Short Assignments

Photo: Bird by Bird, front cover, from Google.com

Well, the ol' writing hasn't gone well lately, and a harsh bout of strep hasn't helped, so we're back to the basics.  I've gone over some good ideas from Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird--which I reviewed here--and I've taken some advice from a writer who's been nice enough to answer some questions for me.  (That would be Dr. Julie Holland, author of Weekends at Bellevue, which I reviewed here, on Goodreads, and here, on this blog.  I'll be posting the Q & A between us, broken down in a few posts, coming soon.  I thank her again for doing that for me.  Her tips about writing were helpful and often eye-opening.  I hope she comes out with another memoir soon.  Buy Weekends at Bellevue.  On another side note, she is unbelievably fast responding to emails and interviews.  I've taken longer to respond to a direct question, with the person standing right in front of me.)

But I digress.  Helpful hints.  Back to basics.  Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird.  By the way, if you haven't read Bird by Bird, you should; if you've ever considered writing anything at anytime, for any reason, you have to read this.  Often.  I've re-read it now many times; I always find something new in it.  It's funny; it's helpful; it's well-written.  I think I'm finding new things in it at different times because I need different types of help at different times.  (And I always need help.)

So the helpful hint today that I'm going with, via Bird by Bird and Anne Lamott, is: short assignments.  Too often I'm aghast at all the ideas I have, all the writing I want to do.  All the novels, the short stories, the articles, the memoir pieces, all the chapters and characters--they come at me fast and furious, and lately they've buried me.  I'm paralyzed.  Too much going on.  And having the living room wallpaper taken down, the walls painted, the carpet ripped up, the floors sanded and treated three times each, living in the small and cluttered den downstairs because I can't walk on the treated floors for 8 hours, paying all these guys, and an overwhelming time with mountains of work to do at and for the job--and throw in everyone's birthdays all in the last week, plus the swollen throat and ears because of the strep--oh my lord, who wouldn't be snowballed?  Oh yeah, there's been that, too.

I've been going a little nuts and stir crazy over here.

So, short assignments.  Narrow it down.  Break it down.  Do something small, but productive.  So, today I'll work on just one scene from...(the wheel spins)...The Gravediggers.  Okay, no problem.  I have to choose something, because there's revamping another novel in 3rd person to do yet, and...okay, whatever, block it out and work on just one scene from The Gravediggers.  Which scene?  I don't know...there are so many.  Okay, let's....let's start revamping the novel in 3rd person instead, and see where that goes.  I think it'll go in a great direction that I'm very excited about, so...okay, let's do that.  Revamping a work into the 3rd person.

Wish me luck!!!  Oh, wait.  Which scene from that?  Easy choice--the first one.  Okay.  Now wish me luck.

The Girl Who Played with Fire--Stieg Larsson

Photo:  First edition front cover of the Swedish book, from its Wikipedia site

Second book of the deceased author's Millenium trilogy, in many ways superior to the first.  It continues the trend of bucking the solid rules of publishing--jumping between even more 3rd person limited characters than the first one did; not getting to the crux of the mystery until well after page 100; many pages of frankly unnecessary pages of exposition...But, again, it all works.  And, of course, that's what matters most.  If it works, do it.

To be honest, this one actually dragged a bit in the first half, but it really took off in the second.  Lisbeth, who Larsson must've known was his most intriguing character when he was maybe a quarter into the first manuscript, is largely out of the picture; she's been accused of three murders, and she's hiding.  The reader, through some clever trickery in Larsson's 3rd person limited narration, has to admit that maybe she did kill Bjurman (I thought so); but it won't take an ingenious reader to see that Larsson leaves us with Lisbeth at the apartment of the other two victims, hoping we'll think she killed them.  You won't think so.  But I'll bet, if you've already read it, that you thought she did kill Bjurman.  It happened according to how she'd threatened him in the first book; he was naked, kneeling and begging.  When it was disclosed that she hadn't killed him, I was surprised.  So that's a good thing about this book--you're somewhat surprised by the actions (or, the non-actions) of a now-familiar character.  (If you weren't fooled like I was, more power to you.)

The plot mostly follows Blomqvist and the many minor characters this time.  Larsson ingeniously pulls a Bram Stoker/Dracula move here: Lisbeth is largely absent through the majority of the book, noticeably visible only in the beginning and in the end.  In the meantime, all of the characters, major and minor, are looking for her.  She's the Hitchcockian McGuffin.  But as Dracula was more of a force in Stoker's book precisely because he was absent and sought after throughout most of it, Lisbeth here is, too.  Everybody talks about her; everyone's looking for her; some are trying to slander her (notice the similarity to her name there; I'll bet Larsson had an extensive outline for all three books at once, and so knew that slander would be how most of the characters attacked her in all three novels--I'm halfway through the last one now) while others are trying to unsmear the many smear campaigns.  And so by omission, her character actually becomes stronger and more dangerous.  And more poignant: when she finally re-appears, the reader is happy to see her again.  Her character is the dessert that you cherish because you're not allowed to have it very often.

And when she does re-appear in the last small percentage of the book, she owns it.  She's a force, not just for the reader; not just for the characters she (righteously) beats up.  She's simply a force, in of herself, like the waterspout she sees in the beginning.  (Which remained a largely unnecessary section, but for the theme just mentioned.  Hopefully the second half of the third book will tie that together, but I'm not feelin' it.)  She is the force that all of the other characters revolve around, are attracted to, and are repelled from.  She is their Sun.

Which is not to say that all is perfect.  A nationally-famous boxer comes to the rescue at the last minute.  (That scene reminded me of one in one of Robert B. Parker's books--which Larsson undoubtedly read, as the constant allusions to the authors of the genre show--in which Spenser and Hawk have to bring down a monster of a man, which they are barely able to do, even together.)  Again, it works, and it shouldn't have.  Lisbeth survives a premature burial, a la Uma Thurman in Kill Bill 2.  She gets out by digging with a cigarette case, after getting shot three times, including once in the head, which exposes a bit of brain.  (How that didn't get infected by all that dirt, especially when she touched the brain with one dirt-encrusted finger, is a mystery.)  This sounds ridiculous, but the scene (and the ones immediately following) was remarkably effective, so much so that when I awoke at 3 a.m. afterwards, for no reason, it was the first thing I thought of (though getting up for work in three hours should've been), and even just the memory of it was smothering.  (This is a high compliment from me.)  The remaining pages is as much of a suspenseful page-turner as you are likely to read.  You will find yourself actually rooting for a character you know is not real.  This is not something I do often, even with books and characters I like a lot.  I amazed myself at doing so.

P.S.--Accolades must now be given to the translator of all three books, Reg Keeland.