Some things just seem to stick in your mind, and listening to my dad tune the radio to Walter Winchell, the 1940s and 50s newscaster is one I vividly remember. I can still hear his teletype clacking away as he gave the newscast. "Good evening, Mr. and Mrs. North and South American and all the ships at sea...let's go to press." I used Walter Winchell in The Red Scarf to give the reader a sense of the 1940s War years. Yes, it's a pretty corny line, but it carried a lot of weight around our house. My Dad would hold up both hands like a football referee signaling a touchdown, and that meant silence. In fact, even scooting your chair or walking around was forbidden. When old Walter rattled out the new from the War it was as if you were there. We sat glued to the old Philco radio, occasionally having to tune it when the signal drifted. Outside of the morning newspaper, the radio was our lifeline to the outside world. And with two of my uncles fighting in Europe, we were more than interested. That was the mid-1940s, and the pre-TV--sans electronic life at home was a lot simpler. Inside entertainment meant playing a board game or listening to the radio.
Wow, have things changed! It's almost hard to believe that today you can download a book on your IPhone. I think you'd have to be a little hard pressed to actually want to read a book on an IPhone, but it can be done. However, the new Kindle reader from Amazon.com puts a new wrinkle in books. I've watched my novel, The Red Scarf jump to #1 in its category on the Kindle edition after my blogs started.
Are we seeing the end of the printed word? No, I don't think so, but we are seeing entertainment and news disseminated in a manner that was unheard of just a few years ago. The Red Scarf is easy to read on Kindle and actually, based on the last sales figure, it looks like I'm selling more electronic books than hard copies.
That a long, long, way from old Walter Winchell's---"Good evening Mr. and Mrs. North and South America and all the ships at sea....."
Showing posts with label Books all ages; Harry Potter; writing for everyone. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Books all ages; Harry Potter; writing for everyone. Show all posts
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
Free Range Boys---and Girls
In some areas of our country we still have what I call "The free range barefoot boys of summer." They wear cutoff shorts and roam the streets of our small towns---when they aren't deep in the swamps, woods, and creeks. I know we live in a society that frets about boys with too much freedom, and you can certainly point out the danger of splashing through back water swamps with poisonous snakes slithering out of the way. And I'm sure you can see the problem in climbing an old abandoned fire tower, or throwing rocks at each other, or maybe even using a sling shot to have a fake war.
Well, you'd be right, and if my mother had ever seen me climb that rickety fire tower she would have passed out---but she didn't and outside of that time I reached in a water-filled hole to pull out a crawfish and instead pulled out a deadly Coral Snake, I didn't really put myself in any more danger than a kid from New York does trying to cross Fifth Avenue against the light.
Are we overprotecting our kids? I grew up in the old oil fields of south Arkansas where big power stations without guard rails temped us to ride the rods---dangerous to say the least, but we survived and in fact we grew up relishing life because we had such a variety of experiences as we explored everything from abandoned hotels to snake infested beaver dams. It seems to me that free range boys---and even girls---come through their formative years better rounded and more capable of tackling the complex world we live in, than do sheltered kids from a gated subdivision.
If you want to get a glimpse of how I grew up as a free range kid, check out my novel The Red Scarf. Yes, it's a novel, but it's like John Gresham's A Painted House--he lived it and I lived The Red Scarf.
Free Range Kids--I think it's the way to let a kid be a kid. So give your boys---and girls--a little slack and let them experience life.
Well, you'd be right, and if my mother had ever seen me climb that rickety fire tower she would have passed out---but she didn't and outside of that time I reached in a water-filled hole to pull out a crawfish and instead pulled out a deadly Coral Snake, I didn't really put myself in any more danger than a kid from New York does trying to cross Fifth Avenue against the light.
Are we overprotecting our kids? I grew up in the old oil fields of south Arkansas where big power stations without guard rails temped us to ride the rods---dangerous to say the least, but we survived and in fact we grew up relishing life because we had such a variety of experiences as we explored everything from abandoned hotels to snake infested beaver dams. It seems to me that free range boys---and even girls---come through their formative years better rounded and more capable of tackling the complex world we live in, than do sheltered kids from a gated subdivision.
If you want to get a glimpse of how I grew up as a free range kid, check out my novel The Red Scarf. Yes, it's a novel, but it's like John Gresham's A Painted House--he lived it and I lived The Red Scarf.
Free Range Kids--I think it's the way to let a kid be a kid. So give your boys---and girls--a little slack and let them experience life.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Wing and Peg--Were they real?
I've been asked if the characters in The Red Scarf were based on real people or were they fictional. For the most part I based my characters in the novel on actual residents, and I used their real names. We all lived in the small southern village of Norphlet.---pop---650.
I guess the two brothers, Wing and Doc Ellenburger were the most colorful of the bunch.
Peg, the owner of the local pool hall, was one of the most off-the-wall characters I have ever met. He could cuss like a herd of drunken sailors and looked the part of an old coot---overalls, a beat up felt hat with wiry gray hair sticking out, and he usually had tobacco juice dripping down his chin. I'm sure it's no surprise to know Peg received his nickname because he only had one leg. In place of the leg he lost (and I don't have a clue how he lost it) was something that looked as if it had been made for an old pirate. Peg would hop abound on that old wooden leg cussing a blue streak and giving forth on politics or the weather. He was really a sight to see.
The funniest "Peg" story that has been handed down has to do with Peg trying to court an old maid school teacher. One morning he stepped out of the pool hall just as the lady came walking by and made a deep bow to impress her. The wooden leg splintered and he fell flat on his face. She stepped over him and said, "Drunk and it's not even nine o'clock!" Of course, Peg tried to hop up and apologise, but he forgot his peg leg was broken and he fell again and rolled over her feet sending her sprawling out on top of him. She never walked on the pool hall side of the street again.
That's why I think the best characters are real flesh and blood folks that are so colorful they seem made up.
Tomorrow, I'll tell you about Wing--yep--old Wing had one arm and he was the City Marshal.
I guess the two brothers, Wing and Doc Ellenburger were the most colorful of the bunch.
Peg, the owner of the local pool hall, was one of the most off-the-wall characters I have ever met. He could cuss like a herd of drunken sailors and looked the part of an old coot---overalls, a beat up felt hat with wiry gray hair sticking out, and he usually had tobacco juice dripping down his chin. I'm sure it's no surprise to know Peg received his nickname because he only had one leg. In place of the leg he lost (and I don't have a clue how he lost it) was something that looked as if it had been made for an old pirate. Peg would hop abound on that old wooden leg cussing a blue streak and giving forth on politics or the weather. He was really a sight to see.
The funniest "Peg" story that has been handed down has to do with Peg trying to court an old maid school teacher. One morning he stepped out of the pool hall just as the lady came walking by and made a deep bow to impress her. The wooden leg splintered and he fell flat on his face. She stepped over him and said, "Drunk and it's not even nine o'clock!" Of course, Peg tried to hop up and apologise, but he forgot his peg leg was broken and he fell again and rolled over her feet sending her sprawling out on top of him. She never walked on the pool hall side of the street again.
That's why I think the best characters are real flesh and blood folks that are so colorful they seem made up.
Tomorrow, I'll tell you about Wing--yep--old Wing had one arm and he was the City Marshal.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
How to write a series.--part two
How to write a series—part two.
My first published novel of the series, The Red Scarf, took a simple premise and tied together diverse stories, such as the hunt for the chicken-killing coon and the robbery of Doc’s newsstand, into a story line that was linked together by Richard’s attempt to earn enough money to buy Rosalie, his wanta-be girlfriend, a red scarf. It worked.
My next step in setting up the remainder of the series was to devise a time line where I could place the remaining stories into sequence. Since I had used the newscaster, Walter Winchell, to link my stories to the 1944 time frame, I had to be sure his newscasts, that I had inserted into the novels, followed the Second World War properly. That sent me to Google to get the war time-line down. Then, as I moved ahead, two other items came into play. The age of the boys had to increase and the sequence of seasons must follow the story line.
The sequel to The Red Scarf is the next in the series. The Red Scarf ended on Christmas Eve, and the sequel, which I have titled, Lyin’ Like a Sorry Yard Dog, begins on Christmas morning and continues through the winter and spring.
The next of the series, The Yankee Doctor, continues the saga of the two boys, now a little older. The stories become more adult, as they encounter an evil doctor and the ‘girls’ of the Randolph Hotel.
The next novel, The Swamp, is more of an adventure for Richard, who is kidnapped by escaped convicts. It’s reminiscent of Mark Twain’s The Ransom of Red Chief.
Following The Swamp, is The Mystery of the Canebrake. Part real mystery laced with wild stories about the boys meeting the Cowboy Hobo, learning how to hop a freight train, and, of course, solving the mystery of what’s in the canebrake
Currently, I have the last of this series going through editing. It’s titled, Half Uncle Snort, The River Rat. It’s full of moonshinning and Catahoula Hog Dogs on the Ouachita River, with Richard meeting his half brother, Rabbit.
Will I write more in the series? Probably. Right now, I have a coming-of-age novel, set in a college atmosphere. I have titled it Choices. I guess you could say it’s the primary character Richard of the Richard Series going to college. Of course there’s room to have a lot of additional stories from age 13 to 17. Who know where the series will end?
So that’s how I came up with a series. It’s an amplified, fictionalized set of remembrances, which have a ring of believability, tied to an overriding plot line that links and ties the stories together.
My first published novel of the series, The Red Scarf, took a simple premise and tied together diverse stories, such as the hunt for the chicken-killing coon and the robbery of Doc’s newsstand, into a story line that was linked together by Richard’s attempt to earn enough money to buy Rosalie, his wanta-be girlfriend, a red scarf. It worked.
My next step in setting up the remainder of the series was to devise a time line where I could place the remaining stories into sequence. Since I had used the newscaster, Walter Winchell, to link my stories to the 1944 time frame, I had to be sure his newscasts, that I had inserted into the novels, followed the Second World War properly. That sent me to Google to get the war time-line down. Then, as I moved ahead, two other items came into play. The age of the boys had to increase and the sequence of seasons must follow the story line.
The sequel to The Red Scarf is the next in the series. The Red Scarf ended on Christmas Eve, and the sequel, which I have titled, Lyin’ Like a Sorry Yard Dog, begins on Christmas morning and continues through the winter and spring.
The next of the series, The Yankee Doctor, continues the saga of the two boys, now a little older. The stories become more adult, as they encounter an evil doctor and the ‘girls’ of the Randolph Hotel.
The next novel, The Swamp, is more of an adventure for Richard, who is kidnapped by escaped convicts. It’s reminiscent of Mark Twain’s The Ransom of Red Chief.
Following The Swamp, is The Mystery of the Canebrake. Part real mystery laced with wild stories about the boys meeting the Cowboy Hobo, learning how to hop a freight train, and, of course, solving the mystery of what’s in the canebrake
Currently, I have the last of this series going through editing. It’s titled, Half Uncle Snort, The River Rat. It’s full of moonshinning and Catahoula Hog Dogs on the Ouachita River, with Richard meeting his half brother, Rabbit.
Will I write more in the series? Probably. Right now, I have a coming-of-age novel, set in a college atmosphere. I have titled it Choices. I guess you could say it’s the primary character Richard of the Richard Series going to college. Of course there’s room to have a lot of additional stories from age 13 to 17. Who know where the series will end?
So that’s how I came up with a series. It’s an amplified, fictionalized set of remembrances, which have a ring of believability, tied to an overriding plot line that links and ties the stories together.
Monday, April 13, 2009
How to write a series
How to write a series---part one
When you start writing remembrances and stretching them into fiction, it's surprising how many stories you'll end up with. When I starting writing what would eventually become the Richard Series, I ended up with dozens of stories. Most of them were about two coming-of-age boys and their Tom Sawyer-like experiences. Not knowing any better, I tried to link them together with an almost nonexistent plot. The result was one whopping 550 page manuscript, weighted down by story after story, most of which didn’t have much to do with the final outcome of the novel. These stories didn’t even work as sub-plots. A couple of publishers read this hunk of a manuscript, and although they complimented it, they all said it was much too long, and noted there was only a weak overriding story line. They were right. It would have been better to have had two volumes of short stories that didn’t have anything to do with the each other, than to try and make one novel from this mound of stories.
That was a good lesson in both presentation and content. It also gave me the opportunity to learn from failure and to take constructive criticism. It would have been much easier to just toss the manuscript aside and do something else, but I didn’t. First, I high-graded it and kept the best of the lot. Then I realized I couldn’t have a story about a swimming hole and a record snow-fall all in a short time frame. Soon I was sorting and placing these stories into a sequence where they fit not only season-wise, but because they could be linked to become an integral part of the overriding story.
After I finished that little job, it became a pick and chose to which story premiss would get my first attention. I guess I’ve always had a desire to write a Christmas Story, and that’s why I picked The Red Scarf as the first of the series. However, as I wrote, I realized the novel, which ends on Christmas Eve, was going to be a lot more than a warm, satisfying Christmas read. Characters seemed to take on a life of their own and events that only weakly had anything to do with the Christmas season exploded into some of the best chapters in the novel. When I finished editing, and, after the novel was picked up by the only publisher I submitted it to, I took a few weeks to relish the idea of being a published author, and then I looked at all the material I still had available—and saved on my computer. You can’t let good work just sit there---can you? No, and that’s the blog I’ll write tomorrow.
When you start writing remembrances and stretching them into fiction, it's surprising how many stories you'll end up with. When I starting writing what would eventually become the Richard Series, I ended up with dozens of stories. Most of them were about two coming-of-age boys and their Tom Sawyer-like experiences. Not knowing any better, I tried to link them together with an almost nonexistent plot. The result was one whopping 550 page manuscript, weighted down by story after story, most of which didn’t have much to do with the final outcome of the novel. These stories didn’t even work as sub-plots. A couple of publishers read this hunk of a manuscript, and although they complimented it, they all said it was much too long, and noted there was only a weak overriding story line. They were right. It would have been better to have had two volumes of short stories that didn’t have anything to do with the each other, than to try and make one novel from this mound of stories.
That was a good lesson in both presentation and content. It also gave me the opportunity to learn from failure and to take constructive criticism. It would have been much easier to just toss the manuscript aside and do something else, but I didn’t. First, I high-graded it and kept the best of the lot. Then I realized I couldn’t have a story about a swimming hole and a record snow-fall all in a short time frame. Soon I was sorting and placing these stories into a sequence where they fit not only season-wise, but because they could be linked to become an integral part of the overriding story.
After I finished that little job, it became a pick and chose to which story premiss would get my first attention. I guess I’ve always had a desire to write a Christmas Story, and that’s why I picked The Red Scarf as the first of the series. However, as I wrote, I realized the novel, which ends on Christmas Eve, was going to be a lot more than a warm, satisfying Christmas read. Characters seemed to take on a life of their own and events that only weakly had anything to do with the Christmas season exploded into some of the best chapters in the novel. When I finished editing, and, after the novel was picked up by the only publisher I submitted it to, I took a few weeks to relish the idea of being a published author, and then I looked at all the material I still had available—and saved on my computer. You can’t let good work just sit there---can you? No, and that’s the blog I’ll write tomorrow.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Time to go back to basics?
When a basketball team plays a lousy game, the first comment a coach will make to the press is, "I think we need to get back to basics." It seems to me, since life is full of cycles, the writing profession will inevitably return to basics. That thought occurred to me this week, when my 13 year old grandson deemed video games, "Boring". He then went into our backyard, cut off a tree branch, and started working on a bow and arrow.
I know the video game folks, the fantasy writers, and the horror film makers would shudder to think their target customer was bored with their offering. But as the writer of Ecclesiastics said, "There is a time for everything under the sun." Maybe he was right. Has the human cycle of interest moved away from the video game, etc, fascination? Are we seeing an urge to return to a simpler time, where a boys imagination and the natural world around him was his entertainment? I think we are. Timeless books and movies such as Old Yeller and Where the Red Fern Grows still hold a spell over their audiences or readers. Why? I think there is an urge deep within us that craves emotional realism. That realism makes To Kill A Mockingbird a wonderful novel.
Well, naturally, I wouldn't be writing this post if I were writing sci-fi or Harry Potter. No, my focus for the past six years has been to portray a couple of young, country boys living in a small southern town in 1944, and their relationship with some eccentric adults. That endeavor has produced five novels. About 18 months ago I started to work on getting them published and late in 2007 August House published the first of the series, The Red Scarf. It's been a real hit with the teens and pre-teens in the schools I've visited, but surprising, it has actually sold better in the mid to senior adult market. I think it's popularity is simply an urge to return to the basics of life, where simple, entertaining stories draw a reader into an easy identification with the principal characters in the novel. There are no boys on broomsticks, magic kingdoms or dragons. The Red Scarf is about life. Sometimes life is laughable, but not always, and in this novel the interaction of the characters will have you laughing one minutes and a few pages later will bring tears. That's life, and that's back to basics.
I know the video game folks, the fantasy writers, and the horror film makers would shudder to think their target customer was bored with their offering. But as the writer of Ecclesiastics said, "There is a time for everything under the sun." Maybe he was right. Has the human cycle of interest moved away from the video game, etc, fascination? Are we seeing an urge to return to a simpler time, where a boys imagination and the natural world around him was his entertainment? I think we are. Timeless books and movies such as Old Yeller and Where the Red Fern Grows still hold a spell over their audiences or readers. Why? I think there is an urge deep within us that craves emotional realism. That realism makes To Kill A Mockingbird a wonderful novel.
Well, naturally, I wouldn't be writing this post if I were writing sci-fi or Harry Potter. No, my focus for the past six years has been to portray a couple of young, country boys living in a small southern town in 1944, and their relationship with some eccentric adults. That endeavor has produced five novels. About 18 months ago I started to work on getting them published and late in 2007 August House published the first of the series, The Red Scarf. It's been a real hit with the teens and pre-teens in the schools I've visited, but surprising, it has actually sold better in the mid to senior adult market. I think it's popularity is simply an urge to return to the basics of life, where simple, entertaining stories draw a reader into an easy identification with the principal characters in the novel. There are no boys on broomsticks, magic kingdoms or dragons. The Red Scarf is about life. Sometimes life is laughable, but not always, and in this novel the interaction of the characters will have you laughing one minutes and a few pages later will bring tears. That's life, and that's back to basics.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
The Great Roach Trick--part two
This is the second part of The Yankee Doctor chapter on The Great Roach Trick. See yesterday's post for part one.
“Ahaaaa! Ohoooooo! God!” That was just a few of the things Doctor Carl said as he tried to get up, and, of course, Miss Tina let out a scream to end all screams as they tried to get to the door, but heck, after stepping in all them roaches, their shoes were so slippery that they’d take a step, fall down again, and then crawl through more roaches than you’ve ever seen in your entire life, cursing loudly, slapping roaches off as they slipped around on the slick floor. Doctor Carl finally crawled to the door, grabbed the doorknob, and started pushing, trying to get the door open. They was so many roaches on his white doctor coat that it was almost brown. We could hear him from across the street.
“The door won’t open!” he screamed as he pushed with Miss Tina yelling in his ear to let her out of that office or she was gonna die. Course, all the commotion and stomping on the roaches got them roaches all upset. You know, most of the time, roaches just scurry around on the floor and crawl up walls, but if they get all worked up they can fly. Well, these roaches—after being cooped up in a sack all night and now being stepped on and slapped―started to flit around like a bunch of super mosquitoes, and pretty soon the office looked like a big brown blur of flying water bugs, let me tell you something right now: Stepping on roaches and slapping them off your leg ain’t nothing compared to having them fly into you face and hair. We thought things couldn’t get no worse, but, shoot, when them roaches started dive-bombing Miss Tina and Doctor Carl the whole dang thing just went out of this world crazy.
“Carl! Carl! They’re up my leg again! Ahaaaaaa! They’re in my hair! Ahaaaaaaa! One flew in my mouth! Help me Carl! Open that damned door, or I’m going to die!”
Doctor Carl pushed and pulled that door so hard that he slipped down again, and knocked Miss Tina back against the front wall where about fifty roaches fell off right down in that Yankee red hair. You ain’t never seen a woman’s hands move so fast trying to knock them roaches outta her hair. Doctor Carl only made it to his knees before he fell down again. After cussing like crazy he crawled over to an office chair, picked it up, and yelled at Miss Tina.
“Tina, get away from the door!”
Then Doctor Carl threw the chair through the door glass, stepped through the broken glass, and managed to pull out the board we’d put under the door. Finally they both ran out still slapping at roaches. Miss Tina was so upset she was just a-quivering, and Doctor Carl grabbed her and pointed to his car across the street.
“Quick, get in the car!” he yelled.
When he said that, me and John Clayton looked at each other and almost split a gut thinking about Miss Tina jumping in Doctor Carl’s big car which was full of roaches. We could see them sticking to the car windows from across the street.
Miss Tina pulled her skirt down, and she and Doctor Carl ran over to his car, opened the doors, and jumped in.
“Ahaaaaa! Ahaaaaaa!”
“Whooooo! Whooooo!”
Miss Tina let out another ear piercing scream and another and another.
“The car’s full of roaches!” screamed Miss Tina as she frantically tried to get out. Well, Miss Tina was pretty fast getting outta that car, but since she’d sat down on top of maybe thirty or forty roaches a bunch of them got out of the car with her hanging on to her skirt, and a few managed somehow to get in that funny colored red hair. Doctor Carl was cursing and yelling like nothing I’ve ever heard, while he knocked roaches off his suit, but Miss Tina was a whole ’nother thing, and I thought for a minute she had totally lost it as she danced and screamed while trying to rid herself of the more active roaches.
“Carl, help! Get this damn roach out of my hair!” she screamed.
Doctor Carl slapped a really big one right above Miss Tina’s ear and roach gunk splattered everywhere.
“Oh, oh, damn you, Carl! Now I’ve got roach guts in my hair!”
Finally, they knocked off the last of the roaches, and with Miss Tina crying hysterically, they hurriedly walked around the corner of the block, and I was danged sure they were going to look for Curly.
“Come on, John Clayton, let’s get outta here! Grab that piece of wood you put under the door, and run for the back of Echols Grocery!” John Clayton grabbed the plank he’d shoved under the door, and we high-tailed it to the back door of Echols Grocery. We slipped in, and there was Donnie stacking feed.
“Hey, Donnie, need some help?” I said.
“You’re dang right I do.”
“Well, listen, if we help you, will you promise to tell everybody that asks that we’ve been here all mornin’?”
Well, this little trick was the start of an all out struggle with the evil doctor and his floozy nurse. It was reform school for the boys, or leave town for the doctor and his nurse.
“Ahaaaa! Ohoooooo! God!” That was just a few of the things Doctor Carl said as he tried to get up, and, of course, Miss Tina let out a scream to end all screams as they tried to get to the door, but heck, after stepping in all them roaches, their shoes were so slippery that they’d take a step, fall down again, and then crawl through more roaches than you’ve ever seen in your entire life, cursing loudly, slapping roaches off as they slipped around on the slick floor. Doctor Carl finally crawled to the door, grabbed the doorknob, and started pushing, trying to get the door open. They was so many roaches on his white doctor coat that it was almost brown. We could hear him from across the street.
“The door won’t open!” he screamed as he pushed with Miss Tina yelling in his ear to let her out of that office or she was gonna die. Course, all the commotion and stomping on the roaches got them roaches all upset. You know, most of the time, roaches just scurry around on the floor and crawl up walls, but if they get all worked up they can fly. Well, these roaches—after being cooped up in a sack all night and now being stepped on and slapped―started to flit around like a bunch of super mosquitoes, and pretty soon the office looked like a big brown blur of flying water bugs, let me tell you something right now: Stepping on roaches and slapping them off your leg ain’t nothing compared to having them fly into you face and hair. We thought things couldn’t get no worse, but, shoot, when them roaches started dive-bombing Miss Tina and Doctor Carl the whole dang thing just went out of this world crazy.
“Carl! Carl! They’re up my leg again! Ahaaaaaa! They’re in my hair! Ahaaaaaaa! One flew in my mouth! Help me Carl! Open that damned door, or I’m going to die!”
Doctor Carl pushed and pulled that door so hard that he slipped down again, and knocked Miss Tina back against the front wall where about fifty roaches fell off right down in that Yankee red hair. You ain’t never seen a woman’s hands move so fast trying to knock them roaches outta her hair. Doctor Carl only made it to his knees before he fell down again. After cussing like crazy he crawled over to an office chair, picked it up, and yelled at Miss Tina.
“Tina, get away from the door!”
Then Doctor Carl threw the chair through the door glass, stepped through the broken glass, and managed to pull out the board we’d put under the door. Finally they both ran out still slapping at roaches. Miss Tina was so upset she was just a-quivering, and Doctor Carl grabbed her and pointed to his car across the street.
“Quick, get in the car!” he yelled.
When he said that, me and John Clayton looked at each other and almost split a gut thinking about Miss Tina jumping in Doctor Carl’s big car which was full of roaches. We could see them sticking to the car windows from across the street.
Miss Tina pulled her skirt down, and she and Doctor Carl ran over to his car, opened the doors, and jumped in.
“Ahaaaaa! Ahaaaaaa!”
“Whooooo! Whooooo!”
Miss Tina let out another ear piercing scream and another and another.
“The car’s full of roaches!” screamed Miss Tina as she frantically tried to get out. Well, Miss Tina was pretty fast getting outta that car, but since she’d sat down on top of maybe thirty or forty roaches a bunch of them got out of the car with her hanging on to her skirt, and a few managed somehow to get in that funny colored red hair. Doctor Carl was cursing and yelling like nothing I’ve ever heard, while he knocked roaches off his suit, but Miss Tina was a whole ’nother thing, and I thought for a minute she had totally lost it as she danced and screamed while trying to rid herself of the more active roaches.
“Carl, help! Get this damn roach out of my hair!” she screamed.
Doctor Carl slapped a really big one right above Miss Tina’s ear and roach gunk splattered everywhere.
“Oh, oh, damn you, Carl! Now I’ve got roach guts in my hair!”
Finally, they knocked off the last of the roaches, and with Miss Tina crying hysterically, they hurriedly walked around the corner of the block, and I was danged sure they were going to look for Curly.
“Come on, John Clayton, let’s get outta here! Grab that piece of wood you put under the door, and run for the back of Echols Grocery!” John Clayton grabbed the plank he’d shoved under the door, and we high-tailed it to the back door of Echols Grocery. We slipped in, and there was Donnie stacking feed.
“Hey, Donnie, need some help?” I said.
“You’re dang right I do.”
“Well, listen, if we help you, will you promise to tell everybody that asks that we’ve been here all mornin’?”
Well, this little trick was the start of an all out struggle with the evil doctor and his floozy nurse. It was reform school for the boys, or leave town for the doctor and his nurse.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Characters should be----well 'Characters'
Volumes have been written about how characters can give that extra spice to a novel, and because that's true, every author spends hours honing and developing the secondary players in their novels. Why? Think of a hit novel---say Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. In my opinion, the real, but almost unbelievable characters in that book, put it in the extraordinary category. I don't know about other sections of the country, but the South is full of characters. We've got some real ring-tail-tooters down here, and most southern authors have very little difficulty thinking up a special secondary player for their novels. All they have to do is think back to their hometown and sit down at the word processor. Maybe it's something in the water, air, or inbreeding, but every southern town I've every been in has yards and yards of these guys and gals.
When I started writing my novel, The Red Scarf, I took out a pad and made notes about every character I grew up with in the small village of Norphlet. After the manuscript was accepted for publication, I met with the publishers and we sat around the table and discussed the novel. One of them asked, "How did you come up with such colorful characters?" I smiled and said, "I didn't make them up. They were just some of the folks from my home town." I guess when a novel has characters such as Peg, the one-legged pool hall owner, Wing, his one-armed brother, the town marshal, Doc, the wheelchair ridden newsstand owner who pretends he's president Roosevelt, and Big Six, the wild sorry roughneck, it's a little hard to believe they all lived in a little village of 650 folks. But they did.
Maybe fictitious characters work for some authors, but as far as I'm concerned you can't beat the real thing.
When I started writing my novel, The Red Scarf, I took out a pad and made notes about every character I grew up with in the small village of Norphlet. After the manuscript was accepted for publication, I met with the publishers and we sat around the table and discussed the novel. One of them asked, "How did you come up with such colorful characters?" I smiled and said, "I didn't make them up. They were just some of the folks from my home town." I guess when a novel has characters such as Peg, the one-legged pool hall owner, Wing, his one-armed brother, the town marshal, Doc, the wheelchair ridden newsstand owner who pretends he's president Roosevelt, and Big Six, the wild sorry roughneck, it's a little hard to believe they all lived in a little village of 650 folks. But they did.
Maybe fictitious characters work for some authors, but as far as I'm concerned you can't beat the real thing.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
How to write a book for all ages.
Well, if you're a publisher or an agent, I'm sure the thought has just crossed your mind, something like this, "Oh, no, every novel must have a category. How else would we submit or find a place on the shelves to stock it." Really? BS, if I've ever heard it. Yes, there are plenty of novels that are strictly adult fiction and bunches that appeal only to youth, but there really is an opened ended category I call--to make it simple--"All ages." This is how I think you get there.
Several ways come to mind, but I think the simplest is to have the story told in the first person by or about a young person--8 to 18. The Harry Potter series comes to mind. The story isn't told in the first person, of course, but it's all about Harry. Basically, Harry is a young boy caught up in a series of adult situations, and as we all know, the Harry Potter readers are from 8 to 88. To Kill a Mocking Bird also comes to mind as well as A Painted House. I think the key to satisfying your readers is to give them a taste of youth combined with an intertwining set of relationships with adults. You can build on this relationship with your readers by bringing in a nostalgic element which may remind them of their childhood. However, your basic task boils down to your skill with building a story line that will intrigue all of your readers.
In my novel, The Red Scarf, an 11 year old paper boy tells the story of his funny, sad, and sometimes exciting times between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's set in 1944. An attorney friend of mine took the book to New York on a business trip. I quote, "My wife had to punch me during the flight to New York, because I was laughing out loud. But on the way back as I finished the book, I had tears."
I think there are several way to sum up the "all readers" status of The Red Scarf. First, the setting: Poor, country boy struggling to earn money---the nostalgic element--set in 1944. The adults that interact with the two boy--Peg, the pool hall owner, Wing, the city marshal, Doc, the newsstand owner, Big Six, the ornery roughneck, and Uncle Hugh, the old black man. "Uncle Hugh is one of our bestest friends," said John Clayton.
Did it make the all ages cut? Well, take a look at the review from Amazon.com I've included in my post.
A. Bryant "Arkansas Bred" (Little Rock, AR USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Red Scarf (Hardcover) Every single person I have shared your book with has loved it. My father just finished it and absolutely could not say enough wonderful things about it. In fact, he asked me if the New York Times had read it and said they really needed to share it with the rest of the world. And, he's buying a copy to give to my Uncle for Christmas. My 9-year-old son even told me how much some of the kids at his school were enjoying reading it and grabbed his copy to start reading it on his own. That is really, really saying something when a piece of literature can cut across so many generations and bring so much Christmas joy to so many. Congratulations and thanks for sharing a piece of your Arkansas childhood with the rest of us!
Several ways come to mind, but I think the simplest is to have the story told in the first person by or about a young person--8 to 18. The Harry Potter series comes to mind. The story isn't told in the first person, of course, but it's all about Harry. Basically, Harry is a young boy caught up in a series of adult situations, and as we all know, the Harry Potter readers are from 8 to 88. To Kill a Mocking Bird also comes to mind as well as A Painted House. I think the key to satisfying your readers is to give them a taste of youth combined with an intertwining set of relationships with adults. You can build on this relationship with your readers by bringing in a nostalgic element which may remind them of their childhood. However, your basic task boils down to your skill with building a story line that will intrigue all of your readers.
In my novel, The Red Scarf, an 11 year old paper boy tells the story of his funny, sad, and sometimes exciting times between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's set in 1944. An attorney friend of mine took the book to New York on a business trip. I quote, "My wife had to punch me during the flight to New York, because I was laughing out loud. But on the way back as I finished the book, I had tears."
I think there are several way to sum up the "all readers" status of The Red Scarf. First, the setting: Poor, country boy struggling to earn money---the nostalgic element--set in 1944. The adults that interact with the two boy--Peg, the pool hall owner, Wing, the city marshal, Doc, the newsstand owner, Big Six, the ornery roughneck, and Uncle Hugh, the old black man. "Uncle Hugh is one of our bestest friends," said John Clayton.
Did it make the all ages cut? Well, take a look at the review from Amazon.com I've included in my post.
A. Bryant "Arkansas Bred" (Little Rock, AR USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Red Scarf (Hardcover) Every single person I have shared your book with has loved it. My father just finished it and absolutely could not say enough wonderful things about it. In fact, he asked me if the New York Times had read it and said they really needed to share it with the rest of the world. And, he's buying a copy to give to my Uncle for Christmas. My 9-year-old son even told me how much some of the kids at his school were enjoying reading it and grabbed his copy to start reading it on his own. That is really, really saying something when a piece of literature can cut across so many generations and bring so much Christmas joy to so many. Congratulations and thanks for sharing a piece of your Arkansas childhood with the rest of us!
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