C h a z z W r i t e s . c o m

See all my books at AllThatChazz.com.

06/11/2010 • 6:50 PM 1

Where does the Darkness Come From?

Short Answer:

The darkness comes from everywhere.

Longer Answer:

Tales of horror arrive in the newspaper every day. This week a toddler was stuck in a high chair for six days while her dead mother lay on the floor in front of her. The child managed to survive because she could reach food from where she sat. The mother had suffered a chronic illness. When a child services worker rang the bell, no one answered but she could hear the child crying, she called police. They broke down the door to find a body beginning to decay and a terrified child.

When asked by an interviewer, “Where does the darkness come from?” these were my answers. Of course, we all have terrible childhoods and can draw on the thousand arrows flesh is heir to, but when done right, fiction can be the valve that lets off pressure. Fiction can make sense in a world that is plotless (though all stories that end with “happily ever after” are conveniently ended before the going gets nasty.)

I said to my wife (it’s funny but I’m dead serious, too): This is our happily ever after now. But make no mistake, this will all end horribly…unless a carbon monoxide leak kills us all in our sleep, of course.

Fiction is the lie that tells the truth. Humour can do that, too. There’s an element in the question that’s subtle and insulting, also. I wrote a short story that would convince you I’ve drowned at least one person in a bathtub. When people reacted to me with alarm, I smiled and pointed out, “It is fiction.” Perhaps they’re disturbed that I give these matters so much thought.

~Mr. Sunshine strikes again

Filed under: Rant, short stories, writing tips, horror, where the ideas come from, writing

06/11/2010 • 6:33 PM 0

The Circle of Crap is Complete

We were waxing nostalgic about how precious and beautiful my baby girl was at less than a year old. I had her in a stroller and was going through Chapters when a woman ahead of me said brightly, “Ohmygawd! You blinked! You’re real! For a minute there I thought your baby was a doll!”

“Wasn’t that sweet?” I said to my daughter.

“She thought I wasn’t real?” my daughter, who is now 10, said. “She must have been an idiot.”

Ah, my teachings have percolated through her cortex.

Delicious.

Filed under: Unintentionally hilarious, unintentionally hilarious

06/11/2010 • 2:23 PM 0

The Basics of a Good Writing Critique

My clients appreciate my input into their projects because:

1. I’m encouraging and I accentuate the positive.

2. I’m not coming up with criticism because I’m convinced they must be there to be found since you asked. All criticism is the constructive kind and I help people find solutions to their story problems.

3. I strive to be gentle and insightful.

4. I don’t mock effort or ambition (I’m looking at some of you FBAs*).

5. My clients know I’m trying to help them make their project better. I’m on their side and it’s their choice to adopt my editorial suggestions.

I’m for the underdog.

*FBAs= Famous Blogging Agents

Filed under: manuscript evaluation, editorial help, manuscript evaluation, writing critique basics

06/11/2010 • 12:33 PM 1

Slap (on) a happy face

I just read some advice for short story writers (from The Writer’s Handbook) where a rather harsh critic slams stories where the protagonist is an unlikeable character and bad things happen to him or her.

Uh-oh. In my stories, that’s my thing. I think just about anyone will disappoint you if you get to know them well enough. That’s my worldview. To be successful by this critic’s estimation, I’m going to need a brain transplant. But I gotta be me.

When a short story of mine won an award, lots of people focussed on the torture. However, the reason it won was that in the last sentence there was a twist of transcendence. It wasn’t about torture. It was about the second chance. Read it here.

I got a reply from another judge (different contest, same story) who was very dismissive. He seemed not to have read it very carefully, perhaps deciding early on it wasn’t something he would care for so he wrote it off quickly. For instance he said, “This doesn’t make sense. Why would a collection agency pursue dead files?” Because I made it clear the bill collector is a bad guy. If I spelled it out more, they’d call me pedantic. Sometimes you can’t win.

I’ll have to ignore that particular advice from The Writer’s Handbook I guess. I’ll keep on writing about flawed people and I’ll keep doing bad things to them. (Flawed characters make some of the best characters. Examples? Plenty, but off the top of my head, Breaking Bad, Dexter and Battlestar Galactica and Portnoy’s Complaint.)

Filed under: manuscript evaluation, short stories, writing contests, critics, short stories, writing contest

06/11/2010 • 1:22 AM 0

Overlap. Overlap. Matrix.

When my daughter was three, and in a philosophical mood, she told me, “Some things happen and other things don’t happen.”

“Um, yeah,” I said. “That’s true.”

Some things happen and they seem like very odd coincidences. For instance, I was working at Harlequin Enterprises (yes, that Harlequin) on the night shift. I’m too tired and ashamed to type out the details of my job there, but one odd story stands out in my mind.

A woman who also worked on the night shift recounted her previous journalism experience. Uncaring, egomaniacal jerks surrounded her. That was my experience, too. In fact, I was one of them. Monica, the fellow employee of the Dark Empire, told how she was working on a story at a newspaper close to deadline when a nosebleed came over her. She bled copiously. I sat up a little straighter, remembering that the same thing had happened to me. I wondered if newsrooms in daily newspapers above the 49th parallel all have such uncommonly dry air that this might be a common experience.

Then she told me about how an editor came over to her work station and handed her a piece of paper. Something to be rewritten or a press release to follow-up or some such thing. She couldn’t remember. The grating thing about the incident was that he did not acknowledge her hemorrhaging in the least. Reporters are a dime a dozen apparently and if you bleed to death at your desk, you can quickly be replaced. I sat so straight at attention my bum felt light in the chair. The exact scenario had happened to me…to the letter.

Odd. Small world. Maybe it’s The Matrix Phenomenon: so many stories overlap because there are so few stories because it’s all fake. We’re just coppertops feeding the machines. Maybe. I’m just still egomaniacal enough to consider that possibility seriously.

In other news, I’m going to try pronouncing the “b” in the word doubt for a week and see if anyone notices. I wonder how often it will come up.

Filed under: What about Chazz?

06/11/2010 • 1:09 AM 0

Writing Advice for Anti-authoritarians

Recently I read a YA novel that omitted all quotation marks. It didn’t hurt a bit because it was so well done. It may have even sped up the read. It’s the sort of thing some grammarians hate. I say tough cookies to some grammarians.

When the rules of proper usage get in the way

between your story and your reader

–and sometimes they will–

dump ’em.

Elmore Leonard says so, too, so it’s not just lil ol’ me. Pedants will say, “Know the rules before you fracture them.” Fine. Then crack ’em open and don’t be so goddamn apologetic about it.

Ooh, and about exclamation points: one in 100,000 words is quite enough, thanks according to Mr. Leonard. (My journalistic mentor referred to the exclamation point in colourful terms. “They’re called dogs’ pricks,” he said.)

Brevity is good, too. It gives you more room for story and story is what your readers sign up for when they open a book.

Filed under: grammar, writing tips, brevity, grammar, writing tips

06/11/2010 • 1:00 AM 0

After All

Stephen King has this little tic that pops up in both his speech and his writing. I’m reading the third in the Dexter series and noticed it there as well. If you have a sentence with the words “after all” in it, you can take that out.

You don’t need it after all.