Beautiful, Sam, and for all my Del Griffith stans: “You wanna hurt me? Go right ahead if it makes you feel any better. I’m an easy target. Yeah, you’re right: I talk too much. I also listen too much. I could be a cold-hearted cynic like you, but I don’t like to hurt people’s feelings.”
Great stuff, Sam. I’ve been a full-time editor for fifteen years now and have encountered all of these.
No. 1: This reminds me of the many times I’ve run into what I call “stage management sentences”: “Jack crossed from the left side to the opposite corner and aimed a slashing kick at Marco, who dodged to the far wall and spun a half-turn on one foot as he reached carefully with his right hand for the knife tucked into the back of his belt with a blood-flecked grin.”
Not only is this tedious, but it denies the reader their right — and want — to see the action in their minds the way they might choose to see it. That distances the reader from the page. It’s like telling the reader: “I’m not just writing, I’m doing the reading for you.”
How about “Jack’s kick met empty air, and Marco reached for his knife with a grin.”
No. 2: I see this a lot in the writing of those clearly in thrall to Elmore Leonard and his jivey, louche, loose-limbed dialogue. Somehow these writers miss that a) these seemingly lazy exchanges never go on for long; b) his characters almost never speak at monologue length; and c) every sentence of these exchanges does the crucial and economical double duty of advancing the plot and developing something new about the characters that’s as pertinent as it is interesting. It’s nowhere as easy as it looks.
No. 3: Usually this lack of drama turns up when the writer insists that they have to explain the story before telling the story. And this usually happens because the story starts in the wrong place. A typical tell:
“I awoke to see a sheriff’s car pulling into the driveway, and reached for my husband. Only he wasn’t there.
“Steve and I were married six years ago after a whirlwind weekend in Vegas. He never talked much about his past ….” (Continues for two pages)
No. 4: Part of the problem here is that Lee Child has spent years telling writers that there’s nothing “wrong” with telling with flat character description. From The Big Thrill: “He said writers are called ‘storytellers, after all, not story showers.’ Because of the show-don’t-tell rule, Child thinks that many writers are so scared of ‘telling’ that they manipulate their work, such as having characters peer in a mirror and describe themselves, rating their own looks. ‘Who does that in real life?’ Child laughed. ‘There’s nothing wrong with just writing ‘he was a tall man with brown hair.’” And the unspoken mic-drop here is: “Do we think we know better than Lee Child?”
I’d respond with: “Do you want your books to be read more than once? To reveal deeper layers and new pleasures with each subsequent reading? To he admired and discussed years from now?” Of course you do. I know few authors cynical enough to say: “I want to write a book you’ll furiously flip pages through to find out who did what to who on a cross-country flight before leaving the book in the seat pocket, forgotten by the time you gather your bags.”
No. 5: One thing I rarely see discussed in conversations about storycraft is the art of finding the perfect balance between how much to reveal n and how much to show, especially in the service of a series. I’ve worked with authors who err on the side of too much withholding, confusing suspense with confusion. Or perhaps apathy. Years ago, I watched the TV series BURN NOTICE, and found it good fun until I picked up on the weak execution of its structure: there’s an episodic story arc, with a season arc and a series arc nested within. Too often each episode made an apathetic nod toward the bigger arcs (“Fiona, that guy you let into my warehouse — what did he look like? And did you look inside that envelope and see those compromising pictures of me in Kinshasa from ten years ago?”) while doubling down on the episode arc. Too much withholding for me; I felt manipulated and I soon gave up.
As for your pet peeves:
No. 1: I come across several fantasy-projection stories a year — usually the male equivalent of Mary Sues. And I usually find in interviews with these authors that they were raised on a steady diet of Travis McGee and Spenser and Amos Walker and the like — knight-errants who kick ass (especially after being shot in the shoulder), always get the girl, speak truth to power, and, before they turned thirty, were boxers and stevedores and government operatives and baseball players and gourmet chefs. They’re so ridiculously front-loaded that they transcend realism, thus making it all but impossible (for me, anyway) to maintain the fictive dream. Usually the authors of these stories throw in a few tiny flaws in an unconvincing effort to keep them in human scale, but even those seem calculated to generate sympathy (the occasional beating, the cheating girlfriend). Your imagined scene is a perfect representation of this type.
No. 2: One thing I see a lot is what I call Unearned Sympathy Syndrome. In these stories, the protagonist suffered a tragic loss in their formative years, off the page or in flashback, and thus the character’s anger and alienation manifests itself in weapons-grade rudeness or inarticulate mopiness that bends everybody to their will because, dammit, YOU CAN’T UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH I’VE SUFFERED, DAMMIT! I OCCUPY THE MORAL HIGH GROUND AT ALL TIMES NO MATTER HOW SHITTY I AM TO EVERYBODY IN MY ORBIT! It’s an assigned dynamic from the start, and rarely one that’s earned in the present-day story.
No. 3: Pretty much the same as my note on No. 5 above. The more you withhold from the reader, the more they’ll withhold their time and money from you.
I skimmed the email headline and read: "How to be a Bad Writer", and I thought, yeah, that will be interesting :) !!! Actually this is much better, thank you, Sam!
Beautiful, Sam, and for all my Del Griffith stans: “You wanna hurt me? Go right ahead if it makes you feel any better. I’m an easy target. Yeah, you’re right: I talk too much. I also listen too much. I could be a cold-hearted cynic like you, but I don’t like to hurt people’s feelings.”
It's an amazingly well written scene all the way through
Really is. “Reading the vomit bag” is such an incredible line. Only Steve Martin could have delivered it. Love that film so much.
Great stuff, Sam. I’ve been a full-time editor for fifteen years now and have encountered all of these.
No. 1: This reminds me of the many times I’ve run into what I call “stage management sentences”: “Jack crossed from the left side to the opposite corner and aimed a slashing kick at Marco, who dodged to the far wall and spun a half-turn on one foot as he reached carefully with his right hand for the knife tucked into the back of his belt with a blood-flecked grin.”
Not only is this tedious, but it denies the reader their right — and want — to see the action in their minds the way they might choose to see it. That distances the reader from the page. It’s like telling the reader: “I’m not just writing, I’m doing the reading for you.”
How about “Jack’s kick met empty air, and Marco reached for his knife with a grin.”
No. 2: I see this a lot in the writing of those clearly in thrall to Elmore Leonard and his jivey, louche, loose-limbed dialogue. Somehow these writers miss that a) these seemingly lazy exchanges never go on for long; b) his characters almost never speak at monologue length; and c) every sentence of these exchanges does the crucial and economical double duty of advancing the plot and developing something new about the characters that’s as pertinent as it is interesting. It’s nowhere as easy as it looks.
No. 3: Usually this lack of drama turns up when the writer insists that they have to explain the story before telling the story. And this usually happens because the story starts in the wrong place. A typical tell:
“I awoke to see a sheriff’s car pulling into the driveway, and reached for my husband. Only he wasn’t there.
“Steve and I were married six years ago after a whirlwind weekend in Vegas. He never talked much about his past ….” (Continues for two pages)
No. 4: Part of the problem here is that Lee Child has spent years telling writers that there’s nothing “wrong” with telling with flat character description. From The Big Thrill: “He said writers are called ‘storytellers, after all, not story showers.’ Because of the show-don’t-tell rule, Child thinks that many writers are so scared of ‘telling’ that they manipulate their work, such as having characters peer in a mirror and describe themselves, rating their own looks. ‘Who does that in real life?’ Child laughed. ‘There’s nothing wrong with just writing ‘he was a tall man with brown hair.’” And the unspoken mic-drop here is: “Do we think we know better than Lee Child?”
I’d respond with: “Do you want your books to be read more than once? To reveal deeper layers and new pleasures with each subsequent reading? To he admired and discussed years from now?” Of course you do. I know few authors cynical enough to say: “I want to write a book you’ll furiously flip pages through to find out who did what to who on a cross-country flight before leaving the book in the seat pocket, forgotten by the time you gather your bags.”
No. 5: One thing I rarely see discussed in conversations about storycraft is the art of finding the perfect balance between how much to reveal n and how much to show, especially in the service of a series. I’ve worked with authors who err on the side of too much withholding, confusing suspense with confusion. Or perhaps apathy. Years ago, I watched the TV series BURN NOTICE, and found it good fun until I picked up on the weak execution of its structure: there’s an episodic story arc, with a season arc and a series arc nested within. Too often each episode made an apathetic nod toward the bigger arcs (“Fiona, that guy you let into my warehouse — what did he look like? And did you look inside that envelope and see those compromising pictures of me in Kinshasa from ten years ago?”) while doubling down on the episode arc. Too much withholding for me; I felt manipulated and I soon gave up.
As for your pet peeves:
No. 1: I come across several fantasy-projection stories a year — usually the male equivalent of Mary Sues. And I usually find in interviews with these authors that they were raised on a steady diet of Travis McGee and Spenser and Amos Walker and the like — knight-errants who kick ass (especially after being shot in the shoulder), always get the girl, speak truth to power, and, before they turned thirty, were boxers and stevedores and government operatives and baseball players and gourmet chefs. They’re so ridiculously front-loaded that they transcend realism, thus making it all but impossible (for me, anyway) to maintain the fictive dream. Usually the authors of these stories throw in a few tiny flaws in an unconvincing effort to keep them in human scale, but even those seem calculated to generate sympathy (the occasional beating, the cheating girlfriend). Your imagined scene is a perfect representation of this type.
No. 2: One thing I see a lot is what I call Unearned Sympathy Syndrome. In these stories, the protagonist suffered a tragic loss in their formative years, off the page or in flashback, and thus the character’s anger and alienation manifests itself in weapons-grade rudeness or inarticulate mopiness that bends everybody to their will because, dammit, YOU CAN’T UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH I’VE SUFFERED, DAMMIT! I OCCUPY THE MORAL HIGH GROUND AT ALL TIMES NO MATTER HOW SHITTY I AM TO EVERYBODY IN MY ORBIT! It’s an assigned dynamic from the start, and rarely one that’s earned in the present-day story.
No. 3: Pretty much the same as my note on No. 5 above. The more you withhold from the reader, the more they’ll withhold their time and money from you.
Thank you, Jim!
Unearned sympathy syndrome is great
I now put in extra shots to the shoulder just to make Jim happy.
Thanks buddy.
This is great stuff - love to show it to those writers that say, "There are no rules!!"
Well, yeah, there actually are some good ones.
Thanks for this.
This was thought-provoking, as always.
Thanks, Lily!
I skimmed the email headline and read: "How to be a Bad Writer", and I thought, yeah, that will be interesting :) !!! Actually this is much better, thank you, Sam!