Games writers play

Barbara here. And unlike Rick, I am not writing about setting a mystery in a school, although there are college-aged students in my current work in progress, THE TRICKSTER'S LULLABY, and some of the action does in fact take place at the college. But I'm not here to write about that.

I am currently nearing the completion of this WIP, and over the past few months, I have devoted a couple of blogs to my writing process, which I have described using various game analogies. In fact, authors are fond of comparing their writing to one sport or another. We're coming down the home stretch, we've knocked it out of the park, we've struck out, we've got too many balls up in the air, and so on. It's actually surprising how many expressions in general have a sports or game origin. Sports are ready metaphors for struggle, loss, and triumph, and lend themselves easily to describing life's travails.

I am a "modified fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants" writer. I used to be a full member of the club but have discovered, since writing more layered plots with multiple points of view and colliding story lines, that I have to have some idea what's coming next. I still don't know where the overall story is going or how it will end, but I try to plan a few scenes ahead so they will fit together. One might call this "the-stop-and-go-by-the-seat-of-my-pants" approach.

When I first start writing a book, I liken the process to tossing balls up into the air, to get ideas and story lines activated and evolving. It can be a random and rather chaotic process, in that it's difficult to predict where balls will fly and where and when they will land. When I am in the saggy, unwieldy middle of the book, the plotting process seems more like a chess game. Plot points, clues, and character secrets evolve step by step. Every move follows from the move that came before and affects what move will happen next. I find myself asking questions like "What would this character do next?", "What would logically happen next?", or "What would be the most unexpected thing to happen?"

The final climax is usually the most difficult part of the process for me. I know I have to end the book somehow, tie all the loose ends together, and solve the mystery in a fresh, compelling, unexpected scene. By this point I have many balls up in the air, many dangling threads to be knitted together, and a great many questions to answer. I always struggle with this task, and yesterday a new analogy came to me. Writing the climax is like clearing a logjam. Living in Ottawa, I've learned a lot about the logging industry that used to be the main source of jobs and income in the region a hundred years ago. Logs were cut in the forests, floated down the river, and funnelled through onto barges or into chutes at the mills. Like any free-floating body, logs tended to have a mind of their own, and often got jammed up together trying to get through narrow sections. Skilled drivers would walk across the logs in the water, prod them apart and guide them into line until all the logs had cleared the narrows one at a time.

At the end of the writing process, all the questions should be answered, the big ideas and small ones fitted into their proper place, and the story has surged to its conclusion. Sometimes I feel like that driver, balancing on the pack of logs and struggling to contain and keep track of all the competing plot points, separating them out and deciding which should go when. Hoping than none are forgotten and that characters all clear the jam.

I'm delighted that as of today, I have a very roughly cleared logjam. Unlike the driver in the logging industry, however, I can go back and replay the game, nudging the logs into an even better and tighter pattern in rewrites. Who knows, maybe the rewrite process will inspire me with yet another game or sport analogy. Stay tuned! Meanwhile, which does your process resemble most? Tossing balls, playing chess, or driving logs?

Writing as chess

Barbara here. I was entertained by Aline's post about the French award for Page 112.  In truth, I think all of us should receive an award for getting to, and past, Page 112. There is a point in the saggy middle of every book when all the brilliant plot ideas that propelled us into the story have been used up, but the end looms nowhere in sight. We still need to dream up material to fill at least 100 more pages before we can bring the wretched thing to its much deserved end. And I don't mean just flabby, meandering prose that limps down one blind alley after another, nor an endless series of contrived crises that pass for tension and suspense in some circles. When I read "action-packed" books like that, I think "Oh for Pete's sake, not another explosion!"

I've often heard story telling, especially mystery story telling, being described as throwing a bunch of balls up in the air, juggling them, and then miraculously catching them all and bringing them safely back to earth by the end. There is a certain truth to this analogy, especially when you are at the page 200 mark, with dozens of balls in the air, and you're terrified of forgetting some ball that will drop on your head at the end, or remain suspended in the ether until some astute reader points it out, long after the book's release.

However, I actually think the closer analogy, at least for my writing style, is more like a peculiar chess game in which the pieces are introduced one at a time until there is a full board, and then they move strategically, each move being dependent on the one made before, until the final checkmate. I use a variant of the "pantster" method of writing with some "plotter" mixed in. I don't outline or plot ahead of time; rather, the next scene grows out of the one that came before. Thus I can't anticipate the end, nor even very far ahead. In the beginning, perhaps the first 112 pages, I am introducing elements of the story, developing the complexity of the situation and unfolding the conflicts of the characters. This is pure fun and creativity. After that, in the saggy middle, the challenge of working with those elements begins. Characters make moves and counter-moves. Each character's moves are determined by what they would do next. I am always asking myself "At this point, with this development, what would be this character's next step?"

I'm actually a very poor chess player, so perhaps this analogy is quite wrong for the master chess player who envisages his whole sequence of moves ahead of time and knows exactly how he will win. But the analogy works for me. When I play chess, I try to think several moves ahead, or at least line up my possible moves in my head. But I can't see how the game will end until it's very nearly upon me. So I am with advancing the plot, by seeing only a few scenes ahead at any time.

I am aware of two storytelling devices as I move my story forward. First, that each step has to move the story forward towards uncovering the solution, even if I don't know what that is. The second is that things must never get boring. Plod work is skipped over, back-to-back scenes of similar content–such as inner monologues, interviews, phone conversations, etc.–are avoided. And every now and then, I ask myself what would really shake things up? What would be the most unexpected thing to happen to a character? I like surprises that slam the character, and the reader, off course.

In practice, what this style means is that I write for awhile, hit a wall, brainstorm the next few scenes, write them, hit another wall, etc. In this fashion, I inch towards that magical checkmate. Often the brainstorming occurs on long drives or walks, when I have lots of uninterrupted thinking time and no distractions. Yesterday I was driving home from a research trip and used to time to brainstorm my way through the next section of my current novel. The problem with brainstorming while going 120 kph is that I can't write down the brilliant ideas as they come to me, but have to rely on my sometimes capricious memory instead. Fearing the ideas might completely vanish by the time I arrive home, I have on occasion pulled off the road (once into a liquor store parking lot) and jotted the whole sequence down on the back of whatever paper was at hand. Yesterday I pulled off the highway and sat at the stop sign to record my ideas on my iPhone. Hurray for technology!

Now I am all set to write the next small section of the book. I am curious to know what other writers do to get from Page 112 to the end of the book. What tricks do you have up your sleeve?

Deadlines: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

I'm writing this post while giving my mind a break from the squirrel-chasing that occurs when a deadline is at hand for something I'm working on. In this case, it's a 900-word article. I wrote a first draft in long hand last night while sitting in bed. After a hectic day, I was able to get my thoughts down on paper. Harry, my cat, had eaten his snack and gone off to his own bed (no more meows to sit in my lap as I worked at my computer or mad dashes through the house as he burned off energy). The house was quiet, and the words flowed -- or, at least, find their way in stops and starts -- onto the sheets of loose-leaf paper. I write on loose-leaf notebook paper when I need to focus. I think it has something to do with being a teacher or maybe having been a student trying to get a paper done.

I got my article written last night, but I knew even as I wrote that it was only a rough draft. And nothing would have been gained by trying to move beyond that last night. And this morning, I had to send a note to the editor who is waiting for the piece to say that I will submit this afternoon. I have missed my mid-morning deadline. But it would have been wasted energy to immediately plunge into getting the draft into my computer. First, I need to re-read with a big mug of tea at hand.

This deadline reminds me of the good, bad, and ugly of deadlines. The good:  a deadline requires a writer to focus his or her attention if it is to be met. The bad: the stress of focusing his or her attention may result in panicked gazing at a blank sheet of paper or computer screen. The ugly: in panic mode, he or she may rush to get something -- anything -- down on the page and off to a waiting editor.

For a moment last night -- as almost every time I sit down to write a draft -- I was in panic mode. Although I know what I'm writing about and knew what I wanted to say, it was all jumbled up. I had spent time re-reading research material. For much of last evening I made less valuable use of my time by imagining how an invisible reader would react to each word, every turn of phrase. I needed to shut off that voice and get down to business. Finally, well after midnight, with ballpoint pen in hand, I got a draft down on paper.

But this morning, I needed to take an hour or two to let my mind clear. And now I have a new deadline. I emailed to say I will deliver the article in three or four hours. The editor I'm working with kindly understood.

I hate missing deadlines, and I'm not cavalier about it. But I know by now when I need to give myself a little more time. What I should have done when discussing the deadline was admit to myself that I would have to follow my usual process -- panic, scribble, re-read, type and revise.I should have accepted the offer of the later deadline rather than assuming I could do this piece more efficiently because I knew what I was writing about. Process always wins.

How do you handle deadlines? What's your process?