The Writer’s Journey
Category: Writing and Poetry

Plotting drives me nuts.  I can put a scene together, flesh out a character, and establish suspense, but one constant criticism of my prose is that it tends to be episodic.  I've read various books on plotting and recently stumbled upon one that seems to work.  The Writer's Journey by Christohper Vogler uses Joseph Campbell's concept of the Hero's Journey as a template for writing your novel.  Drawn from Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Vogler dumbs down Campbell's concepts enough that even simplistic writers like myself can use them (a good thing, since reading Campbell is akin to swimming through quickset concrete).

The Hero's Journey is a basic and common theme that runs throughout most human cultures.  The Journey follows a general template or path and has many common archetypes that can be used for your characters.

Archetypes

Hero
Herald
Mentor
Allies
Shapeshifter
Shadow
Trickster
Threshold Guardians

Characters can assume different archetype roles at various points within a story.  Thus, a mentor may in the end turn out to be a shadow (or villian).  (Think of Jeff Bridges' role in Ironman)

Vogler's basic template is as follows:

1. Ordinary World
2. Call to Adventure
3. Refusal of the Call
4. Mentor
5. First Threshold
6. Tests, Allies, Enemies
7. Approach to the Innermost Cave
8. Ordeal
9. Reward (seizing the sword)
10. The Road Back
11. Resurrection
12. Return with the Elixer

Like Archetype roles, templates are fluid, not fixed.  In Dances with Wolves, the Ordeal is in the first act.

Most of the Vogler's examples are drawn from screenplays rather than novels; i.e., Witness, Titanic and The Lion King.  The Hero's Journey has been hot stuff in the movie business for the past several years (George Lucas modeled his Star Wars series on Campbell) and is a popular method for preparing scripts (see Save the Cat by Blake Snyder), but it transfers well to novel writing.  Short stories may be too brief for the full Hero treatment, but we can incorporate some of the elements within that form.

If plotting is a nemisis for you, take a gander at Vogler's book and see if it helps.

Currently reading : The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers, 3rd Edition By Christopher Vogler

2:57 PM - 2 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

First Amendment Blues
Category: News and Politics

Redneck jerkwaters accuse Rachel Ray of being a terrorist.  The crime?  In a Dunkin Doughnut ad, the scarf she is wearing looks like an Arabian headpiece.  Dunkin Doughnuts ignores the fact that thousands of American women wear similar scarfs believing they are fashionable.  Instead, DD shows their complete lack of spine and pulls the ad. 

Apparently, to those on the right, freedom of speech doesn't extend to clothing choice.  Thomas Jefferson rolls over in his grave and asks, "What has gotten into my country?"

8:41 AM - 3 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Ups and downs
Category: Life

Life was up and down last week.  I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, not the greatest development, but at least I'm getting some meds now for the pain.  My doc put me on prednisome.  She told me one side effect is personality shifts - land of paranoia here I come!

Last Thursday, my novel was rejected by an agent I had hoped would be interested.  I spent the rest of the day feeling sorry for my self, thought about giving up writing. The next day I received a letter from another agent asking to see a partial, so of course everything is hunky-dory again.

Good news:  The Ducks won.  Yahoo!  And the weather in Portland has been stunning for the past few days.  Oregonians always tell out-of-staters that life here is dreary, gray and full of rain.  The real scoop is that summers here are pretty near perfect: 75-85 degrees and sunny almost all the time, no thunderstorms, moderate humidity.  Of course, February is dark and wet and miserable.

Anybody out there going to the Surrey Writer's Conference in B.C. next month? 

11:46 AM - 3 Comments - 3 Kudos - Add Comment

Roxanne Climbs the Great Wall
Category: Travel and Places

Hot day, grumpy child, great experience.


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Now playing: The Bangles - Hazy Shade of Winter
via FoxyTunes   

10:35 PM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Mini Reviews
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

Brick - a movie
High School noir starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt.  Yup, the kid from The Third Rock from the Sun has grown into quite an actor.  Brick is noir, through and through, femme fatale, the hero getting the bejesus kicked out of him and lots of dead bodies. One of the best movies I've seen in the last year.

The Princess and the Warrior - a movie
A psychological thriller starring Franke Potente and directed by Tom Twyker, both of Run Lola Run fame.  Deep, twisting, complex.  Highly recommended

The Road - a novel by Cormac McCarthy.  Simply written, yet totally engrossing story of a father and son trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic land.  Winner of the Pulitzer prize and a stunning piece of fiction.

10:56 PM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Story Process
Category: Writing and Poetry

My mother moved into an assisted living facility this past June.  Since then, I've been sorting through decades of stuff that she and my father and I had accumulated in our house.  Stuck behind a pile of boxes in the back storeroom, I discovered an empty Thunderbird wine bottle.  My dad was a drunk.  He quit drinking when I was twelve, just shortly after we had moved into that house.  From then on, he was a dry drunk until the day he died.  That bottle must have been stashed there in his last, arduous days as a wet drunk.  He always said he hated wine.  How far he must have fallen just before hitting bottom, and had been force to quit,  taking secretive slugs of Thunderbird all alone in the storeroom, hoping we wouldn't discover his secret.

Our home was filled with secrets.  Some I uncover as I toss my family's junk into the dumpster, saving the good pieces for the estate sale, and allowing myself to turn loose of my toys and books and keepsakes, the things that had been so important to me as a child.  I feel as if part of me will be lost forever.

Some secrets are still hidden and I know there's a story in that house somewhere.  I'm just not sure I want to fucking write it.

10:49 PM - 1 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

High School Daze
Category: Life

Last weekend was my high school reunion (I'm not saying which year).

Observations:  None of the popular boys showed up.  Curious, eh?
  

Comment I heard most:  My, you grew taller after high school.  The reality is that I was about the same height then as now.  People's perceptions of me are different.

11:04 PM - 4 Comments - 3 Kudos - Add Comment

At the hop
Category: Life

God, I can remember 1957, I feel so old.

You Belong in 1957

You're fun loving, romantic, and more than a little innocent. See you at the drive in!

11:36 AM - 5 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Query: Harkness
Category: Writing and Poetry

10:58 PM - 6 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Netflix friends
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

Are you a netflix addict?  Want to see what kind of trash I watch?  If you want to be my netflix friend (I'm so lonely ;-}), plug this into your browser:
http://www.netflix.com/BeMyFriend/PX3oKK3NmunSzSh8vhQl

10:51 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment