, might get his ticket jerked for loaning you those hours.""But I need a fix," he cried, twisting his long emaciated body into a near-pretzel."Sorry, can't help you," the proprietor said without a shred of mercy.The white man stared at the pharmacist.  "You suck, man.""That's not what you said last week when I loaned you ten hours."The grey eyes that once may have been blue looked at the floor.  "I'm going to take the pill if I can't get hours.""Then take the pill," Smith said, his voice void of emotion.The man turned slowly and walked out, opening the door to let in the summer heat and ringing the bell hanging over the portal.  Smith didn't know if the man would take the e-pill or not.  But there was nothing he could do for the man and his choices were his choices.  There was a reason use of virtual reality was monitored carefully as addiction was a virulent social problem.  After all, if you could save the nubile purple-skinned Arcturian princess with a laser pistol and a monoatomic-edged sword, then engage in a little inter-species copulation, well, that beat the hell of out reality.  The white guy was your typical v-head.  He didn't eat, sleep, or bath, he just looked for his next hours.Another skinny white guy walked in and Smith assessed him in a few glances.  Nice clothes, good shoes, and a very illegal slug-thrower under his jacket according to back-scatter detector.Smith reached for the alarm button that would call down about sixty heavily armed cops in about thirty seconds."I wouldn't touch that button if I were you," the man said, reaching into his jacket where the gun was.Smith stilled his finger."It'll take the local constabulary at least thirty seconds to get here and in that time you will be dead, I'll have what I want, and be gone.  It don't matter to me but I suspect you'd like to keep breathing this stupidly thin air a bit longer.  Either way, I get what I came for."Smith couldn't help himself.  "Who are you?"The man smiled, showing good teeth.  Smith wondered why he was in an indigent pharmacy.  "I'm just a man.""What do you want?" Smith asked.  His finger was still hovering over the red alarm button."Your hands where I can see them for a start," the man said.Smith put both hands on the counter, his dark skin contrasting with the white surface."Good," the man said, pulling his hand from his jacket.  It was empty."Anything else?" Smith asked."The pill.  Not many, ten should do.""One is sufficient.""Well, yes, if you just want to kill yourself, I suppose."Smith's eyes widened.  He thought quickly.  "I'm about to be audited.  The authorities will show up any moment.""Then I suggest we hurry before I have to kill you and anyone else who shows up."Smith turned and got down ten doses of the pill.  He set them on the counter.  "There, now go."The man gave Smith a predatory grin.  "That easy?""Yes.""And what of your audit?""I'll tell them I was robbed.""Will they believe you?""There's vid."  Smith regretted it the moment he said it."How do we delete the vid?""You don't, it's immediately uploaded to the Ministry of Health's servers.  I can't access it.""Then how do you loan hours to v-heads?"Smith frowned."You've hacked the system," the man said as a simple fact."Yes," Smith growled, understanding how this man chose to rob him.  His reputation for dealing out hours under the table for cash was well known in the city's dark underbelly."Then we'd better hurry before the auditors get here," the man said."And if I refuse?""I kill you.""And it's all on vid.""I'll be off-planet before they find me."Smith frowned.  "I know who you are."The man smiled.  "I see my reputation precedes me.  So you know I don't care.  I'll kill you like you swat a fly.""Fly, huh?"  Smith smiled.The man looked at him.  "We need to take care of this business.""Yes, we do," Smith said keeping his voice low and even.The white man, the man whose reputation was that of a callous, heartless, ruthless kill hesitated.Smith's chest opened up and the toothed appendage shot across the counter, across the space between him and the killer, and bit the face of the man.  The fellow screamed until His face was gone and he flopped on the floor like a fish out of water, a red puddle of blood spreading out from his headless body.
Smith sighed as the bloody appendage sucked into his chest through the hole ripped in his smock.  Now he really needed to edit that video.  But first things first, he had a body to eat.

Writer's Don't Wanna

Yesterday I wrote about overcoming writer's block.  And then, later that day, I ran smack dab head on into writer's don't wanna.

What, you ask, is "writer's don't wanna"?  Let me explain.  I was working on my Work in Progress (WIP) which would be a fantasy/western mashup in the Adept Series universe.  After a bout of writer's block about the work, I had an idea to move forward, a great little plot twist and an explanation of why certain things happened in the novel I'd sort of not had a good explanation for, yet.  Then I decided I'd better go back and read what I'd written, all approximately 33,000 words, to ensure that nothing conflicted with my plot twist.

I got half-way through chapter two and just went "yuck."  I didn't want to do it anymore.  I didn't want to read anymore, I didn't want to edit anymore (which I was doing as I read it), I just didn't want to write.

This isn't writer's block, this is "writer's don't wanna."  And at the moment I have no words of wisdom for getting out of it.  And I'm a bit worried that if I don't want to read my work, no one else will either.  Maybe this whole fantasy/western mashup is just a bad idea and I should quit it and write something else.  Maybe I'm a lousy hack of a writer.

You see, it's fear and self-doubts again.  This is a form of writer's block.  The fear that it's NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

The only thing I can think to do is take a break and go back and read it some more.  Keep working.  Just keep writing (as I say over and over again).  Writing requires discipline (I've said that before, too).  Your first draft will be crap, get over it and write the damn thing.

So, obviously, I need to keep writing.  And not on this blog.

Later.

Overcoming Writer's Block

I once had writer's block for two years.

Now, admittedly I was working more than full time, I was busy with other stuff so I wasn't staring at a blinking cursor for two years.  But I could not finish Hammer of Thor , my first Adept Series book for two stinking years.  I had written almost up to the climax and could not force myself to write more.  I had the climax sort of planned out (as much as I plan out any writing in advance) but could not bring myself to write it.  For two long years.

Then one day it suddenly occurred to me: my plans sucked.  I realized I had plotted out a climax that was pretty anticlimactic.  My main character, who had just spent over 100,000 words getting to this place, was going to sit back and watch it happen.  I needed to get him into the action.  And when I got that figured out, I wrote the climax and denouement in a about a week of spare time (I was still working at my day job).

Now that was a special and I think unusual case of writer's block.  My subconscious was telling me "it sucks" so I never wrote it.  And it did suck so it was good that I never wrote it.

However, I think a great deal of writer's block is caused by our fear that what we are about to write will suck.  We let the perfect be the enemy of the good.  I've said over and over on this blog: your first draft will suck, get over it and write the damn thing.  Then you can fix it in edits but you can't fix it in edits if you don't write it.

As John Rogers said, "You can’t think yourself out of a writing block; you have to write yourself out of a thinking block."  Which is good advise, but sometime I think you can't even write yourself out of it.  If I'd gone ahead and written the climax of Hammer of Thor as I'd plotted it out, it would not be as good as it is now.

I have two methods of overcoming writer's block.  One is: just keep writing.  It might suck, but at least you're writing.  And if it does suck, fix it in edits (you do edit, don't you?).

The other method is to stop writing.  This is different from writers block.  Writer's block is when you don't write when you want to.  If you stop writing, you just stop because you don't want to write.  What good does that do?  It frees the mind from the pressure of producing.  It lets your mind wander and think about other stuff other than YOU'RE NOT WRITING.  And often this will after a short time, produce an idea that will get me past the writer's block (okay, two years was not a short time).

Last week suffering a bit from writer's block.  I am about half-way through a novel and I suddenly had no idea where to take it from where it was at.  So I stopped writing and let my thoughts wander and didn't think about it and didn't worry about it.  As I was driving on Friday on a 360-mile round trip, I had an idea.  This got me thinking.  Then I went to my writers' group Friday night.  It was a "writing writers' group" where you are expected to produce.  I sat there staring at the cursor not getting anywhere.  So I backed up a few pages and read what I'd written right up until I got stuck.  And I had an idea that built upon the idea I had while driving.  If I changed the villain from who it seem to be to a minor character, that would be a great plot twist, would solve so many problems I was having with the plot, and would let me continue.  I wrote down some notes on my thoughts so I could do a little thinking about where the plot should go from here (and I need to do a bit of research).  But I no longer feel as if I have writers block because I used both methods: I backed off from the writing, and then I was in a situation where I was forced to write.

The same thing happened in God of Strife , the fourth Adept Series novel coming out May 15th.  I was about half-way through it when I realized my planned plot for the rest of the novel was weak.  So I took a break, and a few days later had the idea that went on to complete the novel.

The more you worry about that fact you're not writing, the more you'll not write.  So either write and admit it might be crap that you need to fix later, or stop writing, stop worrying, and let the ideas flow.  One or the other method (or a combination of the two) should let you overcome writer's block.

All of the Empirical Data

It's raining today.

So what? you say.  You live in Washington State and it rains a lot.  Well, yes and no.  The western side of the state (west of the Cascade Mountain range) it rains a lot.  But I happen to live in the rain shadow of those mountains and we average 8 inches of rain per year.  Seattle got more than that last month!

So it's raining today and my thoughts hearken back to my 9th grade "Earth Science" class.  The teacher (who was a PE major in college) decided to demonstrate the scientific method using rain as an example.  He ask the class to pretend we didn't know rain came from and what facts could we observe to form a theory of where rain comes from.  One student said, "It gets cloudy."  Another offered, "It gets cooler."  Now this is empirical data, i.e., data that is observed.

So I said, very seriously, "It falls out of the sky."  And everyone laughed.  No, this is not about childhood trauma.  I am very used to, and was even then, being laughed at or ridiculed when I know I'm right.  Even in the face of authoritative opposition because the PE major laughed, too.

But here's the thing.  If it got cloudy and cooler and the water came out of the ground, you'd need a different theory than you'd have if it came from the sky.  That was an important empirical datum.  But to everyone else in that classroom, rain fell from the sky by definition.

This is why science is difficult.  You have to look at all the data.  And there might be data you're not aware of that you're not seeing because you're assuming rain always falls from the sky.  People often miss what is right in front of their eyes because it doesn't fit their pattern of thinking.  Or they see patterns where they aren't because of prejudice.

For instance, if you think people with green eyes are all idiots, anytime you see a person with green eyes being an idiot, it reinforces your prejudice.  If you see a green-eyed person acting smart, you dismiss it and often forget about it because it doesn't fit the patterns of your prejudice.  This is why scientists have developed many tools to eliminate prejudice and preconception and other facts of human nature.

So when you're looking at a phenomena, try to gather all the empirical data, even that you don't agree with.

Supersonic Molten Sulfur

Io with a volcano on the left side of the picture.For the Work in Progress (WIP) I'm just finishing up (I'm waiting on two more beta reads) I decided to describe the moon of Jupiter, Io, in greater detail than I had.  In The Treasure of the Black Hole my main character is talking about learning to pilot a spaceship around Jupiter and how difficult landing on Io was.

Io (pronounced eye-oh) is the inner-most Galilean moon, that is, one of the four moons discovered by Galileo in 1610.  Due to its proximity with Jupiter, tidal forces keep the moon's core molten and there are numerous volcanoes on the moon spewing molten sulfur.  Some of the volcanoes shoot the sulfur 200 miles above the surface.

So I decided I wanted to say in my WIP how fast that sulfur was moving.  This is an easy calculations and according to my college physics book (yes, I still have it), the formula is:


Where v0 is the initial velocity as it leaves the surface, h = the height it reaches, and g is the acceleration of gravity.  In computerese we write that: v0=sqrt(2hg)

For example, if you throw a ball straight up (ignoring air resistance) and it went up 5 meters (about 17 feet) you would have to throw it with an initial velocity of 10 meters per second (about 22 mph).  That's because the acceleration of gravity on Earth's surface is about 9.8 meters per second per second so plugging those number is v0=sqrt(2*5*9.8) = 9.9 meters per second.

So let's do this math for the molten sulfur on Io.  Again, ignoring air resistance (because there is no air).  In this calculation h = 200 miles = 322,000 meters and the acceleration of gravity at Io's surface is (at the equator) is 1.796 meters per second per second.  Now, everything is in the units of meters and seconds (don't try to multiply miles by meters, it doesn't work) so you plug those numbers in and v0=sqrt(2*322,000*1.796) = 1,075 meters per second.  Which is 2,405 mph.  Wow!  That just doesn't seem possible.  The speed of sound is 767 mph.  So that molten sulfur is going three times the speed of sound or Mach 3. (Yes, I know there's no air on Io and thus on sound.)

Anyone out there see a math error, let me know!

Write, then Edit, then Edit Some More . . .

I'm getting beta reads back on a science fiction novel I wrote called The Treasure of the Black Hole.  Getting the beta reads done is the last step (almost) before submitting or publishing a novel.  At least, that's my opinion.

This is April.  That novel was a NaNoWriMo project.  That's five months almost since I finished the first draft to it being almost done.  I say "almost" because I want to read through it one last time.

Why haven't I stuck a fork in it and called it done?  Well, I'm about to, but, to paraphrase Orson Wells: I will submit nor publish no novel before its time.

In this blog I once said: "Your first draft will suck.  Get over it and write the damn thing."  And I stick by that.  Write your first draft either as a NaNoWriMo project or just sit down and write.  Just keep writing.

But when the first draft is finished, there is still a lot of work to do: months of work.  The manuscript needs to be edited by you at least twice, three times is better.  But before you edit it, you have to let it sit and the longer the better.  I call this process "festering."  The errors and bad writing become more blatant the longer it sits.  I have a writer friend who says she won't go back to a manuscript until she's started working on something else.  "I have to fall in love with something else so I can see it objectively."  I'm not that extreme but I do wait a minimum of a week but, as I said, the longer the better.

Then I have my wife and (if she's willing) a friend proofread it.  Proofreading is a different function from editing.  If I were doing a venn diagram, proofreading would be inside of editing.  But proofreading is more concentrating on typos, spelling errors, and punctuation while not looking at sentence structure or writing.  Proofreading has its place in the editing process.

Then I have someone read it out loud to me.  When I hear it and don't see it I pick up on things I don't when reading.  I hear word repetitions, clunky construction, stilted dialogue, and writing that just isn't up to my standards.  It works very well.

Then I let it sit again, and edit it again.  Then I do beta reads with as many people as I can get (this is where your writers' group comes in handy; you are part of a writers' group, aren't you?).  You want to get all the feedback you can because people see things you don't see.  Or they have questions that make you realize you didn't explain something well enough.

Then, read though it one last time, and stick a fork in.  There's a balance there.  You don't want to tweak a manuscript for ten years.  You have to, at some point, realize that it's good enough.  Or great enough.  You need to publish or submit it as is.  Will there be a typo in it?  Probably.  Will there be a sentence that isn't absolutely beautifully written. Very likely.  But you need, now, to submit or publish it.

Then start writing that next first draft (which I actually hope you started sometime during the editing process of the last manuscript).  Because you need to just keep writing.

Book Trailer: The Adept Series

The book trailer for the Adept Series is now live:


Learn more about the magical Adept Series on my webpage.