Spec Fic Writer's 101: Action Sequences with John A. Pitts

They say all good things must come to an end. And with this final entry into Speculative Fiction, we've come to a close. John A. Pitts volunteered to take on a topic, when Ken Scholes recruited him to the cause. I have to admit, I'm a slacker. I haven't made the time to read John's books yet, but Black Blade Blues, is on my to read list. Plus he's a fellow martial artist, as his post on writing compelling action sequences shows. Without further adieu, let's get to the reason we are all here.

Action Sequences with John A. Pitts

Action Sequences are essential to writing any story.  A good action sequence drives the story forward, keeping the reader at the edge of their seat, holding their breath, while they flip the pages with urgent need.

Many writers assume that action sequences are synonymous with battle scenes.  This is a misnomer.  While fight scenes are definitely action, many things encompass a good action sequence.  Car chases come to mind, or a heroine running to safety, trying to avoid being eaten by a beastie. 

In my novel, Honeyed Words, I have one such scene that I'll use to illustrate.

Katie spun around, listening.  There were noises in the walls.  She glanced up at the windows; the black, swirling mass of spirits continued to spiral down toward the house from the sky.

Whatever was happening here was drawing in the spirits from all around.  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw spiders crawling from the walls.  Eaters had breached the house.  Masses of them were pouring through the windows then, flowing around Sarah and Qindra, but coming right for Katie.

She ran.

Out in the hall, she bounced against the bedroom door.  The dead man sat up, opened his eyes and hissed at her.  She fell back against the wall, ping-ponging down the hall, past the laundry where the face spoke to her through the dryer door. 

Something scrambled across the tile of the bathroom, but it had not reached the door, and she ran on. 

Here young Katie is trapped in a haunted house which is being inundated with spirits, walking corpses and eaters, a spider like creature from a sideways dimension that parallels our own.  Notice while the sentences start out longer, setting the stage for the events at hand.  There is no fight here, just terror as she flees back to the front of the house, hoping to avoid the nasties that are coming for her.

Notice the short choppy sentences and clauses.  The point of an action sequence is to build tension and drive the story forward.  The horror aspect of this scene adds to the overall sense of urgency.

Another way to show action is in a fight situation.  In Black Blade Blues, my main character, Sarah Beauhall, has her first real battle.

No one stopped me when I careened through downtown.  I parked in front of a fire hydrant and jumped out, heading for Katie's door.

"'Ware, smith," Homeless Joe yelled at me as he hobbled around the corner.  "Flee, child, before it is too late."

I spun around.  Joe was nearly running with a large staff in his hand, limping along with a bad knee or hip, I never knew which.  I took a step toward him, curious about his sudden outburst when two very large bodies came out from the alley and hit Joe.  The first man, whom I recognized as Ernie from the other night, clipped Joe on the back of the head, sending the old man sprawling onto the sidewalk.

The second thug, Bert, kicked the staff away and stomped down on Joe's elbow.  I heard the pop from the street.  Joe let out a guttural cry, and Ernie kicked him in the chest.

"Leave him alone," I shouted, balling my fists at my side.

Ernie kicked Joe again, and Bert turned to me with a feral grin.  "You again," he said.  "I'll squeeze your head until it pops."

He took a step toward me, and Joe lunged forward, grabbing him by the ankle and causing him to trip.

I turned to the car, fumbled the keys a moment, and then got the hatch opened.  My hammers were in the back, along with the rest of my personal smithing gear. 

I found the first hammer, and at the same time, found the roll of pants and swords.  My left hand fell on Gram's pommel and the world shifted slightly.  The grunting and yelling of the two brutes took on a more rough and grinding quality, like the sound of a landslide.

I spun around as Bert ran up to me, and I stepped aside, swinging the hammer back to clip him in the elbow.  I didn't stop, but ran forward and launched myself at Ernie, hammer in my right fist, Gram in my left.

That was when I got a good look at them.  With Gram in my hand, the glamour that hid their true appearance fell away, and I saw them for who and what they truly were.

Giants.  That's what Rolph had said.  These guys were twelve feet tall and as wide as a bus.  How they managed to fit in even a Hummer astounded me.  I leapt at Ernie, landing to his left side, and brought the hammer around.  He dodged at the last moment, and instead of catching him in the head, he absorbed the blow on his shoulder.

If felt like striking a granite wall.

However, he felt something, because he stumbled away from Joe and grunted with the blow.

Bert rushed me from the rear, sounding like a freight train.  I spun, letting him come to me, and feinted with the hammer, only to bring Gram around in a short thrust, and then a quick flip of the wrist.

The blade by-passed his outstretched arm, and flicked against the side of his neck, sending a spray of blood into the cooling night.

He grabbed his throat and fell to his knees, his eyes as big as lamps.

Each step in the battle drives an emotional punch.  Sarah does not have time to think,  but acts and reacts without thinking.  She dances into combat with decisive actions and an urgent need to save the homeless man, Joe whom she's gotten to know.

Every motion is choreographed.   Each short sentence or clause raises the stakes and heightens the tension.  I treat these scenes with care, sometimes mapping out every sequence to insure that logical actions follow the one before it.

I've even gone so far as to draw maps of scenes so I can keep up with all the players.  This is especially important in the larger battle scenes that occur in each  book.  There are no limitations on the tools you can use here, just find the ones that work best for you.

Now that you understand rising tension and the use of action scenes, I think we need to look at the down beats.  There's a fine balance between rising tension and release.  This is a skill that takes much reading and practice to perfect.  You want the reader to feel their heart pounding, want their adrenaline to pump through their blood and if you are very good, they'll find themselves out of breath.  I've experienced this from high intensity action scenes. 

The key is pacing.  Drive the action faster.  The purpose of short sentences is to give the reader fast bits of information so they don't have time to catch their breath.  Long languid sentences slow down the pace, letting the reader relax, calm down.  These can be just as powerful if done correctly.

What you don't want to do is totally fatigue your reader.  Rising tension and exciting action sequences are great, but if your reader has to put the book down because they can't breathe, you've gone too far.

To have a fulfilling experience, you need to let them down from time to time.  Think of it like climbing a mountain.  Rising tension is the steep climb up, but every now and again you need a small plateau to allow the reader to catch their breath.

There are a couple of very handy ways to accomplish this without letting the reader put the book down and go wash their dishes.  First use humor.  Making jokes and funny quips is a great way to release some tension.  How many books and movies have you seen with a wise-cracking hero.  Think about the movie  Die Hard.  Bruce Willis's character is in a tight spot, injured and surrounded by bad guys who have him out numbered, out gunned and hold all the hostages. 

And yet, John McClane, Bruce's character, constantly uses smart ass responses and his quick wit to antagonize the bad guys and give the viewers a bit of relief from the incessant drum beat of violence.

There's no real point where John McClane is safe but we have moments where we can catch our breath and laugh knowing he has a moment's reprieve.

Then, the actions swings into full-force once again.

John McClane's antics bring us to the next way to give your readers a moment of reprieve.  Dialogue allows the readers to break up the action.  Now, again, we don't want to allow the reader to settle into complacency and security, but we can give them a chance to relax for a heart beat or two before we amp things back up.

Remember, for this to work, you need to keep the exposition to a minimum.  This is the antithesis of action sequences.  Long lovely scenes describing  bits of history or scenery are wonderful, and absolutely required to make a story or book work, but they will bring your pacing and tension to a grinding halt.

Use each sparingly, and as defined counter points to keep the story interesting and the readers turning those pages.


And one last word from our sponsors: In case you missed some of the excellent articles from the fine authors who have contributed to this series, you'll find the links to all of the previous posts below.

Research with Teresa Frohock
World Building with Ken Scholes
Plotting with Michael J. Sullivan
Characters with Stina Leicht
Prose with Myke Cole
Pacing with Courtney Schafer

Spec Fic Writer's 101: Pacing with Courtney Schafer

Pacing is perhaps the most ephermeral off all of the balls a writer has to juggle, but it also one of the most critical elements of compelling storytelling. The effect good pacing has on the flow of a novel can make or break the reception a author recieves in the marketplace. So when, Courtney Schafer, an up and comer in genre circles agreed to take on this difficult subject, I was anxious to see what words of wisdom she would have for would-be authors. I was really impressed by her debut novel The Whitefire Crossing which showed an impressive understanding of the craft of writing, and daring willingness to break with conventional structure. Her take on pacing is no less impressive. I found her advice to be both well informed, by her own experience and useful for writers of all levels of experience. I hope the readers of this series will glean as much useful information in her words as I did.

Pacing: The Art of Keeping Your Readers Riveted to the Page

Ah, pacing: the area most often singled out by book reviewers as problematic in debut novels.  Why?  Probably because pacing is one of the hardest things for a writer to evaluate objectively in their own work, especially at the higher, structural level.  But before we talk structure, let’s talk about the simplest aspect of pacing: the speed of the story, as experienced by the reader.

Descriptive and expository passages slow a scene’s pace down.  Pure dialogue and action speed it up.  You can also use sentence length to change a reader’s perception of pace: long sentences feel slower, short sentences feel faster.  For example, look at two snippets from my own writing.  First this one:

I sat cross-legged on a flat topped chunk of talus and soaked in the view.  Below me sprawled the broad rock strewn basin at the head of the canyon.  Dawn’s light painted the surrounding peaks a vivid gold and softened the contours of the icy snowfields that spilled from their heights.

Compared to this one:

I turned, listening in darkness. Where was he, where –

An impact slammed me against unyielding stone. Pain flared in my ribs.  I twisted and lashed out with the knife. The blade hissed through empty air.

 I spat a curse.  The only reply was a low, mocking laugh.

Second one reads faster, right?  That’s due to a combination of action and shorter sentences.  Another way to increase pace is to use run-on stream-of-consciousness sentences to convey a sense of breathless immediacy.  But that’s a technique best used in moderation, and preferably in alternation with far shorter sentences.  Here’s an example from a car chase scene in Adam Hall’s espionage thriller The Tango Briefing:

His headlights seemed rather bright even allowing for the fact that I was now facing them and I started wondering again whether I’d judged things right but there was a rising fifty on the clock by now and everything was shaping up well enough; I think it was only the primitive animal brain starting to worry: the organism didn’t like the look of this at all, up on its back legs and bloody well whining.

Ignore.

Speed now 70.

His estimated speed: 80 plus.

Minimum impact figure if things went wrong: 150.

I didn’t put the heads on yet because I wanted to save that till later: three or four seconds from now. At the moment he wouldn’t be absolutely sure what I was doing: he would have lost my rear lamps but that could mean I’d simply turned them off; he would have picked up my parking lights but he wouldn’t necessarily identify them: with an eye-level horizon the big North African stars seemed to be floating on the dunes and this would confuse him.

As Hall’s spy protagonist and a rival operative play a high-speed game of chicken that ends in a deadly crash, Hall continues to alternate between Quiller’s thoughts and spare, brutal statements of fact.  The technique is startlingly effective to maintain intensity – but it works because it fits perfectly with the book’s overall style.

 You’ll need to experiment and find out what techniques work best with your own style.  Another important thing to keep in mind is the “right” pace will vary between scenes.  Got a thrilling action scene?  Keep the pace quick.  But for a character moment, you might want to slow down to let your readers savor the emotional nuances.

You want to add in enough description to keep the reader grounded in your world without losing their interest, and enough of an internal view into a character to make them feel real and compelling without drowning the reader in angst or irrelevancies.  How do you walk that line?  It’s an art, not a science, and the really tricky part is that the answer’s different for every story.  A sword-and-sorcery tale requires a much faster pace than literary dystopian SF.  Thankfully, there are two excellent ways to judge the success of low-level pacing, and they work no matter what type of story you’re writing.

The first and easiest way: read your story aloud.  (Better yet if you can have someone else read it aloud while you listen, but that requires an extremely patient friend or spouse.)  Are there spots where your attention starts to wander?  That’s a big red warning flag that you need to increase pace and tension.  (I’ll talk more about tension in a moment, when discussing pace at the structural level.)  Conversely, is the action happening so fast that it’s confusing?  If something important just took place, does the scene convey the appropriate emotional impact to the characters, or does it rush on to something else before the reader has time to process the change?  If so, you need to slow the pace down, by adding internal dialogue, descriptive tags, or other indications of character reactions. 

But even reading aloud, it’s not always easy to see pacing issues in your own writing, because you know your world and characters so well that you see beyond what’s actually on the page.  That brings me to the second and best way to evaluate pacing: get blunt, honest feedback from readers experienced in your genre.  When I say “experienced in your genre,” I don’t mean the feedback-giver should be some professor of creative writing.  The person doesn’t have to be a writer at all.  But you want someone who both enjoys your genre and is well-read in it.  That means they’ll have an intuitive grasp of the range of pacing appropriate to the type of story you want to tell.  And even someone who’s never written a word of their own can tell you where their interest flags, or when a scene is confusing or rushed. 

Speaking of that experienced reader, I want to point out that reading widely in your genre may be the best thing you can do for yourself as a writer.  The more you read, the more you internalize what works and doesn’t work in stories – especially if you not only read, but think about the books you read.  What was it about that favorite novel that kept you glued to your chair until the wee hours of the morning?  Or what about that book whose premise sounded so intriguing, but turned out to be an utter bore?  Why did your interest fade away?

But okay, let’s move up a level now, and talk about overall story structure.  You may hear people talking about how these days debut authors need to open their novels with a “bang” to get the reader hooked.  (Established authors enjoy a little more leeway, because readers already trust in their story-telling skills.) Sometimes people misunderstand this to mean they need to start in the middle of some frenetic action scene.  But if the readers aren’t yet invested in the characters or story, it’s far more likely they’ll find the action confusing and/or boring.  I think a more useful suggestion is to try and put your story’s inciting incident as close to the start of the book as possible. What do I mean by inciting incident?  The event that sets your primary plot in motion.  To use a familiar example, in Harry Potter it’d be the invitation for him to attend Hogwarts.

Once you’ve got the hook set and the plot in motion, you can relax into a bit of a slower pace to flesh out characters and fill in your world.  But even here, you don’t want to lose narrative tension entirely.  So what is narrative tension?  It’s the suspense that keeps a reader turning the pages, wondering what will happen next.  Lose tension, and you risk losing the reader.

A lack of tension can be awfully hard for a new writer to spot.  I know it was for me.  When I first queried my original draft of The Whitefire Crossing, I got all these extremely complimentary rejections from agents praising everything from my prose to my worldbuilding...only to finish with the dreaded, “But I just didn’t fall in love with it.”  It wasn’t until I joined a critique group and got chapter-by-chapter feedback on the draft that I learned what the underlying problem was: the story lacked tension.  I wrote a post a few weeks ago at the Night Bazaar in which I go into detail on this point, complete with an example scene from my first draft of Whitefire, compared with the same scene in the final draft.  I won’t repeat the entire post here (this one’s gonna be long enough already!), but if like me you learn by example, you might find the comparison illuminating:  http://night-bazaar.com/inching-or-leaping.html.

Basically, you need to look carefully at each and every scene: is the scene pulling its weight, story-wise?  Are you always furthering the plot, deepening the characters, adding new sources of tension – or better yet, doing several of those things at once?  If not, you need to either cut or rewrite it.  And the more tension you have in the story, the faster-paced it’ll feel to the reader, because they’ll be driven to keep turning pages. 

You also need to look at the flow of tension.  You’ll have natural peaks and valleys, as characters set goals, try to achieve them, encounter setbacks or reversals, and adjust goals/plans accordingly.  But in a well-paced book, those peaks and valleys will be imposed upon an overall rising slope – the tension should increase as the book goes on, rising higher and higher until you reach the book’s climax.  A simple way to do this is by increasing the stakes (either emotional or physical) for the characters involved, each time there’s a major point of conflict.  Think of the classic epic fantasy, in which first a character’s village is destroyed by the baddies, then they realize a war’s coming to their country, then they find that the villain’s ultimate goal is the subjugation/destruction of the entire world.  Or the urban fantasy in which a detective’s hunting a monster that first threatens strangers, then the detective herself, then kidnaps the detective’s lover/child/partner (thus upping the emotional stakes).  Those are simplistic examples, perhaps, but hopefully you get the idea. 

All this is a lot to think about, right?  The good news is that you don’t need to worry much over any of it while writing your first draft.  Pacing is often best addressed in revision, when you can consider each scene in the context of the story as a whole.  So first, get that story out of your head and onto the page. Then you can cut out the dross and adjust the pacing to ensure your reader stays riveted until the very last page. 

Spec. Fic Writer's 101: Characters with Stina Leicht

My interview with Stina Leicht has been one of the top posts in the history of this blog, and one of the highlights of my experience as a reviewer. So when I decided to put together this series of guest posts, Stina was one of the first people I queried. Not only did she graciously agree to put together her thoughts on creating compelling character, she also championed the idea to her fellow writers at Night Shade Books, gathering the talents of Teresa Frohock and Courtney Schafer. I found her insights into character to be very informative and helpful in my own writing and hope you all feel the same. Not to mention, she's just so damn fun to run. Enough of my prattling, page down and enjoy.

Where Do Characters Come From? by Stina Leicht

Whenever someone asks me that question I'm tempted to tell stories of cabbage leaves and storks. But I won't. Characters and plot both come from the writer's sub-conscience. Writing is like daydreaming that way. Also, like daydreaming, there's no ONE WAY to do it--no rules. Keep in mind that there's only what works for the writer. Myself? Creating characters is one of my favorite things about writing. I enjoy watching them develop and flesh over time. My characters always start out as strangers, but we end as close friends. I usually start with at least one characteristic that is all their own. That characteristic might come from multiple sources. It might be something I noticed about myself or someone else. When I give them characteristics from people I've met I almost never do so in a way they might recognize. (Unless I tell them first. It's too easy to get in trouble.) My characters are always patchwork quilt of my own characteristics and other people's. By the way, I've never created a character based on a real person I disliked and then out of revenge killed them. That's… just not something I'd do. It feels unethical to me.

Anyway, I think it's important to like your characters--even the Black Hats. If the writer cares deeply about their characters, the readers will care. Also, a basic knowledge of psychology helps because it's important to understand people. What motivates a person to behave as they do? What failings do they have? (No one is perfect. And if they're perfect, they're not likely to be very realistic or terribly interesting.) What are their fears? Who do they love? What is important to them? What do they hate? What do they like to eat? Do they have any personality disorders? Beliefs? Oh, and whether or not your character's vision of how the universe works is correct or not isn't what really matters. (Sometimes it's more interesting if their belief is wrong.) Belief move us. We all see ourselves as the hero of the story -- even the evil people.

If you're stuck for ideas, there are fun ways to work through it. You can use character worksheets like the one found in Writing a Breakout Novel Workbook by Donald Maass. Or you can use character sheets from role playing games. I've heard of people using tarot decks, paintings, and photographs as inspiration for creating characters. I use photos and songs. It doesn't matter what you use as long as it works for you.

Three things to keep in mind regarding the creation of a realistic and interesting character:

1) Strong characters tend to be sympathetic in some way.

In my first writing group, they used to call this "petting the dog." That is, the POV character needed to demonstrate to the reader that they are worth their attention. POV characters need to be likeable in some way. There are a lot of options. The writer can use humor (self-deprecating or otherwise) or by helping someone or displaying a positive quality (courage for example) or by doing something with which the reader can relate. Understand, the POV character needs to do this as soon as possible. (I prefer to do it on the first page.) It also needs to feel natural for the character. If you force it, the reader will see right through it.

2) Strong characters have flaws.

What makes the Daniel Craig James Bond so intriguing? It's his humanity. His vulnerability. Mind you, he keeps it hidden, but it's there just beneath the surface, and we know it. We cheer for him because in spite of his weaknesses, he's strong enough to go on. Flaws give characters something internal to struggle against. Flaws add dimension. Think about it. It's our faults that make us human--not our perfection. Perfection seems too robotic or like author wish-fulfillment. Also, mistakes are important. Mistakes are how people learn and grow. We all learn by trial and error. Characters should too. Let them make mistakes--just make sure they're smart mistakes and don't repeat the same ones over and over. That gets old fast.

3) Strong characters have a touch of mystery.

They don't instantly reveal everything about themselves--everything about their past or even their present. Let's face it, no one knows all there is to know about themselves. Sometimes we get it wrong. People change. The element of surprise in a character is pretty wonderful stuff. Used correctly, it can make a beloved character even more interesting. It's best to leave the reader with a few questions about the characters--nothing major to the plot, mind you. Just trust the reader to fill in some of the blanks for themselves. It's the blanks that we fill in for ourselves as readers that make reading an interactive experience.

Characters really are my favorite aspect of writing.

Spec. Fic. Writer's 101: Plotting with Michael J. Sullivan

I know I've been conspicuously absent from the blogsphere and I want to take a moment to sincerely apologize to everyone who has been reading and commenting on my ruminations since I started this little vanity project. Real life and my own tendency to over-extend myself got the best of me for a while but I'm back and here to stay, though I doubt I'll be as prolific as I once was. With that said, I am happy to continue the Spec. Fic Writer's series with this entry on plotting by Michael J. Sullivan. Michael's a real genre success story one of the first to go from self publishing into the wider acclaim enjoyed by those who follow the more traditional road. He's a gentleman and scholar and has been a joy to read, interview, and work with on this subject. I trust you'll find his advice as enlightening as I did. Enjoy.

In various online forums I’m usually surprised when someone new to writing asks for advice as to whether to outline their plots or is it better to be a “pantser” (develop the story as you go – named for flying by the seat of our pants). The notion that anyone would ask such a thing, as if they could will themselves into one or the other based on popular opinion, shows that people are struggling to develop techniques to help them find their way. But there is no right answer to this question, and each author needs to find what works for them. For some, outlining will destroy their creativity. They prefer to discover as their characters do. The downside is you can write yourself into a corner, which could result in abandoning the book or at least having to do significant rewriting.

I’ll share my technique, as it might be helpful to those haven’t yet found what works for them…do both.  I always start a book with a “light outline” this may mean just a few sentences per chapter, or a listing of a number of scenes that I’ve already thought about before beginning. I don’t start writing until I know where I’m heading, but, and here is the important point, that doesn’t mean you can’t change direction as the story begins to unfold.  I look at the process much like a road trip.

If I’m traveling across country I’ll start with a given route and make plans where to stop to get a bite to eat or to spend the night. Along the way I’m not so focused on the trip that I ignore something interesting that I may happen upon. I’ll take that unplanned exit, and explore that back road. Perhaps I’ll be rewarded by a really cool covered bridge or a breathtaking view. It may even give me an idea at a different destination…and that’s fine. 

Characters and plots grow naturally out of plausibility and creative bursts that redirect the story. Fighting these opportunities can result in a stiff, contrived book. The trick I found was to take those unexpected paths, but then reorient the outline to accommodate for it. The idea is to always be able to see the end from where you are in the story. If at any point you make a turn and you can’t see exactly how your story ends, then you have to stop, take an hour or so and work out the problem before starting again. Once solved, you resume until the next unexpected turn. The worst thing you can do, is push on blindly writing tens of thousands of words and find yourself in a locked room that your character can’t possible escape from.

So my outlines are pretty fluid things, and little more than skeletons with some chapters having only the single bullet point "something happens here." Here is an example of how I might have outlined the start of The Wizard of Oz.

The Farm (Depression era Mid-west)

•          Gulch arrives with court order to take Dorothy’s dog Toto
•          Dog escapes returns to Dorothy
•          Dorothy fearing for Toto’s safety runs away from home

 On The Road

•         Dorothy runs into circus performer/seer/wizard
•          Old guy scares Dorothy into going home

You can see a lot of potential problems already. There are a lot of unexplained questions. Why is Gulch upset with Toto? How does Toto escape? Who exactly is the old guy and how does he scare Dorothy into going home? And these are just plot issues. What about setting and characterization? Where does this story take place? Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma? Who is Dorothy living with—parents? What are they like? Does she have brothers and sisters? Farm hands? Neighbors?

These kinds of questions can often be explored while writing. In doing so, you can still have the fun and excitement of discovering things about the story and yet, feel secure that the story will work out in the end.

Building an outline is pretty simple. You just start with a few ideas: where the story starts; something that happens in the middle; and then the end. This gives you three bullet points. You run the story though your head a few times and you get more ideas—more points. If you’re lucky you know the anti-climax and the climax. Imagine telling your idea to someone. What questions might they ask? (Exactly how old is this Dorothy? How are you going to account for Oz?) Answering these questions add more points to the outline. After a while these bullet points work like one of those draw-by-number pages. You can sort of see the story taking shape. Still it isn’t until you begin writing, that you draw that line that connects the dots and the whole thing comes alive. A few dots might need to be moved, some erased and some added, but in the end you have a well constructed story ready for polishing.

I hope this is helpful to those trying to find their own approach. Remember, there is no single right answer (and probably why it’s asked so often).  Bottom line, the more writing you do, the closer you’ll come to developing your own system that gives you the right balance of the “fun of discoverability” and the “satisfaction of completing” a novel that follows a given story arc.

Spec Fic Writer's 101: World Building by Ken Scholes

Ken Scholes is, in my opinion, one of the most underrated writers in the industry, seamlessly combining disparate elements of both science fiction and fantasy in his epic fantasy series The Psalms of Isaak. His world building is sweepingly original but maintains a comfortable familiarity to long time readers of the genre. So when Ken agreed to take part in this series and asked what topic I'd like him to cover, world building was a no brainer. I found Ken's approach to both unexpected and intuitive and am sure you'll agree. Enjoy.

World-Building, Trailer Boy Style

I’m pleased and grateful that Matt asked me to participate in his series of guest posts on speculative fiction writing.  When he invited me, I asked which topic he’d like me to tackle and he suggested world-building.

Now, though I’ve created dozens of worlds over the years including the world in my series with Tor, The Psalms of Isaak, I don’t for a minute consider myself an expert on the subject of world-building.  I’m still learning as I go, having just recently finished my fourth novel, and I’m already seeing what I’d like to do differently the next time I tackle a multi-volume series.  Still, it’s a topic I have some experience with.
When I think about the world my stories take place in – whether it’s truly a world or a universe or just a room in a house – I think about it only in terms of doing what is necessary to suspend the disbelief and engage the imagination of my reader.  The setting I place my story in is as critical to that story’s success as the characters I place in that setting and the problems that they face.

The Psalms of Isaak was my first foray into creating a big world and my approach to it was actually rather sparse.  I didn’t start out with copious notes or a map or any of that.  I started out with telling the story and allowed the world to fill itself in as I wrote.  I don’t think I even had a map until I’d finished Lamentation. Most of the world lives in my head and in the pages of the books I’ve written.  Other than some map sketches, I don’t think there are any notes around about the Named Lands.  But I do have some other things.  Other stories from earlier in the history of that world – things referred to as myth or history in the series and now being expounded upon – that reveal more of the earlier times that produced the present.  But I also have bits of verse and snippets from imagined books.  And, throughout the series, references to events, artists, actors, leaders, beliefs, quotes, descriptions of meals all to make that world a place readers can imagine.

I try to think of the things that make our world feel plausible, real, believable and then layer them into my narrative about this other world.  But again, I try to keep it light so that my reader is using their own imagination to fill in the gaps.  I like to get them to do the heavy lifting.

The other thing I do in regards to my world-building is actually rooted in my characters.  I tend to be quite brutal about my third person limited POV and that also translates into how my characters interact with their world.  If they are in a familiar place they are not going to spend pages and pages on the texture of a leaf or how the banking system works.  They will have enough information in their head about those things to move through them but not enough to bog down the story into an info-dump about things that they would never pause to think about in the midst of their present activities.

POV can be a great tool – perhaps the greatest tool – for showing readers your world.  But not all at once in paragraph after paragraph of detail.  Instead, little bits of world revealed here and there as the characters move through it.  And a world is more than what a character sees – it is what they hear, smell, taste, touch – which gives a writer tons to work with.  And by layering in those details, spread out across an entire book, you build a sense of your character’s connection with their world that the reader then experiences vicariously.

So, distilled down to a few bullet points, here are my suggestions for world-building based on my own process (so your mileage may vary):

• Less is more and patience is a virtue:  Layer your world into the book throughout the book.  Use small, minor details – like bits of history, reference to artists or other historical characters, important places -- so that by the end of the book, the reader feels like they visited a real place.
• Engage your reader’s imagination for the heavy lifting:  Give enough to get them seeing what you see and then trust them to see it.  Resist the urge to overstate the world.
• Stay faithfully in your character’s POV and show us what they see through all of our senses:  Again, less is more but when you’re layering it in from multiple sources, lightly, by the end of the book, the reader feels like they’ve experienced that character’s life, including the world they live in.

Again, big thanks to Matt for including me on his guest list.  You’re all welcome to follow my regular Saturday blog at Genreality.net, chase me down on Facebook, or find out more about me at www.kenscholes.com.

Spec Fic Writers 101: Research with Teresa Frohock

When I first started this project, I reached out to all of the authors I have interviewed since the blog started and asked them if they would like to contribute. But with that number being fairly low in comparison to the number of topics I'd hoped to cover, I also asked that they invite any other industry professionals that they thought might like to contribute. Stina Leicht was kind enough to connect me with not one but two other authors who had already made my 'to read' list. Teresa Frohock was one of those. With NaNoWriMo and various other projects and obligations kicking my butt at the moment it make take a while for me to get to Miserere: An Autumn Tale, but based on the sample chapters available on Night Shade's website and what an absolute pleasure Teresa was to work with on this project, I will definitely find the time sooner than later.

About the Author: Teresa Frohock is the author of Miserere: An Autumn Tale and is currently concluding work on a second novel, tentatively entitled THE GARDEN, which is unrelated to the Katharoi series. Teresa was raised in North Carolina, lived in Virginia and South Carolina before returning to the Piedmont, where she currently resides with her husband and daughter. Teresa has long been accused of telling stories, which is a southern colloquialism for lying.



With our author introduced and her bona fides established, lets see what Teresa has to say about the most seemingly mundane and often foolishly avoided  aspect of writing in speculative fiction; research.


A quick disclaimer: I know this is intended to be a 101 how-to; however, I’m going to assume you already know that you need to research things like how many miles a person can walk in a day or how fast a horse can run, etc. I’m not going to insult your intelligence (or mine) like that. Instead, I want to focus on research in a slightly different vein.

Story, characterization, and a strong plot are the true backbone of your work, a series of bold lines, if you will. Solid research gives your fiction a deeper pigmentation and enables you to show character development in order to intensify the realism of your fiction. The trick is not to bombard your reader with useless information.

If you can develop the knack for weaving your research into the story seamlessly, then a well-researched novel is going to give you an edge that others lack. So, how do you do that? Consider this exchange from Patrick Rothfuss’ The Name of the Wind:

“I don’t want iron,” the innkeeper said. “A drab has too much carbon in it. It’s almost steel.”

“He’s right,” the smith’s prentice said. “Except it’s not carbon. You use coke to make steel.

Coke and lime.”

The innkeeper nodded deferentially to the boy. “You’d know best, young master. It’s your business after all.

This passage clicked with me because in my current novel, my protagonist Guillermo is a blacksmith. I originally intended a scene with Guillermo working in the forge, and in order to understand the process of making steel, I did quite a bit of research, whereupon I learned the following: steel is comprised of several alloys, carbon being the most important and coke is a fuel with a high carbon content.

Knowing these two things, I saw how Rothfuss divulged some important information about the innkeeper to any of his readers who also happened to know these facts.

First, the innkeeper is knowledgeable about process of making steel, something beyond most laymen in a medieval society. No two blacksmiths worked metal exactly alike and they guarded their processes jealously—think trade secrets and you’ve got the right idea. The smith’s apprentice, who should understand the process better than an innkeeper, knows that coke and lime make steel, but he doesn’t understand why (i.e. because coke produces carbon).

Because, like the innkeeper, I know these things, then I realize the smith’s apprentice is kind of dumb and the innkeeper is more than he seems.

Second, when the smith’s apprentice corrects the innkeeper, the innkeeper concedes the boy’s point and does not shame him by pointing out that coke has a high carbon content and is merely a fuel. This denotes graciousness on the part of the innkeeper. He doesn’t need to make the smith’s apprentice look the fool in front of the other men. The innkeeper knows he is right; however, he doesn’t need to pump his own ego at someone else’s expense.

See what Rothfuss did there?

The preceding analysis rolled through my mind in the few brief seconds that it took me to read the exchange between these two characters. For those in the know, that very tiny exchange rendered quite a bit of information about the innkeeper and the smith’s apprentice, but Rothfuss also took into account that many people wouldn’t know the carbon/coke references. For those people, the exchange was so brief as to be a quick side-trip in a very serious discussion.

And that is precisely how to entwine research into your story to enhance characterization and deliver important information to your reader without pages of useless facts. Rothfuss uses his research to enrich his story, not overwhelm it.

So then the question becomes: How much information is too much information?
Here’s the deal: you’re telling a story, not writing a treatise. There is a big difference between these two things, and in fiction, it is necessary to relay a fact as expeditiously as possible.

The issue is to weave the facts into the story without breaking the rhythm of the prose. For me, this takes practice and numerous edits, but once I hit that right mix of prose and fact, the story simply sings. Your number one rule should be that any research that you relay to the reader should be tied directly into the immediate events in the story.

Research into Iberian military practices gave me the information I needed to construct the break between Tomás and Guillermo in THE GARDEN. By knowing that a strict table of fines and punishments were set out for soldiers’ infractions during a war, I could easily weave the fine of four hundred maravedís for killing a señor during a conflict into the discussion between Tomás and Guillermo.
My example:

“You’ve dishonored yourself.” Tomás’ whisper was a hiss. “And me.” The rain did not cause the water in the older man’s eyes.

Guillermo didn’t drop his gaze. “Vicente gave the insult.” Why, for once, couldn’t Tomás take his side?

“He was your superior! You think you are better than him? As good as him?” Tomás’ gauntleted fist struck Guillermo’s chest, just over his heart. The steel ripped his gambeson and tore into his flesh. “Why can’t you accept your place in this world?”

“Tomás—”

“Shut up. He’s dead, Guillermo. It is four hundred maravedís for killing a señor during a conflict! Do you have that money?”

“You know I don’t.” Neither of them had to articulate what would happen if the fine wasn’t met. Guillermo remembered the caballero’s shrieks as the lash had shorn his back into shreds.

"I can—”

“No!” Tomás’ eyes blazed. “You will let me handle this. I will talk to Don Flores. We can offer the smithy, but you must come back and accept responsibility. You can work the debt off in Vicente’s household. It’s a matter of honor, Guillermo.”

I don’t need to go into a great deal of detail about the rank of a royal señor or what is considered honorable conduct. Tomás lays it all out brilliantly for me, and Guillermo’s refusal to take responsibility for his actions gives me the impetus I need for Tomás to walk away from him. This exchange also enables me to show the reader that Guillermo has something of a superiority complex and I get to highlight the generational gap between Tomás, an older man who is a staunch royalist and good soldier, and Guillermo, someone who is looking out for number one.

I don’t have to lay out the entire table of military codes for the reader, or give the exchange rate on the maravedís. The reader can infer that four hundred maravedís is a lot of money, because Tomás is willing to put up his smithy in place of the money. The primary focus on this section is not the factual details, but the story: Guillermo has done a very bad thing, he is in way over his head, and Tomás is willing to give up his livelihood to save his life. The factual details—the murder of a royal señor, the maravedís, working the debt off in the family’s household—simply add layers and texture to the interplay between these two men.
So how do beginning writers know when you’ve got too much information? The best thing to do is write the scene or chapter with all the information embedded in the text. Sometimes I do that just to cement the details in my mind. Then wait a few days (or weeks) and go back and reread the section. If at any point, the explanations overshadow the story or the action—for example if you have three lines of dialogue followed by three paragraphs of exposition—then you’ll want to trim the exposition until you’ve whittled away the extraneous material. Once you’ve eliminated the superfluous information, start looking for places where you can work the facts into the dialogue and the action of a scene.

This is a definite case where less is always more. Two or three subtle facts—the texture of the clothing, the coinage, or even utilizing a colloquial term for a mundane object—can enhance the realism of a story. Start watching how other authors interweave their research in their stories and note when they do it well and when they don’t, then practice.

That is what all good storytelling is about—practice.