{"id":32037,"date":"2018-03-29T09:02:50","date_gmt":"2018-03-29T13:02:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/?p=32037"},"modified":"2018-03-29T09:02:50","modified_gmt":"2018-03-29T13:02:50","slug":"aaron-rosenberg-five-things-i-learned-writing-digging-deep","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/2018\/03\/29\/aaron-rosenberg-five-things-i-learned-writing-digging-deep\/","title":{"rendered":"Aaron Rosenberg: Five Things I Learned Writing Digging Deep"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>DANGER RUNS DEEP.<\/i><\/p>\n

New York. City of millions. Home to the largest subway system in the world. Miles of tunnels stretch far underground, home themselves to a vast, displaced populace.<\/i><\/p>\n

But now someone\u2014or something\u2014is slaughtering these homeless. Along with anyone else foolish enough to venture underground.<\/i><\/p>\n

And whatever it is, it is slowly rising toward the surface.<\/i><\/p>\n

Can a young empath, a finicky professor, a flighty linguist, a foreign hunter, and a lone cop stop the threat before it spills out into the rest of the city?<\/i><\/p>\n

<\/i>* * *<\/p>\n

Knowing Isn\u2019t Enough<\/b><\/p>\n

Digging Deep<\/i> is set in New York City. My parents were both born and raised in New York City.<\/span> I wasn\u2019t, but I used to visit my grandparents here when I was growing up, my wife and I moved here many years ago, and I\u2019ve lived and worked here ever since. Which means I know this city pretty well. More than well enough to write about it.<\/p>\n

Or so I thought.<\/p>\n

Turns out, there\u2019s a lot I didn\u2019t know about this city. Oh, sure, I can tell you where there\u2019s a good Thai restaurant in Midtown (Topaz, 56th between Sixth and Seventh) or the nearest Citibank to my office (the one on 53rd and Fifth is marginally closer than the one on 53rd and Park) or which subway is the quickest way to World Trade (the E goes straight there but the 4 or 5 to Fulton is a lot faster, and only a block away). But I didn\u2019t know which subway station was the deepest underground (that would be the 191st Street stop on the 1) or that NYC doesn\u2019t have a SWAT unit (it\u2019s called ESU here, Emergency Service Unit, instead).<\/p>\n

These are all things I needed to know for my story, though (well, the subway info and the police info, not the bank or restaurant locations).<\/p>\n

Which is why it\u2019s crucial to do your research, even if you think you\u2019re already an expert. Because all it takes is for one reader to go \u201cHey, wait, NYC doesn\u2019t have SWAT!\u201d and they\u2019re thrown out of your story. Then they\u2019ll tell their friends, \u201cEh, don\u2019t bother, he clearly doesn\u2019t know what he\u2019s talking about.\u201d<\/p>\n

And okay, maybe it isn\u2019t critical to your story whether the cop is in SWAT or ESU. But it is critical to earn the reader\u2019s trust. It only takes a few minutes of Google-fu to find the right answers, and a read-through by a few other locals to make sure you didn\u2019t miss anything obvious.<\/p>\n

Why not take that time to be sure you\u2019ve got it right?<\/p>\n

The Three Types<\/b><\/p>\n

With the exception of the DuckBob novels, I tend to write in third-person limited (\u201c<\/span>Malana felt the pain and grief and terror washing over her again. She reached out toward the cops with her mind or soul or whatever it was that felt such things, using them to anchor her so that the wave couldn\u2019t sweep her away.\u201d). In Digging Deep<\/i>, I switch between the main characters from chapter to chapter, so that each one gets proper attention. One of those characters, a rather uptight anthropology professor named Tidijin, refers to everyone by last name (\u201cMs. Tai\u201d instead of \u201cMalana\u201d). My editor wanted me to change that\u2014not in his dialogue, just in the narrative for his chapters\u2014to keep it consistent.<\/p>\n

One thing I\u2019ve figured out over the years is that notes from editors and beta readers fall into three categories, which I call \u201cD\u2019oh,\u201d \u201cEh,\u201d and \u201cUm\u201d:<\/p>\n

D\u2019oh: These are the ones where you say, \u201cCrap, why didn\u2019t I catch that?\u201d This is why you have beta readers and editors, though, because often you\u2019re too close to your own manuscript to see the actual words on the page. You\u2019re still seeing the glorious construct in your head, so you need someone who doesn\u2019t have that to tell you \u201chey, you\u2019ve got him shrugging on a heavy coat here but a page ago you said it was sweltering out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eh: These are the comments where you think, \u201cYeah, okay, I guess.\u201d It\u2019s like when you\u2019re getting ready to go out, hold up two shirts, and ask your wife, \u201cWhich one?\u201d You don\u2019t really have a preference. For that matter, if your wife said, \u201cWhy don\u2019t you wear your green one instead?\u201d you\u2019d probably shrug and say, \u201cOkay, sure.\u201d You\u2019re not sure these changes really enhance your manuscript, but they don\u2019t hurt either, so why not make them?<\/p>\n

Um: These are the ones where you scratch your head and wonder, \u201cdid I do such a bad job conveying what I meant, or did it just not work for you?\u201d With a good editor, this becomes the start of a conversation, as you explain what you were trying to do and either figure out how to do it better or realize that there\u2019s simply a disconnect between what you wanted and what they think should happen here, and decide where to go from there. The \u201cUm\u2019s\u201d are the ones you fight for, but you need to be careful. Not every comment is an \u201cUm,\u201d and you need to pick your battles. Only fight for the ones that really matter to you because they really change the intent or the feel of your story.<\/p>\n

In my case, I thought about it, talked to my editor, and finally said, \u201cno, I\u2019m not changing that. I think the readers are smart enough to remember that Malana\u2019s last name is Tai, and changing the names in those chapters is necessary to convey Tidijin\u2019s mindset.\u201d And my editor said, \u201cokay, fine, have it your way, it\u2019s your book.\u201d<\/p>\n

Listen Closely and Learn to Parse<\/b><\/p>\n

After I finished the first draft I sent Digging Deep<\/i> out to several friends, most of whom have beta-read for me before. Two of them are fellow writers, two of them are avid readers. All four of them came back with really good feedback. Not all of it consistent, of course\u2014one character annoyed the hell out of one beta-reader, for example, but the others didn\u2019t have a problem with him at all. But all of it useful.<\/p>\n

Of course, once I\u2019d gotten their notes I had to collate them and compare. As a general rule of thumb, I divide comments into the three categories I mentioned above. Then I look at frequency. If all four readers gave me essentially the same \u201cEh\u201d note, that\u2019s reason enough to make that change. If more than one reader gives me the same \u201cUm\u201d note, I really need to take a hard look at whatever they thought needed to be changed, because clearly it\u2019s not working for a number of people. But if only one person made an \u201cEh\u201d comment, I probably wouldn\u2019t bother. If only one made an \u201cUm,\u201d I queried the other readers, like I did about that one character, to see if it was really an isolated incident or if they\u2019d also had problems with that element but hadn\u2019t even realized it consciously.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s crucial to be able to make those distinctions between what\u2019s affected several readers and thus is a real concern and what just tweaked one person the wrong way. If you were to make every change every beta-reader or editor suggested, you\u2019d wind up with a horrible mish-mash\u2014book by committee\u2014and it wouldn\u2019t be recognizable as your story anymore. But you don\u2019t want to ignore feedback either\u2014you are ultimately writing for an audience, and if a significant portion of that audience has a problem with some aspect of the story, you need to figure out why and address that.<\/p>\n

I had several \u201cD\u2019oh\u201ds on Digging Deep<\/i>, thanks to my beta readers, and wound up rewriting a large chunk of it. The book was infinitely better as a result, which is why I make sure to send each story out to them and the others on my list every time.<\/p>\n

Change Is Good<\/b><\/p>\n

Some of the characters in Digging Deep<\/i> are new, but four of them had shown up elsewhere:<\/p>\n

\u2022 <\/span>Wendell \u201cMack\u201d Macklemore<\/span>, the founder of OCLT and its resident tech-guru, first appeared in my OCLT co-creator David Niall Wilson\u2019s novel The Parting<\/i>, and then showed up again in my first OCLT novel, Incursion<\/i>;<\/p>\n

\u2022 <\/span>R.C. Hayes, OCLT\u2019s head honcho, first featured in my OCLT novella \u201cBrought to Light\u201d and then again in Incursion<\/i>;<\/p>\n

\u2022 <\/span>Isabella Ferrara, the Italian monster hunter, appeared in Incursion<\/i>;<\/p>\n

\u2022 <\/span>Malana Tai, the young empath from Tuvalu, was the main character of my short story \u201cClarity of Mind,\u201d which was included in the anthology Apollo\u2019s Daughters<\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mack and R.C. are only incidental in Digging Deep<\/i>, but Malana is one of the main characters. This was the first time I was writing her as part of an ensemble, though\u2014or, for that matter, the first time R.C. wasn\u2019t taking center stage. That\u2019s a very different dynamic for both of them, which meant I had to handle them differently.<\/p>\n

I could have gotten myself all tied up in knots worrying about how writing them like this was going to affect them both. They\u2019re both really good characters, and I really like them, both in the sense that I enjoy writing them and in the sense that I think they\u2019re actually good people, and I didn\u2019t want to screw either of them up.<\/p>\n

But in the end I forced myself to relax about it. I had a story to tell, and they were in that story, and if I worried too much about bending them out of shape I\u2019d wind up distorting my story instead.<\/p>\n

So I just wrote it. Wrote them. And they were fine. In fact, they were better than fine. Seeing R.C. as just support cast him in a whole new light, illuminating facets of his character that weren\u2019t evident when he was forced to carry the weight of the narrative. And forcing Malana into situations where she had to react to, and work with, other people, people with their own unique skills and traits but with the same mission she had acquired, allowed her to grow a great deal.<\/p>\n

Trying to keep those characters who they were in the previous stories would have done them a serious disservice, and marred Digging Deep<\/i> as a story as well. I\u2019m glad I let them change and grow instead.<\/p>\n

Nothing Wrong with the Occasional Deviation<\/b><\/p>\n

I get flack from my friends sometimes for how rigid my writing process is. I come up with an idea, then write up a short pitch, then turn that into a full summary, then flesh that out into a proper chapter-by-chapter outline, then sit down and start writing. Once I start, I work through from beginning to end, start to finish, with all my focus on that one project alone.<\/p>\n

Except when I don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

The first time I deviated from this was when I wrote the first DuckBob novel, No Small Bills<\/i>. A friend had dared me to do something different, and I hadn\u2019t written comedy before, so I decided \u201cwhat the hell?\u201d It was also the end of October, and I\u2019d always meant to do NaNoWriMo properly (I\u2019d written parallel to it a few times), but that meant no time to outline. So I wrote the entire novel by the seat of my pants, no outline at all, only a vague idea of where I was going, mainly just letting DuckBob bang into things along the way and seeing what happened next as a result. That worked out pretty well\u2014at least, I\u2019m happy with the book, and the people who\u2019ve read it have told me it\u2019s a ton of silly fun\u2014but I\u2019ve never been able to replicate that completely carefree, no outline approach.<\/p>\n

Digging Deep<\/i> started out the usual way, for me. Except that the process got interrupted. I wound up having to set the manuscript aside when it was only half done and take care of a few other projects with more urgent deadlines. A few months later, I was finally able to sit down, get back to Digging Deep<\/i>,<\/span> and finish the first draft. It was strange for me, though. I\u2019d never taken a break halfway through a novel before. I had to reread Digging Deep<\/i> from the beginning, of course, and that was odd too, because it had been enough time that I\u2019d gained some distance. I felt like I was reading it for the first time. There were pieces I really liked, which was cool. And others where I thought, \u201cWhat was I thinking?<\/p>\n

In the end, I\u2019d say Digging Deep<\/i> was a lot stronger because I got that new perspective on it. Because I deviated from my norm.<\/p>\n

Which doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019m going to be taking a break in the middle of all my novels from now on. But maybe when something forces me out of my usual pattern I\u2019ll see it as an opportunity instead of an irritation.<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

Aaron Rosenberg<\/b> is the author of the best-selling DuckBob SF comedy series, the Dread Remora<\/i> space-opera series, the Relicant epic fantasy series with Steve Savile, and\u00a0the O.C.L.T. occult thriller series with David Niall Wilson. Aaron’s tie-in work contains novels for Star Trek<\/i>, Warhammer<\/i>, World of WarCraft<\/i>, Stargate: Atlantis<\/i>, Shadowrun<\/i>, Eureka<\/i>, and more<\/span>. He has written children\u2019s books (including the original series STEM Squad and Pete and Penny’s Pizza Puzzles, the award-winning Bandslam: The Junior Novel<\/i>, and the #1 best-selling 42: The Jackie Robinson Story<\/i>), educational books on a variety of topics, and over seventy roleplaying games (such as the original games Asylum<\/i>, Spookshow<\/i>, and Chosen<\/i>, work for White Wolf, Wizards of the Coast, Fantasy Flight, Pinnacle, and many others, and both the Origins Award-winning Gamemastering Secrets<\/i> and the Gold ENnie-winning Lure of the Lich Lord<\/i>). He is the co-creator of the ReDeus<\/i> series, and a founding member of Crazy 8 Press. Aaron lives in New York with his family. His new novel Digging Deep<\/i> is available now from Crossroad Press.<\/p>\n

Aaron Rosenberg: Website<\/span><\/a> | Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Digging Deep: Amazon<\/span><\/a> | Crossroad Press<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

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DANGER RUNS DEEP. New York. City of millions. Home to the largest subway system in the world. Miles of tunnels stretch far underground, home themselves to a vast, displaced populace. But now someone\u2014or something\u2014is slaughtering these homeless. Along with anyone else foolish enough to venture underground. And whatever it is, it is slowly rising toward […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-32037","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-theramble","8":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pv7MR-8kJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32037","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32037"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32041,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32037\/revisions\/32041"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}