Laura Brewer's Blog, page 10

On Writing Challenges and Goals

I have noticed a tendency in writers (and people in general) to respond with more productive work when they have a definite, short term goal. This Ultimate Blog Challenge is a good example. I usually post once a week, now I am going to post every day? Are they nuts? The mind starts throwing up all sorts of reasons why it won’t work, we just started a new school year, I have to finish the trilogy, NaNoWriMo is next month…  However, I’ve been down this road before.  Non-essentials have a way of fading from view, leaving more time for what actually matters. Creativity gets shifted into overdrive and you start thinking outside the box.

When I am just writing, all sorts of things distract me from the task at hand. The only times I used to get serious about writing was when I was part of an active, online writing group that regularly challenged each other by posting word counts and during NaNoWriMo. For those of you who don’t know, that it National Novel Writer’s Month and the challenge is to write 50k words on a novel in the month of November. That’s a huge goal, and I have never quite achieved it. I continue to participate because the goal, the awareness of daily word counts for a finite period, makes me both more productive and more creative. This seems to extend out beyond the actual time of the challenge for several months.

I guess we are all a bit lazy. It would be easy enough to set personal goals for yourself all the time, but something mystical seems to take place when doing it as part of a group. Part of it is cheering each other on, or maybe the sense of competition. Whatever it is, it gets the mind in focus, the fingers limber, and the spirit seems to soar.

The Chicken Herding Cat – A TRUE Story

Today I have something a little different. A conversation with another blogger participating in the Ultimate Blog Challenge inspired me to write this offering. It is actually true, all of it. I couldn’t make up something like this.

First, let me tell you a little about the cat who used to claim us (she died last year at 15). Rain was part Norwegian Forrest cat and they are quite territorial. She had definite ideas about what was allowed to come in the yard, much less in the house. I have known them to take on coons. And the neighborhood Rottweiler. It took us forever to teach her that if we were feeding it, she wasn’t allowed to attack it. That was the only way my son could have a puppy. Both of our cats absolutely detested dogs. She had also taken on the duty of keeping all sorts of pests out of the garden, rabbits and coons for the most part.

Enter a few free range hens.

It took the hens a couple days to get brave enough to explore much beyond their nesting boxes, but as they wandered farther from the area, they naturally went up the drive towards the garden. I happened to be looking out the kitchen window when Rain saw them coming up the drive. She got up from her spot in the sun and started hesitantly walking towards the chickens. I could see the wheels turning from the window.

Critters don’t belong in the garden.

But, I’ll get in trouble if I hurt them.

But, CRITTERS DON’T BELONG IN THE GARDEN!

The lead hen was just about to pass the wild rose bush and Rain walked towards her. The hen, quite reasonably, ran back the other way. A hen on the other side of the drive tried to go past and Rain repeated what worked. The second hen ran the other way.

By this time, I was laughing so hard I could barely call my husband to the window. Within a few minutes, the cat had herded all the hens back to the yard as if she were a sheepdog.

After this success, she was powerful. She had control. Why, she could do anything!

Some months later, the deer were in rut and therefore almost as territorial as Rain was. I heard this loud snort and bellow at 4 AM. Now, at this time of day, I had only been asleep for a couple of hours. My first inclination was to turn over and ignore this intrusion of my dream world. But the snorting got louder and was coming from the front yard. My bedroom was in the back. Okay, I had better check this out.

Turning on the kitchen light revealed the most astonishing scene. Rain was on the stone wall right outside the front door playing indignant, angry, Halloween cat. Reflected in the light from the window were the eyes of a large buck a few feet away, blowing and shaking his rack at my feisty Rain disputing his right to our yard. Behind the buck were several does. The buck completely ignored the light in the kitchen as he continued to posture in grand spectacle – trying to impress my cat. I haven’t quite decided if this show was for the benefit of his ladies, or if he actually considered Rain a threat, but he didn’t stop when we turned on the porch light either. Only when we came out on the porch, did he spin around and run.

Rain marched back into the house, tail high, like the reigning empress she was, convinced she had vanquished the buck, who’s rack alone outweighed her.

Ghost Leads The Way

This shortstory came about while doing some background for a new series. While I know there will be far more humor in the books, the poignant tale of how a cat helped an elderly woman gave me the groundwork for the paranormal detective he will become.

He turned off Main Street and walked into the park. A compulsion drew him, but in his short life he had learned to follow these impressions. A sharp wind ruffled the fur on his back and carried the scent of storm. He should be looking for shelter instead of walking calmly through the park. Others, both prey and predator, moved out of his way. Those who were neither, he ignored.

He turned onto the wide path, nearly deserted this late in the day, and raised his head as the scent of need teased his nose.

Confusion. Despair.

He slowed his pace to make sure of the source, but there was only the one forlorn figure sitting on the bench under the old oak. A woman, bent with age, radiated a soul-deep sense of lost. He went to her, speaking softly as if to a kitten, not approaching until acknowledged. His kind had exquisite manners, even when raised in the streets.

She turned to look at him, her fog of confusion lifting a bit. “Well, hello there.” She reached down and held her hand to him, open – in friendship. He politely sniffed her fingers in return.

The scent told him much. She was not from the streets, first of all, and was one whose reason ebbed and flowed as darkness sought to take hold of her mind. She didn’t belong here. He tried to tell her, but speaking to humans was not like speaking to his own kind.

He rubbed her hand, submitting to a gentle stroke down his back. It filled his thoughts with warmth, comfort.

Home.

“You must be lost too, kitty.” She shook her head in a decisive gesture. He sensed a momentary clearing of the fog shrouding her mind. “No, kitty is not right. You need a real name, handsome fellow that you are.” Her voice faded as her thoughts faltered.

He accepted the compliment and sought to keep her attention focused. He rubbed against her legs and then gave her a gentle nudge. There was another, younger, scent closely associated with her. He thought he could trace the scent backwards in time to lead her home. Besides, it would be nice to have a warm sleeping place out of the storm fast approaching.

Very gently indeed, he grasped her fingers in his jaw and gave a tug. A few steps in the right direction and he looked back over his shoulder and called. She gave him a puzzled look and he sighed. He had to repeat the message two more times before a glimmer of awareness reached her eyes. He stared deep into them, working to forge a bond for the first time in his young life. In her confused state, it was easier than he felt it should have been. With his tail up as a flag, he traced the way she had come and she followed, mesmerized by the waving tail.

He was appalled at the distance the Old One (a feline term of respect) had wandered before he found her. Several times, she had lost her focus and he had to go back for her, but she always came and seemed to be fixing him in her thoughts. He knew they were near when he scented the younger human she belonged with. There was a frantic taint to the man’s smell, urging him to hurry. The wind was picking up also, adding instinct to the impulse.

There were several humans milling around. He smelled concern, and extreme agitation in the young human. He led her up to the group and watched, slipping out of their sight.

“Gran! I was so worried about you. Come inside and warm up.” The young man gave her a hug, gentle even in his relief, and turned to the other humans, “Thank you, officers.”

“No problem, we’re glad she’s all right.” The one who seemed in charge leaned in to speak softly to the young man, “You are going to have to get help or find her a nursing home soon, for her own safety.”

“I know,” the young human replied.

The exchange jarred his senses and he shifted through the door, left ajar, to wait for them inside. This was his destination. He didn’t know why, exactly. That would come in time. He sat calmly atop the stair rail, pale gray tail decorously draped over his toes.

“Daniel, where is the cat who walked back with me? You didn’t scare him away did you?” Her words drifted through the door as they climbed the steps.

“Cat? I didn’t see any cat, Gran. Come inside and I’ll get you a nice cup of tea.”

When they pushed the door open, Daniel looked straight at him, astonishment saturating his scent. Gran came to greet him eagerly.

“Well, there you are, a fine ghost of a cat. That’s what I’ll call you, Ghost.” He squeezed his eyes in approval. He had always been proud of his stealth.

 

Ghost settled in to life with his humans easily. At first, it had taken some work on his part to teach Daniel about proper food. He had stared in shocked indignation at the hard, dry stuff that had been set before him at first. Even life on the streets had not made that seem edible. He knew where to find fresh fish scraps whenever he wanted them.

He also discovered that his stealth trick was much easier with only two sets of eyes to avoid, even in the smaller spaces. It amused him to surprise his humans with his sudden appearance. He enjoyed the practice and instinct told him the skill was important. Equally important in those first days was learning efficient communication. He understood manspeak, many felines did. Getting them to understand him was stretching his creativity. It became a new game to see just how much he could convey with gestures, sounds and subtle thought pressure.

His delight in trying new skills didn’t blind him to the problem the Old One posed. Daniel was gone for a time every day and then she either wandered around the rooms taking to the air, or sat in a chair for hours without moving, her mind blank but not asleep. He did what he could to try and keep her alert, but those times were becoming shorter.

 

He observed the Old One behaving strangely one day. When Daniel was away, she had taken a small, concealed thing and placed it in a drawer with others like it. As soon as he felt the sly, stealthy thoughts she let leak out, he worried. Ghost jumped on the bed beside the Old One and laid a gentle paw on her arm, mewing softly for attention. When she looked at him, he stared hard at her and then looked at the drawer with an emphatic, questioning yowl. She felt a spark of guilt, quickly lost in the dimness of her mind.

This required action, but he needed Daniel’s help. The Old One’s mind slipped into a deeper fog by the day. He sensed the things she was hiding were important and may even the reason for the fog growing so fast. Or they might be related to her growing weakness. Not knowing what else to do until Daniel returned, he settled on her lap and purred.

When he heard the steps approaching outside, Ghost sped to the inner door. As soon as Daniel entered, he yowled for attention.

“What is it, boy, are you hungry already?” Daniel asked, not really paying attention.

He yowled again and took two steps towards the Old One’s room. When his human followed with concern, he sped to the cabinet in question, relieved. The Old One was sleeping again and he tried not to wake her. It would be easier that way. Standing on his hind legs, he pawed the drawer open and sat to look at Daniel.

Concern flared sharply in Daniel’s mind as he looked in the drawer. Before he did anything else, he reached out to stroke Ghost down the length of his spine in gratitude.

“Thank you, Ghost. I don’t know how you knew about this, or to tell me about this, but thank you.” He turned back to the drawer and carefully gathered up all the things the Old One had been concealing. Once he had them all, he beckoned to Ghost.

“Let’s let her sleep and try to figure this out.”

After putting the things in box, his human sat in his chair, radiating a troubled spirit. Ghost stayed close to comfort and help when he was needed.

“First thing is to call her doctor, I guess.” Daniel picked up the phone and punched buttons. Ghost watched while his human explained things to the voice on the other end of the device, sometimes listening to that voice. His concern, no, sadness for what the other was saying seemed to saturate the air around him.

“All right, Doctor. I’ll make an appointment this afternoon. I really hate to do this, she has lived almost her whole life in this house.” He listened some more. “I know, I’ll have her moved by tomorrow if it’s possible.”

“Well, my friend, we are going to have to move Gran to a home. At once, the doctor said.” He picked up the phone again to make more calls.

Ghost went to keep watch on the Old One, feeling she should not be alone right now. He didn’t catch all the details of what his human had decided, but he did know the Old One was going away. He even understood why, but it would be different with her not here.

You Can’t Afford Not To – On Crit Groups and Editors

It makes me want to cry, or maybe bang someone’s head against the wall. I came across yet another indie book with a fabulous story – told with the English skills of a 5th grader. Folks, you are not helping yourself by putting out what amounts to a rough draft as a finished novel. Your best friend may make a good cheering section (and you do need those), but he or she is NOT going to take the place of a good critique group of your peers or a professional editor. Usually, either one will do, if they are good. We have all seen books put out by the big publishing houses that are full of sloppy sentences, lost plot threads and general bad writing, so I am not advocating the exclusive use of professional editors. At the same time, unless your crit group is willing and able to take your work apart at the seams and be utterly ruthless (politely, of course) in pointing out what doesn’t work, where the writing needs to be tighter and that you really do need to lose that flowery description of the young maid’s dimples, they are not going to be much help. That ruthless tearing apart of your manuscript is what focuses your work and makes it polished. It seems like we have way to many writers out there who subscribe to the philosophy of “Good Enough”.

As I said in an earlier post, finding the right crit group is essential, even if you later also hire an editor. They will be with you through the process as a sounding board for thorny plot issues or possible sources for technical details. We have always had at least one grammar whiz that would bless the whole group with their ability to spot a missing comma. They point out errors in characterization. You do the same things for them. That seems to be one of the things that puts some newer writers off, the commitment to repay in kind on crits. I have been a part of several for years now, and can truthfully say the burden has never been that great. While there have been occasional OMG I need a final, nit-picky crit Now, those are extremely rare and seldom answered by the group at large, but only those who have the time right then. It doesn’t matter if you don’t happen to be a grammar whiz, you will have your own strength to contribute, I assure you.

The harsh bottom line is you may think you don’t have the time, but if you do not take the time to have every word of your work the best it can be when you send it out into the world, then the writing is a hobby for your own enjoyment, not a finished-for-publication book. It is like putting an apple pie on the table that’s half-baked and filled with whole apples from the tree. I don’t know about you, but I am embarrassed to find a small piece of seed has slipped into the filling.

Yes, I had that happen with Dream Song and pulled the book until some editing errors were corrected. The changes were so small, Amazon didn’t even list it as a revised edition. Yet, I still cringe when I think about it.

Time To Loosen Up – NaNoWriMo Is Just Around The Corner

When I was in art school, one of the first exercises we did in Life Drawing was quick sketches of the model in action poses, running, throwing a ball, etc. They had a three minute time limit and the model would take a different pose. The purpose of this was two-fold. First, it got the class past the fact that the model was nude to focusing on how to draw the figure. Second, it forced us to get the basic lines of the figure down quickly with no detail at all. That was especially hard for many of us who were way too detail oriented. Doing this exercise had a great impact on my drawing. I loosened up. The pencil flowed over the paper. Minutiae were unimportant. We also got a crash course in how the muscles and joints shifted in movement (the reason for the lack of clothing).

Sometimes our writing also needs some loosening up so the words and ideas will flow. Way back when I was involved with a large writers group that had an active chat room, sometimes a person would throw out a writing prompt and see what we could do with it. This was actively online and had a time limit and/or word count. The prompts were simple, mere dry tinder to kindle a fire from. One I remember was “flashing blue lights”. Now, those blue lights became everything from invading aliens, to cops responding to a robbery, to an alternate world gate. I think one person wrote about a young rock band working on a light show. The possibilities are endless.

There are different approaches to this. You can build a scene, like a photograph, capturing an instant in time. You can also use it to start a foundation for a compelling story line. What does the prompt make you think of? Write it down. Fast. Let your fingers do the thinking.

There are rules to this game:

1. Grammar doesn’t matter.

2. Spelling doesn’t matter.

3. Knowing where the scene/story may be going doesn’t even matter.

All those can come later, if you want them to. The only purpose is to stir your imagination and at the same time, write with bold strokes in a very short time. No more than an hour, 30 minutes would be better.  Even 15 minutes. The faster you work, the more you will throw off the conventions and thought of extraneous detail. If you have other writers you chat with regularly, or a group that meets in person, it’s a lot of fun as well. We used to have a word count goal involved, 300 words in the time limit, or sometimes the first person to write 300 words using the prompt. Sometimes, it was only 50 words.

Here are a few prompt ideas, though they can be anything at all.

screeching

loose line/rope tossing in the wind

….fills with water

stepped off the bus and …

a flower on the …

the next three words you hear

See a picture or ask yourself who/what/where/why.

Go on and try, it will be fun.  Ready. Set. WRITE!

Write What You Know – A Challenge

I have been thinking lately about the admonition to write what you know. Write what you know? Just how is that going to relate to Science Fiction or Fantasy genres? Historical Fiction, Romance, Political Thrillers, etc. are all areas in which a writer can have direct knowledge. How could that possibly apply to an area that, by definition, cannot have direct knowledge since it does not exist and has never existed? I submit the idea that it is even more important for us than it is for those with actual facts/events/cultures subject to research. After all, you don’t have to be a gourmet cook to have one as a character, but you would probably need that skill to even think of designing a race/culture where taste was a critical part of communication. I’m not sure that could be done, but that probably means someone will do it

If you look at different writers in the Sci/Fi and Fantasy genres, you will see some enlightening tendencies in the kind of stories different writers produce. It is not necessary to see a bio to know that an author is a historian, or at least has a love of history. That is obvious in their writing. Some in both genres either come from military backgrounds or have a keen interest in it. Ditto for medical or life sciences. In short, we also write about what we know. Not a single body of knowledge, but the multiple bodies of knowledge that make up our personal backgrounds.

Now, some knowledge is more a subjective understanding. I don’t know exactly how other writers have acquired the understanding to write credibly about telepathy and other psychic abilities, but in my case, it is a combination of empathy and making assumptions to expand that sense into broader areas.

My challenge is two fold.

First, what knowledge or understanding have you acquired that help you write other worlds/cultures/creatures more credibly? Identifying what you already know is harder than learning new things. Very little of our knowledge comes from formal instruction. Most of it comes from observation, of the world around us, of the interaction of people everyday, and of our own thoughts. At least, I hope you observe your own thoughts and question your own insights. So, what do you know?

Second, I challenge you to devour all learning that interests you. If you are curious about something,  follow up and learn about it. My father was a modern day Da Vinci. He grew up on a farm and they had to do nearly everything for themselves. His abilities in finding creative solutions to oddball problems still amaze me thirty years after his death. The man loved learning and would pursue any new tidbit he found fascinating. We spent one whole winter sorting antique type because he had bought an old, hand-operated printing press. He did not want to start printing things; he wanted a little hands on learning. Once he had run a few test printings, he moved on. Now, personally, I think there were probably easier ways to get that hands on knowledge, but a family that sorts type together stays together

I really can’t say anything against it though. I have pursued lots of areas of knowledge I had no intention of using on a regular basis. That made me feel guilty until I realized that just because I knew how to do something didn’t mean I had to do something productive with the knowledge. What a relief! I can learn how and why for the simple joy of learning. You never know when that chance, two hour discussion you had with the glass blower at an art festival may end up being the basis for your next story. Especially if she let you play with her toys.

The challenges to all of you, whether you write or not, are to find out what you know and to consume learning more avidly than chocolate. It makes life sweet and full of fun.

To Prologue Or Not To Prologue

Hmmm, that is a question. I expect there are many different answers to it, nearly as many as there are writers. I know some people who never read prologues and hate them passionately, yet they persist.

Prologues are used in a number of ways – some good, some bad. I find them most useful in multi-book stories to fill in needful background on what has happened already, without cluttering up the current book with a lot of backstory. In this way, the information is there for anyone who missed the earlier books and it can easily be skipped. I recently read the second book of a series where I wish the author had written a prologue synopsis of the first book. Instead of the beginning of the story, most of the first chapter was talking heads discussing what happened before. Not a good way to start off. If I had not known the author’s work better, I would have put it down. Once you got past that, it was captivating.

Of course, a prologue is not the only way to do that. You can fill in bits of background as needed through the story in a natural way. All of us think about our personal past on a regular basis. Allowing the characters to do it occasionally simply makes them real. Seldom is all this information actually needed right up front for someone new to a series. It is really a matter of style though.

I used a prologue in Dream Song for a slightly different purpose. There was a significant event that was foundation for, not only the main plot, but also one of the subplots. This was originally supposed to be the ending of the first book, but feedback from my beta readers changed my mind. Unfortunately, it had to happen for the second book to work. It also was not the start of the actual story arc in the second book. It was a head scratcher. I finally used it as a prologue. I think it worked fairly well.

Another good use can be found in Andre Norton’s Witch World series. There are quite a lot of them covering different times and continents. In some, she used a prologue to instantly ground the reader in the time/place for the story.

So far, I have talked about the good points of prologue use. I am actually more of the kind to ignore a prologue in most cases. I can think of several works that use them for detailed world building that, not only isn’t necessary, it’s often boring. Nearly all of those are fantasy works. World building is a part of the fabric of the story. If the story is well crafted, the reader will discover it on their own as they explore the world through the story. What happened 500 years ago on that world will be important only when it is important to the characters. If a writer is that interested in what happened in the past of their worlds, they should do what I am doing – go back and write about it.

The other kind of prologue that’s annoying is when it really seems like it should be Chapter One. I have never figured out why some writers, well established writers, put a scene in a prologue that is clearly the beginning of the story. It seems dishonest somehow.

 

Developing A Story Arc

A story arc is actually pretty simple – beginning, middle and end. That’s all it involves at the most basic level. The problems occur in deciding what those are. Sometimes it is not simple at all.

The Beginning is where the actual story begins. It is not backstory; it is not regurgitating descriptions of the setting all over the place. It is also not in the middle of the story or right before the end of the story and then catching up in flashbacks. There is maybe one in ten thousand writers who could pull off such a story arc and I can’t at the moment think of but one example. In The Cat Who Played Post Office, Lillian Jackson Braun makes excellent use of flashback from a pivotal point in the story. This is one of very few instances (and one of few writers) where this bending of the rules works to advantage. I came across one story by an indie writer that tried something similar. He started in the middle and spent (probably) the first half telling the story in a nearly continuous flashback because he started the story in the wrong place. I never finished it and never will.

So, the tough part is deciding where the story actually starts. If you know what your main plot is (you should), the story arc will begin with where that plot either begins or is first revealed to your main character. There can be minor variations. A disaster might be presaged by some unremarked event involving wildlife that has no direct bearing on the characters at all. I have seen that used to good effect several times. Any critical discriptions of character and setting should be worked into the opening scene naturally so as not to detract from whatever is creating the tension in the scene. Go back and read that sentence again. While I won’t go into the elements that make a powerful beginning, that sentence is a large part of it.

One author started her story with a note that was not a solicitation from the local Madame to a mercenary Captain, though it looked and smelled like it. The note was a job offer that was the exact beginning of the story. She did not give background or world building details up front, she simply presented the scene and let the image grow in the readers mind. Now, she could have given the whole background in narrative on the reasons behind the job offer and that information was important to the story eventually, but those reasons were not the beginning of the story. Begin at the beginning.

The middle of the story can vary depending on the kind of story it is, but it will have one consistant characteristic – a pivotal point. This is the point where the character has an epiphany, or a crisis errupts to change the direction, or a new piece of information comes to light. Maybe the suspect you were certain commited the murder is killed, again, changing the percieved direction of the story. In some cases, there may be many small such points, but there will always be one notable instance that stands out. After this point, the pace usually picks up like a snowball rolling downhill as the character(s) works to resolve the challenge in view of the new direction.

The end of the story generally has two parts, the climax and tidying up. The climax is the resolution of the plot in the story, not nessecarily the conflict. Some conflicts have no real resolution, though I know some would disagree. Life goes on and people walk in and out of it. Characters are the same way and while this segment of the story thread may be done, it is always connected to many others, even if they are never explored. Tolkien comes to mind here as a classic example.

The tidying up is what Twain called the marrying and the burying. Tie up those loose ends somewhat to leave the reader either satisfied or not, depending on the intent of the story. It should have a sense of closure even if it’s something of a cliffhanger.

Here, I want to put in a little about how multibook stories are different and how they are the same. I am writing my story of Selarial and Alcar as a trilogy because it quickly became apparent it was too big for a single book if handled properly. In a series of stand alone books you have a single story with a single plot in each book, rather like any TV series you care to name. They are connected in story type, characters, setting, etc., but they are also self contained as to plot. A true trilogy is different in that each book is part of a larger plot and story arc. Each will also usually have it’s own subplot and story arc. The two must work together.

In my first book, the beginning is when Selarial and Alcar meet. The middle is their shift in awareness that the increasing conflict between the Coalition and their Thess’n enemies has deeper roots and a personal element. The subplot of book one is this change in awareness and the knowledge that their future is not what they thought it would be. While both characters are involved in the conflicts and the  plot, the first book is primarily Selarial’s, not Alcar’s. The end of this book is when they both embrace that future in a meaningful way. I’ll try not to give any spoilers. The end of one book must lead into, or at least point to, the next book.

The second book has a totally different, yet related subplot. Alcar stuggles to find his stride in the leadership of Selarial’s planet while Selarial is stranded half a galaxy away. There is a reason for that I’ll get to in a moment. The external conflicts with the Singer Council and later with the Coalition Assembly are what drive him towards taking his role in the larger scheme of things. This had to be done on his own, without Selarial’s presence, in order to be effective. Otherwise, she would have dominated that part of the story and the second book is his book. Her subplot is secondary.  The beginning is his first open conflict with the Singer council. The middle is the resolution of that conflict and the shift to the larger one. The end is also a lead directly back to the main plot of the entire trilogy.

I won’t go into the story arc of the third book here, but rather, the way the three books fit the overall story arc of the trilogy. Book one is plainly the beginning of the larger plot. Book 2, largely using the same pivot point, is the middle and book 3 is obviously the end, wrapping up the plot threads and finding at least some resolution to the various conflicts. One, in particular is not really resolvable, at least not in any permanent way.

One thing to note is the individual story arcs are a part of the larger story arc development. in a multibook story, you will resolve some of the conflict and plot with each story, but not all. They are sort of stories within a larger story. There is also a progression from smaller, more personal plots and conflicts, to the larger plot as the over all story arc develops.

Happy Writing!

Thoughts on SciFi Tech

While somewhat mechanically inclined, I am not modern-tech savvy and have never wanted to be. I am a spoiled writer person who has no real interest in knowing exaclty how a computer works, much less all the new gadgets that come out. It is a tool. I expect it to work in a way I am familiar with and if it doesn’t, I start calling for my husband who is tech savvy. Yet, the first main character in the Talmanor trilogy is an engineer. Go figure.

Maybe it is because, as much as I love Andre Norton’s work, I do not agree with her anti-tech possition that mechanical/technical aptitude could not coincide with life sciences and/or psyhic ability. I excelled in both sides of that fence in high school and threw in some serious art classes as well. I think it’s safe to say I am not by any means alone in feeling that way these days.

That being said, I have good reasons for caution in getting too indepth in exactly how any given tech works. Think about some of the older Scifi from the 50′s. We used rockets as launch vehicles back then and it looked like that was the way things were going. No one had come up with other ideas at the time, not publically anyway. Man had not yet actually walked on the moon. Space probes had not been dispatched to tell us how inhospitable Mars is or the poisonous atmosphere of Venus. Older books are full of what we now know are impossibilities, or at least improbabilities. Those books are dated by their technical knowledge.

I make up my own star systems for that exact reason. I have absolutely no intention of trying to explain my theory on how the Coalition’s hyperdrives work. First of all, that theory is not important to the story. Second, I don’t want to saddle the books with something that may prove to be silly to others twenty years from now. Outdated tech can jar a reader right out of the story and leave them shaking their heads at what is now an obvious error.  As knowledge changes, perceptions and expectations change. We no longer think in terms of colonizing another world in a giant rocket. Star Trek began to get us out of that box and Star Wars confirmed it, interstellar vehicles will be whatever shape we need them to be.

I deviate from that only when it’s relevant to the story and plausible enough to hopefully stand the test of time. My personal exception to tech explanations is something Sorth devised that allows telepathic control of computers and other devices. It involves the use of a particualr crystal found on their world that happens to be responsive to psychic energy. As crystals of various kinds have been used in electronics, going back to crystal radios and certainly to modern computer chips, I think I’m safe here.

Shameless plug time If you want the details, you’ll have to wait for the new trilogy now in progress. When I go back to that earlier time in Sorth’s history, I get to play with tech in a serious way. Some of the things that are common in Selarial’s time were fairly new, or just being developed. I am having fun with the process of developing new tech, but I still haven’t found out how one of their spaceships ended up inside a mountain. I suspect I won’t till the end of that trilogy.

Oh, wait, I better finish the Talmanor trilogy first. Darn, I was having so much fun.

Just Say What You Mean

Today, I’m not really blogging about writing, though it will have some applications. I have been noticing two growing tendencies in recent years. These are disturbing, in view of the trends towards instant gratification media rather than print, which does take some time and thought. It’s only going to get worse.

First, people have gotten really sloppy in their speech, misusing words in a way that would have gotten their hand smacked with a ruler in my seventh grade English class. I am a lover of words and the fine distinctions of their definitions. One of my favorite reference books was a 1950 Funk and Wagnell; Synonyms, Antonyms and Prepositions. It is one I am in a hurry to replace because it gave the fine shadings of meanings for different words. There is a difference between anger and rage, annoyance and irritation. There is also a difference between a wrecker and a tow truck. Both are obvious, yet wrecker (which is actually a large crane with a big steel ball attached) is regularly used as synonymous with tow truck – even by the owners of said tow truck. Granted, that linguistic error has been around for decades and few people even notice the absurdity of calling a wrecker – when you’ve already had the wreck. I don’t think that really justifies mangling the language to incomprehensible absurdity.

Words are what we use to communicate in every endeavor in life. It does not matter if we are instructing a child in cleaning their room or discussing a design problem with a fellow engineer, we use words. We MUST use words. After all, we are not Sorthian or Zhyrean to be able to communicate telepathically. Those words must have commonly understood meanings, including all the nuances, in order to communicate. Words are not mud that you throw in the air hoping some will stick to the listener and explain the idea in your head. If in doubt, spend some time in a dictionary. Yes, I did mean in a dictionary. Get your mind actually in what it says and pay attention. Another good place to go is a thesaurus, like the one I mentioned above, and take the time to notice the nuances.

My old English teacher would never, not once, explain the meaning of any word. She made us look it up in the dictionary. That habit has stuck with me all these years and may be one of the most important things I ever learned in school.

The second thing that really concerns me is the apparent trend to talk around a point instead of coming out and saying what you mean. I’m sorry, I am an impatient person. I detest this habit of obfuscation in politicians and salesmen. I will end a conversation quickly, if not always abruptly, when a friend or family member starts doing this. If you have something to say – then say it already. Do not talk at me for an hour and never actually say anything. I am obviously not talking about reminiscing or storytelling, but the sharing of thoughts and ideas. Get to the point succinctly and clearly. Add on supporting arguments briefly. If you don’t, you may never get there at all. I’ll be somewhere else, talking with someone who knows the value of both time and words.