What Did You Just Ask?

December 21, 2015December 21, 2015 / Lisa / 1 Comment

I just finished a Frequently Asked Questions page dealing of course with writing. But sitting this evening looking for reasons to not work on book four, I started remembering other questions I’ve been asked, or been witness to. Such as…

My son (age 3) to my mother: ‘Do you have a vagina?’

My son to my mother: ‘Can I see?’

From a Sheriff’s Deputy, to me, as I climbed in the back of an aid car: ‘Can you check his breathing? He just ate his cigarette.’

From many, many people, variations of ‘What is that?!? A horse?’ as I walked my Irish Wolfhound.

The one and only Strider

From a friend, during a walk with me, and asked with a certain note of rising panic: ‘Is that bear poop?’

Followed by: ‘What do you mean it’s fresh? How fresh?’

The romantic marriage proposal: ‘Don’t you need health insurance?’

And he’s not short, folks.

Asked by a stranger from Scandinavia after hearing my American accent: ‘Do you have ice beers?’ (He meant polar bears; I wanted to give him directions to a bar.)

Asked by an ER doctor outside the hospital room where a young woman, broken bones treated by me during a call, sustained as she tried to rescue her three year old daughter from raging whitewater, when the news came to us that the daughter died during the air lift: ‘Can you tell her? You’ve established a relationship with her.’

Me, very young and teary, asking my grandmother after a conversation with uncles: ‘Do freckles really come from walking too close behind cows?’

And so many more. What questions stay in your mind as the years go by?

Who’s Your Antagonist?

December 16, 2015December 16, 2015 / Lisa / 3 Comments

A friend of mine asked if books always have to include a ‘bad guy’ or if the antagonist can just be ‘life happening’. That made me wonder if the underlying question isn’t actually more along the lines of defining just what an antagonist is.

Life happening…just quietly. More conflict than you might imagine though!

I know there are genres out there where antagonists are still villains, still the black hats out to destroy the world. But for the most part antagonists these days have to be as multi-layered as everyone else. Believable, in other words, as most of us already know.

But at it’s most basic definition, an antagonist is the one who causes conflict for the protagonist. And that could be anyone. In some ways it almost needs to be all the characters. I think each one should provide some sort of conflict (internal or external). Their purpose for existing in the story must tie into the plot. Even the friend, or supporter, or lover of the protagonist must in some way add conflict. Think about it. How boring would a secondary character be if all she did was be the ever-cheerful, ever-supportive best friend?

A huge source of conflict for our dog, Vala

And of course the antagonist can be non-human. You have the solitary survivor of a plane crash trying to make it through the bush in Alaska and she’s the only human in the book. But her antagonists are hungry wild animals, nature, her own fears, her own lack of knowledge, etc.

Conflict with Nature. The road lost.

Each antagonist creates something the hero must overcome, adapt to, survive, etc. In that sense, going back to my friend’s question, I suppose depending on the story, the antagonist could be ‘life happening’. Depending on how that was written. If it’s someone simply dealing with the stresses of long grocery lines, though, those conflicts are going to get mighty boring.

Because us readers want someone to root for, and that means needing someone to root against. Or something to root against. No matter what type of fiction we read, I think we all want to see someone win and someone lose. How they win, or how they lose will depend on the genre, story, market, etc.

And hey, let me just tip my black hat here before I stroll away. Because at the even more basic layer, the author is the biggest antagonist of them all. Think about it. Aren’t we always looking at ways to screw things up for our hero?

What do you think? Does a story always have to have an antagonist? And how do you define one?

The Kid Who Sat Next To Me

December 3, 2015December 3, 2015 / Lisa / Leave a comment

This is the writing prompt of the day. I’ve decided writing prompts are simply excuses to tell a story.

There was this girl. Christina. Quiet. Shy. Socially awkward. Not beautiful. Ignored by most.

In other words a lot like me back then. Well actually, she was me, doubled, tripled, quadrupled.

By the time her stop came around the school bus was mostly full. But because I was similar to her, no one sat with me. And my stop was one of the first ones so I could get a prime seat. I spent the time watching the scenery and day dreaming. Far, far away in my story world.

Somehow Christina started sitting with me. At first we didn’t speak. But then one day, with me being so alive in my stories and so not present in real life, noticed a dog.

I said something about an adventure the dog was heading off on. I don’t remember the details. Christina actually spoke.

She said something about the dog adventure, too.

And here, hidden in this equally quiet and awkward person, was a reader, a writer, a vivid imagination.

From then on the bus ride was too short. One of us would spy something and point it out, and off we would go creating a whole story between us about whatever fired our imagination. A tree leaning just so. A stranger riding a horse. A car parked in a field.

I have no idea if kids around us heard. When I sat alone on the bus, a boy regularly spit in my hair. Another told people I was from the Land of the Weird. Thinking back on those bus rides, I probably did appear to be very weird.

But when Christina and I were lost in the make believe world, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you if those kids were even on the bus. We certainly didn’t get picked on.

Oddly, Christina and I didn’t interact in school. She had a small group of friends and so did I. But on the bus? A different story. Every day.

What happened to Christina? I have no idea. I think she moved away in later years. I can’t even remember her last name now, to try looking her up. I do know that when school reunions have come along her name has never appeared. Of course I don’t go to those either.

But I know that somewhere, she is out there dreaming stories.