Chad A. Clark's Blog, page 35

New Cover Reveal

Both of my books have just been reissued with spectacular new covers and to celebrate the release, I am offering the following exclusive deal. If you purchase either title in paperback, I will send you a copy of the other book for the Kindle, free of charge. That’s two books for the price of one!
I will be running this book from now, until the end of the year. In order to redeem, all you have to do is email me with a screen shot from Amazon, verifying your purchase. I will then email your other book to you. You can reach me at cclarkfiction@gmail.com
Follow the links below to purchase either title:
Borrowed Time
A Shade For Every Season
Thank you for your continued interest and support. I wish you the very best for this holiday season.

Issue #127

The house had stood at the top of the hill for over a century, built over a period of several years, the original owner taking great pains to make sure that every detail of the home was perfect. The gossip in town was that the rich doctor had gone out of his mind, sinking such money into a house in such frivolous fashion. As far as the people were concerned, it was just another person, determined to hold sway over them with the power of his money.

The house had no way of knowing any of this. It was only tasked with the caring for the family that lived within its walls.

The family would reside in the house for several generations, They were personable enough, or at least they tried to be. But eventually, the barely shielded hostility of the town drove them progressively further away from the local populace. Before long, they were living out the majority of their lives in the serene privacy of their hilltop home.

As the weather steered into winter, the family would huddle together to take what warmth they could from each other, and pray that they would be able to last until the spring. Their loyalty to each other was as strong as had ever been seen, and the house did all it could to help preserve them. It was a relationship that stayed strong for more years than anyone could keep track of.

Then, the pestilence began to seep into the house’s world.

It came in the form of the drifter, who had shown up one night, wandering in from the forests outside of town, and while the family had taken him in, the house didn’t trust him. There was a darkness that seemed to follow him, one that the house had not experienced before. The stranger was a restless sleeper, talking during dreams of such violence and anger, but no one in the family ever heard him. The house could do nothing but sit back and hope for the best.

It was one week to the day, after his arrival that the world crumbled into pieces.

Everything that the house had come to depend on took approximately one hour to bring to an end in one, sudden night of violence. The drifter moved on after killing everyone, was never caught or identified. Still, a vital essence of himself was left behind. It was as if a physical taint was left behind on the walls and floors and windows of the house. Standing there on the hill as a vessel for the newly dead, the house found itself starting to decay from the inside. There was no way to completely recover, as it had been just as much a victim of the random act of violence as the family.

For years after, the house remained vacant, a ghost itself, observing the world constantly changing around it, but living with nothing but the same sorrow within. The stains of the violence had not even been completely washed away, and served as constant reminders of how those it had cared about were ripped away. The harsh winters became the most desirable time of the year as that was when the desolation and death of the world around it came the closest to matching the darkness within.

A decade passed before a new family finally came to visit the house, to consider the possibility of purchasing it. As much as the house had despised being alone, it proved to be worse to see this impostor of a family traipsing around, making whatever absurd changes they felt like.There was nothing to be done, however, and before long it found itself having to grow accustomed to new people, new sounds and voices and laughter. There was a time when all of that would make the house feel warm, with it’s own worth and value. Now it just felt like a shell in which it now held the worthless dregs of society. It missed the ones it loved, the ones that had been so cruelly ripped away from it.

It was a year later when the house realized that the darkness which had been brought by the violent stranger, was still present, just under the surface. All it took was some work, and effort, before that dark entity could be released, and deposited into one of the members of the family. Once this was accomplished, the house would have the luxury of sitting back and watching it all unfold within its walls. Death found its way into the house again, this time by design, instead of random happening of chance.

In the end, it took the death of yet another family before the house was left alone, standing atop the hill in disrepair and discontent. The family it had once cared so deeply for seemed like a long forgotten memory, never achievable again. Each day seemed like another step towards the darkness below that it would soon merge with forever.

A cool, stark wind blew through the shattered windows, moaning as it made its way through the halls and crevices of the house. Few would dare to even gaze up at the house on the hill as it stood, bathed in scorn and wrath. The house would never be able to break free from the spite, from the desire to take in anyone it saw and show them the pain and suffering it had experienced at those hands so many years ago.

It had become a vehicle of destruction and pain. Anyone who made the mistake of entering through those now tattered doors would learn well enough the extent of the tarnished legacy of this place.

This house had become.

Baked Scribe Flashback : Qalupalik

“He’s too fuckin’ scared.”

The high pitched, squalling laughter had been enough to make Glenn actually take a step out onto the ice. The possibility of being beaten within an inch of his life made him walk further.

It wasn’t long before the shoreline behind him was lost in darkness and all he could hear was their idiotic cat-calls and mocking. He looked down, and by the light off the moon, he could make out a shadow under the ice, circling around him like a large fish. There was a hole in the ice ahead where some of the locals had been fishing. His attention jerked in that direction at the sound of splashing, and something crawling up out of the water.

The thing was standing there over the water hole, glaring out at him from behind hanging, clotted hair. He couldn’t guess at the thing’s gender from the overly thick parka it wore. He could also see a large pouch attached to the back, just underneath the hood like a thick, woolly backpack. The pouch looked to be just about his size.

It was suddenly advancing on him, hands outstretched with dagger-length nails, reaching for him, hunger in its eyes.

“Wait.”

The thing actually did respond to his command and paused, although he doubted for very long.

“You can’t take me, I’ll never fit in that thing.” It was the first time that his weight had ever had the potential of being an advantage. It still hesitated though, giving him wisps of hope. “That thing is ripping half up the sides as it is, I’d just fall out of—”

In an instant, the creature was on top of him, grabbing at his neck to cut off his breath. A finger was placed against his mouth and then somewhere behind that wall of hair, he heard a low voice utter one sentence.

“If not you…” It trailed off into some kind of gurgling expulsion of water and foul breath, but he immediately knew what he needed to do.

“You weren’t out there long enough.” Rodney’s ice pick of a voice was what greeted him when he returned to shore. “You gotta go back or—”

“There’s a wallet out there on the ice,” Glenn interrupted, taking delight at the glint of greed he saw in Rodney’s eyes. “Looks like it’s stuffed with cash. Some fisherman must have left it.”

One of the buddies stepped out onto the ice, but Rodney stopped them with a glance. “Where the hell are you going? This is my score.” He returned his glare to Glenn for just a moment before jerking his head in the direction of the main road. “Beat it, fat-ass.”

Glenn stuffed his hands into his pockets and sauntered off, smiling as Rodney clumsily stumbled out onto the ice, rushing out to claim his just reward.

Baked Scribe Flashback : Phi Tai Hong

This wasn’t his fault.

How was he supposed to have known that the guard rail had been out right at that curve in the road?

For that matter, how was he supposed to have guessed that the other driver was going to freak out like that when he passed her? Would an able driver have swerved, and gone right off the road like that?

It wasn’t his fault.

It wasn’t his fault and that was exactly what the cops likely would have told him if he had stayed around for them to show up. Besides, it wasn’t like she could have survived that fall and someone would find her eventually.

Her fault, not his.

Her fault.

It was the mantra he repeated in his head, even as he heard the window behind him shatter.

She was standing there in his room, gaping wounds across her body. She stared him down, with a look of rage such that he had never seen, even in his worst nightmares.

She had come for him.

The light bulbs above him shattered, and he blinked away inside of himself, lost forever to darkness and the inescapable screams of vengeance.

Tracing The Trails Of The King : The Stand

FAIR WARNING – if you have not read this book, there will likely be spoilers contained within this essay. This is the fourth essay in my ongoing series on Stephen King, and is intended to be a free discussion of the book. I cannot be held responsible if I inadvertently ruin the ending for you, so if you think this might apply to you, I would encourage you to turn back now.

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“Show me a man or a woman alone and I’ll show you a saint. Give me two and they’ll fall in love. Give me three and they’ll invent the charming thing we call ‘society’. Give me four and they’ll build a pyramid. Give me five and they’ll make one an outcast. Give me six and they’ll reinvent prejudice. Give me seven and in seven years they’ll reinvent warfare. Man may have been made in the image of God, but human society was made in the image of His opposite number, and is always trying to get back home.”

-Stephen King, The Stand

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There come moments in the career of an artist, a writer, a band, a director, where they put out a project that completely blows everything out of the water that came before it. Even for artists who had previously put out a solid library of material, there comes that one amazing piece of work that manages to put all of that to shame and serves forever from that point forward as a benchmark for all future work.

I’m willing to bet that you can guess what book I’m referring to right now.

It’s a masterpiece. It’s his fifth symphony. It’s his Abbey Road, his Hamlet. I can’t say enough about how much I have enjoyed this book, every time I have read it, and how much I learned about the process of layering a story and developing characters. There’s so much I could say about the book, that this essay really is going to brush the surface but I’ll do my best to be somewhat structured and organized.

I read this at a fairly young age. I don’t remember precisely, but I want to say that it was either late Junior High or early High School. King had just released the newly unabridged version of the story, expanding an already long book by several hundred pages. So I suppose, in a way, I’m reading this out of order as it is not the version that was originally published. This will not be the only time I will deal with this issue, and as you will find when you get to my essay on The Gunslinger, I did the exact opposite in that case, so I know I’m not being consistent. Regardless, I’m choosing to read this version now, because it is the only one I have ever read. I didn’t read the original release and as King suggests in the forward to the book, this is always the story that he had intended to tell. Now I think he did cheat a little bit in that the book is clearly updated to be taking place in the year it was released. He also places a reference to Tommyknockers, which hadn’t been written at the time The Stand was originally published. Still, I feel like I am being true to the spirit of his intent at the time.

Post apocalyptic fiction has become extremely popular, often linked with the zombie genre as well. Personally, I think that if anyone has any interest in writing this type of story, this book should be your first natural starting point. If you want to know how to tell a story about the end of the world, this book is a master class on the genre. Say what you will about King, this book is genius. Simple as that. It isn’t my absolute favorite King book, it’s not the one book I could choose to take with me if I was going to be stranded on a desert island, but if I was going to be able to pick two books to take with me, this would probably be the second.

The book can be broken up into two main parts. You start with the world as it is, just before and then during the collapse. Following this, you have the world, or whatever is left of it, in the aftermath.

I have always preferred the first half of the book. The scenario that he lays out, describing the slow burn before everything falls apart is chilling to behold and I challenge anyone to put in a good, long marathon, reading this while they have a really bad cold. The beginning of the end is quiet and simple. Maybe a dropped test tube. Possibly a rip in someone’s containment suit. Whatever the cause, an outbreak takes place at a secret government lab who evidently is developing a weaponized version of a deadly virus. A guard at the facility spots what is happening, and manages to escape with his wife and child, moments before the facility is shut down.

Like so many other times, the fate of so many is decided in the span of a moment that literally takes seconds. A random string of improbabilities can create some of the most terrifying of scenarios to unfold. The guard gets free and along with him, is a silent hitchhiker who will spell death for almost every man, woman and child in the country, possibly the world.

Of course, no one actually knows this yet.

One of King’s strongest areas is in the creation of characters who are three dimensional. These feel like real people on the page and somehow, universally likable. This is difficult enough as it is but in this book, King increases the stakes and difficulty even more by creating a cast of characters, disparate people who are eventually drawn together under in spirit of common purpose and morality. Somehow, he manages to keep all of this in the air and present any number of different actors to the play that are all captivating and interesting in their own ways. Often in books, I find that if I latch onto a particular character, I tend to skim over parts of the book where that person might be absent, but in this case, pretty much every character is someone who I want to follow and pay attention to.

The protagonists of the book all have their own story arcs that unfold but one thing that seems to draw them all together is their dreams. They all dream of an old woman who tells them that they need to come and find her and en masse, from separate parts of the country, they all begin making their way towards her home in Nebraska. Through the chaos of a society falling to pieces, these people turn to their faith in this woman whom they have never met, and before long they are together, living as a community under the guidance of Mother Abigail, the spiritual leader of the group that ultimately ends up settling down in Boulder, Colorado.

Appearing for the first time in The Stand is one of King’s most enduring and popular and villains, Randall Flagg, the walking dude. It isn’t clear if he isresponsible for the outbreak of disease or if he is merely using events to his advantage, but he serves as a dark presence in the story, a force that exists among the death and destruction, a counterpoint to the hope embodied in Mother Abigail. Anyone who is a fan of the Dark Tower series knows Randall Flagg quite well, and this book serves as an effective introduction to the character. He stands as the magnetic center that draws the worst out of people and the people who exhibit the worst kind of tendencies. They are drawn to Flagg in the same, inexorable way as the other characters of the book are drawn to Mother Abigail.

This is the basic setup of the book, the ultimate faceoff of good against evil or at least, the good and evil that people perceive in each other. I think that The Stand offers in interesting look at how people can be controlled by information or, a lack of information and how their fears can influence everything. The people of Boulder often live under the fear of Flagg as the ultimate bogeyman with the people under him as the worst, bloodthirsty type. Later in the book, when we get to meet some of the people under Flagg’s control, we find out that a lot of them are just normal people as well, who have simply found themselves under the leadership of the wrong person. They seem to be just as afraid of the intentions of the people in Boulder as the other way around, mostly driven by lies told to them by Flagg, himself.

One of the biggest tragedies of the story falls largely to who you trust and who you put your faith in. I suppose that it speaks somewhat to the notion of religious fanaticism and whether or not that level of devotion is justified or dangerous. Nadine Cross certainly deifies Flagg to a remarkable extent, convincing herself that she will achieve glory as his wife-to-be. She sees herself as his property to direct as he sees fit, and despite the awful things she ends up doing, by the end of the book, it’s hard to not feel sympathy for her as she is reduced down to an empty shell, ruined by the one person who she thought was going to be her savior. Characters survive and become parts of each others lives and many of them still end up dying, the ruthless nature of the universe of the book expertly laid out without apology. One of my favorite chapters (unique to the expanded edition) is devoted to tiny little vignettes, showing people who managed to survive the plague but still end up dying from some random turn of chance. It was such a brilliant way of showing how tenuous things have become in the lives of these characters.

This book is a journey. It isn’t just a simple story, told and wrapped up within a few hundred pages. It’s an emotional roller coaster and one that I have taken many times over. It’s fascinating to watch a society completely fall apart, break down to its bare, base elements and then to watch a new society build from that rubble. Those elements begin to coexist and meld, reforming civilization in a slightly more enlightened mindset but also making some of the same mistakes. The Stand is a brilliantly plotted novel but really it’s about the characters and marking their experiences of having everything they care about disintegrate around them and trying to go on with life, in the absence of everything they once had used to define themselves.

This is a monster of a book. If you haven’t read it, you should read it. If you have read it, you should read it again.

My name is Chad Clark, and I am proud to be a Constant Reader.

Issue # 126

Ravi pressed his foot to the accelerator and watched out of the corner of his eye as the darkened roadside blurred past. There was little or no other traffic out that night, but in this case, he would have welcomed it, especially the sight of a trooper as the car behind him continued to follow and draw slowly closer. At first, he had taken the trailing headlights as a coincidence, an amusement on a late night drive, but when the car behind him continued to match him, turn after turn, it started to edge out beyond the realm of strange and into that of unsettling. He rarely saw anyone take this back road before, especially at this time of night. There were two other houses besides his in the five mile stretch before it dead-ended at the river and, in both cases, the elderly couples living there rarely left their home.

Still, the car behind him remained in position, never getting too close, but also not letting him get too far ahead. He could make out the billowing smoke behind the car in the bright moonlight and seemed to notice every time it fishtailed on some loose gravel. He caught himself praying for the thing to run off the road but it never happened. He wished he could call ahead to the house for someone to help but even if his phone hadn’t died, coverage out here was rarely reliable enough to count on.

Last fall, Ravi and his father had plowed a rough path from the road which led to the back-side of the property. It was the kind of thing that you would miss unless you knew to look for it. He looked at the car in the mirror and braced himself, waiting as long as he could before slamming on the brakes and swinging the car onto the path. One side of the car lifted up off the ground for just a moment, before it leveled out and found purchase. Ravi looked up into the mirror and saw nothing but darkness behind him. Maybe he had managed to shake the guy loose. Or maybe, the person hadn’t been following him in the first place.

He slowed down, and tried to focus on their make-shift road, which had been intended more for tractors and lawn equipment. Every few seconds, the car would slip from side to side as the tires lost their grip on the soft ground. As he reached the center of the tree-line and turned left, towards the house, the lights behind him flipped on again and he heard the engine revving, over the sound of his own. Whoever it was back there and whatever he had done to piss them off, they weren’t going to give up so easily.

Ravi accelerated towards the house, hoping that maybe the noise would cause someone to look out the window and call the police at the sight of the two cars racing around on the property. His moment of possibility, however, dashed against his triggered memory that his parents and brother were out of town for the weekend, up at auction to scout out some new equipment. Whatever was going on here, he was going to have to deal with it himself and the looming, darkened house ahead of him seemed to look down in amusement at the situation he had somehow managed to find himself in.

Before he could manage any other thought, he was rocked forward as the car behind him sped up and collided with his bumper. He lost his grip on the steering wheel and the car swerved off into the grass, throwing dirt and debris behind it in a wide fan. Ravi pumped the brakes and grabbed hold of the wheel, steering into the spin, and after a few over-corrections, managed to get back onto the path. He raced past the house, onto the proper driveway and back out onto the road. Maybe he could outrun this guy back to the highway and get help.

The car behind sped up, and again collided with him and this time, he slipped forward on the seat but managed to keep his grip, swerving a little from side to side. Still, he didn’t know how much more the car was going to take. The problem was that until they got to the highway, there wasn’t anywhere else to go, no avenue of escape other than simply driving faster. Ravi accelerated, burying the needle on the speedometer as the other car began to fall further behind. He maintained the high speed, risking the gravel surface and saw that he had gotten significantly farther ahead. He didn’t let up, needing to get as far away as possible. Who the hell was it? He knew that he tended to be somewhat loose with the booze on the weekends, but it was hard to imagine what he could have possibly said to warrant something like this.

His heart sank as he topped the next hill and realized that he still had several miles before getting to the paved highway. He was starting to wonder if he could even make it, when he saw the headlights behind him start to shift from side to side, first lazily and then violently as it whipped around, spun and then blinked out completely.

Ravi stopped and turned to look out the rear window. The headlights did not reappear.

Every sense in his being screamed at him to go on, to get out of here and to try and call the police. Still, he couldn’t shake the need to know. Who the hell had been chasing him? He had to find out. He backed up until he reached the point where he had seen the crash happen. It didn’t take long as he spotted one of the taillights, now blinking as they cast a dim red light up into the air. He stepped out of the car and eased his way down, unsure why he was suddenly okay with doing something so idiotic as this. As he reached the car, he put his hands out to brace himself against the frame as he made his way to the passenger window to peek inside.

There was no one there.

Nobody.

There was no way that anyone could have walked away from this. There had been so little time, that he would have spotted anyone shambling away from the accident.

Ravi frowned and looked around again. It’s not like the car could have driven itself. In a moment of clarity, he saw the person hiding out, just out of sight and then sneaking past him to try and steal his car. He rushed back up to the road but it was still there, engine running smoothly. He could have sworn he had turned it off as he had stepped out to investigate the scene.

As he eased behind the wheel, something was jabbing into his leg and he reached down into his pocket to find out what it was. Frowning he reached into his pocket and at the familiar weight and jingling sound, his heart went cold. His hand came out clutching his keys.

Ravi looked up at the dashboard in a panic as all four door locked around him and the engine revved up, taking him up to an even higher speed than he had been driving before. The back wheels started to lose their grip on the road and he felt the back end starting to come around. The pedals moved out from underneath his feet, operated by a forces unseen and the steering wheel moved from side to side, under its own power. He thought about the car that had been following, seemingly driving itself, a notion he had thought was so absurd. Now, as if something had passed between the two cars, he was beginning to realize that it wasn’t as absurd as he had thought.

As his stomach lurched from a partial lift off the ground, the stereo came on in a burst of static. In the background he could just hear some kind of music playing but mostly what he heard was the static as it bellowed out through the car’s speakers.

It sounded like the car was laughing at him.

Baked Scribe Flashback : Okuri-inu

The footfalls matched his exactly.

They were coming from somewhere above, and to his left, on the ridge and out of his sight. But he could hear it, the clear sound of rocks crunching under footfalls, in perfect time with his own.

Don’t lose your step.

He couldn’t explain where the thought had come from, but he couldn’t shake it either. One foot in front of the other. No mistakes. It was more important than ever.

The thing up above, whatever it was, continued to follow along. Every step matched his. He tried speeding up, and his unknown companion simply mirrored him perfectly. When he tried slowing abruptly, the speed of the other’s steps matched the change with exact precision.

Don’t lose your step.

The sound of his breathing filled his head as he walked, and just over the sound of the competing sets of footfalls, he thought he heard ragged, anticipatory breaths, also in perfect time with his own.

Don’t lose your—

His foot caught on an upturned root, causing him to first stumble and then, in his panic, fall to the ground.

He felt the thing leap down on him just as he heard the snarling cry. The large canine pinned his arms to the ground and slashed at him with teeth that ripped through his skin like paper. It bit into his arms and chest, clawing at the flesh on his legs and torso. He tried to yell out for help, but was cut off as his mouth was already filling with blood. Something bit into his neck and pulled, causing bright stars of pain to explode all around him as the world first went to the stark white of overly saturated film before dropping back down to the perpetual cinders of darkness.

Baked Scribe Flashback : Nachzehrer

Coming to visit this grave was difficult enough, add to it the ominous silence of the family’s private graveyard at night and it was a wonder that she hadn’t simply begged off. But this was important. No one in the family had ever been there for him in life, the least she could do was try and be there for him in death, suicide or no. It had barely been a week since the funeral, but she still felt strongly that she needed to visit, to be here in this place where she would be able to pay her respects.

The discovery upon reaching the burial site made her breath stop in her throat. She paused and took a step back as her brain scrambled to catch up with what she never would have thought possible.

The grave had been dug up.

No tools. The hole didn’t look to be the handiwork of a shovel. Dirt and debris were blown outward in a circular radius from the hole as if something had exploded out from within.

Or crawled out.

The thought was absurd. What kind of animal would have caused that kind of destruction?

She heard the sound coming from the trees to her right.

It sounded like chewing.

Her brain pleaded with her to run, to sprint for the street, and put as much distance between herself and this place as she could. Her feet carried her on towards the sound.

Towards the darkened figure huddled down on the ground.

Her cousin.

Crouched down in a kneeling position with his own arm clenched between his teeth, consuming his own flesh in the midst of a meal that looked like it had been going on for a long time already.

Her scream caught in her throat as he suddenly looked up and saw her. His eyes blazed at the sight of her and, before she could react, he was on his feet and charging, overtaking her in a volley of snarling, hot breaths and clambering hands.

She pulled a hand out from her coat pocket, fingers clenching as she did so, grabbing a few of the coins left over from doing laundry. He opened his mouth wide and descended on her as she raised her hand up to try and hold him at bay. Somehow her hand ended up inside his mouth and a coin that had clung to her sweaty palm was knocked loose, in and through his questing teeth.

The contact of the metal against his tongue caused a violent gagging sound and he staggered back, away from her. His contorted expression of fury went suddenly slack. He toppled stiffly to the ground and did not move again.

Finally responding to her brain this time, she took to her feet and sprinted out of the cemetery, her screams breaking the silence, as lights began coming on in the neighboring houses and curious onlookers ran out onto now welcoming porches.

Ramblings On The Craft : The Rules Of Writing

DISCLAIMER : I consider myself to be a life-long writer but I am still an aspiring author. What’s the difference? Essentially, to me anyway, it means that while I have devoted a great deal of time to my words and my art, the amount of money I have made as a professional writer to date could maybe be used to purchase a nice steak dinner for two. So while I have a deep and devoted passion for writing, I do not claim in any way to be an expert or authority figure. What you will find in these essays represent my personal thoughts and feelings about various issues related to writing. I think that in any endeavor, it is essential to have the mindset that there is always something to learn, something you don’t know. As soon as you start to think that you are an authority on anything (besides how to eat a hot dog or perhaps, spelling your name) there might be a problem. With that in mind, I am fully cognizant and comfortable with the fact that on any and all of these issues, I could be completely wrong.

Put another way, I recognize and admit that I could be full of shit.

The rules of writing.

It’s a simple enough phrase, but one that is rife with issues and problems. As writers, it stands to reason that there should be clear cut delineations of what is and isn’t allowed. We should hold ourselves to consistent standards of conduct, and take care to see to it that our writing doesn’t stray too far from the borders that have been established by the literary masters who came before us.

The problem is that if you put a hundred writers down in the same room, chances are you will get close to a hundred different answers when asked to explain what the most important rules of writing are. It isn’t like it is for athletes, where the rules are clearly stated and enforced by game officials. It isn’t like lawyers who operate under a strict code of conduct or doctors who have strict parameters in which they are allowed to conduct themselves. The problem that you encounter when you go from writer to writer is ultimately that hardly anyone is operating out of the same playbook. Even the commonly held, established rules are often easily identified, but not easily explained. I think that in many cases, the rules we bandy about as writers have been a part of our collective awareness for so long that, often we don’t even really remember why we follow them. You are told simply, “you can’t do that”, but when you probe into that statement with simple inquiry, you often find nothing explanatory within the flat refusal of permission.

One unfortunate bi-product I have witnessed in the enforcement of our rules takes place during my comings and goings in social media, when I see less experienced writers getting the door slammed on them for the choices they make. I have seen writers who clearly fancy themselves as being “in the know”, going out of their way to shut down a writer for a perceived infraction, as if they are the arbiter of what should and should not be allowed. Sometimes I get the vibe that in the course of playing in the supposed “competition” with other writers, there are some that use the rules as a benchmark to show other people why they are inferior. It’s sad to witness and I am often tempted to come to the defense of some of these writers but that’s simply the nature of the Internet for you. To try and intervene is to stick your arm into a giant Venus Fly Trap. You fix nothing and there’s no escape once you get involved.

And to be clear, I don’t mean to imply the opposite, that there are no rules. There are plenty that I am perfectly fine with and think that we should just agree on following. Start a new paragraph when a new person is speaking, just to name an example. I think that few people would object to the need for respecting that. But even then, if I come across a writer who chose to broke that rule, I’m not going to appoint myself as some kind of literary crusader, and go after the writer for their egregious offense. I think that if you have a firm idea of where the path is, then you should feel free to stray from it every now and then. If someone has made the conscious decision to do something a certain way, I don’t think that it’s my place to wave the red flag in front of their face because at some point, someone decided that for some reason, you shouldn’t be allowed to do that.

This comes down to a core issue for me, namely, how we are using the so called “rules” as a way of evaluating each others writing. Through the technology of social media, I have had the privilege to meet a number of top flight writers. These are individuals who are exemplary and in every way, a credit to their craft. They are creative, respectful and encouraging, and I constantly find myself proud to call myself a friend and colleague of many of them. That said, there is another group of writers who fall outside the realm of this description, writers that have a harder time playing nice.

Namely, there are a lot of writers out there who are just spiteful cunts.

And that is no different than any other endeavor in life but this is how it relates to this topic. There are unfortunate instances where, as writers, we turn to each other for guidance and advice and often, the more petty writers out there, will simply use the rules as weight to give to their club that they are using to try and beat down writers that they see as less than themselves. I’ve seen it time and again, where one writer smacks down another for not keeping in line with the “rules” and I can’t help but think that deep down, all that person is trying to do is convince themselves of how awesome they are. I don’t think that we need to be unjustly complimentary when it comes to evaluating each others work, but I do believe that whatever our feedback, we should strive to be supportive of each other. If the rules are brought up in the evaluation of another person’s work, it should be done because your core intent is to be helpful, not because you want to use that rule to make the writer look silly or stupid. We do a good enough job tearing ourselves down from the inside, there’s no need to add external pressure to that.

For the purposes of discussion, here are a few common examples of what I’m talking about.

YOU CAN NEVER CHANGE POINT OF VIEW DURING A SCENE!!!!!!

There are a number of different points of view that your story may be written from. A few of the more popular ones are the first person, in which you spend the entire book completely inside the head of one character. You know all of their thoughts and emotions and see everything in the book, filtered through their perspective. The advantage of this is that, as the reader, you become intimately connected with one character. The challenge is in creating any kind of narrative scope on the story as the reader is only privy to information gained if the main character is present to see it. Third person limited is another popular choice in modern fiction, told from the perspective of an unseen narrator who offers the reader a more global perspective on the story. Think of the reader’s perspective as that of the viewer of a movie. You still get to see the internalizations of the characters, but with third person, there is more freedom and flexibility than there is in the first person. It is considered acceptable to see the internal thoughts of more than one character, but the rule of thumb is that if you are going to switch perspectives, you have to stop, and start a new scene from the new perspective.

To do otherwise is to put the story into third person omniscient. Basically what that means is that the narrator, at any given time, is privy to everything. The thoughts and feelings of every character and that information may be shared with you at any given time. It is a style of writing that was once more popular, but it has fallen out of general use. So why is this such a big deal? A significant part of the writing establishment has decided that it is too confusing for the reader if the narrator jumps around from character to character and that it’s too much to ask someone to keep up. They argue that the writing becomes too messy and muddled. So if you plan on changing from one person’s perspective to another, you’d better insert a section break, either start a new scene or a new chapter. If you don’t, you’re dead wrong.

Someone should tell Stephen King that he can’t write that way.

Look, here’s the thing. Yes, third person omniscient is less popular and has its own unique set of challenges. Personally, I’m not as much of a fan but I don’t inherently hate it. I certainly don’t think so much of my own tastes that I’m just going to tell someone that they aren’t allowed to do something. If you want to write your story in the third person omniscient, go for it. If it ends up not working out, well, that’s what editing is for. You only have to get it right once. So don’t let the others out there bully you into something that you want to try. If you are passionate about something, often that can be what it takes for your prose to be fresh enough to pull the reader through your less-than-common narrative format.

NEVER USE ADJECTIVES OR ADVERBS!!!!!!

Seriously, don’t do it. Never. never, ever, ever, never ever. It’s a classic sign of lazy writing and you should always show something to the reader instead of cheating, and telling.

Said the writer, warningly.

Look, I get it. I’m not a huge fan of the “ad” words and I think that there are plenty of instances where they are not used effectively. Sure, it’s generally better to give the character physical action that demonstrates what they are feeling, without having to actually say what they are feeling. But you know what? It also gets annoying when it seems like a character is constantly setting their jaw or grinding their teeth or letting out a frustrated sigh or smacking a fist into their open palm.

The thing is, really, that I think this is one of those things that writers get more upset about than readers. I would be surprised if there is actually any instance when a reader has tossed a book across the room, declaring, “Enough with the adverbs, already.” And the fact is that I don’t feel so high and mighty about my personal preferences that I feel the need to brow-beat anyone around me who might do things differently. What it comes down to for me is, they are tools in your toolbox. Use them if you deem fit. Focus on the story, that’s more important than anything. JK Rowling seems to use the adverbs and adjectives about as often as she uses commas, and she’s probably about as rich as the Queen of England now.

Interpret what you will in that.

NEVER USE THE PASSIVE VOICE!!!!!!

The old stand by, never use the passive voice. I think that this is a classic “workshop note”, in that when you submit a story for review in a writers workshop, you will inevitably end up with at least one person admonishing you on your use of the passive voice. I think that this is because it’s one of the easiest criticisms to make because you can usually find at least some of it. What exactly is the passive voice? Basically, take a standard sentence like, Chad drank the vodka. That’s written in active voice, it’s simple and to the point. In a passive voice construction, the target of the verb is flipped around to make it look like its the subject of the sentence and you get a weaker phrasing like, the vodka was drunk by Chad. It’s conveying the same information, just in less effective fashion.

Again, I don’t love passive voice and, as before with the “ad” words, I would use it sparingly or for specific reasons, but I also think it’s being unreasonable to just ban it from the party altogether. Sometimes a passive sentence works better, sometimes it has a better feel for the mood you are trying to accomplish. Ultimately, if that’s the way the words feel right to you, then go for it, don’t worry if it’s going to pass some other writer’s literary pre-flight checklist. For example, politicians often speak in the passive voice, do you have any of those in your story? I think for the most part the active voice is better, and is something that your readers will be more likely to relate to. After all, when you finish reading this, you will be probably going to be saying, Chad wasted my time with this essay, as opposed to, My time was wasted by Chad. But passive voice can have its place as well.

There are other examples to be sure, but I think that these have been enough for me to get my general point across. Rules are fine. I don’t have a problem with them, but I tend to have the kind of personality that if you tell me that I’m not allowed to do something, chances are I am going to immediately to that thing. My problem is not with rules, necessarily but in how they are applied. Many times, when I see the rules being thrown around, they often seem to be used as weapons as opposed to aids. I see too many writers using their rules as a way to methodically point out to less experienced writers why they are no good. When I see writers acting that way, it’s hard to believe that down deep, they aren’t really just saying,

I DON’T LIKE ME!!!!!!

Every writer has their own path to take, their own method and perspective to find. Think back on all the groundbreaking authors that have influenced you and I would be willing to bet that more than once, they had someone tell them that they couldn’t write that way. Now obviously, that’s not to say that every person who breaks the rules is destined for literary greatness, but I don’t think that any of us are so whiz-bang amazing, that we have the right to grant or deny permission to people to tell the story they want to tell.

Write your stories people! Look to those around you for inspiration and guidance and advice, but don’t let them so far in the door that one day you wake up and find that you’ve ceded all control of your work to other sensibilities. Believe in yourself and the rest will follow.

He said, bracingly.

Issue #125

Josiah squinted out over the hard packed desert, into the blasting wind. It felt like putting his face directly into an open fire. There was no life out here that he could see, but he knew that the people he sought were out there, just beyond the ridge at the edge of the horizon. The people in that valley would pay for their insolence, for their arrogance and failure to show proper respect for the divine allowances which had brought them into being. He gripped the hilt of the sword, letting the tip leave a trail in the sand behind him as he resumed his slow pace forward.

Above him, the sky looked as an unmarked canvas. The midday sun blazed down through the complete absence of clouds and made the searing heat even more unpleasant. He squinted again, wiping the sweat from his brow and then flinging the moisture off of his hand. The objective was close enough that he needed to stay alert, had to be ready. Any minute now, he would probably start coming across scouts or people of the city, out and about in their normal day to day routines. He would expel of the vermin in whatever order they happened to show themselves.

No one had sent him on this quest, given him the divine instructions to do what was needed. He had seen the danger, all on his own and realized that he had been given the divine sight in order to take it upon himself to do whatever he could to save everyone. The job would be performed, even if it required his own life for the giving. It was the rarest of moments, where one stood true and put steel to whatever threat may be approaching.

He felt the sound before he heard it. It was a deep rumbling in the ground, as if a massive unit of troops was moving, possibly already aligned and attacking for a battle that Josiah feared could never truly be won. If that ended up being the case, he felt like he would rather meet his maker, standing on his own two feet, instead of having to experience the heartbreak of defeat. And if he fell, but the battle was won, those left behind would remember him as standing tall, facing down the oncoming enemy with no thought to his own safety.

Now he was hearing the noise, metallic sounding as it crunched its way across the sand. There was another noise accompanying it that he did not understand. Something that sounded odd, but for reasons he couldn’t place. He made his way up the hill, using the blade to support himself and peer down from the hilltop.

Down below, there was a great cloud of dust and sand, thrown up from whatever was on its way up, towards him. It sounded like some kind of mechanical animal, howling over the wind and increasing in intensity as it drew closer. Josiah hefted the sword and renewed his grip. Whoever was unlucky enough to be at the head of the pack would be the first to feel the bite of his steel.

As he peered past the blade of the sword, he noticed with some confusion, the rust that now covered the blade. The metal which had just been gleaming in the sunlight now looked ancient, like a weapon of old that had not seen use in many millennia. As he took this in, the all-terrain vehicle topped the hill ahead of him and raced down into the next valley before rushing up towards him. It slowed as it drew near, and through the windshield, Josiah could make out two people pointing at him, expressions of bewilderment as they took him in, this person standing atop the hill, brandishing an ancient broadsword.

Josiah shook his head violently. He could not explain this trance that the enemy had clearly placed him in, but it made no difference, did not matter when he was here to complete his life’s path. Lifting the sword up in the air, he charged, stepping into the path of his imminent destiny.