Category Archives: writing

On Fictional Cursing

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Recently on the social media sites where writers congregate there has been a small discussion on the subject of invented curses. Should a writer just use the curses that everyone uses and is familiar with or invent new one for their fantasy and far-future settings.

Invented cursing like artificial slang is a very touchy thing to pull off. Those of us geeks old enough to remember the original run of Battlestar Galactica recall the programs invented curse words like ‘frak’ and ‘feldercarb.’ (I am not cure of the spelling of that last one.) Which were one-for-one replacements for ‘fuck’ and ‘bullshit.’

This ‘just replace it with an invented word’ style of fictional cursing misses the point and understanding of cursing. Cursing is transgressive.

Cursing is about violating the ‘good taste’ and decorum of your culture. It is shocking and emotionally powerful because it is breaking norms and rules. If all you do is change ‘fuck’ to ‘frak’ then in effect you are saying that this alien culture thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of years in our history is just the same as ours today. Possessing the same values the same taboos and therefore the same sense of what is proper and polite.

That’s just lazy.

Plus, it misses the chances the golden opportunity for the writer to show us something about the new culture without stopping for exposition.

A culture with a lot of religion on its history or its current make up will have curse derived from that sense of religion.  No culture that doesn’t have some belief in torturous punishment through damnation is going to have the curse ‘damn you.’ If a culture places no important on familial bloodlines and lineages, then they are not going to use ‘bastard’ as an insult.

Star Trek’s Vulcan are a fiction race that prides itself on total control of their emotional reaction to the point that they insist that they have no emotions. Displaying and suggesting a Vulcan has displayed emotion would be an insult and transgressive. While they are not given to angry outbursts, I could see a Vulcan character calmly looking upon an enemy and saying,’ I have no doubt that gives you,” then with a pause for emphasis ‘joy.’ A stinging insult and rebuke delivered with a flat affectation.

So, think about the cultures your create and then ponder deep on what they consider transgressive and there you will find you curses and insults.

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Pleasantly Surprised

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Last week I returned to a manuscript I hadn’t touched in something like three years. My plans are to prep it and send it out to small press publishers of SF novels.

Naturally, I had to review it to make sure that I had the correct file and that there weren’t any major glaring embarrassing errors lurking in the text.

While I am tweaking a sentence here and there, just a really light edit, overall, the text is reading just fine. In fact, I find myself pulled into a story that I already know quite well. Not only am I not unhappy with the work I am quite pleased with it.

This may all be self-delusion. The creator is often the worst judge of the creation but three chapters in and I really am very happy with my writing.

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After ‘The End’

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Sometimes when a film has finished the credits have scrolled into history my mind ponders the next sequence of event for the characters. I am not speaking of sequel stories and further adventures but rather the immediate fallout of the events that just transpired.

67 years ago this week a classic of American Cinema was released to theaters 12 Angry Men, the story of a jury originally deadlocked 11-1 in favor of a murder conviction that grapples with prejudice and racism as they search for justice and their own souls. *spoilers* bit by painful bit the jurors uncover doubt in the prosecutions seemingly open and shut case until after conquering their own biases they reach an acquittal. The story ends with the jurors going their own way on a rain-soaked street as sunlight returns to the world.

I adore this film. Masterful writing, acting, and filmmaking in a tightly confined location. I do also ponder what the newspaper the next day looked like. The case against the young defendant looked so absolute, so solid. No one writing about the case or reading about would have been treated to the deep discussions and debate over evidence that in the public eye had seemed so certain and incontrovertible. I have no doubt that there would have been excoriating opinion pieces about an idiot jury that let a killer walk free, opinion pieces that might have proved quite popular.

Another movie that sparked fascination in what transpired after the final reel is the Cohen Brothers’ neo-noir Blood Simple.

A tale of lust, greed, and murder Blood Simple is a salute to classic film noir but one that isn’t like its predecessors constrained by the ‘Production Code.’

In the film one of the protagonists takes what he assumes is a corpse to a field to bury it. The person isn’t dead but gets buried anyways. Horrific. However, it’s not the gruesome nature of the killing that really set my mind wondering but rather the ‘hiding’ of the body. When I said it was in a field you might have imagined an open stretch of unused land, perhaps in a secluded forest. Nope. This is a farmer’s freshly plowed but not yet planted productive land. It’s a striking visual, the parallel lines of the plow interrupted by the stark unique rectangle of a grave, but what happens the next morning? I imagine a tired farmer ambling to his field to begin the daily work and stopping shocked at the sight of a grave in the middle of his future corn field. This ‘hiding’ isn’t going to last twelve hours as it’s almost certain that the county Sheriff is going to be involved very quickly.

It’s this sort of pondering that prompted me to write an epilog to my horror novel. Perhaps, if it sells, the editor will ask me to cut the epilog but I knew that had I read or seen my own story I would have been wondering how, with so many dead people scattered about the town, did the protagonist not spend the rest of his days answering very difficult charges.

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The Soul Crushing Exercise of Querying

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Once you have a completed, edited, and polished manuscript the next step if you are not self-publishing is to find a publisher and or an agent. This is done by sending out letter asking them to review your work and possibly take you on as a client. Those letters are queries and for many people, me included, it is painful frustrating process.

First there is the search for the right sort of agent. You have to find one that represents the sort of writing you do. It’s a waste of everyone’s time to query an agent that specializes in historical romances with your far-flung space opera. You have to find agents that are open to queries. There are so many writers aspiring to a traditional publishing contract that the agents are overwhelmed by the flood of queries. Most only open are specific times and for limited durations.

Once you have gathered a list of potential agents you start sending out those queries, paying particular attention to each agents preference in how that query should be submitted. Do they want a synopsis, something many writers dread crafting. Do you they want sample pages? How many? 5, 10, a chapter or 3 chapters?

Following each agents guidelines you send off the query and wait.

A growing number of agents will let you know in their guidelines that if they are not interested that they simply will not respond. So, you will get absolutely nothing in reply. The vast majority utilize form rejection templates. You know that they are not interested but you can’t be sure of why. Was the writing not good enough? Do they have too many clients with similar stories? Did this story just not ignite a love for it? Did you just catch them on a bad day? You can’t know and you will never know, all you have is the form rejection with your name and the book’s title filled in.

If an agent actually likes the prospect of your book they may ask for the entire manuscript. When you submit that it is more waiting, more uncertainty and still the most likely outcome is another rejection.

With this exhausting and demoralizing process, it is easy to see why so many authors in this day and age prefer to self-publish. it is not a statement about quality but for those of use with talents in graphic design and numerous other skill that make for a good physical book the traditional publication path with tis soul-crushing machinery remains the path we must walk.

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Vernor Vinge, Rest In Peace

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I do not often post about the passing in notable people here. While there are artists of all arts that I enjoy, admire, and are fans of, I rarely feel any great emotional tug when they pass. Losing a parent at a young age can impress upon you with great force the truth that everyone dies.

I do want to make a note of the passing this week of SF author Vernor Vinge. He was a celebrated author, often credited with popularizing the concept of the technological singularity, the point where advancements in technology change humanity so completely that what exists on the other side is incomprehensible to those before the event. The reason I am making this post is not because of his talented writing, his impact on the field, or even his influence on the wider culture but because I had the good fortune to have met him on a few occasions.

I cannot say I knew him. Sharing a few panels at local SF conventions is not enough to truly know a person, but I was acquainted with Vernor.\

He was a kind man, a local celebrity who did not throw that weight around at conventions. Even away from the dim spotlight of small local conventions he remained a friendly and approachable person. Our paths crossed at San Diego’s airport once as he was flying out to an eclipse and my sweetie-wife and were departing for a convention. The time we shared before boarding our flights was pleasant and affable.

It is strange, perhaps, that such a kind and seeming decent man created one of the most chilling and evil cultures in literature. The Emergence from A Deepness in the Sky and their viral form of slavery frightened me in a manner rarely found from pages of text. The book and those villains were so compelling that I was unable to resist reading it on the bus home from work, despite the intense motion sickness reading on a moving vehicle provoked.

Vernor was talented, kind, and he will be missed.

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Time for the Next Novel

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Well, the query letter has been composed, the synopsis written and once they have survived the sweetie-wife’s sharp eye for error I will climb back into the query trenches and The Wolves of Wallace Point will begin seeking representation and a home.

The best thing to do once a writing project is done is move on to the next project. My next novel, also a horror, will combine the sentiments of a 70s disaster flick, large cast, dispersed storylines, not plot armor for anyone, with my favorite style of horror, the ghost story.

I have no working title for this piece, but I have discovered one important thing about it. I cannot write this one by the ‘pants,’ as I did with Wolves. It’s going to end up too intricate, with multiple points of view and interweaving narratives. There are authors who could writ that without an outline, but I am not one. So, for this next novel I return to my usual process and will begin with a 5-act structure outline, but in this case one that breaks down the five acts among the five plots.

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Writing the Book was Easy.

 Writing the Book was Easy.

Beta reader feedback is coming in on The Wolves of Wallace point and the signs are good. There aren’t any major issues that people have a consensus on and as such no major rewrites or revision required at this stage.

I have drafted a query letter to use in the search for an agent to represent me and my horror writings but before I can start that process, I must tackle the toughest part of the writing, the synopsis.

I recall an interview with the master Japanese director Kurosawa when the interviewer asked him what the message in his latest film Ran was. Kurosawa replied, through a translator, that if the message was simple enough to be an answer to a question, he wouldn’t have made the film he would have just stood on a corner with a sign.

It took 97,000 words to tell the story of The Wolves of Wallace point and now I must retell it in something like 1000 words and still make it compelling, interesting, and engaging.

This is way I would rather just jump into the next book.

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Ready For Beta Readers

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My first horror novel, tentatively titled The Wolves of Wallace Point is ready for beta readers.

Beta readers, for those who do not know, are the test audiences of the book world. People invited to read a manuscript, provide feedback about what they liked or did not like about the work and then the author may revise, edit, rewrite, or junk the entire project. I have certainly had novels that did not survive the beta read stage, where I hadn’t quite achieved what I wanted to, and it was easier and simpler to set the manuscript aside until I was more confident that I would tackle it properly.

This is an open call. If you are interested in reading this book and providing me with your honest opinion and feedback either use the contact me link on my blog or drop me a direct message in Facebook and I’ll put you on the list.

The novel is about 100,000 words, so that much like most SF books but a little thinner that most fantasy novels, and I would appreciate a turnaround time of about two weeks.

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Inconvenient Inspiration

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So, last night I went to bed and started drifting off to sleep. Somewhere I had heard or read that in order to sleep your heartrate has to drop below 60 beats per minute and mine was slowing, approaching that moment when cognitive systems shut down and slumber would take over.

As I drifted my minds began recalling carious Tabletop Role Playing Games in the horror genre I had run for my friends. When I run a horror themed games I like to do it as a ‘one off,’ just that set of characters and events. Horror repeated becomes adventure. One of the games I recalled had been a massive game made up of several sessions instead of the customary single night of game play. I had borrowed the structure of the classic film Citizen Kane with the characters investigating aspect of someone life searching for the key that would unlock the nature of their life.

My heartrate shot up from the gentle slowing and sleep fled from my presence.

I hadn’t thought about that game in years and years now grasped a new purpose for it, a novel.

Now that particular story, much of which I do not recall, but the structure. That would make a fine way to approach a horror novel that would be both grand in scope and focused on a single character. Much more of what the plot might entail flooded into my brain like a river washing away the Black Riders chasing after Frodo. Even more concepts fell into place. I adore the five-act structure and each act could encompass one of the historical aspects of the investigation; a character introduced in the epilog of my werewolf novel could be the point man in this one.

It took quite a while for my thoughts to cease racing, for my heartrate to once again begin to slow, but that sudden inconvenient flash of inspiration still burns this morning.

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Quick Novel Update

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So, 3 out of 5 acts have been proofed so I am nearing the point where I will be looking for beta readers for ‘The Wolves of Wallace Point.’

I often hear about writers who detest their first drafts, but I am not one of those. Sure, sometimes the draft fails, and I didn’t get to my target. But it’s never detest or I can’t stand reading it as I edit and revise. This novel was no different even though it was written without an outline. There were elements that need minor adjustment because as things became clearer to me near the end earlier scenes had to be adjusted to ensure a consistent continuity.

As I wait for my sweetie-wife to complete her pass on the final two acts I have begun actual writing on the next horror novel. I may need to put something else as the opening scene however as this sequence is so dark and troubling it may be more of a turn off that an enticing opening.

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