Friday Fictioneers: The Buzzard

Hi readers and writers,
Madison Woods, on her blog, challenges writers to come up with 100 word responses to a photo prompt each week in Friday Fictioneers.  Here is mine for this week.  I would love any constructive criticism or general reactions to this piece, as usual.  Cheers, Laura
                                                           
                                                               The Buzzard

Roger said, “C’mon, Susie.  They’re beautiful, how they soar up there with so little effort.  See how they go around in spirals to rise up so high?”

“I know, but they eat carrion.  Not birds of pleasure for me.  Never can see them without a shiver.  If one of us dies out here, they’ll get us, right?”

“In the Australian outback, people put dead bodies on a platform, giving them to the buzzards to eat.  It’s not wrong, it’s part of the whole schema…”

I got up and left.  I’ll just go for a run and let him sit under the tower.  

Friday Fictioneers: The Power of Adobe

Hi readers and writers,
I was cruising in Glacier Bay, Alaska last week, so I missed the usual Friday Fictioneers exercise.  But I'm back, and now I can't resist the photo prompt, so I will write it late.  If you enjoy reading the many, various ways people can approach the same stimulus as much as I do, go to Madison Woods' blog here and check out the responses.

To Friday Fictioneers who drop by later than late:  I'd appreciate any constructive criticism on my 100 word piece.  The photo is by Amanda Gray and is called "Outside Pecos."

The Power of Adobe
We barely survived, Ricky and me.  When I drank the last drop of water he shouted, "Lupe, no!"  We believed in the mirage of a tiny rectangle on the endless plains and we dragged ourselves here.  Behind the abandoned adobe hunkered a well with a pump.  Ricky jacked out water into his hat and we drank, laughed, poured it over our heads and down our backs.  And inside the house, the mud bricks sheltered us from the sun with their thick, earthy power.  But now, Ricky wants to go on.  Why can't we stay, make the power of the adobe our own?

Guest Post from Carolyn Howard-Johnson: I as a Conceit

Using "I" As a Conceit

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success

I don't know when I learned the word "conceited." I was raised in Utah where most of us didn't use "conceit" in the sense of an elaborate or strained metaphor but rather to mean that someone thought they were extra-super special. The little girl across the street who snubbed me because I didn't wear long stockings with garters (which was an immediate tipoff that I was not her kind) was "conceited" rather than prejudiced. The kid who was quick to make a point of how bright he was when I made a mistake was "conceited" rather than arrogant (or insecure). Gawd! I loved the word "conceited." I could apply it to so many situations and avoid learning new vocabulary words.

Of course, in a culture where being extra-super humble was valued, I soon noticed that our English language is, indeed, "conceited."

I'm speaking of the way we capitalize the pronoun "I." None of the other pronouns are capped. So what about this "I," standing tall no matter where you find it in a sentence?

Recently as I tutored students in accent reduction and American culture I noticed that some languages (like Japanese) seem to do quite well without pronouns of any sort. I did a little research. Some languages like Hebrew and Arabic don't capitalize any of their letters and some, like German, capitalize every darn noun. So, English—a Germanic language at its roots—just carried on the German proclivity for caps.

But the question remained. Why only the "I?" Why not "them" and "you" and all the others. Caroline Winter, a 2008 Fulbright scholar, says "England was where the capital "I" first reared its dotless head . . . .Apparently someone back then decided that just "i" after it had been diminished from the original Germanic 'ich' was not substantial enough to stand alone." It had to do with an artistic approach to fonts. The story goes that long ago in the days of handset type or even teletype machines little sticks and dots standing all alone looked like broken bits of lead or scrappy orphan letters.

Then there is the idea that religion played a part in capitalizing the "I." Rastafarians (and some others, too) think in terms of humankind as being one with God and therefore—one has to presume—it would be rather blasphemous not to capitalize "I" just as one does "God." Capitals, after all, are a way to honor a word or concept.

Which, of course, brings us back to the idea that we speakers of English are just plain "conceited."
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Carolyn Howard-Johnson is an instructor for UCLA Extension's world-renown Writers' Program, and author of the HowToDoItFrugally series of books for writers including The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success (www.budurl.com/TheFrugalEditor) and its companion booklet, Great Little Last-Minute Editing Tips for Writers: The Ultimate Frugal Booklet for Avoiding Word Trippers and Crafting Gatekeeper-Perfect Copy (www.budurl.com/WordTrippersPB) .She is also celebrateing the New! Expanded! And now USA Book News award-winning! Frugal Book Promoter! http://budurl.com/FrugalBkPromo) The former is a USA Book News award-winner as well as the winner of the Reader View's Literary Award and a finalist in the New Generation Book Awards. She is the recipient of both the California Legislature's Woman of the Year in Arts and Entertainment Award and is a popular speaker and actor. Her website is www.HowToDoItFrugally.com. And she blogs about everything from wordiness to style choice at www.TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com.

Friday Fictioneers: Red Berries

Hi readers and writers,
This week I am getting ready to go on an Inside Passage cruise next week, so I'm ahead of schedule. Next week I'll be away and I may not be able to post, but this week I want to participate in Madison Woods' Friday Fictioneers 100 word challenge.  If you'd like to try it, check out Madison's blog instructions here. 

Red Berries

"Don't touch those, they're poisonous," Donna hissed at me.
"Silly, they're raspberries," I replied, snickering.  I ate one while she stared at me wide-eyed.
We walked on, and I saw her sneaking a glance at me every so often, expecting me to keel over and drop dead.  Finally she asked, "How do you know they're raspberries?"
I enumerated on my fingers, "Shape, size, three leaflets per leaf, thorns, juicy when red (blackberries aren't you know.)"
"Show off," she said, flouncing off down the hill.
She asked for it, didn't she?  I will never understand girls.

Development

Hi readers and writers,

Madison-woods.com has a new photo prompt up for Friday Fictioneers today, with 100 word responses due Friday. Do join if you like to write flash fiction; go to her blog for more info. Since I'm flying out Friday, I am jumping the gun and posting early this time.  I had written three 100 word pieces for the three Fridays before, each seeming to fit into the same story of perfidy, spying, and conflict.  But this week, the prompt took me in a different direction.  Would you consider being in an insect's brain science fiction?  Here goes:

Development

It feels tight under this rock. I’ve been here a long time.  I need to move around.  It’s hard.  I’ll rest a while.  Ahh.  Okay, now I can move more.  Yes!  The house is open, I feel the universe pulsing, smell flowers and rotting stems, fish, more.   If I wiggle really hard, I can explore. Now I’m outside.  I was in that broken box, how strange.  But look at this long green leaf above my rock.  If I let go, I can float up there and explore.  It’s so beautiful.  A suction, oops, it’s a huge mouth.  Good bye.

To Outline or Not to Outline

Dear readers and writers,

There's a never-ending argument among writers about outlining, with passionate advocates on both sides.  One of my writer friends posted recently about how important an outline can be to connections, to underlying themes, to making sure no balls are dropped.  My thought is this: If you can do it, yes, it can do all those things.  I'm in the no-outline camp for my own writing.  I have nothing against those who can do it.  But when I outline, my writing resembles a sixth grade essay, not the kind of subtle, interesting prose I would enjoy reading myself.  I need the element of surprise in drafting the fictional story to keep my interest high.  Once I've constrained the spirits with an outline, the life has drained out of it and I can't write it any more.
So does that mean my fiction is un-connected, without persistent themes, and full of disconnected dropped balls that beg for catches and resolutions?  Yes, in my SFD (refer to Anne Lamott for translation of first draft epithet).  But that's okay, because during revision (which is really re-visioning the whole for me) I can rearrange, cut, add, stream in thematic references, and find and fix the dropped balls.  That is a very different job for me than the writing itself.  I suppose it is a lot less important and intrusive for the outliners, but I love the way it feels like working a jigsaw puzzle.  I have all these pieces.  How am I going to optimally fit them together into a complete story?  Looking at the box is OK, but so is correcting the box.  Some of my no-outline friends refer to this method as post-outlining.  I must say it has things in common, but I do most of it in my head by reading and thinking, rather than making that outline on paper.
But whatever you do, the important thing is to connect the dots at some point during the process.  Your payoff with an outline is efficiency.  My payoff without is suspense (for me) and freshness (for readers).  I think I also probe deeply into my characters in places where the story might not finally have to go, but where the depths enrich the development of that character.  So while I cut out a lot, those pieces have contributed to the background in important ways.
Enjoy writing!
Cheers, Laura

Friday Fictioneers--Woods of Danger

Hi readers and writers,

Madison Woods has given us a really idyllic photo of a path in the woods this week.  100 words about this might put me to sleep.  I don't know if it's good or bad, but I seem to have a group of characters in play for the fictioneers, and they want to have a military adventure in the quiet woods.  Okay.
cheers,
Laura

                                         Woods of Danger 

Five Bendizi warriors stood on the path, then they disappeared.  Cosima and Alex darted left, Miriam, Hector, and Wulfram IV dashed right. Cosima and Alex took refuge in thick brush. The others clambered high among the branches.  Tramping feet thundered louder.  The path teemed with armed changlits, marching fast, looking neither right nor left.  After they passed, the Bendizis  saw Brin and Rouxlan’s close advisor, Sevrin, cruising along the trail in an all-terrain vehicle.  Cosima feared the outcome of their conflict, now that Brin was against them.  If only the balloon had landed closer to Bendiz.