Tag: The Art of Writing

Why I Don’t Use Magic

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I’m always looking for new fantasy novels. Yesterday I was reading lists of “the top fantasies of 2013”–there are any number of them on the Internet–but I gave it up when I found a new series about a boy who goes to wizards’ school. No, the boy isn’t named “Barry Rotter” or anything like that. Couldn’t they have waited until after J.K. Rowling died? To rip her off while she’s still alive and still writing is the height of bad manners.

I was struck by an overall sense of un-originality among these fantasies. It came through the rave reviews like a whiff of mildew.

Dreariest aspect of it all, fantasy writers are still using “magic” to get things done. The real world functions without magic–and look at all the mischief we get into. A sane person believes the laws of nature hold throughout the universe; so where does “magic” fit in?

So I have ruled out “magic” in my Bell Mountain books. If my characters want to get something done, they actually have to do it–instead of just saying “Ooga-balooga-razzmatazz!” I do allow things that look like magic, but aren’t. The creation of such stunning illusions is still very much with us: see Global Warming.

But there is a more important reason why I’ve kept “real magic” out of my books.

The laws of nature are subservient to God, and we are under both God and the physical laws of our world that God created. “Magic” is a way of making the magician superior to those laws–an altogether wicked and impious concept.

Wicked and impious characters–at least in my books–will seek to acquire magic, will pretend to have it, and may even convince themselves that they do. But only God can say, “Let there be light.”

Proud and corrupt minds always seek to usurp God’s function. In case you hadn’t noticed, that’s what the whole “transgender” business is about. “Male and female created He them–oh, yeah? Well, watch us turn the males into females and the females into males! Now who’s the god? Hah!”

There is no way that kind of thinking leads to any end but evil.

A Writer Who Can Write About Race

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The Australian mystery novelist, Arthur Upfield, never wrote a book that was any less than very good. But No Footprints in the Bush was a high achievement even for him.

First published in 1940 as The Bushranger of the Skies, used copies of this masterpiece are still available sometimes on amazon.com. I’m reading it now, and I’m in awe of it.

Not only does Upfield tell a fast-paced, exciting story; not only does he bring to life an exotic Australian landscape, and put you there; not only does he populate it with characters who live and breathe and get you emotionally involved with them–besides all that, Upfield probes his country’s history of racial strife and breaks through the polemics and the stereotypes to connect with the rock-bottom humanity of white settlers and black aborigines.

He doesn’t get all misty-eyed and sappy about the aborigines and their ancient way of life. He has too much respect for them, for that. Nor does he even try to sidestep the realities of prejudice, hatred, and mutual misunderstanding. Beyond that, he’s passionate about the subject.

It’s a far cry from what we’re used to in America, these days–whites can do no right, blacks can do no wrong, and because there was slavery here 150 years ago, black teens are entitled to play knockout and a black president can only be opposed or criticized by “racists.”

But then no issue in our time is shielded from the impact of massive foolishness.

We could use someone like Upfield to talk sense to us.

 

A Very Far-Out Fantasy

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Taking a break from reporting on the slow murder of our civilization at the hands of its ruling classes…

In 1924 Lord Dunsany published one of the strangest and most creative fantasy novels ever, The King of Elfland’s Daughter. If you’ve ever gotten bored with same old-same old in fantasy, this might be your antidote.

So… there’s this English town whose elders want to be ruled by “a magical lord,” because they think it will make them famous. And so the prince sets off for Elfland and, after some odd adventures, comes back with the King of Elfland’s daughter as his bride; and in due course they have a son.

But Elfland is a parallel universe. Everything is different. Elfland is entirely and uncompromisingly other. So the elders get their wish, and they have a magical lord; but it has not turned out as they expected or desired. Not even close.

I don’t want to spoil the story for you, so let’s say no more about the plot. Lord Dunsany’s writing style, though, will surprise you. Every word is chosen with care, with the eye of a jeweler. The effect is almost hypnotic. There are very, very few writers who can do this.

Dunsany himself was quite a character–soldier, big-game hunter, writer and producer of plays, famous for his weird short stories, and a great amateur chess player (he once played to a draw against the immortal Capablanca–you can find their game on http://www.chessgames.com).

The King of Elfland’s Daughter is in a class by itself. A few writers–most notably H.P. Lovecraft–have tried to imitate it, but fallen far short of the mark. Today, 90 years since it was first published, it remains one of the most original fantasies ever written.

This is Frustrating!

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Ever since the summer, I have been trying to contact Meghan Cox Gurdon, the children’s book reviewer for The Wall Street Journal. Why? Because she gave a speech at Hillsdale College, published in the college newsletter, in which she made “The Case for Good Taste in Children’s Books.” In it she discussed “the increasingly dark current that runs through books classified as YA, for Young Adult–books aimed at readers between 12 and 18 years of age–a subject that has, in the four decades since Young Adult became a distinct category in fiction, become increasingly lurid, grotesque, profane, sexual, and ugly… too many books for adolescents act like funhouse mirrors, reflecting hideously distorted portrayals of life.”

And so on, amen.

But when she discusses what she thinks YA fiction ought to be–well, the only way she could get anything closer to that standard than my Bell Mountain series would be to write it herself.

Naturally, I want to get my books into her hands. I’m confident she would like them a lot. But this is precisely what I am unable to do.

None of my contacts have any contact with her, so I haven’t been able to find anyone to  drop a word for me into her ear. As for initiating contact myself–well, as Zacherley used to say, “Ha, ha, HAH!”

Every week I get dozens of emails inviting me to read and review books I never heard of. Meghan Gurdon must get thousands of them. So, although I have sent her emails, the chances approach zero that she will ever see them, much less wind up answering.

Having been a reporter of one kind or another for going on 40 years, I can truthfully say that media bigwigs are the most insulated people in the world. If I wished to interview a governor or a senator or a cabinet secretary, I could do it. It might take some time, but I would get that interview. But with Meghan Cox Gurdon, I can’t get my foot in the door. I’m just another faceless fan in a sellout crowd at Yankee Stadium, way up in the bleachers.

Somehow I need to achieve this impossible thing. I haven’t found a way to do it yet, and it’s driving me nuts.

There has to be a way…

Respect the Reader’s Imagination

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One of the hardest things to learn, if you want to write fiction, is when to shut up and let the reader’s imagination take over. If you can’t learn to shut up, you might as well go into politics.

To me, the art of writing fiction is to cause pictures to be created in the reader’s mind–partly by what you have written, and partly by the reader’s own imagination. I know I’ve succeeded whenever a reader says something to me like this: “I felt like I was there!” That’s when you know you’ve done it right.

You learn how to do this by reading and reading and reading, and by writing and writing and writing. It’s not something that can be taught in 12 easy lessons.

A friend of mine wrote a novel in which he spent a lot of time telling you exactly what each character was wearing–which had no bearing at all on the story, and only served to slow the pace of the action. I mean, we’re not going to imagine the characters as nude, are we? He also spent a whole page getting some characters across a little stream, when he could just have said something like, “And then they crossed the stream.” He might have even gotten away without mentioning the stream at all.

When you set a scene, you want your readers to be able to “see” it. But you also have to remember that each of them will see it in his own way–and that that’s perfectly all right! If you don’t provide enough descriptive detail, no one will imagine much of anything. But if you provide too much, you’re trying to dominate the reader, and it won’t work. He can always close your book and never open it again if he feels you’re trying to boss him around.

This free lesson on the Art of Writing Fiction is brought to you by me, the unacknowledged master of fantasy.

Mangling Agatha Christie

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How much violence are you allowed to do to a novel when you make it into a movie?

I haven’t seen this winter’s assault on J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit II: The Desolation of Smaug, in which the movie-makers invented their own major character and plugged her willy-nilly into the story. But I have seen (on youtube–thank heaven I didn’t pay for it!) the 2010 travesty of Agatha Christie’s novel, Appointment With Death.

The 1988 version, starring Peter Ustinov, sticks closely to the story, making only such changes as are to be reasonably expected from a movie. But the 2010 edition, starring David Suchet as Hercule Poirot, cries out for revenge.

Appointment With Death concerns the murder of a horrible, sadistic woman, a former prison wardress who married into money and was left a filthy rich widow. Her hobby is tormenting her step-children and screwing up their lives. The mystery isn’t so much who killed her as who didn’t.

Well, said the 2010 screenwriters, let’s change all that! So the wretched woman’s husband’s still alive, he’s an archeologist, and he loves her and calls her “Poppet.” Poppet? He calls this two-legged alligator Poppet?

There is something profoundly dishonest about all this. You’re using the name of the author and her title to trick people into watching your movie.

Jaws was a not-so-hot novel that was turned into a great movie because the screenwriters cut out all the crap stuffed into the story by the author, Peter Benchley. The rest of the time, it works the other way: they cut out the author’s good stuff and plug in a lot of hooey.

If you like Agatha Christie and her most famous character, Hercule Poirot, the 1988 Appointment With Death is worth your while. If you like watching train wrecks, check out the 2010 version.

A Book I Wrote–But Never Read?

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They say a little mystery is good for you; it spices up your life. Well, here’s my little mystery–and it’s still unsolved.

At various places on the Internet, I’ve found references to a book called The Lion’s Share, by Julia Kent… and Lee Duigon.

Gee, I don’t remember writing that.

I can’t find out what kind of book it is: only that it seems to have been published in 1988 by Pinnacle Books. I, too, had books published by Pinnacle around that time.

As for my co-author, Julia Kent, I haven’t been able to find out anything about her, either. There’s a Julia Kent who’s a musician, but it can’t be her; she doesn’t look anywhere near old enough to have been writing a book with me in 1988.

Maybe I’m just not using the right search terms. I dunno. It’s really puzzling. Did Pinnacle somehow turn one of my rejected manuscripts into a book, and not tell me about it? Maybe Julia Kent knows.

It would really cheese me off if there was a bad book out there with my name on it. Then again, it might be a really good book to which I’m not entitled.

If you can provide any information that might help solve this mystery… let me know!

 

A New Kind of Fantasy

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Sometimes I think I would enjoy writing a fantasy novel in which the lead character is a coward and an idiot who can’t do anything right. For instance, the Knight turns to him and says, “Soon the battle will begin.” And Mr. Screw-up answers, “What? What did you say? Did you say battle? Man, no way–I’m outta here!” Think Bill Paxton in Aliens or True Lies, and you’ve got exactly the kind of character I mean.

Or, “Sir, did you not know that this is Camelot, and the stronghold of King Arthur?”

“Camel lot? Like you can buy used camels here? Fooey! And what’s this king, Arthur Whatsisname? King of what? Why can’t anyone around here talk sense?”

This could be fun. But it could also get very tiresome: the writer would have to take care not to cross the line. And of course, in addition to the fun of shaking up fantasy cliches, there would have to be a point to the story.

I think some of you can probably guess what that would be.

Here’s hoping you all had a nice Thanksgiving.

 

Did I Write That?

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I’ve been reading a book I wrote circa 1988 and published in 1990–and what I wrote has shocked me.

Mind Stealer was the last of four horror novels I wrote for Zebra Books during the 1980s horror boom. At the time, I didn’t know it would be the last.

I was never terribly proud of it because they changed editors on me and the new editor made a mess of the book. I had to work like crazy to restore some semblance of readability.

Mind Stealer is the story of a special, hush-hush management training program run by Japanese consultants somewhere in the North Carolina wilderness. Back then, America’s business community worshiped everything Japanese–especially their insanely fanatical devotion to their employers.

So I wrote about that. And I wrote savagely. I wrote raw. I read it now and wonder, “Why was I so angry? What was in my heart, to make me write like this?” I’ve found in it no glimmer of redemption, and I don’t remember writing any such thing into it.

If that was who I was then, and God has heard my prayers and changed me so that I can hardly recognize my own writing from that age of my life, then I give Him thanks and rejoice. If I had stayed the man whom I discern in the pages of Mind Stealer, I’d have burned out like a highway flare. The fire would have consumed me.

I would write that story very differently today, if I had to write it at all. But I’m sure I don’t have time for it.

A Helpful Hint for Writers

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Charles Laughton sometimes had trouble getting into the character he was playing. When that happened, he suffered agonies. So did the producer and director. Laughton was usually the star of the movie, and when he stopped, the whole show had to stop. That could get very expensive.

On occasion, Laughton broke out of the jam when he suddenly “found the man.” Someone else, often a real person, would become for him the character he was trying to play. By using this real person as his model for the character, Laughton would be able to play his role. He was a great artist, but don’t ask me to explain how thinking of the real-life Edward VIII suddenly showed him how he should play Claudius the Roman emperor.

I use a similar method when a character won’t come alive for me. If you’ve tried to write fiction, here’s a trick that might come in handy.

Most of my fictional characters don’t need any special help to come to life, but there’s always somebody who can’t quite make it. In The Glass Bridge, which I’m currently writing, Lord Chutt suddenly came alive when I “found the man” in British actor John Nettles, who plays Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby in Midsomer Murders. I sincerely hope I don’t have to pay him for this: but as soon as I imagined Nettles playing Lord Chutt in a movie, I had the character–bingo! Worked like a charm.

I often do this with a book I’m reading. When I read The Lord of the Rings, I “see” and “hear” Strider/Aragorn as Charlton Heston. Elrond is Leonard Nimoy, Saruman is Vincent Price, and so on. This makes my reading experience much more vivid; and I’ve learned to do it in my writing.

So, to those of you who are taking a crack at writing fiction, try envisioning your story’s characters as played by some of your favorite actors.

It works for me.