There have been tools on the market to assist with the story telling process. Before writing was invented, tales were memorized and presented aurally by poets and bards who could recite tens of thousands of words. When writing was developed, stories could be written on papyrus, animal hides, stone columns and clay tablets. This was a major advancement in recording ideas for future generations, high tech for the time.
Charles Dickens wrote every book with a quill pen on paper. Those were, once more, breakthroughs in technology.
With the advent of the typewriter, authors began to create stories at a keyboard. Audio recording equipment allowed the option to dictate books and have someone else type it up. Word processors added the ability to easily make edits and corrections, store files electronically, print them and later transmit them electrically to agents and publishers.
Word processors also offered spell checking. At first, this was a file with a list of words the program would compare against a manuscript. Any words not in the electronic list were flagged and the author had to make corrections manually. Grammar checkers were added to catch double words, mismatches in tense and other simple problems. Later advancements presented possible replacement words, yet it was always up to the author to make the corrections or ignore the warning if they didn’t match their style.
Technology has enhanced the ability of authors to share concepts in more efficient ways.
With the widespread acceptance of the personal computer, other tools appeared that didn’t just flag possible errors in spelling and grammar, they corrected them automatically. These offered a teaching opportunity. Writers could see examples of how to improve their communication and employ these lessons in future work.
They also carried disadvantages. People can continue to write poorly and rely on these tools to fix errors. As in any profession, practitioners must learn the craft by heart and take off the training wheels.
It is in the act of writing where we form our ideas, concepts, arguments, observations and have the opportunity to explore subjects to understand them more fully. In some cases we may change our own perceptions as we discover new facts and consider previously held convictions.
Good writing doesn’t require a degree in English. Everyone can learn how to write well with some instruction and reference material. A great resource for clear writing is Elements of Style by William Strunk and E.B. White. This little book of and writing style.
Today, a new tool gives great promise and carries a dangerous threat; artificial intelligence, AI. When people use it to write sentences, paragraphs or whole books, the words produced are not the authors. They are drawn from a massive database of written material drawn from Internet posts and published works taken by AI companies, often with no compensation to the creators.
AI can also lead to the homogenization of text where every report, every resume every university entrance letter and every story fall into a predictable format so there is no distinction.
Writing is art, be ita work of fiction, nonfiction, business report or proposal. Art is the expression of the human soul, not in a religious sense, but as it expresses the essence of what it is to be human. In art, creators share themselves with others and help bind communities together.
AI produced materiel does none of this. The large language models (LLM) don’t think. They have no consciousness. They are computer programs that use sophisticated neural network feedback to draw stored data points and guess the most probable word in a sentence given the billions of examples fed into it.
These answers are not hard wired. The neural network design and programs that run them scan the databases and make a guess as to the next word. Humans from around the world, mainly in third world countries where they earn $1 a day, check the answers and mark it correct or incorrect. The computer then seals off incorrect neural network pathways and reinforces correct ones until the AI is trained to select the answer with the highest chance of being correct. How correct? Astrophysicist Niel deGrasse Tyson, director the Hayden Planetarium in New York, asked AI a set of question he already knew the answers to. The machine gave the wrong answer 20% of the time because it always has to respond with something. By design. AI can’t return, “I don’t know.”
Even when correct, a major problem with asking AI to provide an answer is you get a result, but because you didn’t work through the steps to arrive at the answer, you don’t really know what it means because the underlying reasoning is missing. As such, you will find it difficult to extrapolate on the answer to apply it on future questions without asking AI again, perpetuating the trap.
There are people using AI to create entire books they upload to Amazon. They may think they’ll make a lot of money, few self published authors do, or want to pretend they’re authors, but they didn’t write the books and can claim neither ownership nor copyright. This devalues actual books and floods the market, making it difficult for readers to discover actual books.
I challenge you to be a true writers. Don’t use AI or lean on writing tools that correct your work so they become crutches. Learn the skills and practice them. Put the time into thinking about who your characters are and where the story is going. Express your observations, opinions and emotions in prose you create.
Create art as the expression of your humanity to share with the world and bind us together. This is the true power of writing.
The process of writing is a solitary one. When I’m writing, all my attention is on the work. In a novel, that means keeping a multitude of threads in my mind to know what came before, how a character acts, what forces push from the outside and so on. I see the world I’m creating in my mind, but that vision doesn’t always come out on the page. Things that seem obvious to me may be confusing to others. Joining a writing group can help you see your material through different eyes.
In my short story “The Hell of It”, published in my anthology Unexpected Consequences, I had a clear theme in mind. When people in my writing group read it, they thought the theme was something else. I had to look at the story and find ways to make my vision clear. Without the members of the writing group, I’d never have known this.
As helpful as writing groups are, you must be careful in choosing one.
A writing group where everyone heaps praise on every work may satisfy you’re ego, but it won’t help you become a better writer. If the group just validates everything, you won’t know what needs to be changed. Find a group of writers who offer solid critiques. Don’t look for approval. Seek comments that help you improve
Yet, avoid groups where members are toxic and make comments to enlarge their own egos or act aggressively.
When giving a critique, only talk about the work, never the writer. Don’t try to psychoanalyze others or tell writers they aren’t qualified to speak on a subject.
Writers can fall into a trap where they begin to think they have to imitate the views of a fellow member or an instructor. Take all criticism in and consider if it can help, but don’t let it overshadow your own vision and voice. At the same time, if a piece of writing confuses too many, examine how you can make your story clearer.
Keep in mind, people in a writing group are trying to help make your story better. We all want to be accepted and praised, but don’t argue about or defend a point. Answer any questions asked. Still, the only thing you should say at the end of a critique is, “Thank you.”
Every word in a sentence needs to be important, otherwise it has no place. This requires word crafting. This is a process that starts with the first draft and is thoughtfully combed through in subsequent drafts.
Think of the pictures and emotions words convey to readers. Look for action verbs to emphasize the feat.
You could write, “Firefighters ran quickly into the burning building to rescue the child.”
Though this sentence gives a sense of urgency, it’s generic. People run in races and “run to the store” for bread. The adverb quickly could paint different pictures to different readers.
To give a sense of firefighters risking life and limb to save someone, we can look for words that match urgency, danger and dedication. “Desperation consumed the firefighters as they fought through the inferno in hope the the child was still alive.”
Here, the word desperation shows their emotional states. The word consumed serves two purposes. It give the sense of the intensity of the emotion and hints at the flames that could consume them and the child. They don’t just run through the flames, they fight their way through. We again get an emotional reaction in the word hope. Both the danger and the possible failure of their mission is emphasized with the words still alive.
When a sentence conveys more than one thing, a deeper picture is painted and readers become more involved in the story and the lives of the characters.
Scenes can concentrate on a few or even a single character. They can also contain large groups of characters, such as at a sports stadium or in a battle. In both cases, the story has to present people and not just the crowd to engage readers.
In describing a political convention, there will be speeches, cheers and chants. If you only concentrate on these, readers will see an overview but not have a character to anchor their attention to. Imagine the following scene at a political rally.
The delegates waved signs reading “Derrick” and “Bring it On” amidst a low rumble of voices. Smiles and laughter flowed in waves across the convention floor.
Jane’s eyes never strayed from the podium as she squeezed Fred’s hand. “He’ll announce funding for River Park. I just know it.”
A roar of voices blasted from the walls to drown out the band on stage as Governor Derrick stepped up to the podium accompanied by his wife and son. He fired his words in short blasts, emphasizing each with a fist smashed into his palm. “My friends, we will win this election.”
People in the crowd shouted in unison. “Four more years. Four more years.”
Derrick raised his hand for silence. “And when we do, there will be era of prosperity as never seen before. A new factory will rise on that vacant land next to the river to brings jobs and wealth.”
The political signs were thrust into the air as people erupted in applause.
Jane stood in shock. Images of the old oaks being ripped out of the ground engulfed her mind. This couldn’t be happening. He’d sworn the park would be built. She was too shocked to cry, yet her whole body shook.
Like the zoom lens of a camera, we start with an overview on the setting and the introduction of Derrick, but we don’t go into his point-of-view. This is at the grand level with no sense of individual wants and needs.
Then, we zoom in on Jane’s personal point-of-view.
The scene zooms back to Derrik’s announcement and the crowd’s large scale reaction. They’re all of a single mind with no individuality.
The zoom lens returns to Jane to see her shock and disappointment through both her actions and her inner thoughts.
I used this technique with battle scenes in The Carandir Sage where readers see the massing of troops, focus on a skirmish, then go into the point-of-view of a single soldier’s actions, determination and fears.
Some writers try to create suspense by concealing information with the idea readers will be surprised when a character discovers something or an action takes place.
Cliffhanger endings are effective, but keeping details from readers and audiences doesn’t create suspense. It creates frustration. Suspense comes from revealing information a little at a time.
In a script I recently read in my TV writing class, a spec pilot opens with the discovery of a murder. The victim is not revealed.
The script then goes back a week in time and introduces several characters in conflict. Some of them we root for and others we despise.
The pilot ends where the police arrive at the dead body from the opening. The victim is still not revealed.
This writer thought viewers would be intrigued to tune in the next week and discover who was killed. Instead, they created frustration. By hiding the identity of the victim, audiences have no investment in the character. If they knew who was killed, they could feel an emotional connection and care about the deceased.
Consider a scene from a movie where a cloaked figure enters an office from a balcony, places something in a desk drawer and leaves.
A second person enters and sits at the desk.
A third person enters and sits in front of the desk.
They discuss an embezzlement by someone in the company. They don’t know who it is, but are waiting for a courier to being a letter with evidence.
The letter arrives. Before they can open it, they hear a car crash and go out on the balcony to see what happened.
As they leave, a bomb explodes in the desk. When they rush back in, the letter is destroyed.
The bomb explosion is shocking. It destroys the evidence, but the scene has no suspense because we don’t know the people are in the danger.
Imagine a rewrite. The cloaked person places a bomb in a desk drawer.
The other people enter and discuss who might be the embezzler. As they speak, we cut to the bomb where a timer is ticking down.
We move back to the conversation, then back to the bomb. The timer continues to tick down.
The people step out onto the balcony and we cut to the bomb. The timer reaches zero and the bomb explodes.
We now have suspense because we’re involved in the characters’ lives and the action.
I’m sure you’ve read books where scene A is followed by Scene B which is followed by Scene C and so on. For instance:
1. SCENE A: Mary gets in her car and drives to the store.
2. SCENE B: She buys some pasta and sauce.
3. SCENE C: She drives back to her house.
4. SCENE D: Her mother comes over for dinner.
There’s a progression of action that leads to an incident, but the story lacks tension. Consider a rewrite.
1. SCENE A: Mary’s mother calls and says she’s coming over for dinner in two hours.
2. SCENE B: Mary frantically opens her refrigerator and cabinets to find she has no food to cook.
3. SCENE C: Mary charges to her car and drives off for the grocery store.
4. SCENE D: Mary left during rush hour and gets caught in a traffic jam.
5. SCENE E: Mary turns off on a side street and takes a route she knows because she’s a paramedic.
6. SCENE F: This delays Mary and the store is closed.
7. SCENE G: Mary slams on her horn in frustration.
8. SCENE H: This causes a man to come out of a new Chinese buffet she never noticed before.
9. SCENE H: It has take-out but just ran out of containers.
10. SCENE I: Mary grabs two empty containers from the back seat of her car from lunch the day before.
11. SCENE J: Mary charges back into the restaurant and throws food into the containers, making a mess.
12. SCENE K: The owner gets mad and shoves her out the door before she can fill the containers.
13. SCENE L: Mary’s mother will arrive in fifteen minutes so she weaves in and out of traffic.
14. SCENE M: The contents of one container spills out onto the front seat and down to the floor.
15. SCENE N: Mary runs into the house and divides the remaining container’s contents onto two plates just as the doorbell rings.
16. SCENE O: Mary’s mother comes in and suggests they go out to a Chinese restaurant because there isn’t enough food for the both of them.
The action in each scene drives the action in the next one. In this way, the story creates tension and situational humor that ties each of the different plot elements together.
I speak with many people when I’m selling my books at the Wolfville Farmers’ Market on Saturday’s. Today, several families with children stopped by. Three of these young people, ages 9 to 10, excitedly shared how they like to write stories and told me their plots. I talked about how rewarding writing is for me and how happy I was that they enjoy telling stories as well. All three smiled broadly. Words are the most powerful thing humans possess. For all I know, the words I spoke today may have inspired a future winner of a Noble Prize for Literature. We can never tell for certain how our small acts of encouragement can change the universe.
There's a rude and inaccurate phrase being spread in online writing groups, "Plotter or Pantser." It implies those who plot out a story in an outline first are professionals and those who don't are amateurishly flying by the seat of their pants. There are professionals who plot with outlines and professionals who don’t.
We who don’t are not flying by the seat of our pants. We start with characters and a situation. As we write, we place characters under pressure and see how they react. That reaction revels the characters true natures, moves the story forward and examines the themes presented, all of which we don’t know in the beginning because we’re discovering our own perspectives and the nature of the world as we uncover the story. The words plot and story are sometimes used interchangeably, yet are quite different. Plot consists of the incidents. Story consists of the incidents, world building and character development. People want to read stories, not plots.
James Patterson writes detailed, chapter by chapter outlines before he puts down a single word of prose. This obviously works for him because he’s a bestselling author and people love his well written books. He’s writing a particular type if book, a puzzle that he lays out, cuts up with a jigsaw and assembles in front of readers. He also works with collaborators He'll give the outline to another author who will write some chapters or the entire book. An outline makes this easier.
If plotting an outline works for you, that’s what you should do. Just don’t use rude terms like pantser for those who don’t. Stephen King, Salmon Rushdie and Margaret Atwood never create outlines or character sheets before putting down prose. None of them can be considered struggling armatures.
There is no one process everyone must follow to write a book. All authors must find methods that works best for them. Some write plot outlines that range from general overviews to chapter by chapter details before they put down prose. There are writers who create descriptions of each main characters with their background, history and traits. As with outlines these vary from general to in depth. Others, like Salman Rushdie, David Mamet, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King Margaret Atwood and me don't write either.
Like the other authors mentioned above, I start with a concept I want to explore, place characters in a situation under pressure and see what happens. The way the characters react reveals their true natures and moves the story forward.
As I write, I learn more about the characters and story. New concepts come to mind. I may realize a setting is wrong. I may turn a hero into a villain. When these ideas come, I don’t go back and change previous martial. I make a note of them and continue from that point as if I had already made the changes.
I keep going until I finish the first draft. Before making any changes, I read the entire first draft. It will have grammar and spelling mistakes, dead ends, missing martial and inconsistencies. It will also have the core of the story and character development.
It’s then that I sit down, consult my notes and begin a second draft where I edit the manuscript and fix not just grammar and spelling, I make the adjustments I noted, alter character relationships, adjust scenes and so forth. I will find that some of the notes I made no longer apply to how the story or characters turned out. As I work, I’ll think of new story elements and characterizations that were not noted. Things shift and change. That’s good. The manuscript is taking on life and consistency.
When I finish the second draft, I read it without making changes, then start a third draft. You may be tempted to think only one pass is needed, yet you will be shocked at how many problems and mistakes you’ll find while writing the third draft; grammar mistakes, missing words, duplicated words, spelling errors, character development, story elements, etc. With the third draft complete, I start the fourth. I keep writing drafts until I’ve combed the manuscript to be the best I can produce. It will never be perfect. It is said a novel is a long piece of writing with mistakes. The stopping point for me is when I see the things I wanted to talk about, the representation of the characters, and the entertainment value express what I set out to deliver. For the final book of a fantasy trilogy, I wrote ten drafts because it had to tie up all the lose ends.
After I complete my drafts, the book goes to my editor. We than work together to improve it. This method has served me through five novels and an illustrated edition of one. Three of these books have won awards. Writing a novel is really rewriting until it sings.
The first draft of a novel is the initial creation of the story. The result will produce a manuscript, not a publishable book. The manuscript must be rewritten several times to craft a book. There will be many false starts, weak writing and mistakes. That doesn’t matter. I never write outlines; I just begin with a situation, put characters in it under pleasure and see what happens. Not everyone works this way. If you do write outlines before starting a book, don’t feel you must constrain yourself to them. You don’t fully know the story you’re writing or the characters you’re creating until you work with the prose for a while.
As you write, concepts will come to mind that you hadn’t thought of. You will realize the true nature of relationship between characters and imagine new twists in the plot. Put these things down and let your imagination run free. If you start on a divergent path, follow it to see where it leads. You may eliminate it later, but explore it anyway. It might lead to something better than you originally envisioned. The final book may bear little resemblance to what you considered in the beginning.
Never go back and edit anything in the first draft as you write. If you realize something needs to change at the beginning, make a note on the side and continue as if that change had been made, then fix the beginning in subsequent drafts.
Now there's only one true rule in writing - you can do anything you can get away with, however the trick is in knowing what that is, and that requires a knowledge of writing guidelines. It also takes experience.
Practice good writing from the beginning. Watch grammar, avoid clichés and be selective with adverbs as you create the first draft. Don't fall back on sloppy writing. Build a story, don't just dump words. Train yourself to be a better writer with each sentence. This will allow you to grow as an author because writing is a life long learning experience. It also makes life easier with the second, third, fourth and subsequent drafts to craft a manuscript into a book, short story or article.
Don’t try to write to trends or opinion polls. These change too often. By the time your book is ready for publication, tastes can vanish.
Be bold. Sit down and write your book. It's all you can do.
The Lord of the Rings was a modest seller when it first appeared in the early 1950s. Nothing like it had been published before.
It wasn’t until the 1960s, when college students discovered the books, that it became the hit we know today.
J.R.R. Tolkien didn’t write to please fans or media swings. He wrote from his heart. Write from yours. Tell your story. It has just as good a change of selling as trying to catch yesterday’s fad.
55 years ago, a movie transformed science fiction films, Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. Written in collaboration with legendary science fiction author Arthur C. Clark, who has second billing for the screenplay and wrote the novelization, the movie is based on Clark’s short story “The Sentinel” in which an object is dug up on the moon and sends a signal to an unidentified alien world, leaving the main character to wonder who will receive the alarm that humans have left the Earth.
Other Sci-fi films have tackled serious questions such Forbidden Planet, with it’s exploration of the human mind and it’s powers, and The Day the Earth Stood Still, whose themes cover the human propensity for violence and war with a draconian solution.
2001 Delved into more than social warnings. It contemplated the existence, place and future of human beings. It also introduced HAL 9000, the artificial intelligent computer who speaks and acts as if human, and in the end succumbs to human foibles to tragic ends.
The meticulous detail Kubrick put into all his films produced ground breaking special effects that won an Oscar and continue to stand up to this day. There would have been no Star Wars, Silent Running or any other modern sci-fi movies without 2001. The measured pace of the spacecrafts contrast with whizzing space battles, yet create the reality of space travel as had never been seen before. Astronauts have said viewing 2001: A Space Odyssey is like being in space again.
I’ve viewed the film over two dozen times, first in Cinerama with its 180-degree screen that wraps around the audience and fills the peripheral vision with the illusion of three dimensions without glasses, then in standard theaters, drive-ins, scan-and-pan broadcast TV before wide screen, VHS, DVD and Blue-Ray, which I watched again this week.
It was one of the major influences on me as a youth and a reason I became a writer, a teller of stories that expand the imagination.
