There was a time when I thought writing a short story was a great idea. I outlined, wrote a chapter or two, came up with a vague idea for the climax, and got distracted by something shiny. Not finishing it has not haunted my dreams1.
Turns out I'm not much of a writer.
That hasn't decreased my love for Writing Excuses, an entertaining and instructional podcast for aspiring authors. The podcasters include Brandon Sanderson (my favorite published author in the entire world), Howard Tayler, Dan Wells, and Mary Robinette Kowal. Over the years they've proven that they know a lot about writing, and especially about how to think while writing. They've done episodes analyzing each other's work in-depth, and they talk about decisions in their own writing in such a captivating way that I just had to try it all.
Howard's Schlock Mercenary is a web comic, and it's now on my regular rotation. I also take into consideration Howard's movie reviews before deciding whether I need to see something in the theaters2.
I haven't read Mary's stuff yet, but I'm still young3.
Most recently (yesterday), I've been reading Dan Wells. A few months ago, I decided to check out Partials from the local library. There were times when I didn't think I'd finish it before its due date, but I liked the premise and persevered. It is a post-apocalyptic world containing the last remnants of the human race and the Partials, the bio-synthetic soldier race that humanity created. A war with the Partials killed many humans, but is not ongoing. A virus with no known cure killed many more, and those left over are immune, but newborns are not. So the human race is facing a slow, drawn out extinction, and our strong-willed protagonist is determined to find a cure. 3.5 stars out of 5.
Wells bridged the gap between Partials and Fragments (book 2 of the trilogy) by releasing a short story called Isolation that quickly fleshed out the backstory of another character. Isolation was absolutely brilliant, and some fans said that this was the quality of writing they'd come to expect from Wells . That got me excited about the rest of the series. I enthusiastically give Isolation 5 stars out of 5.
Then came Fragments. It took me two 14-day check-outs of the e-book to finish Fragments. That's almost an entire month that I spent procrastinating instead of reading4. Writing Excuses talks frequently about following the rule, "in late, out early," which helps keep the story interesting and moving quickly. Fragments asked that rule out on a date, then stood it up and Facebooked about its crush on the whole Tom Bombadil section of The Fellowship of the Ring.
Basking in Isolation's afterglow, Fragments opened brilliantly, then drizzled boredom through the halfway mark. Some plot advancement burst brightly through the clouds for a chapter, and then again left us trudging through the chilly puddles of character stagnation. I didn't feel properly gripped by the story until the climax (93% of the way through, according to my e-reader), and then I spent an hour angrily writing down all the things that the climax did wrong. Characters made key decisions that were out of character for them because the plot required it (there's no Excuse for that), and a key premise of Wells' world was based on smart people making an obvious and massively stupid decision5.
Ugh.
I wouldn't be so annoyed if the premise hadn't captured my imagination.
With the pacing, exposition, and other issues through Partials and Fragments, I can say that the entire trilogy would probably fit better in a single book.
With all that said, because of Isolation, I'm giving Dan another chance. I'll read the last 10% of the third book (Splinters? Crumbs? Very Small Rocks?) because I want closure. He also wrote the John Cleaver series, which I'm hoping will turn out to loosely be a cleaner, Young Adult horror version of Dexter.
Wish me luck.
1 The current nightmare is Manu Ginobli in Miami cooking apple turnovers.
2 Sorry, Man of Steel, Howard told me you use shaky cam for action scenes. That means I'll wait until you cost $6 on eBay, or I may just skip you entirely, like I did with Wolverine, Electra, and Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood.
3 Okay, I just did the math (and hurt my back in the process), and it turns out I’m not all that young.
4 Also, sorry that I haven't called, Mom. I've been really busy.
5 Even more stupid and more massive than the current round of Obama Administration scandals.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
For the record, the John Cleaver series was excellent. We bought all three books. Definitely re-readable. No messing around with the library on these.
ReplyDelete