Tuesdays with Story

Writer’s Mail
Tuesdays with Story
December 13, 2015

The first word . . .

“A well-told story is an arrangement of words and images that re-creates life-like characters, issues, ideas, and events in a way that promises dramatic fulfillment of our needs, and then delivers on that promise.”
– Bill Johnson, author and teacher (website: http://www.storyispromise.com/)

Who’s up next . . .

December 15: Alicia Connolly-Lohr (part 2, Ricin Unleashed), Kashmira Sheth (chapters 5-7, Nina Soni), Pat Edwards (3 poems), Cindi Dyke (chapter 24, North Road), Kashmira Sheth & Amit Trivedi (chapter 1 rewrite, novel), Bob Kralapp (???), and Jerry Peterson (short story, “Three Kings of Kansas”).

* First-and-third meets at Alicia Ashman Branch Library.

December 22:
* Second-and-fourth meets at The Chocolaterian Cafe.

January 5: Lisa McDougal (chapter 46, Tebow Family Secret), Alicia Connolly-Lohr (part 3, Ricin Unleashed), Kashmira Sheth & Amit Trivedi (chapter, novel), Judith McNeil (???), Millie Mader (???), and Kashmira Sheth (chapters, Nina Soni).
* First-and-third returns to Barnes & Noble Westside.

Goodreads and you . . .

Have you joined Goodreads? If you haven’t, you should.

If you have, are you using the site’s author program? You should, particularly if you have one or more books out.

Forty millions readers are members of Goodreads, and, by means of the Goodreads author program, you can promote yourself and your book or books to them. Here’s the web address that will get you there so you can get started: https://www.goodreads.com/author/program

Dilbert’s Scott Adams tells us what we need to know . . .

From Adams’ blog post of August 22:

One of my blog posts from 2007 has been making the rounds on social media this week. (Thank you, Naval Ravikant.) I take that as a signal that I should re-post it here in case you missed it the first time.

And now a second look…

The Day You Became A Better Writer

I went from being a bad writer to a good writer after taking a one-day course in “business writing.” I couldn’t believe how simple it was. I’ll tell you the main tricks here so you don’t have to waste a day in class.

Business writing is about clarity and persuasion. The main technique is keeping things simple. Simple writing is persuasive. A good argument in five sentences will sway more people than a brilliant argument in a hundred sentences. Don’t fight it.

Simple means getting rid of extra words. Don’t write, “He was very happy” when you can write “He was happy.” You think the word “very” adds something. It doesn’t. Prune your sentences.

Humor writing is a lot like business writing. It needs to be simple. The main difference is in the choice of words. For humor, don’t say “drink” when you can say “swill.”

Your first sentence needs to grab the reader. Go back and read my first sentence to this post. I rewrote it a dozen times. It makes you curious. That’s the key.

Write short sentences. Avoid putting multiple thoughts in one sentence. Readers aren’t as smart as you’d think.

Learn how brains organize ideas. Readers comprehend “the boy hit the ball” quicker than “the ball was hit by the boy.” Both sentences mean the same, but it’s easier to imagine the object (the boy) before the action (the hitting). All brains work that way. (Notice I didn’t say, “That is the way all brains work”?)

That’s it. You just learned 80% of the rules of good writing. You’re welcome.

Scott

* Here’s the web address if you’d like to read Adams’ blog regularly: http://blog.dilbert.com/

Great phrase . . .

From Word Spy Paul McFedreis:

bozo explosion
Meaning: (noun) The large number of inept employees that a company ends up with when it hires an incompetent executive, who in turn hires incompetent managers, who then hire incompetent workers.

Examples
“In the chapter about designing the original palmtop, Andrea suggested that I pay more attention to a Palm mantra from the early days, a favorite saying of Ed Colligan, who was then Palm’s vice president of marketing: ‘Delight the customer.’
“Now, Colligan was also responsible for many mottos that were far more clever, including ‘Avoid the bozo explosion’ (if you hire one clueless manager, you’re dead; that person will hire more bozos, and they’ll hire more).”
– David Pogue, The Dumb and the Delightful, The New York Times, June 7, 2001

“As we enter the first quarter of fiscal year 1992, it is appropriate and important to discuss the issues and challenges Apple faces in the coming year. … I’ve divided the most important issues and challenges into three categories.
“Category 1 – This category contains issues we control and are therefore entirely responsible for dealing with. …
“* Bozo explosion: Given a commitment to long-term employment, we must carefully scrutinize who we are hiring because new employees will be with us for a long time. In the past, we’ve used lower earnings projections to justify laying off bozos and have had less fear of lawsuits. We won’t be able to do this anymore.”
– Guy Kawasaki, From the desk of management changes at Apple, MacUser, December 1, 1991

Notes
In David Pogue’s citation, he gives credit for the phrase bozo explosion to Ed Colligan. However, I believe that honor should actually be given to Guy Kawasaki, who first used the term in an open letter to Apple employees in the December 1991 issue of MacUser magazine.

The last word . . .