Durango And SIlverton

Last year my family and I went to Durango Colorado (which in itself is not all that exciting, but hey, it was a vacation). If you ever get the chance, go there and take a ride on one of the last steam train lines in the United States. The scenery is spectacular, and the train ride itself is pretty fun.

Here's some of the photos I managed to take during the ride:

This is probably the most visually stunning part of the trip. At a section of rail known as the Highline there is a cut across a cliff for the rail. You can look out the side of the car and see four hundred feet straight down to the river below.

Like I said, it can be a fun experience and one that if you have the time and money you shouldn't pass up.

Making Good Ideas Great

One thing that gets asked at every writer's conference I've ever attended has something to do with how to get ideas. It seems that many people are convinced that if they could just get a great idea and go with it, the New York Times Bestseller list is only a matter of time. Maybe they're right. Who knows?

What I've found personally however, is that the idea for a book is hardly ever the problem. I've got tons of ideas. But ideas alone don't make a book. It takes work. Lots and lots of hard work.

True, it's not like working in a coal mine or catching fish on a trawler out of Gloucester or anything like that, but it is work, nonetheless. I know, I know. This goes against what many believe about art, that it is organic, that it should just be allowed to happen. Yeah. The truth is that all art takes work. It takes artists a long time to develop the skills to work a masterpiece.

Writing is no different.

So, ideas aren't everything. But they do have their place. So how do you turn good ideas into great ideas and make them work for you?

Mix them with other ideas.

It sounds simple, but it really works. That's what writing is all about after all. It is about taking something familiar and adding in something new, something we haven't experienced before. Fiction can take us to places that literally only our imagination can carry us to.

The other thing that I've learned is that when you're working on a book, don't hold back. If there are two many ideas floating around in your book, you can always cut them back as needed later. But when you are putting your story together don't hold out some of your best ideas for other books. Especially if you are writing a series. That's fine if you have a bunch of ideas that will make a killer ending to your trilogy. But if there isn't enough going on in the first two books, if the reader has to wait until book 3, well, then you've failed. Besides. Ideas are infectious. One leads to another and so on. And if your reading as much as anyone hoping to become a published author should be, then ideas will always abound.

For a writing exercise, try this: Take two ideas, make them as different as possible. Trivial things, you name it. Just make them very different. Now combine them. That will give you a basis for your story. Then take another idea. This will be added in to raise the stakes, exacerbating the conflict. Now, finally, take a fourth idea and find a way to work a solution from it. Have some fun with it and see what you come up with.

Naming Names

Over the weekend I had a disagreement with my wife. We're expecting a baby in November, we don't know what it will be yet, but we're trying to decide on a name that we both like.(Actually two names, one boy, one girl,)

So. I'm reading the names off that I like out of a baby name book. I think every one of them was met with "no, no, are you serious," and the like.(In my wife's defense I was joking about some of them)

And then I found it. Pure gold in the world of naming. Raiden. Meaning: Japanese god of Thunder and Lightning.(I should probably preface this next part by explaining that my wife has never played Mortal Kombat) I excitedly told her that this had to be our choice if it was a boy. I mean, come on, right? Her reply was, "do you want him to get beat up?"

I stared back at her, incredulous. "You think he'll get beat up? Don't you know who Raiden is?"

"No."

I pulled up a picture of him on the computer. "This is Raiden. You don't #%$%& with Raiden. You get zapped!"

Unfortunately, she wasn't impressed. And so the search for a name continues, much to my dismay. It could have been so perfect, but alas, it's not meant to be.

Do you think she'd go for Sub-Zero or Scorpion?

Movie Review: The Cave

Title: The Cave
Year Produced: 2005
Notable Actors/Actresses: Lena Headey, Piper Perabo
Trep's Rating: 3 Stars

For Friday's now I'm going to be posting a movie review(in addition to Thursday's awesome book review!). I watch a fairly wide variety of stuff, but again, mostly in the fantasy/sci-fi/horror genre. Thrillers are popular too, but I'll make an effort to branch out for these reviews. The point is not to review things that most everyone has seen, but to pick movies that, for whatever reason aren't very well-known.

First up is The Cave, which caught my attention with the awesome cover. I mean, seriously, doesn't this make you want to watch it?

In reality, I knew I was probably getting into a B-movie. But, what the heck. The plot also caught my attention, because it sounded a lot like the book I was reading at the time(Subterranean). It's about a group of cave explorers who get contracted to map out a cave system discovered under the ruins of a monastery in Eastern Europe.

When they arrive they discover a warning from the long-gone monks at the entrance to the caves, warning that they are supposed to be sealed so that winged demons don't get out. Of course, this doesn't bother the explorers and they start off on their expedition.

All seems to be going well, but then one of their team goes missing. Then another. Eventually the leader of the team is attacked while looking for the other members and is wounded by the flying demon. Something really cool and unexpected comes into the story around here, and I won't give it away, but it's what made me revise my opinion about the movie. It's a B-movie, but a good B-movie.

Now, trapped in the caves and cut off from escape, the team must fight their way through this nightmare and find another way out. No real stars in this one, but the acting is decent. Piper Perabo is the girl from Coyote Ugly and Lena Headey played Queen Gorgo in 300. The writing is above par for a film like this, and the movie had a really cool song at the end. Here it is:

So, all in all, it was a fun movie. Not too much in the way of a content warning, either. So if you're looking for a good flick to get into, and you like sci-fi/fantasy, this might not be the most amazing movie you will ever see, but it is entertaining. Check it out. 

Book Review: Subterranean

Title: Subterranean
Author: James Rollins
Genre: Thriller
Trep's Rating: 3 and a half stars

James Rollins is an author that I was put onto by a guy I work with. I was told that he was the greatest author this guy had ever read. I was skeptical, especially since I know that this guy has read about four books in his entire life, three of them by this author, and only then while in jail with nothing to do. But, I gave him a chance.

Subterranean starts out with a team of scientists being assembled for an expedition to a newly discovered cave system in Antarctica. Not only are they there to find out about the unique ecosystem one mile beneath the ice, but they are there to find out what happened to a lost culture whose artifacts and cave homes have been found buried down there.

But that is not all. Not everyone in the world is happy about the supposedly top-secret discovery. The finding of diamonds large enough and in enough quantity to destroy the worlds diamond market puts the new dig site squarely in the sights of and extremist group hired by African diamond nations. One of the team is not who they seems, and time is quickly running out for them to discover it.

As though this weren't bad enough, there are other things in the caves. Monsters. Giant reptiles that are capable of shrugging off most bullets. As the team run for their lives they encounter aid in the least likely of places, the lost civilization that apparently only moved deeper....

All in all, I liked this book. I did find it odd that there should happen to be kangaroo-monkey-people in this book, and that I should pick it up right after I finish Into The Storm, which featured cat-monkey-people. Don't ask me, odd coincidence.

There were a few things that I liked, and a few that I didn't. The pacing of the book is great. It's 353 pages on my nook, so not too long. In that length Rollins packs a great story about survival and pitting man against nature in a realistic way. One thing that I really liked was how realistic the injuries and the stunts in the book were. Most of the injuries happen when characters trip, fall, twist their ankles, slip, etc.... Cave exploring is dangerous on its own. The addition of these very menial yet very realistic injuries did a lot for me in helping to create the illusion.

The only real problem I had with the book was the main character's political view. Don't get me wrong, it's fine that characters have political views. It's what helps give them life. Yet I don't want to be preached to, regardless of that view. The main character spends half the book randomly going into monologues, extolling the endless virtues of her point of view.

The story was good however, and if that sort of thing doesn't bother you, then this is a good book for you. It almost killed it for me, but I hear that he doesn't do it in his other books, so I'll give the author another chance at a later date.

Pet Peeves In Writing

I love this video. It's not just because it's fracking hilarious, which it is, but it makes a good point. There are things in writing(and of course, screenwriting) that are way overdone. Some of those things don't even make any sense. For example:

Brad was knocked to the ground by a wicked blow to the back of the head. He reached up and felt the warm and sticky blood as it matted in his hair. Suddenly Rick took a step forward and pressed the barrel of the gun to his forehead.
"Time to say goodbye," he said dryly.
Rick thumbed back the hammer. Brad swallowed. It was not supposed to end like this. He had a wife, a son, back at home in bed. He was supposed to be there too, but he had offered to do his boss a favor, and this was his reward.

OK, so some of that was pretty corny but that was kinda the point. But the part I'm really talking about is where he "thumbs back the hammer" on the gun. This drives me nuts. I understand where it comes from, of course. You see, many of the guns they used to use required one to pull back the hammer. But unless your using one of those guns for your book/story/screenplay, you should just be able to pull the trigger. If you've ever shot a modern handgun you should know that you can pull back the hammer, but it accomplishes nothing.

I suspect my opinion on this will go largely ignored, and that's OK. Some of my favorite authors do it regularly, and I still like their work. It's just one of those things that I think is funny, much like the above video.

So, what are some things that you think are overdone? What gets under your skin because it either is done ad nauseum or doesn't make sense or both?

Using Symbolism Effectively

We've all heard about it. Symbolism, when combined with an already-strong story can make that story into a classic. It can take a great plot with great characters and give it meaning. Conversely, the same is true if you were to take it away from a story, because part of the magic would go with it. (Imagine Les Miserables without symbolism, and suddenly it turns into a really drawn-out action story)

So, using symbols in your writing is important. But how do you go about doing it?

If you've ever read the book On Writing by Stephen King you'll remember where he talks about it. He uses the example of his first book, Carrie, about a girl who has telekinetic powers and kills the whole school when they pull a prank on her at a school dance. (To be honest, not his best work, and he even says that he doesn't really like it, but that's not the point).

In each of the important scenes of the book Stephen King discovered that there was blood. Blood itself can be very symbolic, so he decided to play with it. He did, and the story is the result. By making the symbolism powerful he turned what in my opinion would have been a typical horror story into a story that has resonance with the reader. It will be remembered, when others that were similar but lacked that symbolic nature fall by the wayside.

Symbols are fun to play with. Dan Brown has all but made his career out of playing with them in the context of stories, and seeing what he can come up with. True, that's not exactly what I'm talking about doing with writing, but part of the reason that his work has enjoyed so much success is due to the symbols he works with and what they mean to his audience.

One of the best examples of using symbolism in movies that I can think of is the 1999 flick Varsity Blues. (Please note, I didn't say it was the best movie ever, but I like it because it's so easy to see how they used symbolism).

The story is about a high school football team in a small town in Texas. A coach, played by Jon Voight, rules the town with an iron fist. A small band of the best players must decide through the course of the movie if they are going to save their own possible futures in football or sacrifice them to end the long chain of abuses and get rid of the coach.

Several things stand out. First, Lance Harbor, the star quarterback and golden child of the town wears the number seven, the number of perfection. The entire team wears blue jerseys, blue being a color that indicates loyalty. The main character, Jonathan Moxon or "The Mox"(which makes him sound more like a disease one might acquire while swimming the Nile in Africa) wears the number four. Four is associated with 4F. 4 and F both represent failure, rejection, and not fitting into the requirements. Even the team mascot, the coyotes, lends itself to a feeling that in this town they are on their own, cut off from the rest of the world like the rogue scavengers are themselves.

In all these examples, however, story comes first. Symbolism can effectively add to your story, but you've got to make the story work in the first place. Characters have to be strong. The plot has to feel organic. If you're able to do these things, then sit down and read through it, and see if anything stands out to you. Maybe something you can emphasize more. If not, oh well, you've still got a great story. But if so, play with it and see what you can come up with.