Jumping The Gun: Suicide by Submission by John Robert Marlow

FORGIVENESS AND DAMNATION

When it comes to writing, most mistakes are—in and of themselves—forgivable. No professional is going to round-file your manuscript or screenplay because of a few isolated mistakes. Unless, of course, they’re Really Big Mistakes. This post is about one of those Really Big Mistakes…

JUMPING THE GUN

This Really Big Mistake probably takes down more aspiring writers than any other. The phrase doesn’t mean jumping someone with a gun and getting shot for your trouble, though the effect can be no less lethal.

In foot races, anyone who starts running before the starter’s pistol has fired is said to have “jumped the gun.” This does not mean they get a head start on the competition and go on to win the race. What happens is this: they’re disqualified. Out of the race, with no chance to win or even place.

It doesn’t matter whether they jumped the gun intentionally, contracted a bad case of nerves, or simply didn’t know any better. They’re gone, because they have shown a complete disregard for the most basic rule of the game. And unless they somehow get themselves in another race, no one will ever know how good they might have been. The same applies to writing.

Ask any agent, manager, acquisitions editor or script reader: the single biggest mistake any new writer can make—and the one most new writers do make—is jumping the gun. Disregarding the most basic rule of the writing game by jumping across the starting line with something that isn’t ready. I see writers doing this all the time. I did it myself, when I was starting out—and I’m here to tell you, it’s not a mistake you want to make.

Jumping the gun happens in one of two ways. The first is…

LACK OF PROFESSIONAL FEEDBACK

The writer is working in a vacuum, with little or no feedback from others. Or the writer does have feedback, but all of it comes from friends, family, and other writers at more or less the same level of ability—which is to say, not yet good enough to sell.

Friends and family are fine, as far as they go. As are writers groups. The problem (aside from soft-peddling criticism to spare your feelings) is that while both mean well, they lack two critical qualities: professional experience and commercial judgment. In most cases, your friends can only tell you what they like and dislike. This can be helpful, to be sure—but remains in the realm of personal rather than professional opinion.

What friends can’t do is tell you whether your work meets professional standards, and whether it’s likely to sell in today’s market. Another thing they can’t do is tell you how to tweak it until it is both professional and commercial.

Relying on the market (agents, managers, publishers, production companies) to critique your writing is at best unrewarding (they simply don’t have the time) and at worst, disastrous (poor work burns bridges—see below).

For that, you need to consult with someone who’s playing the game at a higher level than you are. Because being stuck in a room with ten, a hundred or a thousand other writers at the same level will get you only so far. You want to move to the next level—and you need someone who’s already there to show you the way.

That could be a friend who’s sold, or a successful writer you happen to know or—more likely—a professional consultant or editor. Yes, these last cost money—but good ones can save you years by showing you how to apply storytelling principles, professional standards and commercial sensibilities to your particular work.

If you can’t afford that right now, there’s a wealth of more general information to be gleaned from the successful works of others, and from interviews with working professionals—in print, online, and via DVD special features. (Always, always get the best special edition DVD.) You may even find the occasional pro blogging free advice.

The other reason many writers jump the gun is…

DESPERATION

Let’s face it: the expression “starving writer” is not entirely figurative. Creative types are often bad fits for conventional (and conventionally-paying) jobs. Many live on the edge, financially, because they devote time to writing that might otherwise be spent in pursuit of a more conventional living.

Simply put, and with few exceptions: you can’t write and give your all to [fill in your job here] at the same time. So until your writing starts to pay and becomes a career, it’s a hobby. (Just ask the IRS.)

Eventually, many unsold writers wind up in a serious financial pickle of one sort or another. Naturally, we start thinking that maybe writing is our ticket out of this mess. Nothing wrong with that, as far as it goes. And maybe we’re right.

Trouble is, our financial pickle has a timeline, and it’s usually a short one. So now we start thinking that, if we can just finish writing our favorite book/screenplay/whatever—and then sell it—by such-and-such a date, our financial worries will be over. This may also be true. But here’s the thing…

Priorities start changing. Instead of trying to make your story the best it can possibly be, you try to make your story get you out of a jam. Because the jam is urgent, you’re no longer focused on the story. You’re focused on the jam. Your writing turns from an act of creation and inspiration, to one of desperation. And it shows. You may think it doesn’t, but—take my word for it—you are wrong.

Maybe your story needs another six months of work. But your pickle-deadline is only two months off. So you force the writing to conform to a deadline that has nothing to do with whether the story is actually ready, and everything to do with a completely unrelated problem.

Whether you realize it or not, you start taking shortcuts. You write too fast, and your style suffers. Inconsistencies crop up in characters and plot, because you haven’t taken the time to read and reread and then read again. You impose quick solutions for your own convenience, when they don’t serve the story. You leave things in that should be cut, and leave things out that should be in. Mechanical errors breed like rabbits. The list goes on.

One of the writers I’m working with now—call him Ben—is a textbook example of this. His writing is, in places, brilliant—and in many places where it isn’t brilliant, it’s not far off. Most of what he writes is interesting, and much of it fascinating. With proper guidance and a bit of patience, he could be magnificent. If the cards fall right, he could also be rich. But…

Ben recently married, has a new baby girl, and had to move into a bigger place. His old salary isn’t paying his new expenses, and the family is living off savings. So he’s in a pickle. As a result, he’s making every one of the errors mentioned above.

The more I point this out, the more frustrated he becomes. He’s in a tough spot. That’s understandable. But he’s trying to make the writing, editing, agent-finding and selling process fit into a timeline determined by how long his savings are going to last.

And the more he tries to force the writing to fix his problem, the less likely it becomes that the writing he produces will be good enough to actually fix the problem. It’s like telling Michelangelo to complete the Sistine Chapel in a week. It might get painted—but not in a way that anyone’s going to remember.

FIRST AND LAST IMPRESSIONS

There’s no telling how long it will take to get an agent or interest a buyer. Your personal timetable is not part of their reality. The industry moves at its own pace. You will not alter that pace, and trying to do so will damage you. What is certain is that the less ready your work is, the less likely you are to find an agent or buyer at all, let alone soon.

And that’s not all. If you go out with something that’s not ready, the first impression you make on the people you need—to get you paid and put your story before the public—is going to be a bad one. If and when you approach them again—with a revised version of that work, or with something new—you’re going to walk a much harder road.

Because you only get one chance to make a first impression. That very first time you show up at an agent, publisher or script buyer’s door, you could be anything–from a clueless hack to the next J.K. Rowling or Shane Black.

To find out where you fit in the scheme of things, you will be read. (Unless you’re submitting to Hollywood without a rep—in which case, go with God.) If what you have to say seems intriguing and commercial, you’ll move up the ladder. If not, you won’t.

Second impressions are different. The next time you come knocking, a different dynamic kicks in. If your last submission wasn’t very good, you may be rejected out of hand, without a read. Or, your submission may be handed to the lowest reader on the totem pole, the one who gets the bad stuff.

If you are read, the read may be biased by the negative reaction to your earlier submission—and if you’re coming back with a revised version of something that’s already been rejected, you can count on it. (Unless you’ve been encouraged to revise and resubmit, which means they found the first submission promising.)

In Hollywood, every script that’s covered is entered into the company’s computer and indexed by author, title, plot, and main character names. New York may be less fanatical about this, but publishers employ a similar system. It prevents duplicate reads, helps track promising (and unpromising) writers, and also comes in handy when some crackpot claims the studio ripped off his unsold script. (Which almost never happens, for the simple and depressing reason that it’s cheaper to buy your script than rip you off and face an unrestrained lawsuit.)

Like the oracle at Delphi, the computer is consulted every time a new manuscript or screenplay—or query—comes through the door. If the submission has already been read, it’s typically trashed (Hollywood) or kicked back at the writer (New York).

If the property is new, but the writer’s last submission was poorly received, chances are good this one will be too (or so goes the reasoning), and it often gets short shrift. Ditto for revisions of previously rejected works. And if it looks like you’re trying to game the system and sneak a new version of an old dog past the doorman, that goes double. Maybe triple.

CONCLUSION

The upshot of all of this is simple: your first impression must be your best—or it may be your last.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Just Do It: False Starts, Late Deaths, and Appearances by John Robert Marlow

PUSSYFOOTING AROUND

There are several things wrong with this sentence: “Frank was visibly upset when he
started to cross what appeared to be a street.” Strictly speaking, there may be nothing
grammatically incorrect here. Stylistically, though, it’s a train wreck—and would be even
if Frank hadn’t died fifty pages back. Simply put, the sentence pussyfoots around, wasting
time and space. This post will help you to avoid doing the same…

FALSE STARTS

Some authors feel the need to precede a great many physical actions with the word
“started” or “began.” Instead of saying the character walked across the room (or street),
or raised a glass in toast, they’ll say he started to walk across the room, or
began to lift the glass. In most cases, this is not an occasional eccentricity;
writers who do this once tend to continue the practice throughout the entire story.

If a character lifts a glass or walks across a room, say he lifts the glass or walks across the
room; don’t bog the story down by saying he started to lift the glass or began to cross the
room. Both are long-winded, unnecessary and distracting ways of saying the same thing.
Have your characters take Nike’s advice and just do it.

Exceptions include situations where you’re setting up the choreography for a subsequent
action or action scene or sequence. In such cases, it may be very important to know, for
example, that Bob has started to cross the street. but has not yet reached
the other side, when the Bugatti Veyron screams around the curve doing two-fifty.

Or that, say, Rain Man is only halfway across the intersection when the DON’T WALK sign
starts flashing. (Note that the word starts is appropriate here because it’s tied
to action: the sign wasn’t flashing when Rain Man stepped into the street—and when it
starts to flash, he stops walking. Note also that it’s okay to switch tenses in the previous
sentence.)

GHOSTS

Somewhat like their namesakes, literary “ghosts” are phantoms of departed scenes and
characters which linger on to haunt your pages. Changing something in one scene often
affects events in other scenes. When we fail to realize this, or neglect to track down and
alter all of the other scenes that need to “match” the one we just changed, we create a
ghost.

In the course of my editing, I’ve seen lost or sold items reappearing in their owners’
possession, individual scenes and entire subplots that have absolutely no remaining
connection to anything else in the story, characters who appear to be doing something
important in one scene but are present nowhere else, a party taking place in a home that
burned to the ground in a previous chapter, and deceased characters who carry on as if
nothing had happened—driving to the post office, playing baseball, making love.

Each of the individual scenes made perfect sense at some stage in the story’s history.
Later changes turned them into ghosts. If not hunted down and excised—or
exorcised—such ghosts can result in a story that appears to have been hastily or sloppily
constructed.

When revising or rewriting, give some thought to both the overall and specific effects of
the changes you’re making. Ask yourself what else must be added, altered,
or deleted to “match” what you’re doing now and bring the rest of the story into line with
the new changes.

Sometimes the answer will be obvious: if Andre is now killed by a pack of wild vampire-
rabbits on page forty-nine, he won’t be having dinner with Priscilla on page eighty-two—
unless he has exceptionally large ears, and Priscilla is on the menu.

Other slips may be less obvious. As a general rule, the more tightly woven your plot
becomes, the greater the chance that any one particular change will ripple outward into
other scenes. Perhaps the ultimate expression of this can be found in the film
Memento, where—because the scene order runs backward instead of
forward—the deletion or significant alteration of any single scene would cause the entire
plot to collapse.

Working with an outline makes it easier and faster to spot most ghosts, but doesn’t get
you out of a final ghost-hunt: after you’re done with the final revision, you must reread
the whole thing one more time, killing any ghosts you find along the way. Better they
meet their end at your hands than spook an agent or publisher into viewing your work as
shoddy.

There are no exceptions here: all ghosts must go.

TRUE APPEARANCES

Like false starts, this habit is tough to categorize. Authors subject to this compulsion tend
to precede their descriptions with “seemed” or “appeared.” For example: “On the table
was what appeared [or seemed] to be a bowl of fruit.”

Now, if the object turns out to be something other than a bowl of fruit—say, a cleverly
disguised surveillance device containing cameras, microphones, heat sensors and motion
detectors—this is perfectly acceptable.

But when (as is usually the case) it really is just a bowl of fruit on the table, this phrasing
becomes unnecessarily long and convoluted—a distracting affectation that makes for an
awkward read and takes up far too much space saying, essentially, nothing.

Like the false start, this issue tends to be habitual: an author who does it once will usually
do it dozens, if not scores of times over the course of a manuscript or screenplay.

When describing ordinary objects or events that are exactly what they seem to be,
describe them as just that; do not tell the reader that they seem or
appear to be exactly what they are.

When you look at a table with a bowl of fruit sitting on it, you don’t think to yourself,
“Hmmm. That seems to be a bowl of fruit sitting there on the table.” You
think: “Bowl of fruit.” So does your reader. And so, too, should your characters.

Exceptions include things or events that are not what they appear or seem to be. (”On
the table was what appeared to be a bowl of fruit. On closer inspection, Henrietta found
it to be a cleverly disguised surveillance device.”) Also things that are unlikely to be what
they seem to be, even if they turn out to be exactly that. (”On the table was what
appeared to be a dead alien.”) In such exceptional cases, you are in effect voicing the
character’s skepticism.

A third and rarer exception would be a character who, for whatever reason, doubts that
things are as they appear to be. This could be due to a psychological problem, previous
experience, unfamiliar surroundings, etc. In this case, also, you’re conveying the
character’s skepticism.

VISIBLIES

It’s a medical fact that one in every twenty authors will at some point come down with a
case of the visiblies. Writers with this malady find themselves writing things like “Sarah
was visibly upset” and “Jimmy was visibly shaken.” Why not simply “Sarah was upset,”
or “Jimmy was shaken?” Because unless otherwise informed, readers will expect the
reaction to be visible; adding the word visibly becomes redundant
and—particularly with screenplays—marks the writer as unnecessarily wordy. (Some
directors and actors might even consider such additions to be infringing on their turf,
telling them how to do their jobs.)

Exceptions include situations where, say, a particular character who has been presented
as stoic, expressionless, or adept at concealing his emotions becomes visibly upset or
shaken—because now, rather than repeating old information, the word visibly
is conveying new information about something that runs counter to reader expectations.

CONCLUSION

While stylistic liberties may be taken by accomplished writers and talented beginners, the
habits mentioned here are awkward, distracting, and unprofessional. Ghosts, on the other
hand, can crop up on anyone—but professionals banish them before sending out their
material.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Blah, Blah, Blah: Overdescription, Exposition, and Stage Direction by John Robert Marlow

THE BLAHS

Have you ever attended a lecture, or sat in a classroom, or watched a video where the speaker droned endlessly on about what should have been an interesting topic? After a while, the eyes and ears glaze over, and all you really hear is “Blah blah blah…” Don’t let that happen to your writing…

OVERDESCRIPTION

Overdescription is a common malady. The primary symptom is a tendency to OD on description, going into endless detail about things that ultimately don’t matter. The author may “see the movie in his head,” even if he’s writing a book.

Driven by a desire to convey this vision to the reader in its purest form, the writer mistakes quantity for quality—and embarks upon a frenzied attempt to describe every factual detail of each scene, no matter how small.

From the color and style of clothing worn by each character to the year, make, model, color, and general condition of their cars, to the wallpaper, floorboards, carpet, furnishings, knick-knacks, architecture, temperature and humidity of each room, to ongoing descriptions of every street, sidewalk, building, lamppost, passerby and blade of grass—it’s all there in excruciating detail; a frenzied minutiae. Some writers do this nonstop, from first page to last. Others suffer from occasional bouts of descriptitus.

Instead of ODing on overdescription, realize that your purpose is not simply to record people, places, and events. A camera can do that—better, cheaper, and faster than any writer who ever lived. But that is not the function of the writer.

The writer’s purpose is to convey emotion. You can write description thick as a phone book, and fail to make a real impression. Facts—alone—are devoid of emotional content. A tree falls in the forest. So what? A tree falls toward a tent occupied by someone we care about—that’s an emotional event.

We don’t need to know who made the tent, or what color it is. Nor do we need to know how many leaves are on the tree. What we need to know is this: that tree is about to kill someone we don’t want to die. That’s it.

What you want to focus on is emotional content. Not: Is this room well- or dimly-lit? Rather: Is this room cheery or depressing? Inviting or forbidding? How do the bare facts relate to human emotions? You can say (as part of your description) that a room is dimly-lit, but you must also set a mood. This doesn’t mean you have to say “The room was cheery;” instead, you use words that evoke an image of cheeriness in the mind of your reader.

Consider: you can factually describe a room without conveying a shred of emotion. You can also describe a room emotionally, without conveying any factual description at all. The best writers blend fact with emotion.

But when you come right down to it, the emotional description can stand alone; the factual description cannot. Because when you’re telling a story—fiction or nonfiction—emotional involvement is what keeps people going.

You are not a recording device; you are a chronicler of emotional journeys.

EXPOSITION

Expository writing is what happens when an author needs to get information across to the reader, but can’t figure out how to work it into the story. What happens is this: the information is clumsily dropped into dialogue or narration, creating an “infodump;” critical details that appear out of nowhere, and exist for the sole purpose of transmitting information from author to reader.

Writers who do this believe that readers will simply absorb the information and move on. What actually happens is similar to the effect described in Hey, Look at Me! Intrusive, Chatty, and Explanatory Writing.

Instead of guiding the reader experience, the author is now inserting himself between reader and story—redirecting the reader’s attention to his own kludgy attempt to graft out-of-place information onto what should be a smooth-flowing narrative. The writer’s intentions are good; his technique, not so much.

There are two solutions to this problem: integrate the information into the story in such a way that it seems “organic” to the tale being told—or drop the information entirely.

Excellent examples of technical information smoothly presented include The Terminator (where Reese must educate Sarah on the nature of the threat they face) and The Matrix (where Morpheus and his crew must educate Neo about “the desert of the real”). Note that the same technique is employed in both of these stories: the mentor relationship. A character unfamiliar with the territory is guided by one who is; as the student learns, so too does the audience.

In True Lies, a humorous approach is taken. Taken hostage by terrorists and dragged before a stolen nuclear warhead, secret agent Harry Tasker is ordered to identify the device for a camera. His response? “I know what this is… This is an espresso machine… No, no wait. It’s a snow cone maker… Is it a water heater?” Finally, when his wife’s life is threatened, he spills the technical details. The wife—who had no idea he was a spy—punches him.

STAGE DIRECTION

Narration describing character action—that’s stage direction. The term originated with playwrights, who had to tell the actors what do via instructions—directions—written into the play. Today, stage direction also appears in books and screenplays. It’s rare to find too little stage direction in either format, but extremely common to find too much.

There are two basic ways to go wrong here. Sitting behind door number one, typing away, is the writer who’s not quite sure what his characters should be doing. Instinct tells him that ten pages of pure, uninterrupted dialogue isn’t working; something more is needed.

And so he gives his characters something—anything—to do: gaze out the window; arch, furrow, or scrunch their brows;, smile, frown, giggle, titter, scowl—or (ever popular) eat. The problem is always the same: the actions being described are inconsequential or meaningless, and exist for one reason only: to provide filler for a scene that is missing something.

Inevitably, this leads to passages brimming with information that is both irrelevant and distracting: instead of having two “talking heads” chatting for ten pages, the reader must slog through a conversation that is constantly interrupted by long thoughtful gazes, arched brows, slurped soup, and masticated meat.

Sitting behind Door Number Two is the author who applies overdescription to stage direction—detailing every slightest motion, gesture, breath, shifting glance, and sigh of one (or every) character. The end result is the same: a choppy, distracting read.

Ideally, everything means something, and nothing means nothing. And while that ideal cannot always be achieved, you can strive to minimize meaningless character actions. Look to see what can be eliminated, but also what might be recast and given meaning.

In The Usual Suspects, Verbal stares ahead during his interrogation. At another point, he gazes up toward his interrogator. Neither action seems particularly significant; both turn out to be crucial. Stage direction is both necessary and inevitable. Your job is to make it count.

CONCLUSION

Of the many sins a competent writer might commit, the worst by far is boring the reader. Technical perfection does little good if the reader’s mind wanders from the story. Even a mild case of the blahs can be damaging. Severe cases can be fatal. Overdescription, exposition, and stage direction are leading causes. Guard against them, always.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Coming to a Bad End: Rabbit-Hats, Cliffbangers, and Other Cheats by John Robert Marlow

Few things in life are worse than a bad story. One of them is a good story with a bad ending. At least with the bad story, it’s pretty clear what you’re dealing with, often in the first few chapters. So you really can’t blame the writer when, despite numerous warning signs, you slog all the way to page 347 before throwing in the towel. In a sense, you knew what you were getting into.

Not so with a good story. There you are, swept along by the narrative, engrossed in fabulous dialogue from characters so real it seems they’ll step off the page—when something goes so terribly wrong that every fiber of your being shrieks: That’s not the way it’s supposed to be!

Somehow, the author veered off course and, in the end, you’re left feeling disappointed, cheated, even angry. A number of authorial missteps can lead to this dark place, but the major boo-boos fall into several broad categories…

RABBIT-HATS

A rabbit-hat ending is one where some wildly unlikely occurrence happens at just the right time, and in just the right place, to turn a dire (or hopeless) situation into a happy ending. The bankrupt protagonist is about to hang himself—when he suddenly inherits a fortune, or wins the lottery. The hit man has Our Hero in his sights—but slips on a banana peel, and falls in front of a speeding train. And so on.

Such events are about as likely as—but less believable than—magically pulling a white rabbit out of your hat. It destroys all credibility, is often unintentionally comedic, and always makes the author seem too lazy or unimaginative to construct a plot that stands on its own merits—instead of resorting to slight-of-hand and parlor tricks. Aristotle complained about this sort of thing two thousand years ago, but many new writers have yet to see the memo.

Despite all of that, you can sometimes get away with this sort of thing when writing comedy—because in this situation, you want the reader to laugh at the sheer improbability of it all. (For a full treatment of coincidence, see What a Coincidence! The Use and (Mostly) Misuse of Coincidence).)

BAD DREAMS & NUTJOBS

We’ve all seen these. Engrossed in a book or movie, we’re hanging off the edge of our seat. Wondering, perhaps, how Our Hero can possibly extricate himself from the most impossible situation of all when, suddenly, the protagonist wakes up—and we learn it was all “just a dream.”

Most of us react with something approaching disgust. Oddly enough, the better the story has been (until now), the stronger this feeling is. Why? Because everything we just experienced, the whole roaring roller coaster of human emotions…never happened. It was all for nothing. Useless. Pointless. Unfulfilling—for us and for the character.

It should come as no surprise, then, that our own readers and viewers will react in precisely the same way. Assuming we make it past the agents and editors, that is. And yet, beginning writers continue to make this same mistake.

A similar dynamic is at work when, instead of finding it was all a dream—we find instead that the main character is batso. Again, the whole thing didn’t really happen, except in the deranged mind of our protagonist.

Exceptions do exist: either of these scenarios can be successfully pulled off. The problem is that every new writer thinks his story is the exception—and almost every new writer is wrong. Most seasoned pros who think this are also wrong; that’s how we know what it feels like to encounter one of these tales.

One writer who wasn’t wrong authored the screenplay for Identity—a low-budget but brilliant example of the batso protagonist.

Still, any time you’re considering either of these moves, reconsider ten times over—because your story is unlikely to be that rare exception.

LINE-CROSSING

Once in a while, an author will get so wrapped up in his own fictional world that he will unknowingly drive the story over the double yellow line, so to speak. The result is a head-on smashup with reader expectations. The most frequent examples involve children and pets.

The Fly (1986) and The Fly II provide an illustrative example. In the first film, Seth Brundle unintentionally transforms himself into a sort of monster. In the sequel, something similar happens to a dog—and this time, the action is intentional. The first film works. But it’s hard to say how well the second works, because that scene is so disturbing that it’s hard to think of anything else—and, in fact, hard to watch the movie at all. That one scene is so far over the line that it destroys the effect of the film as a whole.

A big part of the reason the first film works and the second doesn’t is this: what happens to Seth in The Fly is—however unintentionally—his own fault. He meddled with things he shouldn’t have, and he made a mistake. In the second film, the poor doggie is an innocent victim of a malevolent scientist. A great many audience members (and readers) cannot bear to see bad things happen to children or to animals—even when adults are considered fair game.

That’s one of the few taboos we have left, and you ignore it—and other line-crossing maneuvers—at your peril. Stray too far over the line and, as far as your readers are concerned—the story ends right there.

There really are no exceptions to this, outside of twisted tales aimed at small markets.

NONENDINGS

Stories are about things that happen to people. So when nothing really happens at the end—things just sort of peter out, or keep going the same way they’ve been going all along, with characters who are unchanged by the journey they’ve taken—readers feel cheated. “What’s the point?” they ask.

Conflict requires resolution. Two dogs, one bone. That’s story. One dog gets the bone, one doesn’t. That’s resolution. Sure, there are open-ended stories, and some of them work, and some of those that work succeed commercially. But something of great importance is resolved, and we very seldom end where we began.

There are stories that break this rule. Most of them you’ll never see, because the manuscripts and screenplays are sitting on someone’s closet shelf or hard drive. A Simple Plan (novel and film) might seem to be a rule-breaker but, really, it’s not; great changes have taken place, and both the main character and his wife have been profoundly changed.

Memento, on the other hand, is a rule-breaker—but the particulars of this example (scenes presented in reverse order; lead character with no short-term memory; circular plot) are so unique to this particular story that it’s hard to see them applying to anything else.

Very few commercially successful stories lack definitive resolutions. And so—absent some astonishingly good reason to break with tradition—you should strive to provide one.

FAILURE

For the most part, heroes are heroes because—eventually—they succeed. Or, as Eddie Dodd says in True Believer: “Don’t give me that liberal yuppie bull**** about a good fight… A good fight is one you win!”

Not every protagonist wins, of course, but the overwhelming majority of commercially successful protagonists do triumph in the end. Even in those instances where they fail to achieve what they set out to do, they very often wind up with something of greater value.

Wall Street is one example of this: when Bud realizes that his blind ambition is about to wreck thousands of lives—including his father’s—he abandons his quest for material wealth, turns on his erstwhile mentor, and averts catastrophe. He loses what wealth he’s gained, loses his girlfriend, even loses his freedom (at least temporarily)—but he gains the self-respect that comes with being an honest man. It sounds corny but, when done well (as it is here)—it works.

CLIFFBANGERS

We’re all familiar with the “cliffhanger,” where a scene ends on a major revelation, or with an important character’s fate left dangling. This technique originated with early silent film serials—where the hero would literally be left hanging from the edge of a cliff at the end. To find out what happened to him, moviegoers would have to return the next week. Modern tv series frequently employ this same technique just before commercial breaks and episode endings—albeit in a somewhat less literal sense.

The cliffbanger, on the other hand, is what you get when the hero falls to his death, banging into the ground at the bottom. (Ouch.) From a reader / audience perspective, this is even worse than the dream / nutjob ending: here, the character they’ve most strongly identified with…dies (or does something heinous—as in The Mist, where a man shoots his whole family to save them from a monster that never comes). What kind of ending is that?

One that angers your audience, that’s what kind. Here again, the trials and tribulations along the way become pointless—and the more readers like the character, the more they’ll dislike you for doing this. So don’t.

Which isn’t to say that protagonists can never die: 300, American Beauty, Gladiator, and many other stories prove that. But note that with 300, we know going in that everyone dies; with American Beauty, we know in the first two minutes that Lester is going to die; with both American Beauty and Gladiator, we are at least somewhat comforted by the assurance that the character lives on—somewhere else—after death.

A dead protagonist must make sense, must (in retrospect) seem inevitable, and should serve a purpose. (The 300, for example, changed the course of civilization.) Still, this is dangerous terrain, and alternative routes should be strongly considered.

PERSONALITY TRANSPLANTS

This is the kind of story where approaching doom is certain, but the day is saved when—for no apparent reason—one of the characters suddenly undergoes a radical personality shift, doing something (or failing to do something) that is completely inconsistent with his or her previous actions.

The Bad Guy who’s been trying to kill the Good Guy for the last hundred pages sprouts a conscience. The meticulous planner overlooks the obvious, with drastic consequences. The abusive husband turns gentle. The evil corporate CEO donates his fortune to charity and takes up residence in a monastery. And so on. Point being, there’s no previous setup, and the out-of-character action (whatever it is) proves crucial to the plot’s outcome.

Such devices are just that: devices—artificial, out of place, and unbelievable. Ultimately, they do as much damage as the situations they’re intended to resolve.

There are no exceptions. When turnarounds work, it’s because they’ve been set up earlier. Darth Vader’s turn in Jedi—perhaps the single biggest character turn in cinematic history—works beautifully, because it’s been set up for three movies. We don’t see it coming—but when it arrives, we understand, and everything clicks into place. It makes sense; it feels right.

In Back to the Future, George McFly—who’s submitted to Biff’s abuse and humiliation for years—suddenly lashes out, with life-changing consequences. But again, we understand: he’s loosing a rage that’s been building for years. Like Darth, he was finally confronted with the one situation capable of effecting massive change. Because we know the character, we get it.

Bladerunner’s Roy Batty is another story. In the version of the film without voice-over narration, his final scene with Deckard is so massively inconsistent with his previous actions as to be totally incomprehensible. In the cut with the voice-over, it works.

CONCLUSION

The Princess Bride is not devoured by Rodents of Unusual Size. Rocky is not killed in the ring. Sam and Annie do not miss each other at the top of the Empire State Building on Valentine’s Day. And, like these tales—your story does not disappoint.

Or your sales figures will.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Snucking Threw the Poring Reign: Mechanical Errors in Writing (Part Two) by John Robert Marlow

As mentioned in Part One, writing mechanics are dull, but essential—like checking the oil and brake fluid when you’d rather be cruising down the coast. You can’t do one without keeping an eye on the other. So let’s take a look at another batch of common mechanical errors…

MORE WORD WRONGNESS

It’s been said that the hardest languages to learn are English and Mandarin Chinese. It’s easier when you’ve grown up with one or the other—but even native speakers find some things confuddling. Herewith, another round of confusingly similar and often misused words…

Farther/Further: Though frequently confused, each has its own distinct meaning: farther always refers to physical distance; further never refers to physical distance. So while the goal line on a football field may be farther away than ever after the quarterback is sacked in his own end zone, his goal of being named most valuable player is further away.

Far, on the other hand, can be used in either situation: “How far is the goal line?” or “He’s a far worse player than you can possibly imagine.”

Effect/Affect: An effect is a result of some kind: “He spoke with great effect.” Affect denotes influence: “The audience was greatly affected by his speech.” You can even use both in the same sentence, though this can look a tad silly: “The effects of the nuclear detonation adversely affected the city.

Appraise/Apprise: To appraise something is to estimate its value or quality: “When Tiffany had her wedding ring appraised, she discovered that the diamonds were fake;” “Sergeant McGillicuddy appraised the situation on the battlefield.”

To apprise is to inform or convey information: “Tiffany was apprised of the ring’s true quality;” “Sergeant McGillicuddy apprised his superiors of the situation.” Again, you can use both, but it looks odd: “Sergeant McGillicuddy appraised the diamond, and apprised General Tiffany of its value.”

Adverse/averse: Adverse means unfavorable, hostile or harmful: weather can be adverse, as can circumstances or side effects. People are never adverse.

Averse means unwilling, opposed, or disinclined toward. This word does apply to people, and is always followed by the word to, which is in turn followed by whatever it is the person finds disagreeable: “Baby Finster is averse to Brussels sprouts;” “The new CEO has an extreme aversion to honest labor.”

Ordinance/ordnance: Ordinances are official rules and regulations: “There’s a city ordinance against sleeping in the park.” Ordnance refers to military hardware, and is most often used to mean explosives of some sort: “There’s enough ordnance here to orbit the Washington Monument.” Wars only work with ordnance; replace that with ordinance, and all you’ve got is a city council meeting.

TENSE SITUATIONS

Most novels are written in third person, past tense: “Amos wrestled the alligator in the swamp.” A few are written in first person, past tense: “I wrestled the alligator in the swamp.” Fewer still are first person, present tense: “I wrestle the alligator in the swamp. He bites my arm off.” Screenplays are almost universally written in third person, present tense: “He wrestles the alligator in the swamp. It swallows him whole.”

Second person narration—in which the main character is referred to as “you”—is seldom used in English-language tales.

In all cases, problems arise when the writer slips from one tense into another, as in this example from character dialogue: “What the hell do you think you were doing?”

Here, do is present tense, were is past. So to be consistent, the sentence must read either: “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” [present tense], or “What the hell did you think you were doing?” [past tense].

In this example, we switch from present to past tense: “If there is [present] one thing Frankie knew [past] to do, it was [past] how to cover his own ass.” The grammar here is also in trouble, and there seems to be a word misplaced or missing.

What the writer wanted to say was this: “If there was one thing Frankie knew how to do, it was cover his ass.” Grammatically, even this could be improved—but it would likely lose “punch” in the process.

Things can also go the other way—from past to present: “One thing Mark couldn’t [past] stand is [present]…” (Which, of course, needs to read” “One thing Mark couldn’t stand was…”) Another example: “The least the devil could have [past] done was [past] to make sure that the air-conditioning is [present] working.” (This should end with “was working.”)

Occasionally, writers will mix past and future tenses: “Mrs. Branch and Prince Juniper were [past] flying to Spain tomorrow [future] to meet with the owner of a partially-constructed treehouse they were [past] interested in buying.” Or: “The test wasn’t [past] starting [present or—in this case—future] until noon.”

Another example: “He’ll find out eventually that she’d duped him.” He’ll (he will) is future, she’d (she had) past. This needs to read either: “He’ll find out eventually that she’s duped him,” or “He’d find out eventually that she duped him.” (And, really, each sentence would read better if it began with “Eventually.”)

Sometimes, a writer will bounce between tenses: “I noticed [past] that incongruously, he is [present] wearing a double-breasted wool suit in the Sahara, which appears [present] to be one of the hottest places on earth. The suit probably explains [present] why he keeps [present] the air conditioning on an icy blast. He turned [past] back to me, and seemed [past] surprised [past] I was [past] still there.”

There are a number of problems here, but what concerns us now is this: the entire passage should be written in past tense.

Some sentences are so badly mangled tense-wise that they’re either impossible to salvage, or not worth the effort: “I’m here only because a judge ordered this visit so that I could assure you someone knew what happened to you, and I could make sure you aren’t being abused.”

In such cases, a total rewrite is called for: “I’m here because a judge ordered this visit. He wants to assure you that the court is aware of your situation. I’ve been instructed to ask if you’re being well-treated.”

Be particularly careful when you use the word had, or any other word ending in ’d, because it’s easier to slip up when one of these is present. “It had been a long time since she was intrigued by a guy,” for instance, should be: “It had been a long time since she’d been intrigued by a guy.”

Often—but not always—the presence of had in a sentence requires the use of an ’d word, or another had. Seldom will the word was appear in the same sentence as had. (“She’d already told him she was a leper, and so she failed to understand his surprise when things started falling off,” would be an exception.)

SINGURALS AND PLINGULARS

It’s surprisingly easy to find yourself on the wrong end of a singular—or plural, for that matter. Singular-plural mix-ups are fairly common, and look like this:

“Anchovies, as I recall, was on your wish list.” And this: “Hers were one of many.” And this: “Samantha liked the architecture in this part of Dubai; lovely modern buildings, each their own signature piece.”

The first two are fairly simple. Because anchovies is plural, the writer must use were (which is also plural) instead of was (which is singular): “Anchovies, as I recall, were on your wish list.” Likewise, one is singular, and were plural—so when referring to one of many, the writer must use was: “Hers was one of many.”

In the first two examples, it’s immediately clear what’s being referred to: anchovies and one. Which makes it a simple matter to choose between was and were.

The third example is a bit more complicated: what are we really talking about here—architecture, or buildings? Neither, as it turns out; the specific word being referenced here is each. Because each is singular, the last part of this sentence should read: “each its own signature piece.”

How do we know that each is the key word here? By asking this question: “What is a signature piece?” Is architecture a signature piece? No, that’s too broad. Modern buildings? No again; how can “modern buildings” be “a signature piece?” What about “each?” Eureka! Each “modern building” is a signature piece. And because each is singular, we must use its (also singular) and not their (plural).

But, really—in this case, at least—we don’t even have to go through all of that. The answer is contained in the question: “What is a signature piece?” A signature piece is singular (signature pieces would be plural)—and so it must be referring to something else that is also singular: each.

Whatever is being most directly referred to determines whether the sentence should employ singular or plural words. Here, the sentence is referring to “architecture” in a general sense, and “modern buildings” in a collective and indirect sense—but “each” is clearly the main focus.

Think of it this way: you’re traipsing through the Alaskan wilderness. Majestic, snow-capped mountains rise in the distance. Sunlight glitters off a nearby river. Gorgeous pine trees dot the landscape.

It’s all quite beautiful, really—but the thing you should be concentrating on is that charging grizzly, and whether he has a buddy. Because if it’s one bear, your biographer will write” “The bear was hungry.” And if it’s two bears, he’ll write “The bears were hungry.”

Sometimes, the problem is a simple typo: “He detested the lack of compassion most detectives had toward the victim[s] and their families.” Occasionally, it’s hard to see how the wrongness was arrived at: “Frank spoke softly to the man, “Your eyes were scooped out like a grape.”” Even then, however, the fix is clear: ““Frank spoke softly to the man. “Your eyes were scooped out like grapes,” he said.”

Finally, two perilous situations that often lead writers astray. The first has to do with people (or other creatures or things) standing beside something—usually a doorway.

“A soldier stood on both sides of the door.” For this sentence to stand as it is, the soldier would have to be in two places at once—the left and right sides of the door. A soldier is singular; both is plural.

“A soldier stood on each side of the door” may be grammatically correct, but—owing to the unintended double meaning—presents the same absurd image in the reader’s mind.

The solution is to abandon the sentence structure entirely, and instead write something like this: “Two soldiers stood by the door.” Most readers will assume that means one soldier per side—but if you want to get specific, say: “Two soldiers flanked the door.”

The other situation often arises in connection with arms. (The kind attached to characters.) A typical example: “He edged out over the roof. His stomach churned. His arms were limp at his side.”

With two arms on one side like that, he might just lose his balance and fall off. When referring to a character’s arms (or anything else there’s more than one of) being at his sides, always double-check to be sure you didn’t say side instead.

TYPOS

We all know the typo. Fingers flying over the keyboard, we hit the wrong key (or several wrong keys). Or we forget to hit the right key (or several right keys). Occasionally, the results are amusing or embarrassing; more often they’re not. And they always make us look sloppy.

Typos are like beetles; there are so many different kinds, it’s hard to keep track. Most, though, fall into a few broad general categories: wrong letters, extra letters, missing letters; wrong words, extra words, missing words.

And then there was the guy who accidentally hit a macro key, and put his lonely-hearts personal ad in the middle of his manuscript.

Mr. Lonely Hearts aside, the trouble with typos is this: we, as authors, know how the words are supposed to read—and so we tend to see what should be on the page, rather than what’s actually there. Our cranial spell-checkers autocorrect spelling errors, fill in missing words, subtract extra ones. But, of course, this only works for us.

The moment someone else reads the thing, every error stands out like a spotlight, illuminating our seeming incompetence. At best, we look lazy; at worst, illiterate. In either case, the result distracts the reader and interferes with his enjoyment of the tale being told.

The solution is simple: first, run a spelling and grammar check. This will catch many errors, but won’t come close to catching them all. (It may also flag things that aren’t errors, or suggest some fixes that shouldn’t be made.)

Next, hand the finished work to someone else to read, and ask them to mark every single error they spot. Needless to say, they should have a firm grasp of the language you’re writing in, and should also be willing to take the considerable time necessary to do this.

Make the appropriate corrections and repeat as needed, with a new reader each time. Then take a fresh look at it yourself; often, a little time away from the story can help you to spot things you missed in a previous read.

Finally, finances permitting, consider sending the finished work to someone who makes his living spotting and correcting writing problems—a professional editor.

CONCLUSION

Again, not exactly pulse-pounding stuff—but stuff you can’t ignore. Because it’s hard for readers to enjoy the ride when there’s a racket under the hood, caused by a dozen untended mechanical problems. You want your story running like a well-tuned Maserati.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Snucking Threw the Poring Reign: Mechanical Errors in Writing (Part One) by John Robert Marlow

“Mechanical errors” have to do with the nuts and bolts of writing. If concept is your flashy car, plot the engine, characters the driver and passengers—then story mechanics are the fasteners holding your engine together. They’re not exciting, glitzy, or personable, and no one pays them any mind. Until something goes wrong.

That’s when you hear an annoying clank, somewhere under the hood. Soon, it becomes difficult to hear the passengers or enjoy the scenery. Before too long, that clank-clank-clank is all you can think about. And if someone doesn’t climb under the hood and fix the damned thing, it will eventually stop your engine.

So let’s take a look at some of the more common mechanical errors…

WRONG WORD

There are two ways to use the wrong word. The first is simple inattention; we’re buzzing along, lost in the moment, and inadvertently type a real word that’s quite similar to—but not—what we intended. Common culprits include here/hear, there/their/they’re, your/you’re, through/threw, passed/past, and lightning/lightening. There’s no misunderstanding involved; somewhere between our brain and our fingers, the signal gets scrambled.

In other cases, the wrong (usually similar) word is employed because the writer is unclear on the word’s actual meaning. Frequently, the correct term is one not often seen in print, making an error that much more likely. A few common culprits in this category:

Peaked/Piqued: It’s easy to get this one wrong, and many writers do. While the phrase “peaked her interest” may seem correct, it is not; the proper phrase is “piqued her interest.” This is because her interest is not peaking, but being aroused, which is what piqued means. (Just to make things complicated, pique can also mean to arouse anger or resentment, but this usage is rarely seen.)

Pour/Pore: Rain pours down. People pour water, soup, tea and other liquids. One does not pour over a document, unless one has a fondness for runny ink. Instead, one pores over the document. To “pore” is to study intently. (Pore has other meanings as well; fortunately, none of them are relevant here.)

Reign/Rein/Rain: Reign is what a king, queen, or other dominant entity or force does. “The king reigned for fifty years” means the king was, well, king for half a century. A reign ends when the reigning entity is replaced. In the computer industry, IBM reigned supreme—until Microsoft came along. Ideas can also reign.

Reins are straps used to control horses. When you see a carriage driver in a movie, holding a bunch of leather straps in his hands as he drives—those are reins. He who controls the horses “holds the reins.” Pulling on the reins signals a horse to stop; hence the phrase “rein him in.”

Rain falls on your head from the sky. Or falls on your umbrella, if you’ve planned ahead. Most of the confusion occurs between reign and rein. For a prominent example of this, look closely at the Forbes magazine cover in the Iron Man movie—where you’ll see the words “Tony Stark takes reigns at 21.”

Hoard/Horde: Neither of these is oft-seen in print, making for a constant source of confusion when writing off the cuff. You can’t horde gold, nor can you be attacked by a hoard of angry editors. A horde of angry editors is another matter altogether, because a horde is a vast crowd or mob—usually of people, but sometimes of other creatures: A horde of orcs spewed from the cave like a raging river.

A hoard is a great amount of something (typically inanimate) that has been gathered up and kept (and often hidden): a dragon’s hoard of treasure, for instance. Hoard can also mean the act of gathering up a great amount of something: The dragon hoarded trespassers, thus ensuring a steady supply of knight flambé to see him through the winter.

Sneak/Sneaked/Snuck: Snuck is not a word. Examples of proper usage in various tenses: “We’ll sneak into the morgue tonight and say our goodbyes to Ignatius.” “I sneaked into Ignatius’ house this morning, and grabbed his favorite hat.” “Ignatius sneaked into the lion’s cage last night, but he didn’t sneak out.” The past tense of sneak is sneaked. Always.

Some would argue that, by sheer dint of recent widespread usage, snuck has sneaked into the lexicon and is in fact a real word—which is sort of like saying that someone who sneaks into the final semester of medical school is a doctor. Whatever the case, it is appallingly bad form—the grammatical equivalent of saying “He ain’t got none”—and should be avoided, outside of dialogue spoken by characters with appallingly (and intentionally) bad grammar.

SPEAKER ATTRIBUTION

There are two ways to go astray here: too much, and too little. When two characters are conversing, there’s no need to use the speaking character’s name with every line of dialogue. Give the reader credit for being able to follow along for a few sentences. Identifying the speaker every third or fourth time someone speaks is a good rule of thumb.

In situations where more than two characters are speaking, on the other hand, you’ll almost always want to identify the speaker with each spoken line, and also let the reader know which character is being addressed. Without this, it becomes very easy to lose track of who’s saying what. When that happens, the reader backtracks and rereads to clarify—and that’s always bad.

Sometimes you’ll do this with one character saying another’s name to get his attention. (”Go to hell, Bartholomew.”) More often, you’ll drop a clue into narration. (”"Hildegard glared at Ignatius. “Well I guess he’ll see you there,” she said.”)

Timing is another important aspect of speaker attribution. One of the most common mistakes is giving a character a lengthy bit of dialogue, and identifying the speaker at the end of it. (”"Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought blahdeblahblahblah,” said Lincoln.”)

The problem here is that the reader is unable to place the line(s) into context and character voice until the entire passage has been spoken. This, in turn, cuts them loose from the story, leaving them to wonder “Who’s saying this?” when they should be carried along in the moment.

The solution is simple: move the attribution forward. (”Four score and seven years ago,” said Lincoln, “our fathers blahdeblahblahblah.”) Problem solved.

FLIPPERS

“Flippers” are sentences that are (more or less) written backward. Because portions of the sentence are presented in a less-than-ideal sequence, they have to be “flipped” in order to read well. Most sentences can be put together in more than one way. There may even be several grammatically correct options. But there is only one best way to say what needs to be said.

With occasional exceptions, sentences should be constructed like this: who-what-how. Character first, followed by what they’re doing, followed (if at all; most of the time this isn’t needed) by the way in which they’re doing it. “John opened the door slowly,” not “Slowly, John opened the door.” The first reads smoothly; the second forces the reader to break rhythm, so to speak—which is why I didn’t just say “Smoothly, the first reads.”

Put another way: if someone asked you how you went to the lottery office to cash in your million-dollar ticket, would you say, “Quickly, I went?” (If so, you really need to be reading this.) Of course not. Why? Because it’s backward. Instead, you’d say “I went quickly.”

Let’s look at all three possibilities” “Quickly, I went to the lottery office” (how-who-what) is an awkward mess with a built-in pause, and is difficult to read. “I went quickly to the lottery office” (who-how-what) is better, but unnecessarily awkward. “I went to the lottery office quickly” (who-what-how) is smooth, easy to read, and has the kind of structure we’ve all been conditioned to expect. The first two sentences are flippers; the third is what you’re looking for.

If you want to drive your reader (or editor) bonko in the shortest possible amount of time, write like this: “Slowly, he got out of bed. Leisurely, he dressed for work. Jauntily, he walked to the car. Casually, he started the engine. Happily, he smiled.” (This is also a great way to increase the price of a line edit or polish, because it ensures that every sentence will have to be restructured.)

There are exceptions to this, and it is perfectly possible to write a smooth-flowing how-who-what sentence that doesn’t need to be flipped—but even seasoned pros use this technique sparingly, because a string of them gets really annoying, really fast. Unpublished writers, on the other hand, are frequent flippers.

APOSTROPHE NOW

Apostrophes are often misused. It’s hard to tell whether this results from inattention or misunderstanding, but here’s the rule: with few exceptions, apostrophes signify contractions and possessives—and nothing else.

Contractions are shortened words: that’s for that is, wouldn’t for would not, could’ve for could have, you’re for you are, that sort of thing. By far the most troublesome word in this category is it’s, a shortening of it is. The confusion likely stems from the fact that, unlike other contractions, it’s looks like a possessive.

Possessives are words that signify possession. Some of these—his, her, their—sport no apostrophe. Others do: John’s, Marie’s, Smith’s, Jones’, building’s, truck’s (”The fire truck’s front end was buried in the building’s north side, where John Jones’ office used to be”).

Its is a possessive with no apostrophe: “The fire truck was on its side.” “The fire truck was on it’s side” makes no sense; what this actually says (because it’s is a contraction) is that the fire truck was on it is side. It’s and its are so commonly misused that it’s worth the effort to do a search on your finished work, and eyeball every instance of each word.

Further confusion arises when the word being designated as possessive already ends with an s. Is it Jones’ or Jones’s, fortress’ or fortress’s? A simple apostrophe after the s is better form, and makes for an easier read. (Technically, you can do the same with words ending in z, but that tends to look silly without a concluding s.)

Exceptions are debatable, and typically relate to things that aren’t really words: 1940’s—which can also be written as 1940s. The latter avoids the appearance of being a possessive.

“There were two hundred Jones’s in the phone book” doesn’t look good (but does look like a possessive, which it’s not)—but then neither does “Joneses.” In this case, consider using Miller instead of Jones, and the problem goes away. Or, if you’re stuck on Jones, rearrange the sentence: “There were two hundred listings in the phone book under Jones.”

CONCLUSION

Mechanical errors can pile up quickly, and often escape automated spell-checks. Fortunately, they are among the easiest problems to fix—once you know what to look for. So grab your toolbox and climb under the hood.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Hey, Look at Me! Intrusive, Chatty, and Explanatory Writing by John Robert Marlow

Authors have a single, overriding function: to connect reader and story. At our best, we immerse the reader so thoroughly in the world of our story that the “real” world disappears and, for a time, there is nothing but the story. That’s the kind of experience readers hope for and deserve. It’s a zen-like state that is not easily achieved.

It becomes impossible when a brightly-dressed, cymbal-banging acrobat starts jumping around in front of the reader, yelling “Hey, look at me!” Yet many authors unknowingly engage in the literary equivalent of this practice by inserting themselves between reader and story—usually in one of the following ways.

YOU THERE!

The word “you,” well-behaved under normal circumstances, becomes suspect any time it appears outside of dialogue or first-person narration. When properly employed—You dunderhead, he thought—all is well. But problems arise when “you” refers to someone outside the world of the story.

The most common transgressor here is the phrase “You never know” (or “You never knew”). Another common phrase begins: “You’d think…” When phrases like this are presented as narration or internal monologue (the character’s own thoughts laid out for the reader) the word you often refers to the reader.

A few other examples, all from narration: “Life never handed out what you expected;” “It was like giving up your lunch money. But when Uncle Noonan tells you to do something, you just flat do it;” “What else could you say?;” “It was the kind of thing you’d find in a junk shop;” “…when you least expected it.” (Notice the tense issues here as well.)

When you come across something like this in your own writing, ask yourself: Does you clearly refer to a character within the story? If the answer is no, you have a problem, because that means you refers to the reader—and here you are talking to him (or her) in the middle of the story.

It’s the rough equivalent of a film director leaning into frame in the middle of a movie and saying “You never know”—or whatever your particular line happens to be—to the audience. Like you, he doesn’t belong in the story.

And, short of a nearby gunshot, nothing tears the reader out of the story more swiftly or destructively.

As a side note, passages that address the reader often have mixed or incorrect tenses as well, so be sure to keep an eye out for these.

Exceptions: First person narration, and some comedies. Keep in mind that letters, sound recordings, and videos which address a nonspecific “you” are usually fine, even when the story is being told in the third person. (These are, in a sense, addressing the character doing the reading, listening, or watching.)

Screenplays are another exception; here, it is permissible—but often inadvisable—to address the reader directly.

GETTING CHATTY

Though not quite as bad as addressing the reader, “getting chatty” also takes a toll on reader immersion and enjoyment. Here, the author writes narration as if speaking to the reader, but without actually resorting to the word you. For example: “He was drinking coffee from one of those big cafeteria roasters.”

When describing something in the third person, you don’t say things like “one of those;” rather, you describe the thing as what it is, outside of shared observations and experiences. (“He was drinking coffee from a big, cafeteria-style roaster.”)

Because you-the-author are not present in the story, you have no shared observations or experiences to draw upon. You are (or should be) invisible; the reader should share observations and experiences with the characters, because this draws them deeper into the story. Being chatted up by the author, on the other hand, pulls them out of the story.

Another chatty passage: “It was a familiar smell, they knew it, every homicide has its smell, but no one ever quite gets used to it.” Here, the use of no one makes this chatty. It’s important to understand why:

This is not internal monologue, so we’re not reading the thoughts of any particular character. Nor is it dialogue. Just as clearly, it’s not directed at any particular character within the story. That makes it narration—but it’s not written like third-person narration; instead, it’s written as though the author were speaking to someone.

Obviously, the author isn’t speaking to anyone inside the story. Therefore, he must be addressing someone outside the story. That leaves but one possibility: the reader. And ten out of ten publishers surveyed agree—you can’t do that, for reasons stated above.

Now, if the passage is changed to read “It was a familiar odor. Every homicide had its smell, but Malone never quite got used to it”—the chattiness issue disappears, because it’s now clear who is being referred to: Malone. The more generalized “no one,” on the other hand, includes the reader—and is therefore chatty.

A different example:

“You said to bring him back in chains.”
Well, that’s not quite what she’d said, or at least meant, but…

Just who is saying well here? Obviously, it’s intended to be the character’s train of thought—but it reads like the author, chatting with the reader. Again, be on the lookout for tense issues when reviewing these passages.

Exceptions include first-person narration, some comedies, and screenplays.

AUTHOR COMMENTARIES

Occasionally, an author feels the need to explain something that is somehow not obvious from a reading of the story itself. Avoid the temptation to do this with comments inserted in parentheses, brackets, or footnotes.

Think of the reader’s thought process: Oh, a note. Who put this here? The author. Suddenly, your audience is thinking about you, and not the story.

Instead, weave the information into the tale in such a way that it is obvious (but not obviously expository) when reading the story. If this is not possible (which almost never happens), put the information in a foreword, introduction, author’s note, afterword, or appendix. Don’t “break the read” by sticking it in the middle of your tale.

CONCLUSION
Your job is to get the reader into the story, and keep him there until the very last page—entranced by a spell woven with words. Anything that calls attention to the author, or reminds the reader that there is, in fact, an author—breaks that spell.

It is as if you were making love to your wife or husband, and the person who introduced you suddenly barged into the room shouting, “Aren’t you glad I brought you two together?”

Go over all of your writing with an eye toward author intrusion, and delete or rephrase as needed. Not just where author presence is clear (addressing the reader or inserting comments)—but also where it may be open to interpretation (getting chatty).

Absent one of the exceptions mentioned above—or instances where you’re being intentionally unclear for other reasons—the reader should always be absolutely clear on who is being addressed, and by whom. The reader should not be directly addressed, chatted up, or given notes.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Is Your Book a Movie? A Crash Course in Book-to-Screen Adaptation by John Robert Marlow

Is your book a movie? Should it be? How do you get there from here—and what’s in it
for you? Fasten your seatbelt, and let’s rip through this…

THE AWFUL TRUTH

Let’s face it: being an author is a noble profession, but reaching the financial pinnacle of
our chosen profession requires more than the ability to put brilliant words on paper.

Consider Forbes magazine’s 2008 listing of the top ten highest-earning authors: JK
Rowling, James Patterson, Steven King, Tom Clancy, Danielle Steele, Nicholas Sparks,
John Grisham… Aside from achieving national or international bestseller status, all have
one thing in common: heavy film involvement.

Rowling has 6 movies out, with 2 more filming; Patterson has 7 film projects, with an 8th
due in 2010; King boasts more than 80 film adaptations; Clancy, 6 with a 7th due in 2011
and 3 more in development; Danielle Steele more than 20 (television), Grisham 14, with
another 5 in development, and so on.

While one could argue that films are simply based on books that are already massive
bestsellers, this fails to account for the many bestsellers that have not been made into
movies, even when written by some of the same authors whose other books have been
filmed (and quite successfully at that).

Michael Crichton is a perfect example of this: nearly twenty of his works have been
adapted to film, his ER tv series is one of biggest ever, and his Jurassic Park adaptations
are (at the time of this writing) the 11th, 43rd, and 136th highest-grossing films of all
time. Nevertheless, two of his most recent works, Prey and State of Fear, have yet to be
filmed, and it seems likely they never will be.

Then too, there are those novels and short stories whose performance is poor or middling
or genre-specific, which gain widespread recognition only after the film adaptations are
released. Bladerunner, Total Recall, Minority Report, Next, and Paycheck (among other
films) were based on short stories in the science fiction genre. All were written by Philip
K. Dick, whose work was—before the movies—largely unknown to the general public.
Two of these films, Minority Report and Total Recall, are among the top 300 highest-
grossing films in the world.

So while it may be true that Hollywood likes to base movies on existing bestsellers, it’s
also obvious that something more is going on here—and equally obvious that if you can
make your work appealing to Hollywood, the truth may not be so awful at all. At least
not for you. And so the most important question for the novelist may be this:

Why are some books made into movies, and others not—and what can I do to make my
book more attractive to Hollywood?

WHAT HOLLYWOOD WANTS

Like publishers, film studios and the companies they deal with look for a good story, well
told with interesting characters, properly formatted. But because of the unique demands
imposed by filmmaking and marketing considerations, they look for other things as well.

Some of these things simply don’t matter to publishers—making it perfectly possible to
have a great book with little film appeal. (Keep in mind, though, that this can be
remedied, even if your book has already been published.)

This is what a studio or production company wants to see:

A CONCEPT that can be communicated in one to three sentences. Agents and studio execs are among the busiest people on the planet. They need to get ideas across to other busy people—quickly.

If this cannot be done, it suggests that the story is not sharply focused, and that conveying the concept to its potential audience in a 30-second trailer is going to be a problem.

The allure of concept is so strong that screenwriter Joe Eszterhas (who, it must be
mentioned, had many previous script sales to his credit) once sold a pitch written on a
napkin for $4 million. How many words can you fit on a napkin?

STRONG VISUAL POTENTIAL. A novel can go anywhere, even inside the characters’
heads. And it can stay there for 300 pages. Film is a visual medium, and interesting
things must pass before the camera.

When not carefully adapted, introspective books make lousy movies. Or, as Groucho
Marx once said: “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too
dark to read.”

A TWO-HOUR LIMIT of sorts; if a story cannot be told in two hours or less (120 script
pages), it may be too costly to shoot. Film is an extraordinarily expensive medium, and
when you’re footing a bill that could run a million dollars per minute of screen time, you
don’t want to hear that some rookie screenwriter thinks his story should run long.
Seasoned veterans with proven track records warrant occasional exceptions; newcomers do not.

A RELATABLE HERO, meaning someone a large segment of the population can relate to,
root for, sympathize or empathize with. If moviegoers aren’t likely to care about what
happens to your hero, Hollywood doesn’t care about your story. There’s simply too much
money at stake to take that kind of chance.

Case in point: the original Pretty Woman script—then titled $3,000—portrayed Vivian as
a crack addict and Edward as a cold-blooded type who picks up hookers when his
girlfriend’s not around. In the end, Vivian tells him to go to hell, and he drives off.

This was changed, over writer J.F. Lawton’s vigorous objections, to the hugely successful
story we now know—in which, of course, Vivian and Edward are much nicer folks, and
wind up together. It’s one of the highest-grossing film of all time.

A THREE-ACT STRUCTURE to your story. The overwhelming majority of commercially
successful films are “classically structured” into three acts. Even those with additional
acts (Star Wars, for example) have three major acts, with the other acts falling within that framework.

Generally speaking, non-classically structured films are the province of independent and
art house films, in which studios have little interest. The few exceptions typically come
from filmmakers who built their reputations on classically-structured films, and then
branched out.

A REASONABLE BUDGET. In the book world, all scenes are in some sense created equal.
The publisher’s cost is the same, whether your characters are sitting down to tea or
blowing up a planet.

This is not true of film, where shooting two characters sipping tea might cost $200,000,
and filming a major battle sequence could run $10 million. If the story seems
prohibitively expensive to film, it will not become a movie unless someone very powerful
pushes the project very hard—and even then, there are limits (currently being explored
by James Cameron).

LOW FAT. Because of time and budgetary constraints, there’s little or no room for
anything that is not absolutely essential to the story. Novelists can spend ten pages
describing a room and its furnishings. A screenwriter might do this in a sentence; going
on for more than a paragraph will mark him/her as an amateur.

When lensing two folks having tea can cost a quarter-million dollars, you have to ask
yourself just how crucial that tea-sipping scene really is.

SEQUEL POTENTIAL. Can a film based on your book be sequeled and prequeled? If so,
that’s a big point in your favor. If the first movie hits, it’s a safer financial bet to release a
sequel to your film than it is to risk vast sums on something new (and, therefore, untested
in the marketplace).

This is not absolutely essential (look at Titanic), but is highly desired—to the point where a
300 prequel is now moving forward.

“FOUR QUADRANT” APPEAL. In tough economic times, studios look to broaden their
audience as much as possible. One way to do this is to base films on already-successful
properties with built-in audiences (books, graphic novels, video games, toys, other
movies).

Another is to make movies that appeal to a larger demographic. The moviegoing
public is composed of four large sections, or quadrants: young male, older male, young
female, older female.

The greater the number of quadrants your project appeals to, the better. Four-quadrant
appeal is the primary reason for the huge success of animated films—and of Avatar and Titanic, the
two biggest-grossing films of all time.

When your story appeals to everyone, it’s hard (though still possible) to go wrong. Four-
quadrant appeal is not a strict necessity (the more people you pull from one quadrant, the
fewer you need to pull from others)—but it’s nice to have.

MERCHANDISING POTENTIAL. Film studios make more money from film-related
merchandising than they do from the films themselves. A lot more. And while films with
low or no merchandising potential continue to be made, the tidal wave is moving the
other way, favoring projects with strong merchandising appeal.

Even so, this isn’t necessarily something you should alter your novel’s storyline to
accommodate; studios are quite adept at wringing merchandising dollars from their films.
Generally speaking, big-budget action and animation films are merchandising bonanzas,
while dramas, thrillers, and comedies have considerably less merchandising appeal.

Obviously, this hasn’t kept studios from making dramas, thrillers, and comedies—which
are less expensive to film and therefore don’t require the kind of Herculean
merchandising blitz needed to keep a marketing juggernaut like the Batman franchise
raking in the billions.

MAKING YOUR STORY FILM-FRIENDLY

Most books are not movies. Some books will never be movies. The majority, however,
could be movies, if carefully adapted. There are several routes to take here.

If your tale is still in manuscript form, you can alter the story to render it more cinematic
by incorporating or emphasizing the elements Hollywood is looking for. (Booklist’s
review of my own novel read: “Reads like a big-budget summer blockbuster.”)

If you’d rather see your manuscript published the way it is, or if your book has already
been published—you can adapt your story by writing (or commissioning) a screenplay
based on the book. In fact, you might want to consider this option even if your story is
already film-friendly.

The reason is simple: nothing conveys a story’s cinematic potential better than a well-
written screenplay. The purpose of a book is to be read and enjoyed for what it is. The
purpose of a screenplay is to play a movie in the reader’s head—to help the reader
visualize the finished film and say, “I want to make this movie, I want to see it on the
screen, and I will pay money to make that happen.”

Chris Lockhart is Story Editor at William Morris/Endeavor, one of the few Hollywood
super-agencies. Before that, he was Executive Story Editor at ICM (another Hollywood
powerhouse). His job is to read and consult on scripts intended for top-end clients
including Mel Gibson, Denzel Washington, Steve Martin, and others.

In his experience, every player in Hollywood asks one question after reading a story: “Is
this a movie?” If the answer is yes, you’ve got a shot at selling your tale. If the answer is
no, you probably don’t—not to that buyer, at any rate.

When approaching Hollywood, it is essential that your story be as much like a movie as
possible—and the best way to do that is to present it as a screenplay. A book raises
questions:

Can we really make this work onscreen? How do we compress all of this into two hours?
Half the book is spent inside the hero’s head—how do we fix that? This book is going to
cost $300 million to shoot—what can we change to make it less expensive?

The plot needs to be simplified, or the story needs more action, or less action, or a more
sympathetic hero, a stronger villain, fewer characters, more characters, a stronger love
story, a higher body count, a three-act structure, a midpoint, stronger character arcs, and
so on.

If we buy the rights, who do we get to do the adaptation, and how much is that going to
cost? And, at the end of all that—will this be a movie?

By presenting a screenplay instead of a book, you avoid such complications, allowing the
prospective buyer to focus on that one, all-important question: is this a movie?

And there’s another very important thing to consider:

MONEY MONEY MONEY

Simply put—and generally speaking—screenplays pay better than novels (and also better
than mere “film rights”). The average advance on a first novel is in the neighborhood of
$15-20,000. The average selling price of a spec screenplay by an unsold writer hovers
somewhere between $300,000 and $600,000.

That’s the average price, mind you, not the top end (which, on rare occasions, can top $5
million). And screenwriters often get bonuses when the picture is made, sequeled,
adapted for television, and so on.

There are other considerations. Novels run 300, 400, even 500 pages of densely-written
text. Screenplays run 100-120 pages of fairly light text. So even if the two formats paid
the same overall—which they don’t—the per-page rate for screenwriting is much higher.

The up-front payment on the book side typically comes in three installments, the last
being upon delivery and approval of the final manuscript. Taken together, these payments
constitute an advance, which must be earned back (via royalties) before you see another
dime.

If the book doesn’t sell well enough for the publisher to recoup the advance from
royalties, you receive no further payment. If the book goes out of print, you can probably
get the rights back.

Spec script payments are typically broken down into several installments. The first comes
when the contract is signed, and is almost always six figures. Later payments come as
certain production milestones are met, with the entire purchase price being due no later
than the first day of principal photography.

If your script is purchased but no movie is made, you keep any payments you’ve
received, but will not receive the full price. You may—or may not—be able to get the
rights back.

Again, and on average, screenplays pay better than novels. At the top end, however, this
ceases to be true. This is so because the purchase price for a screenplay has an upper
limit: once the film has wrapped and bonuses (and so-called “net profits,” if any) have
been paid, the well runs dry. For you, that is; the studio makes money forever.

In the book world, there is no ceiling: every copy sold puts more money in your pocket.
To match this kind of cash machine, the film studio would have to agree to give you
“gross points,” meaning a percentage of the film’s gross profits (before the studio deducts
so many questionable expenses that the hit of the summer seems to have lost money—on
the books, at any rate; this is where “net profits” get such a bad name).

People like James Cameron and Russell Crowe get gross points; writers do not. Doesn’t
matter if you write the next Titanic–you will never (as a screenwriter) be paid a percentage of
the gross.

This is why there are no billionaire screenwriters, and also why there are no pure
screenwriters on Forbes’ list of the world’s highest-earning writers.

Terry Rossio is perhaps the best-paid screenwriter in history, and holds the record for the
highest-selling screenplay ($5.6 million). Still, he says, “there is a brutal glass ceiling for
screenwriters,” and even a clueless director has “ten times the power, ten times the control
over content, ten times the rewards of any screenwriter.” Books may be a writer’s
medium, but film is the province of the director.

SYNERGY

Having a book and a screenplay opens up new possibilities. Interest in either will bump
up interest in the other. The actual sale of either will make sale of the other more likely. If
things go astonishingly well, a savvy agent might be able to play studio interest against
publisher interest and jack up the price on book and screenplay to ridiculous heights.
(This doesn’t happen often, but it happens.)

If the book is published and does well, the screenplay is more likely to be produced (even
if it’s already been purchased and has stalled at the studio). If the book didn’t sell to a
publisher, but the screenplay does sell, publishers will suddenly become interested in the
book. (The reverse is also true: if the script doesn’t sell, and the book sells high, the
screenplay may get a second life.)

If the book was published but did poorly, a successful film will resurrect sales, and
almost certainly make the book an instant national bestseller (which, in turn, may earn
you far more than the film does, and launch a sluggish writing career). A successful film
will make studios want your next movie, and publishers your next book.

If you want to maximize your chances of success—for your story and for yourself as a
writer—it’s best to pursue your stories in more than one medium.

CONTROL

When you write a book, you have the ultimate say on each and every word, comma, and
paragraph. So long as the publisher likes your manuscript, “final cut” is yours. In
Hollywood, the moment you sell your screenplay, you relinquish all control over content.
Period, end of story. (Unless you’re, say, JK Rowling.)

It costs a publisher maybe $50,000 to put out a new hardcover; a studio might spend $50
million on a middle-of-the road film, $250 million on something like Dark Knight—and a
rumored $400 million-plus on James Cameron’s Avatar. With that kind of money on the
line, you bet the buyer calls the shots.

On the other hand, if you have both a book and a screenplay, and Hollywood blows the
movie, you can always point to the book and say, “Look what Hollywood did to my
wonderful book.” And you still have something to be proud of: your book. As for the
film, you can cry all the way to the bank—because you get paid regardless of how well
(or poorly) the movie does.

A FUNNY THING HAPPENS

Another point to consider is this: when a publisher says “No, we don’t want to publish
your book,” that’s generally the end of it, unless the two of you agree to some sort of
revision.

Assuming you or your representative have chosen an appropriate publisher (that is, one
who publishes the sort of thing you’re trying to sell), a turn-down or “pass” generally
means that, in the publisher’s opinion, something doesn’t measure up—most likely the
overall quality of the manuscript.

In Hollywood, a “pass” could mean the same thing—or any one of a hundred other
things, none of which have anything at all to do with the quality of the script. That’s
because, as Chris Lockhart points out, the second question every Hollywood player asks
himself (when the answer to “Is this a movie?” is “Yes!”) is: “Is this a movie I want to
make?”

Often, the answer will be no. Why? Perhaps the budget is too high for that particular
buyer, or someone else has a similar project already in development, or your buyer just
met with Tom Cruise and he wants a romantic comedy, not another action script. Or the
head of the company just finished a shoot in Alaska, and wants to go someplace warm
next time—and your script is set in Antarctica.

Maybe the actor whose company is reading the script is doing court-ordered community
service in Los Angeles, and can’t leave the country to shoot your Sumatran jungle
adventure.

Point being, though most scripts are turned down because they’re not good enough—
good, even great scripts get passed on for other reasons. When that happens, it’s not
uncommon for a buyer to say, “We don’t want to buy this script—but we’d like to see
what else you have,” or “We’d like to hire you to do something else for us.”

If the writing or the story makes an impression—really makes an impression—you might
be hired to flesh out a concept or a treatment, help with story development, or to do a
rewrite on another script that just isn’t working and no one knows why.

If the company you’re dealing with is a WGA signatory—and most “real” buyers are—
they must pay you no less than the WGA minimum for your work (and you must join the
WGA). That comes to roundabout $50-90,000 for a full script with treatment, revision,
and polish. Remember, a script is generally 100-120 pages.

Because of this, because not every script that’s bought gets made, and because many
scripts that are made wind up hitting the screen with later writers’ names on them—there
are many working screenwriters doing quite well turning out scripts that never become
movies, or that do become movies but have someone else’s name on them by the time
they hit the screen.

Ever heard of a novelist making a few hundred grand a year writing books that aren’t
published?

THE HARD SELL

You should be aware that it’s harder to sell a script than it is to sell a book—again
because of the vast difference in production costs. When you’re putting $100 million on
the line, you tend to be picky—despite occasional onscreen evidence to the contrary.

ADAPTING YOUR BOOK

Once you’ve decided that your book should be a movie, and should be adapted into
screenplay format, you have three basic choices: write it yourself, get someone else to
help you, or hire someone else to write it for you. Here are the basic pros and cons of
each approach…

WRITE IT YOURSELF

On the pro side, this costs you nothing but time. On the con side, it’s going to take a lot
of time, particularly so if you’re not used to writing screenplays. The format is radically
different, and so is the mindset.

Don’t let that 120 pages fool you—a screenplay can be every bit as difficult to write as a novel. The challenge of the screenwriter’s art is to say more with less, using fewer words
to convey greater meaning.

The most difficult transition of all is going from novelist to screenwriter. This is because
novelists tend to write long, and long blocks of anything—description, dialogue, even
action—are the surest mark of the amateur scriptwriter. Still, given enough time—one
can master both forms.

Questions that come to mind once this decision has been made:

How long is it going to take to become a good screenwriter? In most cases, the answer is
years.

Is there a way to speed that up? Yes if you work with—and learn from—someone who’s
already there, and is also good at teaching.

Can I get a good script on the market faster? Again yes—if you work with an
accomplished screenwriter, or have them write the first script for you while you work to
perfect your new craft for future scripts.

CONSULT WITH SOMEONE ELSE

A second option is to consult with an experienced screenwriter or—better yet—
screenwriter/novelist. This person can review your manuscript or novel with a practiced
eye toward screen potential, and tell you where things stand. He or she can also suggest
specific changes to consider during the adaptation.

The best route here is to find the right person (see below) and work with them to come up
with a detailed outline for the screenplay. Given professional input and some flexibility
on your part, this should at least provide you with a solid three-act structure, proper
pacing, a relatable hero and good character arcs.

Of course, it’s still up to you to make all of that work. You can check in again with your
consultant every thirty pages or so to see how you’re doing, and to make sure you don’t
wander too far astray or break some screenwriting rule you didn’t know existed.

The downside here is that most screenwriters write several bad scripts before showing
any real promise, and going out with (trying to sell) a not-good script—to say nothing of
a bad one—often does more harm than good.

To be fair, it should be noted that very few aspiring screenwriters are working with
professional guidance—which should make your learning curve faster. Still, if it takes
you a long time to become a good screenwriter, those consulting fees can add up—quite
possibly to the point where it would have been cheaper to hire someone else to write the
script in the first place.

HIRE A SCREENWRITER

Hiring someone who knows their way around a screenplay is the fastest way to ensure
quality results. WGA members are out, unless you have $50,000 or more to put on the
table (WGA members are contractually forbidden to work for less; those at the top of the
heap often ask—and receive—$1 million or more, typically from studios).

So how can you be sure that a probably-unproduced scriptwriter knows his (or her) stuff?

Look for someone who’s been optioned by a real producer or company (as opposed to
their father, sister, or uncle), or someone who’s been in development with a real company
or filmmaker (same caveats). If genuine industry professionals have shown strong interest
in your writer’s work, that puts him/her very far above the cast of thousands of would-be
screenwriters.

Another thing you can look for is someone who’s placed very highly in a prestigious
screenwriting competition. And be warned: there are many bozo script contests, designed
more to fatten the wallets of their creators than anything else. Placing highly, even
winning one of these may mean little. As Lockhart says: “Hey man, you know—
somebody’s gotta win.”

The Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting program, on the other hand, is run by the same
organization that hands out the Academy Awards. If there’s one competition that matters,
this is it. Those who’ve placed in the top 10 have gone on to write scripts like Air
Force One, Erin Brockovitch, Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen, Pocohontas,
Arlington Road, and 28 Days (among many others).

Ideally, you want someone who also knows what it’s like to write (and adapt) a novel,
because they’ll have a better understanding of where you’re coming from, and what it
takes to get your story from 300-plus pages to 120.

You should also be looking for someone who sees the story as you do, and is interested in
keeping the story’s “heart”—its most essential elements—alive and beating strongly in
the new medium. Many things may need to change during the adaptation process—but
the heart should remain.

This doesn’t mean you should be closed to suggested alterations—only that you must
know when to say enough is enough, and this is no longer the story you want to tell.
Again, to help ensure that the script does reflect the tale you want to tell, work with the
screenwriter to create a detailed outline before moving forward with the script itself.

This will serve as a blueprint for the finished script, ensuring that things stay on track
during the writing process. Major deviations from the agreed-upon outline should be
approved by you before being written.

Check in every 30 pages or so to make sure things are going as planned, and then consult
again at the end, because you’ll want the writer to go back and do a “polish” to tighten
things up, correct the inevitable small inconsistencies, add texture, improve the
occasional line, implement good ideas that came late, weed out typos, and so forth.

Most (not all, but most) screenwriters who’ve made some kind of progress in the industry
live in Los Angeles. If they weren’t here to start with, they moved here to be close to the
business. Something to keep in mind when shopping for a writer.

Also keep in mind that, like everyone else, screenwriters have bills to pay. The classic
amateur move is asking a writer to work for nothing up front, and a percentage of the sale
price if the script sells. L.A. papers and online classifieds are littered with such offers.

As Rocky Balboa might say, “it’s simple mathematics:” if the screenwriter does his own
script and sells it, he gets 100% of the money. Why should he put his fabulous idea aside
and work on yours—for free?

Great ideas are more common than you might think. Doing those ideas justice for the
duration of a screenplay (or novel) is rare. That’s what good writers are paid to do.

CREDIT

Credit is very important in Hollywood, and is generally broken down like this: screenplay
(who wrote the actual words on the page), story (who thought up the story the words tell),
and—in the case of scripts based upon works in another medium—source credit (”based
on the book by,” for example).

When it comes to screen credits, the WGA (Writers Guild of America) has the final say
on scripts that fall under its jurisdiction. This includes all studio films, and most others
with significant budgets. If someone else wrote your screenplay, they will be accorded
screenwriting credit.

If the screenplay follows your book precisely (which is unlikely), or
you dictate every single thing that happens in the screenplay (also unlikely, especially if
you’re new at this), you will get sole story credit. If the screenplay incorporates elements
thought up by both you and the screenwriter, you will share story credit. (Which is often
good for a bonus payment, and can help you get future gigs.)

Source credit is yours and yours alone, but only if you know enough to put that clause in
your contract when you option or sell the screenplay. If you don’t insert that clause, you
may or may not receive source credit.

And have no doubt: you want that clause. Because then every person who sees the film,
whether in the theater or at home—in fact every person who even sees the trailer or the
movie poster—will also see that the movie is based on your book.

A certain percentage of those people will then buy your book. And maybe your next
book, too. And the one after that. This means money in your pocket.

One more word about credits. Because the buyer (typically a studio) controls the script
absolutely, they’re free to hire additional writers, and often do. There are many reasons
for this—some good, most bad, but the point is, it happens. A lot.

And so it’s entirely possible that the script will be so heavily rewritten that the WGA
decides that your screenwriter will no longer receive screenwriting credit. If the same
thing happens to the story, both you and your screenwriter could lose your story credits.

But you can never, ever lose your source credit. Because a source credit is not a
screenwriting credit, the WGA has no jurisdiction whatsoever. If your contract says you
get source credit, that’s it. No power on earth can change it.

Aside from who buys your script, it’s probably the only thing about the movie that is
absolutely, totally, one hundred percent under your control.

Until you start directing.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Repeat Offenders: Why Repetition is Bad Bad Bad by John Robert Marlow

PETE & REPETE

There’s an old joke that goes like this:

“Pete and Repete sat on a fence. Pete fell off. Who was left?”

“Repete”

“Pete and Repete sat on a fence. Pete fell off. Who was left…?”

The joke continues until the guy answering the question wises up. Too many budding authors never do. I see this again and again and again. And again. The basic issue comes down to this: writers are expected—by agents, managers, editors, readers; everyone who matters, really—to have large vocabularies. Repetition indicates that the writer in question either: a) doesn’t know any better, or; b) can’t be bothered getting it right. The first screams “amateur;” the second, “lazy.” Neither is a word you want applied to you. Repetition can be deadly in any one of several, all-too-common forms:

REPEATING WORDS

As a general rule, avoid using the same word (or similar words) multiple times in quick succession, as this makes for a poor read. Word repetition creeps up on the best of writers, who often don’t notice while lost in the throes of creative passion. Professional writers do, however, notice on their next pass—and correct the problem before anyone else sees the manuscript. Amateurs don’t notice, or correct.

Often, a word will repeat twice in the same sentence, or in adjacent sentences. Occasionally—as with the sentence you just read—this is okay. But writers who are unaware of repetition tend to do it a lot, and most instances are not okay.

A few simple examples: “She was whisked off in an unmarked car, which took her to the airport. Twenty minutes later, they were off to Belize.” “He pulled his gun, stuck Harry’s gun in his belt, and crept down the hall.” “Joan cried and ran to him and threw her arms around him.” In each of these sentences, one word repeats too often—off, gun, and and—and must be changed, even if that means restructuring the sentence. (Notice my artful use of the word and, three times in a row.)

A slightly more complex example: “Joan’s father thanked the police department and the public on his and his family’s behalf.” Here, his is the more obvious problem, but and is also a repeat—if lesser—offender. A simpler phrasing would be: “Joan’s father thanked the police and the public on the family’s behalf.” Because Joan’s father is a member of the family, the same meaning is conveyed.

This sentence has three repeaters: “Tears welled up in Bixby’s eyes and he averted his eyes to avoid O’Shea’s sympathetic gaze. O’Shea gazed out the window.”

Other instances are (or should be) more obvious: “The trail of blood suddenly stopped in a pool of blood at the edge of the road.” A quick fix: “The blood-trail stopped at the roadside, where it formed a small pool.” Another example: “Joan called Madge and said she was back and safe and sorry she’d missed their appointment.” (Note the non-artful employment of the word and in this sentence.)

As an editor, it’s common to see the same word used two or three times in quick succession. Every now and then, I’ll see one word used five, six, even seven times in the space of three, perhaps four sentences. More often than not, that word is he, him, his, she, her, or hers. Keep a sharp eye on him, her, and the rest of the gang.

REPEATING NAMES

Names are among the most common repeat offenders. Frequently, this occurs when a character’s name is used in dialogue, and then in narration—or vice versa. For example: ““Linda, wake up.” Linda heard the voice, as if in a dream.”

Occasionally, it happens when the writer is trying to sort out the choreography of a scene—as in the following sequence (the Sailors and the Skippers are rival gangs):

“Then one of the Sailors pointed toward Brother Sam. Two Skippers walked toward Brother Sam, the other one joined several other Sailors, who immediately circled him. Uncle Nathan and Peter quickly flanked Brother Sam.

Nick and Gordon were making their way to Brother Sam from the other side of the room, as the two Skippers reached Brother Sam and said something. Brother Sam waved off Nick and Gordon. Everyone, including several Skippers at the dance, breathed a sigh of relief.

Brother Sam said something to Peter and Uncle Nathan. They nodded. Then Brother Sam quickly followed the two Skippers out of the auditorium.”

All told, that’s two Uncle Nathans, two Peters, two Nick and Gordons, three Sailors, four Skippers, and eight Brother Sams. Instead of clarifying events, such repetition tends to confuse matters.

At other times, an author will simply repeat the character’s name, every time that character is referred to (even if he’s the only guy in the scene)–so instead of mixing things up a bit and saying John, he, him, and his, the writer will say John, John, John, and John’s. For the reader–to say nothing of the editor–that way lay madness.

THE DREADED DOUBLE

The worst repeating-word offender is the “double,” in which the same word appears twice in a row. That makes it screamingly obvious–which, in the eyes of editors and agents, makes the writer that much less attentive for missing it. Often, doubles happen where sentences join, like this:

Bill handed the crocodile to Bob. Bob screamed when it bit his arm off at the shoulder. Shouldering his backpack, Bill bent down and picked Bob’s arm up off the street. The street was slippery, and Bill fell on his ass. His ass was sore where he hit the sidewalk. The sidewalk was slick because it had been raining. Rainwater rushed like a raging river along the street beside Bob and the crocodile. The crocodile bit Bob’s other arm off at the elbow, and fell into the water. The water swept the beast down the street and into the sewer, along with Bob’s arm.

Okay, I made that up—but I cannot tell you how many times I’ve seen the double in action, albeit in slightly less absurd scenes.

“Doubles” can also occur in the middle of a sentence: “He told me that that was the only way I’d ever see my children again.” Grammatically correct, but awkward. The same precise meaning is conveyed by the following sentence: “He told me that was the only way I’d ever see my children again.” (Come to think of it, the word “ever” could also be cut from this sentence, though its inclusion arguably makes the moment stronger.) As long as the set-up for this line adequately explains just what “the only way” is, all should be well.

Sometimes a character name will lead you into (or close to) a double. I found the following two sentences in the same manuscript: “She turned to Turner.” And “Turner turned toward the sound of the explosion.” Now, if the guy’s name had been Finnegan—no problemo. Something to think about when you use search-and-replace to change a character name throughout the manuscript.

Overall, the “double” is the easiest type of repetition to spot and correct. Writers who fail to catch these most likely sent the manuscript out the moment they typed “The End,” without bothering to read and “proof” it from start to finish.

Exceptions: Few and far between. “Doubles” are sometimes employed for comedic effect. Occasionally, when used in dialogue, they’ll indicate a character who habitually stutters (Ken in A Fish Called Wanda), or who is now stuttering under extreme stress (most often fear or grief). Very occasionally, a passage will be unclear or read awkwardly if repetition is completely eliminated. Rarely, “doubles” will result from an unavoidable sentence structure—one that cannot be changed without becoming awkward. Be aware, though, that this almost never happens, and should not be used as an excuse to leave a double in place. Always, always try to eliminate doubles.

DISTANT REPLAYS

Repetition can also be a problem when a word repeats pages, even chapters after its last occurrence. The more unusual the word, the less frequently it should occur. No one’s going to notice that you used the word “man” or “woman” two pages ago—but throw in “hermaphrodite” on page 26, and you can be sure that readers who see “hermaphrodite” on page 347 will remember having seen it before. The same is true of repeating phrases.

REPEATING PHRASES

Pretty much the same logic applies here. Sometimes, our own favorite phrases—ones we use in daily conversation—will creep into the writing. Which is fine, so long as they’re appropriate and well-placed. But what often happens is this: we’ll use the same phrase two, three, or more times without realizing that we’re repeating ourselves. Or we’ll think up a cool phrase and put it in, not realizing that we’ve already used it.

To the reader, this looks—at best—like lazy writing. At worst, it comes off like the ramblings of an old-timer who can’t remember what he told you two minutes ago—and so proceeds to tell you the same thing all over again.

Exceptions must have a purpose, and usually appear in dialogue. Perhaps the character repeating himself really is an addled old codger, and you’re illustrating this point by having him repeat himself. Or maybe he’s an ass who repeats instructions because he’s treating a subordinate like an idiot. Or he’s talking to someone who has trouble remembering things. Or (and I hope you’ve noticed that I’ve now begun three consecutive sentences with the same word)—my favorite—a character repeats a phrase he’s used before, tipping off the reader (or another character, or both) that he’s the same guy who used this phrase earlier.

This last technique was employed to good effect in the 2003 film The Italian Job—with a twist: here (spoiler coming), Stella’s conning Steve, who doesn’t know her but did know (and murdered) her father. Without even thinking about it, Stella uses a turn of phrase often employed by her father. Steve picks up on this, immediately realizing that she’s somehow connected to the man he murdered—and that Stella means him no good.

Phrases can be repeated for comedic, ironic, or dramatic effect. The film A Perfect Murder makes wonderful use of the ironic turnaround: lines like “What if there were no tomorrow?” and “That’s not happiness to see me” are each voiced by Steven and Emily (to each other, at different times) in emotionally charged scenes dripping with tension. The movie 300 has a magnificent turnaround line (three, actually) involving Queen Gorgo and Theron.

In Strange Days, Mace calls Lenny paranoid for thinking he’s being followed. Later, when their car is burning rubber to escape a hail of machine gun fire, Lenny says: “Oh no we’re not being followed, Lenny. Don’t be so paranoid, Lenny.”

Each of these exceptions has one thing in common: in every case, the repetition is intentional.

PARROTED DIALOGUE: THE “WILLIAM SHATNER MOMENT”

Dialogue is “parroted” when one character says something, and another immediately and unnecessarily repeats all or part of what was just said. The effect is, at best, comedic. Which is fine if: a) you’re writing comedy, and; b) the repetition is both intentional and funny. Probably ninety nine percent of the time, that’s not the case.

When Star Trek’s Captain Kirk (played by William Shatner) did this in the television series, it was intended to be dramatic. Today, it seems unintentionally comedic—a sort of so-bad-it’s-funny moment. Still, we groan rather than laugh.

Too many writers insert this kind of thing into their work without a second thought. Unfortunately, the technique is so overused it’s become a joke—literally: in the film The Long Kiss Goodnight, we see the following exchange:

Henessey: We found a note that’s in her handwriting.
Nathan: She saw a note?
Henessey: Who are you, William Shatner?

Here, it’s funny—and intended to be so. More often—almost always, in fact—it marks the writer as a novice, and swiftly becomes annoying.

Exception: When done—and done well—for comedic effect.

HE SAID, SHE SAID

One of the most common repeat offenders is the “He Said, She Said Syndrome,” in which every (or nearly every) line of dialogue is followed by “he said,” “she said,” or “[character name] said.” I once counted 34 of these in a row. Take it from an editor: few things get old faster than this.

Which does not mean that you should start substituting words like chortled, snorted, barked, and spat for said—but that’s a topic for another day.

INTENTIONAL REPETITION

Intentional repetition—whether of words, phrases, or whole passages—rarely works. I recall one writer who repeated entire paragraphs and conversations, with two different characters, in different places. His intention was to demonstrate an uncanny similarity in the lives of two strangers destined to meet. The effect was a distracting read during which I wondered why he’d take up so much space (in the first of an unpublished trilogy of phone book-sized manuscripts) with such obvious repetition–while at the same time marveling at what an unbelievable coincidence it was that the same exact events and conversations were taking place in the lives of two perfect strangers.

Any time you’re thinking of repeating something intentionally, ask yourself why. Then ask yourself whether the repetition has the intended effect. Then show it to someone else and ask them (without explaining your intended effect beforehand), because you’re biased.

For exceptions, see those listed under Repeating Phrases, above.

CONCLUSION

Repetition is, well, repetitive. As an author, you’re expected to have a lot to say. You’re also expected to have an unusually large vocabulary with which to say it. Repetition flies in the face of both expectations. It’s like having two noses, when you should have only one: it makes you look bad bad bad.

So give your writing a facelift, and dump those doubles—along with your other repeats.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved

Bouncing Eyeballs and Other Unintended Meanings by John Robert Marlow

LITERAL VS. FIGURATIVE

Unintended meanings are mood-killers. This is as true on the page as is it is in life: you say one thing, your listener hears another, and trouble soon follows. They heard every word you said, and accurately too—but they took those words to mean something very different from what you intended.

Consider the following passage:

“His eyes bounced between Teddy, Mandy, the girl, the geologist, then back to Franklin.” Read literally, this tells us that “his eyes” are flying around the room, bouncing between characters like a pinball between posts. And while it’s true that very few readers are going to take this figure-of-speech sentence literally, many will nonetheless read it the wrong way. When they do, one of two things will happen: they will stop, go back, and read it again to clarify—or they will laugh. The first reaction is never good; it “breaks” the read and kills momentum. In a work not intended to be comedic, the second reaction is also not-good.

When I first read this bit (an actual line from one of the manuscripts I’ve edited, though the names have been changed to protect the innocent), it conjured up images of John Anderton in the film Minority Report, chasing his freshly-dropped eyeballs as they bounced down the corridor at Precrime. Aiding and abetting this impression was the fact that, in this particular manuscript, one of the first murder victims had his eyeballs scooped from his head—making a literal sentence about bouncing eyeballs somewhat more credible than might otherwise be the case.

Another zinger: “Judy’s eyebrows jumped like she was impressed, then walked toward the front door and stopped at the fish tank.” That’s one lively pair of eyebrows. It is of course Judy doing the walking. So here again, we have a perfect example of grammar gone slightly askew, and completely changing the sentence’s intended meaning–so much so that, in this instance, there is no multiple choice: the unintended meaning–walking eyebrows–is the only one present. “Judy raised her eyebrows as if impressed, then walked toward the front door and stopped at the fish tank,” on the other hand, would at least be clear, if poorly constructed.

DANGEROUS SITUATIONS

You might expect such unintended meanings to be rare, but this is not so. Most manuscripts have at least a few—admittedly less bizarre—multiple-choice sentences. The vast majority are unique to the stories in which they appear. Still, when you’ve read enough manuscripts, you begin to notice that certain. grammatically dangerous situations lend themselves to particular variants of this problem.

One that pops up consistently goes something like this: Our heroes—call them Dick and Gwendolyn—are trapped in an old warehouse, where they’re hunted by armed thugs. Dick ambushes Thug One and takes his gun. Telling Gwendolyn to stay put, Dick moves forward, gun at the ready. Suddenly, Thugs Two and Three appear. The next line is:

Dick shot Gwendolyn a glance.

Tense scene, mounting suspense, edge-of-the-seat reading and then—Dick shot Gwendolyn? Of course not but, thanks to unfortunate grammar, that’s the way it reads. And that’s your reader’s first impression. It doesn’t matter how skillful you’ve been to this point, or how much suspense, drama, and reader involvement you’ve managed to create—it’s all gone, right there. Shot to hell, you might say, along with poor Gwendolyn. The good news is, the heroine will recover. The bad news is, the writer may not.

Quick tip: when you’ve got characters running around with projectile weapons, thinking they may have to shoot someone, never—ever—use the word “shot” unless someone has in fact fired a gun (or crossbow, or whatever). In different circumstances, this phrasing is perfectly acceptable; here, it is not.

MUDDLED MEANINGS

Unintended meanings are not always so dramatic but, dramatic or otherwise, they do always interfere with a clear, smooth-flowing read. This holds true for both fiction and nonfiction.

In this example, we have a character kneading a small, pliable object: “Now the size and shape of a pistachio, or tiny football, he achieved what he wanted and gently laid it to rest inside a wooden cigar box.” Read literally, this says that he—meaning our character—has somehow become the size of a pistachio.

More often, unintended meanings are mundane, and lead readers astray on such simple matters as choreography (specific physical actions and the order in which they occur), or which character performed a specific action or spoke a particular line of dialogue:

“O’Rourke was dead, shot in the head by an off duty cop fleeing the scene of a robbery.” It’s clear that O’Rourke is dead—but was he shot while he (O’Rourke) was fleeing the scene of a robbery, or was he shot by a cop who was himself fleeing the scene of a robbery? Even without crooked cops (which this story had), the meaning is not quite clear. Also unclear is whether the person fleeing the scene of the robbery actually committed that robbery.

The addition of a single word would clarify this: “O’Rourke was dead, shot in the head by an off duty cop while fleeing the scene of a robbery.” (To get the opposite meaning, add two words: “O’Rourke was dead, shot in the head by an off duty cop who was fleeing the scene of a robbery.” Still, the phrasing itself—a cop fleeing a crime scene—runs sufficiently against expectations as to warrant rephrasing, or the addition of a second, clarifying sentence. Even though the meaning is technically clear, the reader may think he’s misread it.)

Another example: “I pulled into the trees, trying to get Frank’s car out of sight and then turned around so I could see whoever came down the road and waited.” This reads as if the narrator is hoping to see someone who comes down the road and waits, but is meant to tell us that the narrator is waiting to see someone who comes down the road. The unfortunate addition of the phrase “Frank’s car” introduces a point of possible confusion here: is the narrator looking at Frank’s car and trying to ensure that he himself cannot be seen by anyone who’s already in (or might get into) Frank’s car—or is he himself driving Frank’s car? A third point of confusion: is the narrator turning around, or is he turning a car around?

“It’s a friend of hers, her son, punk kid.” Is it a friend of hers, or a friend of her son’s? And who’s the punk kid—her son, or her friend’s son?

““He really does look much healthier again,” she said as they walked into the market.” In this scene, two women are walking together—but which is speaking? Because the speaker is not identified, the line could be read as having been spoken by either character.

As writers, we’re expected to have an exceptional facility with language. With few exceptions (political speechwriting and a few ex-presidents come to mind), we are in the business of making ourselves perfectly clear. Unintended ambiguity—“multiple choice sentences” that can be read in more than one way—do a disservice to both reader and writer.

Exceptions are few: situations where a character is deliberately employing multiple meanings (think of Klaatu in the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still, saying “I’m a friend to the earth”), or where you as author are doing the same for purposes of deception, comedic effect, etc.

CONCLUSION

Unintended meanings are the antithesis of good writing. The reader is taken out of the moment, plucked from the world of the story like Dorothy from Kansas, or Neo from the Matrix. What should have been dramatic is now confusing or–worse–comedic. The spell we’ve worked so hard to weave is now broken; the reader who a moment ago didn’t know the real world existed, now marveling at our ineptitude.

Multiple meanings creep into our work—and, often, remain there—for the same reason typos do: we as authors know how the sentence is supposed to read, and so that’s the way we read it, regardless of what’s actually on the page. For us, only one meaning is possible. For someone unfamiliar with the work (and with what was going through our heads when we wrote it), the meaning of each sentence is conveyed by the words of which it is composed—and nothing else.

So as you write, keep this question in the back of your mind: Is there any possible way to misread this sentence? If the answer is yes, rephrase it. When the manuscript is complete, proof it with the same question in mind. Then have someone else do the same. Hunt these sentences down without hesitation, pity, or remorse.

Then kill them—before they kill you.

Author John Robert Marlow is available for professional editing, development, and consultation. If you’d like help taking your work to the next level, contact John here.

JRM

copyright © by John Robert Marlow
all rights reserved