Stories as Arrangements of Patterns
(crossposted from Livejournal)
One of the things I like about teaching is that it makes you think about the things you're trying to teach. In the first Writing F&SF class, I asked the class what makes a story a good one - how do we know it's good? Answers included a world so well constructed you can sense it; immersion in the text to the point you forget you're reading; something you can identify with.
All of those are fine and true answers, but it occurred to me they point to something beyond that: a story must consist of a pleasing set of patterns, ones that fill it out and create its shape. For example, tension must rise and end in a climactic moment. The point of view must not change or at least do it in a meaningful way. What's allowable in the world of the story is usually set up in the first few paragraphs and they usually echo or foreshadow the main source of conflict in the story. For me, thinking about patterns and the shape of the story is a crucial component of my writing process.
Everyone's writing process is different. Mine varies from story to story somewhat. Stories have been known to arrive in my head complete. "Pippa's Smiles," a fantasy story I wrote a couple of months ago, is a good example. I was in bed, waking up and thinking about the story, and letting my unconscious mind help assemble the pieces. When I got up, I sat down at the computer and wrote it in the course of a morning. That's more typical of flash or at least short pieces.
More commonly, a story begins with an idea or a character. If it's an idea, a character soon follows, because it's a crucial part of the mulling process. Here's some of what went into "Long Enough And Just So Long," which will appear in Lightspeed Magazine.
I was thinking about heroines in YA literature as a result of a Wiscon panel I'd been on, and some of the stories that had been mentioned. At the same time, I'd noticed an announcement from Redstone Science Fiction about a contest called "Towards the Accessible Future".
One of my all-time favorite stories as a teen was Heinlein's "The Menace of Earth," and I decided I wanted to riff on that. A number of my stories are sparked by stories I hold particularly dear - The Mermaids Singing Each to Each takes Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea as its inspiration. I also wanted to nod to a favorite Heinlein YA heroine: Podkayne of Mars.
So with all of that swimming around in my head, I was just about ready to write. I had a name for my heroine and I knew that she was missing limbs, which helped her in her career as a pilot. I wanted her to have a friend to play off of, and I knew that friend's name, taken from another girls' literary figure: Pippi Longstocking. It irritates me that we don't see many good female friendships in speculative fiction, so I wanted to make that friendship the overall arc of the story.
"The Menace from Earth" has an uncomplicated plot. Two Lunar teens, one male and one female, are friends. A visiting woman from Earth snags the boy's attention and the girl is jealous. Then she does something stupid and learns that the boy really loves her. Yeah, I know, it's got gender issues out the wazoo. At any rate, because its plot hinges on romance, I wanted something dealing with that to move things along in the story. A sentient sexbot was called for, and led to some of my favorite comic moments in the story.
Most of this was clear in my head when I sat down to write, and it was at that that I let the story flow out as it wanted to, which is always a weird process where you feel like Lucille Ball trying to keep up with a candy assembly line in that you're throwing words at the page in a desperate attempt to keep things flowing. Then you finish up, look back at what emerged in that spurt, and it informs the next one. Usually I go stretch and then sit on the balcony for a little while thinking about the story before starting the next chunk, which is usually anywhere from 300-1000 words, depending on how well I'm keeping up with the word assembly line.
I often don't know what will emerge. I didn't know the ending to Podkayne's story until I was nearly halfway through. My unconscious mind, which is much smarter than I am, is a vital partner in the writing process. The best way for me to access it is on a regular basis. If the pump is primed, the words flow better. Somedays the flow is smooth and effortless -- other days it's like grinding up your own guts to make sausage.
Pattern making enters into this. As I'm writing, I'm trying to construct patterns from the flow. Certain rules are ingrained: the more attention you give a character, the more important they should be to the plot; significant moments or motifs are pleasing in clusters of threes; bringing back something from the beginning at the end will make the story feel more complete; the resolution occurs near the end; a sentence or two that pulls out an ending and extends it provides a reader with the chance to savor and understand it; moments of tension should be spread out, rather than all clumped together; if anyone says something can't be done, it probably should be accomplished or in process by the story's end.
The important thing, though, is to get the story out. Then in editing, you can rearrange, reinforce, amplify, eliminate, and so forth to make the pattern more appealing. That's my first edit pass. After that things get nit-picky and labor intensive.
Everyone's process, though, is different, and any writing teacher who preaches the One and Only Way should be shunned. Figure out your process, experiment with it, find out what works, and then do that. Lots.
One of the things I like about teaching is that it makes you think about the things you're trying to teach. In the first Writing F&SF class, I asked the class what makes a story a good one - how do we know it's good? Answers included a world so well constructed you can sense it; immersion in the text to the point you forget you're reading; something you can identify with.
All of those are fine and true answers, but it occurred to me they point to something beyond that: a story must consist of a pleasing set of patterns, ones that fill it out and create its shape. For example, tension must rise and end in a climactic moment. The point of view must not change or at least do it in a meaningful way. What's allowable in the world of the story is usually set up in the first few paragraphs and they usually echo or foreshadow the main source of conflict in the story. For me, thinking about patterns and the shape of the story is a crucial component of my writing process.
Everyone's writing process is different. Mine varies from story to story somewhat. Stories have been known to arrive in my head complete. "Pippa's Smiles," a fantasy story I wrote a couple of months ago, is a good example. I was in bed, waking up and thinking about the story, and letting my unconscious mind help assemble the pieces. When I got up, I sat down at the computer and wrote it in the course of a morning. That's more typical of flash or at least short pieces.
More commonly, a story begins with an idea or a character. If it's an idea, a character soon follows, because it's a crucial part of the mulling process. Here's some of what went into "Long Enough And Just So Long," which will appear in Lightspeed Magazine.
I was thinking about heroines in YA literature as a result of a Wiscon panel I'd been on, and some of the stories that had been mentioned. At the same time, I'd noticed an announcement from Redstone Science Fiction about a contest called "Towards the Accessible Future".
One of my all-time favorite stories as a teen was Heinlein's "The Menace of Earth," and I decided I wanted to riff on that. A number of my stories are sparked by stories I hold particularly dear - The Mermaids Singing Each to Each takes Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea as its inspiration. I also wanted to nod to a favorite Heinlein YA heroine: Podkayne of Mars.
So with all of that swimming around in my head, I was just about ready to write. I had a name for my heroine and I knew that she was missing limbs, which helped her in her career as a pilot. I wanted her to have a friend to play off of, and I knew that friend's name, taken from another girls' literary figure: Pippi Longstocking. It irritates me that we don't see many good female friendships in speculative fiction, so I wanted to make that friendship the overall arc of the story.
"The Menace from Earth" has an uncomplicated plot. Two Lunar teens, one male and one female, are friends. A visiting woman from Earth snags the boy's attention and the girl is jealous. Then she does something stupid and learns that the boy really loves her. Yeah, I know, it's got gender issues out the wazoo. At any rate, because its plot hinges on romance, I wanted something dealing with that to move things along in the story. A sentient sexbot was called for, and led to some of my favorite comic moments in the story.
Most of this was clear in my head when I sat down to write, and it was at that that I let the story flow out as it wanted to, which is always a weird process where you feel like Lucille Ball trying to keep up with a candy assembly line in that you're throwing words at the page in a desperate attempt to keep things flowing. Then you finish up, look back at what emerged in that spurt, and it informs the next one. Usually I go stretch and then sit on the balcony for a little while thinking about the story before starting the next chunk, which is usually anywhere from 300-1000 words, depending on how well I'm keeping up with the word assembly line.
I often don't know what will emerge. I didn't know the ending to Podkayne's story until I was nearly halfway through. My unconscious mind, which is much smarter than I am, is a vital partner in the writing process. The best way for me to access it is on a regular basis. If the pump is primed, the words flow better. Somedays the flow is smooth and effortless -- other days it's like grinding up your own guts to make sausage.
Pattern making enters into this. As I'm writing, I'm trying to construct patterns from the flow. Certain rules are ingrained: the more attention you give a character, the more important they should be to the plot; significant moments or motifs are pleasing in clusters of threes; bringing back something from the beginning at the end will make the story feel more complete; the resolution occurs near the end; a sentence or two that pulls out an ending and extends it provides a reader with the chance to savor and understand it; moments of tension should be spread out, rather than all clumped together; if anyone says something can't be done, it probably should be accomplished or in process by the story's end.
The important thing, though, is to get the story out. Then in editing, you can rearrange, reinforce, amplify, eliminate, and so forth to make the pattern more appealing. That's my first edit pass. After that things get nit-picky and labor intensive.
Everyone's process, though, is different, and any writing teacher who preaches the One and Only Way should be shunned. Figure out your process, experiment with it, find out what works, and then do that. Lots.
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