THE ICE PICK

Creating Short Fiction, by Damon Knight. Rev. ed. Cincinnati, Writer’s Digest Books. ISBN 0-89879-166-9. $9.95.

Aimed primarily at beginners, including those who want to write a story but have no idea how to go about it, as well as those who are writing but feel the need for advice, this practical book is a treasure. His explanations of plotting and viewpoint, and how to choose the right point of view for your story, are especially excellent.

The author, Damon Knight, well-known to science fiction readers and writers, is a master of the art of the short story. If you’ve never heard of him, and you yearn to write science fiction stories, do look for and read some of his work.

The book is divided into six parts, plus an introduction. The introductions of some books are important. This is one of them. It’s only five pages long. Read it.

The first part of the book is "Developing Your Talent as a Writer" and contains several exercises in how to learn to see, hear, feel, and think like a writer. If you are still floundering and trying to get started, or if you’ve been writing, but are now stymied by writer’s block, this is the place to begin. It is pure inspiration.

For those still asking "Where do you get your ideas from? And how do you make a story out of them?," the second part, "Idea into Story," and the third, "Beginning a Story," deal with how to get ideas, and how to get those ideas out of your head and onto a piece of paper. They cover organizing your thoughts, and the basic form and structure of story-making, including situation, conflict, plot, characters, motivation, setting, and viewpoint.

One of Knight’s techniques is to visualize your story idea as a tent, with character, emotion, setting, and situation as the four corners, and theme as the center pole. You can begin with any one of these tent poles, but eventually you must include the others before you have a story.

Parts four and five, "Controlling a Story" and "Finishing a Story," discuss taking your raw story and making it a good one. Here Knight includes the elements of revision plus the narrative techniques of style, voice, tone and mood, etc. that enable you to create the magic and illusions that are the basis of all good fiction.

The final part, "Being a Writer," addresses work habits, the pleasures and frustrations all of us writers face, some excellent advice on what reference books we should own (and use), and what we should be reading ("Everything!"). Personally, I think this section should be earlier, and you might want to read it first, but as Knight himself says, "There are no non-linear books. . . . The topics dealt with here are all interrelated." Read it in any order you like.

Preceding the index are suggested readings, well worth checking out, and a list of the helpful exercises found throughout the book. The index is excellent for what it covers, but is not as inclusive as I would have liked. For example, an important point he makes about writing a character’s thoughts is under Tense on pages 139-140, and does not show up in the index at all. In general, you should be aware that Knight does give a bit of a short shrift to character and to dialog techniques, and I recommend you supplement him with other how-to-write books on these subjects.

Included in our Workshop’s list of Mandatory Reading, because it really can help you, this is a truly excellent book--especially for beginners--and I highly recommend it.

{Published in GPIC, the Oklahoma Science Fiction Writers Newsletter. Dec. 1998. Reprinted in SF & Fantasy Workshop Newsletter, Apr. 2000.}