I said the other day I would post about this movie, which is the last one I've seen -- I am so relishing the chance to go to the movies more often. Soon, I'll be back at work and time will be shorter and something will have to give. In the meantime, I'm making the most of it.
I am Legend was an interesting film experience for me because I felt that I'd seen it before. Didn't I read somewhere that it was a remake of The Omega Man with Charlton Heston? I have seen that but so long ago that I don't really remember it. I do vaguely remember him flitting out of his apartment in daylight hours and barricading himself in at night, but am more familar with his performance in Planet of the Apes, a film that was vastly superior to the original. And whatever did they do to The Time Machine in the remake? Took the guts out of it is what! But I'm getting off the track.
More recently, however, I've seen 28 Days Later, and this felt like the same movie, even though there were striking differences. Setting for a start. I suppose, the longer I dwell on the Charlton Heston movie and the more it comes into focus -- even if still blurred -- the more I can see that it does bear a stronger resemblance, but even so there's the sense both in Legend and 28 days at their beginnings of a man alone in a devastated world filled with violent creatures who used to be human. In both films that whole I-am-alone experience proves not to be exactly true. Both have moments of high tension, guaranteed to make at least half the moviegoers jump. We did.
Without getting too deep into spoiler territory (I hope), the ex-haematologist railed at the ending. Just didn't work for me on a scientific level. Let me say a few words that might mean something to those who have seen it: transport of biological specimens, and the scientific logistics of doing what was suggested . . . Yes, already, that's more than a few words. I'll shut up now, except to say that again the whole spectre of suspension of disbelief rears up and spoils the storyline for me. Writers, research please!
Showing posts with label research. Show all posts
Showing posts with label research. Show all posts
16 January 2008
24 December 2007
Why I love real life research
It's all very well to hit the books and read up on a location, but nothing beats actually being there and absorbing the sights and sounds and smells. And best of all you can happen upon things that you didn't expect to see. I've been to the Prom a number of times, and, having grown up in a beach-side suburb, I've spent a lot of time at beaches in general. But on this trip I saw something that I'd never seen before: thousands of little crabs, each no bigger than a ten-cent piece (Australian -- say about 1.5 cm diameter), leaving fabulous patterns in the sand. As we approached, they burrowed under the sand, completing this with a somersault-type action. It was hard to get a close-up photo because they seemed to sense our approach and dive under early. Here a few photos though -- and I just know that the editing pass I'm about to embark on is going to have a new detail in the coastal scene: crabs. It's these little details that make the setting more believable, more unique.
22 December 2007
Prom
Last weekend we had four days at Wilson's Prom. I love the Prom, and it makes me feel close to the characters of my novel because it is part of their world. The beach ride that my characters embark upon under cover of darkness takes part on a much longer version of Norman Beach. I did the research there -- walked a good way with eyes closed in freezing water to see whether I could navigate the beach, blind, with only the feel of water on my ankles as a guide. The tracks that lead away from Normal Beach -- both to Little Oberon Bay in one direction and to Squeaky Beach in the other provided inspiration for the forests near the beach. So I go to the Prom and feel close to my characters. So here's the first four months of my "calendar trip" to the Prom:
10 December 2007
Currently reading
Ah, the non-teaching part of the year, and the best part about that is that there's time to read for pleasure! Of course, this doesn't mean I stop reading as a writer, but still it's nice to read something that I have to think about purely for me and not with any other motive.
So, the first book I've tackled was a change -- I decided I'd like to give Matthew Reilly a go. I've bought two of his books along the way, with the intent of reading them (obviously!). I think as writers, no matter what type of fiction we're writing, it's interesting to go and have a look at the writers who are selling megacopies, because obviously they are doing something right. Now, I was at a writers' group meeting awhile ago and Matthew Reilly's name came up, and those who had read him (iirc) said that they couldn't finish his books, that they were badly written. Hmm. Always interesting. He's not had one book that has sold megacopies but many. Readers don't keep coming back to writers whose books they don't finish. Not everyone, it seems, feels the same way that my friends do.
So, I sat down, prepared to be entertained. And within a few pages I could both see why my friends (writers) didn't like his writing, and why lots of people (readers) do. Matthew Reilly is doing something right. I finished the book (all 700 pages of it) in two days (and I'm very happy to see that the other book that I have has the same main character -- maybe they all do?). So, that might be my next read -- though I had said that these holidays would be my Harry Potter catch-up time.
Anyway, for the writers out there, here's my analysis of what I think (and it's only my opinion of course), MR is doing right, and what he's doing wrong. (And Matthew can laugh all the way to the bank, clearly.) I'm just going to pick three things for each argument.
What he's doing wrong:
infodumps -- oh, my goodness. Does this guy love to infodump. We tell our students not to do this -- do not stop the story to give information. Try to weave it in some other way. MR has infodumps on missiles, aeroplanes, ice -- you name it. Now, here's a little admission, I go quite gooey with any information that's vaguely aeronautical (well, especially anything pertaining to space/rockets/astronauts) so I actually didn't mind some of these infodumps, though there might be better ways to handle them. The thing is that there's so many that doing them other ways might not be possible. So the real question becomes: how much of this info is absolutely essential to the reader?
description -- MR tackles this the same way that he does infodumps -- stops the story to deliver it. Usually, it's better to show the protagonist (or other characters) interacting with the scenery, e.g. rather than "The gantry was made of steel and painted blue. It spanned the chasm between the two platforms. David ran across it", it could be something like: "David ran across the steel gantry, his feet sending slivers of blue paint plunging into the chasm between the two platforms". (These are all my words, not MR's.)
suspension of disbelief -- okay, this is a high-octane story, and everything's happening in the last second before disaster strikes, but sometimes this goes a bit far. The baddies are all bad shots. The good guys are not. (MR attempts to explain this away with an infodump about weaponry that helps, but doesn't solve the problem.) One small team against a much larger force of the world's best? Hmm. But it's also the little research things -- a doctor with no equipment diagnoses how a person died by spotting lactic acid in the dead guy's throat. Really? I don't think so. There were a few moments like this for me. But still I'm prepared to give a little here, for two reasons: one is that I was being swept along, and two is that I think it's a hard call for writers to be expected to get every little thing right. Clearly, we are not experts in every field, and while I do think it's important that we endeavor to get things right, I recognise that it's not always possible. Some writers employ researchers to do the research for them, but even so surely there must come a time when we say enough is enough? If not, we could spend all our time researching and never get around to writing. There must have been about a zillion things Reilly had to research for this book. I can't tell how many things he got right and wrong, but I suspect they're mostly right. I'm prepared to cut him some slack here, but I do notice them, and they do pull me out of the story.
Let's look at the other side of the coin: what he's doing right:
plot -- most bestsellers are strongly plotted, and MR's book is no exception. This book is as tightly plotted as they come. MR does all the things a good plotter should do -- he takes his characters, puts them under pressure and then tightens the screws. He puts his characters under intense pressure, makes it as hard for them as possible, constantly backs them into corners where they seem to have no escape, and then he makes it worse. Not a page passes without something happening. A new writer could do far worse than study Reilly to see how he handles plot. Hell, I could do far worse than study how Reilly handles plot...
pace -- make no mistake, this book zips along, even despite the infodumps, and that's no mean feat given there are so many of them. Never did I feel bogged down or impatient. No, those pages were flipping over. His writing style is clean, not overly laden with adjectives, and written simply in a manner that doesn't impede the reader's progress. Still, I think the pace has a lot to do with the plot -- there being so much action and conflict -- and lots of dialogue.
scene endings/cliffhangers -- lots of these. Nearly every chapter ends on a cliffhanger. Sometimes this is overdone and verges on the Goosebump-type endings that drive me nuts, but Reilly never really crosses that line. A cliffhanger, of course, drags you on to the next scene. You have to find out what happened, and so the book becomes unputdownable. Not a bad thing for a book to be, of course!
Final word: the other book I've bought has an interview with Reilly at the back, and he addresses the question of how he interacts with his two military advisers, and says that he sometimes eschews their advice to better serve the plot. It's not a bad point, but then if credibility suffers, if readers do find their disbelief no longer suspended, then really the plot hasn't been served at all -- something we all should think about, and maybe it's a game of risks, and speculating about how many readers are going to be affected by any one error. I had an award-winning book ruined for me once, because at the beginning the main character was talking about the Morlocks in the War of the Worlds. Trouble was the Morlocks were from Wells's "other" book, The Time Machine; the Martians were the bad guys in War of the Worlds. It's all about the way the information was delivered -- it made the character lose all credibility for me. Another reader may not have been bothered (though it was for an audience who might be expected to know this).
Final final word: the real test is will I read another book. Having discovered that the two books are based on the same characters, I have to say that I will definitely read this second book. Will I buy another? Trickier question, because I see in the back of this other book that they're not all based on the same character. So many books... I might buy another based on this character, but maybe not his other books. Then again, I might not. This isn't my usual genre, and that's really where I want to be doing most of my reading. Still, it has made for a good diversion for a couple of days.
So, the first book I've tackled was a change -- I decided I'd like to give Matthew Reilly a go. I've bought two of his books along the way, with the intent of reading them (obviously!). I think as writers, no matter what type of fiction we're writing, it's interesting to go and have a look at the writers who are selling megacopies, because obviously they are doing something right. Now, I was at a writers' group meeting awhile ago and Matthew Reilly's name came up, and those who had read him (iirc) said that they couldn't finish his books, that they were badly written. Hmm. Always interesting. He's not had one book that has sold megacopies but many. Readers don't keep coming back to writers whose books they don't finish. Not everyone, it seems, feels the same way that my friends do.
So, I sat down, prepared to be entertained. And within a few pages I could both see why my friends (writers) didn't like his writing, and why lots of people (readers) do. Matthew Reilly is doing something right. I finished the book (all 700 pages of it) in two days (and I'm very happy to see that the other book that I have has the same main character -- maybe they all do?). So, that might be my next read -- though I had said that these holidays would be my Harry Potter catch-up time.
Anyway, for the writers out there, here's my analysis of what I think (and it's only my opinion of course), MR is doing right, and what he's doing wrong. (And Matthew can laugh all the way to the bank, clearly.) I'm just going to pick three things for each argument.
What he's doing wrong:
infodumps -- oh, my goodness. Does this guy love to infodump. We tell our students not to do this -- do not stop the story to give information. Try to weave it in some other way. MR has infodumps on missiles, aeroplanes, ice -- you name it. Now, here's a little admission, I go quite gooey with any information that's vaguely aeronautical (well, especially anything pertaining to space/rockets/astronauts) so I actually didn't mind some of these infodumps, though there might be better ways to handle them. The thing is that there's so many that doing them other ways might not be possible. So the real question becomes: how much of this info is absolutely essential to the reader?
description -- MR tackles this the same way that he does infodumps -- stops the story to deliver it. Usually, it's better to show the protagonist (or other characters) interacting with the scenery, e.g. rather than "The gantry was made of steel and painted blue. It spanned the chasm between the two platforms. David ran across it", it could be something like: "David ran across the steel gantry, his feet sending slivers of blue paint plunging into the chasm between the two platforms". (These are all my words, not MR's.)
suspension of disbelief -- okay, this is a high-octane story, and everything's happening in the last second before disaster strikes, but sometimes this goes a bit far. The baddies are all bad shots. The good guys are not. (MR attempts to explain this away with an infodump about weaponry that helps, but doesn't solve the problem.) One small team against a much larger force of the world's best? Hmm. But it's also the little research things -- a doctor with no equipment diagnoses how a person died by spotting lactic acid in the dead guy's throat. Really? I don't think so. There were a few moments like this for me. But still I'm prepared to give a little here, for two reasons: one is that I was being swept along, and two is that I think it's a hard call for writers to be expected to get every little thing right. Clearly, we are not experts in every field, and while I do think it's important that we endeavor to get things right, I recognise that it's not always possible. Some writers employ researchers to do the research for them, but even so surely there must come a time when we say enough is enough? If not, we could spend all our time researching and never get around to writing. There must have been about a zillion things Reilly had to research for this book. I can't tell how many things he got right and wrong, but I suspect they're mostly right. I'm prepared to cut him some slack here, but I do notice them, and they do pull me out of the story.
Let's look at the other side of the coin: what he's doing right:
plot -- most bestsellers are strongly plotted, and MR's book is no exception. This book is as tightly plotted as they come. MR does all the things a good plotter should do -- he takes his characters, puts them under pressure and then tightens the screws. He puts his characters under intense pressure, makes it as hard for them as possible, constantly backs them into corners where they seem to have no escape, and then he makes it worse. Not a page passes without something happening. A new writer could do far worse than study Reilly to see how he handles plot. Hell, I could do far worse than study how Reilly handles plot...
pace -- make no mistake, this book zips along, even despite the infodumps, and that's no mean feat given there are so many of them. Never did I feel bogged down or impatient. No, those pages were flipping over. His writing style is clean, not overly laden with adjectives, and written simply in a manner that doesn't impede the reader's progress. Still, I think the pace has a lot to do with the plot -- there being so much action and conflict -- and lots of dialogue.
scene endings/cliffhangers -- lots of these. Nearly every chapter ends on a cliffhanger. Sometimes this is overdone and verges on the Goosebump-type endings that drive me nuts, but Reilly never really crosses that line. A cliffhanger, of course, drags you on to the next scene. You have to find out what happened, and so the book becomes unputdownable. Not a bad thing for a book to be, of course!
Final word: the other book I've bought has an interview with Reilly at the back, and he addresses the question of how he interacts with his two military advisers, and says that he sometimes eschews their advice to better serve the plot. It's not a bad point, but then if credibility suffers, if readers do find their disbelief no longer suspended, then really the plot hasn't been served at all -- something we all should think about, and maybe it's a game of risks, and speculating about how many readers are going to be affected by any one error. I had an award-winning book ruined for me once, because at the beginning the main character was talking about the Morlocks in the War of the Worlds. Trouble was the Morlocks were from Wells's "other" book, The Time Machine; the Martians were the bad guys in War of the Worlds. It's all about the way the information was delivered -- it made the character lose all credibility for me. Another reader may not have been bothered (though it was for an audience who might be expected to know this).
Final final word: the real test is will I read another book. Having discovered that the two books are based on the same characters, I have to say that I will definitely read this second book. Will I buy another? Trickier question, because I see in the back of this other book that they're not all based on the same character. So many books... I might buy another based on this character, but maybe not his other books. Then again, I might not. This isn't my usual genre, and that's really where I want to be doing most of my reading. Still, it has made for a good diversion for a couple of days.
07 September 2007
The importance of research
Research is a tricky thing. How much is not enough? How much is too much? Is it the world's best writing procrastination tool? After all, if you're doing research you are working on your novel, right? Yeah, but you're not actually writing it. My students often ask me if they can submit the number of words they've written down during research as part of their novel writing word counts, and I'll inevitably say no.
Do we expect writers to know everything? Is it even possible? And do we expect editors to pick up every little mistake that's slipped through. Think about the reader though -- is it average Joe or someone with specialist knowledge?
A few years ago I was listening to a well-known editor from a well-known publishing house, talking about a well-known author's well-known book in which the sun magically set in the east. Three editors had perused the copy and not one of them picked it up. Readers did though. And complained.
I also remember reading another well-known author's prize-winning book, in which the main character talked about the Morlocks in the War of the Worlds. Trouble was the bad guys in War of the Worlds were Martians; the Morlocks were in The Time Machine. Right author, wrong book. Trouble was the effect this had on me as a reader was to totally distrust the narrator -- after all, he had presented this as FACT, and I found I could no longer trust anything he told me. He wasn't supposed to be an unreliable narrator, so this totally wrecked my reading experience. That wasn't me being smart or mean, that was me losing trust in the author, whom I actually think is a wonderful author, otherwise, but there you go.
So do you crosscheck every fact? It's really not possible. You'd never get any writing done. I subscribe to the look-up-the-facts-that-you're-going-to-build-your-story-on-now theory, coupled with the if-you-come-across-something-you-need-to-look-up-in-the-middle-of-writing-plough-on stream. Bookmarking is a wonderful thing. With something like that, I'll usually type in three asterisks on either side, and then later search for three asterisks. Doesn't matter what it is, provided you've got something you can easily look up.
Sometimes, with historical fiction, there is the quandary of contradictory resources. It's not always possible to go back to primary sources, but really there's no reason these mightn't sometimes be contradictory as well. Facts are always open to interpretation. Ah, the joys of research.
Do we expect writers to know everything? Is it even possible? And do we expect editors to pick up every little mistake that's slipped through. Think about the reader though -- is it average Joe or someone with specialist knowledge?
A few years ago I was listening to a well-known editor from a well-known publishing house, talking about a well-known author's well-known book in which the sun magically set in the east. Three editors had perused the copy and not one of them picked it up. Readers did though. And complained.
I also remember reading another well-known author's prize-winning book, in which the main character talked about the Morlocks in the War of the Worlds. Trouble was the bad guys in War of the Worlds were Martians; the Morlocks were in The Time Machine. Right author, wrong book. Trouble was the effect this had on me as a reader was to totally distrust the narrator -- after all, he had presented this as FACT, and I found I could no longer trust anything he told me. He wasn't supposed to be an unreliable narrator, so this totally wrecked my reading experience. That wasn't me being smart or mean, that was me losing trust in the author, whom I actually think is a wonderful author, otherwise, but there you go.
So do you crosscheck every fact? It's really not possible. You'd never get any writing done. I subscribe to the look-up-the-facts-that-you're-going-to-build-your-story-on-now theory, coupled with the if-you-come-across-something-you-need-to-look-up-in-the-middle-of-writing-plough-on stream. Bookmarking is a wonderful thing. With something like that, I'll usually type in three asterisks on either side, and then later search for three asterisks. Doesn't matter what it is, provided you've got something you can easily look up.
Sometimes, with historical fiction, there is the quandary of contradictory resources. It's not always possible to go back to primary sources, but really there's no reason these mightn't sometimes be contradictory as well. Facts are always open to interpretation. Ah, the joys of research.
03 September 2007
Writer's 40th
Yesterday (or two days ago, as I see it is now past midnight) I went to a writer friend's 40th birthday party. Sarah is one of my Clarion buddies, though I knew her well before we braved the Queensland heat and humidity for six weeks (hmm, I started to write months there -- what does that say about the whole experience?) of SF writers bootcamp. Still, I got to know her a whole lot better like there, and we all came away from the experience as family. Strange what sweating together will do together.
Birthdays are always a great chance to catch up with people, of course, and I hopped along with Ellen and Lita. A few people had flown down from Sydney, which I must say impresses the hell out of me. I've never gone this far for a party -- a wedding (my brother's) yes, but not a birthday, and in fact when my brother turned 40, I didn't even score an invite! Not that I would have gone up for it -- there's something about living in a family that procludes spending that kind of money on your own social life. Perhaps it's me being unselfish (all money to the family), or perhaps it's me being selfish (I wouldn't spend this money for a friend's birthday) -- I don't know. But for me it was great to catch up with the Sydneysiders, and to acknowledge how great it was for them to come down.
Of course, stick a whole lot of writers and editors in a room and what do they talk about? Their writing. Is there anything else? Well, as it happens, there is, and Lita, Ellen, Kirstyn, Alex and I got talking about the mechanics of sword-fighting, with Alex offering to give Ellen and I a sword-fighting lesson in his back yard. I got the distinct feeling he was going to belt the crap out of us, but nevermind. Of course, I still remember the swordfighting lesson I had in the ever-gentle hands of another Clarion bud, Chris, who took his sword out and scanned the boys' faces, wanting to know who wanted to volunteer to be his sparring partner. And I was sitting on my hands, thinking, pick me, pick me, oooh, pick me, pick me, and then was most surprised when none of the boys leapt up. And so I did. And I know that if Ellen had been there, she would've done the same. (And she used to fence -- something I didn't know. One of the teachers at my school was an Olympic fencer, and one of my students this year was fencing in the World Championships.) Of course, none of the boys were writing the type of fantasy that Ellen and I are writing. And research is everything. (And how many sentences can you start with "and" anyway. A lot it seems! Especially, when no-one but me gets to edit my blog. Oh, and, and, and, and -- I do love that word.) I still remember my nighttime walk in the dark in the waters at Wilson's Prom to check whether my character could navigate the beach by the depth of water on his ankles, and was very happy to find out that yes it could be done. This is my favourite type of research -- when I get to go out and actually experience something. It's why I tried the aphrodisiac spice at the last con. Why I'm not sorry I've eaten bulls' testicles in Morocco (though admittedly I didn't know what they were till after I had eaten them -- and don't they have a particularly strange texture!).
What a rambly post. But isn't that just the beauty of blogs! This one has been very stream of consciousness -- very much free writing, and while I could edit it for coherence, perhaps it better reflects my thought processes left this way.
But, back to the original topic: it's great too to sit down and have a quiet one-on-one with people and catch up with where they're at, listen to their recent epiphanies on writing and life in general, catch up with goss on other people whom I've missed. Attending things like this (and like the Melbourne Writers Festival, which I confess I've missed completely this year) are important to make me feel like part of a writing community.
Birthdays are always a great chance to catch up with people, of course, and I hopped along with Ellen and Lita. A few people had flown down from Sydney, which I must say impresses the hell out of me. I've never gone this far for a party -- a wedding (my brother's) yes, but not a birthday, and in fact when my brother turned 40, I didn't even score an invite! Not that I would have gone up for it -- there's something about living in a family that procludes spending that kind of money on your own social life. Perhaps it's me being unselfish (all money to the family), or perhaps it's me being selfish (I wouldn't spend this money for a friend's birthday) -- I don't know. But for me it was great to catch up with the Sydneysiders, and to acknowledge how great it was for them to come down.
Of course, stick a whole lot of writers and editors in a room and what do they talk about? Their writing. Is there anything else? Well, as it happens, there is, and Lita, Ellen, Kirstyn, Alex and I got talking about the mechanics of sword-fighting, with Alex offering to give Ellen and I a sword-fighting lesson in his back yard. I got the distinct feeling he was going to belt the crap out of us, but nevermind. Of course, I still remember the swordfighting lesson I had in the ever-gentle hands of another Clarion bud, Chris, who took his sword out and scanned the boys' faces, wanting to know who wanted to volunteer to be his sparring partner. And I was sitting on my hands, thinking, pick me, pick me, oooh, pick me, pick me, and then was most surprised when none of the boys leapt up. And so I did. And I know that if Ellen had been there, she would've done the same. (And she used to fence -- something I didn't know. One of the teachers at my school was an Olympic fencer, and one of my students this year was fencing in the World Championships.) Of course, none of the boys were writing the type of fantasy that Ellen and I are writing. And research is everything. (And how many sentences can you start with "and" anyway. A lot it seems! Especially, when no-one but me gets to edit my blog. Oh, and, and, and, and -- I do love that word.) I still remember my nighttime walk in the dark in the waters at Wilson's Prom to check whether my character could navigate the beach by the depth of water on his ankles, and was very happy to find out that yes it could be done. This is my favourite type of research -- when I get to go out and actually experience something. It's why I tried the aphrodisiac spice at the last con. Why I'm not sorry I've eaten bulls' testicles in Morocco (though admittedly I didn't know what they were till after I had eaten them -- and don't they have a particularly strange texture!).
What a rambly post. But isn't that just the beauty of blogs! This one has been very stream of consciousness -- very much free writing, and while I could edit it for coherence, perhaps it better reflects my thought processes left this way.
But, back to the original topic: it's great too to sit down and have a quiet one-on-one with people and catch up with where they're at, listen to their recent epiphanies on writing and life in general, catch up with goss on other people whom I've missed. Attending things like this (and like the Melbourne Writers Festival, which I confess I've missed completely this year) are important to make me feel like part of a writing community.
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