The giving chain

I’m a terrible blogger.

In the last several months, I’ve been nominated for some very sweet awards, and it’s taken me forever to post them! Here they are:

I was nominated for these awards by:

• JM McDowell (Dragon’s Loyalty Award), who runs http://jmmcdowell.com/, a blog filled with good humor, advice, and original stories about her archaeologist mystery-cracker, Meghan Bode;
• Jenny the Wren (Liebster Award), who writes up all kinds of different musings, reviews, and personal stories of life and new-mommyhood over at http://itsjennythewren.wordpress.com/;
• Subhan Zein (Versatile Blogger and Tell Me About Yourself Awards), the talented and soulful writer of short stories, poetic observations, and freedom from the mundane at  http://subhanzein.wordpress.com/;
• Summer (Wonderful Readership Award), whose inner peace and graciousness always shine through on her blog, http://summer4soul.wordpress.com/.

Some of these awards come with rules for posting: nominate so many bloggers, tell so many facts about yourself, don’t stop the giving chain. Normally, I’m one to adhere to rules. But, for the purpose of blogging awards, I usually let those rules go.

“The rules are, there ain’t no rules!”

But, for those of you interested, some “facts” about me:

• I like saying I’m an artist, but, really, I’m a jock. I have to exercise every day, or I don’t feel like myself. At school, I competed in Track and Field; the 100-meter dash was my main event, and I anchored our team for the 400-meter relay. I love swimming, and surfing is a relatively new passion. Aside from the sprints, I’m not a great runner, though I often find it centers me. When I’m feeling troubled, there’s not much that can’t be cured by a good, sweaty run!
• I’m Miss Middle-of-the-Road. Maybe it comes from being a Libra, but I’ve always had to look at both sides of a situation. Sometimes, that’s helpful, like when I have to mediate an argument between family or friends. Other times, not so much, as it can cause me to vacillate too long, and opportunities can pass me by!
• I’m not the brightest bulb…but I’m not the dimmest, either. Sports are, by their very nature, competitive, and that competitiveness found its way into other parts of my life. I was always comparing myself to other people: their strengths, their successes, the accolades and adulation. But, for every winner, there has to be a loser. It took a long time for me to understand that losing gracefully can be just as worthwhile as winning graciously. A good thing, since winning is so rare!
• I play favorites. Not among my family (my sister), or for my girls (the older one), but with my characters. Whoever is foremost in my story-writing brain naturally gets privileged child status, of course, but I’ll always have my perennial favorites, too, especially in my fan works.
• Speaking of fan works, there’s nothing wrong with writing what you want, whatever that may be. Fan fiction, open poetry, stream of consciousness diary, historical biography, children’s, drama, sci-fi, horror, terror, thriller, romance, research, religion, comics, smut, slice of life, short fiction, long fiction – it’s all good. Certainly, some of those genres relate more easily to publishing, but always write first for your own passion.
• Lastly, I can only be myself, just like you can only be yourself. Every person has their own conflicts, their own burdens, their own triumphs. The world is a big place; we only ever see a sliver of it. But, just because we don’t see it, doesn’t mean it isn’t there. So, be excellent to each other.
  

Would you like to pick up one of the above awards? Please, feel free to grab the icon!

If you’re looking for some great bloggers to follow, I advocate the talented ladies and gent above – JM McDowell, Jenny the Wren, Subhan Zein, and Summer - as well as some other blogs and bloggers I always make certain to keep up with:

• Limebird Writers
• 4am Writer
• Vanessa-Jane Chapman, and her specialized “Sugarness…for everything sweet” blog
• SJB Writing
• Kellie Elmore
• Lillie McFerrin Writes
• Shade the Raven
• The Red Pen of Doom, and
• beebeesworld.

Many thanks go out to everyone who’s ever followed, liked, or commented on my words and musings.

Happy blogging, everyone!

Relief and Shame

I’m back to Julia’s 100-Word Challenges for Grown-Ups. This week, the prompt has a bit of an Easter theme to it:
…looking at all of that chocolate….
We’re not required to incorporate the exact phrase in this challenge’s 100 words, but I did, because it evokes such a vivid image. Maybe a bit too vivid, though?

Public domain image

“Relief and Shame”

The gift basket was a lovely gesture…but just looking at all of that chocolate made a tide of sick rumble up from her belly to the top of her throat, threatening with a rancid belch she barely caught in her palm in time.

She didn’t notice Wennie crouching beside her in the toilet, not until it was all over. “You want some water?”

Easing back against the wall, she nodded.

Wennie returned a moment later, glass in hand.

She sipped, the cold taste of relief sliding down her throat. And shame.

Wennie gave a tsk. “Have you told him, yet?”

I can’t be the only one who’s felt queasy in this situation.

Did you partake in the chocolate challenge, this week? How did that taste to you?

Of silence, sound, and rhythm

Most folks likely didn’t notice, but I was away last week, “away” meaning cramped into an editing suite, poring over timecode and doing frame extraction. I’m back again, but last week’s work has stayed with me. Mostly, because editing video always makes me think of this scene: the Warriors gang fighting off the Baseball Furies, from the 1979 film, The Warriors.

Oh, Ajax, you pithy pugilist, you!

A fight scene without a soundtrack instantly feels much more violent than a fight scene set to music of any kind. That silence can often work in a filmmaker’s favor. Director Walter Hill says he wanted to preserve a cartooniness with this scene from The Warriors, so he kept the music in. That’s not a critique, for musical sound and rhythm can also do a fine job of adding tension, excitement, and drama, just as well as silence. It all depends on how it’s used.

When we write, we’re not given the luxury of pumping music at our readers. So, how do we create the same level of tension with words alone?

One idea? Choose your words carefully for more than just their meaning.

Writers often think they work in silence, because words are static on a page. But the rhythm of words can be just as important as what they mean. Poets and lyricists understand this better than most other writers, because their space, time, or meter is often limited. But even the self-proclaimed short story writer or novelist shouldn’t ignore that poetic ear.

Try speaking your scene aloud. You’ll hear how the choice and cadence of each word interacts with the ones to follow, and how those interactions affect the way your story is told.

Have you ever read a story that was just he said after she said, all the way down the page? There’s nothing wrong with that approach – it’s certainly serviceable to a story. But, words can move people by more than just their definitions. Why not let them do that?

Now, lots of writers and editors will tell you that prose and poetry are two different styles for a reason. That’s not incorrect. And, it may not be the best idea to turn your action thriller into a garden of flowery prose. That’s not what I’m saying, though. I’m saying, words should fit the moment, theme, and emotion of the story being told. Even readers advanced enough not to have to read aloud will still hear those words in their heads.

Study a good action scene. The words and ideas come quick, like lightning, one after the other. No time to describe in minute detail. Why? Because it slows the reader down. On the opposite hand, study a moving scene of gentle emotion. Words move more slowly, here, like leaves drifting on the wind, spiralling to a quiet settling on the ground. An argument will crackle, snap, and finally flare up like a paper bag thrown on a fire; a sex scene will start small and grow, mounting higher and higher until it crashes like a wave against a beach, where it eases down to foam again.

Brian Robert Marshall [CC-BY-SA-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Of course, those descriptions are only how I might decide to write those scenes. Deciding how words work best for you is another part of finding your own voice.

Do you have any such rhythm techniques when you write? Which are your favorite types of scenes to write? Why?

Alternate Realities

No new original fiction, this week. Instead, an older 100-word post I did on my own, for my Songbirds.

“Alternate Realities”

Armed with an arsenal of books, pamphlets, and websites, Larry thought himself ready for anything Katie might throw at him: from the logistics of gender possibilities and a tidy explanation of where babies come from, to gentle assurances that nothing or no one could ever usurp the love and devotion he and Sally felt for their soon-to-be elder child.

Throughout his entire rambling explanation, Katie sat quietly in his lap, until he paused, smiled, and asked, “Do you have any questions, about the new baby?”

To which his daughter thought, and blinked, and said, “Can I have a puppy, instead?”

By Sam, Photos8.com [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)%5D

I adore the relationship between parents Larry and Sally…but I also really enjoy examining the relationship between their girls, Katie and Billie. I think because the Nightingale family gives me an opportunity to reflect on and remember my own life, while still keeping a touch of fantastic silliness and adventure so integral to their universe.

I’ve been lax with picking up prompts these last few weeks. I think they must be designed more for writers who want to write but don’t necessarily have any larger projects on which they need to concentrate. But, I’ve got two Works in Progress which I want to complete/edit/perfect. I don’t necessarily feel bad neglecting the prompts to work on my larger projects, but I do want to keep some semblance of regularity to this blog.

So, for any of you out there looking for a writing challenge, below are a few good ones I follow. I’m sure there are more out there, too, if you just poke around a bit.

• Julia’s Place 100 Word Challenge for Grown-Ups (runs Monday-Sunday; this week’s prompt is “…despite the pounding in my head…”).
• Lillie McFerrin’s Five Sentence Fiction (runs Thursday-Wednesday; this week’s prompt is “PARADISE“).
• Kellie Elmore’s Free Write Friday (starts on Fridays; runs for a week. This week’s prompt is Writing Wrongs.)

And, for those of you busy concentrating on your own long projects, here’s to a good wordy weekend!

I never meant to kill her.

I hadn’t meant to kill her.

I certainly didn’t start out the day planning for it to happen. I didn’t even know it was happening, until I looked at what I’d wrought, and realized she was dead.

Somewhere deep down, though, I knew: it had to happen. I’d been waiting for it to happen.

That knowledge didn’t make it any easier to do. It didn’t make the squeeze of the trigger any less jerky, or the thunder of the shot any less loud. Or the pain I felt watching the once-bright light in her eyes go out any less acute.

One moment, she was there: fighting, struggling, strong. And the next, she simply…wasn’t. She wasn’t there. She wasn’t anything. She was just gone, like she’d never existed in the first.

I cried when I killed her. I honestly and truly did.

Sitting back, I had to stop. Everything. And let her have that one moment of my reflection. Because I hadn’t given her the chance to have anything else. Not the happiness she’d sought, or the love she’d desired. Not even the fleeting freedom for which she’d run and fought so hard.

I’d never killed anyone before. Not anyone who’d mattered. Flitting bystanders with no histories, random casualties of war: they didn’t make a difference. They had no stories.

This one, though. She’d had a story. A story I’d cut short, for a split-second of excitement. For the sake of mere plot.

“Acceptable losses,” I called her, the next day, after I’d had the time to reflect. A phrase to describe her and her ilk, the ones I’d left soulless and smoking along the way. Because in love and war, sacrifices must be made.

I knew it was for the best. I knew it had to be done.

But, I’d still cried.

---

I’ve been thinking about this topic ever since a recent blog post about what heroes can do, by Vanessa-Jane Chapman.

I’ve always thought death in stories should be warranted. Many of them are. They’re often valuable for completion of a story. But, when it came time to do the deed, myself, with one of my own…it got to me.

Let your story go where it needs to go, even if it’s someplace terrible. You may end up stronger for it. Or, you may end up realizing you’re not as nice a person as you’d always thought you were.

Death in your stories: how do you react?