While I was growing up (and it remains a matter of debate whether I ever did) much was made about the dangers of ‘stifling a child’s creativity’. Everyone in popular culture seemed preoccupied with the idea that telling a brat that he was being a brat and that should choose to stop being a brat before someone made sure that he stopped being a brat would somehow permanently damage them. How could they be writing the great American Novel write music for the ages or craft plays, painting, films or other works of art later in their life if they were creatively stifled? Of course, one might argue that such bruising may have been the origin of writing a number of tell-all biographies later in life, but that was beside the point. So in order to avoid this stifling, an entire range of permissive parenting was wheeled out that would, it was argued, allow the child to ‘explore without fear’ and ‘get in touch with their inner creative self without have artificial constraints (a.k.a. parenting) to slow them down.

Now, it seems, we must slow down these unrestrained creative children with Ritalin. We have in our desire to ‘free’ our children raise a generation whose understanding of discipline has been completely stifled. We have a generation who were taught that they were ‘special’ and ‘unique’ but who lack any of the discipline required to translate those elements into anything meaningful and lasting.

Writing by the ‘Special’

I often have new writers in our writing workshops who, after examining our structural segments on story plot and character relationships tell me something like, “well, that’s fine for those OTHER writers. But I’m different! My imagination is too creative, to unique, and too special to fit inside the constraints of such mundane rules!” Whenever I encounter such people I realize that they are almost certainly enormously creative and most likely talented as well (those elements having not been stifled previously) but who have been completely stifled in discipline. I imagine them having managed to ‘slide by’ their parents or their grade-school teachers based on the brightness of their smile and the ‘cleverness’ of them. They now believe that they can continue that trend by writing from their talent alone. They are, in their view, above the rules and discipline.

These are also those who’s stifled discipline insures that they will never develop the craft to execute consistent art over time. They might have a ‘one hit wonder’ in the same sense that a meteorite might hit the manhole cover outside my house — but they will spend most of their lives dreaming of the incredible books they never wrote or the wonderful plays they never performed or the fabulous music they never wrote or played. Such people make wonderful readers of the writing others produce but mistake their love of reading for the ability to write. It’s creatively easy to enjoy a world-class violinist. It’s much hard to play world-class violin.

Writing is Talent, Craft and Discipline

My father once approached an artist in a museum in Paris. This man was cleaning his brushes after having painted a copy of one of the Great Masters paintings. The reproduction was amazingly exact. My father asked the artist why he had not made any changes to the copy he had just painted or tried something new of his own. The Artist replied that he needed to learn the craft and technique of those who had preceded him so that he would know the rules they had discovered before he tried to make new rules of his own.

Perhaps there are new writers out there who will break the rules in new and wondrous ways but you have to understand the rules before you can break them. It does not ‘stifle’ an architect’s creativity to understand the laws of physics, load and stress — but it does make for buildings that do not fall down before they are built.

In our writing workshops we teach the ‘foundations of story’ and the ‘physics of character relativity’. We deal with the fundamental structure of plot and how it relates to character function in the story. The craft of writing is not just about being creative; it is about translating that creativity in to writing that can be shared consistently with an audience and have meaning again and again.

Writing requires discipline … so don’t stifle it!

GUEST AUTHOR POST BY W. DANIEL WILLIS

I have a confession to make, it’s been three weeks since I did any serious writing.  I’m supposed to be finished with my next book right now.  Fact is I’m a little less than halfway through.  I’d like to blame it on the holidays or the fact that I’m juggling writing, being Mr. Mom, and taking a class in programing.  Heck I’d settle for blaming it on my rampant ADD, I’m easy that way.

Truth is, however, that I’m not writing because I’m just not seeing any future in it.  The writing industry is changing rapidly right now and even if I got a contract on my last book, who knows if the market will be there when it comes out?  Then there’s the whole e-self-publishing route where no one really knows what’s going on but we know that some people are selling millions of books.  Quite frankly it sounds like there are better odds playing the lottery.  (For the mathematically challenged, playing the lottery is only slightly less risky than throwing your money down the garbage disposer.)

So, for the last three weeks or so, I’ve been kicking an idea around in the back of my head.

What if I just quit?

I mean lets face it, while I have been published four times, I haven’t cracked the level of success where I can actually make a living.  I used to be a hotshot computer programmer and, while my skills are very rusty, I can whip them back into shape.  Programmers make good money (provided you move out of Utah, which I could do).  Heck, I’ve worked in the game industry and have contacts there, maybe it’s time to resurrect that dream.

So what if I quit?

I don’t have a fan base to speak of, so there’s no one to disappoint.  Writing is an incredibly time consuming activity.  Who knows what I could do if I got that time back?

So that’s what I’ve been thinking.  Maybe it’s time to commit professional seppuku and move on.  It wouldn’t be my first career that went that way.

I wrote the previous thoughts this morning while my youngest played with her barbie and the sink full of dishes glared at me, meaningfully.  I got busy (though I studiously ignored the dishes) and didn’t post it.  Then a few minutes ago, while checking my email, I got a newsletter from a professional friend of mine, a writer of great talent, renown, and success.  It was his periodic newsletter to friends and aspiring writers and it’s message was simply; “Don’t Quit.”  The letter detailed the struggles of top shelf writers like J.K. Rowling, Stephen King, and James Joyce.  I have to admit I’d heard most of it before and didn’t really pay much attention.  What I needed was the subject.

Don’t quit.

I’m a religious man and I believe God has a plan for everybody.  I believe you have to go and find it, and that he’ll lead you to it if you’re listening.  I’ve been praying for guidance as I moved through the black labyrinth of the last few weeks.  If this isn’t the answer I’ve been looking for, I don’t know what is.

So that’s it then.  The wakizashi goes back in the scabbard and I move on.

I’ve got twenty chapters left to write in Traven’s Gambit (my latest book).  I’m going to take tomorrow off to get my head right and hit the ground running on Monday.  I plan to be done five weeks from now on the 27th of February.  From there, it will be off to the editor for a few weeks then back to me for revisions.  That should put the whole shootin’ match over by Easter.

Wish me luck.  I’ll keep you posted.

Tracy’s Note: Dan Willis is a friend of mine and author of four books set in the Dragonlance world. I thought you might find some thoughtful ideas in his post.

As we ring in the new year, a quick shout of congratulations to fellow Scribe’s Forge author Tom Bielawski and his Kindle ebook “A Tide of Shadows“. This first book by Tom has risen meteorically into the top hundred of best sellers in Fantasy Books on Amazon.com. You may recall Tom recently was featured as a guest post on several of our websites. We hope you’ll all join us in congratulating this promising author.

When Christmas time comes around each year, one of the first movies that we get out and play is ‘Miracle on 34th Street.’ Not the horrible remake that was done a few years ago but the real deal: the 1947 version with Maureen O’Hara, John Daily, the Oscar-winning Edmund Gwynn and the delightful child-star Natalie Wood. The story came from Valentine Davies who was purchasing a present for his wife in a New York department story on Christmas Eve of 1945. Pressed by the crowds he wondered what Santa Claus would think of all the commercialism of the season. This became the spark for his story which George Seaton adapted into the screenplay.

It being one of our favorite holiday films and with both Laura and I in the car driving down to visit my parents some five hours away from our home, we found ourselves talking about the story and passing the time doing what any good student of story enjoys doing from time to time: deconstructing the elements of the story.

If you happen to be one of our apprentices of story in our Scribe’s Forge writing seminars, then our musings on this classic tale will make more sense as you already have the context and the vocabulary of story structure under your belt. If you are new to story structure we hope you’ll hang on for the ride.

Every story is basically told through the progression of four throughlines: Objective Throughline, Main Character Throughline, Impact Character Throughline and Subjective Throughline. Our deconstruction of ‘Miracle on 34th Street’ falls nicely within this structure.

OBJECTIVE THROUGHLINE: Macy’s Santa Claus battle with a mean-spirited psychologist results in Santa being on trial in a competency hearing that threatens to lock him up before Christmas Eve.

MAIN CHARACTER THROUGHLINE: Doris Walker, a divorced and disillusioned manager in the toy department at Macy’s Department Store struggles with her loss of trust and faith as she tries to build a relationship with her neighbor, Fred Gailey.

IMPACT CHARACTER THROUGHLINE: Kris Kringle battles the commercialization of the holiday in hopes of bringing back the spirit of joy and selfless giving to Christmas.

SUBJECTIVE STORY: Kris Kringle and Doris Walker struggle with each other between the concept of faith and rational pragmatism that disguises Doris’ fears and disillusionment.

The characters are numerous and diverse but ultimately reveal some very interesting story telling structure underpinning the tale that makes it fascinating all these decades later. First, let’s take a look at the Driver Characters … those characters that move the Objective Thoroughline forward in the story.
DRIVER CHARACTERS

• KRIS KRINGLE / PROTAGONIST: Our Santa Claus character provides both the action and thought characteristics of a protagonist. However, as he is NOT the main character of the story, he would not be considered a hero per se.
• RATIONAL WORLD / ANTAGONIST: Kris Kringle is in direct opposition to the ‘rational world’ which we experience around us. This makes the antagonist in this story ‘situational.’ Kris is battling a condition or situation that exists at large. This part of the story structure is actually represented by a number of characters who come and go in the story with various affect. The most prominent representative of the world is the District Attorney Thomas Mara who represents the world view throughout the trial. However others also represent this view through other parts of the story: R. H. Macy, Mr. Gimble, Julian Shellhammer, Mrs. Mara and her son as well as the post office mail sorter. All these characters are a part of the situation that drives the Objective Plot forward.
• FRED GAILEY & DR. PIERCE / GUARDIANS: This is where things got rather interesting for us as we discussed this structure. Fred Gaily represents the ‘Action’ characteristic of Guardian as he literally defends Kris in court. On the other hand, Dr. Pierce represents the ‘thought’ characteristic of the Guardian in his brief appearance in Doris Walker’s office as he counter’s Mr. Sawyer’s diagnosis of Kris as having ‘latent maniacal tendencies.’ As Dr. Pierce only represents one half of a full character’s aspects, he is a thin, two dimensional character and we feel that way about him in the film. On the other hand, this makes Fred Gailey into a ‘complex character’ and, as such, more interesting. Speaking of Mr. Sawyer…
• GRANVILLE SAWYER / CONTAGONIST: Mr. Sawyer is in direct opposition to the guardians at every turn and, most importantly, definitely has his own ulterior motives in his behavior. He both thinks and acts as a manipulator in the story … an ideal representative of a contagonist position in the story.

Now that we have the Drivers of the Objective Throughline, let’s take a look at the passengers of the Objective story who are being pulled along by that plot.

PASSENGER CHARACTERS

• DORIS WALKER & JUDGE XAVIER HARPER / REASON: Doris is actually a complex character her actions are those of a skeptic but her thought processes are all about reason.
• FRED GAILEY & ALFRED / EMOTION: While Fred Gailey’s actions are those of a Guardian, his thinking and rationality are those of the Emotional Argument.
• SUSAN WALKER / SIDEKICK: Susan Walker is Doris’ little girl and, as the central theme of the subjective story revolves around the conflict between Santa Claus and her mother – the personifications of faith vs. rational pragmatism – she is at the center of their conflict. In a sense they are struggling over what she represents, child-like wonder and hope being crushed by the commercial world.
• DORIS WALKER & CHARLIE HALLORAN / SKEPTIC: Charlie Halloran is the District Attorney who is prosecuting – which he takes pains to explain to his wife is different than ‘persecuting’ – Santa Claus. He is the action half of the Skeptic in this case while Doris Walker represents the thought processes of the Skeptical Archetype.

Finally, as we look at the Main and Impact Characters of the piece, we must determine which of them remains the same and which changes as a result of the journey. Despite the forces against him, it is Santa Claus in the form of Kris Kringle who remains constant and, ultimately, it is Doris Walker who accepts that ‘Faith is believing when common sense tells you not to.’ She changes to realize that it is hope and faith that offers her an opportunity for happiness that she will never find in the commercial world.

Which, after all, IS what Christmas should be all about.

by Tom Bielawski

Note from Tracy Hickman: Tom Bielawski is one of our authors taking part in our ‘Scribe’s Forge Online Writing Workshops and Seminars.’ We thought you might like to hear about his experience both in our workshops and his journey as a new author in modern publishing.

I really feel honored to be a guest blogger on Tracy Hickman’s website. I read Dragonlance Chronicles and the Darksword Trilogy during my youth and those works are what laid the foundation for my love of speculative fiction and my desire to write fantasy. Thank you, Tracy, for giving me this opportunity.

I am a student at Scribesforge, a career law enforcement officer, a Marine who served “in every clime and place,” a husband, a father of two, and a “CF Dad.” As I type these words I am in the process of concluding my second and final year in Afghanistan as a police mentor. I will hang my hat on what I’ve done here and go home to pursue my writing career.

Writing my first book was a lengthy process, I won’t tell you how lengthy. Having found the world of Facebook, I eventually found Tracy Hickman, one of my all-time favorite authors. I was amazed at how approachable to, and interactive with, he was with his fans. Through that medium, Tracy introduced me to the Scribesforge online workshop where my goal of completing my book and sharing it with the world went from “someday” to “now.”

One of the important concepts that I learned from Tracy at the “Forge” was thinking of writing is a true craft, and that a writer is a skilled craftsman. Thinking of myself as a craftsman writer really helped me put that label on who I am: I am a writer. And it helped move away from that “someday” trap we all know and hate.

Another important concept from the “Forge” is: “being read” vs “being published.” It may seem like splitting hairs, but it is not. You cannot be successful if no one reads your work, whether you publish in traditional print or otherwise. Scribesforge, helped me make my book something which people enjoy reading!

I found that my biggest obstacle to becoming that “craftsman writer” was conquering the world of distraction, in whatever form that takes. The following is my take on a discussion on this very subject in the forums at Scribesforge:

“Working over here and finding time to work on my novel amidst the distractions of here and the distractions from 7000 miles away (at home) is a challenge. The distractions had been my worst enemy when it came to overcoming writers block.
One day I was feeling pretty homesick. And I realized that only thing that is keeping me from my dream of writing for a living is writing. Even though I was pretty blue and out of sorts, and in no mood to write, I found that the emotion I was feeling at that moment moved onto the pages with surprising ease. With the raw emotions of my problems, both foreign and domestic, sitting on my shoulder I just forced myself to write. I found that the dialogue seemed more believable and, well, more emotional. Which was appropriate for the emotional strain my character was under. My descriptions became simpler yet more poignant, which was the point I was trying to make in that scene anyway.
Necessity forced me to find a way to overcome my blocks and I used my mental enemy to my advantage. It still works for me because, like everyone else in this world, I still have the things in life with which I must face and reckon. But, I have found when I make myself sit down in front of the computer, those very issues make my writing just a little bit better.”

Learning how to defeat the distractions of my life was integral to actually finishing my novel, and sharing these experiences with other writers really helped. But, most important was the support of my family and my relationship with God. Without those, I couldn’t have overcome the distractions which have haunted me these many years.

The success of my first book, “A Tide of Shadows,” has been very encouraging. The feeling of seeing my name and my work for sale on Amazon for the very first time was indescribable. Better was the feeling when people actually bought my work; better still was the feeling when people continued buying my work!

“A Tide of Shadows,” is the first installment in my series of epic fantasy called “The Chronicles of Llars.” In this book Carym of Hyrum is a well respected village hero. But a turn of events forces him into a confrontation that leaves an agent of the church dead, and Carym wanted for murder. But Carym receives unlikely assistance from a group of outlaw criminals, a group to which his best friend now belongs. While he has been saved from the executioner’s axe, he must repay the outlaws for their help by undertaking a dangerous quest to find a vial of water from the mythical Everpool. Meanwhile, a dark wizard in league with an evil god leads an army bent on the conquest of the entire Northern Continent. He, too, seeks the Everpool, but for far more sinister purposes and his powerful minions hunt Carym at every turn. In order to reach the Everpool Carym must learn to deal with his new powers, dodge monstrous hunters, guard against betrayal, and resist the evil temptations that threaten to overwhelm him like a Tide of Shadows.

My second work is a science fiction novella called “The Centaurus Legacy.” This is a fast paced, action driven, novella filled with intrigue and suspense, set in the universe of lauded 22nd Century lawman, Marshal Hendrick (Heck) Thomas. Marshal Thomas suddenly finds himself on the wrong side of the law when a criminal mafia mastermind with connections to the government links him to a series of heinous crimes. With the Bureau of Investigation and the Commonwealth Fleet in pursuit, Marshal Thomas must find a way to avoid capture by corrupt officials, clear his name, and prevent the dangerous Centaurus technology from tipping the balance of power forever.

For more information about my books, stop by my webstite: www.tombielawski.com or look me up on Facebook and Twitter.

Thank you, Tracy, for providing me with the tools to turn my dream into reality.

by Tracy & Laura Hickman

The craftsmen writers are taking over the Publishing Guilds.

I have always admired the idea of craftsmen. A craftsman, in my mind, is an artist who has successfully merged his musings, inspirations and visions with practiced skill and the tools with which to realize those visions. I have little use for those who claim to be an artist only because they lay on the fainting couch, the back of their hand to their forehead and are perpetually moaning as they wait for some muse to slap them with brilliance that will make them immortal. Give me a craftsman who stands up, rolls up their sleeves, grabs every tool they command and forges their art into something meaningful and real. Craftsmen are not content to wait for immortality to find them … they go out looking for it, seize it and own it.

The idea of craftsmen goes back to the foundations of civilization. There were craftsmen known as early as 600 B.C. in India (even earlier in China) and 300 B.C. in Ptolemaic Egypt. These craftsmen held ‘secrets’ of their trade, imparting their artistry as ‘mysteries’ only to those who apprenticed after them. This was a matter largely of remaining employed: if you needed a particular thing done that required the skill of a craftsmen, then you were limited to employing those craftsmen who knew the skill.

The protection of these skills and the tools to bring their arts into reality eventually led to the rise of the guilds which allowed the communal protection of their ‘mysteries’, being a combination of cartels, trade-unions and secret societies. Beyond their mythic origins, Freemasons have their medieval roots in simple rituals associated with the craft guilds of mason stone craftsmen. The value and contribution of such guilds had been hotly debated in terms of Europe: some claimed that the rigid protection of craft secrets stifled innovation while others claimed that the system paired craft masters and produced a higher level of craft development than could be accomplished by individual craftsmen at large.
Until recently, Publishing Houses operated very much like guilds of literature. Publishing houses – like guild houses – protected their own ‘mysteries’ of selection, editorial, production, marketing and distribution. Their ‘pitch’ process became the initiation which had to be passed before one could get published. Above all, Publishing Houses were the guardians of what constituted ‘literature worthy of print.’ Until you became a ‘published author’ – in other words, one of the editorial craftsmen inside the Publishing Guild thought your words worthy of being accepted into the Publishing Guild – then you were outside and your options were largely limited to, at best, smaller, niche press houses or, worse, vanity press. The major publishing houses largely determined what you could purchase and it had to come from their guild. They had the economy of size (large print runs and they owned their own presses) and were part of an established and self-sustaining chain of distribution which ran all the way from the editor you got all those rejection slips from to your local book store whose selection of books sitting at the front of the store largely determined what they thought you should purchase.

Then came Amazon and the ebook … and the Publishing Guilds were under siege.

The benefits of the traditional Publishers to authors have been eroding ever since. Their economy of scale in publishing huge print runs has been compromised by the fall of the Brick-and-mortar Local Bookstore in favor of the quick convenience of online shopping. The result is that the marketing power of the publisher has become severely handicapped because they no longer have as much control over what you see when you first walk into the shop – because you now shop online. Increasingly, publishers expect their authors to provide the audience for their books, because traditional marketing methods in print and through the old methods are increasingly dysfunctional.

Add to this the completely unanticipated rise of the ebook. The Kindle and the Nook – as well as on smart phones tied to the same system – were initially dismissed by the Publishing Guilds as a ‘fad’. No one would want to read a book on a computer screen, they reasoned.

They reasoned wrong. Not too long ago, Kindle download sales exceeded those of paperback books on Amazon.com. Ebooks take up zero shelf space, cost zero to ship, have zero printing costs and are delivered practically instantly.

So, the protected secrets and power of the Publishing Guilds are dwindling and with them the benefits they offer to the upcoming author. They no longer control the distribution and marketing of your book as they have down through history. Their ability to print large numbers of books is challenged by the fact that an ebook essentially has a copy available instantly for every person who wants one. Yes, they can pay advances to authors but those advances are shrinking in the face of decreasing revenues and largely fixed overhead costs. And, of course, anyone with a computer can become ‘published’ (if one were so crass as to make such a ridiculous claim) simply by barfing up their words in a Kindle file through Amazon’s Self Publishing program.

One of the remaining benefits to the Publishing Guilds (i.e. traditional publishing houses) is that they are still the bastions of literary quality. They still provide editorial on their author’s manuscripts, direction and polish … and every craftsman desperately needs that polish. There is not a writer in the world whose prose is as perfect as they believe. I’ve been a professional in this industry for over a quarter of a century and, craftsman that I am, I still love an editor that purchases red ink by the gallon

As we say here at Scribe’s Forge, being an author today is no longer about being published … it’s about being READ. Self publishing in electronic format has become the new gateway into becoming an author but without the ‘quality assurance’ system provided by traditional Publishing – editorial, layout, art direction – many of these books are doomed to failure. William Goldman says that ‘story is structure’ and it takes a craftsman storyteller and writer to provide an ebook that will acquire an audience and establish a career. We teach story craftsmanship in our Scribe’s Forge online writing seminars but that is only part of what you need to hone your craft today … you also need the help of craftsmen who know the part of publishing that publishers do best. You need an editor who will work with you to ‘see the fire through the smoke’ of your words. You need proper art direction and a layout that looks professional to the reader.

You may no longer need the guild … but you certainly need the help of other craftsmen.

Laura and I have been watching the ABC television series ‘Once Upon a Time‘ here in the United States. It is about an Evil Queen in a fantasy world filled with fairytale characters all of whom she curses with the most terrible of magical spells … condemning them to live their lives in our reality and not remembering their true, better selves.

It is, indeed, a terrible curse.

The conflict between what we desire — our fantasies — and what we perceive as real has been a long standing one. Recently, Laura and I watched the traditional holiday movie ‘Miracle on 34th Street.’ Avoid the modern version, the only true Santa Claus is found in the 1947 version with Edmund Gwenn, Maureen O’Hara, John, Payne and the perfect Natalie Wood. The curse is found here, too, in Maureen O’Hara’s character of Doris Walker when she addresses John Payne’s Fred Gailey on the subject.

WALKER: But I think there is harm. I tell her Santa Claus is a myth, you bring her here… and she sees hundreds of gullible children… meets a very convincing old man with real whiskers. This sets up a very harmful mental conflict within her. What is she going to think? Who is she going to believe? And by filling them full of fairy tales… they grow up considering life a fantasy instead of a reality. They keep waiting for Prince Charming to come along. And when he does, he turns out to be a…

GAILEY: We were talking about Suzie, not about you.

Mrs. Walker is condemned to live her life within the confines of her own perception of reality … and only comes alive when she takes off these blinders and considers being open to something more and find hope once more.

As a writer, I’ve come to believe that there are there is apparent truth and desired truth. Reality, I believe, is found in both but not fully explored or understood by either.

We think of apparent truth as reality but what is apparent isn’t always real. It was apparently true to the ancients that the world was flat. Science has down through the ages changed its perspective, broadened its understanding of the universe and, with each new perspective, the apparent truth of yesterday is replaced by the apparent truth of today. Reality has not been altered but our perspective on it has changed. Consider that science, in order to progress beyond our current understanding, must accept that it does not yet have a complete perspective on reality — and so our apparent truth of today is incomplete. ‘Here be dragons’ continues to lurk beyond our apparent understanding.

Desired truth is not just a wish … it is a hope for a reality that is better than the one which is apparent. Desired truth acknowledges that there is an ideal to be achieved beyond the imperfect trappings of our perceived reality.

Some men see things as they are and say why – I dream things that never were and say why not.

– George Bernard Shaw

A friend of mine was speaking a few days ago about our church hymns. He said, “We don’t sing about what’s real … we sing the ideal.” That thought has stayed with me these last few days. We are coming into the holiday season with a day of Thanksgiving and the many religious holiday celebrations in December. It has made me reflect on the purpose I have in writing.

There are many, I know, who believe that our literature should be about the reality — I would say ‘apparent truth’ — of our existence and should reflect who we are in honest examination. I believe that is only partially true; we should examine the apparent truth of our lives but we must do more than just wallow in our sorrows, inhumanity to man or the bleakness of troubled economic times. I believe that the real value in the written word comes not in our apparent truth but in our desired truth — in telling us not who we are but who we can become.

One of my favorite poems is by Robert Frost written in 1947. It’s called ‘Choose Something Like a Star’ and it is about our desire to understand and how we are inspired to rise above ourselves.

O Star (the fairest one in sight),
We grant your loftiness the right
To some obscurity of cloud –
It will not do to say of night,
Since dark is what brings out your light.
Some mystery becomes the proud.
But to be wholly taciturn
In your reserve is not allowed.

Say something to us we can learn
By heart and when alone repeat.
Say something! And it says “I burn.”
But say with what degree of heat.
Talk Fahrenheit, talk Centigrade.
Use language we can comprehend.
Tell us what elements you blend.
It gives us strangely little aid,
But does tell something in the end.

And steadfast as Keats’ Eremite,
Not even stooping from its sphere,
It asks a little of us here.
It asks of us a certain height,
So when at times the mob is swayed
To carry praise or blame too far,
We may choose something like a star
To stay our minds on and be staid.

Story, as Joseph Campbell saw it, exists not so much to tell us who we are as to show us who we should be.

We may write what is real … but when we do, let us be sure to sing the ideal.

The season approaches and we thoughts we would like to offer the gift of the storytelling craft. Now you can purchase gift certificates to our online writing seminars to give to your favorite aspiring author!

$160.00 U.S.*

You may email your gift directly to the recipient on a specified date
OR…
If you do not yet know to whom you are giving your certificate, leave the recipient’s name and email blank during your purchase and print out the certificate to give to whomever you like!

*You may make your gift certificate for any amount that you wish but we RECOMMEND $160 to cover the full cost of the seminars. Gift Certificates may also be purchased and used for our Personal Review Workshops for $460. I believe recipients can even redeem multiple Scribe’s Forge gift certificates on a single seminar purchase.

For all our Nanowrimo friends out there … an ode to you!

I was recently intrigued by S. Peter Davis’s article ‘Six Reasons We’re In Another Book Burning Period in History.’ It listed them in the following order:

• #6 Libraries are burning books: We’re not talking about some backward dictatorship oppressive regime here: we’re talking the British Library, the University of New South Wales in Australia and several other such institutions. The closing of Borders stores nation wide is resulting in the wholesale destruction of books. This is happening because…
• #5 It’s Cheaper Than Giving Them Away. Maintaining all those books in a large library is expensive … and it’s actually cheaper to destroy them than to give them away.
• #4 It Has to be Done in Secret: People go crazy when they hear that books are being destroyed … so it’s done quietly as possible. This is important because…
• #3 The Economy is Killing Libraries: Libraries are not museums of books … they have to live and die by subscriptions and keeping current. If you don’t have enough money to keep all those books … then some of them just have to go.
• #2 Libraries Can’t Grow Fast Enough: More and more books are being printed every day — and we’re’ not talking just those fun novels we like to read. We’re talking textbooks and journals and technical publications. That’s a lot to keep up with and there just isn’t room enough for every book anymore no matter how boring the subject matter or how badly written. Since the library can’t get bigger … the number of old books has to decline to make way for the new.
• #1 Books are going Digital: So why pay all that money to maintain a library when you could do it from a kiosk?

Perhaps you thought that book burning was safely in the realm of the past of the Third Reich or in fiction like ‘Fahrenheit 451.’ There is even more to this frightening tale … which is the secret fright called ‘strippable covers.’

Imagine you are walking into your favorite books store (remember, I said IMAGINE) and the first thing you see just inside the doors of your Barnes & Noble is a HUGE stack of Tracy Hickman’s latest novel: ‘Citadels of the Lost.’ (Again, this is a fantasy … stay with me.) Now seeing that his Barnes & Noble has stocked about a thousand copies of my book and is displaying it prominently in the front of the store. You and everyone else coming through those double doors would naturally think ‘Say! That’s a lot of books! This store must be expecting to sell a LOT of them. It must be a really good book if they expect to sell that many of them!’

Actually, it’s an illusion. The bookstore has probably been paid to stock that many books and the publisher has printed a gazillion copies of the books because … it doesn’t matter if they sell or not. The argument is that it would be prohibitively expensive to send unsold books back to the publisher. So, all the book store has to do in order to get a FULL CREDIT refund for the book is to rip the cover off of it and mail only the covers back. (Kind of like an assassin sending back a finger to prove he’s really done the job.) The, the bookstore where all those books were so proudly displayed last month is required to destroy the books that no longer have a cover.

Of course, it really isn’t as sinister as all that. If a book were to really become an overnight success then you would want all those books out there to be bought up by happy, hungry customers. But the problem with this is that too many books get printed … and then because they are surplus in the marketplace, they are burned.

This is one of the interesting aspects of new media publishing. Ebooks may be a volatile medium but they have the benefit of not having to print more than there is a demand. POD (Print on Demand) is evolving and may soon also prevent over-publication of books. Our own Scribe’s Forge Publishing Method (serial books followed by printing ONLY enough books to cover subscriptions) is another model that is essentially ‘green’ — printing only those books that are needed.

We may be in a book burning age … because the beauty and artistry of books is being destroyed by pragmatism and economics. As for me, I hope that there is a dawn at the end of such a night.