Finally, A Good Book on Writing

I'm not a fan of books on writing.

They're either too mechanical -- Strunk and White are fine, but vastly unimaginative -- or entirely too preachy and concentrating too much on the writer than on the craft of writing.

Robert Newton Peck's "Secrets of Successful Fiction," though dated and -- at the end -- revelatory of an author who sometimes doesn't follow his own advice, is among the best books on writing that I've ever read.

Here's why:

Peck is a doer, and invites writers to jump into the practice of writing, rather than wasting time with the theory. Though he himself is a professor of writing (or was when the book was published in 1980) he's leery of those who teach writing without ever having done much successful writing of their own.

He's an advocate of daily writing, which in of itself isn't all that unusual, but he's also an advocate of novelists pursuing daily poetry writing as a way to hone their craft. He probably enjoys free verse, but he states implicitly that he admires the strict structure of formal poetry, particularly the sonnet, in helping a writer become disciplined in shaping his or her writing.

He also offers what I think is some good advice on dealing with editors, from neophyte author to seasoned professional. The best advice, in my opinion:

(page 97)

Your editor's prime function, in my opinion, is to cut. Painful though it may be to an author, when in doubt, throw it out. It makes sense to hearken to the folks who are working to make you richer. And you can always holler "pearls before swine!" at him or some other dandy little artistic epithet.

But your temper is less useful than your editor.

Editors know things that authors don't know. I never truly know what I have written. Why? Because I'm too close to it, deep inside it, where I can't see the whole of the book. My editor can.

I find this is true in my own writing. I'm too close to it. I'm never anxious to cut. But I realize as well that there are things that are going to have to go in order to make what I write better.

Ironically, Peck doesn't follow that advice with the last chapter of the book, which could easily have been trimmed to a few paragraphs and still retained its punch. (He delves into what I believe is a cardinal sin of all writers: Believing that since he or she is successful at writing that his or her opinions in other areas matter, are important, or are significant enough to deserve mention.) I know I do a lot of that on my blog, but, yuck, shoot me if I ever descend into that in my own writing.

I Feel Your Pain, Ted

A long time ago when I was near to finishing my bachelor's degree, I remember hearing -- and experiencing -- the common almost-grad lament:

All the jobs I see want me to have experience I can't get until I get a job.

That caused a lot of frustration way back when in the fuzzy, cocoon-like world of the mid- to late-1990s, when the economy was robust and companies and government were offering all kinds of opportunities for just the right person.

Years later, I'd like to go back in time to my almost-grad self to deliver the following message:

It gets worse.

I have, right now, a pretty good job. I'd like a better one. But in cracking into the current job market of the early 2000s, when the economy is in the crapper and companies and government are keeping hires to a minimum, the challenges even in getting an interview are astronomical.

Used under the fair use doctrine for commentary purposes.

The bar is continually raised. I'm not complaining about that. I realize that I can't expect to experience a career in stasis: I have to continue educating myself and working to make myself more marketable to employers. Still, there is some frustration. I have earned a masters degree. I have taken that degree and parleyed it into a part-time teaching gig at BYU-Idaho -- but until I actually get a class to teach and am invited back, that entry on my resume is going to bear that asterisk.

Meanwhile, employers knowing that there are a lot more people out there looking for jobs, are able to be a bit pickier. I'm not complaining about that either. Obviously, an employer wants the best-qualified person for the job.

Still, it's frustrating. With every accomplishment I find others that still need to be finished before the next career step may be taken. And I suppose that's just a lesson on life: Never stop learning, because the expectations will always increase.

Uncharted Visits the Hoover Dam. No Vacuums in Sight.

Ever since I was a little kid -- and don't ask me why -- I wanted to visit the Hoover Dam. Finally got to do that this past December. Read all about it here.

Shutpocalypse!

So, the big question on the lips of the media this week is: If the government shuts down, will we really notice?

No, really the question on the media's lips is: GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN! Flee to your fallout bunker and whatever you do, don't visit Yellowstone National Park because maintenance of the hot pools and geysers was WAAAAAYYY down before everything shut down so the whole damn place could blow at any minute! And it's the Republican's fault! Of course, so is my psoriasis!

I think if they could they'd use the opening sequence from Wall-E to illustrate what the landscape will look like if the government shuts down:

We got a rather more calm memo from the higher-ups in my company yesterday concerning the shutdown. Their message: Folks, we've got enough money in the coffers to keep things going for about a month, so come Monday if the government is shut down you'd better be at work unless you want to be put on the layoff list.

The bit about the layoffs isn't true, of course.

So yeah. If the government shuts down, it's highly likely we won't notice a thing. We've already got our federal tax refund. We're not in need of passports. And anyone who goes to Yellowstone National Park in early April is going to have a lot more trouble dealing with snow, waking grizzly bears and other more natural calamities than the total and complete absence of federal workers.

The media -- and some of the more wide-eyed conservative locals -- make it sound like it's the Shutpocalypse if the government shuts down. The media, of course, because they're on the side of the Democrats in this argument (and if you say they're not, well then, I have a recording of about five minutes' worth of long, cynical laughter for you to listen to). At least they may more sense than the wide-eyed conservatives around here, who seem to be ranting on about why the hell does the government have to shut down because that's what I'm trying to pay the bare minimum of taxes for anyway? Like any of them are going to need to rush out and get a passport any time soon.

Beautiful Vistas and Thrilling Bursts of Speed

There's still a big part of me that would love to work for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. To be part of a team that sent a probe to a neighboring planet, to send a probe out to the stars.

NOVA may be the closest I get.

I wanted to be an astronomer, thinking the thoughts Carl Sagan thought as he put together his television show COSMOS. Then I encountered algebra, trigonometry and such in junior high, in high school. The Ds and Fs I got in those subjects, consistently -- I did better in geometry, but I'm at a loss to explain why -- steered me away from that dream.

But I can write. So I've been working on that.

But there are a lot of writers, a lot of science writers, a lot of technical writers, who also want to work for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, so the competition is fierce. And living in Southern California is expensive.

So I can watch these shows. I can read a lot about science, and space exploration. And do my little bit of technical writing for those guys in the Lost River Desert digging up the leftovers of nuclear weapons production.

"Anyone who imagines that bliss is normal is going to waste a lot of time running abound shouting that he's been robbed," says Gordon B. Hinckley, former president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "The fact is that most putts don't drop, most beef is tough, most children grow up to be just people, most successful marriages required a high degree of mutual toleration, most jobs are more often dull than otherwise. Life is like an old time rail journey . . . delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed. The trick," he says, "is to thank the Lord for letting you have the ride."

These JPL guys in the video know all this. They work through it. As do I. I'm not working at JPL, but I am working on other stuff that takes me, maybe, to those beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed Hinckley talks about.

And go to the stars in my mind, every time I listen to this:

Another Sign of Aging: Comedic Apathy

Last Monday, we rented a copy of “Megamind” from the local Redbox (I know; how quaint). I very much like the storyline to that one. And the voice acting – especially on the parts of Megamind himself and Minion – is wonderful.

Problem is: I don’t really know who Will Ferrell and Tina Fey are.

Oh, I know they’re big. Real big. Biggly big as far as movies and Saturday Night Live and such go. But I don’t watch a lot of movies. I don’t watch SNL. I don’t watch “The Office” or “30 Rock” or anything else these people may appear in. I have, in fact, been out of toch with 99.9 percent of popular culture for more than a decade.

Insert obligatory Grampa Simpson quote here: “I used to be with it, but then they changed what ‘it’ was. What I was with wasn’t it, and what was it seemed new and scary to me. It’ll happen to you!”

It has.

So when I’m watching a movie and someone else gets really excited because Ferrell or Fey or Steve Carrell is in it, I say “Who?” then follow that up with something intelligent like, “Oh. That guy.”

It’s not that I find them uninteresting or unfunny, it’s just that, for the most part, they’re outside my current circle of interests. They may have a rich, comedic influence on current American society, but my intersection with that circle is spotty. I just have other things to do. And that’s fine. They obviously don’t need me to flourish.

And that circle goes both ways.

Consider Pixar’s Up. First time I saw it and heard Carl Frederickson speak, I said, yeah, that’s Ed Asner. Many of the younger folks, however, had a reaction similar to mine: “Who? Oh. That guy.” But I watched Mary Tyler Moore when it was on the air. I watched Lou Grant. I am a pop culture fossil. It’s quite possible my pop culture circle stopped expanding in the mid-1980s. I know a hell of a lot more about the Carol Burnett Show and Hee-Haw than do those of the current generation. I am pop-culturally rich, though my riches may appear to be as ancient as doubloons (or Daffy Ducks’ triploons and quadrooploons) to the infants of today.

So maybe I don’t feel so bad about not really knowing who Ferrell and Carrell and Fey are any more.

Angry Mob Supplies

Used under the fair use doctrine for commentary purposes.

Nathan Bransford is trying to use the fire hose of reason on the folks attacking Jacqueline Hewitt and the books she’s written, after Hewitt rubbed a reviewer the wrong way and concluded her tirade with a few choice expletives.

Bransford, an author and former literary agent, correctly frames the situation as the result of an Internet angry mob, overreacting to Hewitt’s overreaction. Here’s the crux of his argument:

In truth, the actions of a mob say a lot more about the people participating in them than the person being scorned. And I think in the dark heart of a mob you'll find a quiet sense of relief. People are secretly and ardently glad that they're not the ones being targeted.

You can feel the relief and sense of superiority in numbers behind the mocking: Well, at least I'm not that bad off. And a hundred strangers agree with me.

But really that's a false sense of security. As the old quote goes, "A mob has many heads but no brains."

As I pointed out in my earlier post, what’s most important to take away from these kinds of situations is the desire to look at one’s own behavior to see what error precursors one can eliminate so such a situation doesn’t happen in one’s own little sphere. My takeaway from the situation: Make sure you have a set of cold eyes – preferably two or three sets – read what you’ve written before you publish. That’s one of the primary examples I see of publishing in the traditional sense, but even those who self-publish ought to be able to find a disinterested third or fourth party to do a read and offer some advice.

Hewitt could have easily turned her experience at Big Al’s into a learning experience, fixed the errors Big Al pointed out and turned the review into a positive experience. That she chose to take the other path doesn’t automatically give the rest of us the right to light those torches. In fact, the last impulse one should give in to (note, not that we won’t have such impulses, but we shouldn’t give in to them) is the one that involves finding pitchforks and lighting torches.

As it is, Hewitt will likely go away from this experience with less of a desire to expose her writing to legitimate criticism before it’s published, meaning she’ll learn less from the experience than the mob might hope. If, as Bill James writes, we want to create writers, we need to provide spaces and opportunities where they can learn early and often from their mistakes. Turning a critique into an angry mob – even if the author brings her own torch and pitchfork to the fight – isn’t conducive to creating a learning environment.

What, then, about Cooks Source Magazine? Here, an alleged serial plagiarist is called on the carpet by the Internet mob and essentially goes out of business. How is that situation different from Hewitt’s?

First of all, it’s no actionable offense to be a mediocre writer prone to odd phrasings and typographical errors. Maybe Hewitt’s work isn’t the best in the world, but it is her own.

But what about the mob mentality in this situation? The mob might, in part, have been responsible for Cooks Source in issuing a half-hearted apology, but what right did the mob have to pursue Cooks Source’s advertisers, vandalize its Facebook page (disclosure: I was one of the angry Facebook mob in this case) and otherwise harass the offender?

Damn few. And they’re all dead.

Paint My House

So, maybe this is a dumb thing to do. I mean, there are probably ordinances in Sugar City against this kind of thing. But you know what? I’d do it if the right advertiser were involved.

Do what, you may ask? Well, this.

Yes, I’d turn my house into a billboard for three months, or a year, in order to have this company – desperate, it seems, for media exposure – pay my mortgage for the time my house was a billboard.

Desperate, you say?

Hopeful, I’d retort.

We could use that money for some other projects – notably replacing windows on said house and remodeling the kitchen. A year’s worth of mortgage payments is $7,200 in our neck of the woods. Even if we took some of that cash and made extra principal payments, we’d come out ahead. Yeah, the neighbors would have to put up with a billboard in town for three months to a year, but it wouldn’t be an obtrusive billboard – most of the front of our house is brick, you see. That may work contrary to my hopeful whim to be chosen, but you never know.

Besides, we need the house painted anyway. Why not get paid a year for a wacky job, then go stucco, like we’re thinking?

Building a Garage

In the fourteen years we’ve been married, we’ve owned two houses. The first was a little crackerbox on a tiny lot in Rexburg, a block north of the Ricks College stadium, so we got lots of cannon noise when they played football and lots of people parking in front of our driveway as they went to games. The second is the one we have now, in much quieter Sugar City.

Neither one has had a garage.

That is a problem, given we live in an area where it snows five months out of the year. We’d like a garage where we could park the cars, maybe a bicycle or two.

So without moving to a new home that already has a garage, that leaves us building one where we currently are.

That’s another problem.

Sugar City, of course, flooded in 1976. A lot of people, when they rebuilt, bought additional lots next to theirs. Not the intrepid owners of our current home. Instead, they built on a rather narrow lot, not leaving future owners a lot of options, garage-wise. We have two, as I see it, and that means only two options for the driveway, not the garage. The garage itself would have to be in the back yard somewhere, preferably to the south, since the only exit to the front yard is on the north. Our other option is an exit to the alley, but since it’s not plowed during the winter, we’d have to plow it ourselves. Not a fun option.

Then there are the setbacks and the size limitations and the fact that if we build, we’d kinda like a bonus room atop the garage – which presents another difficulty. So I’m doing the homework on sizes and setbacks now, and, this weekend while Michelle is away at Scout training, I’ll go out into the back yard and stake out a few likely options. I have to see how things’ll fit visually – as does Michelle – before I can really envision things. I’m plenty worried we’ll end up with nothing but garage and driveway in the back yard, which is something we’d like to avoid. That is, unless we take the alley exit option. That’s what I’m leaning towards, but Michelle isn’t sold on the concept. So we’ll have to see what I can figure out this weekend.

Rumpole of the Internetz

I’ve read a few stories about Anonymous, the non-group of whatevers who occasionally band together when they really, really want to in order to stick it to the man by assaulting their web sites and such.

It’s good to see the boys – now, I assume there are girls involved as well, but given the nature of things, I’m sure most of them are boys – doing something with their talents, whatever they may be. I, too, have felt the urge to protest. Mostly furniture store sales and the occasional yard sale and car wash. One election year I put up a sign reading “Don’t Vote. It Just Encourages Them” on the front of the house. Just for the lulz. So I understand that they want to have their say.

But toilet paper? Really? I understand the Koch brothers connection, yadda yadda blah blah blah. But you know what? How many people really want to go online and research toilet paper? How many of us really noticed Anonymous’ failed distributed denial of service attacks against Angel Soft, brief as it was? Unless you’re in my house usin’ my toilet paperz, I promise you I didn’t notice. At all.


Protest is a great American tradition. It brought us the civil rights movement. It brought us the American Revolution. Suffrage. The repeal of Prohibition. But if political hacktivism the Anonymous Way is the way protest is headed these days, no wonder it’s going out with a whimper, as Ars Technica writes. (And Anonymous, this is Ars Technica, Rumpole of the Bailey of the Internet here, poking fun at you. I wouldn’t take that lying down, friends.)

And when you post things like this:

We laugh in the face of tragedy, we mock those in pain, we ruin the lives of other people simply because we can, these things we do for the lolz [sic] and we do them with no remorse, no caring, no love, and no sense of morality, we attack all things in this way, we can, we will, and we have destroyed countless that stand to harm Anonymous.

And then get people to agree with it, well, no wonder you’re fragmentary and losing your effectiveness, at least in the Toilet Paper Wars.