Writing with James Patterson...and Joyce Maynard

Despite not writing a blog post for, whew, almost a year, I have been writing. Writing a short story, a novel, and two plays. In all honesty, I've only tinkered around with everything with the exception of the short story.

That story I actually finished (go me!), and I'm in the middle of a second major rewrite after feedback from a few friends. This will be the first piece of fiction that I'll be submitting -- I'm really to start my collection of rejection letters!!

Maybe I'll soon have a rejection letter of my very own!

I think I might actually finish one of the plays too...it has a full outline and is coming along smoothly.

With all this writing practice and slow improvement, I figured this was the time to take James Patterson's MasterClass. This class seems perfect for me as I have no literary aspirations, but just want to tell a fun story. I am about halfway through watching the lectures. After that I plan on viewing them a second time and doing the writing exercises that come in the accompanying lesson plan.

He's a real sweetheart that James Patterson. He's so encouraging and is clear about what he thinks works -- and it must, the man sells a ton of books. But a better review than I could write, from a seasoned writer, is from Joyce Maynard. I've never heard of the woman, and I am a little embarrassed about that.

Joyce Maynard, photo by Micke

Joyce is charmed by Patterson, but I shouldn't paraphrase her -- simply reference her great article!

I now have read her Wikipedia page and know a bit more about her -- she wrote To Die For! I'm curious to read now to see how similar or different it is from Buck Henry's movie script. 

So although my work life is a bit nuts and less than inspiring at the moment, this month I hope to submit my first story, finish my little play, maybe complete Patterson's course, and start reading some Joyce Maynard. Wish me luck!

 

Characters

When I say characters, I don't mean the sometimes charming and sometimes not-so-charming eccentrics who populate my beloved city, instead I mean fictional characters.

I enjoy just about everything more when I am involved, a participant. So at some point, as an avid reader, I had to try my hand at fiction. I've written a chunk of my story, but the characters are flat and not well motivated. I have an idea what one looks like -- Maureen O'Sullivan. Adorable, right?!

Okay, one step at a time.What characters do I find interesting and why? One that comes to mind is Cardinal Chang from The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters. He has had a rough life. He was injured and disfigured years before. He is clever and has devised strategies to be a success in his profession as a mercenary despite his handicaps. And despite his dubious profession, he is motivated by a noble cause -- to rescue a woman who showed him kindness. I became a bit obsessed by the character and the other characters paled in comparison. I found the book a bit tedious until he appeared.

Today I was thinking, why didn't the other characters in the book interest me in the same way? They were ordinary people trapped in a bad situation. They also had to be clever and not only survive, but discover the plot driving the people trying to kill them. I should be able to relate to these characters and therefore root for them, but they didn't have a noble cause; they simply used their wits to escape from a situation they somewhat carelessly stumbled upon. I could relate to them perhaps, but I didn't have the respect for them that I felt for the Chang character.

The another that come to mind is Valentin St. Cyr from David Fulmer's mystery series.

The setting, New Orleans, and time, 1907, definitely interests me, but Valentin is another example of a clever mercenary (private detective in this case) who is a success despite his flaws and rough past. Hum, I'm sensing a pattern. Am I simply attracted to intelligent, solemn, and damaged detectives? I think that's a yes. The third character that came to mind is another detective. Jane Tennison is a police detective who has to use her wits to solve crime while battling the "boys club."

Her major flaws are in reaction to the stress of her job and her obsession with her work. I see the pattern, it's a certain kind of respect. Certainly, I respect the happy, content person who is a success through intelligence and hard work, but their struggle doesn't excite my emotions. These three characters -- Chang, Valentin, and Jane -- inspire my respect because they solved puzzles under the most stressful of circumstances that few others could solve. They were almost consumed by the hunt for the solution. They sacrifice to crack the mystery and save the day. That really kicks me in the gut.

Next steps? Sitting down and fleshing out many more background details on my characters. Give them character; give them personality and background that would incite my emotions and make me root for their success.

More 1st Paragraphs

I really enjoyed the opportunity to type out the words of Ross Mcdonald, so I scanned my bookshelves again for another author. I have a soft spot for author Richard S. Prather and his detective Shell Scott.

Richard S. Prather in 1967, he looks so much like a Daniel Clowes' character!

I have no fewer than 15 paperbacks, most with fabulous covers—the element that first attracted me. These books are far more "pulpy" with an old-school obsession with the ladies, but charming none-the-less, with a silly sense of comedy and a dash of the absurd. Prather's first paragraphs are consistently pretty brief.

Upon typing them out it's clear that most of his books begin with a reference to a sexy dame to hook the reader. I assume this consistency enabled him to crank out 45 books in his career; all but six published in the 1950s and 60s.

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

She looked hotter than a welder’s torch and much, much more interesting. – Case of the Vanishing Beauty, 1950

It’s a funny thing. If you were in the middle of the African veld and heard a couple of high notes from a hot trumpet, you’d undoubtedly think it was some animal sounding off. Or if there were a python hissing on one of the top floors of the Empire State Building, you’d probably think it was an office boy whistling through his teeth. – Everybody Had a Gun, 1951

She still had all her clothes on and was standing in the blue light from a baby spot when I came in, but I knew it wasn’t going to last because the way she was moving I could tell it was that kind of dance. I was glad it was that kind of dance. – Find This Woman, 1951

It was Bedlam, and Babel, and Baghdad galloping, and Lady Godiva in the middle naked as an artificial eye on a white-satin spread. And not a sign of a horse. – Bodies in Bedlam, 1951

The morgue in Los Angeles is downstairs in the Hall of Justice. It was seven o’clock at night, dark now, and Mr. Franklin stopped me when we reached the building’s entrance. “You go ahead,” he said. – Have Gat—Will Travel: 6 Shell Scott Stories, 1952-1956

I awoke in darkness, dull pain throbbing in my head, my side aching with each breath, and I lay quietly for a minute trying to remember where I was. A faint, slightly sickening odor of ether and disinfectants recalled the white-uniformed nurse, the too cheerful doctor. Now I remembered: Manning, Memorial Hospital in Seacliff. Room 48. Patient, me, Shell Scott, private detective, somewhat disabled. – Too Many Crooks, 1953

This was a party that Cholly Knickerbocker, in tomorrow’s Los Angeles Examiner, would describe as “a gathering of the Smart Set,” and if this was the Smart Set I was glad I belonged to the Stupid Set. – Strip for Murder, 1955 (tag line “Shell Scott invades a nudist camp”)

She had a seventy-eight-inch bust, forty-six-inch waist, and seventy-two-inch hips—measurements that were exactly right, I thought, for her height of eleven feet, four inches. – Take a Murder, Darling, 1958

He lay there in the silk-lined casket looking very waxy, but it was eight to five that he looked no more waxy than I. – Slab Happy, 1958

The Rand Brothers Mortuary was so beautiful it almost made you want to die. – Dig That Crazy Grave, 1961

She has eyes that sizzled and lips like flaming puckers, and a body flaunting the vital statistics you’d expect on a gal with such facial sizzle and smack, but she was not so bright she would give a dummy an inferiority complex. That was the kick in the pants—my pants, of course, since I was with her. – Dead Heat, 1963

They dug up Johnny Troy that day. – The Trojan Hearse, 1964

When I went through the front door of the Jazz Pad, Lilli Lorraine was singing in a voice filled with fever and the words hung in the smoky air like heat. – The Meandering Corpse, 1965

That say time will tell, and on Mrs. Gladys Jellicoe it had spilled everything. She was about fifty years old and quite well preserved: she looked like a mummy. Her eyes were the color of coffee with the grounds still in it, and her hair was the same interesting shade as her eyes; she had a face to unwind cuckoo clocks and a shape like an old girdle. – The Cheim Manuscript, 1969

I swung left into Mulberry Drive and headed back toward town, hoping Mayor Everson Fowler’s phone call to the local law had taken Sergeant Samuels and Officer Jonah off my tail for good. I was also hoping, with slight unease, that we’d been talking about the same people. – The Sweet Ride, 1972

Thoughts on Writing, the Return to Blog!

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I’ve been attending a writing group and consequently I’m playing around with a story I have no intention of finishing, but I like the tinkering. This had led to thoughts of first sentences.

What makes a good first sentence? How much significance must it contain: just a tidbit or should it be literally dripping with meaning? I was drawn to my bookcases in search of good first sentences. After opening a few books to their first page, I was thinking about comparing the first sentences of books by the same author. There are few authors who I’ve collected more than a book here and there, especially since my aggressive culling of my library two months ago, the idea was to concentrate on only those books I needed in my possession and to visit my library more. I am a member of an amazing private library in downtown San Francisco, the Mechanics Institute Library. Just the name makes me swoon.

After scanning a few shelves I found six volumes, more honestly, paperbacks of Ross Macdonald (aka Kenneth Millar), that prolific mystery writer.

Here are his first sentences:

The cab turned off U.S. 101 in the direction of the sea. – The Moving Target, 1949

If you didn’t look at her face she was less than thirty, quick-bodied and slim as a girl. – The Drowning Pool, 1950

I was dreaming about a hairless ape who lived in a cage by himself. – The Doomsters, 1958

The law offices of Wellesley and Sable were over a savings bank on the main street of Santa Teresa. – The Galton Case, 1959

Coming over the pass you can see the whole valley spread out below. – The Wycherly Woman, 1961

It was August, and it shouldn’t have been raining. – The Far Side of the Dollar, 1964

* * * * * * * * * * *

Maybe this exercise doesn’t give the author a chance for a thought-out first impression. Perhaps the first paragraph would more interesting. Francine Prose in her book “Reading Like a Writer” quotes Rex Stout and his character Nero Wolfe: “A clever man might successfully disguise every element of his style but one—the paragraphing. Diction and syntax may be determined and controlled by rational processes in full consciousness, but paragraphing—the decision whether to take short hops or long ones, and whether to hop in the middle of a thought or action or finish it first—that comes from instinct, from the depths of personality.”

* * * * * * * * * * *

The cab turned off U.S. 101 in the direction of the sea. The road looped round the base a brown hill into a canyon lined with scrub oak. – The Moving Target, 1949

If you didn’t look at her face she was less than thirty, quick-bodied and slim as a girl. Her clothing drew attention to the fact: a tailored sharkskin suit and high heels that tensed her nylon-shadowed calves. But there was a pull of worry around her eyes and drawing at her mouth. The eyes were deep blue, with a sort of double vision. They saw you clearly, took you in completely, and at the same time looked beyond you. They had years to look back on, and more things to see in the years than a girl’s eyes had. About thirty-five, I thought, and still in the running. – The Drowning Pool, 1950

I was dreaming about a hairless ape who lived in a cage by himself. His trouble was that people were always trying to get in. It kept the ape in a state of nervous tension. I came out of sleep sweating, aware that somebody was at the door. Not the front door, but the side door that opened into the garage. Crossing the cold kitchen linoleum in my bare feet, I saw the first dawn at the window over the sink. Whoever it was on the other side of the door was tapping now, quietly and persistently. I turned on the outside light, unlocked the door, and opened it. – The Doomsters, 1958

The law offices of Wellesley and Sable were over a savings bank on the main street of Santa Teresa. Their private elevator lifted you from a bare little lobby into an atmosphere of elegant simplicity. It created the impression that after years of struggle you were rising effortlessly to your natural level, one of the chosen. – The Galton Case, 1959

Coming over the pass you can see the whole valley spread out below. On a clear morning, when it lies broad and colored under a white sky, with the mountains standing far back on either side, you can imagine it’s the promised land. – The Wycherly Woman, 1961

It was August, and it shouldn’t have been raining. Perhaps rain was too strong a word for the drizzle that blurred the landscape and kept my windshield wipers going. I was driving south, about halfway between Los Angeles and San Diego. – The Far Side of the Dollar, 1964

Rereading, certainly the single first sentences are easier to absorb and consider what set-up they might intend. Although I think I prefer the meatiness of the first paragraph. Macdonald seems to be pretty consistent with a paragraph of 2-3 sentences, with just a hint of promise of what's to come.



It's an interesting exercise to type out these sentences and consider the structure. I tend to get caught up immediately in a story and have trouble paying attention to the writing. I think I'll stick with mystery/detective fiction with my next author...who will it be?