WRITERS ON WRITING: Kurt Vonnegut (Jr.)

   1.Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.


  2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.


  3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.


4. Every sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action.


5. Start as close to the end as possible.


6. Be a sadist.  No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them—in order that the reader may see what they are made of.

 7. Write to please just one person.  If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.

 8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible.  To heck with suspense.  Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.


The greatest American short story writer of my generation was Flannery O’Connor (1925-1964).  She broke practically every one of my rules but the first.  Great writers tend to do that.

The EVIL EDITOR

Doesn't look very evil, does he? Don't be fooled.

The Evil Editor set up shop in 2006 and, largely thanks to plugs from Miss Snark, quickly gained sufficient followers and material to begin publishing a series of books -- collations of online contributions. He also sells mugs.

The site is based on a simple premise -- writers forward draft query letters to the Evil Editor and he runs his eyes over them, marking emendations, corrections, and often wickedly witty observations, in a different colour, and then presents a clean version.

These Face-Lifts, as they're called, also incorporate an element called Guess the Plot, where readers are given the title of a writer's text, a half-dozen tag lines, and asked to pair the tag with the title. All very amusing.

Then there are New Beginnings -- contributors are invited to supply the first 150 words of a work and allow site visitors (minions) to write a continuation.

The Evil Editor also invites writers to forward synopses of up to 400 words for analysis and surgery.

Then there's Book Chat, a monthly invitation to minions to chat about a book.

And there's Cartoon Caption, where minions supply captions to cartoons.

Back when I was really clueless I submitted a query letter to the Evil Editor and received a public make-over. He was very good. His assessment made me laugh. He did a really good job of untangling what was a right old minestrone. I tweaked his cleaned up version a little and used it -- didn't work though. But it was all good fun.

I used to hook up to this blog every day -- though now, it's probably just me, it all seems a little too pally and smug (too many in-jokes maybe?). Having said that, an occasional visit to the Evil Editor always prompts a smile.

If you have time to spare, a healthy sense of humour, and want join the fun and games go here.