Happy Blog Day Everyone!
Today, I'm going to delve into the process I use to write Brennan and Riz Tales (of all sizes, with some alterations) using last week's short story as a case study. If you have read it, I implore you to go and check it out!
Before that though, we'd better catch up with the pair in comic form!
The Comic Tales of Brennan and Riz
Another entry in my wordless strips and...it could be better, definitely messed up a few things in the art department (should have made the bars thicker). Still, the idea is sound, and who doesn't love the idea of Riz being put in time out within a pet carrier?
Brennan and Riz: A Case Study
So, where to start?
Like all good stories, it starts with an idea...one that I hastily scribbled in a note book, giving the idea a single sentence to sell itself. That sentence for the story last week? Five Lamps of Thornaby. I didn't have a lot to go on, but this story behind the story actually starts earlier than you'd think. You see, I actually wrote a draft up of this very idea a few years ago now. It would have been for a proposed "3rd Anthology" book of Brennan and Riz short stories. There is still plans for that book, but obviously you won't find this one in it.
I have the basis of the idea, I just need to expand it. In this case I wanted to turn it on its head and play with another idea that was churning in my mind: belief making things real. Now, I was already planning another story to use this with, a longer one (spoiler alert: still haven't written it) but this seemed like a good place to start a narrative thread. To make it work, I changed it from a real piece of folklore, to a fake one. I kept a real explanation of the Five Lamps of Thornaby that was a basis of the fake 'five death lights' of Thornaby.
When writing shorts, I'll either plot exhaustively or go at it with just the idea of where it's starting and see where I end up, going back to edit things if needs be. Seldom, I'll do bits of both, which is what I did with this story. I had a beginning, and I had a rough ending, the middle was a work in progress. Thus I went at it.
To simplify the plot, Brennan and Riz get called to deal with a couple of unusual deaths in Thornaby, revolving around the aforementioned 'Death Lights" except Brennan had never heard of them before, despite growing up in Thornaby. What followed is the duo trying to figure out how a made up piece of folklore can kill anyone before realising the truth. Knowing this, they then have to race to save the final victim and proving that seeing isn't always believing.
Sounds like a fun story right? Nope. I knew early on their was issues as the pacing was well off, and the threat practically non-existent. I pushed on, confident that I could fix things in editing but I hit another snag, u wasn't enjoying myself. The story had quickly changed into a comment on Internet culture, the idea of how a community could give life (see Slenderman for example) but the execution was flawed leading to a climax that dragged, as despite best efforts, nothing seemed in character. I finally finished it, but reading back through it some days later (always give time before you do a read through), it just wasn't very good and like other works I've talked about on this blog, it would have needed a complete redo rather than an edit. I made the (easy) decision to shelve it.
Let's flash forward to a few weeks ago when I was thinking of what short stories I could do for the blog. I had not long wrote down a new list of possible Brennan and Riz story ideas, for a proposed 4th anthology, I'd come up with a fair few ideas but found I'd put the five lamps on the list. After digging through some notes I'd made on the legend, I didn't think there would have been enough for a short story, not a decent sized one anyway. It was then that it clicked that it would be a perfect size for the blog (it didn't turn out that way, but that's the beauty of hindsight!). Using the research I crafted a small narrative, whenever I look at folklore, I have to decide the angle I take on it. Sometimes this is easy, others, not so much. With this one, it fell into the former category. As far as plot was concerned, I didn't plan further than the reason they were looking into things, deciding to 'pants' it. Evidence of this can be seen in the ending, which went darker than I would have liked, but it did fit the tone the story ended up with.
It's funny to look back and contrast the two versions, both born from the same facts but veered off in two complete different directions. Could I have fixed the other one? Maybe, would it have been worth it? No. I think I'm happy enough to allow the Lights on the Green appear as representation of one of Thornabys greatest legends.
Well, that's that. Not exactly the deep dive into my creation process but a greater look at how my weird brain works all the same.
There's another short deviations next week, and I can confirm that Isabelle and Robyn are returning for a walk down memory lane...
Till then,
Keep on writing!
Peter James Martin
Quick Links
The Strange Tales of Brennan and Riz Volume 1
The Strange Tales of Brennan and Riz Book 1: A Boy and A Rat
The Strange Tales of Brennan and Riz Volume 2
Malarkey's Imaginomnibus Volume 1
Malarkey's Imaginomnibus Fade to Noir
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