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 This is a continuation of my blogging here at WdC |
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This will be a blog for my writing, maybe with (too much) personal thrown in. I am hoping it will be a little more interactive, with me answering questions, helping out and whatnot. If it falls this year (2024), then I may stop the whole blogging thing, but that's all a "wait and see" scenario. An index of topics can be found here: "Writing Blog No.2 Index"  Feel free to comment and interact. |
| Dreams I received this request: I know the conventional wisdom of "don't open a story with a dream" but what about writing a whole story where your character is within the dream world and it's only revealed at the end? Is that considered a "cheap trick" ending? I quite literally only thought of making it a dream when it got too absurd to be real. Letās look at dreams in stories! First, and this is important, never end a story with āit was all a dream.ā That was fine 150 years ago, but even Carrollās Aliceā¦ stories had it ambiguous as to whether it was a dream or reality. This also goes for āit was all the drugsā or āit was just a vision of a possible futureā ā dreams in different clothing. It feels cheap, like a cop-out, like the author could not find an ending. Having said that, there are some exceptions. When it starts and ends with a dream is fine, especially if done well. When dreams make up a large chunk of the narrative, then that can also work. Hereās an example ā from a TV show in the 1980s (like a sort of Twilight Zone, but not the 1980s remake of that show) a man kills his wife and then goes off with his secretaryā¦ then is woken up and kills his wife and goes off with his secretaryā¦ then is woken up and kills his wife and goes off with his secretaryā¦ then is woken up, kills his wife, his secretary has no idea what heās talking about, the police arrest him and he begs the camera to tell him itās all a dream. And finally when a character is broken and a dream is the only place they now exist. Opening with a dream is something that can work, but it went through a spurt in YA fiction in the 1990s and it still feels clichĆ©d. It is designed to show the ideal for a character whose life sucks. We saw it so often that when you read a story of a happy kid you knew next chapter was going to show a miserable reality. And the ending was never like that dream-state. Using dreams through a story works better. Think of the original Nightmare On Elm Street ā Freddy got you through your dreams! Gilliamās Brazil (UK version) used dreams to show an ideal, and the fact they were never achieved makes it all the more depressing. In some contemporary fantasy and horror, dreams can be used as signals to the future or premonitions, with hidden messages to those with some sort of āsightā. And at their most obvious, dreams can show us the innermost thoughts and feelings of a character that would otherwise not be able to be shown in a narrative without being an info-dump. Dreams can be an important story-telling device, so long as they are not over-used. Looking at the question ā I donāt think it is an issue to open with a dream, but to come to the end and discover the whole story was a dream can be something that turns readers off. And there has to be a good reason for it being a dream, not just because the story has gone in a surreal direction. One story I did read was a story where a man talks to his wife and child; about halfway through she mentions her death and the child says that it hurt; at the end it was a dream the man was having while he was on the verge of death himself. That worked because it was him coming to terms with the sadness and realising he was not ready to go, so his mind/body fighting to stay alive after all. But if itās because a writer is struggling with an endingā¦ maybe not. Finally, there is also the ambiguity of dreams. Was it a dream or not that makes the Aliceā¦ stories I mentioned before so intriguing has been done a lot, but I feel there is so much left to explore. A bit of early pulp horror was focused on this conceit, as was a deal of fantasy, especially in the EC pre-code comic days. So itās old, but possibly hasnāt been explored in a modern/ contemporary setting. Something to consider. So, dreams can be fine. Thereāre just a few caveats, is all. |
| Recurring Characters Following on from "20250523 Frame Story" .This is something that a few writers have experimented with ā the idea of recurring characters, though not writing sequels. This is when the same character appears in separate and distinct stories. I guess the most famous would be the creations of Robert E Howard: Conan, King Kull, Solomon Kane. And so, as such, I am going to use Howardās technique to show how to do it well, and how not to do it well. Something that Howard understood was that characters age, their skills improve, they become smarterā¦ but they also become a little slower and their attitude becomes world-weary. He understood this, and he wrote the King Kull and Conan stories in a vague sort of order so that he could show them aging. In the original Conan stories, he even had allusions to the stories he had already written to make sure there was a sense of continuity. However, the reader did not have to know this previous story to enjoy or understand the one they were reading ā it was only a reference, a brief mention that maybe heād faced this sort of opponent before, or maybe that heād known fear only once, as a child. With the King Kull stories, though, he did this and made the allusions to important events that had been writtenā¦ and then he went and wrote a few stories of early on in his life, including how he became a king. The problem? That was a brutal fight and the later stories make no mention of it. So such an important life event meant nothing to the older Kull. It hardly felt right. However, when it came to Solomon Kane, Howard wrote two stories, and then went and outlined a sort of life story with question marks at certain points where he had no idea what could happen. He wrote a heap of older Kane stories, then a few earlier, but these stories had been alluded to already because Howard had the life worked out. This is the way to do it properly. And he had friends re-appear where Kane said he knew him from elsewhere, and then Howard went back to write that story when he had the details some time later. You can read the Kane stories out of order because each is a standalone, but in order and they paint an interesting life picture. That is the thing, though ā each story needs to be a standalone. I use a core group of around 10 characters in my main fantasy stories, but I have a complete chronology worked out of important events, so when something unimportant happens I can put that into the chronology and it is understandable that later on the characters would not remember it after the War of the Demons. They have scars and gain them in other stories, but there have been times when I allude to the scar and then later I might write about how they got it. I follow Howardās method. An example in my own writing is here: "Whispering Jack" . The recurring character is a cryptid hunter. Some previous stories are alluded to, but each story can be read independently of the rest. In fact, only the last story is a sequel to the very first; the rest are just with Whispering Jack the recurring character.Writing stories so the events of the previous story have an impact on the next is writing a sequel, and there is nothing wrong with that. But standalone stories are an easier sell (and, yes, I have sold seven stories from my fantasy world); recurring characters are more fun for the writer and, if you become well-known, for later readers to get the whole life of a character. Recurring characters are perfectly acceptable away from sequels, trilogies, decalogies or whatever. And they are some of my favourites I have created. |
| Novel #8 We hit another (and not the last) glitch in the road after Invisible Friend. Brooke was written at the end of 1996, after almost a year of churning out clichĆ© ridden fantasy short stories. Clocking in at 50000 words, it has a flawed premise, and poor writing. I think the only bits I like are the first meeting of the titular character, and the ending where the narrator, Rick, finds out what she is going through. Brooke tells the story of Brooke, a girl who is fostered by a family who are friends of Rickās family. She turns out to be a demon who has no memory of her demonic nocturnal activities. She is an evil killer at night, but an angst-ridden teenager during the day. Okay? Rick goes out of his way to save her, but fails spectacularly, though she is no longer evil. Stupid, odd, and probably I wrote it 15 years too early. Itās the sort of childish tripe which seems to get a huge audience nowadays. Much like Invisible Friend, the main character is whiny, though he has no reason to be. And Brooke is a two-dimensional cardboard cutout of a girl who needs the man to save her. Pathetic. But it does have some good bits. Some of the descriptions of transformation I think are well done, and I like the seminary library I created for this tale. I also revisited Mondragon, a town I invented for Invisible Friendā¦ and would subsequently revisit a few more times. And my love affair with the ellipsis continued unabatedā¦ But a bump in the road is what this is, a bump I think I needed to get this sort of supernatural horror clichĆ© out of my system, so my next novel actually had a sort of original premise. Sometimes itās good to drive those clichĆ©s onto paperā¦ Excerpt: Ch 11. Brooke sat beside me in the car in silence, not even complaining about my choice of music for a change. I had told her that we had to go somewhere, that it was important, that it could even help her. I could not bring myself to tell her that I thought the person we were going to visit was potentially our only hope. Yet she had just shaken her head and curled up in my arms, sitting there on the floor of our apartment. She fell asleep quickly; I not long after. I woke sometime after eleven in the morning. After laying her on the bed I showered and cleaned myself up. Then I very carefully dressed her, carried her to the car and took off; we were both going and that, I decided, was that. I had all but convinced myself that this was her only chance. She did not actually awaken until we were well past Gawler and on our way headed north. And for more than half an hour she just sat there, tense, refusing to speak, even shrugging off all of my attempts to touch her. It was only when the cassette stopped and I fiddled with a second one that she finally spoke. āWhere are we going?ā she asked, her voice full of fear. āWeāve got to see some-one,ā I responded carefully, repeating the words I had been saying all morning, sounding harsh even to my own ears. She stared at me out of the corners of our eyes. āYouāre not going to kill me, are you?ā she asked pathetically. āWhat?ā I asked in confusion. āIām a monster.ā She was crying. āIsnāt that why weāre out here? So you can get rid of the monster?ā I sighed and grit my teeth as I pulled the car to the side of the road. The two cars that had been following us since Port Wakefield zoomed past at high speed, shaking my old vehicle a little, and then I faced her. She almost seemed to shy away from any contact with me yet again, but I grabbed her hands with mine and stared into those wide, deep, brown eyes. āYes, it is why weāre out here,ā I stated. āTo get rid of thatā¦ that thing. But Iām not going to kill you.ā āI am a monster,ā she whispered as if the realisation had only just dawned on her. āCome on, Brookeā¦ā And I dragged her in close to me. She resisted at first, still trying to keep away, but I held firm. She stared at me, looked into my eyes, then grabbed me just as tight, suddenly not wanting to let go at all. āIām a monsterā¦ā she sobbed, over and over again. She was twelve years old again, trying to cope with an all-too realistic bad dream. And I did what I had done back when, as a fifteen year old, I was extremely uncomfortable with a situation that had been forced upon me with this youngster: I simply reacted as I would have back then ā I stroked the top of her head and rocked her back and forth, but said nothing. Too much like when I was that teenager being asked to help a poor, sick child who had taken a liking to me, who I considered one of my best friends, I did not know what to do. So I did nothing really; I was just there for her. Like once before (and at least twice more to come), tough to find a good piece hereā¦ But this story was a real character study and told me just what I needed to learnā¦ although I didnāt get the lesson for a few more years. |
| Frame Story Frame Story is the term used in folklore studies; Framing Device is the term used in film and TV. A Frame Story is a way of telling a series of stories in one narrative. The classic example is 1001 Arabian Nights where Scheherazade tells a story to her husband every night in order to stop him from killing her. Many of the portmanteau films from the Amicus company (a rival to Hammer in the UK, and my favourite portmanteau films) have a similar device ā men on a train (Dr Terrorās House Of Horrors), the story of inmates in a psychiatric facility (Asylum) et al. ā and even the famous Stephen King Creepshow has the framing device of a comic book a father took from his son. In many of these situations, the last story, or an additional little coda or epilogue story involves the framing device itself (Dr Terrorā¦, the men discover they died in a train accident; Asylum, the doctor does not work out that the person he is seeking is the nurse; Creepshow, the kidās ordered a voodoo doll from the comic book and gets revenge on his father). As you can tell, I love a good portmanteau horror film! Want a non-horror example? Song Of The South with Uncle Remus telling the tales of Brāer Rabbit et al. Sure, I know, itās allegedly racist and itās buried, but it is still a Frame Story around some classic tales of folklore. However, where does this come in when writing? Good question! It is not used often, but is becoming a little more common. See, anthologies of short stories are always common and are a good way for writers to get their stories out there. These will often have common themes or topics, but the stories are all self-contained units. They are not related at all. If you have a good reputation and decent sales as a writer, then a collection of short stories, a personal anthology, can be commissioned. But you need to have a built-in audience ā Stephen King, Jeffrey Archer, names like that ā and you need to have sold short stories to other markets. But some publishing houses do do calls for single-author anthologies, and it seems the books that have the highest acceptance rate have an over-arching Frame Story. There are two ways you can do this. The first is the classic way. This is where between each story you have a short (no longer than three or so pages) interlude of sorts, normally formatted in italics, which explains where the story-teller is and where the next story comes from. This can work really well, and is almost expected, but is becoming a little clichĆ©d, and the framing device can become an impediment and come across as same-y. The second way is something that was popularised by Stephen King. Although he didnāt invent it, and only utilised the format a couple of times himself (he never produced a book worth), this is where each story stands as a completely stand-alone work, and the framing device is used in the story universe. Kingās was a gentlemanās club where each man would tell a tale. It was, in fact, the price of admission. This is what I prefer. In my own writing, I have written a series of stories told by Uncle Joe to his great-nephew. Why did I choose that format? Because I was telling standard horror tales with an Australian twist, and needed something to tie them together, and an old guy whoād travelled when he was younger seemed the ideal way to do that. It also meant I could sell each individual story to anthologies (okay, Iāve only sold two, but the idea is still there, as Iāve written 25). If I collated them, Iād probably have to edit out the explanation of who Uncle Joe was at the start of each, but thatād be all. So, one other thing. It is not simply stories with a recurring character (blog post on them will be coming!) In the Frame Story, the recurring characters tell the story, are not involved in the action of the story. Usually. My Uncle Joe Tales, Joe tells the story to his great-nephew, but he is also the recurring character in many of them. Anyway, the recurring character being the narrator first and foremost is an important difference. Anyway, thatās a Frame Story. You might as well give it a go. Might be something different, and who knows what it could lead to? Good luck! |
| In Media Res This is from an old question, from my "20240612 Starting A Story" post. Sorry it took me so long. And the person who asked the question has since blocked me, soā¦ meh. Still a good question.Can you explain what in media res is in more detail? Sure. In Media Res is a Latin phrase which means āin the middle of things.ā It has become a standard of narrative story-telling, especially in the short story format and script work. What this means is that the opening of the story happens with something occurring, we are in the middle of the action. In films, think the opening of Avengers: Age Of Ultron, the first three Indiana Jones movies, and Deadpool And Wolverine. They open, in order, on a mission with lots of shooting and death, seeking a gold statue, trying to get an antidote for a poison, a young Indy on a dig and with a chase, and Deadpool killing TVA agents with the remains of a Wolverine. Give us the action from the word go! Of course, not every movie does this ā Die Hard has the slow build of tension, for example ā but many do. In short stories, though, in media res is a great way to engage your reader from the word go. You can introduce the characters over the course of the events, but the thing is, the reader wants to read on because it is already engaging. It does not mean every story needs to start with an explosion or a death or something. But starting with something happening is a great way to engage. Too many writers start with character introductions. āGeorgina Smith was 5ā6, 130lbs with bobbed hair that was blonde, brown eyes and a smattering of freckles on her nose. She wore a pink top and purple pants with her new KSI-branded sneakers and a bracelet that said, āLove.ā She liked cats and kittens but loved tigers.ā I changed the details, but this is the opening of a story I read here on WdC. And, guess what? Nothing in that description meant a damn thing in the 1100 word story that followed. I am about to toot my own horn here, but letās compare that to the opening of my short story "Audrey" . We start there with Audrey being led to the back yard by her grand-daughter. Something is happening. We donāt even get a description of a single person in the whole story. Does it matter? I donāt think so. The story tells the tale of a woman treated as useless because she is old and blind. Details are sprinkled into the story; I donāt think Iāve done an info-dump. We start in media res and the story does not have a lull afterwards. I think. (I used that story because it seems people like it.)This technique does have two disadvantages ā one, it reduces word count. On WdC, that hardly matters, but in the real world when submission calls ask for a set word count, it can be an issue. So use more show and youāll get your word count up. Two, sometimes it feels like the writer is starting at the climax. And that is the way with some stories. I guess also some writers want to use the slow build ā show a normal day and then mess it up for the characters bit by bit. And that is perfectly valid. I do it in a fair amount of my horror. However, the advantages, I feel, can outweigh the disadvantages. And it will help get rid of the info-dump character introduction (stop doing that!) and make the reader get into your story faster. In. My. Opinion. |
| Sympathy For The Monster A few online horror sites have been having discussions lately about why the Universal monster series from the 1930s through 1950s are often considered the best monster portrayals (coming in light of the recent version of Nosferatu). Yes, the more recent monster portrayals using CGI might be more monstrous (whether they look better is up to the individual; I think too much CGI looks like the animated sequences in Mary Poppins), and Hammer Films might have had better production values and introduced us to gore and realistic kills, and the slasher films that have been there since the 1970s might have more violence and bloodier deaths, but people tend to always go back to those old favourites of the golden age of Universal: Frankensteinās Monster, Dracula, the Invisible Man, Gill-Man, the Wolf-Man, the Mummy. They keep trying to remake them. Some work (about 40% of Hammerās films, Brendan Fraserās The Mummy), some are okay (about 40% of Hammerās films, Andy Warholās Frankenstein) and too many fail and are just abysmal (about 20% of Hammerās films, Tom Cruiseās The Mummy). So, what is it about the Universal black and white originals that just make them the pinnacle of the monster movie? Well, first, on a visual, there is something about the black and white that just works, I think. But visually the make-up is good and the monsters are there and are real, so the others are reacting to physical things sharing a set with them. The sets are real, not green-screened, so they can all interact with all their surroundings. Models? Sure, but physical models with real shadows. But thatās the physical. As a writer, there is one thing that makes these resonate ā the monsters, the so-called bad guys, have an element about them that induces sympathy in the audience. They are not written as killing machines (this is where a lot of Hammer films fall down and every single slasher), but have something else about them. The audience is given a reason for sympathy. The least of these is Dracula, but the way Lugosi played him, going back to the stage, was that the vampire was lonely. He was thoroughly evil, but he wanted companionship. That hint of humanity made people think more of him than just some mindless beast. Frankensteinās Monster is, of course, all about the outsider being treated appallingly. Considering the personal lives of the writer and director, it is hardly a surprise. He was created, not born, and he was not given a place in the world. He didnāt understand. And yet he was hounded to a deathā¦ sort of. Sympathy for the monster is easy here. Just as it is easy when it comes to the Gill-man, (The Creature From The Black Lagoon). This was a creature, a remnant of a prehistoric time, uprooted from his home, taken to civilisation, operated on and then left by the humans. The three films are really depressing, and the fact that at the end of the third film there is a sort of a nice ending for the poor abused Gill-man. But it was so easy to be sympathetic for the being. Maybe too much. And this carries on to the Wolf-man. Turned by a bite, unable to control the change, hating the change, searching for a cure, the Wolf-man remained sympathetic throughout his films, even when killing people. Removed from the original werewolf myth, it was an interesting take. And the Wolf-man is, in fact, one of the forms from original folklore, not a movie creation. Then there is the Invisible Man. Experimenting on himself, he does lose his mind, but it is gradual and we feel sorry for him as he loses itā¦ and then, at the end, he remembers his humanity. Just. We might lose that sympathy for a while, but it is still there. And, finally, we have the Mummy. Forced into his situation by love, later brought back to life through magic, forced to do the bidding of a priest, the love for his princess is still there. The Mummy is not the villain, that is the controlling priest, and we feel for the Mummy and what he is going through. So, I think thatās why these films have lasted coming up 100 years as examples of fine monster movies. The best non-Universal example is very obviously King Kong. Taken from his home, shown like a zoo animal, and then killed by humans who just thought of him as an animal. Sympathy abounds. Except in the Japanese remakes of the 1960s and 1970s. They were just awful. What this boils down to is: making your monster at least a little sympathetic can really capture an audience. Donāt be afraid to show it. |
| Novel #7 On the heels of Return came the first long story I actually shopped around ā Our House. Written in a month at the end of 1995, clocking in at 62600 words, I was really proud of it. Looking backā¦ not so much. It garnered a total of 17 rejections, of which 13 were form rejections. One said in rather diplomatic language that it was crap. One said that it was a rip-off of half a dozen other stories, most particularly Amityville Horror. One I canāt remember. And the other was the best, and also the last I received: The editor said he liked the story, ālovedā the writing, but found the middle section meandered, and the constant self-referencing by the narrator, especially with what was yet to come in the story, was off-putting. So he basically told me to rewrite a lot of it, and I decided to do just that, and so stopped sending it out. However, by then, I had written so much other stuff that it fell by the wayside. So Our House was the first novel that got rejected. The story involves an old house that takes over the lives of a group of children, all the way into adulthood. It makes them do things out of character. But is the house haunted, or is it a reflection of themselves? The narrator is watching some protestors trying to save the house, and relates his own history with the place as he sits in his car, trying desperately not to join them. He fights itā¦ and failsā¦ sort ofā¦ Further, the narrator is used rather literally here. The story has no chapters, and is written from the first person perspective as though the narrator is talking into a hand-held tape-recorder. And that is how I wrote the first 25000 words ā me talking into a dictaphone and then transcribing. The house itself existed, an old deserted house on Nelson Rd, long since torn down, which some of us broke into in year 7. The car in the shed was there as well, though not as old as in the story. Oh, and we didnāt kill anyone either. It is written like someone speaking, something Stephen King later did so much better with Dolores Claiborne. This is really based on a sort of reality. In fact, at the time we broke in and saw the damage inside the old house, I wrote a quick story about a murder in the place and my friends - this was primary school, remember, and I was 11 ā passed it around so much it wore out. This happened fourteen years before I wrote Our House, and it was all still as clear as anything. It was also the first long story Iād written that got an emotional response from some friends ā some claimed it gave them nightmares. That would be good if it was true, but I donāt know for sure. Look, the story definitely needs work, it suffers (as you shall see) from a diarrhoea of the ellipsis, and it drags a bitā¦ a lot, but one day when I am suffering from writerās block, I may come back to it and revise the bits that old editor told me to. Not bad, all in all. I mean, not good, but alsoā¦ not bad. Excerpt: Hmmmā¦ Nickyā¦ Okay, letās go. Get this over and done withā¦ It seemed like Nick was a nice enough bloke. I mean, he had some annoying habits, but didnāt we all. Essentially, though, he was pretty cool. āThea turned up with him on the same day that Brian turned up with Yvette and Gina (the latter was who he was trying to set me up with, having heard from Randy that I was a bit depressed after losing āThea). We met in town and went to the pictures. I donāt remember what we saw, but it was an action film. Had Bruce Willis in it, I think. All I remember is that none of us spent a great deal of time actually paying any attention to the screen. Randy and Shelley, āThea and Nicky, Brian and Yvette, me and Gina, four couples spending the whole afternoon kissing like there was no tomorrow. What I do remember ā very clearly, in fact ā was that when Gina kissed me it was like kissing a spittoon; Christ, did that girlās mouth water. She almost dribbled. It was disgusting. I was almost relieved when, after a week or so of constant attention, she decided that I wasnāt right for her. And Brian and Yvette didnāt last a great deal longer, either. I think he found it hard to come to terms with dating quite an intellectual girl, a science student at university. Majored in physics, I think. But āThea and Nicky, that turned out to be quite a couplingā¦ We all liked Nicky, at least a little, though I knew Brian was suspicious of something. I never found out just what, but there was something he didnāt like about the tall, nineteen year old (two years older than me at the time), dark-haired teaching student from Flinders University. Butā¦ hey, you knowā¦ Maybe he just didnāt like an outsider, any outsider, coming into the circleā¦ Especially after we sort of inducted him into the groupā¦ No, he wasnāt inducted, just sort of acceptedā¦ No, thatās still not right. Oh, shit. Well, letās be honest hereā¦ We were looking for a Jamie substitute, some-one to replace the friend weād killed so crudely, and Nickyās affable personality and apparently deep affection for āThea made him a candidateā¦ The perfect candidateā¦ But his first visit to the house seemed to completely contradict this assessmentā¦ It was near the end of September of that year, 1988, when āThea apparently first told him what weād been doing since we were little kids. She said later that she wasnāt sure if he believed her or not at first. She reckoned that he looked at her as though she was having a joke, or setting him up for one. But she persisted gently and he said that he wanted to see for himself. And that was when she asked Brian if it would be all right if he came in with us one night. Brian took two days (during which time he asked Shelley and Randy, but not me; apparently he didnāt think Iād like āTheaās new boyfriend just waltzing inā¦ and he was probably rightā¦ but at least he did tell me after the decision was made) to make up his mind and the next Saturday night there were once more six people seated around that small, dirty, smelly room where āThea and I had first made love, where Jamie had been killed, where five of us had grown upā¦ But things felt different. The atmosphere was really claustrophobic in the room, almost oppressive, and despite the rather cool night outside, the room had a sweltering feel about it as well. We all felt uncomfortable and uneasy and what little conversation there was was very forced. It was almost as though the house didnāt want him here, didnāt want anything to change, no matter what had happened to Jamie. And Nicky apparently felt it worse than any of usā¦ so much so that it almost created a split between he and āTheaā¦ which, I suppose, was probably what the house wanted, anyway. I was so happy with it at the time, and it reads now like it was written by someone trying just too hard. I can see why it was rejected. But the idea is fine and the characters are not too bad. I might revisit it some day. Justā¦ not at the moment. |
| Technical Terms This came up on Discord recently ā when do we use technical terms in writing fiction? First, a definition ā a technical term is a word or phrase that is specific to an occupation or qualification, or which has a different meaning when used by an occupation. So, an example would be āpedagogyā which is a term used in education circles and very few other places; another word would be āindulgenceā which has a meaning most people know, but has a very different meaning in Catholic ecclesiastical terminology. If we know about a subject, we are going to want to use technical terms in our writing. But is that entirely appropriate when dealing with an audience that will probably not have the same knowledge base as the author. We could go the Michael Crichton route, where technical terms are explained in-text, though this does tend to slow the pace to quite a ridiculous degree. In Jurassic Park, he changed it up by having a film made for the uneducated give the technical terms and their meanings. But, still, it was essentially an info dump. Or we could go the Arthur C. Clarke route and just dump a heap of technical terms into the narrative and assume your reader is intelligent enough to understand what they mean by context or prior knowledge. Personally, this is the way I would prefer to do things, but editors are as unadept at the subjects I know about as the general populace, and so this has caused issues for my publication chances. Soā¦ what? Here is what was recommended to me by the editor of a magazine in the US back in the early 2000s. When people talk, they will use technical terms, acronyms and abbreviations because they know what they mean. They never explain them. In general, it is said that the first time you use an acronym or abbreviation in a story, you explain what it means, but people are not going to say, āGive me twenty ccās of ibuprofen, stat! Which, of course, you know means give me a syringe with twenty cubic centimetres of the drug ibuprofen, a non-steroidal pain reliever, stat, and by that, I mean right away.ā The editor said to try and get the more technical terms into the narrative and then explain them with a clause of no more than half a dozen words. So, āGive me twenty ccās of ibuprofen, stat!ā // Bob nodded and drew twenty cubic centimetres of the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug into the syringe before handing it to Bill, going as fast as he possibly could. That is as clunky as all out, but everything is explained without info-dumping; it is a part of the ongoing action. Another way is having a newbie character ā see the first Hellboy movie for an example ā who knows nothing and so everything needs to be explained to them. They can ask questions, acting as an audience surrogate. I personally find this cheap and a little lazy, but it does make sense, and works well for most audiences. Thatās all well and good when it comes to dialogue, but what about in narrative? If I said, āBill grabbed Bob around the waist and suplexed him hard onto the edge of the ladder,ā in a fight scene, the word āsuplexā would make most people go, āHuh?ā But if I said, āBill grabbed Bob around the waist and lifted him off the ground, above his shoulders and then down hard, Bobās back slamming onto the edge of the ladder, a picture-perfect suplex,ā I have explained it first and then given the technical term without detracting from the narrative flow, and yet explaining a word I can then use without explanation later on. So, that was the advice given by a few editors I have worked with ā use the description first, and then add the technical term afterwards. Donāt do it too often, and too close to another time you do it, or else it reads rather boring, but that is the way it was recommended to me. Letās go back to that opening question: when do we use technical terms in writing fiction? Whenever they would be used in real life, but explain them carefully, without giving an essay, and make the explanations part of the flow of the action, not be a simple info-dump. |
| Autofiction Following on from the last entry: "20250509 Using Real People In Fiction Pt 2" ā¦A few times I have made fun of Hulk Hoganās autobiographies, for the sheer amount of bullshit that exists on their pages. I may also have mentioned Frank Dux and his alleged autobiography. But what if those lies were all a part of a plan, if they were deliberately told in the way they were as an artistic statement, not just because the author was a self-deluded egomaniac? Welcome to the world of Autofiction. Okay, that is rather flippant. Autofiction is a serious recently developed genre where a personās real lived experiences are mingled with fictional tales in order to tell a story, usually with a deep message. In fact, I have not come across one that did not have a barrow to push. Sorry, but that seems to be the way it is. Being as averse to message stories as I am, I generally find autofiction tedious. However, it is still a valid form of modern writing that I feel can be expanded beyond the simple message tale. And in April I attended an Autofiction online workshop. Now, in Australia in the early 1990s, we had a woman named Helen Demidenko win a few prestigious awards with her book about a Ukrainian refugee, based on her own lived experiences. There was a problem, however. Her real name was Helen Darville, she was not a Ukranian refugee nor did she work with refugees nor was she related to any or even know any (possibly). She made the whole thing up based on some stories sheād heardā¦ and when she got caught out, the literary world in this country went ballistic. To this day she has not been forgiven. If sheād done this 30 years later, then she would have probably claimed it was a work of autofiction, and she would still be writing award-winning (and boring ā the book was dull) books. Autofiction is generally considered a seamless mixture of personal history with fictional storytelling. Most of the time it is used to explore sexuality, identity, displacement, cultural lore, sense of belonging or a societal negative. Real people are mixed with fictional aspects, and the reader is left in no doubt that this is a work of fiction, but some stories might be true, some people are real while some have been created,places could be real, made up or renamedā¦ and yet, without exception, the emotions are definitely personal. When it comes to some of the issues I have mentioned previously when using real people in works of fiction, the autobiographical aspect can (and is designed to) blur the lines here. I donāt think it has been tested in court (at least, not that I could find), soā¦ not sure here how this would be approached. From the worskshop, there are a few things a writer will need to do if looking at a work of Autofiction: 1) Be prepared to explore memories which might not hold true for all participants. While this is true for all autobiography, the lack of recall matters less here, and can create conflict. 2) Balance truth and fiction without relying too heavily on one or the other; this is probably the greatest issue when trying to write this style. Is it just a fake autobiography? Or is it an exaggerated real autobiography? Or do the made-up bits really matter and help the tale? Tough line to walk. 3) Be prepared to explain just what it is you are writing, because it is so new. This includes to potential publishers. 4) Remember the author is the most important character in the story; it is a form of autobiography, after all, even if it is mixed with fiction to make a point. 5) Using it to show something that the writer feels needs to be shown should still reflect some of the writerās lived experiences, and not just be made up wholecloth. For example, it would be a complete work of fiction for me to write a book as if I was an African woman living in Canada; I have no lived experience in that. It could be Autofiction for me to write about being treated like pond scum by American companies and American people for being an atheist, adding extra tales to my own lived experience. As an aside, sometimes the narratorās name and the name of the author are different. This does help make the work more fictional, but it gets really confusing in this case. I will add here that Autofiction is sometimes seen as a form of experimental writing, and I can see that. As such, publishers are still dubious about it, though more and more works are being published. So, in essence: Autofiction is a life story written as a work of semi-fiction with the author appearing as a/the main character in the narrative, drawing from a lived life experience while at the same time incorporating fictional elements, characters, and events, to give voice to a complex societal issue. Might be a new genre worth consideringā¦ |
| Using Real People In Fiction Pt 2 The first time I brought this up is here: "20240526 Using Real People In Fiction" .So, didnāt I cover everything there? As it turns outā¦ no. What if you use your friends or family in a book, including their proper names, and you do NOT have their written permission (written is very important in a court of law)? You might think youāre doing the right thing including them, or that it is essentially harmless, but, then you decide to put the work into the public sphere, publishing it (in any form) and you discoverā¦ 1) They might not like their portrayal. Even if you, the writer, think you are portraying them in a sensitive light, they still might not like it. They might think they are too passive, they might think the relationship isnāt what they would like, they might even think they wouldnāt act that way or say those things. Technically, it is not enough for libel/defamation (and it has been tested) because they are not being portrayed in a negative light, but it can be a problem. 2) They simply donāt want to be in a book. Unless you are writing a family history and their details are a matter of public record, a person is perfectly within their rights to say they do not want to be in a book or story. Especially if they put it in writing that they do not wish a character based on them to be in a story before the story is publicly or semi-publicly published {i]in any form, then you might have an issue. It could be for privacy or they just donāt see the point, but their wishes need to be considered. 3) Your relationship with the person changes. Youāve put a person into a story in a very heroic sense, but then you have a falling out, so this becomes reflected in your writingā¦ and that can be a problem. It is not, again, generally something a court can help with, but that person is within their right, especially before a story is publicly or semi-publicly published to give a written cease and desist which you must obey. Oh, and a person can decide at any time they do not like the portrayal, by the way. Literally, any time before public or semi-public publication. Soā¦ is there a way around this? Yes, and it is very simple: DO NOT USE THE FULL REAL NAMES OF REAL PEOPLE FROM YOUR PERSONAL CIRCLE IN A BOOK! Base the characters on them. Make them look similar. Have them act in similar ways. But if Jane Doe thinks Mary Sue is based on her, she will have to prove it, and that is not easy. However, if Kylie Baggins thinks Kylie Baggins in your book is the same, then youāre in trouble. The grey area is if Jeannie Hart thinks Jeannie Smythe is the same. First names are common; the portrayal is going to have to be blatant. Yes, as a beginner writer, it makes it easy for your characters to be people you know; my discussion on my early novels shows that I did this ("20250321 Novels #1 & #2" ). But I changed the names!Anyway, I went through this with Sins Of The Father in 2020. A former friend named Troy felt a character in the book named Troy (different last name) was based on him. But his lawyer said that he would have to admit to abusing his kids and being an out of control alcoholic, as the Troy in the story was portrayed, to a court. He couldnāt do that, so he let it slide. This brings me to my second point ā make changes! Except if writing your autobiography (which is a different kettle of fish altogether), do NOT use a person whole-cloth. Change them! This might seem logical, bit there are people I know who are being forced to rewrite whole books they wish to publish because a daughter doesnāt want her kids in a book, or a partner left them. Donāt let it happen in the first place ā donāt use people you know blatantly in a story you plan on publishing in any format. |
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Thank you for this very informative piece.
