by Marty Coleman | Mar 19, 2012 | Raymond Chandler, Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
Here is another in my ongoing series of Writing Lessons. I think I will go to 10 and then the series will be complete. Any good lessons you can think of that I should consider for the final 2?
What does a man coming through a door with a gun do for a story?
It causes anticipation. If you are in doubt about the direction of your story it is likely due to you yourself having lost that anticipation of what is going to happen. So, gun or not, door or not, make something that will cause you feel anticipation about the future of the story and you can guarantee your readers will feel it too.
It causes mortal fear. If you are in doubt about issues you are really dealing with in your story add in the fear of death and it will clarify your thinking on your reasons for writing the story. It will also clarify the course of the story for the reader.
It causes anger. Someone is about to violate one of the prime tenets of civilization, respecting other people’s right to their life. What is causing this person to reach that point in life? Or what is causing the person to protect others from that threat?
It causes humor. Nothing is more absurd than seeing a man or woman out of their comfort zone. Put the gun in the hand of a pageant queen or a elitist intellectual who has never seen a gun before and it could get pretty funny.
It obviously doesn’t have to be a man with a gun. But when it doubt, think about what might reignite anticipation, fear, anger or humor in yourself and the reader and you will be well on your way to clarifying your doubting thoughts.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman, who last fired a gun while skeet shooting as a teenager.
Quote by Raymond Chandler, 1888 – 1959, American Novelist and Screenwriter
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by Marty Coleman | Jan 16, 2012 | Stanley Schmidt, Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
Another in my occasional series on writing.
Have you ever been on a movie set? If you have you know how fake the whole thing is. Beautiful buildings, looking solid in marble and brick are in fact wood facades with painted on brick and marble. Luscious landscaping with exotic plants turn out to be plastic and fake. Actresses in ornate costumes turn out to have old t-shirts and shorts on underneath, not the sexy lingerie the outer garment suggests.
Writing is similar. All the stylistic hoops you jump through won’t be of value unless there is a real story underneath. Something of substance that is worth the reader spending their time paying attention.
Pay attention to that and all the style you want can be added on. Ignore it and all the style in the world won’t overcome the emptiness.
Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman, who types left handed.
Quote by Stanley Schmidt, 1944- not dead yet, American science fiction author
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by Marty Coleman | Nov 14, 2011 | William Safire, Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
When my daughters were young they started a running joke with me. It was because of my tendency to exaggerate in my story telling or explanations. For example, I might be explaining something about sports and say, ‘Joe Blow was the GREATEST catcher who ever lived.’ or if I was talking about history I would say, ‘General YadaYada was the MOST brilliant war tactician ever!’ They started expecting my superlatives and would crack up or roll their eyes when they came. My eldest, Rebekah, was adamant that I see the movie ‘The Big Fish’ when it came out because it was about a father who was a giant story teller, exaggerating the stories to absurd lengths. Now, of course, I NEVER did that. But she thought it would be fun for me to see the movie anyway.. uh huh.
All that is pretty much in good fun – no harm, no foul. There is value in clarifying and refining an experience in story telling so it has more power. But going farther than that, as we have seen in recent years with reporters exaggerating events or authors exaggerating their memoirs, can lead to a real lack of trust and believability on the part of the audience, not to mention a career destruction.
So, crystalize it so it sparkles but don’t forget the story plainly told still needs to be able to grab the reader’s attention. Move too far away from that in your story line and word crafting and you might lose the essence of what makes your story great in the first place.
Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
Quote by William Safire, 1929-2009, American writer, columnist and speechwriter
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by Marty Coleman | Oct 13, 2011 | William Safire, Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
Is it a problem that I am interrupting ‘Problem Week’ to post something different?
I am not a great writer. I get my grammar wrong, my sentence structure is sometimes caddywumpus and I definitely do not know proper punctuation. But I do know metaphors and analogies pretty well and it’s one of my great pleasures in life to read, hear or come up with good ones. But just as pleasurable is when I hear, read or come up with really bad ones.
Why is it so great to hear something so bad? Because it’s as if the world suddenly became an absurdist Looney Tunes cartoon with funny looking people and fractured language right in front of my eyes. I like things that make no sense whatsoever but still point to something that makes sense.
Most importantly, it makes me laugh and I like that.
Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
Quote is my variation on one by William Safire
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by Marty Coleman | Sep 2, 2011 | Elmore Leonard, Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
On Wednesday I had a guest post, ‘Writing Lesson #4’, at Rachelle Gardner’s blog. I have been drawing a series of ‘Writing Lessons’ for her readers, who are mostly writers and publishing industry people. I realized that for some reason I forgot to post Writing Lesson #2 to my own blog when I first drew it a few weeks back so here it is.
Geographic Friday it is!The NDD got visits this week from some very cool places.
- Nha Trang, Vietnam
- Bangkok, Thailand
- Cebu, Philippines
- Brisbane, Australia
- Maputo, Mozambique
- Sandton, South Africa
- Aurangabad, India
- Izmir, Turkey
- Kolin, Czech Republic
- Buenos Aires, Argentina
- San Jose, Costa Rica
- Wrexham, United Kingdom
- Dauphin, Canada
- Rancho Cucamonga, USA
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by Marty Coleman | Aug 29, 2011 | Kingsley Amis, Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
Here is another in my occasional series on writing that I am doing in collaboration with the literary agent, Rachelle Gardner.
Have you ever read a book where you liked everyone and everything they did? Did you like everything about how they behaved, all their quirks and eccentricities, all their choices and concerns? If that was the case I think you read a pretty boring book.
The essence of a story is conflict. Maybe it’s not through a ‘good vs. evil’, black and white dilemma, but in a story you are introducing characters who have to go through something. They can be very nice people, but if you don’t show some aspect of their character and their methods contributing to the problem as well as the solution, then they really aren’t all that engaging.
You can’t root for someone who has nothing to overcome. What they have to overcome isn’t always something on the outside. It’s often overcoming their own shortcomings. It makes you annoyed seeing those things inside them holding them back while at the same time you are rooting for them to overcome.
Sort of like real life, isn’t it.
Drawing, commentary and Chapter 12 by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
Quote by Kingsley Amis, 1922-1995, English novelist
You can find Rachelle Gardner’s blog here.
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by Marty Coleman | Aug 1, 2011 | Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
Another in my occasional offerings on writing. Share it with a writer you know, I bet they will enjoy it!
Don’t do this when you write. Simple enough.
Merci to the Napkin Kin in the towns of Quimper, Toulouse, Clermont-Ferrand and Lusignan in France. You have been coming regularly and I appreciate it!
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by Marty Coleman | Jun 25, 2011 | Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
A few weeks ago I was invited by Rachelle Gardner to contribute to her blog on an ongoing basis. Yesterday she posted the first drawing. She is a literary agent and her audience is primarily authors, would-be authors, other agents, editors and others in the publishing industry. As a result I decided to do the drawings as a series of writing lessons, using humor and fun illustrations to get the idea across.
Here is the first installment. If you want to contribute to the conversation at her blog, I would greatly appreciate it, as would she.
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by Marty Coleman | May 24, 2011 | Anonymous, Writing Lessons - 2011/12 |
I have been writing a short story lately. You have probably been reading it as I am posting it as a weekly series on Sundays. I have taken on a new appreciation for proof readers as a result! It’s hard work, made HARDER by spell check, not easier.
If you ever notice a mistake in my writing, be sure to write to someone else who has read it and talk together about what a bad writer I am, ok? Don’t write me about it. JUST JOKING, I want you to write me if you have good suggestions!
Quote by Anonymous
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