Steal this idea - A cottage industry: prequels

A prequel to "The Maltese Falcon". Why didn't I think of that? To what novel (or movie) would you like to see have a prequel?

How about "The White House's Bell Tolled" where Rick (Humphrey Bogart from "Casablanca") runs guns in Spain and has a showdown with Robert Jordan (Gary Cooper from "For Whom The Bell Tolls") over Maria (Ingrid Bergman)?

What Does a CopyEditor Do?

Okay, I've not been through publishing process, but I ran across this blog entry and thought, hey, I bet a lot of people don't know this. Happy reading.

"The Heat of the Moon" by Sandra Parshall

It begins with a slow drive-by reflection, a mangled basset hound, and screaming child calling for her mommy. It then escalates into a gripping psychological mystery as Rachel Goddard, a veterinarian, questions her own identity and her idyllic life with her mother, a psychologist, and her younger sister, who is following in her mother's footsteps. As Rachel peels away the layers of her past in her search for the truth to who she really is, what she'll do with it when she finds it keeps you flipping pages to the very end. Though Rachel's new man irritated me, there is little doubt that this novel deserved the Agatha for Best First Mystery in 2007. But it's not just a mystery. It has pages lingering in the literary fiction aisle, because it's also about how we establish, create, and perceive one's identity. It is a five star read out of five stars.

OJ is Truly Stranger Than Fiction

Don't know if it was a rerun, but I just watched "Dr. Phil" talk with the Goldman's and the ghost writer for "If I Did It." Won't go on about OJ or the Goldman's. I was more interested in the ghost writer, and the apparent integrity he brought to the project despite his declaration to O.J., "I believe you did it then and still believe you did it." Yeah, he got good money for his efforts, but all believed he made O.J.'s words real and correctly framed a compelling though sickening read.

When I grow up, I want to be a ghost writer. I bet many spirits want their story told.

MMWUC for October 15, 2007

EXERCISE: "Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and relax. No. I really mean it. Close, breath, and relax. Doesn't that feel good. For the next ten minutes, write from any animal's point of view, 'If only my owner would...'" Lassie walked down the aisle between the writers nipping at those who hadn't started to write. Benji patrolled the front row while Beethoven slobbered near the student in the corner. Paulie flew overhead, dropping motivation on unsuspecting writers. Morris the Cat smiled, and then swiped some poor girl's ho-ho. Maraduke bounced Garfield and Odie out of the room. "Freeloaders," he growled. Esmarelda slithered near a group of writers from Maine, imploring them to write with flicks of her tongue like crack of a whip. As the ten minutes expired, the writers gingerly headed for the back of the room to escape to the relative comfort of the cafeteria down the hall. They passed a portly man with strange, slurring British accent and the hundreds of birds perched near and on him.

MUSINGS: My mind wanders a lot. It wanders often in the library where I've been spending some time lately, escaping the household chores, while attempting to study for the Project Manager's Professional exam. It's not going well. My mind wanders a lot. My brain isn't absorbing the material as readily as the memories of all the animals that have appeared in books and movies in my lifetime and that I find calling to me from the library shelves. And yet, when I write an animal story, I can never get the animal to shine on the page like in my mind. My mind wanders a lot, and I find animal traits elusive to capture and make real. I've started Sydney's story a dozen times, but it dies a slow death on the page like the worm that feel out of the sky the other day. Breakfast for a robin, I presumed. The worm wiggled a few times, but the sun shriveled him before my eyes. My mind wanders a lot.

Murder Advice

Gabriella asked the other day about the origin of the phrase "killing your darlings".

Mab Morris did some excellent sleuthing and found the original in "The Yale Book of Quotations". Arthur Quiller-Couch (English writer and critic, 1863-1944) wrote: "Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetuate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it--whole-heartedly--and delete it before sending your manuscript to the press. Murder your darlings." The quote is from the section on the Art of Writing in "On Style" (1916).

There is an important lesson for all of us when we pat ourselves on the back for an exceptional piece of writing. Is it exceptional? Does it belong in the story? Wait a few weeks to answer your own question. It might end up on the floor like all the turkey seques I keep adding to my novels.

Steal this idea - "The Way to His Heart"

Certain bacterias in your stomach make you crave certain foods, like chocolate. What if...

a). Comedy. Her biological clock ticking away, a woman scientist decides to inject the men of her dreams with a bacteria that make them covet the one great food she makes in the hopes that will spur them to love her, only to find out that the grocery delivery guy with a bad accent is really the hunk of her life and is an immigrant scientist from Tysklansksten.

b). Sci-fi. Friendly aliens decide to take over the Earth by getting the entire population addicted to an alien dish that we can no longer resist, but Muslim extremist refuse to eat the unholy dish. Can they save the Earth?

c). Horror. An addictive food turns most of the Earth's population into zombies. (Don't they always turn into zombies craving brains walking deadly slow but always able to catch up to an Olympic sprinter who trips over a moon beam to become their next meal?) Well, maybe not zombies, but a population consumed by only one goal: the acquisition of that food. How do we save ourselves? Think of the rotting mess.

Inquiring Minds Want To Know

The beginning statement on a NANO thread was: "You know you're writing literary fiction when..."

And I snarkily answered: "...you've only sold 2,147 copies of your 1,387 page novel and reporters show up while you're eating dog food out of the can in the back of your yellow Pinto to tell you that you've won the National Book Award, Pulitzer, and Nobel Prize in the same year. And somehow you manage to give them the finger because you just don't care."

But it begs a question. Is litfict just an uber-genre anointed on a genre book ("Mystic River" - a mystery, "For Whom the Bell Tolls" - adventure/war, for examples) that resonates on a deeper level? Can one really write a literary fiction novel ("The Corrections" - a saga) and self-anoint it as litfict and bypass what it really is?

Or are all novels really mysteries where someone struggles with someone for something?

Steal this idea - Instant Series

Feeling a bit lost for NANOWRIMO? Adopt a title; steal the pitch; write the story. Bon appetit.

Title: "Nine One One" Pitch: Nine dead, one murderer, one victim left. Will she live? Or, will she be the tenth victim? Or, will Detective Tim Rhodes arrive in time to save her?

Title: "The Tenth Victim" Pitch: Detective Tim Rhodes leads a crack team of FBI investigators on the trail of serial killer. With nine victims already, has Tim's missing daughter become the tenth victim?

Title: "86" Pitch: Detective Tim Rhodes hunts down a mad killer who scrawls "86" on each victim. Tim believes the message means much more than the obvious. Then, he runs into the next victim, an old classmate and mother to the daughter he didn't know he had until now.

Guest Blog

My fifteen-year-old cockatiel, Sydney, begged for a guest post. Here it is:

Bright lights. Someone comes. It is early. Darkness outside. On my purse, gawd, l love my soft purse, I stretch. Food. Now. Can't they hear me? I've bee yelling politely for ten seconds. Ah, Cheerios. Ah, a cashew. Is it my birthday? Oh, I'm dying of joy. Millet seed. Crunch, snap, pop, snarf. Wait a minute. Every time they give me millet. Wait. Ah, good bowel movement. Where was I? Millet. Delicious, wondrous. Wait a minute. Every time they give me. Ooh. A finger. Oh, I love being on shoulders. Ear lobe. Hey! If I want to nibble, I'll nibble. Damn hand, but the purse is soft. Ooh. Millet. Snarf, gobble, chew. Wait a minute. Every time they. Fresh water. I drink the sweet nectar and shout it's goodness. Ooh. Millet. Ooh. A finger. I can't chose! Up and away on the shoulder again. Yes. To the office. Yes. Ah, that was a good poop. Tissue paper. Get away. Back down on office purse. Bare toes. Attack. Attack. Up and away. No not the kitchen. No I want the office. Not the kitchen purse. Ooh. Millet. Crack, fresh, 2007 is a good year. What's a year? I'm tired. My cardboard box. Darkness. Chewed cardboard is soft underneath. It was a hard morning. I yawn. Yawn. Yawn. Eyes heavy. Sneeze. Sneeze. Ah. Sleep, perhaps to dream. Yawn. I have to remember. Yawn. Remember sleep. Eyes close.

Renaisance Faire Turkeys

My wife and five members of her newly formed recorder group went to the Faire near Charlotte, NC on Sunday to scout out the competition though they are years away from performing in public. (My wife is the merry leader having had a group in Wisconsin for fifteen years.) I stayed home and played housemaid, gardener, bookkeeper, repair man, and writer. She brought me home a roasted turkey drumstick. I gobbled it up in minutes. It was a noble leg, a good leg, a tasty leg. I dreamt of turkeys the past two nights. A gleam of a story not yet ready to be pulled upon is coagulating like the cholesterol plaque in my arteries. Time for more pills and turkey. My mind wanders, and I just hope it finds its way back to my body.

On a side note: What does Buffalo have to do to beat Dallas? Oh, my! What a weird, crazy game.

MMWUC for October 8, 2007

EXERCISE: Columbus Day cancels class, but the writers gather on their own. They do that you know--writing on--despite events going on around them. Downtown, Norwegian descendants fight Italians financed by the Spanish over the right to claim land inhabited by Native Americans who wandered across the Being Sea from Asia 14,568 years ago. I figured out the exact year, ya know. The writers don't care. They conjecture about landing on other worlds with strange beings, the emotional angst of growing up in a two mother or two father family, how to murder someone in a way that hasn't been done before, and what would happen if Bambi really DID meet Godzilla? Somewhere an ape throws a bone high into the sky and hits a butterfly. The dying butterfly flaps no more and causes the mother of all hurricanes to hit Wrightsville Beach on October 19th. It will be just my luck. Chaos.

MUSINGS: I think I've mused too much already. "Close your eyes (unless your driving), take a deep breath (but not if you're in a fire at the moment), and relax (unless you're fleeing a Grizzly Bear in Yellowstone Park). For the next ten minutes, write from the protagonists POV, 'The clown approached...'."

NANOWRIMO

I'm in. Are you? User name is anilyb. (For those who haven't had their cup of coffee, that's my last name backwards.) I have no idea what I'm writing about, but I'm going outside to cut up some firewood with my chainsaw and think up an outline of a story. Chainsaw? Story? Murder? Naw. It's been done to death. Oooo. But what if the tree falls on me. And I'm alone. And it starts snowing. And the chainsaw is out of reach. And my wife has just left to go up north for a week of ice fishing with her brothers. Naw. But I'll figure something out by next week.

New Word Definitions

There just are never enough good words.
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Here are the 2006 winners of the Washington Post Mensa Invitational, which once again asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition.
1. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying (or building) a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period of time.
2. Ignoranus: A person who's both stupid AND an a- -hole.
3. Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which only lasts until you realize that it was your money to start with.
4. Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.
5. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.
6. Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting some.
7. Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, very high.
8. Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
9. Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.
10. Hipatitis: Terminal coolness.
11. Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)
12. Karmageddon: It's when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, and then the Earth explodes and it's a serious bummer.
13. Decafalon: (n. ): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.
14. Glibido: All talk and no action.
15. Dopeler Effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.
16. Arachnoleptic Fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.
17. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.
18. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating.

"Farewell, My Lovely" by Raymond Chandler

The move to read the classics continues. Marlowe is a hard-headed detective in this novel of twists and turns, and which cheats just a bit on the plot. I can't see the pivotal picture at the center of the plot twist, but that's okay. It fits the noir category perfectly with most of the action occurring at night or in a seedy environment filled with booze and more cigarette smoke than fog in San Francisco. The element that nothing in life is fair rings true. One thing I did learn was that slang and product placement erode after sixty-seven years to the point of footnotes. Not as bad as reading Shakespeare, but it is something to keep in mind as you contemplate the latest cool word that will disappear from our vocabulary next week. Someone commented that Chandler swept Hammett out of the room. Perhaps. "The Maltese Falcon" was a better story; this was better written. The Marlowe here is better drawn (and slightly more likable) than the Spade in the "Falcon" book, but not the movie. F,ML is a five star lovely book.

Oral Traditions Database Now Available

The Center for Studies in Oral Traditions at the University of Missouri is offering it to anyone worldwide with an internet connection and a browser. This site contains nearly 500 articles and 10,000 pages, with all of the contents downloadable as pdf files that you can read online or print out as you wish. The entire electronic archive of Oral Tradition is also searchable by keyword or author name, with phrase-based and Boolean searches possible as well.

Thanks Jeannette for the heads up. This could be a great muse tool.

Writing tip for the ages

Monday's writing tip: "Hook your editor with a strong opening sentence to bring attention to your writing." Are we listening?

Can PNS create POS?

If you have POS (Piece of S---) syndrome about your writing, it may actually be PNS (Perfectly Nice Syndrome) that created it, and you just don't realize it. "Follow the highlighted link, follow the highlighted link, follow, follow, follow, follow, follow the highlighted link."

"She's in the castle, you dummies," Toto barked. His nose twitched and his ears stood on end as Dorothy's three companions shushed him. He bit the lion, tasting the sweet meat. No one had feed him in days, and he tired of his situation with the three stooge's.

"Murder on the Mind" by L. L. Bartlett

After a brutal mugging in NYC, Jeff Resnick struggles to patch up his life, accept his new psychic abilities, and attempt to use those abilities to help solve a gruesome murder of a banker in Buffalo, New York. The slim book is tightly written and moves briskly forward, a great asset for any mystery. A former insurance investigator downsized out of a job prior to the mugging, Jeff takes the tantalizing clues his on again/off again psychic abilities provide and combines them with sound detective skills to hunt down the killer until he pushes the killer too far threatening his domestic situation. The main plot is intriguing, well done, and a solid read for any mystery lover. The secondary plot surrounding his domestic situation plodded a bit and lacked depth. Still, "Murder on the Mind" is a four out of five star read for the mystery reader in me. For those mystery readers who like the psychic angle, it might climb a bit higher.

MMWUC for October 1, 2007

EXERCISE: A disheveled writer collapsed into his seat in the classroom. "Sign up for NANOWRIMO starts this evening." The words tumbled out of his mouth to no one in particular. His thoughts centered on a plot that didn't exist, dialogue that hadn't been spoken by characters who hadn't been born, and scenery which coloured the mood and tone of the non-existent story. This year he would do it. Fifty-thousand words and a new novel that can be polished over time. Isn't that the hardest part? Getting down a complete original story. The instructors words crashed through the wall of thought. "Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and relax. For the next ten minutes, write from your protagonists POV, 'The shoestring lay in front of me...'."

MUSINGS: Some people view NANOWRIMO as a fools earned--fifty thousand useless words thrown together in a meaningless rush just to create. Perhaps for some people that's true. But for myself and many others, plowing ahead and reaching that goal provides us with the jump start we need once a year to create another story to refine over time. Two of my three completed novels are NANO winners. One year I wrote 79,000 of the initial 84,000 first draft words of my completed novel of 87,000 words. Another year I wrote 38,000 words of a novel I never finished. Someday I might go back to it, knowing I have the germ of an idea to work with. NANOWRIMO generated nearly a billion words last year. This year, I stake my claim to 50,000 words, and who knows, with a little planning, maybe I'll complete an entire novel. Now where are my notes for the workshop I attended?