RANT 'O THE WEEK:
by WritersCollege.com Director Steve Morrill
I live in Florida, which is to say that in the summertime I really love ultraviolet rays frying me, a humidity level straight out of the Devonian epoch, folks driving miles down city streets with their left blinkers on, and hurricanes. Yep, it's June and we get to spend the next four months glued to our television weather reports.
We also get a lot of thunderstoms. The Tampa Bay area is proud to be the lightning capital of the country. I'd prefer it if we were the rutabaga-growing capital or maybe the place with the giant ball of twine from that movie Michael. But you take what you get. We have an Arena football team named the Storm and a hockey team named the Lightning. I suppose Tampa Bay Rutabaga wouldn't have the same ring.
And what every smart person around here has is both a battery backup system for their computer and some separate hard drive and backup system. You need these things too. You are writing immortal prose (I know this is so because I sneaked a peek at your computer. I can do that.) Forget the television, phone and all that stuff. those are just things you can replace and no harm done. But can you replace the product of your mind, put into tangible form in a word processing document? Do you really want to have to do that? I suggest, if you don't already have these:
- A seriously good UPS or Uninterruptable Power Supply. This is not the cute power strip at the end of an extension cord. This is what the power strip plugs into and then you plug the UPS into the wall socket. The UPS is about the size and weight of an anvil because it has a battery in it that could propbably jump-start your car. It totally isolates from a power surge or lightning-caused spike anything downstream of it. As a bonus, it keeps your computer and monitor running for a few minutes even when the power fails, giving you time to shut things down without losing data. Only problem with a UPS is that it's not sexy or a fun toy. It sits there in the corner and does nothing until it's needed. And a good UPS will set you back $100 or more, depending on your needs. (Before you galivant off to the store, add up the total amperage needed for all the devices you expect to plug into the UPS. Then buy for expansion.)
- A backup hard drive and, equally important, a program that makes the backups automatically. Remember that the world is divided into those who regularly make backups—and those who, someday soon, will be very, very sorry. But, human nature being what it is, all the good intentions in the world fade in a day or a week and you find yourself not making the backups as needed. There are many programs available to do this automatically, in the background, even as you work. You might already have one on your machine, included by the manufacturer. I use Apple's Time Machine on my iMac, backing up hourly to a 4-terrabyte hard drive on a nearby table. If the house catches fire I will grab the cat and that hard drive. I don't care about the computer, computers can be replaced. It's my work product I need to save. (If I were a total fanatic I'd back up also to an off-site location, using the modem.)
Now, you may not live in the lightning capital of the nation, but give some thought to these two devices. They're not pretty, fun or sexy. But they can save your sanity someday.
SCHOOL
NEWS: We're bustin' out all over. We have a bunch of new courses to announce. Check them out in more detail at the Catalogs page:
Essays and Personal Stories: This is a class for any writer who is motivated to write short pieces based on his or her personal experiences, explorations, dreams, longings, emotions, thoughts, and/or ideas. These pieces can be targeted to magazines or complied into a book.
Flash Fiction: Flash fiction, when crafted with care, works within the boundaries of the genre and on the periphery of traditional storytelling. In the world of flash, a compelling story can be told in fewer than a hundred words!
Nonfiction Book Proposals: The best kept secret to marketing nonfiction books is that you don’t have to write the entire book. In this course, you will learn about all of the elements that need to be included in a book proposal and how to put them together for maximum effect on the agent and/or editor, setting you on the path to signing a contract with a publisher.
Shadow Writing: Are you curious about writer’s block (a myth), the dreams, longings, cravings, obsessions, and needs that distract you from your writing because of the strength of their grip? Do you suspect that there are depths that you can’t quite reach in your writing for fear of turning up something unpleasant? In this class, we will turn toward these things. Step on the accelerator and move into one of the darkest places you’ve ever been as a writer—your own unconscious.
Web Presence for Writers: Develop a basic knowledge of the internet, how it functions, how web sites are made, and the steps necessary to build your own web site. Learn how easy it is to have your web presence!
ESSAY: World Doom and Mysteries
by WritersCollege.com Director Steve Morrill
I wrote this for the web site of the American Society of Journalists and Authors, a national society of nonfiction writers:
Isn't there some saying that every journalist has a novel manuscript in his or her desk drawer? Here we are, a bunch of ruthless nonfiction writers who would rush a flamethrower for a buck, envious of the creative freedom of the novelist and wondering how to make that work financially.
Count me among you. I have one mystery about done and am working on a sequel and also a five-book fantasy series only just underway.
For the mystery series, I happily admit to one and all that i ape the best of what I glean from three authors who most influence me: Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe lent the the idea for the two-detective office-oriented story, with the narrator being the less-intelligent (though still smart) gofer for his boss. John McDonald's Travis McGee series gave me the idea for having my detectives live aboard a boat (and office) that can move around Florida and the Caribbean. OK, perhaps this is a blatant tax dodge to let me write off research trips. And Robert Parker's Spenser books reinforce my own desire to give my narrator a smart mouth and irreverent wit. I've read many other mystery authors too, but those are my main influences.
Not so with fantasy. Fantasy has one huge advantage in that you get to make everything up and nobody can say you're wrong. It has one huge disadvantage in that you also cannot assume much in the way of reader background knowledge and you find yourself describing things like common animals. It's too easy to wander off into expository lumps bigger than the most devoted reader would swallow.
But one reason I am trying this form is that I have rarely found a fantasy series (they're almost all series these days) that I liked. Oh, sure, i liked Tolkein, the fountainhead for all modern fantasy, but subsequent writers don't take forty years to write a three-book Ring series (I exclude The Hobbit, an earlier work). Perhaps they should. What I see today is writers who create tension by having their characters, usually a group, act so stupidly that you wonder who let them outside, or who seem to almost willfully misunderstand one another's intentions. They also run to wordy; apparently, told by the publishing houses to write series, they write three or four or six or more books, each 80,000 to 100,000 words, to accomplish a single plot. This isn't telling stories, this is just processing a lot of wood pulp. I find myself flipping pages ten at a time and saying "Gawd almighty! Enough drivel. Get to the point already!"
Partly it's training. I've spent almost 25 years having brevity hammered into me, making every word pull double-duty, scanning manuscripts looking for ways to cut thirty words. Fantasy novelists never use five words when fifty could do the same job.
To top this off, fantasies usually assume that if some horrible monster is not stopped the whole world will end. Even Tolkein gave in to this. Well, yes, this certainly ups the ante and makes the travails of our little band of heroes that much more gripping. But even Tolkein, in the conference at the elven valley in book one, had a hard time putting forth the notion that the way to stop impending World Doom was to entrust the task to four untrained and ignorant hobbits and a lot of blind luck when there was so much more experience and talent available.
I find that, in fantasy—unlike with mysteries—there's nobody I want to copy. This is probably a mistake since we know that publishers are sheeplike while, at the same time, lacking the IQ of ewe and I. (sorry) I expect to turn in a manuscript and be told, "These people are not stupid enough! Each 80,000 word book tells a complete story as part of a series! We have Canadian pine forests needing mowing, you have to be less succinct! We want to see a story arc like a rainbow: it starts here and then just sails off into the clouds and vanishes! Get with the program, write like all the other lazy writers we hire!"
It's just lucky I'm not bitter about it. Meantime, I will happily go along doing my own fantasy which will be like none other I have ever seen. What then becomes of it, who knows
FEATURED
COURSES: (Also see our homepage for daily featured courses)
Because we have so many new courses, let's shine the spotlight on them for this week:
Essays and Personal Stories: This is a class for any writer who is motivated to write short pieces based on his or her personal experiences, explorations, dreams, longings, emotions, thoughts, and/or ideas. These pieces can be targeted to magazines or complied into a book.
Flash Fiction: Flash fiction, when crafted with care, works within the boundaries of the genre and on the periphery of traditional storytelling. In the world of flash, a compelling story can be told in fewer than a hundred words!
Nonfiction Book Proposals: The best kept secret to marketing nonfiction books is that you don’t have to write the entire book. In this course, you will learn about all of the elements that need to be included in a book proposal and how to put them together for maximum effect on the agent and/or editor, setting you on the path to signing a contract with a publisher.
Shadow Writing: Are you curious about writer’s block (a myth), the dreams, longings, cravings, obsessions, and needs that distract you from your writing because of the strength of their grip? Do you suspect that there are depths that you can’t quite reach in your writing for fear of turning up something unpleasant? In this class, we will turn toward these things. Step on the accelerator and move into one of the darkest places you’ve ever been as a writer—your own unconscious.
Web Presence for Writers: Develop a basic knowledge of the internet, how it functions, how web sites are made, and the steps necessary to build your own web site. Learn how easy it is to have your web presence!
WEB LINKS:
Once a year I like to replay Viking Kittens. Call it a paen to '70s heavy metal. It just amuses me.
You just knew there had to be a web/blog covering Facebook, Twitter and all that social media stuff. here you go.
The Write News has news, features and resources for media and publishing professionals. I know this because that's what it says right on their web site.
Here's a fun and uplifting moment at the Antwerp railroad station. Had this in the last newsletter but it's worth looking at again. And I don't even like The Sound of Music movie.
|
