Blog

Writing Exercise: The Other

Erin Penn

Image courtesy of photostock at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The Other. Other what? Other person, writing someone other than you. The female, the male, the black, the white, the able-bodied, the physically disabled, the transgender, the heterosexual, the asexual, the old, the young. Crawling in their heads and bringing them to the page beyond stock tropes.

George Stroumboulopoulos once interviewed George R.R. Martin and asked him the following:

There’s one thing that’s interesting about your books. I noticed that you write women really well and really different. Where does that come from?

The fantasy master responded with:

You know I’ve always considered women to be people.

As a writer, solid worldbuilding means having characters in your world as diverse as the world you live in and making them real people.

A writer is told to read to outside the comfort zone become better. Reading outside your comfort zone does not mean just crossing genre lines. (See The Man who Doesn’t Read Women by Lorraine Berry, March 15, 2017.) To be well read requires exposure to thoughts and ideas different from your own.

WRITING EXERCISE: Write a flash with The Other as the Point-of-View (POV) character. 

READING EXERCISE: Read a book with the main POV character who is The Other.

Flash: David B. Coe Con Challenge Two – Bigger on the Inside

Erin Penn

freedigitalphotos.net

During ConCarolinas 2013, I added a panel where David B. Coe promised provided a series of writing challenges to help those in attendance develop tone, dialog, and voice skills. This is the second of three postings related to the challenges.

2) Write a scene between two people that does not use “said” or “asked” or any other direct attribution of dialog, but instead relies on gesture, mannerism, or just the established order of who is speaking.  Make sure it’s always clear who has said what.

“I’m not sure about this.” Tom looked over his shoulder at Rose.

The blond pursed her lips, her eyes invisible behind mirrored sunglasses. “I promise you, it’s just a prank. A jokester like Baker will love it.”

“He does like his jokes.” Finally getting the lock to release, Tom pushed the dorm room door open. No one had noticed them in the hall yet. The campus was empty for Spring Break, but a few stragglers like themselves could come by at any time. The couple hurried into the room and closed the door behind them.

Tom looked around surprised. Evan’s room was empty. Not empty as in bed stripped and closets safeguarding a couple bent hangers empty, but nothing. No bed, no closet, no desk, no window. Still, light filled the room. A seemingly endless room. “What the hell?”

“Sorry about this sweetie.”

A needle buried itself into Tom’s meaty shoulder. He tried to turn, but Rose was too quick. Cool liquid burned into his system and he felt onto the non-floor.

“Why?” Escaped his lips as the world fuzzed.

“Two may enter where one can leave.” Satisfied her dupe was in la-la land, the coed known as Rose Davison tapped a button on her glasses activating features GoogleGlass would love to reverse engineer and got to work. “Now, my dear Baker, where did you hide the keys? I only want a joy ride. I promise to return everything in good order. Maybe.” (words 243)

Flash name: Bigger on the Inside

(First published 6/12/2013; published in new blog format 4/25/2017)

Geeking Science: Red Changes Everything

Erin Penn

Geeking language today – how language is developed.

Language is the first tool humans learn to use – it’s necessary to control the parents. Instead of a cry for I hurt, I bored, I hungry, and I working on my lungs – suddenly you can say “nana” to get the yellow sweet thing and “down” frees you from Aunt Kissy-Duck-Face. Such power.

But how did this technological tool develop? How difficult is it? I mean a baby can learn it.

If I was creating a language for science fiction or fantasy, what limitations should I put on the color words? Is there an order to them. Dark and light is obviously. Then I would have assumed blue or green since they are so prevalent in the world. Turns out, for humans at least, the next word is Red. Blue as water and the sky is fairly far down on the list.

All bets are off for aliens and fantasy creatures, but if my worldbuilding goes down this path – figuring how what they see, how they see it, and how they group it can help me understand the culture which the sentient beings will develop.

Language is the bomb!

Author Spotlight: L. Frank Baum

Erin Penn

Amazon Cover

I would be remiss if I didn’t bring the spotlight on L. Frank Baum and his incredible Wizard of Oz series.

A female protagonist – strong and my age at the time I read them. Changed my world … changed a lot of women’s worlds. Dorothy went on the adventure and the others supported her. She killed the witches. She stood up to those in power.

Then the next book, The Marvelous Land of Oz, continued the story – but now the main character was a boy (Tip). EXCEPT, he becomes a she – Ozma of Oz – the rightful ruler of the land!

Mr. Baum supported the suffrage movement of his day, to the point of being the secretary for the local suffrage club. I can’t go all gooey over him, because he was still a product of his day and his views on PoC are definitely not 2017 approved.

But he did many things which have helped create the 2017 we live in. His strong female characters. His transgender character. His asexual leanings, removing nearly all romance from his books.

Reading his books is always a good day.

 

Flash: David B. Coe Con Challenge One

Erin Penn

During ConCarolinas 2013, I added a panel where David B. Coe promised provided a series of writing challenges to help those in attendance develop tone, dialog, and voice skills. This is the first of three postings related to the challenges.

1) “Write a scene of about 250 words, or one manuscript page.  It doesn’t have to be a complete scene — it’s more a vignette really.  Put in some description, some character work, maybe some dialog.  It’s really up to you what direction you take it in.  But when it’s done, I want you to replace a single word in each sentence or clause. (I say clause, because sometimes in a multi-part sentence changing one word won’t be enough.)  The changes should be designed to alter fundamentally the tone of the piece.  So if it started dark, use the changes to make it lighter.  If you started light, go the other way.  One word in each clause.  It might not be entirely enough, but that’s okay.  The idea is to get you to appreciate the power of a single word choice in setting tone, mood, setting, etc.” (from David B. Coe)

Hunger ripped at her guts. Unexpected and dangerous. Too long, she had concentrated on climbing, digging, escaping. Bloody dirt clumps fell from shredded fingers. Her neck cracked from a sudden jerk. She scented something delicious nearby. Human, young, soft, juicy.

The part of her mind which had tried to keep her in the casket screamed. The rest of her lumbered away from the grave her family had lovingly sentenced her to so many days ago. Food was nearby. (words 78)

********************

Hunger ignited her guts. Surprising and dangerous. Too long, she had fixed on climbing, digging, escaping. Bloody dirt clumps fell from frayed fingers. Her neck cracked from a sudden turn. She scented something tempting nearby. Human, young, soft, male.

The part of her mind which had tried to keep her in the casket whimpered. The rest of her slid away from the grave her family had lovingly laid her in so many days ago. A meal was nearby. (words 78)

*******************

The changed I aimed for: unthinking to thinking. Continued from the Waking Up Dead flash.

(First published 6/12/2013; republished in new blog format 4/16/2017)