The Best You’ve Never Heard
Back in college one of my best friends turned this phrase about a band he was listening to. I believe the band was “Failure” and indeed I had never heard of them before, and indeed the band was truly great.
Since then I have taken to that phrase and I use it to describe authors, movies and music that I’ve discovered and most people have never heard of it. I’ve a penchant for posting music periodically on my Facebook page ( https://www.facebook.com/Sean-McBride-Author-293451414004074/?fref=nf ), but I thought I’d take a moment to post some authors that you probably haven’t heard of, but are tremendous talents.
Arthur Nersessian.
This guy is like a mixture of J.D. Salinger and Jack Kerouac, but for a modern crowd. Anyone who liked “The Perks of Being a Wallflower”, you need to read “The Fuck-Up” by Nersessian. He speaks of New York in such a real way, he echoes Paul Auster, who is known for his books about New York. Description aside, he writes angst, despair, hope and happiness with such pith, that you really feel for the characters, instead of being told how to feel about them. Truly a wonderful author, check him out.
Kevin Brockmeier.
He follows in the footsteps of the magical realists, where he takes these strange premises and adds in some kind of supernaturality, or magic. For example in “The Illumination” whenever anyone gets hurt, or cut, their injury lights up. What Brockmeier does so well is let you infer what is actually going on. Your imagination blooms when reading him. He writes with such incredible heart and poise and grace. Everything he does is short, but if you can sit back and really think about what he’s trying to say it’ll blow your world.
Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Zafon is a little more well known than the first two, but there are still so many people who have never had the absolute joy of reading one of his books. As of the writing of this blog he has three adult books, which are semi-sequels in the Cemetery of Forgotten Books sequence, and five children books which easily read as adult. Zafon has been linked to being up on Umberto Eco’s level, and his writing is so lyrical is really does sing to your soul. Of course having Lucia Graves translate it from it’s native Spanish just elevates it that much more. With echoes of Shakespeare, Goethe, Dickens, Proust, Eco and so many more, they are just beautiful stories “The Shadow of the Wind” being my favorite book of all time. If you’ve ever considered yourself a writer then you must read either “The Shadow of the Wind” or “The Angels Game”. They will change your life.
Mark Danielewski
And now for something completely different. You may not recognize the name, but many of you will probably recognize his epic first novel “House of Leaves”. At turns creepy, vivid, and evocative, Danielewski plays with form like nobody ever has. If you’re a fan of Palahniuk because of his form, drop that hack’s shock jock bilge and pick up anything by Danielewski (And really if you’re the fan of the shock value, pick up Bret Easton Ellis, or Irvine Welsh). You’ll find yourself turning the book around and reading from back to front, but you’ll also find yourself biting your fingers, crying, laughing and just down right flabbergasted. Just as deep as everyone else on this list, but because of form, not because of prose. Try out “House of Leaves”, it may take you a year to read, but you’ll find yourself going back to it.
That’s all for now, but I’ll be sure to post more later!
In Memorium
“Noal would die with honor. Once, Mat would have thought that kind of thing foolish-what good was honor if you were dead? But he had too many memories of soldiers, had spent too much time with men who fought and bled for that honor, to discredit such notions now.”- Brandon Sanderson/Robert Jordan “Towers of Midnight”
This is a sensitive subject, but one necessary as we come through memorial day. As most of us enjoy having a bit of time off of work and the impending beginning of Summer we have this holiday.
Perhaps the most important holiday.
I have quotes to bookend this little narrative to try and illustrate the pride and truth of what the holiday really means. Your Facebook will have been filled with pictures of military graveyards, or pictures of soldiers helping others, or of the Flag flowing in the wind.
But what do these symbols really mean to people who weren’t there? What does the semi-amorphous meaning of country mean?
It is nothing without brotherhood.
Men and women fight and die for their friends and family and for that kinship. The idea goes far beyond ideals and faithfulness to a country or to a flag. The true meaning of heroism comes from love and friendship. To people and to each other. This is what this holiday is really about. Honoring the men and women who gave their lives so that we might live in a better world. Our brothers and sisters (both metaphoric and blood) who have changed the world to try and save us.
People go to war for an ideal or a country. They die to protect their brothers and sisters.
That is the most honorable thing in the world.
I use words to try and give that honor back, though it falls short, it is all I have.
Thank you my brothers and sisters who have died to save me.
“God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more methinks would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns for convoy put into his purse;
We would not die in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is call’d the feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say “To-morrow is Saint Crispian.”
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say “These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.”
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words—
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester—
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb’red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.” -Shakespeare Henry V
Game of Thrones, Storytelling, and closure
Before you say anything, yes. I have read the books. I almost wish I had not at this point because who knows when GRRM will ever put out another one, but I digress. The point of this blog post isn’t to point fingers, but to point out how good the books, and by proxy, the show really are.
I don’t mean they’re good because they’re shocking. I don’t mean they’re good because the characters are cool. I mean these are just good old fashioned storytelling. With all long epics like this you begin to worry after a while, because usually authors start with a shtick, but by the time the end really needs to come together it’s to daunting to do. A perfect example of this is the Wheel of Time, by Robert Jordan which was finished by Brandon Sanderson. You have this big sweeping epic and an author who is to close to the story to feel it ending appropriately, so bringing in another talented author to complete it is necessary. GRRM seems to be doing this with Benioff and Weiss.
There are five books and five and a half seasons of the show, and now that the show has pulled ahead we are starting to see some of that storytelling come to fruition. A large problem shows that contain mysteries have, is they focus on expanding the mystery to the point it is so untenable that it becomes too loose and no longer entertaining. Game of Thrones (and the book alternative A Song of Ice and Fire), after Sunday night’s episode is seeming to be eliminating some of these issues.
We are finally getting explanations to why the characters are the way they are. We are finally getting information about the forces in the world trying to destroy it. We are finally getting some closure.
That’s what good storytelling is really all about. Anyone could be like the show Lost and come up with all these crazy ideas, but the trick to good storytelling is being able to bring them all back together in a nice cohesive bundle. Story telling is cyclical, your ending must hearken back to the beginning and pay off the events that happened that got your story started, and it appears as though GRRM did in fact have a plan, from the beginning, as to what he was going to do. That gives me hope for a good show. That gives me pride in a great book series.
And it all came with the realization of a characters name.
The Drifter
Today in honor of finishing one of my books which is based upon poetry, I’m submitting some poetry of my own. I wrote this one a few years ago, but I never published it here. Enjoy!
Driftwood finds it’s way to sand, how is it that it’s so hard for me to find land?
and this state of constant wonder, leads me divided; torn asunder
in this horrid devil’s playground in my head…
My fingers tell the story, of the broken trumped up glory
when my mind refused to listen, drowned out by broken pistons
the silence beating louder than my heart…
The darkened frozen night glows, and the turgid sky just bellows
of my time examining seams, on the boulevard of broken dreams
as words flow down as kindling for my hearth…
But those wounds of empty pages, who speak louder than the ages
as the clock runs down to zero, I’m not a battered, broken hero,
just a man who wont give up until he wins…
Where my nerds at?
Marvel has brought an interesting resurgence of popularity to the movie theaters which has been lacking lately. So why are these movies so poplar? What has Marvel tapped into to bring such popularity to their movies?
Their writers are brilliant and timely. Marvel has brought hope in the form of superheroes at a time where apathy and drama are the norm.
So why is it Marvel and superheroes which dominate the market instead of something else? Because we all have a tendency towards nerddom.
The last time there was a spike in, what people would call a movie for nerds, was “The Star Wars”. This movie came about when people were distrustful of their government and life had become so much harder and, frankly, more real. You had Vietnam. You had the Civil Rights movement. You had Nixon and Goldwater. Who could you trust? What could you believe in?
Is it any wonder “The Star Wars” was later re-titled “A New Hope”? This brought a generation of people who were told that hard work could get you where you wanted to go, and to imagine a young farm boy who worked hard and was able to throw over a galactic empire as part of a rebel alliance was what brought them together. It was topical, it was timely. It was something people could hope for.
We’re in a similar time now, except the ideals of the populace are slightly skewed. Now the movie going generation is the millennials. A generation who grew up with the previous disenfranchised generation as parents. These parents wanted the best for their children and they didn’t want them getting hurt like they did, so protection became paramount. Making playgrounds safer. Making food safer. This is the generation who lived in a bubble. And what do they have to think about? What do they have to hope for? The generation who was told that if they just did what they were supposed to do, then everything would work out for them?
This is a brand new world in ever shifting priorities. Now instead of outright war, we have terrorism. We have fear of going to our work, of the movies, of going to dinner and getting killed by some crazy loon with a gun. All the sudden the life the “Star Wars” generation wanted for their kids is in jeopardy. no matter how much they do for them, there is still an outside factor making things tougher. Making life dangerous. So what do they turn to now?
Superheroes. Superheroes who would make sure that the status quo is kept. It’s no longer a plucky farm boy who people can relate to because the feeling is that there is nothing you as an individual can do. You need something more. You need something bigger to make the change. Enter the superhero.
This is the societal fantasy. This is why people who are considered nerds and the things they like are so pervasive. These types of movies are escapist and they lash out against the Kardashian reality. These things strike a chord so deep in the social consciousness that we don’t even notice it as it’s happening, but we can feel that hope in our heart, we feel that rush as these superheroes do what we want to do, to effect the change that we as a culture wish. These are the new difference makers in our culture.
The Real Writing
There has been a lot of talk of editing lately on the social media channels and I thought I’d throw in my two cents here. The bottom line?
If you don’t edit, you’re not a writer.
Being a writer is work and the more you put into your world or your stories the more you and everyone who reads it will get out of it.
The best and most fun part of writing is coming up with the story. This is what everyone wants to do when they first start writing. It doesn’t matter if you’re a poet, a genre author, or a serious literature progeny, the desire to write come from the love of creation. Your mind blossoms around ideas and, in general, the only way your mind will leave you alone is when you get those blossoming gems down on paper (or on the computer screen).
This process makes you creative, it does not make you a writer.
Editing makes you a writer. Editing is the work that needs to be put in. Writing professionally (it doesn’t matter if you make 500 or 5 Million a year, if you make money by your craft you’re a writer) is work, like it or not, and if you’re going to put your work out there, why would you not want it to be the best possible version of itself that I could be? If you were a handyman working on tile, would you want the tile crooked and mislaid? Could you be proud of that?
People edit in different ways, and editing means different things to different people, but since this is my blog, I’ll give you my process.
The first draft is an intensive and detailed outline. This outline is the creative version and generally the part I like the most. This will include dialog and notes to myself for what I want the story to contain and motivations for characters.
The second draft is what most people think of the first draft. This is the full story, with exposition and dialog and is fully fleshed out.
The third draft is the first edit. I go through and edit content. I streamline for readability, I clean up the dialog, I correct any grammar that catches my eyes, I double check my characters motivations, and ensure there are no continuity errors.
The fourth draft is the line edit.
Then there are about five more drafts where others will read it and give feedback and things will change around.
But the editing is the work. The editing is making sure that everything is perfect (lets be real nothing is ever perfect for a writer, but as close as possible). The editing is what makes the story real.
So if you don’t edit, you’re not a writer. You’re too lazy to be respectful to your reader. You’re showing them that you don’t really care about what you’ve created. You’re showing them that you don’t really care about the money or the time they’re going to spend on you.
Be a writer. Edit. Streamline. Work.
A question of importance
Sorry I’ve been away so long, but I’ve been gearing up for a new book series I have coming out. If I might be so bold as to plug it, it’s The Elsie Jones Adventures a children’s chapter book series surrounding literature and history. It’s been all consuming since last year, and honestly, it’s been one of my favorite creations.
The publisher has recently asked me to do an interview surrounding the series and my process and where I wont bother you with the details of what happened, because I know you all care, I do want to talk about one question that was asked.
What would you say is the most important thing for an aspiring writer to do?
The answer that immediately came to me was the most obvious and the answer that most authors will give.
Write every day.
This is true because the more you write the more fleshed out your writing gets, the more alive. But I didn’t want to give this answer because it’s trite, and frankly, not exactly true. The best answer is, like the best things in life, a little more elusive. Writing every day will (without taking another step) only help those who write text books. No, there’s a better answer for those who want to be a writer.
Read every day.
Yep, reading everyday is the basis of every great writer.
The most interesting and the hardest thing about becoming a writer is finding your own voice. You need to experiment and push to find your sound. Its the same (I imagine) as anything else artistic. You need to be your own unique self. But this only scratches the surface.
When you first start to read you read for story. You enjoy the characters and you’re entertained. The more and more you read, you begin to notice subtleties in character. You begin to become critical of how an author infuses individuality into their characters.
Then you move onto language.
The causal reader doesn’t care about language, but a writer does. You begin to start paying attention to what words authors use. This is directly correlated to the voice, because just like speech patterns, people all have certain phrases, or words they prefer to use.
Once you noticed the verbiage, you move on to structure. Are you a James Patterson staccato writer? Or are you a Tom Rob Smith who stretches out his sentences? Neither one of these are wrong, neither one are right, but both infuse voice.
When you first start to write you’ll copy the stylings of authors, but then as you continue to write and continue to read, the form and grace of the written word will blend in your mind and your true self will emerge. It takes time and it takes repetition, but there is nothing better than having your true voice emerge and begin to speak with a will of its own.
Taking the Path more traveled.
I recently just spent about two weeks with my wife in New England. We traveled through Providence, RD; Boston, Mass; Portsmouth, NH; and Portland, MN. I was struck by the history of the area, where here in California things really only go about 50 years back before they get remodeled or replaced. We went to Concord and saw the place where the shot heard round the world took place, to start off the Revolution. We went to Walden Pond. We went to Emerson’s house and looked at his personal collection of books, which still held his liner notes. We went to the Old Manse where Emerson and Hawthorne lived. There was so much history and culture here, but it’s just the memory of history and culture.
These things only matter to those who care.
What would visiting the Old Manse matter to someone who had never heard of Transcendentalism? What would visiting this old decrepit house matter to someone who had never been blown away by Hawthorne’s beautiful prose?
These places made me sit back and contemplate on what we as a society are doing. Are we moving forward? Are we towing the line? Are we causing problems for our future generations?
There are two stories which struck me and have weighed heavily on my mind, one of which was told to my wife and I in the Old Manse and the other happened at a seminar I attended for my day job.
While we were in the Old Manse the tour guide told us a story in which Waldo Emerson wrote “Nature” at a desk which faced the window looking out at his garden and the woods beyond. He did so because it inspired him. A few years later Hawthorne moved into the house and tried writing at the same desk as Emerson did. But he found that nature was far to distracting for him, so he had a desk build which faced a wall, to eliminate those distractions. Here he wrote “Mosses from an Old Manse”.
The seminar I attended was about education and what people (specifically young people) needed to succeed in the world after school. I was on a panel with adults ranging from their late twenties to their early sixties and resoundingly I heard that the younger generations had no etiquette. They had no sense of responsibility. They had no attention span. Ostensibly, that “these kids have no respect.”
I listened and in turns was disgusted and agreeable. I think that some of these people didn’t realize how young I was and I think I held a unique perspective to them. I have encountered many young people who have respect. I have encountered many people who have a sense of responsibility, who have an attention span. I have also encountered many older people who have no respect, have no sense of responsibility nor respect.
There’s a lot to be said for people who spend the time and develop themselves. Take responsibility for themselves and I don’t think that the younger generations are given enough respect themselves. It is true that most people take the road more traveled. They want to live easily, they don’t want any hardships, they don’t take responsibility for the hardships which do occur in their lives. Yet there are those who embrace their lives and strive for their dreams. These people take the road less traveled and they grow and become more empathetic and wise and respectful.
I think the story of Emerson and Hawthorne is apropos to this story because Emerson wanted a space where he could be inspired by nature. Instead of complaining that there were too many distractions (for Hawthorne is was the garden and the animals and the forest, for me and my generation it is the internet and cell phones, Hawthorne decided to make a change for what he needed and made strides to make it happen.
There are always distractions. There are always diversions. It doesn’t matter if you live now, 50 years earlier or 150 years earlier. It doesn’t matter what type of phone, or computer, or car, or yard, or television you may have. There is no easy road to get to your dreams, no matter what those dreams are. But if you chance it, if you take that first step through the brush, you just might find the right path to your dreams.
The Road Not Taken
by Robert Frost
Two roads diverged in a yellowed wood/And sorry I could not travel both/And be one traveler, long I stood/And looked down one as far as I could/To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair/And having perhaps the better claim,/Because it was grassy and wanted wear;/Though as for that the passing there/Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay/in leaves no step had trodden black./Oh, I kept the first for another day!/Yet knowing how way leads on to way,/I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh/Somewhere ages and ages hense:/Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-/I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.
On Writing Versus Storytelling
The first book I ever read was “The Bachman Books” (so technically the first book I read was “Rage”, the first book in “The Bachman Books”) by Stephen King writing as Richard Bachman. I was in sixth grade. I had previously tried to read other books such as “The Hobbit” and “Something Wicked This Way Comes”, but there was something in the language of those novels in which I was having trouble accessing. So I had to write a book report and my parents brought me into B. Dalton books (anyone remember those?) and I looked at the gruesome cover and I thought it was cool.
Throughout my life I have said that Stephen King is my favorite writer. But then I started getting into writing myself late in high school. I loved being able to tell a story, just like Mr. King. I loved being able to evoke emotion out of the people who read my writing, but I never considered myself a wordsmith. I never considered myself literary.
In college my love of writing deepened and I began to expand my reading repertoire. I read everything under the sun and I practiced writing in styles of these writers. I soon came to the realization that there was an inherent difference between being a writer and being a storyteller and I attribute Stephen King to creating the difference in modern popular culture.
I would not consider Stephen King a literary writer (and when I say writer this is what I’m talking about) and I think that he would probably say the same thing about himself (he has often spoken out against the literati crowd. Specifically people like Jonathan Franzen who purport that they are disparaged for writing in a literary vein.). He writes stories which capture your imagination through character and place such that I’ve never really experienced in another writer. His characters jump out of the page at you and no matter how ridiculous the situation King brings reality by making the characters human. I would not call his writing beautiful the same way I would Thomas Pynchon or or John Irving, or in a more modern literary crowd Kevin Brockmeier or Paul Auster. However you cannot discount his stories or his characters.
The writers of the world focus more on subterfuge and the aspects of the words used. It is the difference between utilitarian and aesthetic. Are you writing to make the language beautiful or are you writing to make sure the story is clear? Both of these mediums (and yes they are different mediums. Most people who read King will never read a Pynchon book and vise versa) are acceptable and both of these mediums are beautiful.
Characters Welcome
First and foremost I have to print a retraction from the previous post. I said that TNT was the network which had the slogan “Character’s Welcome”. The correct network was USA.
To that note however, because of my propensity for writing more character centric, I thought I’d comment on how our television media has changed into what I would consider a new “Golden Age” of television.
I’ve thought back onto where all this began and I’ve traced it back to one show that really got the ball rolling. To one man, really, who broke from conventional archetypes to create a new type of character. Something more than the classic Hero/Antihero standard which we had been working with. For better or for worse, whether you like him or not, Joss Whedon is this man. He was a writer for many movies before he wrote the screenplay for Buffy the Vampire Slayer as a feature length movie. The point was to flip the horror trope of a blonde teen girl running down the alley and being chased. He wanted a character who would take charge of the situation, to empower while blending horror, humor, suspense and coming of age into one movie.
Being just a script writer, he had no power over the end result and has been purportedly upset over the result. His response was to develop a TV show to encapsulate his original vision and the WB network signed him on. Buffy the Vampire Slayer premiered in 1997. Before this television was primarily sitcoms and formula dramas (think Law and Order).
Buffy went on for seven years, featuring a spinoff. The WB network also held other less popular shows like Charmed and Smallville which tried to help corner the market on the teen ratings.
These shows captured the imaginations, but the situations went beyond the everyday occurrences and production values began to rise. Suddenly a show that had more to do than just police procedure were getting budgets which would make the shows a bit more realistic than the old Hercules special effects debacle.
Then despite the success, the WB went against these shows and other networks took on the character mantle. They began to understand that television could do more for us than just to give a cheap laugh or thrill. In 2001 other networks took up the mantle of the “Character”. As the WB fell into obscurity, USA network began to emerge as the leader of interesting character centric programming. USA came up with the slogan “Character’s Welcome” and came out with a with a new spin on the police procedural with Monk in 2002 and then a multi-layered drama called Burn Notice in 2008.
You may ask, why had HBO not been mentioned here? After all they did start out with their original programming in 1997 with OZ and continued on with shows like The Sopranos at the same time.
The most interesting thing with HBO is budget. They have far more budget to deal with the characters that creators want to create. For example Deadwood had two very well funded seasons before they started to have to worry about ratings. The difference is that the people who watch HBO pay for that right. Because they do HBO creators can be much less discerning about what the audience wants because they’re going to get what is put out. This is not the case with network television.
Then in 2011 at the pinnacle of the reality TV push (thanks a lot Fox), Netflix announced it would release it’s own shows. Netflix has put the budget where it matters and the production value has never been higher. Now all other networks are pushing through their own shows to match these budgets and are working on coming up with new and unique concepts.
Now the question is, will it become a battle of the premium cable networks (of which Netflix is included because you pay for it) or are the remaining networks going to continue with provocative shows?
Singing the Mid-Story Blues
I’ve been working hard on “The Book of Antiquity”. I’ve worked through a second draft (a second draft of a 550 page book) and now I’m working on a third. I have recently started a writers group to help me in this process, which I have to say is maddening, difficult and frustrating, but it’s also one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve had.
I worked on my first book “A View of the Edge of the World” by myself. I wrote all the stories through various means. I have outlined. I wrote and let the voice of the story take me where it wanted to go. I wrote plot heavy stories. I wrote character heavy stories (thanks TNT, now all I can hear is “Characters Welcome” when I think about character driven stories, but that’s a discussion for another time). I wrote character sketches. I wrote histories of place. I wrote to shock. I wrote to pull on heart strings. I wrote to scare. I wrote to provoke. In all this time I spent writing and re-writing and editing it was always about what the end product was like. I seemed to have lost focus on what writing should really be about. Namely the love of writing.
I quote Stephen King a lot because I respect him as a storyteller (I’ll have to get into my rant about the difference between a storyteller and a writer later on) and I’m in awe of his ability to focus. He’s been said to be able to sit in front of the computer for hours knocking out story after story, or page after page of novel. He never seems to have a problem with where the story is going to go, but instead is very vocal about letting the character dictate where the plot will go (This could also explain why so many people hate the ending of his novels, because sometimes they feel as though they weren’t thought out). In fact he is said to have sat in his chair writing for hours just after being hit by a truck and bleeding out. Blood dripping down into a pool on the ground underneath him because a stitch broke while he was writing, but he had such focus he didn’t notice.
I have often thought about this focus and why I seem to lack it. Does it have something to do with personality? Is it the fact that Stephen King has an addictive personality and he gets addicted to writing and cant quit? Is it because he comes from another generation? A generation without MTV, without “Real Housewives” and without twitter where people could stick around for more than 140 characters? Is there a focus gene that people are born with? Is this a nature versus nurture issue?
I know for a fact that others whom I’ve spoken to have this same issue. They have trouble with focus and writing a outline feels as though it’s cheating, or its a crutch, or it’s too strict for the natural course of the novel. I have talked to people at length about the mid-story blues, where they know where the story starts and where the story ends, but when they get past the beginning and wade into the proverbial deeper end of the pool; into the darker second and third acts, they get lost and writers block settles in. Suddenly twitters 140 characters rules your life and you burn the midnight oil with Facebook as a companion instead of your protagonists.
Is this truly an endemic? or is this a shift in perspective?
I work full time to support my writing habit. I have a wife and a dog. I have a house which constantly needs work (and I am never endingly grateful for all of these, don’t get me wrong). I think about all of these things when I sit down to write. I think about my life, I think about the lives of others, I think about money. I think about promotions. I think about what my wife wants for dinner. I wonder if I fed our dog that morning. Then I stress myself out and think that I have to write the Great American Novel, so I can do all of these things while doing what I love and not worry about any other type of working.
I focus so much on getting just right what the potential agent, or publisher, or future reader might think, that I think about them instead of my character and what they are thinking about. This is why the mid-story blues hits so strong for me. I’m worrying about all the other things that might happen instead of just enjoying my time with the characters and trying to force something amazing to happen to them.
I’m taking the character pledge. I’m going to write for the character and the world they live in instead of writing to improve my own. I’m writing for the love of the story instead of the love for what the story can bring me.
Its a new dawn, a new day, a new life, for me
There’s been a lot going on in the past two years. I got married, started a new job (no not the writing gig I’ve always hoped for, but a pretty sweet deal to pay the bills), moved to a new city and moved into a new house. Needless to say that I’ve let the site go by the wayside for good or for ill. Now that life has finally slowed down and I can feel a rhythm on the horizon, I decided I need to get back to roots. Now where I’ve never stopped writing (because, come on, those who write know that; to stop means to stop living) I’ve slowed down a bit. However in the past four or five months I’ve picked the pace back up enough to warrant the blog to continue. So in the future, you will see poetry and some new fiction, as well as lots and lots of book reviews and in depth writers critiques, as well as editorials. So I thank whomever has stuck with it over the long haul and lets get back at it again!
Poetry Recommendations
I’ve been having some trouble streamlining my new essay, so while I work out the kinks, i thought I’d pass on a few classical poetry recommendations. If you’ve never read Auden, do it now. He’s the most brilliant poet ever. I have a busy week, but hopefully I’ll be able to finish that essay and present it here next week. Enjoy!
Samuel Taylor Coleridge: With feral longing and melancholy (The Nightingale) ST Coleridge paints beautiful dark poems. They range from esoteric (Kublai Khan) to the downright epic (The Rime of the Ancient Mariner). His surprising rymes make him a joy to read and his bipolar views that range from perverse to quintessential love make him a perfect read for any occason.
W. H. Auden: Probably the best poet to ever live (much better than the poet laureates who don the stage now [no offense to those who like Billy Collins or Charles Simic]) he has a way with language which stays with you long after the poem is finished. His verse is so layered you can re-read many times and come out with something new each time. Notables are The Shield of Achilles; At the Grave of Henry James; who stands, the crux left of the watershed; Under which Lyre; and In memory of W.B. Yeats.
William Blake: If you’re interested in dark literature, with a hint iof redemption read Blake. The nice thing about him is he was also an artist so you can view the horrors he depicted in words and through his own eyes. If you’ve ever heard of Hannibal Lecter, you’ve serripticiously heard of William Blake. Does the poem and paiting Red Dragon ring a bell?
John Keats: The Most read in high school and also the least appreciated. Everyone knows the classic Ode to a Grecian Urn but what about Ode to a Nightingale, or On the Sea or even On sitting down to read King Lear Once Again? He has a beautiful and resonant flow, ebbing with emotion and description. There is a reason high schoolers have to read him, he is one of the best poets at extracting emotion.
Edgar Allan Poe: Poe has beautifully dark and resonant poems, but with an almost juvenile rhyming scheme and whereas everyone knows The Raven, try out others such as the melancholic (and probably his best) Tamerlane, or such melodic gems as Annabel Lee and The Bells. If you long for the nostalgia of reading The Raven try out the poem (which is actually much better, though little known) which inspired its creation, Lenore.
Langston Hughes: You will never find a more melodic human being. He infuses jazz in everything he writes. Think slam poetry, but good (you know those annoying people who get up and read at open mike nights and make a bunch of hand gestures and say absolutely nothing.). Even when his writing is depressing, there is nothing more hopeful or empowering than Hughes. If you’ve never read him, you’re missing out.
Deliquency
I sincerely apologize for the absence of posts for the last two weeks. My apartment has been under construction, so I’ve had to be off the grid for a while. I’ll be back in full force on Saturday (05/12/12) with a scathing treatise on leadership, science and religion; with, hopefully, a dash of insight. Stay tuned!
Sorry Everyone!
Sorry everyone. I was on vacation and had every intention of posting last Friday, but I got a little too busy and wasn’t able to. Tomorrow I’ll post a Bowling Alley poem and if all goes well next Friday I’ll be posting a new never before seen short story called “a place you cant come back from.” My goal with that story was to create both a character sketch of a relationship and also to write the scariest story I have to date. Let me know how it panned out…
She was Perfumed with Cigarettes and Beer
These are both from the Bowling Alley period. I find when reading back through them there is an underpinning of angst, fear, loneliness and anger, but there is an underpinning of hope strewn throughout, weaved into a tangled skein of confusion. There were a few “desire” poems from that period and I submit one for your approval.
She was Perfumed with Cigarettes and Beer
She stomped her feet
in defiance.
A gesture only known to youth.
To encapsulate beauty
with he word “cute”
Would be presumptuous;
superfluous really.
A life of desire
only known through gestures
of copulation for redemption.
Speaking of love
in the throes of ecstasy.
The drug of choice.
A modicum of desire
is all that’s required.
Alcohol, the catalyst
of wanton cruelties,
ruling consciousness,
the pain of friendship
and the flurry of seduction.
The moniker “cheater”
so deferential as to
abandon hope.
A life separated from a
promise of dreams
a promise of touch
a promise of love.
So valued as to capitulate
the necessity of abandonment.
Where is home?
Where is love?
So abstract a concept,
only to be requited by the foolish.
Unrequited,
the only vestige for the depressed.
She downs the wine with
one singular swallow.
Devaluing the past
with a hope of the future.
A desperate cry of my name.
To bring resolution to pain.
To bring absolute restitution
to choices so wrongly executed.
But how to absolve?
How does one abandon
that driving force to mend others?
How does one ignore hope?
ignore love?
ignore life?
to adhere to pretensions held by priests?
Who am I to absolve
the pain of others when
I cant evolve through
the pain I derive?
Love contracts hope
but desire trumps all.
Matters of the heart are forgotten
for individual moments
of ecstasy.
So she stands and pounds her feet
with the beat of my heart
and I smile
hug
console
then abandon her to problems
as I embrace my own.
Ruminations on life and craft
I have previously stated that every story in this blog (thus far) is in my first book “A View of the Edge of the World” and before moving on to new and differing subjects I’d like to talk a little about the book’s genesis and in the process talk about my theories of writing and how it pertains to personality and life.
Ok, first things first. I want to spend a little time going over the chronology of the stories and display which stories I’m proud of and which stories I thought were just “good enough” to get placement in the book. The range and timeline is broad and in my opinion as a reader you can see the evolution of the writing, however much editing took place (and to all you aspiring writers, be prepared to edit more of your precious work than you’d ever thought possible).
The first story written in the collection was “The Dream.’ I wrote this as a high school senior and it was the first story I was really proud of. It’s been augmented some, but the ethereal element is still there and of course, the plague of all young (or inexperienced) writers…the twist ending.
The second story was “Purgatory” and was written when I was a freshman in College. People seem to love the story (in fact it was made into a short movie by Roman Scott who also asked me to expand it into a feature film called “Denmark” which was made but never released) but every time I go to read the thing I cringe at the writing. I’m still searching for my voice, but here it was just sloppy exposition because the plot was screaming to be told.
The third story was “Another Ace in the Hole” This was during the third year of college and it was something that I was working on in between classes. I wanted to write a story that would encompass what my concept of my own personality was at the time and what it was becoming. I was and am a late bloomer in almost every category and it was just about here that I started to feel the need to begin to write full time, to stop relying on, and reliving past successes and focus on the present and how that would shape my future. This was also the first story which started to venture out of the safe and comfortable work of horror.
The fourth was “Deja Vu” I wrote this right after “Another Ace in the Hole” during the summer between my third and fourth years at college. This was supposed to be the first story in a group of stories which told the overlaying tale of Tamskinelli park, a brain child of Ben Lilly’s and mine. However this, for some reason never took off. Maybe it was the booze.
The fifth story was “Final Punch” and was written for a creative writing class my senior year in college. I generally disliked the writing classes in College because they were filled with pompous wannabe literati who viewed genre fiction as childish and a waste of time (This was not EVERYONE mind you, just most of them). So I put my head down and wrote from memory, purposefully trying to catch one of these douche bags , which I did. (“something like this could never happen. Teenagers dont drink under bridge and box!” “Actually this story is autobiographical, for the most part, so you theory is invalidated because I did these things!”)
Then I graduated from college and had no idea how to get into the publishing world. I had a bevy of really horrible writing and a desire to continue, but at a loss for how to continue. Would this be a life choice? or would it always be something that I did on my off time.
“The Barnburner” came next. It’s really a horrible story. It’s actually not a story at all but a character sketch. Not just that but a character sketch I threw away (This was supposed to be Stephen, the main character for a novel in progress called “Dark”). Why did I keep it and actually put it in my book you ask? Why, because there are little snippets here and there in the story which proved that i could actually do it. I could write and get published. Just look at those four passages! This story was a turning point. I pursued writing because with this story I saw that it was possible.
The next one was Call “Dark Secret.” In my opinion it’s the creepiest of the stories in the bunch and it just came to me. I wrote it in two days and this one took the second fewest rewrites. I like this one a lot.
The next was “We Proud, We Few.” I was working on “Dark” at the time, organizing and getting the story line together (actually “Dark” started the process of my new writing style. The outline. Something that I never thought that I could do, but I now see as being invaluable. Late Bloomer remember?) and I decided to write a little something which would introduce the world. It’s not the best writing in the world, but I enjoyed it so it got it’s placement.
Then came probably my favorite story in the bunch. There are still glimpses of bad writing, but they are few and far in between. “Carol-Ann and the Nothing Man” was my first real foray into the regular fiction world; heavily influenced by John Irving I wanted to tell a story of two fully functional people, but one who was so drawn in on himself that his name would never be mentioned and another who soared so high her name would be almost lyrical. I wanted to show the fragility of life and the need to grasp it. Something I was feeling very strongly because I was just promoted and I had just gotten the book deal.
“The Hypothesis” had been on the back burner for a long time. I’m fascinated by cosmology and physics and I wanted to write a story which would encompass one of my favorite TV shows (The Twilight Zone) with modern scientific thought. Though there are a few facts which are far fetched and a few which are just plain wrong, I had a blast writing this one. This was also the first short story which I wrote using an outline.
Then there was “The Sniper.” This is probably my second favorite of the stories in the book. I love the scenes between Sven and Rodger. They drive the crap out that story.
The last was “All Night Diner” and though I was writing both “The Sniper” and “The Hypothesis” at the same time as this, this one was a bitch to get out. I came across the first obstacle of writing by outline, the fact that sometimes I was forcing the story than letting it flow. This story is filled with way to much telling the reader what is going on rather than showing the reader. All that aside, it’s still a fun story.
After all was said and done I sent the book off to my publisher and the edits ensued. I edited them all myself before I sent them off (My process is write first draft, then read it and fix bad grammar, while assessing the story and fixing any continuity and plot errors the second way around. Then go back through and edit for readibility. Rewording and sometimes eliminating entire paragraphs if they are superfluous to the plot. Then one last edit for grammar’s sake.) and then they came back with some more major edits. Then a second edit by the editor, then finally a proofread before sending ti to the presses. After reading them all that many times (especially the ones I wasn’t particularly proud of) I couldn’t wait to put the damn thing behind me. I never wanted to see any of these stories again, and posting them here sometimes was painful, but it was cathartic in a way. Thomas Pynchon’s first book was a group of novellas which he entitled “Slow Learner” The reference wasn’t one of the story lines, but of how he was slow to develop his craft. I feel ya Thomas, from one slow learner to the other, I feel ya.
At least I can move forward with some other things which’re bouncing in my head!
Dark Week for Podcast
No new Podcast Episode the week after Thanksgiving. A View of the Edge of the World, the Podcast will return next week with Episode 9: The Sniper.
Meanwhile, please enjoy the 8 episodes currently available.
Sean McBride 
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