THE POWER CLUB Chapter 2: "Tryout"

Chapter 1.

            “ISTHATTHEBESTYOUCANDO?” shouted Veryl Evans as he raced past Damon.

            “That’s not fair!” Damon shouted back.  “Hold still!”

            Veryl—Vee, as he preferred—ran circles around Damon, easily evading the darkspace.  His voice seemed to come from everywhere.  “If we were criminals, we wouldn’t hold still.” 

Damon tried to make the darkspace come faster.  But it came slowly, as always, a gentle cloud flowing out from every pore of his body.  By the time it spread ten feet, Vee was cackling from the other side of Mackintosh Park.

            Damon inhaled, making the darkspace go away, and glowered.  Vee could run faster than anyone else in the district and, though six months younger than Damon, was already a founding member of a club.  Damon, four months past his thirteenth birthday, still hadn’t been invited to join a club.

            That, he determined, was about to change.

            Damon turned to face his next opponent, Danner (“Don’t call me Danny!”) Young.  The fourteen-year-old liked to show off by standing at six feet almost always, but, no matter how tall he could grow, Damon would make sure it wasn’t tall enough.

            Damon closed his eyes and inhaled, envisioning the darkspace flowing straight up as far as it would go.  When he opened his eyes, his “night vision”activated.  Only Damon could see inside the darkspace, though everything appeared black and white, like an old-time cartoon.

            But Danner didn’t appear worried.  He flexed his muscles and started to grow: ten feet . . . fifteen . . . twenty.  Then, to Damon’s dismay, the older kid’s head disappeared—a sure sign that he had grown too large for the darkspace.  Then his torso and legs turned confidently away from Damon and simply walked out of the darkspace.

            “HEY, DAMON!” someone close to him shouted.   “THAT’S A NEAT TRICK!”

            Damon turned to face his third opponent, Kyle Powell.  At fifteen, Kyle was the oldest member of the Power Club and the most powerful.  So why is he just standing in the dark, shivering?

            No one could hear inside the darkspace unless Damon wanted them to, so he willed a hole—“a soundspace,” he called it—to open.  “Hey, Kyle, why are you just standing there looking stupid?”

            If Kyle was embarrassed, he didn’t show it.  “I don’t teleport when I can’t see where I’m going.  Might merge with a tree or something.”

            Perfect. If Damon could defeat Kyle, he’d be in the Power Club for sure.

            “So, is this it?” Kyle said, looking around at nothing.  “Can your darkness do anything else?”

            It doesn’t have to. Damon carefully closed the soundspace so Kyle wouldn’t hear him.  Then he ran toward Kyle.  All I have to do is trip him.  A feeling of immense power overcame him as approached the unsuspecting kid, then—

             . . . fft!

            Kyle disappeared—as did the darkspace!  Damon found himself floating.  He couldn’t sense anything.  He felt as if his body were liquid, being scrambled and rearranged.  His head lay on his torso.  Now it jutted from under his left knee.  His thumb protruded from the opposite side of his hand . . .

            Normal sensation gradually returned.  Blue sky . . . hot summer air . . . birds chirping . . . and Damon found himself standing in mid air.  He fell three feet to the ground, landed on his feet, and fell to his back.  The park spun, and he felt sick.

            He forced himself to sit up, not believing what had just happened.  Kyle teleported ME!  He looked around and saw a huge, twenty-foot, black cloud floating above where he’d been standing.       Awesome!

            It was his darkspace.  The black cloud lingered like a small child separated from its parent.  Then, slowly, it did something Damon had never seen it do before.  It turned grey and vanished, leaving behind its sole occupant, Kyle Powell.   

            Kyle jogged over to Damon.

            “I thought you said you couldn’t teleport when you can’t see where you’re going!”  Damon scolded him.

            “I said I don’t teleport.  A sly grin came to Kyle’s lips.  “But I keep my teleporter field on, just in case.” 

            “But you could’ve—”  As sensation in his legs returned, Damon struggled to stand and talk at the same time.  “You could’ve teleported me into a tree.”

            “Nah.  I know Mack Park pretty well.  I just had to make sure you were a few feet off the ground.”

            Vee and Danner, who had returned to his six-foot size, joined them.  “You musta tried to attack Kyle, didn’t ya?” Danner teased.  “Don’t feel too bad.  I used to do the same thing.”
            “Yeah, but you tried to sneak up on me more than once,” Kyle responded.  “Maybe Damon’s smart and will learn his lesson the first time.”

            They bantered back and forth like as if they had known each other a long time.  But Damon felt both in and out of the group.  He found himself laughing at jokes that weren’t funny.  “So, what happens next?”

            “Now,” Vee answered, “we vote.”

            “. . . in private,” Kyle added.

            Damon took the hint and jogged several feet away toward the sandpit where a group of younger kids—ords, probably—were playing on a slide.  He snuck a glance back once or twice to see the three Power Club members huddling like football players.  When he glanced back a third time, Kyle was running toward him—alone.

            Damon steeled himself.

            “Your power’s okay,” Kyle began, “but it’s not strong enough for the Power Club.  You need more practice.”

Murder Your Words: Be Ruthless in Revision

This is a photo taken of a peer revision comment from a writing class. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In his seminal book On Writing, Stephen King advised writers to “kill your darlings.”  A variation I’ve heard is “Murder your children.”

No, we’re not talking about a crime that will land you 25 to life. We’re talking about being utterly ruthless in revising and editing your work.

Any piece of writing becomes the writer’s child: You conceived it, you gave birth to it, you nurtured, clothed and fed it, and you will one day send it out into the world to make you proud. 

But, as any parent knows, sometimes children don’t turn out so well. Good parents, of course, love their children anyway.

Writing, however, is not something you should accept as-is.  Mediocrity breeds antipathy in readers. If you’re not excited about your work, how can you expect the reader to be?

That’s why writers have to become murderers—murderers of their own words.

Sounds extreme?

It is.

I learned this lesson anew when I recently went back and re-read some of the earlier chapters of my novel-in-progress, The Power Club™. The story I had slaved over for months was good—but just good.

Writers, your new mantra: “Good enough is never good enough.”

So I wrote a new version of Chapter 1 and sent it out to my critiquing group. They raved over the improvements, but one member suggested even more drastic changes: cutting out the entire first half of the chapter, beginning the story with the mid chapter break, and filling in the previous information as needed.

My initial reaction?

Drat! More work. I thought this book was finished. I thought this writing gig was supposed to be easy . . .

No, I’m not being hypocritical. Although I said in a previous post that writing never gets easier, it’s perfectly human to have such thoughts. Besides, I didn’t ignore his advice. I gave his suggestion a shot, and I think he’s right:  the new beginning improves the story dramatically. 

Of course, this means other revisions have to be made . . .

But the bottom line is this: I want a book that’s going to set the world on fire, not wallow on the shelves and beg readers to pick it up. Experience has taught me that I don’t remember the struggles that led to self-improvement. What I remember instead are the feelings of pride and accomplshment. What I gain through the effort is self-confidence.

So, go ahead: Murder your words. Killing them makes you and your book stronger.

Related articles

• Revision (emergingwriters.typepad.com)
• Just One More Page, and Then I'll go to Bed (hugs-and-chocolate.com)
• Making Your Revisions Count (theweekendwriter.wordpress.com)
• Write Now and Revise Later, or Right Now, Revise? (theweekendwriter.wordpress.com)

Should Your Character Be an Orphan?

Spider-Man debuts: Amazing Fantasy #15 (Aug. 1962). Cover art by Jack Kirby (penciler) and Steve Ditko (inker). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If you're writing a story that features a young hero, one of the most difficult questions you will have to answer is this: How many parents should your character have? Two? One? None?

Why is this difficult? Because writers often pattern their young characters after themselves at the same age, and killing off your character’s parents can feel like killing off your own.

Also, doing away with your character’s parents flies in the face of our normal human desire for our characters to be happy, healthy, and whole.

Yet heroes who have lost one or both parents dominate all kinds of fiction: Superman, Spider-Man, Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games, Scout Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird, and so forth. “Cinderella,” “Hansel and Gretel,” and other children's stories also feature heroes whose parents are either dead or absent.

Why can offing your character's parents be a good thing? Let's take a closer look at some of the examples above:

Katniss Everdeen

Katniss lost her father to a mining accident some years before The Hunger Games begins, leaving her to care for her emotionally absent mother and very young sister. Although it’s not explicitly stated in the film, Katniss appears to be her family’s sole provider: she hunts and begs for food.

These dire circumstances imbue Katniss with a streak of independence and strength of character which make her actions in the story plausible. Protective of her sister, Katniss volunteers to take her place in the Hunger Games. Able to hunt and hide, she possesses an advantage over most of her competitors.

In short, the loss of her father has turned Katniss into a survivor.

Scout Finch

Jean Louise “Scout” Finch ages from six to eight in Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird, but Scout lost her mother when she was two. Although she and her older brother, Jem, are looked after by their father’s cook, Calpurnia, the absence of a close female role model becomes apparent when Scout’s aunt, Alexandra, comes to live with them. 

Alexandra tries to mold Scout into a lady and indoctrinate her into the beliefs and practices considered proper for ladies in their small, 1930s Alabama town. But tomboy Scout wears overalls, gets into fights with Jem and other boys, and sneaks into the courthouse to watch her father, lawyer Atticus Finch, at work. 

In fact, Scout’s close relationship with her father plays a significant role in her open-mindedness and acceptance of people who are different from her (such as black people and the Finch's reclusive neighbor, Boo Radley), attitudes which are decidedly at odds with the judgmental and racist views common in her town. Scout learns to see the world through another's perspective, echoing her father's philosophy.

Had her mother lived, the novel implies, Scout may not have had such a close relationship with Atticus.

Superman and Spider-Man 

Both are orphans. Superman lost not only his natural parents but his entire world when Krypton exploded.  Raised by the kindly Kents, he becomes orphaned a second time when they pass away (in the original continuity, at least). 

Why was it necessary for Superman to lose two sets of parent? The answer DC Comics gave was to show that, for all his powers, Superman was not a god. There were things he could not control, such as death.

Spider-Man’s parents died when he was young, and he was raised by his aunt and uncle. He, too, experiences a second tragedy when Uncle Ben is shot and killed, which provides Spider-Man with his motivation to become a hero: “With great power comes great responsibility.”

Would it have made a difference if Ben Parker were Spidey’s father instead of his uncle? Perhaps writer Stan Lee chose to distance Peter Parker from his natural parents because the death of a parent in story would have been too schocking or hard for his young readers to take. (Consider how the murder of Batman’s parents, which happens in story, makes that character so much darker and his readers’ expectations of him so different from the examples above.) 

Katniss, Scout, Superman and Spidey lost one or both parents years before each of their stories begins. In each case (except Katniss), they are too young to remember the lost parent or parents. This allows the reader to feel sympathy toward them without being too horrified or grief-stricken.

Damon and The Power Club

Readers of this blog who have checked out the chapters of my novel-in-progress, The Power Club™, may have noticed that I've violated this apparent rule: Damon's parents are both alive and well, at least in the prologue.

Truth is, it never occurred to me to kill them off before. Even now, I'm on the fence about doing so. Damon has plenty of other things to cause him consternation, and I want him to be an individual character, not an archetype.

Besides, some stories do feature heroes whose parents live. (The Waltons and numerous other TV series come to mind.)

Another besides: Damon’s entire story has yet to be be written, so who knows what the future holds in store for Mr. and Mrs. Neumeyer?

Tie Your Mother Down?

So, why should you consider offing your character's parents? Because in our world the traditional family unit of two parents and 2.5 children is, whether we admit it or not, often considered the norm—the ideal standard for raising healthy, happy, and whole children. At least that's what many of our politicians say.

But your hero lives in an imperfect world (as do most of your readers). Something is missing and your hero sets out on a quest to find it. Or something is not right, and your hero tries to fix it. 

Taking your hero out of her "perfect" world sets your story in motion.

If you like this post, you may also like:

• Playing the Game: How The Hunger Games Combines Adventure and Social Commentary

• Should Writers Be Original or Do What the “Experts” Say?

• Superman Vs. Batman: Choose Your Icon

Playing the Game: How The Hunger Games Combines Adventure and Social Commentary

The Hunger Games (film)
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Jumping through hoops. Scratching someone else’s back. Tit for tat. Playing the game.

These are all terms young people face at some point in their lives if they want to succeed in the so-called adult world.  It’s not what you know—it’s who you know. It doesn’t matter how wonderful, talented, unique, and bright you are—you have to get people to like you.

And there is a lot of truth to these sayings. The world is run by imperfect human beings, many of whom got where they are by playing similar games. Yet most of us hope we can succeed on some level by being who we are, not by being forced to become something we’re not.

Enter The Hunger Games with its horrifying version of “playing the game” and what young people must do not only to succeed but to survive: kill each other.

In case you’ve been hiding in a cave for the last few weeks, The Hunger Games is the latest film franchise (based on a trilogy of novels by Suzanne Collins, who also co-wrote the screenplay) to be touted as the heir apparent of Harry Potter. (Succeeding a popular film franchise is, itself, a game, which makes The Hunger Games almost a parody of itself.) Like HP, HG is set in fantastic world in which young people must fight against overwhelming odds to survive and make a positive difference in the world.

But the differences between Harry Potter and The Hunger Games are more striking than the similarities. HG features a female protagonist (Katniss Everdeen). Instead of using a magic wand, she uses a bow and arrows. Instead of being helped along her journey by supportive friends such as Hermione and Ron, Katniss faces 23 youthful competitors whom she must kill or who will kill her. Instead of being guided by caring, powerful adults such as Dumbledore, she’s on her own, her every move observed by voyeuristic, decadent adults who get their jollies by watching kids kill kids.

Harry Potter, meet reality TV.

Of course, there’s much more to The Hunger Games than superficial comparisons to another successful film franchise. Indeed, the dark premise of The Hunger Games seeks to offer social commentary couched in the trappings of a Young Adult adventure story. It succeeds more often than not, and, for writers, it gives us a vivid demonstration of how to play our own game.

Just Another Adventure Story?

The Hunger Games is set in a future America called Panem, ruled by an effete, spoiled and insanely rich upper class. The Have Nots of this world live in 12 impoverished districts. Each district must satisfy the rich overlords’ annual lust for entertainment by offering up a male and female “tribute” between the ages fo 12 and 18 to participate in the Hunger Games, a violent Romanesque blood sport.   

Sixteen-year-old Katniss (played by Jennifer Lawrence) volunteers to take the place of her younger sister, Primrose. Fortunately for Katniss, she has spent her young life sneaking into the forest outside her district and learning to hunt. She can use a bow and arrow (quite expertly, in fact, as she demonstrates to a group of would-be sponsors by shooting an apple out of the gamemaster’s hand). She can climb trees and track animals. These skills put the odds of surviving decidedly in her favor.

And it’s a good thing, too. Katniss finds herself facing not only 23 kids who must kill her but also a forest fire, mosquitoes whose bites cause hallucinations, and ravenous beasts conjured at the gamemaster’s whim. In short, The Hunger Games combines breakneck action and imaginative scenarios which are bound to lure viewers into theaters (and readers into books). 

(Bowing to the sensibilities of its audience (and perhaps to secure a PG-13 rating), the film glides over the violence aimed at children.  Most deaths are shown in quick cuts without blood and gore. Still, it is perfectly clear what is happening, which makes the deaths all the more disturbing.)

Mirror, Mirror . . . on the TV Screen

One of the films previewed before the start of The Hunger Games was Snow White and the Huntsman, a lavish retelling of the familiar Disney classic. Snow White uses a literal mirror as a character who tells the evil queen she’s “the fairest in the land” but forces her to face an unpleasant truth: her beauty will one day be surpassed by that of Snow White.

The mirror used in The Hunger Games is metaphorical but no less “in your face”. Every time the film shows the Capitol and it’s heavily mascaraed citizens clamoring for tributes, I couldn’t help thinking of our present-day immersion in celebrities and the growing divide between the super-rich and rest of us (the 1 percent/99 percent mantra). Corporations and oil companies rule the day, and presidential races appear to be nothing more than contests for rich people who don’t know (or care) what’s it’s like to work hard and still fall behind.

Whether The Hunger Games says anything meaningful about the current state of affairs is debatable. What it does is escalate these twin phenomena of celebrity immersion and income disparity to ridiculous extremes. But are they so ridiculous? In the age of Charlie Sheen, it’s hard to say yes. While people have sat glued to their screens, awaiting the latest mishaps of celebrities du jour, young people have spent the last ten years dying in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Sure, we have “reasons” to justify slaughter, but so do the residents of Panem.

It’s to The Hunger Games’ credit that it doesn’t offer easy solutions (or any solutions, really—this is only the first film in the series). An uprising—evoking the Occupy movements—is shown briefly, but, in the end, Katniss learns to play the game as much as she learns to bend the rules a little (or, rather, to persuade those in charge to bend the rules for her benefit). Likewise, she does not come away with a new mission in life (as one might expect for the hero of an adventure story), but rather with a sense of “What do we do now?”

So it is in life.

This question does not have to be answered in a two-hour movie (nor even in a novel). Having the courage to ask the question is what elevates The Hunger Games and makes us—even writers—more fullly aware of the games we are all playing. 

What If Super-heroes Walked Among Us?

How would the real world treat people with super-powers?

Lots of stories have been written to explore this theme and, to a degree, I touch upon it in my work-in-progress, The Power Club.  However, I do so with a slightly different twist.

Most authors assume that people with extraordinary powers have some responsibility “to serve and protect” ordinary folks.  Like Superman, they become super-cops, in other words.  And super-hero fiction tends to adopt two extreme views of super-heroes: Either their influence on the world is overwhelmingly positive (Superman again) or overwhelmingly negative (Watchmen). 

But my take on people with super-powers (I’m deliberately avoiding the term “super-heroes” for a reason I hope will become obvious) is a little different.

In order to understand how people with powers would be received in the real world, we need to look at those the world already regards as exceptional: celebrities, politicians, star athletes, and anyone else who is famous for 15 minutes or longer.

First, though, we need to define what a super-power is.

A super-power can be defined as any ability that

• is not shared by most people, 
• makes its possessor stand out or unique, 
• controls the physical world or manipulates perceptions, and/or
• would be considered impossible by most standards of human limitations.

But even that definition breaks down.  Most people have some ability that makes them stand out from their peers or makes them unique in some way.  All of us have a limited ability to control our physical world, and the media, for one, manipulates perceptions every day.  Also, standards of human limitations are often broken by athletes.

Still, there would be an obvious difference between a bona fide super-power (Superman-level strength, for example) and more ordinary abilities (bench pressing 200 lbs, perhaps) – but where does a circus strongman who can lift a Volkswagen fit in?

Our inability to define precisely what a super-power is would play a role in how we treat those who are different.

We would start to question if anyone who exhibits remarkable abilities has a superhuman power. 

If my Uncle Fred has a unique ability to diagnose and fix car engine problems, does that mean he has some sort of car ESP?  Does a golfer who routinely gets holes-in-one use telekinesis to manipulate the ball in mid-air?  Do politicians who get elected year after year exert mind control over their constituents (actually, the last is probably true . . .).

This would create a lot of confusion, paranoia, and wish-fulfillment (“Daddy, can I have a super-power like Uncle Fred?”).

But let’s say that a few people – very few – could run at 200 mph, fly without artificial support, or manipulate light and darkness at will.  How would those people be regarded?

Most of us – busy with our own lives – would at first not regard them as much more than a curiosity, something to tweet about or share articles about on Facebook.  Sure, everyone would have an opinion.  Some would question why the government doesn’t use these people to take out [dictator or terrorist of your choice].  Others would wonder why they don’t use their powers to end world hunger or cure cancer (assuming, perhaps, that they have a responsibility to do such things).

And, if the government decided that people with powers must live in their own community – as happens in The Power Club – many of us express outrage that taxpayers have to foot the bill.  

So, for most of us, life would continue on as we watch Fox News and CNN or read the Internet to see what happens next.  Will the government figure out what do with these people who have special abilities?  Will they  figure out their own purpose?  Will Uncle Fred have to go live in “the district”?

And most of us won’t really care – until one of those people with powers goes rogue.

(And if that’s not a shameless plug for the novel, nothing is.)

Tell me your opinion: How would you react if you discovered your neighbor had a bona fide superpower?

Why You Should Write Your Character’s Biography

Image by jjpacres via Flickr

You’re soaring right along in your novel or short story when suddenly you’re stuck.  Your character reaches the crisis point or has to make a decision.  What does he do?  Does he go left or right? 

All writers face this dilemma at one point or another.  The great idea you had in the back of your mind now seems unworkable.  Your character could make either choice and it doesn’t matter.  Or, worse, you’ve been “winging” it all along and now there’s no wind to keep your story aloft.

But much uncertainty can be avoided if you take one simple precaution:  Before you write the story itself, write your main character's biography.

A character biography is not the same thing as your story.  Whereas your story will probably center on one crucial event or series of related events in your character’s life (“How Luke defeated Darth Vader”, “How Dorothy traveled to Oz and got back home”), the biography is an account of everything that’s happened in the character's life up until the moment we encounter her in the story.

A biography includes date and place of birth, parents’ names, siblings (if any), friends, the character’s physical attributes (height, weight, hair color, eye color, and so on), occupation, education, and even seemingly minor aspects such as her favorite color, favorite music, and sense of humor.

Furthermore, a biography does not merely list these aspects.  A biography should incorporate them into a mini-narrative – four or five pages, max— to show you how the details weave together and form the sum total of your character's fictional life.

The most important thing about your character biography is that the vast majority of these details will never be mentioned in your story.

.

So why write a character biography?

Because the more you know about your character, the more you know whether he will turn left or right, how he will behave in the crisis, and the probable outcomes from his choices.

Think about the choices you’ve made as a living, breathing human being.  Whether it’s who to marry, where to live, what job to take, or even what to order for lunch, weren't those choices based on some combination of your previous experiences, fears, or preferences? 

If you know you like chocolate cake because you’ve always liked chocolate cake, you’re more apt to order it for dessert than the peach meringue rhubarb pie, which you’ve never had before and which doesn’t sound appealing because you don’t like peaches or rhubarb.  On the other hand, if you’re sick of chocolate because you had a mocha almond shake yesterday, you might take a chance on something new.

So it is with your character.  If a group of older boys taunted her on the playground when she was 11, she might be wary of men as she grows older.  In The Da Vinci Code, we learn that Robert Langdon nearly drowned as a child, an experience which left him claustrophobic; not only does this detail reveal more about his character, it plays a key role in the story.

While writing my own novel, I’ve learned that because my young character likes root beer, he is favorably disposed toward a character who gives him root beer candy; this leads him to make a crucial decision later in the book.  Also, his devotion to a particular TV series influences how he interacts with certain other characters.

Know your character as well as (or even better than) you know yourself, and you’ll know exactly how he’ll respond in any given situation.  You may even find yourself saying the story is writing itself.

What has your character biography taught you about your character?