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If you substitute “Oh sugar!” for “Oh shit!” because you’re thinking about the Legion of Decency, you are breaking the unspoken contract that exists between writer and reader—your promise to express the truth of how people act and talk through the medium of a made-up story.
believe me, writing fiction in America as we enter the twenty-first century is no job for intellectual cowards. There are lots of would-be censors out there, and although they may have different agendas, they all want basically the same thing: for you to see the world they see… or to at least shut up about what you do see that’s different. They are agents of the status quo. Not necessarily bad guys, but dangerous guys if you happen to believe in intellectual freedom.
If I were a Henry James or Jane Austen sort of guy, writing only about toffs or smart college folks, I’d hardly ever have to use a dirty word or a profane phrase; I might never have had a book banned from America’s school libraries or gotten a letter from some helpful fundamentalist fellow who wants me to know that I’m going to burn in hell, where all my millions of dollars won’t buy me so much as a single drink of water. I did not, however, grow up among folks of that sort. I grew up as a part of America’s lower middle class, and they’re the people I can write about with the most honesty and
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Some people don’t want to hear the truth, of course, but that’s not your problem. What would be is wanting to be a writer without wanting to shoot straight. Talk, whether ugly or beautiful, is an index of character; it can also be a breath of cool, refreshing air in a room some people would prefer to keep shut up. In the end, the important question has nothing to do with whether the talk in your story is sacred or profane; the only question is how it rings on the page and in the ear. If you expect it to ring true, then you must talk yourself. Even more important, you must shut up and listen to
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The job boils down to two things: paying attention to how the real people around you behave and then telling the truth about what you see.
It’s also important to remember that no one is “the bad guy” or “the best friend” or “the whore with a heart of gold” in real life; in real life we each of us regard ourselves as the main character, the protagonist, the big cheese; the camera is on us, baby. If you can bring this attitude into your fiction, you may not find it easier to create brilliant characters, but it will be harder for you to create the sort of one-dimensional dopes that populate so much pop fiction.
Boredom can be a very good thing for someone in a creative jam.
At one moment I had none of this; at the next I had all of it. If there is any one thing I love about writing more than the rest, it’s that sudden flash of insight when you see how everything connects. I have heard it called “thinking above the curve,” and it’s that; I’ve heard it called “the over-logic,” and it’s that, too. Whatever you call it,
Good fiction always begins with story and progresses to theme; it almost never begins with theme and progresses to story.
But she’s also unflinching when she sees something she thinks is wrong. When she does, she lets me know loud and clear. In her role as critic and first reader, Tabby often makes me think of a story I read about Alfred Hitchcock’s wife, Alma Reville. Ms. Reville was the equivalent of Hitch’s first reader, a sharp-eyed critic who was totally unimpressed with the suspense-master’s growing reputation as an auteur. Lucky for him. Hitch say he want to fly, Alma say, “First eat your eggs.”
Back story is all the stuff that happened before your tale began but which has an impact on the front story. Back story helps define character and establish motivation. I think it’s important to get the back story in as quickly as possible, but it’s also important to do it with some grace.
The most important things to remember about back story are that (a) everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn’t very interesting. Stick to the parts that are, and don’t get carried away with the rest. Long life stories are best received in bars, and only then an hour or so before closing time, and if you are buying.
In truth, I’ve found that any day’s routine interruptions and distractions don’t much hurt a work in progress and may actually help it in some ways. It is, after all, the dab of grit that seeps into an oyster’s shell that makes the pearl, not pearl-making seminars with other oysters.
You don’t need writing classes or seminars any more than you need this or any other book on writing. Faulkner learned his trade while working in the Oxford, Mississippi, post office. Other writers have learned the basics while serving in the Navy, working in steel mills, or doing time in America’s finer crossbar hotels. I learned the most valuable (and commercial) part of my life’s work while washing motel sheets and restaurant tablecloths at the New Franklin Laundry in Bangor. You learn best by reading a lot and writing a lot, and the most valuable lessons of all are the ones you teach
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It’s a question that people ask in different ways—sometimes it comes out polite and sometimes it comes out rough, but it always amounts to the same: Do you do it for the money, honey? The answer is no. Don’t now and never did. Yes, I’ve made a great deal of dough from my fiction, but I never set a single word down on paper with the thought of being paid for it. I have done some work as favors for friends—logrolling is the slang term for it—but at the very worst, you’d have to call that a crude kind of barter. I have written because it fulfilled me. Maybe it paid off the mortgage on the house
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because it seems to me that one of the things marriage is about is casting the tiebreaking vote when you just can’t decide what you should do next.
Writing isn’t about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it’s about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life, as well. It’s about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy. Some of this book—perhaps too much—has been about how I learned to do it. Much of it has been about how you can do it better. The rest of it—and perhaps the best of it—is a permission slip: you can, you should, and if you’re brave enough to start, you will. Writing is magic, as much the water of
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As you scan this list, please remember that I’m not Oprah and this isn’t my book club. These are the ones that worked for me, that’s all. But you could do worse, and a good many of these might show you some new ways of doing your work. Even if they don’t, they’re apt to entertain you. They certainly entertained me. Abrahams, Peter: A Perfect Crime Abrahams, Peter: Lights Out Abrahams, Peter: Pressure Drop Abrahams, Peter: Revolution #9 Agee, James: A Death in the Family Bakis, Kirsten: Lives of the Monster Dogs Barker, Pat: Regeneration Barker, Pat: The Eye in the Door Barker, Pat: The Ghost
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Abrahams, Peter: End of Story Abrahams, Peter: The Tutor Adiga, Aravind: The White Tiger Atkinson, Kate: One Good Turn Atwood, Margaret: Oryx and Crake Berlinski, Mischa: Fieldwork Black, Benjamin [pseudo.]: Christine Falls Blauner, Peter: The Last Good Day Bolaño, Roberto: 2666 Carr, David: The Night of the Gun Casey, John: Spartina Chabon, Michael: The Yiddish Policemen’s Union Child, Lee: The Jack Reacher novels, starting with Killing Floor Connelly, Michael: The Narrows Costello, Mark: Big If Cunningham, Michael: The Hours Danielewski, Mark Z.: House of Leaves Díaz, Junot: The Brief
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Atkinson, Kate: One Good Turn Atkinson, Kate: Started Early, Took My Dog Atwood, Margaret: The Year of the Flood Barclay, Linwood: Never Look Away Bardugo, Leigh: Ninth House Bazell, Josh: Beat the Reaper Bellow, Saul: The Adventures of Augie March Benioff, David: City of Thieves Berlinski, Mischa: Fieldwork Blake, Sarah: The Guest Book Boyd, William: Ordinary Thunderstorms Braffet, Kelly: Save Yourself Caputo, Philip: Crossers Cronin, Justin: The Passage Trilogy Cummins, Jeanine: American Dirt De Haven, Tom: Derby Dugan’s Depression Funnies Donoghue, Emma: Room Egan, Jennifer: Manhattan Beach
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