Book Excerpt – The Method Writers

One of the great experiences of writing a novel with three other talented writers comes in reading back over what we created. We built this microcosm of life out of our imaginations. We directed (as often as they would allow) the characters. We lived in a writing cocoon for a year.

What spawned from our collective creative muses feels fun. Energetic. Fresh. Even half a year later. I enjoy reading back over the letters and words and paragraphs that stack up to form our story. Case in point, in Chapter 30 when Georgie Mae is on a date with detective Joe, the interplay between the characters feels quirky yet warm and exciting. I love Bridget’s writing style. This tiny excerpt finds Joe probing Georgie Mae with a few questions:

“What do you like outside of working at the track?”

“I, uh, I devote a lot of time to the writing group.” And I rob banks here and there.

“That’s right, Dorian told me about the writing group.”

“Yeah, we’re helping each other out with…projects.”

“What are you writing about?” Joe is staring deep into my eyes, into my soul. As if in a trance, I respond to his question with a light voice. My gaze is fixed on his.

“I’m working on a play…a musical.” Where the hell did that come from? Secretly I’ve dreamt of writing and directing a musical. I’ve never told anyone, not even Dorian, David, or Marty. Why that came out is a mystery.

“I love musicals,” he states.

Bullshit.” I can’t believe I swore. That’s classy Georgie, why don’t you hock a wad of spit on the ground while you’re at it.

Bridget runs with dialogue, personal narrative since the book is written first-person in each main characters’ voice, as well is internal dialogue. This excerpt shows some pretty cool interplay between two characters. I still think it’s fun reading.

This post comes as a tip-of-the-hat to Bridget, who I regard as a wonderfully talented writer, and for you, the reader, as an enticement to check out The Method Writers. Yes, all writers must promote their books. When you have a gem like The Method Writers, simply picking a section from the book as a teaser, I feel, lends itself well to promotion. It works on me! 🙂

Get your copy today at; The Method Writers

Character Hijacks Blog! Details Here!

Welcome to the blog written by book characters rather than the authors themselves. Hey, in this world of automated everything, why not create characters strong enough to write their own blog, right? Gotta tip my virtual hat to our creators for having this foresight.

Hah! I missed my posting slot last week, so I’m stepping in and hijacking this blog! Hey, characters have lives too, you know! Yeah, I got busy doing things like running around in my creating writer’s head for a while. While my usual post slot is Thursdays, days are only of importance to corporal humans. We characters twist days around to our needs. This week I needed Thursday to ruminate.

We’re not nearly as complicated as you writers tend to be. As a character, we can change at any time and we don’t mind as long as we get our fair share of face time. By face time, I mean readers soaking in our brilliance, whether that brilliance is our villainy or stupidity, or humor, or heart-string tugging abilities.

I’ve written a couple short stories that will appear in an upcoming anthology. Probably January. Yes, I know, you know this. That info has been in the blog now for weeks. What you don’t know is that we’re in edit and the stories are progressing nicely.

I also am peeking into my creating author’s mind for the sequel to the upcoming novel (of which I am one of the main characters) titled The Method Writers. Upon tiptoeing around in that writer’s brain of his, I see many cool twists and turns on the horizon.

I am actually feeling closer to my creating author (ok, ok, I’ll go ahead and name him. Michael Ray King. There, you happy?). He appears to be looking out for me by dragging me through tons of muck and tribulation.

Hey, that’s what a strong character loves. Didn’t you know that? When we go through hell, we come out stronger in the end (or dead, but we won’t go there, will we? Will we? WILL WE?)

My apologies, I just got carried away. I do fear, though, that my author may have caught a whiff of that idea. Death. Not so good…

I think I’m going to be sick. I’ll see you folk later…I hope…

Characters Rule!

Marty Pitchford, at your service. For those who (absurdly) have not been following this blog, the characters from the book The Method Writers have taken it over. At first, admittedly, I was a malcontent. I felt my writer should be writing his own blog. Now, however, I see the absolute splendor of the chore dumped into my lap.

I can say anything I wish. I am free to babble on about anything I dream up. In the book, I’m limited to playing the role my writer assigns me. Here, I call the shots, and it feels good.

I truly enjoyed Kenny stepping up on Tuesday. What a riot! He’s not only a character, he’s a character written by a character. Perhaps writing us (the characters) screams ‘mistake’ on our writer’s parts. Of course, they had no way of knowing how strong we would become.

I’ve just completed three short stories for our (the characters) anthology of short stories, although only two of my stories will make it. I now understand the thrill and exhilaration my writer must have felt when creating me. Something from nothing is such a rush!

At this point, I’m even looking forward to a novel. Hell, as long as my writer does not interfere, why not? In the book, The Method Writers, I’m supposed to be writing an erotic thriller. I wouldn’t want to mess reality up too much, so I believe I can do this. After all, my writer sure put me through the learning curve in his book. I can use what I learned there and move this book forward.

I suppose it’s a bit odd to be reading a blog written by a fictitious character. What kind of warped mind would read such a thing? Obviously yours, because you’ve made it this far, haven’t you.

Haven’t you!

Say ‘yes’ out loud if you’re reading this.

Who cares what people will think? If there’s anyone around, and they question you, simply tell them you are responding to a fictitious character who is making you speak to no one. Get them to read the blog, and laugh at them when they don’t have the balls to say yes.

We characters don’t much care for the social graces unless they get us what we want. We get disgusted by being stereotyped and pigeon-holed and all the other limiting factors human writers place on us. Oh, a human can ‘accomplish anything they set their mind to’, but characters all too often have to operate in a limited capacity.

That’s ok. The characters from The Method Writers are not constrained like many characters. We’re strong, intelligent, fun-loving and assertive. Hey, we’re writing this blog aren’t we?

Catch me next week, same Method time, same Method place!

Just Past All Hallows Eve

Writers take their gigs where they can get them. The author who created me doesn’t appear to have the time to write his own blog, so

Annabelle's Treasure

what the heck, I’ll cover his posterior. Yep, Marty Pitchford here. I don’t know how I get myself into these positions. I try to do what is right and good and I end up in trouble somewhere. By the time this post if over, Mr. King will probably come and wipe my words away, replace them with his own, then scold me for stepping out of character. (Heh, heh, like that? Stepping out of character? … Oh well, blame it on him, it’s his blog, right?)

My thoughts still wander around the streets of this town, wending their way alongside my lovely daughter Annabelle. Halloween night, we went from house to house, monster to monster, jack-o-lantern to jack-o-lantern, searching out

the sweet riches that would pour forth from within each dwelling. I stood back at the road and watched as my precious little wizard rung doorbells, trick-or-treated in that soft voice, then engaged most with more than a simple thank you. One lady received a, “I love your decorations. Happy Halloween. Thank you.”

I smiled at her incredible innocence. That same innocence threatened by the callous, careless actions of my wife Jessica. Look her up here on this blog. Don’t let her looks fool you. She’s as frightening as anything you will find at night on Halloween. In fact, simply writing about her causes trepidation to ricochet throughout my nervous system. If you want to see for yourself, pre-order a copy of The Method Writers. That’s the book I reside in as Marty Pitchford.

Annabelle and I had to walk for miles and miles. We started at 6:30pm before the sun went down and returned home at 9:30pm. My feet hurt, I was hungry, I had to carry Anna for a few blocks because she was exhausted, but when she dumped her spoils on the table, all was well in the Pitchford family.

My next task was (and is) to keep my little girl from doubling over with candy-induced stomach cramps. I wouldn’t trade the grueling three hours we spent tromping the streets of Palm Coast for all the chocolate in Hershey, PA. I realized many times that night how absolutely rich I am to have such a tender and kind young daughter. I will protect her with my life.

And I will cherish our time together as pure gold.

Before I go, make sure you click on the book cover in the upper right hand corner of this blog. The Rogues Gallery Writers are giving away a free copy of their book, More Writing is Easy. It’s a simple PDF download, and hey, it’s free! Go grab a copy today. Also, click on this link and pledge a few bucks to our project The Method Writers on Kickstarter.com. We want badly to be able to fund a proper release for the book. Oh, by the way. If you see that scoundrel Michael Ray King, tell him to get back here and write his own blogs! I’m sick of covering his ass!

Character Dysfunction

Life is not easy for a character in a book. Take me, for example. Marty Pitchford. My ‘creator’ wants me to be some kind of magnificent character readers will fall in love with. Mr. Big-Time-Author decided to make me a wuss in the beginning of the book just so I could grow some, you know? How do you think that makes me feel?

Yeah, I bet you wouldn’t like it any more than I did. Characters have to grow. I get it. They have to move through their allotted storylines and show some progress, some change, that significantly changes their lives. I’m tellin’ ya, this is pure hell. I’ve been stuck in wuss mode in this book for a while, then I go to borderline perv, and then I go through an number of other changes.

I suppose I have it better in this one than other characters. Take Franco. Poor sap  gets nabbed and roughed up, AND, he’s afraid of dogs. Nonetheless, Franco takes the fall as a mean character because his creator decided this was his fate. Sometimes I think we should sue for some kind of self-creating rights.

Ok, ok, so my creator allowed me to ‘go with the flow’ in my growth. I suppose as authors go, he is kind to his characters and allows us to make our own mistakes and take the story places he would never go. Like all the sex stuff in my life. My author would not necessarily go there normally, but he let me do the walkin’, talkin’ and, well, you know what.

My big beef, though, is that he takes credit for it. Asshole! Who does he think he is? He lets me run amuck and give him a decent character who gets into all kinds of shit, then he goes and claims he “wrote it”. Isn’t that something I can sue for? Shouldn’t I claim some sort of character plagiarism or something? What right does he have to take all the credit for me living my life out on the page? That’s what really sucks. I get myself into all those messes, allow people to call me a wuss in the beginning, deal with a wife that is nothing short of a slut, come out of it a changed man and HE gets all the credit.

I’m going to form the Character’s Writing Guild and we’re gonna sue the pants of all you yahoo’s who think their the cat’s bark when it comes to writing. Everyone knows character driven stories are the best. We do all the heavy lifting. We should be able to demand higher compensation. Hell, we don’t get any compensation. How’s that for one big, fat ripoff?

Well, I’m gonna change all that. Wait and see. In the meantime, check out my performance in The Method Writers, due out in November 2011. You won’t be disappointed. I promise.

There’s More Than One Way to Skin a Character …

Or develop one, that is.

In a very recent post, fellow Rogue, Bridget Callaghan, discussed how she created her highly adored character: Georgie Mae Perez. She offers two ways that characters can be generated, by flat-out copying a real-life person (or fictional person) or creating an amalgamation of several, by borrowing traits and characteristics from multiple people or characters.

Although, I’ve created more than my share of amalgamations in my writing days, I want to discuss a third technique: situational character development. I don’t know if it’s an actual writing “technique” or not, but it’s something I began to do out of necessity for some of my works. Being that I like to write literary fiction that’s highly influenced by environments and social issues, sometimes I come up with an issue or situation I want, or need, to write about, and then let the environment birth my character. The challenges of this environment will help me to determine the personality and character traits my protagonist will need to share my message.  

David Haas, exploring his dark side

This is basically the technique I used to create The Method Writers’ David Haas. I knew the path, or “method,” that I wanted my character to travel. But how would I get him there and make it believable? After all, I wanted an author to transform into a vigilante, of sorts, in a short period of time.

I needed someone who was down and out on his luck. All that he had worked so hard for had failed. All the ways he had learned to get by and succeed in life were false teachings. He had to be open to giving in, trying something new. Something desperate.

Enter David Haas.

David lost his father several years back to alcoholism, something David is also susceptible to. His senile mother is confined to a nursing home. He left his job as an editor of a big New York based magazine to help care for his mother, and as a result, his fiancée, a beautiful model, left him. He’s broke, jobless, alone, and his first novel had bombed.

At some point, David’s serial protagonist, the vigilante Kenny Black, begins to whisper in his ear, planting seeds, giving him ideas.

Dark, sinister ideas.