The Timeless Story

Shakespeare’s play “Romeo and Juliet” and Verdi’s opera “Rigoletto” were originally set in Italy, around the 16^th century. How amazing, then, that you can move either of them four centuries forward, to an iconic location like Las Vegas or New York, and watch the same characters unfold the same story, conveying the same emotions and themes. If the heart of a story is true, it can happen anywhere, any time. It’s eternal.

Baritone Zeljko Lucic admitted that it made no difference to him whether he played Rigoletto as a jester in Mantua or a comedian at a strip club: the character stayed the same. He’s an archetype: a father whose cruelty and vengeance destroys his beloved daughter, just as irrational hatred destroys Romeo and Juliet or Tony and Maria.

How timeless is your story?

Could you move your story to ancient Rome or futuristic Marstopia and reveal identical truths? Wouldn’t it be great if you could?

·         Reduce your story to fundamentals. It doesn’t matter whether the protagonist is a NASA

astronaut or a Greek philosopher. What basic dilemma does she face, and how will the plot

skeleton resolve that? (Incidentally, this is the best approach for a logline, if you’re working on

that.)

·         Free your plot from specific conditions or circumstances. If those disappear, so does your plot. So do your characters. Eternal stories come from the human foibles and passions that endure wherever people are.

·         Unearth the changeless conflicts of your story, like love versus duty, or survival versus freedom.  These may not be obvious. But they’re in there. If they’re really not, discover them. Add them. Build your story around them.

Tip: Dig deep to compose a story that isn’t about this group of people, but all people everywhere.

The truths that unite everyone make novels haunting. Isn’t that what you want for yours?

Flowers and Focus

Madison’s Garden Expo houses hundreds of people, from horticulturists hungry for spring to bemused guys seeking valentine gifts. Attractions range from copper-covered gingko leaf earrings to gigantic black and orange diesel tractors. It’s easy to get lost in the possibilities, especially if it’s your first time in this world.

Even if you’re writing a sequel, it’s still your reader’s first time with these characters at this moment. Because it’s new, they can easily get lost, and it’s your job to help. Maybe they’d like a map?

But unless you’re creating a historical or fantastical world, wandering feels more fun than reading a map. Wouldn’t some sort of guide be more helpful? So you can make your way through this new world?

No matter what point of view you choose, your narrator is a guide. A charming and illuminating one. Your narrator supplies running commentary on the landscape, whether it’s a garden show, space station, or bath in Pompeii just before everything erupts.

·         Don’t let your narrator reveal too much. Good guides let folks discover things on their own.

·         Do have your narrator foreshadow what’s significant.

You can also guide readers through choice and arrangement of details. While this can be trickier, it can be even more satisfying, especially for those who prefer to read more actively than passively.

·         Don’t expect readers to connect all the dots on their own. To visualize your map, they need hints that are neither obvious nor obscure.

·         Do provide clues that feel organic. Accomplishing this in your first draft is quite difficult. Much easier to set up what you’ll need after you’ve written “the end.”

Either way, provide focus rather than expecting readers to navigate without assistance. That separates fiction from reality. Good novels encourage exploration without confusion or overstimulation. Using the details, narrator, or both, supply a map for the world of your novel.

Tip: Provide just enough guidance so readers don’t get lost.

Figure skating and Your Plot

It’s not everyone’s sport. Maybe you’re no fan of glitter, Puccini (which many skaters choose), or a sport reminiscent for many of what they dislike about ballet. Despite all that, as a novelist you might want to at least notice the metaphor.

Take all those lutzes and loops.  Most of us never quite understand the distinction between them, whether skaters execute three turns or four, and if the entrance is difficult or ordinary. (How do the judges arrive at those “magical” numbers, anyway?) It’s like asking a reader, or perhaps even a writer, to differentiate turning points from pressure points. To the observer, the machinery isn’t relevant: only the final effect.

Plot works the same way. The average reader isn’t hunting down the details a writer cleverly inserted in order to exploit later. Readers don’t pause to wonder if that event caused this outcome. And no reader will articulate, “Wait. This is right at the end. Isn’t it supposed to be the most exciting part?”

But just as in figure skating, you needn’t be a judge to notice the painful, disheartening mistakes. So like a skater, you should avoid disappointing your audience. Here’s how.

·         Don’t bite off more than you can chew. If you can’t generate effective transitions, for example, don’t create a scenario requiring an endless succession of them.

·         Don’t stuff the middle with obvious gimmicks. Readers notice attempts to add fluff or distract with irrelevant plots or characters.

·         Don’t fizzle out at the end. You may be exhausted. But if your audience is still there, your book has to be, too.

·         Do plan. You can get through the first draft or wait until after. At some point, though, you’d better notice how everything fits together. If you don’t, someone else will.

Tip: Leave your audience saying, “I don’t know how she does that. But, wow, that was among the best tricks I’ve ever seen.

The cheers will make the whole thing worth it.

“Downton Abbey’s” Back

When last Sunday’s episode ended, it seemed that it’d only just begun. How did fifty + minutes fly like that? Again, there’s food for novelist thought here.

·         Rich characters. An impractical earl, a questionably charming new footman, and a morally impeccable convict defy every stereotype. These characters—and all characters—emotionally engage us by transcending type. In this episode, every character, however minor, is both individual and representative, both specific and universal. That’s every storyteller’s goal.

·         Interwoven subplots. Each character’s tribulations must impinge on every other character’s. This weaves not a series of brief, tangentially related stories but one gorgeously unified tapestry with no visible evidence of the separate threads that produced it.

·         Moral dilemma. This has driven story since the origin of the form. The classic conflict is a character passionately loving someone with a different ethical code. Whether the moral center is how to run the estate, maintain honor, or treat the employees, there’s genuine trouble if the beloved does not agree. This is in fact the very worst trouble of all, because how can the protagonist choose between love and morality. What terrible trouble! And trouble drives stories. Otherwise, there’s no point in telling them.

·         Cultural upheaval. Context for individual dilemma not only adds a layer of texture but deepens understanding of the characters inhabiting a world. No one ever lives in a vacuum. Culture impinges on everyone—and always has.

Novelists can find much to gnaw on in the unfolding of this story—not to mention the bliss of following “Downton Abbey’s” characters through the twists and turns of their lives.

Tip: Train yourself to study the machinery of story in everything you watch and read.

Not at All yet Completely New

At a Mount Holyoke College commencement speech, Pulitzer Prize winner Anna Quindlen warned that “Every story has already been told. Once you’ve read ‘Anna Karenina,’ ‘Bleak House,’ ‘The Sound and the Fury,’ ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ and ‘A Wrinkle in Time,’ you understand that there is really no reason to ever write another novel.” Now that’s discouraging! But then she added this: “Except that each writer brings to the table, if she will let herself, something that no one else in the history of time has ever had.”

How true. And it isn’t just that each writer has an individual voice. Unless that voice captivates—and instantly—then we’ve heard it before, and it’s yesterday’s news.

Writing about death, dragons, and denial? Nothing new there. But watch what D. L. Burnett does in this passage from “In the Kingdom of the Dragons”:

“Death wasn’t as easy as Gaspotine the Dark expected. He tried denying it, choosing to believe this a fever-induced nightmare. Or perhaps he’d stayed in the Continuum too long and exhausted his flesh. Shortly he’d return to his Cavern of Diamonds, strong and virile.

The Niede, a primordial instinct like hunger and thirst but ninety-three times worse, demanded his spirit rejoin his body. He tried again and again until he’d lost half his mist.

He must really be dead.

Gaspotine thrashed his tail. The tip flew off. Shocked, he froze. These deteriorations had never happened before. But then he’d never died before, either.

Code decreed another Dragon must devour his remains, easing his spirit’s permanent transition into the Continuum, preventing him from returning to dead flesh. Tallasha the Resplendent had done that, but without diminishing the Niede.

Dragons shouldn’t die, especially the greatest current rider, Gaspotine the Dark.”

By creating a new world for us, Burnett offers insight into our own world. Imagine a Continuum where we survive after we’ve died, where we can ride silver waves and see the future. Imagine the lifeless body struggling to merge with the surviving spirit. Imagine feeling yourself too powerful—too special—for death to claim?

These are a dragon’s feelings. But how many humans have experienced them? More than empathy entices here (and empathy for dragons is pretty special): It’s the voice. Snappy sentences set off long ones; strong verbs like “thrashed,” “flew,” “froze,” and “devour” propel this forward.

The other strength here is harnessing the external to convey feelings. This wouldn’t work if Gaspotine whined about weakness, frustration, and anger. Instead, Burnett supplies the concreteness of “fever,” “Diamonds,” “hunger,” “thirst,” and the specificity of “ninety-three.” Those images lay a foundation for the shocking cannibalism of the Code and grip of “the Niede.” Burnett’s voice creates this new world—and our empathy for this tormented dragon.

Tip: It’s not necessarily your job to offer something “new.” It’s your job to use your voice to make whatever you describe feel completely new.

Full or Frantic?

 Like many Americans and Brits, last Sunday I tuned in to “Downton Abbey” with anticipatory pleasure. And don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed it. But I also sensed two issues I’d never noticed before, both relevant to the craft of the novel.

The first is self-consciousness. Who knows what the writers or cast actually think, but it almost seems as if concern about rivaling past performance swallowed the freshness and vitality of past seasons. This kind of pressure often surfaces when you let yourself worry if you’ll ever outdo the success of the last great season, scene, or sentence.

Once you enter “worry” mode, you might just decide that the solution is to add more. More of what? Why not everything? This can generate a deluge of detail, sub-plots, minor characters, imagery—everything but the kitchen sink, and if you’re desperate enough, maybe that, too. Here’s the danger:

Tip: Blurred focus makes for perilous pace.

That’s true not only for scenes but also individual sentences. The too-much-of-everything

syndrome can generate a painful irony: Clutter feels simultaneously frantic and tedious, hectic and monotonous. How do you solve this?

·         Remind yourself that for most writers, early drafts don’t start out great. But if they’ve been great before, they will be again. Then you’ll have the confidence to streamline.

·         Streamline not by offering tons of everything, but one or two or maybe three additions that really work, whether it’s a detail, sub-plot, image, or clause.

·         Emphasize what matters. That sounds easy, but if you want readers to grasp significance, you must first identify it yourself. That can be less obvious than you imagine.

·         Finally, offer an uncluttered view of what you want readers to see. That means you’ll have to cut. And that’s okay. Because “Downton Abbey” acquired the fame it enjoys by doing lots of things right. That means it’s highly likely that it will do most things right again. Guess what? So will you.

Resuming the Routine

“I write when I’m inspired, and I see to it that I’m inspired to write at 9 o’clock every morning.” ~Peter De Vries

Right now the media are bursting with resolution tips. Naturally. If your resolutions are worth anything, it’s tough to keep them, particularly following the holidays. During this time most of us—in every way—have been less rather than more disciplined than usual. But before you throw up your hands in abject despair about writing at least as well or much, give yourself a break, then a push, in as quick succession as possible.

Vacations, wonderful as they are, always make the first day back to work taxing. It’s not just that you have to catch up; you have to remind your mind how to do this, much the way you remind your muscles what to do if you’ve been deprived of exercise for a while. The good news is that eventually you do the work, reclaim your mind, restore your muscles.

Writing’s the same, and a few reminders may help you recapture your routines more quickly and comfortably.

·         Don’t fight.

The harder you are on yourself, then the longer it will take.

·         Don’t demand more until you catch up.

If you ran a mile every day before, you can’t run five miles if you didn’t run at all for three whole weeks.

·         Do fastidiously record all the great ideas you encountered when not thinking about your writing at all.

These can be the deepest, most exciting ones. Take advantage.

·         Do remind yourself that you created your own routine.

It can feel challenging, tedious or both, but it also comforts. You developed this practice because it works for you—and it will again.

·         Do accept that routine matters.

A large percentage of writing quotes remind that the more you treat writing like any other “job,” the better and more productive you’ll be. Here’s Harlan Ellison: “Anyone can become a writer. The trick is staying a writer.”

Tip: The writers who get farthest fastest set goals, and, with needed adjustments, they keep them.