Post #190 October 28 2019

“Story Basics: Beginnings, Middles and Endings”

There’s an old saying about beginning at the beginning.  Often in my writing, I don’t do that.  I’ll begin right in the middle of the action.  But don’t forget the beginning.  If you drop a reader in the midst of some critical, page-turning action, you will have to bring the reader up to speed at some point. 

The website storysci.com says this: the beginning sets up the story.  The middle carries the story as our hero tries to achieve something important to him or prevent something bad from happening.  The ending pits the hero against his main adversary in one final contest and the hero either vanquishes his foe or fails magnificently. 

Recently I began writing a new science fiction short story called “Second Sun.’  Here’s my beginning paragraph…

Not everyone was happy about having a second Sun.  That’s why the Guardians sent me to Bernini in the first place.  Kisan Malakel, engineering inspector 1^st class for the Concordance.  I had an official job to do and that was to make sure everything aboard station Bernini was up to spec…the gas pulses streaming off Saturn’s atmosphere were coming in on schedule…the deflector controls were receiving and diverting the pulses properly into Jupiter’s atmosphere…the King of Planets was bulking up on schedule so the thing could be ignited on time…that all aspects of the Second Sun project were proceeding according to calculations.  Oh, I had a job all right.  But my real job was to sabotage the whole works, sabotage the deflector system, and get away before station Bernini was likely destroyed by an incoming pulse.

In my beginning, the ‘hero’ is a man named Malakel.  He’s come to do a job.  He briefly describes that job, then tells you that this is not his real job, that it’s a cover.  His real job is to destroy the very thing he’s come to inspect.

Right away, the reader is (I hope) intrigued. It’s not what you’d expect.  Moreover, the beginning paragraph drops you right into the middle of a potential conflict, for there are surely people who don’t want Malakel to destroy their station and will work to prevent it.  The beginning sets up the premise, hints at the conflict and leaves you wondering how it will all work out…all in the very first paragraph.  Plus, it’s just different enough to pique your interest.

It should go without saying that beginnings are critical to capturing a reader.  Just as in public speaking or teaching, both of which I do a lot of, the first few minutes are vital to setting the stage, establishing rapport with the audience and giving them some reason to keep listening.  You should do the same thing for your readers.

In the military, there’s an old axiom about training and how to make it work: (1) tell ‘em what you’re going to tell ‘em; (2) then tell ‘em; (3) then tell ‘em what you told ‘em.  A lot of this applies to storytelling as well, although point (3) applies to the repetition so essential to learning, but not so much in storytelling.  Point (3) is really the climax and resolution of a story, where the hero meets and defeats his adversary.  Storysci.com calls this “the promise of the premise.”

Human beings as readers and listeners of stories expect a story to have certain characteristics.  We just wired that way and it goes back thousands of years.  You deviate from the formula at your peril. 

In the same way, understanding why the scaffolding is constructed this way will give you a much stronger frame to hang your story on.  It’ll keep you on course to produce the best story you can and allow you to focus on the other elements of a good story, the next of which is Point #2 of Story Basics: Show, Don’t Tell.

We’ll look at this one in the next post to The Word Shed, which comes on November 4, 2019.

See you then.

Phil B.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Post #189 October 21 2019

“Story Basics We Often Forget”

With this post, I want to go back and remind ourselves of what we’re doing as writers.  The craft of storytelling is as old as man but just because it’s old doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be reminded of some essentials from time to time.  We don’t often think much about our skeletal frames unless something’s hurting, but your skeleton is what holds you up and the same is true for storytelling basics.  They hold up a story…or not, depending on how well you take care of them.

No matter if you are a writer, filmmaker, game master, or stand-up comedian, here are the top 10 most important basic points of storytelling you need to bring your story to life.

I’m indebted to the website Storysci.com for the following list:

1. Include a beginning, middle and end.

This occurs at every level. Just as a trilogy has three parts, so does an individual story have a beginning, middle and end. The same goes each and every scene within that story. How can you tell the difference between a beginning, middle and end? A beginning sets up the story. It’s a blueprint or road map to the rest of the plot. In a good story it won’t be obvious. The middle develops the story from the point of setup to the climax. It plays out the “promise of the premise” and shows how the new status quo introduced at the end of act one affects the world of the story. This takes us to the end. An ending centers around the obligatory confrontation between protagonist and antagonist. It concludes by answering all the questions raised in the story, even if the answers are new questions (aka, cliffhangers).

2. Show, don’t tell.

Instead of telling the audience that something is happening, show them by devoting screen time (or page time) to the illustration of these events. Telling (aka “summary”) is not very interesting in comparison to the audience experiencing the same thing. You don’t need to state what is going on directly. The audience will figure it out for themselves, and in so doing will create a stronger bond with the story than if you simply told the audience that it happened.

3. One word: Conflict.

Conflict is the natural result of one character’s desire intersecting an obstacle. Conflict increases proportionally to the amount that each side pushes back. It drives the story forward and keeps the audience interested. Without it, nothing in the plot would be worth mentioning because story without conflict is not story, it’s summary. 

4. Make your protagonist proactive, not reactive.

The more proactive your protagonist is, the more invested in him/her your audience will be. They will want what (s)he wants. A protagonist is proactive when (s)he is the one to take charge and initiate events that advance the plot. The opposite of this is a reactive protagonist who responds to events forced on him/her by the plot. A reactive protagonist will not only make the audience feel like something is missing in your story, but they will fail to build a personal connection with the protagonist as well.

5. Have a central core to your story.

Your story ultimately needs to be about something, and that something is the central through-line (also called the “spine”) around which everything in your story is based, especially the theme. The central core brings unity and order to all the elements of your story. For example, the film Love, Actually has a central spine about love, from which it thematically branches off into different types of love. Or the novel Catch-22 whose central core explores the concept of the same name in various circumstances.

6. Know what your story is about.

It doesn’t matter if your story is based around a character, plot or theme. At some point you will need to know what your story is about—not just at its core, but at every level—in order to weave a story around it. For example, on the surface your story may be about a father-son road trip and the hilarity that ensues, but underneath that veneer it’s actually about father-son relationships and an estranged parent bonding with his troublesome child while also exploring other related thematic material, such as what it means to be male in today’s society.

7. It is better to be simple and clear than complicated and ambiguous.

Simplicity creates clear understanding in the minds of the audience. They won’t view it as overly simplistic if it smoothly and adequately conveys your story. A common mistake storytellers use is to try and tell too much without spending enough “screen time” on each segment. Set aside the big picture to work on the simple steps needed to get there. Want to see this point in action? Pick up a copy of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.

8. Say as much as possible with as little as possible.

Convey maximum information using minimal text (story) to do it. Implicit over explicit. This requires the use of subtext: whereas text is what is said, subtext is what is not said. Without subtext, your story will be dull and shallow. Some subtext occurs naturally but very often you have to work at it. For examples, a brother and sister talking about their lives at college but not talking about the recent death of their father colors the scene very differently than if they were just catching up like old friends. It also tells us their emotional state—that they aren’t ready to confront the truth about their father’s death.

9. Get in late, get out early.

Start as late as possible in your scene or story to provide both audience interest and optimal conflict, and then end the scene as soon the conflict has run its course. This doesn’t mean truncating valuable exposition or foregoing a beginning, but it does mean opening where the vital information starts. And once the scene or story has said all there is that needs to be said, get out! Don’t hang around and dawdle or you will be diluting your story’s final punch. For example, the audience doesn’t need to witness an entire 4-hour board meeting. They only need to see the handful of minutes that count. In short: focus on where the action is happening.

10. Characters, characters, characters.

Even if you have a plot-driven story, your characters are what make a story really shine. A bland or passive protagonist makes for a boring story. Interesting and unique characters are memorable, if not timeless, even when relegated to smaller roles. Go the extra mile to give each character distinction, depth, and history. Consider writing character bios for each member of your cast and see if it gives you further insight into how to portray them.

In the coming posts, I will deal with each of these basics in turn.  When we’re done, we should have yet again a better grounding in what makes a story go.

The next post, covering a story’s beginning, middle and end, comes on October 28, 2019.

See you then.

Phil B.

 

Post #188 October 14 2019

“Story Themes”

Every work of fiction has some kind of theme.  The author may not know what it is and it may be muddled or it may be crystal clear and well thought out.  This post considers what themes are, why they’re important and what they mean to a hard-working writer on a day to day basis.

Wikipedia says this about themes: The most common contemporary understanding of theme is an idea or point that is central to a story, which can often be summed in a single word (for example, love, death, betrayal). Typical examples of themes of this type are conflict between the individual and society; coming of age; humans in conflict with technology; nostalgia; and the dangers of unchecked ambition.^] A theme may be exemplified by the actions, utterances, or thoughts of a character in a novel. An example of this would be the thematic idea of loneliness in John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, wherein many of the characters seem to be lonely.

I write a lot of science fiction.  Beyond what Wikipedia says above, there are certain continuing themes that are common to many sf stories and more or less unique to the genre.  Again, from Wikipedia, examples are first contact, time travel, AI and robotics, space war, alternate histories, parallel universes and so on.  I have often written stories with these themes and ideas and I still do.

To me, a story theme is what the story is about.  It’s the point of the story.  It’s why the author is writing this story.  Most themes should be able to be stated simply: unchecked ambition can lead to ruin…there are limits to everything but sometimes they should be pushed (a recent story of mine had this one)…what might an aging parent do for a loved child if time travel were available.

What does all this mean to the working writer on a daily basis?  I have several thoughts on this.

1. The theme of your story is like the spinal column in your body.  It supports everything and helps invigorate and gives meaning to what you’re doing.  Sometimes, I write down my theme as clearly and simply as I can and post it at my desk while writing a story.  This reminds why I’m doing the story. 
2. Ask yourself this: what’s the point of the story?  Why am I writing this?  What am I trying to get across to readers?  Every story has a theme, sometimes implicit and unsuspected but lurking in the background nonetheless.  Writers should be explicit about their themes, at least to themselves, to avoid writing scenes or whole chapters at cross-purposes.  This only confuses readers.  Recently, I’ve been reading an sf novel by a very well known and respected sf author.  The individual scenes are pretty well done but there’s no obvious story line, no obvious narrative being carried forward.  Let’s not confuse narrative or story line with theme.  However, I have the impression that the scenes are written in and of themselves without any thought as to how they support the narrative line.
3. Ask yourself this: does any one change or grow or learn anything during this story?  If your characters can be seen to change or grow as a result of what happens, your readers will be able to empathize better with them.  Your characters will be memorable.  Part of what I am talking about is being able to draw realistic characters and carry a strong narrative line, but theme is what informs all of this.  Theme is the framing and the characters are the drywall and the plumbing and wiring, to use a familiar analogy.  If you were a plumber without schematics, you might wind up running your piping in all kinds of directions.  That happens to stories without a strong theme as well.
    
   In future posts, I want to go back to basics.  Let’s explore how good storytellers carry their stories forward in engaging and memorable ways.  The basics of storytelling really haven’t changed in 10,000 years, from the time of Og and Grog around the campfire.  In fact, it’s no secret that real stories began as oral traditions. 
    
   Look for more on these critical basics in upcoming posts.
    
   The next post to The Word Shed comes on October 21, 2019.
    
   See you then.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Post #187 October 7 2019

“Editing and Flossing Part II: We Do It Because We Should”

Every day, I floss my teeth, like all real Americans.  Twice a day.  I don’t particularly like it but I do it.  The dentist says I should.  That’s how think about editing too.

Wikipedia says this about editing: Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible and film media used to convey information. The editing process can involve correction, condensation, organization, and many other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate and complete work.

I’ve just finished Episode 11 of my Time Jumpers serial.  It’s 43 pages long.  Right after finishing the first draft, I do a thorough read-through.  Does it flow?  Does the story make sense?  Is it believable and consistent?  I take this read-through as a chance to correct awkward grammar, fix typos and misspellings (later I’ll run spellcheck) and generally find out if I have a decent story, with all the proper elements of a story…plot, characters, a problem for the characters, some complications, some kind of resolution in the end, etc. 

Let’s take what Wikipedia says and expand on correction, condensation and organization as major points in the editing process.

Correction

Everybody makes mistakes.  I know that’s hard to believe but it’s true.  Editing gives you the chance to find them and fix them before your readers do.  Nothing destroys the power of a story, the verisimilitude of a story, faster than an obvious factual error.  Typos and awkward grammar can be fixed easily enough.  But when you say Mars is a billion miles from Earth and it’s really only a hundred million miles away, plenty of readers will pounce on that and toss your book, assuming you haven’t taken the time to be a pro and find and fix obvious glitches.  It does not reflect well on your craftsmanship when your story reeks of mistakes.  We don’t build houses that way and we shouldn’t build stories that way either.

Condensation

To condense a story means a lot of things, mostly taking things out.  One of the practices that makes Time Jumpers possible as a serialized story of 20,000+-word episodes, uploaded to Smashwords every 4-5 weeks, is the fact that I freely copy and paste from other stories.  After the chop job, though, I have to smooth things out, condense down the paste job so it will fit my story size and smooth things out so the story flows, the plot makes sense, the story is adequately carried forward, the characters are consistent and believable, in other words, condensation and correction work together, like ham and eggs.  It’s a rare story that can’t stand some enlightened pruning.  For the last thirty years, I have spent much of my life as a professional technical writer.  This turns out to be good discipline for story-telling.  Tech writing is done mainly to instruct.  Story writing is done to tell a story.  But these two things are related.  Moreover, in tech writing, as in any good writing, use only the words needed and no more.  Be spare.  You don’t have to be Ernest Hemingway.  But try to tell the story with the minimum number of effective words.  I interpret condensation as a form of literary distillation, paring down my words to the most essential ones, pruning away all but the essence.  That’s what makes for effective writing, in any genre.

Organization

The editing process also involves organization.  In any story, things should happen and flow logically, for a reason.  Dick did this and then Jane did that.  For me, organization starts with a strong outline.  Outlines are the heart of my writing.  If I don’t have a good outline, I can’t tell a story.  But other authors are different.  Good editing involves understanding what makes a story tick.  Characters are motivated by certain things.  A problem hits them and their motivations drive them to react and deal with it a certain way, hopefully consistent with their nature.  The hard part is making this look natural and keeping the character’s responses both believable and consistent.  The really good storytellers have a way of using plot complications to cause a character to grow in their response, thereby revealing something we can all learn from.  Hey, maybe if that happened to me, I could do what he did.  It makes sense, it’s satisfying at some fundamental level.  Stories that do this are the memorable ones and organization (tightening the story up) is one key part of that. 

Obviously, there’s a lot more to editing than this but I like to keep my posts short and to the point…as we’ve just been discussing.   Corrected, condensed, organized…any writing will benefit from these.  Behind every successful writer is an effective editor and in this day of indie, self-publishing and e-books, those two are often the same person.

Next week’s post will come on October 14, 2019. 

See you then.

Phil B.

Post #186 September 30, 2019

“Book Titles: What’s in a Name?”

Every book has a title.  Some are good and some aren’t.  What makes an effective book title?  Let’s explore the art of giving a title to your book.

First, let’s ask a question.  What purpose does a book title serve?  I can think of several.

1.  Identifies the work.
2. Captures the story in a few words. 
3. Grabs the reader’s attention.  Brings the reader in.
4. Sells the book.
5. Genre compatibility

Let’s look at each of these in turn.

1. Identifies the work. This should go without saying.  You want to select a title that positively and uniquely identifies your book.  Name authors don’t have this problem as what is really being sold is the brand name of the author.  Your title should identify the book along several dimensions (see #5 below).  Is it science fiction?  Mystery?  Romance?
2. Captures the story in a few words, maybe even one.  One of my best-selling books (in Smashwords downloads) is called Johnny Winger and the Serengeti Factor.  Not a few words but it does identify the main character and a key location or element of the story.  One of my latest sf novels is entitled The Farpool.  Probably a better title.  Punchier and with a word that you don’t see or hear very often.  Which leads me to….
3. Grabbing the reader’s attention.  Here’s one title I like because it immediately grabbed my attention: Freakonomics.  It’s a juxtaposition of two words that aren’t normally put together.  It seems just wacky enough to make you want to look a little closer.  By the way, one-word titles are all the rage now:  Twilight, Endurance and so forth.  Be careful with this, though.  Your word choice should reflect the story in some way, and ideally, it should offer an unusual perspective or angle or alternative use of that word, maybe in a way you never thought of before…something to get the reader thinking: “Hmmm, maybe I should look at this more closely.”
4. Sells the book.  The whole purpose of a book title (and it should be amplified and work well with the cover too, by the way) is to sell the book.   Readers want to know what to expect when they see your title.  You probably wouldn’t name your science fiction masterpiece Galactic Love.  Love is a word associated with romance, not sf.  Frank Herbert named his best-known book Dune, which is a great title.  It neatly captures images of lots of sand, deserts, brings to mind the kind of cultures that develop and live in deserts, the importance of water, etc.  This one simple word carries quite a punch and performs multiple duties in identifying and selling the book.  It doesn’t hurt that it’s a great read as well. 
5. Genre Compatibility.  This idea is alluded to above, when I mentioned how you wouldn’t normally put “Love” in the title of a science fiction story.  Readers want to be reassured that what they’re potentially buying is what they expected.  Titles help provide that assurance.  One way to do this is to, as an example, go through the science fiction section of your local bookstore or your favorite web site and list common words in the titles.  That’ll give you some idea of what words to use in your titles. 
    
   As an example, here’s a list of Arthur C. Clarke titles from my bookshelf, right beside me:
   2001: A Space Odyssey
   The Songs of Distant Earth
   The Fountains of Paradise
   Rendezvous with Rama
   A Fall of Moondust
    
   What do you see in common with these titles?  References to space, earth, cosmic things.  And if you look at the covers of these books, you’ll see images of Earth and astronomical settings. 
    
   Think of Carl Sagan’s wonderful novel Contact.  It’s one word.  It implies extraterrestrials and aliens and a whole syndrome of thought that surrounds these subjects.  And it works with the cover too: some editions show huge radio telescopes and stars in the background.  There’s no doubt what you’re getting when you look at this book or buy it.
    
   Titling books, fiction or nonfiction, is both art and science.  It isn’t hard to generate titles.  Lots of writer web sites will do that.  The art comes in when you choose your title to meet the 5 conditions I’ve listed above. 
    
   One web site I consulted as research for this post even adds discoverability as a key concern.  The site talks in great detail about keyword search and search optimization as other factors to consider, in this age of digital content and ebooks.  But that’s a topic for another time. 
    
   The next post to The Word Shed comes on October 7, 2019.
    
   See you then.
    
   Phil B.
    
    

 

 

 

 

Post #185 September 23 2019

“Handling Rejections Part II”

You get a letter in the mail or an email: “Thanks for letting us review your story.  Unfortunately, we feel it is not quite right for us.  Good luck in the future.”  Or words to this effect.  Congratulations.  You’ve just been rejected.  It’s an occupational hazard for every writer who puts his or her work out for consideration.

Nowadays, much of my work is published online so I don’t have to deal with rejections, just the ever-shifting daily download numbers.  But I still write short stories and novelettes that I try to place with print publications.  And from them: lots and lots of rejections. In fact, I recently started shopping around an sf short story called ‘Upload Incompatibility.’  In one of the rejections, the editor said he liked my prose but the narrative didn’t hold him. 

This led me to make several changes, after which I re-submitted to another market.  And back came a standard rejection letter. 

How should a writer deal with this?

Emma Bowd, on the website writersandartists.co.uk has this to say about rejection letters:

(My editor) used to tell me that being a writer is like being a farmer – you work for many years on a product (without income) and then, when it’s time to go to market, you literally do not know if there is going to be a glut of your product or no demand at all.

She also wisely said that the book would “end up where it’s meant to be” – and painful as it was, I completely agree with this. It is so wonderful to be with a publisher that completely ‘gets’ my work and is so very supportive of me. 

So the message is, keep going and believe in your work. Always revisit your manuscript after a rejection letter and take what positive feedback you can from it and tweak accordingly. A manuscript is an evolving entity. And you are the only person in charge of its destiny.

All good advice, especially the part about learning from each rejection whatever you can and tweaking accordingly.

Many years ago, I submitted a story to the old OMNI magazine.  The science fiction editor sent me an interesting rejection.  He liked my writing and suggested that I had the makings of a decent novel but needed to change the focus from one of character relationships to the hard science at the core of the story.  I didn’t (and still don’t) fully agree with this assessment but he was honestly trying to put me in a position of future commercial success.  By the way, this basic story has become the nucleus of a new science fiction novel that will appear in 2020, entitled Monument.  Look for it.

Writers can’t take rejection letters personally…of course, that’s easier said than done, if you put any real effort into your work.  It can’t be personal.  The editor doesn’t know you.  They know only the work.  Some editors have informed me that my work or my story was a very good story, polished, engaging, well-written, just not quite what the publication was looking for at that time.  Editors always say study the publication first.  Read copies.  That way you’ll know what they’re looking for.  And that makes sense.

I’m working on a science fiction short story now entitled “The Battle of the Gauntlet.”  It’s not finished and naturally, it hasn’t been sent around yet; I’m collecting feedback from fellow writers and friends whose opinions I value.  I have made some changes based on this feedback, so hopefully the story will be better for it.  Soon, I’ll send this story out and see what happens.

I’ll leave you with some Do’s and Don’ts about handling rejection.  This is from author J.T. Ellison and her website jtellison.com:

Do – Give yourself permission to be upset when a rejection comes. If a piece of chocolate or an ice cream cone will make you feel better, then have it. Enjoy a drink with friends. Be social.

Don’t – Comfort yourself with destructive behaviors, like going out on the town and ending up blowing in a tube. It’s just a rejection letter, not the end of the world.

Do – Go for a walk.

Don’t – Burn your manuscript, shred your notes, and delete all the files on your computer. Seriously.

Do – Take a day off from writing and read a book.

Don’t – Call all your friends and tell them you’ve decided not to be a writer anymore.

Do – Step away from the computer for a few hours, allow yourself a break from the cycle.

Don’t – Call the originator of your rejection to ask why they didn’t like your project. Really, that’s just not a good idea.

The next post to The Word Shed comes on September 30, 2019. 

See you then.

Phil B.

 

 

 

 

Post #184 September 16 2019

“The Eureka Gambit”

As a writer who feels more comfortable in longer fictional forms, I often have to plan new projects ahead by several years.  In this blog, I’ve posted recently about my upcoming series Quantum Troopers Return (first episode available in February 2020) and an upcoming science fiction novel called Monument.  But I’ve actually been planning projects further out than that.

One on my next projects, likely not available until late 2020 or more likely in 2021, is called The Eureka Gambit.  It’s an alternate history novel, a sort of what-if? story.

Below is an excerpt from my notes on Chapter 1.  I’ve actually plotted and outlined the entire story, but there is still a lot of background and research work to do.  Note the date in the chapter intro.

Chapter 1

Dasht-i-Kavir Desert, Iran

Lat. 35 North, Long 53 East

November 26, 1943

0235 hours

It is past midnight in the Iranian desert, some 150 km from Tehran.  A convoy of trucks waits patiently alongside a cleared landing strip in the desert hardpan.  There is a sound of distant aircraft.  Suddenly, landing lights come on, outlining the crude runway.  Then, one after another, three Junkers Ju-52 small transports bearing no markings make bumpy landings on the strip, a location their maps call Alpen-Eins.  The landing lights go out immediately and the scene is then illuminated by lights from the trucks.

 

Standartenfuhrer Otto (‘Scarface’) Skorzeny emerges from one of the planes and witnesses a hurried transfer of men, equipment, guns and munitions from the planes to the trucks.  There are nearly a hundred men, three detachments of Operation Long Jump, all handpicked from SS Battalion Friedenthal for this special mission.  Their target: Josef Stalin, Franklin Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill, all meeting in two days in Tehran at the Soviet legation.  The gathering is code-named Eureka.

Skorzeny knew that an advance party of six German radio operators  had already dropped by parachute near Qum, 60 km (37 mi) from Tehran. An existing Abwehr network had been set up in a villa in Tehran. From this location, the German observers had radioed numerous intelligence reports back to Berlin. A second group of operatives, led by Skorzeny, had now been dropped into Iran for the actual kidnap attempt in late November.

In Tehran, the Abwehr field station had readied a villa and a warehouse for their stay. The first reconnaissance group had traveled by camel, and were loaded with weapons. They would stay at the villa. The second group would be led by Skorzeny himself and would be housed in the warehouse.

Skorzeny supervises the transfer and loading of gear, discusses conditions with White, Gold and Black detachment commanders (Obersturmfuhrers) Hans Eisler, Jurgen Holtz and Fritz Born, and reviews the latest intel on Soviet, British and American security force deployments in and around Tehran.  Consulting crude maps by flashlight, they discuss the best route into Tehran to their safe house, their weapons and ammunition supplies, the forecast weather and the best exfiltration route, for they fully expect to be back at Alpen Eins with their special ‘cargo’ in less than three days.

 

There is a sudden commotion on a nearby road.  Detachment troops have spotted an old bus wheezing along the road in the middle of the night.  It’s a routine passenger bus, en route overnight to the nearby town of Samnan.  At Skorzeny’s orders, the German commandos flag down the bus, order all passengers off for interrogation, and then commandeer the bus for their own use.  The passengers are marched off into the desert (there are some sixteen of them, men, women and two children).  We hear staccato burps of machine guns in the distance.  The commando detail escorting the passengers returns to the convoy.  The passengers don’t come back.  They have all been executed and left in the desert.

 

Finally, the transfer is done.  The trucks form up into a crude convoy with the bus in the middle.  Several dozen troops board the bus.  It will be taken to the safe house in Tehran that is their destination.  The convoy gets underway, even as the Ju-52 transports are revving engines and preparing to take off again into a black, moonless night sky.

 

The last of the planes is airborne and the landing lights are doused.  But a small crew stays behind to gather up all evidence of their work.  The runway lights and markers will be used again in three days, for if all goes well, the convoy will return with their hostages in tow and the planes will be used to exfiltrate them to distant places, ultimately to a castle in the Austrian Alps, guests of the Third Reich. 

 

The convoy moves quickly through the desert and approaches Tehran before sunup. The trucks scatter and disperse to take different routes into the city, though they will all wind up at the same place.  Their destination: an abandoned warehouse on Mehrabad Street, down the street from the Greek Orthodox Church of the Ascension. The trucks all contain various innocuous-looking gear and even farm produce to cover their real cargo. 

 

One truck encounters a Soviet military checkpoint as they enter the city.  There is high tension as the Soviet troops (part of a 3000-man contingent of Red Army, NKVD, Interior Ministry and Border Patrol troops) examine the truck, its crew and cargo, and their (forged) papers.  But the Germans manage to elude or pass through the checkpoint, thanks to Iranian sympathizers who ride with them.  One Iranian is even a local police chief and he vouches for the truck and its equipment as needed to support crowd control for the upcoming conference.

 

After some discussions and consultation with headquarters, the Soviets let the truck pass. 

 

The truck eventually reaches Mehrabad Street, which is mostly deserted at this early hour.  Skorzeny gets out, hears the local call to worship from loudspeakers of a nearby mosque and brusquely orders the truck to be quickly off-loaded and hidden.  Then, over the next hour, the other trucks and men of the convoy and appear at the warehouse and do the same.  The other detachment commanders have safely made it into the city without major incident.  Skorzeny knows the easiest part of Operation Long Jump has been successfully completed. 

 

As the men check off and stow their gear and bed down to lie still for the daylight hours, Skorzeny and his commanders go over the details of the next phase carefully, reviewing every little detail: the route to the Soviet Embassy compound, likely security deployments, the floor plan of the critical buildings, the timing, the weather, traffic conditions in that part of Tehran, their supplies and route out of the city back to Alpen Eins.

 

Finally, exhausted but unable to relax, Skorzeny walks outside with Fritz Born and they  reminisce about the operation they just finished several months before, rescuing Benito Mussolini from Italian partisans.  Skorzeny opines that Mussolini was a breeze. 

They both know that Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt will be much harder targets.  The sun comes up over the ornate gold dome of the Greek church, they see churchgoers beginning to appear and both hear the wailing of the muezzin admonishing Muslims to come to a nearby mosque.

 

“Perhaps, we too should be praying,” Skorzeny mutters, dousing his Sulima-brand (Turkish) cigarette.  They both laugh at the idea and duck back inside. 

 

 

So that’s the excerpt and this is a good example of how I outline a novel chapter.  From what you have just read, I should be able to write a 15-20 page chapter, with characters and appropriate background to kick this story off.  I expect to begin writing this one next fall, at the latest.

Look for it in early 2021.

The next post comes on September 23.  See you then.

Phi. B.