Author: Brendan

Story Hacks: Sixth in a Series

July 25, 2007 /

Pronouns? More like don’t-nouns!

Sure, you can use pronouns if you have to, like if you’re addressing someone in the second person and don’t know what real name to use. But here’s an AlternaTip–just imagine up a real name for your audience! For example, I’m going to call you Laura. Isn’t that better, Laura? (I bet that somewhere somebody’s reading this who actually is named Laura and they think it’s so awesome. Laura: it totally is!)

The real “Pronoun Problem” is that they’re so short. Pronouns reduce not only page count, but often word count as well! Plus, if you (Laura) have more than one person of a given gender in a story, pronouns might refer to any of them, reducing the laser-like accuracy of Laura’s sentences. And such ambiguity can lead to worse things, like speculation, or interpretation! These serious flaws may even prevent consumers from properly receiving your (Laura’s) Vision.

FACT: The previous paragraph was 56% shorter before I took out all the pronouns. FACT!

Writing without pronouns (or “liprography”) may not come easily at first, Laura, but it can be done–with enough AccomPracticeMent. Here’s an example to get Laura started!

“As you know, Kevir, today is your wedding day and it is a very important day for all of Pseudio,” said Kevir’s Mom seriously.

“Yes, serious Mom,” said Kevir to Kevir’s Mom. “It’s because I’m marrying the Princess Launa, the most famed Princess in the Land, who loves Kevir’s Mom just as if you, Kevir’s Mommy, were Launa’s own Issues Mommy!”

“I do!!!!!” Princess Launa began saying to Kevir’s Mommy. “You, Kevir, and I, Launa, are almost like your Mommy’s son and daughter!”

“Which is as it should be,” said Kevir’s Serious Mommy. “After all, no woman can truly love you, Kevir, unless she, Launa, is family!”

“Kevin’s Mom is right,” exclaimed Kevir.

“All of us love each other, but not necessarily in any sexual manner!!!!!” said Kevin’s Serious Fucking Mommy Issues.

Today’s Hack in a Nutshell: Laura, seriously, give me a call because I have this screenplay and there might be a part for you.

July 19, 2007 /

Oh, I haven’t mentioned this yet, have I? Kevan’s new site lets you earn XP for chores. Would that my mother had had this when I was fourteen! I probably still have a dozen Nintendo Time Tokens (or “pennies”) saved up from taking the trash out, but I have to tell you: I was not always responsible about properly deducting them.

Follow-up

July 18, 2007 /

Mr. Munson wrote me a great email about The Implicit, and noted echoes of Naomi Shihab Nye’s Valentine for Ernest Mann–which I think we read in his class, and which I had completely forgotten until I read the “poem like a taco” bit, but had clearly absorbed and recycled. Just illustrates the point, really.

And Holly made two cakes (they were supposed to be a four-layer cake, but they got nervous and decided to be two cakes instead), one of which had this written on the dish around it:

Eventually he finds himself writing another pubic hair story, and realises he’s bored. He’s done three zombies, twenty-six otherworldly small girls, ninety-three ninjas; fifty states, every tube stop, all two thousand UN constituent nations, cutting everything he’s ever seen into 101-word pieces. He’s sent the small girls to Ganymede to fight the ninjas (the small girls won), and then set up a rematch deep within the sun (they united against their common enemy, the masked superwhale).

“Next time,” he says, eyes narrow beneath the unruly crest of his white eyebrows, “a hundred and two.”

People read my stuff and write about it. There is no better feeling in the world.

The insignificance of numbers

July 17, 2007 /

Today I posted the 1001st story in Anacrusis, and I wanted to do something a little different for the occasion: an audio story, read aloud by a startling array of generous people. I thought the hardest part would be actually asking them to read the silly little thing without cringing, and the next-hardest would be the actual mixing process. It turns out that the hard part is not being able to use all the material from everyone for the whole thing. They were all so good!

Thanks to Robert Baker-Self, Maria Barnes, Amanda and Jon Brasfield, David Clark, Amanda Dale, Kevan Davis, John Dixon, Holly Gramazio, Josh Hadley, Sumana Harihareswara, Stephen Heintz, Catriona Mackay, William O’Neil, Leonard Richardson, Kristofer Straub, and everyone who’s had a kind or critical word to say about Anacrusis. Let’s do this again when we hit 10,201.

I promise I’ll do the hard part

July 10, 2007 /

Finally got around to following Leonard’s links to Rachel Chalmers’s blog, and now regret not doing so in 2004. Her blog is the blog other blogs want to be when they grow up. Blog up. Wait, no.

I’m reading backwards through her archives, so most of the content so far has been about her daughters Claire (who appears, from this perspective, to be carefully paring down her vocabulary) and Julia (who has disappeared, then had her name retconned to Zoë, as if in a bad thriller movie). I know blogging is the new selective memory, but they sound like amazing kids. I want kids now, dammit! SOMEBODY HAVE SOME KIDS WITH ME.

Self-exposure

July 3, 2007 /

I have the instinctive habit of never mentioning the goals I set for myself, on the grounds that if I then fail to meet them, I don’t have to be embarrassed. But embarrassment makes for good blog entries! So here’s the setup, even if it takes a long time to pay off, one way or another.

My goals for 2007 are to get my driver’s license and complete a half-marathon.

My goal for 2008 is to teach at the Kentucky Governor’s Scholars Program.

My goal for 2009 is to attend Clarion South.