As you may have noticed...

The blog is on hold for a while as there is so much craziness going on in my life right now. See you guys when I can!

New Story

Hey guys, I'm focusing on writing college essays and filling out applications. It's important but it's a lot of work, so sorry that I haven't been posting much recently. I'm currently working on a short story, though, so let's hope it's a hit! It should be coming your way hopefully within the next few weeks.

Crime of Passion

You smell of spices, and smoke
And sometimes of sadness
Your scent draws me in
Like a buffalo to water,
A scent I need and
A scent I know

My soul finds yours
In a sea of people
Reaching out to softly
Steal you away from the madness
To coax you away
Quietly, so softly

And I love you, oh
I love you
When you sing and walk
With me
In the afternoons

And I see you and wonder
If anyone would notice
If I stole you away
And loved you to death

Essays again

Sorry I haven't been posting lately. I've been busy preparing my college essays!

It has actually been fun for me to fill out college applications and write about myself. Has anyone on here been doing the same?

Interesting article

Here is an interesting article on what makes a good story.


http://www.readerviews.com/Articles-WritingGoodStory.html


Here is the written article:

What Makes A Good Story?

Why do some books stink?

Why do some books remain memorable, their characters living in our minds long after we have closed the book?

 A good book doesn’t just depend on the reader’s taste. Definite rules exist for creating a story the reader will enjoy.

Why do people read novels in the first place? I think Ayn Rand was right when she said, “I read a novel for the purpose of seeing the kind of people I would want to see in real life and living through the kind of experience I would want to live through.”

The kind of experience I want to live through is a positive one. Too many modern stories—books and films—are depressing. A good writer does not depress his readers or offer them negative portrayals of life. We do not need any more stories of drug dealers, prostitutes, crime and murder. While I enjoy a good mystery, I don’t need to read about a sensational killing filled with blood and gore. Now, I’m not saying stories can’t have a drug dealer or a prostitute in them, but the author does need to consider the purpose of including such characters in the story.

Some writers will argue that such characters represent “reality” and that life isn’t always rosy. I agree, but we don’t need to wallow in misery. I am reminded of Peter O’Toole, as Don Quixote in the film “Man of La Mancha,” declaring, “Maddest of all is to see life as it is and not as it should be!”

Authors must not limit themselves to depicting life as it is—that is equivalent to being a photographer, when the author’s task and privilege is to be an artist, a painter who creates an interpretation of what he sees.

Authors have a grave responsibility to take life and depict it in a way that will help us live ours. The story does not require a moral, but it should make us understand life better and inspire us. Stories need to be uplifting and heroic; readers need something to grasp upon when they have had a bad day, something that makes them feel they can go on, and do more than go on, to inspire them to persevere. Reading about the hum-drum dysfunctional family next door will not do that. To write books about such people and their messed up lives is not doing one’s job as a novelist—it is giving up on life and one’s readers.

A reader wants to relate to characters like himself, but characters just slightly better than him or her—characters he can see himself becoming, characters who struggle to achieve, and make us believe we are capable of achievement.

The key element to a good story is a main character who is a hero, NOT an anti-hero like so many of our modern-day stories.

The second key element is an uplifting plot, where the hero overcomes an obstacle that either makes him a better person or makes the world a better place—usually both.

The problem with modern stories is we have been brainwashed into admiring unattractive characters. Let me give you an example of a bad story, one modern literary critics wrongly choose to celebrate. The book is “Molloy” by Samuel Beckett, a writer best known for his play “Waiting for Godot.” “Molloy” is considered by literary critics to be one of the greatest novels of the twentieth century. It’s so fantastic, in fact, that I couldn’t read past page twenty. Why? I couldn’t relate to the character. I did not care about the character. I saw nothing in the character to admire or make me want to be like him.

In the novel’s first twenty long-winded, first-person, stream-of-consciousness pages, I learned that Molloy, a grown man, apparently not too mentally stable, likes to ride around on his bicycle while worrying he will lose the pieces of paper he keeps in his pockets for wiping his rear because he is constantly concerned his mother will yell at him if he gets poopy stains in his underwear. My first question at the start of this article was, “Why do some books stink?” I think in the case of “Molloy,” we have the answer in those poopy stains.

Why would I want to read about Mr. Poopy-Pants? What is heroic about this character? How is his story going to benefit me? I knew after twenty pages, nothing about Poopy-man was going to make me feel better about myself, or convince me I want to spend several hours of my time reading about him. (In all fairness to Beckett, I did skim the rest of the book, but the story did not get any better).

In good literature, a hero overcomes obstacles that are worth overcoming. Often the obstacle is himself, and he achieves it when he has to make a decision that requires action, which in turn advances the plot.

An example of a good story is “The Scarlet Pimpernel.” It’s not really a tale of the French Revolution. It’s the story of the love of a man and woman, and how that love is threatened by a misunderstanding between them. Percy is the Scarlet Pimpernel who rescues French aristocrats from the guillotine. He must keep his identity a secret from his newlywed wife because he mistakenly believes she has betrayed the Marquis St. Cyr to the guillotine, so he feels he cannot trust her. Marguerite suffers throughout the book because she does not understand the loss of her husband’s affection. When her brother’s life is threatened because the French government learns he is part of the Scarlet Pimpernel’s band, Marguerite is blackmailed into helping betray the Pimpernel, not realizing he is her husband.

“The Scarlet Pimpernel” is a fantastic story because life and love are at stake, and the author, Baroness Orczy, formulates the plot to make matters as difficult as possible for the characters so that the reader keeps turning the page to find out what happens.

In the end, when Marguerite and Percy’s misunderstanding is resolved during a dramatic ending that endangers their lives, the happy ending brings a sense of relief and joy to the reader. Readers respond to it because they wish their own difficulties can be corrected and their own lives will be as noble as Percy and Marguerite’s become.

I don’t care what becomes of Beckett’s Mr. Poopy-pants. I do care whether Marguerite wins back her husband’s love, and whether her husband will live so he can forgive her. I certainly don’t want to be Mr. Poopy-pants, but I do want to know the steadfast love Marguerite and Percy find in the end, and I want to believe love matters, and that good triumphs over evil.

What makes a good story, therefore, are 1) likeable characters who inspire me to be a better person and 2) a plot with something important at stake, a plot that inspires me, like the story’s characters, to seek a better world. Then, when I turn the book’s last page, I can feel satisfied and say, “That was a good story.”

Birthday

May 9 is my birthday. I will be 17 years old. I have lived for 17 years on Earth, and I hope to live many more!

Rewrites

Well, after having the flu for a week, it looks like a weekend of English essay rewrites and makeup homework. That's one of the bad things about high school- when you miss a week of school, you are constantly playing catch-up. Six pages of Great Gatsby Analysis revisions is underway. Happy weekend, people, and don't get the flu. And if you do, don't come to math class so you can give it to others.