Donald Voorhies, Wizards Fallen, book reports

[DonaldVoorhies]

1. The Art of Fiction, by John Gardner

 

Invoking the power of the pen (keyboard), I will return to review this novel after the other three with a brief explanation for why I changed the order.

 

 

2. Writing the Breakout Novel, by Donald Maas:

 

I read the book years ago and reread it for this program. Key overall aspects I took to heart then (and now) include: I want to write a breakout novel, not a mid-list one, storytelling matters above all other considerations, word of mouth drives a breakout novel rather than marketing, and high stakes and gut emotional appeal are critical, especially when they escalate.

 

Major lessons that I sort of learned years ago, and then refocused on after this reread include the following. Create a larger than life main character who begins as a flawed “regular” person. Write stories like the ones I loved, especially with great characters (thank you J.R.R. Tolkien and David Eddings). Suffering builds characters into great ones.

 

I found two points different than in the Author Salon writing program. One, when Donald Maas discusses 5 essential plot elements, he doesn’t mention reversals (although I believe he lumps them in with complications). Two, he states that backstory belongs later. That advice surprised me during my reread.

 

 

3. Write Away, by Elizabeth George.

 

I found her novel particularly helpful, so after reading it, I made a list of advice and posted it by my computer. Being a former chemist, I love lists, so I’ll subject you to it. I won’t apologize for the length, for this is good stuff. The quotes aren’t precise, just my paraphrasing.

 

1. One half of writing is craft, which can be taught. The other half is art, which cannot.

 

2. Story is character. An event alone cannot hold a story together. Characters learn from unfolding events. Readers are interested in the characters’ conflict, their misery, their unhappiness, and their confusion. Readers are not interested in their joy and security.

 

3. “Creating a character in advance allows a writer to adopt a persona…” You have to know the character before you can write her properly.

 

4. Dialogue is character.

 

5. Setting creates atmosphere, triggers mood, and stimulates emotional responses.

 

6. POV character’s voice defines their way of speaking and thinking.

 

7. “Writing about your own back yard” advice is “balderdash.”

 

8. Events that occur as the conflict unfolds must be organized with an emphasis on causality. Think of events as dramatic dominoes, each triggering an event that follows. Create scenes that lay down, not answer, dramatic questions.

 

9. Five basics for characters: What is their core need? What do they do under stress? What are their attitudes toward sex as well as her or his sexual history? What circumstances in their past has had a huge impact? What does a character want?

 

10. !!! “Relationships take on life through dialogue.” Dialogue has the look and sound of natural speech even while it isn’t a reproduction of it. Natural speech isn’t fluid. Dialogue like that would be unreadable. Yet…dialogue needs to seem real. Dialogue is another tool in the craft of writing.

 

11. The theme is the unity of the novel.

 

12. Bum glue (what keeps you seated in your writing chair) is about commitment to the self, to the dream, and to the process.

 

I found the advice particularly helpful about characters learning from unfolding events, and also relationships taking on life through dialogue.

 

As for conflicts with novel writing program, her seven step story line and 3 act structure differ a bit from the 6 act, two goal structure, but I found the concepts similar.

 

 

4. The Writing Life, by Annie Dillard

 

I made notes about these examples when I first read this. They typify how this novel helps me as a writer: “I do not so much write a book as sit up with it, as with a dying friend…I enter its room with dread and sympathy for its many disorders. I hold its hand and hope it will get better…This tender relationship can change in a twinkling. If you skip a visit or two, a work in progress will turn on you…revert to a wild state overnight…(so)…you are, quite rightly, afraid to open a door to its room.”

 

The second example: “When you write, you lay out a line of words. They dig a path you follow…deep into new territory. You follow the path fearlessly…(even though) it is not clear. You attend. The line of words is a hammer.

 

The third example: “Putting a book together…is sufficiently difficult and complex that it engages all your intelligence. It is life at its most free…The obverse of this freedom…is that your work is so…worthless to the world, that no one except you cares whether you do it well, or ever.” These type of comments taught me I’m not alone in this solitary/expose-your-soul-to-the-universe exercise.

 

Major lessons: (paraphrase) “Remarkable…is the writer’s attempt to control his own energies so he can work.” A second lesson (paraphrased): “What you thought of as excellent when you started drove you forward. You usually discard it as you learn more about the novel.” A third lesson: “Words lead to other words and down the garden path.” And maybe the best lesson: “Write as if you were dying. Write about winter in summer.”

 

I noted nothing that conflicted with the program’s lessons.

 

 

1. The Art of Writing, by John Gardner

 

I found this the hardest of the 4 novels to read. The tenor struck me as condescending, and my difficulties started with these quotes from the prologue: “Most grown-up behavior…is decidedly second-class.” And the second quote: “Not everyone is capable of writing junk fiction (like nurse books or thrillers or the cheaper sort of sci-fi): It requires a junk mind. What is said here is for the elite; that is, for the serious literary artists.” Grrr. Fur up on the back of my neck. I wonder why I would ever read this were it not required. But I read on and this following quote helped soften my annoyance: “None of this high-minded rhetoric is meant to deny that fiction is a kind of play.”

 

Overall aspects this novel taught me: “Art depends heavily on feeling, intuition, taste…The great writer has an instinct for these things…an infallible sense of timing.” A second concept that I found well stated: “The primary subject of fiction is and has always been human emotion, values, and beliefs.” A final particularly helpful concept I’ll highlight: “the value of great fiction…is not just that it entertains or distracts us, but also that it helps us to know what we believe, reinforces those qualities that are noblest in us, leads us to feel uneasy about our faults and limitations.”

 

Lessons I am applying to my novel: First, I’m reminded to not skimp on details. In his words: “In all major genres, vivid detail is the life blood of fiction.” Second, the climax must tie up everything that came before it. In his words: “A novel is like a symphony in that its closing movement echoes and resounds with all that has gone before.”

 

As for something that contradicts lessons from this course? John Gardner considers short, punchy sentences intended to heighten tension to be beneath a literary writer’s skills. This contradicts this writing program’s lesson about the verve and cheek in the opening to Fight Club.