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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. |
| Jargon Following on from my column on technical terms ("20250514 Technical Terms" ), this came up – jargon. I did mention words and phrases that have different meanings to the norm, but these are actual words in formal use. Here I am going to look at some with even more niche meanings, but which are not official words or phrases. They are not technical terms – they are just words and phrases used on the job.Why? Because when writing about a group of people who know one another well or a well-established group or profession, you might want to portray them as having a language all their own. Still English, but different enough. It makes your world unique, and can be a part of world-building, creating that jargon-laden language so many have. Telling you how to do that is long and complex, so what I’ll do is list a bunch of them and hopefully you can see where the ideas come from, and utilise this to create your own. So, this is words, abbreviations, acronyms and initialisations that I have picked up in my various researches that are not exactly technical, universal terms, but are on-work jargon. Code Brown – in hospitals or police stations, something really bad is happening involving poo. Human excrement. Shit. Crop-dusting – when a flight attendant lets out a slow, silent fart while walking down the aisle of the plane. DWI – in the USA, police use DWI for “Driving While Intoxicated.” In Australia, the term is DUI, “Driving Under the Influence”, and covers drug-driving as well (remembering our more liberal drug laws). But sometimes cops will mention DWI. Most people think this means the US version… Nope. “Driving While an Idiot.” Elf On The Loose – used in retail stores for when a child goes missing during the hectic Christmas shopping period. Elf On The Shelf – used in retail stores during the Christmas madness when a child has been found and parents are being sought. Face/Heel – the good guys and bad guys in pro wrestling, now used in describing movie or TV characters as well. Face comes from Babyface, while Heel comes from the fact nothing is lower than a heel. Gone Camping – in hospitals means a patient has been moved to an oxygen tent. Hicide – another Australian police term, it means a death caused by a speeding vehicle, especially used for a motorcycle fatality. Honey Wagon – the truck used to empty septic tanks, especially from private residences. ID-ten-T Error – another tech support phrase. Why? ID-10-T… id10t… Mark – in carny speak or pro wrestling, a mark is one who does not realise that the games are rigged or the outcomes of the matches are pre-determined. PEBKAC/PEBCAK – a computer term used by people who work in IT tech trouble-shooting, especially for large companies: Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair/Chair And Keyboard. PICNIC – UK version of PEBKAC: Problem In Chair, Not In Computer. PO Box – another hospital one, slightly morbid. A patient is described as a PO Box meaning they are being kept alive as a “Parts Only” receptacle, there for organ donation only. Roo Poo – chocolate covered sultanas or peanuts; used to disguise just what is being shipped for… reasons. Sand-bagging – in professional wrestling and circus performing, it means dropping the weight and stopping co-operating. Can be because of injury or just being a dick or, often, forgetting what they were supposed to do next. Scooby Snack – a police term for a suspect who has been bitten by a police dog. Shoot The Puppy –in business, making an unpopular decision, often seen as cold and heartless, for the greater good of a company or organisation. Status: DQ – hospital term meaning “Status: Drama Queen”. Used for a patient who is, well, a drama queen. If asked, the meaning given to a patient I have heard is “Diagnosis Qualified.” So, there’s a few jargon terms that are very specific for certain occupations or situations, and can be used to hide the real meaning, so as to not upset or alarm the public, or because they just want to keep their inner workings to themselves. If making up your own, you can probably see where a lot of these come from. And why they would be used. Some are funny and abusive, yes, but all of this goes towards making people doing certain jobs feel like they are a part of an elite or special group. And humour can help alleviate a stressful situation. Don’t be afraid to invent your own. Heinlein did it in The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress with TANSTAAFL: There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. And in the Long… series Pratchett and Baxter developed “stepping” as the ability to move between worlds. Don’t be afraid to experiment. And if it fails? Delete in draft #2. Have fun! |
| Novel #9 Brooke was written quite quickly – I had an idea and it just came out onto the page, logorrhoea. However, it was actually written in the middle of my writing the next novel – Brothers In Arms. This one I was really happy with. Clocking in at 78100 words, it was also the first novel to break that 72000 word barrier, and so be officially classified a novel by every publishing house I knew at the time (I have since found some that consider 78000 words to be the cutoff, and it breaks that as well, albeit only just… but Baen has 80k words, so not quite there). As is my wont, it falls into that genre of supernatural horror, with demons and the living dead and lots of death and destruction. Brothers In Arms tells the story of a young man, recently divorced, whose parents and twin brother have all died, as well as a young son. But his brother somehow comes back, and is pursued by otherworld entities that do not wish the dead to return to Earth. While these monsters are the “bad guys”, I like to think I put enough shades of grey in the story for the reader to think they were just doing their job; after all, what would the world be like if the dead could come back at will? And yet, in the end, there is a hint that maybe it was allowed after all… The story follows along smoothly. I like the character development, even though yet again I have a whiny, neurotic main character. His ex-wife is well developed, though, and the brother who comes back has just enough manic presence to be believable (I hope). The secondary hero – a cop – is a bit of a two-dimensional stereotype, but he is only important at the very end. I also like the way I have set up Adelaide, Victor Harbor and Port Hughes (all real places). I think I’ve captured a little something of the towns/cities in winter. At least, at that time. Port Hughes looks very different nowadays, after a golf course and subsequent development extension, and Victor Harbor has exploded in size. Also, the destruction scenes are surprisingly subdued for me. The biggest complaint I’ve had from readers is my description of the hunter at the very end of the story. The general consensus is that I put in too much description, and should have left more for the reader’s imagination. As it is, I described it using a Hieronymus Bosch creation as the template, and yet I probably agree with the criticism. If I ever do go back and try a re-edit, I’ll definitely reduce the physical description in this case. I was so happy with it that over the next year I sent it out to 6 publishers and 2 agents. I got one response, from an agent, who said it was not “the genre” he sold, even though supernatural horror was prominent in his advert. I edited it and rewrote bits of the middle and tried again in 1999 with (according to my records) 5 publishers, including one I’d sent it to before, albeit inadvertently. Surprisingly, it was this second try publisher who was the most encouraging. They wanted the full manuscript, and an alternate ending. I gave both. 6 months later a “sorry” rejection, but with 3 suggestions for improvements: amp up the blood and gore aspects, amp up the relationship between hero and ex-wife, and get into the hero’s emotional head a bit more. But by now I was rewriting another novel, and so put it on the back-burner, and never got around to rewriting it. Now, of course, I’d have to re-write absolutely everything and make it 2025… almost 30 years later… Excerpt: “Relax…” the husky voice said soothingly. “Just calm down…” “What?” Panic had taken a firm grip on Robert’s mind. The sight before him was one which should not even exist in his nightmares… but here it was. Tony, his own brother, drowned at Port Hughes ten years ago, was standing before him… although it wasn’t Tony, was it? It could not be him… No way known… “Robbie, I need your help,” the person pleaded. “This can’t be happening,” was the muted response. Robert could feel his mind going numb again… but he also knew he had to fight it. If – just if – he let go this time he probably would not come back… “You’re not real.” “But I am.” The figure shook his head sadly, but never took his eyes off Robert. His eyes… and finally a smile crept across Robert’s lips. “You can’t be Tony,” he whispered. “Tony had…” “Blue eyes, I know.” An uncomfortable pause, then: “And brown hair, like yours. My eyes are black, the eyes of death. And my hair has gone white. It’s just the way it is…” “NO!!” Robert started to scream, but a firm hand over his mouth silenced him. A cold, clammy hand, waxy to the touch, slightly damp… He shivered violently and the Tony-person released him. “Please, listen to me,” he begged. “It is me, Tony, Anthony, Tone, as you called me, whatever you want, but it is me…” “A ghost,” Robert stated firmly, nodding, grasping at this new conviction firmly with his mind. “If this isn’t a dream, then you’re a ghost… ow!” The figure slapped him hard across the side of the face. “Can ghosts hit people?” “Poltergeist, then…” Robert rubbed his jaw slowly, not really feeling either the blow or his hand on his skin. Despite all his best intentions, he could definitely feel his mind slipping away from him, going fast, going forever… “If you’re real, and this isn’t all just a bad dream…” And that comment seemed to stir something in the dark recesses if his mind. “You can’t be real. I just think you look like Tony. You’re just some little punk playing stupid fucking games with me, aren’t you?” He grabbed the collar of the too-big jumper the teenager before him was wearing and shook him hard. “So who put you up to this? Who’s making you do this to me? Answer me, dammit!” The look of fear which came over the other’s face was instantaneous. “You used to call me Toto because you knew I hated it,” he muttered. “And I called you Robber Robbie because you stole two dollars from mum’s purse when we were ten or eleven. You caught me sleeping with Jody Harmer’s undies one night when we were fourteen. And I saw you kissing our sister Kathleen’s best friend when we were fifteen and she was nineteen! You lost your virginity when you were fifteen to that Margie Carlyle girl from up the road! What more do you need to hear? I’m your brother! I’m Tony! And I need you now!” Robert’s whole body shook madly, without restraint and he was doubled over in pain. He could sense the nausea rising strongly in his chest and into his throat, but he did not want to go through that again. “I don’t believe you…” he growled. “But you’ve got to,” was the response. “I need your help…” “You’re a ghost, if you even exist. And ghosts don’t need help…” he returned thickly. His tongue was growing thicker in his mouth, or so it seemed, making speech difficult… and, for some reason, thought as well. “Robbie…” “I don’t think you’re even real…” Robert muttered as thought he teenager wasn’t even talking. “It’s the cold, and my grief and everything else. I’m imagining things. I’ve just got to see a doctor and everything’ll be all right, I know it will…” “Robbie…” “…I just know it will. It has to be. I’m seeing things and hearing things and feeling this and it’s just not right…” “Robbie, please…” “…I need help…” “Robbie…” Suddenly Robert’s head snapped up and his angry eyes seemed to push the youngster back. “Go!” he growled. “Just leave me be. I don’t want to know about it!” “But…” “GO AWAY!” he screamed, dropping to his knees and leaning his head on the damp ground, his wet hair plastered about his face like a coating of wet mud. Nothing came to him through his mental anguish… then footsteps walked briskly away, fading into the distance. He was alone again. Alone with his feelings and memories… alone in a world all his own… It is too much tell and not enough show, I stick with very superficial descriptions of what is internal, ignoring a lot of that physiology that hits, and the emotions are surface level. The rekindling of the romance also feels undeserved. And look at all those ellipses! But I think this story shows me (at least) that I was improving, even if a little, as a writer. I do still like this story, and is one of the very few older novels of mine I don’t mind re-reading. Maybe one day I will give it a do-over… Maybe. One day. |
| External Writerings May 2025 That time of the month where I list the writing I have done for Weekend Notes (and any other places that could be bothered publishing me online). Songs and films only this time. Just some favourites and a DVD review. Standard stuff, but lots to listen to! Remember, you do not have to listen to the songs (though I would be grateful if you did), but every look at the articles from a different IP address with no ad blockers helps me out in my increasingly desperate attempts to make money as a person who writes. My favourite songs from Eurovision... and most didn't make the final! Although the winner is here. Some songs about praying. Reviewing a film that I think is often under-valued from the Star Warts canon , for May the 4th (B with U). Some very different cover versions and reinterpretations of classic rock and pop songs. (And a Christmas carol.) My favourite albums released in 1965. Some absolute corkers here! 5 articles this month. I have to do at least 4 to keep my ranking in the top 25 contributors, so your clicks will also help me in that regard. As usual, if you want a certain topic covered in songs (I can do films and books as well), leave a comment below. I would love to give readers what they want. |
| Using Real Places – A Warning A thing happened. This is sort of related to my "20250509 Using Real People In Fiction Pt 2" post as well.A fellow local writer (who has had a great deal of success as a writer of Westerns) and I spoke about this the other day. Yes, an Australian writing US westerns, all of them published by a UK firm and selling really well in mainland Europe. Let’s not get into the way publishing works… Anyway, nowadays he writes historical romance stories and modern thrillers, all set in the local area in which we live. He self-publishes and sells them at markets. I’ve read them; they are quite good. He could easily have a publisher pick them up, but he reckons he’s beyond that at over 80 years of age. Like me, he uses the real local locations to make our stories more realistic. If anyone read my Invasive Species, they could go to Ardrossan and see all those locations; and, yes, all of them are still there! A mutual friend of ours who also self-publishes – her books are not the best; I avoid reading them now – writes detective stories set in the same area. Like the other two of us, she uses businesses and buildings that exist. She’s been doing this for a few years – I think her series (with a recurring character…) is five books in – and she makes a point of mentioning when businesses change or close or whatever, to give her stories that sense of now, and a sense of definite time. I have no issue with that. Sue Grafton did something similar with her alphabet series. However, someone has now had an issue with that. One of the businesses that appeared in her first two books, and was then quietly dropped, has demanded the business be taken out of the books. So… what happened? Well, the reason the business – a café – was dropped from the books was because the author and the owner had a falling out. To the author’s credit, her detective simply started going to a different place to have her “cuppa, white, no sugar” and no mention was made of the other business. Nothing disparaging, nothing at all. The character just went elsewhere. Readers might have been confused but it was hardly a big deal. Well, the issue between then grew a little more heated recently – neither of us know why, but there are “sides” being formed; stupid small town personality politics –and now this demand. The author went to our local (state) writer’s centre for free legal advice. Guess what? The business is fully within their rights. There was not even a verbal agreement between them. The author just started using the business and its name. I guess that beggars the question – how have the other two of us not been caught up in something similar? I mean, apart from the obvious reason of not being dicks and getting involved in petty power politics of a personal penchant. One, both of us went to the businesses and asked permission to use them. In my case, it was a café, a gym, a bakery and a corner store. The gym has since changed hands, but it is still there. Second, and I think this is very important, neither of us used the actual names of the businesses. I called the bakery “the bakery”, for example, not “Ardrossan bakery”. We use the names of real streets, but both understood you don’t have to use the real names of businesses. What I think this means is that you need to be careful not just using the names of real people, but everything that has a name. Now, the advice we have received legally is that multi-national corporations are fair game (like public figures), and only two companies do not like their company names used in fiction works – Disney and Apple. So your characters can drink Coke or Pepsi, go to KFC or McDonalds, use an IBM or HP computer , no issue. But drinking the KIS honey drink, go to Wallaroo Shores Eatery, use an OZMachines computer… maybe not? Just use generic terms: “the pub”, “the deli on Washington Ave”, “the local ginger ale”… Better be safe than sorry. As to our mutual friend, the legal advice is that she might have to pulp any leftover copies of those first two books unless she can reach an agreement with the business owner. There is nothing libellous, so what a court would decide is anyone’s guess, but it will also be costly. Just be careful who you mention and who you talk about. |
| 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. Let’s look at dreams in stories! First, and this is important, never end a story with “it was all a dream.” That was fine 150 years ago, but even Carroll’s Alice… stories had it ambiguous as to whether it was a dream or reality. This also goes for “it was all the drugs” or “it was just a vision of a possible future” – 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. Here’s an example – 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 secretary… then is woken up and kills his wife and goes off with his secretary… then is woken up and kills his wife and goes off with his secretary… then is woken up, kills his wife, his secretary has no idea what he’s talking about, the police arrest him and he begs the camera to tell him it’s 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 clichéd. 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 – Freddy got you through your dreams! Gilliam’s 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 “sight”. 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 – I don’t 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 it’s because a writer is struggling with an ending… maybe not. Finally, there is also the ambiguity of dreams. Was it a dream or not that makes the Alice… 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 it’s old, but possibly hasn’t been explored in a modern/ contemporary setting. Something to consider. So, dreams can be fine. There’re just a few caveats, is all. |
| Recurring Characters Following on from "20250523 Frame Story" .This is something that a few writers have experimented with – 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 Howard’s 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 smarter… 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 – it was only a reference, a brief mention that maybe he’d faced this sort of opponent before, or maybe that he’d 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 written… 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 – 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 Howard’s 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 cliché 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 Rick’s 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. It’s 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 Friend… and would subsequently revisit a few more times. And my love affair with the ellipsis continued unabated… But a bump in the road is what this is, a bump I think I needed to get this sort of supernatural horror cliché out of my system, so my next novel actually had a sort of original premise. Sometimes it’s good to drive those clichés onto paper… 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. “Where are we going?” she asked, her voice full of fear. “We’ve got to see some-one,” 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. “You’re not going to kill me, are you?” she asked pathetically. “What?” I asked in confusion. “I’m a monster.” She was crying. “Isn’t that why we’re out here? So you can get rid of the monster?” 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. “Yes, it is why we’re out here,” I stated. “To get rid of that… that thing. But I’m not going to kill you.” “I am a monster,” she whispered as if the realisation had only just dawned on her. “Come on, Brooke…” 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. “I’m a monster…” 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 – 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 here… But this story was a real character study and told me just what I needed to learn… although I didn’t 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 – men on a train (Dr Terror’s House Of Horrors), the story of inmates in a psychiatric facility (Asylum) et al. – 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 Terror…, 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 kid’s 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 Br’er Rabbit et al. Sure, I know, it’s allegedly racist and it’s 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 – Stephen King, Jeffrey Archer, names like that – 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 clichéd, 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 didn’t 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. King’s was a gentleman’s 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 who’d travelled when he was younger seemed the ideal way to do that. It also meant I could sell each individual story to anthologies (okay, I’ve only sold two, but the idea is still there, as I’ve written 25). If I collated them, I’d probably have to edit out the explanation of who Uncle Joe was at the start of each, but that’d 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, that’s 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, so… 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 “in the middle of things.” 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 – Die Hard has the slow build of tension, for example – 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. “Georgina Smith was 5’6, 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, “Love.” She liked cats and kittens but loved tigers.” 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 let’s 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 don’t even get a description of a single person in the whole story. Does it matter? I don’t 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 don’t think I’ve 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 – 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 you’ll 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 – 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: Frankenstein’s Monster, Dracula, the Invisible Man, Gill-Man, the Wolf-Man, the Mummy. They keep trying to remake them. Some work (about 40% of Hammer’s films, Brendan Fraser’s The Mummy), some are okay (about 40% of Hammer’s films, Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein) and too many fail and are just abysmal (about 20% of Hammer’s films, Tom Cruise’s 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 that’s the physical. As a writer, there is one thing that makes these resonate – 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. Frankenstein’s 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 didn’t understand. And yet he was hounded to a death… 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 it… 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 that’s 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. Don’t be afraid to show it. |
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Thank you for this very informative piece.
