How-to, again

The first book on writing craft I encountered was Writing for Story by Jon Franklin, a gift from a good friend and writing colleague Lisa Westberg Peters way back when we were both newly published. Lisa's moved on from writing children's books and is now in school again and also blogging about her SE Minneapolis neighborhood. I'm still struggling with writing novels, however, and yesterday I pulled the Franklin book off the shelf.

Still a lot of gems in the yellowed pages, albeit arguable ones: "All of literature, in short, can be divided into two parts. Focuses are one thing. Transitions are quite another," or, "... there are three kinds of narrative, transitional, preparatory, and climactic."

And in case you don't immediately know what the heck he means, well, neither did I and I've read the book a couple of times. Yet, after some mulling and reading, it sinks in and makes sense.

Students in the Hamline program know I love talking and thinking about structure. I'd not looked at the Franklin book in years--over a decade, I bet--but I'm amused now to see how much he emphasizes structure. Evidently this first encounter with a writing book left a strong imprint.

The Wisdom of Short Track

I was trying to put together a post yesterday, but my boy woke up coughing at 4:30, I burned myself on the fireplace and impaled myself on my cat's tooth. Sometimes, it's better to keep to yourself.

Ron asks about our ambition in the post below. I've certainly had many works Karl me--When You Reach Me was the latest, and perhaps the most devastating. Speak is another. Holes. The Wednesday Wars. Robin McKinley's Spindle's End. My work is not the Karl-ing sort, I don't think. But sometimes when I close a book I am filled with the need to write, to add to the well of stories that produced this one. I would love to leave people with that feeling.

I've been watching the Olympics rather obsessively. Short track skater Apolo Ono--geriatric at 27, apparently--decided to come back this time for one more hurrah. He had to get himself in mental and physical shape again after long revels with Bacchus (and reality TV), and he said when he was training he asked himself every day, "Did I do everything I could do today to be the best?"

So I'm thinking about that. About the things I can do to be better. About good work, and the good things it produces. All that leads me to the inevitable conclusion that I need to do exercises in poetry. I'm no good at poetry. I don't have the patience or precision. But I have a book--In the Palm of Your Hands. It has exercises. It looms on my shelf. I eye it warily, like an unpaid bill.

"Did I do everything I could do today to be my best?" It's hard--there are sick toddlers to care for and calls to the insurance company to be made and taxes to procrastinate doing. But I'm thinking it's time to crack open that book.

On another note, back to first sentences, Kate Coombs at Book Aunt has a post on MT Anderson's.

Rules

Lately I've been doing a lot of talking on the subject of writing (as the invited guest at some function, mind you, not just on a corner with a bullhorn). The well goes dry after too much of this, and with more such gigs coming up on my calendar, I've been turning to the How To Write section in my library, 808 on the Dewey Decimal dial. I've lugged a lot of books back and forth. One book that's gotten renewed, however, is an entertaining little collection of short essays that I recommend: Rules of Thumb; 73 authors reveal their fiction writing fixations (edited by Michael Martone and Susan Neville).

Many of the essayist claim to eschew all rules; indeed, a number have a fixation on "no rules." This is not a how-to book in the typical sense; but there is plenty to take away. I especially loved one nugget from a favorite writer of mine, Lydia Davis (profiled this week in The New Yorker, BTW): "A comma or lack of it can be so eloquent."

Crafty Books

John Gardner. There, now that his name has been mentioned I guess The Storyteller's Inkpot qualifies as a forum for the discussion of writing. Today I was rereading some chapters in his The Art of Fiction as I prepared a presentation, and I was reminded that I don't exactly love the book. One's affection for these sorts of books ebbs and flows, I suspect. I'm curious as to what "how-to" books on craft my colleagues here are currently recommending to students. Anything newer than Janet Burroway, Robert Olen Butler or Gardner?