Feeling Bad for Neil

r-avatarWe give our characters a rough time. They’d probably all feel like taking a swing at us, were we to somehow meet. Some of them inspire no sympathy, while for others we do spare a regretful thought now and then for what we’ve put them through.

At the moment, we’re feeling a little sorry for Neil. He’s a secondary character (and it feels unkind just pointing that out — “thanks, now you’re marginalizing me, too?”) in the music novel. Not quite 10% of it is from his point of view. He’s probably the nicest person in the cast, at least top three. He’s a sweetheart. And we’re cruel to him.

The latest ignominy to be visited on Neil is that we cut one of his scenes. Not just any scene: this was his Emmy Moment, a cathartic, self-revelatory monologue. It’s tranquil, but not boring. Peaceful. Stuff that we kept includes some truly brutal events, things Neil might have voted to cut instead.

Sorry, Neil.

In a previous draft of the book there was substantially less Neil POV, as in one scene. Rune Skelley doesn’t have a lot of rules (not strict ones, anyway) but we really do try to avoid giving anybody exactly one POV scene. In this case, it was a really good scene that performed important functions in the story, and it worked because of Neil’s POV specifically. Our solution was to find at least one other beat that could be shown from Neil. We knew we were already bending our “rule,” so we took special care not to create a pointless scene just as an excuse for the POV. That’s how he got his chance to grow as a human being right before your eyes.

swish pan!

Now we’ve made huge revisions (resulting in a borderline-huge manuscript!) and, in this draft, Neil gets point of view several times. That cathartic moment of discovery we set up for him is still a lovely scene, but, well, there’s pacing to consider… A good writing partner offers suggestions for what to cut as well as what to add. Suggesting cuts is easy when the material in question is shoddy, but that wasn’t the case here. Sometimes it has to come out even though there’s nothing wrong with it. Those are the difficult choices.

It’s not that we suddenly decided Neil was slowing things down, rather the story beats had shifted due to all the restructuring. We no longer wanted the stillness of Neil’s big scene in that particular spot. So, Neil loses out in pursuit of the greater good for the book overall. The events still take place, just not on the page. (See, Neil? It’s not so terrible.)

We also cut a short scene from one of the other secondary POVs, but we have no sympathy for Darren.

Professor McMurphy

  • k-avatarsuch isolating topography
  • blanched, blotched, and faded
  • a beautiful double-cube room
  • some gigantic log spinning
  • slid into the huge four poster bed
  • why in all the hells

Professor McMurphy liked to follow a carefully planned curriculum, spending the early part of the semester on simple quadratics and such, isolating topography from less demanding material. But his students showed little appreciation, showering the professor with old cabbages that were blanched, blotched, and faded. He taught Abstruse Mathematics, lecturing in a beautiful double-cube room (216 square meters, 125 seats) in a prime location (room 97). Overhead, a mobile made of aluminum numerals slowly pivoted, like some enormous exponent or some gigantic log spinning in the air. But the students didn’t care.

Kelsie was by far the worst, but Professor McMurphy couldn’t flunk her. She knew too much. Where he was ticklish, mainly. That night, as she slid into the huge four poster bed beside him, he wondered why in all the hells she didn’t share his passion for math. Then he turned his mind to other things (computing the billionth digit of Pi) and turned his body to Kelsie.

 

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The Aesthetic Accomplished by the Artist

  • by jeninsecure escapist
  • certain foundation of misery
  • witches who steal penises
  • aesthetic

“The aesthetic accomplished by the artist is a certain foundation of misery seen through the eyes of an insecure escapist,” Desmond wrote, “but why this piece is called ‘Witches Who Steal Penises‘ is beyond me.”

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Madness In Our Method, But Not Like Back Then

r-avatarWe recently devoted an entire meeting of our critique group to the Rune Skelley Method. Jen and Kent brought the rainbow, and a hard-copy of the outline, and a few sample stubs. Our fellow authors were keen to hear details of how we use all these components in our process. How we do things, of course, is not necessarily what will work best for you. (But details are available at the links above, if you’re interested.)

The key is that we have a process.

You know you’re supposed to have an outline. You know that the more you road-test your plot before you start writing prose, the less likely you’ll get stuck. You know you’re supposed to get enough sleep, and eat your veggies, and not run with scissors. We certainly hope you’re heeding at least some of that advice, but knowing what you should do and doing it consistently are not the same thing.

That’s another hidden strength of writing in a partnership: you can’t get away with winging it, which forces discipline upon you. It makes you actually do the things you know you’re supposed to.

The conversation at our critique meeting spanned the entire Rune Skelley career. We didn’t always have a defined process — we didn’t know we wouldn’t get away with winging it, and wing it we did. We ran, with and without scissors. We wrote much of our first novel from inspiration, letting the characters find their ways into more and more trouble with little supervision. It built up effortlessly into a top-heavy mess. There was no outline, just a vague sort of mission statement for how it was all supposed to end. For a while, it ended in tears and an abandoned manuscript. We had to put it aside for a year. A year. We just stopped writing it. When we did go back, we largely started over. It took a long time and a gigantic amount of work to figure that book out.

What we know now is that all those impulsive maneuvers our characters came up with, which we spent months transcribing into elaborate prose, should have been explored in brainstorming sessions where they could be be debugged quickly, and where potentially better alternatives could more easily be considered. By doing all the exploration in long-form text (written longhand, BTW) we gave ourselves a huge disincentive to think about changing it. So when it became clear that we didn’t have a way forward from where we were, that something had to change, we needed that year off before we could face the task.

In contrast, Novel #5 worked the first time. There’s still work to be done, but it came out the proper overall shape in one go. We devoted a considerable amount of time up front to documenting what was supposed to happen, and fleshing out the setting, and analyzing the characters’ psyches. Considerable time, but way less than a year. And we didn’t have cry about it.

They All Shared Her Grace of Posture

  • k-avatarfor verily, her breasts were like melons
  • the sitter responded with a slack-jawed grin
  • complimented Ian on his quick head
  • inwardly he didn’t feel too sympathetic
  • they all shared her grace of posture

They all shared her grace of posture, oddly, for verily her breasts were like melons. Her ass was like additional melons, a fact perhaps holding the key to the mystery of her poise.

Balance. Balance in all things, not just melons. The young twins lacked melons altogether, having yet to attain lemons, but they were balanced. When their parents went out, the twins looked forward to their sitter’s company.

“Stephanie!” enthused both youngsters. The sitter responded with a slack-jawed grin. (But a well-balanced one.)

Lurking in the bushes, two snipers shared candy. Discovering that the bag held an odd number of M&Ms, the left-most assassin placed the last chocolate morsel under a bush, for the squirrels. Keith complimented Ian on his quick head. Ian expressed poetical regret that they must make orphans of these children, but inwardly he didn’t feel too sympathetic.

 

 

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Turning Her Lips

  • by jenstill damp from the bath
  • turning her lips
  • I know he is alive
  • you do have a lovely arse
  • made use of vibrational lore
  • revel in the soft skin of the breasts

Turning her lips from a smile to a grimace, Reggie made use of vibrational lore handed down to her from her grandmother to confuse the mind of her supervisor so that she could slip out of work early Friday afternoon.

At home later, her hair still damp from the bath, Reggie turned on Maury in time to see a woman declare, “I know he is alive!”

I guess she’s talking about her baby-daddy, Reggie thought.

In the kitchen she opened the refrigerator to find an early dinner. The only thing that looked appetizing was the leftover fried chicken. She took a moment to mentally revel in the soft skin of the breasts before nuking them.

After eating, Reggie shimmied into her slinky black dress and checked her appearance in the mirror before heading out to the local pub.

“You do have a lovely arse!” she told herself happily.

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Stomp!

r-avatarIt was tedious and time-consuming, but last night we finally finished stomping the weasels in the music novel. Weasel words are useless little things that take up space and bloat a manuscript while adding no nutritional value. Words like “that” and “had” and “then.” Removing them is sort of like combing out nits. Kent and Jen sit together at one desk, sharing a single monitor, and make monkey noises at the text. We look at every single instance of each trouble word and debate its merits.

Often no discussion is necessary. Kent and Jen agree that a particular “just” stays or goes. Other times there is dissension and a heated debate develops. So far we have not needed the intervention of an impartial arbitrator, but we have come close.

The de-weaseling process is one a solo author can go through, but a writing partner makes it much more efficient. Of course when you’re working on your own you won’t get into any arguments, which we will admit has its appeal. When you work with a coauthor, though, you cover for each other. There will be work sessions when one or the other of you isn’t feeling particularly ruthless. That’s when your collaborator takes the lead, leaving the weasels no safe harbor. Your manuscript will thank you.

Through the judicious use of weasel-stomping boots, we removed 652 instances of “that,” and 468 of “had.” All told, we cut over 5000 garbage words from our prose. It’s leaner and meaner now, and that much closer to publishable.

The Condition of the Sheets

  • k-avataran army of sweating mules
  • supple-looking, with iridescent lapels
  • “like a cat?”
  • a month’s rent in advance
  • the Trump Bordello
  • wearing only yachtsman’s loafers and underpants

The condition of the sheets suggested that the bed had been the scene of some great undertaking by an army of sweating mules. But the condition of Rodrigo’s attire made it clear that, if he’d had any part in those labors, he was now above such menial things and destined for a corner office. His lime-green corduroy trousers were counterpointed by a plasticine blazer in tones of orange and gold, supple-looking, with iridescent lapels. (It was surely a very stylish corner office.)

Three sharp knocks at the door. Rodrigo crossed the suite and opened the door to Faye-Wren, his confidante, his bookie, and his hired wrench. Her pillbox sat askew to the right, meaning her latest assignment had been completed successfully. The twinkle in her almond eyes meant she’d heard about Rodrigo’s exploits of the previous night. “Was she very flexible and fastidious?” Faye-Wren asked impertinently, “like a cat?”

Rodrigo responded with a lazy-eyed smile. His carnal escapades had centered on someone quite catlike, but not feminine in the least. By paying a month’s rent in advance, he got first pick of the diversions on offer at the Trump Bordello.

It was then that Faye-Wren doffed her hat, and Rodrigo saw that the gesture left her wearing only yachtsman’s loafers and underpants.

 

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I Had Been Tracking the Missing Goats

  • by jenthey sup at alien tables
  • the missing goats
  • kiss the girls
  • “Bandits — Bandits! Bandits!”
  • water-gypsies!
  • the toothed circle of a reconstructed Stonehenge

I had been tracking the missing goats for almost 24 hours, ever since my sister ran from the barn screaming, “Bandits — Bandits! Bandits!” The trail led me here, to the toothed circle of a reconstructed Stonehenge on the lonely, windy Salisbury Plain. Who could have re-erected these enormous stones in a single evening? And then the answer came to me. Water-gypsies! Harnessing their intrepid water-moose, the lovely aquatic extraterrestrials could accomplish nearly anything. I sat on the cold, damp ground and leaned my back against one of the towering sarsen stones and waited for my chance to kiss the girls from another world. As for the goats? Well, I’m afraid to say that tonight they sup at alien tables. We shan’t be seeing them again.

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