Ever since I got the word last August that Parke Godwin’s health and faculties were in decline, I knew I was going to have to write this post sooner or later. It was perhaps selfish of me that I wanted it to be later. Much later. I had dreams of receiving one more of his witty letters, finished with that flourish of a self-caricature he always drew after the closing, even though we’d long since switched to email and those caricatures were gone. Then I thought of my father in law, who I loved dearly, telling me, not too long from the end, “I’m so tired.” I understood what he meant then, though I tried to pretend that I didn’t. His body was just worn out and it was time to go, and it was the same with Parke Godwin. “Pete” to his friends, who were legion. I was proud to count myself among them. Continue reading
Category Archives: Writing
In Which I Am a Sadistic Rat
I really don’t like thinking that I’m a sadistic rat, mind you. I mean, I know I’m a long way from being a good person–keeping in mind that I have rather high standards in that regard–I’m far too aware of my own shortcomings, and all the times I knew what the right thing to do was…and didn’t do it. So no, I don’t consider myself a particularly good person in the sense of being a credit to my species, but a “sadistic rat”? Isn’t that a little harsh?
No, not really. See, I’ve been working on a writing project in plot resolution mode for a bit. It’s slowing down the actual word count, but it’s a necessary step. And the question “What’s at stake for my hero in this?” quickly morphs into “What is the absolute worst thing I can do to him?” And I thought of something diabolical. Nasty. Heart-breaking. I know what you’re thinking, but that’s not the “sadistic rat” part. That came out when I realized that the absolute worst thing wasn’t actually the absolute worst thing, because I had already done the absolute worst thing to him that I could do in a previous adventure…which wasn’t the absolute worst thing either, because it occurred to me that the absolute worst thing was something I’d done to him even before the reader ever met the guy, something that continues to haunt him until the present situation and will beyond it, assuming he survives.
So, not the “absolute worst thing” I could do to him, because I’d already done it. Twice over. But pretty damn bad. And, yes, I’m going to do it. The story needs it, and the story always comes first.
I am a sadistic rat, no question. It goes with the job description.
Don’t Get Comfortable
The problem with being comfortable is…well, the “comfort” part. As human beings, we like our comforts. Very smart people spend a lot of time trying to figure out new ways of making people comfortable, and there’s a reason for that. Kick up the recliner with a beer and a bag of nachos, watch the game, what could be better? So far as comfort goes, not a lot. Just everything else. Comfort is the killer.
You say that like it’s a bad thing.
For writers, painters, musicians, artists of all sorts? Not just a bad thing, but possibly the absolute worst thing you can do is to get too comfortable. Not physically—we’re not talking “starving in garrets” here–but in every other way that matters to your work. And it is way too easy to get comfortable, because as you progress in your work, whatever it is, you will eventually discover your strengths. We all have them. On a process level, you may find that you have a gift for tight, vivid descriptions, or catchy dialogue. So much so that you find yourself fighting the urge to make your stories all description or all dialogue, and that’s a good thing. You’re going to know instinctively that overemphasis on one or the other is a bad idea structurally and esthetically. Yet there’s a level to this where instinct doesn’t serve quite as well.
Once you get out of process, there are more things to be good at. Yes, I know, that’s not a bad thing…until it is. Say you have a gift for painting landscapes. Comes easily, almost naturally. You’d be quite happy painting landscapes for the rest of your life. Or writing space opera. Say you’re really good at writing space opera, you have a devoted readership who will devour whatever you write on the subject. Even if the tenth book feels a lot to you like the first three. Are you writing the same story over and over? Maybe not, you work at keeping it fresh, for yourself if for no other reason. Or maybe what you’re really good at is writing one sort of space opera. Maybe your readers won’t notice. Chances are they will, eventually, but chances also are that you’ll burn out long before they do.
Playing to your strengths can be a trap. If you want to avoid it, every now and then you have to get out of your comfort zone. This can be easy or extremely difficult, but what matters is that you do it. I’m mostly a fantasist. That’s where I’m comfortable, and I don’t plan to leave. But every now and then I have to do a pure quill science fiction story. Partly because the story was there to write, but also to stretch the writerly muscles that don’t get enough exercise. I’ve done comic scripts for the same reason. Or to talk about an extreme example, for our last anniversary I wrote and performed an original song for my wife. Music and lyrics both. I’d never written a song lyric in my life, and I’d certainly never attempted music. As for the result, let’s just say the critics were being kind. I may not do it again. But I might.
Or as one of my guitar mentors put it—“Don’t practice what you can do. Practice what you can’t do.”
And, now and again, surprise the hell out of yourself. It’s good for you.
Yume no Monogatari
This is an account of a dream, so those of you bored by such things can be forewarned and skim elsewhere. I dreamed that the old Victorian-style house I spent most of my childhood in was still standing (it isn’t). Since we weren’t using it, I had volunteered it to be blown up (think Mythbusters), but my mother said no, we can’t blow it up. We should sell it.
Fine, says I, but if we’re not blowing it up I know the attic is full of things I need to look at before we sell it to anyone else. So I go into the attic. In real life the attic was just an attic, unfinished, no flooring, and the only time I ever went into it was the time I accidentally set the house on fire and needed to make sure that there was no smoldering going on, but that’s another story–which I will never tell, because it’s just too embarrassing. Anyway, in the dream the attic was HUGE. Bigger than our living quarters even. Divided into large rooms. Each room held something different. In one room there was nothing but very large stainless-steel vessels, which I recognized as parts of old milking machines. Another room held nothing but quivers full of arrows. The last room I visited was, to me, the most interesting because it was full of old books. Apparently I had spent quite a bit of time there as a kid, and one book was lying on the floor, open to the page I’d been reading years ago before I’d gone off to college and never finished it. Yet even that wasn’t what caught my attention, that was yet another book. A large book. And by “large” I mean about four feet high and three across, a picture book called something like SCENES FROM TOKYO. It was published just after WWII, and show paintings (not photos) of street scenes from the early 1950’s.
I opened it and it happened to fall open on a page showing three large men dressed as either Mongols or Tibetan Sherpas standing in a Japanese ice cream shop. The proprietor is handing one of them an ice cream cone.
Caption Reads: “Visitor Being Presented With the Ice Cream Cone of Redemption”
I was relating the dream to Carol, but after the Large Book she just sighed. “You know, I was doing pretty well parsing this in symbolic terms until ‘The Ice Cream Cone of Redemption.'”
Maybe it means something. Maybe I just had a craving.
How About “Free”?
Just a quick note in case anyone didn’t know that LightSpeed Magazine now has reprinted “The Man Who Carved Skulls” on their website, and as of the 7th, it’s free, along with an Author Spotlight mini-interview which will tell you more than you ever wanted to know about the story and the process that put it there. It’s set in the same universe as A Warrior of Dreams, but you certainly don’t need to have read the book to follow the story.
For no particular reason, I was thinking about rewards, those little things you do for yourself when you’ve accomplished something and deserve a treat. For a good hour’s guitar practice, for instance, last night I rewarded myself by jamming along with a recording of Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood playing “Cocaine” on YouTube. It’s also practice, in that it helps with things like taking cues from other players (play softer during Eric and Steve’s solos!) and keeping in time. Also a lot more fun than doing Spider Fingers.
Then I thought about writing rewards. What’s the reward for a good day’s writing? And I realized that I don’t give myself rewards for that. I look at the words produced and that makes me feel good all by itself.
Richard Parks 