Buck

About two years ago I was walking out in Round Valley and saw a rider on a horse coming down a hill through the brush.  I got to him just as he moved onto the road. Right away, I noticed that there was something a bit off with the horse’s gear—the rider was not using a bridle. The rider, Wayne Batty, was using nothing more than a rope harness that went around the horse’s head. I was amazed; how did you steer the horse without a bit in its mouth?

I asked Wayne if I might walk alongside as he rode. He agreed, and then began to talk about training and riding horses. I stuck with him for little over a mile before I had to turn back. I learned in that short period that Wayne was able to communicate with that horse with small nudges. The horse also communicated to him many things with its stance, ears, the cock of its head. Most importantly, I learned they both had built up a trust of each other. Wayne’s methods were not based on fear, it seemed, but something else.

It reminded me a lot of the fascinating and compelling The Man Who Listens to Horses, the autobiography of Monty Roberts, that shares Roberts’ life and his development of natural horsemanship methods. Unlike many training approaches which seek to break a horse’s will through harsh punishment-based methods that often veer into abuse, natural horsemanship employs methods that are much gentler and seek to build trust in the handler. Roberts can join up with (he doesn’t “break” horses) a wild or un-ridden horse, be up on the saddle calmly riding the animal, in an incredibly short period of time.

But Batty and Roberts aren’t the only ones practicing this. These methods have been around some time. One of the most famous practitioners and teachers is Buck Brannaman, who found his years of being severely physically abused by his father actually provided some insight into training horses.

Says Brannaman: “I’ve started horses since I was twelve years old and have been bit, kicked, bucked off and run over. I’ve tried every physical means to contain my horse in an effort to keep from getting myself killed. I started to realize that things would come much easier for me once I learned why a horse does what he does. This method works well for me because of the kinship that develops between horse and rider.”

Recently, a film was produced that looks at Brannaman’s life and methods. It’s called Buck and is worth every minute. If you love horses, you’ll love this movie. If you have a horse and think you might want to learn these methods, or just want to watch and listen, you might want to check out Brannaman’s teaching schedule at his site brannaman.com. He travels all over the country and is likely to hold a class within driving distance.

America The Vulnerable

A few years ago I received an email from my bank. At least, it looked legit to me. I opened it. It said it needed me to update some parts of my account and provided a link to the bank’s website. I clicked on the link, which took me to my bank’s website. At least, it looked exactly like my bank’s website. I entered my account number, login, and password. I made the requested changes and logged out.

Two days later, somebody in Spain cleared every penny out of my account—thousands of dollars stolen.

That email was a phishing (fishing) scam. The website had been a fake. I had willingly handed over my account number, login, and password to thieves.

Luckily, the bank insures such thefts. But the problem of information security remains. Thieves living in Spain, or Russia, or LA, or China, can rob me blind from their bedrooms in their pajamas. They can do this because our information processing nowadays is increasingly tied to the internet.

And they don’t just rob dopes like me, because it’s not just individual criminals who are in the business. Corporations and governments are in this business as well.

They steal billions of dollars of trade secrets, engineering designs, and other intellectual property from American companies through computer hacking. They steal military secrets. For example, the US Navy spent years and about $5 billion dollars to develop a quiet electric motor for submarines that would make them incredibly hard to find and track. Chinese spies stole that technology. The Navy then spent billions more to develop a new radar for their top-of-the-line Aegis Cruiser. Chinese spies stole that, too.

And they not only steal. Terrorists, crime organizations, and foreign governments can now insert malicious software into the computers that control, among other things, our electrical grid. They can use this in an attack, not just to shut the grid down for a while, but to destroy power generators. They can insert such software into our air traffic control system. Our train transportation systems. Our banks. They have already done this. They have already breached some of our most secure government systems.

It sounds too far-fetched to be true, but it’s reality. Joel Brenner, who has served as the former senior counsel at the National Security Agency (NSA), the national counterintelligence executive in the office of the director of National Intelligence, and as the NSA’s inspector general writes about what he’s seen in America The Vulnerable: Inside the New Threat Matrix of Digial Espionage, Crime, and Warfare. In the book, he explains the cyber threats to individuals, corporations, and the country and what we can do about it. If you want a fascinating look into the next phase of crime, espionage, and warfare, and an introduction to some of the things you need to do to protect yourself and your company, and what we need to do as a nation, you’ll want to read this book.

If you ask the “conservative” talking heads–Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity, etc.–who THE best conservative president of the last 100 years was, they will say Ronald Reagan. If you ask their dogs, they will bark “Ronald Reagan.” Their gerbils will say other things, but everyone knows you can’t trust rodents. Ask the regular conservative Wanda and Mack (Jane and Joe is so cliche), and they’ll give you the same response as the dogs and people. Ronald Reagan is the guy we conservatives and Republicans have been taught to worship.

Except, when presented with a candidate as conservative as Reagan, no, probably more conservative (I’m talking Mitt Romney), many of these “conservatives” get out their inquisitional torches. Which is a big reason why the GOP primaries are as fluid as they are at this point.

As a side note, have you noticed that these talking heads and the mainstream media either have a hobby horse they ride above all else (Rush Limbaugh and his anti global warming crusade) or they seem to promote some flavor-of-the-day litmus test for each election. In one election, they’re going on and on about homosexual marriage. The next election, it’s a talking head approved stance on Taliban bombing. The next, it’s the fact that budgets must be balanced. They line the candidates up and then start whacking them based on these flavor-of-the-day tests. It’s like going to buy a car and focusing all your attention on the steering wheel.

Anyway, I think many of us have forgotten what THE so-called best conservative president of the last 100 years looked like. If Ronald Reagan were to run today as John Smith, the conservative talking heads would drop him like a hot potato.  You don’t believe me? Well, let’s see how he stacks up.

1.      ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

1. Reagan signed in amnesty for 3 million illegal aliens. The south-west-east-north-of-the-border kind, not the ones with green antennas.
2. Talking Head Response: After crapping a brick, they would proclaim that John Smith, aka Ronald Reagan, is a pro illegal immigration RINO and must be thrown out!

2.      ENVIRONMENTAL REGULATION

1. A few weeks ago Rush Limbaugh told a caller that Romney is not conservative because of his stance on man-made global warming (Romney says he doesn’t know, but there seems to be evidence men contribue; women, of course, never to contribute to such things–they’re too smart), which Limbaugh thinks will lead to big-government regulation of emissions etc.
2. YET AS GOVERNOR, Reagan established the Air Resources Board to battle California’s worst-in-the-nation smog problem. In a 1984 radio address to the nation, Reagan took credit for the strong action he took in California to combat smog, saying: “I’m proud of having been one of the first to recognize that States and the Federal Government have a duty to protect our natural resources from the damaging effects of pollution that can accompany industrial development.”
3. THEN AS PRESIDENT, he signed, with great pride, what many consider THE most successful environmental treaty of all time – the Montreal Protocol in 1987, which regulates emissions. Back in those days Ozone depletion was the Global Warming. Reagan believed it, despite folks questioning the science and was happy to regulate.
4. In the 1987 State of the union he said: “We are also developing proposals that make use of market incentives to control air pollution caused by sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions and the causes of acid rain.”
5. What?! A cap and trade like program? Yes, putting Bush in charge. In 1990, the first Bush Administration successfully pushed through legislation establishing a cap-and-trade program to reduce acid rain—the program Reagan started!
6. Talking Head Response: John Smith is a total pro-environmental regulation RINO, please queue Al Gore singing “Burning Ring of Fire”

3.      ABORTION

1. Reagan signed a permissive law that allowed abortions. Since that law went into effect more than 2,000,000 abortions have happened in the Golden State.
2. Reagan says he failed to see how it would be abused. He blamed his own inexperience, stating that had he been in office longer he would have realized that the bill was wrong.  He blamed doctors for misinterpreting the bill. President Reagan stated his prolife position by saying: “Abortion on demand now takes the lives of up to one and a half million unborn children a year. Human life legislation ending this tragedy will someday pass the Congress, and you and I must never rest until it does.”  BUT he never introduced a bill to ban abortion or amend what he’d done. Not in California, nor as president.
3. Furthermore, today’s conservative inquisitors would point to his Supreme Court appointments. He appointed the moderate Sandra Day O’Connor.  Anti-abortion groups were livid, fearing, rightfully as it turned out, that Mrs. O’Connor would not vote to overturn Roe v Wade.  He appointed Justice Anthony Kennedy who had a long history of supporting expanded rights of privacy, gay rights, and preserving a woman’s right to choose.
4. Talking Head Response: actions speak louder than words–John Smith is a pro-choice RINO

4.      UNIONS

1. Reagan was a union president 8 times in a row.
2. Reagan, aka John Smith, also had lots of troubling connections to the Teamsters, who endorsed him, and who suddenly saw less investigation of their leaders for corruption. This is during the Jimmy Hoffa organized crime years.
3. Talking Head Response: choke, ack, sputter–Smith is a pro-union gangsta RINO!

5.      GUN CONTROL

1. It was Governor Ronald Reagan of California who signed the Mulford Act in 1967, “prohibiting the carrying of firearms on one’s person or in a vehicle, in any public place or on any public street.” Yeah, he aimed to stop the Black Panthers et al, but affected all gun owners.
2. Twenty-four years later, Reagan was still pushing gun control. “I support the Brady Bill,” he said in a March 28, 1991 speech, “and I urge the Congress to enact it without further delay.” He was right with Clinton on that issue.
3. The Brady Bill, for the first time ever, instituted federal background checks on firearm purchasers in the United States.
4. NRA spent millions fighting it, when it pass they mounted cases in a number of states wanting to have it overturned as unconstitutional.
5. Talking Head Response: anti-gun RINO!

6.      FISCAL POLICY

1. As Governor, Reagan signed into law the largest tax increase in the history of any state up till then. Meanwhile, state spending nearly doubled.
2. As President he continued. While he did cut taxes his first year, he signed into law tax increases of some nature in every year from 1981 to 1987. Furthermore, the debt increased to nearly $3 trillion, roughly three times as much as the first 80 years of the century had done altogether.
3. Talking Head Response: tax and spend RINO!

7.      RELIGION

1. Smith, aka Reagan, let Nancy’s astrologer affect his schedule
2. Talking Head Response: troubling devilishness (scary for evangelicals everywhere!), even if he only did it to make Nancy feel peace

Reagan the RINO? Are you kidding? And yet Reagan would be hounded out of the Republican party if he ran today. The talking heads would sound the warning long and loud, which is a shame.

On the other hand, I’m not saying we need another Reagan. Clones never pan out–hasn’t anyone seen Multiplicty with Michael Keaton?! And despite the recent zombie craze, I don’t want one in the White House, even if the world would be a better place if said zombie should eat Vladimir Putin’s brains out. I tire very quickly of Reagan worship. Or any other politician worship. As good as Reagan was, I disagree with a number of things he did. What I am saying is that those who want to get another president “as good as Reagan” had better know what such a president looks like. And it ain’t the caricature that’s being held up today by many conservatives, especially the talking heads, who seem to gloss over the facts of history.

Sherlock Holmes & Mission Impossible

I have been looking forward to two movies this holiday season. One of them was as good as I’d hoped it would be. The other disappointed me because the story tellers forgot to make things clear. The two movies were Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.

I loved the first Sherlock Holmes movie—the story was intriguing and plotted well, the atmosphere and music were amazing, and the characters and relationships were even better. In fact, the movie presented some of the most delightful characters I’ve enjoyed over the last few years. So it was a no-brainer to plan in a date to see this new episode.

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows provided the same great atmosphere and music as I enjoyed before. Holmes and Watson were as wonderful as they’d ever been. The film introduced a wonderful new character: Madam Simza Heron, a gutsy gypsy who you can’t help but want to know better. And it brought on Professor James Moriarty, the uber-villian. There was plenty of the wit that we enjoyed in the first one. It had all the elements to work.

However, the film fell down in its plotting. There were many times when I had no idea why the characters were doing what they were doing or how it fit into the overall threat. At other times, it appeared Sherlock could have taken out the villain but didn’t only because it would have ruined the plot.

The film makers also decided to kill off one of the characters, and therefore relationships, that had provided so much satisfaction in the first movie. And they did it without much fanfare. Who thinks it’s a good idea to kill off beloved characters like that? If you’re going to kill someone we love, you’d better make it meaningful and the core of the film. Alas, they didn’t.

In fact, it felt like there was too much stuffed into this film. Cool ideas that couldn’t be explored or have much impact including facial surgery for spies, a lost brother, European politics, resistance fighters, a henchman we hardly see. The wonderful Madam Simza Heron didn’t play the pivotal role she could have. So unlike Irene Adler in the first movie who becomes central to the story, she’s more of a bit of the setting.

If you loved the first film, you’ll have to see this. There’s a lot of good. But you must go knowing it’s a grade lower than the first film.

Now, I stopped liking the Mission Impossible movies about thirty minutes into the second in the series. But the previews for Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol intrigued me. I like Tom Cruise as an actor. And so we decided to give it a try.

Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol didn’t provide the atmosphere or super-delightful characters and relationships of Sherlock Holmes. But that’s not to say its characters were tepid. On the contrary, the cast was great with a lot of funny interplay. Furthermore, unlike some action films where everything seems to work for the hero, a lot of things go wrong for Tom Cruise’s character. These problems and his reactions are part of what make the movie.

The story also provided plenty of “action” but did it in a new way. This is the first time, for example, I’ve seen a car chase in a sandstorm. And it was a fab chase. It’s also the first time I’ve seen a final battle in an automated parking lot. The director and writers did a good job choosing new twists on common action elements.

But a story needs more than characters and new sights—the plot has to make sense. Especially when the plot takes center stage, which it does in action movies. And I’m happy to say that I never once wondered why our characters were doing something or how it affected the main threat. Furthermore, every one of the characters made a difference. The result was that I thoroughly enjoyed the film from start to finish. I can’t wait to watch it again. If you like action films, I think you’ll enjoy Ghost Protocol.

The Art of the Shaving

When I was on a mission in the Netherlands I was an idiot and did not take care of my face in the winter. I’d hop onto the bicycle with the temperature hovering around zero degrees (not counting the wind chill) and bike out with Fearless Companion to an area to meet with people or knock on doors. And I’d do it with hardly a thing covering my face and ears. As a result, I damaged my skin.

So now when I’m exposed to cold, my face flushes and stays that way for some time even when I’m in a warm house. I can’t wear cologne. And I’ve had a love/hate relationship with shaving. I can’t stand the prickle of a beard and so love to shave, but I hate the fact that when I shave, my face turns the color of a tomato for four to six hours. And this is when I use shaving cream specifically formulated for “sensitive skin.”

But then I walked into The Art of Shaving store in Fashion Place Mall and learned that those shaving creams designed for sensitive skins weren’t super gentle. They just numbed the skin so you didn’t feel the shave. The folks at The Art of Shaving suggested, of course, I use their product.

I bought a kit (I’m a sucker for good sales pitches even when I know I’m being suckered) which included: a badger hair brush (optional), pre-shave oil, shaving cream, and after-shave balm. They had five types to choose from: unscented, lemon, sandalwood, ocean kelp, and lavender. I selected the lavender because it was formulated for sensitive skin. At first I was worried about being overpowered with the smell, but was pleasantly surprised to find the scent as light as a feather. I didn’t need a new razor; they said my Mach3 was just fine.

I came home with my bag expecting a huge dose of buyer’s remorse. Except after my first shave with their product, my face didn’t flush. Could this really be a product that worked? I wasn’t willing to make that conclusion at the time. But now, after about a month of shaving, I can honestly say that this is the best shave I’ve had in years. My face doesn’t flush. The after-shave balm does what a balm is supposed to do–sooth. There’s no alcohol burn. In fact, I use the after-shave balm on non-shave days. If your skin hates shaving, let me suggest you visit theartofshaving.com and order some product or go to one of their stores. I think you’ll also become a fan. 

Info for Choosing a Career

There are many things I wished I’d done differently when choosing a career. I wish I’d broadened my horizon on the horde of different careers possible. I wish I’d really looked at what the various careers earned on average. Luckily for those looking to select a new career today, Utah’s Department of Workforce Services compiles data on more than 700 occupational wages and shows you the average and median annual wage as well as the average for inexperienced folks in that occupation.

Not only does looking through the list help you see options you might not have considered, it also helps you get a realistic expectation for what you might earn in that profession. Now, the list, although large, doesn’t show every possible occupation (FBI agent, Marine) or every permutation of the occupations shown. For example, there’s one line for accountants and auditors, but there are tax accountants, fraud accountants, security accountants, auditing accountants, etc. Nevertheless, this is an excellent list to begin a search.

To get the list, go to this state website: http://jobs.utah.gov/jsp/wi/utalmis/default.do. Click on “Utah Occupational Wages.” That will open a page with a map of Utah. Click on the link on the right “Utah Occupational Wages” to get the Excel spreadsheet of all 700+ occupations listed.

Pure Delight

One of the most delightful literary characters to appear in the last decade is the cheeky Bartimaeus–a five-thousand-year-old djinni (“genie”) who plays the lead role in Jonathan Stroud’s trilogy The Amulet of Samarkand, The Golem’s Eye, and Ptolemy’s Gate.

In Stroud’s world, magicians have no magic in themselves, but they do have the lore to summon and enslave demons, who can work magic. There are demons of various levels and powers. The lowest regularly summoned and enslaved are Imps, who can be crude and like to tell outright whoppers, but are good for standing watch and carrying messages. Next come Foliots, which Bartimaeus describes as “cut price djinn.” In the middle of the great chain of beings are the Djinn themselves, whose clever intelligence Bartimaeus extols, followed by Afrits, and finally Marids, who are rarely summoned because they are too strong for any but the most powerful magicians to control. Of Marids, Bartimaeus insightfully reveals that they are “dreadfully full of themselves.”

In the trilogy, Bartimaeus is summoned and enslaved to do the bidding of a sometimes jerkish young magician who learns to be a better person, despite himself. Of course, along the way the magician sends Bartimaeus in great peril, which he eludes with cunning, sardonic wit, and many good one-liners. I read the first book, loved it, then listened to all three read by Simon Jones, who makes these stories even better. The sad news is that I finished them. I simply wasn’t ready to let Bartimaeus go.

Which is why I was so happy to find that Stroud recently released a fourth book: The Ring of Solomon, which is a stand-alone prequel to the trilogy. The family and I just finished listening to it, and it is every bit as good, if not better, than the first three.

This story is set in biblical times where King Solomon has risen to uncontested power because of his possession of an all-powerful ring which allows him to summon hordes of powerful demons in a blink. Bartimaeus is enslaved to one of Solomon’s magicians.  A mean man, who Bartimaeus catches in a mistake and escapes, principally by devouring him. But Solomon doesn’t take kindly to that, and orders Khaba, a sinister and cruel magician, to summon him back to make an example for the other demons.

Meanwhile, the Queen of Sheba, having denied Solomon’s marriage proposal three times, is sent an extortion threat.  Angry and frightened, she sends Asmira, a young woman and loyal captain of the guard, to Jerusalem to assassinate Solomon.

Bartimaeus and Asmira hook up and find themselves in quite a pickle as they attempt to solve their problems. The story provides lots of humor, adventure, peril for both Bartimaeus and Asmira, and a number of surprising turnarounds. It also, in its own way, makes a comment on leadership, loyalty, and zealotry.

You’ll find it in the middle-grade section of your bookstore, but don’t let the placement fool you into thinking it’s not for adults. Like the best stories, it offers something for everyone. It’s a perfect blend of insight and entertainment and had my whole family, oldest to youngest, spellbound for the duration as we listened to it riding in the car. This is one of my favorite books this year. And if you want to really indulge yourself, listen to the audio book read by Simon Jones.

Travel to Medieval England

I love learning new things about places and peoples, even if it’s a place I’ve “been” to before, which is why Ian Mortimer’s The Time Traveler’s Guide to Medieval England intrigued me. The first page convinced me to buy to book. And I’m so happy I did.

I’ve read my fair share of interesting and well-written texts on this subject, including, among others, Life in a Medieval City and Life in a Medieval Village by Frances and Joseph Gies, Standards of Living in the later Middle Ages by Christopher Dyer, The Medieval Castle by Philip Warner, Daily Life in the Middle Ages by Paul B. Newman, and Power and Profit: The Merchant In Medieval Europe by Peter Spufford. All engrossing reads. What sets Mortimer’s book apart is that he not only approaches the topic as a travel guide that leads to you interesting sights and shares fascinating tidbits about the place, but he also helps you imagine how it would be, as a 21^st century person, to actually travel there.

For example, where would you go if you got sick? What happens if you’re robbed, where do you report the crime, and should you? Where might you get food and would it be something you’d find palatable? How will you get from place to place? Why kind of entertainment can you expect? And what can you wear without offending your hosts?

Mortimer focuses on the fourteenth century England, since this period comes closest to the popular idea of the medieval times. He tackles the topics of the landscape, people, the Medieval character, basic essentials, what to wear, traveling, where to stay, what to eat and drink, health and hygiene, the law, and what to do. And he does it all in a chatty, clear, and informative manner, with a bit of humor thrown in for spice.

Each page was a delight, and I found myself feeling like I was there. Furthermore, I learned a number of things that I hadn’t picked up in my previous readings. I’m tempted to quote all sorts of interesting tidbits he shares about the age, but I’ll refrain. If you are at all interested in the Middle Ages, I think you’ll love this book.

I finished the 10% edit, going from 205,000 words to 185,000, this morning and emailed the finished manuscript to Super Agent Caitlin who will perform various incantations before sending it off to ye Editors for review. 

While that’s happening, I will be switching gears and starting the thriller. I’m looking forward to this.  Not only am I having fun developing the ideas, but unlike these epic fantasies I’m writing with a gajillion story lines, this is going to have one story line (okay, with maybe, maybe two subplots), one point of view (instead of three or four), and a limited cast of characters like six (as opposed to close to twenty). I’m preparing to reach  escape velocity. I’ll tell you what jupiter looks like when I get back.

Even after you choose a genre, you still need to develop ideas for character, setting, problem, plot, and text.

What do you do? How do you develop those ideas?

The first thing you do is hunt zing.

Feeding the beast

Zing is any idea that turns you on, sparks your imagination, or stokes your desire. Zing tingles your cool meter. Dude, yes, ah, oh baby, man-o-man, great oogily boogily–these are all common responses when you come across these types of ideas.

Most zings are small tingles. Sometimes they’re zaps. Rarer still are the freaking gigawatt monsters that shake you about and leave you breathless. But I’ve found I can’t wait for those. Or maybe I should say that they often come only after I’ve caught smaller prey.  

Your imagination is a beast. Feed it and it will get up and terrorize the neighborhood on its own accord. Starve it and it will lie there like a gigantic dust mop and gather flies.

Nothing in, nothing out.

YOU MUST FEED YOUR IMAGINATION!

Some of us might feel we don’t have much to feed our imagination. Most of us are not Ann Franks or CIA agents or little old ladies caught in terrorist plots. But we don’t have to be.

I once taught teen writers workshop where we met one day each week for three weeks. During the first class I introduced zing and told the students they were to hunt for 10 zings each day.

They were dismayed. They groaned. Ten? Was that possible?

The next week all of the students came back bubbling about all the things they’d found. One of them said it had changed things for her: her world which had been relatively hum-drum was suddenly filled with the cool. The other students agreed.

We all are limited by what we can perceive and focus on. Our working memories are so small. And so it’s easy to focus on so many mundane business-of-life things and miss the wonderful show of lights that goes on around us.

This is what hunting for zing does for you. It quite literally changes your world.

Be a hunter.

Capture the zing.

This is the first step. You have to gather interesting material. Lots of it. Which means you must turn your zing sensors on.

What do I mean by this?

Open your eyes and ears and heart. Be on the look out. When something cool comes along, capture it. Use scratch paper, the back of a receipt, get a notebook, a folder file, a camera, a sketchbook. Just capture it when it comes. And it will come.

Most of the ideas are never used, but unless you capture them, i.e. notice them, you won’t get the ones that do develop into something special. For many of us writing them down is the way to really give them the attention they need. I promise you: these little scraps and snippets have a way of combining at the oddest moments, and suddenly you have more than an itty-bitty old zing, you have a freaking power plant!

The Drag Net

Having your sensors on is like deploying a drag net—it catches whatever swims into it. One of the benefits of this is that you get ideas you’d never in a million years come up with on your own. Here are some random things I caught in my drag net.

Some people actually raise chickens in their apartment (from a book I happened to pick up while browsing a section of the library).

Hum, what if my character’s neighbor does that? What if it’s his kooky sister? Maybe his wife decides they need to be more self-sufficient. Or maybe she’s told a neighbor she’d take care of her chickens.

A girl was sold to cover her father’s debts (while reading an article about ancient history)

Could that happen today? How would that work? What if it was someone else kidnapping a girl to pay off debts?

“The monkey, which costs $15,000, is what Truelove envisions as the ultimate SWAT reconnaissance tool. Since 1979, capuchin monkeys have been trained to be companions for people who are quadriplegics by performing daily tasks, such as serving food, opening and closing doors, turning lights on and off, retrieving objects and brushing hair. Truelove hopes the same training could prepare a monkey for special-ops intelligence.” (From an online newspaper that’s sent to me each week)

A SWAT monkey? Come on! Could this primate be put to nefarious purposes? What if he stole something incredibly valuable? What if a major thief uses them? What if it’s a boy in the neighborhood?

There’s a guy who lets his toenails grow to horrible lengths; they look like claws. It’s incredibly disgusting (Something a friend said about one of his friends in an email)

Does your main character have a partner? Someone they work with in the office? A mate in their medieval army squad?

GARDEN GROVE (CBS) — An Albertson’s supermarket on Harbor Boulevard was evacuated Monday after a burglary suspect fell through the ceiling to the ground near a cash register.

What if that’s your main character? What was he doing stealing copper? Maybe he was forced to?

Headline in Daily Mail Reporter: Ghurka kills 30 Taliban. ‘I thought I was going to die… so I tried to kill as many as I could’: Hero Gurkha receives bravery medal from the Queen. Corporal Dipprasad Pun defeated more than 30 Taliban fighters single-handedly.  Used the tripod of his machine gun to beat away a militant after running out of ammunition.

 Could this be used as a scene in the story? What about the tripod business?

 

In this May 2011 security camera frame grab provided by the Stevens County Sheriff’s Office, dogs are seen at the home of a resident near Deer Park, Wash. A pack of dogs has killed about 100 animals in the past three months while eluding law enforcement and volunteers in northeastern Washington state. The killings are happening in a wide area of mountains and valleys west of Deer Park, a small town about 40 miles north of Spokane, authorities said. (AP Photo/Courtesy of the Stevens County Sheriff’s Office)

What if these guys are roaming the neighborhood where your character lives? What if it’s a fantasy story and these are not just dogs? Are they bewitched? Trolls? Something come in from the woods?

As far as pictures go. How about this gal? Would she fit in a romantic comedy? A murder mystery? What if she went missing? What if someone kidnapped her son?

 

What about this newspaper clipping? Click on the image and read the fine print.

All you have to do is start asking questions of these zings and they can’t help but produce character, setting, problem, and plot.

Deploy your drag net.

Do it now.

Hunting With A Purpose

Even though your drag net is out, you cannot rely on it to deliver all the ideas you need. Very often you need to go hunting with a purpose. In fact, whenever you have development objectives, you’ll be on the lookout for that thing you need to develop.

Let’s say you want a funny and new fight scene in your story. Look at the stuff above.

• A fight including that gal in the wedding dress?
• One in the space the copper thief fell from?
• How about one in a chicken apartment?

Maybe you need a new love interest.

• What if she’s the copper thief?
• What if she’s out hunting the wild dogs?
• Maybe he’s the guy who kidnapped the nun?

Do you see? When you have a purpose, you look at the things you come across with a different lens.

But you might need to be a bit more active in your hunt. You might need to do some things to find what you’re looking for. I’m talking about directed research.

An Example

I attended Orson Card’s literary boot camp. He had us take a day and develop five story ideas (or seeds) which we were to write down on ONE side of a 3×5 card (hum, sounds a bit like the story setup we talked about in the previous blog).

2 of the cards were for story ideas we developed from research conducted at Barnes & Noble or in a library

2 were for ideas developed from a drag net of events or curious things I saw that day

1 card was for an idea developed from an interview with someone.

The assignment was to look at things as a writer, to exploit what I see as a writer. On the card we were to tell a story. The fundamental idea–what happens and why. Just the idea and some events. The space limint on a 3×5 card forces you to think of story and NOT the writing.

Oh, and the research was supposed to be for something we didn’t find interesting, which meant we didn’t know squat about it.

I researched Iroquois Indians, women who did crazy things like going over Niagra Falls in a barrel, and some other crap I can’t remember. I also read a bit about an American Indian in 1614 who was stolen as a slave, taken to Spain, got his freedom, went to England and then back home.

I interviewed two women in a music box shop and worker in a Thomas Kindcade art gallery. The gallery gal was blonde and rode Harleys. Had tattoos. What in the world was she doing in a THOMAS KINCADE gallery?

I used the Elizabeth Smart poster (abducted girl) and an empty music box as my curious things.

I worked from 5PM until 9PM on the ideas and never really got anything. Went up on a hike up Rock Canyon still thinking about it. Saw a cave; evening came; the canyon was beautiful. Marvelous. Almost stepped in a snake. Worked and worked on the music box idea and the kidnapping idea. More on the music box.

No ideas really pulled me.

Next morning I woke at 6 AM and started thinking. Decided I had no time AND I WOULD HAVE TO FOLLOW NELLIE’S [my wife] ADVICE and simply go with what I had. I made a decision and go with it even though I didn’t really feel it inside.

During class, someone else talked about bone magic. It was cool! I stole the bone magic idea and crossed it with the Iroquois stuff I’d looked at and suddenly started liking my story a whole lot more. Decided the tribe that lost their only bone breaker (that’s how the magic was obtained) in a raid (he was sold to the French as a slave) and sent out a woman who knew French and a warrior to retrieve him.

The next day I was supposed to write the story. I found I didn’t really want to write that one. Spent all day at the library reading juveniles and encyclopedias on Iroquois and Eastern Indians. Read for 5 hours then began to try to write.

Now, let me stop here.

Through my directed research I had collected gobs of zing. There were Indian names like “Handsome Lake” and “He Who Keeps Them Awake,” the fact that the Iroquois had a peace sachem (leader) and a war leader. The peace leader was a woman and chose the male war leader. I had stories about abducted Whites and Indians being sold into slavery and escaping. I read about men purchasing Indian wives. I added tidbits I knew from the Netherlands and Bible. It went on and on and on.

I had TONS of cool material to work with because I’d actively gone on the hunt for it.

If you look back as the example I shared about the golem story in the previous post, you’ll see I researched golems and Croatia and found TONS of cool material. I added to that other tidbits I already had. And the result was massive zing.

So what happened with that Iroquois story?

Well, I finished it, and it went on to sell multiple times. It’s called “Bright Waters”. Here’s how it starts. But the thing to remember is that it all started with the directed hunting for zing.

Bright Waters

In the spring of 1718 Jan van Doorn returned to his log house with a load of molasses, flour, and a fine green dress for his new wife. He found she had run out on him and taken half of his goods with her.

She was the second wife he’d bought. And the second one to run away before a season was out.

Her name was Woman With Turtle Eyes, an older Huron of 23 years. He had thought an older woman would be more stable than the girl he purchased the first time. Besides, she said she wanted him to buy her.

Jan didn’t understand how the men in the settlements courted and kept their women. And it couldn’t be because he was ugly. He’d seen plenty of ugly men marry. The only ones that seemed to have any interest in him were the whores at Fort Montreal, and when he’d given in to his urges that one cursed time, they took far more from him than his money.

There was nothing to do about Woman With Turtle Eyes. If he hunted her down, she’d just run away again. He could beat her, but she’d run nevertheless. Besides, her theft meant he’d have to start working his old claim, and there were precious few weeks before the beavers began to shed their winter coats. No, there was nothing to do but fold up the dress and put it in the cedar chest.

He looked down upon the dress for a few moments admiring the fine, shimmering cloth. Then he closed the lid.   

That night Jan cooked himself a meal of kale and old potatoes. When he finished, he rubbed deer urine onto his traps to prepare them for the morrow. Then he went to bed. 

 Remember: zings are almost always small. Don’t be looking for the ONE killer idea. Usually the killer story is made up of a bunch of smaller zings.

“What generally happens is that I’ll be reading up on some topic just for entertainment — spies, pirates, the Romantic poets, mountain-climbing — and I’ll notice a few indications that the situation might do as the basis for a novel. At that point I declare that this isn’t recreation anymore, it’s research. So I start reading lots of books and articles on the subject, even if they’re not entertaining. And I follow any side-paths that show up — for one book, Tarot led to Poker which led to Las Vegas which led to famous gangsters. And while I’m reading all this, I’m looking for bits that are “too cool not to use.” When I’ve got a dozen or so things that are too cool not to use, then I’ve got — obviously — a dozen elements of the eventual novel.” ~ Tim Powers

Your Zing, Not Mine

Again, you don’t want any old idea. You want good ones. So how do you recognize a good idea?

YOU FEEL IT!

Good ideas carry current, they spark your interest, they tug your heart strings, they turn you on. This is what I’ve learned: a good idea is like an electric jolt. Sometimes it’s very small, sometimes it’s overpowering. It’s the feeling of “cool,” “whoa,” or “oh, boy, this has possibilities.”

But notice I said they spark your interest.

You’re not looking for what turns me on. For you to write a story, you have to follow your zing, not mine or your friend’s or your mentor’s.

The trick is finding your zing and then sharing your zing with people who have similar tastes.

Where to find zing

There are a few places where I seem to find TONS of zing. Maybe they’ll be productive for you.

Source 1: Other stories

I get an unlimited supply of ideas from other stories. Here are a number of sources.

• The news
• History
• Friends and acquaintances
• My past
• Strangers
• Scripture
• Gossip
• Fairy tales
• Poems
• Movies
• TV programs (fiction and non-fiction)
• Summaries of actual court cases
• Novels
• Magazines
• Biography
• Interviewing a relative or friend for their life story

Source 2: Snippets of life

Every week I run across interesting conversations, lines, facts, events, images, and people. These things aren’t stories but they can be used to enhance or generate one. In fact, part of the joy of writing is finding ways to incorporate the cool things I encounter into the current story. There are many places where I find these snippets of life:

• People I know or talk to
• Science
• History
• Poetry
• The Discovery Channel and its many cousins
• How-to books, videos, tapes
• Current or historical issues
• Books on how people used to live
• Photographs of other lands and cultures
• People I see (The hero of my Writer’s of the Future story was based on a transient I picked up one night who lived in a storage space at the town’s used bicycle shop)
• Learning about other people’s professions
• Trying new things

Source 3: Research

This is just another way of coming across stories, facts, events, people, and trying new things, but it’s more directed.

• Do it
• Visit it
• Talk to those who have done it or been there
• Watch movies about it
• Read about it, starting with Juveniles & Encyclopedias and then moving to thicker texts

When I moved up into the hinterlands of Utah, I found out they had an annual local testical festival. As a regular joe I might have gagged and moved on. As a zing hunter, I couldn’t afford to do that.

No, they do not taste like chicken.

They do taste like something many people find delicious. But I’ll let you identify what that is with a little research of your own.

When you get a chance to try something new–try it. You get marvelous details, wonderful ideas. And you just might find you enjoy life a little bit more. Or at least be grateful you’re not trapped in a coffin.

I was writing a scene for one of my books, where a secondary character accidentally locks himself in a casket. Not having experienced such a tragedy, I began winging that thread on imagination alone. But the scene simply wouldn’t jell. When I finally finished the first draft and read it, it felt two-dimensional. So I wrote it again. It still stank. By the third draft my frustration level had peaked, and I shoved my chair away from the computer, knowing there was only one solution to this two-dimensional problem. I would have to experience it. Now you would think a logical person would take into consideration that the number of readers who’d actually been trapped in a casket was minimal enough to make the whole issue moot. Then again, we’re talking about a rational person…I’ll tell you, I’ve pulled some crazy stunts before, all in the name of research, but this one ranks in the top three.  ~Deborah LeBlanc

Nobody can copyright an idea or technique

Don’t worry about stealing ideas from someone else or using a technique you find in another story. Don’t worry that something’s already been done. What you want to avoid is copying the writing. But take any idea or technique and run with it–in your own direction. Remember: The Terminator & Back to the Future have the same premise but are two totally different stories. So go wild.

Be a hunter.

Capture the zing.

Start gathering your writing material today.

 More on Generating Story

• Generating Story 1: Can You Create A Redneck Crapper?
• Generating Story 2: No Clue, No Solution
• Generating Story 3: Develop the 6 Core Parts, Start Anywhere
• Generating Story 4: The Story Setup
• Generating Story 5: Hunt Zing