Never Kick A Sleeping Skunk

By Michael Ehret

 

Would you kick this sleeping skunk?

"Never kick a sleeping skunk."

-- Kelly Long's Mom

 

Here on Novel Rocket, we give a lot of advice, much of it writing related. Makes sense, right?

Sometimes we may even sound like a "Mom," telling you the things you already know but are, ahem, choosing to ignore. 

And Mom's have a lot of great advice. I'm sure we've all heard:

• Money does not grow on trees.
• Don't make that face or it'll freeze in that position.
• Always change your underwear; you never know when you'll be in a car accident.
• Be careful or you'll put your eye out.
• If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all.
• Be careful what you wish for, it might come true.

We could go on — obviously.

But, I was intrigued by this bit of advice when Kelly shared it with me some time ago. Is there a writing application? What do you think?

What is your "sleeping skunk" in writing that you're afraid to kick? What do you fear will happen if you do kick it? 

What is a sleeping skunk?

It's that thing in your life that is holding you back. You're afraid of what might happen if you kick it—if you wake it up. 

 For me, it's "You're not really good enough." I'm afraid if I kick that skunk, it'll jump up and spray me—and that fear keeps me paralyzed. For a person who deals in "What Ifs," why am I so afraid of my own unknown?

You know, I could kick that skunk and it gets so startled that it stands up and runs away. It could happen. After all, it's sleeping, not actively menacing me.

My foot's getting itchy.

Enter your writing related advice about kicking sleeping skunks below.

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Michael Ehret has accepted God's invitation and is a freelance editor at WritingOnTheFineLine.com. In addition, he's worked as editor-in-chief of the ACFW Journal at American Christian Fiction Writers. He pays the bills as a marketing communications writer and sharpened his writing and editing skills as a reporter for The Indianapolis News and The Indianapolis Star.

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Why Can’t I Go To A Conference?

By Michael Ehret

After a solid decade (almost) of regularly attending writer’s conferences, this year I’m not able to. Let me correct that: I’m probably able to, but the door to attend one has not opened for me this year.

My conference of choice, American Christian Fiction Writers, is even meeting within driving distance of my home and the keynoter is one of my favorite authors: Ted Dekker. But it’s not happening this year and I vacillate between being OK about it and being pretty ticked off, truth be known. Can you relate?

At last year’s conference, I got what I considered a pretty clear message from God about my writing. (See the details here and here.) “I’m inviting you into a new season of writing.”

Surely that would include attending my favorite writing conference? Seeing my favorite writing friends? Surely? Apparently not—and don’t call me Shirley.

Feel like this guy because you can't attend
a writer's conference?

Despite my efforts to pry that door open—or to find that ‘promised’ open window God provides when He closes a door (you know that’s not biblical, right?)—there’s no conference in my year.

Are you there too? Are you feeling left out? On the outside looking in? Not one of the cool kids? Bring your pocket-protector self over and have a seat. OK, you’ve got three minutes to cry and fuss and whine. I’m setting a timer. 3-2-1 Go!

Feeling better? No? Well, me either, but here are three things you can do if you’re not attending a writer’s conference:

1. Buy yourself a much-needed or long-desired writing resource.

One of my favorite
fiction craft books

One of my reasons for not being able to go this year is monetary. That may be a reason for you, too. And it’s a valid reason. Even though we’re writers, we still have responsibilities that we can’t just toss away. Am I right?

So, instead of buying a conference (easily upwards of $1,500 with registration, hotel, plane ticket, etc.), treat yourself to some resource you’ve been wanting and putting off. Maybe that’s a craft book. Maybe that’s a writing assist program like Grammarly or Scrivener. Maybe it’s a framed inspirational quote to display in your writing corner.

Just buy it. Feel guilty later if you must, but console yourself that (whatever it is) it’s far less than the cost of the conference you’re not going to.

2. Consider, oh, I don’t know, writing?

Wilma Rudolph, an American Olympic track and field sprinter who won three gold medals in 1960, once said: “Believe me, the reward is not so great without the struggle.”

You get that, right? The struggle is what makes the reward, when it comes, so sweet. So persevere in your writing. Take the time you’re not going to spend at your preferred writing conference, put your butt in your chair, and write.

Honor your gift and your calling—and, for your own sake, get lost in your fictional world. Bring life where there is no life. And if your sadness is overwhelming, choose to write the scenes where your hero and heroine face their Black Moments—and all seems lost.

All is not lost for them. You know it, as the creator, but they don’t. They are just living the day-to-day lives you, their creator, wrote for them … You’re getting the point right? You don’t need a hammer on the head, right?

3. If you can’t write, then pray for your writer friends who are attending conferences.

No, I’m not kidding. When you’re locked in a pity party, the best way to break free is to do something nice for someone else. So, if you can’t be there…then be there for your friends who are there.

Hold them up before the Lord. Pray for encouragement. Bravery. Their emotions. The editors and agents they’ll meet with.

Pray for the casual, unplanned for meetings around meal tables. The overwhelming feeling of the introvert writer who just can’t face another class or another “thank you, but this isn’t right for our house” appointment.

Be Aaron to their Moses.

If you do these three things, you’ll find the time goes much quicker, you’ll feel more productive, and you’ll be a blessing. And isn’t that better for everyone, including you?

____________________________________

Michael Ehret has accepted God's invitation and is a freelance editor at WritingOnTheFineLine.com. In addition, he's worked as editor-in-chief of the ACFW Journal at American Christian Fiction Writers. He pays the bills as a marketing communications writer and sharpened his writing and editing skills as a reporter for The Indianapolis News and The Indianapolis Star.

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Create. Create. Just Create.

By Michael Ehret

I haven’t learned a lot, comparatively, in my walk with God. Sometimes it seems like I’ve learned more, sometimes less. But there are a few things I’ve learned (and these aren’t all of them) over the years:

How do you create?

1. God loves me the way I am and wants me to allow Him to show me how I can become more like Him. (Sort of like how I loved my infant son when he was born but, man, am I glad I’m not still changing that almost 32-year-old’s diaper.)

2. The more I learn the less I seem to know about God and how He works. (This is OK, because it fuels my hunger for Him. By the time I die, I have high hopes of being a complete idiot about God.)

Then there’s this:

3. God won’t show you a truth in your life until you’re ready to see it. (Because, if you won’t see it, why show you?)

Recently a blog post by Esther de Charon de Saint Germain made its way around Facebook. The post, “Why Art Is Important for Highly Sensitive Persons,” opened a previously shut door into my personality for me.

In it, Esther wrote:

We (highly sensitive people) are the ones who remain seated in the movie theatre. Long after the move has ended. Because we need to compose ourselves before re-entering the world.

We are the ones unable to speak after that gloriously beautiful concert. It’s not because we don’t like you. Give us some time. We’re processing. There are no words yet. … We still are the music. We’re still living in the world of feelings, emotions.

Wait, hang on. I'm still in the moment.

She goes on to talk in detail about how being highly sensitive might look in real life—how it looks for her—how it might look if you are also one. Through it all, I’m nodding, nodding, nodding. Agreeing, experiencing the post.

Then, while reading, I see:

BUT

And that’s when I get that feeling in my gut I’ve come to identify as a nudge from the Holy Spirit: “Hey, if you pay attention here, you might learn something.”

Esther writes:

But ... creating our own art is scary. We sensitive peeps have set some pretty high standards for (ourselves). We fear we are not good enough at it.

How can we get the multitude of ideas in our head on a sheet of paper? All we can see is how flawed it will be…

If you are a highly sensitive person—and not all writers are, by far—can I suggest that you try harder to silence the self-talk Esther writes about that is convincing you, even more than any negative outside voices you might encounter, that you’re just not good enough? Don’t work so hard to convince yourself you’re not good enough, creative enough, talented enough.

Create to live. Live to create.

She writes:

Because if that’s the kind of chatter that goes on in your head, it means you Most Definitely need to make art. Find a course, get those pencils out of the drawer. Use your trait.

If you’re an HSP, like me, sometimes you just need to create. You need to write without your internal editor. You need to garden giving no thought to practicality. You need to color outside the lines of your adult coloring book because that’s your creativity—your art.

Write your prayers. Sing them. Dance them. Read your daily devotional out loud in your best Donald Duck voice—do what your muse (or your whim) tells you to do. Open your mind to the possibilities. Just create.

Just create.

Question: Other than write in your latest WIP, what do you do to be creative? How do you feed your creativity?

____________________________________

Michael Ehret has accepted God's invitation and is a freelance editor at WritingOnTheFineLine.com. In addition, he's worked as editor-in-chief of the ACFW Journal at American Christian Fiction Writers. He pays the bills as a marketing communications writer and sharpened his writing and editing skills as a reporter for The Indianapolis News and The Indianapolis Star.

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Filling Your Well of Ideas

By Michael Ehret

Sometimes I think my idea well has run dry. The plots I dredge up are so spare they couldn’t even flesh out a flash fiction story.

What's in your Well of Ideas?
Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net and cbenjasuwan

Can you relate?

Usually what this means is I need to switch from “creative” mode to “ingestion” mode—I need more raw material to draw from. Some writers can create a story idea from nothing except their own imagination.

That is not me. And if that’s not you, too, maybe this trick will help you fill your well.

Feed Me, Seymour!

Much like the carnivorous plant in “The Little Shop of Horrors,” I need constant feeding. Often I chow down on a great novel; less frequently nonfiction fills my gullet.

Maybe it’s my background as a newspaper reporter, but some of the best food for my imagination comes from the news—including quasi news sources like blogs. Because, as Mark Twain said, “Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.”

When I read news, online or print (broadcast doesn’t work for me), invariably I read an article that sparks an idea or two. Now, I freely admit not all of them will produce even a flash fiction piece, let alone a full-blown novel, but the important thing is I’m filling my imagination. At the appropriate time, several of the ideas will likely congeal together and produce something workable.

But I can guarantee that nothing workable will be produced if raw material isn’t imported into the processor.

Is he talking about you?

What are the costs of living together?
Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net and Ambro

For instance, I read this commentary from Regis Nicoll the other day called “The High Costs of Living Together.” It included this gem:

In 1969, although the vast majority of people, 82 percent, reported having had sex before marriage by age 30, only 21 percent felt that was morally acceptable.

… Over the next 40 years, as public acceptance grew three-fold (to 63 percent) and (more) people (94 percent) admitted to having “done it,” there was far less social pressure to restrain it or keep quiet about it.

This sea change in attitudes and practices can be attributed to two things: “no-consequence” sex and a morally-compromised Church.

… With roughly 80 percent of the U.S. populace Christian and 94 percent admitting to pre-marital sex, that means that a lot of Christians—very likely the majority—are guilty of sexual sin.

Woah … right? I know a lot of people who will take offense at a study like this. But that’s what makes great fiction!

Is that giving you ideas? (Story ideas, guys, story ideas.) It sure did me. My oeuvre, the framework within which I write, includes marriage, fidelity, trust—and all the antonyms of those, of course. I took the entirety of Nicoll’s piece and fed my imagination with it. Who knows where it may lead, but now that information has been uploaded and is available. (And also stored electronically.)

Fill your well

The point is there are ideas for fiction everywhere if you open your eyes, your heart, and your mind to them. If you read something that sticks with you—good or bad—file that away in your Well of Ideas. Maybe you’ll use it, maybe you won’t. But you for sure won’t use it if you don’t have it stored away.

Obviously our world is ever in need of the transformative power of story—and of Story. What ideas have you picked up from news sources and used in your stories?

Want to play?

Screenshot from Jan. 25 FOXNews.com home page

Go to the front page of your local paper (or to the home page of CNN or Fox News or your favorite online news source) and read the main story—no cherry picking. Choose one fact or one quote or one idea from that story as your idea seed and freewrite a paragraph or two in the comments.

Here’s my example. I wrote this on Jan. 25 based on this story, but the story has changed since that day and my idea seed is no longer in it.

My idea seed from that story: The scene was “believed to be secure” police said in a tweet issued at about 12:36 p.m.

Ethan was dead. True. He’d been an effective triggerman. Also true. But there were others. Many others.

Captain White’s tweet that the mall was “secure” made Gaston—almost—laugh out loud, but he did not "LOL." When he laughed, and it was rare, it was real not some fake social construct. But that “out loud” part was a luxury he couldn’t allow himself right now. Later? Most definitely.

Stupid twerkers. Ethan got a few, but they’d be back prancing through the mall in their tight clothes and loose morals soon enough. It was “secure,” after all. White said so. Truth. 

So not true.
 
And then he did chuckle—but quietly. After all, the shoppers trapped in his store from the lockdown were still shook up and hyper aware—no sense in giving them something odd to remember if the police did questioned them.

They’d soon enough embrace again the fragile cloak of security they thought protected them. True, always true.

So, if you want to play leave a comment. Or, if you want to talk about where you get your ideas from—how you fill your Well of Ideas—leave a comment.

Michael Ehret loves to play with words as a Marketing Communications Writer for CHEFS Catalog and as a freelance editor at WritingOnTheFineLine.com. Ehret is the former editor of the ACFW Journal and has edited several nonfiction books, proofedited for Abingdon Press, and reported for The Indianapolis Star.

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The Summer of Success

Facing a career crossroads at the moment—what step to take next and all that. I’m not all angsty over it, but I have been thinking a lot about Donna Summer lately, as a result.

Donna Summer? The Queen of Disco?

First of all, thinking about Donna Summer is not new for me. I’ve had a long time interest in her career and in the singer, herself. I’ve even been known to be a defender of Summer (she’s so much more than disco), because I think her talent was far overshadowed by her persona and by the Super Storm known as Disco that came in and tried, unsuccessfully, to obliterate the Rock and Roll shoreline.

Still, I’m more interested in Summer’s genre-hopping than in her music, per se. For instance, did you know she was nominated for 17 Grammy Awards in eight different categories (genres)? Further, did you know that she won five times in four different categories—twice in Inspirational? That’s right, Inspirational. The singer of 1975s disco moan-fest, “Love To Love You, Baby,” won two Grammy Awards for Best Inspirational song (1984 and 1985).

Conventional wisdom is to not genre hop in the publishing world. Start in romance (or speculative or historical or suspense) and stay in romance (or speculative or historical or suspense).

But, I must have a little Donna Summer in me because I don’t want to be constrained in that way. Before we get all crazy, let’s remember that no one is knocking down my door for my next book—or, for that matter, my first book.

But—again—we can look to the diva for guidance. Because “conventional wisdom” isn’t called “conventional-sort-of-good-advice,” you know?

Summer made her mark in one genre—disco. It was the red-hot genre of the time and she rode that horse for all it was worth. But when the horse started to get hobbled, she made the smart move of wrapping up that era with a Greatest Hits collection, changing record labels, and then came roaring back in 1980 with a rock-pop disc without even a whiff of disco, The Wanderer. And a song from that project earned her one of her Grammy nominations.

What are the lessons for a writer?

1. Do your homework. Summer worked in Germany and Europe in various touring companies of shows like “Hair” and “Godspell” before connecting with Giorgio Moroder for her first album, Love To Love You Baby.
2. Establish yourself as an excellent writer of (choose one: romance/historical/suspense/other) and then, like Summer, work your butt off to make your mark. She released seven disco albums from 1975 to 1979—that’s four years—three of them in a row were blockbuster double albums.
3. Keep your nose to the ground and your face forward. If you pay attention to the market and publishing trends, you’ll know when it’s time to change genres. If you’re a big enough success, you’ll get your opportunity. When you do, show the same quality, perseverance, and dedication to craft that got you where you are.

That’s the way to build a Hall of Fame career (Summer was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013) and do all the things you want to do.

Summer died May 17, 2012, at age 63. At her death (from cancer) she was working on two albums simultaneously—a collection of standards and a new dance music collection.

For the record, Summer’s Grammy wins were for:

1. Best R&B Female Performance, 1979, for “Last Dance.”
2. Best Rock Female Performance, 1980, for “Hot Stuff.”
3. Best Inspirational Performance, 1984, for “He’s A Rebel.”
4. Best Inspirational Performance, 1985, for “Forgive Me.”
5. Best Dance Music Performance, 1998, for “Carry On.”

Additionally, she was nominated four times for Best Pop Vocal, twice for Best R&B Vocal, twice for best Rock Vocal, once for Album of the Year, once for Best Disco Vocal, once for Best Inspirational, and once for Best Dance Music.

Not a bad career.

Your turn: So, do you have a little Donna Summer in you?

Michael Ehret loves to play with words and as editor of the ACFW Journal ezine, he is enjoying his playground. He also plays with words as a Marketing Communications Writer for CHEFS Catalog and as a freelance editor at WritingOnTheFineLine.com. He has edited several nonfiction books, proofedited for Abingdon Press, and reported for The Indianapolis Star.

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Old Newspapers -- A Treasure Trove for Researching Your Historical Novel

Ever since I began writing fiction, I shied away from writing historicals because you have to make sure you have all the details correct, right down to the type of shoes they wore, food they ate, even whether or not their words were part of the vernacular at the time. Otherwise, the historical junkies will be sure to spot your mistakes.

I stuck to writing contemporaries until at an ACFW Chapter meeting,  when I told the editor from Summerside Press that I was raised in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. Intrigued that I was from the very popular Midwestern resort area, the editor wanted to know more because they were interested in resort settings. I instantly began plotting a contemporary in my head.

The bubble burst when she said, “Why don’t you work up a historical proposal for me?” Of course I agreed and quickly decided on 1933 when the iconic lakeshore building known as the Riviera was opened.

Growing up in the town did give me somewhat of an advantage, but I still needed to know what the town was like in 1933, not when I was a child. I owned several coffee table books about Lake Geneva that featured pictures from the past, but I needed a more up-close-and-personal snapshot of the town. I decided what better place to find that than copies of the weekly newspaper from that time.

Fortunately I live about an hour away from Lake Geneva and was able to make frequent trips to the public library where I discovered a treasure trove of information hidden in the microfilms of the Lake Geneva News Tribune.

Not only did I find needed information regarding the building of the Riviera, but I also discovered the heartbeat of the town as I read about how everyone came behind the plan to make the lakefront a tourist magnet. Tourists meant money spent on lodging, using the beach and dancing up a storm in the Riviera’s new ballroom. After all, this was the time of the Great Depression.

I’d grown up taking for granted the Riviera when I passed it daily, but as I read, I began to feel the same passion for the structure as the townspeople of 1933. And when I later began writing the story, I couldn’t help but bring that same passion and excitement to my heroine and the other characters.

I didn't just read articles related to the building of the Riviera. I read about the society doings, bank robberies, high school activities, ete. etc. Often times I came across a last name I recognized as the same as one of my classmates. These weekly editions truly were a "Back to the Future" type of moment, giving me a view of my hometown from a time before I was born.

Not everyone can travel to their story setting to take advantage of the local library’s microfilm library, but there are there are a lot of newspapers from the past available on line. By typing “newspaper archives” in the Google search bar, I received dozens of hits to sites—some free and others by subscription—that just might have newspapers from your story’s setting. Some go back to the 19^th Century. 

A few that I came across include:

http://www.newspapers.com

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/

http://guides.library.upenn.edu/historicalnewspapersonline

That's the tip of the iceberg, so start exploring!

On a future post,  I’ll discuss another way the newspapers helped me make the setting become real for my readers.

A native of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, author Pamela S. Meyers lives in suburban Chicago, an hour's drive away from her hometown which she visits often to dig into its historical legacy. Her novels include Thyme for Love, and Love Will Find a Way,  contemporary romantic mysteries from OakTara Publishers, published in 2011 and 2013. Her 1933 historical romance, Love Finds You in Lake Geneva,Wisconsin, released April 1, 2013. She can often be found speaking at events around Lake Geneva or nosing in microfilms and historical records about Wisconsin and other Midwestern spots for new story ideas

She can often be found speaking at events around Lake Geneva or nosing in microfilms and historical records about Wisconsin and other Midwestern spots for new story ideas.
 

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Desperately Seeking Story

Rachel Allord grew up as a pastor’s kid, vowed never to marry a pastor, and has been contentedly married to her husband, a worship pastor, for seventeen years. She holds a B.A. in English education and is privileged to be both a biological and adoptive mother. Mother of My Son, her debut novel, released in May 2013 through Pelican Book Group (Harbourlight). She resides in Wisconsin where she avidly consumes coffee, sushi, and novels– preferably at the same time.

Visit Rachel at www.rachelallord.com!

* * * * * * * * * *

   When I began writing my novel Mother of My Son, I didn’t know first hand what it was like to adopt. A few years later, after holding my daughter for the first time in a sun-lit governmental building in China, I did. From then on, when I fleshed out scenes from the viewpoint of my adoptive mom character, experience grounded me. I’d been there. I knew.  And we all know—altogether now—write what you know. Write what you understand, what you’ve experienced, what you get. 

    Seek the story in what you know.

    But here’s the truth: If we only crafted stories centered on our experiences the world would be full sleepy books because, let’s face it, life is a whole lot of humdrum. Sure we all have a handful of those firecracker moments—death and betrayal and crisis and danger, utmost joy and searing loss—but mostly our days consist of moments not worth writing about: losing keys. Staying up all night with a throwing up kid. Muttering at the pick-up behind you riding your tail. Yawn, yawn and pass the coffee. Not the ingredients for a best seller. 

    And yet…

    Could these moments be helpful, even essential, to a writer? Does that frustration you feel when you punch a series of numbers into your phone, desperate to talk to a real live not automated person, bolster your ability to flesh out a character desperate for a job? When you slam your finger in a drawer—can that pain help you create a better car crash scene?  Can the daily blah be transformed into fodder for the craft?

Oh yes. The lackluster everyday provides lovely, rich soil in which honesty and resonance flourish in our manuscripts. 

    The thing is, we have to pay attention. As storytellers our job is to take what we know, what we feel, begin there… and run like the wind. Take it a step further.  Take, “When I was seven and my cat died I was so sad I could hardly swallow” to “What if my father had died when I was seven?” True, in terms of loss, the experiences can’t be compared; in terms of emotion, they can. 

    Here’s what I love about writing: We are forced to wake up to the world around us. Why? It’s all potential fodder. All of it. That mom hollering at her kids in aisle six? She has a story. And it might be worth telling. So drink her in.  What do you see in her eyes? I mean past the anger? What do you see in the eyes of her children? In the eyes of those passing by? It’s like my high school art teacher used to say: draw what you see, not what you think you see. Write what you see. 

    Seek the story in the mundane. 

    People are wonderfully, infuriatingly complex. And we love complex characters, as layered as tiramisu. But doggone it, they can be so tricky to pin down with words. 

When I was knee deep in writing Mother of my Son I was hit with a frightening realization: I didn’t understand my protagonist, Amber. Not only that, I didn’t even like her. And if I didn’t like her, why would my readers? She does this awful thing, right off the bat in the first chapter—she leaves her newborn beside a dumpster. I felt compelled to tell her story, I couldn’t shake it, but I didn’t get her. 

So I got really quiet. I stopped clicking the keys and prayed. And then I listened. Shhhh. What does she say? Who can I listen to in my real world that’s tread a similar path?  What news stories and radio shows can lend me understanding? What memories and emotions can I dredge up to evoke empathy? How can I move past the stereotype of her, the image that surfaces when I think “girl leaves baby in dumpster” to her, so I can write not what I think I see, but what I see. 

    Seek the story in what you hope to understand. 

    Because story is all around us, when we are watchful and hushed to see and hear.

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What next, you winner?

It’s an unfortunate truth—if there are writing contests, there will be people who do not win them and most of the time those people will be you and me.

The American Christian Fiction Writer’s First Impressions contest recently announced 2012 winners—out of almost 600 entries, five people won (one in each genre category). The organization’s Genesis contest had 438 entries this year and will announce nine winners in September.

So know going into it that, when it comes to writing contests, the odds are against you winning. Does that mean you shouldn’t enter? Not at all! But what it does mean is you need to enter contests for the right reason—getting that invaluable feedback. If you win, great! In fact, stupendous! But if you don’t, what can you learn from your contest scores?

If you were one of the 595 or so who didn’t win First Impressions—or if you find yourself among the 429 who don’t win in the Genesis contest—give yourself a half hour to mourn, but remember, putting your work out there for review in any contest is brave. Here’s the truth: Even if you don’t win the certificate, you are not a loser. You still win!

Obedience pays off

It’s true. In a real sense, you win—regardless of what writing contest you enter. You took a critical step—you submitted your writing for review. You poured out the story God laid on your heart and invited experts to judge it. You were obedient.

But you also won because you will receive your judging score sheet with those invaluable comments from publishing professionals on the details of writing, such as Characterization, Plot, Conflict, Dialogue, Setting, Mechanics, and Overall Writing Quality.

If you apply the suggestions you receive to your manuscript, you could be a finalist—or even a winner (again)—next year.

Male winnner image courtesy of imagerymajestic; Female winner image courtesy David Castillo Dominici/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Michael Ehret loves to play with words and as editor of the ACFW Journal, he is enjoying his playground. He also plays with words as a freelance editor at WritingOnTheFineLine.com, where he often takes a writer Into The Edit, pulling back the veil on the editing process. He has edited several nonfiction books, played with words as a corporate communicator, and reported for The Indianapolis Star.

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Redemption in The Hunger Games?

I’m reading James Scott Bell’s The Art of War for Writers again (excellent book) and flipped open to page 104 today: “The writer who understands redemption is on the border of enduring fiction.”

I read this three days after seeing The Hunger Games, a movie that disturbed me greatly—and, truth be told, still does.

I think I’m beginning to understand why the movie so bothers me: No redemption—or is there?

Literary redemption

Redemption Scene from The Shawshank Redemption

I have not read the books. I saw the movie with my wife, a children’s librarian, because I thought it would be an interesting experiment—a movie buff who hasn’t read the book watching the movie with a reader who generally doesn’t appreciate movies. Plus, it was at the bargain theatre.

From Bell’s book: “Flannery O’Connor talked about the need for a story to show ‘grace being offered.’ …  Redemption is bound up in choice. The right choice brings about redemption because the wrong choice will leave the character in a worse moral condition.”

First of all, what do I mean by redemption?

Redemption: The action of saving or being saved from sin, error, or evil.

This includes, but is not limited to, the traditional Christian understanding of redemption: Where Jesus Christ laid down his life to save humans from their sins, and the price of those sins, eternal separation from God.

Lies and more lies

If you haven’t seen the movie or read the book—and you want to—you may want to stop reading.

Katniss and Peeta considering suicide

At the climactic moment, after being lied to by the games’ organizers that both could survive, Katniss (the book’s main character) and Peeta, a young man from her District and also a participant in the game, are faced with a horrific choice: one of them must kill the other to survive and win the game or they both must kill themselves, choosing to go out on their own terms.

There is no redemption—no way to save or be saved from sin, error, or evil. In fact, what Katniss’ gambit (pretending to be star-crossed lovers willing to commit suicide) does is force the game’s organizers (who are clearly evil) to offer a faux redemption and reinstate the rule change that two participants from the same District could win together. There will be repercussions for all involved.

But wait

Earlier in the movie, after finding Peeta injured and dying, and after hearing the lie that there could be two winners if they were from the same District, Katniss risks coming out into the open to retrieve the medicine Peeta needs to survive.

And even earlier, Peeta, seeing Katniss nearly starving to death and being in love with her, contrives a way to get a loaf of bread to her that saves her life. Self-sacrifice! There is redemption, then.

But Katniss doesn’t really love Peeta the way he loves her. She has another young man back in District 12 she’s in love with. But she knows the “star-crossed lovers battling against insurmountable odds to survive” is a powerful myth that will resonate with the television audience watching the game.

So her love is “ends justifies means” love—she will love Peeta if it means they have a better chance at survival.

What does it all mean?

The phrase the end justifies the means refers to the morality of an action and is based solely on the outcome of that action and not on the action itself. Example: Telling a lie that has no negative effect on anyone, and saves someone grief, is good.

But there can be no redemption in a lie. “O how terrible for those who confuse good with evil, right with wrong, light with dark, sweet with bitter.” Isaiah 5:20 (The Voice)

Think about that quote from Bell again: “Redemption is bound up in choice. The right choice brings about redemption because the wrong choice will leave the character in a worse moral condition.”

At the end of the story, all of the characters are in a worse situation than they were before—alive, but morally compromised. I walked out of the theatre, dejected and oppressed rather than encouraged and freed.

At the end of the Harry Potter movies, even the darker ones, good triumphed—often at cost, but it triumphed. That does not happen here.

What do you think? Have I missed something essential by having not read the books?

Michael Ehret loves to play with words and as editor of the ACFW Journal, he is enjoying his playground. He also plays with words as a freelance editor/writer at WritingOnTheFineLine.com, where each Tuesday he takes a writer Into The Edit, pulling back the veil on the editing process. He has edited several nonfiction books, played with words as a corporate communicator, and reported for The Indianapolis Star.

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