Gambling casino online.

Looking for a good time sailor? How about checking out a book signing?

Okay, I know. I’m preaching to the converted here, but I’ve really enjoy book signings. Admittedly, there have been a few duds. On more than one occasion, my ass has gone numb sitting on a folding chair, listening to a writer ramble on and on about some plot device I could care less about. For the most part, however, they’ve been great. Going to see Charlie Huston and Marcus Sakey a few weeks ago reminded me of that.

Put simply, for the low, low price of one book, I get to listen to an author I admire wax poetic on the craft I love. What could be better?

But try telling your non-writer pals this. The words will barely leave your mouth before you see their eyes glaze over with stupification. You can read it in their faces, plain as day. "Why would anyone want to a book signing?"

Because they’re damn entertaining, that’s why. And I’ve got the list to prove it.

What follows are some of the most entertaining authors I’ve gone to see. My criteria has nothing to do with their insights on the craft, or the thought provoking discussions they inspired (that’s another list altogether). Instead, I picked them for one reason and one reason only–they made me laugh.

JENNIFER WEINER

I’m the first to admit, I wasn’t thrilled about being dragged to a Jennifer Weiner signing. My wife absolutely lovers her books, and I have no doubt she’s a very good writer. But frankly, I’m guy. And I’m guessing the main character of IN HER SHOES rarely if ever breaks out in a killer, karate rage. With that established, I’m here to tell you Weiner is one of the funniest, most engaging speakers I’ve seen in a very long time. I’m not exaggerating. This woman could give up writing for a career in stand-up. She was so funny, I quickly forgot that I was one of only four people in the room with testicles.

JAMES PATTERSON

I understand the criticism of Patterson’s work, but I also admire his ability to create page-turning plots, and I’m fascinated by his phenomenal success. So when Mr. P visited the Poisoned Pen on the Jester tour, I jumped at the chance to hear him speak. To give you an idea of the pull Patterson has, the president of Time Warner books traveled with him, introducing the mega-seller at each stop. After a few minutes of gushing by the pres., Patterson regaled the audience with funny vignettes about his life, his fans, and about the wild ride of success. In his most endearing story, Patterson described going to his local bookstore and counting copies of his novels on the shelf to see how many had been sold. I guess multimillionaires are neurotic just like the rest of us.

JAMES ELLROY

You can call James Ellroy many things, but boring isn’t one of them. Ellroy has earned a reputation for being cocky, outrageous, and totally uncensored. And it’s all true. Sans microphone, his voice boomed over a crowd of fans, answering questions with a wit and style all his own. I vaguely remember the mention of his unrequited love for his dog ("She’s a dyke," said Ellroy) and his opinions of then presidential candidate John Kerry ( who he described as a donkey filater). But through all the bravado and cursing, I heard glimpses of Ellroy’s brilliance and saw a true appreciation for his fans.

R.L. STINE

At last year’s Thriller Fest, when I heard children’s author Stine was speaking at a luncheon, my first reaction was, Well, I’ve already paid for the grub so I might as well go. I don’t remember what I ate, but I do remember Stine. In a convention full of highlights, this man was a star. He had the whole audience quivering in their seats with laughter. From tales of his early writing careers, to descriptions of fan letters, each story was better than the last. Walking out of the ball room, I noticed just about everyone had smiles stretched across their faces. A complete stranger turned to me, shook his head and said, "I can’t believe how good he was."

I can’t help but notice each of these writers is a huge bestseller. Is this a coincidence? Or is there a correlation between being an engaging public speaker and a bestselling author? What do you think?

And…

Let me hear some of your picks. Who should I go see next if I need a good chuckle?

Killer Diller

by Rob Gregory Browne

As I write this, the Killer Year anthology has just come out.

What started in the summer of 2006, just a few months after I got my first publishing deal, has now blossomed into something I’m truly proud of — and I know my fellow Murderati/Killer Year bloggers, Brett, JT and Toni are just as proud as I am. (And let’s not forget that Ken’s in there, too.)

And since I’m less than a week away from my deadline for book three and sweating bullets over it, I’m going to take the lazy route today and offer up my final post from the Killer Year blog.

It went something like this:

What can I say about Killer Year that
hasn’t already been said? Not much, I suppose. This past year has gone
by in a blur of emails and conferences and late nights getting drunk
and reveling in the knowledge that we all finally made it, finally
fulfilled the dream we’d been nurturing for years.

I don’t really remember how I became
involved with Killer Year. I think one of the founders sent me an
email, asking if I was interested in joining them in a little
experiment in promotion — and I said “yes” without hesitation.

Despite that yes, however, I was a
little skeptical about what our little group could accomplish. After
all, who really gave a damn about a bunch of first-time authors?

But then I met JT and Brett and Jason
and Toni and Marcus and god knows who else at Thrillerfest in Arizona
and I knew I was in good company. Knew that these were high caliber,
enthusiastic people who were determined to make the world notice us.

JT brought customized Killer Year
t-shirts — one I still wear to this day (I’m wearing it right now, as a
matter of fact) — and Brett brought hats. Or maybe it was the other way
around.

Whatever the case, the next thing you
know, Barry Eisler and Joe Konrath were wearing them and helping spread
the word about us, and a short time later I was sitting with the crew
and MJ Rose, being told that ITW was interested in giving us a helping
hand.

From that point on, Killer Year became something of a phenomenon.

I knew we had arrived when I was down in
San Diego teaching a writing workshop, and one of the participants came
up to me out of the blue and said, “You’re one of those Killer Year
people, right?”

When the idea that we pitch an anthology
was raised, I have to admit I didn’t think we had much chance of
getting one published. But one thing I’ve learned about JT Ellison is
that she’s not only a great talent, but a very determined woman, and
she worked tirelessly in prepping the proposal. I sent her a story that
was added to the packet and when the email came saying we’d made a deal
with St. Martin’s, I was pretty much flabbergasted.

The final result is getting spectacular
reviews. And as I hold it in my hand, I can’t help but think that it’s
truly a representation of what we are as a group. The variety of
writing styles. The diversity of subject matter. The authors who
supported us and helped turn Killer Year into that phenomenon. It’s all
there in one package. A testament to what a handful of people can
accomplish if they try hard enough.

But what it represents to me most of all
is friendship. This last year has created a bond between us that I
don’t think will ever be broken. The kind of bond that few writers ever
have the chance to experience.

Because writing is, after all, a lonely profession. An old cliche, yes, but an accurate one for the most part.

And Killer Year has managed to shatter that cliche. Many times over.

——–

For those of you in the Los Angeles area, Brett Battles, Marc Lecard and I will be signing copies of KILLER YEAR: Stories to Die For at 5:30 pm this Saturday, January 26th, at the Mystery Bookstore in Westwood.

Hope to see you there.

——-

Me, again. If you made it this far down on the post, I’d be curious to know if you’ve had any of those frantic a-week-away-from-deadline-and-still-a-hundred-pages-to-go moments like I’m having right now. How close have YOU come to missing your deadline?

rgb

My New Fan

By Louise Ure

“I saw the information about your appearance in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, and have decided I should become one of your fans,” the note read.

The wording struck me as strange. How does one “decide to become a fan?” And why do so simply by reading the roster of author events at a local bookstore?

That was ten days ago, and I had just finished the signing event for The Fault Tree at one of the nation’s best independent bookstores, Book Passage in Corte Madera, California. It was a fitting place to launch this second book. That’s where I took my first writing class, “Eight Weeks to Stronger Fiction” taught by Judy Greber (Gillian Roberts), and first imagined that I could write something longer than an email. Where I attended a Mystery Writers Conference and began to believe that I could be published. Where I went on to become a Mystery Conference faculty member and an author launching her first book.

I’d been worried about the launch of the second book. You know how it goes, you can ask your friends to help you move once, but when it comes to loading up that van and toting that furniture a second time, that’s really testing the friendship. I didn’t know if I’d have one person in the audience or none.

I shouldn’t have worried. It was a grand event, one that seemed to merge all the parts of my life into one grinning crowd. Old friends from my advertising days showed up. Newer friends from my writing life. People I’d studied with, gotten drunk with, and slept with. There were even a couple of people I didn’t recognize.

When it was all over, Reese Lakota from Book Passage had a significantly shortened stack of books that she wanted me to sign for the store, some of them pre-orders and some to put out on the shelves. The first one she handed me was a pre-ordered book that came with that note. “I have decided I should become one of your fans.”

“In my long and now retirement stage of life,” it went on to read, “the Ures that I’ve encountered have been few and far between.”

That would be right. There’s Mary Ure, the actress who co-starred in Where Eagles Dare. But she’s some kind of second cousin, so I guess that’s still my family.

There’s Midge Ure, the rock-and-roller and Live Aid organizer from Scotland. I can’t stand his music but I like his name.

And then there’s my family in Arizona. Desert dwellers. Happy with their prairie dog behavior of poking their heads up from their sandy burrows every now and again to see what’s going on, but not ever venturing far from home. There’s no reason to. As one cousin puts it: “If you wait long enough, everything comes to Tucson.”

“My name is also Ure,” the note concluded. “Robert Ure.”

Imagine that. Just forty miles north of me, is quite possibly a member of the family I’ve never met before. At a minimum, just forty miles north of me is a generous, open-minded mystery reader with a sense of humor.

I signed the book, “From one Ure to another.”

We’ve since begun an email relationship, and he’s also asked me to sign a copy of my first book for him. It makes me wonder if I could increase my reader base by changing my name to Smith or Park.

I’m heading down to Arizona this week for signings in Tucson and Phoenix and I’m really looking forward to it. Another blend of all parts of my life: family, high school buddies, writer and librarian friends, and readers. (Phoenix phriends, please note that the signing is at 1:00 p.m. Saturday the 26th at Poisoned Pen. The bookstore mistakenly put the wrong time on their website.)

I got a note from a former high school teacher of mine, Kay Ijams, saying that she’d be at Clues Unlimited in Tucson for the signing on the 25th. I told her that we might have to reintroduce ourselves after forty years with no contact. “I’ll be the old woman in the back of the room with pride in her eyes,” she wrote. She’s right. I’d recognize her anywhere.

I wonder at what point in an author’s career the readers and fans who come to events outnumber the friends and family that do so. Even now, at every signing or conference panel or library presentation, there is at least one person in the audience I don’t recognize. Maybe they’re new fans. Maybe they’re high school teachers from forty years ago.

Maybe they’re all named Ure.

Okay, Rati’, what’s the weirdest connection you’ve made to a fan or an old acquaintance on tour? And readers, have you ever “decided to become a fan?” Why’d you do it?

I’m strapping on my high-heeled sneakers

by Pari

The other night, I told one of my daughters, "It doesn’t matter what you look like. It’s what’s inside that counts."

The next day I went to get my hair cut and eyebrows waxed.
Yeah, I know.

I’ve been in a dither about gray splicing my once-brown mane. I weigh too much. My clothes don’t fit right.

Do as I say, not as I do.

Welcome to the pre-booktour jitters. Those who know me, know these superficial concerns are waayy out of character. But, then it hit me, in public, I play a character. It’s the together writer. (Hah!) Gone is the soccer mom in sweats, the occasional misanthrope, the woman who worries about whether the shephard’s pie she made will be loved by her family. In her place is a well-coiffed, cleaned up gal who is witty and fun.

Playing this character made me think about the ones I write (thanks to Brett for his great post last Thurs.). And, in the weird way my mind works, I turned to superficialities. How important are looks to those we create in our novels/short stories?

Of course we need to be able to visualize our characters. Readers need that, too. Bulbous or cheerleader noses, breasts the size of champagne glasses (thanks, Arthur Koestler) or crenshaw melons, eyes the color of wet sand or pristine sky — all of these give us clues about the person.

And, well, clothes are important — up to a point. If a woman picks horsehair over silk for her slacks, that tells us something.

But it’s about two steps beyond those necessary descriptions where I get hung up. There’s this vapidity about fashion that I just don’t understand. Brands become code words for entire character traits. Vera Wang, Calvin Klein, Kanye West. Paris Hilton? Paula Abdul? Huh?

The problem is, I haven’t got any idea what the code means. I also don’t feel compelled to get the education. Is this writing that deserves our effort or is it simply lazy?

From my POV: If a woman carries a purse, I could care less whether it’s a Coach or Andrino. What I want to know, what really matters, is if it’s big enough to conceal the murder weapon.

So, my questions today center on fluff and frippery as they are translated into crime fiction.

When do clothes matter? (Do you have an example?)
When do brands matter? (Do you have an example?)
Have you read any great books or passages where these kinds of fashion concerns are done just right?

changing space

When I started writing many years ago (stuff for the local paper, then magazines), I wrote wherever I had enough space for the computer. In the first house we had, that was a sliver of a back porch which we converted to an office space for our construction company. I wrote with a four-year-old zooming in and around and an infant in a playpen. If there was a square inch of floor space, it probably had a book or a toy piled on it. I think the only free space was the tiny spot where my chair fit. I don’t think it was entirely a coincidence that I excelled at finishing short projects (news articles), but floundered at anything beyond a short story length.

The second house wasn’t much larger–just arranged slightly better so that more of the square footage was usable. In that house, there was a third bedroom. The boys liked bunking together (well, most of the time, except when they were trying to kill each other), so the third bedroom became the office. I thought at the time: wow, all of this room… I’ll never use all of this room. Yeah. I know. Delusional. The construction business grew, and its need for office space grew, and pretty soon, I was back to having a zillion filing cabinets and construction stuff cluttered around and the kids still zoomed in. I had a hard time focusing, though, because that room was pretty much in the center of the house. It was the front bedroom, and when you walked out of the kitchen into the hallway, you were facing that door, and everyone in the entire universe tramped through that kitchen. Yes, including you. It didn’t help to close the door because everyone then knocked and stood there. I started writing at night just to have enough consecutive uninterrupted minutes to be able to form a thought and then actually write it down. (I have always been a night owl–but when the kids were younger and I had to drive them to school at the buttcrack of dawn, I did not have the luxury of staying up late to take advantage of the quiet. I did it anyway, and functioned for years on three or four hours of sleep.) I managed to write slightly longer projects (screenplays), but anything longer than that was impossible for me to conceive. Not just produce, but actually conceive. I didn’t have the quiet, the head space, to work out the characters and dynamics of a longer story.

When we moved to the house we’re in now, the kids each had a room and we converted the front formal dining room into an office. We still have the construction company and still have tons of stuff for it, and for a long time, it was all still piled together. When the kids moved out, there was a spare bedroom and, joy of joys, my husband moved his office there and I had this entire office space to myself. My husband had built floor-to-ceiling bookshelves for me, and I was in heaven.

Except, heaven had a glitch: the office was still at the front of the house, next to the kitchen. My husband’s new office was further away, which meant everyone in this universe and the next one over tramped through the house back to his office. Yes, even you, do not try to deny it, I saw you and the chocolate chip cookies you ate.

I had been loathe to trade offices with my husband, even though he’d offered to do so several times, because I love the size of this space and the beautiful shelves. I love the gorgeous French doors he hung for me, which was an attempt to dissuade people from walking through (doesn’t help, people come and stand at the door and watch me write) (I feel like a science project). I love the convenience (I can burn the bread really close by, which means I can put it out before the fire department gets here).

But I want the quiet.

I know a lot of people write at places like Starbucks or at a restaurant, and I shudder at the thought. I need the quiet space, the lack of movement around me. I am too easily distracted, and I enjoy talking to people, which means, I end up talking to people instead of writing. And, it occurs to me that a lot of people who go out of their home to write do so to have the stimulus of life and people around them. I have always had the universe tramping through my house, so I’m not really at a shortage for company.

So today, as you’re reading this, my husband and I are moving my office. He’s building a bigger place for himself outside. I am either packing up stuff, or purging it, or I’m at the hardware store, buying paint. This office is far away from everything else. I’m going to expend a little extra effort to make it feel like it’s mine, like it’s a sanctuary. It has a large walk-in closet, in which I’ll have plenty of storage, and a small kitchenette. My husband just built two large white-erase boards that I’ll use for brainstorming and keeping track of the big picture of the novels in progress.

Changing space is a little scary. After all, I had success here. I wrote the first two books mostly in this room, and like any superstitious writer, I don’t want to jinx a good thing. But on the flip side, I’ve always had good luck with change, and I know the new space will give me what I crave: quiet, room apart from the busy world.

What about your ideal space? Do you already have it? If so, tell me about it. If you’ve got a fantasy of what your perfect space would be, I’d love to hear it today. You may just be my inspiration as I’m changing spaces.

What do you teach?

by Alex

I thought I’d continue JT’s topic from yesterday because, well, there’s a lot to say about it.

Instead of asking the question “Do you teach?” though, I’d like to focus more on “WHAT do you teach?”

It seems to me that we are recruited to teach these workshops and we have an appallingly limited time in which to do them. What can you really teach anyone in an hour?

I had a conversation with an author friend recently and she said she doesn’t even do any teaching or even speaking on the subject of writing or getting published, anymore. She feels strongly that until the business model changes, we shouldn’t be encouraging people to go into writing at all.

Well, yeah, it’s rough, no doubt!

Still, I told her that I had taken scads of screenwriting classes when I first moved down to LA, some good, some bad, but almost all useful in some way, and in every class, when the Jaded Screenwriter would look out over a class of fifty or a hundred people and say, “Realistically, only one or two of you will ever make a living at this,” I would think to myself – “Well, that’s me.”

My point in telling her this was that it’s always worth it to teach just because there MIGHT be the real writer in that room who can benefit from what you say.

But looking back, I wonder if I was also making another point, which is that it really didn’t MATTER who was up there teaching or what they were saying. The critical factor wasn’t the teacher, it was ME – and what I was getting out of the class for myself. And when not in class, what I was getting out of books, and movies, and my own false starts and dead ends.

I could be inspired by just a sentence, really.

But when you agree to do a workshop, you’re committing to teaching SOMETHING. So what can you teach in an hour?

I have stolen my foundation for teaching anything craft-related from Barry Eisler. To tell you the truth, I’m not even sure that he really has ever said this – it might have been my own interpretation of what he was saying. I tend to do that. But I think what he said was that “All writers are essentially self-taught, and you need to be able to break down everything you read to figure out what that author is doing and how s/he’s doing it.”

Well, that’s really all you need to know, as far as I’m concerned.

So when I walk in to teach a one-hour class, on suspense, on character, on theme, on story structure (which is my favorite thing to teach), I always start by saying exactly that: that you have to teach yourself to analyze how other writers create the elements of a story, and then I have them write down ten books (or movies, or a combination of both) which are in the genre that they are writing in and which are similar to the movie or book that they are trying to write (and GOOD, of course). It has to be ten, no less. Then hopefully there’s some overlap in the lists – that there are a number of people who name the same work, and we can use that one to analyze. I’ll also bring in a few of my own favorites as examples. So if I’m talking about story structure, I’ll walk them through a quick analysis of, say, the three act structure of a book or movie, including the stakes, the central question of the story, and the hero or heroine’s desire (external drive) and need (internal drive).

Then I’ll have them do another one or two together as a class, and then I’ll have them take one of their own and do it on their own, and have a few people share their analyses.

Same with breaking down suspense. Write down ten books/movies, choose one that a lot of people have listed, have them break down the elements of suspense that are set up and played out in that story.

Once they get the method, I tell them what they have to do is break down ALL TEN of their listed works in the same way. And then they have a template for creating the structure, or suspense elements, or whatever, in their own story.

People get it (and it’s exciting to see them get it!), I can do it in an hour, and I know that people will walk out with a practical method that they can use for virtually any element of story.

So, kids, if you feel like it – tell us what YOU can teach in an hour, or what you’ve been successfully taught in an hour.

(It’s supposed to snow in Raleigh today – fingers crossed!!)

Congrats to our Ken

MAJOR CONGRATULATIONS to our very own Ken Bruen for his Edgar Nomination!!!!

PRIEST was shortlisted for Best Novel. HUZZAH!!!!!

We’re pulling for you, Ken!!! Good luck May 1st!!!!!

XO,
Murderati

Chaos Theory

by J.T. Ellison

I have a framed print in my office. It sits on the shelf, looming over me. It’s an image from the I Ching.

CHAOS

Before the beginning of great brilliance, there must be Chaos.
Before a brilliant person begins something great, they must look foolish to the crowd.

I spend a lot of time looking at this symbol, at the quote below it, thinking about what it means to me. I bought the print because I was attracted to the word. Chaos. It signifies so much. A chaotic mind. A chaotic life. A willingness to let the universe dictate your course. I didn’t know it at the time, but the I Ching explores the dynamic balance of opposites, seeking to ultimately predict the unpredictable. Bringing tranquility to a chaotic world through a mystical yet scientific method of prediction.

My Dad has books on the other spectrum of chaos theory, ones that I read with fascination. Nonlinear dynamics that are influenced by initial conditions, and grow out of their seeming non-reaction. Minute changes in the initial event can cause widespread change. Boggles the mind. It boggles my mind especially, since I’m not all the way down with Quantum Physics. It was the less esoteric term for Chaos Theory — the Butterfly Effect — that gave me a glimpse into this world. A easy way for me to understand the theory of Chaos.

A butterfly flaps it’s delicate wings, and on the other side of the world, a hurricane develops.

I see the correlation between the I Ching’s version of Chaos and the Rocket Scientists. Both seek to tame the untameable, to explain the unexplainable. But the basic thought is that no matter what happens, whether you mean it or not, you are affecting change.

I commented on Toni’s post last week that something odd happened when I watched A WONDERFUL LIFE on Christmas Eve this year. It’s my tradition, a chance to remind myself that there’s a reason for everything. But I’ve never seen myself in George Bailey. Why would I? Outside my friends and family, how have I affected change? I’m not looking to cure cancer, or change the world. I’ve always just been a girl who does her thing.

Watching the movie, I was struck by a crazy thought. This year, I’ve become the butterfly.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not having delusions of grandeur here. But my teaching experience last weekend solidified the feeling. I did affect a change, directly, on a group of students. It may not be a positive change, but it was change nonetheless. You know, I don’t have kids. I’ve never taught. My first book came out two months ago and that’s the first real communication I’ve had with the outside world in years. I’ve never been in a position to affect change. I’ve never thought that I wanted to.

The class I taught had ten students. The goal for the weekend was for them to walk out of the class with a flash short story, 1,000 words, that had solid characters, a definable setting, and a plot. To help them get to this point, I devised a series of writing exercises that would give them all these items, utilizing pictures I’d found that I felt would cause a reaction — good, bad or indifferent. By the end of the first day, we’d built 5 characters — two men and three women, developed three different settings, and then moved into plot. I thought it would be fun to use the seven basics — Man vs. Man, Nature, Supernatural, God, Self, Technology and Environment. I made up "The Wheel of Plot", each person spun the wheel and had to write their story based on the random plot they landed on.

I had one more exercise at that point, but they’d had enough. I didn’t realize just how taxing the session had been, how far they’d been pushed. Working out of the comfort zone was the point, and man, had I ever pushed them. They’d exited the comfort zone during the very first exercise, and I didn’t realize it. A good lesson for me. I’m a working writer, which means I write daily and don’t think too much about how much I actually output. Some people write in their spare time, and need lubrication.

I was so thrilled the following morning, when the writers read their work aloud for a group critique session. They’d performed brilliantly. The stories were strong, the characters developed. There was one that could have been submitted on the spot, and I gave an ezine suggestion right there. But the most amazing part was the pride on their faces. They’d pushed themselves, at my request, and created something that wouldn’t have existed if I weren’t there to guide them through it. Wow. That’s a heady feeling.

Harnessing chaos can be intoxicating. I’m still riding the high. I’m starting to realize that I may have affected more change than I originally thought, simply by decide to share my work. Between the books and Killer Year, I shattered the chrysalis. I’ve become a butterfly, and I’ve truly stretched my wings. I seriously doubt that there’s going to be a hurricane as a result, but maybe a stiff breeze will come of it one of these days.

My question for you — have you ever taught? Do you think writers should be writers and teachers should be teachers? We all know how a bad teacher can derail you, that forcing a student to bend to your will is never a good idea. One of the things I repeated a hundred times over the weekend was "You make the rules." Do you think that the modern MFA programs and writers workshops are allowing writers to truly stretch their wings?

Wine of the Week: Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon, courtesy of my host for the Tennessee Mountain Writers weekend, Sue Orr. Thanks so much for everything, Sue!

————————-

AN ANNOUNCEMENT!

KILLER YEAR: Stories to Die For, goes on sale Tuesday the 22nd of January. This unique anthology is edited by Lee Child, with original stories by all thirteen Killer Year members, original stories by Allison Brennan, Ken Bruen and Duane Swierczynski, an essay from MJ Rose, introductions to all the stories by each member’s ITW mentor, and a fascinating coda by Laura Lippman. This collection is sure to please. It’s one of a kind. Come by Killer Year to read the reviews and pre-order yours today.

Are You Experienced?

As a writers, we use many tools to create our stories and characters. Many of the tool are forged from experience, from trying new things, from stepping outside our comfort zones. Some experiences just happen. Some we go in search of. They all effect our writing, some more directly than others. A hike through the Hollywood Hills might translate to the burn a fugitive feels as they escape from their prison into the wilderness. Or turbulence on a cross country flight might become a plane nearly out of control with no idea if they will make it down or not.

We’ve all had experiences, both big and small. In my case, I’ve jumped out of airplanes, been “baptized” with cold water and reindeer’s milk at the Artic Circle in Finland, and crawled around the rafters of the Silverdome in Detroit. I’ve talked with the last man to set foot on the moon in a kitchen in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, gotten the “I-don’t-think-so” raised eye from Dudley Moore when I offered to move his Bentley out of a crowded parking lot, and listened to Rusty the Bailiff – from the old Judge Wapner version of The People’s Court, tell his weekly dirty joke to anyone who would listen. (Those last two were from my first year directly out of college when I worked at a small studio in Hollywood. Fun times.) I’ve gone to the shooting range to feel the recoil of a pistol in my hand. I’ve flipped an eight-ton equipment truck on its side on the main road between Mexico City and Veracruz. I’ve ridden the S-Bahn and U-Bahn trains in Berlin for hours with no destination in mind.

I’m not trying to boast about anything here…hell, who would want to brag about crashing a truck and causing a major, multiple hour traffic jam? What I am trying to reinforce is that we all have experiences in our lives. As I mentioned before, big ones and small ones. Sometimes we need to recognize them and take advantage of them. They add to the texture of who we are, and, therefore, add to the texture of the stories we write.

A lot of the experiences I listed are things that just kind of happened to me. Sure I put my self in a position for them to happen, but when they did, they were often a surprise to me. Some, though, I made happen. Jumping out of a plane, for instance, and going to the firing range.

One of the most important experiences in my life, as far as my writing is concerned, was something I made happen. It was a class I took in college.

The class was beginning acting, and my teacher was fantastic. She was kind, supportive, and encouraging. We would perform scenes from famous plays. Sometimes it was two or three of us. Sometimes it was a monologue we would do ourselves. My teacher would really push at us to understand the character we were playing. We would even improvise scenes that had nothing to do with the actual play with these famous characters, forcing us to make up the dialogue on the spot. That meant really getting into the characters head, and acting how we thought they should act.

She did something else that was also really cool. She’d have us write character essays about the role we were taking on.

As you might imagine, I dove deep into that. I wouldn’t just write a dry character description, I would make it something else entirely, something that really exposed the character in an interesting way.

The one I remember the most was when I did a monologue from Our Town…I think from the third act. I was George. For the character essay, I decided to write it as a prose scene between a newspaper report and George at a diner many years after the end of the play. I actually think that character essay was one of the best things I wrote in college.

That class continues to be invaluable to me. I had actually done a little acting in high school and community theater before that, but that particular class really focused things for me. The lessons I learned back then are directly responsible for the characters I create and the dialogue I write today. For example, I’ll act out scenes to myself using some of the improvisational methods I learned.

My point is this…some experience happens to you, some you make happen. Soak them all in, and take every advantage possible.

As a sub-note, enrolling in an acting class is something all writers can do, and the benefits will be great. Don’t worry if you think your not any good. It’s not about your ability as an actor, it’s about what you learn when you have to “become” someone else.

I’m sure many here have other suggestions for active experience. Would love them if you want to share!

OFF TOPIC: I’m sure JT, Toni, and Rob will be talking about this in their posts, but next Tuesday the KILLER YEAR ANTHOLOGY edited by Lee Child hits stores. It’s a fantastic collection of crime and thriller stories, and all four of us have contributions in it. It’s been getting great reviews! Hope you consider picking up a copy.

Live it up,
Brett

If You Only Knew the Power of the Dumb Side….

by J.D. Rhoades

After five thousand years of
civilization…we could all use a break.

-Tagline
from a forgotten 70’s movie.

Oy. January. January may actually rival August for my least favorite month, despite (or maybe because of) my birthday being this month. The fun of Christmas is over, the bills for same are rolling in, and it finally got cold in North Carolina. So when those midwinter blues set in, it’s time to shake them off with something fun. But this kind of malaise requires a special kind of fun: dumb fun.

The other night, we rented
“Grindhouse.” If you’re not familiar, “Grindhouse” was a movie released last
year by directors Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez that was intended to
be a tribute to those great low-budget features of the late 60’s and 70’s, the
one’s that played in the low-rent, low-class theaters like the old Sunrise in
my home town. You know the ones I mean: the ones where your feet stuck to the
floor with every step because they rarely, if ever, mopped the place. The ones
where you threw Atomic Fire Balls at the screen whenever the film broke, which
was about every other movie.

Actually, “Grindhouse” is two
movies, in honor of the fact that the old cheap-seats cinemas were running
double features more often than not. In this case, the two movies are Tarantino’s “Death Proof” featuring Kurt
Russell as a homicidal stunt driver, and “Planet Terror,” Rodriguez’ entry in
the killer-zombie-virus genre.

About “Death Proof”, the less said
the better. I didn’t know it was possible to be that bored by a Tarantino
movie, and I’m a huge Tarantino fan. But “Planet Terror”– now that was some
great lousy cinema, right there. It had
everything a low budget horror flick needs: scantily clad women, zombies, gore,
more zombies, stuff blowing up for no apparent reason other than it looked
cool, zombies blowing up, homicidal lesbian doctors, and a one-legged stripper
who replaced her hastily engineered peg leg with an assault rifle that
propelled her high in the air when she fired the grenade launcher attachment at
the ground.

In short, “Planet Terror” was dumb. It was GLORIOUSLY
dumb. I laughed till my sides were sore.

Now I like a smart, sophisticated
entertainment as much as the next
feller. But lord help me, every now and then I just like something
dumb-but-fun. And in mid January, when the cold winds whistle ‘round the
corners of my old pile of an office building, and everyone but me seems to be
coming down with something, it just seems like a good time to turn off the
frontal lobes and indulge in some nice mindless cheesy amusement.

Note: This is the sort of thing
that some people refer to as “guilty pleasures,” but I don’t believe in feeling
guilty about my pleasures. So I just call them what they are: dumb, but fun. So
here we go.

In music, the epitome of
dumb-but-fun is the Ramones. Ramones music wasn’t exactly what
you’d call complex. What it was most of all
was propulsive. Everything was geared to create a sense of urgency, from Joey’s
staccato, machine-gun repetition of lyrics ("Twenty-Twenty-Twenty-four
hours to go…"), to bassist Dee Dee Ramone’s warp-speed bass to guitarist
Johnny Ramone’s buzz-saw guitar attack.

It was the lyrics, however, that
really made the Ramones what they were. Joey wrote words like "Guess I’ll
have to break the news/That I got no mind to lose/ all the girls are in love
with me/I’m a teenage lobotomy," and the mathematically challenged verse
"it’s the end, the end of the Seventies/It’s the end, the end of the
century…" And Joey hung onto the mike stand as if the band’s sonic assault
were about to blow him off the stage and delivered lines like "The KKK
took my baby away" with a total seriousness that, paradoxically, made them
all the more hilarious. The Ramones were rock and roll made goofy.

But, you say, this is a site about
reading and writing. What about books?
Oh, there are plenty of dumb books around. But for sheer outrageous mindless
amusement value, it’s hard to beat the Destroyer series of pulp adventure novels by Richard Sapir and Warren Murphy. In the
series, which must be over 200 books by now, police officer Remo Williams has
his execution faked by a secretive government organization called CURE. After
this, he becomes a secret agent, and a
disciple of Chiun, the only living master of the oriental martial art of
Sinanju. And what a martial art it
is: “A master can hold his breath over an hour, rip steel doors from their
hinges, dodge bullets, overturn a moving tank, outrun a car, seem invisible –
you get the idea. They have mastered the full potential of the human body.” Oh, and there’s a bonus, since of course the Sinanju training turns you into the world’s greatest lover. But you have to be careful, because most Western women will not be able to bear the intensity of Sinanju style lovemaking and will, in fact, go insane.

Now that’s
dumb. But fun. Largely because the books refuse to take themselves too
seriously, and the banter between the haughty Chiun and Remo is hilarious.

So, fellow Murderati and assorted
spectators–chime in. What are your favorite examples from music, literature,
and film that are dumb dumb dumb, but
fun, fun fun?