From The New Yorker:
Write the story that you most want to read. Which, yeah, for the majority of us means a story about a giraffe and a fireman who are best friends, and the fireman hangs out in a tree so that he can be eye-level with the giraffe, and then one day the zoo catches on fire, and the giraffe and the firemen are looking at each other, like, “Oh, no!,” and the fireman is thinking, How do I get down out of this tree to fight the fire?, and then he looks at the giraffe’s long neck, and the giraffe looks at him, and they both grin, like, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?,” and then the rest of the book is a choose-your-own-adventure story.
Nothing kicks ass more than when a character in your novel says the title of your novel. You don’t want your readers to miss this amazing moment, so make sure to set it up such that it’s really obvious that your character is about to say something important. I haven’t read “Hamlet,” but I would bet that Shakespeare probably wrote something like “Mrs. Globe sighed and pushed her spectacles up her nose. ‘Welllllllll,’ she began, very slowly. Then she paused to wrap a scarf carefully around her neck, shook her head ruefully, and, in an important voice, declared, ‘I guess that’s why they named the puppy Hamlet.’ ”
In order to finish your novel in a timely manner, you should set a goal of writing a thousand words per day. But these can’t just be any random words you think of, typed up in a list. I learned that the hard way.
Always write in the third person. The third person is Cain, the firstborn son of Adam and Eve. Every novel must be from his perspective. Even if you want to write a book about baseball or something, you still need to find a way to involve Cain, even if it’s just, like, “One day Cain went to the library and checked out an amazing book about baseball. This is what he read.” And then, after that, just put your whole novel. And, at the end, have Cain close your book and smile, really satisfied, because that will signal to your readers that it was a good read. But don’t have him burst into tears of amazement, because most readers will think, Now, this is just a bridge too far.
Link to the rest at The New Yorker
Hilarious! The piece really hits its stride when it repeats the (lousy) writing advice that you have to write in the third person, then points out that the third person was Cain, so you have to work him in somehow.
Great satire! Thanks, PG.
“Oh, no!,” and the fireman is thinking, How do I get down out of this tree to fight the fire?, and then he looks at the giraffe’s long neck, and the giraffe looks at him, and they both grin, like, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?,” and then the rest of the book is a choose-your-own-adventure story.
There’s a genre of stories (probably for kids) all about “why” animals have various characteristics they do. The charming scenario with the giraffe sounds exactly like something a kid in my fourth grade class would have come up with, when we were assigned to write such stories.
The OP’s “Cain” also has possibilities, simply because he’s the most mundane and harmless of the Cains than the ones I usually see in pop culture. I’ve begun to think that if a character’s first or last name is “Cain,” then the author is signaling the character has a “dark side.”
When I was growing up, one of my uncles’ best friends was named Cain. He had a wicked sense of humor. He was also a seminarian. Now a priest.
I doubt he chose that life in reaction to a “dark” name. But you never know, right?
On the other hand, I’ve seen my share of lazy authors name blackhearted villains Cain/Kane. Usually mustachio twirlers.
On the gripping hand, a clever author might name his otherwise unassuming serial killer Abel. 😉
“Abel” would be the refreshing choice 🙂 And yes, those lazy writers were exactly who I was thinking of.
I wrote a story opening about a hero named Cain for an assignment at a writing workshop.
I liked the character so much that I turned that opening into a novel. But I changed his name; too much baggage that clashed with my secondary fantasy world. 😉
Darnit! There really needs to be a nice, harmless “Cain” in fiction 🙂
LOL! Obviously I fell down on the job. 😉
The fireman, the giraffe, and Cain have transformed my writing life forever.
Like most “rules” elitist snobs like to throw out, some can be bent, others, broken.
Now that doesn’t mean you can break them willie-nilly, or ignore them without knowing why they are “guidelines.” Once you do, you know how to subvert them in a way that is pleasing to the reader.