Tuesdays with Story

Tuesdays with Story
April 26, 2021

The first word . . .

“Imagine a reader you can trust.” –Verlyn Klinkenborg

Tuesday evening on Zoom . . .

Eight TWS writers came together this week. Here’s what was said.

— John Schneller (chapter 8, Precious Daughter) . . . Kashmira suggested ending the second scene earlier. Larry pointed out the 1st and 3rd scenes could be combined. Jaime initiated the thought of paying attention to the gender of the reader. Would a young male reader need a little less fashion discussion? I promise that fashion will be intertwined with blood and bruises and dark escapades very soon. Thanks for all the comments!

— Mike Austin (“Dog People,” short story) . . . I received some excellent feedback and suggestions for “Dog People.” There were suggestions that there would not be the hiss of tires on wet pavement so soon after the melon was run over. There could be more indication of the narrator having an interest in being a mechanic, or at least a history of it somewhere. And perhaps the story could come full circle, with Darlene looking past Ralph to Charley. Jerry, had some; input for me. Regarding proper punctuation. Also!!!! I use too many exclamation points. What?!?!? I have to admit, it’s true. Thanks everyone! 

Bob Kralapp (“Rialto,” part 1) . . . When is the story happening? There was some confusion on this point. Which is understandable, since several historical referents do not align. Others appreciated the ambiance of the story – the feeling of being in a Woolworth store or a down-at-heel movie house. Jaime asked whether astrology would come back up in the story, or whether it’s in there thematically, since the story seems to be about the forces at work in people’s lives.

— Kashmira Sheth (chapter 3, Nina Soni, Snow Spy) . . . Kashmira submitted the third chapter of Nina Soni, Snow Spy. The overall comment was that it worked well and had a warm family feeling. Larry wanted some conflict in the chapter and some anxiety about the tall stranger. Bob wondered if the idea of webbed relationships could be explored further. 

—Larry Sommers (chapters 5-8, Freedom’s Purchase) . . . In Ch. 5, three was confusion about the identity of the “long-jawed American” who is referred to without being in the scene, and also about Kirsten’s speech to the sheriff, which is belatedly noted as being in Norsk even though it appears in English for the benefit of readers. Although Anders does speak English, his foreignness of speech ought to be more evident.

Who’s up next . . . 

On May 4, here’s who will be presenting:

John Schneller (Precious Daughter)

Jerry Peterson (Escape to Conch Republic, chapter 7-8)

Amber Boudreau (Dragoneer book 2, chapter 12-14)

Jaime Nelson Noven (Outsleep, chapter 12)

Amit Trivedi (???)

Paul Wagner (???)

Our editor . . .

Mike Austin will edit our May issues of Writer’s Mail. He would appreciate your news. Email it to him and he’ll include it in the next issue.

When will TWS go back to being in-person?

We will be resuming in-person meetings in June. The June 1 meeting will be at Jack’s, the June 15 meeting at Larry’s. The Zoom link will be maintained, so everybody can be there. Further details later.

Props are more than yet another thing to keep track of . . .

How often do you let your characters’ interactions with props tell us about their state of mind, rather than dialogue, sensory descriptions, or emotion words? An untouched meal or a crumpled note can tell us a lot about how your character is feeling. Try assigning one prop to every plot beat in your story, and let the prop do the “talking.”

On his blog, Alec Nevala-Lee says: “When you look at it more closely, a list of props is really a list of actions, or moments in which a character expresses himself by performing a specific physical activity. Unless you’re just giving us an inventory of a room’s contents, as Donna Tartt loves to do, a prop usually appears only when it’s being used for something. Props thus represent the point in space where intention becomes action, expressed in visual or tactile terms—which is exactly what a writer should always be striving to accomplish. And a list of props is nothing less than a list of the times which the story is working more or less as it should.”

The last word . . .

“It’s not that I’m trying to introduce into a story surrealistic things and situations that I became aware of. I’m just trying to portray things that are real to me, myself, a little more realistically. However, the harder I try to realistically portray real things, the more the things that appear in my work have a tendency to become unreal. To put it another way, by viewing it through an unreal lens, the world looks more real.” –Haruki Murakami (in an interview on Amazon Book Review)