Ben Fogelberg

Asilomar Sunset

2008-07-25T21:21:00.003-06:00

Asilomar Sunset, originally uploaded by bfogel.

Heading out to NoCal in a week to run a half marathon in San Francisco with M, then hang out with the fam in Pacific Grove. Bringing the laptop and hope to get some writing done, but with views like this, I may just spend the time looking at the ocean.

God's Country synopsis

2008-07-18T13:44:00.003-06:00

Here's a brief synopsis of my novel. Actually, it's more of a back-cover blurb, if I should ever have the great good fortune to find a publisher. I've been calling it "historical fiction" because the story is based on fact with fictional characters, but I like to think of it as a historical thriller with a heavy dose of tasteful romance.

Winter 1811. The worst earthquake in North America’s recorded history hits a frontier settlement on the Mississippi River. Some fear the apocalypse. Jacob Pelegrin thinks it’s personal. Burdened by sorrow and the belief that he is responsible for his parents’ deaths, the young man seeks redemption in the West—God’s Country.

Jacob’s journey begins upriver in St. Louis—a village overrun by adventurers, fur traders, fortune seekers, and a more than a dozen Indian tribes. Here he meets the exotic Maria DeSilva, two years his elder. When Maria is captured by Comanche warriors, Jacob joins a brigade of rescuers and is unwittingly caught up in a personal vendetta—and a wild treasure hunt—with the potential to change the course of American history.

Comanche Empire

2008-05-23T19:50:00.003-06:00

“You want to read a real history book, read Howard Zinn’s A People's History of the United States. That book will f---in' knock you on you’re a--.”

Now, I don’t really agree with the sentiment, but the famous line from the movie Good Will Hunting stuck with me nonetheless. And it occurred to me yesterday while reading a better—but equally controversial—history book, The Comanche Empire, by Pekka Hamalainen. This one did knock me on my a--, and how.

I first encountered Hamalainen’s work while writing interpretive text for an exhibition exploring the history of American Indians in Colorado . The co-curators of that exhibit directed me to one of the UC-Santa Barbara prof’s earlier articles called “The Western Comanche Trade Center: Rethinking the Plains Indian Trade System.” Notwithstanding the blasé title, the article ripped apart my understanding of the colonial relationship between Europeans and American Indians. Which is a boring way of saying that everything I thought I knew about power on the Great Plains in the 1700s and early 1800s was wrong.

Instead of being victims of European colonial ambitions, Hamalainen argues, the Comanches established their own empire in the very heart of North America. “It is a story,” he writes in the introduction, “in which Indians expand, dictate, and prosper, and European colonists resist, retreat, and struggle to survive.”

Hamalainen’s concept of “reversed colonialism” provided the conceptual foundation for my novel, God’s Country. Now, don’t get me wrong: I’m not writing self-conscious post-frontier cultural commentary. I hate that crap. My book is an out-and-out adventure with a love story to boot. But I am trying to write a book that retains the core elements of good westerns but uses those elements in unexpected ways.

Synopsis to follow.

If only I had known...

2008-04-23T19:27:00.003-06:00

I guess I've been wasting my time. Candy Moulton has compiled all the research I need in one convenient book called Everyday Life Among the American Indians: 1800 to 1900 (Writer's Guide to Everyday Life Series). Here's the publisher's blurb:

"The Everyday Life series helps writers, students and researchers save valuable time and bring richness and historical accuracy to their work. Each guide describes the food, clothes, customs, slang, occupations, religions, politics and other historical details that are so often difficult to find."

Gee, Wally, that's real neat! Instead of going to dozens of primary and secondary sources to find out how one particular clan of the Great Osage tribe lived at a particular time and in a particular place, I can just go to Moulton's table of contents, find the chapter on food, clothing, and shelter, and I'm good to go! Why bother with fictive kinship ties among Comanche bands and non-native traders in 1811 when I can just look up "Trade" (9 pages to sum up 500 tribes) in the "Government and War" section. Yee-hah!

I thought we were past this kind of stereotypical generalization of American Indian peoples. Guess not. Can you imagine a book called Everyday Life Among the Whites, 1800 to 1900?

I'm confident that readers can tell difference between the veneer of authenticity and actual authenticity. If I'm wrong, I'm wasting a whole lot of time.

Blogger's Note: My wife says this post is elitist and just plain "rude." What did Ms. Moulton ever do to me? Well, I suppose my better half has a point. As usual.

I'm sorry. Mea culpa. Wait, Latin phrases are also elitist. Okay, I guess my point is this: Moulton's book tries to do writers a service. However, because she is limited to a single book, she cannot even scratch the surface of the complexity and richness of American Indian cultures. My critique probably stems from my own insecurities about my own inability to truly represent that complexity and richness in fictional form.

At least someone is making sense

2008-04-06T14:11:00.003-06:00

Rather than write another uninspired post full of self-indulgent musings, I'm just going to provide a link to something useful for writers. A shout-out to my good friend Mo-La for bringing it to my attention.

Childhood's End

2008-03-26T11:53:00.003-06:00

The passing of Arthur C. Clarke caused much grief in the Fogelberg family. I credit the author for feeding my teenage appetite for books. My dad has many bookshelves filled with nothing but sci-fi paperbacks from the 50s and 60s. I grew up on Clarke and Asimov, and I think both authors encouraged my habit of devouring a couple books a week. In a sense, they turned me into a diehard booklover, and by extension, a writer. Sci-fi writers take a lot of flack, but there's good stuff out there. And anything that encourages young folks to make reading a habit is good.

When I first learned about Clarke's death, I told a friend that I had read "about 50" of his books. I just did a quick count using an incomplete bibliography and it's actually more like 17. Childhood's End is still my favorite.

It's all about story

2008-03-09T19:14:00.003-06:00

In the last two days, three people have mentioned to me that they a) don't like history because it's boring, and b) love to read history when it's done by telling good stories. Every time I hear this, I want to punch the people who designed history curriculum for junior high and high schools. To me, history is nothing BUT stories. How can history be boring? It's the sum total of human existence.

My wife, bless her history-hating soul, wants to see the The Other Boleyn Girl. Not because she's fascinated by Henry VIII, but because she loves stories of love and betrayal involving powerful and privileged people. In other words, top-down history like they used to teach before the advent of the New Social History. Now, there's nothing wrong with history from the bottom up, but it's often presented anonymously, without focusing on individuals. Census records and statistics rule. Poor people were too busy suffering to keep good diaries, it seems.

Hogwash. Historians just need to dig deeper (though I must admit, some are). And if we can't find the sources to write full biographies, let's just make them up. Historical fiction can fill in the gaps. What I'd like to see is the equivalent of David McCullough's John Adams about an eighteenth-century half Comanche, half Hispanic girl who confronts the mixed race turmoil of the early fur trade era. Now, that would be a great story.

Speaking of which, I've just finished chapter four.

The Ideal Writing Venue

2008-02-27T21:25:00.004-07:00

I don't read much Stephen King, but I did find his book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft to be fairly interesting and useful. It's been a couple years since I read it, and the one thing that has stuck with me is his realization that idealized writing environments do not facilitate writing. If I remember correctly, he claims that he can only write well when he's in a decidedly unromantic place, such as a tight nook next to the laundry room or some such place. It's noisy, full of distractions, and uncomfortable.

He's right, of course. My ideal writing venue would probably be a log cabin in the mountains with big windows and a view of a lake bordered by snowy peaks. Or perhaps a room in a B&B overlooking the ocean near Monterey, California. The only problem is that if I had access to such a place, or places, I'd spend my time hiking or sitting on the beach.

In the real world, I write whenever I get a chance. That means during my son's basketball practice, during lunch in a museum overrun by fourth-graders, and on the bus.

And like good fiction, the reason these places work is because they create tension. There are multiple distractions, time limits, noise and foul smells. And all that forces me to concentrate, to focus, and to realize that writing is important enough to squeeze into a busy, chaotic, and full life. But not important enough to impinge on it.

Novel update: Well into chapter 4. I'm really enjoying the process of developing characters in these first chapters, especially the female ones which are turning out to more decisive and strong than the male characters.

To hell with revision

2008-02-15T13:09:00.003-07:00

All two of you who read this blog on a regular basis will note that the progress meter has been stuck at 9,500 words for some time now. However, that doesn't mean I haven't been working. I've been revising. Ah yes, revision. A friend has told me to resist the temptation to tweak the text at risk of impeding the story's inertia. And he's absolutely correct. However, I went back through my first three chapters to fix fundamental timeline inconsistencies and not to worry over style, tone, or to proofread.

Okay, I just lied a little bit right there. If there's a 12-step program for habitual revisionists (or is it "revisers?"), someone tell me where to sign up. I made the mistake of printing the entire mss out and did a, gasp, line edit. And while I did fix my timeline problems, I also fixed words here and there, rewrote sentences, played with some dialogue, and, you get my meaning.

But I'm fully aware of the dangers. Too much of this and I'll doom myself the 13 circle of hell, reserved for people who tell all their friends "I always thought I had a book in me" but never actually wrote it. To get there you have to travel on a road paved with outdated volumes of the Writer's Market. And the bookstores in this particular level of everlasting perdition will only carry books by authors who are less talented than you, but had better work ethics.

I better end with that. Blogging, I've discovered, is almost as bad as revising.

The Calculus of Coffee

2008-01-30T08:01:00.000-07:00

Coffee shops are overrated as creative zones for wanna-be authors, but I've discovered that they're ideal venues for more practical activities. I used to write in a cozy home office outfitted with cable internet and a comfortable bed for creative rejuvenation. But then we had kid number two (the product of too much rejuvenation, I suppose). He didn't annex my space until several dozen well-meaning relatives bought him every Thomas & Friends train accessory known to man. Summarily railroaded out of my office, I set up shop in the garage. A good concept, but unworkable during the winter when its ambient temperature dips below the level necessary for basic sentence construction.

That's when I hawked a dozen or so of those wooden trains for enough green to buy 67 espresso drinks. Thirty-eight mochas and one disgusting skinny latte later, I've written something like 9,180 words (241.58 words per mocha). By my calculations, it will take 621 mochas to complete a 150,000 epic novel (and it will be epic, nay, a tour de force). At $4 per drink, that's a $2,484 investment with a lot of downside risk.

Now, I'm no eavesdropper, but I can't help but overhear the conversations of other coffee shop customers. And they're not writers. Here's a review of the conversations I've, ahem, overheard, in just the last week:
1) Landlord discussing rental contract with tenant
2) Real estate agent discussing foreclosure rate with banker
3) Different landlord discussing rental contract with tenants
4) Two elderly women making a list of people to pray for
5) Job applicant being interviewed on his cell phone
6) Boyfriend breaking up with girlfriend

A quick summation reveals a startling truth. Measured in real dollars and/or happiness, five of the six conversations have the potential to out-perform my investment. Maybe six, if the boyfriend made a good decision.

The P-word rears its ugly head. Again.

2008-01-16T17:45:00.000-07:00

I don't read romance novels (no great revelation there), but a recent NY Times article on romance novelist Cassie Edwards caught my eye today. Allegedly, she pulled a little cut-and-paste routine. As in, she may have plagiarized. But that's not what grabbed my attention.

This is what did it for me: According to the Times, Signet, her publisher, maintained that “copyright fair-use doctrine permits reasonable borrowing and paraphrasing of another author’s words, especially for the purpose of creating something new and original.”

I promise you, if a historian, or a historian's publisher, said that, they would be hanged by the neck from the nearest ivory tower. In the museum field, "fair use" has another meaning. A source may be used for purely educational purposes, in an exhibit, for example, BUT the author must be given appropriate credit. Museums almost always go a step further and get permission for re-use. Usually, they pay a use fee for the privilege.

So, what about fiction? I think authors in ANY genre, but especially historical fiction authors, should be held to the same standards that historians adhere to. I use historical sources all the time; I depend on them. But, I use them for informational purposes only. They inform my presentation of setting and character. And most historical fiction authors include end matter telling readers where to find more information on their particular historical period. These lists usually include sources that the author used to gain enough background to create a fictional story within a real time and place.

The Accuracy Rule

2008-01-09T13:23:00.000-07:00

As an editor who works for a state historical society, I have a pretty firm grasp of what constitutes good historical writing. Like all types of writing, the recipe for success depends on connecting with your audience. Therefore, museum exhibit text will be much different from narrative prose for history magazines. And the narrative style may not be appropriate for scholarly journals. Each venue has its own audience. And each audience will have its own expectations.

The same rule of expectations can be applied to the various sub-genres in historical fiction. Readers of literary historical fiction will have different expectations than historical romance readers. However, all historical fiction must adhere to at least one rule: accuracy.

When I read Patrick O'Brien's Aubrey/Maturin novels, I expect that the era of history, in this case the Napoleonic Wars at sea, will be accurately depicted. And the story will come to life through strict adherence to the details of life in the Royal Navy at that time. O'Brien took the accuracy rule to the purest extreme: most of his events (battles, certain voyages) actually took place. And his portrayals of character actions and motivations are based on meticulous research using diaries, letters, naval records and the like. When he deviates from this rule, he provides a note to the reader. However, his main characters are entirely made up.

But what about novels that depict actual historical figures?

Consider Conn Iggulden's Julius Caesar trilogy. These books depict some of the most well-known historical figures and events in world history. Again, the research is good and the resulting portrayal is pretty accurate. The lure of this type of writing lies in the author's ability to provide a behind-the-scenes look at famous people and their activities.

So how far can authors deviate from the accuracy rule? As far as they want, as long as they consider their sub-genre and audience expectations. And here's where we get into the territory agents and publishers know best: the market.

Historical romance and historical fantasy writers can use history as little more than a setting, and leave it at that (a Victorian love affair or a Celtic legend, for example). As long as the book is marketed correctly, the audience will be satisfied because their expectations will have been met. They aren't "in it" for a history lesson. History merely provides a backdrop.

But if historical events play a role in the plot, the audience will expect accuracy. They'll expect to be drawn into another time and place; a time and place that actually existed. The best historical fiction writers use real history to suspend disbelief. Once they've accomplished that feat, they can dramatize actual or fictional events with abandon, secure in the knowledge that the reader is happy to come along for the ride.

I'll post the synopsis of my novel in a future entry, along with personal reflections on how I'm dealing with historical accuracy and other issues particular to historical fiction.

Progress report: 7,000 words

Vacation and Clarification

2008-01-03T12:31:00.000-07:00

Spent the last five days recharging the creative batteries in Pacific Grove on Monterey Bay with my family. Did no writing whatsoever, but I did find time to do a little photography (see photo) and a bit of planning for chapter 3. I've got the main story outlined, so by "planning" I mean the small details. And this brings up a point I've been wanting to write about for a while.

I've heard other writers talk about being surprised by their own story. Sometimes they'll say that they are just going wherever their characters lead them. This phenomenon has always amazed me because it makes novel writing sound like jazz improvisation. And that's fine, I suppose, if you have the ability and courage to just sort of riff along with your narrative bliss without undermining the larger story.

I can't do that. I need structure, an overall plot framework on which I can "hang" the story. And each chapter has its own framework that (usually) contains its own predetermined plot elements. That's why the outline is so important. The main level of my outline blatantly references structural elements such as rising action, complication, etc... Chapter abstracts fit under these headings, and include notes on the finer points, such as motivation and tension.

The good thing about working with this much structure is that I rarely suffer from writer's block. I think of the book in terms of discreet sections, each of which is almost a story unto itself. It's hard to get overwhelmed by the immensity of the project when you are focused on a 2,000-word subsection. It's like that old adage, How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

However, the obvious drawback to so much structure is that I might stifle the impulse to go somewhere unexpected or to expand on a promising, but unplanned, idea. So, I reserve the right to modify the outline, but not the basic story. I hope it works.

Clarification: I got a comment on my last blog entry saying that Word is perfectly capable of handling large files, and I agree. What it does not do, is give you a good way to visualize the structure. That's what I meant by "unwieldy."

Dumping MS Word

2007-12-28T12:01:00.000-07:00

I realize that complaining about Microsoft Word is not the most original blog subject, but I'm going to do it anyway. I've used Word forever and all of its keyboard shortcuts have become second-nature. It's great for short documents: letters, essays, brief articles and the like. But I've learned through painful experimentation that it's totally unsatisfactory for novel writing. I tried putting the entire draft in a single document, but it was already becoming unwieldy at 4,000 words. And, of course, I rely on tons of other research materials, including notes I've taken from primary and secondary sources, plus maps and photos that I save as PDFs or jpegs. I tried organizing everything into folders, but again, it's too cumbersome.

What's a writer to do? Especially a historical fiction writer who depends on research? The answer is in the question. Research. And research I did until I found Scrivener Gold, a FREE program that makes composition easier and facilitates the organization and use of all my other materials.

I've been using Scrivener Gold for a month now and have no complaints. The free version is a beta with full functionality. If the program continues to serve me well, I'll plunk down the $40 bucks for the somewhat slicker final product. And the best thing of all: it's Mac-only.

Novel update: 6,000 words (first draft for 2 chapters)

tv or not tv

2007-12-13T13:52:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Steve and I were interviewed for "am Sunday," a local morning show on channel 2 in Denver. I had the usual jitters, but the show went well. I think Steve talked more than I did (he always does), but we had a good time. I got on my soapbox for a minute or so, talking about the importance of telling good stories in order to convey the significance of historical places. The program airs Sunday, December 16, at 6 am.

Novel update: 4,000 words so far, which doesn't seem like much, but I'm doing a lot of front-end research that should speed things up as I progress. I'm a firm believer in doing your homework for historical fiction. But not too much. Some novelists let their stories get bogged down in detail. Those details should add to the narrative, and wherever possible, should be kept to a minimum.

Book signing at Roxborough

2007-12-04T20:08:00.000-07:00

Roxborough State Park is hosting an authors' event on Saturday, December 8, 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. I'll be there, along with several other authors, including Dr. G.K. Guennel, Andy Marquez, Vince Mathews, Maryann Gaug, and Jan Murphy. I saw Andy Marquez's photos at the Taste of Colorado and was impressed. Looking forward to sharing some photos of my own, as well as a couple stories from Walking Into Colorado's Past. My co-author won't be able to attend, but I'll try to cover for him as best I can.

Disadvantages of being prepared

2007-12-01T09:21:00.000-07:00

After years of jotting down scene ideas, plot notes, bits of dialogue, and character sketches on bookmarks or other scraps of paper, I decided to get a little more organized. I grabbed an unused spiral notebook and turned it into a catch-all for everything related to the novel. Stuffed in my backpack, it's with me most of the time. Now, when I get an idea, I scribble it in the notebook and it's there when I sit down to write.

I realize this isn't a terribly original idea. Nor is it always beneficial. But last night the notebook almost got me lost.

Seven p.m. I'm on the bus to Longmont, iPod blaring the Golden Palominos. Nicole Blackman breathes the vocals to "You Are Never Ready" from the Dead Inside album. It sounds like deranged pillow-talk. I wipe condensation off the window and watch on-coming headlights red-shift and disappear. The cars are close, a split second lapse of attention from a head-on collision with the bus.

Something about the music, the cars, and the darkness makes me pull out the notebook. I scribble furiously, turning an image into dialogue, dialogue into a scene. I can barely see the paper in the weak circle of illumination provided by the tiny overhead light and my hand shakes from the unpredictable bounce of the bus's suspension over the deteriorating surface of US-287.

I'm lost in my writing until the driver breaks hard, jolting me from my reverie. I wipe the fog off the window again and don't recognize the street outside. End of the line. I've missed my stop.

I shove everything into my backpack and hurry to the front of the bus. A brief conversation with the driver reveals my location: 20 blocks from my stop. I've got a long, cold walk ahead of me. And a half chapter of writing I pray I can decipher in the daylight.

Miles to go

2007-11-23T21:59:00.000-07:00

Going through some of my photography, I found this image of the Ute Trail. Taken well above timberline, it evokes for me a sense of beginning. But it's an ancient path. Colorado's longest continuous inhabitants, the Ute Indians, used it to travel between winter and summer hunting grounds. The Arapaho, Cheyenne, and other tribes also ventured here. They still do.

Writing the book I want to read

2007-11-21T19:24:00.000-07:00

A few months ago, I went to the Tattered Cover without a specific book or author in mind. I wanted something smart, but not too literary. Something plot driven, but with solid character development too. Ideally, an epic historical novel that would keep me diverted and enthralled during my insanely long commute on the Longmont express bus to Denver for a couple weeks or more. Something like Shogun, The Pillars of the Earth, or The Winds of War. But not wanting to part with $35 for Ken Follet's best-selling 1,000-page sequel to Pillars, I went away empty handed.

Given more time, I'm sure I could have found something worthwhile. Or I could have taken the easy way out and picked up volume 15 of Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin novels. The 21-volume series has been called the "best historical fiction ever written," and I agree. But I want to make the remaining seven of those gems last. It'll be a sad day when I finish the last one.

So, unable to fulfill my needs with other people's writing, I've decided to take matters into my own laptop. I'll just have to write that novel I've always wanted to read and can't seem to find.

I know what you're thinking. The ability to write nonfiction (even award-winning nonfiction*) may not translate to fiction. Understood. And coffee shop couches everywhere are littered with the over-caffeinated carcases of unpublished novelists. Fine. But I'm doing it anyway.

So far, I've written about 2,500 words, not including a synopsis and extended outline. Progress reports to follow.

*Note to readers: I will shamelessly make references to The Award as often as possible.

Norman Mailer and narrative history

2007-11-13T16:44:00.000-07:00

While reading Norman Mailer’s obituary in the New York Times, I noticed a bold assertion. Mailer, so says the Times, “transformed American journalism by introducing to nonfiction writing some of the techniques of the novelist.” Hmmm. Thought Truman Capote did that. So says my sidekick/co-author. But I guess it doesn’t matter who did it first. The important thing is that someone provided journalists with an example of how to present factual information in a narrative format.

People remember stories, not facts. They retell the stories to their friends and families. History, as Mark Twain said, might be a set of “lies agreed upon.” But if presented in a compelling fashion, past events—true or not—become shared experience. By sharing the stories, we give them life.

Some of my favorite historians are actually journalists or novelists who trespass into the history field. Hampton Sides and Wallace Stegner come to mind. Call them popularizers if you want. I call them storytellers.

Stranger things have happened

2007-10-27T12:08:00.000-06:00

Steve Grinstead and I were pleasantly surprised to win the Colorado Book Award for Walking Into Colorado's Past: 50 Front Range History Hikes. We were both overwhelmed, but managed to get up on stage without tripping and say a few words of thanks to our families, friends, our publisher, and of course, the good folks at Colorado Humanities. We've promoted the book as a different kind of guidebook; one that not only gets you to historic places in the wilderness, but one that tells you fascinating stories along the way. It's nice to see that other people agree! And besides, if the Colorado Rockies can make it to the World Series, a guidebook can win an award for best nonfiction. Stranger things have happened.