From: roll 'em Subject: EXERCISE: Scenic Splendor Comments: To: "seven, come eleven!" [okay, ready to think? let's get those little neurons hot, cause here comes the big scene...] 1. Take your scene (this is your selection. pick one, with characters, etc. come on, just choose something...) 2. The structure of a scene--the moment-by-moment action of characters in a background--is GOAL-CONFLICT-DISASTER. Start by writing down the question you want the reader to have about the scene: specific, definite, immediate goal-oriented, with a yes/no answer. 3. Pick the ending you want to reach. There are only three basics: No!; Yes, but (conditions)--usually dilemma; and No, plus (added failure). Pick out the disaster you want to get to. It should be an unanticipated but logical development that answers the scene question, relates to the conflict, and sets the character back. Write that down. In searching for your scene-ending disaster, don't always grab the first idea that comes to your mind. Your reader will be guessing along with you, and you don't want him to outguess you and anticipate the disaster before you give it to him. Chances are that if you make a list of six or eight possible disasters that would work, one of them well down the list from your first idea will be fresher, brighter, worse for the lead character - and not predictable by the reader. You always want the reader kept guessing! 4. Make a list of conflicts. You want somewhere between three to five twists or turns. Make a list, then arrange them in a rising order, so that the reader can feel the tension grow. 5. Write it up! Throw the reader into that scene, walk through the action, make us feel Tim dodge and Gwen raise her voice, oh, duck, the monkey just threw a plate across the veldt, and watch for the bomber... [and for the one-line seed folk...] She swung the ax down once, twice, three times--and laughed. [ahah! do you know her? what is she chopping? and why is it so funny?] buried in a neverending flow of words, afloat among the bytes, I remain. so what? I divide and conquist adores! (spelling intentional!) tink