Writerly Ways: the cows are like dogs version
So this was the final day of my 3 festivals in 3 days (my knee is now suing for divorce) It was the Bob Evans Farm Festival. For those who don't know my university now owns Bob Evans farm (the actual farm, not the restaurant chain, we should be so lucky) This festival is a huge deal but on the other hand it doesn't change much from year to year. I go in, overpay for things I can get anywhere and maybe buy some crafts. So yes, I have maple sugar cotton candy (I'm not taking notes on this. I get it once a year and I'm well aware it's bad for me), my local honey that'll last me 2 months and pulled my arm out of its socket lugging it around the fest.
I got some jerky and lunch was 10 mini donuts (see above note) some aphrocheesiac cheese and another piece of glass for mom. I saw a cool lamp made of an antique meatgrinder and a colander and thought I can do this. I got some of my favorite coffee and an apple cider slushie (that was 90% iced cider and not a slushie) I got into an argument with the bean men. They cook ham/bean soup in iron cauldrons over fire. It's yummy. They would NOT hold my beans (which they usually do) because it was after 12. I'm like you're here to 5 pm what the hell does it matter? Keep the beans. I am NOT lugging a gallon of fucking beans thru this fest and my car is parked in timbuktu. I don't need the gas that bad.
One of the new things I found was delicious jam (blueberry cardamon) but I wasn't into spending 10$ on a small jar of jam that a) i could make b) can't technically eat. But it was very good and they had Highland cattle which was new. Also new alfalfa pellets so we could feed the longhorn cattle. They have soft tongues and just like a dog, you can be there with a handful of treats and all they want is the one you dropped and it bounced somewhere they can't find. Also got poked in the shoulder by said longhorn (not hard but man these boys could do some damage)
So what does this have to do with my writerly ways? Not much but in these three festivals I've seen a lot of t-shirts and what not and thought, you know this is one way to help define a character. I used it in
These Haunted Hills as a running joke really but it very much helped to show Josh's personality and his interests (I've done this in other stories and lots of fanfic) I just think it's a fun way to do some characterization. For Josh he wore a red shirt reading Expendable, one that had a surly Batman holding a cup of coffee and the saying “Not a morning person.” a T-shirt with a dragon sitting on a hoard of books with the words “book wyrm” on it and his T-shirt that read In My Defense I Was Left Unsupervised. Does that help you get an idea of what Josh is like?
As for me yesterday I had a shirt saying I'm Not Yelling I'm Italian (which went over well) and today's was I myself am Strange and Unusual (and if you got the movie reference you're my people). People could tell things about me.
On the flip side you can see negatives in this too, like the lady in the restaurant parking lot with the t-shirt reading the sun is high and so am I or the guy in the pick up truck at Wal-Mart yesterday with a bumper sticker reading four doors means room for more whores. Whether or not my instant assessment of these people was accurate I assure you it was made based on that.
I've had editors who really liked this technique and one who hated it (but I think he hated me or genre fic or something but he was the only editor I ever complained to the publisher about because he called this stupid and he wanted major revisions (which this was a third edit which is only usually line edit stuff not a full on rewrite) and some of it was straight out personal attacks (I did get an apology from the head editor)
OPEN CALL
5 Paying Literary Magazines to Submit to in October 2024
Spring in the City Dark Speculative Fiction that takes place in a city
Loki
Untitled Cosmic Horror Anthology
From Around the web
Marketing Planning For First-Time Authors
How To Get Book Reviews
10 Important Parts of a Book for First-Time Authors
Kristin Owens: Five Things I (Painfully) Learned While Writing Elizabeth Sails
The Importance of Trope Awareness
Capture Readers with the Magic of Interactive Fiction
Don’t Tell Authors You Hate Their Work
The Climax (Secrets of Story Structure, Pt. 11 of 12)
From Betty
Eight Dos and Don’ts for Making Magic Interesting
Five Ways to Cultivate a Viewpoint Character’s Personality
Five Common Harmful Representations of Disability
Five Tips for Taking Your Dialogue to the Next Level
Do Background Injustices Need to Be Addressed?
What's Your Character's "WHY"?
Lessons in Business Cards and Bookmarks
Character Secret Thesaurus Entry: An Undisclosed Bias
Misconceptions about finding your ideal readers
Writing Terror into Your Horror
Three of the Most Important Things for New Writers to Know
CoWriting Rules to Make Writing with Others Easier
I got some jerky and lunch was 10 mini donuts (see above note) some aphrocheesiac cheese and another piece of glass for mom. I saw a cool lamp made of an antique meatgrinder and a colander and thought I can do this. I got some of my favorite coffee and an apple cider slushie (that was 90% iced cider and not a slushie) I got into an argument with the bean men. They cook ham/bean soup in iron cauldrons over fire. It's yummy. They would NOT hold my beans (which they usually do) because it was after 12. I'm like you're here to 5 pm what the hell does it matter? Keep the beans. I am NOT lugging a gallon of fucking beans thru this fest and my car is parked in timbuktu. I don't need the gas that bad.
One of the new things I found was delicious jam (blueberry cardamon) but I wasn't into spending 10$ on a small jar of jam that a) i could make b) can't technically eat. But it was very good and they had Highland cattle which was new. Also new alfalfa pellets so we could feed the longhorn cattle. They have soft tongues and just like a dog, you can be there with a handful of treats and all they want is the one you dropped and it bounced somewhere they can't find. Also got poked in the shoulder by said longhorn (not hard but man these boys could do some damage)
So what does this have to do with my writerly ways? Not much but in these three festivals I've seen a lot of t-shirts and what not and thought, you know this is one way to help define a character. I used it in
These Haunted Hills as a running joke really but it very much helped to show Josh's personality and his interests (I've done this in other stories and lots of fanfic) I just think it's a fun way to do some characterization. For Josh he wore a red shirt reading Expendable, one that had a surly Batman holding a cup of coffee and the saying “Not a morning person.” a T-shirt with a dragon sitting on a hoard of books with the words “book wyrm” on it and his T-shirt that read In My Defense I Was Left Unsupervised. Does that help you get an idea of what Josh is like?
As for me yesterday I had a shirt saying I'm Not Yelling I'm Italian (which went over well) and today's was I myself am Strange and Unusual (and if you got the movie reference you're my people). People could tell things about me.
On the flip side you can see negatives in this too, like the lady in the restaurant parking lot with the t-shirt reading the sun is high and so am I or the guy in the pick up truck at Wal-Mart yesterday with a bumper sticker reading four doors means room for more whores. Whether or not my instant assessment of these people was accurate I assure you it was made based on that.
I've had editors who really liked this technique and one who hated it (but I think he hated me or genre fic or something but he was the only editor I ever complained to the publisher about because he called this stupid and he wanted major revisions (which this was a third edit which is only usually line edit stuff not a full on rewrite) and some of it was straight out personal attacks (I did get an apology from the head editor)
OPEN CALL
5 Paying Literary Magazines to Submit to in October 2024
Spring in the City Dark Speculative Fiction that takes place in a city
Loki
Untitled Cosmic Horror Anthology
From Around the web
Marketing Planning For First-Time Authors
How To Get Book Reviews
10 Important Parts of a Book for First-Time Authors
Kristin Owens: Five Things I (Painfully) Learned While Writing Elizabeth Sails
The Importance of Trope Awareness
Capture Readers with the Magic of Interactive Fiction
Don’t Tell Authors You Hate Their Work
The Climax (Secrets of Story Structure, Pt. 11 of 12)
From Betty
Eight Dos and Don’ts for Making Magic Interesting
Five Ways to Cultivate a Viewpoint Character’s Personality
Five Common Harmful Representations of Disability
Five Tips for Taking Your Dialogue to the Next Level
Do Background Injustices Need to Be Addressed?
What's Your Character's "WHY"?
Lessons in Business Cards and Bookmarks
Character Secret Thesaurus Entry: An Undisclosed Bias
Misconceptions about finding your ideal readers
Writing Terror into Your Horror
Three of the Most Important Things for New Writers to Know
CoWriting Rules to Make Writing with Others Easier