Posts filed under ‘WALT’S OBSERVATIONS’
READING AS A WRITER
I’ve always been an avid reader to the point where it’s almost an obsession. I cannot remember the last time I was not in the process of reading a book. If I go anywhere where there is the slightest chance of waiting, I feel naked if I do not bring a book along.
I’m sure most writers would agree that being a compulsive reader is a prerequisite for being a writer.
What I would like to discuss in this piece is how the appreciation of the book I am reading has changed. I began writing fiction approximately twelve years ago, and since then I have noticed that the qualities I look for in a book are different. Before I became a writer I was just appreciating the story at face value. Now I look for much more.
Now, when I read a book I look for character development. I look for descriptions of the character and how this sometimes leads to overwriting of the book. I will discuss this in an upcoming piece giving examples. Plot is something I examine, wondering if the author outlined the story or if events occur which the author did not see coming. In my writing, I sometimes use a dynamic outline with nothing cast in stone. I also have events occur that are created during the writing process.
Another quality I look for in a story is background information to explain details in the story. In science fiction, horror and fantasy not everything needs to be explained, nor should it be. But there comes a point where some background is necessary.
These are some of the changes I have in mind when reading. I wonder if other writers
approach a story differently since they began writing.
THE CASE OF CHARLES DEXTER WARD by H.P. LOVECRAFT
Our lab-mix, Millie, has not tolerated the thunderstorms very Here in southeastern Pennsylvania we have endured, for the last week or so, and continue to endure almost daily rain and thunderstorms.
well. My computer table is rather small with a printer beneath and all the necessary plugs and cords. During one particularly violent storm Millie squeezed all of her 61 pounds under the table while I was working. I fear that if I decided to turn on the vacuum cleaner during one of these events I would surely send poor Millie over the edge.
These storms, however, provided the perfect atmosphere for my latest reading endeavor, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward by H.P. Lovecraft.
The background of a good thunderstorm forms the perfect atmosphere of a story full of the nameless and unspeakable.
Unlike most of Lovecraft’s writing efforts, primarily short stories, this work is a short novel, one of his longest works. The story begins with Joseph Curwen and follows his activities during the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Curwen is consumed with certain mystical activities involving obscure chemistry and strange chants. Charles Dexter Ward is his great-great-great-grandson and follows in his relatives footsteps.
I love Lovecraft’s stories and his style of writing. However, I think he would have some difficulty finding a publisher in today’s market. This effort is almost exclusively narrative. As usual, the atmosphere of the story is rich with the bazaar and implied bazaar, but he occasionally violates the writer’s rule of ‘show don’t tell’.
Yet, no matter how archaic his work may be, I still enjoy his stories a great deal.
ANOTHER CLASSIC NOVEL
Writer’s Digest once published a list of famous authors and the books they considered essential books in their lives. One book mentioned by a great deal of them was One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The English translation was first published in 1970. In 1982, Marquez was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
I felt an obligation to obtain this novel and recently finished reading it. It is both a haunting and haunted story. The one problem I had was the names and remembering which character was which, but Marquez provides a genealogy chart to help in this matter. The problem was that many of the names are very similar, but that confusion, on my part, was a small price to pay. This was a most excellent read. It’s one of those stories that is a little difficult to get into but once you’re there, you’re sorry when you’re finished.
It essentially follows a family that establishes a town in the Caribbean. The exact location is never revealed nor is the date. The story is populated by some characters that live well over a hundred years and by a healthy amount of ghosts. The book is full of both sorrow and humor. One common theme for most of the characters is no matter how many family members or friends they have, they experience a feeling of solitude in their lives.
I highly recommend giving this book a try.
A FATHER’S DAY POEM
The members of my writers group, The Wordwrights, were given an assignment to write a Father’s Day piece. I decided to write a poem.
The poem is bleak, but it reflects a trend I see.
I could be totally wrong. I hope I am.
THE FATHER THAT NEVER WAS
Contributing their seed,
They flee,
Gone.
Not knowing life was passed,
Never hearing the first cry
In the silent night,
Creating a hollow being,
Guidance from the streets
Of despair,
Walking a path
Into a world
Of dead ends,
Death, all too young
The only future.
A NEW APPRECIATION OF AN OLD STORY
For the last few months I’ve been doing a lot of reading and I’d like to share with you a book that I recently finished that I found to be a fantastic read.
I’ve been haunting the local Goodwill Store lately, picking up books and stumbled across a paperback written by Nikos Kazantzakis and first published in 1952. The title of the book was well-known to me but I had no idea of what the story involved. I should add that he is also the author of The Last Temptation of Christ. The title of the book I wish to discuss is his novel, Zorba the Greek.
Who has not heard of this book, yet again how many continue to read this work? If I hadn’t stumbled upon it I too would have remained ignorant of this fantastic story.
The story takes place in Crete. The two main characters are the narrator, whom I think is never named. He is bookish young man who comes to Crete with money, hoping to make more. He hires Zorba and together they start mining for coal.
The thrust of the book is the frequent talks about what life is about and the existence of God between a young man wrapped in words and not life and 65 year old Zorba who has experienced life to its fullest and is not ready to stop his search for love and his lust for life.
This is not meant to be a review but only to let you know that this is a most satisfying read and worth the trouble to seek out this book.
Michael Dirda, a book critic for the Washington Post, loves used book stores. He said in one of his books that you should try reading something written fifty years ago indicating that there are long forgotten treasures out there. I found one.
MY INTERNATIONAL READERS
I would like to do something I have meant to do for some time now. That is to thank the residents of the many nations that have visited my blog. In the past year my blog was viewed by 39 nations, granted of those 39, 21 were just a single visit. I don’t think I can use the term ‘global’ yet, but I appreciate your interest.
In the future I plan to post more regularly. I hope to share with you my current writing projects and completed novels I am trying to publish.
Take care my friends.
UPDATE REHAB
My consistent readers, 4/11/13
I’m home now and have been since last Saturday. I thought I’d share some of my thoughts while getting to the point that I could come home.
Once I left the hospital after my bout with a ruptured spleen, I was not able to go home so I entered a rehab facility. I would like to share some of my thoughts while experiencing this period of my recovery.
I was now a resident, temporarily, of Devon Manor, after falling and suffering six cracked ribs along with a lacerated spleen. The spleen was a big problem for I was on blood thinners when it began bleeding. I went to the rehab center after a ten-day hospital stay and was weak as a baby. I needed a walker to walk and breathing exercises to rebuild my lung capacity.
Once I made fun of walkers calling them ‘jungle jims’. Now that I was using one to get around during my recovery they were no longer a source of ridicule.
I went through a strange period when I first started rehab. We did our exercises in a large room with about four or five patients at a time each working with a physical therapist. As I looked around at my fellow patients I realized that, except for those with brain injuries, I was the youngest at 65. Later I would visit another gym where those in rehab were around my age or younger.
What started me thinking this way I do not know. But as I looked around at the patients working along side me, some extremely elderly and barely able to move, unable to do the simplest tasks, I wondered why rehab them at all? What were they going to rehab to?
But after much thought my heart softened and my mind opened. They were rehabbing back to the life they left no matter how limited that life may be. They were rehabbing back to their families, their children and grandchildren.
I’ve mellowed during my rehab experience. Perhaps it’s having your routine, your normal life; take away from you and trying desperately to get back to where you were. I now know it doesn’t matter how old you are or what that life was like – you want to return.
The care, the concern of the therapists at Devon Manor was highly professional. I owe them a great deal, especially, Lisa, the physical therapist who worked with me for most of my stay.
UPDATE RADIO INTERVIEW
My consistent readers,
I wanted to tell you that I have a radio interview this Sunday, 1/13/13, with the Writers and Readers Broadcast Network. I am excited about his and hope you get a chance to listen to me talk about my work. It will be at 1:00 pm MST.
I’ll let you know how it goes.
Here’s a link to the site.
SPACE; THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER
THE ULTIMATE ROAD TRIP
GO CURIOSITY
If you are interested in space science at all you are definitely aware of the landing of Curiosity on Mars. For the landing of this rover the artist’s concept appeared like something that might be the cover of a pulp science fiction publication.
AND IT WORKED.
With the platform, with thrusters firing, hovered over the Martian landscape and lowered Curiosity to a soft landing. Imagine that happening in your back yard, a craft coming from another planet.
As I assume you know by now, I write science fiction. My mind immediately engaged in the ‘what if mode.’ As a writer, it is your obligation to also be a reader. I am currently reading a novel, accelerando, by Charles Stross. It is a fantastic read and I encourage all science fiction readers to read it. The author deals with the advancement of post humans and The Singularity. The concepts in this novel are fantastic and I will talk about them in the future.
I also have another book, The Singularity Is Near, by Ray Kurzweil. This is a work of nonfiction and deals with the mating of computer technology and mankind. This is another book which I will discuss in the future.
But now to my ‘what if’ moment. I can imagine Mars covered with cells below the surface, ether one cell deep or millions deep, it doesn’t matter. What if Mars is one massive intelligence? If you read the books I have mentioned, you will gain a concept of post humans and The Singularity.
My readers, I hope this opens an appreciation of science and a desire to read science fiction.
A GREAT READ ABOUT HURRICANES
Isaac’s
Storm
by
Erik Larson
While the horror of Hurricane Sandy is still in our minds, I had a brother-in-law lose his home; I want to suggest an interesting read about a hurricane that was far more destructive. It may have not caused as much property damage, but the loss of life was unbelievable.
The subject of this book is a hurricane that occurred on September 8, 1900 and still remains the most deadly natural disaster experienced by this country.
Isaac Cline was the weatherman working in Galveston, Texas for the U.S. Weather Bureau, a relatively new organization. On the island of Cuba, members of the same organization were stationed, along with local weathermen. They knew a storm was coming from reports by ships in the Atlantic. The Cubans said the storm would enter the Gulf of Mexico. The Americans said that no hurricane had ever entered the Gulf, to their knowledge; the storm would make a 90º turn on journey up the eastern United States. Cline received no warning, and by the time he suspected a storm was about to impact Galveston, it was too late. The book states that over 6000 people lost their lives to this storm. A recent article in our local paper reviewing past hurricanes puts the death toll at between 8000 and12000.
For those who are interested with what life was like before we had technology to predict weather that we have now, I suggest you read this book.
