Top Ten Things I Know About Rewriting

by Alexandra Sokoloff

I am in teaching mode (I know, always, right?) because I am teaching this weekend, at the Black Diamond Romance Writers Retreat in gorgeous Sonoma, California. 

I think the best thing anyone can tell a new writer is that old saying, “Writing is rewriting.”

Before I started writing novels, I worked as a theater director, a Hollywood story analyst, and a screenwriter. All of those jobs have given me some pretty useful perspectives on rewriting and editing. So I’ve put the best things I know into one of those ever-popular Top Ten lists:

1. Cut, cut, cut.

When you first start writing, you are reluctant to cut anything. Believe me, I remember. But the truth is, beginning writers very, very, VERY often duplicate scenes, and characters, too. And dialogue, oh man, do inexperienced writers duplicate dialogue! The same things happen over and over again, are said over and over again. It will be less painful for you to cut if you learn to look for and start to recognize when you’re duplicating scenes, actions, characters and dialogue. Those are the obvious places to cut and combine.

Some very wise writer (unfortunately I have no idea who) said, “If it occurs to you to cut, do so.” This seems harsh and scary, I know. Often I’ll flag something in a manuscript as “Could cut”, and leave it in my draft for several passes until I finally bite the bullet and get rid of it. So, you know, that’s fine. Allow yourself to CONSIDER cutting something, first. No commitment! Then if you do, fine. But once you’ve considered cutting, you almost always will.

2. Read your book aloud. All of it. Cover to cover.

The best thing I know to do to edit a book — or script — is read it aloud. The whole thing. I know, this takes several days, and you will lose your voice. Get some good cough drops. But there is no better way to find errors — spelling, grammar, continuity, and rhythmic errors. Try it, you’ll be amazed.

3. Find a great critique group.

This is easier said than done, but you NEED a group, or a series of readers, who will commit themselves to making your work the best it can be, just as you commit the same to their work. Editors don’t edit the way they used to and publishing houses expect their authors to find friends to do that kind of intensive editing. Really.

4. Do several passes.

Finish your first draft, no matter how rough it is. Then give yourself a break — a week is good, two weeks is better, three weeks is better than that — as time permits. Then read, cut, polish, put in notes. Repeat. And repeat again. Always give yourself time off between reads if you can. The closer your book is to done, the more uncomfortable the unwieldy sections will seem to you, and you will be more and more okay with getting rid of them. Read on for the specific kinds of passes I recommend doing.

5. Whatever your genre is, do a dedicated pass focusing on that crucial genre element.

For a thriller: thrills and suspense. For a mystery: clues and misdirection and suspense. For a comedy: a comedic pass. For a romance: a sex pass. Or “emotional” pass, if you must call it that. For horror… well, you get it.

I write suspense. So after I’ve written that first agonizing bash-through draft of a book or script, and probably a second or third draft just to make it readable, I will at some point do a dedicated pass just to amp up the suspense, and I highly recommend trying it, because it’s amazing how many great ideas you will come up with for suspense scenes (or comic scenes, or romantic scenes) if you are going through your story JUST focused on how to inject and layer in suspense, or horror, or comedy, or romance. It’s your JOB to deliver the genre you’re writing in. It’s worth a dedicated pass to make sure you’re giving your readers what they’re buying the book for.

6. Know your Three Act Structure.

If something in your story is sagging, it is amazing how quickly you can pull your narrative into line by looking at the scene or sequence you have around page 100 (or whatever page is ¼ way through the book), page 200, (or whatever page is ½ way through the book), page 300 (or whatever page is ¾ through the book) and your climax. Each of those scenes should be huge, pivotal, devastating, game-changing scenes or sequences (even if it’s just emotional devastation). Those four points are the tentpoles of your story.

7. Do a dedicated DESIRE LINE pass in which you ask yourself for every scene: “What does this character WANT? Who is opposing her/him in this scene? Who WINS in the scene? What will they do now?”

8. Do a dedicated EMOTIONAL pass, in which you ask yourself in every chapter, every scene, what do I want my readers to FEEL in this moment?

9. Do a dedicated SENSORY pass, in which you make sure you’re covering what you want the reader to see, hear, feel, taste, smell, and sense.

10. Finally, and this is a big one: steal from film structure to pull your story into dramatic line.

Some of you are already well aware that I’ve compiled a checklist of story elements that I use both when I’m brainstorming a story on index cards, and again when I’m starting to revise. I find it invaluable to go through my first draft and make sure I’m hitting all of these points, so here it is again.

STORY ELEMENTS CHECKLIST

ACT ONE

* Opening image
* Meet the hero or heroine
* Hero/ine’s inner and outer desire.
* Hero/ine’s arc
* Hero/ine’s ghost or wound
* Inciting Incident/Call to Adventure
* Meet the antagonist (and/or introduce a mystery, which is what you do when you’re going to keep your antagonist hidden to reveal at the end)
* State the theme/what’s the story about?
* Allies
* Mentor (possibly. May not have one or may be revealed later in the story).
* Love interest
* Plant/Reveal (or: Setups and Payoffs)
* Hope/Fear (and Stakes)
* Time Clock (possibly. May not have one or may be revealed later in the story)
* Sequence One climax
* Central Question
* Act One climax

___________________________

ACT TWO

* Crossing the Threshold/ Into the Special World (may occur in Act One)
* Threshold Guardian (maybe)
* Hero/ine’s Plan
* Antagonist’s Plan
* Training Sequence
* Series of Tests
* Picking up new Allies
* Assembling the Team
* Attacks by the Antagonist (whether or not the Hero/ine recognizes these as being from the antagonist)
* In a detective story, questioning witnesses, lining up and eliminating suspects, following clues.

THE MIDPOINT

* Completely changes the game
* Locks the hero/ine into a situation or action
* Can be a huge revelation
* Can be a huge defeat
* Can be a “now it’s personal” loss
* Can be sex at 60 — the lovers finally get together, only to open up a whole new world of problems

______________________________
ACT TWO, PART TWO

* Recalibrating — after the shock or defeat of the game-changer in the Midpoint, the hero/ine must Revamp The Plan and try a New Mode of Attack.
* Escalating Actions/ Obsessive Drive
* Hard Choices and Crossing The Line (immoral actions by the main character to get what s/he wants)
* Loss of Key Allies (possibly because of the hero/ine’s
obsessive actions, possibly through death or injury by the antagonist).
* A Ticking Clock (can happen anywhere in the story)
* Reversals and Revelations/Twists. (Hmm, that clearly should have its own post, now, shouldn’t it?)
* The Long Dark Night of the Soul and/or Visit to Death (aka All Is Lost)

THE SECOND ACT CLIMAX

* Often can be a final revelation before the end game: the knowledge of who the opponent really is
* Answers the Central Question

_______________________________

ACT THREE

The third act is basically the Final Battle and Resolution. It can often be one continuous sequence — the chase and confrontation, or confrontation and chase. There may be a final preparation for battle, or it might be done on the fly. Either here or in the last part of the second act the hero will make a new, FINAL PLAN, based on the new information and revelations of the second act.

The essence of a third act is the final showdown between protagonist and antagonist. It is often divided into two sequences:

1. Getting there (storming the castle)
2. The final battle itself

* Thematic Location — often a visual and literal representation of the Hero/ine’s Greatest Nightmare
* The protagonist’s character change
* The antagonist’s character change (if any)
* Possibly allies’ character changes and/or gaining of desire
* Could be one last huge reveal or twist, or series of reveals and twists, or series of final payoffs you’ve been saving (as in BACK TO THE FUTURE and IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE).

* RESOLUTION: A glimpse into the New Way of Life that the hero/ine will be living after this whole ordeal and all s/he’s learned from it.

———————

So, anyone have a top few rewriting tricks for me (and my class?)  I’m always looking!

– Alex

Screenwriting Tricks for Authors

WELCOMING NEIL CROSS

By Stephen Jay Schwartz

 

If you only read American crime fiction you might not be familiar with Neil Cross, but, trust me, he’s a big deal in the U.K.  A successful television writer and the author of a growing number of tight, psychological crime dramas, Neil is currently enjoying the excitement of seeing his latest novel find publication in the U.S. 

BURIAL, a compelling, psychological story of one man’s descent into the darkness of his own conscience, was published by Forge Books in March of 2010.  It has been called ‘Terrifyingly scary . . . brilliantly written in taut, humorous prose, while being exceptionally well observed and paced’ by the Daily Mirror, and, ‘His scariest and most satisfying yet . . . What it doesn’t tell you about the perverting, abasing power of guilt isn’t worth knowing’ by Time Out.

Neil was lead scriptwriter for series six and seven of the acclaimed BBC spy drama series Spooks and is the creator of the forthcoming BBC crime thriller Luther, which is scheduled to appear on BBC1 in 2010, starring Idris Elba.  I’m very happy to host Neil here today.

Stephen:  Neil, I have to apologize for not having read your work until recently, when my editor handed me an advanced copy of BURIAL and said, “You HAVE to read this author!”  I read the book and I truly could not put it down, nor did I want to.  What makes BURIAL different from the rest of your work, and do you think these differences built the bridge that enabled this book to “cross the Pond?”

Neil:  Well, thanks for the generous words. To be honest, in some ways Burial is typical of what I write.  Perhaps the cardinal difference between it and my earlier novels is actually how I’m perceived as a writer.

For quite a while I was marketed as, and therefore considered to be, a“literary” novelist. But I never accepted any distinction between “literary” fiction and “genre” novels, just between good books and bad books.  I wanted to ensure that readers knew me for what I am, which is a suspense novelist. I’m proud of that.

All that aside, with Burial I felt that I’d learned to tell the story I wanted to tell in the best, most suspenseful way I could.

People keep telling me it kept them awake at night, which is immensely gratifying. I love to think that I can frighten a reader, move them, excite them….make them think: Just one more chapter before I go to sleep.  I can’t think of a higher calling than that.

Stephen:  The plot of BURIAL is launched from one simple mistake, an assumption on the part of the protagonist, Nathan, that he shares the guilt of murdering a young woman with a man he barely knows.  I won’t spoil the incident for our readers, but I can certainly see how Nathan has been led to believe that he is equally responsible for the death.  The story then becomes a psychological examination of Nathan’s sense of guilt, and all of his actions going forward, for many years, are predicated on this terrible secret he keeps.  What drew you to this material?

Neil:  In general, I’m fascinated by how easily we make the transition from one moral realm to another; by how effortlessly an ordinary human being, almost any human being, can behave like a monster. It really doesn’t take much. Ask Stanley Milgram.

But what really horrifies and fascinates me isn’t so much that wickedness happens…it’s what comes after. It’s that you somehow have to live with yourself.  Everyone knows how it feels to lament their own behaviour — things they did or said in the heat of the moment, perhaps after one drink too many; things they now bitterly regret.

So how must it feel, to wake up and remember not that you insulted your best friend or were unfaithful to your spouse…but that you did something truly horrifying, something that could never be justified or forgiven?

Simply by committing such an act, you became another kind of being. But you still have to get up and shower and go to work. You still have to lead a life, one in which you hope nobody ever knows, or ever finds out what you did: not because you fear for your freedom, but because you couldn’t endure the shame of the people you love knowing what you’ve become.

This happens to real people, every day. It’s happening to somebody in your town right now, maybe the person behind you at the lights this morning. I wanted to write a book about it, and that’s the place Burial came from.

Stephen:  Bob, Nathan’s “partner in crime,” is an eerie individual.  What was the inception for this character?  Have you ever met anyone who so fanatically studies the paranormal?

Neil:  I’m a rationalist with a mechanistic world view….in the daytime.  At 2 a.m., alone in the dark, with the wind in the trees outside, my thinking is entirely different.  Basically, for reasons I can’t guess at, I grew up fascinated by and terrified of ghosts. At forty-one, I’m still fascinated by and terrified of ghosts.

I’ve spent a lifetime studying the subject, and I can happily recount the most rigorous and plausible scientific, psychological and cultural interpretations for most apparently supernatural phenomena. But that doesn’t stop me being scared of the dark.

So although I don’t write autobiographical fiction, there’s definitely a fragment of me in Bob.  And Nathan’s guilt-ridden, obsessive fear of the dark is entirely mine — an autobiographical  sketch from my own life as it was, twelve or fifteen years ago, when I lived alone in a fifth floor apartment in a London tower block.

Stephen:  Despite all the unnerving things that Nathan does—his uncomfortable stalking and wooing of Holly, the dead girl’s sister, and the duplicity he exhibits at his workplace—I still end up liking him and wanting him to succeed.  I want him to be happy.  Why do you think that is?

Neil:  I’m fascinated by how certain novelists beguile the reader into becoming a kind of accomplice — a shudder of confederacy I experienced first and most utterly when I read Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr Ripley.  In that remarkable novel, the author makes no attempt whatever to excuse Ripley’s homicidal behaviour…but we still want him to get away with it.

Ever since, I’ve been trying to work out how and why — and I’ve been trying to replicate that feeling of complicity in my readers, so I’m very happy you felt the way you did.

I don’t think I can give you a definitive explanation of how, not yet —I’m still learning this stuff. But one thing I’ve learned is that making it work on the page requires a deep trust in the reader. Another thing I’ve learned is that the reader is smarter than I am, and usually at least one step ahead of me.

Stephen:  There’s a real tempo to BURIAL, and I don’t think it’s all represented in the plot.  I think you’ve created a dilemma that drives the psychology of the story beyond the confines of a simple three-act structure.  The stakes are much greater than whether Nathan goes to prison or not.  Because of the trusting relationship he’s built with Holly, we sense that the consequences of his failure would absolutely crush her, and this would be worse for Nathan than if he were incarcerated.  So, your psychological dilemma and your plot crisis intersect in the climax.  First of all, could you comment about the way you approached handling the psychological versus plot elements of the book, and secondly, do you outline and plot your books carefully, or do you just sit down with a concept and write until you’re done?

Neil:  I think psychology and plot are the same thing. Nathan is who he is and he did what he did. The way those two things intersect is the story called Burial which, in the end, is all about love.

At the outset of writing a story, I’ve got a moderately good idea of where it’s going, or at least where I want it to end up. But in order to keep me excited the route I take has to be flexible.  If I outline too much, things start to feel kind of fixed…and once a story feels fixed, it’s a short hop to stagnation. So usually I scribble down a few notes — a rough beginning, a rougher middle, a downright crude end.  Then I just dive in and get on with it. If there’s research to be done, I do it on the fly, often trusting it to coincidence. ( I always seem to stumble on the right article or hear the right news report at exactly the right time.)

I’ve settled on this working method — if you can even call it that — by way of a lifetime’s trial and error. Unquestionably, it’s not for everyone: I get lost, I get stuck, I get sleepless nights. I stare at my laptop with a baleful eye.

But somewhere, right at the back of my head, part of me seems to know where I’m headed, if not quite how to get there.

Stephen:  Do you think your experience writing television has in any way influenced your style and technique? 

Neil:  Writing  screenplays is a much more methodical and structured affair; but not quite as structured and methodical as some of those “how to” books would have you believe.

Each discipline informs the other — for instance, learning to write for the screen taught me a lot about the frugality of structure. But writing novels taught me a great deal about the practicalities of characterization…which is equally significant.

Actually, in the end it seems to me that character, action and structure are essentially the same thing.

Stephen:  When did you leave the UK, and how did you end up in New Zealand?

Neil:  When I was young, I read (and re-read, and re-re-read) the science fiction novels of Harry Harrison. In those cherished, used paperbacks, the author’s biography listed some of the places he’d lived:  America, England, Italy, Denmark, Ireland. It also listed some of the places he’d visited, which seemed to include pretty much everywhere.

Having at the time been pretty much nowhere, this notion dazzled me. I grew up thinking: that must be the best part about being a writer…you get to live anywhere you want to.

Although my wife and I met, married and had kids in London, she’s a New Zealander. She and I visited New Zealand several times together, but I only needed to be here about ten minutes before I fell in love with it.

At the same time, I’d grown wholeheartedly sick of London. By then I was a full-time writer. Remembering that childish fascination with the nomadic Mr  Harrison, I thought: I’m a writer. The best part about that is, I get to live anywhere I want to.

So we upped sticks and emigrated.

We’ve been here for seven years now. I continue to set my books and TV dramas in England, and work takes me home several times a year. I’m always happy to be there; being away from London rekindled my love for it.  The secret to maintaining that relationship is that, London and I give each other plenty of space. It’s a long commute, but a good compromise.

Stephen:  Are you planning on doing a U.S. tour for BURIAL?

Neil:  I’d love to; any excuse to spend some time in the U.S. But I don’t think it’s going to happen this time round — not least because I’ve got so much work to do.

Stephen:  Will there be other Neil Cross novels published in the U.S.?

Neil:  I certainly hope so. Captured was published in the U.K. this year.  Hopefully it’ll be available in the U.S. sometime soon.

Stephen:  What’s in store for Neil Cross in the future?

Neil:  Luther, my new BBC crime drama, is due to screen in Britain very shortly— and hopefully in the U.S. shortly thereafter. It stars the Wire’s Idris (Stringer Bell) Elba, who you won’t be surprised to hear is truly extraordinary in the title role. I can’t wait for people to see it.

I’m working on a number of movie projects — one in England, one in NewZealand, one in L.A. My adaptation of M.R James’s classic Victorian ghost story Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come to You is about to go into production, screening in the UK Christmas 2010.  I’m writing a six-hour sequence of historical dramas for the BBC, and developing a number of other returnable series. Plus, I’m about half-way through, and very excited about, the next book.  (It’s still just “the next book” because I’m damned if I can think of a good title.)

Stephen:  Thanks, Neil!  I can’t wait until “Next Book” hits the stands!

Okay Murderati, let’s give Neil a little love…

Have you ever read…..?

By Brett Battles

Every time someone asks me that question, I know the answer is probably going to be no. I cringe sometimes, wondering what author’s name they are going to throw out at me, and how stupid I’m going to look when that “no” slips from my lips. It’s inevitable.

See, not only are there just too many books to read ‘em all, but, personally, I have some gigantic holes in my reading history.

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve pretty much been reading solidly since about fifth grade. At different points in my life I’d read a couple books a week. (I realize there are some of you out there who read almost a book a day. Wow. That has never been me.) There have also been points in my life – mainly during particularly stressful periods when I had a day job – where I was lucky to read a book a month. But no matter what, I always have a book I’m reading.

Thanks to my father, I started my reading life in the world of sci-fi. He was, and continues to be, a huge fan of the genre. I ripped through Asimov’s FOUNDATION series (trilogy at the time I started), through various books by Arthur C. Clarke, and nearly everything by Robert Heinlein. I read James White, a few by Phillip K. Dick, and bits and pieces of all sorts of others.

For a while the only thing I would let myself read was sci-fi. I remember one birthday my mother giving me a Western novel. I’m sure I said, “Thanks,” but I never read it. I was a purest. And, by definition an idiot.

Eventually my horizons broadened, and I started reading thrillers and adventure stories – almost everything by Alistair MacLean, THE EAGLE HAS LANDED by Jack Higgins, BLACK SUNDAY by Thomas Harris, and then, of course, the works of Robert Ludlum.

And as I grew older still, I’ve come to enjoy books of many different genres, but those holes remain. For example, because of my sci-fi fanaticism in my teens, I missed out on the whole pulp crime/intrigue world of fiction. Why? Because a) I just didn’t even know about it, and b) if I had I probably would have said, “Where’s the spaceship?”

By missing that chunk of our collective history, I had missed some of the greatest writers of our time. I know, I know. I should be taken out and shot. But before you pull that trigger, know that all of that has been changing over the last decade. Slowly at first, but really picking up speed now.

And thanks to the 31st Vintage Paperback Collectors Show & Sale here in L.A. held a few weeks ago, I’m moving into light speed catch up mode! If you’ve never gone to a classic paperback show, you should. They are unbelievable! Thousands of old crime and thriller and adventure novels. And –tapping into that old first love of mine – tons of vintage sci-fi stuff, too!

I left the show with 138 books. That’s right. 138.

Now, admittedly, that number is cheating a little. I met up with someone who had offered to give me a box of books they didn’t want any more. Turned out to be a total of 100 books, most of where were part of the Edward S. Aarons’ ASSIGNMENT: series. There are 48 books in the series, I am now the proud owner of 44 them, with duplicates of most. Couldn’t be happier.

But beyond this wonderful gift (thank you, Michael & Jodi!), I purchased 38 more. One goal was to fill out missing parts of the MATT HELM series I didn’t own. Got some, still need more (but that means more happy searching in the future). Other finds were: THE MAN WITH MY FACE by Samuel W. Taylor, PERRY MASON THE CASE OF THE HESITANT HOSTESS by Erle Stanely Gardner, RUN SILENT, RUN DEEP by Edward L. Beach, THE SINGAPORE EXILE MURDERS by Van Wyck Mason, and LOVERS ARE LOSERS by E. Howard Hunt (yeah, that E. Howard Hunt.)

I also gave into that sci-fi boy inside and got about a dozen or so 50s era sci-fi novels.

Kid in a candy shop? Yeah, that’s me. 

But the best part is once I get through all of these, then when someone asks me “Have you ever read…?” I won’t tense as much waiting for the name. Sure, the answer is still going to end up being “no” more often than not, but the percentage will be less. And I’m working on tilting the scale the other way!

So, holes in your reading history? Are you doing something about it? And who have you read, but wish you had read sooner?

The Big Fear

    First, a bit of BSP: I recently decided to try an experiment in electronic publishing. My friends J.A. Konrath and Lee Goldberg have had some success putting stuff up on Kindle and other e-pub formats. So I thought I’d stick my own  toe in the digital water, so to speak,  and put my novel STORM SURGE on line, for those of you who are electronically enabled. In keeping with the idea that e-pubbing should be cheap, it’s only $1.99. 

     You can find the Kindle version HERE, and Smashwords has other formats HERE. Let me know how you like it. I’ll report back,  as Joe and Lee have done, on my experience with the experiment.

     Now, on with the show:

It’s spring again. Gorgeous outside, despite the yellow clouds of pollen hanging so thick in the air that it looks like we’re under some sort of chemical warfare attack. It’s warm, the trees are blooming, it’s a great time to be alive. 

So naturally, perverse critter that I am, I’m thinking about fear.

Recently, while looking for something else,  I stumbled across the work of photographer Joshua Hoffine, who’s done a stunning series on childhood fears:

 

  If you click through (and I recommend that you do), be warned that some of these images are extremely disturbing and some are definitely NSFW.

 

 (All images used with the permission of the photographer, who also invites you to visit his blog).

 

 

     A short time later, I was having a conversation with my wife, who’s currently reading a Nevada Barr book that features spelunkers–people who explore caves for fun.  As she described passages about exploring narrow passages deep in the earth, crawling along chutes too narrow to even sit up or turn around in, I recalled one of my own childhood terrors.

   When I was growing up, there were a number of storm drains and drainage pipes in my neighborhood:  long, narrow concrete tubes to divert storm run-off away from the roads and people’s yards. I remember looking down one of those pipes and wondering what it would be like to be crawling  through one of those and get stuck halfway through, unable to go forward or back, where no one could reach you or hear your cries, where the only thing to do would be die a long slow horrible death, alone in the dark….

    I was a lot of fun as a kid, believe me. But you will never,  EVER get me into one  of those chutes underground.

    It  started me thinking about how everyone’s afraid of something:

    I was talking to my girlfriend the other day, and I asked her, “what are you afraid of?” And she said, “I’m afraid we’re growing apart, that you’ll leave me some day and that I’ll die alone. What are you afraid of?” and I said “Bears.” -Mike Birbiglia

    And how, despite the fact we hold many fears in common, each of us has, locked within us, the one Big Fear, the one thing we just can’t abide: 

‘The worst thing in the world,’ said O’Brien, ‘varies from individual to individual. It may be burial alive, or death by fire, or by drowning, or by impalement, or fifty other deaths. There are cases where it is some quite trivial thing, not even fatal.’ George Orwell, 1984.

  And then I started thinking about my current WIP. One of the antagonists is a former military specialist in PSYWAR–psychological warfare. His specialty involved things like this. His job was to scare the enemy, literally, to death. And now, he’s come home, bringing his private war with him, wielding his favorite weapon: stark terror. 

   And so,  in the interest of research, I want to hear what it is that scares other people. So tell me….what are you most afraid of? I’m not talking angst here, or worry. I’m talking about the one thing on earth that even thinking about makes you cold. The thing that can send you skitttering backwards across a room to get away. What’s your “worst thing in the world”?

    Sharing time, boys and girls…

You are what you are

 

In my family, I’m known as the Trip Daddy.

When arrangements need to be made, passports checked, flights booked, everyone rounded up to get to planes/trains/ferries on time, I’m the one in the family who does it.  I go around the house banging on doors, telling people it’s time to get up so we can get on the road.  I herd people along, get them to gulp down breakfast, and ask if everyone’s got their toothbrushes packed.  In short, I’m the horrible family nag.

I became aware of how irritating that can be during a recent trip to the US Virgin Islands.  I was trying to hurry everyone along to catch a ferry, and my son blurted out, “God, will you just chill out, Mom?!!!”

That hurt.  I was just trying to get everyone where they needed to be, and no one appreciated it.  Yes, they wanted to catch the ferry.  They wanted to get moving.  But no one was doing anything about it.  And the one person trying to do something about it — me — was getting criticized for trying to make things happen.

I decided, then and there, to adopt a completely new attitude: Whatever.  So what if we didn’t make the ferry on time?  So what if no one got to do what they’d planned to do?  It wasn’t my problem.  I was just going to lie back, read my book, and wait for someone else to take charge and be the Trip Daddy.  

And that’s what I did.  The next morning, the family had plans to go into Charlotte Amalie to go shopping.  But noon came and went and no one got out of bed.  Whatever.  I just enjoyed myself sitting on the porch, reading.  Eventually family members started stumbling downstairs to eat breakfast.  They surfed the internet.  They hung out.  I didn’t make a peep.  It got to be late afternoon.  The ferry was long gone.  

Whatever.

The family started whispering to each other.  I’m sure they were wondering: “What’s wrong with mom? Why isn’t she nagging us to move our butts?” 

Evening rolled around.  We had reservations for a steak dinner on the beach.  I didn’t say a thing; I just kept reading my book.

The earth was beginning to shift.  My husband said, “Um, maybe we should get going…”

Hunh.  Whatever.  I was no longer the Trip Daddy, so let someone else round up the troops.

Hubby got more insistent.  Maybe he was hungry; maybe he’d sensed that in this new vacuum, someone had to take charge.  So he got everyone moving.  I cooperated, obedient as a cow, but I was through being the leader of the pack.  I was tired of it, and tired of having to be the nag.  Because, let’s face it — no one likes Trip Daddies.  

Even though they know they need one.

I resolved to adopt Whatever as my new motto.  No longer would I be responsible for the family’s daily vacation schedule!  No longer would I feel the pressure of making sure that everyone was happy and well-fed!  It was every man for himself. I was just going to look out for myself.  

 I luxuriated in irresponsibility.  The next two days, I ate breakfast alone when i wanted to, got up when I wanted to.  I didn’t tell anyone what to do or where to go.  We missed ferries.  We got to dinners late, and ended up at the lousy tables that no one wanted.  Not my fault, not my problem.  I was learning to be a slacker, and it felt pretty darn relaxing.

But two days later, I realized our vacation cottage had run out of bottled water, as well as milk and bread and fruit and eggs.  Someone had to catch the ferry into town and go shopping. I looked around at my dear family, who hadn’t even noticed that the refrigerator was empty, and realized that if I waited for one of them to notice the problem, the last ferry would be long gone for the day.  And we’d have no breakfast in the morning.

I caught the ferry and went shopping.

My brief experiment in slackerhood was over.  I was back to being the Trip Daddy and the obsessive-compulsive mom, back to automatically taking inventory of toothpaste and oatmeal.

What I discovered from this vacation experiment is that it’s not easy to change one’s basic nature.  From the time I was a little girl, I was irritatingly responsible. Occasionally, I’ve tried to cut loose and be spontaneous, but I just can’t keep up the charade. I look at the calendar and can’t help but think of deadlines.  I obsess over everything that can possibly go wrong, and I plan accordingly.  And because I do, no one else feels the need to.

No matter how much I may want to change, I’ve accepted that this is who I am.  I’ll never be the wild woman who throws on a backpack, abandons the family, and disappears without warning into the jungles of Borneo.

 But if you want your refrigerator stocked and dinner on the table every night, I’m your gal.

Going in the opposite direction

by Pari

Last Thursday, I began a two-month contract to help the Albuquerque Youth Symphony with a three-day alumni reunion. The work involved sits squarely with much of my former professional skill set in PR. Ladies and gentleman, I know how to put on an event. (That’s probably why I didn’t get hives or balk at chairing LCC Santa Fe.)

But starting a job out of the house – even though it’s short-term – is playing emotional havoc with my image of myself as a writer, as a professional writer. The fact that I don’t have a book in the publishing pipeline, and might not for who knows how long, isn’t helping.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m still writing. I’m actually more productive now than I’ve been in many years past. I’m sending out short stories, writing freelance articles. But do I have the right to call myself a “professional writer” when that production isn’t supporting me, isn’t paying for my kids’ tuition at a pricey private school, isn’t resulting in new books with covers you can see on the side of this blog?

I don’t know . . .  

Many of the authors I know work full-time at other jobs. They carve time out at night and in the early morning hours to keep their fiction going. I’m going to have to learn how to do that again, to balance it all in a way that I haven’t done for fourteen years. (How did Allison and so many others do it for all those years?)

I’m not whining here. My priority – my children’s education – is right where it should be. I’m also incredibly grateful to have this consultant job. It’s fun; I enjoy most of the tasks. It’s nice to be out of my home, having contact with all kinds of people, doing something I’m very good at. Feeling confident and making money at the same time.

But creatively it feels like I’m going backward, like everyone around me is jumping to full-time writing. And here I am, going in the opposite direction.

Somehow that feels like a defeat . . . like I’ve failed.

So today I’d love some perspective, a way to frame it so that I stop beating myself up. I’m sure many of you, dear ‘Rati, have had similar times in your life when you have had to readjust your self-image after years of going in one particular direction.

Please, share your experiences with me. Your comments always illuminate in such positive and thoughtful ways.

Thank you.

unfinished books…

by Toni McGee Causey

Have you ever started a book that everyone glowed about and you just could not get through it? Maybe it hit the NYT list, maybe it got starred reviews from everyone and God, but it made you roll your eyes by page five and by page twenty-five, if you made it that far, you wanted to spot check the rest of the readership for actual brain waves? Maybe–and I know every one of you has known this one–maybe it was considered a classic, a masterpiece, and you secretly hated it. 

Welcome to the weirdest aspect of the entertainment world: guilt for not enjoying the material.

I don’t know of any other art form or entertainment where the participants feel actual guilt for not “getting” the material or enjoying it as happens with books and reading, and I think that’s significant, culturally. How are we creating readers, if we browbeat them into thinking that every book needs to satisfy some internal English critic or create an essay on themes and comparative merits? What does that mindset say about how well books and reading are marketed to the general public? 

Maybe there are other concerns that create frustration — dollars spent, time spent, but those issues create aggravation, not guilt. It’s the guilt that stumps me. (Not that I haven’t felt it–but that I’ve allowed myself to feel it.)

I started thinking about this during the week after hearing Julia Keller‘s NPR piece on the unfinished book, where callers talked about why leaving a book unfinished bothered them so much. Some people admitted to trying to read some “great” work for years, before finally giving up. 

One woman (and I’m paraphrasing) explained that she felt particular guilt about books because when she couldn’t get all of the way through it, it sat there on her shelf, mocking her. If it had been a TV show, she could have just turned the channel or if it had been a movie, she could have left and never worried about it again, but the book sat there, on her shelf, evidence of her failure. And my first thought when I heard this was, “Why not give the book away?” 

Why do we feel the need to turn reading into some sort of gauntlet, the literary equivalent of the Navy SEALs Hell Week? 

Why is it not okay to recognize that where we are in our lives influences what we want to spend our time doing? reading? That mood and crises play as much a role in what we’re able to comprehend as our education? And where is it taught that if it’s fun, it must not be good for us, and therefore, isn’t of value? When did reading become the equivalent of taking medicine?

Sometimes, a work just doesn’t speak to us. And that’s okay. Sometimes, we’re in the wrong mood, and nothing that work could do, nothing that it had done well for others, would work for us. The work didn’t change between all of those accolades and our read. But most of the time, instead of saying to ourselves, “This isn’t what I’m in the mood for,” or “This isn’t working for me,” we instead feel like we’ve failed. That somehow, we aren’t smart enough (or current enough, or well read enough) to make the connections that obviously everyone else made, so what’s wrong with us? And that’s where the guilt starts.

This issue goes deeper than just the “literary vs. genre” wars that crop up every now and again. It goes all the way back to middle and high-school, where we often teach reading with the enthusiasm of a sadist–they are going to learn what “good” literature is, dammit, whether they can stomach it or not. And in the process of being absolutely determined to show young readers what “good” literature is, we manage to turn millions of them off reading forever, because they cannot relate. They don’t “get” it, or they are simply bored, and they don’t have enough points of reference in their lives to realize that literature encompasses an extremely wide-ranging cornucopia of choices. 

In one of the talks that I give to grade schoolers, I ask them to name their favorite TV shows or their favorite movies. We usually write down the list and when we have a nice collection, I point out that someone wrote those stories. Then we move on to favorite books, and for every one they name in a genre, I try to name two or three others that have something in common, that I think the kids will love. They’re almost always in shock, that there are these worlds out there. (Except, of course, for the one or two bookworms in the room, who are finally the ones who are cool, because they read.)

Now, I am all for great literature being taught, and all for vastly different types of stories, from genre to whatever it is that we call literary nowadays (which, frankly, is a misnomer–because many genre books can also be literary–these terms are not mutually exclusive). I’m glad to see that many reading programs in schools include current popular books, Caldecott or other winners, but I wonder if we aren’t also missing a huge opportunity when we don’t include things like favorite popular books in the different genres? I have bought at least ten copies of Ender’s Game, for example, and given it to boys over the years and every single one of them not only loved it, but started reading other books afterward, when they hadn’t been readers before.

I think one of the reasons the Kindle and now the Sony and the iPad are going to continue gaining in popularity is that people don’t feel judged for what they’re reading, because no one can see. Many people don’t want to be judged, don’t want to be taken as frivolous, or seen reading something less “important” than a great literary classic.  

So I wonder, how has the publishing industry and marketing of books failed to erase this perception of reading? Is there a solution? (Or is the solution in process–the upswing of popular YA literature?) Is there anything that could be done to show how much fun reading can be? And finally, fess up — what book did you start and not finish? (Are you glad you didn’t? Or do you plan to try again?) Or was there a book you were forced to read (for school) and as much as you anticipated loathing it, ended up loving it? [I have way more questions than answers today! I’m hoping our backblogger ‘Rati will chime in on why these things bother you.]

For me, the “put it down, feeing guilty for it” book it was Follet’s PILLARS OF THE EARTH. I had heard such rave RAVE reviews, I bought it without reading any sample; I barely started it, and my eyes just kept wandering off the page. I just could not hook into the story, as much as I admired the quality of the writing. I suspect I was just not in the mood for it at the time, so I will try again, later. Eventually.

 

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggety Jig

By Cornelia Read

Our beloved friend Louise Ure is in all our thoughts this week. Please consider making a donation to the American Cancer Society in her husband Bruce Goronsky’s memory.

 

Well, this will be the second time I’ve written this post this morning. I’m lying in bed at my pals Sue and Glo’s house in Glendale, California, and didn’t do the intelligent thing of asking them how to log onto their wireless service before I tried to save and publish my thoughts to Murderati today. O joy, o rapture. But maybe it will make more sense this time (at least I hope so.)

The bed belongs to their son Malcolm, who’s away on a sleepover, and it’s made up with extremely cozy Star Wars sheets, so there is definitely some mojo in being wrapped in likenesses of Han Solo and Princess Leia.

I’ve been on book tour since Monday, and it’s a wonderful thing to be back on the green lush west coast when everything in New Hampshire is still very grey and mouse-colored. I’v been blessed to see dear friends at every stop along the way. I’ve been given rides to and from every airport, and beds to sleep in, and have gotten to break bread with people I love at every meal–in Seattle, in Corte Madera and Berkeley and Piedmont and San Mateo, and now here in LA.

In Seattle, Fran and Lillian blessed me with a mojo-rich leather biker jacket that belonged to their friend Lou, who died seven years ago of breast cancer. The only condition of the gift was that the little pink ribbon pin on the left lapel must always stay in place, and I am honored to oblige them in that.

The only thing that’s felt a little off about my travels this time is me. Normally, I’m pleased to get up and speak to a crowd at the drop of a hat. I’m very lucky, especially in this line of work, to have no nerves whatsoever about public speaking. This time, though, I haven’t felt as solid about what to say about my work. I think this is partly because my third novel is a tougher thing to encapsulate in a polished way. The issues in it go too deep for me, it’s too personal, and it’s become a divisive thing within my family. This is the book I worked on as my marriage fell apart for once and all, and it’s also done a good bit to shatter the fragile peace of my immediate family’s long held truce of denial. It’s a dark book, though I’m pleased and honored that the Richmond Times-Dispatch called it “at once heartrending and hilarious.”

And, too, seeing so many wonderful friends on the west coast has driven home how solitary the life I’m returning to on Monday is, by comparison. I lived in Berkeley for nine years before lighting out for New Hampshire, and I was blessed with a wonderful collection of beloved friends and colleagues in the Bay Area. I miss them all a great deal.

This year has been the first in which I lived alone, ever. I met my husband a couple of months after leaving college, when I was still sleeping on a friend’s dorm room floor at Williams. I haven’t ever been the sole grownup in a household, and I’m discovering all the ways in which I’m not very good at being said grownup, when everything’s on me. Parts of it have been really cool, but most days there are at least a few instances where I feel like a twelve-year-old masquerading as someone who knows what she’s doing in a forty-seven-year-old body.

The best part of the year has been the realization that I am supporting myself and my daughter with my writing alone, the scariest part my uncertainty that that will remain true, given the tenuous nature of this line of work. My friends have sustained me through all of this, even though most of them are now 3000 miles away from the zipcode I currently claim as home.

If you’ve found me a little more shy and hesitant at signings this time out, all of this is what’s been going through my head. And I have one more gig today, 3:30 p.m. at The Mystery Bookstore, 1036 Broxton in Los Angeles. I’d love to see you there if you’re local at all.

So, ‘Ratis, who are the people who’ve sustained you at points in your life when everything changes, especially when if feels like there’s no context at all?

At Zoe’s kind behest, the name of the book is Invisible Boy, my publisher describes it as follows:

The smart-mouthed but sensitive runaway socialite Madeline Dare is shocked when she discovers the skeleton of a brutalized three-year-old boy in her own weed-ridden family cemetery outside Manhattan. Determined to see that justice is served, she finds herself examining her own troubled personal history, and the sometimes hidden, sometimes all-too-public class and racial warfare that penetrates every level of society in the savage streets of New York City during the early 1990s. 

Madeline is aided in her efforts by a colorful assemblage of friends, relatives, and new acquaintances, each one representing a separate strand of the patchwork mosaic city politicians like to brag about. The result is an unforgettable narrative that relates the causes and consequences of a vicious crime to the wider relationships that connect and divide us all.

and the cover looks like this:


 

20,000 Leagues Under The Sea

by JT Ellison

If this is your first time to Murderati this week, I’m sorry to tell you we’ve lost one of our own. Louise’s husband, Bruce Goronsky, lost his battle with cancer on Monday. Words are simply inadequate. Please consider making a donation to the American Cancer Society in his name, and send prayers and love to Louise.

 

You’ve all heard the term “underwater.” The service industry refers to it as  “being in the weeds.” It’s reserved for that moment, the perfect storm, when there is simply too much going on for one person to handle.

Yep. That’s me this week. Home from tour, FINALLY, thinking I’m going to get some time off. Not really time off, per se, since I have a book due May 1, but a little breather? Maybe a chance to catch up on Gossip Girl? Read the massive stack of People Magazines that have taken root next to my chair? Talk to a couple of friends? My parents? Heck, my mom literally started pouting yesterday when I had to get off the phone after a quick five minute call because we haven’t had a chance to just plain chat for almost a month.

Suffice it to say, I’ve had a lot on my plate. And yes, the vast majority of it I put there myself, which means I’ve got a damn sore backside from kicking myself.

The tour went great. The highlight, by far, was getting to travel with my good friend, the brilliant and talented Erica Spindler. We rocked the West Coast and Denver, and had a great time. Special thanks to everyone for dinners and drinks and rides during our coastal stay (Keith Raffel, Ken Isaacson, Michelle Gagnon, Jason Pinter, Maddie James, Steven Steinbock (though I think I bought HIS drink ; ) Jim Scott Bell… ) I even saw my dear friend Lee Child and managed not to get sucked into the vortex known as the Camel. Denver was wonderful, because I got a chance to see my family, and a couple of my dearest friends. D.C. was the same, I got to meet Katherine Neville and Robbie Goolrick, which was incredibly cool, and I made a new friend, Pickles, the Easter Bunny from Borders. Though poor Randy got food poisoning and we got stuck in Baltimore whilst he was ill. I feel sorry for our neighbors.

The Tennessee Mountain Writers conference in Oak Ridge, Tennessee was wonderful. I taught two fiction sessions, Building an Idea into a Novel and Murder Your Darlings: the Art of Revision. And I spoke to the plenary session, giving a long, convoluted speech about the joys and dangers of social networking. As always, teaching gives me insight into my own writing, and while I’m still not the best teacher in the world, I’m at least getting the hang of it so I don’t have the night terrors before I go in.

And then I came home. March was gone. The book did great. My sanity, not so much.

It’s that damn To Do List, you see.

Priority 1 – My AAs are here for my October book, THE IMMORTALS. AAs, Author Alterations, are Harlequin’s version of page proofs. It’s my very last chance to see the book before it goes to press. Being a bit of a perfectionist, I do my absolute best to catch all the little mistakes: copyedits that didn’t make it in, repeated words and phrases, typos and the like. It’s painstaking work. I’ve marked the manuscript with mini-post-its every place there’s a change, purple for copyedit fixes, yellow for my changes. I’ll compile them all into a spreadsheet and mail the whole thing to New York (today!) So there’s one thing off my plate.

Priority 1.5 – Golf started this week. Randy and I made an executive decision to join a golf club this year. Playing golf on the Nashville public courses has always been good enough for us – the municipal courses around here are fantastic. But the price has gotten completely out of control. A single round of 18 holes for two, with a cart, on the public course, was running us $90. That’s just plain insanity. When we looked at the number of times we played, and the number of times we wanted to play, we realized that it would actually be cheaper to join an actual club. And said club has 27 holes and a strong women’s league, which I promptly joined.

We had our first outing Wednesday morning – and I’ll be playing every Wednesday morning from here on out. I joined the group for a couple of reasons – 1, so I would have some accountability, would make myself get off the computer and actually get outside in the fresh air and get some exercise. You can burn 1,000 calories during a sedate round of golf. And 2, the ongoing attempt at socialization. Being an introvert means I’m perfectly content sitting in the house and not interacting with people, and I have to force myself to go out and do these things. So it should be good for me.

Yes, I took 3 hours away from the multitude of things on my To Do list (one so long it’s actually giving me hives) and played golf. I played like hell, but at least I wasn’t on the computer or staring at words. One of my personal goals for the year was to drop ten strokes off my game, and by God, I’m committed.

Priorities. I Has Them.

Granted, I haven’t read a book since I downed Robbie Goolrick’s A RELIABLE WIFE (fantastic book) last month, I have a stack o’stuff that needs dealing with, two books to read and blurb, oh, and that naggy little thing called a DEADLINE coming up.

But you know what? Life is too damn short. I’m the one who put all this pressure on myself, and I’m going to take it off. It’s my new mantra. I will not feel guilty for doing something that’s good for me. Everyone around me will benefit. My priorities have changed.

This has been coming for a while, but Bruce’s death this week really hammered it home for me. I have been trying to fathom Louise’s loss, and I can’t. I’m in tears right now just writing about it. And I’m getting to an age where loss is going to become a part of my vernacular. So I don’t want to lose a minute of the time I have left.

I hope you’ve taken some extra time this week to love the ones you love. Not just be with them, but truly reach out and let them know just how much they mean to you. Let me take a moment and thank all of you for reading this blog. It’s a true honor to write for you.

And now for some good news. April 16, our very favorite editor Neil Nyren will be here at Murderati for his fourth State of the Industry interview. It really couldn’t come at a better time – the industry is changing, and we couldn’t ask for a more more expert opinion on what’s going to happen. So plan to show up, comment, ask questions, etc. If you have something pressing that you’d like me to ask him, leave it in the comments. Otherwise, Happy Easter to those who celebrate!

Wine of the Week: In honor of our friends who just celebrated Passover: Covenent Cabernet Sauvignon, a Kosher Napa Valley wine. I want to go to this vineyard – I’ve heard delighful reports.

Just Foolin‘

Zoë Sharp

 

Before I start, for those of you who don’t know, the beloved husband Bruce of fellow Murderati member, Louise Ure, lost his battle with cancer this week and very sadly passed away. Our deepest sympathies go to Louise and all the family. I’m sure she’s been inundated with cards and notes and emails, but if anyone would like to make a small donation to a cancer charity in the name of Bruce Goronsky, that would be a lovely gesture.

 

This is not the post I was intending to write this week – that I’ll save for a later blog. It wasn’t until I looked at the calendar and clocked the date that I realised I was going to have to come up with something more suitable. What does it say about me that I end up with the April Fool’s Day post, I wonder?

 

 

So, I thought I’d report some facts that are definitely foolish, and should be untrue, but they aren’t. Or are they? I could have made up some of these – maybe even all of them. After all, we’re writers of fiction. Making Stuff Up is, after all, what we do.

 

 

I’m inviting you all to point out any which you think are made up, as opposed to genuine, or just to let me know a similar ridiculous fact that’s either made you laugh or want to throw things.

 

 

I should point out at this juncture that the ones I haven’t made up are all quoted from Simon Carr’s two wonderful collections, THE GRIPES OF WRATH, and SOUR GRIPES. If you don’t own copies, buy them now. I have also interspersed these with some great photos from the excellent Perfectly Timed Photos website. If you haven’t come across it before, it’s definitely worth a visit next time you need a pick-me-up.

 

 

Instructions for the Dumb

 on Sainsbury’s Peanuts

Warning: This product contains nuts.

 

 

on Dremel Electric Rotary Tool

This product not intended for use as a dental drill.

 

on Rowenta steam iron

Warning: Never iron clothes on the body.

 

on smoke detector

Do not use Silence Feature in emergency situations. It will not extinguish a fire.

 

on Bowl Fresh

Safe to use around pets and children, although it is not recommended that either be permitted to drink from the toilet.

 

 

on Harry Potter broom

This broom does not actually fly.

 

on Nytol Sleep Aid

Warning: May cause drowsiness.

 

on twelve-inch-high storage rack for CDs

Do not use as a ladder.

 

on vacuum cleaner

1  Do not use to pick up gasoline or flammable liquids.

2  Do not use to pick up anything that is currently burning.

 

on McDonald’s coffee

Warning: Contents may be hot.

 

on baby stroller

Remove child before folding.

 

on bottle of dried bobcat urine, made to keep rodents and other pests away from garden plants

Not for human consumption.

 

 

on hairdryer 

Never use while sleeping.

 

on massage chair

Do not use without clothing … Never force any body part into the backrest area while the rollers are moving.

 

 

on flushable toilet brush

Do not use for personal hygiene.

 

 

Or how about these – true or false?

A four-foot-high boy of twelve tried to rob a grocery store armed with a sawn-off doubled-barrelled shotgun. He had no previous convictions. His lawyer said, “Since the offence his behaviour has been exemplary.”

 

 

The term British Isles is said to be offensive to those in the Republic of Ireland and it is proposed to rename them as the Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA).

In Australia, Pastor Daniel Scot was charged, tried and found guilty of incitement against Muslims for a lecture explaining why he had fled his home in Pakistan.

 

 

A nursery school teacher defended her class against a machete-wielding assailant; she received injuries requiring several hundred stitches and compensation of £80,000 ($112,000).

A woman police officer was held back from promotion on account of her gender and received compensation of £500,000 ($700,000).

A female merchant banker who was told she had “nice waps” by her employer received compensation of £1.2 million ($1.68 million).

 

 

A French couple called Renaud called their daughter Megane. The state prosecutor felt the child would be teased in later life for bearing the name of the Renault Megane car and so took them to court.

 

 

Insurance company Zurich Municipal produce an annual list of some of their more outrageous claims for compensation:

—a motorist who claimed he did not see a traffic roundabout in daylight, despite there being a large tree in the middle.

—a shoplifter who sued because she fell downstairs while running from the scene of a crime

—a man who claimed to have injured his arm after slipping on steps owned by a housing association: he had jumped out of a window to avoid being caught with another woman when his girlfriend returned home unexpectedly

—a man who tried to sue a local council for making the decision to close a public lavatory. He argued he was owed a new pair of trousers, for reasons you really don’t need me to go into, do you?

 

 

So, what do you think, ‘Rati? Have I made all of these up, or none of them, or just a few? Do you have any similar ridiculous examples of political correctness gone mad, or the compensation culture, or risk assessments taken a step too far? Let’s have ’em!

This week’s Word of the Week is dunt, which is a lovely word with several meanings. It’s either (of ceramics) to crack in the oven because of too rapid cooling; (in dialect) the disease of gid or sturdy in sheep; or (in Scots) a thump, or the wound or mark made by a thump.