In 2008, I discovered how
little I knew about writing after hearing children’s writer, Lin Oliver speak
at a convention hosted by the Minnesota Society of Children’s Book Writers and
Illustrators. To learn more – and to satisfy my natural tendency to “teach
stuff”, I started a series of essays taking the wisdom of published
writers and then applying each “nugget of wisdom” to my own writing. During the
six years that followed, I used the advice of a number of published writers (with their permission) and then applied
the writing wisdom of Lin Oliver, Jack McDevitt, Nathan Bransford, Mike Duran,
Kristine Kathryn Rusch, SL Veihl, Bruce Bethke, and Julie Czerneda to an
analysis of my own writing. Together these people write in genres broad and
deep, and have acted as agents, editors, publishers, columnists, and teachers.
Today I add to that list, Lisa Cron who has worked as a literary
agent, TV producer, and story consultant for Warner Brothers, the William
Morris Agency, and others. She is a frequent speaker at writers’ conferences,
and a story coach for writers, educators, and journalists. Again, I am using
her article, “A Reader’s Manifesto: 15
Hardwired Expectations Every Reader Has for Every Story” (2/16/18 http://blog.creativelive.com/essential-storytelling-techniques/)
2. The reader expects the story to revolve
around one, single plot problem that grows, escalates and complicates, which
the protagonist has no choice but to deal with…The plot problem is constructed
to force the protagonist to confront, struggle with, and hopefully overcome a
long standing internal problem…Can my plot problem grow, escalate and
complicate from the first page to the last? If so, can it force my protagonist
to struggle internally, spurring her to make a much needed internal change in
order to resolve it?
I just got Lisa Cron’s book from the library, WIRED FOR STORY, and from
the introduction, I’ve already learned something! Using clear references from
brain research, she makes the point that “Story is what enabled us to imagine
what might happen in the future, and so prepare us for it – a feat no other
species can lay claim to, opposable thumbs or not.”
Whew! I expect that this will be a book I’ll buy soon so I can write in
it. I will also make sure the kids in the Writing To Get Published classes know
about it.
Back to the point at hand. I’ll be analyzing my work in progress through
the lens of this expectation, which is currently called “Road Veterinarian”. I’m
not going to go into plot detail mainly because the point above is concerned
with character motivation.
Dr. Scramble – who I WANTED to call Dr. Scrabble, but the word is a
trademark and I don’t want to get into trouble – is an urban veterinarian and
researcher. He works with people who don’t have big budgets but need big budget
things done with animals. But until this moment, I didn’t realize that Dr.
Scramble – whose real name is Javier Quinn Xiong Zamar (Spanish (place name); Gaelic/Irish
(descendant of Conn = wisdom, reason, intelligence); Chinese (cultural hero); Arabic
(= secret)) – had NO motivation for doing what he’s doing.
But he’s got this job where he could make loads of money if he moved to
the suburbs (which are being subsumed into the monolithic Vertical Villages,
which are growing because the population of Earth has reached ten billion and
the surface has to be returned to its wild and/or cultivated state. A loose
world-wide confederation f independent states (NOT the United Nations any more)
and seated in New Zealand (I think) has declared that Humans on Earth need to
move to one of 20,000 Vertical Villages. He lives in the growing shadow of the
Minneapolis Saint Paul Vertical Village (from a future I’ve created that
culminates with Humans joining a Unity of Sentients whose foundation is interconnected
debt…)
But who the heck IS he???
Until I started reading Cron’s book, I didn’t think it was important. His
presence served my purposes…but now, apparently, I can’t really write the story
until I know what his motivation is. So, you’ll now witness the creation of a
character so that he will WORK in the story I’m writing!
Outward motivation: he’s a veterinarian, but WHY? He grew up in Minnesota,
so that’s established. Northern Minnesota. In his time, roughly 60-80 years
from now, the decay of the iron industry is complete and that part of the state
has become a haven for the elderly – those who were born in the early years of
the 21st Century. They’re characterized as Generation Z (born
between 1995 and 2010): the complete integration of social media into their
personal lives; AVATAR and HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL; the Disney channel, the
submersion into porn; the rapid Islamization and sexual fluidity of Western
society; their learning takes place online, but they have a terrible time
separating fact from fiction; they believe that they will be in debt to others
for the rest of their lives; as far as their pets go, they depend on
veterinarians (one MORE debt) but see their parents more involved with PETS
than they are with kids (whom they may treat as pets), they prefer
non-traditional venues for their pet services, they are VERY eclectic in their
ownership…
So Javier grew up as a child/pet and resented it. OTOH, his parents hated
taking their pets to a “veterinarian” rather than the trendier Pet Hospital or
(even worse), Animal Hospital, Pet Health Center, Veterinary Center, Partners
in Veterinary Health Care, Animal Wellness Center, Advanced Veterinary Care…etc…
He showed an aptitude for science, biology in particular, and they cultivated
it, giving him more and more care of their iguana, pot-bellied pig, Hyacinthine
Macaw, mouse house, Emerald Tree Boa, and turquoise Discus 400 gallon tank and
four 40 gallon breeding tanks – with the intent of breeding a true Emerald
Discus (they like green). Both of them are licensed, practicing pharmacists in
a Box Store with a bent toward holistic remedies. Both of them were opioid
addicts when they were YA and so he cannot EVER have painkillers. He is an only
child as well (though mom had six miscarriages between 14 and 36 when she
carried him to term and dad had two other kids outside of marriage and has no
idea where they ended up; they married each other at 41 (dad) and 43 (mom) and
he was born a year later without any kind of intervention). As they lost
interest in taking care of their pets, that fell more and more to him. Then
they were killed in a car accident (one of the newest, safest auto-autos) when
he was 13 and all of the animals were sold off. He remained for the rest of his
life with an older couple who were friends of his parents and who had two old dogs
and a cat; until he graduated when he was 18 and went to college to be a vet
because the dogs and cat were his only real companions…
So – his motivation to become a vet was to make sure he had someone
around him at all times. Someone he could trust, someone who would take care of
him. He narrowly escaped a drug addiction after starting to use a chemical
called pegfilgrastim, originally used to stimulates to production of white
blood cells after cancer chemotherapy, but with the conquering of 86% of cancers,
there was an overabundance of it that made its way to the drug cartels. It became
important after a mutation in the AIDS virus created a strain that could
survive in saliva and mucus and was viable when passed by sneezing, called “pneumAIDS”.
More virulent than the original AIDS virus, it was suspected that it was a
Russian, Chinese, or North Korean bioweapon. The street name for pegfilgrastim
became Boost, Stimwhite, SWBC (or Sweet Becky), and Peg or Phil (it became a
trend to genderize the drug based on sex).
He lost friends to it and became more or less a loner, dependent on his
animals. He preferred the anonymity of the city and had no trouble running his
business from there as if it wasn’t actual animal treatment, he could consult
anywhere in the world.
His motivation: don’t let anyone get close to you; help and trust animals
(but don’t be stupid about it!); live and let live.
“Road Veterinarian” draws on his skills; he also has to interact with a
very big woman, whom, he comes to suspect, is the product of some sort of
genetic engineering or gene grafting…she looks like an attractive Bigfoot. The
external story will be the two of them – she’ll be named Theodora Ujin Thatcher
(Theodora: Empress of Byzantine Empire; wife of Ghengis Khan; first female PM
of the UK) – who is very protective of her own heart – working together to save
America from war with Canada…
They will each let the other get a little closer to them (they’ll also be
sarcastic and there WILL be humor…)
So, there you go. Development of character in order to satisfy Reader
Expectation #2!
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