Tuesday, January 1, 2019

The finale – readers favs of 2018: bring on 2019!

Talk about beginning 2019 with a bang – two of my (and readers!) favorite posts of 2018, are combined here in a double edition! Today’s post combines the fast and furious recaps of the inimitable Tex Thompson’s Juice Box Hero format, published here first on September 25 and October 1, 2018.
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Boy, does Tex Thompson know how to put new twists on creative writing issues – witness such discussions as her analogy of book revision to Dante’s tour of the Inferno which I blogged about earlier this year. She didn’t disappoint with a world premiere of her newest program – Juice Box Hero: Squeezing Plot from Character – at this month’s meeting of the Writers Guild of Texas .

Because nothing can equal the actual experience of being in the same room with Tex, I’ll only provide a brief summary in this post. If you want to hear the full deal, you’ll have to urge your own writing group to book her next performance.

Which comes first in creative writing – character or plot -- she asked her audience. The fact is, both are essential, but putting too much emphasis on either results in a story as dry as a squeezed-out lemon. 

Enter Tex’s “10 Big Ideas” for extracting the maximum juice from both elements:

1.   Dial up the contrast

Whether it’s contrast between the main character and another, between characters and their environment, or a character’s “other self” – the person they want (or fear) to be, “this works for any manuscript problem,” Tex assured us. “If the contrast has been sitting at a 3, try dialing it up to 11.”

2.   Turn “and then” into “but” or “so” (or “therefore”)

If the plot has turned into what I once heard an editor call “a bus ride” (“A happens and then B happens”) try changing the format to “A happens, but then B happens.” Or “A happens, therefore B happens,” to create a domino effect of consequences.

3.  Take away the “reasonable” option or add a conflicting gain

mage: pixabay
Either forget that old “lesser of two evils” choice by taking the “right” choice completely off the table. Or, set up “mutually exclusive good” choices. And yes, you can do both! 

4.   Add a different kind of conflict

Given the three major kinds of conflict characters can experience -- internal, interpersonal, and external – give them more than one. The effect of internal and interpersonal conflicts is to elicit sympathy from readers. External conflict elicits admiration for the character. Now juice things up by adding a temptation or cost for each decision the character makes during the conflict. Think: “is there something a character would never do but that he/she must do to accomplish a goal?”

5.    “Force the wizard to throw a punch”

That thing your character is absolutely worst at? Make that the thing she must do. Tex noted that when a masculine character is forced to perform a job with feminine associations, the conventional result is comedy, i.e., Kindergarten Cop. On the other hand, when a feminine character must perform an act conventionally considered masculine, the usual result is a drama, i.e., Aliens or Kill Bill. Tex of course, being Tex, urged us to subvert these conventions. 
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Today it’s the conclusion of the inimitable Tex Thompson’s Juice Box Hero: Squeezing Plot from Character presentation. And since nothing beats hearing Texas in person, I’ll only give the barest skeleton of the writerly techniques which received their world before the recent meeting of the Writers Guild of Texas. Want more? You’ll have to persuade your own writing group to host Tex herself for the full meal deal!

Now – are you ready for the final five ideas? Ta-da!
6.     Use the four stages of competence 

Uh, what? Right, that’s how I felt. Like, you’re either competent or not, aren’t you? So Tex expanded this concept for us. She also graphed it, which I’m sorry I can’t show you. But as I said – consult Tex herself for the whole show. 

Here are those four stages of competence: unconscious incompetence (the we don’t know what we don’t know stage); conscious incompetence (we’re at least aware of our own inadequacy); conscious competence (we can do it, but we have to think about it); and unconscious competence (the never forgetting how to ride a bike stage). 

Tex also mapped these onto the three-act plot structure, remembering that Act 2 has two parts, with a major change in the middle: Act 1 – the character is unaware that a problem exists until, boing! his incompetence reaches his conscious level. Act 2 – the character starts to figure things out (moving from conscious incompetence to conscious competence), with numerous falls off the bike. Act 3 – ride the heck out of that bike! 

7.     “Jump before you’re pushed” 

Which in Tex-speak means, “that awful thing that happens to your character is something she brought on herself.” (Review the three forms of conflict and “choose whichever one most advances the story.”) 

8.     Include a well-intentioned catastrophe
Think “Gift of the Magi,” Tex urged us, in which each character, with the best of intentions, fails to realize what the other is doing. (Note: Catastrophes that can be averted by five minutes of honest communication don’t count. Our job is to prevent those characters from having those communications!)
9.     Use “so” to turn emotion into action  

Haven’t we all been at some point letting our characters wallow in their emotions? Tex’s solution aims to keep those emotions from descending into navel-gazing, while providing “kindling to make your plot catch file.” Her example of the solution: “. . . he’s upset. How upset? So upset he decides to (fill in the blank)”  

And the final idea is like unto it: 

10.   Use “so” to turn virtues into faults
“She’s generous. How generous? So generous that she takes on too much, gets overburdened and then . . .”
And then, as a special treat for us, her original audience, Tex shared a bonus idea, but I’ll let you in on it as well: Let the worst thing happen
We’ve probably all heard this one, but how often do we act on it in our writing? Maybe because we thought that worst thing was unbelievable? 
“We have to rethink about what happens not only to the story but to the character,” Tex said. “That forces the character to rewrite his own identity.”

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