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Yep… that’s right, yesterday was National Donut day. Go figure. Who knew that they even had a donut day? I sure didn’t.

Ultimately, I feel as though I was failed by the system. My calendar at work, my day planner, my google calendar, none of those things showed national donut day. Speaking of Google, everyone knows it’s not a real holiday unless Google changes their logo for the day. I checked… nothing. You’ve failed me, Google! You’ve failed me.

So, donut day… apparently there’s a little more history to it than just “Let’s eat donuts and see how high we can make our cholesterol.” I’d encourage a quick perusal of the Wikipedia page so that you get it straight from… well, it’s wikipedia. It’s not straight from the source, but it might be straight from somebody quoting the source. If you’re lucky. I guess.

Once you have read up, though, I propose a make-up National Donut Day today, June 6th, for all of us who didn’t get to eat a donut yesterday. After all, it’s a historical celebration. Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. And that sounds way more sinister than anything that has to do with National Donut Day ever should.

It is awfully easy to be old, cynical and jaded when you go through the daily grind and pay bills and deal with, well, adult concerns. Like the daily grind and paying bills. Wait, I already said that.

Today, I had the blessed opportunity to watch my fourteen month old use his imagination. Every time I get to watch this sort of thing, I feel like I’m transported to a better time.

In this case, he’s started drinking from a cup. He’s gotten pretty good at it, too. Today, he found a little cup from his set of stacking cups, and decided to pretend to drink out of it. Then, he brought it to my wife, so she could have a swig. Finally, after another sip for him, I got my turn.

There is beauty in this event on multiple levels. Creativity (after all, we’ve never put a liquid into the stacking cups before), Sharing (now if only I could get him to understand that it’s not always a one-for-one trade. No, just because you brought me that toy doesn’t mean you get to play with the laptop), Joy (the look on his face when my wife or I took the cup from him, pretended to take a drink, and handed it back to him was absolutely precious). It was all around a great time.

It’s not his only imaginative venture, either. Just about every object in the house has been used as a phone at one time or another. Strip of box board, one inch wide, four inches long? Up to the ear with murmuring, raised voice, and giggles. The horse from the Little People train set? He can do just about anything!

It reminds me of my Lego days. I can’t wait for the little guy to graduate to lego (it’ll be a while yet, I suppose). I remember days of building with my little brother, playing out wars and emergencies, tearing down and building again. There was no end to the activity that went on in the world of lego.

Perhaps that’s why I enjoy the little guy’s imaginativity. (how’s that for an imaginative word?) I can see a little bit of me in there, and I long for those days. Of course, every thing changes and everything stays the same. Instead of living out lives with the little lego men, or talking on my cardboard phone, I attempt to work out ideas on paper.

Maybe I’m not so far from the lego stage after all. Where’s the phone, I need to call my little brother and see if he’s up for another round in the lego battles.

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, Here he goes with books for kids again. And you’re right. Here he goes again. Eragon is a book that I goofed up with. We watched the movie first. Gulp. It didn’t do very well and got pretty lousy reviews. Double Gulp.

We really liked it! We looked at each other at the end of it and said “That was way better than I expected.” So, Rebecca went right out and got the book from the library and read it. Surprise, surprise, she liked it too. And the sequel. And the third book. And she’s chomping at the bit for the next one.

(Using the term chomping at the bit in that sentence felt wrong. Really excited? Frustrated by not being able to read? I dunno. I’m going to leave it in, in hopes of giving you some insight into my self-editing process. And my self-aggrandizement process. Aren’t I cool?)

Anyway, last time we were at the library, I was casting about for a good book to read. My wife handed me Eragon. I’m about halfway into it. It’s good. It’s especially good because, honestly, it’s not perfect. The writing is a little too… big for its britches maybe? It feels a little forced, I guess. But it works. It’s encouraging too, because it’s the author’s first book. I’m sure he’s going to get better at the technical parts, just as I hope I will. But his story, the story is really good.

So anyway, next time you’re thinking about wanting to read something with dragons and swords and really good bad guys, Eragon might be right up your alley.

Hatrack River is Orson Scott Card’s website. Orson Scott Card is a force in Science Fiction writing. The man can write. A lot of my early fascination with Sci-fi can probably be blamed on him. After Ender’s Game, I wanted to read more books with that kind of political / technological setting. So, my reading took me the direction of Asimov, Herbert , and others. But it all traces back to OSC.

He’s been a help to my writing as well. While I haven’t had the opportunity to sit in on one of his writing classes (one day, one day), I have been able to benefit from the Writing Lessons portion of his website.

Today, I want to point you to the two lessons on naming characters in particular. I’ve learned of late that I’m not the only one who struggles with naming characters, and Mr. Card (Mr. Scott Card? How do you deal with a guy with three names?) has an interesting approach to solving the problem.

A quote from the first lesson on naming:

Sources: Foreign language dictionaries. Phone books. Biographical dictionaries. Foreign language websites. Make up your own based on existing elements in ways that people really combine names or make them up – Zewonda, Peterette, Albena, Davisha. Make first names out of last names. Make up cool nicknames and then stories about how the characters got them.

Avoid: Names stolen from people in the news right now. It dates the story and makes the writer seem desperate.

OSCs website is a great resource for writers… lots of good information. Spend a little time there. Learn. Soak. And then, as the Writing Excuses guys emphasize, go write! You don’t become a better writer without actually writing.

I’m off to write.

Every once in a while, I try to get some exposure to literary fiction. It usually goes like this: “Well Self, I’d like to be a successful writer, so I need to read successful writers. I should find some stuff that’s not sci-fi/fantasy and read it to see what’s popular in the mainstream.” This is usually followed by a google search for the best novels of the 20th century or something like that.

I’ll end up trying to read All the Kings Men, or The Grapes of Wrath, or Beloved. And I’ll get somewhere between a handful of pages and halfway through before I just cannot drive myself to pick up the book any longer. Especially not if something fantastic is sitting beside it, waiting to be read. Oftentimes, I’d rather read bad science fiction than good literary fiction.

I always end up asking myself, what’s so great about literary fiction? I guess I hope it’s just a matter of taste. I hope it’s just a matter of some people genuinely preferring a story about the ordinary. I hope…

I hope I haven’t precluded myself from ever being taken seriously in the realm of literature by saying this. Oh well… give me the fantastic or give me death! Not really. Just give me something fun to read.

(And a side note: I realized after a few of these adventures that being listed as one of the best novels of the 20th century doesn’t have much (if anything at all) to do with being successful. Most of these novels were outsold greatly by the average Nicholas Sparks/James Patterson/Steven King/John Grisham release. So, maybe what I need to be reading is not what is best but what sells best to get an idea of what is currently successful. It’s kind of like the academy awards: there’s a massive disconnect between what critics adore and what people buy.)

This post is more therapeutic than anything else. I’m struggling in my writing. I feel like my bad guys aren’t all that bad. I don’t know if it’s a mental block or a philosophical one. I feel as though I’ll have a hard time writing them accurately if I make them genuinely bad. Or, genuinely badder.

As a result, I’m mostly making the situation the bad guy. The bad guys are really more nuisances than anything else.

The problem I have with that is the prominence of bad guys in my reading. Ender’s Game, for example, features bad guys that aren’t really bad, good guys that aren’t all good (Graff… although he’s somewhat redeemed), and bad guys that are just plain bad (Peter, although redeemed in the later books, doesn’t smell so good in this book. Also, Stilson and Bonzo. That sentence fragment is for the editors in the crowd. I like to make you think on Monday morning). In the Lord of the Rings, you have Sauron, the Ring Lords, and their armies who exude evil, Saruman who was good but turned evil, and Boromir who has a little personality flaw but recovers.

In the light of all that, making the situation the problem seems bland by comparison. So, I put it to you, readers (all four of you), do you prefer writing with clear, evil-doing, bad guys? Do you like shades of grey/gray? Or would you rather the author just write the good guys?