Author: peterclines

This was supposed to be up a week ago. So sorry it’s late. Of course, y’know, it’d never be late if you subscribed…

Anyway…

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Oh, hey! There you are.

We’ve been having a few long, wet weeks here in southern California. The kind where the rain sucks all the heat out of the air and leaves you with a deep chill. In some ways, it’s great and reminds me of growing up in New England. And in other, much more current ways, I’m reminded that I live in a sixty-year old house built when the idea of needing insulation in southern California was just ha ha ha ha ridiculous. Also that I need to get the roof fixed in the garage. And also that we have half a dozen cats who think the sound of central heating means a street sweeper has somehow gotten into the house and we should all RUN IN TERROR!!!

And speaking of running in terror…

The world is an awful place right now. There are so many things to—rightfully—be angry or worried or openly scared about. I wish I could put an optimistic spin on it but… man, my optimism tanks are pretty much bone dry after the past few weeks.

What I can tell you is that being angry and scared all the time is exhausting, physically and emotionally. It’s unavoidable at points, I know, but try to give yourself permission to just breathe. Toss your phone over there and go for a walk. Go for a run. Play with your pets. Play a game. Read a book. Watch a favorite movie. Work in the garden. Make something. Seriously, do whatever you can to give yourself a couple minutes of peace and joy—and try not to feel guilty about it. We’re all going to need to be strong for the foreseeable future, and it’s easier to be strong when you’re not exhausted.

Thus ends the monthly pep talk.

In other, happier news…

Just as I sat down to start scribbling up this newsletter, I got an email to let me know God’s Junk Drawer is heading into copy edits a.k.a. line edits. The editor and I have already traded a few emails about scientific nomenclature vs casual conversation. Because that’s how my books roll, folks.

Also, a reminder that you can preorder the book right now from your favorite local bookstore. Or request your library grab a copy. Or both! Both is good, as the gif says.

On a related note, I know I’ve mentioned the west coast/ new England book tour a few times. After talking to a few folks, I’m probably going to let that simmer for a few months. Most places aren’t going to be start setting their fall schedules until mid-summer at best, so trying to plan a lot before then is kind of silly. But I’ve made note of the places some of you suggested, and I’ll probably be asking you all again in… July? August? Somewhere around there.

Also, my early readers for TOS have given me their thoughts and notes and overall they’re… really good. They don’t think it’s flawless (everybody had a few critical observations, and most of them were spot-on), but for the most part they were creeped out at the right points, laughed a lot at the right points, and… well, got misdirected at all the points I’d wanted them to be. So I’m going over the manuscript again with a lot of their notes in mind, then a quick polish, and… well, my agent will probably have this before the next newsletter.

I finished that comic script (finally) and the editor and I are bouncing around a few artist names. It’s still a ways off, but I thought some of you might want to know.

Thanks to all of you who came out during the mini-signing tour for Combat Monsters. Was great to see people and talk about Carter & Kraft. And I think some of those talks actually got me thinking about another story for our two intrepid WWII heroes…

On a related note, at the end of March I’m going to be at WonderCon in Anaheim. I’m part of a Sunday morning panel on Writing Blended Genres, then a book signing right after that, and then I’m probably going to be wandering the floor, talking to folks and looking at cool things. Maybe I’ll see you there?

What else can I tell you about?

Cool Stuff I’ve Been Watching
A couple days after sending the last newsletter we watched Flow, the now-Oscar-winning animated movie about a cat and a capybara and look it’s just amazing, okay? The movie itself and the story behind the movie. Academy Award very well-deserved. My beloved and I are caught up on Severance and holy crap what amazing show! Also, it’s not so much “watching” but we’ve been binging Midnight Burger off a friend’s recommendation. It’s about the staff of a time-raveling, dimension-hopping diner, and if you like my stuff I think you’ll really enjoy it.

Cool Stuff I’ve Been Reading
I’m late to the party, but my to-read pile finally coughed up Assassins Anonymous and I enjoyed it quite a bit. Currently about two-thirds through Craig DiLouie’s new one, My Ex-The Antichrist, which comes out this summer It’s about a guitarist who discovers her ex-bandmate-and-boyfriend is the actual son of Satan destined to destroy the world. After that I’ve got a blurb book and then (also long overdue) John Wiswell’s Someone You Can Build A Nest In.

Cool New Toys
Not a lot of new toys physically in hand this month. My beloved gave me a Gundam Guncannon model for Valentine’s Day, because somewhere along the line she started giving me a red robot every year. I took advantage of the Spero warehouse sale and grabbed a few Animal Warriors figures to customize and/or add to my Horrid army. I preordered a few things and backed a fun Kickstarter for Space Zombies from Mars action figures because, hey… who doesn’t like zombie astronauts, right?

Okay, I think that’s all for now. As always, thanks for reading. See you next time next month.

Over the past month or three I’ve seen a bunch of people offer their views on conflict in storytelling. And a lot of them had very strong opinions about it. What it is. Why we shouldn’t be obsessed with it. Why, maybe, we don’t even need it in our story.

To be blunt… I think they were wrong. But they were wrong for a few different reasons. And I think if we go over those reasons, maybe we can all get a better grasp of conflict, how to use it, and how we can make it work best in our stories. Sound good?

Let’s start with basics. What is conflict?

In a literary sense, conflict is something between my character and what they want. It’s an opposing person or force or set of conditions. Note that the thing they want doesn’t have to be something physical and neither does the thing between them and it. My hero wants to date the cheerleader/ save Uncle Ricky’s Surf Shop/ get the big promotion/ save the world from destruction, but first they have to overcome their shyness/ raise $50,000 by Friday/ figure out what happened to Doug from sales/ stop the alien invaders. Feel free to mix and match those into whatever combination works best for you.

Conflict is what drives my plot forward, because it forces my characters to make decisions and take actions. If there’s no conflict, they don’t need to do anything. And if my characters don’t do anything… well, that’s not much of a story. It might work in a weird artsy way but… look, nobody wants to read the story of how I once did data entry for eight hours a day for the better part of a month.

Two key things to note, before we move on.

First is all the random conflicts I mentioned in those examples up above require a degree of effort to overcome. None of them can be brushed aside or ignored. If I’m thirsty and go the kitchen to get a drink of water, there isn’t any opposition to overcome or effort required. There’s not really tons of consequences if I don’t do it. It’s not so much forcing me into action as barely requiring minimal action. If something doesn’t require much conscious thought to resolve, it’s not conflict.

Remember this. It’s going to come up again

The second key thing is that most of these conflicts don’t involve lots of shooting or punching or ninja throwing stars (spoiler about that cheerleader). There’s a common misconception that conflict just means aggression and violence. If I had to guess, I think this view’s grown out of ye olde advice nugget “start with action” which gets misunderstood a lot to mean we should always start with car chases and kaiju attacks. And that just belief just grew from there and now some folks see conflict and action as the same thing.

Remember this, too.

Now… with all of that in mind…

First, I’ve seen a number of folks who have odd ideas about conflict, and I think it comes from that misconception that conflict and action are the same thing. They’re smart enough to know “start with action” doesn’t always mean explosions and no-holds-barred cage matches. It can mean almost any sort of action, right?

The catch is these folks now think any sort of action counts as conflict. Walking my dog is conflict. Eating lunch is conflict. Taking a shower is conflict. But like we just said, conflict needs a degree of effort. It requires something preventing me from doing the thing I want to do. Yeah, it’s possible taking a shower could be a huge conflict in my story but… that’s probably going to be a really specific story.

A simple way to check this is a trick I’ve mentioned before. Whatever story we’re talking about, get the whole thing in your head and write out a good solid summary. One page, tops. Try not too skip anything, but don’t overthink it. Just get it all down like you were telling it to me at a bar or over dinner or something casual like that. “I just read this great book about…”

When you look back over this summary, you’re probably going to see the word but a few times (or maybe some of its kissing cousins like however or although). And a lot of those buts are going to be points where there’s conflict in the story. If I didn’t instinctively use but to explain how this element fits in my summary, there’s a really good chance this element isn’t conflict.

I mean, look at my choose-your-own conflict example up above. It’s a simple story explanation, and what’s the conjunction tying it together? It’s a natural way to explain conflict. They want this, but that.

Another thing I’ve seen a lot of in the discourse is some people arguing conflict’s completely unnecessary in a story. But almost all of their statements seem to tie back to that misconception—that conflict only refers to sword fights and alien invasions and ninja cheerleaders. And conflict can cover a lot of stuff. Heck, how many 80s movies are just about needing to raise money to save the orphanage or the car wash or, yes, Uncle Ricky’s Surf Shop? How many romantic comedies are based around misunderstandings that need to be resolved or class inequality?

So a lot of the folks insisting conflict’s unnecessary in a story are just, well, misunderstanding what conflict is. They’re defining conflict as just punching and ninja cheerleaders and the like, and therefore this story which has neither punching nor ninja cheerleaders… has no conflict. And that’s almost certainly not true. I mean, it’s true that they don’t have a ninja cheerleader, yes (maybe? ninjas are everywhere), but it’s not true the story doesn’t have conflict.

Again, conflict needs to be an opposing force or obstacle, but it could be the nagging doubt in the back of my mind that never shuts up. Or a letter from the bank telling us they’re going to foreclose on the surf shop if we don’t pay back all the loan money by 5:00 this Friday. Or the third point of a romantic triangle. Or the hundred miles of desert between me and getting that drink of water.

I think some of this misunderstanding also spills over into discussions about storytelling forms or structures. Someone will say “this type of story doesn’t need conflict” and then give an example that… well, has conflict. Not jetfighting/ spinkicking conflict, no, but they’re absolutely stories with obstacles that need to be overcome. It might not have one main, overall conflict, but the individual elements have lots of smaller conflicts. Or maybe the ensemble characters don’t have a single united obstacle they’re all trying to overcome, but they each have their own individual obstacle to deal with throughout the course of things. And sometimes it’s just plain old regular conflict.

Now, a closing disclaimer or two before anyone starts typing up responses.

Am I saying it’s impossible to have a story without conflict? No, of course not. But as I’ve mentioned once or thrice before, I personally find it really hard to be interested in a story about a normal day where nothing happens. Yes, it may have beautiful turns of phrase and inspired vocabulary and vivid imagery, but they’re all serving… well, a boring, normal day.

And ultimately—again, might just be me—I don’t think a lot of readers are going to sit through a boring, normal day. No matter how inspired my vocabulary is. Because we all go through boring, normal days all the time. We want to see something happen.

Even if it isn’t a spinkicking ninja cheerleader.

In other news…

I’m going to be at WonderCon this weekend! All day Sunday. I’m part of a panel Sunday morning at 10:30 on writing blended genres (Room 300 C) and after that, starting at 11:45, I’ll be in the autograph area for forty-odd minutes scribbling in books. And then I’ll be walking the floor saying hi to folks and looking at things. I’ll be the guy in the cranberry blazer with a Midnight Burger shirt.

And next time… well, I’ve been bad about the ranty blog these past few months, so I’m going to try to redeem myself.

Until then, go write.

My beloved and I tried to watch a show a month or three back. From the moment we met them—their very first scene—one of the characters was just awful. Blatantly ignorant and incompetent, and always trying to bluster past it. Insensitive to the point of almost being cruel. And incredibly self-centered. We watched three episodes before giving up, and in all of that I think said character maybe had two conversations that didn’t center around themself.

In fact, said character was the reason we stopped watching. Yeah, by then there were some hints of growth and improvement, but at that point they were so deep in the hole we didn’t want to watch another two or three episodes and see if they managed to climb out.

And just to be clear, this wasn’t a minor character. This was one of the leads! Arguably the lead, depending on who you asked and how the show had worked out billing. Pretty much from the start, the main character of the show made us not want to watch the show.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, first impressions matter. In the real world and in fiction. Maybe even more in fiction.

This ties back to an often-misunderstood idea I’ve mentioned once or thrice before– three act structure. No, really. As a writer, I establish the norm, I introduce some form of conflict into the norm, and then I resolve that conflict. That makes sense, right?

So when I introduce a character, nine times out of ten I’m establishing the norm. This is who they are. It’s how they act every day, how they usually treat people. These first impressions is where my character arcs are going to begin. They’re who my character is without the added pressure of that conflict I’m going to be introducing.

It may sound really obvious, but this is why we tend to meet protagonists doing good things (or at the very least, neutral things) and antagonists doing bad things. Because if I start with someone being a self centered idiot, well… they’re a self-centered idiot. And probably have been for a while. Which doesn’t always make for a compelling character.

Getting past that first impression can be tough, especially if it’s something that’s going to give my audience—my readers—a strong reaction. It’s not impossible, but I’m definitely choosing an uphill battle as my starting point. If your first thoughts are that my character’s kind of a rude bastard or just a general ass or maybe a bit creepy in the bad way… I have to spend time getting past those perceptions. And that’s time I can’t spend getting to, well, the plot.

Think about some of your favorite characters from books or movies and think about how we first meet them. How often are they doing essentially decent things, even if it’s just in a low-key, maybe even not terribly joyful way? It’s rare that a character’s first page is trying to convince us they’re a horrible person.

And just to be clear, I’m not saying they have to be so happy-go-smiley-sweet that Mr. Rogers goes into diabetic shock. I just don’t want them to be an awful person. That’s it. Someone can be frustrated, depressed, annoyed, or even full-on angry and still not do awful things.

This might sound a little weird because we had a big, maybe ten year span where it was really common to have main characters who were… well, jerks. They were rude. Petty. Sometimes flat-out cruel. We’d see it in movies and TV shows and even commercials. They’d show people doing unquestionably mean things and narratively treat it like “ha ha, that was great!” If you stopped to think about it, though… those people were jerks.

And there’s always going to be exceptions of course. It’s possible I could have a clever reveal planned, and this ruthless gang lieutenant we met in chapter one is revealed as an undercover FBI agent early in chapter two and hey wait did we actually see him do any of this stuff he keeps talking about? It’s also possible to structure my story so we’re first meeting someone a bit further along their arc, and that might change things a bit, too.

But I still need to introduce an interesting and semi-likable character. Or, at the very least, not an unlikable one. If my readers don’t enjoy following a character, there’s a really good chance they’re just going to stop reading. And then they’ll never see that cool twist I set up at the start.

So think about those first impressions. Because I only get one chance at them.

Next time, unless there’s some serious opposition, I’d like to talk about conflict.

Until then, go write.

This issue of the newsletter was a little date-specific, so some of it may not be relevant anymore. You could avoid this horrible faux pas by subscribing to The Uncanny Cosmic Horror Zombie Almanac and then the newsletter would be delivered to your inbox in a timely fashion.

Just sayin’…

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A little early this month. For reasons. Which I will explain.

Eventually.

You’re probably reading this the day before Valentine’s Day, a holiday that can get a bunch of different reactions from people for a bunch of different reasons. I hope you’ve got someone to celebrate it with. Somebody who, in one way or another, makes you feel a little more complete or whole and a little less… well, less. A lover, a friend, or even a pet. Heck, even if it’s a place or an activity or a hobby. Something that makes your days feel a little lighter and easier.

In other news… about two weeks after the last newsletter I was finally done with Instagram. Locked down, no longer updating, no long replying. The only reason I’m not deleting is because A) I don’t want some rando grabbing my name/account and posting who knows what and 2) I mean, seriously, it could be a month before half my followers even see the announcement I’ve left. Which right there is, y’know, a pretty good argument for leaving.

That said, I was pleased to see a bunch of names I recognized from Instagram show up on Bluesky over the next week or so. A couple old friends (old in the sense of we’ve known each other along time—not that any of us have gotten old, ha ha ha ha, no). One or three toy-related folks. Heck, my publisher, Blackstone, has started an account there (which I think makes them the biggest publisher on Bluesky).

Speaking of social media, I also finally deleted my Twitter account. Well, deactivated, and now I’m waiting for Twitter to actually delete it. Like I mentioned last month, it’s been two years. More than enough time, and the past month has established it’s never coming back. Plus, y’know, all the Nazi stuff from Musk That made it easy, too.

So at this point I’m on Bluesky. Right now there, here (the newsletter), and my website are probably the best places to reach me. I’m still trying out Pixelfed and Cara for more visual stuff. No idea which one, if either, will be the one to pass that all-important critical mass point. I like Cara more, but it does feel a little more art-oriented. I get this weird vibe that my random toy photos or book covers are pushing some sort of invisible line. Pixelfed seems to be a little more open and has a lot of features I like, but like so many federated things (see: Mastodon) it’s kind of impossible to find anyone/anything unless you know exactly where to look, so it also feels very empty right now.

No, this isn’t an invitation for anyone to explain how inherently better and simple federation is, you just need to…

Anyway, let’s get to the real reason you signed up for this newsletter…

As I mentioned in the surprise mailing, God’s Junk Drawer is now up for preorder. I think everything’s updated/ rolled over/ rebooted/ whatever so it should be available to preorder everywhere now. I’ll probably bug you about it in the next eight or nine newsletters because preorders are so important and you wouldn’t believe how low the numbers usually are. Folks were stunned (and very happy) when my book, The Fold got around (if memory serves) 1300 preorders. I’ve been told Stephen King rarely gets more than a few thousand. If everyone reading this newsletter preordered it (and there’s only about 500 of you at the moment), it’d make my publisher giddy. Seriously.

So I’m going to keep mentioning it.

THAT SAID… Now that we’ve got an actual release date and preorders, I want to hammer out details for that west coast signing tour I mentioned last time. Starting in San Diego and then tentative stops in LA, San Francisco, Sacramento, Portland, Seattle and… I don’t know, you tell me. Is there somewhere else in there I should stop? I was thinking of San Luis Obispo at one point, but I don’t really know the town. Feel free to toss out suggestions for specific bookeries in these cities or other places I should consider stopping by (and yes, some of you already have).

There’s also New England. Hoping to be out there just after Thanksgiving. I think I’ve got a slightly better sense of bookstores out there, but if you’ve got a local indie you think would be open to me scribbling, please let me know. My hope is to do a stop in each state, with maybe a signing in eastern and western Massachusetts. And yes, some folks have already offered suggestions here, too.

Again, none of this is a guarantee—it’s possible stores might not be able to make my schedule work for them (completely understandable), plus… I mean, who knows what’s going to happen between now and then. It’s the undiscovered country. But once we get these nailed down (hopefully in the next couple of weeks) you could switch your preorder to your friendly local bookstore, give them some business, and then we’ll all see each other this fall.

In other news, TOS is off with a handful of trustworthy, brutally honest friends and so far the response is… positive? I’m feeling really good about this one, which could very likely be massive self-delusion or… maybe it’s actually good? Hoping to have notes/ comments/ critiques back from everyone in another week or two, which means I’ll probably have more thoughts on this for the next newsletter.

Also– Combat Monsters came out this week and is available everywhere. yes, everywhere! It’s got a new Carter & Kraft story from me, “The Night Crew,” and if you live in southern California I’ll remind you that a few contributors (including me) are going to do a sort of mini signing tour over the next few weeks. We’re going to be at- Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego this Saturday (the 15th) at 1:00, then Dark Delicacies in Burbank (3pm, Feb 22), and Artifact Books in Encinitas (3pm, March 1). Preorder the book through one of them, then come by and get it signed by us when you pick it up. And if you’re a few hundred miles away and can’t make it, I’m pretty sure they all deliver. Just sayin…

Also-also– I’ll be at WonderCon at the end of March. Possibly doing a few panels. Probably more on that next time, too.

Wow this has gotten long. Okay, not much more…

Cool Stuff I’ve Been Watching
Finally started watching Severance, which I’ve been hearing about for a while. Only knew the premise, very little of the actual plot or story so this has been fantastic. We’re probably four episodes in as you’re reading this. Also The Dragon Prince is back and we’ve been enjoying that a lot, as always.

Cool Stuff I’ve Been Reading
Got an early peek at Fantastic Four: Solve Everything by Jonathan Hickman and Dale Eaglesham and that was really great. Also finally got around to Eight Billion Genies by Charles Soule and Ryan Browne and it’s simple phenomenal.

Cool New Toys
Weirdly enough, the cool new toys that stood out this past month were a bunch of old toys. See, back when I was in college my parents cleaned a lot of stuff out of my bedroom and accidentally (or so they claimed) got rid of, well, pretty much every toy I owned before the age of twenty. The only ones that escaped were some things I’d locked away or taken to college with me. As such, it kind of stung when, a few years back, my mom started talking about this box of Transformers she’d found that was probably mine or my nephew’s. I grumpily pointed out they couldn’t be mine since those were all somewhere in a New England landfill. She laughed it off and eventually asked my nephew, who looked at the box and said they weren’t his, either. Said box came up again when my folks were visiting back in November and I said, fine, send it to me. It’s be interesting to see what it was, anyway.

Anyway, I told you all that (this is so long, I apologize again) so you’d have an idea how stunned I was to open this box when it showed up and see that it was a random bunch of my old toys, including, yes, some G1 Transformers. Things I hadn’t seen in almost thirty-five years! An Optimus Prime. Two of my favorite Decepticon jets. A GI Joe B.A.T. And more! I just sat there kind of awe-struck for almost half an hour.

Okay, I think that’s all (ha ha ha) I’ve got for you for this month. See you next time. Thanks for reading.

And again, I hope you get to spend some time this weekend with someone or something that makes you feel more complete.