A Writer's Tale (38 page)

So, given any basic plot setup and the story’s natural logic, ten different writers would develop the story in ten different ways. But there would almost certainly be basic, inevitable similarities among most of them.

And some of the stories could be so similar that people might be led to suspect plagiarism though no plagiarism occurred.

In my opinion, a major characteristic of a good writer is his ability to unearth the natural logic of a story, use it and develop it.

As an author, how do you discover a story’s internal logic?

If you have common sense and a store of good, general knowledge, it should be easy.

Consider the situation of your story. Then say to yourself, “If that happened, then what would probably happen
next
in the real world?” Let me stress, the
real world,
not the make-believe crap that usually tries to pass itself off as reality in the movies, on TV and in a lot of fiction. Say to yourself, “If that happened, then what would
I
do about it?”

Don’t ask what Clint Eastwood or Bruce Willis or Drew Barrymore would do, ask what
you
would do. You, or real people you know.

Keep asking yourself those questions. Each time you find a good answer, use it. And you’ll find that, for the most part, your story will develop easily and naturally. You’ll feel as if you’re
following
your story, not making it up. You actually
are
making it up, but it won’t feel that way. You’ll sense that the story has a life of its own. If that happens, you can be pretty sure that you’re writing a good story.

Having expounded on this topic, I feel compelled to qualify things. Obviously, some of your characters will not behave as
you
‘would behave in certain circumstances. And obviously, you don’t always want to go with the first event or course of action that pops into your head. Obviously a lot of other things. I’m not trying to cover every aspect of writing; I just want to pass along certain observations and suggestions about a few matters that I’ve discovered during my years as a writer.

The deal is, you’ll be better off as a writer if you’re aware that stories
do
have certain underlying, secret structures.

You need to find the natural elements of the story you’re trying to write. Show them to your reader, manipulate them, play with them, possibly mutilate them but ignore them only at your peril.

In writing
Island,
I let the story develop in its own way and I mostly just followed along to see what would happen next. But I helped it along, too. I was MOG. My game was to keep things moving along at a quick pace and to see how far I could go.

I pretty much pushed the situation and the format to its limits.

And on the final page of my manuscript, 594, I tossed a hand grenade (figuratively) into the works.

As for the ending, I didn’t know I’d do it till I
did
it.

I knew I
might,
but it was almost as if I left the final decision up to Rupert.

To my way of thinking, that’s the way it should be. Let the story lead the way. Be the chronicler of what seems almost inevitable. And don’t shove the story out of its natural path, even if the path appears to be leading toward a cliff.

That way, you surprise yourself and your readers.

I finished writing
Island
on January 23, 1995. Headline published it later that year, and Book Club Associates ordered 23,000 copies. In 1997,
Island
sold to Russia.

The Headline paperback edition is presently in its 7th printing.

BODY RIDES

As of January 25, 1995, I was done with
Island
and ready to embark on a new novel. I sat down in front of my computer. At that point, I didn’t have a clue about the subject of my next novel. So I went through my usual routine. In order to give you a look at how I get started on a new novel, I’ll reprint some of my early notes.

The notes will give you a close-up look at the way my mind operates when I am trying to get started on a new novel. Though I’ve already shown you my initial notes for
The Cellar,
I think that the notes I made in the early days of
Body Rides
are a lot more revealing about my mental processes.

And, after all, delving into mental processes is what
Body Rides
is all about.

Ideas for new novel Jan. 25, 1995 Just finished
Island
Next book.

1. Something that does not focus on a sex-maniac guy stalking, raping and murdering people.

Make the villain a woman? (Which is sort of what I’ve got in
The Glory Bus
partial.) 2. Come up with a big, catchy idea. For the background. Of course, the big, catchy ideas have all been used. So it would have to be a variation.

Maybe go with the
Hitcher
idea that I came up with back November, 1993.

As it turned out, I’d only made some very sketchy notes on the
Hitcher
idea, back in 1993-But the idea seemed to have potential. The next day, I sat down and explored the possibilities.

Jan. 26,1995

General plot.

A guy is in town. Happens to be in the right place at the right time, and saves a woman’s life. She leads him to her place. Rewards him with the gift of “Drifting”? You can drift from person to person, going along for the ride inside their bodies.

You are there, but separate. You remain aware of yourself, but you know their thoughts, feel what they feel. However, you can’t effect their thoughts or behavior in any way.

You’re just along for the ride.

The gal shows him how to do this. She gives him a ride to show him the ropes. Then explains the limitations.

Warns him that there are dangers especially, you don’t want to be a passenger at the time someone dies. Also, your actual body needs to be someplace safe.

The guy is excited, but nervous about his new powers.

He decides not to tell his girlfriend. She works nights. So shortly after he gets the power, he rides with her. She is great. Loyal, loves him, etc. But maybe when she gets back, he plays “games” with her. Makes a few remarks to let her know that he “knows” something.

This annoys her. Does he admit his power? She wouldn’t believe him, though. Would think he has been spying on her. This could be the beginning of the end.

Excellent way to start.

What are their jobs? In this book, it might be important. What if the gal is a cop? That might be pushing things, making it less “real.” Not a hospital worker. Something to do with a restaurant or bar? Better, something at the airport. What if she ‘works for something like Hoffman? Greets celebrities, etc? Gives them the royal treatment? If I have questions, I can check with Murray.

What about the guy? He could lose his job. Maybe he already did lose his job. He is out on streets during the day because he is looking for employment. Which means he is already a victim, and ready for a little trouble.

Big question. Do they live together? No. Gal won’t go for it. Wants to keep her own place unless they are married. She has a nicer place than him. He spends a lot of time over at her place.

What kind of guy is he? Timid. Dreams of wild adventures, but is too weak, nervous, etc. to do anything. Feels as if he is an “outsider.” Or should I make him more normal?

He is good, decent. Has never done anything terribly adventurous, or terribly wrong. He would like to do things, but fears the consequences. Is not experiencing much of life.

Stays pretty much in his own shell, etc.

This would be an ideal situation for a guy who wants to be a college professor. Maybe he is one of those guys who is a student for years. He is doing postgraduate studies at the local university.

Let’s play it by ear.

Except. How does he save the woman’s life? He is normally timid, not a risk-taker. She ends up basically uninjured, unless maybe minor injuries. Maybe should not involve cops.

That way, they can leave immediately afterward go to her place.

Maybe he is a grad student, walking home from the campus library at night. Or he is driving. Sees a woman get dragged into the bushes. Drives off the road, goes for the guys. Honking. The assailants take off. No. Maybe he has to get into a fray. Fights him/them off. Maybe with a knife.

Okay.

At that point, I quit making notes and began to write the book itself. I wrote steadily for about two weeks before pausing to make any more notes. Here they are.

Feb. 9, 1995

I am now up to about p.60 of the new book.
Drifters???

So far, Neal has rushed to the rescue of a woman in distress, Elise. He has shot and apparently killed her weird, bearded, sadistic assailant. After shooting the guy, he frees Elise. They cover bad guy with bushes, etc., leave bad guy’s van by road and return the videos.

Then Neal drives Elise to her home in Brentwood.

He is a screenwriter, substitute high school teacher.

Has a girlfriend, Marta. She works nights at LAX. Does not live with him.

Elise is a former diver. Divorced. Has nice house. She was diving in the dark when the guy supposedly grabbed her, applied choke hold. She came to in his van, in which she was taken to the place in W.L.A. where Neal rescued her.

There is possibility that her ex-husband may have sent the guy to nail her. But they both believe, pretty much, that she was actually just the random victim of a sociopath.

When they return to Elise’s house, she insists that Neal come in with her. She has spoken of giving him a reward. He has insisted that he doesn’t want a reward.

Ideas for what goes on in the future.

The plan is for her to give Neal a present. A bracelet, maybe. It allows him to “drift” or “hitch” rides with people He tries it out at her place, just after she gives it to him.

Afterward, he starts using it to “hitch” rides with people.

But I need to figure out general structure. Mainly, what about the bad guy from the opening???

To hitch, you have to find a person. Maybe it needs to be someone nearby, at least at the start. Within a couple of miles, or something? Because you have to float around, and can’t go great distances. Maybe the distances can be increased with practice.

Is the guy dead? Yes. But maybe his body disappears. Neal, concerned, drives past the area to see if there are cops. Then he even goes in on foot to see if the body is still there.

It’s not.

The deal is, I COULD go ahead with the story and leave out all the business about the Drifting or Hitching. Which might be a good thing, since its presence would make the book supernatural.

Try to figure out a plot that does without the hitching.

It would focus on Neal, Elise, Marta and the bad guy.

And maybe Elise’s ex-husband.

On the other hand… the drifting bit is what makes it different, more than just a crime story.

Maybe she (Elise) had already quit hitching. Got tired of it, scared, etc. Was controlling her life. So she fought it like an alcoholic. She only has the one bracelet. Gives it to Neal as the reward for saving her life. Warns him not to let it control him. It can be a curse, or a great thing, depending on its use.

The original idea was this. While Neal is hitching with a gal, she meets a bad guy. He is there when she is beaten, raped, murdered, etc. Gets out just in time. And then he wants to find the killer.

Maybe Marta is the victim. (This would free him up for Elise, etc.) But this can’t be a coincidence. Has to tie in, somehow, with the guy he killed.

Someone else might’ve been there, watching it all, unseen by Neal and Elise. He or she sees the shooting.

After making those notes, I returned to writing the novel and wrote steadily for another two weeks before working on another set of notes.

And so it went.

It is my usual method of working.

In a sense, I am an explorer making my way through an uncharted jungle. I have a general goal in mind getting through the jungle to its other side. But I know very little about what lies ahead. I trudge along, doing the best I can. Then, before getting helplessly lost, I climb a tree and scout the area ahead. I pick a distant landmark, climb down, and resume my trek until I reach the landmark. Or until I start to worry about being lost. Then I climb another tree make a new set of notes.

If you look closely at the notes that I reprinted above, you’ll get some very clear indications about how I go about developing my ideas.

As often happens, I had a concept that I liked a lot. But where to go with the concept wasn’t easy to discover. I simply relaxed and played around with some of the possibilities searching for what seemed right. (Searching for the inherent, natural structure?)

Plenty of the ideas mentioned in my notes did not end up in the story. Others arrived, but in strangely mutated forms.

Very few of the ideas appear in
Body Rides
intact. Why?

There are a lot of reasons. But a major, important reason is that I consider my notes to be a process of scouting the territory ahead. They give me general ideas about which way to go, but then the actual writing of the novel takes over.

As a story is being written, I find that one thing leads naturally, almost inevitably, to another. Almost in spite of my own intentions.

Sure, I could force the issues. After all,
I’m
the author.

I’m
the Master of the Game.

As stated before, however, I’ve found that it’s better to “give the story its head,” not try to force it into directions that might be more convenient for me.

If the novel doesn’t bear much resemblance to the preliminary notes, so much the better. It may be an indication that the story came to life and went racing off for adventures beyond anything I’d planned for it.

Body Rides,
like
Savage,
presented such an enormous challenge that I had strong doubts about my ability to pull it off.