The Making of a Storyteller ( Part 2 )

Looking back now, I think it would be safe to say that Robinson Cursoe was an ambitious book for a ten/eleven year old to attempt. However, when the book was finally finished there was a feeling of great accomplishment. Completing that book gave me the confidence to read other books. Most of the books will never be measured against Defoe’s tale, but each had its own value. If for no other reason, they provided entertainment.

The library of Griffithsville Elementary School was no public library, but it did offer a wealth of reading opportunities for its students. Many of which I read or at the very least perused well enough to decide not to read. Among the books that entertained me were Between Planets, Red Planet, and Space Cadet. These books were written by Robert Heinlein a noted master in the realm of science fiction.

Another writer I enjoyed reading was Curtis Kent Bishop. He wrote sport stories dealing with football, baseball, and basketball. Two of those three interested me and I learned if the book had his name on it, it was worthy of reading. One of his books – Lank of the Little League – is still with me as a fond memory. That either speaks positively for my memory, the quality of his writing, or both.

The first book I ever read more than once was Sabre Jet Ace written by Charles Ira Combs. This book is the story of Joseph C. McConnell a fighter pilot in the Korean War. He was the first triple ace jet fighter pilot. I think I enjoyed this book the second time I read it as much as I did the first. Once again, I can thank my mother for this joy. Having told her I couldn’t find anything at the library  I hadn’t already read, she suggested I reread a book that I previously enjoyed. Hesitant at first, I soon realized really good stories can be read and reread over and over. Thanks again mom.

But reading isn’t the only thing that played into my love of telling stories. During my time in grade school and later high school, I was blessed with the task of being one of the first students to arrive at the school every day. In those days in the sixties, when students arrived at school, they entered their classrooms and found something to occupy ourselves with until the beginning of school. On many occasions, we would gather to talk about what was on TV the previous night.

“Did you see Gunsmoke last night?” I might ask one of my classmates.

“No, what was it about?”

That was all it took to launch me into a detailed oral reconstruction of the entire show. I felt I needed to speak to every lift of a hat, every order of whiskey, or every draw of a gun. To tell of the goings-on’s of an hour TV show took time. But somehow I finished before class started. On the rare occasions when I didn’t there was recess to complete the telling.

Almost always before I finished I had a gathering of nearly a dozen fellow students standing around my desk hanging on my every word and detail. I must have done a good job conveying the story, because I was soon being requested to recount other shows I’d seen the night before. More than once I had friends tell me they didn’t need to watch a show they just needed to make sure I did. That way, I could recount everything to them the next day. That was okay by me.

When next we meet part 3. Until then happy reading. : )

The making of a storyteller ( Part 1 )

The biggest influence on my love of reading and stories was my mother. Some of my fondest memories from childhood were on the nights she would read or tell me and my brother a story. My mom grew up the oldest of eight children in a coal mining community. Being the oldest child put her in the unique position of helping to raise her siblings. I’m sure many of the stories she told them at night were also the stories she told us at night.

Of course there were the standards. Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Little Red Riding Hood, Jack and the Beanstalk, and my favorite, and I think her’s as well, Epaminondas and his Auntie. Most stories she told us were recited and not read, but later on we did get a great number of stories read to us from one of my older brother’s school books. As desperately as I’ve tried, I cannot recall the name of the book or any of the names of the stories in the book. One thing I do remember is that when she opened this book to read, I opened my ears to listen.

It is from that book that I developed a love of stories put down on paper. It was almost like some magical spell fell upon me when she read the words from the page that transported me from the comfy covers of our bed to the grassy plains of the Midwest. In that land of buffalo and Indian braves I got to experience an excitement far beyond the reaches of our valley. So it was that I longed for that red book to be opened so I could be once again the hero of the story.

From this love of words it would be reasonable to conclude that I had no problem learning to read. Far be it from the truth. Learning the mechanics of reading somehow eluded me. Not until the fourth and fifth grade did I become comfortable holding a book in my hands and reading the words on the page. That is when I bloomed as a reader and began to use our grade school library to its full advantage.

The first book I can recall reading on my own was Robinson Crusoe. I proudly sat down every evening after dinner and turned the pages eager to see what was to happen to Robinson. Not many days after I started this Everest of words my mother asked if she could read it too. I was happy to allow her to read this book. It would only add to her vast collection of stories. The next day the book remained home as I went to school. That evening after dinner I asked her if she wanted to read the book that night. To my horror she told me she had already finished it. She read in a day what it took me two weeks to accomplish. At first, I felt dejected because it was taking me days to read the book she’d managed to finish in hours. I put down the book determined to let it go unfinished.

When my mother realized I’d stopped reading the book, she questioned me as to what had caused me to abandon the story. I explained to her that it must be too challenging of a book for me since she had read it in a few hours and after days I’d only managed to scratch the surface. She told me that everyone reads at different paces based on their reading expertise and the personal desire to finish the story. This made sense to me, and I rejoined Robinson on the island now content to stroll along the words rather than rush through them making sure to take my time and savor all their meanings.

When next we meet part two. Happy reading.

A couple literary did you knows?

I love books. I can thank my mother for this. She introduced me to stories and the books wherein many of them reside. I say this because one of my favorite stories she told my brother and me during our childhood is nowhere to be found in print, so it must have made its home with her. One of the best stories I know, but not what I want to write about. So I’ll begin with the first literary oddity.

Do you know what a lipogram is? If you don’t already know, then you will be surprised to learn that a lipogram is a written work composed in such a manner as to avoid the use of one or more alphabetic characters. Thank you dictionary.com.

Ernest Vincent Wright would you please take the stage please. Mr. Wright was an American author who lived from 1872 to October 7, 1939. Between 1896 and 1918, he published three books. Several years before 1936, Wright accepted a self-imposed  challenge to write a novel completely lacking the letter “e." Why would he do such a thing you ask? The answer is simple. Someone told him it couldn’t be done. It took him years to complete the manuscript but once completed it contained 50,110 words. Nary a one contains an “e." Where would such a book find a publisher? It didn’t. So in 1939, Wright self-published the book himself. Shortly after the printing, the warehouse holding many of the copies burned destroying nearly all copies of the book. Some did reach circulation, and they are quite valuable. If you happen to have a first printing of Gadsby cherish it. If you’d like to read it for fun, it is available as an e-book or POD.

When I was first told of this feat, the story indicated the letter “e” on his typewriter was broken, and he decided to write a book anyway. As it turns out, he intended to avoid the letter and took great pains to guarantee none snuck into the finished work by tying down the “e” key.

The next oddity happened in my lifetime. I even remember when the announcement was made on TV. I can’t recall the show, but there was a great production made about the book and the introduction of the author. The book published in the summer of 1969 had quickly sold 20,000 copies, and by the end of the year it had spent 13 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list.

So sitting in front of the TV that night, the nation expected to see Penelope Ashe a housewife from Long Island and the reported author of, Naked Came the Stranger. When the curtain opened, the first of twenty five Newsday journalists stepped out onto the stage. The entire book was written as a literary hoax. The brainchild of Mike McGrady, a prize-winning reporter for Newsday, he solicited twenty-four of his fellow writers to be co-conspirators in his truly unique work of fiction.

In recruiting his cohorts, two hard-and-fast rules presided. The book should contain as much sex as possible, and it should be written as awful as possible. Why would this noted journalist do such a thing? It was an experiment to see if good writing didn’t really matter. They found out it didn’t. The adage of sex sells was upheld. That’s still true today. Books considered soft porn are the top-selling  books year after year, and their authors are becoming rich spewing out sex scene after sex scene between the covers. But if you want to read a collaboration of hot steamy sex check out Naked Came the Stranger. It was rereleased in 2004 and has sold over 400,000 copies.

Until next we meet, keep reading.

In the beginning

So let’s begin. What’s in a beginning? More importantly what should the beginning of any writing do?

Before I tell you what I think an opening line should do let’s look at what American Book Review considers the top five opening lines. Imagine the daunting task of choosing these from thousands and thousands of books. Somehow they did it and here are the results.

Number 5

Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins.

 Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita (1955)

As is the case with many of the novels in the list of 100, I had to do some research regarding this book. From this opening line it is evident the POV character has an infatuation with Lolita. This sentence wants the reader to ask who Lolita is, and what makes her so desirable? The shocking answer is that she is a sexually promiscuous girl of twelve which makes the character of Humbert Humbert a pedophile.

Let’s move on.

Number 4

Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967; trans. Gregory Rabassa)

After reading this opening, two questions come to mind. What did Colonel Aureliano Buendia do that caused him to be sentenced to the firing squad? Next, why would he think about his first time seeing ice when facing his death? Basically this book is a multi-generation account of the Buendia family. In 1982, Gabriel Garcia Marquez won the Nobel Prize for his body of work. This book, being his most popular work, definitely had a lot to do with that decision. Thanks in part to his opening sentence.

Number 3

A screaming comes across the sky.

Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow (1973)

Combined with the title this opening sentence spoke of something new. The two words in the sentence that speak to me are “screaming” and “across.” Set in Europe at the end of the Second World War, this combination depicts a rainbow which stretches from one place to another. Some device which screams across the sky could only be a rocket. The V-2 rocket which if perfected before the end of the war may have changed the course of the war’s outcome.

Number 2

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (1813)

Did these words carry more weight two hundred years ago than they do now? A bold statement is that something could be acknowledged a universal truth. Our universe is a vast place and to think that anything could be true throughout it is quite staggering. Then to say that a single man with money would want a wife simply boggles the mind even further. So why would a single man with money want a wife? Who is this single man, and where did he get his money? Does he want a wife? Does he need a wife? Will he find a wife that will make him happy? Does he need love? How many more questions could this sentence spawn? I don’t know?

Finally we’ve arrived.

Number 1

Call me Ishmael.

Herman Melville, Moby-Dick (1851)

That’s it? Why not: My name is Ishmael. Maybe: They call me Tom. What about these three words is so powerful? Why is it considered the best opening line in literature? Why did he use the name Ishmael? It certainly doesn’t have the same impact today as it did one hundred and sixty two years ago. So to get a better understanding of the line, I think the reader has to be aware of how important The Bible was to people living in 1850s. Since Melville could have chosen any name for his narrator the question as to why he decided upon Ishmael is important. The name comes from The Bible and is the name of Abraham and Hagar’s son. I won’t go into the complete details of the significance of this correlation except to say that Melville uses the name to signify the narrator as an outcast. If we examine the line we see that he doesn’t say his name is Ishmael but to call him that. In essence he is saying that he is an outcast. By doing so he proclaims himself unworthy.

Someone living in the 1850s would have been very familiar with The Bible and would be aware of the name and the significance of it. When someone of that time read that first line it would’ve created a number of questions. Why did he call himself Ishmael? Why does he consider himself an outcast? Why is he unworthy and of what? Will this man ever tell us his real name? What happened to this man? To find out we must read further.

The main goal of an opening line is to make the reader want to read the next line. The line creates a desire to know more about the person, place, or thing the story is about. The lines that make the reader need to answer these questions and read the next line are the ones that go down in history as great opening lines. This line deserves to be at the top.

Out of the list of one hundred books with the best opening line(s) I myself have only read seven.

#12   The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain (1885)

#48   The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway (1952)

#53   Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury (1953)

#56   Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Defoe (1719)

#59   Catch-22, Joseph Heller (1961)

#64   The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald (1925)

#100 The Red Badge of Courage, Stephen Crane (1895)

I’m not going to list the opening lines of these books as well, but if you’d like to check to see how you’re doing in your reading of best opening line novels you should check out this link.

http://americanbookreview.org/100BestLines.asp

Now when it comes to reading, everyone has their own personal tastes. Some people like mysteries while others like action adventure. I’m sure you have your own favorite first lines from books that you love. If you’re a voracious reader then your list probably changes quite often. Here are my top three lines.

One morning, when Gregor Samsa woke from troubled dreams, he found himself transformed in his bed into a horrible vermin.

Franz Kafka, Metamorphosis (1915)

When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow.

Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird (1960)

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

Stephen King, The Gunslinger (1982)

Although they didn't make the top one hundred list it doesn't matter. I've read them. Tell me what are some of your favorite lines. Maybe I'll read them too.

Another Orphan

I think all writing needs a little love. More than a few tears, blood, and sweat go into the effort of putting the words into something that resembles a story. This is the opening chapter of a story that is some six years old. It hasn't gotten any love or been touched for that length of time. I thought it needed to see a little love. I hope you like it.

Itch

Merlin gave the doorknob a turn and pushed it open for the twenty forth time. Today would be the final day for this job. After what seemed like months, this task had finally come to fruition. He’d practiced and perfected his plan for weeks until he'd become completely confident in his ability. This time tomorrow he’d go for a walk on the beach to celebrate. That’d be a nice reward for a job well done. He closed the door and moved across the thin layer of pea gravel toward the roof’s edge. Over his shoulder, he carried a black nylon silk lined bag.

At the last landing, he’d pulled on his coveralls, nylon gloves, and rubber booties. The gravel crunched and growled beneath his feet, but the result of his foot attire would be no detectable prints on the roof. Merlin came up with the rubber bootie idea, because he didn’t want to leave anything for the police to ponder over and call evidence. He took great strides in his planning to eradicate anything of the sort. He pulled a reed mat out of his bag and unrolled it close to the edge. He lay down on the mat and slowly moved toward the edge of the roof.

He’d have about a quarter of an hour wait, but he wouldn’t be burning up that time smoking. When he started his new profession, he knew that habit would be a liability, so he gave it up. It’d been difficult at first, but when he got the first installment in his bank account, he had no doubt he'd be able to maintain his diligence. So far, he had, and that had been more than five years. Someday when he retired, he might take it up again. He actually liked smoking. At one time, it'd been one of the great joys in his life. Another joy had always been a nice hot cup of coffee. When he really wanted something special, he’d add a shot of Irish whiskey.

After he slipped the rifle out of the bag, he examined it for signs of trauma. Most people didn’t know such a weapon could suffer trauma, but it certainly could. The slightest jolt could upset the alignment and render the most expensive weapon useless. Especially when shooting from extended ranges, a fraction of imperfection at the origin of the shot could result in a miss of several feet. It would be very embarrassing for a paid assassin to call up his handler and try to explain he’d shot the flowerpot instead of the mark because he bumped his weapon while getting into his shooting position.

Today that wouldn’t be a problem. After taking almost ten minutes to slowly and meticulously inspect his weapon he felt satisfied. The L96 looked fine. Earlier, he sighted it in at a vacant pasture in the hills. He couldn’t take the chance of going to a shooting range and having some ambitious cops come asking questions later of the employees. “Sure I remember a guy sighting in his scope on that afternoon.” That’d be the beginning of the end. That’s why he’d developed such an attention to detail. That’s where the devil lived.

Patience, perseverance, and practice were the magical P's that made his profession worthwhile. The money didn’t hurt either. What else paid a quarter of a million dollars for a few days work?

He raised the barrel of the weapon over the lip of the ledge. The image of the empty driveway swam into view inside the scope. For the past twenty-three days, it’d been vacant until approximately five forty five, and that would be in five minutes. Merlin knew the mark had started dutifully making his way into the killing zone. He knew this because the mark had developed a routine that he adhered to with the utmost vehemence. Merlin knew other people like the mark, and they all loved being able to walk away from the daily grind of life and step into a world they'd created for themselves. It always proved to be a place that pleased and soothed them and in turn gave them the courage and strength to make it through one more day.

Merlin gently placed the gun on the mat and picked up his compact binoculars. He looked up the street and then down. He wasn’t looking for anything, in particular, but then again, he was. He looked for anything that didn’t belong. An oddity that set itself apart from anything that he'd seen in the past three weeks. The low probability of seeing something out of the ordinary did not diminish his need to search. He didn’t want to realize later handcuffed in the back of a patrol car that the scene had been screaming for him to forget his task and just get out. Right now, he hadn’t really broken any laws here, but when he loaded and fired his gun, he’d become the prey. He believed his attention to this detail would benefit him in the hunt to follow. One he intended to last for a very long time.

The sky overhead exhibited a brilliant blue with nary a cloud anywhere. Any wind had been virtually non-existent for the last few days, and the weather radio station had alluded to the possibility of a stagnant air warning if the situation did not change. Perfect conditions for his eight hundred and fifty five meter shot prevailed. After he completed this job he could tell his handler, who called himself Gandalf, never to second guess his decisions again. The guy had been pushing him to finish the job for almost a week now, but Merlin told him he’d finish it when he felt ready and not a minute sooner. Gandalf didn't like that, but that’s the way he did things. No one would ever tell him when to pull the trigger. He had the patience necessary to complete a perfect job. He’d never decide to finish a job until its completion would be a thing of beauty.

The afternoon sun had started to set behind him and the long thin shadow of the building he'd stationed himself atop silently crawled over the distance and approached the empty driveway. If, for some reason, the mark looked toward the rooftop upon which he waited, his eyes would look directly into the evening sun. Merlin planned this as well. He didn’t want anything to go wrong with this job. For no reason other than he considered it a high profile hit. The mark had simply become an itch to someone who would pay to have it permanently scratched. Merlin knew all too well that tomorrow every cop in the city would be working overtime to find him. He paused and gave his situation one last consideration.

    Everything felt right. The time to finish what he’d started had come. He pulled out a box from the bag and removed a single bullet from inside. He looked at the shiny object that seemed to glow in the reddish light of the afternoon sun. He put it to his lips and kissed it softly then placed it into the open gun chamber. He closed the bolt and sent the bullet into the firing position. He looked at his watch.

    “Time for the final act to begin,” Merlin said to himself in a barely audible whisper. He looked again over the edge of the ledge at the empty driveway. “Now cooperate with me and don’t make me wait. I’ve got a TV dinner in the oven at home, and it’s getting cold.”

The Zone

“You're traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That's the signpost up ahead—your next stop, the Twilight Zone.”


—Rod Serling


I was thinking about these words the other day. They were one of the introductions to my all-time favorite TV show. If you’ve never seen any of the episodes, then you have missed some really terrific writing. As in anything some of the episodes were better than others, but as a whole, the show stretched the boundaries of sixties TV.


Even so, I have no intention of praising that show here in this post. What I would like to embellish on is Rod Serling’s words. For the last two years, I’ve enjoyed taking part in the National Novel Writing Month held every year in November. If you are so inclined you can find more information at nanowrimo.org


The catch line for the challenge is: “Thirty days and nights of literary abandon." In my opinion, this is absolutely correct. When you’re attempting to put 50,000 plus words into a story, there isn’t time to think about what you’re writing. So it is very liberating for a writer’s muse to take hold of a story and run. That’s what I try to do. If the story isn’t completely concrete, I’ll have time to flesh it out after the 30th. The important thing is to get those words out of my head onto the paper or into the computer.

So with November 1st fast approaching, I see a signpost up ahead. In fact, for me, there are two.

The first image that comes to mind is the tunnel sign. For me, November is like traveling through a tunnel. There is a beginning, a middle, and an end. At the onset, the light at the end of the tunnel is obscured by the Everest of words I’ll need to churn out as fast as possible, so I can keep the story fresh in my mind. The focus is on that story and those words that will tell the story.

The second is the caution sign. I don’t want to spend my entire month focused on this challenge. Let’s face it November is a time for celebrations and holiday prep. The last thing anyone needs to do is shirk those challenges to sit in front of a computer screen with some background music blaring as white noise. I plan to proceed with caution and schedule at least three hours a day to reach my daily goal of 1667 words. Those hours may be early or late but I'll need to make them count.

When midnight on the last day of November arrives, I plan to look at another completed story. Oh sure it’ll take some rewriting and some editing to make it shine, but that magical muse will have done his work, and I’m sure he’ll want a few days off. He always asks for Christmas.

If you join us in nanoland this year, you will enter another dimension. Not one of sight and sound but of mind. You’ll journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. If you should need a guide or a writing buddy search for rc022762. See you there.

Octoberfest

October, the harbinger, has finally arrived with a basket filled with pre-holiday forebodings and sharpened tools of harvest. It seems as if yesterday the lazy days of summer pressed down upon us with the heat of canicular days bursting with abundant sunlight. Every so slowly Old Sol has trekked on to a new path leaving us northerners for the belly dwellers of the earth. Our days have shortened and made way for a show of varying shades of orange, gold, purple, and red. We can stand back and be amazed as we witness nature’s own brilliant color display. It is wonderful how each year goes out in a blaze of brilliance.

Fall is upon us and with it, the closing of another year fast approaches. The favorites of Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years Eve peek laughingly at as from the shadows that linger along the edges of the road. Three-quarters of 2012 lay behind us and the light we see at the end of the path is the year 2013 hastening toward its birth. Over the next three months, we’ll all remark how short the time seems and wonder how we’ll manage to perform the mountain of tasks that stand between us and a new year.

Somehow I’m sure we’ll manage just as we always do. At the end of this month, we’ll pass out candies and treats to little ghouls that walk our streets every other day masquerading as adorable children. Three weeks later we’ll load up our tables with a feast fit for any kingdom, and celebrate our year giving thanks for how far we have come. Then on the day after we’ll rush out with a list of tasks into the senescent remains of 2012 determined to be triumphant, and we’ll either succeed or submit but either way we will declare victory. After Christmas comes the winding down. Not only for the year that lay behind us, but for ourselves in preparation for the last hurrah on New Year’s Eve. Hours will tick away into minutes, then seconds, and at last we’ll kiss and sing as we welcome the fresh New Year. All the time of 2012 will have evaporated, and we’ll have only the memories we choose to store within our heart.

On New Year’s Day, we’ll arise to look at the path set before us and survey the 365 steps we have yet to take, and we’ll vow to make 2013 better for us in some amazing way. It’s out there waiting for us like a virgin field of untracked snow. A white pristine fresh canvas waiting for us to paint the scene, and it will become whatever we choose from our hearts and minds. We can start sketching it out now. Get a feel for what it’s going to be and how we’re going to make it happen. Then when we step up to that unmarred year, we’ll be ready to make of it whatever we want it to be. Think of the possibilities.