On the Bloody Good, Good Bloody Art of Surprise

There's nothing quite like a good jack-in-the-box to take a writer's breath away and send him smiling back to work.



I outline more than most, I know, to screw up my nerve to begin a new book. But I outline only to a point, after which I may know the main 'beats' of the tale, though not the connecting links from one chapter to the next. And sometimes the beats have long spaces between: for example, from my hero's realization that X was actually murdered and that Y is the villain...to his knowledge of how to Correct this.

My new WIP (work in progress), the fourth Boss MacTavin mystery, has blindsided me repeatedly with its infernal surprises. Now, I don't mean only the plot twists, which I can't give away here. I mean little mysteries that simply refused to come clear...until now: how, when and where Boss will get to use the fab new gun he was given in Boss #3, when he's been forbidden in this book the use of any weapon--and is regularly checked by the cops...how, when and where he'll get a scene with Suzy Wong, his new love, though it isn't safe for her to be with him now in Seattle...etc.




The question for me is no longer whether to outline or not. To me an over-structured tale that drives the tale's beats with a whip is as flawed as a shaggy dog story that's been made up on the fly. Whether s/he writes down the outline or conceives it on long, brooding walks by the beach, the writer should begin, I think, with a working sense of the book's structure and a grasp of the general beats.

That said, I now would add that surrender is also essential. The best stories are not paint-by-number. And the real heart often won't come clear until we've begun. When that happens, we'd better be humble enough to turn the reins over and let Baby drive.




Gotta go. Still waiting to find out how to get Boss MacTavin his gun!

When Writing, Come Ready--Not Ready-or-Not

The deadline to start writing my next Boss MacTavin mystery has been set now: March 1.  I've been brooding and taking preliminary notes since 12/16...feeling readier and readier. But the pieces did not really fall into place till this week, when my research took me in a new direction.



I'd already committed to tackling a crime-line that no one else had done. But I feared the crime might seem too small--and that attempts to make more of it would come across as far-fetched. I had one angle that might work but my confidence still remained shaky. That is, it remained shaky till I rolled up my sleeves and began to really dig. The specific research had unexpected benefits. For one thing, it led me to an additional character, a former cop with expertise in this growing crime. And the more I learned about the crime, the more easily I could plot out ways for Boss MacTavin to find Mr. Big.



Well, be 'evil' enough--in your writing, at least, to learn how to out-think your villains.

If I did not believe in readiness...if I were driven to crank out as many books as can every year...I suppose I could start now and finish the book in three months, as some do. But I'll improve my readiness this month in the following ways:
1) Step up research and  note-taking
2) Draw up a working outline
3) Make a set of character cards for my recurring cast: the basics, things one can easily forget over the course of the years.
4) Continue tinkering with opening lines
5) Buy a different style of Moleskine notebook, one that feels right for this book
6) Work out and get plenty of rest
7) Go to San Francisco at month's end for a short vacation and the chance to take notes for the opening scene in S.F.

So readiness, for me, is a winning combination of training, research, preparation, strategy, energy maintenance and confidence. The first two drafts of any book are brutally rough on most writers. But in our way we are athletes. And as I prepare for the big brawl ahead, I try to keep these words in mind:

Research: Before or After?

Some best-selling writers prefer to get the story down, with blanks left for things to research: the history of a part of town...types of trees and flowers,,,architectural styles of homes...etc. In an interview, a while back, Stephen King claimed that he filled in the blanks after completing the story. And in his Top 20 Rules for Writers he advises: 'If you do need to do research because parts of your story deal with things about which you know little or nothing, remember (the) word back. That's where research belongs: as far in the background and the back story as you can get it.'

It's hard to argue with success. But, even so, other sorts of writers--especially historical novelists--may need to do the research first...and do a lot more of it. For them, the details are more than seasoning to sprinkle through the story...but close to the soul of the feast. Margaret Mitchell took time to learn when the bustle replaced the wide hoop skirt--in 1868. By her own account, she read the files of old newspapers from 1860 to 1878, plus hundreds of old magazines, diaries and letters, while consulting hundreds of books. Interestingly, she claims to have taken very few notes. She retained what she needed in a mind like a steel trap, allowing the facts to suffuse her with a rich feeling for the era.

We'd have had a far different book if she'd dreamily made it all up at her desk, then took time to fill in the blanks.




Does attention to detail like that matter in a mystery or popular novel?

Stephen Saylor's Roma Sub Roma mysteries, set in the time of Sulla, Cicero, Caesar and Cleopatra, feature a detective named Gordianus the Finder. The books are far less densely detailed than the Roman epics of Colleen McCullough, yet readers around the world revere them--not just for the mysteries and the breakneck packing...but for their sense of time and place, conveyed in the just-perfect details.

http://tinyurl.com/mhw2sgh

Inspired by Saylor's method...




Four months ago, when I moved to Seattle, I'd already decided to set most of the next Boss MacTavin mystery here. And in the past four months I've acquired a working sense of Seattle--specifically, the rougher parts that I wanted to make my real focus. So I might have just jumped in and started to write...But I did what I always do, beginning with a journal I proceeded to fill up with questions and notes.

I may end up using 10% of my research. Even so, I won't regard the 90% as a waste. I want the confidence level that comes with knowing 100%. I want the sense of power that comes with carefully selecting. So, here I am spending a couple of months researching things that cross my mind as the book in my head gathers more depth and shape. And every now and then some cool thing I learn will offer the plot line a dazzling new spin.

Back to school now to learn more about:
1) Alternative weapons.
2) Retail theft: by both shoplifters and staff.
3) 3rd and Pike, 'The Scourge of Seattle'.
4) Pioneer Squars
5) Tent cities for the homeless.
6) The ritzier parts of Seattle.
7) Drug use and alcoholism.
8) Racial make-up of Seattle.
9) Income diversity.


Viva, La Digging!

Three Ways to Begin Almost Anything...Plus One

Those are the big 3 components of most start-up plans, whether we're starting a business or beginning a new book. I agree, but in my case I do need one more:




A small itch, to start...then the son of an itch...All the rest amount to nothing till I have that inner itch. I can nurse Ideas and play with Plans until the cows come home. But it won't make a damned bit of difference. I need the itch to get in gear. And the itch is the one thing that cannot be forced.

The itch manifests in several ways: the desire to find a new notebook, something a little bit different this time, in which to lay the groundwork...scheduling possibilities for writing daily while I work...a growing need to spend time with my characters...more and more questions about them...

This is quite different, for me, than sitting one day like a calm, controlling pro. As the itch progresses, in fact, I grow more and more controlled until I really can't resist scratching the itch as I must.

So yesterday I found the just-perfect notebook for the new Boss MacTavin mystery. I passed a slew of Moleskines to snatch a 9x12 stiff-covered, 80 sheet Cambridge notebook. What grabbed me was the 2" bordered column on the outside of each page. I could make special notes there, memos to myself, etc.

Within the next few days, after I've finished preparing Red Champagne for its December launch, I'll begin to scratch with pages of questions and notes...which, I'll know from memory, will quickly multiply. Questions breed questions and notes breed more notes. And this could be a dangerous thing--as the wannabe writers in bars will tell you between beers--if the scratching didn't generate an even fiercer itch one day:

To try out some opening sentences. No plan to really start writing--not yet! But one of those opening sentences will lead us to try out a second...then a third...

And then we're lost as well as found. We're into perpetual scratch mode...and loving every second...as our confidence grows while the happy itch goes wild.

What the hell. At least we're not suffering from this dread affliction:

What If Every Book Has Its Own Mojo?

Here are only a few of the tools that great writers swear by:
--Pencils
--Pens
--Legal pads
--Stenographer's notebooks
--Moleskine notebooks
      Reporter-style
      Standard
--Spiral schoolboy notebooks
--Index cards

Now let's proceed to the writing itself:
--Long hand
--Laptop
--Tablet
--Dictation software

And let's consider the eternal questions:
--Outline
--Spontaneous creative combustion
--Number of drafts

As writers we may spend years fine-tuning the method that we say as ours--without meeting anyone who works in the same way. Though I put a lot of mileage on my laptop in the long course of writing a novel, I can't imagine not drafting it out first by hand. With what? Why, a mechanical pencil filled with thick number 7 lead.

I used legal pads for many years, gravitating to index cards because I frequently wrote on the run and liked the notion of having much of my book in my pocket. I also liked the ease of shifting pages or chapters around. Still, Moleskine notebooks came to exert a potent appeal: pocket-sized but with a solidness that strengthens my sense of a real book in the works.

So, I'm a Moleskine man for now. But I find myself starting to wonder if certain new books may call for new methods, new tools. One day I may hear the call to draft a new book on a tablet...or even use dictation software. And I've committed to heeding the call if and when I hear it.

Oh, I'll still love my pencils and Moleskines. And there'll always be a soft spot in my heart for index cards. But new footwork may lead to new journeys. And isn't that, after all, what art is all about?