Tag Archives: creativity

This month we’ve had a lot of great posts with tons of concrete advice on how to break through a wall or break out of a plateau where we might be stuck. But what about life in general? Do we ever feel stuck, unmotivated?

Breaking out of those ruts can be harder than overcoming writer’s block. One of the keys is to try to identify what motivates us. What makes us smile or laugh or cry, helps renew our enthusiasm, or drive?

Something that dives deep, strikes a chord, resonates with our deepest held beliefs. Something that inspires hope or love.

The greatest books and movies are those that touch such a chord, that drive us to tears when they connect with our reality. Think Rocky, Gone With The Wind, Titanic, and It’s a Wonderful Life. Think The Help, or Pride and Prejudice.

It might be a romance, like An Affair To Remember, or it might be a heroic drama like The Dirty Dozen (I love the scene in Sleepless in Seattle where the men and women get emotional over these two different films – watch the clip here).

Whatever the story, the truth is someone put together the right sequence to touch your heart deeply. Those kind of stories can inspire us to be better people, help us break out of an unproductive rut, or change our lives at a fundamental level. That’s one of the reasons I love good stories so much, and why I work so hard to write them.

I want to try an experiment. What is one movie or book that touched you in a deep, meaningful way? It’s useless to put together a top 50 best books or best movies of all times because different stories touch different people. It’s too subjective. But each one of us has a personal list.

So what book or movie moved you the most?

It’s all too easy to find works that speak to me. When I read a book or watch a movie, I deep dive. I get sucked in completely. For me it’s a vivid, powerful experience, and so I find myself responding emotionally all the time. Whenever the hero faces the ultimate test and risks all to achieve their goal, I find myself choking up and responding to the stakes that they’re feeling because I feel them too.

In movies, I get sucked in almost too easy. From Wreck-It Ralph to The Avengers to October Sky, I’m fighting tears at the end of all of them. In books, most of my favorite authors trigger a powerful emotional response. From Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson to Hard Magic by Larry Correia to The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss.

But even so, some works stand out and make a deeper impact. In books, both Enders Game by Orson Scott Card and The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson impacted me greatly with their fantastic twists at the ends. But one of the stories that I found even more powerful was The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson. Kal, one of the main characters, pushes himself to the utter brink to save others, and that heroism demands a reaction from any reader.

In movies, a couple of my all-time favorites are Star Wars and Avatar. But I was also powerfully moved by The Shawshank Redemption and Remember the Titans.

There are many others, but that’s enough for today. This is not an easy question, but taking the time to find an answer can give you a clue as to what motivates you, what themes or qualities you respond to. In life, perhaps you’ve just identified qualities you want to emulate more every day. In writing, perhaps you’ve just identified what element you need to add to our own work to make it really shine.

Please add your comments, and then share the challenge with friends on Facebook or Google+ or whatever other media you use to connect. See if they’re willing to share an example too.

I think we’ll find some common themes, and a few surprises.

Let’s find out.

Breaking Into The Next Level Of Craft

September 2, 2013

Frank Morin

Craft & Skills Frank Morin The Writing Life Writing Tools No Comments

We all know the journey to becoming a professional writer is a long one. It takes a while to “Break In”, and no two writers ever seem to take the exact same path to get there. New writers are told to keep working, be persistent, and they’ll get there.

It’s like dropping off an inexperienced climber at the base of a challenging mountain and telling them to just start climbing, and eventually they’ll make it to the top.

But there are trails on a mountain, easier paths marked by those who have gone on before. True, but someone who knows next to nothing about mountain climbing can still easily get lost. Same for writers. There is lots of help available, but sometimes we don’t know enough to know what’s missing when we get stuck.

Climbing a mountain is done in stages, and one thing that comes as a shock to some new writers is that becoming a professional writer is similar. We don’t Break In just once. There are levels to craft, plateaus we reach on our journey. Sometimes we get stuck there, unable to Break In to the next level and resume the climb up toward the ultimate goal.

Throughout the month of September, we are going to explore some of these writing plateaus where we’ve been stuck, and ways we’ve found to pass the barrier and Break In to the next level of craft.

Sometimes we need a mentor, a writing group, or an unusually honest loved one to tell us we can do better. When I decided to pick up writing several years ago, I pounded out 70 pages in one weekend and thought, “I’m on my way!” My wife read those initial chapters and said, “I don’t like your protagonist.”

She was right. He didn’t work. First obstacle.

Thankfully the answer to that one was straight-forward. Swallow pride, throw away thousands of words of crap for the first (of many) time, and start again.

Sometimes we need a seminar or a conference or a book on writing to illuminate the shadows and show us a couple steps forward down the path. We might need to arrange our schedule better to find more time to write.

And sometimes we just need to write another hundred thousand words of crap before we get it.

In the end, we all hit multiple plateaus, or ruts that block our forward progress. But we don’t have to stay there.

This month the shared wisdom and experience of the entire group will help map out some possible routes to reach the next plateau.

Exploring Story Concepts Prior to Writing

August 28, 2013

Frank Morin

Craft & Skills Frank Morin World-building 1 Comment

This month we’ve discussed great games that inspire, games that highlight effective storytelling, or that identify pitfalls in the creative process. We’ve also discussed some of the dangers of trying to port game scenarios directly into book form (review that excellent post here).

I’m going to visit that topic from a slightly different angle and discuss the effectiveness of finding avenues for creative input. It’s hard to build a great story, and harder still if we try to do it in a vacuum. Utilizing creative input sources can prove effective in developing foundational concepts for your story. The goal is not to try writing a book directly from a game scenario, particularly if it pulls in any material that may be copyrighted elsewhere. However, it is possible to utilize a RPG or other creative input source to explore some of the general concepts you might be kicking around as the foundation of a story.

For example, if you want to flesh out a new magic system, inviting your gaming friends to utilize that magic system in a game scenario can really help. They’ll try to break the rules, and they’ll try to use it in ways you never expected. The experience will force you to think deeper and broader than you might have on your own, and lay down rules and boundaries you had not realized you needed. This is particularly useful if you don’t have someone who makes a good sounding board to brainstorm ideas and plumb the depths of your new concept.

You can also explore other aspects of the world building in a game. What are the nations and races that exist in this world? Do they get along? What motivates them? What do people eat? What kind of money do they use?

In my family we play a customized RPG that utilizes only one 20-sided die for all decisions. It removes a lot of the technical hassle of similar games and relies more on the storytelling skill of the person leading the game. It’s also an excellent creative workout routine. I rarely plan out the details of a game beforehand, so am forced to come up with each element in a just-in-time delivery sort of way. I’ve found it helps break down creative barriers and triggers some exceptionally creative moments.

I’ve used this process as a way to explore multiple story concepts. Many of them prove mediocre or uninspiring, so we drop those and try something different. A few have resulted in ideas with lots of potential. Those I set aside for later exploration, or launch secondary game scenarios to consider further.

Once I’ve got what I need, I throw away the specifics of the game, including the characters, and start building my story from scratch – drawing upon the foundational concepts we explored through the game.

Storyteller — The Boyhood of Raleigh by Sir John Everett Millais, oil on canvas, 1870

But RPG gaming is not the only creative input I use, and it’s not even my most productive. Even better is good old storytelling. In our family we tell a lot of stories, and I’ve used that verbal story time to develop magic systems and explore plot concepts with my kids. It’s proven highly effective. Kids (2 of mine are teen-agers now) provide instant feedback, and they are brutal critics. If an idea isn’t working, I know about it instantly. On the other hand, if a story generates lots of enthusiasm from them, I might be on to something.

The danger there, just as with using RPG games, is to recognize that the novel you write will not be the same as the game (or verbal story). A couple years ago, I spent a lot of time developing a story line with my kids. They actually came up with the original magic system idea, which I then fleshed out and used to launch into a series of stories where we explored many other aspects of the world building. The resulting story proved so engaging that I decided to write a book based on all the material we produced.

At first I tried to follow the story line we’d developed, since we were all so enthusiastic about it. However I quickly ran afoul of the hazards lurking down that road. After those hard-learned lessons, I threw away that unproductive plotline and made a hard break – the story would not be a novelization of our hours of storytelling. Instead, I would craft a novel from the ground up, building upon some of the foundational elements we explored in that storytelling, but the plot and characters were entirely new. The resulting novel is a YA fantasy titled Set In Stone, which is now in the hands of my agent. Hopefully we’ll find a home for it soon.

Take Away: Use any creative avenue available to you to explore creative ideas, but remember the limits of what you can accomplish. Take the foundational elements, strip out the rest, and go build a great novel.

Where else do you turn for creative input to explore story concepts as you begin working on a new novel?

Pirates of the Caribbean – The Curse of the Black Pearl

July 22, 2013

Frank Morin

Character Craft & Skills Frank Morin 1 Comment

I love this movie! What an enjoyable tale. Of course it’s a pirate movie and, like most people, I like pirate movies. There’s something that stirs the blood at the mention of pirates, and this one delivers all the tropes we expect in a pirate flick: tall ships, great battle sequences, swashbuckling heroes, a kidnapped governor’s daughter, and lots of pirate treasure.

But this movie rises above other pirate films for several reasons. First, I love the fact that the treasure is cursed, and the pirates’ mission is more than just pillage, plunder, and loot. They are seeking redemption, looking to undo the terrible curse that’s befallen them. That’s a great twist that deepens the plot tremendously.

More importantly, this movie has something none of the others did: Captain Jack Sparrow.

This fantastic character, brilliantly played by Johnny Depp, drives the movie into uncharted territory, and rightly earned him many awards. Captain Jack is not the hero, he’s not the character the story hangs on, and yet he steals center stage in every scene he appears in. Jack Sparrow is a pirate, but it’s often hard to decide which side he’s on. He’s crafty, clever, and usually obtains his goals without having to fight, although he’s an accomplished fighter when required.

Jack Sparrow is the spice in the movie that allows the serious, epic tale to contain a solid thread of comedy without becoming silly, but the story could only work if he had straight-men characters like Will Turner to play off of. As Director Gore Verbinsky stated, “You don’t want just the Jack Sparrow movie. It’s like having a garlic milkshake.”

In the IMDB Top 100 movie characters of all time, Jack Sparrow is rated 32.

And in EmpireOnline, he’s voted number 8.

Pirates of the Caribbean would not have worked nearly so well without Jack Sparrow, just like Star Wars would not have been so great without Han Solo.

The main swashbuckling hero, the blacksmith Will Turner, is the character we want to succeed, but we’re drawn to Jack Sparrow. His complexity, his murky agenda, his fresh quirkiness, fascinate us. He represents the carefree outlaw, epitomizing freedom from responsibility and any constraints. It’s a powerful draw to audiences looking for escape. Jack Sparrow can do anything, with no limits, while other characters are constrained by their employment, social status, or lack of confidence.

So, what are some things we can learn from this iconic figure?

First, a healthy dose of humor is possible even in an otherwise serious story, but it needs to be approached carefully and woven in as a secondary thread.

Second, great characters are complex, multi-faceted figures that require planning and care and a dash of brilliance to bring to life. Without the actor pushing the limits beyond the initial parameters laid out by the writers, Jack Sparrow never would have taken flight like he did.

Third, people are drawn to larger-than-life characters that struggle sometimes to decide their moral code, sometimes falling on the side of good, and sometimes on the side of not-so-good.

Fourth, great characters often don’t choose the easy, expected path. For example, when Jack duels Will the first time, he refrains from shooting him. We’re left wondering about the cryptic reference to the bullet, and whether or not he really didn’t want to hurt the dumb kid who got in his way, or if something else is going on.

Take Away: When crafting your characters, look for figures who can embody more than their limited role originally suggests. Work hard, with attention to detail, and leave room for flashes of inspiration that can leap from the foundation you’ve laid, and imbue your character with greatness.

What are some other iconic characters you can think of, and what makes them special?

(References from Wikipedia and IMDB)