Are writers sadists?

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“Every book I’ve ever written ends with someone dying; every one. Really nice people too. Like the book about Helen, the school teacher. I killed her the day before summer vacation. How cruel is that?”

–         Karen Eiffel, Stranger Than Fiction

“I’d really like to see him,” he added. “Dustfinger, I mean. Naturally I’m sorry now that I thought up such an unhappy ending for the poor fellow, but it somehow seemed right for him.”

–         Fenoglio in Inkheart, by Cornelia Funke

Admit it. You love writing in the sad bits, the death scenes, the broken hearts. I know, because I do, too. But why? Why do we so enjoy torturing characters we’ve come to love? I mean, we wouldn’t do that in real life. We’re all pretty good people, right?

But if the author is good, how come bad things happen to good characters?

Because that’s the Way Things Are. It wouldn’t be realistic if I wrote it otherwise.

Then why are you writing it, doofus? Save yourself the trouble of making up sad stories and just stick with true ones.

Maybe I just like the control. We all like to play God.

Baloney sandwiches. You know perfectly well that after you have created your characters, you lose control of them completely.

Fine. Then I guess because…it’s beautiful, somehow.

Beautiful? What kind of a sick person are you? You think it’s beautiful for a person to have their heart ripped in two?

I don’t know. Something about it is.

My theory is this. We sense beauty in these situations and misinterpret it, thinking darkness is beautiful. But really, pain is beautiful only because it is evidence of something good. We love to write about the grieving widower because it illustrates how much he loved his wife. We love writing about the child dying of cancer because it illustrates how precious life is. It’s that love, that preciousness, that is beautiful. We have trouble seeing goodness if all is well, but when we take something away from a character, or threaten to take it, we prove the worth of that thing by the character’s reaction.

Say you have the chance to meet your protagonist (as did the authors in the quotes above) – to enter your story at its darkest moment. You kneel beside your hero as he coughs up blood, look into his slightly glassy eyes, and tell him everything is going to be okay. You wouldn’t give him any details, of course – that he’ll overcome the villain at the last moment – that would ruin the ending. You wouldn’t even want him to believe the part about everything being okay, not really. You’d just want to give him the tiniest glimmer of hope. Not enough to banish his fear, not enough to lift the deepening despair; just enough to keep him fighting. To push himself off the floor and pick up his sword.

And even if you prefer sad endings, and he does die, the point remains – that he picked up his sword. He didn’t give up, because there was something worth fighting for.

And that is beautiful.

Go Ahead, pull your Finger

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Musicians do it, so should we.

Snap, crackle, pop. It is important to properly maintain your tools regularly. Whether one writes with a pen(cil) or a keyboard, we must all take care of our hands. Some people think popping knuckles is bad for you, some are just uncomfortable doing it.

Do it anyway.

Chiropractors pop necks, backs, elbows, ankles, and all other joints, and you pay them for it. Writing for hours can be a big strain on the hands and fingers. Once my fingers got stuck in the pencil-grip position for several minutes after. It could happen to you. 

Pop your knuckles

Stretch your fingers

Bend them behind the hand

Pull them gently out from your hand to extend them all the way from your wrist

Bend your wrists back

Bend your thumbs back

Extend your fingers in a wide stretch then bend them like claws, repeat that a lot.

Play with chinese medacine balls (they’re the little metal ones that jingle); this is for dexterity.

Put a rubber band around your fingers and thumb and move them in and out repeatedly to create and release tension in the band; this is for strength and stretching.

Massage your hands

Do the Mr. Miagi rub together for warming up.

Do these before/during/after long writing sessions and your hands and fingers with be happy and crampless.

Don’t let your hands get like this.

That is all.

Inspiration Monday XII

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Last week was rife with the (unfounded) insecurity of Rewriters who didn’t like their pieces but had the courage to post them anyway, much to the delight of the readers, who found them as good as ever. Be sure to read around!

Also, in case you missed yesterday’s post by TragicPete, be sure to pop over. “Pete” is my long-time critique partner and also happens to be my brother. He mentioned he needed an outlet for some of his shorter work, and just last week it occured to me that inviting him to join my blog would be the perfect solution. He expects to post once or twice a month, and you’ll probably see him around in the comments.

***EDIT: Check out the InMon page for official InMon badges created by Marantha!

Jinx and two

Patti

Marantha

Mike

Ken

Scribbla

Kay

Billie Jo

Drew

Hugmore

Fredi

Char

Carl

—

The Rules

There are none. Read the prompts, get inspired, write something. No word count minimum or maximum. You don’t have to include the exact prompt in your piece, and you can interpret the prompt(s) any way you like.

OR

No really; I need rules!

Okay; write 200-500 words on the prompt of your choice. You may either use the prompt as the title of your piece or work it into the body of your piece. You must complete it before6 pm CSTon the Monday following this post.

The Prompts:

Paper towns*

The firing squad couldn’t face him

 Seemed like a good idea at the time

Unorthodox alarm clock

You wouldn’t think to look at her

If you want to share your Inspiration Monday piece, post it on your blog and link back to today’s post; I’ll include a link to your piece in the next Inspiration Monday post. No blog? Email your piece to me at stephanie (at) balcomagency (dot) com.

Happy writing!

—

Today’s first prompt brought to you by a book of the same title, by John Green.

The New Kid

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Good day to you all. I am Tragic Pete. I will be assisting bekind with this blog, posting various tips, as well as a few of my own pieces of writing on occasion. Below is my most recent random thing; a sample, an introduction.

 

All the bits and pieces of the earth collide, combine, tear apart and reconnect repeatedly and continuously forming new and different bits out of the same elements. New grows old and becomes new again, disintegrate, rearrange, and converge into a bit that was not there before and yet has always been. All that I am in contact with becomes me, and I a part of it. I walk on the floor, I sit in a chair, I wear clothes and yet am naked, for my skin touches the cloth, the cloth touches the chair, the chair touches the floor and the floor is the ground where the earth is kept neatly out of sight. Everything touches everything else, molecules brush up against others that are not the same, but opposites attract and hold on to communicate what could be accomplished if electrons make the effort to produce and reproduce in a consummation of elemental harmony. I am therefore out of my body and into the earth. I am the wood of my desk, I am the circuits in the screen that displays words that are the fruit of my labor, my life’s work, an accomplishment of my brain to my fingers to the keys to the light that beams from the screen to my eyes that tell my brain I have written this, for here it is. I am what I write,what I write is what you read, what you read becomes a part of you. I am you.

How to Format Your Manuscript

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Times New Roman. 12 pt font. Double spaced. You’ve got all that covered. But what else do you have to do to get your manuscript in shape for submission? Here’s some handy info I stole from a used copy of Writer’s Market (any edition of which I highly recommend; mine’s a 2004).

Cover page

In the upper left-hand corner, list your real name, street address, phone number, and email address (remember to use a professional-looking email addy based on your name) – this is the only part that should be single-spaced.

 In the upper right-hand corner, put the word count rounded to the nearest 500.

 One-third of the way down the page, center the book title in all caps. Double space, “by,” double-space again and type your name (or pseudonym).

Chapters

Start each chapter on a new page, one-third of the way down the page. Write the number of the chapter, a colon, and the chapter title (if applicable) in all caps, centered. Double space and begin the chapter.

Header

Create a header with your last name, page number, and shortened version of book title (unless it’s already short), all separated by dashes, and all caps. (For directions on this, type “insert header” into the search in MS Word Help.) 

Spaces

Double space everything. Indent the first line of every paragraph. Do NOT include an extra line between each paragraph, and do NOT include an extra space between sentences. Align text to the left; do NOT justify. Your margins are fine at whatever Word automatically sets them (usually between 1 and 1.5 inches).

Favor Chicago over AP Style

Generally, fiction favors Chicago style and journalism favors AP style. So use em dashes—like this—instead of en dashes – like this. And don’t forget your serial commas when listing three, four, or more of anything. When in doubt, consult Strunk & White.

No fancy fonts!

I know I already mentioned Times New Roman. Apparently Courier is okay, too. But seriously – don’t even use a fancy font for the titles. Your story should stand out because of the writing, not the type. Besides, if you send an e-query, the agent’s computer might not recognize said fancy font, and it’ll just pick the next-closest thing, which may look grotesque.

No fancy paper!

Standard 8.5×11 white printer paper. No colors, designs or sparkles!

File type

“.doc” seems to be the universally accepted file type. If you have a current version of MS Word, it may automatically save as a .docx, but if the agent you are querying has an older version of Word (like mine), they won’t be able to open it – so make sure you change it to .doc.

Questions? Need clarification? Shoot me a comment!