Getting to the Heart of the Matter

I've found another interesting blog, by one Barry Eisler. Apparently he's famous, or something. One of his thriller books has been made into a movie that was probably never released on this side of the Atlantic.

I will say without a shadow of a doubt that I dislike modern thrillers. I just don't find them particularly appealing; the interplay of suspence and action that seems so widespread in them is wasted on me, probably because I find the characters to be one-dimensional. That's my taste, of course. I'm not the target audience for such books after all.

Why subscribe to Mr. Eisler's blog then? It's very simple, really - he is a good writer. He writes with style, clarity, and a great deal of passion on his blog, and that is something to be appreciated and valued.

I'll probably never be sold on thrillers in general, but if I'm in a book shop and I happen to see his work, I'll certainly recommend it to people I know who'd like it.

Male and Female

I sometimes wonder how to write believeable characters in books. I'd consider characterisation as being one of my strong points in my work, but like every aspiring author, I do struggle with some aspects of it.

The Novel has two main characters; one male, one female. I've written them in very specific ways, and I know where they are alike and where they are very different. But the biggest problem I have is, predictably, with sex.

Books typically characterise men and women in very different ways when it comes to sex. The virgin-whore paradigm, for example - historical romances make enormous use of it in their characterisation of the heroine, who is almost universally chaste until her encounter with the hero. Those romances get a pass because that's just how it was, back then, but even modern characterisations of women seem to follow the same path - and it's just so boring. Why reduce one half of human sexuality to something so trite and uninteresting? Where are the shades of grey?

Men are frequently characterised as biological whores, their hormones driving them to sleep with the attractive females regardless of whether it's a good idea or not. This is so very, very dull as well, and does men a great disservice - as if they are not rational, not capable of being governed by their heads and not their privates. Am I the only one who thinks this charactetisation is just plain stupid? We are meant to believe that these men are also intelligent and sane enough to save the world or captain a ship or have made millions on their own... No. I don't think so.

I'm playing with a little subversion of these characterisations right now for my main characters. I have a leading lady who views sex as a weakness, and is easily powerful enough to have her opinion respected. She is like a man, neither virgin nor whore, where her sexuality is a tiny and irrelevant part of her life. My leading gentleman is a lover and a worshipper of women, who has sex out of adoration. He is like a woman in that he places a higher value on emotional attachments than the mere physical act.

I could spend hours thinking through the facets of their characters, discovering new nuances and reflections that change how they react in tiny ways. I might make a few alterations as time goes by, but I will never return to the silly clichés that infect so many other well-woven stories. My characters deserve better than that.

The animals went in two by two

Ah, creationism. Creationists, I should say - they are a strange and byzantine species, full of nuances and expressions that would puzzle the average homo sapien. I adore them, and their almost-childlike view of the world.

Noah's Ark is an interesting story. God takes umbrage at the world of man, and decides to destroy it all except for the few that please him. And so his chosen take the animals that will survive and carry them into the Ark, and after forty days and nights of global flooding to wash away the wickedness, Noah is left to repopulate the world.

Interesting does not equal true, however, for the accepted value of true associated with historical events - meaning that these things actually happened, and the story of the Flood is factual. There's nothing to show that it is. There's any number of problems that arise if we even assume the most basic facts, and then extrapolate the likely effects; for example, let's say there was a global flood that lasted for forty days and nights. There isn't enough water on earth to flood the whole world, forty days of flooding is enough to destroy a good chunk of all life on earth, and if it happened, all evidence of it was magically removed from the geological record.

But people still believe it's real, like Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. Their bible is so important to their faith that if even one part of it isn't true, none of it is. The details of the story are made more important than the morals or lessons contained within it. That is the real tragedy of creationism; its proponents remain forever childlike, trapped in a parody of faith because they can't let themselves see the wood for the trees.

I still smile at their antics, and try to be gentle with them as I would with a child. Creationists are not inherently bad, or stupid, or misguided, although some would label them as such. They need time and space to honestly examine their faith and the book they hold so dear, and the constant battering of science isn't doing them any favours.

What does all this have to do with me? Nothing, really. I don't know any creationists. Being a predominatly Catholic country with a very lax attitude to bible literalism, Ireland doesn't seem to have enough of them to be organised. But I find the concept fascinating, like an adult who still believes in Santa Claus.

And the holidays are past

I'm back again after the holidays.

I like to take a break over Christmas. It gives me time to relax and recover from the year gone by. I didn't have any real holiday in 2009 during the summer; blame that on my work ethic if you will.

I've made some New Year's resolutions, as always. The first, to finish the Novel and start querying. The second, to learn how to play the piano. The third, to finally get into shape and exercise more.

I'm not making any others for the time being. Three very hard ones are more than enough. Of the three, the Novel will be the hardest, I think. I'm not looking forward to having my work put on trial, even if the eventual aim is to get it out and on the shelves.

Learning how to play the piano is a little challenging. I'm playing "The Music of the Night" at the moment. It's a matter of connecting what I know the piece should sound like with the notations on the page - no trivial task, of course, when you have to decode each section first. A friend has told me that I'm doing very well for someone who's never played before, which is certainly very encouraging. I'm planning to try a little bit of the start of "Clair de Lune" once I get more confidence.

Sigh. Honestly, I'm talking to myself. I'm sure there's a point to all this, but I probably won't be able to find it without the help of a therapist.

Is it obvious that, in the face of a hopeful new year, I am more hopeless than ever?

No. Hopeless or not, I have to have some kind of faith in my writing, because otherwise I would not write at all - and that is as likely to happen as the sun going backwards around the earth. I am a weaver of stories, good or bad, and especially when I'm talking to myself.

So. Another year. What would Brenda say?

This is what I learned: that everybody is talented, original and has something important to say.

She will always be my hero.

Christmas Threads

'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a... writer?

This falls into the category entitled 'Dubious'. I get ideas all the time. They tumble through my head in drips or in torrents, and I catch as many as I can and pour them into my book of things that need writing at some point. But, dear reader, not all ideas are created equal - and yes, I am talking to myself right now because no one else is looking at this.

I have an idea for a story, and that story is a Christmas story. They've been done to death and then some, and yet I have some hope that this story is a worthy one. But what I fear more is the commercialisation of Christmas, and the fear of my worthy story being brutalised in the pursuit of money - whether by dismissive review or desperate interferance.

All this, and I haven't even written a word of it! I can't help thinking about it, though. The tales we weave are a part of us whether we want them to be or not, and seeing one bastardised in the name of greed is painful.

A thought for another day, I suppose. I'll have to flesh it out a little and see where the thread takes me.

Being instead of doing

Much as I don't like to cast myself as the tormented artist, it seems that that is sometimes my fate. To suffer for one's art implies that you deny yourself in some way - avoiding people, spending money you don't have, breaking relationships - but the reverse is just as likely to be true, and that is the situation I find myself in.

Writers are driven to write for various reasons. I've found that lately I write because the world is tormenting me; the threads of my own life become unravelled, despite my best efforts to stop them, and so sinking into the narrative of the Novel is escapism at its finest. It's also leading me to question myself, and my ambition of becoming a published author.

I believe, as I always have, that I was born to taleweave. Clichéd it may be; the world is littered with the remains of those who believed something similar, and they never made it. But I can't define my success or failure by whether I make it as an author, because I asked myself the hardest question: if there were no hope, no chance of ever being published or of living from my writing, would I still write?

The answer is yes. I would write even if I lost both arms. I would write even if every day my work was taken and burned in front of me. It's so simple, so obvious. It's the difference between being and doing.

I have a job, and it is a thing that I do because I am paid to do it. But writing is not what I do; it is what I am, in the bedrock of my soul, because the need and desire to tell stories is as much a part of me as my own name; so much so that I can't imagine a world where I am not a storyteller.

So what then? I will write even if no one will ever read it, and I judge my success or failure on whether I can look over my work and be happy that the result of my taleweaving is the best that I can do. Even this blog is a part of that.

The song of pain continues

I've read Part 2.

I did try to post only about things to do with writing on this blog, but some narratives are too big, too violent, too insidious to ignore. The story of the Dublin report has threads stretching out over the country and into the heart of every good Irish person who has ever walked inside a church. I can't ignore it, and I can't bring myself to stay silent about it. There has been too much silence.

Why did they do it?! WHY?! What damaged them so much that they thought it was acceptable to rape and to hurt?! Enough excuses, enough sanitisation - I want every last priest, every last believer in Ireland to know that this, this is the horror that was inflicted on the young, and the bishops let it happen! They were incompetant, and uncaring! They are unrepentant even now!

That the government were, and are, so utterly indifferent to the whole mess speaks volumes about their moral worth, and of the value they place on the Irish people. The evidence is there for all to see. These crimes were committed, and shown to have been obfuscated by the Catholic Church in order to save face, but there will be nothing done - not even a statement of condemnation - while the government remains spineless and self-absorbed. Andrew Madden talks here about his experiences while trying to obtain justice. The response of Bertie Ahern (then the leader of the country), that the State could not investigate the Church, chills me to the bone. And the sad truth is that they only care to speak about it at all because the Irish people are screaming at them.

It sends a clear message that the Catholic Church here is accountable to no one. That if a priest does something to me, or to the people I love, the law will not hold him to the same standard as a non-priest. I don't know if I want to live in this country any longer, knowing that.

I know I cannot be part of a religion whose leaders are so morally bankrupt that they allowed this to happen, and then refuse to take responsibility for the pain their decisions inflicted on hundreds of people. I will not have it on my conscience.

And so I sing across the Net, my voice lost in the chorus as the sons and daughters of Ireland call out the true lament; that our beloved country is broken, that there will never be justice to ease the pain.