The Scrawl

Neil Gaiman writes some of my favorite stories, and his latest novel, The Graveyard Book, hits shelves and virtual shelves today. Advanced buzz on this one is good, so do yourself a favor and pick up a copy. Ooh, and look at this fancy counter his publisher has made for me to imbed into my blog post (yes, it comes out today so the counter isn’t counting down anymore but still, it’s shiny):

Tonight is my first Beck concert. I’ll let you know how much rockaphernalia (look it up in the Becktionary!) there is to be had tomorrow.
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Write about a character’s experience involving technology. Maybe they remember the world before it seemed like most everyone carried an iPod or a cell phone. Perhaps they our having their first experience using a computer or figuring out how to program the family VCR or DVD player. Or maybe they’re taking their first online college course or beginning to blog. However you approach this prompt, let the emotions of the character remain prominent and use the specific details that keep your tale interesting. Give this exercise fifteen minutes of your time.

Write it up and see what happens.

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I can’t believe I’ve been a Beck fan for ten years and this will be my first time seeing him live.

I’m not the world’s biggest concert fan, but every once in a while an artist I really enjoy comes to town and all the things I hate about concerts – the pushy crowds, the hazy smoke, the unidentifiable smells, how I’m buying a ticket for a seat which I won’t get to use because everyone in front of me is standing so then I have to stand – all of that melts away. I’m too thrilled by the prospect of “sharing” an evening with a great artist, and impressing everyone around me with my well-tuned sing-a-long skills* during the show. I wonder if one can gain a better insight into an artist by seeing them perform live. The show is Tuesday night so I’ll post some follow-up next week.

Gearing up for the Beck concert sees me listening to his latest record, a collection of music that’s held my attention since it came out this summer. Today’s recommendation is Beck’s eight studio album, Modern Guilt.

And lucky me, someone worked out the chords to the record’s lead-off song, “Orphans,” online so I can pluck it out on the ukulele. There are places where the rhythm of playing notes and singing the lyrics don’t necessarily match up which is difficult for me to overcome but I’m trying. Someday I’ll learn enough sharp note chords to play one of my favorite Beck songs, “Pressure Zone,” from the record Midnight Vultures.

Give the record a listen, and I’ll update you on the concert next week.

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* Well-tuned sing-a-long skills may not actually be well-tuned nor skillful.

Write a story in which time is running out. Let the ticking clock be the impetus, not the focus, for why your characters feel the way they do. Let your reader understand the stakes involved because your characters show how they feel emotionally through their actions. Let the story lead up to the moment that time runs out – whether you go on to show the aftermath is up to you, but use the countdown to zero to move the story along and then give your reader a payoff. Give this exercise fifteen minutes of your time – in fact, set a stopwatch and let the countdown spur you forward in your writing!

Write it up and see what happens.

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I’m a “film guy.” You know that person in your life who is really, really into movies? They talk about camera angles or maybe throw out terms like “diegetic music” or even own a few art house films on DVD? For many people in my life, I’m their “film guy.” They know I have a love for and a wealth of knowledge about the movies, and they can always come to me for who starred in what, when what was made, and learn more about the craft that goes into making a brilliant film.

What they don’t know is I still haven’t seen Casablanca.

That’s right. Casablanca, often considered one of the greatest films of all time. Casablanca, the film that brought all the best cast members of The Maltese Falcon back together for an equally-compelling story. Casablanca, the film that has been quoted, parodied, emulated, and studied quite possibly more than any other film in history. Yes, that Casalanca. I haven’t seen it. People are floored to hear that and their estimation of me as a “film guy” wavers just a little. No matter how often I tout the greatness of Bicycle Thieves or sit people down to experience The Seven Samurai, this glaring oversight in my viewing repertoire is too obvious a gap in my film experience. But that’s what this week’s recommendation is all about.

This week or weekend, your recommendation is to take time out to start reading that novel or short story, watch that movie, listen to that record, or otherwise experience that piece of art that is the definitive glaring oversight in your ability to claim status. You know Literature with a capital “L” but you haven’t read The Great Gatsby? Shame on you and your high school English department – get to work! You claim to be the “rock-n-roll” expert in your group of friends but have yet to experience Hendrix? Get thee to a used CD shop! You know movies but haven’t seen Casablanca, Bicycle Thieves, The Seven Samurai, The Maltese Falcon, or the cinematic genius that is Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure? Get. Cracking.

I have plans to watch Casablanca with my wife this week (her copy – she’s seen it a dozen times). Maybe then I can win back my “film guy” status. Maybe next week I’ll try to bone up on my capital “L” Literature knowledge by reading my first Robert Owen Butler novel or see if Catcher in the Rye is right for me or maybe even tackle The Grapes of Wrath.

As for you, what’s your missing link? What haven’t you yet experienced but you know you need to for a fuller understanding of the art you so desperately desire to know and love?

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I’ve been working on my home office today, trying to get it organized, cleaned up, and otherwise comfortable for better creative times. I’m not surprised by how easy it is for me to let my office pile up with clutter – mostly paper – but I’m not excited by how long I let it stay the way it is. Either way, a change is in order and I think this is exactly what I need to get myself excited to do some writing (yeah, yeah, spending time cleaning my office may seem like I’m avoiding getting my writing done, but trust me, I do a lot better in a clean environment).

So here’s my plan. When I feel like my office is ready for public display, I’ll post a few photos here for your perousal. Sorry, don’t expect any photos of what it looks like in its current state; I’m way too embarrassed (and please, think of my poor, dear wife and her embarrassment!). Instead, I’ll do this: I will post photos of my office once a week for four weeks so we can all see whether or not I can maintain a clean home office. Maybe this will force me to keep it cleaner than I normally would, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Expect the first photos to go up early next week…

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One of my MFA compatriots, Bryan Johnson, recently wrote about film adaptations of novels and this week a few new publicity photos and an “insider scoop” about two novel-to-film adaptations coming up got me thinking this week…

Two of my favorite modern novels, The Road by Cormac McCarthy and The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold, have film adaptations coming out this winter. Both are bleak, emotional stories with subject matter the public-at-large may find difficult to witness on the screen even if they were both bestsellers (The Road scored McCarthy the Pulitzer Prize, and I think both are Oprah Book Club selections). Sometimes when I hear a studio is turning a book into a movie I cringe because the end results could be pretty disastrous. In these two cases, solid directors have me confident and eager to see the movies: John Hillcoat (The Proposition) is taking on The Road and Peter Jackson’s made The Lovely Bones his pet project all year.

Some good books have had some pretty bad adaptations. Elmore Leonard’s The Big Bounce was pretty awful and Be Cool really could have benefited from the great director+screenwriter combo that Get Shorty got with Barry Sonnenfeld and Scott Frank. Stephen King adaptations are hit (The Shawshank Redemption) or miss (Maximum Overdrive). My thoughts on Jaws are in the comment section of Bryan Johnson’s blog post. The one movie that is hands-down better than its novel counterpart? Last of the Mohicans. That book can go die.

How about you? Have you read The Road or The Lovely Bones? Does the prospect of film adaptations frighten you away or keep you intrigued? Do you have favorite books you know would make a great (or terrible) film? Is anything in the pipeline that makes you cringe?

And if you think there are books out there that should never be adapted into a film, check out this list of what shouldn’t be a movie, according to Cracked.

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I picked up a copy of “Zen in the Art of Writing: Releasing the Creative Genius Within You” by Ray Bradbury at Half-Price Books and I’m wondering if anyone out there has thoughts on it before I crack it open. Bradbury is one of the first writers I read on a regular basis and I lead a short small group discussion on “The Martian Chronicles” with a group of teens this summer. He’s a writer I respect and enjoy though I had no idea he wrote a book on writing craft until I saw it on the shelf, waiting for me to buy it.

Okay. Get over the pure 1990s cheese of the cover art. Let’s chat a little bit about the inside of the book instead. Bradbury’s published over 500 stories, novels, plays, essays, and so on. He likely has something worthwhile to say about writing. Plus, it’s short at 158 pages so I’m sure it will be a quick read. That said, it’s likely to sit at the bottom of the pile on the bedside table for at least another month or two as I work through this book and that collection. So while I have every intention of reading it, that won’t be for a while and in the meantime I’d appreciate reader help.

Does this book work for you? Why or why not? Is there another book about writing as craft you would compare it to, for better or worse? Is it worth a young writer’s time? What do you think of Bradbury overall? I’m especially curious to hear from the people who had to read his work in middle or high school (not me – I found Bradbury on my own). Does anyone out there consider him influential on their writing style?

See you in the comment section, and thanks in advance.

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Write a story that takes place in the future. It could be five minutes from now or five-hundred years from now. Make your vision of the future unique; try to avoid all the different futures you’ve seen in TV and the movies. Perhaps go a subtle route – everything’s the same except we now have fourteen twelve-hour days of the week – or go for the gusto – humanity has developed stalks for our eyes and aliens are pets. Since the vision of the future is entirely yours, run with it and have some fun. Maybe even toss a favorite character into it and see how they live in another time. Give this exercise at least fifteen minutes of your time, though world-building may make you want to keep going.

Write it up and see what happens.

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Find a story you’ve exclusively read on the page or listened to on audio book. Then, reverse it. If you’ve read a story, find the audio version and listen. If you’ve listened to an audio version only, get a print copy to read.

I’m a big fan of audio books and I have plenty of books I’ve only experienced that way. Every once in a while I find a print copy and read it, trying to see if the experience is different (it always is) or better (sometimes yes, sometimes no). For me, classics have always been more appealing on the page than as audio. For example, I can’t name a Ray Bradbury story I didn’t like better on the page. Meanwhile, I first heard Dennis Lehane’s “Mystic River” before reading it and I really prefer the audio. David Strathairn reads with compelling urgency, it’s just great.

One story I found equally amazing on the page and pumping out stereo speakers is “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien. I heard the audio first but found nothing lost when I moved on to the printed page. I’m fascinated, too, noticing the correlation between page space and audio length, and “The Things They Carried” is a good example of that. The story on the page is rich and moves slowly to me (not a bad thing) and so the audio version spands several discs but I remember being surprised at how quickly I breezed through them all. It reached the point where I was sure I was going to be missing a disc or something but nope, it all corresponded correctly. I found this, too, with “The Lovely Bones.”

Give it a try. See if one way of experiencing a story ends up better than the other. Please use the comment section to let me know what happens or if you’ve done this before and what your experience has been.

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