A NAME SHOULD FIT THE AGE

Oops. I said on Monday that I would continue the series on naming characters on Tuesday, specifically how to make the name fit the character, but I forgot and posted a review of Karin Fossum’s Eva’s Eye instead. I hope you did not misname a character while my brain and half-baked ideas were absent to guide you.

Sometimes I go to restaurants where they ask for your name so that they can call it out when your food is finally ready. “John” is a good name for someone who is old and bald and white-bearded and extremely good looking. I do not tell the child behind the counter that my name is John, though, because when they call that out later, half the old men in the place will jump up and try to get my food. A long time ago, John was a cool name, so that’s how all the cool babies were called. Now it’s a “forever” name, in that every generation will have some babies named John, but it’s not a cool or trendy name. It’s mostly an “old” name, so it fits characters like I. [“I” doesn’t sound right, but I think it is a predicate nominative, isn’t it?]

To protect my food from predator Johns, I give a different name to myself for the occasion, a name to the kid behind the counter, a name no one else will have. No one would believe me if I say my name is Dustin or Trent. Also there may well be Dustins and Trents there waiting for food. I need a name no one else has. So I tell the kid behind the counter, who is wearing a name tag that says Dustin or Kristel, that my name is Ambrose or Oscar. There is hardly ever another one of those in the place.

One day I forgot what I wanted to be called and told the college girl [Yes, I know she’s a woman, but at my age, she’s also a girl.] to give me a name. She immediately said “Rumpelstiltskin.” She enjoyed it so much that she kept bringing me free food so that she could sing out as she came to my table, “You forgot something, Rumpelstiltskin.” She thought that was an appropriate naming of my character. Or else she was a kit lit or folklore major, which explains why she is working in a restaurant.

A character’s name needs to fit the age. If I tell you a character is: Beulah, Betty, Barbara, Bo, Belle, Becca, you can probably follow right down the age range, from 90 to 15.

In addition, if a character is major, she needs a memorable name. When I wrote a book for my granddaughter in her senior year of high school, I chose Bronwyn for the heroine. It’s different, memorable, and cool. If she is an ancillary character, give her a name that does not compete with the main character, something nice but common, like Mary or Brunhilde. OK, maybe not Brunhilde…

Oops, too many words for a “high concept” blog. More tomorrow.

John Robert McFarland

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

Well, “tomorrow” is a moving target at the moment. Sometimes you are short on time and internet connections, which may be true for me the next four or six days. I try to post here every day, for personal discipline and sanity and enjoyment. Also, I think that if you are kind enough to come by on any day, looking for something new, there should be something new. Feel free to come back by any day; there may be something new, if I have time and internet. If I don’t, I look forward to that “tomorrow” when we can share a few minutes.

I tweet as yooper1721.

I hope you never need a cancer book, but if you know someone with cancer, you might give them a copy of NOW THAT I HAVE CANCER I AM WHOLE. Paul K. Hamilton, MD, the co-founder of CanSurmount, called it “The best book for cancer patients, by a cancer patient, ever.”

EVA'S EYE--a review

Kate Atkinson and Karin Fossum are similar writers, similarly excellent writers, each from a north land, each with a similar detective, who, like every other crime novel detective is middle-aged, divorced or widowed, single but looking, jaded but still trying. Both Atkinson and Fossum are intrigued by how one event leads to another, but Atkinson wants to see how one event leads to another in action. Fossum wants to see what happens inside the character’s brain as one event follows another. Atkinson looks outside; Fossum looks with the inward eye, in this case, Eva’s Eye.

Eva’s eye has so many dimensions. She is a painter, with a unique way of trying to find light in darkness. She is also able to see many possibilities, how Michio Koku describes human identity, “the ability to simulate the future,” an ability animals lack. Eva definitely does not lack it. She sees so many possible futures, for her daughter, for her father, for her friend, for her self, for revenge.

This is the first of Fossum’s Inspector Sejer novels. Apparently daughter Mary Beth read my many whines about always receiving the 2^nd in a series before the first when I receive a gift book, and so she went clear back to 1995 to get the first in this series, although I would not have been able to read it until 2002, because that is when James Anderson translated it from Norwegian.

I don’t ready many Norwegian crime writers, although if we lump Scandinavians together, as Americans tend to do, we could include Sweden’s late Steig Larrson, [The Lisbeth Salendar Girl With the Dragon Tattoo series], because there aren’t many, to my knowledge, besides Jo Nesbo, and yes, I write these convoluted sentences so that your brain will be exercised so well you won’t get dementia in old age. Nesbo is excellent, but dark. I like Fossum better. She’s certainly not “light,” but like Eva as she paints, Fossum thinks there is light that is worth looking for.

It’s tricky to read a translation. If you are confused, you’re not sure if it’s because of the author or the translator. I suspect translator James Anderson is British, for at more than one point the characters use the word “shan’t.”

It’s always a little harder to follow a foreign work. Unless you have been there, you don’t know the layout, and you don’t know how much a kroner is. When someone pays a thousand kroner for something, is that a lot, or is it like Italian lire?

That’s part of the fun of reading a foreign author, though. You get to be some place different, have to figure out how much a kroner is worth or if a Figueroa is a small or large car.

One of the confusing aspects of writing/translation in this book is the concept of size. Everyone keeps referring to the setting as a “small” town, but at one point the detective figures a trip to see a witness will take him 30 minutes. In my thinking, it will never take that long to get somewhere in a “small” town.

Inspector Slejus is appealing, but actually a minor character in this novel. Yes, it’s his series, and he solves the crime, but this book is really about Eva, and her eye. Note to daughters: I look forward to getting to know Slejus better in subsequent novels.

Eva’s Eye is a really good read.

John Robert McFarland

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

This started as an author blog, but writing guru Kristen Lamb says author blogs are counter-productive, that blogs need to be “high concept.” I have no idea what that means, but this blog is now high concept.

Daughter Katie Kennedy’s Learning to Swear in America will be published by J. K. Rowling’s publisher, Bloomsbury Press, in 2015.

My novel, VETS, about four handicapped and homeless Iraqistan veterans who are accused of murdering a VA doctor, will be published by Black Opal Books in 2015.

I tweet as yooper1721.

I also write Christ in Winter: Reflections on Faith from a Place of Winter for the Years of Winter. http://christinwinter.blogspot.com/

HOW TO NAME CHARACTERS 2

Yesterday, in response to Black Opal Books’ question on FB as to how we name characters, I told how I remember the names of my characters as I write. Today, how do we help our readers remember which character is which?

I don’t know how Alistair Maclean ever remembered the names of his characters himself. I certainly couldn’t tell one from another. He named them all alike. The men were always Henderson, Peterson, Swanson, Johnson, et al son. Maclean was a fabulous story-teller, especially his WWII novels, like The Guns of Navarone and Where Eagles Dare. I could never keep the guys straight, though, unless I read Maclean in German, like Angst ist Der Schlussel, which I did to try to improve my German. I was so busy struggling with the Deutsch that I didn’t care which son was which. Mein Deutsch is sehr schrelich.

Maclean’s women were even worse. He named every one of them, in every book, Mary. [In all fairness, I do think he had a Marian once.] In one book he even named a Mary and a Mary 2, and blamed it on the characters. According to Maclean, since they were both Mary, Nelson and Henderson and Johnson and Gunderson dubbed them Mary and Mary 2, as though Maclean had nothing to do with naming them both Mary in the first place.

The key to helping the reader is to identify each character, regularly, by something other than name alone. That’s especially true if a character has not showed up for a few pages. Rather than just Chuck Shaw, or Shaw, say: “County Sheriff Shaw,” or “Sheriff Shaw,” or just “The Sheriff.” His position, profession, tells the reader more than his name does, especially if he is “fifth business.” [1]

Sometimes physical description helps the reader. “Beulah, the woman with three eyes,” or just “the woman with three eyes” reminds the reader quickly just who you’re talking about.

Tomorrow, making the name fit the character, so that the reader has a better chance of identifying the character even without a job category or physical description.

John Robert McFarland

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

1] A phrase used mostly in play writing. There is the hero, the sidekick, the woman, and her best friend. Everyone else is “fifth business.”

Daughter Katie Kennedy’s Learning to Swear in America will be published by J. K. Rowling’s publisher, Bloomsbury Press, in 2016.

Author guru Kristen Lamb says that author blogs are counter-productive, that a blog must be “high concept.” I have no idea what that means, but just forget about JUST WORDS being an author blog and consider it ‘high concept.”

My novel, VETS, about four handicapped and homeless Iraqistan veterans who are accused of murdering a VA doctor, will be published by Black Opal Books in 2015.

I tweet as yooper1721.

I also write Christ in Winter: Reflections on Faith from a Place of Winter for the Years of Winter. http://christinwinter.blogspot.com/

MY OTHER BOOKS:

NOW THAT I HAVE CANCER I AM WHOLE: Reflections on Life and Healing for Cancer Patients and Those Who Love Them [AndrewsMcMeel & HarperAudio, with Czech and Japanese translations] Paul K. Hamilton, MD, the co-founder of CanSurmount, called it “The best book for cancer patients, by a cancer patient, ever.”

AN ORDINARY MAN [HarperPaperbacks] Randall MacLane just wanted to be an ordinary man. But sent with a message for Custer, he became a drifting lawman with a knack for killing, and a deep well of loneliness. Then a twist of fate brought him full circle…

THE STRANGE CALLING: Stories of Ministry [Smyth&Helwys] I didn’t want to be a preacher, but I made a deal with God to save my sister’s life. Was that really a “call,” though? I said, “I’ll try t for 50 years, and if I still don’t know, I’ll do something else.” These are stories of what happened in those years of questioning the call.

WHEN FATHER RODE THE MAIL and Other Stories of Christmas [lulu.com] ISBN 978-1-300-38566-0

If you like baseball poetry, take a look at “Frosty & the Babe” http://www.baseball-almanac.com/poetry/frosty_and_the_babe.shtml

REMEMBERING WHAT I NAMED A CHARACTER

Black Opal Books recently asked on Facebook how we go about naming characters.

There is a lot that goes into naming, starting with remembering which character has which name as you write.

I may rename a character later, but when shehe first arrives in the story, I use the initials of hisher role in the story for the name.

The physics professor is Paul Powell, county sheriff is Charlene Sellers, funeral director is Fred Davis, and so on.

I try to allow for age and ethnicity in those names. For instance, an Italian funeral director would be Franco De Fiore. That is not important in the beginning, though. I don’t want to slow down the writing by contemplating too hard on a name. When a funeral director suddenly shows up, I take the FD initials that come readily to mind. After all, the point of this initial naming is for ME to remember who is whom.

It’s easy enough to remember your main characters, but the lesser ones can be a problem. You don’t want to just guess and end up with more than one name for the same character, nor do you want to take the time to look it up in your index. The initials approach makes it easy to remember that the Spanish teacher is Serena Toscano. Of course, if you don’t normally use Spanish names, and thus Serena Toscano is really not easily conjured up, it’s perfectly okay to name her Sue Taylor. She still has the initials of Spanish Teacher.

More tomorrow.

John Robert McFarland

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

Daughter Katie Kennedy’s Learning to Swear in America will be published by J. K. Rowling’s publisher, Bloomsbury Press, in 2016.

Author guru Kristen Lamb says that author blogs are counter-productive, that a blog must be “high concept.” I have no idea what that means, but just forget about JUST WORDS being an author blog and consider it ‘high concept.”

My novel, VETS, about four handicapped and homeless Iraqistan veterans who are accused of murdering a VA doctor, will be published by Black Opal Books in 2015.

I tweet as yooper1721.

I also write Christ in Winter: Reflections on Faith from a Place of Winter for the Years of Winter. http://christinwinter.blogspot.com/

SLASHLINE

I read a lot of sports stuff. One reason is because sports writers tend to be really, really good writers… Bob Hammel, Frank Deford, Gary Smith, Mitch Albom, Rick Reilly, Jim Murray, John Skipper, Dave Revsine…

Also, I like sports. A lot. It’s a sickness. I don’t bet. I don’t do fantasy leagues. I’m always for the underdog, except on those rare occasions when the IU football team or the Cincinnati Reds are considered the favorites. My love of sports has no redeeming value. I do not think of sports as metaphors for life, or as training for other realms. I just like sports.

Also, I like new words. Sports writers try never to use a conventional word when they can find or invent a more “interesting” one. A basketball is a rock, or a globe, or an orb. A pitcher is a hurler. A home run or a touchdown is “taking it to the house” or “taking it downtown.”

I have read so much in sports, however, for so long, that I am always surprised when a new word appears in my reading. Should I not know all these words already? No, that’s the fun of it.

So it is with the “slashline” in baseball. For instance, Joey Votto’s 2009 slashline is 322/25/84, .322 batting average, 25 home runs, 84 RBIs [runs batted in]. I have seen those slashlines ever since I started reading the sports pages, but I have never heard them called that before. “Slashline” communicated immediately, though, as soon as I read it, because I’m familiar with the genre.

How should we use new phrases in writing, though, understanding that not every reader is up to date or familiar with the peculiar argot of the?

I read a lot of quantum physics and brain research. I’m not a scholar in either field. I have no background. So I can tell quickly which authors are trying to write for novices like myself, as well as readers more conversant in the field, by how they illuminate and illustrate the new terms as they arise.

It’s important, even as a fiction writer, to write for the novice, the new reader, as well as for the readers who are familiar with the ways of Miss Marple and her ilk.

John Robert McFarland

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

Daughter Katie Kennedy’s Learning to Swear in America will be published by J. K. Rowling’s publisher, Bloomsbury Press, in 2016.

Author guru Kristen Lamb says that author blogs are counter-productive, that a blog must be “high concept.” I have no idea what that means, but just forget about JUST WORDS being an author blog and consider it ‘high concept.”

My novel, VETS, about four handicapped and homeless Iraqistan veterans who are accused of murdering a VA doctor, will be published by Black Opal Books in 2015.

I tweet as yooper1721.

I also write Christ in Winter: Reflections on Faith from a Place of Winter for the Years of Winter. http://christinwinter.blogspot.com/

MY OTHER BOOKS:

NOW THAT I HAVE CANCER I AM WHOLE: Reflections on Life and Healing for Cancer Patients and Those Who Love Them [AndrewsMcMeel & HarperAudio, with Czech and Japanese translations] Paul K. Hamilton, MD, the co-founder of CanSurmount, called it “The best book for cancer patients, by a cancer patient, ever.”

AN ORDINARY MAN [HarperPaperbacks] Randall MacLane just wanted to be an ordinary man. But sent with a message for Custer, he became a drifting lawman with a knack for killing, and a deep well of loneliness. Then a twist of fate brought him full circle…

THE STRANGE CALLING: Stories of Ministry [Smyth&Helwys] I didn’t want to be a preacher, but I made a deal with God to save my sister’s life. Was that really a “call,” though? I said, “I’ll try t for 50 years, and if I still don’t know, I’ll do something else.” These are stories of what happened in those years of questioning the call.

WHEN FATHER RODE THE MAIL and Other Stories of Christmas [lulu.com] ISBN 978-1-300-38566-0

If you like baseball poetry, take a look at “Frosty & the Babe” http://www.baseball-almanac.com/poetry/frosty_and_the_babe.shtml

The Opening Kickoff-a review

I often tell young people that if they want to learn how to write, read the sports writers, Bob Hammel [who mentored Michael Koryta] and Frank Deford and Gary Smith, and now Dave Revsine.

I usually mean it for fiction writing. Not that sports writers make stuff up, but they have to learn to tell stories in such a way that folks who already know the score still want to read about the game.

However, in the case of Revsine’s THE OPENING KICKOFF: The Tumultuous Birth of a Football Nation, [Lyons Press, 2014] I mean “write like a sports writer” for history, too. He makes me think of Bruce Catton or Shelby Foote writing on the Civil War, not like “history,” with all the dustiness that word induces, but as though it’s a really good novel. Revsine is simply a good story-teller.

Revsine uses so well the story of Pat O’Dea, the famous-then but forgotten-now U of WI kicker, as the red thread that runs through the book.

Revsine’s main historical conclusion is that all the ills that beset modern college football were there almost from the beginning.

Revsine writes just as he talks, as the chief studio anchor on the Big Ten Network, calmly, personally, thoughtfully, and reflectively—every word just the right choice, every word in just the right place. [Anyone who can keep Gary Dinardo and Howard Griffith under control, or almost so, is obviously a personage of considerable gifts.]

This story needed to be about more than O’Dea, so it’s not just a biography. Revisine rightly felt, though, the need to complete the story of O’Dea, beyond his college football years, so the book ends with the longest epilogue in the history of publication. I’m not complaining; the rest of the O’Dea tale is a good story, well told.

If you like football, or college, or history, or just good writing, you can’t go wrong with THE OPENING KICKOFF.

John Robert McFarland

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

Daughter Katie Kennedy’s Learning to Swear in America will be published by J. K. Rowling’s publisher, Bloomsbury Press, in 2015.

My novel, VETS, about four handicapped and homeless Iraqistan veterans who are accused of murdering a VA doctor, will be published by Black Opal Books in 2015.

I tweet as yooper1721.

I also write Christ in Winter: Reflections on Faith from a Place of Winter for the Years of Winter. http://christinwinter.blogspot.com/

Since this is a review of a sports book, I’ll suggest that you take a look at “Frosty & the Babe” http://www.baseball-almanac.com/poetry/frosty_and_the_babe.shtml

THE VANISHING PAST

The past has vanished.

No, I’m not talking about history. It’s the past tense that has vanished.

“The past, present, and future walk into a bar. It was tense.”

Can’t tell that joke anymore, because the past tense no longer exists.

Have you noticed on TV, etc that no one uses the past tense anymore? It’s all present.

Putting a past event into present tense used to be an effective dramatic device. No longer, since it is used all the time, for every past event, including football games and court trials that were twenty years ago.

Then Moses sees this burning bush, and he says, “Hey, this is different.” And I notice that he’s taking his shoes off, so I take mine off, and we go…”

Yes, present tense is dramatic. But, you know, the past tense is there for a reason. So is future tense. They help to clarify. At least, they used to…

John Robert McFarland

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

Daughter Katie Kennedy’s Learning to Swear in America will be published by J. K. Rowling’s publisher, Bloomsbury Press, in 2016.

Author guru Kristen Lamb says that author blogs are counter-productive, that a blog must be “high concept.” I have no idea what that means, but just forget about JUST WORDS being an author blog and consider it ‘high concept.”

My novel, VETS, about four handicapped and homeless Iraqistan veterans who are accused of murdering a VA doctor, will be published by Black Opal Books in 2015.

I tweet as yooper1721.

I also write Christ in Winter: Reflections on Faith from a Place of Winter for the Years of Winter. http://christinwinter.blogspot.com/