On the Nightstand

JACK: SECRET CIRCLES
by F. Paul Wilson

I've talked a number of times about going through the Borderlands Boot Camp program, but I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned how it changed my reading habits.

As anyone who knows me can tell you, I've always been an avid reader. They can tell you how I'm prone to boring everyone around me with long lectures about the books I love. Not to mention the sheer number of books in my office, and my often mocked need to alphabetize them.

(Can't help it. Spent too many years working in a bookstore.)

I've spent my entire life reading nearly any book I could get my hands on -- Fiction, Non-Fiction, Sci-Fi, Mystery, Horror, you name it. And I enjoyed nearly every one of them in one way or another.

Looking back, I guess I'd have to admit I wasn't a very discriminating reader. I just loved to read. And boy, did I love to read. Ever since I was a kid, I never failed to finish a book that I picked up. Never. No matter what it was about, or how well it was written.

But then I went through my first Borderlands Boot Camp, and suddenly I was putting books down left and right, only half-read. Even new books from authors I'd always liked. They just weren't doing it for me any more.

Learning about the process of writing prose changed the way I read. It made me far more aware of predictable plots, narrative cheats, lazy writing, and in some cases just plain bad writing. And it turns out many of my favorite writers were just as guilty of these transgressions as anyone else.

In fact, there's one writer who used to be on my own personal 'top 3 greatest writers of all time' list, but whose work I can't read anymore without noticing all the passive verbs and the heavy handed narrative voice.

Which brings me to F. Paul Wilson. I was a little nervous when I went back to read one of his books in the wake of my first trip through Boot Camp (where FPW was actually an instructor). Paul was on my personal 'top 3 greatest writers of all time' list, and his novel THE KEEP is one of my favorite books, period. So I was pleased, and even a little surprised, that not only did I still enjoy his books, but if anything, I enjoyed them even more now that I could see the deft way he moved a plot forward, or established a character with only a few well chosen words, or created a creepy atmosphere without hitting you over the head with the words 'dark', 'stormy', or 'night'.

F. Paul Wilson's latest book, JACK: SECRET CIRCLES showcases all of these skills. It's the second in his 'Young Repairman Jack' series, targeted at teenage readers and featuring his classic hero -- Repairman Jack -- as a teenager.

These books have been really engaging so far, fleshing out both Jack's childhood and the mythology that forms the backdrop for nearly all of F. Paul Wilson's stories. As a long time fan of Paul's it's fun to spot all the little threads that link up with other books, but they don't really distract from the story at hand, or the incredibly precise way he tells it.

In a funny way -- and god help me, it sounds like the most over-the-top sucking up ever committed in a blog post -- I envy a teenager who picks one of these books up, gets their first taste for what Paul calls the 'Secret History of the World', and chases it through all of the other F. Paul Wilson books.

When I first read THE KEEP, it was just out in paperback (back in 1983 or so), and Paul hadn't planned on tying everything else who wrote together into one long narrative, and hadn't even conceived of the Adversary Cycle (which forms the backbone of the Secret History), at least not as far as I know, or not as a cohesive whole. But now a reader can burn through all of those books in one go -- much like I burned through JACK: SECRET CIRCLES -- and only have to wait a couple of years for the last few new Repairman Jack books and the revised versions of REPRISAL and NIGHTWORLD. I however have been waiting 27 years.

As for the YA Jack books, my original understanding was that there would only be three of them, but recently Paul mentioned he had an idea for a fourth one. Yes, please. I'll buy that one, as well.

It'll keep me busy while I wait for the Secret History to come to a revised end.

On The Nightstand

THE SHIMMER
by David Morrell

Several years ago, when I first started thinking seriously about learning how to write prose, I tried out for the first of Borderland Press' writing boot camps. At the time, F. Paul Wilson and I were pitching projects to do together (which ended up being his adaptation of THE KEEP for IDW) and I was visiting his website on a fairly regular basis. While digging around in his always entertaining forum, I happened to come across an upcoming appearance thread where FPW mentioned he'd be teaching at a writing workshop, and if anyone wanted to attend, they could try out.

With no idea what I was in for, I wrote the first 30 pages or so of a horror novel that had been kicking around in my head for a while (the first prose I'd ever really written), and sent it off. As anyone who's read this blog before knows, I got in, had an amazing time, met my best friend, and have gone back several more times to learn everything I can about this strange beast called 'writing prose'.

But to be honest, I went that first time to learn everything I could about writing from Paul. He was (and still is) one of my writing heroes, and I thought if I could learn how he did it, then maybe I could do it, too. I'd heard of the other instructors -- Tom Monteleone, Richard Chizmar, and David Morrell -- but I was nowhere near as familiar with their work as I was with FPW's. I was in for a surprise. Not only would I meet Tom -- who has become a kind of writing father figure to me (at least in my head) -- but I also got to hear what David Morrell had to say about writing.

I was more than familiar with David's famous creation, John Rambo (or at least the cultural icon Rambo became once he escaped from the printed page on to the movie screen), but knew nothing about the author or the rest of his work. But on the first night of boot camp, he gave a lecture (which started out with the deceptive question, "Why do want to be a writer?") that knocked my socks off. Much of what he has to say on the subject can be found in his excellent book, LESSONS FROM A LIFETIME OF WRITING. It's one of the few truly useful books on writing that I always recommend, and do so once more. If you want to be writer, go read it. Now.

After the dust settled and I was back home, I went out out and bought as many of David's books as I could find (and quite a few of Tom's, as well). I liked those enough that I've taken to buying his new books as soon as they come out in hardcover. Which brings me to his latest, THE SHIMMER.

As everyone who follows my blog knows, I've been buried under work recently, racing against the clock to get out various issues of the DOCTOR WHO ongoing, and wishing I had more time to read. Still reading a lot. Just not as much as I'd like. But every once and a while, something happens and I either have to step away from the art table to give my brain a rest, or I'm stuck in a brownout or a thunderstorm with nothing to do but twiddle my thumbs, waiting for the lights in my office to come back. On Friday, when the lights dimmed and didn't go back up, I knew I was in for a long, frustrating afternoon.

So, I did what I always do, I grabbed the chance to catch up on some reading, pulled out THE SHIMMER and dove right in. By the time the lights were back, the book was finished, and my socks had been knocked off again.

I'd been expecting one of Morrell's typical thrillers (which aren't really all that typical, but I mean typical for him). Instead I got an interesting mix of genres held together by strong description, well-drawn characters, tight plotting, and his usual smooth prose. It's one part thriller, one part sci-fi mystery, with a dose of technothriller thrown in for good measure. But the best part is the ending. He made a choice about the ending of this book that fits so well with what I like in fiction, but if I told you what it was, and why I like it so much, it would probably ruin the whole story for you. Seriously, though... I loved how he handled the ending.

And again, to be honest, I probably would never have read this book if it hadn't been for that first Borderlands Boot Camp. If I'd come across this book in the store, I probably wouldn't have paid it much attention. At most, I'd have thought, 'hey, isn't that the guy who wrote FIRST BLOOD?' and moved on to something else.

I would have missed out.

Back From The Borderlands

I spent last weekend in Baltimore, attending the Borderlands Press Writing Boot Camp, an excellent program for anyone interested in writing prose, especially if your work falls in that strange territory we call 'Genre Fiction' (whatever that really is).

As I posted a while back, this was was my fourth -- and probably final -- time through the program. I had a fair amount of experience with comic book scripts and screenplays, but I'd never tried my hand at prose before, so I spent the first two trips through the program trying to get a grip on the basic mechanics of prose. As my confidence grew, I started to focus less on how to write than on how to write the kinds of things I was interested in writing. It's a subtle difference, but an important one for me, and it influenced the material that I brought to be critiqued.

Last year, I brought a Fade short story, which was the first piece I'd written that felt like 'me' as opposed to something I'd written to just follow the rules of telling a story that would make sense and be nominally entertaining. And it went over well with half the people, while the other half thought it was well-written, but not particularly entertaining. Better than I'd expected, really.

This year, I brought what I think of as my ultimate goal as a writer, and the reason I wanted to learn how to write prose in the first place -- the Fade novel. It's a story I've been developing for years, but never found the right outlet to tell it properly. It doesn't quite work as a month-to-month comic book, works slightly better as a graphic novel, but really comes alive for me as a prose piece. Which pretty much meant that I was going to have to learn how to write prose, all of which lead me to these repeated visits to the Borderlands Press Writing Boot Camp.

With the feedback on the Fade short story in mind, I began work on the novel in earnest, working out the plot, breaking it down into chapters that flowed well, and writing the first few chapters to be critiqued. My friend Dan Waters served as an occasional makeshift editor, telling me what was working and what wasn't, often encouraging me not to settle for the easy solution to a story-telling problem.

Yeah, he's going in the acknowledgments if this thing ever gets published.

Even with Dan's encouragement, I was pretty nervous to see how the material went over with the Boot Camp instructors and my fellow attendees. Considering some of the difficult choices I'd made in my approach to the material, I was expecting a failure of epic proportions. Can't help it. I've got self confidence issues.

But the material went over very well. I can't say that everyone loved it, but the feedback was overwhelmingly positive, and I got some good suggestions for tightening up a few things in the sample chapters I brought. Plenty of food for thought as I work on finishing the novel over the next few months.

So, yeah... feeling pretty good about everything I've learned over the last few years. I still have a long way to go, but more than ever, I feel like the best thing to do is write a lot more, have fun, and keep trying to tell the kinds of stories I want to tell.

And on a personal note, I got to hang out with a couple old friends last weekend, including my roommate Kyle Steele, our friend Martel Sardina, the always entertaining Brian Hatcher, the disgustingly talented James Chambers, and a host of new and interesting people like John Hornor Jacobs. A successful weekend all around, as far as I'm concerned.

Oh, and Kyle taught me a new and thoroughly disturbing joke that I can't really tell anyone without getting things thrown at my head.

What more can you ask for?

On the Borderlands

Come January, I'll be attending the Borderlands Press Boot Camp for writing. This will be my fourth, and probably last, time through the gauntlet of razor sharp critiques from my fellow "grunts" and our star-studded lineup of instructors.

It's a crazy experience. You spend a weekend at Towson University, talking about writing, taking stories apart, and staying up all night working on one of their infamous "secret assignments", which usually involves writing a new story from scratch to be read aloud on the final day, just to show much you've learned.

I attended the very first Boot Camp*, and I've tried to attend every session since then. So far, I've only missed one due to my workload. Still regret it.

This year, the instructors include two big shot New York editors, Gary A. Braunbeck (whose Cedar Hill short stories are well worth hunting down), and Thomas F. Monteleone (editor, writer, and one of my favorite people I've met in the business so far).

For those of you who don't know, Borderlands Press is a small publisher that specializes in Horror and speculative fiction. They've done beautiful editions of F. Paul Wilson's Adversary Cycle, as well as a number of other classics in the genre, including an upcoming edition of Whitley Strieber's THE HUNGER that I designed the cover for, my first real book cover.

They get good people for their Boot Camps. F. Paul Wilson, Douglas Winter, and David Morrell have all taught at the Borderlands Boot Camp, and their thoughts and notes have had a huge impact on my writing.

Last time, I brought a Fade short story**. This year, I'm bringing the Fade novel. I'm nervous about showing it to people, since it's such a personal project for me, but I'm excited at the prospect of getting some good feedback. I've never come away from a Boot Camp without a stack of notes that will help me make my story -- and my writing -- better.

I've said it elsewhere, but anyone who is serious about their writing really should attend one of these sessions. It's intense, tough, tiring, and one of the most rewarding things a writer can do. There are several of us who have attended multiple Boot Camps, and each time I see one of them, their writing is better and sharper.

This week, I started reading the other submissions for this year's Boot Camp, making notes to give my fellow grunts. Looks like a good batch this year, and I'm looking forward to meeting everyone. Have a lot of reading to do between now and then, though.

As I said, this may well be my last session. Between drawing comics full-time and writing on the side, time gets to be a bit of an obstacle, especially if you spend as much of it reading as I do. But I've gotten a lot out of each Boot Camp I've gone to. There's always something new to learn and you never run out of room to grow as a writer.

For anyone out there who might be curious about their program, or interested in attending, visit the Borderlands Press website and see what other people have to say about the experience. This year's session is already closed, but if we're lucky, there's always next year...

* An annoying personal side note -- one of the other benefits of these sessions is getting to meet other writers who take their craft seriously. I've met a number of people I keep in touch with fairly regularly, and a few who have become close friends, including the annoyingly talented Daniel Waters, who took his Boot Camp submission (GENERATION DEAD) and sold it to Hyperion Press. They published it this year to a flurry of good reviews, including a spot on Oprah's recommended reading list. It would be easy to hate him if it wasn't for the fact that he's such a nice guy, overflowing with talent, and endlessly supportive of my own writing.

** Yet another annoying personal side note -- I wouldn't be writing a Fade novel now if it wasn't for the Borderlands Boot Camp. At my second session, F. Paul Wilson (who had seen some of the Fade comic book stories) said he was disappointed that I hadn't brought a Fade prose story to be critiqued. Never one to question Paul, I wrote one and brought it the next time. It went over well enough that I found the courage to finally start a full length Fade novel. We'll see how it goes over.