Category: Writing

‘When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’

‘The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’

‘The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master — that’s all.’

– Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass, Chapter 6.

I read two great essays recently at Huffington Post, both by Jonathon Owen. The first is 12 Mistakes Nearly Everyone Who Writes About Grammar Mistakes Makes and the other is a rather defensive response to criticism he got as a result of the first, Yes, ‘Irregardless’ Is a Word.

Both are great reading, and as an admitted unreconstructed Grammar Nazi I recommend you go read them now (if you haven’t already) if you are serious about being a writer. And this is despite the fact that Owen is essentially hauling my Grammar Nazi ass to Grammar Nuremberg in both articles. I suggest you go read them because he is right and I am wrong.

Grammar has been very much on my mind as I’ve been slogging through the first draft of Crush Story. With two teenage boys as protagonists, swapping narration and POV back and forth between them, it’s vital that I maintain separate voices for the two of them. The best ways to do that on the printed page are through word choice and grammar. So I decided that one of them, Jason, would have a fairly well developed vocabulary and would use somewhat proper grammar. The other, Sam, would have what I call “lazy” grammar and use fewer words. It got so bad that I had to turn off grammar check in Microsoft Word because when I would write a chapter by Sam, half the page would get green underlines about sentences ending with prepositions or “me and him did that” phrases.

But if the book ever gets published, I will lay better than even odds that Sam’s chapters “sound” more real to the teens who read it, because the way I have him talking is closer to how English is actually spoken today by kids born in this Century.

Grammar is an evolving beast. Most of the rules of grammar as learned by students in the Twentieth Century were not the rules of English as it had actually grown, they were imposed upon it by academics who decided that nothing had changed since the days when Latin ruled the known world. Those academics trying to impose the rules of Latin spelling and grammar on English (which has more in common with Germanic tongues than with Romance languages anyhow) are the reason we spell “vittles” as “victuals” although no one who has ever spoken the word has ever pronounced the c or u. And please don’t start me on the insanity of trying to impose the rules of a language that declines its nouns upon a language that determines sense by word order.

But as right as Owen is in the two essays, I do have to take exception with him on one matter. In both of them he defends “irregardless” by offering a supposed counterexample:

Flirgle, on the other hand, is not a word — it’s just a bunch of sounds that I strung together in word-like fashion.

This is where Owen is wrong. “Flirgle” is a word. Why? Because he used it as a word.

Words are invented every day. I’ve created a couple. “Metroburb” wasn’t a word before someone first used it, and now it refers to a metropolitan area that is subservient to a larger metropolitan area, like Jersey City is to New York. “Smog” wasn’t a word until someone felt the need to use one word to describe the combination of smoke and fog created by auto exhausts. Dr. Seuss and Lewis Carroll created hundreds of words between them. We’ve lost count of how many words Shakespeare coined. (Or at least I have; smarter people could probably tell you an exact number.) None of those words existed until they were used. And now they do.

And now, despite Owen’s protests to the contrary, “flirgle” does.

What does it mean? It must mean something, even if it is assumed it means nothing. Even gibberish has some meaning behind it when you get down to it, even if the meaning is nothing more than a desire to amuse. So it must have a meaning. If it must have a definition, I proposed that a “flirgle” be defined as a nonsensical counterexample to a logical thing. After all, that’s how Owen used it.

So never say that a word isn’t a word. “Flirgle” is now as much of a word as “irregardless” ever was, because Jonathon Owen willed it into existence. It may die out from lack of use (and probably will, as most new words do), but for one fleeting moment, it achieved worddom, and a word it is.

Put that in your pipe and euphemism it.

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I met a character in one of my upcoming books last weekend. I don’t know who the character is just yet, or where I’ll use him, but I do know I met him.

It was on the platform at a light rail station in Baltimore, where I had just come from an appearance at Comic-con. One of the other people there made such an impression on me that I decided to base the appearance of a character on him. He’ll probably end up being someone’s best friend or big brother since he didn’t strike me as the protagonist type, but who knows who he will end up being in the end.

One of the tricks to making your writing realistic is to use as much of the “real world” as you can in it, and the best way to make sure you do that is to always be on the lookout for inspiration.

As another example, while walking to that light rail stop, I passed by an old boarded up restaurant whose sign was falling apart. Where once it said “China Doll” restaurant, it now reads “Chia Doll.” My immediate thought was “don’t eat the salad.” I will probably use that setting and that joke somewhere down the line, too.

It’s not just characters and settings that present themselves to you at random moments, either. Whole story concepts can smack you upside the head at times like these. While “backstage” at our local Fantasy Fair (where I was performing some scenes from Shakespeare with a friend) I saw someone’s sword and helmet laying on a blanket, next to a pair of high top sneakers. It took the better part of a year for that image to yield fruit, but it stuck with me, and when I was trying to come up with a story for a new novel I remembered that image and Sidekick was the result.

If you’re serious about writing, spend some time just wandering around looking and listening. Walk through neighborhoods, especially if you’re in or near an old historic town with lots of character. Make notes in your handy pocket notebook (which you do keep with you at all times, right?) whenever something strikes your fancy. If you have your phone handy snap pictures of images or locations that strike you as interesting. I won’t advise you to take pictures of people you find interesting because that can get a little stalkerish, but to each his or her own.

Sit in the Mall or a park for a couple of hours and look at the people going by. Try to imagine stories about them: who they are, what they do, what their hobbies are, etc. If you find an interesting idea, write it down. You might find use for it somewhere down the road.

As a writer, your eyes are as important to your craft as your fingers are. Keep them open at all times. You never know when your next story is going to stare you in the face, or vice versa.

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As I start the heavy lifting on Crush Story, I thought it might be a good time to discuss one of the ways I like to develop the plot of a novel.

There is no “right way” to plot a novel. There are a couple of wrong ways, but even they can yield positive results sometimes. It isn’t even necessary to actually plot a novel, as was the case when I wrote Sidekick. I knew where the story began, I knew where and how it would end, but I left almost everything in the middle up to chance. Yeah, I had a couple of scenes I knew I wanted to include, but how I got to them, and from them to the end, I didn’t know until I actually started writing.

Some stories, however, can’t be done by the seat of your pants. They get intricate and complicated, and you might either leave something out or get your story so tied up in knots that you’d do better to just start over. I expect Crush Story to be that kind of story, so I am going to actually plot it.

Ingredients

There are a couple of things you will need while you are plotting.

The first thing is a good thing to have handy even if you’re going to try and wing it. You will need notebooks. I used the plural there for a reason. Keep a stock on hand just in case you mislay one of your notebooks, as I have been known to do on too many occasions. Also, carrying them around in your pocket will all but destroy the notebooks pretty quickly, and you’ll have to move on to the next before too long. My local Walgreens recently had a sale on pocket-size “memo books” selling them three for a dollar so I snatched up several. Keep an eye out for bargains like that and never let yourself run out.

Once you have notebooks, make sure you carry one around with you at all times. And a pen or pencil, too. You literally never know when you will have inspiration strike. I was actually riding on a train a while back when an idea hit me that would wind up changing the entire “third act” of the book. (More on that later.) If I hadn’t had my notebook I probably would have forgotten it a couple hours later when I got home. Never be without your notebook!

Second, you will want index cards. Index cards are wonderfully useful items that let you rearrange major plot developments in no time at all. As you can see in this picture, I’m using two different colors of index card because Crush Story is going to be narrated by two separate POV characters who pretty much alternate chapters. This way I can see which plot points belong in which character’s chapters, and I won’t need to jump back and forth between POV’s more often than I want.

Once you have your index cards, use them. Copy important scenes you scribbled in your notebooks onto them. If you already have more than just an idea or description for a scene you want, add “bullet point” notes on the rest of the card for lines, gags, important things to remember, and so on. Feel free to use both sides of the card.

The other thing you will need, or at least I need, is caffeine. When I do writing marathons (as I tend to do once inspiration has hit me) I need my Pepsi Throwback to keep me awake until the muse stops hitting me over the head.

With notebooks and index cards on hand, you’re ready to start on the plot. You’re going to want some structure, which I will discuss in an upcoming entry.

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