Jonathan Dyer's Blog: The Nick Temple Files, page 9

Rules for Writing Fiction

The Most Important Rules for Writing Fiction

Somerset Maugham, no lightweight when it comes to writing fiction, is supposed to have said, “There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.” That attribution astounds me. When I first came across Maugham’s quip, I thought, “Good God! I don’t have a chance!” Of Human Bondage is one of only two novels that I read cover to cover without stopping except as nature required and to make a brief call to my employer pret...

Climate as Character

The Importance of Climate and Setting in FictionA Novella Set on the Fictional Island of Santa Clara

My work is all fiction, but the settings are generally real. For example, each Nick Temple File takes place in a variety of real locations. Berlin is often the focal point for those works, but I’ve used Mombasa, Paris, Prague, Garmisch, Washington, D.C., Monterey, Cairo, Rostock, Heraklion, and many other cities as additional or key settings. When I establish a scene’s setting I have to decide h...

A Peak at my Short Story Collection

A Sample from a Short Story CollectionBirds Work the Tide in Santa Barbara

As noted in this blog, I completed a collection of short stories in March. I’m shopping the collection around to see if I can generate any interest in it. In the meantime, I thought I’d release one of the stories here. You never know who might be reading this blog, right? So, to that end, “Gathering for Dinner” is below. I hope you enjoy it. Oh, and don’t try this at home!

GATHERING FOR DINNER

I kept running back and for...

From Behind the Iron Curtain

Three Years Behind the Iron CurtainThe Berlin Wall at the Brandenburg Gate

My second trip to a divided Berlin was in August of 1983. I’d been to the city in 1975 on a brief visit with my father. The details of that visit were already a blur eight years later, but some enduring impressions accompanied me on my return trip. My second visit was to last for nearly three years, plenty of time to test those earlier impressions, form new ones, and store a myriad of details into my long-term memory.

Th...

Developing a Voice as a Writer

The Influence of Genre on VoiceBerlin: Winter on the Wannsee

When I started writing in my late teens and early twenties, I ran into a problem that I assume many aspiring writers encounter. My work sounded like what I had most recently read. The influence of other authors was more than mere influence, and it showed. While imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, it probably isn’t the best avenue for unique expression. The problem had, I think, two main sources: the limitation of my perso...

Writing, Rewriting, Submitting, and Resubmitting

The Writer’s Life Between Projects New Cover for The Holy Lance

I completed a collection of short stories in March. Finishing a writing project is always an odd moment. On the one hand, the feeling of accomplishment at that moment approaches the sublime. On the other hand, the writing habit isn’t easily turned off or set aside, particularly after the flurry of activity accompanying final proofing and edits of a complete manuscript. I considered starting a new Nick Temple File. And to the extent ...

New Collection of Short Stories

A New Collection of Short StoriesMock up cover for my new collection of short stories

I recently completed a collection of short stories. As the preface to the collection explains, “This collection began as half of a cold case murder mystery. After several attempts, and a good deal of research, I concluded I do not possess the tools required to write a credible murder investigation, even a fictional one. But I was unwilling to abandon more than a year’s worth of work. After considering my optio...

An Old Screenplay About Government-Mandated Inoculation

An Old Screenplay About Government-Mandated Inoculation Jonathan Dyer’s Screenplays

About 15 years ago I decided to try my hand at writing a screenplay. I’d already written a couple of books, but the idea of putting together a full-length script intrigued me. I did some online research about the basics, bought a book about formatting, and got to it. I enjoyed the process and I liked the result.

The title of that first screenplay of mine is Keepers of the Flame. It has its origins in a dream I ha...

A Cold War Point of View of Berlin’s TV Tower

A Cold War Point of View of Berlin’s TV TowerBerlin’s Fernsehturm Completed in 1969

Berlin’s Fernsehturm, its TV Tower, has become an internationally recognized symbol of a vibrant, modern city. I follow a number of Berlin- and Cold War-oriented sites on Twitter, and hardly a day goes by without someone posting a picture of the tower, often accompanied by text praising its unique and iconic presence above the Berlin skyline. I took the picture of it to the left in 1983, during my second visit t...

A Nick Temple Christmas

A Nick Temple ChristmasOriginal Nick Temple File from Field Station Berlin

The Christmas season is upon us, so it’s time to once again post an original bit of Nick Temple I composed while stationed in Berlin during the early 1980s. I wrote this bit while working in subsystem Echo at the Field Station’s intercept site on Teufelsberg. It’s one of about a dozen similar snippets that constitute the origin of the Nick Temple character.

To the left is a jpeg of A Nick Temple Christmas. I have the ori...