Farewell to "The Wire"

The best TV show ever made is over. I'm depressed that there will be no more new episodes of The Wire.

Don't worry, I won't spoil the ending here. I have a group of friends who still haven't seen the last two episodes, and I must remain mum for fear of inciting their wrath. This weekend they will all come over to my house (I'm the only one with HBO), as they have all season, to watch those episodes, eat pizza, and raise a glass of Jameson's to their favorite show.

Yes, it's almost like a cult. Want to join?

Seriously, if you haven't watched this show, YOU MUST. Anyone who does watch it acquires an almost evangelical fervor about it. Check out this post on McSweeneys if you don't believe me.

Start with Season One, because this novel-like series builds a complex, fascinating web of characters and stories from the very beginning. Events in Season Five harken back to moments in Season Three, or even all the way back to Season One. It's the portrait of the American city. It features some of the best unknown actors on the planet. It's brilliant, angry, violent, insightful, and often hilarious.

It's damned entertaining and enlightening. For a taste, check out this famous scene from Season One, when detectives McNulty and Bunk go to the scene of a long gone murder... and solve it while saying only the word "fuck."

Then go watch it all. A few episodes in, and you'll be joining our cult. I guaran-damn-tee you, dog.

Thanks to creators David Simon and Ed Burns for this show. They are fricking geniuses, our modern day Aeschylus and Sophocles. As Omar Little (played by Michael Williams, pictured above) would say. True 'dat.

Don't Die, Dammit

So here's a real life story that suggests some interesting fictional possibilities.

Reuters reports that "The mayor of a village in southwest France has threatened residents with severe punishment if they die, because there is no room left in the overcrowded cemetery to bury them."

In an ordinance posted in the council offices, Mayor Gerard Lalanne told the 260 residents of the village of Sarpourenx that "all persons not having a plot in the cemetery and wishing to be buried in Sarpourenx are forbidden from dying in the parish."

It added: "Offenders will be severely punished."

The mayor said he was forced to take drastic action after an administrative court in the nearby town of Pau ruled in January that the acquisition of adjoining private land to extend the cemetery would not be justified.

Lalanne, who celebrated his 70th birthday on Wednesday and is standing for election to a seventh term in this month's local elections, said he was sorry that there had not been a positive outcome to the dilemma.

"It may be a laughing matter for some, but not for me," he said.
(Reporting by Claude Canellas, Writing by Andrew Dobbie; editing by Sami Aboudi)

What if the folks in this small village DID stop dying? What if they all remained alive as long as there was no room in the cemetery, and this went on for years? And then what if, all of a sudden, someone offered them land for burials?

Possibilities for story everywhere in this big crazy world!

I feel a short story coming on.

Are You a Cat or a Dog?

All right, one more personality test - are you more Cat or Dog?

Here's my result. Rather predictable for those who know how much of an animal lover I am.

You Are: 50% Dog, 50% Cat

You are a nice blend of cat and dog. You're playful but not too needy. And you're friendly but careful. And while you have your moody moments, you're too happy to stay upset for long.

Are You More Cat or Dog?

What spice are you?

There are days when I love to do these stupid personality tests that tell you which type of dog you are, or which Star Wars character you are. Today's test - what spice are you?

Go here to take the test.

My result? Well, I found it hard to pick which type of food is my favorite, so I picked Italian because my four months in Bologna were the tastiest of my life. So here's what I got.

You Are Basil

You are quite popular and loved by most people. You have a mild temperament, but your style is definitely distinctive. You are sweet, attractive, and you often smell good.

What Spice Are You?

The Homicide Report

Found a sobering, fascinating blog on the LA Times site today called The Homicide Report. written mostly by blogger/reporter Ruben Vives, with contributions from Jill Leovy. It catalogs every single homicide in LA County, along with victim's age, occupation, race, family, and the particulars known about the death. Click on a sidebar and they'll tell you why they report the race of the victims - because race is a huge factor in whether you will die via homicide. Black men make up 4% of the population in Los Angeles, but they are far and away the most numerous victims of homicide. Other statistics are available if you look around and click, including a homicide map of LA, which shows that the area south of the 10 Freeway is much more dangerous than the area north of it.

The story at the top of the page today when I clicked showed a photo of a young black football player, shot to death by two Latino youths when he failed to tell them any gang affiliation. Click on the comments, and you'll see everything from political commentary to condolences.

Each death suggests a longer life cut off too soon. Each suggests a story, a character, or a dreadful moment. It's the real life stuff that trumps fiction every time, and leads a writer to wonder how the earnest lies we write can ever illuminate the truth out there.

Misogyny in Hollywood? No!

Today's must read: Radar Magazine has a funny, spot-on piece available online called "No Country for Fat Chicks," which highlights the most misogynistic films of the past decade.

They begin with Superbad, tweak Ocean's Thirteen, and rightfully slam my pick for most misogynistic movie of the decade, Sin City. Take that 13 going on 30, Bridget Jones' Diary, and Hustle and Flow!

February

by Margaret Atwood from Morning in the Burned House

Winter. Time to eat fat
and watch hockey. In the pewter mornings, the cat,
a black fur sausage with yellow
Houdini eyes, jumps up on the bed and tries
to get onto my head. It's his
way of telling whether or not I'm dead.
If I'm not, he wants to be scratched; if I am
He'll think of something. He settles
on my chest, breathing his breath
of burped-up meat and musty sofas,
purring like a washboard. Some other tomcat,
not yet a capon, has been spraying our front door,
declaring war. It's all about sex and territory,
which are what will finish us off
in the long run. Some cat owners around here
should snip a few testicles. If we wise
hominids were sensible, we'd do that too,
or eat our young, like sharks.
But it's love that does us in. Over and over
Again, He shoots, he scores! and famine
crouches in the bedsheets, ambushing the pulsing
eiderdown, and the windchill factor hits
thirty below, and the pollution pours
out of our chimneys to keep us warm.
February, month of despair,
with a skewered heart in the centre.
I think dire thoughts, and lust for French fries
with a splash of vinegar.
Cat, enough of your greedy whining
and your small pink bumhole.
Off my face! You're the life principle,
more or less, so get going
on a little optimism around here.
Get rid of death. Celebrate increase. Make it be spring.

Exercise # 5 - Who Lives Here?

(Photo from www.ffffound.com)

Writing exercise for the week - who lives here?

UPDATE:
My own haiku thoughts on this important question below.

Stay puft marshmallow
Man exploded on my house.
Dog made it out safe.

Screenwriting vs. Graphic Novels

I enjoyed reading the X-Men comic books in college, which was lo, many years ago, back when Jean Grey became Dark Phoenix and nearly destroyed the universe. My roommate, Alex, would buy the latest issue, and it'd make the rounds of all five of us roomies.

And now one of my favorite TV and film writers, Joss Whedon, is writing X-Men graphic novels with his trademark wit, darkness, and insight. And YA writers like Cecil Castellucci have found success with graphic novels like The Plain Janes, which has been optioned to be a movie. I'm caught up in an online comic that puts out fresh panels every Friday, for free, called The FreakAngels. And I've got a couple of far out movie ideas that would never make it onto the screen. So now, of course, I'm thinking about them as possible graphic novels.

Turns out comics/graphic novels need a writer and an artist. No way could I illustrate one of these puppies. But I'm thinking that my training as a screenwriter would come in handy, since graphic novels demand that the story be told visually just as much, if not more, than it be told in dialogue and prose. Then I'd either have to network and get a great artist, or sell the script to a publisher and let them find one.

So for me the first step is research. I bought a book on writing graphic novels. I started reading more graphic novels. I perused popular titles in the bookstore. I talked to my geek friends (and I have plenty of those!) about it and will be borrowing from their collections. I'm not ready to go forward with my own graphic novel script... yet. My current novel would make a great graphic novel, I think.

But first things first - the actual novel. Then, once that's published to much acclaim (cough cough) I can sell off the movie rights and write the graphic novel version to add money to my overflowing coffers.

Oh wait. I have to actually finish writing the dang thing first, don't I? And wait wait - that takes time, discipline, and talent, doesn't it? Well I guess I better get right on that then. (Hustles off to write some more...)

Get Yer Work On

The writers strike is over at last, and the TV business has gone INSANE.

Did I just put that in all CAPS? Is it justified? (Thinking...) Yes, by gum, it's justified.

It's as if all the pent up energy that would've been spent setting meetings, making deals, schmoozing, and pushing ideas from the months of the strike has emerged all at once and it all must happen now now now.

Selfishly, I'm glad they came to an agreement so that my job is both unthreatened and much more interesting. Is it a good deal? I wish I knew. But the writers I know are happy to get back to work, and everyone's breathing a huge sigh of relief... until the possible Actors strike when their contract expires June 30.

Sigh. Show biz. It's extremely difficult to break in. It batters the shit out of you if you do manage to get your toe in the water. And it's ready to spit you out at a moment's notice.

Flu Block

There's this thing called writer's block that hits me every now and then. Although it's really not a block at all, just my inner critic getting in the way of my creative inner whatcha-majiggy.

But the flu? Now that blocks my writing. I've been suffering from this dang bug for a week now, and I'm sick of it. So to speak.

I'm back at work, but I'm dragging. I haze off into the ether at odd moments, then am brought back to earth by a coughing fit. I'm cancelling all my night time activities and heading straight home to turn my mind off and get some sleep. I even had to beg off from tonight's critique group meeting, which bums me out. I really want to hear their take on the next chapter, but no way I can haul myself all the way over there and back after a full day's work. As for writing? I just can't focus. It's hard enough to read scripts and arrange meetings while I'm at work, let alone come up with hilarious and insightful crap for my novel.

This flu is blocking my writing far worse than my inner critic, and that's saying something. Makes me appreciate how wonderful it is just to feel normal and healthy. Hopefully I'll perk up in the next couple of days so I can kickstart myself back into gear. Once you take some time off from a manuscript, it take a lot of energy to reconnect with it and get back in the swing.

Stay healthy. Wash your hands. Get the flu shot. Shun your sick friends if you want to be well enough to write.

Yes We Can

If you are in a primary state, vote today. I did.

I cast my vote for Obama. But it wasn't an easy choice, and I do feel that whoever wins, we'll be okay. If you're in the mood for a little inspiration and don't mind celebrities, check out this pro-Obama video.

And here he is at his most inspirational in a speech from last year...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BznUPlwbQ7Q

Vote! And hope!

Ultimate SoCal Day

I inherited a couple of free tickets to Disneyland and used them to take a good friend out for an important birthday. This was Superbowl Sunday, now, and it was raining.

Really, just the perfect time to go to Disneyland. The crowds are usually forbidding in that Happiest Place on Earth. Go on a weekend in the summer at your peril. But a rainy Sunday in late January? What the hell!

We got there early and went straight onto my favorite ride, Space Mountain. Without crowds, we managed to cover most of what we wanted at the park and next door California Adventure (check out the Soarin' ride there if you haven't already) by 2:30 or so.

Then we hopped in the car and headed for Malibu to watch the Superbowl with some celebrities and their families.

Didn't I tell you it was the Ultimate SoCal day? As we drove along the 5 freeway, the traffic slowed down unexpectedly. What was this? The Superbowl was just starting! What was everyone doing on the road?

Turns out they were slowing down to lookyloo at a car that had flipped off a bridge onto its roof on the (dry) bed of the so-called LA river. A tow truck slowly hoisted it up. Oy. Not a happy sight. But once again, typical Southern California.

The drive after that was smooth, and we took the 101 to Las Virgenes and Malibu Canyon, a gorgeous drive as the rain broke and the sun shone spectacularly on the wet green hills and shimmering ocean.

One halftime touch football game, lots of buffalo wings, amazing banana cream pie, and a Giants win later, we headed home. Exhausted but satisfied. SoCal can be a glorious, crazy place to live, let me tell you. There's always some new adventure to be had.

Writing Exercise #4 - Hit and Run

Over a year ago I in my green Honda accord was rear-ended by a young woman in her early twenties driving a battered black American-make muscle car of some type. We were on a busy street, and I was stopped at the light and she just rammed into me.

As I sat there, stunned, she got out of her car, and looked at me through my window. "You OK?" she asked. I sort of nodded. "Why don't we get out of traffic? Pull across the street over there and I'll follow you."

"Okay," I said. When the light was green, I pulled across to a side street and waited for her. She gunned her engine and... turned left, racing away. Hit and run. I cursed, did a U-turn, and raced after her, only to be pinned in place by a construction truck.

I called the cops, made a report, and got the car towed to a body shop.

But what was going through that young woman's mind as she cold-bloodedly plotted to get me and my car out of her way so she could make a safe getaway? Taking her point of view, write something (anything from a haiku to a short story) that gives some kind of insight into why she did what she did. Every villain has their own story, their own reasons for what they do. Get inside this one's head.

Believe me, I'd like to know what the hell she was thinking.

Patry Francis - Author of "The Liar's Diary"

(photo "Invisible City" by magic fly paula.)

Writer Patry Francis has a book coming out in paperback today. It's called The Liar's Diary. But she won't be able to promote it because she's busy being treated for an aggressive type of cancer.

Which is where her fellow writers come in. Patry is a member at Red Room, an online community for writers. When they heard about Patry's problem, one of them, Laura Benedict, came up with an idea to help her. Laura began recruiting other writers who blog to talk about Patty and her new book on their blogs today - the day her book comes out. Writers like Neil Gaiman and Khaled Hosseini have joined with institutions like Publisher's Weekly and Writers Digest to blog about Patry and her book today in hopes of publicizing it and showing their support to her as she struggles against cancer.

You can read Patry's own unsentimental account of what she's going through on her blog, Simply Wait. And you can check out her book here.

Beauty Inspires Creativity

Here's another shot of my favorite beach in the world, Bellows on the windward side of Oahu, about 3pm on a Friday afternoon in late December.

A visit to Kulak's Woodshed to listen to five different women singer/songwriters equally inspired me this past Friday.

For a $10 contribution, you can attend this "private club" on Laurel Canyon, close to Magnolia in the Valley, and be part of the audience of a vidcast. The night I went with a friend, we saw a round of four very talented women singer songwriters. Of special note were Tracy Newman (http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=72836967) and Michelle Mangione. Tracy was funny, witty, insightful. Michelle rocked out and told stories that felt true. In her one song, "Jupiter," (available on ITunes) she sang: "The hero and the villain are the same."

Now if that doesn't provoke story ideas, I don't know what does.

So go out there and look at something beautiful. Watch talented creative people do their creative thing. It'll nurture your own muse.

How to write a novel

Since I'm still in the process of writing my novel, I like looking around for expert advice. If you're inclined to write a novel, check out the advice of published author David Louis Edelman here in his blog Deep Genre.

Writing Exercise #3 - Luminiferous

Look at this cool, weird gun! I found this image on ffffound, and a dozen scenarios involving possible targets of this gun immediately sprang to mind.

Or perhaps it's not a gun, but an "exciter," which does something to the "aether"? I can't read the small print on this image. But in a way that makes it an even better stimulus for ideas.

This week's assignment is to write a scene featuring this device. It must be used at some point in the scene.

Extra points for using the word "luminiferous" in a way that makes the word's meaning clear without giving me a flat-out dictionary-type definition.

Update: Thanks to a perspicacious reader, I've identified this illustration as coming from Dr. Grordbort's Contrapulatonic Dingus Directory. You can find out more at the accompanying website Dr. Grordbort's Infallible Aether Oscillators and other Marvelous Contraptions, created by Greg Broadmore. Raygun lovers rejoice!

Isn't Nature Wonderful?

Need to bring your blood pressure down 15 points? Want a glimpse of heaven under water? Harbor any doubts that animals can be as intelligent, playful, and beautiful as humans? Watch this video.

:-0

Writing Exercise #2 - The Mascot

Even if you have no interest in writing exercises, keep on reading. The material below is fascinating - no thanks to me!

On January 16 I listened to an extradinary interview on NPR's show The World. Anchor Lisa Mullins did an interview with Alex Kurzen, a Jewish man now in his 70's who lives in Australia but who survived the Holocaust in an extradinary fashion. When he was about five years old, the Nazis slaughtered everyone in his Russian village, including every member of his family. He escaped, only to be saved and adopted by a group of Latvian soldiers in league with the Nazis. This tiny Jewish boy survived World War II acting as a sort of "mascot" for this group of mass murderers. He witnessed many horrors, even as they were kind to him. After the war, he moved to Australia and started a family, and he never spoke of his experiences. At the age of 72, he finally told his son Mark the story and asked him to verify it all for him. Even to Alex Kurzem, it all seemed like a dream.

That's just the start of this extraordinary tale. Listen to the interview here. Scroll down till you see the segment titled "Alex Kurzem - The Mascot" and listen to the interview. It's riveting. There are also links to photos, including some of Alex as a boy in an SS uniform, and to the book his son wrote about their search for the truth.

After perusing these materials, your writing exercise is to take a moment or two from this amazing story and write it from the point of view of the five-year-old Jewish boy who has been adopted by these Nazi-affiliated soldiers. It can be anything from a haiku to a full fledged short story.

Even if you have no interest in writing, I urge you to listen to this story. It'll move you.

Publish your Writing!

So I've just had a reader response to my post suggesting a writing exercise. (Scroll down or click here to read the exercise.)

A reader has started to write a story in response to this exercise! I'm so excited!

Someone actually reads my blog.
Someone followed one of my writing suggestions!
Someone contacted me about it!

Okay, so it's all the same "someone," but you get the idea.

Which has inspired me to add a feature to my blog...

I will post a writing exercise once a week. Readers who write a piece in response can send it to me at nina@ninaberry.com, and if it's good, I will post it on my blog.

A few rules:
1) So-called obscene words and situation ARE allowed. I don't mind the occasional "fuck" (if you know what I mean) or sex scene at all. But if your story indicates a psychopathic obsession with killing, say, or it makes me think you need psychiatric help, I probably won't post it. That said, I think writing should move the reader. So if it moves me to feel horror or sadness or something, that's all good.

2) All genres accepted. That includes humor, sci-fi, fantasy, poetry (all types - limericks, haiku, sonnets, free form), horror, erotica, "literary" (whatever that means) and so on. I'll read more abstract or experimental stuff, but that's not something I usually enjoy and so the cards are stacked against you if that's your style.

3) Pieces can be anywhere from one sentence to 2,000 words. Now 2,000 words is long, especially for reading on the web. So I suggest you keep it a lot shorter than that. This rule may be revised as I see how many really long posts I want to add here.

4) There's no absolute deadline for sending me pieces based on writing exercises. Say you write a piece based on an exercise I posted two months ago - I'll still publish it if I like it.

5) Decision on what to publish here is up to me, Nina Berry, and only me. No payment of any kind to the writer can or will be made. But you'll be able to say you were published in a webzine. Dude, how cool is that? On your website you'll be able to link to your story here and show that an outside party thought it worthy.

True, that outside party is little old me. But, believe it or not, I have a lot of editing experience. I've edited five published books. I've been paid to read and analyze film and television scripts by Playboy and Warner Bros. I made it to the semi-finals of the Nicholl Fellowships and to the finals of the Disney TV Writing Fellowships. I wrote an episode of the synidicated TV show Ghost Stories. If I think your story is good, then it probably is.

6) Rules may be added, deleted, or amended at any time and at my whim. If I get overwhelmed by responses (ha!) that may happen.

7) Pieces may be proofread and spelling problems fixed before I publish them.

8) But please try to send clearly typed pieces, sent in the body (not an attachment) of your email that have been thoroughly proofed and spellchecked. Pieces with egregious spelling and grammar issues will tire me out and not get serious consideration.

I already have a great photo to base the next exercise on. Not all exercises will include photos, but I think they're a great way to get a story going in your brain. Now that I think on it, my first exercise, with three crazy photos to tie together, is a tad challenging. Not all exercises will be so nutty. But some just might!

Feel free to send pieces based on that first exercise. Another one will come your way next week!

9) If I publish your piece, I only need first time publication rights. After it appears here, do with it what you will. But no pieces that have been published elsewhere. The pieces are meant to be based on writing exercises presented here, not on stuff you did before. The idea is to get your imagination working and your writing juices flowing, and other metaphors that imply activity and imagination.

10) If I don't publish your piece within two weeks, figure that it won't get published. I may or may not be able to respond with a yes or no to all your emails. So if two weeks go by and it ain't up here, then figure it's a "no, thanks," and move on.

More rules as I think of them. Happy writing!

ffffound

Found (ha!) a cool new site called ffffound that features nothing but images.

From the eerily charming:



To the terrifying:



To that which raises a question in the mind:



A possible writing exercise - look at each of these photos and then write a story that incorporates elements of all three.

The Universe is Sherwood Forest

So Yahoo news had this cool story about "rogue black holes" on the web today. Check it out here.

This is one of those instances when a phrase sends my imagination off into Neverland. Imagine, rogue black holes, roaming our galaxy in search of stars and planets to gobble up. Suddenly, our universe seems like a vast jungle where polite, civilized stars and planetary systems are quietly making their way down the path, minding their own business, when they are suddenly jumped by an outlaw black hole. Once inside that rogue's event horizon, you're doomed. Doomed, I tell you!

What if the black holes got together and ganged up on all the stars, nebulae, and planets, and quasars? Would they form one gigando black hole that sucked in all matter and obliterated the known universe?

What if one black hole turned Robin Hood and started spewing the stars he'd eaten back out into the dark space between galaxies, stealing from the matter-rich parts of the galaxy and giving back to the impoverished?

What if, like giant, light-sucking tigers, black holes stalked and pounced upon unsuspecting white dwarves and red giants?

I mean, seriously. The universe is just like some Tolkein rip-off fantasy novel.

Serve the Story

So I'm writing my novel the other day, and I get to a scene where the female protagonist has to re-enter a group of old friends, most of whom did not treat her well, and one of whom is her ex-boyfriend who has hooked up with someone else.

I wasn't sure what I needed from this scene as I wrote it. I knew the scene was somehow necessary and should be dramatic, but what was my heroine trying to accomplish here? What were the specific conflicts, and how should I use them to drive the story forward?

The suddenly I was writing down words I'd always wanted to say to one of my exes. The words poured out of my heroine's mouth with all the power and anger I didn't get the chance to express all those years ago. I wrote down the response of the Ex, which was the same sort of self-justification my ex offered up to me, and which can still make my blood boil. And my fingers flew over the keyboard, and I was all intense, focused on making a scene happen in my book that never got to happen in real life. It felt good to make blood drip from my pen (yeah, that's a metaphor).

That night, I was lying in bed, and I thought - hold on a second! Is my heroine's relationship with her ex REALLY just like my relationship with mine?

Uh, no.

And just exactly how does that scene serve the story and move the plot along?

Well, it's doesn't. Not really. But it's good! It flows. It's full of passion and fire. It's witty. It's fun.

So what? This isn't about you, it's about the characters you created. It's about serving this story, not your story. You wanna berate the bonehead who mistreated you in print? Then write a story about THAT. This is NOT that story. It's a better one.

Then I got all up in my own shit. I berated myself for still having anger, for not having completely let go of issues long dead. I thought I was done. I thought I didn't give a hoot. I thought I was happy and otherwise occupied. And even worse I thought - I've ruined my novel! I've derailed its focus! I'm a bad writer!

The next day I looked again at that scene and deleted - a page. That's all I'd written that was wrong. I hadn't derailed diddly squat. All I had to do was delete a page of stuff that didn't work, rethink what I wanted from the scene, and take a stab at it.

Then I forgave myself for my anger. And I wrote a damn good scene.

Lesson here? Sometimes it helps to write out the crazy stuff that's in your head. Being a writer is a bit of a power trip. You are the demiurge, the omnipotent Creator, and in your world, people do whatever you tell them. But don't mistake your issues for whatever your characters are going through. Don't let your own life take over your novel. Your own life is not nearly interesting or structured enough to be a novel. You are the creator, but you are also the servant of the story. Serve it well, then you will serve the reader too.

The Last Word

I got chills when I read this blog post today.

It's the last blog post ever from a soldier named Andrew Olmsted, a blogger for the Rocky Mountain News, who died in Iraq. He wrote his "last entry" to be posted in the event of his demise. And die he did. In the war.

According to this NY Times article he died January 3 in Sadiyah from small arms fire from insurgents.

What a strange, sad, yet oddly uplifting thing it is to read someone's final words.

Holy Wombat

Spirituality is pretty simple, when you think about it. Folks complicate it by saying "my belief system is better than yours," but really, it all comes down to what the Holy Wombat says here.

Happy New Year!

Happy Holidays!

I'm humming as I walk around the house these days because I do love Christmas. Lights now hang on my wall, and if it didn't make me nutty I'd hang jingle bells on the cats and officially become a crazy cat lady.

And soon I shall be spending Christmas the way it was meant to be spent - at the beach.

Call me crazy. Call me spoiled. But Bing Crosby was wrong. White Christmases are overrated. Try surfing warm turquoise waters or lounging on soft white sand in the shade of a coconut tree while tropical breezes blow. That's Christmas to me.

Yes, I've lived in snowy climes. Six years in Chicago, thank you very much. When it started snowing I was the first to shout "snowball fight!" and drag my dormmates outdoors for a battle. I remember feeling so cooped up one winter that I dashed out of my apartment around 1am and found myself at a deserted playground, where I made a snow angel and swung high on the swings. I love the crunch of snow under waterproof boots, the deserted lamplit quads at night the University of Chicago softened and blurred by flurries of snowflakes. The Vienna Woods were a gorgeous study in black and white in December.

But would I rather be lounging in a bathing suit under a hot yellow sun (covered in sunscreen) gazing out at blue-green ocean deepening to purple at the horizon?

Duh.

You know I'll be posting the required photo of Bellows, the best beach on earth. I'm so danged lucky.

Love and Happy Holidays to all. May you find the best beach on earth in your heart this holiday season!

Tis the Season

...For a sweet short film called Tis the Season.

My good friend Sarah Baker produced it and was the assistant director. It's being shown on all Delta flights this holiday season. It's part of a contest, where the movie who gets the most votes wins, and the makers make a small stipend.

So go to this site, watch the movie, which is only six minutes long, and give this movie five stars so Sarah can win!

Facebook Madness

I just joined Facebook, and it effectively 'wasted' several hours of my time as I looked up everyone in my address book, reconnected with some old friends, and spied on a couple of guys to see if they were the same guys I dated oh so many years ago.

This thing is insidious!

Why join? Why waste time like this?

Well, there's this whole networking thing going on there, even among those over the age of 22. A lot of people at my workplace are on there, not to mention agents, producers, execs at other companies. Once you make one "friend" you can see their friends and possibly connect with them. Film and TV-land is small. My plan is to check in on fellow Warner Bros folks, reconnect with old friends, see if that cute guy from college remembers me, and eventually use it to network once my book is published.

Yes, it will be published, by gum. Gotta finish writing it first, though!

If you're on Facebook, look up Nina Berry and ask to be my friend. We can all use more friends!

November Word Count

Well, I didn't make my goal of 50,000 words in November. You may recall I entered NaNoWriMo with that stated goal.

However, I did write 28,435 words! Yee ha!

To put that in perspective, that's 98 pages, double spaced, in 12-point Times New Roman with page breaks between each of the eight chapters.

The reasons for not reaching 50k words are varied. The main one is that I'm not really motivated by competition or arbitrary goals. For example, I often work out by running around my neighborhood. I have no idea how far I run and have no interest in figuring that out. I just know that it feels right and helps keep me in shape. So when it comes to writing, I'm motivated because I love the project and love the process of writing it. So even though I failed to reach the 50k mark, I succeeded in instilling the writing habit in myself and wrote 98 damn pages of pretty good stuff.

I also couldn't resist doing some rewriting during that month. I know, I know. The idea was just to forge ahead, and be-damned to the quality. But as I wrote, I came up with good ideas for the earlier parts and felt the need to go back and stick them in before those good ideas vanished. I also got some great notes from my critique group and wanted to effect those before I lost the gist.

As a result I'm about 40% done with my novel. And I'm still high on it. I'll be writing more, every day. Early next year it'll be done, then watch out literary agents!

Titles

Finding a title for your book is tough. So many possibilities! I have time to come up with mine still because I'm maybe 40% into my first draft, but the issue continues to vex me.

Yes, I used the word "vex." I like it. Sue me.

One strategy I use is to find cool quotes that deal with themes or issues in the book. I'm considering using such quotes at the top of each chapter, or maybe just one quote at the beginning of the book. Regardless, sometimes the quote has a phrase in it that makes a nice title. Shakespeare and the Bible have been pillaged for book titles - Something Wicked This Way Comes springs to mind, but there are dozens more.

I recall a line from an Aeschylus play: "Still there drips in sleep against the mind/Grief of memory." I always liked "Grief of Memory" as a phrase but have yet to come up with an idea where it's an appropriate title. An obscure eighties song had some lyrics: "I met the devil at a party/we played power games./He out-sinistered me severely/I had to look away." Not great lyrics, but I love the pseudo word "out-sinistered." Not sure how that might be used in a title, but juicy words like Sinister and Nefarious often make good title fodder. But then I like turning odd nouns into verbs like that as well.

Thesauri are useful for titling. As is surfing Amazon.com and seeing what titles others in your genre (or other genres) have used. See what works for you and what doesn't. Come up with a huge list, then begin to whittle.

Say the titles out loud. This often weeds out the silly ones that might past muster if you only read them in your head. In fact, try reading all your fiction out loud to yourself. It's a great way to see what works and what doesn't.

Late Night TV Fix

Missing your late night television these days because of the writers' strike? Well, I have a stopgap measure that will help you get through these dark days without John Stewart and David Letterman.

The writers from Letterman's "Late Night" show have started a blog. It's funny as hell. A must read, regardless of your take on the strike. Occasional political jokes speckle the posts there, just to give you a small political humor fix.

Then, Comedy Central has finally done John Stewart's "The Daily Show" justice by making a very accessible archive of all their bits available. This is truly a treasure trove of political humor. Go back in time and see Steven Colbert before he got his own show and Steve Carrel before Forty Year Old Virgin and The Office. Search by any term - "Dick Cheney" or "Rob Corddry" or "elephant," and you'll get something hilarious. Check out this priceless piece as Steward and Corddry discuss the Dick Cheney shooting incident in 2006:

A World Without Writers

I'm sick of arguing about the writers strike. (For the record, I sympathize mostly with the writers, although I am not in the WGA and I work for a studio. A prolonged strike might lead to me getting laid off.) People have actually YELLED at me about this, and have gone on yelling for minutes at a time. The whole topic now gives me a headache. I will say that if you a provider of creative content of any kind, you might want to pay attention.

BUT - this video is pretty funny, and can be appreciated no matter what you think of the strike.

13,000 words and counting...

So I've written about 13,000 words since November 1.

Well, I've actually written more than that, but I couldn't resist the urge to rewrite. I got some good feedback from my critique group and wanted to follow their suggestions while they were still fresh in my head, so I went back and renovated the first couple of scenes in my book.

So I'm still way behind in my ambition to write 50,000 words this month. Don't know exactly where I should be, but today is November 12, not that far from the halfway mark. By the 15th, I should've written 25,000 words, and there's no way I'll make up the difference and write 12,000 more words in three days. Truth is, worry about the writers strike/my job/other life issues has taken a bit of a toll. Nonetheless, I have written something every single day this month. I really hope to establish this as a life long habit, and so far so good.

So I am not downcast. I'm 13,000 words into my novel! And lots of it is actually good! At this rate I will be more than halfway done with it by the end of the month. And if I have a blast of energy and creativity, I may actually get close to done. Hee hee! Writing is fun! I've actually come up with a very viable idea for another novel series even as I bash away at this series. Creativity breeds further creativity. I feel quite happy in spite of possible job loss looming before me.

Productivity plus creativity equals happiness. At least for me.

Download Me! I'm in a Podcast

My friend Pilar Alessandra has a popular podcast about screenwriting, and this week she asked me to join her and share my so-called expertise on TV writing and development with her listeners. I was one of two guests, the other a great TV writer, and we discussed the current WGA strike, how being a writer's assistant leads to being a writer, and other aspects of writing for television. All this while sipping beers and having a few laughs! It's fun, it's free, and it's about 30 minutes long. You can click on the link below and then click on Ep. 10 to hear it. Or search on ITunes for "On the Page: Screenwriting" and you'll be able to download Ep. 10 for free there as well.

Hey, I'm just glad I don't sound like too much of an idiot... And I'm grabbing my five seconds of "fame" while I can!

http://feeds.feedburner.com/OnThePage

Gah! Falling behind...

So I haven't been particularly good about writing these past few days. Last night I had a meeting with my critique group (great feedback, guys!), got home, gabbed on the phone for an hour, and then collapsed into bed. Work is surprisingly busy. Surprising because you'd think with the writer's strike there'd be tumbleweeds blowing through here.

Well, that's my excuse, anyway!

And now I really want to rewrite the first couple of scenes rather than forge ahead with new scenes! Ack! What to do!?

Why We Invaded Iraq

This week's comic strip from Berkeley Breathed explains so much...

Click on it to make it larger and easier to read.

NaNo count - 3639

Mixed success on the writing front for NaNoWriMo - only about 3600 words so far, and we're five days in. I'm behind at least 1700 words.

BUT - I had a nice Sunday at my last screenwriting class, recorded a podcast for a friend, and had delicious stew at a close friends house and saw some folks I hadn't seen in ages.

As soon as the podcast is available on ITunes, I'll post about it. My friend Pilar has a popular free podcast about screenwriting, and she asked me to sit in as one of her guests to discuss the WGA strike and writing for television. It's quite fun, and informative. At least I hope so! I'll have to listen to myself and make sure I don't sound like a fool...

Day One Word Count

Success! As of 7:10pm tonight, I'd written 1829 words of my novel, more than the daily average of 1667 I was shooting for.

Now I can watch 30 Rock and The Office guilt free!

National Novel Writing Month - Day 1

NaNoWriMo begins today. The goal is to write 50,000 words of your novel in the month of November, which means a daily average of 1,667. As Homer Simpson would say - "A-bah!"

So I got up an hour early today to write.

Yes, really.

Those who know me, know that this is a big deal. I am not a morning person. Most days I sleep until 8am to be at work by 9:30am. (Ah, Hollywood!) But today my alarm went off at 7am, frightening the cats. I listened to the news on KCRW, trying to justify pressing the snooze button. But no dice. I got up, got ready for work, then sat down to write just a few minutes after 8am. I don't drink coffee. That may change if this keeps up...

I wrote 644 words in that hour. Not bad. But - I need two more hours like that today and I'll more than have the daily wordcount covered. That sounds easy, but it isn't, especially since I'm tired from getting up an hour early.

Then I have to do it all over again tomorrow. And then the day after that. And the day after that...

This whole writing thing is hard work. Dang!

The only good thing for me that might come out of a writers strike here in Hollywood is that work will slow down considerably and I may be able to write while at work. Heck, if I get laid off, I could end up writing 100,000 words!

Oy. Let's hope THAT doesn't happen.

I'll post an honest daily word count tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Writing the Parachute

On a lovely little blog called Sage Said So by poet Sage Cohen, I found a quote that describes a writer's process in a way I find profound and terribly relevant.

From poet William Stafford:

"I have woven a parachute out of everything broken."

And a heavy dose of profundity from Kahlil Gibran's The Prophet:


And a woman spoke, saying, Tell us of Pain.

And he said:

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.

Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.

And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy;

And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields.

And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief.

What will writers do come the strike?

From YouTube comes "Heroes of the Writers Strike," which imagines what highly paid Hollywood screenwriters might do if/when the strike happens...



Truth is, the possible WGA strike will affect thousands, if not millions of people, if it goes forward sometime after Halloween. Each TV show employs about 350 people. Not to mention the restaurants, gardeners, and other businesses that get income from those who will not be employed if a strike occurs. I'm hoping the writers and producers can come to an agreement both sides can live with... soon!

Dwarf City

You never know where ideas can come from.

I trotted over to one of my favorite internet sites today - the latest news on archaeological finds from Archaeology Magazine. They had this tantilizing tidbit:

A Roman villa in Austria was rediscovered and excavated after archaeologists found references to it in an eighteenth-century manuscript. Back then, the villa’s low-ceilinged heating vaults had led to legends about a “dwarf city.”

First, there's a Roman villa in Austria. Dang, those Romans got around!

Second, doesn't your mind reel at the idea of a "dwarf city" in Roman Austria?

You can find the facts here. This villa was originally equipped with wall and floor heating. (Which reminds me of a fact I read about how Hadrien "air conditioned" his villa near Rome by having his guests sit in an pavilion with a ceiling and no walls. This pavilion was equipped with a water tank and system so that sheets of water could continually run from the eaves, cooling the air inside the pavilion. Amazing! And probably more environmentally friendly than our current system of air conditioning.)

As a writer, I'm always alert to what triggers my imagination. (Well, I try to always be alert. Those who are most alert get the most ideas. Those, like me, who are semi-alert, aren't huge idea-factories.) And a Roman dwarf city -- maybe it's the gamer/history geek/fantasy lover in me, but that's pretty fricking cool.

Then things get silly and I imagine the Roman dwarves skiing down the Alps in Austria, or joining Julie Andrews at a convent near Salzburg. You see how this imagination thing works?

Why the photo of a badger? Well, the Archaeology news also says:

A medieval cemetery in Pembrokeshire, England, has been cleared of badgers, but
infested with archaeologists.

Seems like they saved the old bones AND the badgers. Good deal!

Don't Inhale

Finally, the fires are coming under control here in Southern California.

I am luckily far from any of the hot zones, but nonetheless, the smoke and other particulates in the air is starting to get to me. My eyes are irritated, my allergies are far worse than they've ever been, and I feel vaguely naseous. I think about how I'm inhaling the ashy remains of some poor kid's stuffed animal collection, or some dude's porn, or some grandma's recipes.

Weird how it all comes back to how everything is connected in way or another. The very act of breathing connects me to the people who lost their possessions in the fire. Donations to help them can be given to the Red Cross.

A Hot Gray Blanket...

...of smoke covers the San Fernando Valley. Normally bright blue skies are smudged. Hot wind blasts through the canyons. Wet skin dries in seconds.

My apartment and work are not currently near any of the many fires now blazing through Southern California, but I'm breathing in the bits of chaparral, houses, dead animals, and photo albums that people had to leave behind when they evacuated. It's a sad time. Sure, bad planning and overzealous development has lead us to build our homes in areas where fire is almost a certainty. But on the radio I heard an interview with a single dad who had to leave behind his wallet, cat, dog, and three goldfish in order to get his daughters out alive. He's now penniless and homeless. No one deserves such a fate. My heart goes out to him and all the other fire refugees.

Reward for Writing

Okay, so I haven't even been there yet, and I haven't done anything much to merit a reward, but I've found a great looking Portuguese bakery here in LA called Nata's Pastries at 13317 Ventura Boulevard in Sherman Oaks (between Woodman and Coldwater Canyon).

The plan is to reward myself for writing every 10,000 words or so with some fabulous treat. Because I grew up in Hawaii, which has a decent sized Portuguese population, I have a huge fondness for certain Portuguese pastries, particularly malasadas, a simple but delicious deep fried donut rolled in sugar. A well-traveled friend of mine has recommended the "custard tartlets" for tea. I have since found out that these tarts are called natas (photo above), and are the emblematic pastry of Portugal. I heard about this place thanks to a show here on local NPR station KCRW called Good Food.

Can't believe I didn't eat any natas when I went to Portugal! (I did eat malasadas there, thanks to my intrepid travel companion, Wendy, who found some delicious samples at a small town fair we attended in the rain...) Now's my chance. Take a look at the goodies this place has... Yum-hey!

Hmm. I did write four pages of my TV spec last night. Maybe I deserve something for that...?

Harry Potter vs. Star Wars

My friend the Tayster sent me this image - check it out and you'll see how all stories are, well, kinda the same.

Sssh! This is a secret most writers know and readers do not. Look away from the similarities! Succumb to our wiles in retelling the same story over and over!

Outlining and Mind-mapping

In perusing the NaNoWriMo forums, I came across a term about outlining a book I hadn't heard before - the Snowflake method. One Google search later, I found the method here.

As luck would have it, it closely approximates what I've done so far with my novel. I've got a fifteen page outline, which I got using a combo of character sheets from First Draft in 30 Days by Karen Weisner, a six-act screenplay structure I got through my online class at Write Tight Now, while incorporating elements of Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey. I'm supposed to move on and do an extensive outline now, that approximates a first draft. But I may just start that first draft for NaNo. Anyway, the Snowflake method looks cool, so check it out if you're inclined to outline but don't know how.

Also found free mindmapping software called Freemind that looks like fun to use. I downloaded it and without any instruction just started making a mindmap for a different book idea I've had for awhile. I'm not sure if this will be useful for outlining so much as a way to generate ideas and get the creative juices flowing. It's probably also useful for less creative types who need to brainstorm for their business or research or something. No idea what mind mapping is? Check out Wikipedia's definition here.

Feminism and Romance Go Hand in Hand

A brief break from blogging about writing to announce something we feminists always knew -- according to Science Daily --

Contrary to popular opinion, feminism and romance are not incompatible and feminism may actually improve the quality of heterosexual relationships, according to Laurie Rudman and Julie Phelan, from Rutgers University in the US. Their study* also shows that unflattering feminist stereotypes, that tend to stigmatize feminists as unattractive and sexually unappealing, are unsupported.

This seems like a no-brainer to me. But at last science can back up the claim that feminism pretty much benefits everyone in their personal relationships. Funny how mutual respect between the sexes does that!

NaNoWriMo - I'm in!

After perusing many online forums and asking other writers how they manage to write 50,000 words in a month when they have real jobs, I've decided to sign up for NaNoWriMo, the November write-a-thon where novelists and would-bes like me try to scratch out 50k words in order to "win."

Thanks, A, for the support! Your idea of giving myself some sort of food reward every 10,000 words is great. I think I've found a Portuguese bakery here in LA that makes malasadas. Mmm. Now that's something worth writing for.

There's no prize, except the personal glory of meeting a creative goal. The NaNoWriMo website is full of forums, parties to launch you off, potential writing groups, ways to procrastinate, and so on. It's great! If you've ever wanted to write a novel, sign up!

If you haven't ever wanted to write a novel, thank your lucky stars and go on your merry way. Your life will be all the easier for it.

To NaNoWriMo or not to NaNoWriMo - that is the question.

Every November, a movement called NaNoWriMo grips the world of would-be novelists. This a kamikaze attempt to write 50,000 words of a brand new novel in 30 days, starting November 1 at midnight, and ending at 11:59pm on November 30. Looking for motivation and inspiration to write? Check out the website here.

The idea is to kill the evil editor in your brain who tells you that your writing is crap and just get 50,000 words on the page (that's less than 1700 words a day, every day of the month), regardless of quality. That's a short, 175 page novel. There are forums on the site, where you can share tales of your carpal tunnel. At the end of the month you send them your 50,000 words, where their computers count the words, then declare you a winner and send you a certificate. No one actually reads your novel, but you can post excerpts for your fellow writers if you like. It's a great motivational tool. Published novels have come out of the event.

Should I do it? I do have a job, for crying out loud. But I do have the outline of a novel that's screaming to be written. 50k words is about the right lenghth for a YA novel like mine...

Home again home again

...jiggity jig.

I'm back from my trip to England, a bit spacey from a cold and jet lag, but happy to be home after a great trip. I'll be posting photos somewhere on the web soon, once I get my shit together.

A brief precis of events: Wendy's flight cancelled, I spend a day alone in London and visit the Tate Modern. Rain. Dali and Di Chirico make me feel like I've landed on an alien planet.



Sleep in our five-star hotel and eat the free chocolates. Wendy arrives next day, I venture to British Museum and spend far too much money on a bronze Egyptian cat.

We eat well, though London is expensive and the dollar pathetically low versus, well, every currency, let alone the mighty pound. British papers trumpet that "Brit" Spears loses custory of her kids. Off to the Tower the next day for bloody tales of beheadings, the rack, garish gold plate dishes, suits of armor, pikes, swords, and the block.



Malteasers (British malted milk balls) a plenty.

The chocolate in England is just... better.

Off to York via (a very expensive) train. Rolling fields, smokestacks. Four days there to explore Roman ruins, huge cathedral (called the Minster), walk the city walls, drink lots of tea and eat scones. Sunny and "warm," around 60 F.

Scones with strawberry jam and clotted cream. Yum!

Back to London, where I start to catch my cold but nonetheless see two musicals with Wendy - Avenue Q and Spamalot. Peter Davison, the 6th Doctor Who, stars as King Arthur. Tons of fun!

Yorkshire

I'm off to England on Thursday. These are photos of some of the areas I'm visiting, just to whet your (well, mostly my) appetite. The first one is from the North York Moors. The next threee are of the Yorkshire Dales. No, these aren't my photos. I found them in an online gallery. Check it out here.

Outlines, outlines

I'm a firm believer in outlining your story. There are a few successful writers out there who don't outline - Stephen King for example. Aaron Sorkin in TV (although Studio 60 could've benefited from some outlining, in my humble opinion.) And many writers resist outlining with all their might. "It messes with my creative process." "I get inspired as I write!" And on and on. Either these folks have a natural feeling for structure and what works in a story. Or their stuff meanders, wanders, offers up dry patches, and gets repetitive. They don't realize that outlining stirs your creativity - it helps you find out exactly what you want to say and how you want to say it. It's the opposite of confining - it points the way, but also offers endless possibilities.

I don't think JK Rowling outlines. She's brilliant in her own way, don't get me wrong. But Book VII of Harry Potter got seriously dull there in the middle when the kids were camping the woods for months on end. A good outline will prevent that sort of thing by identifying it early in the process, giving you the chance to fix it before you spend all that time writing it. Once you spend days/weeks/months writing several chapters, it's a lot harder to just chuck them or even to give them a big overhaul. So outline!

I just finished a preliminary 15-page outline for the first novel in my proposed teen series, and a two-page 8-sequence outline for my TV spec. Victory!

The 8-sequence idea comes from Pilar's screenwriting class at On The Page, and I don't want to steal her stuff, so I won't detail it here. I ended up using it on my novel too. I'd already done the 15 page outline, but I went back and did a smaller, 8-sequence "beat sheet" (as they call it in the film/TV biz) in two pages, just to make sure that the structure of the outline worked. After all, you can do outlines until you're blue, but what good are they if you don't assess them and revise them in order to see what works? The good news - my outline works. I think. But the smaller 8-sequence beat sheet made me realize that I had a major turning point for my character lurking in there that I hadn't really zeroed in on. I've seen this in other people's writing too. A big, life-changing event occurs to the protagonist, and the writer just slides right past it, barely taking note. Beat sheets, outlines, structure - they all help you identify these moments.

The basic idea is that your character has a goal. (I need to buy milk to put on my cereal.) The character does something about that goal. (I walk to the store.) Complications ensue. (At the store, I drop the carton of milk, and the cute grocery clerk helps me clean it up, and it's love at first sight.)

From those complications, a new goal emerges (I want this guy to ask me out), the character takes action, (I return to the store the next day with my best friend to scope him out and flirt) , and another complication ensues (we meet him, we flirt, but he asks my best friend out instead of me). And so on. Now add on top of that, a structure - like the Hero's Journey, or Syd Field's 3-Act template, or Pilar's Eight-Beat template, and you've got a story.

The Hero's Journey is famous, but the basic idea is that a certain structure underlies the myths that last through the ages. This structure is useful in shaping a modern day story that will really work well for a modern day audience - and for future audiences. That structure is basically:

1. A call to adventure, which the hero has to accept or decline.
2. A road of trials, in which the hero succeeds or fails.
3. Achieving the goal or "boon," which often results in important self-knowledge.
4. A return to the ordinary world, again as to which the hero can succeed or fail.
5. Application of the boon, in which what the hero has gained can be used to improve the world.

As Campbell said in his book, Hero with a Thousand Faces:

"A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man."

Your story doesn't have to involve supernatural forces for this structure to work. Almost every successful story you can think of, whether it's The Wizard of Oz, Chinatown, or The Great Gatsby, fits.

So now I'm off to write my huge, formatted outline for my novel. It'll be anywhere from 50 - 100 pages and really be a sort of first draft. And I'm also off to work out the scenes of my TV spec and get a more detailed outline for that. When I sit down to write these pieces, I'll know what I'm doing. New ideas will occur to me, and revision to the outline will occur. But I've got a map. Now I can figure out which path between point A and point Z I want to take. I usually favor the scenic route.

I'm off to England next Thursday. Yep. England. Two days in London, then a farm in Nottinhamshire, then York. I'm a lucky so-and-so, aren't I? But I'll be writing during the down times, taking that big fat notebook so I can keep moving forward. And perhaps do research for the next book!

Getting notes...

If you've ever wondered what it's like to get notes from an agent, or a development or network exec. Click here.

Write that TV Spec!

So I've chosen to write a spec TV pilot for my screenwriting class at On the Page. I was leaning toward making it a feature, but Pilar said that she thought the idea was fresher as a pilot, since she'd never seen anything like it on TV, but had seen features like it.

Here's the thing about writing a spec TV pilot - it's really really hard. You have to introduce an entire cast of characters that people will want to see for an hour every week, show the "franchise" - which is what viewers will see every week, tell an outstanding story, all in 50 pages. Crazy. You need five act breaks that will keep viewers interested through a commercial break. You need a strong protagonist with a complex background you only hint at. You need to keep it affordable. It needs to familiar enough that it doesn't alienate readers, but it needs to something new and fresh.

It's ridiculous! But that's part of the fun.

On the Page Rave

My friend Pilar has been teaching screenwriting and getting paid to be a screenplay consultant for nearly a decade. I've been tempted in the past to take one of her classes, and recently Pilar made me an offer I couldn't refuse - help her out as an assistant (which mostly involves folding up tables after class) and I can take the class for free. Her company is called On The Page. And Pilar rocks. Fair disclosure - I helped write her publicity materials when she was first starting up. Doesn't mean I don't speak truth! I do, I do. I know that now for sure because I had my first class with Pilar this past Saturday.

This is the From Premise to Pages class, which pretty much guides you through exactly that. The first class was three hours, and it was jam-packed with brainstorming techniques, logline pointers, structural ideas, and so on. It is a workshop, so we all got to throw out our loglines and get feedback. We volunteered to hear comments on our ideas and so on. Very helpful. Whether you're starting out with a theme, a character, or an event, Pilar's class can help you flesh out your screenplay from there.

I'm really looking forward to the next class. Pilar is not only smart, you can tell she's having fun when she teaches. She used to do stand up and act, so she's comfortable speaking in front of groups, is very funny, and can handle anything you throw at her. I feel very motivated and supported. This is what a class should do.

Now I have to decide which idea to move forward with. I've got an idea that could be either a feature or the (expensive) pilot for a TV series. And then there's my book series idea. Pilar's techniques could be quite useful for that too! Oy. Must decide before next Saturday. Any way I go, should be fun.

What is a Book Series?

I've gotten some questions on just what a book series is, exactly. At the workshop I attended, the official definition (by editors of varous YA book series) was:

A series is 2 or more books linked by characters or themes.

Very dry, I know. Examples would include Nancy Drew, Encyclopedia Brown, The A-List, Gossip Girl. Those are all teen books. In adult land, series books are often genre - mysteries, sci fi, or fantasy. Robert Parker's Spenser books, the Kinsey Milhone A is for Alibi books, Agathe Christie's Hercule Poirot books - these are all mystery series. Lord of the Rings, however, is not a series - it's a trilogy with an end point. Few "literary" novels become series.

Series books are beloved in children's lit because kids get addicted to them, which gets kids reading. Librarians and teachers are big proponents of series because kids who don't read stand alone books will gobble up series books.

From a fellow writer's notes at the workshop we both attended:

In coming up with a series, you need to:
Do research and see what's out there
Pick your age group
Pick your genre
Pick your main character and friends
Find your hook, come up with something different.

The hook is all important in book series. Given my Hollywood training, hooks and high concept are old hat to me.

Hook = the high concept or gimmick that frames the theme of the story.

Examples:
1. Three friends who have to spend the summer apart.
Hook: connected by their dreams at night.
2. A child's parents divorce and she moves across country with her mom.
Hook: She turns into different people to cope
3. A child needs to improve his grades or get kicked off his sports team.
Hook: Brings baseball cards back to life to tutor him.

So you take something familiar and make it unique with an unusual twist. It's a coming of age story - on Pluto! You get the idea.

The familiar part of it means 1) your reader will identify with it - mystery readers who like male detectives will like Spenser novels; 2) your editor will recognize the genre; 3) the publisher will know how to market your work.

Yes, you must keep the market in mind when coming up with a book series. These things are money making machines. Study what has sold in the past, then put your own unique twist on it.

The twist makes your work stand out. Folks who read and liked Nancy Drew might try The Hardy Boys, which is basically the familiar Nancy Drew idea with the twist that the detectives are now brothers.

In our next post - how to write a series proposal.

Hot Writing

Ever tried to write when the temperature is in the triple digits? Ever tried structuring your story while you sweat and your cats come out from the bedroom and eye you blearily, meowing in anger because it's so damned hot?

Have I mentioned that it's hot? Well, it's hot. It's over 100 and the humidity is high, and my a/c is struggling mightily to keep my living room a reasonable temperature, with mixed results.

My lovely little MacBook gets so dang warm as I type on it. Surely it would be better for it if I let it rest during this ridiculous heat wave? I can't ask my brain to function in this sort of weather, can I? Heck, I have to go look in on a friend's cats later today in the Valley (the VALLEY, people, where it's even hotter...) so I need to move as little as possible and remain cool in the hours leading up to that event, right? Wouldn't want my brain to explode from the heat. Last night it was still 80 degrees at 10pm. I mean, come on here, folks, this sort of extreme is just stupid!

Oh heck. I'm procrastinating, and procrastination makes no sense. Still, I don't know how tropical authors manage. Perhaps they rely on trade winds, when all we have here in Hollywood is everlasting sun sun sun and a blast furnace of warm air zooming up out of Mexico. I'm praying hard right now the God of the Canadian Low that weathermen tell us is ambling in from the northern Pacific as we speak. Blow, Low, blow! Bring us back down to something reasonable and I promise never to mock Canada again. For at least a day or two.

Plotting

Here's the deal with plotting a book series - there's a TON of it.

1. I have to plot out the overall arc of the series. That is, what big 'ol story will my main character go through over six or seven books?

2. I have to plot the first book, which has many suspense elements and is thus, to use a technical term - "plotty".

3. For the series proposal I have to give synopses of at least two more books, possibly more. So, even though I don't have to plot them out completely, I need a strong idea of their plots.

S'all making me plotz.

Book Series

One spot to make real money in kids books is in book series. You've probably heard of the Goosebumps books, although you probably haven't read them. These days big sales come from Young Adult series focused on upper crust girls and their sex lives -- series like The A-List and Gossip Girl. Also big - vampires and werewolves with a twist in books like Twilight, and faeries in books by Holly Black. Chapter book series kick ass too - the Katie Kazoo series has nearly 5 million books in print.

I'd like write something good, don't get me wrong. But I'd also like to make money writing.

So I'm thinking about a book series. I think I have a kick ass idea (not to be shared on the interent, thanks anyway!) and am forging ahead.

The other good thing about books series? You don't have to write the whole first book to get it bought - just a fabulous proposal and the first three chapter. I'm gonna churn that out in a couple of months, if my insane schedule permits. Wish me luck!

Kaena Point

Have I mentioned lately that my home state of Hawaii is beautiful? On my last trip there I went to a beach I've never visited before - Kaena Point, at the far Western tip of Oahu.

Makaha used to be the last beach park to hang out at that end of the island. But they've added a lifeguard stand, parking lot, and bathrooms to the crystal clear waters and white, sinking sand at Kaena. A soft wind blew as white clouds scudded by, and the turquoise water deepened to purple where the reef began.

On a Saturday afternoon in July Mom and I were two out of maybe ten people there. Ssh! Don't tell. Just visit and keep the sacred beauty of it as pristine as you can.

Found a great quote on writing from George Orwell. The last couple of sentences strike me as, well, amazing.

All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness.

One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand. For all one knows that demon is simply the same instinct that makes a baby squall for attention. And yet it is also true that one can write nothing readable unless one constantly struggles to efface one's own personality. Good prose is like a windowpane.

SCBWI Conference Mania

So I just spent four days at the big ol' Los Angeles conference for the Society for Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. Four fat days of lectures, workshops, parties, networking, lunching, schmoozing, clapping, laughing, fighting off drowsiness, excitement, nervousness, and hard work. On the fourth night I went out for pie with my best friend and was totally hyper. I giggled and made faces and in general just acted very silly. After all the focus demanded by the conference, I guess I let my inner doof loose.

Highlights for me included:

The Keynote by Walter Dean Meyers, in which he talked about how it's a passion for detail that lead him to become a writer. He really made me think about why I write and what makes writing good versus bad. And he's right - finding the RIGHT details to include about your character and what she's doing and how she does it - that's key.

Emma Dryden's passionate Keynote about the adventure of writing.

Agents Kate Schafer and Tracey Adams talking about their different styles of agenting. Later I attended Kate's "Advice from an Agent" workshop and was blown away when she mentioned an obscure book as one of her favorites - Tomorrow, When the War Began by John Marsden. "Any John Marsden fans out there?" she asked. "Yes!" I said, though I don't think she heard me.

These are fabulous teen novels about a group of young people in Australia who go camping without their parents. While they are off in the bush, the rest of their country gets taken over by a foreign power, and they must first struggle to survive before they begin an underground resistance movement.

I loved this series so much that I pitched it to a producer I was working with at the time. She loved them too and went into a bidding war with another producer for the TV rights. Alas, she lost. But I immediately loved Kate for loving that book. Amazing - the power of a great novel.

Tamora Pierce, who wrote some of my favorite fantasy novels, talked about all the many sources she uses for inspiration. Her quote from another writer: "The immature artist imitates. The mature artist steals."

And my favorite - the Writing the Series Workshop with Bonnie Bader and Judy Goldschmidt from Grosset and Dunlap and Price Sterns Sloan. This was two mornings spent learning how to put together a proposal for a book series. After the first day we had homework, and I worked late into Sunday night, determined to make my proposal kick ass. I figured that it ain't often you get to pitch directly to an editor and get feedback. So what the hell. In the second session, as it came near my turn to read my series concept, I could feel my heart start to beat very loudly and very fast. I'd written it in the voice of the protagonist. Would that work? I thought it was pretty damn good. Was I wrong?

Turns out, I was right. Bonnie and Judy said that my proposal was a good example for the others to follow. They liked it! They really did! I just need to really hone the voice. I was shaking by the time I was done. I couldn't really hold my pen to take notes on what they said, so thank goodness most of what they said was positive. After they moved on to other people, I finally calmed down. Whew! So now here I go - I'm gonna rewrite this proposal, come up with three slick, fabulous chapters to submit, and go from there. Very exciting.

I also really enjoyed the Golden Kite Awards luncheon, which included a singing contest and great speeches from Sarah Pennypacker, Larry Day, Walter Dean Meyers again, and Tony Abbott. I'm forgetting someone else very cool, but they all rocked, and our table bonded over the shared fear of singing, and over the ridiculous and fabulous singers from other tables.

Overall grade for the conference: A.

But I'm exhausted and exhilarated. You've got to work, baby, work! And even in college I didn't sit listening to speakers for eight hours at a stretch. Work is less intense, and my job is pretty damned demanding.

I'll be there next year. Wish I could afford the upcoming NYC conference!