Exploring Fear

 by M. L. Buchman

Or perhaps, the fear of exploring?

I think that one of the primary jobs of being a writer is to constantly test and push boundaries. We are explorers of emotion and circumstance.

The Uncomfortable

Sometimes this means writing the uncomfortable.

ONE

The first truly uncomfortable, scary uncomfortable scene I ever wrote was for my first publisher on my first book. They kept pushing me to put more and more sex in the book. They wanted me, as a male romance author, to go over the top. (The fact that I was writing a fantasy novel was apparently beside the point.)

Finally sick of it, I wrote a crude, blatant, erotic over-the-top scene to show how ridiculous I could be. "Perfect!" And it ended up in my humorous fantasy novel. That taught me a hard lesson.

Let's just say that I'm glad to have since redrafted that title. And that scene, which didn't fit the rest of the book at all, has been purged. It's now safe to read my Deities Anonymous #1, Cookbook From Hell: Reheated.

TWO

The second one was for a writing class. The challenge? Write something like you've never written before.

Hmm... Up until then I'd never written a first-person story. And I'd never written a true villain. And I never write horror.

I wrote a villain who makes Hannibal Lecter look, well, maybe not cuddly, but at least approachable. And I got so far into his first-person head that he never even got up to the word "I". In ten thousand words (long short story) I never even learned his name. It is the single most chilling thing I've ever written. For over a decade that character shouted and screamed, demanding his novel based on the short story. I will never give it to him. I think he finally realizes that as it's been almost 20 years and he pops up only occasionally in my thoughts. 

Why won't he get his novel? Because I have a criteria that controls all my writing, other than that one story. A message of hope. A message of belief in people. Oh, I've written villains since, but they are villains, not glorifications of the most evil aspects of people. 

I'm not critiquing those who read or write horror. I'm just saying that it isn't me and isn't my choice.

THREE

However, I'm a huge fan, as a writer, of pushing into personally scary territory. I once heard Norman Mailer say that, "A character must be at least 5% me or it doesn't come to life on the page." Over time I've decided that his number is a little low (I'd go for 15-20%).

It's scary, as a writer, to put a chunk of ourselves on the page. But that's where the good stuff lies, the heart and soul of a character out there wearing our hopes and our fears. Of hopes quashed and fear realized...and the eventual triumph if I'm the one doing the writing. :)

Those are the hardest scenes to write, the ones that are personally scary. "Am I putting too much of myself on the page?" I'm not sure you can. Because that is where the characters come alive for me.

MODERN DAY SCARY

We business professionals, though, we authors have a new and different scary problem to contend with. 

MeToo, Black Lives Matter, Whitewashing, LGBTQIA+...

PC RULES! It is far scarier as an author to face the demands of "politically correct", and the possibility of immediate and brutal backlash, than to face our inner selves. 

How do we know? How do we anticipate? 

MeToo began three years ago last week (about two millennia late in my opinion, but we won't get into the Council of Nicea in 325 AD that purged women from most of the positive roles in the Bible). Whitewashing is now so severe that last week Gal Galdot (an Israeli) was slammed for taking the role of Cleopatra (Egyptian) because the two cultures haven't lived in close proximity for the last 2,000 years (oh wait, it was more like the last 4,000). Chinese-American actors are being slammed for taking on "pure" Chinese roles. And... Yeah, you get the point.

So how do we confront this as writers? I'd like to share a post I recently made on a writer's loop where this was being discussed.

A Drummer of a Different Sort

by Courtney Pierce

Flawed characters are infinitely more interesting than those who always say and do the right things. Personally, I love to create protagonists with issues that get in the way, whether they be irrational fears, physical challenges, or emotional complexes. Great stories incorporate protagonists and antagonists who must stumble past their flaws to get out of trouble.

Who cares about the character who gets up in the morning after a restful sleep, encounters no traffic on her way to work, chats with her co-workers, and punches out to come home to a Healthy Choice dinner in front of the television? Good luck to the author who can turn that into a compelling novel.

However, the above scenario could be a fun set-up for something to happen that jolts our protagonist right off the couch. It can be as simple as a phone call, a knock on the door, or a bang on the roof that forces her to turn off a re-run of Laverne and Shirley. And after that “something” happens, it must become impossible for our protagonist to return unchanged to her normal life.

This is off the cuff, but let’s play “what if” with our boring scenario.

Our protagonist, who I'll name Lana, has a complex about being unusually tall. At six-foot-two, she has held herself back by being too self-conscious. Flat loafers are her footwear of choice, and she hunches her shoulders in an attempt to diminish her size. Co-workers find Lana's height intimidating, and so do men. Without a love life, she feels isolated, alone, and useless.

But what if there really is a loud bang on the roof while Lana is watching Laverne and Shirley reruns? She runs outside and discovers a small spaceship has crash-landed and hit her chimney. Pouring out of it are dozens of tiny inch-high aliens. Maybe they’re friendly . . . or maybe they’re not. 

When the aliens flood into the house through the mail slot, they freak out when see how tall our character is. It's Attack of the 50-Foot Woman meets Invasion of the 1-Inch Squeakies. Lana can't communicate with the aliens, catch them, or kill them. They're too fast and small.

Both sides of this confrontation are completely out of their comfort zones. How does she get those aliens to stop biting her ankles and blistering her knees with needle-like laser beams? The aliens are frightened, intimidated by Lana's size, and panicked that they might never get home. Lana is ready to get out the bug spray in self-defense.

And at the 50% mark—the climax—Lana locks herself in the bathroom and frantically searches for a pair of tweezers. She finds a set just as one of the aliens shimmies under the door and pops up to a Karate-chop stance. Lana plucks him up by his foot. While hanging between the pincers, the alien smiles and points toward the bathroom window. Lana's gaze shifts to the trajectory of the alien's tiny finger. 

Ah, hah!

A moment of understanding pushes Lana into hero mode. She has the upper hand, so to speak. The aliens need her height in order to get their spaceship operational again. Only she can reach that key spare part that is hanging by a wire at the edge of the roof. Thus, our protagonist begins her journey from victim to hero. She is desperately needed and appreciated for the very flaw that has plagued her. All of their fighting was for naught.

Lana puts on her high-heeled boots and stands up straighter.  With the spaceship fixed, it's a teary departure for our tiny aliens, all waving at their tall friend as they board. 

This could be a hilarious comedy or a scary drama, straight out of an episode of Rod

Serling's Twilight Zone. And like every one of Mr. Serling's imaginative stories, the above silly story was a simple allegory with two layers of meaning. It's that all-important second layer that latches and holds readers in their grip, because readers see themselves in the protagonist's struggle. 

In similar fashion, one of my favorite Twilight Zone stories is "To Serve Man." If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend you check this one out. The premise is that aliens come to earth with seemingly benevolent intentions. They are friendly and gracious to build human trust. The humans gladly board the spaceship, on which they're given luxurious accommodations. Then the humans find out the real reason for why they're there. They've been duped. 

"To Serve Man" is a cookbook.

Photo: Micah Brooks

Courtney Pierce is a fiction writer living in Kalispell, Montana with her husband, stepdaughter, and their brainiac cat, Princeton. Courtney writes for the baby boomer audience. She spent 28 years as an executive in the entertainment industry and used her time in a theater seat to create stories that are filled with heart, humor, and mystery. She studied craft and storytelling at the Attic Institute and has completed the Hawthorne Fellows Program for writing and publishing. Active in the writing community, Courtney is a board member of the Northwest Independent Writers Association and on the Advisory Council of the Independent Publishing Resource Center. She is a member of Willamette Writers, Pacific Northwest Writers Association, and She Writes. The Executrix received the Library Journal Self-E recommendation seal.

Print and E-books are available through most major online retailers, including Amazon.com.

Check out all of Courtney's books: 

courtney-pierce.com and windtreepress.com 

New York Times best-selling author Karen Karbo says, "Courtney Pierce spins a madcap tale of family grudges, sisterly love, unexpected romance, mysterious mobsters and dog love. Reading Indigo Lake is like drinking champagne with a chaser of Mountain Dew. Pure Delight."

Coming in 2020!

When Aubrey Cenderon moves to Montana after the death of her father, the peace and quiet of Big Sky Country becomes complicated with a knock on the door from the sheriff. An injured grizzly bear is on the loose and must be eliminated before it kills again. The sheriff's insistence that she buy a gun for protection will present Aubrey with some serious soul-searching, because the grizzly-on-the-run is hunting for her too . . . for a different reason.

That All-important Opening

by Courtney Pierce

I tend to agonize over the opening paragraph of my books, even more so about the very first line. I’ll spend hours ruminating over that first sentence, which is such a waste of time. I end up squeezing out whatever gets things going, and then I go back to rewrite it later, maybe after fifteen or twenty chapters. My writing car needs a thorough warm-up before its engine purrs.

The coaches I’ve had over the years have given me great advice about the importance of those first fifty pages. If we authors don’t adopt a grab-and-go momentum by plopping our characters into an action scene, then our books will fall to the floor with a snore and a thud. Since I don’t write thrillers or espionage stories, a sharpened hook can be a challenge. The first lesson drilled into me was to never start a book with the main character getting out of bed in the morning. That’s boring and amateur hour.

A book's genre dictates how readers expect the story to begin. My previous trilogy about the Dushane Sisters had an element of light humor, so I opened with my protagonist’s major personal dilemma and quirky character traitsꟷgood and bad. The stage was set for launching the five Ws: who, what, where, why, and when. How comes a bit later. 

Before I even type the first word of a new book, I invest quite a bit of time to thoroughly understand my characters strengths, weaknesses, and personality traits. I need to know them better than the reader, and intense outlines give me the ability to transform them into real people. After all, I have to live with them for many months.

While many of those intimate details never end up on the printed page, they do shape how my characters respond to situations. Little things mean a lot to help create conflict, like favorite foods, allergies (that can make it super interesting), irrational childhood fears, obsessions, and what they find humorous. Also, what happened their er past affects their moral decisions going forward.

In my new book, Big Sky Talk, I’m departing from my usual opening technique to jump into the incident that kicks off the storyꟷa crime scene. Since this book is going to be more dramatic with a love story attached, a quick grab is required to start the show. I introduce the love interest first, who happens to be the Sheriff of Flathead County in Montana. A killer is on the loose, and that fugitive is a grizzly bear. 

Here's my draft of the opening paragraph:

Sheriff Russell Knowles studied the nude body on the metal table. He’d never seen a chest wound so deep, and he'd arrested this guy before—a poacher—but now he’d been rendered nearly unrecognizable. Just one of the gaping wounds on the victim’s chest would have killed the man, but the animal had obviously kept attacking after the fatal swipe. Who was the victim here, anyway?

My protagonist is introduced in the second scene. Aubrey Cenderon is sixty-two, a professional photographer, and has just moved to Montana after having lost her father. She’s divorced, likes her wine, loves the outdoors, and she has just moved to the rural community of Many Lakes in Kalispell, Montana. 

Then BOOM! Something happens in the first twenty pages to yank Aubrey out of her comfy little world. And it plays right to the heart of her internal conflict. This is “the hook” and my character’s raison d’être. The hook is one of my favorite moments to write, because it’s power-packed with unexpected emotions: fear, joy, misunderstanding, insecurity, and anticipation. From this moment, life looks very different to my character.

But back to that first paragraph. I’m actually writing three options for the first scene: a crime scene, Aubrey moving into her new home, or Aubrey with some backstory of why she has moved to Montana. Personally, I want the crime scene, but I’ll pick which one sticks after I get some opinions. Unlike many authors, I have a family that won't dance around when offering suggestions, and their instincts are usually right.

The beginning scene is so important because it also determines how the story concludes three-hundred or so pages later. In author land, it’s called “bookending.” The story ends in the same way it begins, with the protagonist returning to her life, enlightened as a result of the experience she has endured. The character comes full circle. And as an author, I, too, come full circle.

Photo: Micah Brooks

Courtney Pierce is a fiction writer living in Kalispell, Montana with her husband, stepdaughter, and their brainiac cat, Princeton. Courtney writes for the baby boomer audience. She spent 28 years as an executive in the entertainment industry and used her time in a theater seat to create stories that are filled with heart, humor, and mystery. She studied craft and storytelling at the Attic Institute and has completed the Hawthorne Fellows Program for writing and publishing. Active in the writing community, Courtney is a board member of the Northwest Independent Writers Association and on the Advisory Council of the Independent Publishing Resource Center. She is a member of Willamette Writers, Pacific Northwest Writers Association, and She Writes. The Executrix received the Library Journal Self-E recommendation seal.

Audiobook now Available!

Check out all of Courtney's books: 

courtney-pierce.com and

windtreepress.com 

Print and E-books are available through most major online retailers, including Amazon.com.

Available Now!
Book 3 of the
Dushane Sisters
Trilogy

The Dushane Sisters Trilogy concludes with Indigo Legacy, available now. There's love in the air for Olivia and Woody, but will family intrigue get in the way? Ride along for the wild trip that starts in a New York auction house and peaks in a mansion on Boston's Beacon Hill. 

The Dushane sisters finally get to the truth about their mother.

New York Times best-selling author Karen Karbo says, "Courtney Pierce spins a madcap tale of family grudges, sisterly love, unexpected romance, mysterious mobsters and dog love. Reading Indigo Lake is like drinking champagne with a chaser of Mountain Dew. Pure Delight."

Do you see how I write book blurbs…by Kristin Wallace

The theme this month on RTG is "Do you see how I..." with a focus on something related to the craft of writing. I chose a topic that leads to cold sweats and terror in many authors...

If you polled authors asking what one thing they hated most about the publishing business, I bet a majority would say…writing the blurb for my book. Blurb writing is one of those things that many authors dread. The thought of trying to take their 80,000-word novel and tell the story in a paragraph or two is terrifying.

That would not be me. I may be the one author on the face of the planet who LOVES writing them. 

To understand the joy of blurbs, you have to know that I am an advertising copywriter. The majority of my job is literally taking large, complicated subjects and breaking them down into a headline and a paragraph of copy to “sell” a product or service. Well, a book is another “product” authors are trying to sell. Once I figured that out, I understood writing blurbs. 

So how do I write them? I came up with a workshop called, “Blurb Writing Doesn’t Have to Suck”. I presented it at RWA Nationals a couple years ago and I’m doing it again at my local writer’s chapter (Florida Romance Writers) in October. 

Here’s a breakdown of what I teach. And hey…if you can get to Fort Lauderdale on October 12 you can come to the workshop!!!

Why blurbs matters

A blurb is one of your most important selling tools for your book, whether you’re going the traditional or indie route. If you're targeting agents/editors you'll need a blurb for your query letters. Indie authors need a great blurb for their sales pages. Once you have a long version of your blurb, you can adapt it for ads (Facebook, Amazon, BookBub), social media posts, your author newsletter, and printed marketing materials like bookmarks or postcards.

The flavor of a blurb

First, ensure the blurb reflects the tone of your book as well as your author brand. (If you don’t know your author brand or haven’t created one yet that’s a whole other workshop, which I’ve also presented.) 

If you write dark, your blurb must show that. If your books have humor, reflect that. It also needs to showcase the genre of your book, whether it's contemporary, historical, paranormal or YA. Erotic romance will have a completely different tone versus an inspirational romance. 

Elements of a Blurb

1. The Introduction

·      First, introduce your heroine & hero. You want to let the reader know *who* they are. 

·      What is their occupation? This can reveal a lot about them. How would you describe a Navy Seal vs. a college professor? A chef vs. an athlete? 

·      Your language should reflect their personalities. If your heroine is snarky and bold, your description should show that. 

2. Plugging in your GMC

The key to writing your blurb is to remember your GMC. Of course, GMC is vital to develop when you're plotting your book, but those same elements can be applied to your blurb. 

Hopefully, you are already familiar with GMC (Goal, Motivation & Conflict). 

·      Goal - WHAT does your heroine/hero want? 

o  If your blurb has a paragraph for both characters than you will need to do this twice.

·      Motivation - WHYdo they want it?

·      Conflict - WHATis standing in their way? 

So now plugin the goal, motivation, and conflict for both your Heroine & Hero.  

REMEMBER: Be mindful of your genre and tone of your book. Enhance GMC with words that reflect this. If your heroine is a chef, pepper in words or phrases that reflect this world (cooking, things come to a boil, heating up in the kitchen, a recipe for disaster, etc.)

3. Romantic Tension

After you have introduced your main characters and GMC for both, it’s time to focus on the romance.

Introduce the main romantic conflict

o  What is going to keep your characters apart for the entire book? Are they from rival businesses? He’s a wealthy Duke and she’s a penniless commoner? 

o  Do they succumb to the attraction? (If this is a spicy or erotic, chances are the answer is yes.) 

o  What is the result of their romantic interlude? Does it set up even more conflict or change the direction of the story?

o  Again, be mindful of your genre and tone. If you write “sweet” the words used to describe the romance will be different than ones you’d use for spicy or erotic. Same for a historical vs. contemporary vs. paranormal

4. A Big Reveal and the Dark Moment

Expose (or at least tease) at a secret or important information that will be revealed. Your story NEEDS this in order to drive the action and lead up to your Dark Moment and Climax. 

·      Give a hint about what the secret and dark moment will be. 

·      You don’t have to reveal every detail of the secret, but give enough of a clue that the reader wants to find out. 

·      How will this drive your heroine/hero apart (maybe forever)? Can they make it in the end?

5. Hook ‘em at the end

Now, you need to craft a closing line that entices the reader to want more. 

·      Write a cliffhanger or question… “Can she let go of her bitterness in order to claim a lasting love?” “Can they save the world in time?”

·      Restate the ultimate GOAL in a more dramatic way. Give them a “dun, dun, dun” moment. “Together, they must steal the ancient artifact…and if they fail the world will never be the same.” 

Okay…sounds easy, right? Actually, it’s not, but you can develop the skill with practice. These 5 tips will help.

If you’re an author struggling with blurb writing I can help. 

Kristin Wallaceis the USA Today Best Selling Author of inspirational and sweet contemporary romance filled with “Love, Laughter and a Leap of Faith”. Her latest book, SECOND CHANCE HERO, is available now. 

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