Will contests.  You gotta love ‘em.

The reason they are such great fodder for legal fiction writing is because they turn people into monsters, destroy family ties and make us realize that the human race is populated by a greedy bunch of bastards.

The challenge of writing about will contests is to find someone in the case that is worth a damn. If the story doesn’t have a sympathetic character somewhere in it, people will lose interest.

We all know the general rule: it’s about the money. Everywhere else in life people can proudly proclaim that they are pursuing the American dream.  They intend to work hard and hope to some day make it big, to become a millionaire.

But at the courthouse in a will contest, people must lie about their motives.  They must convince a judge or jury that they are not seeking grandma’s mineral interests, but rather a beatific expression of pure justice. Brother is sent by the devil to corrupt the American legal system and take advantage of an old widow woman who in her last days knew not what she was doing when she modified her last testamentary expression.

In will contests you should always include some sort of conspiracy.  Each side sincerely believes that the other side had secret agents at work to persuade grandma. Maybe it was the nurse who cared for her in her final days, the lawyer who came to her home to record her last wishes, the long-lost love from WWII who came to her side to comfort her.

If the contestants as a whole are unsavory, you may have to look some place else for a hero.  Maybe the judge gets sick and tired of the whole mess and refuses to rule in favor of any of them. Maybe he puts them all on probation and tells them he will rule in six months.  Maybe he bases his ruling on how the contestants behave during the probationary period. Maybe they all come back truly reformed and the judge finds himself in a quandary.

Hey, wait a minute.  That sounds like a pretty good story.

Lubbock minister David L. Wilson figures he’s got hail to deal with on this side of the River Jordan. Dr. and Mrs. Wilson built a new home in 2006 and are now on their third new roof. Hail wiped out the first one four years ago and provided a similar roof-pounding last month.

“The roofer asked if I wanted a thirty-, forty- or fifty-year shingle,” Wilson recalled. “I asked him to quote a price on a four-year roof.”

Michael Brown, a long ago Dallas TV newsman, often told a story about his short-lived stint as a TV weatherman.

“No one told me that the temperature numbers shouldn’t be stuck on the weather map until minutes before the telecast,” he explained. “The bright lights soften the wax, and soon, the numbers are not firmly attached.”

One evening, he warned of a cold front coming into Texas from Oklahoma. Brown glanced at the map, where the numbers were sliding downward. “Look, the temperatures are starting to fall already,” he defended.

Adherents to Chicken Little’s claim that the sky is falling are growing greatly in number. Even when we “buys our ticket and takes our chances,” odds worsen by the day. And “tickets” cost more.

In our debt-ridden culture, the world groans about ever-growing demands on the pocketbook. “Nickel and diming” has given way to “dollar and hundred-dollaring.”

A current example is a proposed new luggage carry-on policy by Spirit Airlines. If it doesn’t fit under the seat, they tack on another fee – a hundred dollars per bag.

The new policy is fraught with “what if’s.” What if the guy in front of you weighs 400 pounds? A bag might fit there until he sits down.

What if one opts to fly without luggage, but sleeps fitfully the night before? Surely this couldn’t lead to an additional airline fee.

“That’ll be another $200,” the boarding agent may say, “$100 for the bag under each eye.”

The masses of us who can’t balance our checkbooks are heartened to learn that even the big guys “goof up,” sometimes “big time.” The nation’s largest bank, JPMorgan Chase, admits to losing two billion dollars in six weeks.

Reasons given leave us with eyes crossed. Chase Bank brass blame “a trading portfolio designed to ‘hedge’ against risks the company takes with its own money.”

Such “hedging” shows that even the giants can get clipped. Maybe even scalped.

Graduation season is often marked by “feel good” stories. One this year is about former Dallas Mavericks’ Coach Don Nelson crossing the stage to pick up his baccalaureate degree at the University of Iowa.

A half-century has passed since he left school a few hours short of graduation to pursue a career in professional basketball.

Some forty family members and friends were in the audience to “whoop it up” for the hoopster, who turned age seventy-two only three days after the ceremony. Shaquille O’Neal, former NBA great who received his doctorate the same day, inspired Nelson to finish requirements for the bachelor’s degree.

In some of life’s arenas – as in some zoos – we draw lines, refusing to step across to acquire more knowledge – particularly about technology. (I send and receive emails, but I don’t text. I’ll break the “never say never” rule with the prediction that I’ll never join the ranks of texters.)

Maybe you read that six orangutans at Miami’s Jungle Island have been given iPads. It is one of several zoos experimenting with computers and apes. In Miami, the four younger ones are “catching on,” actually communicating in a mental stimulus program. The two older ones, however, ignore the iPads. I agree with oldsters. Some technology is not to be “monkeyed with.”

Final thought: There’s now an answer to the nineteenth century poet’s question: “What is so rare as a day in June?” How about almost any day in May that the Texas Rangers’ Josh Hamilton fails to swing a mighty bat?

Dr. Newbury is a speaker in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. Email: newbury@speakerdoc.com. Phone: 817-447-3872. Web site: www.speakerdoc.com.

You have a beginning that, you believe, fairly leaps off the page, a plot that has as many twists and turns as a dirt road in North Georgia, and a definite ending that dredges up a few surprises along the way.

You have a novel. The last period is in place. You have a stack of 347 pages, not counting the title page. And you love your title – short and full of imagery.

Now comes the hard part.

An editor has a question.

What is it?

The agent has a question.

What is it?

The publisher has a question.

What is it?

Even your friends and your spouse have a question.

What is it?

Do you know? Can you tell them? Do you have a hook?

Creating a hook may be the most important writing an author will ever do. The hook reaches out, attracts the attention of potential agents, editors, publishers, and readers, and lets them know exactly what to expect if they find your novel tucked away amidst that vast sea of retail and Internet bookshelves.

So often, we write those 347 pages and can’t tell anyone in a sentence or two exactly what the book is about or what the story happens to be. The hook carries impact. The hook captures the imagination. The hook says, “You won’t ever be able to walk away without reading this book, and if you do walk away, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”

I thought I probably knew what a hook was all about. I certainly understood the critical importance of having one, but it wasn’t until I heard Jodi Thomas speak at a recent NETWO writer’s conference that I really grasped the idea.

Jodi was talking about one of her books, and she said, “There are five women in this small Texas town who are called to the emergency room of the hospital because their husbands have been injured in a fiery explosion out on an oil rig where they work. A nurse tells them that the men have not yet been identified, but one is dead. Here are five women, and one is suddenly a widow, and none of them know who the widow is.”

Now that, I told myself, is a hook. That’s about as good as it gets. If those three sentences don’t make you want to charge into The Widows of Wichita County, then you’ve lost both your curiosity and your imagination. You may as well stay snuggled up to some reality show on television or go out and plant another row of pole beans.

I did a little research and found the hooks – the loglines – for movies, which could just as easily be hooks for novels.

For Die Hard: “A cop comes to Los Angeles to visit his estranged wife, and her office building is taken over by terrorists.”

For Pretty Woman: “A businessman falls in love with a hooker he hires to be his date for the weekend.”

For The Retreat: “A just hired employee goes on a company weekend and soon discovers someone is trying to kill him.”

For Ride Along: A risk adverse teacher plans on marrying his dream girl but must first accompany her overprotective brother-in-law – a cop – on a ride from hell.”

The loglines are short. They are punchy. They get right to the point. They are filled with irony. And, more importantly, they lure you right into the story.

The secret is being able to boil your 347 pages down to twenty-five good words that make your novel different, more intriguing, and much more enticing that any other book in the marketplace. Success or failure often depends on those twenty to thirty words. Make sure you choose the right ones. A good hook may be the only secret weapon that an author possesses.

Provided with a good hook, agents, editors, publishers, and readers no longer ask, “What is it?”

Now they’re asking, “What happens next?”

You’ve done what you need to do.

They’re hooked.

On May 15th, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius issued a news release about the long-term plan the United States has implemented to fight Alzheimer’s disease.

It has been a long time coming. It will be a long time before we see any results.

Most of the persons with Alzheimer’s disease can’t afford to wait years for answers.

This national initiative may be too little too late. But, at the very least, it is a step in the right direction.

The Author: Libby Fischer Hellman

The Story: It all began with a line of Persian poetry . . . Anna and Nouri, both studying in Chicago, fall in love despite their very different backgrounds. Anna, who has never been close to her parents, is more than happy to return with Nouri to his native Iran, to be embraced by his wealthy family.

Beginning their married life together in 1978, their world is abruptly turned upside down by the overthrow of the Shah, and the rise of the Islamic Republic.

Under the Ayatollah Khomeini and the Republican Guard, life becomes increasingly restricted and Anna must learn to exist in a transformed world, where none of the familiar Western rules apply.

Random arrests and torture become the norm, women are required to wear hijab, and Anna discovers that she is no longer free to leave the country.  As events reach a fevered pitch, Anna realizes that nothing is as she thought, and no one can be trusted … not even her husband.

Review: “Iran is in the news these days and the issues are important to us all, so it was with interest that I picked up Libby Fischer Hellman’s new novel, A Bitter Veil, set in the midst of the Iranian revolution that brought Khomeini to power. In a viscerally effective tale she brings that key moment to life, and we see it in a nuanced way that we would do well to carry into our understanding of the current crisis. I certainly remembered the overthrow of the Shah and the hostage crisis, but I can’t say I ever got inside that world until I read Hellman’s book.

“One of those themes Hellman succinctly identifies in her author notes: ‘I am drawn to stories about women whose choices have been taken away from them. How do they react? Do they simply surrender? Become victims? Or can some survive, even triumph over their travails?’

“The other theme that Hellman gradually unfolds is best summed up by Hannah Arendt’s famous phrase “the banality of evil.” As Anna says at one point when describing Iran during the revolution, “It’s as if an entire country–an entire culture–slipped off its axis. Black became white. White became black. Kind people were unkind. Good people were bad.”

“Arendt’s notion that an ordinary person can be led to evil actions arose from her study of the Nazis, and Hellman has Nazis in this book. I won’t tell you how–it will spoil some of the plot–but she creates a subtle and effective parallel between the Iranian extremism and Germany under the Nazis. She shows willingness of “good” people in Iran to perform orgies of killing through the process of identifying the “other” and then vowing to eradicate that other in order to purify society. Hellman includes amongst the “good” villains those allied with the Islamic revolution and those just trying to survive. Isn’t that precisely why such villainy works? No need to be a true believer to become tangled in the darkness.”

The Book: The Ninth District

The Author: Douglas Dorow

The Story: The Federal Reserve has never been robbed.

FBI Special Agent Jack Miller, pulled into a high-profile case to mentor a new agent, finds himself in a clash with the toughest opponent of his career.

The chase culminates in the bowels of the city, in the storm sewers and tunnels beneath The Ninth District Federal Reserve of Minneapolis

Review: “Author Doug Dorow presents a realistic action thriller story that makes one feel like you are hanging on for life as FBI Agent Jack Miller drives hell-bent in quest of the Governor, bank robber and killer. The detailed descriptions are smoothly written to allow a comfortable fast read. Does Agent Miller get his man? Does he get his woman? Read this great story for the answers.”

Review: “I heard about this book from a fellow Twin Cities resident who knows I love John Sanford’s writing, and I’m so glad I took a chance and tried it for myself. I was absolutely pulled in from the first page, and loved it right up to the last sentence. As a resident of Minneapolis I admit I got a big thrill from the many scenes, which took place at familiar landmarks and through some of the highlights of our city, but I think anyone, regardless of where they live, would find the book just as compelling.

I love crime thrillers and this one has all the key components that make a hit. The main character is seasoned and jaded and perfectly juxtaposed against his rookie partner. The author does a great job of weaving in just the right amount of the main character’s personal life as well. The villain is easy to hate and yet believable in the way he is written. I found myself so uneasy at some points, worrying about what would come next, that I would turn off my kindle only to turn it back on in the next moment, needing to know how things would be resolved.

“It is always exciting to find a new and promising author in this genre – I hope there is more coming soon! I highly recommend this book.”

Review: “When a series of bank robberies result in the murder of a pregnant woman, Jack Miller, a seasoned FBI agent and Ross Fruen, “Junior”, are assigned to the case. The robber has never killed before, so why did he start now? This is just one question they need to uncover in order to find their guy.

“The gunman wore a mask, and due to its appearance was quickly assigned the nickname of “the Governor”. As they follow the clues, and the case threatens the agents’ lives, they only become more determined to find their guy.

When it becomes clear the ultimate target is the Federal Reserve, “which has never been robbed before,” they believe they know what “the Governor’s” next step is.

“Dorow has written a well-paced thriller, which sweeps the reader along through the use of multiple points of view. His characters were well written and had me invested in the story until its exciting conclusion.”

Larry and Elaine Whitlock brought me a framed photo of the Delta County Champion Indians in the charter year for Little League. Gerald Dewitt of the Giants was also there.

Jim Ainsworth signing copies of "Go Down Looking" for Tory Humphries of Sulphur Springs and Sarah Stevens of Sulphur Bluff

Dr. Stephen Turner came from Plainview with his latest book On the Western Trail. And poet Wanda Myers Glawson, ninety, came from San Antonio. She’s one of those people I knew, but didn’t know that I did before Rivers Flow.

My attempts to chronicle the past through fiction brought about more connections than I can list here. Wife Jan said I should write about them all.  When I saw the faces of people that I would never have known if not for the books, saw old friends reuniting for the first time in decades, I discovered an answer to a question I have been asked many times.

Some of my friends seem incredulous about my now decade long venture into writing novels (most are guys who might buy a book, but never crack the cover). Their questions range from a simple “Why?” to  “How many novels are you going to write before you give up? Have you had a best-seller yet? Why don’t you write a thriller so it at least has a chance of selling big?”

I now have an answer, but they still may not understand.  Someone said that writers write to explain the world we live in to ourselves. But during this signing event, I learned that I also write because of the people in that room, people who are sending in orders, all the people who read my books, people who read this blog, and people who reconnect because of the books.

And writing has given me a whole new appreciation for songwriters. One of my favorites is Tom T. Hall. A particular line in one song often pops into my head when I hear those comments and questions.

You remember how the young boy follows Clayton Delaney around because he is “the best guitar-picker in our town?” The young boy asks Clayton why he doesn’t “pick up his guitar and head on down to Tennessee”.  Clayton’s reply, “Son, you better put that old guitar away. There ain’t no money in it; it’ll lead you to an early grave.”

That part about the money could certainly be said about writing. And writing non-genre novels could leave to an early grave, I suppose.  Publishing and marketing those babies is tough.

But writing allows me to be more introspective and reflective. I hope it helps readers to do the same as they identify with my stories.

The few early readers of Go Down Looking want to know if any of the stuff I wrote about happened. Again, I turn to a song. Remember when George Burns recorded “I Wish I was Eighteen Again” when he was in his final years?

I always thought one of the lines was “Going where I’ve already been.” Turns out it was “Going where I’ve never been.” Well, both lines apply to this book and me. Writing allows me to be eighteen again, going I’ve already been and where I’ve never been.

Ken Ryan, who came to the signing from Lufkin, has already read the book and sent me his comments. We were both astonished to learn that he was an eyewitness to at least one critical scene in the book. I can’t share all that he said without giving away too much, but suffice it to say that the connections are uncanny. And he is a guy I never met before the signing. We connected through this blog.

It is said that writers have buyers, readers, fans, and evangelists. I appreciate every single person who fits into any of those categories. I know a few folks buy the books, never intending to open them. I still appreciate them because they want to support my efforts.

I also recognize the tendency to think that someone we know can’t be a real writer. That’s even truer if you are related to the writer. Some readers read to see if they recognize the characters.

I know there are readers who are indifferent or just don’t care for my books. I even appreciate them. At least they gave me a chances.

Author Jim Ainsworth with Elizabeth Young of Reilly Springs, left, and Mr. and Mrs. Avon Acker of the Union Community

Fans are the good folks who read them and take the time to let me know they liked them and why. I need more of them. They encourage me to keep going.

Then there are the evangelists. They hold a special place in my heart because they like the books enough to make their reviews public and to spread the word. They are the biggest sellers of my books. I need many more of them. They may keep me away from that early grave.

About two years ago, I sold out of Biscuits and Rivers Flow books and could not get more.  A publisher went out of business; a set of plates damaged by storm. To get those books back in print, I made a deal with a new publisher.

Long story short, that deal replaced me as the only source in the universe for Rivers Crossing and Rivers Ebb. All my books are now digital. That means orders from bookstores and Amazon are now filled elsewhere, leaving me with an overstock of quality hardbacks.

I gave books to wounded vets, VA hospitals, etc., but who better to have the surplus than the people who have been fans and evangelists.

With that in mind, I am offering a two for one deal. With the purchase of any of my books, I will send a free copy of either Rivers Ebb or Rivers Crossing. I know that many have purchased these  books already and I thank you for that. If so, please consider giving copies to friends or family (with your recommendation).

If you haven’t read them, I hope you will. There are no catches or tricks to this offer. It’s two for one, four for two, any quantity as long as they last. We are updating the website for this offer now, but just e-mail or call and we will work out details.

If you purchased your copy of Go Down Looking before this offer, just let me know and I will see that you get your free copies.

The publisher wanted to know if I wanted a catchphrase on promotional items for Go Down Looking.  Find the Flow, Hear the Music, sort of tumbled out in a split second. Those six words underscore an underlying theme in all my books. Did I know that when I started writing? No. It began to emerge only after three books.

A few days ago, one of the connections I made through writing sent me a poem written by a terminally ill young girl. Here are a few lines from Slow Dance.

You’d better slow down
Don’t dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won’t last.

Ever told your child, we’ll do it tomorrow?

And in your haste, not see his sorrow?
Ever lost touch, Let a good friendship die
Cause you never had time to call and say, ‘Hi’

You’d better slow down, don’t dance so fast.
Time is short–the music won’t last . . .  Life is not a race.
Do take it slower
Hear the music
Before the song is over.
When you run so fast to get somewhere
You miss half the fun of getting there.

Terry Smith

He was a crook.

Well, Terry Smith was a crook first.

Then he became an author.

He, with all of the humility he could muster, had simply described himself as “Britain’s most infamous armed robber.”

He did make a mistake now and then.

Terry Smith even got caught now and then.

He served a little prison time.

But that was then.

This was now.

The new century was barely three years old when Terry wrote his book: “The Art of Armed Robbery.”

You wanted to steal a little?

He told you how.

You want to follow a gun into a bank?

He told you how.

Terry Smith even boasted about an “audacious” escape from custody, and he proudly wrote that he was personally responsible for some of the most daring robberies ever witnessed in Great Britain. In certain criminal and political circles, he referred to himself as a “minor celebrity” and a “robbologist.”

But, of course, that was then.

This was now.

And now he was a reformed man. He had seen the wickedness of his ways. He had repented. His sins were washed away, and his feet were on the straight and narrow path to glory.

He had a wife now.

He had a family now.

Terry Smith had decided to live a civilized life and make his fortune writing books. That’s what authors did, wasn’t it? Make a fortune writing books?

The author business, he found out, was a little slow.

He discovered that fortunes came much easier when he was carrying a gun instead of sitting all day at a keyboard, slamming nouns, verbs, and adjectives together.

He read his own book again, the one about “The Art of Armed Robbery,” and became inspired once again.

A good book will do that to a man.

He picked up a couple of friends, and they picked up a couple of guns, and the men, with nothing better to do with their time, attacked security guards who were delivering cash to those little hole-in-the-wall machines in East London and Essex.

Strike quick.

Don’t hang around.

Hit the road.

And do it again.

Terry Smith knew the formula for success. His little escapade earned the armed bandits about two hundred and fifty thousand pounds.

It was a good haul. It had been a good way to spend the morning.

But, unfortunately, a man had made a really poor decision, which they could do nothing about. He had tried to stop them, and, lo and behold, he made the mistake of walking directly in front of a bullet.

When the police grabbed him, Terry Smith started talking.

“I’m reformed,” he said.

Nobody was listening.

“I’m an author,” he said.

Police just shook their heads.

“I’m a writer and consultant on a movie,” he said.

Well, Terry Smith did serve as consultant for a few television programs, and he had been hired as a technical advisor for Spike Lee’s film, Inside Man.

“I’m a good man,” he told the judge.

“I’ve seen the light,” he told the jury.

Detective Superintendent Michael Field, however, described Terry Smith, as a violent, cynical individual with no regard for the law who was prepared to go to frightening ends to ensure his demands were met.”

The jury heard both men. The trial last six days.

Guilty was the verdict.

No parole for twelve years, the judge said.

Terry Smith could not understand.

Didn’t they know he was a writer?

Didn’t they know he had published a book? Didn’t they know he had published several books?

Why, he wondered, had they turned a deaf ear to his defense. It sounded perfectly logical to him.

“I’m not a robber,” he said.

“No?”

“No, Your Honor,” he said. “Let me explain what I was doing.”

“All right.”

Terry Smith squared his shoulders, stood tall, and tried to look for all the world like the author he was. “I’m working on a book,” he said. “I was just carrying out a little literary research,” he said.

There wasn’t a lot of difference between the sound of the judge’s gavel and the metal lock on his cell door slamming shut.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3gEe_OFOZU

The digital monster is hungry.  I am feeding it a  morsel now with these few words, not enough to satisfy it.  Just enough to make it mad.

I have seen several blogs this week that address the issue of what to do with the voracious omnivore that the new world of publishing has become.  I commend  these blogs to you, and suggest you read them from top to bottom.

The first is Russell Blake’s “Why I learned to Love KDP Select and Ignore Falling Sales.” Blake discusses the decreasing effectiveness of KDP free days as a way to drive sales and the importance of “borrows” under the KDP Select program.  Then he turns his attention to his writing strategy for the next year or so.

I think the single biggest differentiator I have from most of my peers who started publishing when I did, is my large and growing backlist. I’m so convinced that makes a difference I have committed to writing five more novels this year, if it kills me. I think once you have critical mass of, say, 15 paid titles, there is a lot more chance for someone to stumble upon one of your works. And when they do, they might work their way through all your books, which translates into considerably higher revenue over the long term. Because you have gained a reader, not made a sale.

The counterpoint to this is Libby Fischer Hellman’s “Whoa! Let’s All Just Take a Deep Breath..”.  Hellman discusses two recent articles about publishing. One from the NY Times about the pressure large publishing houses are applying to their name brand authors, pressure that they turn out more product. The other article from Forbes compares the old world of publishing to the new digital/social media model. It includes these words:

What makes the writing scene so exciting these days is that talent can well up from virtually anywhere.  If someone writes well and is skillful about how to build his or her brand, incredible things can happen.

Hellman points out the tension between the drive for more content and the need for quality writing.

The point is that great novels, whether genre or literary, can take time—whether it’s research, editing, or just figuring out what the story is really about. The pressure of writing more than one book a year isn’t good for any author who cares about his/her craft. Most of the authors I know are always pushing themselves, trying new things, working to deliver fresh, dynamic stories and characters. The need to crank out more in less time threatens that drive and can lead to works of lesser quality. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle– and risk —  which no writer, especially a best-selling author, should have to face.

But they are, mainly because other e-writers are putting out an enormous amount of product. Some writers release e-books at the rate of one a month. I’m sorry, but with a few exceptions, those are not books I am going to rush out and buy. I know they’re not going to be at the same level as a new Daniel Silva or a new Mo Hayder. I don’t care how much “branding” an author does. I can tell within two or three paragraphs whether I’m going to like a book, and that depends on the writer’s mastery of craft. If it’s not there, it’s not for me.

So the discussion is joined, and the monster is still hungry.

Something about this reminds me of a golf coach that takes a student out to the range.  The student has a bad slice.  Every shot he hits with a driver takes a hard right turn.  The coach watches him hit a few shots and then offers his advice.

“Hit the ball down the middle,” he says as he walks back to the club house and leaves the student on the practice tee.

The frustrated student addresses the ball, swings with all his might and slices his drive time after time. After fifty balls, he throws his club on the ground and leaves the range forever.

Or, it’s like a batting coach who is trying to teach  a hitter how to hit a ninety-five mile per hour fast ball that is low and away.

“When you see that pitch coming, drive it to the opposite field and run like hell,” he says.

The batter swings and misses at the next ten pitches and breaks his bat against the dugout wall.

So, what’s my point?  I agree with both Blake and Hellman. And I think the golfer and the batter have a simple lesson to learn: They won’t succeed if they quit.

Some writers, like Blake, can turn out a tremendous volume of good writing in a short period.  Others require a slower pace to produce quality work. What both types of writers have in common is that they are willing to keep practicing. If they slice ten in a row, they keep at it and make adjustments until they start hitting the ball down the middle. If they strike out a dozen times when they face a hard pitch low and away, they may hit the ball out of the park on their thirteenth at bat.

The monster is hungry and must be fed. Writers must decide when and how they will feed it, or whether they will let it eat them alive.

Air America carried out most of the air rescue ops and often intercepted mayday radio calls in real time. They usually immediately vectored the coordinates of a distress call if they were in the area concerned and frequently were on the scene before the bad guys could react.

Air America Bell 205 helicopter taking flight above a Hmong support base.

Once, a USAF pilot sent out a distress call, and an Air America helicopter was sitting on the ground to receive him when he landed in his parachute. In another, a case officer and his Air America pilot were shot down and landed in the middle of an NVA company-sized unit.

They held the enemy off with their assault rifles until an Air America helicopter swooped down through enemy fire and plucked them out without benefit of air cover. As a result, most case officers who carried only sidearms before began also carrying assault rifles afterward.

However, the case officers’ best weapon was their ground-to-air radio, with which they could call in air support or relay calls for other types of assistance.

But air rescue was not an Air America monopoly. Based on CIA intelligence, the USAF evacuated an entire Hmong village just ahead of the North Vietnamese troops.

Assisted by CIA personnel and using four CH-53 helicopters (Sea Stallions), the USAF got the job done in two days in spite of enemy fire and weather that normally would have grounded all aircraft. The link between Americans and Hmong went both ways.

After World War II, General Eisenhower credited the French resistance and the men and women of the Office of Strategic Services, the CIA’s predecessor organization with keeping fifteen German divisions from reaching Normandy during the 1944 landings. Similarly, the estimate is that the CIA’s efforts in Laos kept three regular North Vietnamese Army divisions away from our troops in Vietnam, a highly successful effort given the small size of the American contingent running the Secret Army.

None of the Americans fighting in Laos were there seeking awards or public recognition. They were there because their country needed them in that place at that time. The CIA’s paramilitary officers, as well as the other Special Operation Forces of the United States, are sent in harm’s way to fight America’s “small wars” because diplomacy by itself could not do the job, and to avoid full deployment of our armed forces.

The Secret War in Laos was a significant chapter of the Cold War and one that is largely unknown by the American public for whom it was fought. It is time for the stars on the CIA’s Wall of Honor to receive the recognition they are due.

Years ago I picked up a black cat at a local diner.  We named him Timmy.

While I was at school the next day, my neighbor hit Timmy as he was running across the street.  Another neighbor witnessed the hit and promptly took Timmy to Dr. David Powers.

I raced to David’s office to learn that Timmy’s rear end nerves were permanently damaged and it would take my learning to express his bladder in order for him to survive.

Every morning for weeks on the way to school I dropped Timmy off at David’s office and got a quick lesson about expressing Timmy’s bladder.  I picked Timmy up after school and David would give me another expressing-the-bladder tutelage.

I reached a level of frustration I didn’t know existed, but David patiently assured me that I’d get it.  

Low and behold, I did.  But not until I had bawled and had a couple of crying fits in his office.  For years David often boosted my ego by telling me I was the only woman in Ardmore who could express a cat’s bladder.

Soon I could whip Timmy up, set him on the commode and express his bladder right into the toilet.  Timmy loved napping in the shrubbery so he was always easy to locate for his morning and evening times of expressing.

One very hot July day, one very hot work-in-the-yard July day, I walked into the garage and noticed the staircase to the attic was down. 

Oh boy, wonder if Timmy had gone up there?  He had a history of checking everything out and an inviting stairway would grind on that cat’s curiosity until he’d have to make the climb to what he’d consider catnip nirvana.

I wandered out into the yard.  There the black cat lay under his favorite shrub.   I reached through, pulled him out and carried him into the bathroom.  Odd though, I could see a few white hairs here and there that Timmy had never had before.

I quickly surmised that because my husband had left the staircase to the attic down Timmy had crawled up there, gotten so hot some of his hair had turned white.

Boy was I hot.  I could hardly wait to give John a piece of my mind.   His heartless carelessness had caused such a trauma to Timmy he had gone white.  Poor Timmy.   I could only imagine the pain he had endured in that 150 degree attic.  It’s a wonder he didn’t pass out up there.  Then we could have closed the stairway and left him to die.  Poor, poor Timmy.

Just as soon as I expressed Timmy’s bladder, John was going to hear just how close we had come to losing Timmy – not that I thought John would be stricken sick over the thought of possibly losing Timmy.  But Timmy had already suffered enough in his young life and he didn’t deserve any more hurt.

I positioned Timmy over the commode, located his egg shaped bladder, grabbed and squeezed as if I  were milking a cow.  I could hear results tinkling into the commode; but as I looked down into the cat’s face and he looked up into mine, I had an euphony:  “Holy cat! You’re not Timmy.”

The cat gave me a “You’re a pervert!” kind of look.

To this day I have no idea whose cat he was.  We never saw him again.  When I dropped him off outside, I saw Timmy snoozing peacefully under another shrub.  At least his contender didn’t have to tinkle the rest of the evening.

David often told me what a good natured cat Timmy was.  Most cats wouldn’t put up with having some one grabbing his bladder and squeezing.  What can I say?  Either there were two good natured cats in our yard that day or, “Hey Man, I just have the touch!”

So this was the way life broke down for Kirby Truett, and it broke down more frequently that it once did, back when he was young, back two years ago when he drove away from the family farm in Northwest Oklahoma and managed to reach the bend of the second dirt road before he bothered to look back.  Good riddance, he thought. He didn’t need the farm. And the farm sure didn’t need him.

It seemed as though he had crawled on a second-hand John Deere tractor by the time he was old enough to button his own shirt, and wore out ten year’s worth of Wrangler jeans following the furrows of crop rows that ran on forever with no end in sight. Corn. Peas. Cotton. He had picked it all. He dug the new potatoes from the same dirt row where he found his fish bait.

But the drought had almost ruined them all. The creek ran dry. The fishing worms withered up and lay like dust on the top of the ground. The cotton withered.

The corn stalks lay burnt, and the ears of corn were so puny Kirby felt bad about pulling them. But the cows would eat anything, especially when they were hungry, and they kept him awake at night bawling for fresh grain, and the grain had been scattered by the dry winds that condemned his daddy’s soul and blew away the topsoil that hadn’t felt the touch of rain since early December.

Kirby Truett didn’t want the farm. The farm had never wanted him.

The day after some fellow in a hundred-dollar suit handed him a high school diploma, Kirby raised his right hand, swore to defend his country, and he left to catch a bus to Fort Benning, Georgia.

His mama hugged his neck. His daddy shook his hand.

“I’m gonna miss you, son,” his daddy said.

His mama didn’t say a word. She simply stood beneath the shade of an old live oak in the front yard and cried. Behind her, she had had hung an American flag from a pole above the front porch. It blew gently in a warm wind but mostly hung limp as the heat of an early summer rained down around his shoulders.

His daddy was leaning against the John Deere tractor, and his mama was crying. That was the way he would always remember them.

“I’ll be back,” he had promised.

“I hope so,” his daddy said. “The farm ain’t much.”

Kirby nodded.

“But it’s yours.”

Kirby glanced around him at the hundred and fourteen acres of land that looked like the ashes at the bottom of wood burning stove. The greens had turned brown. Even the John Deere was out of gas.

“I won’t be gone long,” he said.

“Don’t get too close to the little commies,” his daddy said. “I heard their guns don’t shoot straight.”

Kirby grinned. He knew he had lied. He knew he would never be back.

Life might be hard. But surely it offered more than a hardscrabble farm where the seeds cost more than the ragged bolls of cotton on the stunted end of dying stalks. The year before, his daddy hadn’t picked enough cotton to make a good Sunday-go-to-meeting shirt with long sleeves.

It was hot when he left home. It was hot when the helicopter set him down in the delta, just on the wrong side of the Nine Dragon River. Mekong he thought he heard his sergeant say. Kirby lay flat on the ground, his face pressed against the rice paddies. And all he heard was silence.

He closed his eyes and he remembered.

His daddy was leaning against the John Deere tractor.

His mama was crying.

A flag was hanging limp in the early morning sun.

Silence. Even the sound of the helicopter had faded in the distance.

Kirby Truett had escaped home all right. He wanted to go back.

No one heard the rifle shot. But Kirby had just turned to look into the face of the soldier lying next to him when a ragged hole suddenly appeared where the infantryman’s left eye socket had been. Death had arrived less than three feet away.

Kirby had killed pigs, chickens, squirrels and deer for years. Never thought much about it.  He had never seen a grown man die.

The private wasn’t much more than a boy. He would never become a man.

Then the frayed remnants of his world exploded around them. Kirby leaped to his feet screaming, running low toward the trees, firing until the M-16 had grown warm in his hands, expecting to die with every step, wondering why he was still alive when the silence returned to the delta. Maybe it was simply because he had a home to go home to. He sat alone in the rice paddies. He missed the old John Deere and he missed the cotton.

“Does it get any worse than this?” he asked his sergeant.

“You ain’t seen nothin’ yet,” the grizzled old man of thirty-three said.

By year’s end, Kirby Truett had seen it all, the good and the bad, and he had lost far too many friends. After awhile didn’t make many friends with the new blood attached to his platoon. It didn’t hurt as bad to lose a stranger. It hurt. Just not as bad.

He had arrived in the delta a scared kid. He was going home a man – straight and strong and walking with a limp. He had been lying in a delta field hospital with shrapnel in his hip when word reached him that his mama had died. Bad heart was what the letter said. Broken heart was closer to the truth.  She had never been a strong woman.

The bus that carried Kirby away from Oklahoma brought him back. His had been an odd and precarious journey home. He had been ridiculed at the airport. He was spat upon as he walked into a café. He saw the crude, homemade signs from the window of the bus, the ones calling him a killer or worse. A young man with long hair, unwashed beard, drug-glazed eyes, torn undershirt, and army boots without the laces tied had cursed him all the way down the sidewalk in Oklahoma City.

Home would be different, he knew. But home would be home.

Kirby walked first into the small community cemetery and stood at the grave of his mama. The dirt was still raw, and only a few brittle blades of grass were trying to grow upon the small mound. He closed his eyes and tried to remember his mama smiling. All he saw were the tears.

He sat with his daddy on the lawn of the old folks home beneath a tree with dying limbs. The doctor said his daddy’s health had gone down real quickly after Bertha died. It grew even worse when he lost the farm. Jacob Truett was a rock, but he hadn’t been himself for months. Then his memory started to go.

Kirby took his daddy’s hand. The old man looked away. There was no flicker of recognition in his eyes. Kirby pressed his Purple Heart and Bronze Star in his daddy’s hands. The old man reached over and placed them in his top drawer next to a pile of letters Kirby had written home. The letters had not been opened. Kirby tried to think of something to say. He smiled instead and walked out of the room.

A taxi carried him back to the old home place. At first glance, not much had changed. The crops were still burnt.  But a For Sale sign sat crookedly in the yard. He was not expecting to see the For Sale sign. The sight of it was a gut punch. The bank didn’t want the farm. Nobody did. The house was dark. A window had broken. The flag had fallen from its pole, the wind had blown it into the field, and it lay tattered in dust where only the weeds were growing.

So that was the way life broke down for Kirby Truett

A country?

A home?

He didn’t have either anymore. He spit and the saliva was dry by the time it hit the dirt.

“You mean the sounds and smells?”

“Yes.  Walking across those tiny bridges and drop-offs is something to be experienced.  You need to go and hike in Oregon,” she said.

My friend’s words rang true for me.  I have always loved the details of the hikes, the trails, and the overall journey whether short or long.  The hidden highlights and shadows, the unexpected symphonies interwoven within activities, and the aromas inexplicably linked in memory are there.

The demands of life often speed up the pace, reducing these details to a blur.  It is sometimes unavoidable, and sometimes it is a choice.  The latter is a point of contention.  In this modern world, it is easy to do things the fastest way possible.  It is convenient and requires less effort.  However, what results might be a little less color and depth on the canvas reducing it to a snapshot to show without the complete experience.

During high school, some of my classmates succumbed to the use of Cliffs Notes.  I detested these abbreviated versions of literary works.  Many contended they still achieved the same grade on the information when tested, but I felt it short-changed the journey the author intended.  However, everyone is different.  Some readers prefer to read the last few pages of the novel before turning to the first chapter.  It works for them.  Personally, I like surprises.

If you have ever topped a hill to find a sunrise of unexpected brilliance or crossed a field in a swirl of butterflies taking flight in synchrony with your passage, then you understand.

It is like the difference of having a mailbox beside the door or by the road.  One is convenient, and one involves a little walk.  A nice stroll down a sidewalk or a short hike along a country path creates time for a breath of fresh air.  This little respite allows a slower perusal of nature, the neighborhood, and an appreciation of home.  The anticipation of finding something more interesting than junk mail or bills has diminished.  However, the enjoyment of the short little walk has not changed.

The responsibilities of life sometimes cause us to hurry; we keep our heads down, and as the old adage states, with noses to the grindstone.  This is necessary, but if it done without ever looking up, we miss the miraculous nuances in the journey.  They are present in the dark, as well as sunny days.

One of the most precious memories came in the middle of the night within the walls of the ICU with my mother.  Family members of ICU patients often sleep in the waiting room and wake for the limited visitation times allowed.  One of the night nurses allowed me to stay a little longer during a few of those pre-dawn visits.  Maybe she understood the true limitations of our time.

The kind nurse slipped from the room, and I held my mother’s hand.  The beeps and gushes of air from the medical equipment lent a strange accompaniment to the hymns pouring from my heart. Although the ventilator prevented her voice from joining mine, the songs reflected in her eyes, smile, and the movement of her lips.

The last few steps on the journey of life are often in a smile, a breath, or a touch without replication. Each day of our lives is precious.  Do not miss the details.

Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

He was political.

• “Thanks to TV and for the convenience of TV, you can only be one of two kinds of human beings, either a liberal or a conservative.”
• The two real political parties in America are the Winners and the Losers. The people don’t acknowledge this. They claim membership in two imaginary parties, the Republicans and the Democrats, instead.
• “There is a tragic flaw in our precious constitution, and I don’t know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be President.”

Vonnegut was a philosopher.

• “New knowledge is the most valuable commodity on earth. The more truth we have to work with, the richer we become.”
• “Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.”
• “The purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved.”
• All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warning or explanations. It simply is. Take it moment by moment, and you will find that we are all, as I’ve said before, bugs in amber.”

Vonnegut was a humorist.

• “One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have died in vain. You will have entertained us.”
• “Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made sense from things she found in a gift shop.
• “Those who believe in telekinesis, raise my hand.

And Vonnegut often wondered: “Who is more to be pitied, a writer bound and gagged by policemen or one living in perfect freedom who has nothing more to say.”

For those who did have something to say and something to write, Kurt Vonnegut developed the basics tenets for what he called Creative Writing 101.

• Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
• Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
• Every sentence must do one of two things – reveal character or advance the action.
• Start as close to the end as possible.
• Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them – in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
• Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
• Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such a complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves should cockroaches eat the last few pages.”

And so it goes, which became Vonnegut’s signature phrases. In his novel, God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, he wrote:

Robert Kennedy, whose summer home is eight miles from home I live in all year round was shot two nights ago. He died last night. So it goes.

“Martin Luther King was shot a month ago. He died, too. So it goes.

“And every day my Government gives me a count of corpses created by military science in Vietnam.

“So it goes.”

A generation picked up the three words, stuffed them in their minds and their pants pockets, and quoted them whenever a crisis arose, and crises were plenty. Vonnegut was their hero even when they did not quite understand what he wrote.  We only knew one thing for certain. He was writing about us and to us as no one had ever written before. We had no idea where Vonnegut was going, but it didn’t matter. We were right behind him.

So it goes.

Hopefully, as Caleb and Stephen takes me by the hand and lead me into this new world of Internet promotion, I won’t be sorry I agreed to come along.

Ever wonder what it was like to live on our American Frontier in the late 1700s? What would it be like to grow up in a Native American culture as a white person? How does one adapt when returned to white society as an adult? These are questions I addressed when I wrote Twist of Fate.

Set In Western Indiana in the 1700′s, Twist of Fate relates the experiences of Audelia Simmons, a motherless child who is kidnapped by Indians when seven. Adopted and raised by the Chief’s wife, her childhood companion rescues Audelia when she’s an adult. I wrote the story to show the woman’s resilience and determination to create a life for herself in spite of the obstacles she faced.

My future blogs examine  ’behind the story’ so to speak.  I will share with my readers glimpses of what life was like in that period of our country’s history – for both the Indian and the white man.

Come along for the journey. Pick up a copy of Twist of Fate real soon.

Tampa police, in an attempt to sanitize that Florida city in anticipation of the upcoming national political convention, sent out patrols to round up the homeless.  They housed many of them in makeshift shelters.  They had special barracks for those who appeared to suffer from mental disorders.

In charge of the mental ward, psychiatrist Mason Whittlesee took his assignment seriously.  He compiled files on each patient and reviewed their charts.

One inmate baffled him. So he requested the orderlies to bring him to his office for an interview.

When Robert Stephens arrived at Whittlesee’s door, he looked the part of a crazy street person.  He wore a thread bare three piece suit, a three-month growth of gray beard, brown horn-rim glasses, the hinges held together with white cloth tape. Stephens refused to make eye-contact with the doctor when he sat down across the table from him. He hummed “God Bless the USA” under his breath, held his hands in his lap and twirled his thumbs counterclockwise while the shrink questioned him.

“Mr. Stephens, tell me a little bit about yourself,” Whittlesee asked to break the ice.

Stephens stopped twirling his thumbs as he looked up.

“What would you like to know, doc?” he asked.  His voice was clear, his speech finely articulated.  He caught Whittlesee off guard.

“Just give me some background information for starters.”

“I grew up in Houston, graduated high school in 1970 and then enrolled in Rice.”

“I see,” the doctor said.  He knew not just anyone could enroll in that prestigious university. “What did you study?”

“I took my undergraduate degree in mathematics, my master’s in philosophy.”

“Two degrees from Rice?”

“Yeah.  Then I transferred to Stanford for my Ph. D. in theoretical physics,” Stephens said.

“That’s quite a resume, Mr. Stephens.”

Whittlesee didn’t believe a word of it.

“Google me,” Stephens said as he motioned with his head toward the doctor’s computer monitor. “DOB is 4-23-1952.”

“All right, I will,” the psychiatrist said.  He turned his back and pressed a few keys on the keyboard. Fourteen pages of hits appeared on Google under the search, Robert Stephens, dob 4-23-1952.

Whittlesee scanned the list of sites, clicked several of them. He saw pictures of the man sitting across the table from him that had been taken over the course of the last three decades.  He read about his accomplishments, the articles he had authored in scientific journals and the many awards he had received. The trail went cold five years before when Stephens seemed to have dropped out of sight.

Whittlesee swiveled his chair and faced his patient with a new respect.

“What happened five years ago, Dr. Stephens?”

“I decided to become a fulltime writer.”

Stephens’ delivery was dead pan.

“What do you mean?”

“I quit my job at a scientific research center and turned my mind to writing novels. It took me six months to complete my first book.  I obtained an agent, and she submitted the manuscript to several major New York publishers. I waited a year, then two years for any word.  Meanwhile, I wrote my second and third novels.  I submitted them and waited.”

“Certainly a man with your credentials would have no problem finding a publisher,” Whittlesee said.

Stephens ignored the remark. He continued.

“When Amazon introduced Kindle Direct Publishing, I got my books back from my agent and published them myself.  I soon learned that today’s author must build his own platform, as they call it.”

“So what did you do?”

“I Twittered until I lost my mind,” Stephens said. He stood up and took a Blackberry out of his pocket.  The battery had been removed from the back, and the front of the device looked as if someone had thrown it against a wall or flattened it with the heel of a boot or hit it with a hammer. Stephens placed the destroyed cell phone on Whittlesee’s desk.

“Can I go now, doc?” he asked.

The psychiatrist took his pen and scribbled something on a pad.  He tore the sheet off and handed it to Dr. Stephens.

“Take this by the pharmacy,” Whittlesee said.  “These pills should make life a little less painful for you.”

Stephens stuck the prescription in his coat pocket and turned to leave.

“Please close the door behind you, Dr. Stephens,” the shrink said.

When Stephens had departed, Whittlesee opened the bottom left drawer of his desk and pulled out a thick sheaf of papers, three hundred pages of a novel he had worked on for two years.

He threw the stack of papers in the trash can and sat for a long time looking at the smashed Blackberry.

(Written for The Writers Collection to the prompt, “The Homeless.”)

I practiced my craft in every letter and memo I wrote. I practiced in advertising copy and instructional manuals. I practiced in press releases and guide books.

Ray Bradbury

Unfortunately, I missed an important part of Ray’s lesson: Write short stories. I told those. I made up countless short stories that I narrated to my children. I even went to their schools and narrated them in their classes. Their teachers encouraged me to write them down, but I guess I lost the incentive after telling the stories. It seemed too much bother to tell them again on paper. However, it was all to the good. I was still practicing my craft.

Unlike Ray, I didn’t receive any rejections until I wrote my first novel. Until then, everything I wrote was accepted and published, even a novella, Dream Pirates. When I began looking for an agent to represent Rebels on the Mountain, the floodgates of rejection opened. More than one hundred agents rejected it without even seeing one page of it. Actually, they were rejecting my query letter. I tried many different ones to no avail. “Thanks, but no thanks…” “Don’t call us, we’ll call you…” “It’s not right for us, but…” I read them all.

I began to wonder: Is it me or is it them? I discovered that it was a little bit of both. I learned that my book needed polishing, and I polished it. I also learned that they didn’t care if the book was any good or not, they only cared if a publisher might want it. Fortunately for me, that doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters in this brave new world of eBooks is whether or not the readers want it. Traditional publishers be damned.

I don’t know if I’ll ever write anything as significant as Fahrenheit 451 or The Martian Chronicles. Maybe I already have and it just hasn’t been discovered yet. But I know that I never will unless I keep writing, like Ray has, and keep on believing in myself even it I do write crap occasionally.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlYAhSffEDM

Kurt Vonnegut, in his own words, admitted that he became a writer because he couldn’t do anything else. He was young, restless, a rebel who didn’t need a cause, and cursed by a wild, madcap sense of irreverent humor that bit hard and cut deep. Vonnegut was, as always, broke, which forced him to take a job at Sports Illustrated even though he did not like sports and knew even less about the games men played for money.

Kurt Vonnegut

He said: “When the magazine was only a glint in the eyes of Luce Publications, they hired a bunch of sports writers from yokel venues who, it turned out, couldn’t write. So they hired a bunch of writers who didn’t care or know squat about sports. I was part of that second batch, having gone broke as only the daddy of six kids on Cape Cod can hit the big casino.”

Vonnegut was shown his office on Monday morning. He walked in and discovered that he had a desk but no chair. “I need a chair,” he said.

One didn’t come.  A week passed. Every day he asked for a chair. He spent the next eight hours sitting on the edge of his desk. No chair. He was on his own.

He made one last demand to his editor on Friday. The editor assigned him to cover a steeplechase horse race over the weekend. “We’ll have the chair when you get back on Monday,” he said.

“What’s a steeplechase horse race?” Vonnegut asked.

“You’ll figure it out when you get there,” the editor said.

Vonnegut returned early Monday morning. He walked into his office. There was no chair at the desk. Vonnegut, without a word, fed a sheet of paper into the typewriter, and wrote his sports story: “The f…..g horse jumped over the f…..g fence.”

He turned around and walked out. Sports Illustrated never saw him again.

Vonnegut's best selling novel of a boy in war-torn Europe who becomes unstuck in time.

The literary world is indeed fortunate. If Kurt Vonnegut had been given a chair, we might have never had such classic novels as Slaughterhouse Five, Cat’s Cradle, and God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater.  It was said that Vonnegut, like none other, caught the temper of his times and the imagination of a generation, especially during the 1970s when a restless nation twisted in the winds over Vietnam. His novels became  classics of the American counterculture. The New York Times wrote that his books “were a mixture of fiction and autobiography in a vernacular voice, prone to one-sentence paragraphs and italics. Some critics said he had invented a new literary type, infusing the science-fiction form with humor and moral relevance and elevating it to serious literature.”

His appearance was unmistakable. His curly hair was always askew. He had deep pouches under his eyes, and he wore rumpled clothes. Vonnegut believed: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.” Although the literary world took him seriously, Vonnegut simply said: “I tell you, we are here on earth to fart around, and don’t let anybody tell you different.”

He had this advice for writers:

“Newspaper reporters and technical writers are trained to reveal almost nothing about themselves in their writings. This makes them freaks in the world of writers, since almost all of the other ink-stained wretches in the world reveal a lot about themselves to readers. We call these revelations style.

“These revelations tell us as readers what sort of person it is with whom we are spending time. Does the writer sound ignorant or informed, stupid or bright, crooked or honest, humorless or playful?

“Why should you examine your writing style with the idea of improving it? Do so as a mark of respect for your readers, whatever you’re writing. If you scribble your thoughts any which way, your readers will surely feel that you care nothing about them. They will mark you down as an egomaniac or a chowderhead – or, worse, they will stop reading you.

“One.  Find a subject you care about. It is this genuine caring, and not your games with language, which will be the most compelling and seductive element in your style.

“Two: Do not ramble though. I won’t ramble about that.

“Three: Keep it simple. Remember that two great masters of language, William Shakespeare and James Joyce, wrote sentences, which were almost childlike when their subjects were most profound. “To be or not to be?” asks Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The longest word is three letters long. Joyce, when he was frisky, could put together a sentence as intricate and as glittering as a necklace for Cleopatra, but my favorite sentence in his short story, Eveline, is this one: “She was tired.” At that point in the story, no other words could break the heart of a reader as those three words do.

“Four: Have guts to cut. Your eloquence should be the servant of the ideas in your head. Your rule might be this: if a sentence, no matter how excellent, does not illuminate your subject in some new and useful way, scratch it out.

The movie based on Vonnegut's classic novel.

“Five: Sound like yourself. The writing style which is most natural for you is bound to echo the speech you heard when a child. I myself grew up in Indianapolis, where common speech sounds like a band saw cutting galvanized tin, and employs a vocabulary as un-ornamental as a money wrench.

“Six: Say what you mean. My teachers wished me to write accurately, always selecting the most effective words, and relating the words to another rigidly, like parts of a machine. They hoped I would become understandable and therefore understood. And there went my dream of doing with words what Pablo Picasso did with paint or what any number of jazz idols did with music. If I broke all the rules of punctuation, had words mean whatever I wanted them to mean, and strung them together higgledy-piggledy, I would simply not be understood. So you, too, had better avoid Picasso-style or jazz-style writing if you have something worth saying and want to be understood.”

Vonnegut’s other thoughts on writing include:

• I want to stay as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge, you see all kinds of things you can’t see from the center.
• Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you’ve been to college.
• I think that novels that leave out technology misrepresent life as badly as Victorians misrepresented life by leaving out sex.
• Any reviewer who expresses rage and loathing for a novel is preposterous. He or she is like a person who has put on full armor and attacked a hot fudge sundae.
• If you can do a half-assed job of anything (including writing) you’re a one-eyed man in a kingdom of the blind.

And so it goes.

If you understand that line, you have read and understand Vonnegut.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmVcIhnvSx8

Writing is somewhat the same way.

So with the question fresh in my mind I sat down the other day and thought of what I would say to that person who asked me the question. The real thing she wanted to know was if I knew exactly where my story was going when I began writing.

Her question reminded me of a conversation I had with Tom Faulkner, the Texas singer/songwriter, who once told me when he sat down to write a new song or to record it, he heard every part in is mind.  He heard the guitars, the piano, the organ the drums – everything. And he heard all the vocals in all their parts, as well.

That is much the same as my approach to creating the storyline of one of my novels. I can “see” the entire story unfolding before me. I know most, if not all, the characters before pen ever reaches paper. (I actually type, but that is such a nice poetic metaphor, I couldn’t refuse it.) I know almost every detail of the story, as it comes to me.

Sometimes I feel as if there is someone inside of me actually telling me the story and I am racing to get it down before they leave. But every detail, every character flaw, every nuisance is there in my head before it gets to paper. It is as if I have watched the movie already.

Years ago a friend and I set out to write a book on Creative Problem Solving. As we began, we realized we had two distinct ways in which we undertook the job before us.  He was very analytical and looked at everything in a mathematical way.  I, on the other hand, was (and still am) very visual. I see the problem and the solution. Can’t describe it to you, but it is there in my mind. The ability to visualize is a gift I have been blessed (or cursed) with and I use it to watch my novel unfold before me.

I once told a class at Texas A&M Commerce that I can teach you to write, but I can’t teach you to concept. That is something you either have or you don’t have.  The ability to create inside of your mind the picture you want to share with the world is a unique talent. I still believe that.

So, to answer the woman who asked me that question, I would have to say, I see the book I am writing from start to finish.  I see the action, the people involved and I hear their dialog and their thoughts. To be sure, there are surprises. There are things they do that I wonder how I got there, but they always get themselves back to the plot line and somehow manage to get us all to the ending, just in time.

I go back to my conversation with Faulkner, who said, “There are times I add a key change or some twist just to see where the muse might take me. And it ends up with some joyous surprises.”  I do the same, from time to time. But over all, I’d have to say that when I sit down to begin the novel, I know where I am headed in almost minute detail. It then becomes my job to capture that and put it to paper in an entertaining and informative way, using as rich a set of language as I can, staying true to the characters of which I write.

So, if you want to write – dream. Daydream a bit. Tell yourself stories. Talk with your characters: Out loud. (Make sure most people are out of the house when you do this, we’re running out of room in our state hospitals.) Yes, try and “see” your story before you start. Go to the movie theater in your head and watch it. Enjoy it. Don’t try and control it, let it happen in front of you.  Let it whisk you along on its own adventure. But most of all, remember it and get it down on paper. (Or at last onto a computer chip.)

Tennessee Mountain Pan

Frank C. Etier knows well the high country of the Great Smoky Mountains. He lives among them. He finds inspiration among them. They have become some of his favored subjects for his photographic art.

The mountains are always changing.

A new light.

A different light.

Fog in the morning.

A mist rising from the valley.

Spackled sunshine on the clouds.

Etier never knows what specter of beauty he will run across next.

Nature has an amazing palette of color.

About Tennessee Mountain Pan, he wrote: “We spent the day in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, with close friends and their kids. We enjoyed a long conversation while the kids swam in the indoor pool with snow on the ground outside. Interstate 40 took us home.

“It was late afternoon, and the sun was low in the sky, pouring golden light onto the mountains. We passed a tractor-trailer and looked over the next hill and were stunned by this un-named mountain on the horizon. Season tickets to Dollywood afford us frequent visits to Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg.

“I hit the emergency flashers, against all common sense, slowed to park on the shoulder of a busy interstate. This was a shot not to be missed.

“Repeated blasts of horns from larger vehicles reminded me of my folly. Using a road sign and legs to form a human tripod, I got this shot and returned to safety.

“We’ve seen this mountain many times but never in this light, covered with snow. Unable to find a name, for it, it has become my own personal Matterhorn.”