Tuesdays with Story

Writer’s Mail
Tuesdays With Story
July 2, 2013

Writer’s quotation . . .
Below is simply a good piece of writing in honor of this week’s 150th Battle of Gettysburg and especially Pickett’s Charge. The Confederate General Pickett led some 12,500 men on an advance over a mile of open ground in the face of cannon fire and small arms at the center of the Union’s forces on Cemetery Ridge, losing nearly half of his force. It was a turning point in the war for the blue. . .
William Faulkner wrote perhaps the most famous account of Pickett’s charge in the American and, especially, the Southern mind in Intruder in the Dust:

“It’s all now you see. Yesterday won’t be over until tomorrow and tomorrow began ten thousand years ago. For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it, there is the instant when it’s still not yet two o’clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and the furled flags are already loosened to break out and Pickett himself with his long oiled ringlets and his hat in one hand probably and his sword in the other looking up the hill waiting for Longstreet to give the word and it’s all in the balance, it hasn’t happened yet, it hasn’t even begun yet, it not only hasn’t begun yet but there is still time for it not to begin against that position and those circumstances which made more men than Garnett and Kemper and Armistead and Wilcox look grave yet it’s going to begin, we all know that, we have come too far with too much at stake and that moment doesn’t need even a fourteen-year-old boy to think This time. Maybe this time with all this much to lose and all this much to gain: Pennsylvania, Maryland, the world, the golden dome of Washington itself to crown with desperate and unbelievable victory the desperate gamble, the cast made two years ago; or to anyone who ever sailed a skiff under a quilt sail, the moment in 1492 when somebody thought This is it: the absolute edge of no return, to turn back now and make home or sail irrevocably on and either find land or plunge over the world’s roaring rim.”

History buffs: on Wednesday 7/3/13, Breitbart News is broadcasting the reenactment of Gettysburg live online. Pickett’s Charge coverage begins at noon EST.

Tuesday at Barnes & Noble . . .
(Thank you to Andy for the notes)

Amber Boudreau started with chapter 16 of Noble. The cliffhanger was well-received and many people were anxious to find out what would happen next. Pat began to ask questions. Why would people try to kill Moira? Who are they? Why would magic backfire? What is Moira’s goal becoming? Why? Why isn’t Moira asking these questions? Andy wanted to know in what way Moira was incapable of using a sword, since it wasn’t shown, and that Moira only almost died by exhausting herself. There were also many opinions about the sword itself as well as the timeframe in which she used it. Millie was curious about Moira’s grades, which will be clarified next time. Lisa began to feel sorry for Bertram in that he suddenly appeared to be lonely, but still didn’t know if she could be trusted.

Lisa McDougal presented chapter 3 of The Tebow Family Secret. She started with an apology for uploading an unpolished version full of grammatical errors, which settled that issue. Ruth wanted to know if Glenn was hiding something from Ahna. Pat noted some discrepancies between passive and active voice; Lisa admitted she needed to read out loud more often. Pat also found the cooking binges unusual, and also thought the chapter should end with “We’re not hiding anything from you.” Pat and Jerry also noted that the dialogue got too long-winded at times, and often became a speech that could induce sleep. Jerry also thought the use of minutes in the sex scene may have unintentional complications, since Ahna would have to be keeping track. He also noted that Glenn couldn’t run his fingers through his wife’s wet hair. Jerry also wanted to know what Izzy, Ahna’s other self, sounded like – and Lisa said “different than Ahna.”

Andy Pfeiffer went next, presenting the first part of Pilleum, a new novella that he was writing for fun. Andy noted timeline issues himself. Lisa and Pat particularly did not like Cadence, and felt that she was superficial and snobbish. Andy said this was not how she was meant to be like, and wanted to know why they felt this way; this became the main subject of the discussion. Jerry noted that the chancellor would investigate an heir to the throne much quicker than a few months. Pat wanted a scene like Luke Skywalker’s “hero” scene for Cadence, to paint an image of her that she’s desirable, and to take out detailus unnecessariums so we can instantly know what she’s like. Ruth also noted some sentence fragments in Cadence’s scenes especially. Pat wanted softer words for Cadence.

Millie Mader presented a revised version of Life on Hold chapter 45. Pat wanted a better ending; Jerry thought Erin getting caked in the face would be an appropriate time, and for the police to have dragged Danny away at the start of the next chapter. There was also discussion about health insurance and covering Erin’s mother’s breast cancer, and for there to be more worry about paying those bills. Jerry finds it unusual why Mum would let Erin go suddenly, and wants Mum to trip and fall so Erin could feel guilty to make her life more complex.

Jerry Peterson closed the show with a behemoth of passages from The Last Good Man. Pat wanted a clear musical genre for the pirate radio station, whether it was punk or heavy metal was Jerry’s to decide. Ruth wanted more of a reaction when the piece was submitted to the journal, which she felt was empty; this was merely reflective of his age, however. Those aside, this was well-received, as always. Stay tuned for the conclusion!

Who’s up next . . .
July 9: Ray Woodruff (short story), Ruth Imhoff (scene from Motto of the Hound), and Carol Hornung (scene from Ghost of Heffron College). Room for more writers. Contact Carol at chornung88@aol.com to get on the schedule.

July 16: Ruth Imhoff (chapter, Motto of the Hound), Alicia Connolly Lohr (novella, scene, Lincoln’s Other War), Bob Kralapp (short story/part 2, “What is Missing?”),
Judith McNeil (chapter 2, My Mother, Savior of Men), Aaron Boehm (film script/part 2, “Mesozoic Mall”), Jerry Peterson (chapters 25-29, The Last Good Man)

August 6: Lisa McDougal (chapter, Tebow Family Secret), Rebecca Rettenmund (chapter, The Cheese Logue), Andy Pfeiffer (novella/part 1 rewrite, Pilleum), Ruth Imhoff (chapter, Motto of the Hound), Pat Edwards (poems), Amber Boudreau (chapter 17, Noble)

July Fifth Tuesday . . .
July 30: FIFTH TUESDAY @ Panera store, University Ave. [3416 University Ave Madison, WI 53705]

Here it is, the Fifth Tuesday writing challenge: Fortune cookie fortunes. Select a fortune from the following list, then write a story, poem, essay, or film scene in which you use the fortune in some way. Maximum length, our ever-popular 250 words. Deadline for emailing your mini-masterpiece to Jerry Peterson by Friday, July 26.

The list
When you feel defensive, examine what you fear.
A man loves his sweetheart the most, his wife the best, but his mother the longest. – Irish Proverb
A man’s work is from sun to sun, but a mother’s work is never done. – Author Unknown
No gift to your mother can ever equal her gift to you – life. – Author Unknown
A sweater is a garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly. – Ambrose Bierce
There is only one pretty child in the world, and every mother has it. – Chinese Proverb
The study of history is the beginning of political wisdom.
The wit of a graduate student is like champagne.
The world is round so the place which may seem like the end, may also be only the beginning.
‘Yogi’ Berra’s real name was Lawrence Peter Berra.
80% of the results flow from 20% of the activities – Pareto Principle
A baby is God’s way of saying the world should go on.
A bashful admirer will soon be reveled.
A beauty is a woman you notice, a charmer is a woman who notices you.
A book is in your future.
A clean conscience is a soft pillow.A committee of one gets things done. – Joe Ryan
A company is judged by the president it keeps. – James HulbertA diamond is a hunk of coal that stuck with it.
A friend asks only for your time not your money.
A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart, and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words.
A friend will soon bring you a gift.
A girl who is free for the evening can be one of the most expensive things in the world.
A good beginning is only half done.
A good example is the best sermon.
A good time to start something new.
A journey of 1000 miles begins with one step. – Lao Tzu
A lean compromise is better then a fat lawsuit. – George Herbert
A little girl, asked where her home was, replied, “where mother is.” – Keith L. Brooks
A long life may not be good enough, but a good life is long enough. – Ben Franklin
A man can’t get rich if he takes proper care of his family. – Navajo saying
A mother is not a person to lean on, but a person to make leaning unnecessary. – Dorothy Fisher
A mother understands what a child does not say. – Jewish proverb
A new challenge is near.

*Newsletter editors: send info & articles for July to Alicia. August editor? Could it be YOU?

Writer’s Craft . . .
Emotion-Charged Settings by Guest Angela Ackerman
[from the writers dojo blog; http://www.ninjaswrite.com/2012/09/emotion-charged-settings-by-guest.html]

Sometimes when we write, we become so obsessed with the characters and events unfolding, we forget to pay attention to the Setting. Conflict and Action are important, don’t get me wrong, but Setting is no wallflower. Used correctly, it becomes a powerful amplifier for emotion.

Setting…The Hidden Character
Imagine if you set a character loose in your story whose only job was to put your Hero off balance. Hmm, smells like tension, doesn’t it? Setting is this hidden character! Choosing the right location for a story event can increase tension, provide mood and offer emotional contrasts, throwing your main character off his game. This makes him more reactive and volatile which leads to bad choices and mistakes…creating great conflict!

This all sounds good, but how do we know which Setting to pick for each scene?

4 Ways to Use Setting For Emotional Impact

Make it Meaningful
Setting can pull double duty by symbolizing something to your character, good or bad. Is it a place of safety, or discomfort? Does it stir up old memories? For example, if a character accidentally started a fire in his cooking class and it led to a school evacuation, if he returns to the classroom a year later,
the echo of embarrassment will return. Knowing your character deeply and understanding what might bother them (or put them at ease if it serves your purpose) allows you to pick a Setting that will encourage your desired emotion to build. This can help increase tension during the scene.

Use Symbols to Trigger Emotion
Symbols hold power. They can foreshadow what is to come and trigger an emotional reaction from characters. If your hero grew up on his grandparents’ farm, he may feel a surge of lightness at noticing a symbol from that time, like an old tractor tire converted to a flower rockery in someone’s backyard. Common symbols will also have an emotional effect on your reader. If your character passes a graveyard on the way home from work, it brings about the feeling of death. The reader on some level will be ill at ease and may expect that something bad will happen. (For a list of symbols to use in writing, check out the Symbolism Thesaurus!)

Contrast can be Powerful
If the hero is filled with rage and about to rearrange the villain’s face for slashing all the tires on his car, a writer might be tempted to set the scene at night, on a deserted street with the air so cold it bites. What if instead the hero confronts the villain at the county fair on a bright blue day, with carousel music and popcorn smells and squealing kids bouncing the balloons tethered to their wrists? Think about how that level of rage stands out against such a happy, family-oriented Setting.

In your own life, how often does bad news come on a gloomy, rain filled day? Does it wait until you have time for it, or for you to be in the mood to receive it? No. Setting is an opportunity to create a contrast that forces the reader to pay attention to the emotions at work and understand their depth.

Play with Light and Dark
A different mood will emerge in any Setting depending on if it is dark or light. Think about the time of day it is in your scene–predawn, sunrise, mid day, nightfall, etc. How can time of day, shadow or light help bring out certain types of emotions? Weather can also add atmosphere to the Setting, causing roadblocks, deepening the emotional value or complicate the situation. Be wary of weather clichés of course, but use everything in your arsenal to power up your Settings!

Writer Tools . . .
Power Thesaurus Collects Reader-Rated Synonyms
By Jason Boog on May 29, 2013 1:42 PM

Struggling to find the perfect word for your next sentence? Try the Power Thesaurus–a crowdsourced tool for finding the best synonym or antonym.
You can also rate suggested words with a thumbs up or a thumbs down, helping other writers find the best word. You can even follow this link to add synonyms for a particular word.
Power Thesaurus is a fast, convenient and comprehensive dictionary based on similarity of meaning. It helps when the most appropriate alternative words have to be found ASAP. Users enjoy easy-to-follow look & feel, yet with powerful assisting tools. It’s a constantly growing and improving synonym finder with the collective power of its visitors and editorial team!
Link to Power Thesaurus: http://www.powerthesaurus.org/_about

When it feels like there’s nothing left to be written . . .
(Thanks to Jerry)

Do you every get the feeling that all the good stuff, all the great stories have been written, that I’m just wasting my time at the keyboard? YA author and blogger Nathan Bransford has some thoughts for you:

There’s a fantastic moment in the movie The Truman Show where young Truman tells his teacher that he wants to be an explorer like the great Magellan. His teacher pulls down a map and says cheerfully, “Oh, you’re too late! There’s nothing left to explore!”

It can sometimes feel this way when writing, too. There are hundreds of thousands of books out there. Every genre feels well-worn. We have the voices of hundreds of writers swimming around our heads.

How can we stand out from the pack? How are we going to get someone to read our book instead of all the others ones? What’s going to make ours different and better?

Writers are often their own worst enemies in this regard. The type of person who will eventually write a successful novel is adept at spotting their own flaws, and mistakes are plentiful at the beginning of the novel-writing process.

What often stops would-be writers in their tracks is that their first efforts aren’t very good. And they know it. The voice sounds like another author’s voice, the plot feels like an imitation of a book they’ve already read, and it doesn’t start out feeling particularly original.

As with every writing problem, there is only one remedy: Keep writing. Keep pushing on. It feels like there’s nothing new out there, but as Truman himself finds out at the end of The Truman Show, that’s not remotely true.

You can write your way to originality, you can write your way to a voice, and you can write your way to a unique plot. It may not start out that way, but if you keep pushing through and keep trying you’ll end up in a place you never knew existed.

Don’t give up. There are still plenty of worlds to be discovered.

Tongue twister is this week’s great word . . .
(Thanks again to Jerry)

Courtesy of Wordsmith Anu Garg:
otorhinolaryngology
PRONUNCIATION:
(oh-toh-ry-no-lar-ing-GOL-uh-jee)

MEANING:
noun: The branch of medicine dealing with the ear, nose, and throat. Also known as otolaryngology.

ETYMOLOGY:
The word is coined so that one is forced to use all three – ear, nose, and throat – to be able to pronounce it. Either that, or it’s from Greek oto- (ear) + rhino- (nose) + laryngo- (larynx) + -logy (study). Earliest documented use: 1900.

USAGE:
“Pete Colangelo, chief of otorhinolaryngology, hunched in front of Ellen Sandler, peering through the center hole of his head mirror at a hyperilluminated spot far within her left nostril.”
Michael Palmer; Side Effects; Bantam; 1985.

Food for Thought . . .
“When a poet digs himself into a hole, he doesn’t climb out. He digs deeper, enjoys the scenery, and comes out the other side enlightened.” ― Criss Jami,

Venus in Arms http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/writers?page=5