Mark Twain wrote, “The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.”
Finding the exact word to describe something, add tension, express joy or communicate sadness can take effort. If you write, “He walked down the stairs”, it conveys a very different image from, “He flew down the stairs.”
The right word can eliminate the need for adverbs, which can make a sentence passive. “He quickly ate the pie,” could be better written as “He devoured the pie.” One word conveys the sense of haste and possession.
You can develop a command of vocabulary by reading. Still, there are times when the exact word eludes us. Then, a thesaurus becomes our friend.
A thesaurus is a collection of related words and phrases, each with subtle differences. You can find on-line thesauruses that give a few dozen examples. More complete guides with greater choices can be found in books, such as Roget’s International Thesaurus. This suggests hundreds of choices to express precisely what you intend.
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.
Science is not just being denied, it is under attack. Some conservative politicians and media constantly deny reality to promote their ideologies of control and mass profits for themselves. The goal of despotic tyrants is to deny anything is wrong to keep people from thinking and asking questioning, such as whether or not the depots should be in power. An uninformed public is easy to manipulate with fear, attacks on those who are different and other lies.
This behavior is not restricted to the United States where people now in power have made false accusations that vaccines are dangerous or cause autism with no evidence to back up these claims, all of which have all been debunked repeatedly. The conservative government of Alberta in Canada, for instance, has just released a report stating vaccines are ineffective against viruses and dangerous with the conclusion no one should take them. Dr. Gary Davidson, a vaccine denier and one of the authors, stated “Science is not a narrative or consensus but thoughtful, public discourse. An ‘international scientific collaboration and consensus’ sounds like a conspiracy, and I stand firmly against conspiracy theories.”
Dr. Davidson is dangerously wrong. Superstition is a consensus of a the public. Science is the methodical examination of the world to understand how it works. As more facts are uncovered and a deeper understanding is reached about the physical world, scientists will alter their conclusions to fit the facts. Despotic politicians and media alter the facts to fit their ideologies.
Science is not an international conspiracy. Science has no ideology, any more than the sun rising in the morning does. It is just reality. There are no alternate facts, only people trying to twist things to their advantage. Yet, reality can conflict with those who seek to take and hold power. The first thing any tyrannical government does is control the message of the media. The Nazis did it. The Soviets did it. Vladimir Putin is doing it. Now, selfish and power mad people in the west are doing it.
Don’t buy into this. Don’t let those who have seized power in certain areas lie to you so they can retain power over everyone. Become informed. Think. Question. Discover the facts and demand those who make statements provide documented, peer reviewed proof, not just assumption. Fact checking is vital. A democracy only works when people do these things. To blindly accept the word of a billionaire or politician with vested interests in taking more is the death of democracy.
I was very impressed with Dune part I but was disappointed my part II. The love story between Paul and Cheney, which is so important to Frank Hubert's book, was lost. She was turned into an angry and confrontation character on the currently held false belief that for a woman to appear strong she must become antagonistic. Paul and Chaney support each other in the book. In the movie she comes off as selfish and rude. At the end of the book, Chaney knows that Pail is marrying the emperor's daughter for political reasons and will never love or sleep with her. Chaney will bear Paul's heir. She will hold that power. She does not run off in a huff and ride a worm.
The movie leaves out the birth of Paul's sister, Alia, a vital part of the plot of the book because she is born aware and is the first to confront the emperor. She is so powerful, she silences the Bene Gesserit who have been manipulating genetic parings for centuries for their own purposes. Alia stops their plans.
Now, I support strong women in literature and cinema. My books are filled with strong, competent women in major roles. In my fantasy trilogy The Carandir Saga, some wield swords. Still, all are female characters, not testosterone filled male characters with female names. Women are powerful as women and in many respects stronger than men, such as in social power and pain endurance. It is true, women have been subjugated for millennia in many cultures, including the one we currently live in, denied opportunities given to men and treated as property to be possessed. Yet to think a woman has to become a man to succeed sets back woman’s’ rights.
Motion pictures are a different media than books and changes must be made to fit that media where there is only sight and sound. Producers, directors and screenwriters who change the temperament and essence of characters or the themes of the author to fit some current idea of social acceptance, which can change in years or even weeks, are creating their own story and should not label it as the book author's work or title.
Dune Part II makes these mistakes. I realize they set things up for a Dune Part III, but I won’t go to see it.
I just heard King Charles’ annual Christmas message. It was not broadcast from Buckingham palace. Rather, the king spoke from an interfaith chapel. He praised health care workers around the world for their contribution and sacrifice and of his personal experience with cancer. His majesty shared his concerns for wars in Eastern Europe, Africa and the Middle East, and the suffering of so many innocent people. His message was one of love, charity and tolerance for all as expressed in Christianity and every other faith on the planet. He talked about violence recently committed by a few in Great Britain against others and the response of so many who came together not to answer violence with violence, but to both rebuild structures and heal social wounds and relationships.
The speech was in contrast with despotic and vengeful leaders around the world who hold power over others, or are about to. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth leads to everyone being blind and toothless.
One thing His Majesty covered was how Jesus lived among the poor and ill, not the rich and powerful who could buy anything, including political influence. If we all lived with the principals King Charles spoke of that are found at the root of every religion; to care for one another, no longer embrace the desire to accumulate wealth beyond their needs, stop seeking power over others and end the exclusion of those outside their group, the horrors of war, hunger and poverty would end.
Yet, so many today seek power and wealth with no regard to the harm and suffering they cause. There are those who seek revenge on any who challenged them. So many who claim to be Christians forget the teachings of love and acceptance, and cherry pick passages in the old and new testaments to twist in an attempt to justify their lying and cheating to exclude any who are different as they seize power to gain wealth.
For those who call themselves Christians, consider the following on Christmas day.
If you embrace only commerce without compassion, remember how a rich man wanted to become one of Jesus’ disciples and Jesus told him to give away all his possessions to the poor and follow him. When the rich man turned and left, Jesus said, “It is easier for a rope to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.” It is not that the rich are damned, it is they must worship through their souls, not their money.
For those who abuse others with different colors of skin or different beliefs, remember the story of the Jewish man who fell and lay unaided while none of the other influential people stopped to help, until a Samaritan, a member of a despised minority, helped the man stand, took him to his home and tended him until he was well. Charity extends to all, whether they are a part of your group or not.
For those who seek revenge on others who challenged or wronged them, recall the story of the woman accused of adultery who was brought before Jesus by a group of men who told him by law the woman must be stoned to death. Jesus looked at them and said, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” One by one, the men left until Jesus was alone with the woman. He asked, “Where are your accusers?” The woman said they had left. Jesus said, “Then I do not accuse you either. Go and sin no more.” Forgiveness, not revenge and punishment, is at the heart of Christianity, though far too many forget this.
For those who tie politics to religion and say God has ordained certain actions and leaders, remember the time a group of men thought to trick Jesus when they asked if Jews should pay Roman taxes, thinking if he answered yes the other Jews would stop following him and if he answered no the Romans would arrest him. Instead, Jesus looked at a Roman coin and asked whose image was on it. When the men said Ceaser’s, Jesus said, “Render onto Ceaser what is Ceaser’s. Render onto God what is God’s.” No leader is ordained. There is a reason the framers of the Constitution of the United Sates of America added the first amendment to separate church from state.
Peace on Earth and good will to all is not exclusive to Christianity. These ideals are enshrined in religions around the world because all of them set social standards to care for each other and work together to achieve the good of society and each individual. Isolated, people spiral into greed, avarice, selfishness and self-loathing because they can never get what they truly desire, love from others.
My works examine the human condition and allow readers to contemplate their own lives. Some people find this offensive because it challenges their world view. None of my books mention any current politician or party, yet the themes of misogyny, racism, intolerance. discrimination, incompetence, tyranny, corruption, lies and deceit are expressed as these things have existed for ages. They can all be found in the current world. I’m interested in making statements rather than trying to please or placate large groups of readers. When I’m dead, all the money in the world will make no difference, yet if I can spark an idea that makes the world a better place, I will have accomplished something important.
Dungeons & Dragons, the fantasy role playing game, turns 50 this year. My high school friend, Jeff, introduced me to the game and I was hooked. A group of us would get together and play for hours. For those unfamiliar with the game, one person is the dungeon master who crates the world and challenges players will face. Based largely on J.R.R. Tolkien's
The Lord of the Rings, players choose a character such as a wizard, elf, warrior, dwarf, hobbit or other imaginary being. They create their background stories and personal goals, then join with the other players as adventurers.
The dungeon master presents them with challenges, such as being attacked by a band of orcs when searching for a magical amulet. Each player, in turn, says what their character does. Wizards may throw fireballs. Warriors may charge with swords. Elves might shoot arrows. Dungeon masters control the opposing creatures. They role multi-sided dice and consult charts to determine success or failure.
It’s a unique game. There is no competition among players. Everyone must work together to achieve the goals of finding treasure, learning magic and winning battles. Ultimate success comes from the players working together as a team, a life lesson people in the real world could benefit from.
My first fantasy novel,
Dragons Unremembered, began as a scenario when I acted as a dungeon master in one campaign. The group of adventurers are in a tavern when an old man tells them about a treasure in a cave guarded by a dragon. I could have left it there and let the players create the story as they fought the dragon. Something inside me pushed to embellish the story, add new traps, create secondary characters for the players to interact with and develop twists.
Eventually, I realized this could be a book, so I wrote one. It was terrible. I had no idea how to write a novel. After years of study under a bestselling novelist and volumes of books about writing, I developed the skills, craft and my own voice. I abandoned the fantasy book and wrote
Beyond the Shallow Bank, historical fiction with elements of Celtic mythology. When I finished that book, I looked back at the original fantasy, saw it had exciting elements, thew out most of the material, and rewrote it from scratch to become the first book in
The Carandir Saga trilogy.
Unlike video games that present pre-programmed stimulation, role playing games like Dungeons & Dragons engage the imagination of players who form the worlds in their minds and make completely free choices outside of any machine control. Players, not computer programmers, decide what actions are possible. I’m certain other writers of fantasy literature were inspired by the game as well. For those who don’t go on to write books, the experience of cooperation and comradeship gives a sense of community people can take back into the real world.
Since 1999, many people have participated in the National Novel Writing Month, known more commonly as NaNoWriMo, to write the first draft of a 50,000-word novel or the beginning of a novel between November 1st and 30th. I’ve never personally participated. It takes me several months to complete a first draft as I explore the subjects, characters, plot and themes of a book. Still, many people find the time constraint of NaNoWriMo just the push they need to finish and have a great time. Up to now, everything submitted has been created by humans.
This year, the organization behind NaNoWriMo posted a statement on its website saying it, “does not explicitly support any specific approach to writing, nor does it explicitly condemn any approach, including the use of AI.”
A great backlash has come from writers, editors and even people on the NaNoWriMo board of directors who have resigned. I am appalled by this decision. If someone can use an AI robot to write a story, what worth is the exercise? It’s not the user of AI who created anything. Having AI submissions makes the whole concepts of NaNoWriMo worthless.
It is in the act of writing where we consider what we want to say and sometimes change our positions in the process as we better understand the materiel and characters while we uncover new ideas and perspectives.
When I write, I carefully consider the words I use and the structure I implore. This hones my mind to truly see what I want to achieve. I never use AI to write stories or even tools like Grammarly to suggest words, structure or plot points. The knowledge of these things as a writer is what allows people to create stories where the craft becomes second nature, like riding a bike or driving, and we can concentrate on the stories and characters. Tools such as Grammarly can be a good learning experience to train on, yet when people continue to rely on these supports and don’t train themselves to write effectively, they fail to communicate their own ideas.
I spent years learning how to write; how to put sentences together, how to form pacing, how to create fully formed, engaging characters, how to build stories that immerse readers in the world, and perhaps most importantly, how to consider the messages I want to share as I present my themes. For inspiration, I draw not from computer generated suggestions, but from my own experiences, my own opinions (which sometimes change as I see things during the writing process that I didn’t before), articles from reputable news outlets and conversations with others to learn about their views and experiences.
Writing is an art, not a mechanical process. Art is one of the important aspects of humanity that binds people and societies together. When we create and tell each other stories, we share parts of ourselves.
AI can be used for marvelous things to benefit people in weather prediction, medicine, drug development, traffic control, environmental assessments and more. When a machine builds a story, there is no human connection. Artificial intelligence tools should never be used to write stories because machines have no emotions or perspectives. They simply manipulate vast amounts of material written by millions of humans and organize it through a pseudo-neural network feedback loop to mash the material together. Sometimes the modelers pay writers or publishers to use their material. All too often, copyrighted works are just taken from the web, newspapers, magazines and books without permission or compensation. This is, in a real sense, plagiarism.
The term artificial intelligence is itself a misnomer, taken from an age-old desire of humans to create life. There is no intelligence involved. There is no sentience. There are no emotions. There is no compassion. There are just computer programs created by humans in which the programs follow rules laid out that are colored by the views, prejudices and agendas of the programmers. The results can be incomplete and unreliable, and sometimes return misinformation and lies.
Write stories in your own voice. It takes time and effort. Then again, so does living a full and socially engaging life.
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.
When editing your work, you can be so familiar with it your eye doesn’t catch missing words, extra words, wrong words (filed instead of filled), missing punctuation (periods and question marks) and many other mistakes. It helps to read your work aloud to yourself. Many of these things become apparent. Still, your brain can insert or delete things even when you read aloud. Here’s a way to help catch problems.
In Microsoft Word 365, for manuscripts, and Final Draft, for screenplays, you can have the program read your text aloud with a variety of voices. Errors jump out. You hear that missing, extra and wrong word. You hear missing punctuation when two sentences run together. When you listed, you’ll get a sense of pacing and discover words or phrases you repeat. This will help you deliver clean manuscripts and screenplays for movies and television to agents, publishers, producers or insure polished books when you publish yourself, though if you are self-publishing you should always hire a professional editor because the final product needs a human touch, which artificial intelligence can’t provide..
For Word 365, select Review on the menu, then Read Aloud. The program will begin reading aloud from the point of the cursor. It will also display a mini-toolbar to the right hand side. This has a play button, >, a stop button, [], a button to go to the beginning of a line a line, <<, a button to go to the next paragraph, >>, and a button with the icon of a gear over a speaker to adjust the settings.
When you click the settings icon, you can adjust the speed of the voice and the kind of voice you want in a drop-down box. You may see only Male and Female for choices. These are what I see in the Administrator account. On my own account I see three selections, David Microsoft which is a monotone male voice, Zira Microsoft which is a female voice with inflection and Mark Microsoft which is a male voice with inflection. I’m not certain why I see three choices for my own account and only two generic ones for the Administrator.
For Final Draft, you have more setting options. Click Tools on the menu. Under the Speech Control Frame you will see a play button, >, a stop button, [], an Assign Voices button, ))), a fast forward button, >>, that moves forward to the next block (scene, action, dialogue), and a Rewind button, <<, that moves back a block.
The Assign Voices button shows a dialog box with three tabs. The first, Characters, allows you to assign each character one of ten unique voices; Man 1, Man 2, Woman 1, Woman 2, Boy 1, Boy 2, Girl 1, Girl 2, Old Man and Old woman. Initially, these will all sound in the same, a monotone male voice. These can be adjusted on the Third tab, Actors. Here, you can assign a unique male of female voice to each actor by selecting the gender from the drop-down box. You can then adjust the pitch and speed. There is a Preview button to hear what it sounds like and make further adjustments. I see two choices, Microsoft David (male voice) and Microsoft Zira (female voice). You may see other choices or a generic male or female. Because you can adjust pitch and speed, you can crate unique types of any gender.
The second tab, Narrator, allows you to assign a unique voice to the narrator who reads the scenes, action and dialogue. Again, there is a preview button.
Other writing program may have similar features.
You will find these tools a great asset to make your work shine.
I keep back all of my old manuscripts. From time to time, I take one out and read the wretched prose I put down while struggling to learn the craft. That deflates my head every time so it fits through a doorway.
There is a particularly odious passage in a very early version of one of my fantasy novels where a dignitary visits a palace and pike men stand in a line as an an honor guard. I thought the piece was Pulitzer Prize winning material and would elevate the fantasy genre. I would be hailed a brilliant young talent and the book would go on to be a best seller. For reasons known to no force in the universe, I had a fly land in the cheek of one of the soldiers, This was a minor character who would never appear again. As the fly crawled around, the soldier fought to remain at attention. At this point, I actually wrote the words, "To flinch would be a fate worse than death." As we all know, you should avoid cliches like the plague.
I was taking a course in novel writing at the time. The instructor would read two manuscript sections each session and everyone would critique them as a learning exercise. As my piece was read, I slunk lower and lower into my chair. What had seemed so great crumbled into a pile of amateurish mediocrity.
I left the classroom and stood despondent on a street corner next to a trash can. I looked at the manuscript and said out loud to myself, “This is it. Either you accept you don’t know how to write yet, the words are not my blood on the page, comments are not murdering my child and I need to consider each critique to discover how to improve. Otherwise, I have to throw the manuscript in the trash can and never write again.
I chose not to throw the manuscript into the trash. At that instant, I stepped above my ego and became a writer. I didn’t have a published book and hadn’t even finished one, yet I was a writer because I began to work at a professional level.
Years later, after much work, an improved version of that book was a semifinalist in Publisher Weekly’s Booklife Prize with a score of 9.5 our of 10. It also won a silver medal for Literary Sci-fi & Fantasy and bronze medals for Fantasy Action & Adventure and Dragons & Mythical Beasts. None of that would have happened if I hadn't overcome my ego.
