That Can be a Drag

Zestful Blog Post #279

Too many writers use too many [that]s. It’s a reflex, I think, having to do with informal speech. Using [that] can become a habit in speech, almost as a placeholder, or filler.

I want you to know that these binoculars used to work perfectly, before you gave them to Timmy to play with.

You could cut the ‘that’ with no loss of meaning. Now there’s nothing inherently wrong with the word [that]—it’s a useful word:

Stop worrying about that police car behind us.

I don’t remember a thing after that.

The whispered gossip that swept through the shire made me sick.

There’s nothing even inherently wrong with extraneous thats. But they do creep into our written prose way more often than necessary, especially when used to summarize conversation or comprehension. And when you’re tasked with keeping a reader’s interest, it’s a good idea to pay attention to pace and economy, even on the most granular level. A few examples:

He told her that he loved her.

Stronger:

He told her he loved her.

She knew that the reunion would be an ordeal.

Stronger:

She knew the reunion would be an ordeal.

[So that] can get tiring as well:

Ted smoothed the cloth so that it would stay flat on the table.

Stronger:

Ted smoothed the cloth so it would stay flat on the table.

While keeping an eye out for enemy forces, the orange dinosaur rolled boulders into the tunnel so that the treasure would be safe.

Stronger:

While keeping an eye out for enemy forces, the orange dinosaur rolled boulders into the tunnel so the treasure would be safe.

You could add a bit of punctuation to change the flavor and meaning slightly, and to be more grammatically correct:

While keeping an eye out for enemy forces, the orange dinosaur rolled boulders into the tunnel, so the treasure would be safe.

(In this case, we put a comma with a conjunction.)

Getting rid of extraneous thats is easy and rewarding, once you know to look for them!

What do you think? To post, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever. If you'd like to receive this blog automatically as an email, look to the right, above my bio, and subscribe there. Thanks for looking in. [Photo by ES, with special thanks to Cheetoh.]

A Simple Plan

Zestful Blog Post #278

Once in a while, an aspiring writer will feel at a total loss. “I can’t write anything.”

Sometimes the aspiring writer is me. Sometimes, maybe, it’s you. Here’s a Jedi mind trick that always jogs me out of my funk:

“Fine. You can’t write anything. That’s OK. But if you could write something, what would it be?”

Write about what you would write if you could. Just make notes on ideas; you don’t even need complete sentences.

I suggest keeping this in your back pocket, just in case.

What do you think? To post, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever. Photo by ES

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Saving it for Good

Zestful Blog Post #277

Until I was about 11 years old, money was very tight at our house. When you got something new to wear, you wouldn’t dream of just putting it on any old time; you’d ‘save it for good.’ That is, you’d reserve it to wear when you had to go somewhere special. If the item fell under the new school clothes category you waited until school started, then only wore it to school, never out to play. I believe some children still go out to play these days. I can’t remember, however, the last time I drove down some residential street and saw, for instance, two young guys playing catch in the street with a baseball and their mitts. Digression, sorry.

The save-it-for-good habit has been hard to break. I still tend to do it even with new t-shirts, which is insane. Another digression, but I bet you can relate.

Moving along. When I was in my 20’s I hung out with a band that played basic pop and jazz/funk at festivals and weddings here and there in the Detroit area. We were just buddies in general, and it was fun to chill with them on rehearsal nights. Once they let me play the tenor saxophone solo in the Billy Joel version of “Just the Way You Are” with them at some local festival. For that occasion, I wore a skirt and a nice top. Man, am I digressing today. But via them I met a band promoter, a very young guy, who invited me to an after-hours club in Detroit for a special show. He had managed to get three record producers to agree to come see a lineup of half a dozen bands he repped. Each band would play a short set. As we sat with drinks while the first band was setting up and the producers were arriving, he explained to me his strategy: He would lead off with the weakest group, progressing until finishing with a bang with the very best one.

[We listened to vinyl before it was retro, didn’ we?]

  

“Their excitement’s just gonna keep building and building all night,” he told me confidently. He figured if he could sell even just the last and best group to one of the producers, the night would be a success.

Aaaaannnnd as I bet you’ve guessed, the plan backfired. By the time the third group took their bows, all the producers had left. I will draw a curtain over the desperate measures taken by my young, inexperienced friend to try to get the producers to stick around.

And you’ve already guessed the moral of my story today for writers: Though it’s tempting to save your best stuff for some future unleashing, it’s far better to lead off with a bang than hope to finish with one. I’m not saying we shouldn’t carefully husband our material. But sometimes saving becomes a reflexive habit. Spend it, enjoy the rush upfront, and feel secure that more good stuff will come!

What do you think? To post, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever. If you'd like to receive this blog automatically as an email, look to the right, above my bio, and subscribe there. Thanks for looking in. [Photo by ES]

They Will Find You

Zestful Blog Post #276

Not long ago I was taking a walk in a nearby state park, on an overcast afternoon. The forest canopy was so thick it seemed like twilight. I heard an owl hooting and recognized it as a Great Horned, which I’ve been fortunate to spot several times wherever I’ve lived. It occurred to me to hoot back, wondering what would happen. Turns out I have a bit of a talent for owl mimicry, because the bird called again. We talked to each other back and forth a few times, then I heard these big, soft, whooshing wingbeats coming through the trees. The owl had likely decided, “She sounds sexy. I have to meet her!” Or perhaps, “I have to check out this goddam interloper.” The forest was so thick I never did get a glimpse of the owl, who I’m sure was then like, “Oh, hell, it’s just this human down there screwing with me.” But it had found me, because it had to.

And this experience brought to mind a conversation I’d had many years ago at a cocktail party with a multiple award-winning, trailblazing, fairly famous author. She had actually read some of my first work and admired it. During our talk, she mentioned that fans occasionally would show up at her house, being drawn by the power of her writing, being moved by it, feeling compelled to meet her. (It was common knowledge what city and neighborhood she lived in.) I said that must be unnerving. She said it was, because of course you never know whether the stranger is entirely stable. This was before social media and all that.

I said, “Well, I hope to get as famous as you, but I’m going to protect my privacy as best I can.”

She gave me a flat look and said, “They will find you.”

[A screwy, ghost-Kilroy, but you get the idea.]

In the many years since, I haven’t become quite as famous as she, and no strangers have shown up at my door, but indeed they have found me. Marcia and I don’t use our street address publicly (we use a rent-a-box in a nearby UPS store), but I’ve received unexpected propositions via snail mail, e-mail, and social media. One of my e-mail correspondents jokingly calls herself my “friendly stalker,” and our back-and-forths are just that, friendly. Another correspondent was pretty frank about things, and had I not already been attached, I might have been open to the possibility. There was a man of a mature age who, for a few years, turned up at my talks at conferences. He was shy and didn’t say much, but he did once tell me he came to all my events. He seemed simply to be a genuine fan who wanted to learn whatever I had to teach. Now I regret not trying to get to know him better.

On a different level, there was the convict of some notoriety who sent me a letter via Writer’s Digest magazine. He said they got the magazine in the prison library and he liked my articles a lot. Furthermore, he had decided I would be the right person to collaborate with on writing his life story. I have to say no more here except that eventually I declined. If you’re interested and we’re somewhere in person, I’ll tell you more.

Certainly, like many people, I’ve had unwelcome romantic attention on Facebook, but it’s easy to block that. When I was doing consulting work with private clients, one expressed surprise that I’d give her my mobile phone number.

And now I come to my point: You can’t control everything, and one must take risks here and there, or just sit in a concrete bunker all day. I mean, I’m not some big public figure, but even I’ve had unusual experiences. I do feel that rent-a-box gives Marcia and me some peace of mind. So, if you’re aimed at fame, you might consider that. And then, hell, just relax and enjoy the ride!

What do you think? Have you had stalkeresque experiences? Have you been a friendly stalker? To post, click below where it says, ‘No Comments,’ or ‘2 Comments,’ or whatever.

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Crowbar Beats Hammer

Zestful Blog Post #275

Not long ago I was corresponding with friend and Zestful Writing subscriber Anne D., and the subject was current fiction. She said something that really struck me: “I don’t pleasure-read to change the world; I pleasure-read to escape it.”

There are implications here. I’m fond of quoting the distinguished author Cynthia Ozick, who, in conversation with Robert Birnbaum in 2004, said, of writing fiction: “And there is a conceptual underpinning and it’s invisible and so no one seems to know but the one who put it there. It’s got to be invisible, because as I said a moment ago, if the concept is going to be visible you have written an essay. You have written a tract of some kind.”

We are talking about pressing ideological points in fiction. I’ve preached against this before. I emphasize there’s nothing wrong with using, or messing around with, or preferably exploring, the current cultural, religious, and political zeitgeist in one’s fiction. But if you do it with a clear agenda, “the concept is going to be visible.” And some readers will be solidly with you, and others will be alienated. Readers prefer to come to their own conclusions. This is a delicate and subtle subject. We agree war is hell, we agree pollution is bad, we agree incest, prejudice, and abuse are wrong. All that is obvious. I love that Ozick used the word ‘tract’, which suggests religious proselytizing. Many of today’s ideologues pursue their points with condemnatory religious fervor.

Memoirists and essayists have it easy: They can and in fact must be transparent about their agendas, or nobody will know what they’re talking about. You can’t write a book that makes a case for something while beating around the bush.

[I rummaged in the garage and came up with a hammer and an anti-hammer.

Yeah. We like a tool that pries open instead of pounds shut.]

I think what my friend Anne meant was, “I don’t want to be hammered with ideology when I’m reading fiction.” Because in general, one reads fiction for pleasure, and one reads nonfiction to learn things—and possibly even to be preached to.

A fiction writer can go to all those interesting sociopolitical places successfully. All you need is an open mind and heart. That way, your characters’ paths will not be predictable, to you or your readers. Because there’s a difference between declaring something to be wrong—or right—and exploring the nuances and contradictions of the human mind and soul. There’s usually a lot more there than an ideologue would admit. Moreover, the best authors let their characters do the thinking.

Have you ever opened a wooden packing case with a crowbar? So satisfying, because you're not only releasing something you've never seen before, you're destroying, at least in part, the status quo of that packing case.

How fabulous is this journey!

Hey, before signing off, I want to give a shout-out to friend and ZW subscriber BJ Phillips, whose new book, Changing Seasons, is available from Desert Palm Press on Amazon. Check it out by clicking HERE. It’s her third book and it sounds intriguing. Congratulations, Beej!

What do you think of all this? To post, click below where it says, 'No Comments,' or '2 Comments,' or whatever.

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