Newton Said

He got his original ideas by standing "on the shoulders of giants." Let's follow his lead.

Or even better: Snatch raw truths fresh from eternity.

Story Alchemy

I outline my stories, because I need to know where I'm going or I get lost and lose heart and quit. But I advise my students never to mistake the outline or story map with the journey.

A story is not a sum of all its parts or a simple string of scenes. A story has emotional pull. A story creates a sense of satisfaction and completeness. This comes from forcing a character to make a moral choice: to act or not to act. The key behind the choice is the main character's internal change. It's a character who changes deep down inside who moves us emotionally.

And therein lies the magic.

Is it good enough?

I'm having a heck of a time making any progress on my full-length story GREEN TARA. It's driving me crazy. My deadline's the end of the month and I'm barely out of the starting block. The problem is, I'm writing this draft for someone else to read and evaluate. If this was my first draft, I'd be gleefully blazing through the story because my primary goal would be to simply string together the story and allow the characters some room to emerge and take charge. But in my fourth draft I'm plagued by all those devilish fears. Will it be picked up? Is it good enough?

The antidote to fear--I know from experience--is to get back to basics and trust the process. Here's how it works:

START (Getting bum into chair can be the toughest part.)
1. Plan the energetic drive of the next scene.

2. Write the scene as quickly as possible. (Or, in my case, rewrite.)

3. Keep going without going back.

ON THE NEXT DAY (Get bum into chair.)

• Reread the most recent new scene--NEVER EVER go back to scenes written more than one day before--and edit for clarity and flow and dramatic juice.
• Move on to the next scene - repeating the above process (1-3), except it's easier because we've already gotten past the most difficult part, START.

If the goal is to write one new scene per day, I'm always editing one scene from the previous day and writing one new scene. So the progress is one back, two forward: netting one new scene per day. Unfortunately, I'm really behind, so I'm in the three scenes back, six forward category.

View from my Hammock

Two days ago I knew I had a last of season opportunity for a swing in my hammock, courtesy of this glorious maple tree above my head and a sister hickory holding up my feet. I took the better part of an hour to snap shots while the light was good. The characters in my novel celebrate the life of the natural world. I felt it would be disingenuous for me to do less.

Philosophy aside, the benefits were clear. The fresh air filled me with so much energy I was able to easily tackle a tricky part of my Green Tara rewrite. I cut three scenes, reordered the ten scenes before and after the cut scenes, and revised one significantly to fit the new content. Yes, I still have to string them all together and revise for flow, but the outlining work is done. I have a plan.

Today the temperature dropped 20 degrees and most of these leaves are on the ground. And I have a solid plan to take me through Act I.

Writing Sound

My screenwriting students are bringing examples of cinematic storytelling to class and on Wednesday Chris brought in JURASSIC PARK so we could focus on the sound of T-rex in his first film appearance. It was so interesting to hear about how the sound designer mixed together the sounds of lions, tigers, alligators and elephants to create the wholy original, never-before-heard T-rex voice.

David Koepp, the screenwriter who adapted Crichton's original story, didn't describe the T-rex's sound in any detail. But what he did do was to build suspense by introducing the sound first as a vibration and then as footsteps. From Koepp's 1992 screenplay, posted on dailyscript.com:

IN THE FRONT CAR

TIM-'Can you feel that?'

Tim leans over to the front passenger seat and looks at the two plastic cups of water that sit in the recessed holes on the dashboard. As he watches, the water in the glasses vibrates, making concentric circles - -

--then it stops --

--and then it vibrates again. Rhythmically.

Like from footsteps.

BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

It was three more pages of suspense in the rainy night inside the tyrannosaurus paddock. A rope without goat, goat leg flung on the windshield, louder vibrations, twitching electric wires, an adult dashing from car to cinderblock outhouse, seeing the T-Rex, moving flashlight beam that really gets him going, until finally the beast opens its mouth wide and--
ROARS.

Wow!

Color Intoxication

In my last couple of posts I made excuses for why I've posted so infrequently in the last month. Yes, I did have a big writing deadline, and after that I was busy evaluating mid-term assignments. Yes, I really did injure my collarbone, or rather all the muscles around it and up into my neck. But the real reason I can't concentrate in my den staring at a computer screen is a miraculos process called photosynthesis.

It's affected me with a serious case of "color intoxication" and I can't resist filling my eyes with the brilliance that mother nature's been storing up all spring and summer. I'm looking out my back door for as long as the leaves hang high on the trees.

Not Writing Excuse

I fell off my bike two weeks ago and strained the soft tissue around my left collar bone. It hurts. I'm not writing much. But I'm so antsy to get back to my Y.A. novel Green Tara.

Yesterday's Tricksters