The Ingenuity of Raccoons

Raccoons, I have come to realize, are quite clever.

Ingenious, some might say.

I mean, I said it.

Okay, I typed it (almost typed “I wrote it”).

Some say raccoons are destructive. I’ve never found them so. Curious, definitely. Cautious, without a doubt. Inquisitive, indubitably.

Destructive…

I’ve often found people define something as destructive when they feel some sense of order has been changed, interfered with, when a new, previously undefined sense of order is imposed or supercedes the old.

I’ve often been called destructive.

And usually because I was curious.

Still am, by the way.

Probably means you best stay away.

 

An Experiment in Writing – Part 35: Write Moments and Feelings

Moments – the memorable experiences, the highs and lows, of one’s life.
Feelings – how one feels during those moments.

 
There are few techniques in the author’s toolbox as engaging readers/listeners/viewers at a gut level, meaning an emotional level.

Make your audience feel – good or bad – and you have them. The secret to making your audience feel is creating believable characters, specifically relatable characters, and the easiest way to do that is by placing characters where they’re experiencing things the audience has experienced and reacting the way the audience reacts.

Your audience hasn’t been solo piloting an asteroid mining ship? Okay, but has your audience ever been alone in an unfamiliar place? Add in they notice something going on they’re unfamiliar with, have no experience of, don’t know how to react to.

Boom. Relatable.

How do you write relatable characters? As described above, through moments and feelings. The audience and character can be (other) worlds apart, and if they’re having the same feelings about what’s happening at that moment, you’ve got them.

 
Think I’m onto something? Take a class with me, schedule a critique of your work, or buy me a coffee.
Think I’m an idiot? Let me know in a comment.
Either way, we’ll both learn something.

Get copies of my books because it’s a nice thing to do, you care, you can follow along, and I need the money.

All Experiments

Fains I (A John Chance Mystery) Chapter 15 – Children of the Corn

Fains I (A John Chance Mystery) Chapter 15 – Children of the Corn

 
Al Campbell sat upright and in a lawn lounge chair beside a phone booth on the northwest corner of a middle-of-nowhere intersection in Nebraska. His eyes went from his Rolex to the setting sun and back, as if checking his watch and the sun were in agreement. Corn stretched skyward in all directions, and the stalks rustled and chittered in the gentle breeze like disobedient children told to stand quietly until called. The western road shimmered in the last of the day’s heat, and Al sometimes cocked an ear in that direction, a cat outside a mouse hole, and squinted into the fading daylight, waiting. Behind him and facing away from the setting sun, Blanche cut up vegetables in their Winnebago.

He checked his watch and called into the RV. “Are you sure about this, Blanche. This is Friday night. You’re sure he comes by here every Friday night?”

Blanche glanced at the digital clock on the stove and sliced her right index finger. “Damn.”

“Damn we have the wrong day? Damn we got here too late? Damn what?”

“Cut my finger. Did you make the payment?”

Al stood, walked to the center of the intersection, checked the roads in all four directions, shook his head and sat back down. “Yes, I made the payment. You read the information correctly?”

“Have I made a mistake before?”

A state cruiser crested a rise on the western road.

“My apologies, dear sister. Here he comes. You ready?”

The trooper pulled up behind the RV and turned its lights on. The officer, a tall man with salt-and-pepper hair and a singer’s baritone voice, slid his baton into his utility belt as he exited his cruiser and walked over. “You folks okay? Breakdown or something?”

Blanche stood behind the RV’s screen door and held up her hand. “Cut my finger slicing vegetables but it’s nothing.”

The officer glanced at Blanche’s knife. She held it in a towel and blood dripped from her other hand onto the towel. “A smaller blade might make be easier to handle, Ma’am.”

Al stood up, smiled, and hooked a thumb towards the booth. “Called back home. We call from wherever we are every Friday night at seven. They must be out at a game or shopping. We’re waiting for them to call back. Is there a problem, officer?”

“Just saw you folks here, thought you might need some help. If everything’s okay, I’ll be on my way.”

Al cocked his head. “Forgive me for asking, officer, but that’s not a Nebraska accent I hear. You a transplant?”

The officer smiled. “Good ears. I’m what Stephen Vincent Benét called a New Hampshire Man. Thought I’d lost that Yankee drawl. Guess not, huh?”

The phone rang in the booth. The officer and Al stared at each other. The officer nodded towards the ringing phone. “You going to get that?”

Blanche opened the door and came down the steps. “I’ll get it.”

The officer kept his eyes on Al.

Blanche thrust her knife upwards into the officer’s back between his third and fourth ribs. She twisted the blade as it entered his heart. He fell lifeless, the knife still in his back.

“Are you sure he was one of them, Sister?”

She entered the Winnebago and came out a moment later with a green covered yearbook in her hands and a bandaid on he finger. The cover read “Little Green Class of ’73”. She flipped pages, stopped, tapped the bandaged finger on a picture, and handed him the yearbook.

Al looked at the picture. He kneeled beside the fallen officer and rolled the corpse onto its back. “Yeah, and wow, you’re good. Nobody can trace this back to us?”

“They’d have to dig through lots of public records, same as I do, and I only do one lookup in one place at a time. The money went to a General Delivery in Lincoln and came to a General Delivery in Grand Island, and everything done through library computers, blind Prodigy accounts, and those computerized phonebooks on CDs you got.” She went back into the Winnebago with the yearbook and reappeared at the door a moment later. “Dinner’ll be ready in an hour. I’m making your favorite, chicken pot pie, nice and creamy with lots of vegetables.

He smiled. “You’re too good to me, Sis.”

“We should be gone before then.”

Al glanced at the blood pooling around the dead state patrolman’s body, at the way the setting sun gave it a polished bronze color, and nodded. “Yeah, seal it up.”

Blanche secured the RV’s door. Al got in the driver’s seat. Out of habit, he turned on his directional and checked his mirror before pulling out into the road.


Previous Fains I (A John Chance Mystery) Chapters

And Now, With Light

I recorded a video with the lights out.

Didn’t work.

A lesson that, me.

Seems this year/month (I’m counting May)/day/hour/minute/second is one of never ending learnings for me.

Which means I’m aware of the learnings.

Which means I’m aware there are learnings happening I’m unaware of.

Which means I’m aware there are learnings I’m unaware I’m unaware of.

This is a paraphrase/refinement of something I learned (relearned, was aware I learned, am aware I’m relearning, won’t know if I relearn the relearning) long ago:


What I’m aware of
What I’m aware I’m not aware of
What I’m not aware I’m not aware of

 
Take a moment.

Be aware.

Expand your universe beyond your boundaries.

For therein lie the Machineries of God.

 
And now, some raccoons

 

An Experiment in Writing – Part 34: Editing

 
Okay, a big one.

Editing.

A word which often strikes fear in the hearts and minds of authors and writers and is meaningless to those not equally blessed, called, summoned, directed, …

Go ahead. Edit it. Pick a word which works for you and use it.

Or a paragraph.

Or character.

Or…

 
Think I’m onto something? Take a class with me, schedule a critique of your work, or buy me a coffee.
Think I’m an idiot? Let me know in a comment.
Either way, we’ll both learn something.

Get copies of my books because it’s a nice thing to do, you care, you can follow along, and I need the money.

PS) the correct quote is

Write on caffeine, edit on wine. – Richard Lewis

(notice how well i edit?)

All Experiments