Master List of Scary Things

[Special note: This posting is on October 31, 2013. Tomorrow, November 1, Amazon is scheduled to feature You've Got a Book in You in its Daily Deals. FYI in case you're interested in picking up an extra copy or two because you've worn yours out… or for gifts…]

Raymond Chandler (The Big Sleep, Farewell My Lovely and other greats) said, "When in doubt, have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand."

Why? Because it's a moment that's not just heart-clutching, it's scary.

Given the season, I've been thinking about scary things and their value in literature. I'm aware that authors sometimes have trouble coming up with scary things to write about. And that's a problem.

To put that problem in the rearview mirror forever, I present the Master List of Scary Things. When in doubt, have one of these come into your story. That's my advice. You are so welcome!

Clowns

A group of clowns

Spontaneous combustion

The IRS

The school cafeteria

Bats / snakes / spiders

Tarantulas (they're a spider, but they deserve their own line item)

Credit card agreement documents

Chinese drywall

Caves

Tsunamis

Rats

Black mold

Cemeteries

Preparation H

Mobs

Zombies

A mob of zombies

Hurricanes

That sealed Tupperware thing in the back of the fridge

Crocodiles

Flesh-eating bacteria

Brain-eating bacteria

Bone-eating bacteria

Old mansions

Crypts

Wasps

A sudden black screen on your computer

Gas station bathrooms

Christopher Walken

Durian fruit

Orphanages

Nail fungus

The homeowners' association board of directors

Flash floods

Nursing homes

Komodo dragons

Basements

Rip currents

Hoarders

Artificial sweeteners

Gigantic bald guys with earrings

Mummies

Tornadoes

Quicksand

The incontinence aisle

High school reunions

Unexplained night house sounds

Vultures

Nancy Grace

Fitness equipment

Great white sharks

Hornets

Earthquakes

Precipices

Elephantiasis

Loners in cabins

Belfries

Giant squid

Deserted parking garages

Tapeworms

Bad facelifts

Chainsaws

Really high platform sandals

Outhouses

Feel free to use any or all in your next writing session.

Did I forget anything? Let me know by posting a comment!

To post your ideas, all of which I read and try to respond to, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever.

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You Become Your Story

All my life I've been a seeker. And for much of my life I was a struggler. I thought the two went together. You know, trials and tribulations! Once you conquer all those dreadful obstacles life puts in your way, you can finally approach your true potential, right?

At some point it dawned on my that I had identified myself as a struggler. That was my story: I'm a person who has to struggle along and hope for breakthroughs.

Even though all the greatest teachers—spiritual and otherwise—try like hell to make us understand that all obstacles are self-imposed, it took me some time to start to believe it.

And then I understood that we become the stories we tell about ourselves.

These days I choose struggle only when I'm out of synch. As soon as I come to my senses,

I quit struggling and remember the peace and zest that are always within.

In You've Got a Book in You, I wrote this sentence:

If it's not fun, make it fun.

But to take it a step further:

If you can't make it fun, decide that it's fun.

Now that's radical. If you've been telling yourself writing is hard and life is unfair, try another way. Take these sentences from my current story and make them your own:

I'm a confident, poised person. Nothing bothers me. I'm a highly talented writer, and I have fun producing beautiful, zestful work every day.

Writing your own story is a wonderful thing to do. If you don't like your current story, write a new one. The story of who you want to be! Write it now!

I was talking about these things with a doctor who's a real healer: a guy who healed himself first, then broke all the rules for running a practice so he could be more effective. We agreed that one's story will fulfill itself, and we talked about how each of us changed our stories to change ourselves.

He said, "And if you don't keep changing your story, you'll stop growing!"

How wise. How wonderful! How zestful!

[photo note: Seaside flower photographed by ES.]

Tell me what you think! To post your ideas / comments, all of which I read and try to respond to, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever.

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The Lounge Not Taken

I've barely shaken the road dust off from the Writer's Digest conference in Los Angeles (plus workshop in Hollywood sponsored by my buds at Kleis TV) and I'm zooming around packing for this weekend's Florida Writer's Association conference in Orlando.

There are few things more boring to read than somebody's postmortem of a conference, unless it's somebody's thinly-veiled promo about getting ready to speak at a conference. The thing is, all conferences want their speakers to shamelessly, tirelessly, and relentlessly flog the conference for months in advance, using every possible orifice of social media, and afterward try to make people regretful if they didn't go, because it was so much FUN, so that hopefully they won't miss it next time.

Oh, baby. As I used to say to the able-bodied panhandlers in San Francisco, "No can do." (Eventually I was driven to say, "Get off your ass.")

As a veteran author and conference presenter, one would think there is no rope I don't know. However, even I learn things, every time. And they're never what I expect to learn.

I think my best insight from Los Angeles happened in the hotel bar.

So this is the Century Plaza, which is the kind of hotel you always hope they'll put you up in. (Thank you, WD!) (In spite of numerous pleading telegrams from my agent, the hotel is paying me nothing to write nice things about it in this popular blog.) And there's this luxurious big cocktail lounge in the lobby, smack in the middle of everything. You have to pass by it to get from the main doors to the reception desk, then pass it again to get to the correct elevator.

And the night we get in, the bar is packed and noisy. I see well-known faces I'm supposed to walk up to and greet—"Oh, hi, so good to see you again, oh yeah, my thing's at 3 tomorrow, when's yours, oh yeah, how cool, you and I are just so cool and having so much fun!"—which is actually the last thing I want to do. I skillfully avoid them and explore, and find that there's a huge part of the bar outside, beyond some glass doors. A place that's quiet, dark, and dramatic, with stone decking and columns of warming flames shooting up in the chilly night air, and servers right handy to bring you a martini and some restorative bar food.

Why isn't anybody out here, instead of cramming up indoors?

That question hovered in the back of my mind for days before the answer burst upon me: The hotel bar is a place to be seen.

If you're someone who might possibly be recognized, perfect; otherwise you're hanging out nearby people who might be recognized, and a little of that sparkle somehow floats over on you. Moreover, this is Los Angeles, nexus of see-and-be-seen culture. You need the relatively brightly lit lobby bar for maximum exposure and ego-gratification.

If that appeals to you, that's the strategy.

No? Then join me wherever it's quiet and off the beaten path.

[Photo note: The many balconies of the Century Plaza, shot by ES.]

Tell me what you think! To post your ideas / comments, all of which I read and try to respond to, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever.

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What to Leave Behind?

A wise old author once said, "Only by giving yourself permission to write poorly will you write anything at all."

Oh, wait a minute, that was me. Haha. It's on page 11 of You've Got a Book in You. I do hope to get old someday (better than the alternative), and I am an author. Wise? Some readers say so, but time—and more readers!—will have the most to say about that.

I just noticed that sentence is the most-highlighted one by readers of the Kindle version. This struck me, because it really is my most important message, and in a way it's the whole book in one nugget. If we let fly on the page without caring beforehand about the results, we free ourselves to discover things we didn't know were in us. Wonderful, good, magical stuff.

Readers have gotten in touch to say how much the book means to them, and a few of them have even attached pictures. This one is from Cordia Pearson, an accomplished writer and businesswoman:

As she said in her message, "Anointed, highlighted, starred, and most of all, used." I love it. Thank you, Cordia!

I hope You've Got a Book in You will be a significant part of my legacy as an author and person. That makes me happy. And it makes me want to do more.

I'm thinking about these things—what one leaves behind—because an elderly family member died recently. Here is a picture of Alice T. Doyle, who passed at age 91:

As the picture suggests, Alice was one of the first flight attendants in American aviation. Her legacy is more than that, however; in spite of being supremely crabby at times, she was a good friend to many people, and she dedicated much of her later life to taking care of my uncle and aunt (her sister) during their final years. She also did her part to support the bourbon industry, as well as keep alive the vocabulary used by Naval personnel during WWII.

She's not a blood relative, but to me she was an honorary member of the family.

The lesson? Since we can take nothing with us, might as well leave behind as much as possible. Whatever we can give, we give.

As for writers? More gifts lie within you. Do like I do, and give yourself permission to write poorly. But do write! And see what happens. Pour it out now, and devil take the hindmost!

Tell me what you think. To post your ideas / comments, all of which I read and try to respond to, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever.

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Small Will Get You to Big

[I initially wrote this post for a Writer's Digest blog last spring, and I've heard so many nice things about it that I decided to publish it on my own darn blog.]

I'm coming to feel that aside from young children, there really is no such thing as a beginning writer. Practically everybody has some writing experience! Making the transition from 'beginner' to 'writer' is simply a matter of finishing a writing project, whether a short story, essay, article, or book.

What does it take to finish something worthwhile?

Two ingredients:

1) Zest.

2) A focus on the small.

Zest is what you have when you feel strongly about your subject, or when you feel excited about the act of writing. I'm working with a fellow who is writing his first novel, set in the world of international sport. Even though he's not very experienced, his writing is exceptional because he's so passionate about his subject. He is determined to get his novel finished and start sending it out. Zest is his fuel.

A writer without zest will not write much of anything good. You just can't. But that's all right! You can simply write, dammit, zest or no, and by writing—just by sticking with it, keeping your pen moving or your fingers going on the keyboard—you will eventually write a piece of a sentence or even a whole sentence that sounds OK. You will go, "Hey! That doesn't suck! Now I gotta keep going!"

Your zest is awakening.

Now, what's size got to do with it?

I used to think that 'the big picture' was the main thing. But over the course of my writing career I've come to realize two key things:

1) The big picture can be overwhelming, thus a hindrance to an artist, and

2) Small will get you to big.

[Note on photo: I took this picture of a prison wall with a seed sprouting from it in Cartagena, Colombia.]

Often, as writers, we don't even have the big picture, as in a fully-realized plot or a detailed outline, whether for fiction or nonfiction. If you feel you need the big picture but don't have it, that can lead to anxiety and tightness.

But a general idea of where you want to go with your writing project should suffice.

To focus on the small, simply pay close attention to each piece of a scene, character, description, conversation or memory that you want to present. If you feel stuck, don't flail around looking for what should come next. Instead, try going back to something you've touched on but haven't fully fleshed out. Write on it. Write deeper, write with more detail, write in the spirit of wanting to find things out rather than presenting them.

Say you've written a scene that ends in a dramatic moment: somebody gets killed. Maybe it feels hard to get your story going again, to ramp it up all over again. Try writing more deeply about the inner life of that victim before their life was snuffed out. Just pretend you're inside that person's head and heart and see what happens. What do you find there? How might it fuel the rest of your story? For one thing, you can do a lot more with the people who knew that victim in life.

If you write in the spirit of discovery, you'll be propelled forward by your subject. Go along for the ride! Don't try to steer, just hang on and keep going! All kinds of wonderful things will happen: you'll find new vectors to explore, you'll learn things about your subject you didn't know before, you'll realize that you ought to explore this territory next, tell that anecdote next, introduce a new character so as to fully bring to life one you've already got, and so on. And as we know, lots of little things can add up to a big thing.

If you simply keep doing that, every writing session, you will be awestruck by the number of projects you start, finish, and ship out into the world.

Tell me what you think! To post your ideas / comments, all of which I read and try to respond to, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever.

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