(It’s not just for SF fans anymore!)
It has often seemed to me that science fiction writers are the people most at home on the web, the people least surprised by its possibilities, the folks most likely to see its uses. This only makes sense: they are, after all, the ones most at ease with potential technology, spending their days writing coherent stories about complex possible worlds.
So it’s not surprising that they’ve come up with new and different ways to approach issues specific to writing and publishing.
During the early brouhaha over Publish America’s legitimacy (or lack thereof) as a publishing venue, it was a group of science fiction authors who banded together to disprove PA’s claim that it vetted manuscripts by composing a truly awful novel (that did, in fact, get accepted for publication). And it’s science fiction authors who co-host Predators and Editors, which has hopefully helped steer many unwitting authors-to-be in the right direction.
Not new, but not widely known, either, is the Turkey City Lexicon, a site meant to help science fiction writers workshop (or critique) each others’ work by giving them nice packages that say, far better than could any one individual, what might be problematic about a given passage. Named for the Austin, Texas workshop that was the cradle of cyberpunk, the lexicon has gone through a number of different editions (carefully uncopyrighted), and is as hilarious (and as thoughtful) today as it was back in 1988.
Here, for example, we can find Brenda Starr Dialogue (”long sections of talk with no physical background or description of the characters”), the Squid in the Mouth (”the failure of an author to realize that his/her own weird assumptions and personal in-jokes are simply not shared by the world-at-large. Instead of applauding the wit or insight of the author’s remarks, the world-at-large will stare in vague shock and alarm at such a writer, as if he or she had a live squid in the mouth”), and the Kudzu Plot (”Plot which weaves and curls and writhes in weedy organic profusion, smothering everything in its path”).
Much of what is offered in the Lexicon is, in fact, very good advice for anyone writing anything, and I highly recommend reading it, laughing over it, and taking it to heart. And then you’ll be … beyond the elements of style!
Posted in The Writing Life, About Writing, Fiction, Technology on June 25th, 2008
So today we’re going to talk about writing; writing fiction, specifically. And there’s a common critique of beginning novelists: “too much maid-butler dialogue!”
We’ve all seen it, whether or not we use that expression to articulate it. It refers to the choice of some authors to include backstory in dialogue:
“Well, Jim, as you know, we’ve been harvesting oysters around these parts for thirty years, and nothing like this ever happened before.”
“Oh? and what about two years ago, the incident around Christmastime?”
“You’re right. It’s very unusual for the harvest to dry up like it did then … and now.”
“Remind me, what was the reason for it then?”
Aie, aie, aie. Getting the backstory into a novel unobtrusively is one of the more difficult tasks facing the novelist or — even worse — short story writer. And maid-butler dialogue isn’t the worst of it.
But this article isn’t about backstory (though I’d be happy to do one someday). It’s on the picturesque names that we find to define these literary devices.
Being neither a science-fiction author nor a science-fiction reader, I probably come very late to this wonderful page: the Turkey City Lexicon. Here we have far more wonderful names (for far more wonderful literary devices) than I’d ever dreamed of. To name just a few:
- Card Tricks in the Dark
- Eyeball Kick
- Mrs. Brown
- AM/FM
- Brenda Starr Dialogue
Want to know what they mean? Go check them out at Turkey City. And then you’ll be … beyond the elements of style!
Posted in About Writing, Fiction on November 15th, 2007
I have to admit: it’s my favorite genre. In fact, I’d rather be curled up with a good mystery — preferably an English country-house murder, a la Dorothy Sayers — than do just about anything else.
And at a time when publishers are constantly shrinking their lists and new books remain on bookshop shelves for a mere 15 days before being returned, it’s heartening for me to know that I belong to a tribe whose appetite for mysteries is as insatiable as my own. There’s a thriving market for mystery and detective novels, which hopefully means that they will always be around for people like me to read.
According to Bowker’s Books In Print database, 5,580 new mystery and detective titles and editions were published in the U.S. in 2006. That’s a nine percent increase over 2005 and a 33% increase over 2002. The peak year for the category was 2004, when 5,715 new titles and editions were published.
How does that divide out amongst the various sub-genres that exist within the categry? Of 2006’s 5,580 new mystery and detective titles published …
- … 22% were mass market editions
- … 23% were hardcovers
- … 44% were trade paper editions
- … 13% were published for children and young adults
- … 37% were reviewed in at least one source monitored by Bowker
- … 7% appeared on at least one bestseller list monitored by Bowker
We have to see that as good news, both as readers and as writers. And it’s certainly a bunch of statistics … beyond the elements of style!
Posted in Books, Publishing, Publishers, Fiction, Reading on October 27th, 2007
All right, it’s not going to sound like this article has very much to do with language, but bear with me. I’ll try to twist it aound there before I’m finished. Maybe.
The truth is, my mind is filled with swirling colors and haunting music. I’m in Philadelphia this weekend at FaerieCon, a gathering for all things and beings magical, mystical, and downright strange. There are Good Fairies and Bad Fairies (you can probably guess which I find more interesting), Green Men and satyrs, even a dragon or two … and it’s all fabulous good fun.
Saturday morning I sat and listened to a lecture by Tolkien illustrator Ted Nasmith, and afterward my stepdaughter Anastasia brought up what she calls Tolkien’s ability to multitask, writing and lecturing and, in the midst of it all, managing to create several complete languages.
And they are extraordinary. A list barely scratches the surface of the riches and complexeties of languages invented for a race that exists only in one’s mind, yet whose history, sociology, and psychology are so clearly understood and articulated that, to many and for all these years after his death, they seem real. It’s not just a gift, though I’ll never argue that Tolkien wasn’t gifted; it’s also an enormous undertaking that could only be done from some sort of passion in the soul.
And for those of you who look to this column for practical advice, I had a nice long talk with Kerry Estevez, the editor over at Medallion Press, who noted that many, many more books would be accepted if writers (and, for that matter, literary agents) would just read the submission guidelines and follow them. Doesn’t sound that difficult, folks. She’s currently looking for historical fiction/fantasy, and if there’s some romance woven in, so much the better!
So pay attention to guidelines for the good of your publications list, and pay attention to the fairies for the good of your heart. And you’ll be … beyond the elements of style!
Posted in Proposal, Books, Submissions, Getting Published, Editors, Words, Fiction on October 15th, 2007
It used to be called a short-short. Or even a short-short-short (though I’ll be the first to admit that the latter sounds a little too silly). These days it’s called flash fiction: a (very!) short storytelling form.
How many words is short? That depends on the publication. Generally anything under 1,000 words is considered flash fiction, though some purists put the number at 100. Others push the envelope at 25. You get the drift.
Do not be seduced by the length, however: good flash fiction is extremely difficult to write. When you’re dealing with so few words, every one of them has to count, every one of them has to be just right.
Believe it or not, you still need a story arc: a beginning, a middle, and an end. This is how flash differs from a vignette: you still need to tell a story, make a point; and the fact that you need to do it with so few tools – words – means that you have to be concise, clear, on topic, and… well, yes: elegant. It still needs to be readable, after all.
What do you need to watch out for? Adverbs and adjectives! Ask yourself whether they are really necessary in getting your story told. My guess is that you’ll end up eliminating most if not all of them. In fact, ask youself whether any of your words are necessary… you may be surprised at what you find!
Exercise: Feeling inspired? Then let’s get going! Try out the flash fiction genre now and see how it works. Your assignment is to write a story in 25 words. Exactly 25 words – not 24 or 26.
Markets: There are a number of online literary journals that accept flash fiction submissions; included here are a few that specialize in flash (feel free to add more in the Comments thread if you know of any!).
But wait, there’s more! Here’s a great side effect to trying it out: even if you never publish any flash fiction, the very act of writing it, as an exercise, will help you develop a critical eye toward all of your writing. Once you get used to asking yourself whether this word or that word is absolutely necessary, you’ll be able to clear away a lot of the overwriting that’s such a common pitfall for beginning writers. And it will take you a step closer to moving… beyond the elements of style!
Posted in Words, Fiction on May 12th, 2006
