Preemptive strike

Normally, I wait until the end of the day to post. But tonight we have an epic Halo 3 gathering planned, so I figure I'll do a quick post now in case I'm not up to it later. Not long ago, I ran across Neil Gaiman's blog. I had heard of his writing, but had never read any of it before. But I enjoyed his blog, so I picked up a copy of Stardust, which was recently made into a movie.

So far I'm enjoying it. Though it seems to spit all over some of the more widespread conventions of writing. First off, I'm 42 pages into it, and I don't think I've really gotten to the plot yet. Actually, the protagonist doesn't even show up until page 31. Taking this much time to build up to the plot might not be a big deal in the daunting acreage that is Tolstoy or Proust or, you know, one of those authors that write really long books. But this book comes in at under 250 pages. Usually, when I've read nearly a sixth of the book, I expect to have gotten to the plot or at least to have some inkling as to what the plot will be. But it's still been a decent read.

Second off (hmm, second off doesn't sound right, but I started off with first off and if I use something else I'll have some parallelism issues, stupid English language), he uses a lot of adverbs. If you ever go to a gathering of writers, I would guess that probably 17 out of 18 of them would tell you that you should avoid adverbs whenever possible. This comes from the fact that Stephen King wrote a very good book, On Writing, that every up-and-coming-would-be writer has read because, after all, it is a very good book. In this book, King makes the argument that adverbs should be avoided because more often than not the image the adverb conveys is already implied in the context. Which is a good point. For instance: "He ran quickly." Is the 'quickly' necessary here? Isn't quickness something to be expected of someone running? Etc., etc., etc. . . But Stardust is full of adverbs. If you were allergic to adverbs even the tiniest bit, reading this book might put you in the hospital.

Third off, Gaiman uses ambiguous descriptions like "Her lips were red and perfectly shaped. . ." What do perfectly shaped lips look like? Are they big ol' Angelina Jolie lips or little bitty not Angelina Jolie lips? The generally accepted convention is that if you're describing something, it should actually evoke a clear image of that something.

But I'm not criticizing. I may be praising Gaiman, actually. He's a successful writer and has become one by creating his own style. I admire that. It's something that has been lacking in every gathering of writers I've ever encountered. They will read that Stephen King says to avoid adverbs, and so they avoid adverbs. This other source says not to use vague words like beautiful or ugly, and so they avoid those words. Someone declares, You must avoid passive voice, and hoards of writers do what they can to find avoidance of the use of a passive voice. But I never got the feeling that any of them really stopped to think about why or even if these things should be done. Writing is such a personal thing that I think it's silly to adopt or avoid techniques based solely on what other writers are doing. It's a good reminder for me though. I always forget that. Write for yourself first, then see what people think of it. (I kind of stole that bit from King's claim that the first draft should be written with the door closed and the following drafts should be written with the door open. Isn't it strange how something can seem both ironic and hypocritical at the same time?)

I'm grateful for a night promising sticky grenades, head shots, and exploding warthogs (20).