Oops!

by Rob Gregory Browne

First, I want to take a moment this morning to offer my condolences to Louise.  As everyone knows by now, she lost her husband to cancer yesterday and I can’t even begin to know what that feels like.  Louise, it’s probably small comfort at the moment, but we’re all thinking about you.  I’m so sorry for your loss.

Those of you who get up at the crack of dawn to read Murderati will note that I’m a little late this morning. Two reasons:  first, I’m working like crazy on a new book and completely lost track of time, date, day of week. Second, my wife and I are gearing up to go to Chicago this weekend.

Why Chicago?  As I said in a previous post, the dream has come true and KISS HER GOODBYE is in the midst of becoming a television series pilot for CBS.  They are in production as we speak, they’re calling it THE LINE, and it stars Dylan Walsh (Nip/Tuck), Michael Rapaport (Prison Break), Terry Kinney (The Mentalist), Sandrine Holt (24, The L Word), and a host of others.

For those interested in seeing some photos of the shoot in progress, a spectator took these shots and posted them HERE.

So, in other words, I’m just so freakin’ busy and crazy with excitement about visiting the set (not to mention prepping to go), that I didn’t even realize that today was my Murderati day until my wife informed me not ten minutes ago.  Sigh.

As a result, I’m going to repost an oldie.  Feel free to kick me in the ass in the comments.

———-

To use an old cliche:  ideas are a dime a dozen.

Truth is, there aren’t all that many ideas to spare. How many times have we seen the same story over and over again, dressed up in new clothing?

A man is accused of murdering his wife, escapes custody and hunts down the real killer.

A daughter commits suicide but her mother thinks it was murder.

Two young teenagers go on a killing spree.

A house/car/insane asylum/ship/airplane/cave is haunted by ghosts. A man/woman/boy/girl/dog/cat is possessed by evil spirits.

A husband/wife/daughter/son is kidnapped and the spouse/mother/father risks his or her life to save them.

A man and a woman meet, hate each other, fall in love, break apart after a huge misunderstanding and finally get back together again.

That last is the plot of many romance books and countless romantic comedy movies.

And you know what?  It doesn’t matter that these ideas are constantly recycled.  Because, as numerous writers have pointed out in my lifetime, it’s not the idea that counts, but the execution.

Or as The Swallows once sang:

It ain’t the meat it’s the motion
That makes your daddy wanna rock
It ain’t the meat it’s the motion
It’s the movement, it isn’t the stock

For example, let’s take a look at movies. I choose movies over books for the simple reason that a) I love them as much as books (but in a different way); and b) it’s much easier to find people who have all seen the same movie.

If we go back to the romantic comedy example — the meet, fall in love, break up, get back together plot line — we could, as I said, point to just about every romantic comedy ever made.

But which ones do we remember?

WHEN HARRY MET SALLY comes to mind. Not because it’s my daughter’s favorite movie of all time (she can quote entire passages of dialog), but because it was a huge, huge hit for everyone involved and most of us have seen it.

But it also comes to mind for another, all important reason:  it is a beautifully written, beautifully executed movie. 

Harry and Sally meet while they’re on the road to New York. Harry’s very opinionated about women and relationships, Sally’s a picky, high-maintenance girl who thinks he’s a jerk and they part ways not liking each other much.

A few years and a couple of relationships later, they meet again in an airport, wind up sitting together on a plane and Harry once again demonstrates what an opinionated jerk he is — only he’s a little more endearing than he was before.

They part ways, only to meet again a couple years later in a bookstore. Next thing you know they’re hanging out together, become great friends and — unknown to both of them, of course, but obvious as all hell to the audience — they begin falling in love.

In the middle of a personal crisis, they finally succumb to their attraction and sleep together. Only Harry, being afraid of commitment, freaks out a little and Sally, sensing his hesitation gets pissed and they stop seeing each other.

The story continues along the usual romantic comedy path, and the two eventually wind up together after Harry races to a New Year’s Eve party to find Sally. And here is an example of where the execution is so important:

Sally at first rejects him. She’s not his consolation prize. But as people are counting down to the new year around them, Harry, desperately in love and wanting to win her over, goes into a speech naming every quirk that Sally has and how much he loves those quirks and wants to be with her for the rest of his life.

Sally, pissed off, tears in her eyes, just looks at him and says, “Now, you see? It’s just like you, Harry, to make it impossible for me to hate you. And I hate you, Harry. I really hate you.”

And then they kiss.

That, my friends, is genius execution.  And with a movie filled with this kind of execution it’s no wonder that people love it.

It ain’t the meat, it’s the motion that makes your daddy wanna rock.

So what are your favorite examples of same old plot but GREAT execution?

The Sounds of Silence

 (Dear ‘Rati Friends,

My husband, Bruce, died yesterday morning, slipping away peacefully in my arms. How can a heart be so full and so shattered at the same time? My words run dry. I had written the following blog post several days ago, unaware that I would have no time to do it today. And unaware that “the other shoe” I was referencing was already dropping. And that my husband’s voice is the sound that isn’t there. Give yourselves a hug today, and send one my way, as well.)

 

By Louise Ure

 

Our days are usually filled with sound. Voices, traffic, music, TV, individual ringtones, jackhammers, birds, pots and pans clanging, a dog’s whine. It’s a cacophony that we’ve become used to, an ordered and expected series of sounds that define our day.

Some sounds are more sudden but less common—squealing brakes, a crash of thunder, a child’s cry– but recognizable enough as part of our world.

In my last blog post I used the phrase “waiting for the other shoe to drop” and it’s that thought—the absence of expected sound–that I was thinking about this week, and how that applies to both lives and our writing.

The term seems to have originated in the mid-20th century, descriptive of a man in a downstairs apartment who is awakened nightly by his upstairs neighbor removing his shoes and dropping them heavily on the floor. The first shoe hits the floor with a loud bang, awakening the sleeping tenant in the lower apartment, who would remain awake until he heard the other shoe drop. In the story my head, (British television? Mid-century American radio?) the upstairs tenant once remembered that he had a sleeping neighbor below, and after dropping the first shoe, took the second shoe off and carefully placed it on the floor, making no noise. The groggy neighbor would then yell, “For God’s sake, drop the other shoe!”

It is the absence of expected sound—the absence of an expected ritual—that gives the phrase such a frisson of power.

In literature, no one used it better than Conan Doyle in the story “Silver Blaze,” which hinged on the famed “curious incident of the dog in the night-time”:

 

Scotland Yard Detective: “Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?”

Holmes: “To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.”

Detective: “The dog did nothing in the night-time.”

Holmes: “That was the curious incident.”

 

The sound that wasn’t there.

I can imagine other actions and plot points that would tweak that tendon waiting for an expected outcome. A slap, but no sound of surprise or pain. What’s going on in there? Is the victim gagged? Is the victim used to such abuse? Or is it nothing more that the thumping swat of a buzzing fly?

A crash outside in the street, but no horns or sirens or voices raised in alarm. Are they dead inside the car? Is the town deserted? Or was it simply a parking brake that didn’t hold on the steep hill?

Like a bolt of lightening without a following peal of thunder, the absence of sound can be as intriguing as what is there. And that goes for dialogue, too. Like real life, what’s left unsaid is sometimes the most important language of all.

What about you ‘Rati out there? Who do you think does a good job of leaving things unsaid, like a shoe waiting to be dropped, in films or books?

 

Schilling, My Inner Diva, and Sandra Bullock

I pride myself on professionalism as a writer.  I meet deadlines.  I (usually) listen to my editor.  I show up to meetings and events on time and sober.  And, as part of this code of professionalism, I make an effort not only to write my books but also to help sell them.  Book tour?   Bags packed.  Signings?  Pens at the ready.  Social networking?  If you’ve been following me online (here or here), you know I’ve lost all trepidation about pouring my guts out on the Internet.

But every once in a while, I’m reminded that I’ll never be a schiller.  I just can’t do it.  This weekend, I took off on my first flight for book tour.  The guy next to me was reading Harlan Coben’s Long Lost.  Any self-promoter worth her salt would have seen the opportunity to gain a new reader.  What do I say?  “He’s great, isn’t he?”  Those promotional bookmarks I keep in my briefcase?  Yep, they’re all still there.

I also have to admit that, as much as I keep my head down as a work-a-day writer, I have an inner diva who occasionally rears her precious head.  I’ll refuse to change that word that irks my editor.  I’ve been known to keep that leisurely scene, the one that doesn’t advance the plot but sure was fun to write (and hopefully read).

I know the pro in me should probably blog today about my new book or at least say something about the tour.  This is, after all, a blog about writing, both the art and the industry.  But you know what?  I was lucky enough to speak last weekend to a room filled with enthusiastic undergrads at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and I’m going to follow a piece of advice I gave them: Write what you want to write.

And, I’m sorry, y’all, but in the middle of the big publicity push, I just can’t bring myself to write about either the craft or the biz today.  What the inner diva wants to write about is Sandra Bullock.
 
As you may know from previous Rati posts (here and here), I have a fascination with both celebrity and sex, and I refuse to chalk either one up to prurience.  Or, at least, not entirely.
 
You’re undoubtedly familiar with the tawdry facts that have put Jesse James, Sandra Bullock, and this gem of a gal on countless magazine covers. 

Michelle “Bombshell” McGee

The tattoos.  The white supremacist connection.  The Vanilla Gorilla nickname.  The additional women who’ve stepped forward, placing James neck and neck with Tiger Woods in the most-women-sexted tourney.  That’s the stuff for the voyeurs.
 
There’s also the human story behind the seediness, and you’ve probably heard most of that as well: the mistress who sold her man out to a tabloid for thirty grand, the intentional timing of the story to coincide with Sandra Bullock’s victory lap, the wince-worthy replays of the accolades Bullock heaped upon her husband as she enjoyed a spotlight that belonged only to her.

 

(At the Oscars, choking up when thanking her mother for allowing her to “have that,” her marriage with Jesse James)

(At the Golden Globes, thanking Jesse “who works so hard, all day, and you get dressed up in monkey suits with people you don’t know… I love you so much, and you’re really hot, and I want you so much.)

(With, gulp, Barbara Walters, gushing about the man who has her back.)

But there’s a reason my inner diva finally had to write about this story today, book tour be darned: I understand why Sandra Bullock might stay with Jesse James.

Didn’t expect that, did you?  Hold on, now.  Don’t throw anything at the computer yet.  Hear me out.
 
Jesse James is a lowlife.  He not only cheats on his wife, but apparently does so multiple times with multiple women and without protection.  So far, so Tiger.  Even worse, he allows her to entangle her professional identity with their marriage and to publicly share her every achievement with the man who “has her back,” even as he’s texting his next stripper hook-up.  In short, he makes us feel sorry for her.  Is there any worse betrayal?
 
As it turns out, the answer is yes.  By all accounts, Sandra Bullock has been a devoted stepmother to James’s three children by two different baby mama.  She has supported his battle against his ex-wife, porn star Janine Lindemulder, for custody of their five-year-old daughter.  While Lindemulder lived in a halfway house after a conviction for tax evasion, Bullock has reportedly raised James’s daughter as her own.
 
Supposedly Jesse James says he wants nothing more than to keep his family intact.  But guess what?  He’s not the one who’s losing his family.
 
Of all the bad, bad, very bad things that man did to his wife, the very worst was to allow her to love his children.  Being burnt by the man you love is hard enough.  I’d like to think I’d leave him every time, but smart women like Hillary Clinton and Silda Spitzer are evidence that love can be messy.  The addition of young children in the mix only makes it messier.  Ask Elin Nordegren, who might (as widely speculated) be staying for money, but could also be unduly optimistic for her children’s sake.
 
But even mothers – most of them at least – can decide whether to stay or go without losing their family.  But Sandra Bullock isn’t most mothers.  She’s not a mother at all, at least not as far as the law is concerned.
 
Of all of Jesse’s crimes, the worst was forcing his wife to choose between her dignity and a five year old child she has come to love as her own.  Ex-step-mothers have no legal rights.  Sandra – who dedicated her Academy Award to “the moms who take care of the babies and the children, wherever they come from” — cannot leave him without leaving them.  She cannot stay with them without staying with him.  And what will America say, and what will happen to her career, if she stays?

At least for now, James’s ex-wife is saying Sandra can stay in her daughter’s life: “She has taken care of our daughter as if she was her own … she sacrificed much … and I will forever be indebted to her for that.”
 
But people change their minds.  Ask Jesse James.            

The most painful Bullock quotes to rewind were given to Barbara Walters:

“I always had this feeling that if you got married, it was the the end of who you were.  I never met anyone who was bigger than me.”   

“We’re not [different].  The end result in life that we both want is the same.  The thing we want at the end of the day is the same.  He’s not out in bars…  He couldn’t be happier…. I never allowed myself to be cared for or protected that way in a relationship…. Not once asking me to be anything other than what I am…. It’s not a mistake that my work got better the minute I met him. I became committed to being scared and being braver.  I really couldn’t fail anymore because I have home to go home to.”

“Ten years from now… I hope the same people in my house today are there ten years from now.”

She appreciated what she had, but her husband didn’t.  She wanted nothing other than to keep it all — her work, her happiness, her man, and her children — but now she can’t.        

And that’s why Sandra Bullock is the person I had to write about today.  And why Jesse James’s next tattoo should be a warning label: Danger.  Loving this man could break you.

P.S. To appease the Gods of marketing, I will say that I’d love to see the Rati on tour.  View the schedule, pictures, book excerpts, and just about everything you can imagine here.  If you enjoyed this post, please follow me on Facebook and/or Twitter.

I think I’ll be a heart surgeon . . .

By Allison Brennan

My good friend Karin Tabke wrote a blog last week asking the question, “How hard do you work?” and pontificating on the 10,000 hour rule: that to be truly good at something, you need to put in at least 10,000 hours. I thought that sounded like an unusually long amount of time, until I figured out that there were 8,760 hours in a year. Suddenly, 10,000 hours didn’t seem very daunting at all.

Doctors go to school–not including residency–for eight years. Between classwork and studying, they probably put in 60-70 hour weeks for at least nine months of the year. That’s over 20,000 hours just to graduate–and most of us probably prefer a doctor with a few years experience.

Musicians–the top guns, the ones who play at Carnegie Hall–practice many hours every day, often from when they are young children. I played piano for eight years, and I was technically proficient–but I didn’t love it so much that I was willing to put in more than the minimum required 30 minutes a day. (I can play piano, I’ve said, but I can’t make music.) A girl two years younger than me practiced three hours every day. Was it any surprise that she was better? Yes, she had natural talent. But without practice, that natural talent would have gone nowhere. Just for the years she was a minor–before going to college–she practiced more than 10,000 hours.

Athletes train year-round, practice hours every day in and out of season, is it any wonder the basketball player who spends his free time shooting hoops and conditioning is the one getting the scholarship?

Then why is it that every writer on the planet hears, “I could write a book if I had the time.” Or, “I’ll write a book when I retire.” Or, “It must be easy to churn out [fill-in-the-blank] books–they’re so formulaic.” (Romance writers get this all the time, but I know many mystery writers who hear the same thing. After all, aren’t all mysteries the same? Murder, investigation, solution. Duh, anyone can do it, right?)

No one goes up to a doctor and says, “When I retire, I’m going to be a heart surgeon.” Or, “If I had the free time, I’d go to medical school.” 

Everyone has a story to tell. Everyone thinks they’re the best person to tell it. How many hours have they put in to read, learn the craft, write, edit, delete, and write some more? I grow frustrated at times by some writers who finish a book and are then stunned and defeated by rejection. Many times these writers blame the system (New York wouldn’t know a good book if they wrote it themselves.) Or agents (they don’t want to work, they want the easy money.) Or the reading public (they just want to read trashy books.) Far too often, these writers become discouraged and spend more time lamenting the system or learning only about the business of published, rather than learning the craft: how to be a great storyteller.

One of the best things that Romance Writers of America does that few other writers organizations do (largely because most aren’t fully open to unpublished writers) is teach want-to-be authors that they need to practice, write, re-write, write some more, and repeat as necessary. That most authors do not sell their first manuscript, or even their second. Or third. Yes, some do–many do not. An article I read when I first joined RWA in 2003, the year before I sold, said that among published authors in RWA, it took on average FIVE MANUSCRIPTS before a sale and FIVE YEARS, SIX MONTHS of writing before making the first sale.

Storytelling is hard work that takes thousands of hours of practice (and this doesn’t include the thousands of hours of reading) but it doesn’t get easier.

A doctor or a lawyer or an engineer may become more confident in their abilities as they gain experience, but I’d venture that open heart surgery is never easy, no matter how many times you’ve done it. Books are the same way. It doesn’t get easier. Authors may gain confidence, or may see problems in their stories earlier simply because they have more experience, but writing is never easy. In fact, as we’ve discussed here recently, it gets harder. My books are tighter and cleaner when I turn them in–meaning, the technical part of the writing is easier for me after 14 books–but the storytelling is harder now than when I started. 

But even so, I love it. With all the warts and heartache and long hours and the fact that I’m still learning and have much, much more to learn about storytelling (like who knew I needed a theme? Thank you Alex and Stephen) . . . I wouldn’t want to do anything else. There is no end of the road, where you’ve learned everything you can. Basketball players, when they win, don’t stop practicing. Doctors, when they graduate, don’t stop reading medical journals. Writers, when they get published, don’t think they now know everything. (In fact, many of us are stunned when people come to us for advice because we’re really just winging it.)

I figured I probably wrote or studied craft about 10,000 hours from when I was ten until I was 34, when I sold my first book. Since I sold, I’ve put in over 14,000 hours writing and re-writing and studying and practicing and learning from people who know much more than I do.

Writing is hard work. It takes hours, thousands of hours, to go from crapola to something marginally publishable. And if you fail as a writer, you can always be a heart surgeon, right? 

Writers, what are some of the odd or insulting comments you’ve gotten about your writing? Readers, what are some misconceptions about YOUR profession? What, if anything, are you willing to put in more than 10,000 hours to master? 

 

 

 

Thematic image systems

by Alexandra Sokoloff

Stephen was talking about theme yesterday and I seized on the topic like a drowning Leo diCaprio dogpaddling in the middle of the broken pieces of the Titanic –

Well, maybe I’m exaggerating just a little.  I’ve actually been thinking about this this week.

I’d just like to say up front that I’m not here to DEFINE theme, today…

Oh, is that cheating?  

Well, okay, if you insist.  Theme is what the story is about.   On a deeper level than the plot details.   The big meaning.   Usually a moral meaning.

Hmm.    See why I don’t want to define it?

Well, how about defining by example?

I’ve heard, often, “Huck Finn is about the inhumanity of racism.”  

Uh… I don’t know about you, but for me, that’s too soft and vague.   

Also have heard a lot that the theme of Romeo and Juliet is “Great love defies even death.”    Except that – in the end, they’re dead, right?   So how exactly is the love defying death?   Risking death and losing, maybe.   Inspiring people after death, maybe.

Okay, how about this?  “A man is never truly alone who has friends” is a great statement of the theme of  It’s A Wonderful Life.   (And stated overtly in the end of that movie.)

The trouble is,  I personally think it’s closer to the soul of that movie to say that it’s the little, ordinary actions we do every day that add up to true heroism.

So defining theme has always seemed like a slippery process to me.   Different people can pull vastly different interpretations of the theme of a story from the same story.    And even if you can cleverly distill the meaning of a story into one sentence… admit it, you’re not REALLY covering everything that the story is about, are you?

I think it’s more useful to think of theme as layers of meaning.    To not think of theme as a sentence, but as a whole image system.

And that’s where it gets really fun to start working with theme – when it’s not just some pedantic sentence, but a whole world of interrelated meanings, that resonate on levels that you’re not even aware of, sometimes, but that stay with you and bring you back to certain stories over and over and over again.

(Think of some of the dreams you have – maybe – where there will be double and triple puns, visual and verbal).

There are all kinds of ways to work theme into a story.   The most obvious is the PLOT.    Every plot is also a statement of theme.

It’s A Wonderful Life is a great, great example of plot reflecting theme.    George Bailey’s desire in the beginning of the film is to be a hero, to do big, important things.    Throughout the story, that desire seems to be thwarted at every turn by the ordinariness of his life.    And yet, every single encounter George Bailey has is an example of a small, ordinary goodness, a right choice that George makes, that in the end, when we and he see the town as it would have been if he had never existed, lets us understand that it IS those little things that make for true heroism.

In our own genre, Presumed Innocent is an interesting book for plot reflecting theme.   I love how that book (and the very good film made of it) depicts the horrifying randomness of the legal system – that justice can turn on the assignment of a judge, on the outcome of a political race, on the loyalties of a witness – or on the very, very clever defendant himself.   To me it’s a brilliant exploration of what justice really is, or isn’t, or can never be.

And here’s a brilliant example of a plot twist conveying theme:  with Lecter’s escape, The Silence of the Lambs drives home the point that we can win a battle with evil, but never the entire war.

DIALOGUE is another way to reflect theme.

I watched the beginning of The Matrix this week and was very amused to note this blatantly thematic dialogue.   I’ve underlined all the thematic references:

—————-

From The Matrix, written by Larry & Andy Wachowski

In Neo’s apartment. He is asleep at his computer, with headphones on. On his computer screen, we see he is running a search on a man named Morpheus. Suddenly on his computer screen appear the words ‘Wake up, Neo.’ He sits up, and stares at his computer screen.

Neo : What?

On the computer, now appears ‘The Matrix has you…’

Neo : What the hell?

On the computer, now appears ‘Follow the white rabbit…’

Neo : Follow the white rabbit?

He presses the ‘esc’ key repeatedly, no effect. the computer comes up with one last message : ‘Knock knock, Neo.’ There is a loud knock at his door, and he jumps. He stares at the door, and then back at his computer screen. it’s now blank.

Neo : …..Who is it?

Choi : It’s Choi.

Neo : Yeah…yeah…you’re two hours late.

Choi : I know, it’s her fault.

Choi gestures towards DuJour.

Neo : You got the money?

Choi : Two grand.

Neo :Hold on.

Neo goes into his apartment, shuts the door, and opens a book, takes out a CD rom, and goes back to the door, handing the CD to Choi.

Choi : Hallelujah. You’re my saviour, man. My own personal Jesus Christ.

Neo :You get caught using that…

Choi : Yeah, I know. This never happened, you don’t exist.

Neo : Right.

Choi : Something wrong, man? You look a little whiter than usual.

Neo : My computer….it..you ever have that feeling where you don’t know if you’re awake or still dreaming?

Choi : Mm, all the time. It’s called Mescaline. It’s the only way

to fly. Hey, it sounds to me like you need to unplug, man.

————

The Matrix is all about waking up, about what reality is, and about Neo as the potential savior of the world, which has been enslaved by a virtual reality program.  And escaping.   And going down the rabbit hole.

Well, that above is maybe a four minute scene,  and look how blatant the themes are.    It spells out the entire story.   And yet it works on the surface level as well, an audience isn’t stopping to think, “Oh, there’s a theme, and there’s a theme, and yet another theme.”

(If there’s anything I learned from screenwriting it’s that you can JUST SAY IT.   And it generally works better if you just do.)

Another hugely effective and important way to convey theme is through VISUAL STORYTELLING.    Whether you’re writing a book or a film, it’s useful to do specific passes through your story,  thinking of yourself as a production designer whose specific function is to create the look of the story – AND – reflect the themes of the story in those visuals.

Nobody does image systems better than Thomas Harris.   The Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon are serial killer novels, but Harris elevates that overworked genre to art, in no small part due to his image systems.

In Silence, Harris borrows heavily from myth and especially fairy tales, choosing elements that create a deeper meaning for his plots, and achieves the sense of a mythic battle between good and evil.   You’ve got the labyrinth/Minotaur. You’ve got a monster in a cage, a troll holding a girl in a pit (and that girl is a princess, remember – her mother is American royalty, a senator). You’ve got a twist on the “lowly peasant boy rescues the princess with the help of supernatural allies” fairy tale – Clarice is the lowly peasant who enlists the help of (one might also say apprentices to) Lecter’s wizardlike perceptions to rescue the princess. You have a twisted wizard in his cave who is trying to turn himself into a woman.

There’s a theme running through Silence of monstrousness.   Before Harris got all Freudian with Lecter,  to the detriment of the character, IMO, he presented this character as a living embodiment of evil – an aberration of nature, right down to the six fingers on his left hand.   In fact, Harris virtually created the Serial Killer as Monster.   

So to reflect this inhumanness (and also just creep us out)  Harris works the animal imagery,  especially insect imagery, with the moths, the spiders and mice in the storage unit, and the entomologists with their insect collections in the museum, the theme of change, larva to butterfly.

In Red Dragon Harris also works the animal imagery to powerful effect. The killer is not a mere man, he’s a beast. When he’s born he’s compared to a bat because of his cleft palate. He kills on a moon cycle, like a werewolf. He uses his grandmother’s false teeth, like a vampire. And let’s not forget – he’s trying to turn into a dragon.

LOCATION is another huge, huge factor in conveying theme.   Places have specific meanings, or you the author can create a specific meaning for a place.    I’ve said this before, but basements are used so often in horror stories because basements symbolize our subconscious, and all the fears and childhood damage that we hide from ourselves.     Characters’ houses or apartments reflect themselves.    The way you describe a city gives it a particular meaning – you can emphasize particular qualities that help you tell your story.

So how do you create a visual/thematic image system in your books?

Well, start by becoming more conscious of what thematic systems authors are working with in books and films that YOU love.    As I am always saying – make yourself a list (ten is good) of books and films that have particularly effective image systems.    Then reread and rewatch some of your favorites, paying close attention to how theme is conveyed, in plot, in dialogue, in visuals, in location.

What I do when I start a project, along with outlining, is to keep a list of thematic words that convey what my story is about, to me. For The Harrowing it was words like: Creation, chaos, abyss, fire, forsaken, shattered, shattering, portal, door, gateway, vessel, empty, void, rage, fury, cast off, forgotten, abandoned, alone, rejected, neglected, shards, discarded… pages and pages like that.

For The Price – bargain, price, deal, winter, ice, buried, dormant, resurrection, apple, temptation, tree, garden, labyrinth, Sleeping Beauty, castle, queen, princess, prince, king, wish, grant, deal, contract, task, hell, purgatory, descent, mirror, Rumpelstiltskin, spiral…

Some words I’ll have from the very beginning because they’re part of my own thematic DNA. But as the word lists grow, so does my understanding of the inherent themes of each particular story.

Do you see how that might start to work? Not only do you get a sense of how the story can look to convey your themes, but you also have a growing list of specific words that you can work with in your prose and dialogue so that you’re constantly hitting those themes on different levels.

At the same time that I’m doing my word lists, I start a collage book, and try to spend some time every week flipping through magazines and pulling photos that resonate with my story. I find Vogue, the Italian fashion mags, Vanity Fair, Premiere, Rolling Stone and of course, National Geographic, particularly good for me. I tape those photos together in a blank artists’ sketchbook (I use tape so I can move the photos around when I feel like it. If you’re more – well, if you’re neater than I am, you can also use plastic sleeves in a three-ring binder).   Brett has talked about doing a slideshow of images he captures on his laptop.   It’s another way of growing an image system. Also, it doesn’t feel like writing so you think you’re getting away with something.

Also, know your world myths and fairy tales! Why make up your own backstory and characters when you can tap into universally powerful archetypes? Remember, there’s no new story under the sun, so being conscious of your antecedents can help you bring out the archetypal power of the characters and themes you’re working with.   

So of course my questions today are: 

What are some books and films that to you have particularly striking thematic image systems? What are some of your favorite images to work with?    What are some ways of conveying theme that I’ve left out?

– Alex

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For those who have been patiently (hah)  waiting for the Screenwriting Tricks For Authors workbook to come out on Kindle for Mac, it’s now available (no Kindle required, just your own Mac).

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Also, I’m going to be teaching a couple of in-person workshops in April and May, on both coasts, since I’m nothing if not bicoastal.

April 9-11   I’m at the Black Diamond Romance Writers April Retreat in Santa Rosa, CA:

Sponsor: Black Diamond RWA

Location: A 4000+-sq.-ft. residence on 62 acres in Santa Rosa, CA

Fee: For Day-Trippers: Members: $60, Non-Members, $75; for Multi-Day Participants: Members: $80, Non-Members $100

Date: (For Day Trippers) Saturday, April 10, 2010, includes lunch, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

OR (Multi-day Participants ) April 9–11, 2010, includes meals, small group time with presenter, & overnight accommodations if available.

For more information: 
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Then May 8  I’ll be in Jacksonville, Florida, for a  

Full Day Master Class: Screenwriting Tricks for Novelists
 
Saturday May 8, 9AM – 4PM, Arlington Congregational Church‎
431 University Blvd North
Jacksonville, FL 32211
 
For more information:

Hope to see/meet some of you there!

WALKING INTO WALLS

By Stephen Jay Schwartz

Left Coast Crime was a blissful chaos.  I threw myself into the experience with the fervor of the newbie that I am.  I attended just about EVERYTHING.  Every panel, every walking tour.  I even extended the conference by participating in the Forensics Day at the LA Crime Lab. 

This was only my second conference.  My first was Bouchercon in Indianapolis, and I barely knew anyone.  This time I knew most everyone, and the folks I didn’t know I met through introductions.  I cannot say this enough – the mystery/thriller community is the greatest, most enthusiastic support group I’ve ever encountered.

I haven’t been myself since the conference ended.  Or maybe, I have.  Maybe I’ve been exactly myself.  The self I choose to be as I contemplate my next book.

See, I’ve been staring blankly into space a lot and walking into walls.  This, believe it or not, is my process.

My brain is on mush-mode.  I’m letting everything enter and nothing escape. 

At the same time, I’m narrowing the field.  I’ve found my setting, the physical environment where I’ll be placing the action for my novel.  That’s a big step for me, because the locale influences the tone and the tone influences the story.  The next big issue I’m grappling with is “theme.”  Motif.  It’s hard to distill the central theme from the bedlam of action and plot swirling around in my mind.  I’ve got flashes of scenes in my head, moments of emotional conflict, visions of deep-seated relationships unraveling.  And cool themes, like betrayal and abandonment and greed.  There’s no real structure to it at the moment.  I’m avoiding structure, just going with the feelings first.  I’m trying to find the emotion that will remain with the reader after the story is over.  If I can capture that emotion and sustain it for 375 pages, I will have done what I’ve set out to do.

I think of music, of symphonies, where there is a central motif and numerous leitmotifs.  The central motif leaves its mark on every scene, every character.  It doesn’t need to be obvious or heavy-handed, but it influences everything, it drives the narrative, escalating to a climax that comes to a satisfying, organic resolution.  Counterpoint, dissonance, pizzicato, rondo.  And there’s an emotional state of being one is left with after hearing a satisfying symphony.  It resonates, for a time.  I want my stories to resonate.

I forgot that this is how I get at the beginning of a project.  My mind goes somewhere else.  The only time I’ve ever really taken advantage of this was when I wrote my first screenplay, at age nineteen.  I had just arrived in Santa Cruz, didn’t have a job, my mom was paying my rent for a few months.  I had nothing to do but write.  My mind went to this place, this place of emptiness, and I would wake up at four o’clock in the morning and write frantically for eight hours, then pass out and sleep for four more hours, then wake up and write for fifteen minutes, then wander in the woods or at the beach, then end up at a café on the pier during a rainstorm but warm and comfortable among wood furniture and classical music and hot tea and croissants and honey.  It was a blissful time for writing.  I didn’t have a care in the world.  It was all about the writing.

I haven’t had that opportunity for many years.  Now I carve out time where I can.  And so I let the mind-mush continuum play out in my daily life, my life at the day job or while I’m doing my taxes and paying my bills.  I find it hard to do these monotonous tasks, this necessary shit, because nothing really seems quite as important as just letting things go, letting my mind find its way.  I feel like I’m only fifty percent here one hundred percent of the time.

I’ve noticed that I stopped reading fiction.  I’m tapping into a different source.  I’m reading “Columbine,” by Dave Cullen, and it’s giving me a sense of reality, of real human suffering in a real world.  And I’m reading the writings of inmates from the California prison system.  Letting it all filter in. 

I’m also setting up interviews with the people who people the world where my story exists.  Adding their experiences to the mix.  I don’t know what story I’ll eventually tell, but I know it will come from the combination of everything I’m doing, all the stories I’m gathering, after I’ve taken an egg-beater to the assembled ingredients. 

I can feel it settling.  This process.  It feels good.  It’s my very favorite part of being a writer.  Easier than facing that evil white page, trying to capture an emotional scene or a complicated bit of action.  I practically buried myself in this phase on my second novel, losing about six months to the research I did with the San Francisco Police Department.  I ended up with a hundred pages of typed, single space notes from interviews and observations.  I used about two percent of it, but the work I had done became the invisible backbone of the book.  It kept each vertebrae in place.

I’m going through some challenging things in my life right now, too.  Everything’s competing for a place in my head.  I could easily spend all my time doing the things required to remain a solvent member of American society.  But I don’t think I’d end up with a decent book if I did.

I’m protecting that place in my head where the stories come to life.  If that means I’ll be walking into walls for a while, so be it.  I’ll be walking into walls.

Does this sound familiar?  How do the other writers here tap into that core of creative thought?  And how do you balance that with your daily, real-life responsibilities?  For Christ’s Sake, how does Allison Brennan do it all?

 

THE GIRL WHO SHOULD BE NOMINATED

by Brett Battles

I declare the race for the Academy Award for best performance by a female actor at next year’s Oscar ceremony over.

It’s done. Everyone else can go home.

I’m sorry Meryl, that little bio pic where you entirely transform into someone else? Not going to work this time. And Sandra, you got yours last year. Julia, Helen, Helena, Kate and all you other fantastic actresses, feel free to take the year off. This is one fight you don’t want to take on because you will lose.

Okay, you might have one little out. Defeat or victory will, unfortunately, hinge on Academy eligibility requirements. If nominations are based on a film’s release date in the US, then all is well. But if they are based on when the film was first released in whatever country it was made, then – no disrespect to Sandra Bullock – the Academy has already made a fatal error.

And not just a “Oh, I took a wrong turn” error. More of a “There’s never been a bigger mistake in the history of the Academy” type error.

Last Saturday I saw what was quite possibly the best performance by any actor that I have ever seen. Seriously. I’m not joking.

And the Oscar goes to:

Noomi Rapace

That’s right. Noomi Rapace.

If you haven’t read Stieg Larsson’s book THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO, or either of the sequels (yes, I know, the third book isn’t out in the U.S. yet), then get on it! And if you have a chance to see the Swedish film version of THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO go. (Don’t wait for the English version, it’ll suck in comparison anyway.)

I mean right now. Stop reading this, head to the theater, and see it. I’ll wait until you come back.

Noomi (if you’ll allow me to call her by her first name) plays Lisbeth Salander, an emotionally damaged social outcast with more than a little skill at solving mysteries. If you had asked me after I read the book who could play the part, I would have had no answer. In fact, I probably would have said, “I doubt anyone could really pull Lisbeth off.” I mean Lisbeth goes through some pretty serious stuff. I mean brutal, cringe-worthy stuff.

And guess what? I would have been completely and utterly wrong. In the words of the popculturenerd on twitter the other day: Noomi Rapace IS Lisbeth.

I couldn’t have said it better myself. Noomi’s performance is so compelling and captivation and, above all else, so brave your eyes are riveted to the screen every moment she is there.

It happens rarely where an actor and a part fit so well together that you can’t even imagine for a split second anyone else playing the role, but this is one of those times. And it’s not just a perfect fit. Noomi’s performance is so mesmerizing that I’m still thinking about it days and days after seeing it.

The only problem I see with my crusade to nominate Noomi (which I alluded to above) is that while TATOO just came out here in the States, it was released in Sweden LAST year. So does that mean she should have been nominated for this last ceremony? If so, the Academy completely screwed up. (Again, no disrespect to Ms. Bullock. She’s a fine actress whose performances I’ve enjoyed immensely over the years. But I’m sure if she saw THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO she’d think the same thing.)

You know what? I don’t care what the Academy rules are. Noomi Rapace should be nominated, and win, next year. And if the Academy has a problem with that? Fine. Then just nominate her for THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE which comes out soon, or even THE GIRL WHO KICKED THE HORNET’S NEST which I don’t even know if they made yet (according to imdb.com, they have). Noomi’s performance demands it. And I’m not going to stop telling people that. (UPDATE: A little web research and I would have learned all three movies are already done – great work there, Sherlock – but the NEW NEWS is info on when those will be released in the US. The answer is soon! Link here.)

So make it happen, Academy, or feel my wrath!

You can read Roger Ebert’s review of THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATOO here.

You can read popculturenerd’s review here.

And read more about the film here.

And just a final thought for the director and producers of the American version of THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO, instead of “going safe” and picking an American actress (rumors are out there that Kristen Stewart is up for the role), why not get Noomi Rapace to play the part again? She would TAKE THE U.S. BY STORM if she did. She would become a mega-star. And if the “but she’s Swedish and probably can’t speak English well” thing worries you, that’s just ignorant bullshit. Check this video out and tell me she can’t speak English well (thanks pcn for the link.)

So Hollywood, I swear to God, if you screw this up, I’m coming after you. I know where you are. I’m just a ten minute drive away, and I know how to make bodies disappear…okay, fictionally, but you get the idea. 

 

 

Gone To Carolina

by J.D. Rhoades

      When Pari wrote her tribute to her home state of New Mexico the other day, my first thought was “Whoa.  Gorgeous place. I need to see this someday.”

     My second thought was “I am SO stealing this idea.”

     Because as much as Pari loves New Mexico, I love North Carolina. All my books are set here. I’ve lived all my life in various cities and small towns across the state. I grew up in the pretty little town of Southern Pines, right next door to the golf mecca of Pinehurst.

     I went to college at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. lived for a short time in the capital city of Raleigh (where I worked the camera for the morning farm show and the afternoon news at WRAL-TV), then returned to UNC-Chapel Hill for my law degree.

      I practiced law “down east” in Greenville and in Wilmington (still far and away my favorite city in North Carolina)

before returning back to my home area to live and raise my family.

You want mountains? We got mountains.

 

You want beaches? We got those.

 

      You want big  cities? You can have them. But we have Charlotte if you absolutely insist.

 

    Oh, and we also play a little basketball.

 

As I wrote a few weeks ago, it’s hard for some folks to understand just how much passion can be stirred up by the web of rivalries between the state’s major universities. Often, when I meet somebody new and they tell me they’re an NC State fan, a Wake Forest fan,  or God forbid, a Duke fan, I tell them that I never hold a person’s religion against them. I’m only partly joking.

      It’s a place steeped in history. One of the first English speaking colonies in the New World was established on Roanoke Island in 1508, only to mysteriously disappear, leaving behind only some abandoned houses and the word CROATAN carved on a nearby tree. (The Lumbee Indians of Southeastern North Carolina claim that they’re descended from the survivors of the so-called “Lost Colony” who fled inland from the marauding Spaniards and  intermarried with Native Americans). In April 1776, North Carolina was the first state to authorize its delegates to the Continental Congress to vote for independence. The fall of Fort Fisher  below Wilmington sealed the fate of the Confederacy by closing its last open port, and General Joseph Johnston surrendered the last major Confederate Army to General William Sherman near Durham on April 26, 1865. In the twentieth century, the first powered flight was made by the Wright Brothers on the barren, windy dunes of Kill Devil Hill on the Outer Banks. In February 1960, the Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro was the site of the first of many “sit-ins” protesting segregation.  One of the protestors relates that while there were some tense standoffs, at one point a “little old white lady, 75 or 80 years old” walked up,  put her arms around two of them and said “I’m so proud of you boys. Your should have done this 10 years ago.” It’s people like that that make me love my state. And I know a lot of them.

      But my love for this place doesn’t mean it  doesn’t sometimes have its dark side. I was driving to court in Chapel Hill  a couple of years ago when I heard a story on the radio about a project in nearby Chatham County that was helping low income people replace their failed plumbing. In some cases, people were getting indoor plumbing for the first time in their lives. It really struck me at that point what a weird state I live in.  I was coming from an area where muti-million dollar homes are common. A few miles away from me were great universities and the hi-tech scientific center known as the Research Triangle Park.  And a few miles away, people were very excited about getting to go to the bathroom indoors.

     We’ve had some high profile crimes, like the mass shooting a few years ago where an Army Sergeant,  for reason no one can explain, walked into Luigi’s restaurant in downtown Fayetteville and stated shooting, killing four people (including the restaurant owner) and wounding six others. More recently, in the little town where I now live, another man, for reasons known only to himself, walked into a nursing home on a quiet Sunday morning and started shooting, killing  eight and wounding three  before being wounded and captured by  a young police  officer.

    It’s those kind of contrasts that make this a fascinating place to be a writer. And we boast of quite a few. There’s Our Alex, of course. Even though she’s one of those Granola-eating California hippies, and even though she’s left our borders for a time,  I’ve adopted her and put in the papers for her to become a naturalized Carolina girl. She just has to pick a basketball  team and declare a barbecue preference, and we’re good to go.

      In the mystery field, we also boast Margaret Maron, Sharyn McCrumb, John Hart,  Sarah Shaber, Katy Munger,  Lillian Jackson Braun, Jeffery Deaver, David Terrenoire, and a lot more that I’m sure folks will remind me of in the comments.

    One of the first explorers sent by Sir Walter Raleigh to scout out the coast of Carolina for a potential colony wrote in his report to Queen Elizabeth, “it is withal, Madam, the goodliest land under the Cope of Heaven.” In the antebellum era, a more cynical observer looked at our position between the wealthier and more poltically powerful states of  Virginia and South Carolina and described the state as “a vale of humility between two mountains of conceit.”

     You know what? He was right. And I like that just fine.

     So tell me about your home state, the light side and the dark. What you love, and what you don’t.

Are your characters telling secrets about you?

by Tess Gerritsen

Because the upcoming TV series “Rizzoli & Isles” is based on the characters from my thriller series, the show’s writers have been reading my novels to familiarize themselves with Jane and Maura’s personalities and back-stories.  A few weeks ago, they flew out to Boston for a research visit, and I got the chance to meet them.  Over dinner, the lead writer turned to me and said, “Maura Isles has Asperger’s, doesn’t she?”

Her insight startled me, because I had no idea it was so obvious.  I never set out to make Maura an Aspie.  I never even knew that she was an Aspie… until I discovered that I’m one, too.

I’ll admit that Maura reflects some aspects of my own personality.  Some of her biographical details come straight from my own life — where she went to school, what car she drives, her taste in music, food, and wine.  Also drawn from my own personality is her belief in science and logic and her drive to understand why things happen.  Nevertheless, she’s a fictional creation, someone I thought I’d simply made up.  

I didn’t realize that it was me emerging on the page.

Those who’ve read the series know that Maura is uncomfortable in crowds.  She’s not skillful with small talk, she likes her solitude and she doesn’t have a huge circle of friends.  In fact, her friendship with Jane Rizzoli is more a matter of their linked occupations rather than from any interpersonal connections.  None of these details struck me as strange, because that’s the way I am too, and I always thought of myself as normal.  My father was this way as well, very much a lone wolf who was obsessive about his work as a chef. 

Growing up, I was the awkward kid who never said much in class.  My few friends were the other awkward kids, the ones who were always last to be chosen for field hockey and volleyball.  When an equally geeky boy I liked took me for a ride in his truck, we didn’t go to the movies or lover’s lane or anywhere that other teens might go.  We drove to the Salk Institute to ooh and ahh at the cool research buildings, where we fantasized about working someday.  

Even though I felt okay about myself, I was always a little envious of people who could walk into a room and circulate and instantly make everyone like them. I’m unable to circulate; I get stuck talking to one person in the room and I have no idea how to move on to anyone else.  I marvel at how good others are at small talk, and how easily they make friends.  I assumed they just had a gift, that they were special.  I never considered the possibility that they were the normal ones.

Then, at a literary dinner last year, I had the privilege of sitting beside a spokesman for an Asperger’s support organization.  Neither one of us was any good at small talk, but we were both really good at being obsessive about a particular topic.  His topic was Asperger’s.  He began to describe the characteristics: Trouble looking people in the eye.  Uncomfortable in crowds.  Tend to focus on minutiae.  Good with numbers. 

“This is starting to sound like me,” I said.

“It doesn’t mean you have it,” he said.  “Now, if you also had synesthesia…”

“Does it count that I see colors when I hear certain notes played on the piano?”

Now he got interested.  “What do you see?”

“If I hear an F, I see yellow.  If it’s C, I see orange.  If it’s B flat or E flat, I see purple or mauve. That’s been true ever since I was a kid.  I assumed that everyone saw those colors.”   

“Yep,” he laughed.  “You’re an Aspie.”

It was something I hadn’t realized until that conversation.  Yet the TV writer, after merely reading my books, immediately saw the diagnosis.  She understood something that I myself hadn’t perceived: that Maura Isles has Asperger’s.  

Just as Maura’s creator does. 

It’s discomfiting to realize how much I’ve unwittingly revealed about myself in my books.  I wonder how many other secrets my characters have told about me.  It’s inevitable, isn’t it?  When we sit down to tell a story, our character’s voice has to come from somewhere.  It’s shaped by our own experiences and personalities, by our own perceptions of the world.  Without meaning to, we spill ourselves onto the page in so many subtle ways.  

It doesn’t mean that mystery writers are all homicidal maniacs and romance writers are lusty women. Our characters are just as likely to be our complete opposites, so readers shouldn’t assume they can psychoanalyze a writer based on how his characters think. But every so often, we writers allow ourselves to walk onto the page.  We take a turn in our own story, and speak the truth straight from our hearts.

We just won’t tell you when we’re doing it.

 

Why I love New Mexico

 

by Pari

So I’ve been sitting here wondering why on earth I decided to chair Left Coast Crime Santa Fe. I mean, it’s a whole year out and already I’m getting daily emails and having to talk with the hotel, worry about content on the website, write the blog (yes, I try to post daily on the blog on the website now), think about the program and on and on and on.

I hope I don’t sound like I’m complaining. That’ll come later when people aren’t happy with their program assignments . . .

But the question still needs to be asked. Why did I agree to do this?

Simple.
I love New Mexico.
I want to show off my home state.

Let do a little of that right now.
Last week, my kids were on Spring Break. We took a small road trip west. About an hour or so outside of Albuquerque, near Grants, we turned south and headed for the Ice Cave and Baldera Volcano. These tourist attractions are on private land. For moderate admission fees, we hiked ½ mile up a muddy, snowy trail that led to a collapsed volcano. From where we stood we could see well more than a dozen other volcanoes. 

Then we walked 400 yards in the other direction, down several uneven stairs, and gazed at the mouth of an ice cave.

Gorgeous hunh?

 

 

Less than an hour later, we visited El Morro National Monument. This rock formation can be seen for miles and harbors a pool that sustained many a traveler across the high western plains of NM. Those travelers left their marks – petroglyphs, inscriptions from people like Juan de Oñate in 1605, children who later died in transit . . . There’s also a pueblo ruin on top of the monument, but we couldn’t visit because of the snow and ice on the trail.

Then it was on to Window Rock, AZ – a short drive, maybe 50 minutes, to see the rock from which the seat of the Navajo Nation derives its English name. I’ve always been curious about this place but doubted it’d be very interesting. A hole in a rock. Big whoopie. We went because it was close, that’s all.

Boy was I surprised. A stunning formation and a meaningful park commemorating Navajo veterans.

After a happy night in Gallup and several visits to the hotel’s nice swimming pool, we headed home by way of Acoma Pueblo (known as the Sky City). Rather than go to the casino, we went to the cultural center and bought tickets to go to the old pueblo on the mesa. This is the longest continuously inhabited pueblo in the country.

 

Photos can be taken – and I took quite a few – but hesitate to post them because of all the restrictions the pueblo places on them. I’m posting this picture of the sky instead. I took it atop the mesa.

I think it demonstrates nicely another reason why I adore my home state: the sense of possibility here.
You find it in our mountains, mesas, wide open spaces.

Well, I’ve gone on long enough. I hope my pix do some justice to the state I love so much.

 

Tell me, what place speaks to your heart?