Writing and Reading

I love getting questions from friends about writing and the literary industry and stuff like that. It makes me feel special .

This is one particular question that I need to address–fundamentally something interesting about us writers in general. I believe agent Nathan Bransford once touched on this topic a little bit. I don’t have the actual post; but believe you me, searching for it on his blog is about as easy as pie or cake or cannoli or just about any sweet and tasty dessert.

I have a friend who inquires constantly about novel writing. And I enjoy elaborating on many issues involving such a procedure. Said friend also has plenty of ideas for projects but, quite frankly, doesn’t think he or she has either the patience or maybe even the confidence to actually translate those ideas into full-fledged plots, leading toward completed, polished novels.

Now I’m going to be honest with you here: I enjoy projects. I have about…lemme see…four projects. One of them is VERMILION EYE, as you know. I also have about maybe a DOZEN other thoughts for possible projects. Actually, at this stage of development, they’d be called…premises.

So to make a long explanation less arduously long-winded, I enjoy new ideas for new books to write, especially if other people pitch them to me.

My friend had a basic premise. Said friend had a main character sort of fleshed out. Imagery was set in concrete. What was funny was how long it took for my friend to develop that. Not laugh-out-loud funny, mind you–I won’t ever laugh at anyone’s endeavor toward writing. What was funny was how my friend thought that it was SO difficult getting past that ’stage’ of writing.

The birth of an idea. A premise.

After my friend laid it out for me, I nodded my head. I processed it. The wheels in my head started turning. I love it when I get that way, by the way. It’s a beautiful thing.

My friend’s question was this: “Is there anything else you need as far as this ’story’? Is that the hard part?”

I had to be honest. No. Not at all.

At least not for me.

And ‘hard’ isn’t the operative word either.

My friend rolled his/her head back in astonishment; developing his/her ‘premise’ took about two weeks of brainstorming. I, in fact, was astonished at that.

Here’s a very simple example of what I mean by ‘premise’. The easy part. At least for me–

A grocery store clerk learns that he has the power to magically stock all the shelves in the store with a limitless supply of tampons, leaving the business without any need for rainchecks.

That would be a ‘premise’.

In my opinion, that’s easy. That premise (which now that I look at it, looks amusing) came about in my head literally in the time it took you to read it. Which would be about 20 seconds, probably.

The ‘hard’ part is the WHY…the HOW…the WHERE…the WHO. The ‘hard’ part is the CONFLICT, the actual PLOT.

My questions would be:

Who is this grocery store clerk? Where did he get this power from? Why does he have this power? What happens when the store runs out of room for tampons? Does he have a girlfriend who is in need of tampons? Does the female manager need tampons? Will tampons start growing out of his ass? What is the grocery store clerk’s mother’s name? Does he have a dog? Does he have a cat? What’s the name of the grocery store? Will he lose his power at the end? Will the store then need rainchecks again? Will all the women in the world suddenly lose the need for tampons and somehow magically dematerialize their used tampons by meditating on it?

I could go on and on and on and on and on and on.

And on.

I guess an easier way of describing this, is a ‘premise’ is basically what the project is about….

A ‘plot’ or ’story’ is how it happens.

How it happens is important to know. And it takes time. It takes a LOT of development. That’s why I say that ‘hard’ really isn’t the operative word. It’s not ‘hard’. It’s just time-consuming (which as you know I don’t have a whole lot of time these days).

To be honest, I thrive on plotting almost as much as actually writing the work. It gets my juices flowing. Here’s the point I need to make–for anyone who’s so interested in writing, like my friend who’s pitched this idea to me–

You need more than a ‘premise’.

So get ready to work.

Getting the idea is a beautiful thing. Making it live and breathe makes that beauty last. Trust me when I say that it’s grueling, too. When anyone writes their first novel, it’s a MAJOR task. Some may say it’s a lot of blood, sweat and tears. Sleepless nights.

So don’t stop at the ‘premise’, thinking you’re set and you can sit at the computer, thinking the words’ll come out. Take some more notes. Some people outline (me). Others summarize, set up playlists, sketch characters in detail (Sarah Jensen, possibly the radiant H.L. Dyer, maybe Mary Lindsey, Scott Tracey, Michelle Mclean, yes, I’m talkin’ about all o’ you!).

It doesn’t matter what you do–just develop your premise into a plot. Understand what you want to write first. Understand where you want to go. Then go.

Where you’ll end up will get you giddy. I guarantee it. So to conclude my “unforgivable ranting”…. Happy writing, people. Enjoy your words. Have patience. And I promise a whole chorus of angels will sing “Alleluia” when you write the last word of your novel. Trust me. I heard the chorus back then.

And it was B-E-A-utiful.

Quick post:

You know your blog is getting out of control (but in a good way) when some person somewhere in this world gets on Google and types in the search words “beastmaster porn”, and then your blog pops up.

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Questions:

Why does my blog, “Writing and Reading”, show up under the keywords “beastmaster porn”? 

Why would someone want to search for “beastmaster porn”?

What is “beastmaster porn”?

Do I want to know what “beastmaster porn” is?

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I was just curious.

Just like me to get really deep, really…well, for lack of a better term, emotional…when writing this. Sorry, guys. It happens. I get that way sometimes. I’ll explain….

This post is about the importance of conflict and character. They’re almost interchangeable. When we read a book, we read these characters, these characters we identify with–we fall in love with them so much because there’s always a conflict. There’s something wrenching inside, an entity that makes them twist and writhe with thoughts, sometimes dark thoughts. You sometimes see the tears, the pain, the worry. You see them asking themselves questions that define their moments, define their lives. Those questions become breaths that last longer than those three seconds normal breaths take. Because the ‘questions’ determine the road a life takes. And that’s phenomenal. That’s the essence of living. That shapes us.

Those characters live. They live because of conflict. Sometimes it’s an inner battle. Sometimes it’s an outer battle. Without that conflict, they’re nothing but mannequins. They don’t live through anything. They just ‘exist’. They’re still pictures. Faceless. Nothing.

Watch this clip….

You understand what I mean about character here? Devito says it somewhat differently, though–but in the end, it’s the same.

Make your characters regret. They need to know they’ve fallen. They need to know that they have to get themselves up.

It’s the getting up that makes you wonder what the journey will be like. Because getting up can be quite the journey…..

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I’ve only been spurred to write this post for a specific reason, by the way.

This is the emotional part for me.

I, as a character in this world, have my own ‘conflict’ right now as we speak. Very soon, there will be a big decision in my life. Very soon. It will decide the road my life will take. It will decide who I’m going to be for the rest of my life. It will decide how the other loved ones, the friends in my life will be affected, too. I will face this ‘conflict’ this coming Wednesday. I will be faced with a decision to make. A very important one.

This is my defining conflict. I won’t explain what it is until I’m faced with it on Wednesday. But I’ll let you, my readers, know what it is soon. I promise.

Until then, I’m still here writing. You keep reading. That’s one of the simpler reasons why I call this “Writing and Reading”….

There I go again with the strange titles: chewy chimichanga. Don’t ask. I just get weird. It’s a purely random title.

So let me explain what exactly this edition of the “Eloquence of Words” is all about.

My brain was racing (as usual), and it suddenly hit an element of many comedies out there that I never even touched on but always enjoyed just for the sheer outrageousness, randomness, hilarity, retardedness, stupidity and utter diction oddities the world probably has never seen (unless you were given too much novocaine at the dentist’s office). There are many comedies out there have musical numbers. Hilarious musical numbers. That make absolutely no sense. Right up my alley.

Well, I take that back. Some of them make sense. But are still retarded. Even perverted. Perverted is okay, though! We’re humans. That’s what we do–we pervert things. It’s in our nature.

So here are three clips of three of my favorite movies that feature some of the strangest musical numbers you will ever hear in your lifetime. I guarantee it. Enjoy. Taco Supreme.

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“Billy Madison”

“Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me”

“Robin Hood: Men in Tights”