Tag Archives: movies

Expose Yourself

04 Friday May 2012

Posted by in Advice, Experiences, Inspiration, Mike

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I’ve mentioned before how much I dislike the old “Write what you know” advice and instead advocate “Write what you want to read.”

Expanded out a little, that becomes, “Tell the stories you want to experience.”

But to know what kinds of stories those are, you need to do some homework. What, homework? Yes. I know it will be terribly rough for you, but you need to expose yourself to stories.

Note that I very specifically avoided saying “…but you need to read a lot of novels.” If you want to be a novelist, you obviously should be reading a lot of novels, but you shouldn’t limit yourself to just them. Watch movies. Read webcomics. Try graphic novels. A story is a story, and although the way they are told varies by medium, the basics of good storytelling transcend those limitations.

When I wanted to be a fantasy novelist, oh so many years ago, I heard the further piece of advice, “Read a lot of novels, including those outside your genre.” To this day, I believe this is excellent advice for all storytellers, from novelists to webcomic artists to screenplay writers to graphic novelists.

Why?

Well, a good story is a good story, regardless of its medium or genre. Regardless of the often arbitrary category in which it is filed. Don’t be embarrassed by these labels assigned to stories by publishers, bookstore owners, or movie theaters. There are amazing stories told in every kind of genre, in every kind of medium.

Want examples?

When I was an aspiring fantasy novelist and heard that advice I went to my mom and asked her to recommend a good romance novel. She went through her collection and found me a historical romance. I read it. I enjoyed it. I remember little about it except the lead character’s surname, which I later co-opted into my own stories because I thought she was cool. The story was inspiring in at least some way, even though I was so far outside the target audience.

Except I am, because I’m someone who enjoys a good story. And that’s another related point: as a storyteller, you are the target audience of everything.

Let’s go with another example. I have a friend who recommended The Hunger Games trilogy to me, although he was a little embarrassed, because they are YA. I told him it didn’t matter, because of my mantra, “A good story is a good story.”

So go forth, friends, and expose yourself to stories. Not just those in the genre you want to write. Not just those in the medium you want to create in. Experience stories all across the spectrum, from dystopian YA to historical romance to mainstream tales, as novels or movies or sequential art.

Watch Your Television

13 Tuesday Mar 2012

Posted by in Advice, Ann, Experiences

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I have a love/hate relationship with the television. I don’t tend to watch broadcast television (I haven’t had cable in about a decade), but I do turn my Netflix subscription on and off, and when it’s on, I spend a lot of time with it. I also have a tendency to re-watch the many DVDs we own. This last weekend, I binged on a marathon to catch up with all the shows my friends have been gleeing about for the last few months.

But why do I dislike the television? (1) I feel like it spends time dragging me passively into their stories instead of considering my own. (2) It’s an easy way for me to waste several hours buried in another reality.

Isn’t that the same as reading? I’d never tell someone not to read a book.

When reading, we are engaged, but it’s not entirely passive as we have to make an effort (however small) to consume it. On the other hand, with the television, it’s easy to just shut your brain off and zone into the glowing screen. Engagement is a matter of choice.

I have many highly creative friends who watch television. It’s clearly not sucking out their creative potential. Why should it sap mine? As I watched television this weekend, I got an idea for a story that I’ve been stuck on for a while. I spent more time thinking about that story this weekend than I have in weeks. This isn’t the first time that’s happened, either. During some of my most prolific parts of my life, I avidly watched DVDs every day. It certainly didn’t slow me down. Most of the time when I’m watching television now, I’m knitting or spinning and I’m looking for something to engage in with the rest of my active mind.

So I’m going to revise my thoughts. The television isn’t the killer of all things creative. The television is just a place where I’ve been known to go when I’m avoiding thinking. But carefully picking shows, and watching with interest, makes watching a television show or a movie as inspiring a story as reading–it’s a form of taking in stories. The trick for me is not to let it become a slack-jawed passive activity and just to watch it for the sake of it being on or something to stare blankly at while avoiding doing something else.

As it seems with most things, if approached mindfully, I don’t think the television is quite the evil time-sucker as I believed it was for many years.

So, go forth and watch television. But be attentive, and turn it off when it’s no longer entertainment, but a passive activity.

Ninja Ambush!

03 Friday Feb 2012

Posted by in Inspiration, Mike

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You just hit the wall, stuttered to a stop, became bored by where your story is taking you, or just can’t find the transition from where you are to where you need to be. Whatever the cause, your productivity on your story just ground to a halt. You are stuck.

Now what?

I have two words for you, my friend, guaranteed to get you out of any logjam or smash through any writer’s block…

Ninja. Ambush.

If you’re bored or lost or uninspired at this point in your story, imagine what your audience is going to feel! It’s time to up the tension level and kickstart your story back into high gear.

Because the ninja are here to ambush.

It’s possible but unlikely that a literal ambush of ninja is appropriate for your story. Chances are, you’re going to need to be a little more liberal with your interpretations, here. What the ninja ambush really means, of course, is to throw in something unexpected that can stir up the story, raise the tension, and shore up any lagging interest on the part of your audience or yourself.

Your Regency romance, for example, is probably not the best place for Japanese warriors to suddenly attack. In that case, maybe the “ninja” in your story are visitors from another country (no, it needn’t be Japan). The “ambush” here, then, is their sudden appearance in your characters’ lives and the ripple effect of their arrival.

Actually, a fair number of stories begin this way, when a stranger shows up and disrupts the protagonists’ lives. That’s not what I’m getting at here, though. What I’m talking about isn’t something to build your plot around but rather to give it a kick where it’s lagging.

And, of course, the “ninja” needn’t be people at all. The sudden arrival of anything that might give your protagonists pause can serve as your ambushing ninja–be it escaped animals from the zoo or the sudden discovery of some artifact.

Let me throw out a few words of caution about using the ninja ambush technique, though.

First, the ninja ambush doesn’t need to make sense to the characters (or your audience) when it happens, but it needs to make sense within the larger context of the world you’ve built. If you are telling a Regency romance and suddenly murder a character with an actual ambush by ninja, you are going to lose your audience. Even if you never bother to explain why the ambush happened, you at least need to know and have a good explanation for it.

Second, the ninja ambush needs to help push the story forward, not derail it. Don’t use it as filler. Remembering my first cautionary point above will go a long way toward helping you with this second point. The point of the ninja ambush is to give your protagonists a new obstacle that nonetheless helps them advance along the plot once they’ve overcome it.

Third, this is a trick. It’s meant to help you out of a tight squeeze, not a replacement for a plot. If you find yourself needing to use more than one ninja ambush in a story, unless your story really is about fighting and warfare in a setting where ninja are appropriate, you probably need to do more work on your plot. Just like how you shouldn’t live off energy drinks and four hours of sleep, neither should you fill your stories with sudden and inexplicable events–no matter how exciting they might be.

Want some examples from existing media? (There are spoilers beneath the cut for The Last Samurai, Dracula, The Adoration of Jenna Fox, and Inception. You’ve been warned!)
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Seeing Someone Else

12 Thursday Jan 2012

Posted by in Inspiration, Mike

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For more than a decade I thought I wanted to write an epic fantasy novel. I diligently outlined the story, started it, and subsequently restarted it numerous times. One day, though, I realized I hadn’t read a novel in that genre for years. I was no longer in love with the genre. I felt a little lost. The oldest memory I have of my mom reading to me was The Hobbit, when I was around four. Fantasy had always been a part of my life, and indeed I have written many thousands of published words within the genre (and edited countless more).

It might happen to you as well someday. Maybe not the same genre and maybe not after a lifetime of reveling in it, but one day you might realize–as you agonize over a story you’re struggling to even write a love letter for–that your tastes have changed. That you have moved on. That realization can be scary, but don’t panic.

This is an opportunity.

The first thing you should do is stop. Stop feeding your brain with the stories you no longer love. If you can find other kinds of stories to write about, or draw, or film, or otherwise create, then by all means continue to do that. But stop putting into your story brain things you don’t like.

The second thing you should do is start. Start looking at other kinds of stories. Don’t limit yourself to any one kind of genre, medium, or set of tropes. Explore what exists. And a lot exists.

When you’re exploring, remember to not just look outside the genre you no longer love but also the medium in which you create. Novels remain a dominant storytelling form, but movies, sequential art (comic books, webcomics, manga), modern computer roleplaying games, and even some television programs (not reality TV) offer compelling and well-crafted stories. Thanks to the Internet, other forms of storytelling keep cropping up as well (such as Youtube, Escape Pod and its kin, Echo Bazaar, and Homestuck). The Kindle might also bring a resurgence of short stories and novellas.

Ann and I will undoubtedly revisit this list in the future, but the important thing to note for today is that you have many, many options when you’re ready to feed your brain with new kinds of stories. (To say nothing of opportunities for telling stories!)

Of course, this advice is helpful even if you are still madly in love with the genres, media, and tropes you’re creating in. Storytelling isn’t a monogamous relationship; you should experiment around a little. You don’t have to dump your true love to learn something new, and the stories you tell in your chosen genre will be better for your exposure to other types. If you haven’t had enough analogies yet, think of it as cross-training for your story brain.

Today, epic fantasy and I are on friendly terms. Fantasy still informs my works; it continues to have an impact on the stories I tell. For now, though, I have a pretty good idea of what I love and the stories I want to tell, but I also know those might change in the next ten years–and if the change does happen I won’t panic, because I’ll know what to do.