Subtext and the Art of Subtle Influence

I just read an interesting and saddening post on blatant idiocy here. Go read this story of discrimination and fear. We'll wait.

So, the upshot seems to be that if you are gay, your writing cannot be trusted. Of course, the un-named 'A' is right. WAIT, before you hoist me on this petard of my own making, hear me out...

'A' was clearly afraid. Afraid of 'The Gay' yes, but more likely, afraid that she and her readers would be shown in plain black and white that being gay does not stop a person from being admirable. Nothing scares bigots more than having light shed on their irrationality. What if the gay writer said something that made sense? What if, please God no, she actually agreed with him. What if she found herself drawn to his words, moved by his arguments, attracted to his ideas. It is difficult to maintain negativity towards people we truly admire. This is the fear that causes bigots to throw up barriers, but it is a line in the sand.

As writers, we would do well to remember that words have power. Blogger A has managed to dance away from the wave that would erase her self-imposed border, but the tide is rising, and that line in the sand grows harder and harder to defend. The best thing we can do is write. Books with gay characters. Books with real people in them. Books with characters worth admiring. Blogs that are inclusive. Articles that ask hard questions. Stories that change us, that shine light into our darkest corners, that bring our own irrationality to light where it can shrivel and die. Blogger A is right: words have power, but Blogger A is wrong not to embrace  the power of words to shape us into better people.

Who Will Be The Gatekeepers of Self Publishing?

Recently, I have found myself overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of self-published and 'indie' authors in my network clamoring for me to read and review their books. I have had ten requests already this year. Out of the ten, only one book held my interest for more than a couple of paragraphs, and that one lost me before the end of the first chapter.

The culprit? Poor writing. Typos alone could be ignored; unfortunately, what I am seeing is basic mistakes - pronoun confusion, tense switching, extreme use of passive voice, incomplete or confusing description, etc. Many, if not most of these authors are active members of the on-line writing community and I encounter them on Facebook, on Twitter, at Goodreads, on Linked In and here. They all seem like such nice people. They all seem so committed to writing.

Of course, I am not the only one encountering this, and there is a lively discussion happening across the community on how we as writers should approach the problem. Chuck Wendig has a lovely (if profanity filled) blog post on it here.

One thing that Chuck brought up is the fact that so many self-published authors gush over the writing of other 'indies' regardless of the true quality of the writing. There seems to be such a strong feeling of camaraderie and support in the 'indie' community, which is good for authors, but does not truly serve the readers.

I have contributed to this atmosphere by politely saying nothing when given a free book that I subsequently find unreadable. I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, so I just say nothing. I am beginning to think that is wrong. As I said in my comment on Chuck's blog post - I need to develop a polite but firm way of calling bad writing, bad. I am beginning to suspect that no response lets authors off the hook. Perhaps no one has told them that their writing is not up to snuff.

After all, my own mother thinks that all the drivel I write is magic. My husband will help me with trouble spots, but in the end knows me so well that his mind fills in blanks left in the story. My writing buddies that haven't yet finished a novel are in awe that I have. My writing buddies that are published have little time to spare.

In the end run, the critical eye is one of the main functions of the so-called 'gatekeepers' of publishing. These are people who don't know you and don't care how long it took you to write the book. They are judging the writing independent of any knowledge of you.

One of the things I think writers who choose to 'indie' or self publish need to do is create their own 'gatekeepers', a group of Beta Readers that can serve as honest reflections of the writing. This means finding people who do not know you, who do not know how long you have labored and who do not care if you succeed, but only whether the writing succeeds.

In the meantime, maybe the rest of us in the writing community need take the gloves off and start being direct and honest with those that have asked our opinion. Here is my version of a 'Thanks but. . . ' reply note:

Dear Aspiring Author:

I greatly appreciate that writing a book is a massive undertaking, and for accepting that challenge, I salute you. However, I do not think this manuscript is the best it can be.

Although I liked: (insert positive things here),

I was unable to read past (the first page) due to: (list of problems here).

I sincerely hope you will not give up on your dream of being an author, but reapply yourself to the craft, working and shaping your prose until you have words worthy of your aspirations.

Remember: “What is written without effort is in generally read without pleasure.” Samuel Johnson

Sincerely, Me

I would love to know what others in this community think.

Chasing Amy: a Viking's Lament

The news today is full of tragedy - one which was courted, invited in and danced with, the other which sprung out of the neverland of inexplicable hatred and madness. Both remind me of why a lack of imagination is the scariest monster we face and why we humans need story. Imagination is the key to seeing a place different than it is, to envisioning a better future, and to understanding our fellow travelers. Imagination is the fuel that will lift you out of the narrowness of self-focus and introduce you to the amazing world of possibility.

JK Rowling said it better than I ever could: 

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people’s places. Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral. One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.

And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know.

I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do. Choosing to live in narrow spaces leads to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors. I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters. They are often more afraid.What is more, those who choose not to empathise enable real monsters. For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.

The best method I have for fighting back against the tragedy that sees taking a life, either your own or that of a group of innocent children, as a solution to a problem is to exercise my imagination and encourage others to do the same. 

I will write stories that help to tell people there is more to this world than our own narrow thoughts. That life is precious. That answers come from unexpected places. That living in the skin of others for those few brief hours of turning pages can help us to know and love ourselves and others more.

What's the Story Anyway?

Many times in my reading and learning about the art of writing I stumble across people who define story as conterminous with plot. I feel this can be a limiting view of story and in the end is harmful to the 'long view' for our writing.


PLOT: 
–noun

1.Also called storyline. the plan, scheme, or main story of a literary or dramatic work, as a play, novel, or short story.

CHARACTER:
  –noun

1.the aggregate of features and traits that form the individual nature of some person or thing.

STORY:
–noun 

1.a narration of a chain of events told or written in prose or verse.

If you stick to these narrow definitions, Plot=Story; but we are missing one critical element here. All fiction is a narration from the lips of a storyteller - you the writer. An interesting thing happens to our idea of story when we consider the root meanings and origins of narration:


WORD ORIGIN & HISTORY

early 15c., from O.Fr. narration  "a relating, recounting, narrating," from L. narrationem  (nom. narratio ), from narrare  "to tell, relate, recount, explain," lit. "to make acquainted with,"

It is this last idea that is critical to how we view story. I find it helpful to think of if this way: I am a storyteller standing on a stage - I must let my audience know not only what happened, but also how, why, and to whom. Everything we write is an effort to make our readers acquainted with our characters, our themes, our ideas, our fictional events - in short, our stories. By keeping the whole tapestry of Story in our minds we will allow our readers to become acquainted with the entirety of our fictional world.


How do you view story?

How Much Sex is Too Much?

First, read this: Sex in YA Fiction.

I have a comment on that post where I say this:

Ok - not to get too personal - but are we doing a disservice to YA readers?

I remember my first 'truly intense' sexual act with vivid clarity - and though the lead up to the act was all emotion - once the physical sensations started it was ALL about the physical. In fact, if someone had interrupted and asked my name I would have been unable to tell them. The physical was THAT powerful.

I think we sometimes color what we write or what we read with an adult sense of prudery. As older humans, we have weighed and balanced the sexual experience - we know the pluses and minuses - we understand the give and take. This was the number one problem with Twilight's "I'm waiting" philosophy - there was FAR too much consideration going on.

Currently YA sex IS less graphic - but in a way, wouldn't it be more honest if it was MORE graphic - or at least more focused on those crazy explosive physical feelings?

I realize this is a sensitive subject, so I have spent the day pondering and this is what I have come up with:

I think YA writers should try and remember the sensations of 'first love' in the physical. For example, I remember the first time someone kissed me on the neck. I felt it on my neck, but I also remember the feelings shooting down my arm; I remember the marked tingling of my fingers and a delicious tickle in the small of my back where his fingers rested. It made me giggle, and squirm and desire to be kissed there again. It created a hunger unlike anything I had previously experienced. This is the type of physical detail that can be added to YA sex, without upping the 'erotic' quotient of the writing.

I wonder at the tendency to self-censor our writing. If it was not inappropriate for me to feel those tingles at age 16, then why should it be inappropriate to write about it? And if we think it is inappropriate but we are writing about it anyway, isn't it coy to measure the language?

In the end run, I say this: If you are writing sex into your YA novel - be honest. Describe the physical sensations as well as the emotional ones. Remember what it felt like the first time you touched someone, and the first time you were touched. Do not view the scene through adult eyes, but through the eyes of your teen-aged characters.  If you do this, your 'sex scene' will come off as natural and not gratuitous.

Thoughts?

The Kid with her Foot in Mouth

I have been called blunt, abrupt, candid, outspoken, rude, forthright, tactless, frank, and matter-of-fact. I have spoken out when it would have been wiser to hold my tongue. I have blurted thoughts as they formed and asked the question 'but, why?' repeatedly.

Tact is not my strong suit. I have no personal boundaries. I say what I mean and mean what I say. Which means, I am often the one in the corner with her foot in her mouth.

Society is not very fond of bluntness - until it becomes irascibility, and then they dedicate books of quotations to you (W.C. Fields or Dorthy Parker, anyone?)  This is why I so often channel my words into story - in a story that you are making up, you can say anything and get away with it.

In the meantime, in case I am never published, I am on a personal quest to convert my mere bluntness into full-scale irascibility. If nothing else, I will be assured that my utterings will grace untold numbers of Toastmaster speeches and commencement addresses. One way or the other, my words will live on after I am nothing but dirt!