Scenes and Sensibility

by Janis Patterson

I had a revelation while working on an upcoming project. I needed a snippet out of each of my books that could be narrated in five minutes.

Five minutes is not a long time.

The first excerpt I tried ran almost fifteen minutes. The second twenty. The third... well, suffice it to say it was not five minutes. None of the passages I had marked were. Oh, I tried to cut back, but what was left - though five to five and a half minutes - was nothing. A collection of words without direction or emotion.

Now for years I have been complimented on my writing, on my creation of emotion and sense of place. Apparently I just don't do it in five minute slots.

Which started me thinking. We have become a sound-bite society, where a maximum of opinion is expected to be expressed in a minimum of words or be cut off. Where entire opinions are encapsulated into thirty seconds. Apparently the long, slow, intensifying build-up that gradually takes you to a satisfying conclusion (even if just for a single scene) is out of fashion.

It's rather like comparing the short, often-repeating core melody of a pop song to the growing, sweeping intensity of a symphony movement. Or a lengthy master shot in a movie compared to short bursts of action like the cuts in a music video. Both styles have their advantages, both are good, and both have their supporters and their detractors.

I'll admit I'm firmly set in the sweeping grandeur of the symphony camp. Short flashes are very well, but you barely have time to know what's going on where let alone get the flavor, the emotion, the sense of place I feel is necessary for a good story. Obviously some people disagree with me, including the project coordinator who is firm in her dictum of five minutes, which means I have to dig deeper in order to find an excerpt that satisfies me at a length which satisfies everyone else.

Sigh.

Short Stories and Music

I'm sure all readers of this blog know by now that our own Earl Staggs won the 2012 Derringer Award for Best Novelette given by the Short Mystery Fiction Society. Earl's story is Where Billy Died. I hope he will check in here to the comments section and tell everyone how to purchase the story, or else give us that information in his blog post.

Hearty Congratulations, Earl. 

I am happy to say I read it, enjoyed and voted for it.

Here is the complete list of winners:

• Best Flash Story: "Lessons Learned" by Allan Leverone
• Best Short Story: "Touch of Death" by B.V. Lawson
• Best Long Story: Tie "A Drowning at Snow's Cut" by Art Taylor and "Brea's Tale" by Karen Pullen
• Best Novelette: "Where Billy Died" by Earl Staggs

The Derringers have been recognizing the best in short mysteries since 1998. I try to read every finalist each year because some of the best cutting edge crime stories can be found there. They have also been a source of inspiration for me. Just knowing there is an award for short mystery stories drives me to make my stories the best I can.

Speaking of inspiration, I just finished Breathing Water, a Poke Rafferty novel by Tim Hallinan. At the back of the novel he lists the music he listened to while writing it. I'd never given thought about how much the music I listen to influences my writing. When I'm at my computer, I either have NPR on the radio or a selection of music on my iTunes. If I'm doing chores such as paying bills or taxes, then NPR gives a welcome relief, but if I'm writing, NPR is a distraction and I turn to the music.

So what's on my playlist? It depends on whether I'm writing or revising. If I'm writing, I like to work with an eclectic mix of blues, rock, and classical. This morning I listened to Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jeff Beck, Joanna Connor, Santana, The Allman Brothers, The Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin, The Traveling Wilburys, Jimmy Reed, Lisa Lim, John Fogarty, and the Beatles. 

For reasons I can't explain, complicated guitar pieces get my writing mojo going. I don't pay much attention to the lyrics, except for Grateful Dead songs, which I stop and listen to, just for the turn of phrase. Whenever I hear "Operator" by The Dead, I find myself in the mind of a character who is "Riding a getaway bus out of Portland, talkin' to the night."  I think someday I will write a whole story about that.

If not blues and rock, then I'm listening to classical. I find any symphony by Beethoven a great aid to writing, except for the ninth. I can't do anything else but listen while the ninth is playing. Other classical pieces that help my writing are Korsakov's Scheherazade, Prokofiev's Lt. Kije Suite, and Stravinsky's Fire Bird. I don't know why those pieces resonate with me. They just do.

You might ask, why not Hawaiian music? I listen to Hawaiian music, also Irish music, and Jimmy Buffett, but not when I'm writing. I put that music on when I'm doing the things that aren't fun, such as checking grammar and spelling. Or else they come on when the writing's done and I have a gin and tonic in hand.

Do you listen to music while you write? What gets your mojo working?

Maybe Earl will let us in on what gets his mojo working. Whatever it is, I might try it.

Mark Troy

Hawaiian Eye Blog

Check out Game Face, my collection of short stories on iPad, Nook, Kindle and other devices.

Studying the Mystery versus Having Fun with the Mystery

I am unique to the staff of contributing writers on this blog in that I have never published a mystery novel. I just love the genre, and am pretty darn well read in it. My main genre of choice is spiritual/inspirational with a bent towards humor and mischief. Kind of a cross-over guy. I plan on releasing a novel this year titled, Detective Snoop – a comedic whodunit detective story with some underlying spiritual messages. And it has several elements in it that are essential in a good mystery book. I also plan on writing a true mystery one day. But that requires more learning on my part.

Like any good student of the art he or she is pursuing, I do my studying. Even with a “cross-over” pseudo-mystery like Detective Snoop, I have to be able to include some mystery book elements. Like “clues,” the all important “crucial clue,” and maybe toss in a couple “red herrings” for good measure.

The crucial clue. The one clue that the protagonist finally “gets it” and solves the case. It could be something that points straight at the perpetrator. Like let’s say one character, call him Billy Joe, claims he got a bizarre visitor at his door at seven o'clock in the evening on a certain day. Later on, the detective (or cop, or protagonist, whatever – main character) gets full information about where all the suspects were at that time. He thinks back to what Billy Joe said about the strange visitor at that time, and now he knows that couldn't have taken place. Gotcha.

And the red herring. A bit of information an author throws out there to mislead the reader into thinking someone who is actually innocent is probably the guilty one. These are fun elements in a good mystery and make the case harder to solve. They can also add punch to the beloved “twist” in a well written mystery.

See? I’m learning about this writing a good mystery book stuff.

Funny, the more you study and work at an art, the less you can be just a casual lover of the craft. I am an accomplished musician. Have been ever since high school. I cannot listen to music like most people. I am constantly analyzing it. Wonder why the artist chose that instrumentation? Interesting bass line. Ooops, the vocalist had a bit of slippage between registers on that passage. I don’t think I would have put the bridge in for a third time in that arrangement. Things like that.

When I undertook becoming a writer, a serious writer, pursuing a career with it, I lost the ability to simply relax and enjoy a good book. Now I am constantly analyzing the writing. Why did she switch from “telling” the story to “showing” it for this scene? Interesting shift in tense – not sure if I like it all that much. Oh no, way too many adjectives for my tastes. Wow – great one-liner – wish I’d thought of that! See what I mean?

And now that I’m endeavoring to learn how to write a good mystery, I’m losing the ability to enjoy reading one without taking it apart and dissecting it for analysis! Help!

It’s all about balance. I need a new hobby. Music and literature are both classroom activities for me anymore. I’ll have to take up synchronized swimming or something for my “fun only” times.

Has anybody else experienced what I'm going through? Oh and I need a partner for my synchronized swimming class. Any comers?