A Writer's Love

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As writers, we often romanticize the horrors of war. The good guy triumphs and the bad guy dies as he deserves. The warrior sees the horror of war, but he shakes it off because he’s the hero who always gets the girl. He’s the huge muscle man who can wield a sword and a shield like Flash Gordon. His eyes glare with superhuman strength and nothing gets in his way. He fears no man or beast, but fights whomever stands before him. He grabs the damsel by the waist, she kisses him and off they fly, swinging away from the bad guy, who lifts his sword, cursing his foe.

But what does reality say about war? It’s bloody, heartbreaking, horrifying.

My manager wanted to celebrate Administrative Assistant Day with her admin staff and took us out to lunch today. So as we sat around the table chit-chatting, someone asked my other coworker about her 19 year old son who is a soldier in Afghanistan. She paused, swallowed and searched for the words:

“Well,” pause,. . . hoping it’s something silly and small, but feeling a fist growing in my stomach, “He called me last week to say they were out on patrol and their convoy hit an IED. It killed his friend.” Horrified!!!! Then she said his words that changed the way I see war.

“Mom, I want to come home.”

We sat stunned as the realization that most of our soldiers are children, 18-19 year old kids forced to witness a grown-up world. Someone said, “I don’t know how these kids do it.” The mother said, she didn’t know what to say to him. There were no trumpets blowing, no parades, no spitting on the ground and lifting swords in triumph. Nope, just a little boy saying, Mom, I don’t want to be here anymore.

As I let her words sink in, I thought of stories I have read about the medieval soldier who shrugs off the death of friends with a simple “Farewell, my friend” and then he walks off into the sunset with a happy thought of his dead comrades and the fun times they experienced. I wonder how many soldiers said to themselves, I want to go home. I wonder how many wished their mothers were with them.

That’s the reality of any war, from Adam and Eve to the present day, I want to come home.

I don’t know if I can ever write the path of the hero again without thinking of this young man, forced to witness death at such an early age. My coworker said she hasn’t heard from him yet, but I believe he’s out there today, guarding the convoys and doing his job. But with scars that we as writers must see and respect in our characters. To not allow the character to witness the horror of wars is like telling this 19 year old soldier to get over it. He can’t and it will never leave him.

That little boy grew up in one horrifying moment and we as writers must also allow our characters to grow up. Allow them the respect of witnessing death and the horrors of losing good friends to enemies who want them dead, of the scars war creates and how it changes lives forever. To deny them this rite of passage is to kill the story, making it hollow and dull and making a character who isn’t human, not to mention disrespecting the soldiers who survived. Humanity sometimes is hard and difficult to bear, but we as writers, must bear that burden and bring it to life, no matter how painful. Even if it means the huge muscle man who wields the sword and shield says to his mother, I just want to come home, mom.

PBS Downton Abby

I first fell in love with Downton Abby when I watched the first episode this year on PBS.  I love this show, love the house, and especially love each character and love to hate the evil ones.  It’s my wicked passion.  So when a Randy Ingermanson had an interesting article about the characters, I perked up. And he really hits the point, which is at the end of the article.   Here’s what he sent out in his newsletter. Oh, and please remember, his newsletter is copyrighted, so give him credit if you wish to use it.
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A friend of mine, Nicole White, has started a Christian Independent publishing firm called Magpie Eclectric Press. Here’s a little bit about it. Enjoy!!

1) Why did you start Magpie Eclectric Press?

I started Magpie Eclectic Press first and foremost because of the strong passion I have for the written word. For years I’ve been considering the idea, but every time I prayed about it, I felt like God was saying, “No, not yet. Just wait a while yet.”

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Hi All!! I don’t know about you all, but this Christmas season wore me out!! But I’m back in the saddle again. I’m starting up the writer’s group again and so I’m posting our latest session from the book The Art and Craft of Writing Christian Fiction by Jeff Gerke. So enjoy, ya’ll!!!

Your hero’s inner journey:
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I do apologize for being away for so long. Life has me by the throat. But I’ll keep up, I promise. This time around, I want to discuss those wonderful Book Tours. I recently signed up for the Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy tour and hopefully, I’ll get books soon and be able to review them. It could be interesting, not to mention I get free books. But I went on a discovery to find out what I could find regarding the blog book tours.
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Our first stop wasn’t the faire but the Institute of Art in Chicago, Illinois, USA.  We arrived at 4pm and the Institute closed at 5pm.  We got in at half price and made our way to the medieval collection.  There wasn’t much, just some coats of armor.  But still very impressive.  I was amazed at how big the knights’ biceps were.   These were some big guys!!  We also saw a suit that was kinda small.  We found out later it was for teens only.  Don’t get any ideas, teens!!!  
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The Lovely Ms Jane the Phoole

I meet Ms. Jane last year at the Bristol faire located on the border of Illinois and Wisconsin in the US. (45 min from Chicago, Illinois) and she was kind enough to take a picture with my friend. Besides being very gracious, she also made my friend and I feel very welcomed. Jane, played by Ann Elizabeth Shapera, plays the Queen’s main silly jester and she is very kind and always has time to talk to anyone at the faire, no matter who they are. She’s silly, serious, whimsical, and likes to cheer up those who have down faces and is convinced Fairies really do exist. When I heard Jane had a blog, I had to hunt her down and get it from her. Thankfully, I ran smack into her, and asked her for her blog addy. After pulling A LOT of stuff from her very deep pocket, (Reminding me of Tom Baker, AKA The Doctor) she finally brought out her card. Here’s the Link. Please be sure to check out her site. Her link is also under my Favey Non-writing links.


I learned more stuff at the faire and I’ll be sure to post it all. Mammasita, did I learn more cool stuff!! I can’t stress the importance of all fantasy, historical, and all other writers to hitting the Bristol Renaissance Faire. Yeah, I know it’s far, and costs money and all the weird people running around thinking they are elves, faires and knights, but there’s a layer to Bristol, something hidden under the makeup, costumes and hot knights – God bless the hot knights!! – something that screams world building. It’s seen in kind Jane, the wonderful queen, the snotty Lords and Ladies, the gallant knights. Something that us fantasy writers need to unearth. When characters gossip about other characters, and yes, they gossip about the character, not the actor, when Jane insists I see the Queen as my favorite person, when a knight makes my toes shiver, then that’s world building. It’s personality, it’s getting to know characters. And believable characters are just as important to world building as magic, cultures and language. Bristol has that unique talent of bringing the 1600′s into the 2000′s.  There are only two things wrong with Bristol:  They open on Saturday morning and kick you out at 7pm on Sunday night (You need at least a good four days to see ALL the faire and they are closed on the week days) and the faire only runs from July 9th to Labor day.  Very sad indeed.  I shall miss the fair Ms. Jane until next August, when I’ll pile more eager writers into the car and head for the mystic lands of Bristol.


Anyway, that’s all for now, my lovely writers. I do have more, LOTS more to share. In fact, I’m already saving money for next years great adventure to my new world building place, Bristol Ren Faire.

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There’s a new book that has been floating around the New York Best sellers now for 100 weeks. One hundred weeks!! That’s almost two (2) years. It sat on the sellers list, happy and smiling, humming a little tune as it sat with its other book friends. They’d gossip and tell stories about their writers and the readers. Always with a secret and almost gloating smile on its little bookcover face.


And 60 agents cursed, snarled and hired people to kick them in their behinds. Why? Because they rejected this happy little book that sat on the NYT best seller list, called it uninteresting, tiring, not good enough, a bore. Really?? Well, thank God the readers didn’t feel this way. The name of this happy little book? It’s called The Help by Kathryn Stockett. Yeap, that’s right. The book about the 1960’s black southern American maids and their white southern bell bosses. Sixty agents who said this book should be burned at the stake are now simultaneously banging their heads on their desks, saying ‘it’s not my fault!’


That same book has now been made into a movie and is rumored now to have caught the attention of another reader/viewer named Oscar. Yeap, Mr. Oscar is now turning his eyes to this movie and thinking, ‘mmmm . . . I think Ms. Katheryn Stockett should come to my house in beautiful Hollywood, California next year and walk my red carpet, stand on stage and accept a little golden statue of myself for best screen play.’ Which really makes the 60 agents steam . . . at themselves.


So the moral of the story is never give up, never surrender, my dear and wonderful writers, because your 61 is just around the corner. Your smiling secretly at the agents/publishers who said your work is ‘tiring, boring, doesn’t attact my attention’ is around the corner. Your gloating is coming, your waving your book in front of the publishers/agents eyes who said your lovely book is dull, clichéd, stupid, a waste of paper and unworthy of a reader’s eyes or the dreaded no response at all is coming. And who knows? Maybe Mr. Oscar will invite you to his house next year. And agents everywhere will shoot a gun at their TV screens. Ahhh . . . life is good!!

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Falling Skies

So I got hooked on TNT’s Falling Skies by Steven Spielberg. I’m not a big Space Aliens attack earth type of viewer, but I do love Spielberg. I decided to check out the first episode, ready to roll my eyes over the same old alien attacks earth, earth fights back, earth wins speel. Instead I found a great show with engaging characters and some serious writing techniques.
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My writer’s group is continuing our quest through The Art And Craft of Writing Christian Fiction. We are now on Chapter 11.

Creating a likeable character.

Jeff says in his book: The main character must be likable for the audience to want to read the story. The reader must empathize with him or feel sorry for him, root for him. If not, then the reader will toss away the book and move on.
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