You’re in the lift of a government building in London. It stops and this guy gets in. He’s chatting to someone else which allows you to learn he’s a civil servant who’s just cycled to work from Camberwell. However, he’s wearing full Tour de France clobber: all spandex– tight shirt covered in decals, tight shorts, racing shades perched on top of his head, pink racing shoes with cleats that clack on the floorboards; in one hand he holds his aerodynamic cycle helmet, in the other his aerodynamic back pack with hydration system (well, he certainly wouldn’t want to risk air resistance by carrying the weight in side panniers or waste a valuable micro-second having to take a water bottle out of its holder or simply get off the bike and take a few swigs, or admit  that he doesn’t really need a drink for such a short ride into the office).  You have to remind yourself: this is someone who is just commuting a few miles to work. The appropriate kit for such a task would be a non-racing bike that can carry weights easily so you don’t have to put your back out doing so; loose clothing that doesn’t make you look like a pratt and therefore become a justifiable target for cycle-hating car drivers; plain glass glasses so you can actually see through smoggy winter London air; and ordinary shoes so you can walk to your desk without looking and sounding like a praying mantis with a ball bearing up its backside.

Now, the question is: does this person believe he’s being an individual by dressing this way? If he does, then he’s almost certainly deluded. It’s far more likely that he’s succumbed to a particular trend, cleverly fuelled by equipment companies who know how to play on his suppressed desires to be ‘different’, to be a contender, to look like a pro.

Does that matter? Well, not if he keeps the delusion to himself. Okay, he will probably irritate a number of other cyclists, either because they’re competing to look the most pro and he’s got a bit of kit they haven’t, or because he’s weaving in and out of traffic and cutting up cyclists who are sane enough to realise commuting isn’t a race. But he isn’t going to impact negatively on anyone else’s development as a serious cyclist.

Okay, here’s where this analogy is going: I want to say something about writers who write articles on how to write. Some writers, at least: the ones I think are doing the equivalent of wearing spandex to commute to work.

There’s a particular tone adopted by quite a few how-to article writing writers. It took me a long time to figure out what it is, other than having a gut feeling it isn’t authentic. I think it goes like this:

STEP ONE: assume position A.

Position A is a wonderful platform woven from organic coconut fronds set at the top of the rain forest. From there, the writer can see everything (well, the tops of every other tree and a few more platforms with other article-writing writers on them at least) and is therefore wise and knowing.

STEP TWO: pretend to assume position B.

Position B is lower than A but still with a fabulous view of all (other writers) below. But because it’s beneath the very top, it allows the writer to adopt a tone of slight self-deprecation and false modesty about the distance he/she still has to go, as well as not being as challengeable as he would be if openly in A. This is a kind of reverse humble-brag, implying that the writer should be at position A but is too modest to say so, thus in one go displaying (fake) humility and protecting himself from any accusation that he’s not actually the top dog.

STEP THREE: disguise position C – where the writer actually is.

Which is where in some ways this blog post begins.

Most writers spend many years waiting to be recognised, to get something published. Probably what they should be doing in the waiting time is working on their craft and producing more stories. But it’s difficult.

It doesn’t help that it’s not only writers and cyclists who adopt this three-step approach to unchallengeable smugness. You encounter it everywhere: in the pub, the office, the gym (I hear) . . . People discuss a topic, assume position A then immediately drop to the tone of position B. Hence the smugness, because they can now discuss every subject on Earth, any of which they have no real knowledge of at all, and in a tone that implies they know everything. And you can’t challenge them because they’re at position B – or at least their tone is saying they are – which is a humble step down from all-knowing.

Where they actually are is in the position of not knowing anything much at all. The shame of it is that this would be the ideal position from which to have a real conversation. Instead of everyone swapping smug pronouncements, they could open up the subject and try to learn something from each other.

Okay, it probably wouldn’t encourage the reading of your article to start by saying, “Actually, I know bugger-all about writing” but it could help if you showed that your real position – C – is not so far above the reader’s but the point is, it is above. Then, you could both open up in the face of sharing reality, instead of the position B tutor protecting his delusion and the would-be tutored feeling they just can’t get hold of what the expert is saying.

The guy in the lift isn’t helping anyone, basically, but he’s going to continue displaying anyway. Some may be desperate enough to believe he knows how to win the Tour de France. They might ask him for advice so they can try to win it too. He might even give it.

Plagiarism is essentially ripping off another author’s work and calling it your own. There are of course grey areas. Clearly, writing a story about King Arthur is not plagiarism, mainly because he’s a public domain character who’s fair game for any writer. But what if you copy a unique idea another writer came up with for one of the Arthurian characters, like Lancelot is ugly instead of handsome as the legends tell?

Rather than argue the exact definition of plagiarism, however, I thought it might be more useful to talk about author integrity. I’m going to use three examples as starting points:

1. I once read a book (well, the start of it anyway) in which the author describes a character as a ‘Harrison Ford lookalike’.
2. A big-selling fantasy novel containing a scene in which the author describes a character looking around a room and noting that each person is ‘better-looking than the previous one’.
3. A big-selling children’s novel telling how a vain, bullying secondary character takes up boxing and becomes an even bigger bully.

In 1, the lack of integrity is obvious. The author is taking a lazy short-cut to telling the reader what his character is like, or at least what he looks like. One of the clear problems with this is: does he mean Harrison Ford as in ‘Star Wars’ or as in ‘Ender’s Game’? Also, Harrison Ford is of course both a person and an actor; so which is the writer referring to? But there is a more fundamental problem that that, which is similar to the wisdom that suggests checking out a restaurant’s toilet before eating there, i.e. if it’s a tip, what’s the kitchen going to be like? Similarly, if the writer is this lazy with a description, what’s the plot going to be like?

With 2, the writer’s integrity might not be in question for a lot of readers. What he’s said is after all the kind of thing someone might say when telling their friends about a showbiz party they attended. It sounds natural. However, if you think about it logically, it doesn’t  make sense. It’s suggesting in effect two things: that everyone in the club arranged themselves in order of beauty, and that the observer somehow managed to visually find the least attractive person first, after which his gaze naturally moved up the pecking order of lookers. Here, we’re probably talking about integrity that should concern the author more than the reader. Why? Because an author is not occupying the same role as your mate telling you a story in the pub. He’s an authority on the story; he’s the creator of it. Therefore, he has a duty to ensure his creation is intact, consistent and believable.

With 3, the author hasn’t exactly transgressed his integrity: it is after all quite possible that a cowardly bully could become an even bigger bully if he learned how to box. However, the lack of integrity here is more in what the author didn’t do: he didn’t take the opportunity to twist expectations and, say, have the bully through boxing develop a new-found sense of self-worth and respect for others, and even become an ally for the main character instead of an adversary. However, this route would of course create more work for the author, both in thinking it through and in making changes to the plot and character arcs.

I believe lack of integrity about details such as the above, encourages lack of integrity about the story overall. Also, if an author commits the kind of thing described in 1, then there’s a fair chance he’ll do 2 and 3 also. And, while he’s at it, grab that idea about Lancelot being ugly too.

The question is, does it matter? So what if an author takes short-cuts; doesn’t that just make the story easier to get into? Maybe, but it also makes it easier to get out of.

Authors who lack integrity are not much different to insurance salesmen. They’ll tell you what you want to hear, take your money and forget all about you (while putting up your premiums the next year because they’re going to offer new customers a better deal). And of course, insurance companies are always plagiarising each others’ ideas.

Authors with integrity take a lot of trouble to get things right that most readers won’t consciously notice. They’ll make their plots water-tight, even in the face of the often plot-less or plot-ludicrous best-sellers around today.

Lack of integrity amounts to lying. It’s similar to when someone buys a house that they intend to rent. They hire a builder and tell him to make it look good but to do so as cheaply as possible. So, he paints directly over old paint instead of sanding it down first; he fixes holes in the wall by stuffing them with wet newspaper and Polyfilla-ing over the top; he paints over the damp patches instead of putting in a damp course. When the tenants walk in the place looks great. It smells of fresh paint; everything gleams. But essentially it’s a lie. The landlord doesn’t care because he doesn’t have to live there and the tenants will pay him anyway.

Well, you see the analogy. Plenty of authors churn out stories which look as if they work but when you strip away the Plotfilla, nothing holds together permanently. TV dramas often disguise this with sleight-of-hand flashy visuals, distracting you from noticing that the plot doesn’t actually work. It’s harder to do this in written fiction but unfortunately these days, many readers’ anti-bullshit vision is permanently blinded by slow-mo shots of billowing curtains, or actors who stare ‘meaningfully’ out of car windows, so that they just don’t notice.

All of which means the first and last reason for an author to keep his integrity is because he simply wants to know that whatever he leaves behind him in terms of story is built to last.

You knock on the dark oak door, wondering what can be on the other side. There is no sign on the door to tell you. All you have is a cryptic letter inviting you to this address in a Victorian back street just off Whitehall. The letter praised your writing, said it had been ‘noticed’; that you should come along tonight and meet people who can help with your career. Natural suspicion fought for a day or two with desperate ego and eventually lost.

The door swings smoothly open. Standing before you is a man wearing a red velvet smoking jacket, whisky tumbler and cigar in his right hand. His eyes appear to possess a perma-twinkle. He’s almost handsome, possibly charming. He’s grinning at you as if he’s known you for years.

“Come in!” he says, moving to one side and gesturing towards the large room behind him. “Welcome to the club.”

You see a log fire, lots of maroon leather chairs, a golden bar at the end of the room behind which a bow-tied waiter moves with calm speed, shaking a cocktail, behind him are sparkling rows of spirit bottles, decanters and flasks. You smell cigar smoke and the mouth-watering aroma of bacon. There are about twenty men and women scattered about the room, most talking in twos or threes. With a lurch of wonder, you recognise some famous writers’ faces.

You are being invited in. To the club. Here, you will be helped by friends who have friends and contacts on the inside. You will be able to casually drop the name of your club into cover letters to editors who are also members. Your stories will suddenly find their way into thousands of hands. You’ll be nominated for writing awards that previously you couldn’t even discover how to approach. You will sit back in a leather chair and smoke big fat cigars and eat bacon sandwiches with the crusts cut off and order drinks you’ve never heard of before. You’ll be cared for, loved, accepted. You’ll be in the club.

Walk inside and you can give up fighting. After all these years of struggle, you can finally relax. Let the system take the strain. You feel a clump of well-won emotion blocking your throat.

Your host is still smiling, waving you inside.

You take a step forward, heart melting with gratitude.

But then something stops you going further. Is it that the twinkle in your host’s smile contains just a hint of self-loathing? Is it that the dim lighting doesn’t quite disguise the dark red stains on the deep brown carpet? Is it those hunting scene paintings on the wall no doubt put there by the real owners of the club? Or the barman’s slightly cynical smile as he pours another cocktail for the grey-haired writer dozing at the bar? Or the slightly over-reaching laughter? Or the, now you think about it, lack of any actual writing going on?

You turn and walk away to the hissed comment of your host, “You’ll regret it.”

The world is run by clubs, of course. Small ones like the group of regulars in your local who can make the difference to your night being pleasant or slightly off. Big ones like the British establishment who can make even the worst crimes committed by its members go away. And the not so clearly defined but nevertheless effective ones like the publishing industry.

When a writer is deciding what to write, he doesn’t tend to think in terms of the admission criteria for the club. At least not when he’s starting out. He’s only concerned with creating a convincing plot, a great character or two, and expressing a new angle on a theme that’s important to him. He’s like the kid who just loves kicking a ball against the wall and playing spontaneous games with his mates; trying new tricks, weaving in and out of defenders, not passing when he should, shooting for the hell of it instead.

But if he wants to play professionally, he has to join a football club. Where there will be rules, codes of conduct, uniforms, non-playing but ultimately powerful owners, a manager who needs him to play more defensively than he’d like.

And here I’ll stop the football analogy. Because it’s actually different for a writer. The club is in us. It’s the accumulated domicile of the many needs to conform, all of which are anathema to the creative process. Despite what I said about the restrictions of a football club, a great player will still thrive within it, even against it. But the ultimate writer’s club is his own inner padded leather chairs and Cuban cigars, which will stop him stone dead.

No one tells a writer to homogenise a character here, to be the right kind of derivative there; to steal his ideas because copyright doesn’t cover them; to toe the latest  PC line; to be ‘cool’ – to wear the story like a branded T-shirt instead of totally inhabiting it with passion and heart and belief. Club writers care about how they’re perceived. They write blogs from a slightly elevated (but pretend humble) position of The One Who Knows. They imitate self-deprecation but in reality want worship. They find out who thinks similarly on the publishing side and seek them out, not because they have a fantastic story to sell but because they might some time in the future have an okay, do the job, inoffensive imitation one that won’t give any readers mental heartburn or that they’ll remember twenty minutes after reading, which is just as well otherwise they might realise they’ve been sold a nicely decorated dud designed to little more than bulk out the writer’s list of credits.

All of which means non-club writers are destined to walk a fine line. They are after all trying to succeed in a world full of clubs, where most people rapidly move from one kind to the next – family, work, social – barely taking the time to suck in a lungful or two of free oxygen in the spaces between. The non-club writer produces a punchy, beautifully written story that makes people feel but also think, and already he’s in trouble.

On the one hand, there is the clear-conscienced writer who has produced the best story he possibly can, but now has no idea what to do with it. On the other, is the club member who doesn’t even start a story unless he knows who’s likely to buy it.

Skewing it all, unfortunately, is the large proportion of public taste for the club concoction; the easy to digest, predictable, mildly exciting ride. Hence the dreary predictability of best-sellers. So it is then, that the non-club writer has two clubs to battle, one giving the other exactly what it thinks it wants, its taste built on what it’s already been given, perpetuating a closed circle of mediocrity.

“England back to their usual,” says Nige. “Huff and puff, give the ball away; huff and puff, give the ball away; late heroic surge to no useful end.”

We’re in the Jolly Farmers and half an hour ago England lost their second World Cup Finals game in a row and barring miracles are now out. The atmosphere isn’t too bad; partly, I suspect because most of the rabid fans are across the road in the Ravensbourne where they have a big screen and partly because, well, we’ve been here many times before with England.

“We always seem to play as if we’re about to fall over,” I say. “Like we have no vision or forward-thinking. We just hope that the ball will land nicely and the other team will somehow slip up.”

“You know,” he says, “I’m so depressed I’ll even let you go straight to the writing analogy.”

And there is one; I can sense it. I buy some time by getting us two more pints.

What’s the equivalent for a writer of an England football team that cannot control a game, that only succeeds when their backs are against the wall?

“I think it’s about the balance between control and creativity,” I say.

Nige doesn’t respond, unless you count a half-pint swallow, so I continue.

“If you start a story with too much control, everything tightens and becomes predictable. But if you just launch with creativity, you risk running down any one of a hundred blind plot alleys, which means you produce something beautiful to read but with no end result. So, the best teams and the best writers make sure they’re sitting with the balance between the two before they take off.”

“Okay . . .  so how you get that balance?”

My mind billows out, taking in personal history, social structures, families, the landscape . . .

“It’s not about balance in a story, or a football match,” I say, “it’s about getting balance in your desire.”

His eyes shine with interest. “Can I take the next bit,” he says. “It’s like wooing a beautiful woman.”

“Well, I’m not sure that’s exactly–”

“Look, Tel, you use your analogies and I’ll use mine.”

“All right, but when was the last time you wooed a beautiful woman?”

He frowns, takes another thought-gathering swallow of beer. “I’m not sure I ever have but I’ve studied the subject assiduously since the somewhat startling appearance of my first pubic hair. And my ex-wife was beautiful.”

His eyes mist over with, well, I’m not sure: either loving memories or the size of his divorce lawyer’s fee.

“You know what, Tel, I think it was on our very first date, when I said she looked uncomfortable being so gorgeous.”

“You said that? Spontaneously?”

He frowns. “You have to remember that I was utterly besotted at the time, but not just about her looks and her body; she had something I really wanted to be with.”

I laugh. “I think you’ve nailed my writing analogy.”

“Really? I don’t detect any links between England’s woeful performance just now and my missus’s hidden depths.”

“You said she had something you wanted to be with. Her looks were just what got you interested in her.”

“I’m not saying looks ain’t important, however.”

“But a story has to have something the reader really wants to be with, too. A lot of stories are rather like the way England play football: they look good and they talk a good game but once they start playing, you’d rather be Brazilian, French, German, Colombian.”

“Or even,” he says, widening his eyes, “Scottish.”

He holds up his glass to catch the barmaid’s eye. Too much control or too much creativity . . . now I’m I thinking it’s not really about finding a balance between the two. Both are part of the ‘looks’ of a story; they get you interested. But what makes you want to be with the story is something else altogether.

Nige puts another pint next to the one and a half I already have, my drinking fitness being somewhat short of his.

“A writer shouldn’t just assume,” I say, “that his writing is something readers will want to be with. He’s got to love what he’s writing about; not just love the process of writing.”

“Are you saying English footy players don’t love football?”

I shrug. “I’m sure they do, at one level. But I guess it gets obscured by money, fame and fear . . . Have you ever thought that your wife may have done that thing she did on your first date deliberately?”

“What do you mean, Tel? I’m not sure I want to hear this.”

“She wanted to be with you, too. So she reached inside for what she really loved about being with a man, being with you, and, well, radiated it so you couldn’t help but notice it and want to be with it.”

He picks up his pint but half way to his mouth, he puts it down again. He seems to be studying the surface, as if the swirling shapes of foam are something he’s never noticed before, changing all the time, finally dying away forever.

“Bastard,” he says.

“A few days ago,” says Nige, “I went past my bleedin’ grumpy old man tipping point. I used to think it’s age what defines when you become a GOM, but actually it’s simply after you exceed the crap accumulation limit.”

I suppose he has been looking a bit older recently. His long hair has a few lines of grey which isn’t Wicke’s Beige Gloss and his shoulders are slightly slumped, although that might be on account of the drinking angle he’s leaning at on the Tavern’s bar.

“Is it the Bilderberg group being more open about their agenda?” I say.

When I read about this in the papers, I suspected that Nige, a long-term conspiracy theorist, might be rather upset that the rich, and therefore probably not too grumpy, old men who really rule the world were actually telling people where they’re meeting and why these days.

But he shakes his head from behind his lager glass, just starting on a half-pint swallow, which means I have time for another guess.

“Is it because you can’t buy a single pork pie in Marks and Spencer’s any more without feeling bad that you didn’t go for the 6 for the price of 4 offer?”

At this he cuts off in mid-swallow, bangs down his pint and says, “Ah! Exactly!”

“Really? An M and S pork pie pushed you over the GOM tipping point?”

“No, but up-selling did. I had this building job in Heathrow all last week and stayed in the Premier Inn on the last night as a treat. I go to the bar and order steak and chips. The girl suggests strongly that I should take advantage of their special dinner and breakfast deal for twenty-two quid. I say no thanks, I’ve already got breakfast booked. But then she repeats how wonderful the offer is. A bloke standing at the bar says to her, he just told you, he already has breakfast booked. Then, with somewhat dead eyes it has to be said, she goes through it again. So I say that’s the third time and no thanks.

“Said bloke at bar tells me he’s over from America; hired a car at the airport and they tried to slip through a massive upgrade that he hadn’t even asked for which would have cost him another four hundred quid. While I’m waiting for me steak, we carry on talking and I offer to buy him a drink, so I order two pints from the same girl. This time, she asks me if I want any snacks with it. I say no, partly on account I didn’t ask for any but mainly because I’ve got a bleedin’ steak coming.”

“Ordered it rare, did you?”

“Very funny, Tel. You should be a writer. Anyway, that wasn’t the tipping point, even if she did ask me about snacks every time I went to the bar, even after I’d had the steak. No, the tipping point was the chips what came with the steak.”

“Oh-oh, I know you take chips seriously.”

“Yes, and these were as soggy as Asda’s economy frozen. Thing is, on the menu they’d banged on about how their chips are just right: crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside. Then said bloke pointed out that those are the chips you have to pay extra for. And I think, why the bloody hell didn’t she try to up-sell me the better chips: that’s something I actually wanted.”

As we both know, I’ve been looking for the writing angle on what he’s saying.

“I’ll do it for you, Tel,” he says. “Authors up-sell when they chuck in a lot of extra tat for the same price instead of giving you more quality, like better plots and believable characters.”

He may be right but I think there’s more to it than that.

“I’m thinking about that girl in the Premier Inn,” I say. “She won’t have wanted to up-sell you. The management would have told her to do it. Same with the car hire firm; same with all branches of M and S. So, maybe the question is, when an author tries to up-sell his readers, is that because he’s not in control of his inner manager?”

Nige frowns, needs thinking time I can tell. Which means a couple more pints are on the way. It’s Sunday night and the Tavern is quiet; just the regulars in, most looking tired at the end of a long week’s drinking, but then they’ll be back in tomorrow.

“Why would anyone need an inner manager?” he says.

“We don’t need one. Well, maybe we do, to organise the day, get the bills paid and make sure there’s enough Evian in the fridge. But the last thing you want is for it to organise your writing.”

“Too much corporate-think?”

“Yes, there’s this modern office culture today in which everyone is constantly doing what they believe will score them corporate brownie points, rather than actually feeling what needs doing. Same in the media; same everywhere in fact.”

“I blame the Bilderberg Group.”

“You blame them for everything.”

“Can you think of anyone more corporate?”

He’s got a point. The descendents of the robber barons who stole all the wealth in this country and hardly likely to encourage rebellion against one’s inner manager. Managing is what they do, after all.

“So,” I say, “if a writer wants to produce work that’s original and interesting, he has to deny his inner manager but he also has to refuse to join any clubs because they all ultimately lead back to the Bilderberg group who are the anti-thesis of imagination and creativity.”

“You’re in a few writers’ clubs though, aren’t you, Tel?”

A this point, I decide it’s time for a long swallow of my own beer.

“You’re right,” I say eventually. “And the SF/Fantasy writers’ clubs are probably worse in some ways than most for corporate behaviour. They have tons of awards for a start, and clubs love awards because it’s a chance to reinforce corporate behaviour.”

“Won any of them yet?” he says, grinning.

I sigh. “I’m not saying I’d refuse one if it was offered. But I do think a writer has to save his club behaviour for after winning the award, not before he starts writing.”

 “What’s up, Tel? You look like you could do with some mental prune juice, or lager as they call it here in the Jolly Farmers.”

Nige and I are in one of our locals, closing in on last orders. Outside the back door, past the resonant smell of the Gents loo, actual evening sunlight is slicing great yellow slabs across the pub’s garden. ‘Garden’ is a little optimistic a description, however, for a patch of concrete covered by a few benches, but it helps the smokers feel as if their night is just a bit healthier and at least in shouting distance of Mother Nature.

“I’ve been working on my blog about writing short fiction,” I say. “It’s very different to working with my students who I can help with specifics directed to their needs. But when you’re writing to people you can’t even see or know much about, it’s harder somehow to explain what works in a way that they, whoever they are, can fully understand.”

 It’s the same with apprentices,” he says. “You need to see them working at close hand to know what’s going to help them best sort their shit.”

I begin to get a feeling-idea from what Nige says. This happens sometimes, when a word or a picture or a piece of music triggers a few separated ideas I have, bringing them together.

“Did you know I once blagged my way into a job as a signwriter,” I say.

“You’ve told me about it but never mentioned the blagging bit.”

 “The council’s signwriter was retiring and they needed a replacement. I guess real signwriters were short on the ground so they believed me when I told them how going to art college and working in props in the opera had given me a good eye.”

 “Hang on: didn’t an apprenticeship for signwriting used to last seven years?”

 “Yes, and with good reason. Every sign in the council at that time was produced with paint and brush. And if I’d tried to do that the way I thought signwriting was done, I’d never have finished a thing and it would all have been crap. Fortunately, the real signwriter who was retiring stayed on for a few months to show me the basics.”

I can tell Nige is engrossed because his half pint of lager has remained unswallowed for the past five minutes.

 “It took me a long time just to learn how to mark up the guidelines on a board,” I say.

 “You don’t just use a ruler and pencil?”

 “No, you coat a long piece of string with chalk, wrap one end around your left little finger; stretch the other end tight, then with your first two fingers, twang the string so it leaves a nice, light, even and dead straight marker line.”

 “Neat, and not the kind of thing you’d work out for yourself.”

 “Exactly, and neither is the way you paint a letter. First you need a mahl stick which has a cushioned end. You hold this against the board with your left hand then balance your right wrist on top of your left; that way, your painting hand has complete freedom of movement, which is not possible when you simply put your painting wrist directly on to the board. Next, you take the right kind of brush; load it up with paint then produce pretty much an entire letter in one sweep of the hand. You start with the edge of the brush, to produce the serif, then you flatten it out as you sweep down, which means the two outside lines of the brush ensure the letter width is right and there are no jagged bits to it.”

 Now he finishes off his pint and orders two more.

 “All very interesting, Tel, but I ain’t sure you can apply the same kind of principles to writing.”

“Not exactly but I think there’s a similarity between putting something you’ve been taught about writing into practice and just having to take on that letter in one smooth movement, not ruin it with lots of baby steps. Take just one element, like tone selection. I mean, how do you explain to someone how to do that?”

 “I was always getting in trouble with my ex due to poor tone selection, as it happens,” he says. “My default tone, apparently, was over-jovial and largely avoiding of the point, especially upon returning from this place.”

 “Default tone, yes,” I say. “Almost every writer has one but is usually unaware of it. For years, for instance, I used to always put humour into my characters’ dialogue, even if the mood was deadly serious.”

 “Frustrated sitcom writer?”

 “I don’t know but an editor once told me that humour and dialogue were two of my strengths, so forever after I was determined to squeeze them in to every story. Default tone is another reason I try to get my writers to produce short fiction, not just novels. They need to try lots of different tones, characters, tenses, genres, so they become skilful in a whole range of tones; then the story will select the right one for them.”

 “I should have asked my missus to select the right tone for me. She could read me like a book anyway.”

“The problem is,” I say. “I’m trying to train people to be craftsman who can produce any kind of story but the reality is that most writers only want to create one kind of story; the one that sells.”

I pick up my glass, realising I’m nearly a pint behind Nige and I don’t possess the mystical open throat. But it’s okay. He’s just finished his last and ordered another two, no doubt remembering it’s Monday and that means Music Night in the Jolly Farmers with an extended bar. In fact, I now notice that the have been here all evening, sitting in a loose circle at one end, grinding out old Beatles and Dylan hits along with the odd sea shanty that sounds like Davy Jones with heartburn, and not the lead singer with the Monkees.

“You know what, Tel?” says Nige. “Sod ’em. If some half-arsed scribbler wants to just knock out derivative crap over and over again, let him. But you need to keep trying to teach the best, to the best. I don’t read much fiction these days, not with all that conspiracy theory stuff it’s my destiny to keep up with. But the novels I really remember are the ones where the writer cared about what he wrote; had something to say; and bleedin’ well said it as good as he could. Like Herman Hesse. Boy, he had a knack of using magical prose to nail down those rare feelings we all get but can’t always articulate. Like meeting some stranger and knowing straight away that they’re part of your spiritual family. Not the flesh and blood one; but the family that’s spread all over the globe, in different races and countries but where every member feels exactly the same thing about the universe, so when you meet one, you just know.”

I say nothing to this, just marvel for a few moments at the articulacy that sometimes results from the right mixture of lager, philosophy, and nostalgia for one’s ex, even if she did render one’s collection of unmarked conspiracy theory videos impotent by stealing the only index book.

And with that, I decided to carry on with these blogs, for whoever may need them now or some time later.

“Do you ever read my blog?” I say, topping up our glasses with the new bottle of white wine I’ve just bought here in the Mr Morris Wine Bar. It’s around ten o’clock on a Wednesday evening and Ben has been talking, for most of the first bottle, about how badly his book shop is doing. It’s a familiar theme and one I sympathise with, even if I do buy most of my books from Amazon.

“Yes, of course I do,” he says, “along with the other hundred thousand writers’ blogs that clog up the ether with rather obvious remarks made in a surprisingly knowing tone.”

I feel this sarcastic remark may off-set my Amazon treachery somewhat.

“Last time, I wrote about openings to stories,” I say.

“I know. You talked about how important it is to get the tone right with an opening.”

“I thought you didn’t read it.”

“I don’t have to, because you always talk about it, so I get the gist.”

“Oh. So can I gist you with what comes after the opening?”

“You can try but that’s probably the most predictable bit.”

“Really?”

“Take self-help books,” he says. “I sell a lot of them; well I did before everyone decided to sacrifice their souls to a faceless international giant that doesn’t care about anything but feeding its endless fiscal appetite. Anyway, I’m pretty good at advising my customers which book is the one they most need.”

“You must read a lot of them, then.”

“No, that’s the point: the most I ever read is the introduction to a self-helper. That always sets out everything that’s going to appear in the rest of the book, nicely summarised.”

“So, why would anyone read the whole book?”

He shrugs. “I guess some people need the message repeated in a hundred different ways until they get the point.”

“Okay, but fiction is different to that,” I say.

“Well, it should be but a lot of it is just as predictable.”

As I’m thinking about this, he really goes for the narrative jugular.

“It’s the same with relationships. You meet a girl; it’s an exciting new beginning; could go anywhere, be anything. But in fact, anyone watching from the outside can easily predict that in no time at all the two of you will be watching the One Show every night, drinking a bottle of wine too many, having perfunctory sex a couple of times a month and basically waiting for death.”

“Jesus, do you have a self-help book that deals with that?” I say.

He smiles, drinks more wine.

“You don’t deal with it by pretending it’s not an inevitable factor of starting anything,” he says. “So, with a story, you set up a character in a situation with a problem then you have to tell the reader more about the specific nature of the problem, and about the world it’s taking place in. No way of avoiding it. Otherwise all you have is one of those dickhead thriller stories that rocket on from one drastic scene to another till you get to the end and realise you don’t give a damn about any of the characters involved.”

“So,” I say, “the trick is to do the predictable in an interesting way. That’s the ‘what follows’ bit.”

“Yes, and it’s what sorts out the writer men from the writer boys. The boys can set up a dramatic opening but what they can’t do is carry the reader through the exposition bits that need to follow. Instead, they try to skip through it quick and get to the next exciting part. Men writers, however, use the what follows bit to make you care about the characters.”

“And to do that, they have to care about the characters themselves.”

“I think they have to like the characters, too, whatever their function in the story, even the bad guys.”

I don’t have any time for royalty, I think, but I like the royal characters I write about sometimes.

This is what follows for Princess Gertrude in ‘[Dragon]’:

She searched his green eyes.

“I saw you missing the lines,” he said.

She climbed down and went to the balustrade, leaning far out into the night so he would tell her not to, but he didn’t.

“It’s bad luck to step on them,” she said. “And I’m going to need lots of luck tonight, because you won’t tell me anything about the dragon.”

She studied the big, hissing fountains and their wide, rippling pools below, and the busy little dots of the servants between them. As always, she wished she could fly down and surprise them by stepping on their heads very fast, keeping her balance, like sprinting over the rocks by the sea.

A strong gust of jasmine smothered her thoughts; the cicadas scratched in a tingly way at her ears, and suddenly she wanted to eat lots of cake. But she couldn’t eat anything tonight, they’d told her; tradition forbade it.

She frowned, realising her father hadn’t spoken, even though she still leaned out dangerously and for all he knew, could be dribbling spit on to the people below.

She turned to see him a few paces away, noticing for once the perfectly pressed navy tunic and cloak, the shiny polished black boots, and the thin gold crown in his black and grey hair, winking in the moon’s peach glow.

She became aware of the sagging trousers and loose cotton shirt she’d worn for the last six days straight, and the muddy boots she wouldn’t let the maids touch. She pulled matted red hair away from her face and said, “I suppose you want the servant women to scrub me with lime and pile up my hair like a big red bum on top of my head, and put me in a white dress with a girdle under it that will make me spew up everywhere.”

“Gertie, you know it’s–“

“Ah! Of course–that’s why I can’t eat tonight: so there’s nothing for my girdle to squeeze out.”

He looked away from her, at the moon or the spaces between the stars, and at last she felt the fear they’d said would only be natural.

“Daddy?”

He turned away, walked back into her room. She followed, not bothering to miss the lines this time. He sat on her favourite oak trunk, next to her bed, gently moving aside her woollen owl and fox to make room.

She sat on the edge of her bed and waited while he traced a wooden leaf with his finger.

“You’ll be the first princess in over a hundred years,” he said, “and, after I’m gone, the first queen since Marlianne.”

“I know that, Daddy. But I don’t want to be queen.”

He didn’t seem to hear. “When I was at my turning age like you, I didn’t need to meet the dragon to become a prince.” He looked up, his smile like a forgotten promise. “But girls have to meet the dragon before they can become a princess.”

“I don’t believe in the dragon,” she said. “No one’s ever seen it.”

“It lives forever, Gertie. It came a hundred years ago and it will come again tonight.”

He’d caught her in his arms so many times, when she’d fallen out of trees or slipped off the saddle, and often he’d brushed aside the servants to wipe the blood and dirt from her knees himself. But he wouldn’t be there tonight.

“Mother told me about it once,” she said, “when I was very young. She said Queen Marlianne was a just and respected ruler of Arcanadia.”

She pictured her mother’s flowing red hair and always occupied green eyes–before the sickness had sucked all the person out of her. She met her father’s gaze and knew he saw the same picture.

“But,” she went on, not wanting to, “no one knows what happened to Marlianne when she met the dragon. Because all the stupid books say you have to meet it alone.”

He said nothing, stricken at last.

“She lived a long life,” Gertie said, “but without a husband or children.”

The King of Arcanadia stood and went to his daughter; he took her in his arms and squeezed so tightly it hurt but she said nothing.

“There’s an awful lot of awful written shit in the world, calling itself art,” says Ben as we’re nearing the end of the second bottle and wondering if we can or should fit in another before Mr Morris decides to call it a night. “Because, I reckon, a lot of people want to be a writer than be a writer.”

“But why would anyone want to read shit?” I say.

He shakes his head at this, knowing I know the answer.

“For the same reason,” he says, “they can’t stop their relationships falling into the trap of being highly predictable and not in an interesting way.”

I stand, having decided that any more wine is going to mean the downhill walk from here to home is in danger of turning into a downhill arms-whirling sprint, ending abruptly and painfully in Nige’s hedge.

“What comes after the bit that comes after?” I say.

He stands and we walk out into the Brockley night, full of coloured splashes of light from the fried chicken takeaway and the rather blaring bus shelter.

“Either,” he says, “the reader is comatose with predictability or he’s joined hands with the author and they’re entering a temporary but highly fulfilling civic relationship that only a truly satisfying end to a story can better.”

I think of saying something but don’t because I reckon he’s probably right.

A lot has been said about the importance of opening lines. How they have to grab the reader from the first word. How it’s like a good chat up line. On the other hand . . .

Some research was once done into chat up lines that actually work. Perhaps not surprisingly, “Do you come here often?”, “Are they missing an angel in heaven?”, “My place or yours?” didn’t have a lot of success outside of the chancer’s head. However, the kind of line that had the most effect was something like, “Hi, my name’s Zak. I hope you don’t mind me talking to you. I’m a bit nervous but I just had to come over and say hello . . . “

Okay, I’m not suggesting that would make a good opening line to a story but the point is that snappy one-liners tend to lack the honest conviction of the bumbling Romeo who’s summoned all his courage to make a bold statement to a total stranger about how he actually feels. I do believe the opening has to be honest to the intent of the story. Nothing wrong with capturing the reader’s attention but don’t do it with gimmicks and wise-cracks (that probably aren’t anyway); do it with the mood and tone of the story.

It might be best to try explain this with actual examples. First, here is the opening to my story, ‘Big Dave’s in Love’ (which won the New Scientist/Arc SF short fiction award in 2012):

I skip down the street like I got sherbet up me backside. I sweep me arms wide and sing to the pigeons and the cats and the bespectacled mice what study form under the bookie’s shop floor.

“What’s up, Jack?” says one of the cats.

I should hold back the news, at least until I make it to the public bar of The Airpod and Nanomule. Then again, everyone in Gaffville deserves to hear the glad tidings.

“Big Dave’s in love!” I shout, so loud I even gain the attention of the rebellious rooks on the multi-coloured cogni-nylon thatched roofs. Other less cynical birds whoop and coo and shake their feathers in sheer joy. And I do a leap to click my boot heels together because this is what we’ve all needed to save us, ain’t it the truth.

 I started this story with just an image and a tone, not knowing how it would end. In fact, I wrote the first page or so then it took me over a year to find the rest of the story and finish it. What I wanted the story to do was reflect the humour and exuberance that I find in many of my relatives from the East End of London, off-setting a little of the irritation I feel that most of the time people from that part of the country are portrayed in books, TV and film as self-centred thickos.

I also wanted to establish the world we were in but as naturally as possible, seeing it through Jack’s eyes. So, we learn that in Gaffville animals talk and even the houses can respond to outside influences. We also are shown the point of the story which is that whatever Gaffville and its inhabitants actually are, their future depends on Big Dave falling in love. This suggest, perhaps, that Jack and the others are not quite real; that Dave is perhaps their owner, that they may be his very advanced toys.           

But possibly the tone is the most important element, and for that I had to just launch myself into it; show it, in other words, not tell it.           

How do you do that? First, you have to commit to it, rather than try to control it. This is a subtle balance to get right. Clearly, the author is in control of the story, at least in terms of the plot (even if it does a twist at the end he didn’t anticipate, he still has to control the factors that can allow such a twist to occur organically).           

So, you let the tone carry your voice within the story. To a degree, I had to become Jack and let his needs, his voice, his character lead the actual prose. You want your character to eventually arrive at the plot resolution that makes your story work; but you want him to be more like a curious child on the journey than a properly kitted out professional rambler, following his map and compass, sticking closely to the designated path.           

How do you know if you’ve succeeded? I think it’s when the reader feels immersed in a story, rather than just admiring it from the outside.           

Here’s the opening of a story called ‘[Dragon]’ which appeared in Realms of Fantasy:

Gertrude ran, stomping the white marble squares of her bedroom, making sure her boots never landed on a line. The black glass doors to her balcony stood open, a pink moon peeping over the balustrade; she reached the last square and jumped.

            “Ow–Gert!” said her father. “You’re getting much too heavy for this.” But he smiled and didn’t put her down right away, so she wrapped her legs around his waist, satisfied that for once she’d made him stagger back a pace.

            “You could have let me jump over the balcony,” she said. “The dragon would have saved me.”

Here, the fact the title is in brackets is significant, supported by Gertrude’s sarcastic reference to ‘the dragon’. I wanted to tip off the reader that this was not a story about a typical dragon; that it was perhaps more representative of the change in character that Gertrude needs to go through if she’s to succeed in her destiny (which is to be a ruling monarch in a land that hasn’t seen a female ruler for many years).           

Essentially, it’s a Young Adult story so I wanted to establish the tone as such. Therefore, the prose is in Gertrude’s point of view, a girl who is on the point of having to become a woman. Which is why we see her on the one hand running around her bedroom in boots but on the other grown up enough that her father has trouble holding her. And her comment about the dragon shows she is developing a teenager’s natural desire to question of authority.           

Interestingly, this story appeared in an issue which dealt with certain tropes of Fantasy, but none of them in a way that might be expected.           

This is the opening to my story, ‘A Most Notorious Woman’, which appeared in Albedo One:

The most powerful woman in England put out her hand to the most powerful woman in Ireland, and the witnesses held their breath. Quartermaster Harris watched, fascinated, disguised as a courtier.

Elizabeth’s white, oblong, face and black, sharp eyes glinted with what might have been curiosity but could just as easily have been displeasure. She wore white silk, embroidered with pearls the size of coffee beans, under a mantle of black silk shot through with silver threads, the end of her long train carried by a marchioness. Her white powdered chest was mostly uncovered, broken by a gold collar studded with fabulous jewels. Her auburn hair, obviously false, supported a small but ornate gold crown.

Despite the finery and status of the English Queen, her guest captured Harris’s attention — in her mid-sixties, like the Queen, but with a face full of weathered lines. She wore a long saffron leine — a simple robe with billowing sleeves — under a plain green dress and long, woollen cloak. Her naturally red hair, now streaked with grey, was held back by a simple silver pin. A little taller than the Queen, she took the English monarch’s hand and said, in Latin, “I am honoured to be invited to your majesty’s magnificent palace at Greenwich, and subject myself to your will.”

At this, the tension increased further amongst the surrounding dignitaries, courtiers, ambassadors and servants. For, although the Irish Queen had formally acceded to the English sovereign, it was more than apparent, by her bearing and holding of the Queen’s gaze, that she saw herself as an equal.

       After a long moment, Elizabeth’s lips parted in a smile, displaying sugar-blackened teeth. “Welcome to my court, Grace O’Malley,” she said. “I have heard much about you and would now hear the truth from your own lips.”

This is a very different opening to the previous two, of course, but then it has a different job to do. Essentially, the story is a ripping yarn, involving pirates, talking sea serpents, love and death. But it’s also based on a real person: Grace O’Malley the Irish ‘Pirate Queen’, sometimes also known as ‘A Most Notorious Woman’. Partly because it’s a longer story than normal, I thought it could start slower than perhaps is usual for a shorter tale. It seemed worth taking the time, not just to build a picture of Grace’s world, but also of her strength of character, especially since that is the backbone of the story.           

This scene is based on true events. Grace really was summoned to Elizabeth’s court, mainly to answer to charges of piracy; and her wealth was certainly based on piracy. However, although it isn’t clear why, Elizabeth pardoned Grace at this meeting. And I thought that would be a good starting point: to show that even as an older woman, Grace had the character, charm, and desire to win others to her way, even the most powerful woman in Britain it seemed.

The opening of a story, then, has to establish the following, but not in equal amounts necessarily:

TONE

FEEL

INTENT

VOICE

PROSE STYLE

MOOD           

But it doesn’t happen through the author working out precisely what each of these means and exactly how to portray them. He has to bundle it all up into his will, in something like the way he would carry within him the essence of a close friend, in this case his main character, then let it loose.           

Essentially, he’s looking for a balance between world-setting and fun. Readers want to enjoy themselves, whatever genre they’re into. But they also want to be educated and convinced about the world they’re going to give themselves to, if only for the twenty minutes or so it takes to read a short story.           

Which brings us back to honesty. A wise-crack leading to a predictable plot involving a generic character in a tired setting is just cheating the reader. It’s not satisfying for the writer, either, unless he’s the kind who measures success strictly in terms of output rather than quality of mood, magic and morality.           

And morality is the last point I want to make about openings. Everyone knows a writer shouldn’t moralise to his readers. But at the same time, a story without a moral core is like an only mildly amusing joke. Characters that stay in the memory, making actions that thrill us, living in worlds we wish we could visit, stem from the author having some kind of moral point of passion driving him.           

I’m using ‘morality’ in perhaps a wider sense than normal here; to mean having a position about; a view on; a desire to see a truth expressed.           

As said, with ‘Big Dave’s in Love’ I wanted to show the warmth and intelligence of East End people that is a large my experience. With ‘[Dragon]’ I wanted to explore what might be closer to the original truth of dragons: as Earth spirit manifestations that can be joined by a human but always with the price of change the cost. With ‘A Most Notorious Woman’ I wanted to explore for modern readers the psychology of a person who doesn’t equivocate and moderate her passions in the way we’re encouraged to do today.           

I’ve talked before about the seven-point plot structure used by many authors and which has the opening three elements:

CHARACTER in a

SETTING with a

PROBLEM           

These make a good skeleton for a story but of course it’s the flesh that a reader is really interested in.           

Too often, writers follow these plot formats with the religious devotion of those who can’t work out their own faith. All that results is a predictable story with predictable quasi-emotions. I once read a story by a very famous FS/Fantasy writer which centred around a good idea. Unfortunately, he hadn’t taken the time or effort to get inside what the idea meant for him, to give the story feel and tone and intent. About half way through, he needed the reader to feel empathy with the main character. So he gave her one terrible illness after another, to the point the fact she survived as long as she did was actually funny instead of tragic.           

The last thing, then, you want your opening to do is tick structure boxes to the point where even the reader least interested in craft can see it all coming a mile off. Instead, you want your opening to fire inspiration, wonder, magic, or simply an unusual emotion; then the structure is a subtle, unseen guide for that magic, not a series of coloured indicator flags around a race track.

“I’m still writing about what an author needs to do before he gets going on a short story,” I say.

Nige raises his eyebrows, apparently not surprised to hear this.

We’re in the Tavern, even though neither of us really approves of its new look. The old look was actually a new made to look old look but at least it had tatty appeal. Now it’s a new made to look old but not quite as old as before and probably erring on the side of new because that should bring in more of ‘the kids’ look. Nige is also suspicious of the uniform white shirts the bar staff have to wear. Before, they also had a uniform but it was one that wasn’t meant to look like one: kind of slightly sloppy cool. After a few pints, you could pretend they were ordinary folk, just like us punters.

“When Cristiano Ronaldo picks up the ball on the half way line,” he says, “what do you think he’s got in mind?”

“Running like fury through the other team’s defence and banging it into the back of the net?”

He smiles; we both know what he’s getting at.

We’re leaning against the counter and Nige has his end of night three pints of lager before him. Well, two now, since he’s just finished the last half of the first while I’m pondering what to say next.

“But, come on,” I say, “scoring goals in football is a very obvious objective.”

“Tell that to Charlton,” he says. “Their forwards need a satnav to get anywhere near the posts this season.”

“But you don’t necessarily know where a story’s going to end when you start it.”

“Bit like going on a date with someone new, then,” he says.

“Well, yeah; I guess so. You wouldn’t want to presume it’s going to end in the bedroom, even if that’s what you wanted.”

He shakes his head, grinning. “But if you don’t presume, Tel, you definitely won’t end up anywhere interesting. Because what you presume is where all the power is, mate. And it’s power – positivity and charm, in this case – what will lead to the mattress of infinite possibility.”

“Again, that’s just another rather obvious kind of score, though, isn’t it?” I say. “Anyone reading you at the start of the night, Nige, is going to see mattresses bouncing in your irises. But a reader shouldn’t find it so easy to guess the ending.”

He reaches for pint number two and downs half of it. He’s frowning at the same time, however, so I know he won’t have fully appreciated the taste.

“You’re missing the point,” he says. “I know you don’t want to telegraph the ending of your story before it’s even got going. But what I’m saying is that the writer needs to have his head and balls fully charged up with passion when he leaps over the half way line, or through the bedroom door, depending on the analogy of your choice.”

I think I know what he means and order two more pints.

“Okay,” I say, “so a writer needs be full of passion, drive, mesmerising ball skills and a clear idea of where the net is, but kind of disguise it from the reader. Because unlike with footy where the ending is obvious, with a short story, as a reader you want to be deliberately misled and distracted before the, um, spermatozoa lands.”

“Yeah, it’d be like Ronaldo not running straight for the goal; instead he sits on the ball and has a chat with his marker about Nietzsche’s concept of the superman translated into the modern footy game.”

“But Ronaldo will only get away with that kind of diversion if he goes on to put the ball in the net.”

He swallows another half a pint and says, “So, what’s stopping you running for the net, Tel?”

“Nothing, really. I mean, I write plenty of stories. I just feel that every story should have a point; not just be about some character experiencing conflict and over-coming it. Or not.”

“But didn’t some bloke once say there’s nothing new; that every bleedin’ story’s been told?”

And with that, I realise I don’t really know what I’m trying to say. Perhaps Nige sees my problem because he appears to change the subject now.

“As it happens, ” he says, “I’m quite fond of conspiracy theories, but here’s the thing: what most of us theorists don’t like to admit is that the objects of our theories – the establishment, the royals, the government, Simon Cowell – are just as trapped in the conspiracy as we are.”

He’s grinning at me knowingly, so I say, “Are you saying that the writer and the reader are trapped together in the limitations of the story form?”

“Yeah. Because they kind of dance around each other like a couple of courting mallards: one of them is all shiny feathers, showing off, and the other’s kind of brown and dull-looking, but they’re both the same species. Which is how eggs get produced, of course, but we aren’t talking plain old, always the same, eggs here, Tel, are we?”

“We aren’t?”

“What I’m saying is: the writer has to be bigger than the story.”

I don’t reply because my neck is tingling with the truth of this statement, even if I might not like what it portends.

“You’re going to have to elaborate on that,” I say.

But the bell for drinking up has just sounded and Nige has more pressing matters to deal with.

Still, there’s always tomorrow.

Okay, it’s time to start a story. Or is it? Because before actually writing anything, you need to decide on what structure the story will have; or don’t decide: just take off instead.

Let’s look at these two approaches:

Structure

a) Rigid

A lot of writers like to stick with the same structure, for example:

1.         CHARACTER in a

2.         SETTING with a

3.         PROBLEM

4.         TRIES and FAILS

5.         CLIMAX, FINAL TRY

6.         SUCCEEDS (or fails)

7.         RESOLUTION

Writers that use a rigid structure tend to claim it works for any kind of story. However, if that’s true, then an obvious problem will be that their readers will eventually know exactly what to expect.

b) Fluid

A writer can use a structure like the one above but deliberately push it back in their writing mix, rather than letting it control too much. So the story will end up (possibly) being resolved but its journey through the other six elements can be flexible according to what the writer wants to explore.

Or to put it another way, say you decide to go on a day trip. You plan exactly where to go, the time you’re going to leave and return; you hire a guide to show you all the key sites; eat your meals on time, and so on, right through to the resolution which is you lying down in bed and saying to your partner, “Well, that all went exactly to plan.”

Or, you could go the same place but become so engrossed, say, in the conversation you’re having with your partner, that the wonderful scenery and slightly over-knowledgeable guide’s take on his role become just background and contrast points. Now, you have two dynamics that play off each other: the trip and the conversation which may actually be the antithesis of the highly ordered event.

Yes, of course, you could create the same contrast within a rigid structure but the danger is that your subconscious will rush the in-between points’ magic, because it’s too keen to get to the next stage; to complete its homework successfully.

Not deciding on structure:

It’s very difficult to make a story work that has no structure. Yet the attractions are clear. If you don’t know where the story’s going, neither will your reader. (Well, that’s not entirely true: readers can be better aware in a genre than the writer and therefore spot a trope he’s following even when he’s blissfully unaware of it.)

Now, perhaps a slightly controversial view: the degree to which a writer can produce work that surprises, elevates and enriches is determined by how fixed he is in his career objectives. If, for example, he has decided firmly that he’s going to be a commercial writer who makes a good living, that’s fine; however, such a goal will probably mean he’s never going to approach a story without a pre-determined structure to ensure he doesn’t waste any words.

Of course, the weakness of a writer who isn’t so sure of his objectives, is that he may actually waste a lot of words following no-structure leads that don’t result in a story that makes any sense. What this kind of writer needs is a different kind of objective; just as strong as the desire to make money but not so easy to follow, to map out, to rationalise.

So, at this point we need to re-arrange the starting categories into:

1.         STRUCTURE (RIGID/FLUID) – PLOT/CHARACTER/SETTING/STYLE PACKAGE – STORY (ENTERTAINING PERHAPS, PREDICTABLE ALMOST CERTAINLY);

or:

2.         DESIRE TO SAY SOMETHING NEW – STORY (USING WHATEVER ELEMENTS OF STRUCTURE ARE REQUIRED TO TRANSCRIBE ‘THE NEW’) – SOMETHING HAS BEEN SAID AND LISTENED TO AND REMEMBERED.

What I’ve tried to do with this post is add some clay to the kind of semi-solid tools I use when writing a story. Of course there has to be a plot of sorts, and characters, and a setting; and a writer has to understand how all these work, to the point their facilitation is instinctive.

However, if he then wants to produce work that isn’t ultimately more of the same, he needs to find ways to limit the rigidity of these principles. This rigidity is inevitable, if only through centuries of teachers showing ‘how to’. But a great story is one that seems to flow without a fixed structure, with characters that appear to have chosen to attend, rather than have been moulded by their creator.

Finally, of course no one wants to be thinking all this at the point of writing a story. That’s like being on a date, operating from a guide book.

The way it works, I think, is something like this:

1.         Write some stories without thinking about it.

2.         Realise you need to learn how to; learn how to.

3.         Write some more stories without thinking about why.

4.         Develop some skill and the beginnings of your own voice or voices.

5.         Go back to the start and think about the sort of stuff raised in this post.

6.         Write some more stories while thinking.

7.         Let the stories begin to tell you why you’re writing and what you want to achieve.

8.         Steer in the direction you want to go – e.g. commercial or artistic, or both.

9.         Keep learning from your chosen direction; keep improving.

10.       Do what you love to do.