I’ve seen Aaron Sorkin’s letter to his daughters about Donald Trump’s victory on Tuesday night. Maybe he should go back and binge watch his HBO TV series, The Newsroom this weekend and remember what all he had to say in it.
Here’s a few sobering thoughts about the news business that should be considered after Donald Trump’s “surprising victory” in spite of the efforts of the news media to collude against him:
–Maybe we don’t need to have news 24/7 on cable channels. Perhaps needing to fill all hours of the day with advertising and something new to say isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. It certainly isn’t easy work to come up with NEWS, so we get mindless, unintelligent babble from hacks with agendas to fill up the space, to say the things that the network wants said, not news.
–Maybe Aaron Sorkin got it right in his HBO series “The Newsroom,” one that was despised by the mainstream news media who scoffed at his call for a return to genuine journalism where the facts are what drive stories, where double- and even triple-source verification is practiced, and where tough questions are asked of those who come on TV shows, not where professional hacks get offered cream puff softballs where they can speculate or drive their own agendas. At the end of the pilot Charlie Skinner, the news director of the fictitious news channel in the series says, “You know how we used to report the news? We just decided to.”
–Maybe there needs to be less reliance on social media in the news business and the pursuit of factual information. Maybe instead of relying so much on Twitter and Instagram and Facebook, news agencies should go back to paying JOURNALISTS to gather information. Maybe the model of not paying those who actually went to journalism school and relying on what you can get for free isn’t working out so well after all. Who knew….
–Maybe temporary heads of a political party shouldn’t be a regular contributor, paid or otherwise, unless all ties have been severed. Maybe there should even be a length of time between when a person left a paid position with a political party, campaign, or lobbying group–you know, like a person leaving government can’t come back the next day as a lobbyist. Donna Brazille comes to mind.
–Maybe someone should really weigh the value of the integrity of political polling in this day and age now that most people don’t have landlines and many, many people hang up when they get called, and we step back and do a hard, harsh look at the practice of exit polling as was done after the 2001 debacle in Florida.
–Maybe news agencies should give less credence to claims that “The Russians illegally broke into our servers,” and actually look at the value of the information that’s being presented as fact and then ask for someone who is denying the integrity of a hacked email to produce the original material, unaltered.
–Maybe when a guest ponders “what am I going to tell my children?” the answer is that not everyone in real life gets a trophy just for playing and sometimes there are victories and sometimes there are defeats in life. It’s a good lesson for all children to learn, no matter how old they are.
–Maybe the news business needs to get off the focus group bandwagon and start presenting news to Americans so that the American populace, whom the East Coast elite view as too stupid to make a fair and balanced decision, are allowed to do just that–because they did in this election cycle in spite of all the efforts of the MSM to influence the election.
–Maybe just because you’re good at singing or acting in Hollywood you don’t have the street cred to tell the rest of for whom to vote.
–Maybe news reporting should once again be focused on the facts, not the bent agenda of the editorial department, the publisher, or advertisers.
–Maybe, and just maybe, it’s NOT the job of journalists to decide how Americans should vote. Maybe it’s actually the job of the electorate to decide. (I know, that’s a frightening thought for so many in the news business.)
–Maybe the American people aren’t as stupid as the NE elite think–that maybe jobs, the economy; the ever increasing costs of health care–the rising costs of Obamacare premiums–ones that were promised to stay low; terroristic threats to our country; gay-marriage; maybe those things actually matter to Americans and aren’t something to be dismissed openly by the NE elite.
I’m certain, fairly certain, little is going to change in the news business as a result of Tuesday. Instead of trying to see that things need to change in this industry, there will continue to be the perception that Americans–the ones who voted and turned the map red, that the red voters are the ones who need to change.
The fact is we all need to change. There has to be a coming together as a country. We can not continue to stake out our positions on polar extremes and have the pendulum swing back and forth every eight years and expect for things to improve. The anger over the past eight years came out Tuesday and those who kept calling someone racist, bigot, sexist, and all that other crap got knocked back, though probably not for long.
But wouldn’t it be great if out of all of this, the news media “just decided to” report the news?
I’ve now finished the first draft of my third book–each one unique and completely unrelated to the other. That’s three written since I began the Writer’s Path program at Southern Methodist University in August of 2014.
The word count of Pretty Has A Price, draft one.
The working title of Book Three is now “Pretty Has A Price.”
The book begins with newly widowed Sterling James leaning over the casket of her husband Harvey, saying a few last words to him before the graveside ceremony is to begin when she opens her eyes to see Annabelle, her nemesis approaching those gathering around. A cat fight, at a funeral, begins, with pallbearers ushering Annabelle back to her car.
Caught in the middle of these two women is Kent Jackson, a New York Times bestselling author who is in Montgomery, Alabama to write so he can meet the terms of a book deal. I enjoyed writing about Kent, who lives in a fictitious house on Old Cloverdale Park, around the corner from the F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum on Felder Avenue. At nights he walks down the brick paved street on Old Cloverdale Park and strolls over to sit on the porch of the museum at night, looking up at the stars, listening to the crickets and night traffic, while wondering how Scott must have felt with Zelda there in the house, or the emptiness he must have felt once she’d gone back east again to be institutionalized. Kent, Sterling and Annabelle all end up at the annual Gala in front of the house in April and enjoy the amazing sights, sounds, and amazing food that even you can enjoy in real life.
Throughout the pages, readers learn about the high society balls that are still held in Montgomery–their elegance, their grandeur and the impact they have on those around them.
This book isn’t about anyone I know, but I’ve heard stories and embellished them from there. The story has humor, love, and explores the impact of pain and societal pressures.
I was told the other night it borders on literary fiction and straight fiction. Revision is next but I’m going to take a month’s break from it and let the characters breathe.
Writing is my life passion. There is no greater joy that to find a blank screen or piece of paper and put two or more characters in a precarious situation and see what happens next. Hopefully you’ll be able to read this story some day….
In late April 2016, my good fortune led me to a meeting with Author Lynn Cullen during the Alabama Book Festival in Montgomery, Alabama. During a workshop discussion about the process of writing historical fiction she used her latest literary work, Twain’s End (Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster).
(The link above is an affiliate link. Should you make a purchase from this link, I may earn a commission on the sale at no additional cost to you.)
Twain’s End book cover for the novel written by Lynn Cullen. This is such a good book.
Twain’s End book cover for the novel written by Lynn Cullen. This is such a good book.
Since meeting Lynn, her publisher has released a paperback edition of her book as well.
LITERARY FICTION
Lynn’s book is a 300-page magical blend of fact and fiction. Dashes of Twain-like prose are poignant.
This book captures the sweet smell of the hydrangeas so oft preferred by the likes of Mark Twain and more so, Samuel Clemens.
As a reader, one can’t discern the difference between what happened and the matter between the lines that Lynn so carefully filled in.
Her work is like a bricklayer setting mortar and bricks.
She accomplishes this feat through the watchful eye of Clemens’ personal secretary, Isabel Lyon, as she manages the building of his famous Connecticut home, Stormfield, in Redding.
All the critical elements of storytelling are wrapped delicately in the telling of this tale of love, conflict, and self-redefinition. Lynn helps us all see, through the eyes of an omniscient narrator, the emotional and mental struggles that plagued one of America’s greatest writers–some of the same troubles we all bear even today.
There is beauty in the poetry of the writing of Lynn Cullen. Often I found myself reaching for my iPhone to pull up a word she used to paint her imaginary scenes–words that I would then write down in my personal writer’s notebook to hopefully employ once again in a tale of my choosing.
For its historical value or not, Twain’s End is an enjoyable read and I strongly encourage you to pick up a copy as soon as you may.
MARK TWAIN
Like all of us, Sam Clemens put on masks to create a world that was kinder and gentler than the one he knew. For the writer in me, passages where she framed the thoughts and events surrounding childhood wounds Clemens alleges, provided insight that’s value can not soon be measured.
Twain’s End paperback edition cover from the novel by Lynn Cullen.
In Chapter 30, Lynn has Hellen Keller ask the most pointed question of the work: “Don’t we all make up our own worlds?”
And therein lies the heart of the message in reading this book.
In my own writing–three as yet unpublished full-length works which you can read more about here–I have found relief from the pains of this life–ways to write (intended) wrongs out of existence; ways to heal pains of days that long since have passed me by that still hurt as much as paper slicing a finger’s flesh.
TWAIN’S END
Pick up a copy of Lynn Cullen’s book, Twain’s End in hardback or paperback. You will be doing yourself a mental treat.
If you have seen author and editor Shawn Coyne’s website, you’ll see the points below and know that I’m not giving anything away that he hasn’t already posted or put into his book The Story Grid, but I have to tell you, being conscious of the five aspects he identifies necessary for every scene, act and an entire book has made a difference in my writing.
In previous posts I’ve talked about how I am a student in the SMU Writer’s Path program. There we have learned to keenly focus on the power of Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey–the Hero’s Journey which was largely spelled out by Joseph Campbell.
In March I learned of Coyne. In late March I began constructing the organizational details for my hero’s journey for my latest draft manuscript–“First Things and Final….” As I developed the wheel of the hero’s journey for my characters, I also printed out a sheet for each scene I anticipated being necessary to tell my story.
Making sure these five elements were in EVERY scene, and that I could pull the camera back and look at each of my three/four acts–Act I, Act II-A, Act II-B, and Act III–and then pull the lens back even further to understand the compositional structure of the whole book, made every bit of difference in how I wrote this third manuscript versus how I wrote my first two books on completely different subjects. In fact, as I’ve been working to revise the first two, I have been developing and printing out scene worksheets for each of the scenes in the other two books to help with my revision process.
This is the Hero’s Journey I outlined in mid-April 2016 for First Things and Final…
Is this a sure fire way to get published? We will have to wait and see. I seem to excel at cranking out stories. What I need to do is find a way for my mind to be able to enjoy the tediousness that is involved in seeking out an agent, writing a query and then sending them out and following up as appropriate. I also need to develop greater discipline in going back into my previously written material and striving to make it better.
Having been unleashed to write stories, my mind is happier doing the writing and doesn’t like to be bogged down in the query process. That is something I must address lest I become a famous writer posthumously.
So what is this structure all about? It’s this simple–Every scene of your book needs to have these five elements. Otherwise, as Coyne puts it, it’s a nice collection of words, not a scene.
Inciting Incident--Something bad happens to a character that they were not expecting. They thought one thing was going to happen, but it did not. (Think of princess Kitty at the ball in” Anna Karenina” and she thought Count Vronksy was going to ask her to marry her.)
Progressive Complications–Insult to injury. Things get worse than what was initially expected. (She’s got that one lad calling her his first conquest as he’s asked her to dance and she’s promised him her third, as if she was confidently thinking it won’t be necessary.)
Crisis–Best of two bad decisions. (Anna has begun to dance with Kitty’s heart’s desire and Kitty is forced to accept dances with the others so she will stay in front of him in hopes that he will return to her, but all the while she can see there is something going on between Anna and the count.)
Climax–Fingers bent, things are getting worse. (Anna and the count continue and it’s now clear that he won’t be having much of anything further to do with Kitty.)
Resolution–The character has gone from an initial state to almost the complete opposite of where they were at the beginning. In Kitty’s case she was positive and excited about her future prospects of being swept away in a fairy tale with her prince–the count–and in this case, that dream has been shattered by the likes of Anna, a married woman with a son.
Recognizing these five elements as applied above to the three facets of every book–scene, act and over all story, made a difference to me when I constructed my present work, “First Things and Final…” Now whether that will ever lead to my books being published remains to be scene, but for me, it has made a significant difference and I encourage you to learn more about Coyne’s Story Grid.
In March of 2014 I began doing something I’d only tried once before–to write a novel. I spent several months buying up whatever book I could find that offered advice on how to write the perfect novel.
It was not until July that year that a successfully published author who was actually a client of mine told me about The Writer’s Path program at SMU run by J. Suzanne Frank.
Since August of 2014, I have been enrolled in the program having worked my way through Story, Plot, Heroic Chapters, and Chapters. Revision is not far ahead.
All the books I bought until I got into the SMU program were not anywhere as helpful or as insightful as the SMU program itself. There are several amazing already published authors who teach the program–from Suzanne, who I have dubbed “The Jedi Writing Master” to Keith Goodnight, Amanda Arista, and Kay Honeyman to name just a few. Each of them has taught me things about writing I did not know from having written so much the past 40-plus years of my life and I am forever grateful to all four of them.
The program’s foundation is centered on Christopher Vogler’s The Writers Journey. Complimenting it is a book by Eric Edson–The Story Solution. And in a pre-revision class Suzanne was teaching in March there’s a new amazing book to use–Shawn Coyne’sThe Story Grid. If you do not live in Dallas and cannot enroll in the program, spending hours, days and weeks in these three tools will help improve your storytelling in ways you will not believe.
To date, I have written three full-length novels.
The first one, The Privacy Patriots, is about a reporter who is given Edward Snowden-like information about the forthcoming launch of the world’s first fully-functioning quantum computer. When Kip Rippin writes about it in The Washington Broadcaster, China, Russia, Iran and North Korea–known as CRINK in the book–go nuts because they can see the computer, code named IBIKTUS–(I can’t tell you what that stands for–it’s Classified)–is nothing but a first-strike weapon. It’s the Red October of computing, designed for one purpose–the get into the computer networks of any on the planet–in a millisecond–or the flash of a few quibets. Cyber Winter ensues. That’s my word. It’s not in Google, yet. But just as there would be a nuclear winter after a nuclear attack, there would be a cyber winter, after the attack described in the book. Kip has paired up with Maycee Vincent, who works for a Menlo Park cyber honey potting group that tracks online viruses worldwide. Getting the lights back on in America–as well as utilities, banking and anything else that’s hooked up to a computing network–becomes the unofficial mission of the two, who are being chased by the government as well as terrorists in America who want information about IBIKTUS. It is a thriller and about 93,000 words in length.
The second book, The Voodoo Hill Explorer Club, is about Kirk Carson, a thirteen-year-old boy who creates a tree house club with three of his best friends on what was K.I. Sawyer Air Force Base near Marquette, Michigan in 1977 after he has been dumped by his girlfriend, Sadie, for another guy. The boys must deal with the meanness of base housing bully Billy Banks–who is also the wing commander’s son and the one who stole Sadie away–as well as overcoming their deepest fears. This includes a trip into a cemetery at night, climbing to the top of the base housing water tower at 10 p.m. to play Revelry right after Taps has been played, sticking their hands in a bunch of gooey worms, and crawling into a cave thats entrance gets shut off by an unknown person who is clearly not happy with their tree house’s location. Kirk has to overcome his betrayal by the other boys, who kick him out of his own club thinking bringing Billy Banks in will keep them safe. The book is a reflection of life while building the fort, while going out in the middle of a Dec. 8, 1977 blizzard where 49 inches of snow fell in three days in order to find Sadie and the four others, and what it’s like now, with Kirk near 50 and longing to once again find the peace of “home,” that he has never been able to find in his life. The Voodoo Hill Explorer Club is a middle-grade work about 75,000 words in length.
The third book, First Things and Final… gets its title from a line in the Old English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: “First things and final conform but seldom.” It is the story about Sterling James, who was a poor country girl growing up in Chilton County, Alabama, and married Harvey, knowing he was gay, but rich enough to elevate her into the social status of Montgomery necessary for her to be a part of the elegant ball system that continues to this day. The book begins with Sterling stuck in a bathroom stall at the ball when her monthly bill comes due and her arch rival, Annabelle Fitzpatrick, comes in with her toady Meredith Head-Alexander and is talking about proving Harvey is indeed gay–not knowing Sterling is in the last stall listening to every word. In that conversation, Annabelle also insists she will be bedding down Kent Jackson, a novelist from Los Angeles who is near defaulting on a second book contract and has come to Montgomery to write a book while living in a home around the corner from the F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum–one of only four houses the Fitzgeralds lived in. (Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald was the belle of a ball in Montgomery in the early 1920s, before she met F. Scott.) In the book, Kent walks over to the museum at night to sit on the front porch and try to capture the feelings the master writer might have felt while sitting there while Zelda was living there with him, or after she returned to the East. To keep Annabelle from her prize, Sterling intervenes and finds herself embroiled in an adulterous relationship with Kent–putting her at odds with Harvey, Annabelle and her morals. The book, 94,000 words in length, paints a picture of the modern South, where thousands of dollars a year are still spent on glamorous dancing balls, adultery is still practiced but not condoned, and Bibles are still thumped loudly on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. Colorful, passionate and full of Southern pageantry, the book asks the question of whether we ever get unstuck from the stuckness of our lives, and if we do, can we stay free or do we retreat back to where we know the street names of our own Hell?
I could not have written these three books without the guidance and direction of my mentors at SMU. I just could not.
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