Howard Andrew Jones's Blog, page 65

My List of Writing Mistakes

A month or so back I was contacted by a reader and fellow writer who’d heard about my mistakes list that I keep in my writing notebooks. She wanted to know what those mistakes were. Today I thought I’d share them with you.

One thing I’ve finally figured out at 45 is that I’ll keep inventing new mistakes, even though I will slowly (too slowly, it seems) get wiser. I believe I’ve already mentioned that I always carry around a mini-pen and a small writing notebook, one that can fit in my back pocket, or even a smaller model (a Paperblanks Micro) that I can slip into a front pocket. You can find a link to my discussion of that very subject by clicking here, along with some photos of my favorite notebooks and size comparisons.

While on that recent vacation I mentioned yesterday, I found it handy to carry around the Micro notebook featured right up there. As my daughter rode and re-rode the Tower of Terror (once was enough for me) I sat on an uncomfortable stone bench and plugged away on an outline and had almost as much fun as she was having plunging up and down. It would have been just as much fun, if not for the bench. I love to write.

Hulk keep list too. Do Not Smash List!

But as to the topic at hand: I keep a running list of my hard-learned errors at the front of every new notebook, and I try to read through them every few days. Occasionally I graduate and remove one mistake  to make room for some new one I’ve discovered. There are always more to add. Some errors I haven’t made in a while, but used to make so regularly for so many years that they retain a place of honor.

Different writers have different strengths and weaknesses, and so I’m sure if every writer made one of these lists it would be a little different. Also, as this list has to fit in a pretty small space, and is really only intended as memory jolt for me, the entries are short and may come off as cryptic. With all that in mind, in the hope it might be useful, here’s what I have near the front of my current notebook.

Don’t be too quick to reveal the villain’s plan
Don’t excuse plot flaws with dialogue
Know what each character wants in the scene before you start
Keep a clear through line
Character interaction should move the plot
Background details can be revealed gradually
Know the difference between procrastination and incubation
Trust starting reluctance. There may be something wrong with the scene.
Character is action
1000 good words = better than 5000 lousy words
Be in your character’s head and see through his/her eyes
Each character has his/her own voice
If you need to invent scenes for a character, maybe you don’t need her
Start with a gripping or intriguing moment
Get reader involved with characters before the huge plot arcs start
Play to your strengths — dialogue, character interaction, small cast
Trouble revising? Read sections out of order.
When you’re stuck moving the plot



   Introduce character with info
   Send in the ninjas



Don’t take readers to uninteresting places
One through line at a time
Give problem a personal connection
Know the villain
Identify what character wants and keep it that way unless you change it for a good reason

Also, Hulk Not Smash Puppy. List get too long! Make Hulk ANGRY!

First, to give credit where credit is due, I got the simple but profound “character is action” from the mighty John Chris Hocking, and the bit about sending in a character with information, or ninjas, from the wonderful game mastering section from the FATE powered Spirit of the Century by Donaghue, Hicks, and Balsera (a game mastering section SO fine that the book should be purchased by adventure writers who don’t even play games). My brilliant friend Sunny Hawkins is the one who coined the bit about knowing the difference between incubation and procrastination.

As for what it all means, I’ll explain some of the more esoteric bits in my next entry. I’ve got books to write.

Some Considered Suggestions

Having recently spent some time at the Disney Hollywood Studios, I feel compelled to offer some suggestions to provide attractions of greater interest, as apart from a nifty roller coaster and a terrifying plunge ride, the theme park seems mostly to consist of shops all selling more or less the same thing.

1. How about a James Bond ride? You could climb into an Aston Martin simulator and back up Double-O Seven and fight Goldfinger’s brother, Copperfinger, or maybe even Goldsting.

2. So you have Star Wars. Why not Star Trek? As a matter of fact, why not model off of Epcot’s Mission: Space, and create a simulator ride that’s a shuttlecraft to the Enterprise? (Although I think what everyone would REALLY want would be the chance to have a lirpa fight to the death, or maybe a styrfoam rock fight with a Gorn.)

3. As long as we’re talking about science fiction, why not a ride that’s an homage to ’70s science fiction greats? You could flee from some Sandmen or play Rollerball. Maybe the reason the carts always turn up empty in the ride is that they deposit all the visitors in Soylent Green vats…

Vampire Earth

At GenCon Lou Anders rightly called me out on one of my bad habits. You see, I have a tendency, when discussing favorite writers, to only discuss those who are dead or near forgotten. Part of that comes from me having spent so much time unearthing the pulp fiction of Harold Lamb and exploring the work of his contemporaries (I wrote my master’s thesis on Lamb) and partly that stems from me having decided, about 16 years ago, that if I was serious about becoming a good fantasy writer I had to better understand its roots.

Thus I immersed myself in the grandfathers and grandmothers of the genre… and sort of lost touch with what was going on in modern fantasy. I’ve just started to catch up. Anyway, with a nod to Lou, I think it’s long past time in this column to mention one of my favorite modern writers, E.E. Knight.

Eric happens to be one of my closest friends, but he wouldn’t be if we hadn’t happened to have stories published in the same issue of Fraser Ronald’s old Sword’s Edge e-zine. I read Eric’s story, liked it, and wrote him, and we struck up a correspondence. We became friends, and then, when he got his book deal with ROC, he sent me an ARC. Something about Vampire Earth. He was hoping I might get it into the hands of a reviewer at Black Gate, for which I’d just started writing an occasional column.

Ye Gods, but I had no interest in reading a vampire novel, but Eric was my pal, so… I read it. And I loved it. Eric’s “Vampires” aren’t cloak wearing Transyvanian counts or sparkly immortal teenagers, they’re life-draining aliens. And the Vampire Earth is sort of like a French Resistance movie with the alien life-draining vampires playing the role of the Nazis. Of course, a lot of folks out there now have never SEEN a French Resistance movie, and the notion that the French are cowards is way, way too prevalent in today’s joke-o-sphere. (Read some history. Or go watch The Train. You’ll find a lot of French heroes.) So maybe comparing the books to a French Resistance movie isn’t enough for a modern audience. Maybe I should say it’s like Aliens crossed with Mad Max… except I’m probably dating myself again.

Look, the adventures of Major David Valentine and his extended allies are damn cool stuff. Knight is great with horror, action, and pacing, and he is an absolute master at world building. One of the things I like best about his world building — something I’ve seen few modern authors pull off — is the way he brings individual landscape in as a character. When Valentine visits new regions of the remains of North America, by God, it feels different, just as it does in real life. Southern Indiana feels different from Missouri and Tennessee when I drive through it, and it feels different when Knight writes about it. The adventures Valentine has in different places aren’t interchangeable moments that might as well happen on a hollywood stage set, they are affected and influenced by the character of the land.

Ten books are out now, with a few more on the way, and Knight’s in no danger of dying before he finishes the series with a fantastic climx. Here’s a link to the first one. Go read it.

Now I would tell you about his second series, Dragon Age, and how much I loved it (one of them is among my very favorite modern fantasies) but I have to go write some books.

 

Vance, Robert E. Howard, and the Role of Women

I’m  having trouble sleeping again, but this morning at least I’m putting it to use and am up early writing. I’ve got a lot of work to do on two projects I’m really excited about, so I’ll keep the entry short.

First, in my continuing effort to be everywhere on the Internet, I had a Q and A over on the Paizo boards about my upcoming novel, Stalking the Beast (which reminds me — I’ve got to create a “cover slide” for the new book so it can join the other four rotating at the top of my main page — hope I remember how!) You can find it here.

Second, on a long trip yesterday I started and finished Jack Vance’s Big Planet, courtesy of John O’Neill giving me one of his four extra copies (thanks, John!). I started to take Charles Saunders’ The Naama War — the fourth Imaro book — but was afraid it would get dinged up on the journey.

Big Planet was typical Vance and a great read, but it was also a product of its time. Lengthwise I can’t imagine it was much longer than 65 thousand words, which left barely any room for characterization. Vance can frequently be pretty light on characterization in some ways, although he will add details to even minor characters to bring a culture to life. But I don’t usually read Vance for his characters (unless said character is Cugel the Clever) I read him for the wild inventiveness about culture and events and amazing scenery, which he again, even in this early work, tosses off with careless ease that few others can even approach. Over the course of Big Planet the main characters travel through a vast landscape and encounter all manner of environments and societies, each different from the other and well described and fairly plausible even in their weirdness. And, as is almost always the case in his work, the pace never flagged. The man was a master and there’s still a lot to learn from him even while you’re enjoying his lighter fare.

Having been written in the early 1950s, it has some artifacts of its time that it can’t really be blamed for. It’s assumed and never, ever questioned, that adventuring and important duties are for men — sexual equality isn’t even on the radar. It makes me wonder how I’d ever share this book with, say, my daughter. Most authors can’t be expected to look beyond their time, and I’m sure in 50 years, assuming anyone’s still reading my books, someone will find something that I’m not doing that makes me dated. Still, in contemplation of this sexism I can’t help thinking about Robert E. Howard’s Valeria, from “Red Nails.”

Now when the topic of dated depictions of women comes up you probably don’t think, “ah, but Robert E. Howard got it right” because he’s usually dropped into the Lost Pit of the Sexist Writers owing to his penchant for having damsels in distress (like Burroughs and nearly every other adventure writer before him and Ian Fleming and countless more writers after).

Yet back in the ’30s Howard could be counted upon to create a character like Valeria, from “Red Nails,” who uses a sword to deadly effect alongside Conan not out of desperation, but by inclination, or the real Red Sonya (not the one in the chainmail bikini) who is the coolest character in “The Shadow of the Vulture.” And then Robert E. Howard would happily have written more tales of Dark Agnes, the French swords woman, if any publisher had wanted to print her adventures rather than reject them.

REH’s sexism seems to have been due to a working writer delivering what the publishing market wanted rather than what he himself necessarily believed, and I wonder how much of Vance’s unconscious sexism is the same way? I can’t know, but having read vast swathes of both of their fiction at this point I also can’t help speculating that the Texan who died nearly two decades before Big Planet was written was actually far more open-minded about women’s roles than other male spec fic writers who followed for many, many a year.

Hercules

In my continuing quest to be all over the interwebs, I’m over at the talented Garrett Caltera’s blog along with some luminaries, and we’re all talking about famous forgotten books. Not books that are “curious” or “interesting” but GOOD books that someone really ought to still be reading.

Mine is Edison Marshall’s Earth Giant, and if you want to find out why I think it’s so cool, follow the link. Hint — heroic fiction fans would love it. Seriously, anyone who loves Leiber or REH or Lamb should be reading the thing.

Howard Andrew Jones (That’s Me!) on SF Signal Podcast

Yesterday I had a mind meld, today I’m on a Podcast over at SF Signal! I hope you’ll swing by and listen to my musings about writing Pathfinder, Dabir and Asim, and sundry other nonsense with the talented (and Hugo Award winning) Patrick Hester!

Arr, the link be here!

Mind Meld!

I was invited to join the Mind Meld this week at SF Signal, and along with some fine folks, I discourse at length about how speculative fiction changed my life. You can find it here.

In other news, I am mightily pleased with the new Dabir and Asim short story I’ve written for the Kaiju Anthology, and, in fact, am now pleased with both of the other writing projects I’m drafting away upon. Absent any more emergency home improvement projects, I should be back on track soon…

Writer at Work

Hulk  still wanting to smash story, so Hulk just post link today.

Hulk hear good thing about Lone Wolf adventure books. Many free now, on the web, and not pirate copies. Hulk SMASH pirates.

Here is the link.

Hulk write now.

Gaming and Jungling

Late last week an essay I wrote about gaming and writing game novels went live over at the Paizo blog. I talk a little about my gaming philosophy and how it impacted my writing.

And Charles Rutledge of Singular Points sent me a link to a British site. In the past I’ve described the purple pulp glories of Tarzan clone Ki-Gor both at Black Gate and here on the site. Well, feast your eyes upon this. The aforementioned British site has scans of several Ki-Gor novellas, including two of the very best (also including a few dogs, for Ki-Gor quality varies wildly).

Here, then, if you dare, is a link to “The Beast Gods of Atlantis.” If you’ve never read pulp or don’t know about Ki-Gor, you might want to visit the essays that Charles and I wrote on the subject so that you have a better idea of just what you’re in for.

In other news, I spent yesterday afternoon and evening digging yet ANOTHER hole, for more waterpipe burst. Yay. I hope to actually do some more writing today after I spend a little more time on the hole.

 

Of Conan and Thieves

I don’t think I’ll ever get more than 48 pages in to Poul Anderson’s Conan the Rebel. Notwithstanding the fact I respect Anderson and have enjoyed a number of his other books, I have no intention of reading further. In those 48 pages of rather small type Conan has only appeared a handful of times, and he’s never actually done anything apart from listening to people talk. There’s been a lot of action, but always with characters to whom the reader has just been introduced. It’s pretty much been a reminder of things NOT to do while trying to tell a dramatic tale. Narratively I’m bored. Because I have a stack of other books, and less time and patience than I used to have, I am sad to say that this one’s being set aside.

But speaking of Robert E. Howard, I recently discovered that another collection of his fiction has been put together. Normally I have about as much interest in boxing stories as, I dunno, watching paint dry, but REH was such a stylist that I’ve enjoyed nearly everything he wrote. (Well, apart from his weird menace stories.) I’ll be looking forward to reading Fists of Iron: Round 1.

And speaking of talented authors, probably the whole world knows that Scott Lynch’s Republic of Thieves is out, but in case you did not, now you do. If you are a lover of swashbuckling fantasy heists with great character arcs, twists, and witty banter, get thee to a bookstore (it’s always better for an author to buy from a bookstore due to the arcane way these things are monitored) and buy a copy!

Now I need to go write something. Possibly a grocery list.