Mythic Impact

Building a Story World

2012-02-28T04:52:00.003-08:00

“Stare at your world until you discover what it has to offer you,” Jack Hodgins

Landscape

The amount of detail you develop for your landscape will depend on the level of its ‘character’ you want it to be in your story. If you are writing an adventure that highlights physical endurance and challenge like the Indiana Jones series, then your setting details will be extensive. However if the bulk of your story occurs within a few city blocks, such as West Side Story, then you need the level of a background stage setting—just enough to ground your reader comfortably and realistically in location. You still need the exact specifics to match the tone and atmosphere.

You can either begin from the inside out by imagining the location of your setting visually, and finding the right pieces to fit; or you begin from a natural habitat and focus on the specifics that define your atmosphere and story questions.

For example, perhaps you have a town set on a mountain. You can either choose an existing mountain town and research its natural habitat, or you can choose a mountain, from wherever you want it to be—study its natural landscape and then transplant a town from somewhere else to reside there. The landscape will give the reality to the fiction.

The moors portray an image of beauty, wildness, danger, freedom and loneliness. Desert, ocean, forest, meadow, stream, canyon and island all have distinct characteristics. Even if your character will be interacting with all kinds of terrain there will still be one that is ‘home’ and one in particular that will seem threatening.

Exercise: Choose a key place in your setting. What natural landscape could hold common ground across centuries, and what capabilities could descendants inherit? List examples that could carry both the foundation of setting and the echo of atmosphere.

Share: What kind of terrain lures you for rest and restoration.

Metaphors

2012-02-24T09:17:00.002-08:00

In her essay “Talent Is Not Enough,” taken from her book on writing for children of the same title, Mollie Hunter says that a writer is like a person locked in a cell for life, who learns things they desperately want to convey and develops a code to tap out the messages on the wall of the cell. “And all the time he taps he is asking himself, Is there anyone out there listening? Can they hear me? Do they understand?”

Often times the words come out in metaphors that we need to decipher, even to ourselves. We are drawn to truths before we may know what they mean. Each of us may only glimpse pieces. So we need to share together to see the whole. Metaphors give us the creative imagination to see truth in fresh ways. And to repackage them when they’ve become clichés.

A Christmas Carol, by Dickens has become a well-worn, well-loved story that touches multiple themes. The characters themselves have become familiar echoes. It’s a holiday favorite, and yet after how many times watching do we think we know the story and may have forgotten key parts? Heart parts.

On a Christmas special, the Dr. Who series re-told the story with familiarity and yet such differences spread throughout that kept viewers on their toes. From set design to story line, past and future merged. The streets resembled Dickens’ England and yet felt odd enough to wonder what had changed, pulling you into the story immediately. For one example, the set designers had made everything out of steel riveted together. And all the windows were round or half-round. Not noticed immediately, or perhaps not at all, until reading the production notes but the effect had a metaphoric impact.

Journal Prompt:

Take one aspect of your setting and replace a few natural parts with another texture. They make be the same color and shape but different. Do one version is subtle tones and another as wildly opposite. How does it change the view?

For example: Take a main street and turn all the wooden buildings into another material, but keep same shape. Or turn all the buildings into breathing wood.

Building a Story World

2012-02-21T04:34:00.000-08:00

Another creative insight into building your world comes through map-making, even if you can barely draw a line. It’s a wonderful way to combine brainstorming and concrete research at the same time. And if you add colored pencils and crayons—well it’s a delightful nurturing oasis.

Mapmaking.

1. Draw your own, especially if this helps you understand your world.

2. Or if unable to draw, trace. Or get an old atlas and do cut and past to make up your own country.

3. Go into research sections of libraries and ask to look at old maps. Make copies. Then turn them into your own. Several years ago a friend sent me a map of a small town in Holland, from around the 12^th Century. It has figures on the streets showing what commerce was done where. A youth is leading sheep down one path. On another is a wagon loaded with produce. The characters of the town are included with the simple street names. One day it will make it into a novel.

4. Look at old city maps, or the tourist versions of historical towns. Then adapt the parts you want.

5. Take the maps and turn them backwards, or upside down.

But set a timetable for your maps and research, especially in early draft stages when you’re still exploring possibilities. Otherwise you might forget to write.

Share: What part of map-making gives you the most creative infusion?

Building a Story World

2012-02-14T04:16:00.000-08:00

Build to Specifics

Once again, just as we can walk around our homes in the dark, knowing exactly where we are, so do our characters. Draw floor plans. Which board in the hallway squeaks? Mark the outside as well. For example, if on a farm, sketch out where the different animals spend the day. Walk around in your world so that you could find your way through the yard in a snowstorm. Or know where the ropes need to be to guide you.

Floor Plans

For each personal building your character inhabits that is important to them, make a floor plan. Begin one.

1. Draw a simple space and write where the main windows, doors, and furniture go.

2. Take old photos, if using an historical place, and make a visual reproduction.

3. Stop by your local bookstore at a quiet time of their day and look through re-modeling magazines. Pick one with floor plans. Do the same with color design decorating. Especially one that combines different cultural themes as well. Use whatever combination fits.

4. For landmarks, look for blueprints in the library. Choose a key feature for your world and take it from another. For example, take a clock tower from medieval Italy and place it in New York City.

5. Keep a city current to today, but make its underground the same as two hundred years ago. Although technically not an Urban Fantasy, the Beauty and the Beast series is an excellent example of showing two disparate living conditions above and below the streets of New York.

Share: If a new person, friend or foe, walked into your character’s bedroom what is the one area that would draw their immediate attention?

Building a Story World

2012-02-07T10:05:00.000-08:00

For paintings or photographs read for theme, story, and image. When we ‘see’ the effect of micro scenes, we can then apply the techniques to our fictional scenes deepening their effect.

1) Journal

a. What makes a photograph or a painting interesting to look at?

b. Why do some catch your attention?

2) Read

a. Choose a photograph or painting that represents either the actual look of a particular place in your world, or the emotion that you want to convey.

3) Respond

a. What do you first notice about this scene?

b. What is the attitude or feeling portrayed?

c. What images, topics jump out at you?

d. Do you think this picture is staged? Why? Why not?

e. What does this imply about this person?

f. What does this painting ‘say’ to you? What is the ‘voice’?

Exercise: Sentence-part two.

For those who posted their opening sentence, choose someone else’s first sentence and write up a short paragraph, using the emotional connections you anticipated for your own paragraph. Re-post, putting the original line in italics.

Share: If, or how, using another character line changed an emotional connection, or not.

Mystery

2012-02-03T12:05:00.000-08:00

Sometimes we don’t need to search for mystery. It can happen during an ordinary day. The unexpected happens, either positively or negatively, shifting our perspective into a whole new direction. Suddenly the ground shifts out and the familiar, the foundation, is cracked opening into a world we do not know and cannot understand.

Choices follow. Do we get out a flashlight and investigate the new terrain, however hesitantly, or hide away and hope the world tilts back to normal in the morning? Perhaps a little of both enables ourselves, and our characters, to cope with sudden change.

In the movie Larry Crowne, when he is called into the office for a special meeting, Larry confidently expects to receive yet another employee reward. Instead he is fired for a supposed lack of education. Which is a total mystery to him. He grew up in an era when high-school education was the only requirement and work experience became the criteria for advancement and evaluation. Now none of it is considered valid? When and how did the life rules change? Or did they really?

Although still in shock, Larry begins to build a new life trying to adapt to a new culture for him—college. Like a young child entering the world of kindergarten everything is a mystery. Some days are extremely difficult and bewildering. However he also embraces the unknown with curiosity, changing not only his life but also those around him—especially his worn out, jaded instructor. He finds a way to blend his past and present into a rich discovery.

Journal Prompt:

Put your character in a situation where she goes with expectations for a promotion, or an engagement, or a birthday surprise party, and instead receives the opposite. How does she process the ‘mystery’ of everything so right going so wrong?

Building a Story World

2012-01-31T03:58:00.000-08:00

“The tourist may look at a place and think ‘What does it do? What is it like? How much does it please me?’ but the fiction writer must look at a place and think ‘What does it suggest? What does it mean to me? What does it mean to my characters?’” Jack Hodgins

He suggests that in order to achieve this perspective, a writer needs to construct a place—“real or invented”—rather than describe it. By choosing specific details you both impress the landscape on your reader and connect them to the meaning of your world.

Here’s part one of an exercise I sometimes give my workshop students. Write a brief few sentences about a character hanging laundry on an outside line.

Seems pretty ordinary—perhaps even a little dull. At the moment it is only a beginning point of a possible reality giving perhaps character and place, but not yet a voice; and perhaps curiosity, but not yet an authentic emotional connection.

However I have yet to have any sentence even come close to matching another as

each writer chooses the unique aspects that interest them.

The character: boy, girl, man, woman, human or alien—what kind? Are they bored or anxious? Normal chore or forced labor?

Hangs laundry: how by old-fashioned string and clothes pegs, or by magic, or electronically? Is it a difficult chore or easy.

Outside line: where—isolated mountaintop, crowded slum, space ship balcony, or cookie cutter suburb? Is it dark outside or light? Windy or not?

The chosen detail for each key focus brings up several shapes to a simple sentence.

Exercise: Write a brief sentence or two, “A character goes outside to feed an animal.”

Share: Post your first sentence. Next week I’ll add the part two.

Memory

2012-01-27T01:20:00.000-08:00

Even when the glass is smudged, a mirror reflects an image. So too do memories, even though sometimes they shift and blur like a house of mirrors giving a distorted emphasis. But then we can filter and process and hold onto the parts that have meaning.

“A fantasy novel is more than an adventure or a quest. Rather it is a series of image-repeating glasses, a hall of mirrors that brings past and future into focus and calls it the present.” Jane Yolen

And this series of repeating images also connects with us in our personal histories, our personal daily adventures and quests. They’re not always easy to grasp though because of other influences and often jaded opinions.

In the movie Larry Crowne, Larry’s navy experience is dismissed by a thoughtless co-worker as irrelevant because of him only being a cook. Yet when Larry himself finally has the opportunity to share those memories in a safe environment, we see what an enriching life that opportunity gave him. His memories hold his audience rapt as he shares traveling the world, crossing the equator, and seeing the Northern Lights, places we often only see in magazines and television. He lived it. And with humor he also shares peeling potatoes, serving up pasta, and doing dishes. Day-to-day adventure.

His perspective takes that particular season of his life and then holds in his memory the parts that matter, the parts that make him real. It has focus in the present.

Journal Prompt:

1. Take a memory your main character has from childhood that she remembers with extreme fondness. Then have a relative turn the actual memory upside down. What impact does that have?

2. Repeat with a memory that causes fear.

Building a Story World

2012-01-24T04:12:00.000-08:00

There are three main obstacles to our writing goals: Perfectionism. Fear. Procrastination. When we develop an ongoing creative process, we can sidestep all three. Our world building becomes an exciting place that we desire to spend time in, instead of an overwhelming dilemma.

Questions: Who, what, when, where, why, and how.

Exercise one: Go back to your free-write and apply these questions to the character of the city. What do you know? What don’t you know? Make a list for further research on missing parts.

Letter: Write a short letter either from your character or to your character.

Exercise two: Choose the city you loved the most from the earlier list and have your character write to a person in that city, or receive a letter from a friend visiting that city. Or make it impersonal as if a business assignment.

Application

Writing Assignment:

Choose a few details from each of your exercises, mixing and matching theme, setting, and memory. Now write up a short episode as a brief memory of your character. It can be either from the POV of this was once her home or as a visit to a strange place.

If you started with an imaginary place in the first city free-write, it now has real footprints.

If you chose a real place, it now has a personal emotional connection to a real person, and if you also added some details from another city, then you have a real place—only different.

Share: Which brainstorm techniques worked best for you? Which were the most difficult? Why?

Building a Story World

2012-01-17T04:09:00.000-08:00

Here are a few more techniques to apply to reach the heart of your worlds instead of staying on surface description.

I strongly recommend that all the brainstorming be done by hand whenever possible. Why? For one, working by hand supposedly shifts our attention into a more creative mode. Second, more importantly, it becomes portable. Each of these methods, apart from journaling, can be done in 2 to 10 minutes. Think of them as ongoing creative breaks through your day. And if you happen to have a job/life that literally will not allow you to write every day, you can still brainstorm every day, so that when your computer time opens up you are ready to write without needing warm-up or re-entry time. Your novel stays fresh.

For those of us slow dreamers who tend to procrastinate, we will have a stack of snippets ready to develop. No lost time. It helps prevent writer’s block, because we’re not really writing—we’re exploring possibilities.

List: Make a list. Set timer if you want. Minimum two minutes, but I suggest five.

Exercise one: List ten to twenty cities that you have visited that you absolutely loved, or would love to visit if you had the chance. (Can also repeat for those you hated.)

Go back through the list, and next to each city write one word that captures that city’s memory for you—why you love it: Architecture, food, felt free, fell in love, etc.

Scratch List: Make a few categories and combine common factors under each.

Exercise two: Look at your city list so far, and see if there are any common factors. Separate accordingly. Does one category contain many and another a few? Why? Make a note of what makes two favorite cites land in different categories.

Share: How many creative breaks were you able to add into your week?

Maps

2012-01-14T12:12:00.000-08:00

Author Dallas Willard says that “we make the decisions that determine what we will do and who we will become” through our “lifescape,” the thoughts for our will and our life.

Often our lives are moving so fast that we don’t often stop to check out this life-map to notice whose agenda we’re on. Not until there’s a major bump in the road, and even then we can be coaxed to continue on a route that is detrimental if we don’t stop and re-evaluate.

In the movie Larry Crowne, after a period of hopeful job searching, Larry realizes that he can no longer afford his home and goes to the bank to release it. However, the bank manger insists Larry sit down with a ‘free’ (exaggerated) cup of coffee to talk it over and ends with Larry still owning a home he can’t afford. He has accepted her thought position and bowed to her cheerful pressure.

However several weeks later, after studying a basic economics class at the junior college, he spends an evening going through all his papers, chooses an envelope, drops in a key and the next morning hands the package to the bank manager telling her that he will vacate the premises within thirty days. As he strides away she still coaxes him to come and have a “free” cup of coffee to re-consider.

The first encounter increased his confusion and depression. The second released him from a burden he could not carry. Although his job loss instigated the situation, Larry’s new perspective enabled him to see that he himself had made choices for the wrong reasons and then allowed others to determine his personal map. Now he was setting a new course for himself based on emotional and financial honesty.

Journal Prompt:

1. Choose a situation for your character outlining a course of action that is not beneficial to them. How does a family member, or work associate, ‘sell’ this course of action to them in order to serve themselves?

2. What knowledge will your character need to see the real “lifescape”?

Building a Story World

2012-01-10T04:05:00.000-08:00

Brainstorm basics help us to filter through the possibilities before we pour hours into world development. There are so many different ways to brainstorm, and we all have our favorites. In addition to all the normal reasons for creative brainstorming, there are three that I think are particularly important for world building. First whether we ground our novels in a real world or an imaginary one, the specific places are different from normal, or at least a perception of normal. That is a key factor. We need to find the bridges to connect our readers to live and breathe in these worlds with our characters. Brainstorming in world building helps forge that metaphoric link between real and imaginary without saying which is which.

Brainstorming throughout all the drafts makes that happen. We do the overview general sweep in the beginning, and then throughout we stop often and do microscopic investigation. This keeps the water from the well flowing with freshness—not dried up with overused generic templates, but rather with unique, interesting and tempting places, situations, and characters.

Second, one real difficulty with the scope of our worlds is the ability to drown out character, plot and theme. The sheer weight can even overpower us.

Taking time to brainstorm helps us choose which details we need to highlight, which we need to keep as background, and which to just plain ignore.

This brings up the third main reason, research. When we brainstorm before each particular research area required, we save hours of time. We also protect ourselves from following possible bunny trails that could lead us away from our main goals. Because we love to build worlds, it’s a real temptation to get lost in the preparation. And it’s a balancing act too, because we don’t want to miss out on serendipities either.

Cluster: Take a word and place it in the middle of a page and then make spokes from the word to bubbles with word associates. For each of the words you choose repeat the process. Go out as far you can.

Exercise: Choose a word or a thought, either for theme or potential research, from your free-write last week and cluster out all the ideas as far as you can.

Share: How far did you get? Which brainstorm of the two generated the most material for you?

Metaphors

2012-01-07T15:24:00.000-08:00

While most metaphors lean towards subtlety building to a slow realization, there are times when the use of social and culture images can startle an audience into looking at the familiar from a new approach. Most often the iconic type metaphors are used as shortcuts to set a theme or atmosphere, such as a John Wayne style western set or a New York cityscape. We enter the story with certain expectations. However—what if they don’t mean what they used to?

The movie Larry Crowne adds an extra layer of vocabulary through its use of social Americana metaphors spread throughout the visual setting. The scooter posse rides motorcycle style through the streets hitting their various stops. On one street they then pass by a ‘traditional’ motorcycle gang who waves to them. Larry’s neighbor operates a yard sale that covers almost his entire property and runs on a daily basis. A junior college class only requires ten students in attendance to remain in the schedule. And then shows the disparity between one class in one small room, barely functioning, and another auditorium size packed with probably four hundred students.

None of these experiences are examined or explained. Different generations may look at each view or circumstance from an entirely different perspective: some humor, or sarcasm, or sadness, or confusion.

Nothing is as expected and what is expected is turned around.

Although movies have an advantage by silently sharing cultural metaphors, choosing particular details in setting and description can still add another layer to our novels when appropriate.

Journal Prompt:

Mentally drive down a key route in your story world. What public icons do you see? What are the advertisements? What kinds of shops or houses or buildings are there?

If one or two could have a connection to your character’s personal journey, then magnify it a little and see if it adds an extra perspective.

Building a Story World

2012-01-03T04:44:00.000-08:00

The reality of our world, its emotional resonance and unique atmosphere, is found in the details. Either we see it though the familiarity and ordinariness of our main character, or we see its strangeness through her confusion or entrancement. So it’s important for us to know the details ourselves. Just as we can walk around our homes in the dark, knowing exactly where we are, so must our characters. What is real to them needs to be real to us. This provides authentic atmosphere, tone and mood. We don’t need to invent everything, but we do need to learn to develop an instinct to connect details with emotions effectively.

Where to start? Right here—exactly where your character is now.

Free-write: Set a timer so you’re not clock watching. Write without stopping for eight to ten minutes. If you can’t thing of the next word—repeat the last word until something else comes to mind, even if it’s random. Write thoughts, words, and sentences—whatever comes out. Ignore spelling and punctuation. Don’t lift the pen from the page!

Exercise One. Choose the room your character wakes up in. Start from her first moments of consciousness and go. Is it a familiar bed or not? Sheets—yes or no—clean or dirty—silk, or cotton, or straw, or an unknown substance?

Exercise One-Part Two. Choose a city that will be in your world, real or imaginary, regardless of whether one of your characters will ever go there. It can be a myth, a historical place, or current to your character. Free-write everything you think you know about this city, or hope to discover.

Share: Did any detail surprise you?

Mystery

2011-12-30T01:04:00.000-08:00

When you’re really rushed for time, do you find yourself toe-tapping when someone gives you a long explanation? What is the point, you wonder. Racing from here to there doesn’t allow for leisurely conversation and even less for stories or riddles.

Yet, what if the meandering is really an invitation to a mystery that can enrich your day, or your heart, or your soul beyond your imagination?

In The Land of Darkness, by C.S. Lakin, Callen and Jadiel are running out of time. With each new clue or riddle they unravel to bring them closer to their goal comes an even more mysterious saying and confusion. Callen’s impatience grows—he wants a direct answer now. But a life-changing mystery, like a parable, needs time to uncover and even more time to discover the meaning.

“Callen’s head swam with images: the king-priest buried under the terebinth, with its boughs in the heavens. The tree cut down, but sprouting again. A king returning, blowing breath into dry bones. But not the king-priest of Antolae—a different king. The boar’s words swam dizzily in his head. ….. How were all theses stories tied together? And the one image that wouldn’t come was the one he yearned for most—the bridge.”

At the end of the encounter all they have is another city to travel to with even more questions that need asking.

Journal Prompt:

1. Even if you do not have a mystery in your novel choose a situation to become a mini-mystery parable with long reaching significance.

2. Pick a scene where your character is pressed for time. Make a list of possible obstacles, such as a flat tire. Have a good ‘helper’ come alongside to assist, but keeps making the situation worse.

3. Then, when your character finally reaches his goal, he realizes that the interference saved him in some way—maybe from a huge embarrassment. How does that change his perspective on his frustration?

Memory

2011-12-23T01:01:00.000-08:00

Memories are like emotional mirrors, reflecting back the image that connects us. The strongest ones often come through our senses. Is anyone baking Christmas cookies this week finding a more than average visitor trek to the kitchen? The memories can show up in unexpected places or be ones we hold tightly, so as not to forget a place or a special person. Traditional hymns are not heard as often recently and it is a special treat for me to hear “The Old Rugged Cross” sung which was my Grandmother’s favorite, and brings her immediately present to me.

When times of chaos, or tragedy, or stress strike, these images can become lifelines as well when they hold goodness and love.

In The Land of Darkness, by C.S. Lakin, Jadiel holds onto her mother’s memory to give her strength to cope first with her stepmother’s cruelty and then to face a harsh quest to save her father. She reaches for her flute and the songs her mother taught her. When her soul bows under the strain the remembrance restores her. It reaches across emotional time. And also across physical distance as her father, now trapped in a hawk’s body, crisscrosses the sky searching for her.

“He singled out the breathy melody, a thin strain wafting his way—from the south. ….The farther south he glided, the more sonorous the music. Now he was certain he heard a flute, its crystal-clear notes stringing into a tune that resonated deep within his soul. A tune his wife M’lynn had sung many nights in the drawing room, beside the fireplace.”

What special images from your past give you hope?

Journal Prompt:

1. Pick a song that is familiar to you from your childhood. Hum the melody. What memories does it raise?

2. Now choose an instrument that is familiar in your story world and give your character your emotions. Does it give him strength or sorrow?

Maps

2011-12-16T01:15:00.000-08:00

Usually maps are meant to be helpful. Sometimes we resist thinking they’re necessary, but still appreciate the assistance when we’re ready. We search them out when planning a trip, or when we get lost, either literally on the road or emotionally needing counsel. Roadmaps give clarity.

Occasionally we have experienced asking directions and becoming even more confused due to a rapid fire answer or an explanation so complicated we can’t track; however, how often have we ever had someone deliberately falsify the right path, or threaten bodily harm if we continue?

In The Land of Darkness, by C.S. Lakin, Callen’s only map for his quest to find the bridge is verbal prompts that are more confusing than logical. He is seeking a bridge from the past that is also to be his future and they’re both in the same place, although nowhere to be found. Yet despite all the barriers he finally arrives at the edge of possibility in a small town almost as forsaken as his search. Rumble. He and Jadiel are received with kindness until Callen states his destination and the room becomes hushed.

“The barkeep stopped pouring ale and glared at Callen. ‘Surely you’re not taking a child into the Valley Perilous? Man, have you lost your beans?’

Jadiel turned her head and caught the wide-eyed expressions on the faces around her—disapproving, incredulous glares that made her shiver. ……….

‘Here in Rumble, anyone venturing onto the plain is our business’. …… The man set down a tall glass of ale before Callen. His voice softened, but his eyes remained full of judgment. ‘Because the foolish likes of you go stirring up the dead, making the ground shake and the animals spook.’”

One man spits at Callen as they leave town and he worries his search will put Jadiel in more danger. However, he must continue to follow this map, this journey, to find an answer.

Journal Prompt:

Put your character in a situation where he knows he is within a few block radius of his destination, but is missing the last few directions. Whoever he asks for directions either ignores him or becomes angry. How does he react? And what does he do to cope?

Metaphors

2011-12-09T00:23:00.000-08:00

We’ve looked at how one metaphor can open up a multitude of possibilities. What can happen when it also opens up a stream of new metaphors, and they’re all tangled together like knot ends on the back of a tapestry? How willing are we to follow the various threads?

The Land of Darkness, by C.S. Lakin, immediately pulls you into a multi-layered richly textured world that you don’t want to leave. Myth and parable, scripture, imagery and mystery blend into a fresh fairy tale. It breathes mythic impact with inviting metaphors, maps, memory and mysteries.

Callen, a woodworking apprentice, sets on a quest to discover a bridge. He wants to see up close the beauty of its designs that he has found in sketches on parchment scrolls. He is practical and hard working and has no time or patience for riddles or abstract references. Yet his search plunges him into myth, into the extraordinary that could change his life if he is willing to see beyond the surface, in both thought and action.

“Speaking in stories and riddles. Talking about circles in circles. And just who was that landowner he’d mentioned, the one who had built the bridge? Callen gritted his teeth. Why wouldn’t that pest tell him how to find the bridge and who the builder was? ‘You’re not ready to hear those answers.’ What nonsense!”

Callen could attempt to dismiss what he perceived as a deranged or sun-stroked prophet, but he couldn’t dismiss the deepening yearning to find the bridge. Threads of connections, warnings, faith, beauty and art wove layers of metaphor into his heart. And drove him to find the answer regardless of the cost.

Journal Prompt:

What ‘bridge’ does your character need to cross, either as a decision or a life-altering truth? Choose a familiar item from her everyday experience to become a springboard metaphor. Then with each new insight add another metaphor.

Mystery

2011-12-02T05:46:00.000-08:00

Thresholds as Connectors

Do we open the locked door at the end of the spider-coated hallway? Are we ready to hear the words written in the old manuscripts found buried under the house?

When Eve saw that the tree God had forbidden, “was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave it also to her husband with her, and he ate.”

Pandora couldn’t contain her curiosity and opened the box. “Out flew every kind of disease and sickness, hate and envy, and all the bad things that people had never experienced before. Pandora slammed the lid closed, but it was too late.”

Both these women were well warned before they succumbed to temptation, but what about the times there are no clear directions. We have good reason to hesitate before the unknown. When do we need courage to resist a threshold, because the consequences are beyond our control and could bring great suffering, or risk stepping into the unknown to bring light into darkness?

If Lucy had not opened the door at the back of the wardrobe and discovered Narnia, she and her siblings would not have been instrumental in breaking the White Witch’s spell. By willingly entering the Beast’s palace, Belle breaks the curse. Hercule Poirot follows every lead possible until he can bring a culprit to justice.

Often the clues needed to solve a mystery, bring about justice and bring the truth out begin with ordinary things and familiar words. The investigator needs the insight to see them in the right light and respect warnings when given.

“..stop and look around and step forward with courage and cognizance across otherwise invisible Thresholds into Discovery.” Tim Wynne-Jones

Journal Prompt:

Look at the literal thresholds in your character’s daily world and choose one to explore as a figurative threshold. Think of ways they could become a life-changing threshold for your character: doors, windows, cupboards, gardens, railroads, or books.

Memory

2011-11-25T06:35:00.000-08:00

“One is poised on the Threshold of life waiting to be born. It’s an ongoing process. Some of us are not happy unless we are born over and over again, still trying to get it right.” Tim Wynne-Jones

Thresholds of Ambiguity

Memory gives us the process of choice and decision-making and thresholds. Our understanding grows and our perspectives shift. A right choice made once before has now become a wrong choice. An ordinary day shifts suddenly into the unexpected—sometimes by events—sometimes morally.

Scripture stories, fairy-tales and folk-tales speak this language into our hearts. We’re not left without access to wisdom or experience. Others have taken this journey and we find hints how to find our way through.

The day began on an ordinary walk through the woods with their father searching for food, but this time Hansel and Gretel are abandoned. They step into the unknown. Many of their choices are made without mature knowledge but they rely on instinct.

Red Riding Hood travels a familiar path to her grandmother’s house, but comes back from one visit completely different, or is she?

The added beauty from a journey perspective is that the reality of common day-to-day activities can be developed into shadows, as passages from long ago or as foretelling to the future. All also have the potential to tap into echoes and allusions and metaphors. It opens up creativity and new beginnings. “Which way is in and which way is out.”

In the movie Avatar, new arrival Jake Sully has no qualms about gathering intelligence on the Na’vi and their world. Jaded by his twin brother’s death and his own injuries, he just wants to walk again. And then he begins a dual life living among the Na’vi and reporting on them. Gradually his values change as he recognizes the threshold he is aiming for has moral consequences far greater than he imagined.

Will the journey chosen to find shelter bring death or freedom?

Journal Prompt:

Although nothing illegal has happened to your protagonist, she begins to notice some discrepancies in the paperwork. When she asks her boss he dismisses it as unimportant. However she realizes that only her signature is on the documents. And she really needs a job. What are her options? What course of action does she choose and why?

Maps

2011-11-18T05:47:00.000-08:00

Thresholds as Commitment

Just as we plot out a map to a new location, this category requires taking a deliberate step of faith. We are not forced. We choose with as much insight as possible, even with an unknown outcome. Sometimes the decision is plotted out ahead of time, and sometimes it’s spur of the moment. But we accept the potential consequences before we act.

Alice follows the rabbit down the hole even though the crossing feels as if she’s in a dream. Her curiosity overrides the penalty she fully expects for wandering away.

Consider a character’s rationalization in a space movie when someone who has never traveled through a time warp has to choose to get "beamed up.” Their career is in the line and that desire to be a part of exploration and discovery is strong enough to squash legitimate concerns.

Do you know anyone who manages to get into an airplane when terrified of flying? What makes the person choose--commit to this action?

Or go backwards. A person refuses to cross the threshold and is held in her immediate sphere, much like phobias trap people, such as agoraphobia. How does a life get mapped out that is restricted by fear?

And yet sometimes choosing a restricted boundary line can be freeing creatively. Emily Dickinson lived a reclusive life. The majority of her poems only became know after her death when her sister discovered the extensive works.

Journal Prompt:

Make a list of your character’s fears from childhood. Then put her in a situation where she has the opportunity to change it. What steps does she take? When does she hesitate? What gives her the ability to push ahead?

Metaphors

2011-11-11T17:31:00.000-08:00

“Thresholds are necessary in the creative process in giving an idea somewhere to go.” Tim Wynne-Jones

Change, no matter how small, can create mental and emotional chaos as you turn into a different direction, physically or emotionally. To cross a threshold though requires a choice, even if it has been forced upon you like a refugee fleeing his war torn land. All sensory memory is heightened and sharpened. It is not just the moment that is at stake, but the journey that follows it. Thresholds become part of our soul shadows as much as our physical bodies cast their shadow. And the question can linger. “Did I choose the right fork in the road?”

In a recent workshop, students and I wrestled with this metaphor and concept using categories suggested in “An Eye for Thresholds,” an excellent essay written by Tim Wynne-Jones in the book Only Connect. As we explored each category we noted that the metaphor opened several tension points as choices challenged beliefs, values and possibilities, either personally for a main character, or in relationship to family or society.

So as I share these ideas, over this next month’s sequence, I hope you’ll join in the discussion.

Thresholds as Crossings

Here we deliberately make a choice to step into new stages, probably never to return: a passage of some moment. It can include walking away from a place, or a relationship, or choosing to no longer be who we were a few minutes earlier. Often that moment of decision become a life metaphor or signpost.

For example, in the novel, The Hero and the Crown, protagonist Aerin made that crossing when she arrived at her first dragon slaying. “Talat halted, and they stood, Aerin gazing into the black hole in the hill. A minute or two went by and she wondered, suddenly, how one got the dragon to pay attention to one in the first place. Did she have to wake it up? Yell? Throw water into the cave at it? Just as her spear point sagged with doubt, the dragon hurtled out of its den and straight at them.”

Despite the moment of hesitation Aerin acted upon all her preparation and stepped into a new role as a dragon-slayer. The threshold changed her life.

Journal Prompt:

Put your character into a moment of choice. Overwrite all the sensory details in the initial draft. Then write up the brief scene twice, once for each possible decision: to flee or fight, or to submit the accepted ‘dogma’ either socially or personally.

Mystery

2011-10-28T09:47:00.000-07:00

Have you ever played the character game where you guess what a person’s job is based on how they’re dressed? With the business industry’s more relaxed protocol over the past few years, it’s a little harder to gauge apart from a uniform or a logo. The next step is to guess what the duties are in their section of the tier. Society still seems to measure people by position, regardless of vocation. And then find ways to lever an advantage.

In the BBC series Downton Abbey, each servant is well aware of their responsibilities and, in some cases, jealously guard their distinction. But they show no hesitation when ferreting out any personal secrets as a power play. In fact some take great pleasure in seeing another servant publicly humiliated or embarrassed.

A young housemaid is ridiculed for taking a typing class. Her attempts to leave ‘service’ are considered snobbery. Two other servants conspire to get rid of the new hire, because they resent his personal connection to ‘The Earl.’ Plus he guards his privacy. Upstairs is not immune either, as a rivalry between two sisters puts their family in jeopardy.

The personal mysteries are as varied as the daily menu. A few seem harmless and a little comical, while others raise ethical dilemmas. To protect his own secret, and therefore his job, a servant stands by while a daughter of the house is placed in moral danger. Later he manipulates and blackmails to attain another position before his own thievery is made public. The lure to uncover secrets for personal gain is as old as time. Cain resented God’s favor of his brother’ offerings over his own and his anger resulted in murder.

Journal Prompt

Put your protagonist in a new workplace situation. What is one thing her co-workers must not know about her? How does she sidestep their questions and remain friendly? Give one version where she answers with vague comments and another where she bristles at intrusion.

Memory

2011-10-21T09:34:00.000-07:00

Some memories we hold on to with such fondness that they gain a saintly status over time. Likewise, parts of our past we’d rather not be reminded of increase in regret to the point we lock them away. Sometimes we actually forget they exist. Until a memory surfaces as in a jolt and we’re forced to acknowledge them.

The very proper and fastidious butler Mr. Carson, in the BBC series Downton Abbey, crashes into his past face to face as an old acquaintance forces his way into Carson’s life. It also shows the social atmosphere now shifting that this charlatan would actually dare enter the estate, especially by the front door. But he is made bold by Carson’s own fears and attempts to keep him quiet from exposing his previous life as an entertainer.

Faithful to ‘his’ family and the position he holds, Carson sees only the possibility of disgrace and loss. In fact, he offers his resignation when all comes to light. Fortunately his employer sees through the blackmail. He also recognizes Carson’s longtime service to the family and sets that commitment as more valuable that Carson’s previous life. Although mildly amused at the concept of Carson in show business, he does not give the situation the weight of shame that Carson himself has. Now Carson is able to see his own memories with a different perspective and interpretation. And yet, his initial concern would have been completely accurate had the Dowager been in charge. She would have immediately dismissed him without even a hearing.

Journal Prompt

Make a list of activities your character participated in when young. Choose one that could become an embarrassment for her if told in her workplace, or publicly at a social function. Make the teller someone who is putting a sinister or shameful twist on her participation. What does she stand to lose if the story is accepted at face value?

Maps

2011-10-14T08:29:00.000-07:00

One tiny smudge on a map, or a slight error, can be enough to send a traveler miles off their route. The delay may be a minor side trip, or a serious delay in destination. An east coast conference I once attended had to revise two days worth of lectures and speakers because the airlines had inadvertently sent a main presenter to a western state in error. They had made an assumption based on the city name and didn’t take the time to notice the state address. Then winter conditions aggravated the correction.

Misheard or misunderstood conversation fragments can also send a character down a wrong path. In the BBC series Downton Abbey, a servant is chastised for crossing respectful boundaries and, instead of acknowledging her error; she fusses and bears a grudge. Then while eavesdropping, she overhears a snippet of conversation and believes she is to be replaced. From then on her attitude and actions become increasingly hostile. Finally she acts on her feelings and makes an immoral decision. Even though she immediately regrets it, and turns to undo it, she is too late, and a death occurs.

While grieving both her own choices and the loss in the family she discovers that, rather than replacement, her mistress had been holding her up as an example of a quality lady’s maid.

Journal Prompt

Make a list of possible comments someone close to your protagonist might say about her actions. Make the range from very negative to glowing support.

Have your character overhear a portion of one of those statements. How does she ‘hear’ it emotionally? What is her immediate reaction and her long term reaction to this fragment of conversation?

Metaphors

2011-10-06T10:57:00.000-07:00

It’s interesting how a metaphor can contain a number of meanings, and that even when it has the same meaning it may also carry a variety of perspectives. Over the past year I’ve watched several ‘period piece’ series from Britain. Downton Abbey and Lark Rise to Candleford top the list with their quality of actors and setting. However all have phrases, metaphors, and references to common historical threads that don’t necessarily transfer over to other heritages.

For example, the central importance of the manor and all that it implies. “To the manor born” reflects an inheritance to prestige and wealth. Or it also means a personality is well suited to manor living. But in many circumstances it’s not only the titled families that are born and raised into the manor, but also many servants can trace their heritage back decades to a life style bound to the manor.

Tenant families considered a position tied to the estate, or in the manor itself, as the highest possible opportunity for their children. Both segments of the societal hierarchy took their position and privilege seriously. Newcomers to the manor though often saw it simply as a job and sometimes with disdain. Not all inheritance manor families accepted their position as a responsibility but took it as a right and misused their power.

Using the word manor, even literally as a location, has the potential to create emotional tensions, questions and perspectives. One word alone can open up multiple threads of possibilities.

Journal Prompt

Choose an expensive dinner celebration, such as an anniversary or graduation. Choose four people involved in the actual meal and write a few sentences for each showing their feelings. Suggestions: guest of honor, family member attending, a staff person in the restaurant, a server or cook in the kitchen, a passerby, another diner close enough to overheard pieces of conversation.

Mystery

2011-09-27T10:22:00.000-07:00

“Thresholds are necessary in the creative process in giving an idea somewhere to go.” Tim Wynne-Jones

In the movie Green Dragon Tai is forced to make a deliberate choice for himself and his newly melded family as a threshold crossing into a fresh beginning. He must face a country filled with mystery, compared to the one he left behind and probably never to return to.

On the surface it is a passage of a moment. Yet it includes walking away from a place, and choosing to no longer be who he was a few minutes earlier. At first fear paralyzes him from taking that step into discovery. There have been too many changes, too many losses and disappointments. Then his American friend takes him for a drive, over the dried-up hills to investigate the small town just beyond the camp walls, just beyond sight. And he returns with a grocery bag filled with familiar foods. He returns beaming with possibility and encouragement, not only for himself but also for the other refugees. A new possibility has bridged the gulf of despair into hope. He is ready now to face mystery with anticipation and curiosity.

Journal Prompt

Choose a psychological threshold that your character must face at each main stage of the novel structure categories: set-up, response, attack, and resolution.

Which one has the most emotional impact? Write it up as a new scene.

Memory

2011-09-15T13:30:00.000-07:00

Shared memories can open up windows into broad horizons. Even when the memories are painful, or contradictory, the willingness to talk about them creates a space for wholeness. Or at least a different perspective. If left unspoken hurtful scenes may board up bitterness and destruction closing off any fresh air.

The movie Green Dragon depicts the story of Vietnamese refugees after the fall of Saigon. Crowded into army tents and Quonset huts the assortment of survivors covered a broad spectrum: young and old, civilian and army, educated professionals and laborers. And across that divide were religious, political and economic stratas, now all together experiencing a common grief from their individual sorrow. In the movie there is at first a stoic silence, even within a family unit. No one is willing to share. Bit by bit the numbness eases. One day a man takes out his instrument and begins to sing a national song, and the camp quiets into listening and then gradually adds their voices and their tears.

This common ground, experienced through a beloved song, drew them together in memory. And as they began to share with each other their escapes, their fears, their losses, they took steps towards a new horizon.

Journal Prompt

Choose a situation for your character with a sibling or friend where they have opposite emotional memories, one positive and one negative.

Write up a page of dialogue between them as they remember.

Maps

2011-09-07T14:18:00.000-07:00

What happens when the ‘map’ of existence as you know it disappears? Instead of a broad landscape you have only a tiny space allotted to you. What will shape your new reality, emotionally and geographically? Going camping in nature gives us a taste of adventure, but fleeing your home with a few grabbed possessions sets a different tone to the journey.

In the movie, Green Dragon, many find solace in establishing daily routines. One young woman volunteers at the sewing tent, and a young entrepreneur tries to set up a mail order business—to both help ease the circumstances and begin to learn to adapt to this new ‘land’ as he is anxious to move forward as soon as possible. Others try to settle in this new location and physically resist leaving the camp when the opportunity arises to find an outside sponsor family. Even with nothing left but a cot in a corner, they still are among their culture and language and refuse to be separated from the threads they still have.

The young children map out their new surroundings and then make a daily tour. Minh in particular makes sure he watches the old man watering his patch of dirt and visits the cook to watch him paint. He diligently reads the notice board, watching for any hint of his family, takes a stand at the arrival gate, checks the bathhouse, the eating tent, and the women washing clothes. He comes to know the routine and lives the camp inside out. When the time comes to leave his understanding and adaptation to new territory becomes the bridge across his uncle’s fears.

Journal Prompt:

Put your character in a situation where she either dreams, or actually experiences, a ‘refugee’ relocation. It can be either by war, or natural disaster. What is the first thing she does to give her space a personal focus? Or how does she resist?

Metaphors

2011-08-24T09:18:00.000-07:00

“Symbol is a technique of the small.” John Truby

When a character is in an unfamiliar external or internal environment, familiar creative pursuits such as gardening, cooking, music, or art can become mirrors, reflecting a spiritual alliance to another place. They can translate the characters’ soul landscape into some sense of stability as they respond to these metaphors. Sometimes these responses come in action, sometimes in desire or longing, sometimes in a symbol. These images often find a ‘voice’ within the small common ground creativity built into everyday activities.

The movie Green Dragon has an abundance of metaphoric symbols that on the surface are not at first recognized as connected. For one, the commanding staff sergeant takes photographs throughout the camp. He thinks he is doing so to keep a record of the historical circumstances and of the people who have been impacted. But it is through the photos and their images that he himself comes to terms with his own secrets and need for healing.

And in another small action, an elderly refugee general plants a seed. An orphaned refugee boy, Minh, watches intently as the old man daily waters a tiny dirt patch. Minh tries to understand why he is even trying to grow anything in the makeshift camp. But like a living photograph Minh is drawn to watch the daily routine. And when the old man dies Minh takes his place, watering and waiting to see what exactly lies under the ground. The general had lost his ‘voice’ to give to his people, and turned instead to a symbol of hope. When Minh presented the first offering from the tiny growth it shook the camp.

Journal Prompt:

1. Choose two different movies from your personal favorites and watch the immediate opening of each with the sound on mute. What images stand out?

2. Re-watch with sound. What changes—if anything?

3. Apply to an ongoing activity for your character. What are some repetitive common actions? Make an image list for them.

4. Choose details that turn them into metaphoric symbols.

Mystery

2011-08-10T07:36:00.000-07:00

To unravel a mystery involves many choices, decisions, and persistent questions. But to unravel an historical one requires another set of problems regarding where even to begin. How to know what elements are important enough to pursue?

Phantom’s opening scene is shadowed with possibilities, all coated in shades of gray. All the viewer has to lean towards is the two interested bidders, so seemingly out of place in the opera house mausoleum. Yet they must be there for a reason. They have obviously chosen to attend this auction despite adverse conditions.

When the elderly man and woman vie for the same item, they repeat their initial respectful nod. Yet they still choose to bid against one another. So the mystery is not between them as a relationship, but is held somewhere within their mutual desire for the musical toy, a commonplace item.

It is such a deliberate purposeful action that makes clear choice will be a major theme in the story about to unfold. The atmosphere of the first scene is ominous, one student noted, but it does not “yet have the measure of how choices effects the characters.”

Only a beginning hint, resting in a child’s battered toy.

Journal Prompt

Make a list of old-fashioned toys such as the ones that every generation has enjoyed. For example action figures have longevity, even though once they were regimental tin soldiers and now may be space aliens.

Choose the least likely from your list and place it in your antagonist’s room or suitcase or deluxe office. How incongruous is it to an acquaintance. What questions does he wish he could ask?

Memory

2011-08-04T11:14:00.000-07:00

Memories are often like torn spider webs. You follow the thin thread a little unsteadily and then suddenly there’s an open space. What’s missing? You look down to the next tier of strands, or perhaps up, hoping for a closed portion, but the ends straggle in the emptiness.

It’s a muddle, like an early morning gray fog that shifts around you in swirls.

Phantom of the Opera’s opening scenes, shot in black and white, give the same sense of movement, as different objects fade in and out of highlight with different degrees of shadow. Why is it important to remember that particular item? As the camera light passes over each object it further shades them like a passage of time. One student commentated that; “there are shades of gray in all of life’s stages.”

So when we look back into memory, to gauge our progress or to find a foothold for the future, sometimes uncertainty hangs in wisps like the spider web. And then a slight flush of air pushes another strand into view—just over there—just near the empty space. Now comes the decision. To jump, or not.

And suddenly the image is blazing with color.

Journal Prompt

1. Choose a turning point memory in your own life, or for your character. Write it up with as many details as possible. Don’t worry about overwriting it. Pour in sensory specifics.

2. Now color code the sensory highlights as if you were filling in a stained glass window or a paint-by-number. Which color is predominant?

3. Now re-write as a scene capturing that particular focus.

Maps

2011-07-29T07:50:00.000-07:00

Emotional maps are unique, even from within a shared experience. Have you ever reminisced over a family incident or vacation, and be astonished at the different highlight memories? The geographical location was identical, but the perspective diverse. Or discussed a memory that to you is almost as vivid as the day it occurred, but another family member shrugs with no recollection at all?

The opening scene in Phantom of the Opera sets up the common physical map ground of emotional experience, first present and then past. It is a bleak day. The access route to the opera house is cold, wet, and icy. The elderly need assistance. And once inside the interior proves even more hazardous. There is no shortage of concrete physical metaphors in the decayed building. One student in the discussion remarked, “I saw it also as the future being the death of the past.”

Upon arrival the elderly bidders nod to each other with respect. In that moment they acknowledge their common ground for being present to this auction. And then both choose to bid on the same item. Ignoring what to the outsider might be considered art works or antiques when presented, they focus on a battered, tarnished child’s common toy, a monkey that plays cymbals.

Both want it and keep raising the bid for the seemingly worthless item. And then they pause to look at each other. Sorrow etches their faces. And the woman acquiesces, as she recognizes in him a deeper need, an emotional map that needs closure.

Journal Prompt:

1. Take a humorous circumstance that your character has experienced, and retell it from the future looking back at least forty years. What stand s out in vivid recall?

2. Repeat, but now use an emotionally difficult decision.

Metaphors

2011-07-20T07:32:00.000-07:00

Visual metaphors often speak in silence. Their images impact emotionally and mentally. All our senses are engaged. Movie opening screen shots can communicate volumes of possibilities within a few minutes by taping into our universal feelings and engaging our curiosity. And yet while all audiences see the same imagery, we often process the material individually.

Sometimes it’s hard to get past all the introductory fanfare, but when we can observe up-close, as in a freeze frame, the metaphors explode. In a recent workshop students shared their observations on the opening scene in Phantom of the Opera, which is shot in black and white. While we all discussed and related to the ambiance and noticed the same details, each one found one or two images that held a primary impact.

For example, the ruins of the opera house were coated with cobwebs. Seems to be a natural connection, but as one student pointed out the cobwebs it took on a deeper meaning. Just as a cobweb is a concentrated and patient work of art, so was the Phantom’s training of Christine’s voice. Just as the cobweb is a lure for a spider’s meal, so was the lure to Christine to join the Phantom in his world. And also as the cobwebs clung to the fixtures after decades of decay, so did the Phantom’s story cling to the frail elderly visitors to the auction.

Journal Prompt:

1. Look over your beginning scenes. What common natural images do you have in your setting? Make a list of them and then next to each one write a possible emotional metaphor. Choose one that can be threaded unconsciously throughout the novel.

2. Develop its characteristics so you will have the details ready when an opportunity opens to include them.

Mystery

2011-07-14T06:42:00.000-07:00

When should a personal mystery be left hidden and when must it come into the light? Buried it has the ability to harm entire lifetimes, and sometimes generations. There’s no recourse for accountability, and truth, for restoration, and healing. Yet digging it up also has the potential for emotional and psychological disaster.

Perhaps the better question is why is it important, and then, what is the motive behind the hunt. Is it purely for self-satisfaction and accolades, or out of a genuine concern for another? Sometimes those lines get blurry too.

In the historical romance “A Memory Between Us,” by Sarah Sundin, Major Jack Novak is determined to find out Ruth’s secret, despite her reservations and warnings from his friend Charlie.

“It’s got to be big,” Charlie said.

“Huh?”

“With Ruth. Something about her makes me think she’s been hurt and badly.”

“Nothing I can’t handle.”

“Watch that pride.”

Jack is falling in love with Ruth, and yet he can’t see her as clearly as Charlie does. Her secret, the mystery has become a challenge, a problem to solve. Charlie later accuses Jack of treating her as a project instead of a person. But Jack keeps pushing for an answer regardless of the consequences. And shatters Ruth’s heart even more than it already was.

Journal Prompt:

1. Put your character together with a new person that you know is going to become important in his life, whether as a friend, or mentor, or lover. What about himself is he not yet ready to reveal? How does he keep avoiding the conversation when it steers that way.

2. Plot out the steps he takes towards revealing himself with this person.

Memory

2011-07-06T22:17:00.000-07:00

Memories can be quite elusive when it comes to recognizing their truths. We tend to look at them through filtered lenses, rose-colored for positive and shaded for negative, automatically changing their initial reality and impact.

But our sensory memories don’t cloud the recall. Whether we appreciate them or not, just a brief taste, or fragrance, or sound can catapult us in an instant. Or, at the least, we have an emotional reaction to the input and don’t know quite why. And the senses sharpen the pleasure or the pain, even when we try to forget.

In the historical romance “A Memory Between Us,” by Sarah Sundin, army nurse Lieutenant Ruth Doherty remembers her past well. In fact, so well, that she has built a protective emotional barrier around herself to keep it locked up. She stays focused and stays professional. And if it should try to derail her, she turns to well-honed defense mechanisms to lock it back.

But eventually she takes a step towards love, accepts a kiss for a brief moment of yearning and then the sensory memory attacks, robbing her of present happiness, and skidding her backwards.

“His breath stank of beer and sausage. He ground the broken watch glass into her wrist, ground the truth into her head: ‘You’ll never get rid of me. You’ll always see my face.’”

And so she runs, convinced she will never be freed from the pain.

Journal Prompt:

Make a sensory list for your character. From each category choose her most favorite memory, and her most horrible memory. Which one is the most dramatic, or the most humorous? Look for a place in one of your scenes to use this memory to create friction with another character.

Maps

2011-06-30T08:56:00.000-07:00

Suddenly we come to a crossroad. And there are no signs, no familiar bearings and limited resources. How do we choose which direction to go in? At some point we sometimes need to make a choice, a gut reaction. But what happens when our emotional history is jamming the process? Instead of letting ourselves think options through rationally and with insight, we allow ‘old stories’, or ‘old fears’ to impact us.

Our past histories can leave markings on our souls as clearly as lines on a paper map. Sometimes they’re so worn and smudged we don’t recognize their influence, positive or negative, until we come to that corner in the middle of choice.

In the historical romance “A Memory Between Us,” by Sarah Sundin, Major Jack Novak, faces one of his greatest fears and allows it to map a critical decision. In addition to the personal failure and recrimination he faces as a result, he loses the faith and confidence of his best friend as well. Like a domino chain his choice plunges forward setting up even more critical consequences.

“Holland. Jack’s feet went cold. The course took them over the Rhine Delta with dozens of watery inlets and marshy islands. He couldn’t think of a worse place to crash or bail.” Due to his own fear of drowning, Jack orders a new course, and puts the entire squadron in greater jeopardy. When questioned his reply is, “Listen, have I ever let you down? Trust me.”

But this time Jack is not making a decision based on the needs of his men, but on an incident from his childhood that has become an emotional map. He thinks he has it under adult control until he faces its reality. And charts his next map point from the wrong premise.

Journal Prompt:

Give your character a fear that you have coped with without success and have her succeed. Or, give one that you have overcome, but in his situation, he doesn’t. What do you learn from each other?

Metaphors

2011-06-23T07:52:00.000-07:00

An evocative setting often provides a powerful effect as a silent messenger through metaphors. It may be the truth behind the story that will last with thematic impact long after the characters/events are themselves forgotten.

In the historical romance “A Memory Between Us,” by Sarah Sundin, there are many opportunities for the external visual scenes to connect to an internal heart connection, making a metaphoric bridge to connect us to a deeper understanding of her characters.

For example, in chapter eleven as they stroll “down the street and through the imposing Norman Gate Tower. Jack pointed out the slits in the thick stone walls.” They walk into a circular garden where a man plays a violin to a group of children. Jack lays down his jacket so Ruth doesn’t snag her stockings on the black, white and gray stones protruding from the mortar. And then too there’s the watch—time moving forward.

The setting is steeped in history—part of a ruined abbey. And right now that is how Ruth views her own life, as in ruins. She struggles between emotions that are black, white and gray as she finds herself drawn to Jack, and at the same time pushes him away. It’s interesting that Ruth considers it stupid that the ancient building were torn down in the Reformation. She has thick emotional walls surrounding her but there a few slits opening and Jack is coming through them. Maybe she also has a premonition, or fear, that her wall will be smashed too. But often our walls have to come down so healing can take place. Which begins a few paragraphs on as they prepare to dance and Ruth finds herself sobbing in his arms.

“Now the tears flowed in an unrelenting stream. Folded in Jack’s arms, she could be weak, she could grieve, she could be nurtured.” (And can’t you just hear the violin still playing.) She feels safe, she weakens, he kisses her, she melts, and then all the past ugliness rises up to poison the moment. In her sorrow and hurt she then lashes out at Jack, and steps back into the ruins of her heart.

Journal Prompt:

Make a list of similar settings you’ve chosen for your novel. Are there connecting images? Choose one that connects to a choice, or a secret, or a fear that your character is hiding. Rewrite the scene using it as a silent metaphor.

Mystery

2011-06-16T09:55:00.000-07:00

Curiosity begins before it has language to express itself. Watch an infant seeing his environment, or a toddler discovering a ladybug. Then as language expands the questions come buzzing incessantly for answers. Where are we going? How does it work? What makes the sky blue? Why?

Spending a few hours with a mystery novel or movie refreshes us and feeds our natural curiosity. Not only do we take a break from our normal schedules, but also we can exercise our imagination and our deductive reasoning together. An enthralling mystery nurtures all our senses.

Often we only need a title to draw us in. The movie caption, as in The Secret of Moonacre, tells us what we are to discover. Or does it? What is the secret? The answer is quite simple but the path to it is long, with twists and turns emotionally and physically. It is covered over by layers of misinformation and misunderstandings.

Why did her father leave her only a battered old book? Why can she see the story when she opens it? Why does her uncle lock it away from her and refuse her access?

Why is everyone so angry? The questions swarm like bees. One answer opens another and then another until she is running to escape the onslaught. And yet, she must find the answer now for herself. Her curiosity pulls her deeper and deeper.

Journal Prompt:

A few weeks after an elderly relative has died, your character receives a special delivery envelope. Inside is a key, a locket, a note from her relative that says, “I’m sorry”, and an oilskin pouch containing a map of his summer home and a ink-smeared fragile letter, that is at least fifty or more years old. What happens next?

Memory

2011-06-09T08:17:00.000-07:00

Busyness, stress, aging, and noise are just some barriers that affect our day-to-day memory retention. Time slips away and we realize we’ve forgotten an errand, or a phone call, or to pay a bill. So we cope with various methods to help us remember, but we also don’t let the frustration control us.

Long-term memories, however, have the capacity to cripple plans and relationships when they become so entwined in our minds and hearts that we measure all our decisions against them. Especially when our memory has become distorted over time. Like the telephone game children like to play, the whispered word or phrase at the end is completely different than the beginning, and usually unintelligible.

In the movie The Secret of Moonacre, memories of an event are passed down from generation to generation, each adapting it to their own perspective. The meaning behind the original event is completely submerged under suspicion and accusation.

Each side of the conflict fuels the animosity all built on a faulty foundation. When newly arrived Maria Merryweather comes to live in this environment, she realizes that if the truth isn’t discovered there can be no restoration. She begins a search through all the stories and memories trying to find the true thread. Her fresh insight finally breaks down the twisted memory brambles and releases everyone to start fresh.

Journal Prompt:

Take a special event from your past and write it up as a free-write, not pausing, just pour out all the pieces you think you remember. Then write down all the emotions that still influence you from that memory.

Ask a sibling or friend or family member, who was also present, to share their recollections. How close are you emotionally? What different details stand out?

Apply this idea to one of your characters. Have them completely misunderstand an event and makes decisions based on that faulty impression.

Maps

2011-06-02T12:08:00.000-07:00

Information boards and kiosks, from local hiking trails to prestigious museums, have one common note. “You are here.” The maps may be plain, in color, different sizes, with or without words, but the X marks the spot is clear enough to give the visitor a sense of place, a center from which to choose their direction.

Not only do these information markers cut down on employees being asked to give directions, but they also add a sense of safety and security emotionally. Disorientation in physical surrounding often results in immediate stress. For adventurers it’s an adrenaline rush of excitement, but for others it can raise fearful memories. Either way we prefer to have some measure of control.

In the movie Moonacre, orphan Maria Merryweather is introduced to her new country home as uncle takes her for a ride around the land, marking out the boundaries, and giving clear warnings as to where she should not go. But he also refuses any explanations, both for external dangers and her internal confusion. He removes her father’s book despite her pleadings and locks it away in a forbidden room. He tells her what she may and may not do, and then ignores her questions, often dismissing her with curt exits.

Left with only a partial map of her new surroundings, she attempts to find some solid ground emotionally and tumbles into more and more bewildering situations. Still she tries to make sense of where she is, and why her uncle lives as he does, and what does it all have to do with the hidden book.

Bit by bit she explores this new territory and creates her own map to discover what her inheritance really is.

Journal Prompt:

Take your character to the home of a relative that she never knew existed. Literally or figuratively, close the door behind her. How does she get her bearings in this place? What emotional roller coaster does it unleash?

Metaphors

2011-05-12T10:51:00.000-07:00

“A novel is never anything but a philosophy put into images.” Albert Camus

Peering into one metaphor alone is like looking though a prism of possibilities. A well-chosen and well-placed phrase provides a dazzling vista of interpretation.

For example, a recent conversation on ‘a castle’ included multiple ways to focus a setting through metaphor and theme.

In the movie The Secret of Moonacre there are two distinct castles, each a reflection on choices. The choices were made hundreds of years earlier but continue to enslave the descendants as each generation takes up a personal decision to perpetuate the feud.

One castle is in ruins; empty, cold, a shadow of its former life. It is a place of sorrow and lost opportunity with only three inhabitants left.

The other castle is stark, cold, grey and brimming with people. Busy, bustling, overflowing inhabitants filled to the brim with anger and revenge. And a closer look reveals a castle in decay as well.

Both castles have become mirror images of heart choices. The reality of this concrete metaphor unfolds with greater perception as the story shows all its secrets and mysteries.

Journal Prompt:

Choose the place that is most important to your character, or most central to the story question. Costume it from a variety of styles: old and decaying, ordinary, flashy, sophisticated, copycat or with a brand new coat of paint. Which version becomes a metaphor for your character’s heart?

Mystery

2011-05-04T10:24:00.000-07:00

Often when we encounter a new idea or challenge it excites us. The joy of discovery and the puzzle of understanding with insight grips our imagination. We’re eager to share our delight. Our amazement. But then another mystery follows. Others don’t find it as interesting, even those closest to us, whether personally or vocationally. Or they’re not willing to put in the time and effort necessary to comprehend all the implications.

Perhaps solving the mystery is only a prelude to years of painstaking research with personal risk, as so many doctors and scientists have done to find medical cures.

In the movie Avatar, after years of study the scientists make an astounding realization. They realize that the indigenous people connect within their world like a neural network. They have achieved an inter-connection between all living organic matter, which is far beyond mankind’s achievement.

They rush to stop destruction, desperate to protect the people and the science. But then they face rejection and ridicule, and finally are confined to jail to get them out of the way. This mystery costs them everything. Their breath-taking words split open the wide gulf of difference between values and beliefs.

Journal Prompt:

Your character has discovered a truth that can bring healing to mind, soul or body. How does he communicate that discovery? How does he react when others reject his gift of life?

Memory

2011-04-27T11:33:00.000-07:00

Personal, public and cultural memory have the potential to loom over current decisions and negotiations in either positive or negative terms. If the memory is old enough to be considered history, it can turn itself into a legend that may or may not have any bearing in reality, other than as a name or a place.

And yet we often use these memories as measures against others and ourselves. That is, if we think one is valid. Or, if we consider it as impossible and only vivid imagination, we will make a concerted effort against it. However the legend may contain truth that unlocks hope.

In the movie Avatar, Jake has lost all possibility of negotiating a peace. He has completely lost the trust of the people he now loves. Desperate for a solution he remembers the story of the Toruk, the mighty predator of the skies, caught by a leader at times when the people were in danger. The previous Toruk riders brought them victory, so Jake sets out to become one, not knowing whether the legend was real history or story, or a mix of both. But it is enough to give him enough courage to try.

Journal Prompt:

Under what conditions would your character be willing to turn and trust in a story, or legend, or person, that may or may not be true? Under what conditions would you?

maps

2011-04-21T12:16:00.000-07:00

Ancient travelers observed nature to guide them to their destination. They depended on the position of the sun, moon, and stars as reference points. They tracked the wind. They examined ground and foliage to trace water sources.

Today we have computerized maps and guidance systems to talk us through strange surroundings, or we can access quick text messages to ask others who know.

Avatar’s world unfolds one view of technology overload. The military is completely dependant on their machines from breathing livable air, to industry, protection and travel. Without their machinery they are virtually helpless on this strange planet. And yet they see themselves as conquerors, as an advanced people, who openly disdain the native population.

But they are locked in their steel worlds and unable to navigate or explore without taking life risks. They pre-set their radius maps, emotionally and physically, and stay hostage in a false sense of safety. They follow programmed sight. Until they reach the floating mountains with magnetic force that sends all their instruments askew, and they have to fly by eye sight. Watchful. Careful. Really seeing the land around them. Involved in beauty and danger side by side.

Journal Prompt:

Choose a travel destination for your character. Is it familiar territory or new? Will she jump in her car and just go? Or pre-plan every step for every possible emergency. Are her precautions common sense or anxiety ridden? Examine her attitude as she approaches each marker en route, and show your reader how she perceives her trip.

Metaphors

2011-04-13T14:24:00.000-07:00

“Tell the truth but tell it slant.” Emily Dickinson

Metaphors also incorporate juxtaposition to catch our wonder. The movie Avatar brims with such metaphors creating not only a visual panorama, but also a breathtaking palette of concepts.

The floating mountains startle us. Our perspective struggles to grasp solid rock weighted familiar assumptions with transparent air. We need mountains to stand firmly on the ground, don’t we? So we can admire their grandeur, scale their heights and conquer the elements. All are still possible in Avatar’s world, except that if anyone falls, they fall into air. Both the beauty and the danger are heightened to an unimaginable level.

Sometimes we become so familiar with the language and the images we use in our writing that we sap their strength. We know to avoid clichés, but often we settle for ordinary when with a metaphoric dab we might shatter open new possibilities.

What about some rock hard assumption we make for our characters, or ourselves, whether positive and negative? What could happen if we released them into air? What consequences could follow?

Journal Prompt:

Make a list of natural elements that we expect to be free-floating. Now ground them as with the weight of a mountain. What new concepts do they provide?

Repeat using personality traits in yourself or someone you know well. Then apply the change to one of your characters.

Mystery

2011-04-06T12:28:00.000-07:00

Mystery opens a trail into questions. It catches us sideways with curious glimpses. When we’re too busy or pre-occupied to notice, it often nudges a little harder, or makes us stop a moment to consider a possibility.

In the Season Five of Doctor Who the story thread of a crack in the universe (that erases memory) takes a backseat among all the chaos and adrenalin in continuing episodes. Yet in each one, following its introduction, somewhere The Doctor manages to ask, “Do you remember what was in your room when we first met?”

Or suddenly he’ll hesitate, look quizzical, then murmurs, “Why don’t you remember?” He doesn’t expect an actual answer and his companion regards him clearly confused as to why he is even asking such strange things, especially now in the middle of dire threats.

But it makes the audience remember, and we sit up, take notice, mull the possibilities, and come up with more questions. It must mean something but what? What does it have to do with this episode? Where’s the connection? The storyline here is completely different. Or is it?

When the finale comes at season’s end we discover the intricate puzzle woven throughout and that all the pieces fit perfectly. And then I wonder how many people were prepared? And can it come back again? What other thread throughout the series will re-surface?

Journal Prompt:

Whether you’ve watched the series or not, make a list of causes that could create such a crack in the universe. Approach it from different perspectives such as science or history, legend or architecture. Play with at least three different threads and set up cause and effect scenarios.

Memory

2011-03-30T00:05:00.000-07:00

If memory holds our emotional reservoir, both personal and public, what happens if it is erased? There are many real situations that cause partial or permanent amnesia: trauma—emotional or physical, stroke, surgical procedures, and aging. Do we become a different person? Can one lost memory impact all who we are in our character? Why do we struggle so hard to hold on to them even when difficult or painful?

Then as writers we can add in all the fantastical and sci-fi versions too. Think of Farscape with Scorpius chasing astronaut John Crichton across the universe to extract wormhole technology from his mind.

One of the story threads for Season Five of Doctor Who is his realization of a crack in the universe. The Doctor began to recognize that if it reached a person they would no longer exist, as if they’d never been born. He tried to convince a young woman to hold onto the memories. If she could keep hold of them then the missing person would still exist in her heart.

Journal Prompt:

If you knew that a special memory would be erased forever, what would you do to hold onto it? Write a scene where your character discovers what you have done and reacts to it.

Maps

2011-03-24T14:50:00.000-07:00

Within the same day work, worship, chores, commitments, family, friends, all have the potential to bring a blessing or brokenness. But we keep moving at such super speeds that we forget our emotions, our hearts, and our wills need time to catch up.

We must pause to map out the internal territory and make adjustments, before we derail. Or head in the wrong direction because of miscommunication and misunderstanding. It can require a quiet listening that goes far inward. And where do we find the time for that level of reflection?

In the painting Automat by Hopper, the woman is alone, both physically and emotionally. Invisible questions flutter in the still moment. Did she choose this moment of isolation, or has it been forced upon her?

Often we resist isolation because the silence can overwhelm us with a passionate barrage. Or we prepare one deliberately, because we know that the next step we take, the next word we speak to ourselves, or another, will result in life-changing relationships. Sometimes the solitude is painful. Sometimes it leads to a restored peace. But before we can take the first step we need to read the map.

Journal Prompt:

For yourself, or for a character, choose a heartfelt incident experienced within the past week and sift through all the feelings. Does acknowledging them allow resolution, or is a follow-up conversation required to confirm a decision?

For a character, expand into both a positive resolution and a negative one.

Metaphors

2011-03-09T10:36:00.002-08:00

“What is art but a way of seeing” –Thomas Berger

Poets use metaphors to present life in a new perspective. Painters and photographers capture fleeting moments. Their images connect us through time. And our curiosity flares when a particular portrait or landscape causes us to pause, to focus.

Sometimes we are caught by the effect and study the craft. Sometimes we are caught by the mood and wonder at the story behind it. Automat by Hopper provides that moment in time to see.

An attractive woman sits alone in a diner, late at night, holding a coffee cup. The room is well lit where she sits, but outside the window only darkness. Has she missed her train? Is she waiting for an arrival? Did someone she loves leave, and she can’t bring herself to go home?

Next to her is a bowl of colorful fruit. She wears a green coat, edged with black fur at neck and wrists, and a yellow hat with a broad rim encircling her head. The table is round, white-topped, also edged in black. Black chairs. A yellow heater. Black doors with a yellow bar.

She is alone. Her isolation frozen in stillness.

If you were to capture this image as a word metaphor, what would you say?

Journal Prompt:

Write up a paragraph of internal monologue as she convinces herself to leave the diner, OR a paragraph that begins with her standing up—what happens next?

Mystery

2011-03-02T00:05:00.000-08:00

What makes the Titanic so noteworthy among so many sunken vessels?

Mystery feeds our curiosity and our desire for knowledge. Whether the mystery is a crime, or a search for science, or to understand a new language, it sparks an interest. We become motivated to listen, to study, and to invest ourselves in the outcome.

Mystery with mythic impact pulls us into both story and illumination. Characters and readers dig deeper to discover truth.

In the novel Elidor, Alan Gardner uses disbelief to bridge, first, the children’s entrance into the land, and then, Elidor’s entrance into their own world. The characters repeatedly insist these things can’t be happening, that there must be an explanation, or it was a dream. With each major transition in the story the disbelief, the impossible, is emphasized. Dealing with the impossible heightens the action, as well as the mystery.

Roland, the youngest, alone continues to insist on examining the odd occurrences and trying to find a solution. Over and over the children try to ignore, forget, disbelieve the strange circumstances surrounding them, but with each impossible occurrence they are forced back into their relationship with Elidor.

At the end, what cannot be explained or necessarily believed is real.

And sometimes the questions raised still simmer, as in the Titanic. Questions continue to keep its tragedy of interest a century later.

Journal Prompt:

Write your own possible reasons for questions surrounding the pendant. 1) What reason did her fiancée really have for purchasing it? 2) Why did Rose keep it hidden all those years? 3) Why did she throw it into the ocean, and not give it to her granddaughter or a museum? Write your ideas from a character perspective, and a plot perspective.

Memory

2011-02-23T00:05:00.001-08:00

Memory holds our emotional reservoir, both personal and public. Some memories are buried so deep that we don’t recognize them when they echo in the present. We have a fleeting pang or touch of comfort, and wonder why. We need these echoes to help us bridge understanding and communication with others. Regardless of language or status we immediately connect, or recognize, the joy of a newborn child or the grief of a death.

Tying the echoes of emotional resonance in our stories adds texture and depth. Jack Hodgins says it helps support a story’s truth; “the writer is attempting to find that place in a reader’s consciousness where myth already exists, to free the ghosts and archetypes that stalk about and haunt.”

The opening of the movie Titanic focuses on the sunken vessel. The camera lingers over the silent giant at the bottom of the sea. What echoes are stirred by this choice? Another opening could extend the newspaper stories, or old photographs. It could highlight the passengers. All of which are included in the movie as well, but not with the slow pace of the mysterious ocean liner seen through murky waters.

Journal Prompt:

Write your own opening to the Titanic using another focus. What echo becomes enhanced? What echo disappears? Apply the same technique to a new scene in your novel.

Maps

2011-02-16T15:25:00.000-08:00

In our writing, as well as on the roads we literally travel on, we continually need to read directions to understand where we are, to make sure we haven’t gotten lost. What does that sign say? Danger ahead, construction work in progress, slow down, curve ahead, slippery, speed limit. The story becomes as much a part of the journey as the destination.

But there are other mythic maps to explore as well: cultural, psychological, spiritual, emotional, and personal. All have the potential to deepen our appreciation of the story we’re in. Our emotions engage in resonance as we hold our breath at the villain, sigh in relief at escape, and cry with happiness at reconciliation. Our hearts watch for the clues.

In the movie, The Seventh Stream, we track the moral direction of the characters through their actions. Actor John Lynch portrays Dunhill, an embittered young man who controls Mairead, the selkie. Greed is Dunhill’s heart’s desire.

Our first glimpse is his attempt to kill a seal. But he stops as he looks into her eyes. Why? Belated compassion? No, instead he has a glimmer of a greater bounty. Unlike Quinn, Dunhill does believe the legends and so he captures the skin of a selkie, forcing her under his power.

He is desperate for a life of ease, for the respect of the villagers and for riches. Greed leads to murder. First he kills her spirit by imprisoning her. Then later he threatens to kill his own father. His choices and decisions are plotted according to his heart’s desires as clearly as a roadmap.

Journal Prompt

Choose one of the ‘seven deadly sins’ and write out a trajectory for its satisfaction, from the smallest impulse to final completion. Apply those steps to your antagonist’s career arc.

Metaphors

2011-02-11T12:45:00.000-08:00

Metaphors help create ‘a holy curiosity’ by capturing our attention. They catch us up, we pause instead of racing past words. Like Moses we turn to see why the burning bush is not consumed. We allow the concepts to soak slowly into our emotions.

In the movie, The Seventh Stream, grief-laden widower Quinn is a man of logic. He believes in only what he can see and feel and “sometimes not even that.”

When a mysterious woman appears in their fishing village he cannot accept that she is walking off the pages of a legend.

However, he recognizes her inner turmoil instantly and her emotional pain strikes his heart. With her pure heart insight as a selkie, (a seal in human form) she discerns his loneliness and uses it to build a bridge of communication, a bridge of possibility. Gradually both Quinn and the audience begin to accept the truth of what she is.

Actor Scott Glenn who portrays Owen Quinn says, “I hope the audience will feel the possibility of magic—if not real magic, then the metaphor of magic—touching their lives, and making them better for it.”

Journal Prompt:

For yourself, or for one of your characters, choose a painful emotion. Then write a short scene where another person bridges that pain with healing by use of metaphor. How does that touch make the pain better, or at least bearable?