Holding the Lantern

Special Announcement! We will give away a copy of our ultra-cool Novel Tips on Rice: What To Cook When You'd Rather Be Writing cookbook to someone who comments today! And we'll mail it to you -- or to your mother -- just in time for Mother's Day. (What? You want a copy for Mother's Day? Just contact Latayne@Latayne.com and she'll mail one out to you TODAY for your PayPal payment of $12.99 plus priority mail postage!) Now back to our regularly scheduled wonderfulness by Patti.)

Welcome to our book talk about Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. We're talking about her chapter on plot today. Even if you haven't read it, please feel free to add to the conversation. We're all teachers here!

We aren't going to learn all we need to know about plotting from the "Plot" chapter in Anne Lamott's book, Bird by Bird. She says as much when she suggests books by E. M. Forster and John Gardner. But she reminded me of things I definitely needed to hear.

"That's what plot is: what people will up and do in spite of everything that tells them they shouldn't..."

Stories are about what people will DO to get what they WANT even if what they're willing to do is a little--or a lot--crazy. I've read some wonderful stories over the last few years, but The Help stands out for its inconspicuous yet charging plot. Every character wants something worth dying for. Talk about tension on every page. And what do the maids want? They want to tell their stories. They want a voice. They want the world to see that the babies they loved and raised hate them beyond reason. As for Skeeter, she wants purpose--a bit of irony there but completely believable. Carrying her typewriter to the colored section of town was pure foolishness, unless you want to rise above your legacy, and Skeeter did.

"I'm the designated typist, and I'm also the person whose job it is to hold the lantern while the kid does the digging. What is the kid digging for? The stuff. Details and clues and images, invention, fresh ideas, an intuitive understanding of people. I tell you, the holder of the lantern doesn't even know what the kid is digging for half the time--but she knows gold when she sees it."

Once I know my character very well and have a handle on what she wants (this will change many times), that's the time to lean in with the lantern. For me, this isn't sit-in-the-chair work. It's my hands-are-wet-and-I-don't-have-a-thing-to-write-with work. I daydream freely about my character--what she will do when she sees her world tilting and spinning away, how she will show the reader where her passion resides, and what she will do when she is pressed to the wall with a knife to her throat, metaphorically speaking.

The smart thing to do is dry my hands and write it all down--or the dreams evaporate, not that the dream stuff is always used, but it's all foundational, very important stuff to know about the character and how she moves through her story world.

"The climax is that major event, usually toward the end, that brings all the tunes you have been playing so far into one major chord, after which at least on of your people is profoundly changed. If someone isn't changed, then what is the point of your story."

While home sick from work a couple weeks ago, I watched lots and lots of movies. (I don't sleep well when I can't breathe.) Since we don't subscribe to premium channels, I did some pay-per-view selections from our cable company. I watched Black Swan and right after that, Country Strong. SPOILER ALERT: I'm going to talk about the endings of these pictures. In Black Swan, Nina, the ballerina who must play the dual parts of the white and black swan in Swan Lake, struggles to express the wildness, the wantonness of the black swan. As a psychological thriller, it's not always easy to know what is reality and what is mindscape, but Nina dances the opposing parts with perfection on opening night. And then she dies, probably by her own hand. In Country Strong, an alcoholic country star is prematurely taken out of rehab for a comeback tour through Texas. She botches her first performance, misses her second, but nails the third in Dallas, even though she is back on pills and booze. After her stellar performance, she locks herself in her dressing room and overdoses.

The endings/climaxes left me cold. The characters fight for change but find the change unsustainable, and so they destroy themselves. Perhaps the changes were unsustainable, but an option would be to redirect the protagonists' desires. That would have worked better in these movies, but I'm a hopeful person. Dead is a big change for a protag, but not a very satisfying one. Keep that in mind when writing your climax. I do not want to revisit the pessimism of the 60s and 70s again. Please!

Let's talk! What was the last book you read that had you sitting on the edge of your chair, saying, "Don't go in there," but you loved the story and couldn't stop reading? What does holding the lantern look like for you? Do you have your climax in mind when you start a story? Have you ever been surprised by your climax? What struggles do you have with plot? What resources have helped you?

We'll be talking about dialogue on May 18th.

Fretting with Creativity

We're ringing in the 12 Days of Christmas on Novel Matters. (For full contest rules, click the link.)

On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me...
Six Geese a-Laying!

I'll send a signed copy of Latter-day Cipher to the person who can find an author's last name in the phrase: SIX GEESE A-LAYING and name a title by that author OR submit a book title with one of the words from the phrase and the author. Submit your entry using the "Contact" button above. See complete details for the contest on the November 23rd post. Good Luck! The winner will be announced on Monday December 7th.

Now, about this creativity bit. I admit to my past sins of thinking that people who write novels don’t have to work as hard as other writers. I had documentation of my work as a writer of non-fiction: every bibliography, footnote, scriptural citation. But novel writers could just pull things out of the air, I thought.

Once I thought two things were over-rated as to difficulty: childbirth and fiction writing. That was before I experienced labor and delivery. That was before plotting a novel.

All writers work, to some extent, with the same “raw materials.” Either imagination or research skills (or both) are essential. But at a more basic level, all English speakers must use the 26-letter alphabet (plus a few other symbols) to write anything, of any genre. I’ll use words that other people have used millions of time in other contexts. If I use foreign words or even if I make up words, they’ll have some tie to known language.

But the delight is in the insight: the combining of those unadventurous 26 letters and oft-rubbed words to bring that spark of new inner-eyesight.

Here’s a video that shows how a musician, Andy McKee, uses familiar “raw materials” in a fresh and engaging way:

So, enjoy the music. I’m off to write on the neck of my novel, to fret with words, and push them right up to your headstock.

Plot Improbabilities

Recently a secular organization asked me to address their annual conference, on how to write effectively. (You can see the link to the video of the presentation – and the handout I provided to the participants -- here. Small enticement: The handout is a kind of resource list/crash course for effective writing and publishing.)

My two latest books are controversial, and that’s why this organization wanted to hear what I had to say about handling touchy subject matter. In addressing others who might want to write on something controversial, I shared with them the most important element of persuasive writing.

It is this: The first task of a persuasive writer is to anticipate, and address, the objections of the reader – before those objections arise in the reader’s mind.

What does that have to do with writing fiction, you may ask?

Everything. Because, more than any other kind of writer, the fiction writer must convince the reader to care about people who don’t actually exist, in predicaments wholly invented by the writer. Now, that’s persuasive writing!

Here’s an exercise to help you do that.

Choose either the plot of your WIP or an extended section of it. Now, imagine three people you know who just won’t put up with illogical or unbelievable plots. (We’re not talking about the writing, just the plot at this point.) Ah, there’s your snotty Aunt Eunice who points out plot holes in Murder She Wrote reruns. And your teenage son who rolls his eyes when something improbable happens at a movie and groans so loudly that you duck down in your theater seat. And don’t forget your spouse who throws across the room any book with too many coincidences.

Imagine them at their worst. Allow them to morph into avatars. Let them hold court on the plot of your novel. Let them be ruthless. Reason out what they would object to.

Then fix it. Every plot hole, improbable coincidence, silly sequence, gratuitous artifice.

Then ship those three avatar plot critics off to a Siberian prison that swirls in the middle of a perpetual ice storm forever, because they have nothing more to say.

Then take lung-deep, ah!-bright-wings breaths.

And write.

Lavishly, recklessly, write.

Guest Blogger Jeff Gerke: Plot-first or Character-first?

We invited Jeff to blog today and next Friday because he asked us to test drive a plotting tool he developed for fiction writers a while back. I like what Katy said about her experience with Jeff's book: "It's like having a brilliant editor at your elbow for the whole process." Curious? You should be. Jeff brings years of experience as an editor, novelist, and publisher to your elbow too.

I believe there are two kinds of novelists in our world. Of course every writer is an individual and no one writes entirely like anyone else. But when you break it all down into its simplest elements, I think you can put every novelist into one of two groups.

You're either a character-first novelist or a plot-first novelist.

A character-first novelist has character ideas all day long. Interesting people populate this writer's imagination. This writer is constantly coming up with cool issues and fears and backstory for fascinating story people. This kind of novelist will have more heroes and best friends and mysterious women in black than she has stories to put them in.

A plot-first novelist, on the other hand, gets story ideas like crazy. Ooh, this guy could totally be a double agent and that's why he's here with the bomb before the president makes his speech that starts the war! Plot-first novelists create fascinating stories and nail-biting plots that make their character-first brethren's minds spin.

The problem with being a plot-first novelist is that most of her characters are more like furniture than people. They don't have real personalities. Typical characters in these writers' books are "the girl" and "the friend" and "the bad guy," which is to say they're basically just more plot elements. They're in the story so that when the truck blows up and they're killed, it gives the hero a reason to go on his rampage.

The problem with being a character-first novelist is that her books are filled with beautifully drawn, realistic characters--who sit around doing nothing. We get manuscripts full of exquisite dialogue and unforgettable story people, but then we fall asleep because there is no story for these interesting people to live out.

A great novel has both strong characters and a strong plot. But how do you do both if you are, like most novelists, naturally better at the one and weaker at the other?

The solution is twofold. First, you have to dedicate yourself to doing the very hard and counterintuitive work it will take to produce excellence in the area you're not strong in.

Plot-first novelists draw shallow characters partially because they don't think they're important but also because it almost hurts mentally to put in that work. It's like making yourself do a semester of calculus if you're terrible at math. It's the same with character-first novelists trying to come up with good stories. It's so much easier just to do one more exploration of a relationship than it is to figure out three-act structure.

So the first thing needed is to agree with yourself to do the work to get better at what you're weak at. Until you decide that crafting a great character is just as important as writing the scene in which the plane crashes, you're never going to do it. Until you decide that it really is vital to give your story a satisfying structure, you'll simply skip it. Your novels will all remain lopsided and defective. And probably unpublishable.

The second thing you need to do is learn how to get better at the thing you're weak at. There are many books and electronic writer's helps tools that can help you. I have developed two myself: one for character creation and one for plot creation. These are the tools I use in my own writing, and I know they can help you.

Next Friday, I'll summarize Character Creation for the Plot-First Novelist and How To Find Your Story, but for now it's enough that you 1) recognize whether you're a plot-firster or a character-firster and 2) commit to doing what it will take to strengthen your skill in the area where you're naturally weak.

By the way, some writers say they are setting-first novelists. I know what they mean, but usually you find out that the setting is, to them, really more like a character. Like Narnia or Middle-Earth or Avonlea. These people are usually character-firsters. Others tell me they're murder-first novelists, but these are really plot-firsters who begin with that element of plot and build the story from there.

You can purchase Jeff's e-books mentioned in this blog at http://marcherlordpress.com/Store_Stand-In.htm

The Plotting Process: No "Right" Way; No "Wrong" Way

Before I talk about the method I use when writing a novel, I'd like to chime in on the first point of Latayne's post on Wednesday regarding a question she was asked by a conference attendee over the weekend. I too was dismayed to hear that an author would think he or she could take a secular story, add some Christian elements, and voila! have something that could easily be sold in the Christian marketplace. Putting aside the fact that selling to a CBA publisher is no easier than selling to an ABA publisher, Christian elements aren't something to be tacked on to a manuscript as an afterthought, any more than elements of horror are tacked on to a story that was meant to be anything but horror. If Christian elements don't emanate from the heart and soul of the author, it will feel as false as it is. That author may get away with it once, but it's unlikely that readers of Christian fiction -- who are a discerning audience -- will buy into it twice.

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Now to the question of how we plot our novels. I loved reading the comments to Wednesday's post and seeing that even in our differences there are a lot of similarities. I've just begun my tenth novel (2 or 3 of which were great learning experiences but will never see publication) and until now my pattern was always the same. I had a beginning and end in mind when I launched the project, with a general idea of how I planned to get from point A to point B. Everything else evolved out of that, often surprising me, including most of the supporting characters. I've loved that process, loved the surprises I found along the way, loved the subplots that presented themselves.

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But this time I'm using Jeff Gerke's "How to Find Your Story." Jeff will be our guest blogger in June, and we'll talk more in-depth about the process then. It's a method that's easily adapted to the amount of detail the author wishes to develop before the writing begins. In my case I've penciled in more detail about plot, characterization, motives, etc. than I've ever begun with, but less than other authors I know. For me, it's an experiment. I'm hoping the writing comes easier without barricading the detours I find so intriguing. Next time I might try Latayne's method of taking apart a novel to use as a pattern. If I do, I have just the book in mind.

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But here's the thing I continue to learn: there is no right way; there is no wrong way. There's only the way that works for the author. And a particular method doesn't have to carry over from one project to the next. That's what's so wonderful about the creative process . . . it's so creative.

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Visitors who are readers and not writers, have you learned anything interesting about the writing process in the blog posts and comments this week? We'd love to hear from you.

The Mechanics of Plotting a Novel

(News! I can't stand it! I just have to give away another copy of Latter-day Cipher! God is blessing it with keeping it on the Amazon best-seller list for its category (Christian Mystery) and I want to send it to someone who has not read it yet. So -- I'll randomly choose someone who comments on this post.)

Now, on to the subject at hand: plotting a novel.

Recently I spoke at the University of New Mexico’s annual Writer’s Conference, “From Start to Sales V."

Though I’ve been asked many questions about the writing of my novel, Latter-day Cipher, I was approached about two issues new to me. One (and this one greatly dismayed me) was the question that was asked by several people in different forms. It was, “How can I take a WIP (or completed novel) and make it Christian so I can offer it to a Christian publisher?” The implication was that the Christian market was a place for what you might not be able to sell to a secular publisher, but if spiffied up with what one contest judge on Twitter wryly called “clunky Jesus insertions.” Ask any of us here at Novel Matters – is the Christian novel marketplace an easy target?

Secondly, the audience wanted to know how I plotted Cipher. I think I surprised them when I told them what I did: I took a class in novel writing about 15 years before beginning Cipher, and started a first novel which I never finished. However, when I began Cipher, I did two things. First, I bought a workbook called The Marshall Plan Workbook : Writing Your Novel from Start to Finish. I tore the pages out, put them in a binder, and did exactly what the author said to do in terms of number of pages assigned to characters, pacing, placing of “surprises,” etc. Then I took a paperback copy of what I consider to be one of the most effective and well-plotted suspense novels I’ve ever read (though I was ambivalent about the content, you understand), The Silence of the Lambs.

I outlined the whole book, noting when the POV changed, when surprises were introduced, what number of pages were used in scenes.

It felt like a wonderful protective armor, a kind of framework within which to be creative but still satisfying the reader.

Later, I learned of Randy Ingermanson’s “Snowflake Method” for writing a novel. I love it, and along with Marshall’s workbook and my notes from Silence of the Lambs, I’ll use it in refining the plot of the novel I’m now working on.

What works for you?