Bit late in the day, but it’s Friday, so it’s #FirstLineFriday! On this day, I post the first or first two lines of a published work, work-in-progress, or potential story. Today’s selection comes from my first published novel, Reborn City. I hope you like it.
Zahara and her family had decided to eat out at a restaurant in North Reborn that served kosher meat, the closest they could get to halāl.
Thoughts? Comments? Grammatical problems? Let me know. Have a good weekend!
I’m getting very naughty. First I’m swearing in Facebook posts, now I’m swearing in the titles of my blog posts.
Recently I had my five-hundredth idea for a short story or novelette since I started keeping a list. It was actually last night as I was getting ready for bed. I was thinking of an SVU rerun I’d watched earlier in the day and I thought of a minor character in the episode and what might’ve happened if he’d done some things differently in that episode. That birthed an idea (ah, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. One of these days I will do a post about how you’ve gotten in my head and given me so many ideas for stories). Anyway, it occurred to me that this would be my five-hundredth idea. And then I asked myself how many I’d actually at least gotten a first draft of. And today I counted.
The total count: 17. Yeah, only 17 out of 500 have at least made it past the first draft (what state they are afterwards varies). This was about the amount I expected, though I’m not happy about how little I’ve written. When I was thinking about this last night, I thought to myself, Time’s a quick bastard. It moves by so fast, and between school, the hurdles of getting a job, practicing German, the Netflix binges I keep getting myself drawn into, and everything else going on, you can’t keep up. Too bad. Some of these story ideas are really awesome.
That’s the sad part about being the author. You want to be able to write all the time, to not have to sleep or eat and the only distractions are ones you want to get distracted by and that don’t take up a lot of time. Sadly, reality is not always so pleasant, and we’ve got to deal with it how we can. As much as I would like to write more, as much as I would like to get a few more items on that list crossed off, I know that I don’t always have the time for it.
And I would like more time, definitely. I would. And maybe someday I will have more time. I know friends who’ve gotten publishing contracts or have gotten enough sales through self-publishing and they find more time to write and edit and publish and market. True, this often comes after many years of writing, when they’ve had careers, built up portfolios, had other stuff work for them. It’s something involving luck, ambition, hard work, dedication, and of course time.
Funny, time’s like money. You have to spend it to make it. Time’s not just a quick bastard, time’s a hard one to work with. And of course sometimes you don’t get the time you look for. Or you do but there’s family concerns or people want you to devote your time to other stuff because suddenly you have more of it. It’s a tough life to live, knowing that the time doesn’t always work with you in your writing career.
Still, I’m not letting time–what time I have–get away from me. After so much time, Video Rage is finally getting edited. I’ watched a documentary tonight over dinner that’ll help me with a story I’ve been struggling with for over a year. I’ve even figured out what short stories I might work on after I’ve finished with Video Rage, and what I’ll do after those are done. What little time I have, I’ll make work for me until I have more.
Time’s a quick and tricky bastard to work with. But I’m not going to let time get the best of me. Eventually, I’ll get time to work for me, so I’ll be the most prolific author I can be.
Until then, I keep doing what I’ve done since I first started my goal of writing to become published: just one word at a time, until the story comes together.
Last night as I was dropping off to sleep and feeling happy about setting up that new blog of mine (thanks to everyone who’s already signed up to follow that, by the way), my mind started to wander, as it usually does right before I fall asleep. This time around my mind went to horror stories (yeah, it does that quite often too), and I started to ponder character depth and development in horror stories. At some point I realized that in horror, you often have either characters who are very well-rounded and developed, or you have characters that are little more than archetypes, e.g. the Skeptical Dad, the Final Girl, The Psychic Child, The Expert, etc. And you know what else I realized, what made me get up out of bed and write this revelation down before I fell asleep and forgot? Sometimes these stories require different level of character development, depending on what the story is.
Let me explain. In certain scary stories, such as Stephen King’s The Shining (the book, not that poorly adapted Kubrick film), the characters are more than just archetypes and we get to know them very well. This is because their inner conflicts are just as important to the story as is the outer conflicts happening with the hotel. Jack Torrance is trying to keep his cool and be a good husband and father for his family after so many screw ups, while also fending off his desire to drink and the mental assaults of the hotel. His wife Wendy is trying to keep her family together while also keeping an eye on Jack in case he reverts to bad habits. And Danny, psychic and wise beyond his years, is trying to stay strong and endure the hotel’s attempts to kill him because he knows a lot is riding on his father taking care of the hotel through the winter. How they react to situations and grow as characters is just as important as what is happening within the hotel, so King makes sure they are well-developed.
Part of the terror (in the book, anyway), comes from the conflicts these characters wrestle with inside themselves as well as the ones the hotel sends them.
Meanwhile other stories don’t need as much character development. Take Insidious 3, for example (yes, I’m using the third entry in a horror film series, but bear with me). Besides main character Elise Rainier, most of the characters in the film do not get much character development. In the Brenner family, who are experiencing all these supernatural happenings, you don’t see much beyond the roles they play in the story: Quinn is a pretty girl with dreams of acting and is being victimized by a spirit, her dad Sean is the scatter-brained parent trying to keep his family together through grief and tragedy, and the annoying younger brother Alex is…well, the annoying younger brother. Despite not getting a lot of characterization though, these three characters do actually get some growth in the story: Quinn’s car accident and the spirit attacking her causes her, her brother, and her father to get out of their own little worlds and come together as a family to save Quinn’s life.
And of course, there are those stories that require little or no characterization or growth at all. This is common in slasher films, where the characters are often reduced to archetypes or roles (anyone who’s seen Cabin in the Woods knows what I’m talking about). This also happens in a short story I had an idea for recently (and that I might write as soon as I finish editing Video Rage). In this story, I decided that I wouldn’t spend time going over why the protagonist’s younger brother is a bratty kid or why the antagonists are as freaky as they are. The reason I decided this is because the events of the story are where the terror and intrigue come from, not from any inner growth. This is usually the case with slasher films as well: the events of the story are where we get our terror and excitement from, so more attention is pointed towards telling the story than going over any inner conflicts of the characters.
Half the fun of this show is seeing these two interact with each other.
What I’m driving at here is that how much character development is required from a story depends a lot on where the excitement and fear is coming from and how essential developing a character is in order to keep a reader or viewer invested in the story. In the case of a Nightmare on Elm Street film or the story I mentioned above, we’re reading or seeing the story because we know that the story’s events is where we’re going to get the excitement we paid to read/see. In the case of stories like The Shining or most episodes of Hannibal though, a major reason why we’re investing time into the story is because of the characters, not just what’s happening around them. This is especially so in Hannibal, because most of the conflicts and intrigue comes from the characters, their psychological states, and how they play against one another. We’re there not just because Hannibal Lecter is a famous and charismatic serial killer, we’re also there because we like seeing how Will Graham’s relationship with Lecter changes and evolves over time.
And knowing how much to balance of these two elements–character development and story-focus–is very important. Look at the remake of Poltergeist that came out recently. It was an awful film, and one of the many problems it had was that they tried to insert character development near the beginning of the film and failed miserably. Early on it focused on the dad losing his job and trying to find a new one, as well as mentioned something about the wife being a writer. I think the filmmakers were trying to translate this into an arc where the family tries to stay together and come together through rough circumstances, but ultimately the whole thread of the dad looking for a job and the parents trying to keep the family together fails to really get resolved or come together and ends up feeling unnecessary to the story. You’d think that it would just be enough to say the dad got promoted or transferred or a new job and leave it at that!
So whether it’s a zombie flick, a novel about a haunted house, or a psychological horror TV show, knowing the balance between character development and story-focus is just as important as creating a memorable and creepy villain or writing the story in such a way so that the story actually remains scary rather than goofy or just plain stupid (*cough* Friday the 13th remake *cough*). If you do, you’re more likely to write a good story worth remembering than you are to write garbage that horror fans sift through trying to find a nugget of gold.
I’ll certainly keep the balance in mind with the next story I write.
It’s Friday again, which means it’s #FirstLineFriday! This is when I post the first or first two sentences of a current work, a work-in-progress, or a potential work. As I know a lot of the people who follow me are also writers, I’m hoping to start a trend. Here’s this week’s entry:
Whenever it snows, I start to feel the old depression and anxiety rise up in me, and I remember those horrific three days. The worst three days of my life.
Thoughts? Grammar or spelling errors? Want to know more? Let me know, I’d love to talk about it.
All for now, I’m busy editing and doing other stuff, so I’ll get back to that. Have a nice weekend, Followers of Fear!
Well, it’s taken me…jeez, over a month to write this particular story, but I finally got it done. My latest story is called “Gynoid” (yes, that is a word) and it’s a story I’ve had a wonderful time working on. “Gynoid” is a science-fiction tale about a teenage boy who orders a robot that resembles a real girl called a gynoid (like the female equivalent to android) in order to help him become experienced in having sex. What he never expects though is to end up building a relationship with his gynoid, and that’s where his real problems begin.
For me this is an unusual story because it’s straight science fiction without any horror, thriller, fantasy, or other such elements. Still, I had a lot of fun writing this one for a number of reasons, including creating a world and a culture much more advanced than ours, making up slang terms and using the story to poke fun of certain things happening in our world today. And of course, like most science fiction stories, there are several themes running throughout the story, the main one dealing with how some guys will get caught up in fantasies of that “perfect woman” and the consequences of doing so. It’s actually quite interesting.
Of course, it’s going to take a lot of work before it’s ready for publication, even if I think it’s a very good first draft. At a little over nineteen thousand words, it’s a long novelette, and there’s a lot to be improved on. I want to make sure the characters’ personalities are consistent throughout, I would like to go a bit more in-depth with the culture and slang of the story (without trying to cram a whole mythology into the story, of course), and I’d like to brush up those rough patches. Still, once that’s done and I’ve had someone look it over, I think it could be published in a sci-fi magazine. Anything’s possible.
In the meantime, I’ll let “Gynoid” lie for a while and take a break for a day or so. After the break’s over–and I say this with all the excitement in the world–I’m going to be getting back to editing Video Rage! That’s right, I’ll be getting back to working on the sequel to Reborn City after putting it aside for so long. So fans of the first book rejoice, Rami Ungar’s back on the case and he’s hoping to get the second book out some time next year. Get excited!
In the meantime, the Big Birthday Sale is going on through the rest of today and tomorrow. So if you haven’t yet, head on over to Amazon or Smashwords, where you can get marked down or even free copies of The Quiet Game, Reborn City, and Snake. It’s the perfect time to get a good book at a great price.
That’s all for now, my Followers of Fear. If you need me, I’m on break and loving it. Have a nice day!
It’s Friday, so it’s time for #FirstLineFriday. This is something that started out on an author’s group on Facebook I belong to and that I’m trying to start as a trend among other writers elsewhere. What you do is on Friday you post the first one or two lines of a published story, work in progress, potential story, or just something you picked right out of the air. It’s a lot of fun coming up with what to write.
This week’s selection is from what I hope will be the second draft of a story I worked on earlier this year. Still trying to figure out how exactly I’m going to edit it but I have some ideas. Enjoy:
“…and in New Orleans, a woman gunned down by police may be the person responsible for the murders of several dangerous criminals. Police say the DNA of the suspect, who at this time has not been identified, matches that found at several other crime scenes of involving the deaths of people convicted or suspected of murder, rape, arson, or drug trafficking, all who died under mysterious circumstances.”
As you can probably tell, this is the beginning of a news report and would be much longer in the opening paragraph. But what did you think? Errors? Questions? Reviews? Let me know.
And if you haven’t, check out the Big Birthday Sale going on through Sunday. All Rami Ungar titles are marked down or free of charge at Amazon or Smashwords. Head on over to those sites to get a good book at a great price.
Have a nice day!
It wasn’t a dud! It wasn’t a dud! IT WASN’T A DUD!!!
Sorry, had to get that off my chest. I’ve seen so many bad horror films lately, it felt necessary to shout praise of a good one. And I’m not surprised that this one is so good. Leigh Whannell, James Wan, Jason Blum, and Oren Peli all worked together on this film. These guys are known for great, scary films, so when they come together you know you’ve got something worth getting excited for.
The third chapter in the Insidious saga takes place a few years before the events of the first two films. Quinn Brenner, played by Stephanie Scott, believes she’s being contacted by her dead mother, and encourages this contact. This tragically leads to a car accident that breaks both Quinn’s legs and puts her at the mercy of the spirit after her, The Man Who Can’t Breathe. At the same time, Elise Rainier, the medium from the first two movies, reappears to try and help Quinn, while facing her own darkness and a loss that has made her afraid to do what she does best.
There’s a lot to be said on this film, so I’ll try and keep it to the things I think everyone should know before going to see this one. First, the actors all handle their roles very well. Scott, along with Dermot Mulroney and Tate Berney as her harried father and annoying preteen brother, have great chemistry as a family crippled by a devastating loss and pulled together again by the dark events surrounding them. Best of all though is Lin Shaye as Elise, whose personal journey to recover her confidence is extraordinary and heart-wrenching. I almost cheered in the theater when she had finally regained her former airy manner from the first two films. Plus it’s fun to see her first interactions with Specs and Tucker and how they formed the team we met in the first film.
And speaking of the first film, there’s a notable change between Insidious 3 and its predecessors. In the first two films, they built a mythology based around astral projections and the realms of the dead (aka the Further), but Chapter 3 seems to eschew that mythology for the most part in favor of creating a good old-fashioned ghost story, and a great one too. The suspense is powerful, the atmosphere tense and the creepiness of the whole movie, coupled with the amazing visuals and sets, the jump-scares and the screeching violins in the background music, will keep you on the edge of your seat throughout the movie.
Creepiest of all, of course, is the villain, The Man Who Can’t Breathe. Honestly, even when you see him fully in the light near the end of the movie, he’s still one of the freakiest looking villains I’ve seen in recent memory. What makes him even scarier than his appearance is that you’re not sure exactly why he’s menacing this girl or where he came from. There’s mention of him living in Quinn’s building long ago, and something about “pets” is also mentioned, but we’re never really sure what his reasons are. And that just adds to the horror factor here.
There are only two major complaints I have with this movie. One is that the character of Hector, the lovestruck boy-next-door, seems like he was going to be a bigger part of this movie than he was. Were most of his scenes cut for time? That, and I feel that the climax was a little cliched and a little too short to be truly frightening, though the ending makes up for that. Other than that, I had a really good time.
All in all, I’m giving Insidious Chapter 3 a 4.3 out of 5. A scary good movie that’s put out of my mind all the bad horror films I’ve seen lately and make me want to tiptoe through the tulips with terrified glee. And if the critics and the box office agrees with me, I think we can expect a Chapter 4 someday. And you know what? Even if it might be a little unnecessary (ah horror, the original junkie for unnecessary movie sequels), I might just be okay with that.
Three of my favorite books by one of my favorite authors. I hear he can be a bit of a narcissist in real life though.
Only 5 days until my birthday and you get a special gift. All my published works–The Quiet Game, Reborn City, and Snake–will be on sale from June 10th to June 14th on Amazon and Smashwords. Paperbacks will be marked down and e-books will be free to download. If you’re looking for something new to read and do it cheaply, or you want to get a gift for both me and for yourself, this is the opportunity to do so.
That’s all for now. Hope you’re as excited as I am. I know my sister is. She shared and retweeted my Facebook and Twitter posts about this. God bless her, she loves my stories (and not just because I wrote them).
All for now. If I don’t post later today, have a great weekend, my Followers of Fear!
Rami Ungar The Writer 