I am a dinosaur decapitator.

We had a great Jot Conference last Friday night!

A full crowd showed up to hear some great speakers, and I was happy to be among them. The conference that my writers group, the Weaklings, put on is just as much for us as it is for other writers in our area. Perhaps more so.

In any event, I’d like to share a bit of what I learned from our first presenter and newest member of the Weaklings, Thomas McClurg.

Saying that Thomas is a film buff is like saying Rip Van Winkle took a catnap. But his passion for watching movies is exceeded by his passion for writing. And in many ways, his experience with films and screenwriting has helped him as a fiction writer.

The overlap between the disciplines of writing for the screen and writing books is obvious. Both invite people to lose themselves in the worlds created for them. Both involve good character development and solid plots. And both are made up of a series of scenes which must further the action or risk losing the watcher/reader.

Photo by ScottRobertAnselmo

To this last point, Thomas shared the example of picturing a scene as an Apatosaurus. The head is the beginning of the scene, the long neck gives more information while moving slowly toward the large body or meat of the scene. The tail is what happens after the main action occurs. After giving us this illustration, Thomas showed us two scenes from the Star Trek reboot, one of which was this one:

In the scene, we are shown a car speeding through the desert driven by a boy. The boy jumps from the car just before it plummets off a cliff. As the police officer who had been chasing the boy stands over him, he asks his name. The punch line for the scene is the boy’s revelation to be James Tiberius Kirk.

If this scene were an Apatosaurus, its head and tail had been removed, leaving only the body of the dinosaur. We didn’t see young Kirk steal the car, and we didn’t see the police officer take him into custody afterward.

Thomas said that this is a good way of keeping the reader’s attention, especially when the attention spans of readers are shortening by the minute. He asked us to write a full scene, then cut the head and tail off the dinosaur. Leave only the meat.

This is as true to screenwriting as it is to novel-writing (and even more true to flash fiction writing), but some writers forget this and leave readers floundering through pages of description without giving them a plot or a character onto which they may latch.

Thomas had a lot more great things to say. You may be able to watch the whole conference online here if the video works. And if it doesn’t, you probably should have come to the Jot event.

A brief rant in response to my lack of free donuts.

My writers group met up the other night at Tim Horton’s. At least a couple of us meet there every week to write, to discuss life, and to enjoy some quality beverages and baked goods.

We started meeting there because they were open all night, unlike the coffee shop where we had been meeting which closes at 10pm. By choosing Tim Horton’s, we were able to push our meeting time back so we could all tuck our kids (and spouses) into bed for the night before going out to write.

At some point, our local Tim’s changed their hours and now they close at 11pm. And that’s fine. But since they now have a definite closing time, I finally worked up the courage to ask a very important question.

“Out of curiosity,” I said to the clerk who had just taken my order for the least expensive drink they offer, “what happens to the donuts at the end of the night.”

He pointed to a garbage can. “They all get thrown away,” he said.

“Hmm,” said I. “My friends and I frequent this establishment weekly, often leaving as the only customers at closing time. Do you think it might be possible to throw them away to us?”

“Here is your drink, sir,” he said.

I went and sat down.

My writers group had a good time of writing and chatting and such, and sure enough, we were the last people there. The employees were systematically shutting everything down for the evening when I caught the gentleman’s attention who had helped me earlier and conversationally asked, “So, have you thrown those donuts away yet?”

“Not yet,” he said, then quickly moved on to the next step of the closing procedures.

I think somehow he missed my hint. Here I was, thinking that I could be the hero of breakfast time in the morning, providing my family with a bounty of day-old free donuts, but he missed my vision.

“Well, have a good night,” I called out as I pushed open the locked door to come home.

“Good night,” he called back.

It was a good night, but it could have been better, Mr. Tim Horton’s Employee Who Throws Away Donuts To Spite Me.

I am Proud to be a Weakling

Great things have been happening in my writers group, The Weaklings.

One of our members, Andrew Rogers, has been named as a finalist in a Michigan writing contest. Andrew and I met quite a while ago (see the full story here), and have been encouraging each other to write ever since. His story, Archived, is available to be read via this link. Be sure to vote for him (you can vote once a week per computer).

In other Weaklings news, we are moving forward in planning Jot: The GR Writers Mini-Conference. It’s a one-night writers conference that is free to attend. It’s being held at Baker Book House at 2768 East Paris Ave. SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546 on Friday, February 8th. As one of the presenters, I’ll be speaking on the topic of flash fiction. Be sure to follow our Jot blog for all the latest posts and news. I recently wrote a post over there about what people can expect from Jot. I hope to see you there!

Thanks for reading! Don’t forget to vote for Andrew!

3 Day Novel Memories

Normally, Labor Day Weekend brings about thoughts of family reunions, cookouts, and the beginning of school (not to mention the economic and social contributions of workers). But for the last few years, it has had very different associations for me. I think of long nights, early mornings, and typing until my fingers ache and my eyes dry out. You see, Labor Day Weekend is the official time-frame for the 3-Day Novel Contest.

It was shortly after the formation of the Weaklings, my writer’s group, that one of our members told us about the 3-Day Novel Contest.

“You write a novel in three days,” he said, as though that were something that could be done. Some of us had already been working on novels for three years at that point.

“What?” said the rest of us.

We looked up the information online. Sure enough. One novel, three days.

Of course, outlining and character development ahead of time were not against the rules. The only real rule was that you couldn’t start the “Once upon a time…” until midnight between Friday night and Saturday morning and you had to be done by midnight between Monday night and Tuesday morning.

And so I outlined. My story idea that first year was about a dystopian world where sound was illegal. The main character gets caught up in the underground movement to overthrow the government. Action ensues.

I remember that year fondly. Writing it was fun, but the best part for me was the outlining. When I explained the bones of the world and my storyline to my beautiful wife, she caught the vision right away and helped me think through a lot of the details.

“What about cars? How do people get around without making any noise?” she would ask.

“Electric cars, Maglev trains, and very quiet shoes. Besides, people aren’t really allowed to move around outside of their cities anymore,” I would say.

“What about babies?” she would say. “Babies can’t help but make noise.”

“When a woman reaches a certain point in her pregnancy, she has to go to a sound proof birthing facility where she will stay with her child for ten years, living in relative sound freedom while the kids are taught sign language and warned of the dangers of sound. This way, the father role can be assumed completely by the government.”

“How about pets? Do people have pets?”

“Sure, but they have to get them from government-approved pet shops after their vocal cords have been removed.”

“What about their claws on wood floors?” she would ask. “Click, click, click.”

“Booties,” I would say.

Issue after issue, we thought about how to create a silent world. And I must say that I really believe that many of our ideas would work. They would require a tyrannical government, but that was okay because my story had that too.

And then fellow Weakling, Andrew Rogers, contacted Ann Byle, a writer at the time for the Grand Rapids Press and got us a story in the newspaper (read it here). Suddenly, it was more than just a private thing my writer’s group was doing. Now it was a real thing. It was something that told the world that I was a writer, not just someone who dabbled in stringing sentences together.

And then the actual weekend came.

It was my first attempt at writing something longer than a short story. I was already more attached to my characters than I realized, because by the end of the novel when some bad things happen, I felt like a monster forcing my characters to deal with the evils I had designed for them. It was the first time that I felt bad about being mean to a fictional person.

During the weekend, the Weaklings all stayed under one roof. We woke at odd hours to start writing, we ate when someone was appointed to cook, and we shouted out word counts and save reminders often enough to spur each other on to longer and better novels.

And when it was done, we all had first drafts. They were terrible first drafts, but I remember thinking at the time that any of us could have won the contest. It wasn’t too far out there that one of us had written something amazing.

We’ve done the contest every year since.

Except for this year. This year, we are all taking a break from new novels. This year, we are honing our existing novels, prepping them for publication, and grooming our platforms.

But next year, we will all be famous published authors, and, if our book tours permit us, we will hole ourselves up again for another 3-day Novel Contest.

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Check out the other Weaklings’ blogs below for their 3-day Novel Memories.

• http://parttimenovel.wordpress.com/
• http://tellbetterstories.wordpress.com/
• http://www.matthewlandrum.com/

For all the times I’ve mentioned “3-day Novel” on my blog, click here.

A Monty Python Fan’s View of Writing in Groups

I’m a pretty big Monty Python fan. I wanted to share this because as a member of a writer’s group, I found insight in Eric’s experience of writing with others.

Now, I realize that Eric Idle was writing comedy sketches to be performed with other members of the Monty Python troupe, but the process of writing in the same room as someone else is the same.

My own writer’s group, the Weaklings, is made up of very different types of writers. I write flash fiction and YA fantasy and I work best in public settings while listening to music. My friend Bob writes epic fantasy tomes and can seemingly write anywhere with anything going on. Andrew writes in silence and preferably in seclusion. And Matt writes poetry, which is as far from my understanding as writing upside-down while wearing a pink tutu (I don’t actually know Matt’s process that well, so maybe he does this).

During the 3-day Novel Contest, however, we all write together in the same room. When we write communally, there is a synergy of ideas, a free-flowing exchange of new perspectives that brings out the best in our work. When I get stuck in my manuscript, I shout out the problem to the world at large and my writing friends shout ideas back to me. When they write themselves into a corner, they shout out and I shout back.

Those of us who need music use headphones. And when our eyes begin to melt from staring at the screen for too long, we stop and eat together, encouraging each other along the way.

I say all that to say this: a good writer’s group has been vital to my experience as a writer. There are some folks out there who say that writing is a solitary journey of hardship, but I don’t think that’s entirely accurate. Sure, when you are putting pen to paper, it is your hands following the instructions from your brain and you have the ultimate freedom to make your story do what you want it to, but there is value in sharing the experience.

If I am allowed to give a little advice, write with someone else this week. Maybe you’ll be frustrated by how they plan out every little detail before figuring out the larger story. Maybe you’ll both have such a good time together you won’t get any writing done. Maybe you’ll write in silence and question why you invited the person along in the first place. And maybe you’ll find someone who you can bounce ideas off and it will make your writing come alive.

I am a husband.

Let me be up front with you about something. I stole the idea for this post from a series of posts that Jessie Clemence did on her blog. Her interviews with her family (husband, daughter, son) made me smile and opened a window to her life that I hadn’t seen before (I knew Jessie and her husband when I was in college, but our paths split before they had kids).

I thought, “What a great idea! How hard could it be to interview your spouse?” So, I made  a list of questions and had my wife answer them. Here’s the result:

How long have we been together?

Not nearly long enough.  That being said, we had our first date 8 years, 2 months, and 16 days ago.  We have been married for 6 years, 8 months and 16 days, but as I said, not nearly long enough.

What are you reading now?

I am just about to finish Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford, which has kept my attention from the beginning of the winter school semester.  I have read the book about three pages at a time for almost five months, but even though it has stretched over a long time, it still kept me coming back for more whenever I had time to spare.

What is your favorite book?

This is a hard question because in every genre I have a favorite book. That being said, the book I have enjoyed for the longest amount of time is A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving.

What are your thoughts on your husband being a writer?

Honestly it depends on the day.  For most days, I am excited and supportive of your desire to do something you enjoy and I try to express that through my words and actions.  There are also occasional days were I become self focused and wonder why you must choose a hobby that is not only time-consuming but also solitary. On those days, I must remember your writing is not about me, but about you doing something that makes you happy.

You work full-time, raise a 1.5 year old, and are 7 months pregnant. You also just completed a master’s course in Accounting. Are you crazy?

No, let’s just say I have an incredible partner that makes all that possible.  I couldn’t do it without you babe.

What is the first thought that goes through your head when I say that I’m going off to write for a while?

Once again, this honestly depends on whether I have my attitude and focus where it belongs.  Given that I feel most loved by spending quality time together, leaving me to write isn’t the best way to say I love you.  So, whether I need an attitude adjustment or it is where it needs to be already, I need to remember that my joyfully letting you go is a good way to say I love you.

What is something that you want strangers to know about me?

Oh, the things I could share…

Do you have any advice for the spouses of writers?

Whether other spouses deal with this or not, maybe it’s just me, but I have to constantly remember it’s not about me, it’s about you.  That applies to all areas, at least in my opinion.

I love my wife.

I don’t know if you’ve read The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman, but it spells out five ways that people feel most loved. There’s quality time, words of encouragement, gifts, acts of service, and physical touch. DeAnne and I read this book in our first year of marriage and it has really helped me understand how to make her feel loved. That said, her love language is quality time and mine is physical touch. When we are snuggling on the couch, both of our love tanks get filled.

But then I took up writing. Like she said in her answers, I write best when I can be focused entirely on my writing, so it is essentially a solitary thing. I try to choose times to write when it won’t affect our time together, times when she is either out of the house (her commute is about an hour longer than mine) or sleeping (I’m a night owl anyway), but there are still times when I get together with my writers’ group when I could be spending time with her.

That isn’t a good way to help my wife feel loved. Sometimes, this makes me feel like bad husband, like I am not giving her what she needs, like I am choosing my own desires over hers. And no matter how many times she insists that I go off and write, I feel that I am messing things up.

This past weekend, through the interview and other conversations that we had, she helped me understand that my writing time wasn’t really the issue. The real issue is that when I am spending time with her, it isn’t always quality time because my mind is still living in writing-land. We may be sitting on the couch together or playing with our daughter, but I’m not fully there because I’m thinking of the next scene in my novel or the blog post that I’m going to write.

Our time together isn’t quality when I’m letting other things come before her and marriage.

Now, I’m not going to quit writing. I think, for the most part, I’ve tried to limit the time that I spend writing when my wife is available. But I am going to try turning off the writing part of my brain when I’m with my wife. For me, my marriage comes first. I love you DeAnne Lynne Mosey!

I am a writer.

I am a writer.

If you are a writer and you haven’t said these words out loud, say them now. As you know, there is power in words. Saying them, writing them down, they make something true. Words can never be unsaid.

It was a couple of months after I joined my writers’ group, The Weaklings, before I said those words out loud. I had been writing for a while, but had never claimed the title. I remember having a conversation with another member of the group about whether or not I should be telling anyone about my writing.

It isn’t that I was ashamed of it. It was more that I was afraid of it. To say it would make it true, and what if it wasn’t true? What if I was just a man with a hobby?

My friend assured me that he felt the same way, but we were still writers all the same.

“Writers write,” he said to me. “That’s the definition of being a writer.”

This definition has haunted me. There have been times since I first claimed the title that I have not written. I still attended writers’ group meetings, still read the right magazines, still made notes for my different projects, but when I had the chance to put pen to paper, I’d choose something else.

Why? I scorned writing for many reasons. Some were valid, like grief and taking the time to be a husband and father. Some were not, like video games, television, and laziness. Some were not, but seemed to be, like research, reading, and making notes. But whatever the case, in those times when I was not writing, I was failing the basic test of being a writer. Writers write.

So here I am, saying it once again, hoping that my will and creativity will meet my goal of putting pen to paper and I will finish the works that I have started. I want to make it real.

I am a writer.

 

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Congratulations to Tim Vine on winning the LOTR set!

Do you want to win stuff like Tim? Stay tuned for more chances coming up!

I am a Weakling.

It probably started at a baseball game. Now, I’m not a big baseball fan, but when my mom asked whether my wife and I would like to join her at a Whitecaps game with her work, Cornerstone College, we came along. It was a good family outing.

As it happened, we sat next to the then-president of the college and his wife, with whom I struck up a conversation. I told her that I worked in the music department at a bookstore and she told me that her son, Andrew, was a musician who was moving back to the area and that he’d be looking for a music-related job. I promised her that I’d give him a call and try to connect him with something.

As promised, I called him. But rather than be all that helpful, I told him that Grand Rapids didn’t have a big recording industry and he’d be better off moving to somewhere like Nashville, the hub of all things music. He didn’t listen and moved to Grand Rapids anyway.

A month or two later, Andrew applied at the bookstore where I work. Remembering his name, and the promise to his mom that I’d try to help him find a job, I encouraged the management to give him a chance. He would have gotten the job anyway, but I like to take as much credit for other people’s accomplishments as possible.

We hit it off. Two weeks after he was hired, I asked him to help my wife and I move out of our apartment. Here’s a bit of truth for you: There is no better way to cement a friendship than to ask them to help you move. Andrew and his wife, Kristen, came over as strangers, but within a couple hours of seeing and packing our belongings, lifting heavy boxes, and maneuvering awkward pieces of furniture up stairs backwards, they emerged as friends.

While moving, we talked about our interests, and one of them was writing. Andrew mentioned that he and a guy named Bob were meeting for Bible study once every couple weeks and that he enjoyed writing as well. I was invited to Bible study and the three of us agreed that we should meet again solely to talk about our writing. Along the way, Bob ran into a guy named Matt, a writer friend from college, and invited him to the meeting.

The night we met, the Weaklings were born. Taking inspiration from the famous writers’ group, the Inklings, which included C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, we formed our own writer’s group, the Weaklings. Matt had been part of the a few writers’ groups over the years and lent his experience and some structure to our meetings.

The early meeting ran along these lines: grab some refreshments – 5 minutes; chat about life – 10 minutes; read something we wrote since the last meeting – 5 minutes each; discuss what was read – 10 minutes each; discuss any writing challenges or goals – 10 minutes; schedule next meeting & leave.

We met at least once every two weeks, usually on the opposite week from Bible study. Inevitably, Andrew and I would discuss writing a lot at the bookstore where we worked (and continued to move furniture together). That encouragement and accountability helped make writing part of my routine.

Since those early days, Matt has  moved to the other side of the state, Bob has two kids, Andrew has one, and I have one with another on the way, but we all still make time for writing. And we all continue to encourage each other.

There is power in writers’ groups, and I am proud to say that I am a Weakling.