Authorpalooza B&N 9/22- See you there!

I'm so excited for the Orem Barnes & Noble coming up this next Saturday, September 22nd starting at 4:00 pm. It's going to be a blast, and there will be a ton of amazing authors there, so come say hi!!!

For more information, check the Barnes & Noble website:

http://store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/event/3714014

Laughing

Today I'm just in the mood to laugh, which meant I spent some time at awkwardfamilyphotos.com. Love it. I have a few new favorites, and one of the photos (not shown) reminded me of one of my favorite commercials, which is apparently banned.

So here they--in case they get a smile out of you, too :)

Venus in Transit

I often say I am vicariously smart. This tidbit below falls in the category of things I know because people around me are smarter than I am. I owe this one to my uncle. Hope you enjoy :) 

Tomorrow afternoon (Tue 5 June) Venus goes across ("transits") the disk of the sun for six hours from 4:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. (after sunset) Utah time (MDT), being maximum (closest to center of sun) at 7:30 p.m.  It won't happen again for over a century, so you ought to take a look.  Sunglasses, pinhole camera, or the like might be a good idea. (It's not as dangerous to the eye as everyone says, but it's tough to see directly!) It will just be a little black spot going across the sun, but it's really rare. It is visible all across the continental U.S., and actually best for those of you in Hawaii, being more at mid-day.

Characters in Crisis

When writing action, it’s important that the author do one very important thing: act it out. And if you can’t do that, find someone who is an expert in what you’re trying to portray to verify that what you are scripting is plausible.

To show both good and bad examples of why it’s important to do this, I’ll use scenes from the same TV series: Castle.

A bit of background: Detective Beckett is a New York City cop who is followed around by New York Times bestselling author, Richard Castle. Shenanigans ensue. There are frequent brushes with death—including this one:

Click and watch the first few minutes (sorry, it won’t let me embed. Right click and open it in a new tab so you can pop right back here when you're done): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlMH81aMBvg

Okay, have you watched it? Were you tense? Did you think they were going to die? Did you empathize with their situation, or did you find it a little frustrating?

Did you think they were going to die?

I’m going to assume that you were not nervous and fearful for their lives, because this is the bad example of making things go wrong for your hero. I’m going to guess that you really weren’t all that tense, and weren’t too worried about things ending up just fine. And no, not just because these are the two leads of a show and they’re not going to kill them off, but because too much went wrong in the scene.

Let’s start at the beginning of the scene where Castle and Beckett are pushed into the Hudson (yuck) by an SUV. We immediately see that this harbor was built adjacent to an endless abyss. The car is sinking, sinking, sinking… and, yep, still sinking.

Cut to our heroes. They need to get out or die. Easy right? Let’s go through their lifesaving process:

1. They try to open the doors, BUT the doors won’t open. Beckett informs us/Castle that there must have been damage to the frame of the car when the SUV rear-ended them (because that’s what people do when they’re looking death in the eye: they rationalize their obstacles). 
2. Next, the windows won’t roll down, so Beckett deduces they should shoot out the window. BUT somehow her gun fell out of its snug little secure holster. So they start looking for it.
3. Beckett tries to find her gun BUT she can’t because her seat belt is permanently locked and isn’t budging.
4. So she tries to move/recline the seat so she can slip out, BUT the seat has suddenly become locked into its upright position.
5. Does she have a knife? Yes, she has a knife, BUT it’s in the trunk.

With this guy they won't need
the flashlight to find the gun.

Cut to exterior shot of the car still falling, falling, falling to the sea floor—presumably to where it’s so dark that some fish have headlights.

What would you be doing at this point? Trying to wiggle out of your seat, perhaps? Contorting yourself into some awkward positions to see if you can slip out of your seat. In this moment, your actions decide whether or not you will die at sea. Would you be sitting still and only trying options that requiring bending from your elbows down? (I don’t know about you, but this part of the scene bugged me enough that I went out to my car to see if I could get out of my seat with the seat belt on and the seat locked in a upright position. I can. And my life isn’t even at stake.)

The decision is made that Castle needs to use the handy flashlight he finds to retrieve the gun and shoot off the belt. (I won’t even  go into the complications there.)

We don’t need to go any farther to see why this is my example of too many implausible things go wrong. Even more annoying, too many solutions are ignored. (Seriously, take ten seconds and think of all the things you would do in their position that weren’t done. It’s a long list.)

But back to the point: when you create this many obstacles for your hero, your reader starts to smell a rat. An otherwise perilous situation starts to become a little ridiculous and their mind (which really doesn’t want to imagine death as a rule), and the mind will start pointing out all the absurdity of the situation to the viewer/reader rather than choose fear.

“What?” it may whisper to the reader/viewer. “Is the radio going to short circuit and start shocking them now? Or is a rogue, garbage-eating shark going to start circling them and Castle will have to shoot that in the murky water too?”

The point is, if you’re going to make a series of things go wrong that should never go wrong (and do so with highly maintained, professional equipment), then there had better be sabotage involved, not just dumb luck. After all, most of us have been in accidents . This incident wasn’t even all that traumatic, really. Their car was pushed into the Hudson, causing next to no visible structural damage, yet it caused all of the following to fail:

• The seat belt lock
• The forward/backward seat adjuster
• The reclining handle on the seat
• The snap on Beckett’s holster
• Beckett’s common sense to try common, lifesaving options

To quote SNL, I’ll say, “Really???”

So when you’re making things go wrong in your own work, take a look to see if you’re making too much go wrong, and therefore, losing your audience.

Now let’s look at a good example of things going very, very wrong. Again, this comes from Castle.

Detective Beckett’s backstory is that she became a cop after her mom’s murder went unsolved. In the season finale of Season 4, Beckett has the opportunity to face off with an inside guy who not only works for her mother’s killer, but who also happened to shoot and nearly kill Beckett in the Season 3 finale.

Season 3 Cliffhanger: Kate takes a bullet, and she's not happy about it.

 And, boy oh boy, Beckett is ready for a fight! She’s waited 13 years for this showdown, and she thinks she has what it takes to face off against a government trained, professional assassin and come out Queen of the Hill.

And it goes a little something like this (again, sorry you have to link out):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gq15-gns1b8

This scene is a wake-up call on par with Loki facing off against The Hulk in The Avengers.

Total smackdown.

Like a true assassin who is as good at killing as he is at mind games, Beckett’s would-be killer let’s her get a few hits in while staring blandly and unaffected into her eyes. This is brilliant, because it shows both the audience and Beckett how completely outmatched she is. Throughout the fight, he paces like a caged cat whenever he has her down, clearly thinking when he could easily be giving her more of a beat down. He could kill her. We know it. She knows it. And he's absolutely mad that he's going to let her live. We sense that without a word. 

In the short span of this confrontation, the assassin breaks Beckett’s body, will, and a bit of her spirit. And at the end, when he leaves her dangling over the side of the building? I believe him.

So many shows try to portray this type of death-by-negligence moment and fail, but here it works. Why? Because this assassin doesn’t have the green light to kill Kate Beckett yet. There is blackmail material that needs to be destroyed before he takes that step. People who are familiar with the show know this.

But if Kate falls? Off a building high enough to leave interpretation it was a suicide? And the assassin can honestly say that he didn’t push her?

Well, then… whoops.

The assassin can report that Kate fell down and went boom after getting a little overenthusiastic in her attack on him.

Every element in this scene is researched and believable. And maybe, just maybe, part of me starts crushing on the assassin for giving a much-needed wakeup call to a protagonist who has started to dangerously overestimate herself.

Well done. Very believable. Just like in the last scene, we knew that Kate Beckett wouldn’t die, but it was a MUCH more tense ride. Because what went wrong for our hero made sense. She really could have—and maybe should have died. If she had, we all would have nodded and agreed that, while tragic, we saw it coming.

With the first example, however, our reaction to death would be much different. People would be rolling their eyes and yelling things like, “Are you serious?!” at the TV screen.

It’s the difference between actually putting yourself in your character’s shoes, or just throwing them into an impossible situation until your only option is to: 

• Cut away (like Castle did in the first clip)
• Have a third party intervene (like Ryan does with the little SWAT team in the second clip)
• Or turn your character into a freakishly capable super ninja long enough to save their own lives (like most action movies do)

My advice, though? Keep it real. Act the action out to see if what your writing is even plausible. If it’s not, try something new until you have something that really works.

Your writing will be better for it.

Conversation With a Muse

Today's ongoing conversation with Rhea (verbatim):

Rhea: I don't think you're ready for this jelly...
Me: What? That's news to me, because I've never met a jelly I didn't like. Bring it.
Rhea: I don't think you're ready for this jelly...
Me: Did you not hear me? I said I'm ready for the the jelly. I'm totally jelly ready. Promise!
Rhea: I don't think you're ready for this...
Me: Really? Well, I thought I was, but now you have me second guessing...
Rhea: This story's too bootylicious for ya', babe.
Me: Really? For me, or for Deseret Book? Or for the part of me that entertains the idea that Deseret Book might actually like Book 5 and want to carry it. Which is it?
Rhea: *silence*

*Sits down in front of computer and opens Word document*

Me: Well, I'm here and I'm ready, so why don't we start small. There's gotta be some place to start.
Rhea: *silence*
Me: Seriously? Nothing?!
Rhea: You'll just end up rewriting it. You're in left field, babe.
Me: Well, then, loan me a compass. Show me where you want me, and I'll go. Promise.
Rhea: *silence*
Me: Rhea?
Rhea: I don't think you're ready for this jelly...

*Deep, calming breath*

All I can say is that Rhea is lucky that she's invisible and has the mystique of a muse. Because the fact remains that I have a draft of Book 5, and Rhea is very adamant that it needs some serious revamping--which is something she's never done to me before.

The good news of all this is that Rhea is definitely on the cusp of letting us all a little farther into her personal rabbit hole. The bad news is that we all have to wait for me to catch on to what she's trying to show me that I am so obviously missing.

If the Spidey sense on the back of my neck is worth anything (which is debatable at this point), then it will all be worth the wait. But send me happy thoughts, okay? Happy thoughts that I can pick up what Rhea is putting down and write it all at record speed and share it with you all :)

In the meantime, here's the theme song she's channeling.

The Winds of Change... I Like Them :)

There’s going to be a little changing here on this blog.

Now some of you might be thinking, “Wait, I thought this was just a blog of randomness followed by further randomness, rarely relating one thing to another.”

And yes, you would be right. To date that was what you could expect here.

But today, that will change. Why? Because I actually have direction now. *pauses to allow gasps to subside*

So here’s the new deal:

I am participating in a new website that will be launching in the next month or so, and this site will be pointing people/writers with specific questions to specific blogs.

This fact quite naturally leads to the question, “Well, what will you be blogging about then?”

I’ll be blogging about why I know best, of course: kicking butt. Teaching martial arts for 12 years does give me a bit of a background--and of the skill sets I bring to the writing table, it is one of the more obscure. Plus, I would LOVE to teach classes on this or receive questions about action sequences.

So FUN!

And since I’m highly “fun” motivated, here we are.

So from this moment on this blog has to do with the various forms of butt-kickery and how to portray it in writing. Questions are welcome. I will either answer submitted questions myself, or link to videos that answer the question the same way I would.

This is going to be fun. Just you wait.

So let the fun begin J

LDS StoryMakers

Each year, there is a great writer's convention held in Utah. The first year I went I didn't have the highest of expectations. I thought it was just going to be some local writers getting together. I don't know what I expected, but I can tell you that I left the convention impressed.

Shouldn't be shocking, right? Mormons know how to get things done, after all. So why wouldn't LDS StoryMakers be an excellent writing conference?

Well, it should have been, and it was.

Last year I was invited to be a presenter in addition to working with authors at the Boot Camp, which was great. Especially the Boot Camp. It's SO great to work with emerging authors and see all the stories that are in other people's heads.And also, as coaches, we get to learn a thing or two. After all, just because you're published it doesn't mean you're all knowing. I'm not the best writer in the world. I'm just a storyteller who gets the job done with the skill I have at the moment.

It's all any of us can do. Be our best in the moment.

And I can tell you in all honesty that a few of the writers in my boot camp last year were much better writers than I was. I told them the same thing to their faces. (One of which seemed flattered while the other stared me in the eye as if to say, "I know. So why are you published and I'm not?" Always fun moments to have. :))

This Thursday, I get to participate in the LDS StoryMakers Boot Camp again. The bonus, this year writers will have the option to choose me--or any other mentor they want! Last year they were assigned. This year it's first come, first served.

So, if you want me, come and get me... or not. That's the cool part of the Boot Camp this year. The choice is YOURS (if you get there early enough... if you get there late, you might be shown to my table by default. We'll have fun, though).

Regardless of the mentor you choose, however, I'd love to meet you and get to say hi face to face! So come find me :)

And to those of you who are going all of the days, I'll only be there on Thursday, but I hope you have a great conference!