Storytelling,

Traveler: Storyteller Tales: Happy Hill

M G Kizzia 2 Comments

            Glen sat in the sandbox and pouted.  The swings and other playground equipment were full of kids, and though the late September wind was turning too cold to swing, Glen found that when he was in the box the other kids left him alone.  He was not necessarily anti-social, but he was not pro-social either.  Not yet being four years old, he honestly did not know what he was, except that he was careful about strangers for some reason, and all of the kids at that place were strangers as far as he could tell.  He never saw any of them before his first day, a day he spent in tears, and he never did see any of them later in life either.  They did not even live in his town.  His Mom called this place Murray Hill – “Happy Hill in Murray Hill” she told him when she tried to convince him that nursery school was a wonderful thing.  Glen was not so sure it was so wonderful.  It certainly did not feel wonderful.

            Glen liked to pick up the sand and let it run through his fingers.  It was like the sands of time, he told himself.  To be sure, he did not yet have much of a concept of time other then the time he got dumped at the school and the time he got picked up; and he certainly could not tell time, but in his mind the sand was like time all the same.  The time winds were blowing strong, he told himself, and with that he looked across the road.  Over the fence and through the trees there was a huge building complex.  Glen would rather be home, away from that building altogether, but as long as he was there he felt it was important to keep an eye on the place, and at three-and-some-years-old, he did not have the presence of mind to ask why.

            Glen turned his eyes from the building when a car pulled up on the gravel drive.  A man got out and Teacher Nancy went to him as her assistant, Mrs. Waterhouse, corralled the children into the building.  Mrs. Waterhouse knew better than to bother with Glen.  She let him stay in the sand so as to avoid a fuss.

            “Nancy.”  The man called the teacher by name as he gave her a kiss on the cheek.

            “David.  Aren’t you supposed to be at work?”  Teacher Nancy asked and the man nodded.

            “But you forgot this.  I thought you might want it.”

            “Oh, blessed coffee,” the teacher said and she took a big sip before giving the man a hug.  She took a second sip before speaking again.  “So you never finished what you were saying.  What is it you are working on these days.”

            “All hush-hush stuff you know,”  He smiled to tease her with the secret.

            “What can the phone company be into that is so hush-hush?”  She was not buying it.

            “No, really.  The Labs has gotten some stuff from the government picked up in some crash out West a few years back.  We are supposed to figure out what it is and what it does.  Pickard has coined the phrase, reverse engineering.  I suppose that sound about right.”

            “Russian?”  In 1957 it was the first and most obvious assumption; but the man shook his head.

            “I don’t think so.  No one will say, but the stuff is indescribable, detailed, sophisticated.  I don’t know.  If it is Russian we might just as well surrender right now.”

            “But if it isn’t Russian, whose is it?”  Teacher Nancy asked.  She looked more curious than doubting, but Mister David just shrugged again before he pointed at Glen

            “Mrs. Waterhouse missed one,” he said.

            “Oh, that’s Glen.”  Teacher Nancy smiled and the two of them came near and squatted down to be friendly.  “Sometimes Glen spends all morning in the sandbox, don’t you Glen?”  Glen could only shrug.

            “Why is that?”  Mister David asked.  Glen pointed at the building complex in the distance.  “What is he pointing at?”  Mister David squinted.  Teacher Nancy could only shrug.  Apparently Glen pointed before when asked the same question, but no one yet figured it out.

            “Are you going there?”  Glen asked, still pointing.  It surprised his teacher who heard very few words escape Glen’s lips, but the man responded, even if it took him a minute to understand that Glen was pointing at the distant building.

            “You mean Bell Labs?  You mean the building there?  Yes I work there.”

            “It is bad, wrong, broken, sick.”  Glen used every word he could think of to explain, but it was hard for him since he, himself was not clear on what he was sensing.

            “Huh!”  Teacher Nancy could not help commenting.  “You are full of words today, aren’t you, young man?”

            “Hush.”  Mister David hushed her.  “Why is it sick?”

            Glen shook his head.  He did not have an actual answer for the question.  “It has bad things.  It is wrong.  Very wrong.  No!  No!”  He really could not explain it.

            Mister David smiled and began to think that the boy really had nothing to say.  Teacher Nancy smiled as well.  “Now, how do you know it is bad?”  Mister David asked again but this time he spoke with some disbelief in his voice.

            “They are not people things.  They are Reichgo.”  Glen said the word though he had no idea what a Reichgo was.  “I can smell them.”  He concluded, and he reached out for David’s hand and smelled the hand when David gave it to the boy.  “I smell them.”  The boy said, and with one brief blue-eyed look into David’s face, he stood, wiped the sand off his hands, and whatever else might be clinging to his hands, and ran inside.  Suddenly, there was too much going on inside his wee little head, and Glen needed some space.  He needed to be alone, but there were grown-ups speaking inside his head and he could not escape them.

            “Huh!”  David looked briefly at his own hand with a very curious expression.  “Spooky kid.”

            “I have never heard Glen say that much since the first day.”  Teacher Nancy’s eyes followed the boy to be sure he got back inside.

            David shrugged it off and let his smile return as he kissed the teacher again on the cheek.  “See you at supper,” he said, and he rose and got back in his car and headed out.

            Teacher Nancy watched and sipped on her coffee the whole time, but when David’s Hudson pulled around the corner, she shrugged it off, too, and went back to the children.

            Mister David came back three days later, near noon, when school was done for the day and Glen was waiting to be picked up.  “David?”  In that name, Teacher Nancy expressed all of her curiosity at seeing him in the middle of the day.  David hardly glanced at the teacher.  He came straight to where Glen was quietly standing.  Glen did not move.  He did not dare.  He saw the expression on Mister David’s face.

            “Tell me about the Reichgo.”  He demanded.  His voice was soft and calm, but to a boy who was not yet four it sounded like a grown-up demand.  Glen’s face curled up like he might cry, but he managed to point into the sky even as two things happened.  First there was what could only be called an explosion near the back of that distant building.  David looked sharply in that direction and mumbled something equally sharp about Rupert and Pickard.  Teacher Nancy also looked, but then the second thing that happened, Glen’s mother came and she hustled Glen into the car.  Apparently, she had also noticed the fire and she knew it would not be long before the whole area was blocked off by police cars and fire trucks.

On Stories: Plots of Competition: Triangles and Trios

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

The classic triangle plot is the love triangle and as far as it goes, it may also be described as an adversary or a rivalry (or an underdog) plot.  The reason I mention triangles (and trios) separately is because they tend to get complicated.  They don’t often lend themselves to simple, cardboard characters or storylines because of the complexity of relationships involved.

As mentioned in the last post, a writer needs to be clear that it is actually a triangle.  If two people are trying to win the hand of a third and that third person is portrayed as little more than the object of their desire, it is in fact a basic rivalry plot.  If that third person, however, has a genuine pick–one or the other or perhaps neither choice–and is a fully developed character, it is a triangle.

Not being a romance fanatic excludes me from serious examples of love triangles, many of which I am sure exist.  What I can give, though, is examples of triangles motivated by something other than love, and yes, there are such things. 

A classic example of a triangle plot can be found in the title: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.  Here, three men are after the same thing: confederate gold (a rivalry).  They each wind their way toward the goal, crossing each other’s paths several times until the final showdown at the end.  Those so-called “Spaghetti Westerns” were very good at inventing triangles.

A similar plot, the trio might be seen, for example, in the film Ghost.  When the young man is killed and can no longer communicate with his love, a third person must enter the fray: the medium or psychic.  She is the only means by which any action (dialogue) can take place, and she almost gets killed along with the girl in the end.  While not the best story of character development, it remains one of the highest grossing films of all time.

Triangles and trios are not easy to write because, as mentioned, the relationships can get complicated.  Also, as in Ghost, the competitive nature of the trio plot is not always simple and obvious.  In Ghost, it is three as a team against an outside force.  In the book, Rebecca, it is a man, his new wife and a housekeeper also against an outside force: the first wife’s memory. 

The Plot:

When the conflict (against) is within the triangle, like an episode of the bachelor, the one you are rooting for must suffer a setback early on.  As in any competitive plot, there is a comeback before the final confrontation, or as the case may be, the final decision.  Shrek is a fair example.  While Shrek and the Prince (with his mother) fight over the girl, Fiona has a mind of her own, and if you watch the films you find she makes her own decision in the end.

When the conflict is external to the trio, something must threaten to break the trio apart—and at least partly succeed in the beginning.  When the young man dies at the beginning of Ghost, that is pretty dramatic and seemingly final, but in fact it causes the formation of the trio which make the expected “come back” and go on to overcome the killer.  The breaking of the trio might also initially involve the separation of the two who might otherwise gang up against the third.  In the film, Trading Places, the commodities trader and the street con man are switched, but not separated far enough.  They eventually figure it out and do indeed successfully gang up on “the brothers” in the end.

Trios and triangles can be strong stories, difficult as they may be to write.  The author, though, needs to be clear that the story qualifies.  If a couple are up against an antagonist and essentially acting as one, it is likely just an adversary plot.  If they are striving for something against another person or even another couple, it is a plain rivalry.  Only if there are three separate characters, however two may come together in the end, as in a love story or as in the example of Trading Places, does it qualify as a trio/triangle plot. 

If the story is a true triangle/trio plot, it is important that the writer be aware of it and maintain the variety of relationships and the full-fledged characters throughout.  To let such a story devolve into a simple protagonist/antagonist story risks disappointing and losing the readers.  There is nothing wrong with two of the characters falling in love half-way through the story as long as one does not become a mere appendage of the other or get lost in the shuffle for the remainder of the tale.

Traveler: Storyteller Tales: The Vordan Can Wait

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            Bobbi looked at Lockhart,  He pulled a bit closer before he locked the wheels on his wheelchair and began.  “Glen is a person, a human being just like us only he lived a number of lives in the past and some in the future, and he can remember them, or some of them anyway, more absolutely than anyone else I ever heard of.  If you already met Diogenes, you know what I mean.  He calls it trading places through time.”

            “But I saw him actually become another person.”  Alice protested.  “He just vanished and this other person was standing right where he was standing, or squatting, actually.  Do you know what I mean?  How can he do that?”

            “It was not another person, exactly.”  Lockhart began again, but Bobbi interrupted.

            “It was still him.  It was another one of his lifetimes.  Diogenes was a first cousin of Alexander the Great way back when.”  Bobbi noticed the slight reddening of Alice’s face.  “He claims he was married to Aphrodite, the love goddess toward the end of his life.  I can’t verify that but I think some of her may have rubbed off on him.  What do you think?”  Bobbi was teasing.  It required no great insight to tell what Alice thought.

            Alice could not seem to help the smile that came to her face.  “Wait!  You don’t mean the real goddess.”

            “Later.”  This time Lockhart interrupted.  “For now you will just have to accept that he has access to other lives like no one else does.  He says since the genetic pattern is nearly exact, and since time has some small flexibility or relativity if you prefer, he doesn’t disturb the timeline when he borrows a past or future life.” 

            “Wait.”  Alice had another question, or several.  “What do you mean disturb the timeline?  Isn’t this like reincarnation or something?”

            “Absolutely not.”  Lockhart answered her.  “He says his lives are because some mysterious “Friends” as he calls them, keep forcing him to be reborn every time he tries to die.”

            “Sometimes he talks about himself as an experiment in time and genetics, like he is no more than a hamster on a treadmill with no way to get off.”  Bobbi added with a touch of sadness in her voice.  They all paused for a minute to look at Glen.

            One of the men from the table took that moment to bring over a tray of coffee, tea and snacks.  They were at cruising altitude, not that any of them ever buckled a seatbelt.

            “Wait.”  Alice regained the floor even as she accepted a cup of tea.  “You said future lives.”

            Bobbi and Lockhart looked at each other again before Bobbi took up the explanation.  “Yes.  You must be a lawyer.  And, yes.  He remembers the future, too.”  She said that much, and then she paused to sip her coffee while she consider something.  The others waited patiently, including the three at the table who were neglecting their work to listen in.  “Let me just say this…  his memory, I mean Glen.”  She pointed.  “It was toyed with at some point in his early years.  Most of the time, he has no idea that he is the Traveler and he just lives a normal, everyday life.”

            “Like a grocery clerk?”

            “He is a minister if you must know.  Mostly, though, he is the Storyteller.  That is what his other lives call him, but he claims it is not an honorific, just a job description.”

            “Anyway, he mostly lives as normal a life as such a person can live.”  Lockhart interjected.  “He says even with his memory blocked, the past and future have a tendency to leak into his mind at the most inopportune times, but without the context to understand what is happening, he says it is very strange and makes him feel like he is living as a stranger in a strange land.”

            Bobbi put her hand up to stop Lockhart from speaking further.  She continued with the explanation.  “Anyway, at times of crisis, the block on his memory is designed to come down and he remembers at least some of his past lives and usually one or more future lives as well.  And it is like actual memory, too; triggered by events and little things just like real memory.  It is a lot to process, though, all at once like that.”  Bobbi paused again to sip and reach for a cookie, bad as it was for her waist, but in this way she gave Alice time to process her own thoughts.

            “I’ve seen him like this before, some years ago.”  Lockhart said to reassure Alice that Glen would be fine after a while.  “He just needs time to straighten it all out.”  Lockhart tapped his own head and stayed away from the cookies.

            “So, he remembers the future?”  Alice shook her head.  “That doesn’t make any sense.”

            “It is the only way to understand it.”  Bobbi responded.  “And another strong reason why his case is not like some kind of reincarnation.”

            “I can see that.”  Alice understood that much.  “But, now, Traveler?”

            “Kairos, technically.  Event time.  An ancient Greek word.”  Lockhart did the translation.  “We might call him the god of history.  The Traveler is just shorthand for the Traveler in Time.” 

            “Time traveler?  Oh, of course, Diogenes.”

            Lockhart and Bobbi both nodded and there was a moment of silence before Alice spoke again.

            “So now, who is this Princess?”

            Lockhart and Bobbi passed another glance, but they were smiling.  “She is a lawyer.”  Bobbi said again.  “She doesn’t miss much.”

            Lockhart nodded and pointed at Glen.  “He is the Princess.”  Before Alice could respond, Glen lifted his head.  He was speaking, though it did not seem like he was speaking to any of them.

            “What?  Sure, that might help.”  He said, and he stood and vanished from the airplane, to be replaced by an absolutely stunning young woman who was maybe twenty-something at most.  She stood around five-seven, with long golden brown hair that was so light it was nearly blond, and eyes as blue as Glen’s, but her eyes flashed with life, youth and health.  Indeed, Alice could not see an ounce of fat on that perfect body.  The Princess stood with a smile for Lockhart, and she turned once all of the way around, slowly.  She was in a dress that fell halfway to her knees but hid nothing of her figure.  Alice wondered where the armor and weapons went, but she held her tongue as the Princess spoke. 

            “So how do I look?”

            “Beautiful, as always.”  Bobbi spoke first.

            “Gorgeous.”  Lockhart confirmed as he matched the Princess’ smile, and then some.

            Alice thought the word gorgeous was an understatement, but her mouth said something else as she watched the woman sit in Glen’s chair.  The Princess kept her knees locked together as only a real woman would do.  “So you are the Princess?  Wait a minute.”  Alice’s thoughts caught up with what she was seeing.  “Do you mean he has lived as a woman?”

            The Princess nodded.  “Half of my lifetimes.”  She confirmed before turning to Bobbi.  “There was so much memory coming all at once I was afraid my Storyteller might burn out his little brain.  What?  Oh, he says his brain is not so little.”  The Princess laughed softly, and the laugh was as beautiful as the rest of her.

            “But isn’t he still remembering?”  Bobbi asked.

            “Yes, but this way I get some of the pressure and he doesn’t have the distractions so he can focus better on processing it all.  At least I think that is what is happening.”  She shrugged.

            “All right.”  Alice spoke and threw up her hands for emphasis.  “I’m getting it, but not really.  I think you better start at the beginning.”  She looked straight at the Princess.  “And I mean you whoever or whatever you are.”

            “Me?  I was born in 228 BC.”  The Princess said.   She sound a bit confused, like maybe she was having trouble translating the English into her native Greek.

            “Do you mean the Traveler?”  Lockhart asked.  “That would be around 4500 BC, near as we know.”

            “I think she means just Glen’s life.”  Bobbi tried, and Alice nodded and pointed at Bobbi.

            “Like when did he first realize he lived all of these other lifetimes and when did he first, what did you call it, trade places in time?”

            “Oh yes.”  The Princess liked the idea.  “Talking it out might be the best thing to do.”

            “Well.”  Bobbi drew out the word as they watched the Princess vanish and Glen return.  He was dressed in the jeans and shirt he wore in the market and, Alice noticed, not keeping his knees together at all. 

            “That would be before my time,” Bobbi said.  “Lockhart, you met him at that college in Michigan.  What was he, seventeen?  Eighteen?”

            “Actually.”  Glen got their attention.  “I was remembering a time when I was four, or actually not quite four.  Things don’t usually happen that early in my lifetimes.  Normally, I get the chance to develop my own personality and learn some things before time starts to open up, generally sometime during puberty; but this was a special case if I remember it rightly.  Let me see…”

On Stories: Plots of Competition: The Rivalry

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

The Rivalry plot follows the same pattern as the adversary plot, only in this case the third element is generally built in.  Often it is a thing, like gold or money, or a concept like power or freedom.  Sometimes it is a person, though that might also be a TRIANGLE plot depending on whether the third person (man or woman) is an active participant in the story or treated more like an object to obtain.

In the Adversary plot it is two people (protagonist and antagonist) or groups against each other, and sometimes, as is often the case in war stories and some thrillers of political intrigue, they are adversaries simply because they represent two opposing worldviews.  In the rivalry plot we are still dealing with the word “against” except the “against” has a purpose: to obtain the object. 

Again, these plots of competition may be summarized in the way my friends talked about plot, as “man against man, man against God (nature) and man against himself.”  Also, again, they may be drawn as internal (character driven) stories or external (action/event oriented) stories, the choice is yours.

Man Versus Man:

In the rivalry, sometimes the object of desire is substantial, such as a National Treasure.  At other times it is an insubstantial object such as power.  The Lord of the Rings was essentially a rivalry plot between a reluctant king and a flaming eye over which will end up ruling the human race.  In the case of the Lord of the Rings, though, that plot is overshadowed by the JOURNEY plot of Frodo Baggins…

Whether substantial or insubstantial, the rivalry plot includes two forces, not necessarily opposed to each other, but in pursuit of the same thing.  In the Film, Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines, a competition from start to finish, we are drawn in to root for the poor American, but not disappointed when the Englishman wins the race.  The American gets the girl, the object of the rivalry.  Nor are we upset when the Frenchman is swamped by the crowd on touchdown in Paris, despite his not winning.  About the closest the film has to a “bad guy” is the German, but he is so comical it is hard to hate him.  In the rivalry for control of the town that culminates in the shootout at the OK Corral, on the other hand, we are glad that the good guys win, if indeed they were the good guys. 

In these examples, you can see two important points.  First, while the protagonist (s) should be fairly clear—you want the reader to root for someone—the line between the good guys and bad guys may be blurry.  In the end of National Treasure II, the “bad guy” saves everyone else’s lives.  Second, win or lose is sometimes less imperative then it tends to be in the antagonist plot.  Consider Ben-Hur and his rivalry with Messala or The Count of Monte Cristo and his love triangle.  We are pleased when the good guys win (in a sense) even if the winning is bittersweet. 

In the Three Musketeers, the good guys also win, but the Cardinal remains in power, untouched, above it all, so it is sort of a half-victory.  In the Hunchback of Notre Dame, the Hunchback does not get the girl.  In Fahrenheit 451, the man saves his life and gets the book, but the dark ages are far from over.

Man Versus God (Nature): 

The first thing that came to my mind was The Old Man and the Sea.  The second was Milton, Paradise Lost.  A third example would be Goethe’s Faust.  All of these express not merely an adversarial relationship, but in some sense a rivalry: for power, control, the means of life and one’s livelihood.  In Bunyan’s works, Pilgrim’s Progress or The Holy War, the struggle is for a man’s soul.  In the Illiad, Achilles and Hector are mere pawns as the Greeks and Trojans play out their antagonism under the hand of rival gods.  In every case, though, there is something to be gained by being the one who is successful.  And perhaps something to be lost for the unsuccessful.

Man Versus Himself: 

In this last form, look for examples where a person is their own worst enemy.  Don Quixote would certainly qualify.  Catch 22 or Cool Hand Luke might qualify.  One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest also, though this last is perhaps best understood as an UNDERDOG story.  Also, Spiderman.  Let me explain. 

Spiderman, in the original storyline, fights himself more than he fights the super-baddies.  That was what made this superhero story so unique and wildly successful.  He has guilt about Uncle Ben, a need to protect Aunt May at all costs and teenage angst and low self-esteem run amok.  He can’t go fully superhero.  He trashed the suit countless times; but he can’t go normal, happy, successful life either, as he seems to want (his object).  He is so conflicted it prevents him from getting the girl (object) too, Mary Jane or Gwen, who have their own rivalry of a sort going on… Sheesh!

The Plot: 

The first thing to decide is what is the key to the story.  If there is something (an object) that two people want to obtain, it is a rivalry and that object always needs to be the motive and front and center in the story.  If not, it is a basic adversarial plot.  Night at the Museum I:  Both the old guards and the new want the tablet = rivalry.  Don’t lose sight of the tablet.  Braveheart (or the Patriot) the men want freedom, the King of England (or his Generals) want to maintain control (opposite objectives) = adversaries.  Here is a question:  Can two lawyers be adversaries?  Can they be rivals?

Like the adversary plot, the pattern of the rivalry plot will remain the same (similar) as are all competitive plots.  Normally the antagonist gains the upper hand at first by knocking down his opponent.  The meat of the story is the protagonist fighting back or “rising up” from the ashes though it may appear hopeless.  The Antagonist gets close to the objective…  But eventually the two meet in the final confrontation where the object is gained or lost (occasionally lost forever.  Occasionally gained and discovered to be unwanted after all).

Competitive plots get some variation when two (protagonist and antagonist) becomes a triangle or when the two “against” don’t start out on the same footing (one starts as a clear underdog).  Though still plots of competition, they are different enough to be worthy of note… next time.

Traveler: Storyteller Tales: The Vordan Named

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

            The woman nodded to the word, “lawyer,” but her eyes were darting around.  She gave the impression that all of this suddenly caught up to her and she was feeling a bit overwhelmed.  “Corporate contracts and such.”  She managed to say that much.

            “Good.  My name’s Glen.”

            The African-American woman pulled out a thin billfold.  “Roberta Brooks, FBI.”  She showed her I. D. but the woman lawyer shook her head.

            “The FBI doesn’t have flying saucers.”

            “Carlson is with the State Department.”  Ms Brooks pointed at the man who was still in the doorway.  “Sanchez, here is with the ATF.”

            Glen handed Sanchez his car keys.  “Glad you didn’t crush my car.  It’s that silver Ford.  Tell my wife I’ll be late for supper, will you?”  Sanchez looked briefly at the black woman.  She nodded her head and Sanchez smiled.

            “I’m only sorry I’ll miss it,” Sanchez said as he headed toward Glen’s car.

            Glen returned the smile as he once again took the pretty blond by the hand.  He began to pull her forward as he and Ms Brooks started toward the ramp and the saucer.  “So Bobbi, what are the Vordan doing here?”  Glen asked.

            “Vordan?”  Ms Brooks said the word as if tasting it for the first time.  “We did not even know who they were.  You tell me.”

            “Mister Smith not around?”

            “No, and that concerns us as well.  There are three battleships on the dark side of the moon, and we only found out that much by accident.  Normally, Mister Smith shows up with that kind of information, but no one has seen him.”

            “Can’t be time for…”  Glen stopped walking.  Clearly he did not finish his sentence.  “Still, this is a Kargill planet by treaty.  The Vordan have no business being here.”

            The high pitched wail that came from the parking lot caused them all to hold their ears.  Apparently there were some Vordan still on the ship and they were taking off for the skies.

            “Get them.  Can’t you get them?”  The woman lawyer asked.

            Bobbi shook her head.  “We got lucky to find them on the ground.  Despite appearances, our vehicle is just a modified stealth bomber with Harrier capabilities.  We are not a space corps.” The Vordan vehicle was already out of sight.  Glen turned and once again held out his hand, but this time the woman balked like before.

            “Do you have a name?”  Glen asked.

            “No.  I’m not getting in that saucer thing,” she protested.

            “I need a lawyer.  How are you with treaties?”

            “I’m a lawyer,” Bobbi protested.

            “When was the last time you practiced or dealt with binding contracts?”  Glen asked and Bobbi said no more.  Glen turned again to the woman.  “What do you say we hire you, name your fee.  After all, I assume there isn’t time to send this out for bids.  By the way, are you any good?”

             The woman stood up straight.  “I am very good,” she said, proudly.  “But wait.”

            “Oh, come on,” Bobbi said.  “Glen won’t bite.”

            “Not hard anyway.”  He and Bobbi shared a knowing look.

            The woman lawyer still hesitated.  “How long?”

            Bobbi shrugged, but Glen responded.  “One day at a time,” he said.  “You can go home anytime you give the word.”

            “Promise?”

            Glen crossed his heart.  “See?  On the left just like you said.”  That got the woman to smile as they walked up to the ship entrance.

            “So who are you people?”  She asked.

            “Men in black,” Glen answered.

            “I am not a man,” Bobbi said.

            “But you are black,” Glen countered as they stopped in the doorway.  Bobbi slapped Glen in the elbow where the short sleeve of his armor did not quite reach to the long gloves he wore.

            “Don’t you ever get tired of that joke?”  Bobbi asked.

            “It’s always like the first time for me.”  A serious expression came and went across Glen’s face, but then his smile returned as he stepped aside to let the women in first.  “So what is your name?”

            “Alice.”

            “Well, Alice.  Welcome to wonderland.”

            The inside of the saucer looked more like a corporate jet than the inside of an alien craft.  While the ship lifted straight up, Bobbi took Alice by the arm and pulled her to the front.  Glen fell in behind.  “Let me introduce you.”  Bobbi pointed to a middle-aged pilot and a co pilot who looked close to Ms Brook’s age of somewhere in the mid sixties.  “Captain Stoloyovich is an ex-astronaut who went twice on shuttles to the International Space Station.”

            “Fyodor,” the man said.  He turned his head briefly and smiled but did not move his hands or take his real attention from his tasks.

            “Alice Summers,” Alice responded, kindly.

            “Alice is a lawyer the Traveler picked out.”

            “Congratulations, I think,” Fyodor said.

            “Hi, I’m Glen, I think.”  Glen spoke in a strange tone of voice and as he looked at Alice, he added a thought.  “Was I someone else back there?”  Alice nodded, not knowing what else to do.  “Diogenes.”  Glen gave the young man a name, but when he looked at Bobbi he added another thought.  “I think.”  He shook his head.  “Too much memory coming back to me too fast.  Maybe I need to sit down.”

            “Who are you?”  Alice finally asked, now that Glen reminded her that he had briefly been a completely different person.

            “WhoamI?”  Glen ran the words together.  “Maybe you should just call me WhoamI for now.”

            “Can’t.”  The old copilot looked up and turned toward the group.  “Jackie Chan already did that one.”

            “Lockhart!”  Glen yelled.  He shook the old man’s hand, vigorously, even as he noticed that the man was in a wheel chair.

            “How’s the Princess?”  Lockhart asked, and Bobbi had no trouble slapping the old man in the shoulder despite the wheelchair.  Lockhart looked appropriately humble for about three seconds.

            “We’re not supposed to tell him about lifetimes he does not remember for himself.”  Bobbi explained to Alice who nodded but was becoming very confused.  Glen, meanwhile, had no trouble answering Lockhart’s question.

            “She is great.  Good as ever.  Still young, too.”

            “It isn’t fair, you know,” Lockhart complained, though he looked like he would not mind seeing the Princess again, young as she might be.

            “Unfair?  Tell me about it.”  Glen also complained and rubbed his lower back as he stepped over to a table where a chair seemed to be calling to him.  The table was full of papers, and three people, two men and a woman, who were working their way through some rather large files and typing furiously on computer consoles in their off moments.

            Glen sat heavily and ignored them all.  Bobbi and Alice came over to sit in comfortable chairs where they could watch him.  Bobbi only paused briefly to speak to the three at the table.  Lockhart followed them after a moment and brought his own chair with him.

            “I would say you all have some explaining to do.”  Alice spoke again as soon as she had a chance to breathe.

            “Actually, we know nothing about the Vordan.”  Bobbi responded.  “We do not even know if they are hostile.”

            “I imagine she is thinking of something else.”  Lockhart pointed at Glen.

            Alice agreed.  “Look, I get the Men in Black bit.  I saw the movie.  So we got aliens on the moon.  So I look good in black, but I am engaged.  Actually, all of this sounds like a show my fiancé would like, if only there was some football in it.  Anyway, I was talking about him.”  She also pointed at Glen.

            “That is a little more difficult to explain,” Bobbi said.

            “Is he an alien too?”  Alice asked.

            “No,” Bobbi said emphatically.  “He is one of us and that is what makes it so difficult.”

            “Not so hard,” Lockhart said as they watched Glen put his head in his hands.  Glen appeared to be mumbling to himself but was otherwise in his own little space.  They spoke around him. 

            “I tried Vordan under every possible spelling.”  One of the paper shufflers interrupted.  “All I can find is a reference that says see Gaian, but when I looked under Gaian it said, mind your own business.”

            Neither Bobbi nor Lockhart knew what to make of that, but there was a little chuckle from the cockpit, and Glen paused briefly in his introspection to grin.  “Keep looking.”  Bobbi decided, and Alice took the stage again.

            “Well?”  That was all she had to say.

On Stories: Plots of Competition: The Adversaries

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

This plot is perhaps the most basic of all plots in the plot library.  It can be summed up with one word “against” and satisfies my professional writing friends who delineated plot for me in three (or 4) forms:  “Man against man, man against God (nature) and man against himself.”

As far as internal versus external storylines goes, the internal (character driven) story will generally be found in “man against himself” plot and the external (action/event oriented) story will generally be found in the “man against man” plot, but not invariably, not always.  As for “man against God (nature),” it can go either way, but tends to lean toward internal storylines.

Man against Man:

This may be the most basic of the basic.  It is the mainstay of the B-movie where the good guy wears a white hat and the bad guy wears a black hat.   The “against” is the given point that needs to be remembered, and everything in the plot must bend to that directive.  Here is where you will find the basic protagonist (good guy) and basic antagonist (bad guy), and the stories built on this alone are innumerable.  (Then again, there are some stories where even those lines blur, for example Neil Simon’s The Odd Couple.  Who is the bad guy?)

Unlike the B-movies and most comic books, the protagonist need not be perfect and the antagonist need not be evil.  They may well be two people trying to do the right thing.  They may each have a mix of internal conflicts going on.  Invariably, though, they will be distinguished in the story by their decisions and actions, usually on moral grounds.  How often has the antagonist believed that the ends justify the means?  How often has the protagonist tried to save the life of the antagonist in the end?

Yes, this is one of those plots where a writer has to be careful.  It lends itself much too easily to cardboard characters and B-movies.  But then, if you are careful, you might produce  the next Star Wars.  That series of movies is built primarily as an adversary plot.  Luke Skywalker rises against the Empire, but is beaten down.  He becomes a Jedi and proves himself against Jobba the Hut. Then, finally, he has the showdown with the Emperor and the Vader himself.

The Magnificent 7 (7th Samurai) is another great adversarial plot, but from these examples you can see that “man against man” need not be just two people.  War stories are mostly adversarial plots, whatever else may be going on in the story.  Consider D-day, Patton, Massada.

NOTE: it is in the “whatever else is going on” that a writer can often avoid a plot of complete cardboard.  Even the thinnest white hat-black hat B-western had a love interest to carry some of the load.  And here we see the third wheel which, if you have been reading these posts, you know I recommend to add depth to your story.

Man against God (Nature):

I am only going to mention a few of stories here, because you need only to get the idea.  The Shack would certainly have to be called a “man against God” story, though it may be an EMOTIVE plot as well.  Moby Dick, on the other hand is clearly a “man against nature” story.  What Melville did in the story, though, was add that third wheel in the form of the narrator:  “call me Ishmael.” 

Some stories in this category mix my professional friend’s ideas.  Both Swiss Family Robinson and Lord of the Flies begin as “man against nature” stories, but devolve into “man against man” stories.  There is nothing wrong with that, as these stories show, but it is important for a writer to know going in to be able to make a smooth transition.  Then there is Homeward Bound.  It is not exactly a “man against nature” story, but you get the idea.

Man against himself:

Robinson Caruso, on the other hand, is essentially a man against himself story even though it outwardly appears as another “man against nature” idea.  Likewise, you will find some sports stories are really “man against himself” stories despite the outward competition.  Rocky might fit here, or The Mighty Ducks, or The Bad News Bears, though honestly, while these are still competitive stories, they are underdog plots…  And anyway, now we are headed back toward B-movie land.

The Plot: 

Adversary plots generally follow the same pattern.  Two forces, often two persons stand against each other in a way which appears that one will win (succeed) and one will lose (fail)—though sometimes both lose and rarely both win.  The two need not have the same strengths and weaknesses, but they should begin on fairly even ground.

The against is all that is needed to provide conflict, tension and resolution.  Consider James Bond versus Doctor No, Sherlock Holmes versus Doctor Moriarity, Van Helsing versus Dracula, or Doctor Jeckel versus himself.  Versus (against) says and does it all.

Most of the time, early in the story, the antagonist gains an advantage.  The poor Count of Monte Cristo ended up in prison.  The meat of the story is the return or “rising up again” of the protagonist to that equal footing and status – to where there is a second chance at the one on one.  The resolution is how things turn out.  As often as not, the antagonist is overcome and never will rise again, unless it is a series…

Then again, the Count of Monte Christ is really a Rivalry plot, but that will have to wait until next time.

Traveler: Storyteller Tales: The Vordan Arrive

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

“Excuse me.”

Glen looked down from his perch.  He stood on an upside-down milk crate in order to adjust the butter which would not fit correctly on the top shelf.  The girl was blond and very pretty, and about half of Glen’s age which would put her under thirty, but not by much.  Glen ran his fingers through his gray and mostly missing hair and felt very old.

“Excuse me.”  The woman repeated herself and she attempted a smile though it was a very poor attempt.  “I would like one of those.”  She pointed.  Glen tried not to sigh as he stepped off the crate so she could reach around him.  She was still trying to smile when Glen grabbed her.  The butter went on the old tile floor, the woman landed on the butter and Glen landed on top of the woman. 

She screamed.  “What is wrong with you!  I am a lawyer…”  She did not finish the sentence as the margarine above their head exploded in a flash of blue-white light. 

Glen grabbed the woman by the hand and dragged her around the corner, into the bread aisle.  She still screamed, but sat and watched as the old man in her face vanished and a well built young man with a terrific smile appeared in front of her.  He was dressed in chain armor that looked ancient, like something medieval, if not Roman, and he had the sword to go with it, slanted across his back with the handle sticking above his left shoulder.

“N-no.  Ex…”  The young man wanted to say “Excuse me” in echo of her words, but his stutter got in the way, and he had other concerns.  Keeping low was a big one.  The young man peeked around the corner of the aisle and whipped out the long knife that rested across the small of his back.  He sent it flying with his left hand.  It entered – whatever it was – and the thing shrieked, a thoroughly alien sound, and it collapsed.

“You missed.”  The woman leaned over his shoulder.  Her curiosity had gotten the better of her.  “My fiancé is a doctor.  Heart is on the left.”

The man in armor shook his head as he stood.  The – whatever it was – was on the ground, its weapon having clattered against the dirty tiles. He pointed at the thing and then at the right side of his chest and smiled a smile that melted the poor woman.  Her heart skipped a beat; but then he was gone and the old man came back.  Curiously, he kept the armor, and in fact, the armor adjusted in size to fit the shorter man, belly and all.  He took her hand to bring them close. The woman gave her hand without hesitation.

“Vordan have their heart on the right side,” Glen said.  “But what the Hell is it doing here?”  Glen picked up the alien weapon and held it in a way that suggested he knew how to use it.

“Vordan?”  The woman looked at the green colored creature on the floor.  It looked like it might double as a swamp monster.  “Vordan.”  She repeated and looked at the old man.  “I would guess it is not from around here.” She smiled a genuine smile for the first time.

“Come on.”  Glen pulled on her hand to move them to the front of the store, but the woman balked and yanked her hand free.  One side of her lip turned up as she spoke.  It was not a flattering expression.

“Who the Hell are you?  You’re just a grocery clerk.”

“Actually, I work for a national merchandising company,” Glen said.  He started to walk.

“But, wait!  What is with that chain mail get-up?  Who was that other man?”

“Later.”  Glen turned to walk backwards.  “You coming or not?”

The woman did not hesitate for long.  She had on a soft summer dress and Glen imagined jeans would have been a better choice, but she had on tennis shoes instead of flip-flops so it was nothing for her to catch up.  “Where are we going?”  She asked above the screams that were beginning to echo around the super market.

 “To find the rest of them,” Glen said.  He thrust his arm out to hold her back while he let loose with a shot from that alien gun.  There was one coming in the door, but it got distracted for a second when the door automatically opened.  The Vordan collapsed and Glen rushed outside right over the body, keeping low the whole way to stay below the front windows.  He scooted up against one of the big columns in the shopping center and the woman stayed right on his heels.  He pointed. 

There was an alien ship about the size of a tractor trailer in the parking lot, and three more Vordan hovered around the perimeter.  One spotted him and fired.  Glen turned and held up his cape between the woman and the blue-white energy beam, a cape that the woman had not noticed before.  The shot hit the column, and while the façade melted, the steel beam at the center remained solid enough.

As soon as the enemy fire paused, Glen spun and returned fire.  He did not appear to do any better than the Vordan.  He missed all three and hit the alien ship.  “Bad aim,” she said.  Glen paused and looked at his gun as if something was wrong with it.

“Communications array,” Glen responded, absentmindedly.  “I don’t want them calling in reinforcements.”

“Too late.”  The woman tapped Glen’s shoulder and pointed to the sky.  A saucer-like vehicle was closing in, fast.

“Cavalry,” Glen said as he clicked something on the Vordan weapon and turned to fire again.  The Vordan that had been creeping up close turned on sight of the oncoming ship.  They were running back to their ship.  Glen shot the mechanism that would delay their ability to open the door, and in a few seconds, the saucer vehicle was overhead, emitting a greenish light that encompassed the Vordan ship and everyone around it for twenty yards.  Both humans and Vordan in that section of the parking lot collapsed, and Glen grabbed the woman’s hand once more.  “Come on,” he said, and this time she came without hesitation.

It was a few moments before the saucer was able to land, but it had to crush one car to do it.  The only thing the woman could do was gasp.  The saucer was much bigger than it appeared in the sky.  A door opened in the side of the saucer and a ramp shot to the ground.  A half-dozen armed people poured out and most headed for the Vordan and their ship, but three headed toward Glen and his lady follower.

“At least these look human.”  The woman quipped, but Glen let go of her hand without responding.  He reached out and hugged a big, African-American woman and she hugged him right back. 

Glen smiled at the greeting but turned his head.  “There’s another one by the butter.”  He shouted toward the man who was examining the Vordan in an automatic door that kept trying to close, but opened every time it bumped the body.  Glen kissed the black woman on the cheek before he let go and turned to the blond.  “You’re a lawyer?”

On Stories: Plot and Theme and finding a way in the story wilderness.

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Last week I talked with two people, professional writers with numerous books to their credit, and even they can’t agree on the idea of plot.  What they came up with was (“J” 4, “M” 3):  Man against man, Man against God—with man against nature separate or included–and Man against himself. 

What I would like to talk about over the next few weeks is more than 3 or 4 plots.  Of course “J” would probably insist I was writing about themes.  Sheesh!  We can’t even agree on the terminology…  Then again, that may be a strong reason as to why plot has been so misunderstood and, I feel, poorly taught in so many settings.

Out of deference to my friend, I want to talk about 3 themes, each of which may be divided into several plots.  In every case (where I can) I will also try to show how these plots might be tailored to internal (character focused) stories and external (event or action) stories..  Working, then, from back to front:

The third theme I call plots of the heart (or maybe soul or spirit if you prefer those terms).  This is not to say all other plots are devoid of an emotional component, only…It will be a while before I get there.

The second theme will be journey plots.  There are many ways one pursues a quest, and they only occasionally end in funeral plots. (Sorry.  I had to work that in here somewhere)  ANYWAY…   This will be the second theme: a journey of one kind or another,

The first theme I want to tackle are plots of competition, and I put it first only because our study of Cinderella has already given us a competitive plot:  The Underdog.  Plots of competition really include all of the plots my professional writing friends named.  These are plots where there is an “against,” as in, Man against man (the obvious one), but also against God, against Nature and against the self. 

I also put plots of competition first because they are the ones that invariably (though not always) include a protagonist (good guy) and antagonist (bad guy) and so they are the ones everyone thinks of when they think of the word “plot.”  Every story has to have a protagonist and an antagonist, doesn’t it?  No… But for the most part, plots of competition do.

NOW THE DISCLAIMER:  I should maybe post this each time…  No plot is pure apart from some simple short stories and fairy tales.  Every story, and certainly every novel, movie and play will be complicated by sub-plots of one kind or another.  So when I give an example, I am NOT saying it is the ONLY thing the book is about.  I am only saying, in my opinion, it is the MAIN plot in the story (or if not main plot, I will point that out).  Your opinion may vary.  I repeat:  Your opinion may vary.

NOW THE PREPARATION:  In the course of these posts, I will not (normally) give much of a template.  The idea isn’t to plug your characters, and setting into the slots and produce a story.  It is enough to have examples and hopefully get the idea of how the particular plot works.  How you tailor the plot to your story is what will make your story great!

For next time, be prepared for The Adversaries!

Writing Secrets 14: “Poofreading” is an art form.

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Consider this:  Proofreading is more than just looking for typos.  Sometimes it is the juxtaposition of ideas that makes something unintentionally funny…

I received these in my e-mail in-box.  There is no telling how far around the net they have been, but if you have not seen them, they are worth a look.

Love those Church Ladies.. They’re Back! Those wonderful Church Bulletins!  Thank God for church ladies with typewriters. These sentences (with all the BLOOPERS) actually appeared in church bulletins or were announced in church services—- These are guaranteed to make you LAUGH, OUT LOUD!  

The Fasting & Prayer Conference includes meals.

The sermon this morning: “Jesus Walks on the Water.” The sermon tonight:  “Searching for Jesus.”

Ladies, don’t forget the rummage sale. It’s a chance to get rid of those things not worth keeping around the house. Bring your husbands.

Remember in prayer the many who are sick of our community. Smile at someone who is hard to love. Say “Hell” to someone who doesn’t care much about you.

Don’t let worry kill you off – let the Church help.

Miss Charlene Mason sang “I will not pass this way again,” giving obvious pleasure to the congregation.

Next Thursday there will be tryouts for the choir. They need all the help they can get.

Irving Benson and Jessie Carter were married on October 24 in the church. So ends a friendship that began in their school days.

A bean supper will be held on Tuesday evening in the church hall. Music will follow.

At the evening service tonight, the sermon topic will be “What Is Hell?” Come early and listen to our choir practice

Eight new choir robes are currently needed due to the addition of several new members and to the deterioration of some older ones.

Scouts are saving aluminum cans, bottles and other items to be recycled.  Proceeds will be used to cripple children.

Please place your donation in the envelope along with the deceased person you want remembered.

The church will host an evening of fine dining, super entertainment and gracious hostility.

Potluck supper Sunday at 5:00 PM – prayer and medication to follow 

The ladies of the Church have cast off clothing of every kind. They may be seen in the basement on Friday afternoon.

This evening at 7 PM there will be a hymn singing in the park across from the Church. Bring a blanket and come prepared to sin.

Ladies Bible Study will be held Thursday morning at 10 AM. All ladies are invited to lunch in the Fellowship Hall after the B. S. is done.

The pastor would appreciate it if the ladies of the Congregation would lend him their electric girdles for the pancake breakfast next Sunday.

Low Self Esteem Support Group will meet Thursday at 7 PM. Please use the back door.

The eighth-graders will be presenting Shakespeare’s Hamlet in the Church basement Friday at 7 PM.. The congregation is invited to attend this tragedy.

Weight Watchers will meet at 7 PM at the First Presbyterian Church. Please use large double door at the side entrance.

The Associate Minister unveiled the church’s new campaign slogan last Sunday:  “I Upped My Pledge – Up Yours.”

 (NOTE:  “Poofreading” is from an old cartoon in the New Yorker:  A ragged man, back to the wall, holding out a tin cup and a sign which says “former poofreader”)

On Stories: What is a plot, anyway?

M G Kizzia 4 Comments

How many plots are there, really?  Ask a hundred writers and you may get a hundred answers, but you will find a consistent note in the answers: that the number of plots in this universe is limited and every storyteller since the beginning of history has merely tweaked the same plots over and over.

This question came up recently in a discussion.  One famous author, who shall remain nameless, was definitive in his answer.  He said:  “There are many themes. Hundreds to thousands. But there are only four basic plots. Man against man, man against nature, man against God, and man against himself.”

A second, nameless author came right back.  She said:  “As for basic plots, there are really only three and they were painted on their authors’ cave walls long ago: man against man. man against god [which includes ‘nature’], man against himself.”

Then someone (I’m sorry.  It may have been me) pointed out that Aristotle saw only two plots in the universe:  Internal (character oriented) plots and external (action or event oriented) plots.  Frankly, I like Aristotle better, because it avoids the word “against.”  At the same time, though, I think we can expand on these ideas a little.  Maybe we should call them “plot-themes” though, to avoid the ire of certain authors who shall remain nameless…

What is a plot?

When I began this series of posts, I compared a story to a house.  The setting was the house itself in a settled location and also the props: the furniture and all the little knick-knacks that turn a house into a home.  The characters are, naturally, the people and often the animals who live there and interact: from whence comes the story.  Plot, I said, was like the air.  It fills every room and is the medium through which all action takes place and through which all words must be spoken (since sound does not travel in a vacuum).  Without air, all die; and it has a peculiar virtue in that air is invisible.  So a plot should be invisible, at least until needed.

Plot is needed in two ways:  First, it is needed by the storyteller to keep them on track—to help them tell the story they intend to tell.  Second, it is needed by the storyteller to explain the story when the inevitable question arises:  “What is your story about?”

Cinderella:

Sticking with the story we have butchered in the course of these posts, how would you describe the story of Cinderella?  If you are like my sixteen-year-old son, you will probably start at the beginning and tell the whole thing, taking longer than it would take to watch the Disney movie.  After the third sentence, though, the movie producer would be snoring and probably have you bodily ejected from the building.  I’ve read too many query letters like that.  So that won’t do.

How about setting?  It’s a medieval kind of story full of castles and clocks chiming twelve and shoes…  That really doesn’t tell us anything.  It might spark some interest in a medieval buff or someone with a clock fetish or Imelda Marcos, but even those people will ask for more information.

So maybe character?  It is about a good girl and a wicked step-mother and step-sisters, and a charming prince… Oh, and there’s a fairy in it. Can’t forget the fairy, to which the movie producer is likely to say, “So?”  Again, character alone doesn’t really say anything.  What is the story about?  You want to include character and maybe setting in a query letter for your novel, but the letter needs to be focused on something else.  Plot is what the story is about.  I can describe Cinderella with one word:

Underdog. 

Not even venturing into the written word, mister movie producer, how many successful movies have been built around the underdog theme?  The Bad News Bears, the Mighty Ducks, Rocky…  How about Home Alone, You’ve Got Mail, It’s a Wonderful Life, or maybe Elf???

Not every one of these movies (and the larger list of movies, books, stories and plays that you can probably build) are purely underdog stories, but the gist of the story is there.  In Cinderella’s case, a good little girl is crushed under her stepmother’s thumb, but by her loving nature, and with a little magical help, she is able to overcome her adverse condition and leap-frog over the head of her oppressor into the arms of happiness…  Do you think?