10 (...or so...) Surprising Books I've Learned From

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If you're at all familiar with my philosophically-oriented brand of psychological suspense, you wouldn't be surprised to read Burke, Ludlum, Koontz, Camus, Chesteton, or Orwell among the list of authors whose books have influenced my writing.  On the other hand, here are ten books or authors you might be more surprised by:

(10) Jubal Sackett by Louis L'Amour.  One of L'Amour's more epic-scale westerns, Jubal Sackett is really the book that taught me that it's not adventure or action, mystery or wonder that really draw me personally into a book: it's the human struggle.  This became the center of virtually everything I've written since reading the book.

(9) Right Ho, Jeeves by P. G. Wodehouse.  This novel, among other comedies by Wodehouse,  really cemented for the important of strong, memorable characterization.

(8) As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner.  This book showed me that, when it's effective, voice and style and the narrative-as-such are more important than any rules or conventions.

(7) Dust Tracks on the Road by Zora Neal Hurston.  While the voice might be thick at points, this book really taught me the power of voice to transform the ordinary into the extraordinary.

(6) Star Trek: The Motion Picture, novelization by Vonda McIntyre.  Turning what I've always found to be a painfully dull movie from a beloved franchise into something readable and enjoyable was quite a feat.  Because of it, I reached out to Ms. McIntyre as a teenage writer.  Thanks to CompuServe, I was able to exchange a couple of messages with her; her words were the foundation of my approach to writing as storytelling.

(5) Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis.  I'll admit it.  In all honesty, I cry every time I read the scene  where Eustace loses his scales and becomes freed from the dragon curse.  I'm almost crying just thinking about.  This reminds me of the overwhelming power of a redemption arc.

(4) The Eaters of the Dead by Michael Crichton.  This book more than any other reminds me that if the writing is good enough, any concept can get published.  "Hi, I've got a few techno-thrillers published.  How about my next book turns Beowulf into a historical account, complete with false scholarly footnotes and everything?"  "You've got it, Mr. Crichton."

(3) Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis.  Also, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  From these books I learned that it is possible for a writer to to engage and explore complex philosophical issues in an entertaining way -- and that, more importantly, it is not important that all readers understand what's going on in order for the explorations to be a success.

(2) The Dirty Dozen by E. M. Nathanson.  I was a huge fan of The Dirty Dozen movie and its made-for-TV sequels.  When I was a teenager, I even programmed a Dirty Dozen role-playing game in BASIC.  When I finally picked up the book, I learned something very important: some things, especially dark things,  play out quite differently on the big screen than they do in print.  What flashes by in a moment on the screen, tempered by sensory stimuli, takes longer on the page, and offers the reader to distractions.  There is no choice but to face the darkness.  In all honesty, I could not even finish The Dirty Dozen novel.  Nothing against the book or the writing; it was simply too psychologically brutal for me to handle and offered little charm to pull me through.  This is something that weighs heavily on my mind when I write.

(1) Jack Higgins.  While his cynical humanism has at times been drenched in nihilism and at times sprinkled with a jaded sense of hope, Higgins has always been the master of the anti-hero.  Whether writing about WWII, the Troubles, or spy thriller fare, Higgins' hero is often dark, rarely more than grey.  Where Lewis taught me about the power of redemption, Higgins taught me how to get readers hoping for the redemption of a character who is beyond hope, beyond help, and beneath contempt.  When you start with an unlikeable character, who suddenly seems to be showing the potential for goodness, the reader is hooked.  When the world becomes a game that breaks that character down, the reader starts rooting.  When it comes down to the wire, and the character faces fate, the reader is squarely hoping to see redemption.  And Higgins taught me that, as an author, sometimes you deliver that redemption, but sometimes you let the game win, rather than the players.

So, there you go!  Anything on my list definitely surprise you?  How about you?  If you're a writer, are there some books that have influenced you we might be surprised by?  If you're a reader, are there some favorite books that have special meaning for you, even if they're not what you usually read?

Love to hear from everyone on this!

.Nevets.

Tactless Tuesday: Listen to Captain Sisko

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Benjamin Sisko: I'm no writer, but if I were it seems to me I'd wanna poke my head up every once in a while and take a look around - see what's going on. It's life, Jake! You can miss it if you don't open your eyes!
-- "The Visitor," Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

Aside from outting myself as not only a fan of Star Trek, but of a huge fan of DS9, I share this quote with you in hopes that it might punch some of you in the face like it punches me in the face every time I come across it.

Here's the context. I'll even remove all Star Trek and sci fi from the setup, so those of you with a negative reaction can move on and get to the meat of the matter:

A young man, in his late teens, has found his passion for writing. Everywhere he goes, he says potential plots. Everyone he interacts with, he regards as potential characters. He spends every waking moment thinking about his writing or with his nose buried in his writing. Sure, there are other responsibilities and he takes care of those, but as soon as they're done it's back to writing. He's not a slacker because of writing; he's just obsessed with his craft.

One day, his dad is taking him on a trip to see something that's once-in-a-lifetime. The young man spends his time on the trip holed up and working on his story.

That's when his dad utters the magic words: "I'm no writer, but if I were it seems to me I'd wanna poke my head up every once in a while and take a look around - see what's going on. It's life, Jake! You can miss it if you don't open your eyes!"

This really hits home with me now, as it did when the episode first aired. When I was a younger man, I spent every spare moment with my writing. (Check yesterday's post if you don't believe me!) In college, when I wasn't doing homework, I was either working on photography or writing. For a while it was songs, not fiction, but it boils down to the same thing. When I gave up writing (more on that another day) I spent most of my time looking for something to fill the void. When I came back to writing, I was pretty much back to the old ways.

And I often still am.

There's work, there's my wife, there are things I have to do. But when not otherwise obligated, I'm writing, or blogging about writing, or talking to writers, or thinking about writing.

Here's the thing. Unless you want to write about writing, or about someone who spends his or her life trapped by obligations, you need to experience more than those two things in order to write. You need to do other things. You need to interact without it being about writing. You need to stick your head out of the rabbit hole and check out what's going on.

I've recently started volunteering for my local EMS as one way of doing this. It's not work, church, marriage, chores, or writing. It's something different. Just one avenue to just plain experience life. I may learn nothing from it to incorporate into my writing. But I will learn more about what it is to be a person in this world, and that will make me a better writer.

So, to all of you, I give the same directive as Ben Sisko gave to his son Jake, and that an elderly Jake then passed onto a young writer who idolized him:

Poke your head up every once in a while and take a look around - see what's going on. It's life! You can miss it if you don't open your eyes

.Nevets.

Writer, not Observer

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I'm not really an outliner. I will confess it here and now. I will also confess that there have been some times that I have really regretted it. And I will further confess that I think the reason two novels have stagnated in-process for me is that I had an open and a close, and lost my way in between. An outline would have helped prevent that.

I'm also a bit of an explorer. I've been an archaeologist. I've been a forensics tech. I've been a historical researcher. I know the thrill of uncovering things, and have been intoxicated by it. When I'm writing, I'm also exploring. I love seeing the story unfold as I write it the same as if I were reading it or watching a movie of it.

But I am writing it.

And that's where I get really confused by other writers sometimes. I do know what it's like to be surprised by things as I write. I do know what it's like to get angry with and even yell at a character. And I do know what it's like to reach a point where I realize that what I was intending will not actually be possible.

What I don't get, however, is when writers find themselves stumped. I'm not criticizing them. I'm not complaining. But I literally cannot conceive of it. Here are some examples of what I'm talking about:

"I don't know if I should have my character do this."

"I don't know where to go from here."

"I had planned for that character to be a villain, but they went and did something heroic, so now I don't know who my bad guy is."

I hit stumbling blocks in the middle of the road. I get that. I can understand how you sit at point A and look to point D but aren't sure how to go from A to D.

But I don't see how you can get to point C and not know where you're heading.

Partly, it just has to do with the way I think. I'm not much of a step-by-step kind of guy. I conceive the overall big picture, and then have to go back and fill out the details. So when I start writing, I know how it starts and I know how it ends, and I have a sense of the voyage between, even if I don't quite have all the details picked out yet.

To me that also seems like basic story-telling, though. If you don't know where you're heading, I'm not sure what it is you're doing when you sit down to write. Again, I don't mean any offense whatsoever. Just journaling about my own confusion. To me, if I go to write a story, if I don't know where it's going, I'm not writing a story. I quite literally don't understand what's in your mind when you write a story that is only a beginning.

Of course, I remember reading a forward by A. C. Crispin in one of her Star Trek novels (blush). It was a great story, and very creative, like most of her stuff that I've read. And one of the things she said was that a lot of her stories just start with her asking a, "What if..." question. "What if Spock and Bones sat down to play a game of chess?" Hmm.

Too, I love writing for prompts. (Check out Flashy Fiction!) But when I write for prompts, I think for a little while, and start writing once the big picture comes to me. I don't start before I know where it's going.

If any writers who work free-form from a beginning want to chime in and clue me in, I'd love to learn. I'm a curious fella by nature, and if I can understand rather than be confused, I prefer it!

.Nevets.