The Seanachai - blog

NPR Entry

Well, I submitted the St. Patrick’s Day excerpt. Many of you made compelling cases for other excerpts but I felt that St. Pat’s was the strongest match with the 1st round requirements.

Thanks for all your feedback. It means more than you know to have your support. Trying to break through is lonely, demoralizing work. You guys make it easier and a hell of a lot more fun.

Part of the contest is judged and part of it involves visitor votes. So go vote already.

http://www.publicradioquest.com/node/629

And while you’re there, go through a few more entries. They’ve got them set up on a random system you just click and it serves up a fresh one to your critical ear. Check out the competition and help them weed through the entries.

Thanks again.

Writer’s Talking Podcast

This Saturday I’m going to be on Matthew Wayne Selznick’s (author of Brave Men Run) new podcast. It will me and Scott Sigler (Author of Earthcore and Ancestor) talking, among other things, about how the publishing industry is changing.

Sure, I like the sound of my own voice, but I’m deeply interested in what Sigler has to say. He’s gruff and scrappy and he just scared the absolute piss out of the “establishment” by having Ancestor’s debut crack the Amazon top 10. I can’t wait to hear all about it.

And since we’re doing it through TalkShoe you can listen in live. May 5th 5:00 EST.

New Website Design!

St. Michael here, just checking in to point out the new website design here at The Seanachai (as if you hadn’t noticed). We’re super proud of the new look and we hope you like it, too! Some other, minor, organizational things on the site may be changing in the near-ish future, but nothing you need worry your little heads about. For the time being; enjoy the new site!

Pifflewalstow – Patrick’s Five Point Plan that Will Allow the Seanachai to Take Over the World

Growing up is hard. And I’m not sure it gets any easier the older you get. It just stays hard. For example, I have trouble delegating. When I get in my head to do something, by gum and Jupiter (and a bunch of other corny psuedo-swear words) I jump in and do it. Read the rest of this entry

In Japan…

Little girls are not allowed to play with frogs that are wacked out on drugs. Read the rest of this entry

So I’m in Japan – Summimasen. Blogu Postu des.

And no, there’s no punchline. I’m actually on vacation in Japan. Jet lag being what it is, I’m awake a time that no human should be awake. Separated from the herd in a country that is uniquely and emphatically about the herd. Read the rest of this entry

TV Commericials

Every job has it’s ups and downs. Recently I had a pretty big up when I shot these spots for the local hockey team. Seriously, this *is* my day job. At least on a good day.

Check all of the out on YouTube. Read the rest of this entry

An odd observation.

In my book Catastrophe: Risk and Return (2004), I examined the issue of scientific literacy briefly, pointing out that only a third of American adults (adults, not 15-year-olds) know what a molecule is, that 39 percent believe that astrology is scientific, that 46 percent deny that human beings evolved from earlier animal species, and that almost 50 percent do not know that it takes a year for the earth to revolve around the sun (many do not know that the earth revolves around the sun). These are amazing statistics, and yet, according to the materials I consulted, the scientific literacy of the U.S. population actually exceeds that of the European Union, Japan, and Canada.

This is an excerpt of Richard Posner from the Becker/Posner blog. It’s not important that you know who these guys are, but they are big brains in the fields of Law and Economics. They kind of guys who have theorems named after them. http://home.uchicago.edu/~rposner/biography. Read the rest of this entry

How to Succeed in Evil Update IN GLORIOUS COLOR

Okay, okay. So I’m lame for being quiet for so long. (And I know I’m lame)

But things are bubbling. I swear they are. For one thing, we’ve got a colorist (the Mighty Myron Macklin) and he’s awesome. And we’re almost, almost, almost, so close I can taste it, done with the color version of the book.
And of course, if you’ve caught up with the latest installment. We can expect many interesting things from Topper in what I’m going to call Season Two of How to Succeed in Evil.
Here’s a peek at the color (unlettered)

technorati tags:How to Succeed in Evil, Patrick E. McLean, comic book, Graphic Novel, Edwin Windsor, Nic Rummel, Myron Macklin

Gutenberg’s anniversary

It was on this day in 1452 that the first section of the Gutenberg Bible was published in Mainz, Germany. It was the first book ever printed with movable type, Gutenberg’s revolutionary idea. At the time, all existing books were copied out by hand, and in order to be as efficient as possible, scribes had developed a way of writing that was full of abbreviations. Words were written in a dense cursive script, and there was very little space between letters or even words on the page.It was Gutenberg’s genius to imagine an entirely different way of writing, in which all the individual letters would be distinct from each other, rather than connected. That way, he could produce individual blocks with letters on them. He fitted these letter blocks into a frame, coated them with an ink made of linseed oil and soot, and then used an adapted wine press to print text on paper. The revolutionary effect of movable type was the ability to print an infinite number of pages from a small number of letter blocks simply by rearranging them.Within three decades there were print shops all over the European continent. It is estimated that more books were produced in the 50 years after Gutenberg’s invention than scribes had been able to produce in the 1,000 years before that.Today, about four dozen copies of the Gutenberg Bible survive. One of the most recent copies to come on the market was auctioned in New York in 1987. It consisted of only the first volume, but it was in good condition, and it sold at auction for more than five million dollars.

http://www.elabs7.com/functions/message_view.html?mid=25571&mlid=499&siteid=20130&uid=731c61ee4d

The last time I was in New York I was blindsided by a Gutenberg Bible. I literally backed into it while checking out the New York Public Library. It affected me tremendously. And perhaps most of all because it was still perfectly legible.

But a few facts not noted here.

1) When John Jacob Astor, one of the main patrons of the library, brought the Bible into the United States he made the Customs officers remove their hats.

2) Shortly after printing his Bible Gutenberg went bankrupt.

Happy birthday moveable type!

technorati tags:Gutenberg, patrick mclean, Seanachai, NYPL, New York Public Library

My Best Writing Hack

I’m a professional writer. My words pay for my bread, my beer and everything else I consume. Last year, not counting re-writes or emails, I generated 400 pages. That’s a novel worth of writing. Except that I don’t write novels.

The average length of what I write is about two pages. Which means I started writing something new about 200 times last year. And as you’ve probably experienced, starting is the hardest part.

Hell, starting an email is hard. I write for a living and starting is hard. But if I don’t start, I can’t finish. And if I can’t finish, I can’t get paid. And when I really get stuck, this is what I do to avoid starvation:

I write longhand.

Seems silly, but, for me, this is the gold standard of all writing hacks. The problem with writing is, in many ways, the same problem as hitting a golf ball. Both the page and the ball just sit there. And when you write you have (theoretically) a lifetime to rewrite it until you get it right.

But that gives the critical part of your brain time to jump in a muck everything up. It needs something to critize. That’s it’s job after all. But when I write longhand, instead of giving me a stream of, “you’re writing sucks, it sucks, it sucks, sucks, sucks and you just changed tenses you eggsucking loser” it pours forth with “you’re HANDwriting sucks, it sucks, it sucks, sucks, sucks, go back to those huge pencils you had in kindergarden you loser.”

This is a huge difference. Because now the critical part of my brain is no longer in the way of the creative part of my brain. The critical function is necessarily and naturally secondary to the creative function. Something must exist before you can start whining about it.

In fact, the more I focus on the quality of my handwriting, the easier the process seems to be. So when you’re really stuck – go low tech on the problem. Bust out the paper and pen and start scrawling away.
And let me know if it works for you.

technorati tags:writing hacks, Patrick E. McLean, writing, writing tips, Structure of Story, Seanachai

Parsec Awards

So the Seanachai (I guess I could just say ‘I’) won two Parsec Awards this weekend. It’s somehow fitting that it was Labor Day weekend. Because if there’s one thing a podcast requires it labor. And it’s very nice to get recognition for that labor.
The Seanachai was nominated in four categories and won in two. Best Long Fiction for How to Succeed in Evil. And Best Non-speculative fiction for Death of Dishwasher.
You can see the field and the other winners here.
One of the biggest difficulties with listening to podcasts is finding good ones. And all the podcasts in the running were vetted by a panel of judges. They’re good. So if you’re looking for something to tide you over until the next Seanachai, they’re worth your while to check out. The ones I haven’t listened are absolutely on my list.
And while I’m pontificating on awards, let me just say this. It’s important not to take them too seriously. It’s wonderful to get recognition. But they are just somebody else’s opinion. And they are subject to all the whims and capriciousness of the rest of human existence.
To put this phenomenon in perspective, check out this list from the 1941 Academy Awards.
Best Actor in a Leading Role
Orson Welles

Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration, Black-and-White
Perry FergusonVan Nest Polglase
A. Roland Fields
Darrell Silvera

Best Cinematography, Black-and-White
Gregg Toland

Best Director
Orson Welles

Best Film Editing
Robert Wise

Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic Picture
Bernard Herrmann

Best Picture
Orson Welles

Best Sound, Recording
John Aalberg (RKO Radio SSD)

Citizen Kane, the film that many pick as the greatest of all time, didn’t win a single one of these awards. Not one. The only Oscar that it garnered was for Best Screenplay.
Connect the dots as you like, but that’s how I try to put award shows in the proper perspective.

technorati tags:Parsec Awards, Patrick E. McLean, Succeed in Evil, Death of a Dishwasher, Seanachai, Seanachai podcast

The Confusion About Dialog

If I told you I knew how to write dialog I would be lying. I have no clue how I do it. I listen and type what I hear. (Yes, these are the voices in my head.) So when people go on and on about dialog it bores me. And not just because I feel like it’s easy for me. It’s because I don’t think dialog is all that important. Not fundamentally. Read the rest of this entry

Expectations – the ball the game is played with

There are many ways to dissect a story. One of the ways that has proven to be most rewarding for me is to consider only the reader’s expectations. Plot, story, theme, character, point of view — all of it, right out the window (it’s fairly liberating). The only analysis becomes what is expected vs. what actually happens.

Because if writing is a game, the reader’s expectation is the ball. If I can put some spin on that ball and move it around well, I feel like I’m doing my job as a storyteller. If I can’t I’m probably just wasting a reader’s valuable time.

Say I describe a character who’s an ex-drill instructor. Crew cut. Ramrod straight posture. The kind of guy who irons his t-shirts. You develop expectations about this guy. He probably doesn’t suffer fools gladly. You expect him to swear a bit and not back down from a fight.

And if tell a story where he swears and gets into fights, well, it’s probably going to be pretty dull. I could be colorful about how I describe the fights and invent all manner of interesting oaths, but that’s really fighting an uphill battle. All that stuff is the window dressing on the story itself. And if there’s no story beneath it, it basically has to be the best window dressing of all time. (Who wants to perfect window dressing when you should be building houses?)

But let’s say I tell you that this guy is scared. In fact, it’s been so long since he’s been afraid, he’s having trouble placing the sensation. It not what we expect from this character. Now it gets interesting. Why is he afraid? What is scaring him?

It could be a fierce monster. Or a guy pointing a gun at his head? But that’s what we expect. What if it’s a 9 year old girl? Now we’re curious about the girl. Why is he scared of the girl? She could have the power to start fires with her mind. But that feels kind of expected. What if she’s just an ordinary girl? No powers what so ever? What about an ordinary girl could scare a hard-ass Jarhead. And I mean really scare him.

Let’s make her Ebola Mary — a carrier of a fantastically lethal disease.
And what does this leatherneck do when confronted with a horrible, inglorious death. He could run away. He could talk big. He could break down crying. He could attack. He could whistle a happy tune. The entire universe of human action is open to us really. But which one is the least expected and why?

Because if everything happens as we expect it will, a story becomes dull as paste.
To be sure, this is quite a simplification of story construction. Some conventions must be adhered to. And paying certain things off creates a very enjoyable experience. But being aware of the expectations that story creates really helped me understand writing in a new way. In the next post I’ll test my analytical tool on a few well-known tales.

technorati tags:patrick e. mclean, Story, writing, The Structure of Story, Plots, Story Construction

Expectation Pt. II

Let’s analyze a few storires using the expectations model. Nothing rigorous here, just what popped off the top o my head.
The Book of Job: A man’s life falls apart. We expect him to curse his maker. We would totally sympathize if he did. (Since it’s his maker’s fault.) But he does not.
Gospel according to Mark: A man dies. We expect him to stay dead. He does not. He returns from the dead.

High Noon – Bad guy returns to town on the day of the former Sheriff’s wedding. We expect the Sherriff to get married and leave town. But he doesn’t. We expect at least some of the townspeople to help him – but they don’t. We expect his wife to stand by him, but she doesn’t. (Do not forsake me oh my Darling…)

Rocky – Even though the conventions of the boxing story demand that the underdog win at the end, the story creates expecations that Rocky is a bum. That he doesn’t stand a chance. Further, we expect the guy who’s a boxer to be brutish and rough. But the plot with Adrian defies that expectation by showing him to be surprisingly tender and gentle.

To Kill a Mockingbird – We expect Boo Radley to be a monster. He winds up saving Scout.
Don Quixhote – We expect the good Don to take the first good beating and go home. We expect Sancho Panza to wise up and desert the old fool.

Raiders of the Lost Ark – We expect Indy to get into a huge brawl with the guy with the sword – but he just shoots him.

I’m not saying unexpectedness is the gauge of a good story – but there appears to be something going on here. You give me a good story and I’ll show you that a big part of it is unexpected.

technorati tags:Patrick E. McLean, Structure of Story, Story, Writing, Story Construction, Plots

“Yes, but…” The Cardinal Rule of Drama

I have an friend who is a very talented actor. And one day he explained to me the secret of improv. No matter what happens, you have to respond with “Yes, but.” For example.

“Your hat is on fire.”

“Yes, but I bought it on sale.”

If you just agree with the other person, the tension is dissipated. If you say no, you really have to know where the story goes next. You have to take the ball and run with it for a while, and you reduce the possibility of the other person bailing you out. But “Yes, but…”? “Yes, but…” is magic.

“You’re wife has run off with another man.”

“(Yes, but…) I’ve been trying to be rid of that battleaxe for years.”
The very same thing is what I think of as the cardinal rule of drama. A character can never get what they want. Or if they do, it must turn out to be something very different than what they expected. (be careful what you wish for. Because If they get what they want the story or scene is over.

For example:
Guy walks into a bar and orders a drink. Bartender refuses to serve him because he’s a Sneech with only one star on his belly, and everybody knows this is “Two star on thar’s” town. But our Sneech is thirsty. So he demands a drink. Patrons of the bar try to throw him out. The Sneech beats them down. Sheriff comes in and breaks it up. The Sneech appeals to the Sherriff for justice. The Sheriff tells the Sneech to get out of town. As the Sneech walks out, he defiantly grabs a shot off the bar and downs it.
Replace the Sneech with Danny Glover and you’ve got a wonderful scene from Silverado.

For my writing, I try and extend this rule. Not only can the character never get what they want, but whatever the reader/audience expects to happen can’t happen. Maybe it’s that I’m a masocist and I just like playing tennis with two nets. But that’s another post.

technorati tags:writing, Patrick E. McLean, story, story construction, drama

New How to Succeed in Evil Episode

Just posted on succeedinevil.com. You can find it here.

(It’s a doozy.)

Story Construction

The business of building stories seems not much different from the business of building anything else.

This is the insight of Lester Dent, the pulp writer who created Doc Savage. This was a guy who would regularly churn out 90,000 to 100,000 words a month on a manual typewriter. There’s no two ways about it, he was a monster. (Carpal Tunnel? Try micro-fractures in your fingertips.)

So, naturally, I’m interested in anything he has to say about story construction. And it makes intuitive sense to me. I have an above average opinion of my prose style. Me makes pretty wordses. But for a long time, when I tried to write a story, it would suck. Literally, the thing would fall down when you were reading it.

My stories had no foundations, the walls weren’t square and the roofs leaked.

But when I started paying attention to the structure and the rules of story. Magic started happening. And I went through a fundamental change. Instead of just enjoying the experience of a story, I started to also enjoy how they were made.

For a while I outlined obsessively. (I still do, only less obsessively.) I felt like there was a dearth of information about story and story construction. And that most of what was out there was written by people who weren’t writers. Who weren’t involved in the often messy business of writing stories. In short, dilettantes.

I’ve come to realize that it’s just the opposite. There is a wealth of story information out there. It’s just locked up in all the stories and films we love so much. It’s just that the first time I read or watched them I was too busy enjoying them (not a bad thing) to learn how they were put together. Because a story, if properly constructed, becomes invisible. You don’t say – “What an elegant subplot.” You say, “Aw man, look what happened to Billy.”

So instead of keeping all these notes and thoughts in my head. I’m going to blog them.

technorati tags:story construction, writing, Patrick E. McLean, plot

Rhetoric of Audio – Introduction

If you’ve heard more than one or two episodes of the Seanachai, you’ve got an inkling that I’m up to something more than just reading my own stories. For the most part, I’m composing specifically for the medium. And along the way, I’ve been experimenting and refining my ideas about how audio storytelling works. And I think it’s time to share.
Ideally, I’d like to put together an e-book on the subject. But rather than just think about doing it, I thought I would be better to do the first draft as a series of posts. And the working title for this amalgamation of ambitious little essays is The Rhetoric of Audio.
If Rhetoric is the art of effective persuasive speaking or writing then the Rhetoric of Audio would be the art of the effective use of sound. And I don’t know that anyone has written a book on the subject. With the explosion of podcasting, it’s a subject that seems important to me (and of interest to people I know)

My primary interest is how sound is used to convey effect and carry a story. In this sense the term rhetoric is used to indicate the persuasion of an audience that story which it patently fictional is in some sense true or real. Hopefully more true and real than everyday experience. And if we don’t feel this way about stories on some level, are they really worth anything?

Tentative (and Partial) Outline

Why does Sound have meaning?

The Uses of Sound

Sound as symbol

Sound as action

Sound as setting

Sound as character

Sound as emotion

Sound as closure

Sound as unknown

Storytelling vs. Story Reading

A broader definintion of reading
Voice technique
Towards a manual of style

Hey, where’s my damn Seanachai episode?

A fine question (even if the tone was a little rude) and I’m glad you asked.
I’ve been travelling, working on a pitch for a thing with a guy at a company (I don’t want to jinx it, but it’s more of a Thing with a Guy at a Company.) and trying to make a little money to feed myself and the poor, suffering, hungry people at the IRS.
I have been working on the next episode(s). I even have a plan for the next 8 or so podcasts – but I just haven’t been able to get to them. Kind of like a dream where you’re trying to run away from a tiger, but it’s like you’re running underwater. And the harder you try, the slower you move. And that tiger wants to eat you so bad, he’s breaking all the laws of physics just to get to you.

A few questions for you

What if the Seanachai was less audio and more text? By making a podcast, I’m adding four hours, minimum to the production process. And I’m adding to the time it takes you to assimilate the story. (Ah, got to use the BorgWord there.)

So how many of you check the ‘blog or read this thing in a newsreader? And how many people would rather have an interesting post or story every couple of days, and audio once a month?
Read or Listen?
It’s the mournful refrain of the Econ tribe, “Tradeoffs. Tradeoffs. Tradeoffs.”