Writing Tips from The Count

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Dracula's castle, Romania

Castle where Vlad the Impaler (“Count Dracula”) was imprisoned (photo: the author)

Inspired by Halloween’s rapid approach, the editors at Writers Digest have used the opening of Bram Stoker’s Dracula as a way to demonstrate 10 key writing techniques, as revealed in the book’s annotated version, with annotations by American horror author Mort Castle.

Among Castle’s observations are how tiny clues provide insight into the character of the book’s narrator, Jonathan Harker, including his domesticated notes to himself about getting recipes for his fiancee back in Victorian England. He praises how masterfully Stoker moves Harker through time and space to get the story moving, rather than lingering on blow-by-blow details of his journey to Hungary and on to Transylvania: “The impression I had was that we were leaving the West and entering the East; the most western of splendid bridges over the Danube, which is here of noble width and depth, took us among the traditions of Turkish rule.” Leaving the familiar, in other words, and crossing into the realms of the barely known.

A little further on, Stoker describes the people of the Transylvania region, “I read that every known superstition in the world is gathered into the horseshoe of the Carpathians, as if it were the centre of some sort of imaginative whirlpool.” Again, as Castle notes, he is setting the reader up for happenings that are beyond everyday knowledge. This must have been quite thrilling for people living in 1897 London.

There was a real Dracula, of course, a 15th c. leader of Wallachia, south of Transylvania. Here’s a well-regarded history of his cruel and violent rule—fighting those Turks, as well as his rivals—written by two Boston College history professors. Don’t read it unless you have a strong stomach. I couldn’t finish it. If Londoners nearly 120 years ago knew even dimly of this real prince, their bones were shivering from the start of Stoker’s tale!

Bad Ideas Don’t Become Good Books

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kindle, book, ereader

(photo: www.wired.com)

Helping writers become published seems like as big a big business as writing itself. And writing, we know, is huge. People will help writers write, help them self-publish, and help with the endless baffling tasks—finding an agent, managing a self-publishing path, and promoting their product. As a book nears completion, a writer’s anxiety grows, and the whole process of sending that precious baby out into the marketing void fills authors with not unreasonable qualms.

That some of these purveyors are unscrupulous goes with the territory. (See links below.) That some of them serve ideas that are cold potatoes, ditto. But every once in a while, amid the cacophony of advice available to writers, comes a message that may not be exactly new but really resonates.

Jane Friedman is a consistently reliable, forward-thinking writing-and-publishing commentator and pulls in mostly helpful guest posters on her blog. Recently she invited Laurie Scheer, “a seasoned development exec and writing mentor,” to talk about a topic most authors (me included!) would rather not examine: What if the fundamental idea for your book is, well, mediocre?

Scheer started off with three questions, then presented what I found the most helpful part of her post: an example.

The Three Questions

question, graffiti

(photo: farm4.static.flickr.com)

Every writer, she says, needs to have persuasive answers to these three questions on the tip of the tongue—for dealing with potential editors, agents, publishers, and the (eventual) marketing team and even the public. Why make this? Why make it now? and Who cares?

The answer to “why make this,” needs to describe what about a novel (or screenplay, for that matter) makes it unique, compelling, and authentic. For people who write in genre fiction—mystery, romance, science fiction, horror, and their permutations—this can be especially hard. A police procedural with a flawed detective? Divorced and drinks too much, perhaps? In truth, most plots have been done and done again—because they work—but something about them needs to be unique, compelling, and authentic. This is a flaw with many memoirs. Nothing new or insightful. That’s a hard message for writers delving into their own personal—and very likely painful—history.

Why make this now? Recognizing trends in the marketplace and when they’ve peaked suggests something about timing. In crime novels, the trend has been for ever-more inventive and grisly threats. This has upping the violence ante to the point of unbelievability, in my opinion. In one I read last year, a victim would awake standing up, with the lower half of his body encased in a block of ice. Nowhere did the text mention the amount of time it would take to freeze that much water, the noise of the generators producing sufficient cooling, how the equipment to do it was transported from one locale to another, in other words, a big “huh?”

And, the third question, who really cares? Who will pay good money to read this book? Herein is the flaw in the new Kindle Scout program—“reader-powered publishing for new, never-before-published books.” Potential readers help decide which books the program publishes and receive the book free if it’s selected. In other words, some of the people most interested in the book don’t have to pay to get it. (Thanks to Build Book Buzz’s marketing maven Sandra Beckwith for pointing this out.)

Here’s the Pitch

biological clock

(photo: fc05.deviantart.net)

Scheer gives this example of the kind of ideas writers often pitch in answer to the above questions:

A story about a 43-year-old unmarried woman who has had a successful career in advertising or law or pharmaceuticals or whatever, and decides at the last minute that her biological clock’s ticking and she wants to have a child.

Scheer says, “I will wait for the writer to tell me the rest of the story. And there is no rest of the story, because in their mind, that is the story.” A story that has been done many, many times. Some new element needs to be interjected to create new and unique conflicts (why now?). That new element might be one that would capture attention of some larger audience (who cares?). Perhaps the baby’s father should be a divorced police detective who drinks too much. Just kidding. Half.

So I’m going back to reexamine my pitch letters and make sure I’m not cutting short my three-sentence description of what my books are about before I get to “why now” and “who cares”!

Writer Resources

  • Preditors and Editors – this widely recommended website rates agents, editors, publishers, and many other businesses for writers. Though encyclopedic, it could use a makeover. Especially helpful would be dates added to its one-line reviews.
  • Writer Beware! – highly recommend website and blog maintained by Victoria Strauss for the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, but applicable to all writers. Especially helpful information on contracts, I’ve noticed. (Her take on Kindle Scout is here.)
  • Laurie Scheer’s new book—The Writer’s Advantage: A Toolkit (Amazon says Tookit) for Mastering your Genre. I ordered this book, and will review it here.

A Dining Room with a (What a!) View

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restaurant, Puglia, Italy, Grotta Palazzese

Ristorante Grotta Palazzese in Puglia, Italy (photo: hereandthere.eu)

At the end of a long week, I’m ready for nothing more challenging than some pretty pictures. And here’s a collection of photos of 35 restaurants with truly spectacular views! I thought some of the dining room vistas in the recent movie The Trip to Italy were beautiful, and here are more, culled from around the world. My favorites: #4 and #33. (The photo above is also from #4, Ristorante Grotta Palazzese in Puglia, Italy).

I hope the diners who patronize #23 never see the restaurant from the angle at which the photo was taken. Looks way too precarious in an earthquake-prone country! That would seriously interfere with my digestion.

#5, is pretty spectacular, too. Pictured below, it’s Ithaa Undersea Restaurant in Rangali Island, Maldives. “I’ll have the steak, please.” And the ladies’ room is NOT out back.

restaurant, fish, Maldives, Ithaa Undersea Restaurant

Ithaa Undersea Restaurant, Rangali Island, Maldives (photo: conradhotels3.hilton.com)

 

10-24-14 ***Still Life with Bread Crumbs

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Anna Quindlen, Still Life with Bread CrumbsBy Anna Quindlen (2014). Unanimity in my first book club meeting about this book—thin, unrevealing, wish fulfillment for 60-year-olds. This was my first Quindlen, so I was glad to hear from others who’ve read many more of her books that this one is an aberration. It’s the story of a dyed-in-the-wool Manhattan photographer, age 60, who moves to an upstate New York cabin to save money while she sublets her apartment.

The man who comes to evict the raccoons in her attic happens to be very handy around the house, in more ways than one, and her biggest quandary is whether to succumb to someone 15 years her junior. There are a few more plot elements, most of which lack believability, as does the portrayal of small-town life. But it’s well-written and an easy read for a day when you’re not up to much of a challenge.

I don’t scoff at reading for entertainment, but the “everything tied up neatly at the end with a bow on it” resolution strained my patience. The book group debated whether this was pure chick lit—I say “yes.”

Mysteriously, it was well reviewed. NPR said Quindlen “still has her finger firmly planted on the pulse of her generation.” Not so the 20 members of her generation in my book club. They were particularly riled by Joanna Rakoff’s New York Times review, which called the book “a feminist novel for a post-feminist age.” What could that possibly mean? Especially applied to a character notable for not taking charge of her life in any plausible way.

This is a book you can skim. It’s kind of like eating a Dunkin Donuts cruller. You know there’s no sustenance there, but if you’re in the right mood, it might taste pretty good.

Little Rock: An American Play

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Little_Rock_Desegregation

(photo: en.wikipedia)

Passage Theatre Company’s current production—Little Rock: An American Play (video)—presents a compelling dramatization of how nine black students integrated Little Rock’s Central High School in 1957. Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus allowed an angry, jeering mob of more than a thousand white protestors to intimidate the students, who, not unreasonably, feared for their lives. School desegregation was the law of the land, however, since the Supreme Court’s 1954 decision in Brown vs. Board of Education, and President Eisenhower sent in troops and federalized the Arkansas National Guard to protect the students. A Civil Rights landmark, this episode was the first major test of the strength of federal support for desegregation.

This production uses nine cast members—six black and three white—to portray dozens of roles: the nine students, their parents, teachers, other students, the protesters, local and national political leaders, and young television reporter Mike Wallace. Comments of a number of people external to the events—including Louis Armstrong, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jackie Robinson, Lena Horne, Rosa Parks—are presented in vignette.

The show begins with a song, as the cast marches in, and music varies the already lively pace throughout. The single set, classroom desks facing the audience, gives the cast members a place to be while waiting their scenes in the spotlight at the front of the stage. More important, it is a constant reminder that all this turmoil was about only one thing: kids wanting an education—a good education. (That this dream still inspires and is not yet fully realized is evident not only throughout the United States, but in the 2014 award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Pakistani teenager Malala Yousafzai.)

The multi-talented cast brings playwright Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj’s conception to life. Little Rock is a reminder of what Passage Theater’s artistic director June Ballinger calls a “shameful time in American history” and of the healing that remains to done. Held over at Trenton’s Mill Hill Playhouse until November 2.

Museum Hours

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Pieter Bruegel, Museum Hours, Jem Cohen

“The Peasant Wedding” by Pieter Bruegel (photo: wikimedia.com)

Quick Netflix queue check: Is Museum Hours on your list? (trailer) If you put it there because you’re looking for an alternative to the deafening noise and frantic pace of action movies, you have succeeded. This 2012 drama was directed by Jem Cohen, the award-winning creator of numerous films about punk rock musicians, including Patti Smith. I haven’t seen those documentaries, but I’m guessing the quiet and snail’s pace of Museum Hours is a significant departure that takes the meaning of “art house film” literally.

Not overloaded with plot, the film includes lots of footage of paintings and sculpture and people looking at paintings and sculpture, a 15?-minute art appreciation monologue on the work of Pieter Bruegel, the point of which was that, in the panoply of people he scatters across his canvases, he doesn’t direct the eye to any single place. You can pick your own center. Each person portrayed is potentially equally important, regardless of the putative “subject” of the work.

That seems to be the Cohen’s point, too. That the two characters—a woman visiting Vienna to attend her comatose cousin—and a museum guard she meets by happenstance, are two random people and subjects as worthy of exploration as anyone else. That’s my guess, anyway.

Only three real speaking parts, all performed superbly: the guard, the out-of-towner, the museum lecturer. Not the comatose cousin. Much of the movie was filmed in Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Museum. New York Times reviewer A.O. Scott gave it 5 stars and called it “quietly amazing, sneakily sublime.” Rotten Tomatoes called it “a mesmerizing tale.” Mesmerized, I fell asleep (briefly). Critics rating 94% — Audience: 59%. Like visiting an art museum without leaving home.

****Sandrine’s Case

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Sandrine's Case, Thomas H. CookBy Thomas H. Cook & narrated by Brian Holsopple. This psychological suspense novel provides a day-by-day recounting of the capital trial of Professor Samuel Madison, accused of the murder of his wife Sandrine. A first-person narration, Madison tells the reader up-front that he did kill her, which gives the author a tall mountain to scale in order to make this protagonist likeable, so he doesn’t try. The prosecutor, the police, his defense lawyer, possibly even Sandrine herself, and certainly the reader decide Sam is “one cold fish.”

Sam and Sandrine are erudite college professors at a second-rate college in a small Georgia town. He claims her death from too much alcohol and too many pills was suicide; the police and prosecutor think otherwise. He calls a note found by her deathbed a “suicide note,” but hasn’t read it. It turns out to be about her academic work, about Cleopatra, and when the police detective refers to “the Egyptian Queen,” Sam—instead of behaving like a recently bereaved husband, confronted with his dead wife’s last words—says, “Cleopatra was not Egyptian.” She was Greek, evidently. This and similar pedantics show how intellectually superior he feels to the authorities and the jury, an intellectual condescension that puts him, as he slowly realizes, in considerable risk of his life.

At first, the day in court punctuated by Sam’s lengthy flashbacks to his and Sandrine’s life together seemed awkwardly handled, though I got used to it. For the middle third of the book, I thought “too much Gone Girl,” but other readers will have to decide that for themselves. In a way, this book might not have worked if Gone Girl hadn’t preceded it. I can’t be sure, because I can’t unread those pages.

The plot is nevertheless intriguing and ends up in an interesting place. The characters—especially Madison’s attorney and several minor characters—are people the reader can imagine breathing real Georgia air. Not so much Sandrine and the daughter Alexandria, but that’s the thing with a first-person narration—is may just be that Madison’s view of them is not quite in focus, either. Holsopple does an excellent narration of most of the characters, especially the relentless prosecutor, but the venomous way his Alexandria spits out the word “Dad” in nearly every line of her dialog became like the jabbing bite of Cleopatra’s asp.

With Age Comes Apparel

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Advanced Style

The Stars of “Advanced Style”

Take New York Times street fashion photographer Bill Cunningham, add some Joan Rivers, Oprah, and Dr. Oz, and you’ve got the formula for the documentary Advanced Style (trailer here).

Photographer Ari Seth Cohen profiles seven fashionable ladies “of a certain age” (60s through 90s) whose sense of color, textures, and bold accessories (clunky cuff bracelets, enormous earrings, and oversize rings and eyewear) he discovered on the streets of Manhattan. Amazing photos of one of them—Tziporah Salamon—are included in this 40+ Style interview.

The women all have a back story, and not everything in their lives is ideal, but they are at ease with who they are. As one woman remarks, “I do a portrait with clothing. I build; I construct.”

Through Cohen’s blog and book, also titled Advanced Style, the women have been noticed by the advertising world in campaigns for Lanvin, and, oddly enough, KMart.

While engaging and entertaining, the documentary devolves into one-line tropes about aging, such as, “Everything I have two of, one hurts.” But overall, it’s worth trying on.

Guest Blogger Jodi Goalstone writes the highly entertaining blog: Going Yard, Offbeat Baseball Musings, currently showcasing the great writing coming out of the unexpected victories by Kansas City and San Francisco.

All the News That Fits We Print

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journalism, Times, New Jersey

(photo: the author)

This photo shows better than words the sorry state of journalism in the capital city of the great state of New Jersey. Would you guess from this that our Governor is a potential presidential nominee? Maybe so, considering he’s a person of weight.

Global warming, Syria and Iraq, the economy, Ebola hysteria—much important stuff is happening in the world and in the nation and even in New Jersey. It’s a major chemical-producing state, headquarters for many pharmaceutical firms, yet still a major farming state (blueberries, cranberries, peaches), important Revolutionary war, American Indian, and industrial history site, host of the nation’s largest seaport, major educational and scientific resources, and a commuter haven. All these industries and activities are vital to the region, with more than 100 million Americans—almost a third of the U.S. population—no more than an overnight drive away. New Jersey is the most densely populated state in the nation, sends 15 people to Congress, and has all the challenges and richness that an economically, culturally, and otherwise diverse population brings to the table.

Trenton itself deserves ongoing, close journalistic scrutiny. It’s just beginning the recovery from a corrupt mayoralty and complicit city council and someone needs to hold its leaders’ feet to the fire, and who’s to do that? Network news stations? The state has none, pinched as it is between New York and Philadelphia. Public media? Governor Christie sold off our public radio and tv resources to powerhouse WHYY in Philadelphia and WNET in New York. They vowed to cover the state thoroughly, of course, and . . .

The recent “local” Princeton story about NBC physician-reporter Nancy Snyderman violating her Ebola quarantine was broken not by the Times, WHYY, or WNET, but by hyperlocal news website, Planet Princeton, run by my friend, Krystal Knapp. When these other entities got around to covering the story, they neglected to give Krystal credit. Not so CNN’s “Reliable Sources” (link to come, once it’s posted) and this Washington Post blog.

I’m afraid the newspaper front page says it all.

The Understudy

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JD Taylor, Adam Green, The Understudy, Theresa Rebeck, Adam Immerwahr, McCarter Theatre

JD Taylor & Adam Green in The Understudy (photo: McCarter Theatre)

An exciting opening night at McCarter Theatre on Friday, with the audience anticipating Theresa Rebeck’s knowing backstage comedy, The Understudy, and area fans awaiting the directorial debut of up-and-coming Adam Immerwahr, McCarter’s Associate Artistic Director. Adam’s fine work has been on stage at Trenton’s Passage Theatre, but this was the Big Time, on the big McCarter main stage. He pulled it off beautifully, in a production whose complexity, pre-show gossip said, required three tech rehearsals.

The conceit of the play is that a new Franz Kafka play has been discovered and is being produced on Broadway with two Hollywood action stars in lead roles (shades of the first season of Slings and Arrows, the hilarious Canadian series). The play opens with a literal bang, when unemployed but high-minded actor Harry (Adam Green) rushes on stage for a rehearsal, as he’s been cast as the understudy to the lesser of the Hollywood lights. Harry’s opening monologue—interspersed with bits from the Kafka play—shows all his disdain (“OK, I’m bitter”) for the star, his acting ability, and the film vehicle he just appeared in, for which he was paid more than $2 million. Harry fixates on this impossibly large sum with a shimmering mix of envy and pop-culture loathing.

The stage manager Roxanne (Danielle Skraastad) is a woman Harry was once engaged to but ran out on two weeks before the wedding—the wedding dress “still hangs in my closet. Like a wound.” The third character, the pretty-boy and somewhat dim star, Jake (JD Taylor), valiantly tries to explain Kafka and the deep significance of this new play. The cast is strong, with Green (who played Figaro last year) having a genius comic touch. The humor in Skraastad’s lines is limited to sarcasm, which she wields expertly. Taylor, too, plays his deceptively complex role so that the audience goes from laughing at his selfies and sense of entitlement to appreciating his vulnerabilities. We never see the stoner manning the light, sound, and set cues, who gets every one of them wrong, creating constant onstage turmoil (and requiring those three rehearsals).

The name of the fake Kafka is “The Man Who Disappeared.” It applies to both of the male characters, and is the one fact about Harry that is never out of Roxanne’s main line of sight. Harry describes a casting call experience where an assistant tells him, “No one will see you, you don’t exist.” Very Kafka, and very apt for all of them at one point or another. What the play shows is how they can exist for each other, at least for a few moments. Rebeck’s intimate knowledge of the theatre and its dilemmas is absolutely convincing, but the problem of “being seen” and heard applies to creative artists in general, to people in general, to all of us who’ve had the dream of going to an important meeting and . . . you . . . just . . . can’t . . . get . . . there.