Part of my job is testing and keeping current our livestreaming software. We use Wirecast as our preferred option. To that end, I’ve been doing weekly tests of the software. This week, since I’m currently sheltering in place due to 2020 Spring COVID-19 mitigation efforts, and since I’ve fallen woefully behind on my BonusParts A to Z project, I thought I’d combine the two efforts into one. So, here is my BonusParts A to Z post for the letter “D” – in video form!
D is for … Diversity
Would you like to hear and see more?
If you enjoyed the video, and you’d like to see me make more of them using this format, let me know in the comments! I’ve got to do the testing anyway….
I hope you’re all staying safe, healthy, and sane, wherever (and whenever) you read this. <3
I took a poll a few weeks ago about what this “C” post should be about. Since I didn’t give the option of Cookie, Character won out. (The other available options – Cursive and Color – I’ll touch on in other posts, since there were a few folks who showed interest in those.) But for now….
C is for Character
There are already a lot of books and articles out there focused on how to write great Characters, and it’s not my place to tell anyone else how to write their characters. Instead, I’ll tell you about how I write mine.
Beginning Concepts
Every one of my stories starts with a main character, and the main character’s conflict. This initial conflict can be very simple, like a young woman finding out she’s falling in love with her teenage rival, or quite complicated, such as a special forces bodyguard trying to help his assignment-turned-friend escape the government conspiracy rising up around them. From that conflict, a personality starts to emerge. Oftentimes, it takes the shape of a voice, a face, and a manner.
My characters have very distinct voices in my head. Some voices come in accents, such as Seven’s clipped Ukrainian enunciation. That character’s particularly precise way of speaking, without contractions, created a picture of a big man with a straight posture who walks and moves with an efficiency of effort. That became his manner and his form. The third basic part of Seven’s creation was his face. He had to be a good-looking man but also scarred by his past. I made that scar physical and on full display on his face, in contrast to its secrecy.
With those three basic building blocks in place, Seven was free to grow as I experimented with dialogue, situations, and relationships.
Telling Their Own Story
No character exists in a vacuum. Story beats and other characters, both major and minor, have an effect on them. As my characters’ voices become clearer and more distinct from each other in my head and on paper, they start to become more fully-realized people. And, I do think of most of my characters as people. They have lives before I pick them up, and they have lives that continue after I let them go. (The ones I don’t kill do, anyway.)
I’m a firm believer in letting characters run as free as they can. Of course, a story has to follow a plot, and a writer can’t let a plot get away from them. But there have definitely been times when a character’s voice has been so powerful that I’ve had to change the story to suit them. For example, in my Persona 4 story 1 More Chance!, Yukiko was originally going to marry Kou, as laid out at the start of the story. But as I began to write more of Yukiko, her own voice usurped my previously-laid plans, and she revolted against those plans. That led to a completely unexpected fourth arc of the story that I personally think works better than my original outline.
What Did We Learn?
My characters rarely start out as traditional archetypes. They may become that – or come closer to that – over their time in my stories, but I prefer to create not from a distinctive mold but from an amorphous and changeable possibility. To me, that’s what makes these characters people.
But what about you? How do you create your characters? Let me know in the comments or on social media!
demanding responsibilities made their personal time precious, so when they did have the opportunity for lovemaking, they made the most of it. No fussing with witty foreplay or coy dancing around the subject. When he’d knocked on her door that evening, announcing his arrival with a subdued clearing of his throat, she’d yanked the door open in only her dressing gown, snatched him by his tie, and hauled him inside in one swift progression, silencing any potential protest with the press of her lips. He’d fumbled out of his suit like a clumsy schoolboy, matching her nakedness quickly if not gracefully.
Once in her bed, he was careful not to huff on top of her, worrying she’d think him a beast. Not that she was any waif or naif! She clutched his hand over her breast and knew how to angle her hips so his single-minded thrusting would hit the spot of her utmost pleasure. When he crested the ridge of his first coming, he wasn’t alone: she tensed and shuddered with him.
The second time, after compliments and cigarettes, she pushed him to his back so he could watch her writhe until the temptation of her rigid nipples became too much for his resolve, and he lunged up to latch his mouth to one and then the other while she squeezed her powerful thighs around him like a vise. They had to stop when their bucking threatened the bolts on the bedframe, leading to a paranoid pause that they soon broke with laughter. Their rolling began afresh then, and they found a gentler mutual rhythm that pushed them to that well-sought point of trembling, blinding joy.
Settling side-by-side, they traded whispered nothings to the ticking of the bedside clock. Tender kisses and dallying caresses conspired to bring them together for a third time, though this one was measured and slow despite the evaporating minutes.
She eased away, too soon,
leaving him with the expected explanation of needing to freshen up before work. He lingered in her bed, faintly drowsing to the smell of the sheets, sweat, and sex. Though, when the water to the shower cut off, he lurched up to get a few final moments with her.
She stood in front of the mirror in a simple white slip that fit her body like a lady’s opera glove, applying a sweet-smelling lotion to her face, neck, and chest. Her eyes flashed to his reflection. “You want to use the shower?”
“I’ll shower at home,”
he said as he came behind her.
She snickered. “Are you sure? You’re rank.”
“Well, you smell beautiful.” He wound his arms around her and pulled her close with a lascivious growl. “Just rub on me a bit.”
“Jim!” Her laugh became a clicking scold. “My shift starts in less than an hour.”
He held on and dipped his nose into her thick fall of hair, still loose and flowing from her crown. “Bugger your shift,” he mumbled there. “I haven’t seen you all week!”
Her willing humor dissipated with a blink. “That’s not fair. You could have come by earlier.”
“I couldn’t have, though!” he protested as she slipped free and away back into the bedroom, to collect her hairbrush. “Chief ordered us out to a round at The Ram’s Head, and I couldn’t well say no, now, could I?”
She stopped and gave him a blank stare. “He ordered?”
He adjusted his shoulders; that look of hers had a way of making him feel vulnerable. Doubly so since he was standing there without even his pants. “Well, maybe not ordered.”
She nodded and started brushing. “Ah hah.”
“It’s a political thing.”
“Since when are you so engaged in office politics?”
“Since the last time they passed me over for promotion for not playing their bloody game!”
“Don’t get angry at me for that,” she snapped with the head of her brush, then returned to grooming.
He clamped his mouth shut and
lowered his head. Drawing a cleansing breath, he followed her to the modest vanity set across from the bed and said, half-pleading, “I don’t want to be stuck a sergeant for the rest of my life. I’m good at this job! But I consistently go unrecognized because they think I’m too clever, or too keen, or too—”
“Or too much a sarcastic know-all?”
“You know what it’s like. You complain to me all the time about being kept on bedpan and sponge-bath duty.”
She whirled again, brandishing the brush in her hand like a schoolteacher’s pointer. “Yes, that is frustrating. But what I have to put up with is not at all the same as what you get yourself into by being a confrontational horse’s ass!” She resumed brushing again, firmly and mutely, her long black hair a stark contrast to the white of her slip.
He released a long breath and laid his hands on her shoulders. They looked almost as colorless against her flesh as did her slip.
“I’m sorry, Rose,” he murmured. “You’re right. I am a horse’s ass.”
The brushing slowed but she made no reply. After a pause, he dropped his head and blew a soft whinny against her crown. That, at least, elicited a chortle, and she told him, “You’re doing the wrong end.”
He smiled at her tolerance. “Make you coffee?”
She bobbed her head. “Yes, please.” As he shifted away, she slapped his buttock with the head of her brush. “And put your pants on.”
He sent her his cheekiest smirk over his shoulder and swaggered into her kitchen, leaving his clothes untouched.
Half an hour later, sitting rumpled but
relaxed in her car, he took the opportunity of a red light near the city centre to say, “Policeman’s ball is next month. Would you like to go with me?”
She turned to him with a cautiously curious look in her large brown eyes. “That’s an awfully important political event, isn’t it?”
“It’s also boring as hell. Or, it will be, without you.”
As she faced front to move through the green light, he caught the subtle crease of a dimple. “Will you dance with me?”
He kept watching her and smiled, too. “If you’re brave enough.”
She chuckled and let the car drift to a stop before the traffic circle that would take her on to the hospital. “I’ll wear boots.”
“I’ll try to practice. Thanks for the ride,” he said, and stretched over to press a quick kiss to her cheek.
“Get some sleep!” she told him before he’d finished sliding out from the car.
As if sleep would come to him with her scent still in his nostrils and the taste of her skin still on his tongue and the sensation of her smooth skin still tingling his fingers…! But as he clomped into his quiet, solitary flat, leaving his suit coat draped over the door handle and his keys on the kitchen counter, and made his way to the bed, he barely got his feet up before he fell into a fast and dreamless sleep.
Origins
I originally wrote this sort-of sex scene as a handwriting exercise, letting the words flow freely from my pen to the page during a commute trip. As the words kept coming, though, I sensed the beginnings of a larger story starting to develop. I was already semi-familiar with the characters of Jim and Rose, but this scene solidified them more clearly to me. Before, they were simply sketches. With this, they’re coming into their own. I’ve already written more for them, a continuation of their prospective larger story that looks at a larger cast, higher stakes, and maybe even a mystery or two.
If this little scene piqued your interest, let me know in the comments below! I’m curious to learn if others are as curious to tread farther into Jim and Rose’s world as I am.
On February 4, 2020, we said goodbye to our almost-18-year-old cat, Pugsley.
Saying Goodbye
Along with her sister Wednesday (who passed away a few years ago), Pugsley came to us as a kitten. She was a feisty but sweet little cat her whole life. Late last week, she started to signal to us that she was ready to leave all this earthly BS behind. Rather than let her deteriorate into a painful or frightening existence, we elected to let her go peacefully at home, among the people and things she loved most.
Thank you to the staff at The Cat Hospital of Media, especially Dr. Kersting, who gave her such compassionate care, and Dr. Peltz and Val, who were so gentle and patient with her in her final moments. It was a blessing to be able to keep her at home until the end.
The Little Princess
Love always
We’ll miss you, Puggles. You’re with your sis, now, over that rainbow bridge, running and jumping with the speed and grace that you had when you were a kitten, and keeping watch over us the same as you did when you were by our sides.
For this entry into the BonusParts A to Z, I’m looking at the Baddies: types, ones I’ve enjoyed, and a few specific examples to hopefully tease some interest.
What’s a Baddie?
Generally speaking, baddies are the bad guys (or gals, or nonbinary individuals) who create conflict within my stories. Not every baddie is evil, though. Sure, some are nefarious villains, but others are simply rivals or foils. They are characters of their own, meaning they can have their own backstory, their own moral code, even their own objective within the story.
The Baddie’s purpose is to offer a point of contrast to the Hero. They are an obstacle to a goal. This can range from a charming challenger for a love interest’s affections to a sadistic crazy person out to destroy all of humanity. It all depends on the story.
She recalled the mysterious stranger in the grimy duster. “Is he a bad guy?”
“‘Bad’ is relative,” the man told her.
“Well, what’s he like?”
“Traitorous, sadistic, egocentric.” He sniffed. “Atrocious table manners.”
A Baddie’s badness level often relates to the overall stakes of the story. Your average Romance probably won’t have a baddie who is a serial killer. By the same token, you wouldn’t expect a Thriller to have a baddie whose primary role was as a romantic rival. I’m not saying you can’t have a serial killer who isn’t also a romantic rival, but the stakes need to add up appropriately for the primary genre you’re writing in.
My Baddies and Me
For a long time, I argued against the necessity of baddies. I thought non-corporeal sources of conflict – societal discrimination, accidents, familial responsibilities – could be enough to propel a story forward. The problem is that conflict against something intangible like social mores or a car accident can only go so far. Instead, these kinds of intangibles initiate reactions in characters that then manifest as more personalized conflicts: the potential lovebirds facing prejudice due to their racial differences. The hero battling his demons of self-doubt. The heroine trying to reconcile her relationships with her traditional family and her nouveau riche boyfriend.
It wasn’t until I looked back on these stories (Sixes and Sevens, Fearless, and 1 More Chance!, respectively) that I realized that a story’s baddies could reside within my goodies. Totally valid, and lots of fun to write. But not as much fun as an actual Baddie.
A Rundown of Recent Baddies
I’m going to highlight some examples of baddies in my novella, Number Seven and the Life Left Behind, which anyone can read if they so choose. [Purchase link; opens in a new tab.] The story’s main protagonist, Number Seven, encounters a few different types of antagonists throughout his adventure:
Number Fourteen is an adversary to Seven. She does her job, but she does it with cruelty, and she’s got a pretty mean streak. She’s designed to be unlikable.
Number Twelve is a counterpoint to Seven. He’s a jaded professional who doesn’t really care about anything anymore. I created him to show that Seven’s working world is full of a lot of different people, and not everyone who disagrees with him has been corrupted. Some of them are just tired.
Number Nine is Seven’s rival, of sorts. She’s as good if not better an agent as he is, though she is portrayed as being more severe. She’s a foil to his endeavors. I wanted her to be a competent but frustrated woman fighting for respect in a predominantly man’s world. Seven doesn’t see her as an enemy except for the situation they’re in, and that’s what really makes her dangerous.
Number Two is the story’s straight-up villain. He’s Seven’s opposite in nearly every way. He’s vindictive, malicious, manipulative, and pompous, a man who will allow or do anything for sake of the grand plan, no matter who it hurts or how.
Not only did these characters serve separate purposes, they also offered diverse perspectives on the world in which the hero lives. And they were all a sheer delight to write. They are still baddies, though, and do not take the place of the hero. I’m not saying antagonists can’t have their own stories or their own motivations; some of the best are those whose points of view we can understand. But your story’s baddie is not the same as your story’s hero. Otherwise, it would be a different story.
Do you like writing Baddies? What kinds of Baddies do you prefer to write or to read? Let me know in the comments!
Welcome to the first post in my BonusParts A to Z theme year! Every 2 weeks or so, I’ll take a letter from the alphabet and choose a word or phrase that begins with that letter and write about what that word or phrase means to me and my writing. This being the first post, I’m starting with the letter A.
When I initially sat down to write this post, I thought I’d look at character names that start with A, since I have so many of them. Just off the top of my head, there’s Aksel, Alana, Amber, Anan, and Aral. But each one of those characters means something uniquely special to me, and I couldn’t put my finger down on just one to write about. So, I turned to my style. One technique I use a lot is Alliteration.
What’s Alliteration?
Alliteration, for anyone out of the know, is when the same sound occurs at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words. Many tongue twisters employ alliteration, such as the popular Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. That repetitive hard P sound is alliterative.
People in the past have accused me of being a bit too in love with words. I don’t deny that. Words can create sadness or horror just as easily as they can beauty and joy. One reason I love stories is for their malleable structure. Of course, too much of anything is not necessarily a good thing. That said, every edit requires a concentrated effort to rein in the more whimsical flourishes that flitter off in my first drafts. Here’s one from my current work in progress….
He lay like a pale, dreaming doll, blindfolded, ball-gagged, and bound by long sashes of shimmering satin to the four corners of the bed. He was shirtless, and his trousers had been pulled open to the very last teeth of his zip. Crouched atop him was a petite woman who was mostly naked herself, save for a set of scarlet lingerie cut daringly from silk and lace. She turned at the interruption of their entrance, flame-red hair tumbling around her shoulders. While beautiful, she moved with a coordination that could more accurately be described as ruthlessness rather than grace.
That opening alliterative phrase – blindfolded, ball-gagged, and bound – came to me as many phrases do, as I was on the edge of wakefulness (a topic for another time). Using that basic phrase as a core, I built it out into a more complete description of the moment. I added more embellishments because they’re fun, and I ended up with the paragraph above.
When to use alliteration
Alliteration, like other stylistic devices, can be tricky to use. Too much, and it becomes messy and distracting. Not enough, though, and prose runs the risk of being boring. An editor or beta reader may read this and tell me to pull it back a bit. I myself might even go back in a later revision and decide that it goes too far. But for right now, I like it. And isn’t that what really matters?
How do you fashion phrases? Do you like alliteration? What would you tell me about the example paragraph above? Let me know in the comments section below!
Aside from publishing “Number Seven and the Life Left Behind,” my thriller novella, I didn’t achieve any writing milestones in 2019. On the other hand, I did write several thousand words in my sci-fi action novel, Riding Through the Dark. I started tearing apart Fearless, my romance novel, and sewing up a more thoughtful outline for it. I also hired an editor to do a developmental edit of my coming-of-age novella, “Finding Mister Wright”, and I started work on revisions there. But I don’t have anything concrete to show for those projects, yet.
Part of my difficulties with meeting goals this past year had to do with work and life interruptions. We can’t help those. One thing I discovered, though, was that my writing mindset increased whenever I got a little win. This usually came in the form of a reaction or comment to some kind of prompt. The tricky part of prompts is that they don’t always mesh with my stories or characters. So, I got to thinking: Why not control that by making my own prompts?
How to Prompt?
There are lots of different kinds of writing prompts: photos, phrases, key words, character traits. I don’t think I could name even most of them, let alone all! I know I need structure for my prompts, as well as variety. When considering which way I wanted to go, and taking into account my habits and style, I knew I couldn’t stick to just one format. Then I thought about time. The year has 52 weeks in it. The alphabet has 26 letters. Every two weeks, I could focus on one letter. That seemed easy, straightforward, and variable enough that I decided to go for it. Get ready for…
Writing in 2020: BonusParts from A to Z
I love writing stories. I also love talking about my stories. Nobody wants to listen, though, which is where this website comes in.
Every 2 weeks or so, I’m going to talk about my stories, from A to Z. The first post will be based on the prompt of “A”, and what “A” makes me think of when it comes to my stories. The next post, I’ll move on to the prompt “B”, and so on. I’m putting no restrictions on what I’ll write: It could be an article, a character sketch, a story excerpt, or some idea I haven’t come up with, yet. I’ll keep my focus to stories finished or already in progress. This is not the time to start completely new stories! I simply don’t have the time, haha.
My hope with this year-long challenge is that readers like you will learn something new about my stories and process, and maybe leave me some feedback. Even if I end up just shouting into the void, I think the more regular attention I’ll need to pay to my stories to keep these prompts going through the year will help me stay on-track with my larger writing endeavors.
What say you, friends and followers? Want to join me on my 26-week writing adventure? What are your writing goals for 2020?
For many moons, I railed against the first-person point of view. That might have been influenced by Beverly Cleary, who used it to great effect in the children’s books that filled my youth. I associated first-person narrative with books directed at kids … and Victorian gothic tales, which are in many ways similar to children’s literature. (Don’t @ me. I specialized in Victorian Lit at university and I won’t be swayed in my opinion that those books are basically great, sweeping, gory morality tales. And I love them for that.)
When it came to what we’ll call popular modern adult fiction, though, my experiences with first-person POV were disappointing. What I read of it felt “shove-y”, like a teenager in desperate want of attention. Characters who wouldn’t shut up in their own heads, telling me what they were feeling all the damn time. In my own attention-grabbing behavior, I ended up throwing more than one book across the room because of it.
I realize now I was simply reading the wrong first-person POV books. Bad first-person POV books. Really, really bad ones.
The Turnaround
Around 2010, I became interested in detective stories. I’d always enjoyed police procedurals, and I’ve always wanted to write a detective story. The problem is, I’m not smart enough to come up with a crime to baffle a detective who’s reasonably good at their job. So, I started watching – and reading – the books on which some of my favorite TV detectives were based. At the time, that was Longmire and Inspector George Gently.
Craig Johnston (Longmire) and Alan Hunter (Inspector George Gently) are wonderful writers. It’s no wonder A&E (later Netflix) and BBC picked up their stories for televised popularization. Their writing is lively, witty, and, at its best, capable of lifting the reader out of their own self and into the lives of the characters on the page. And many of Hunter’s and all of Johnston’s stories are written in first-person! Due to my enjoyment of those series, I actively sought out other detective stories in the same vein. That’s when I discovered perhaps the greatest first-person crime novels of all time: Ross Macdonald and his weary but dogged private detective, Lew Archer.
It didn’t hurt that Lew was played onscreen in 2 films by the greatest actor of all time, Mr Paul Newman.
My life as a reader and as a writer has not been the same since.
Macdonald’s prose practically sings off the page into my head with every line. I’ve caught myself laughing aloud to Archer’s snappy repartee. Lew feels like a real man with real desires, hang-ups, and ambitions fulfilled and lost. The stories make me love being a reader, being able to enjoy a master – undisputed in my mind – working their craft. As a writer, the books inspire me to examine what I put down on my own pages, to write with clarity and purpose but never by sacrificing honesty and genuineness in the characters. I’ve found myself going back and re-reading all of the Lew Archer books multiple times, not just for the enjoyment factor but because each reading offers me new insight into craft, skill, and the characteristics of the first-person perspective.
The Future
When I read Ross Macdonald, I want to write as well as Ross Macdonald did. That’s not going to happen, but it’s a worthy goal. And every time I pick up my pen or open my laptop, I take that challenge to heart and try to put my best work forward. I’m even thinking of giving my own first-person noir a try.
What’s your take on first-person POV? Do you have a story that changed your mind one way or another? Let me know!
Sometimes, one gets the urge to write a raunchy sex story. I do, at least, though it’s been a while. I looked back through my archives and found I haven’t written a play-by-play sex scene in at least 2 years. I haven’t written a heterosexual sex scene in 5. And I haven’t written a het sex scene from a woman’s POV in 8. So I’m a bit out of practice. But I had fun with it.
The characters of Eve and Alan took me by surprise in that they appeared from basically nowhere with half their backstory already taken care of. As this is a first draft, it’s very rough around the edges (and through the middle). I don’t know if I’ll go back to these characters later or if they even warrant a second look-through. I did enjoy figuring out the ins and outs of this vignette/short story/whatever you want to call it. And hopefully I haven’t completely lost my touch for fluffy smut.
Click the title card to decide for yourself; the link will open a readable PDF. And if you’re so inclined, let me know what you think in the comments!
Some of you may know that I’m a videographer and video editor at my day job. On occasion, one professional life can carry over into another.
When I published my novella, “Number Seven and the Life Left Behind”, at the beginning of the year, I also made this little book promo video. It’s my first time making a book promo, and I did it without actors. All video and images are taken from royalty-free sources, as is the audio.
This was really just a fun way for me to stretch my work legs in my personal life. But if you like the video – or you liked my book – please let me know! It’s always great to hear when anyone has enjoyed my work.
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