Story Resuscitation

(Originally published in the Spring/Summer 2003 issue of WordWorks)

There are times when we set aside writing projects—we move residences, start new day jobs, have babies—only to find when we return to our neglected half-written corpus of words that it has expired, died, given up the ghost, bought the farm, kicked the bucket, pushed up the daisies.  And there are times when the story dies on the page right in front of our bare faces, despite weeks, months, even years, of loving toil. The death of beloved story or novel project is undeniably painful, but it is not, however, without hope.  As a fiction writer and a paramedic, I am well acquainted with both stories in full arrest and humans in full arrest. From experience, I can say that resuscitation, if you’re prepared for it, if you’re willing to be utterly engaged in the attempt, and if you’re ready to roll up your sleeves and do the grunt work, can be exhilarating.  And successful!

This summer at the Nelson Fine Art Centre, Luanne Armstrong read from her new novel, The Bone House. Afterwards, an audience member asked how long it took her to write the novel.  Armstrong simply laughed.  She explained that she worked on The Bone House for a year and a half while living on the East Shore of Kootenay Lake, then she packed up and moved to Vancouver and the novel got neglected.  And neglected.  And neglected.  Finally, a three-month retreat at Berton House offered her the opportunity to finally finish The Bone House, but to her dismay the very first task she had to tackle was not the glorious tip-tip-tipping of glowing words piling up on her computer screen but rather the muscle-grinding, sweat-dripping, Tim-Allen-grunting exertion of story resuscitation.

Armstrong went on to argue first for prevention, saying that when one is writing a novel, nothing should get in the way of the work.  And she meant nothing—don’t move residences, don’t go to work, don’t even eat if you don't have to.  Inattention could mean death.  Of course, her tongue was in her cheek.  Wasn’t it?

So first things first.  Prevention.  Armstrong is right.  Slug it out, dammit.  Get that first draft down, then you can put your corpus of words in the drawer and neglect, ignore, disabuse it all you wish.  In fact, Holley Rubinsky (author of Rapid Transits and At First I Hope for Rescue) would recommend a lengthy period of neglectful internment in said proverbial drawer because it will lead to a freshness of vision when you finally get around to hauling the corpus back out of the drawer and dusting it off with the sleeve of your sweater.

I assume, however, since you have read this far that prevention has failed.  But before leaping higgledy-piggledy into a full-blown resuscitation attempt, it is prudent first to determine whether or not your story is in fact dead. Maybe it’s only ill and in need of treatment:  perhaps the story needs to be told with a different voice, or from a different point of view, or perhaps the structure is wrong.  How do you tell the difference?   Paramedics use several tools to determine whether or not their patient is clinically dead:   they look for specific physical signs, such as fixed and dilated pupils, rigor, discolouration of the skin from pooling blood; they listen with a stethoscope for the absence of heart and breath sounds; they hook the patient up to an ECG monitor to read the heart rhythm. 

Writers, too, have diagnostic tools at their disposal.  They’re called (gasp!) writing exercises.  I’ve adapted several writing exercises from Ursula K. Le Guin’s, Steering the Craft, to help me diagnose whether a story is still kicking or not.  Rewriting an ailing story as a first person narrator when it was originally written in limited third person helps me hear if the story’s heart is still beating.  Rewriting a handful of chapters using different point of view characters can rally a dying novel by transfusing new life into the story.  To determine if structure might be the story’s ailment, I cut up the manuscript into scenes and piece it back together in various orders.  My short story, “Road Kill,” originally written with a linear structure, found new life with a point-counterpoint structure laid out under thematic headings.

Once you’ve used your writing exercises and diagnosed that your story or novel is indeed dead, deceased, departed, how do you go about the resuscitation?  Good paramedics train and practice, review their protocols, bone up on their physiology and pathophysiology, and hit the books or corner the doc in the ER when they get stumped about a particular patient’s condition or presentation.  They prepare so that when they are in the middle of a call they don’t have to stop and scratch their heads and wonder, “Gee, what should I do next?”

Writers who are about to attempt story resuscitation need to practice the same level of preparation.  You need to be mentally prepared for the hard work to come. Do your research all over again so that the facts you need are at your fingertips.  Rewrite your character profiles; revisit locales and settings, or, if they’re the product of your imagination, sketch them out; block out your revised story-line; make detailed notes about the changes you’re planning.  As former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani advises in his book, Leadership,  “Prepare relentlessly.”

Now, butt meets chair.  Yup, it’s now time for the grunt work.

I have regularly whined to my partner that little snippets of time here and there in the day aren’t really long enough to get any real (read “serious”) work done.  However, writing my novella, “Blue Glass Pebbles,” taught me that what is critical here is not so much time but one's mental engagement with the story—the characters, their ethical dilemmas, the themes, the settings, the research, and so forth—so that the moment one isn't having to pay attention on the job, or do the dishes, or bathe the mutt, one's mind automatically turns, nay leaps, to the story at hand.  Engagement.  Agreed, it makes one a dull conversationalist.  However, being deeply engaged with your story and characters means that when butt does meet chair, even for brief snippets of time, the result is most certainly glorious tip-tip-tipping!

Crawford Killian, in his book, Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy, recommends keeping a project “bible,” namely is a three-ring binder that you can carry with you anywhere.  What do you put in your “bible”?  Lined loose-leaf paper to jot down notes, photocopies of articles you’re using for research, your latest printed version of your story or novel, relevant quotes, lists of character’s names and attributes and eccentricities, maps, photographs…any dang thing that will engage you in your story-in-progress whenever you find yourself with a few minutes to kill at the dentist’s office, or stuck on the bus, or sitting in the mini-van waiting for the kids to be let out of school.  I’ve discovered that I can get quite a chunk of work done on long-distance ambulance transfers when it’s three a.m. and we’re still an hour away from Kelowna General and the patient we’re taking over for an angiogram is trying to snatch forty winks.  Not only am I able to use down time constructively, but also keeping at the project when I’m away from my desk engages me with the story.

When she was writing Buffalo Jump, Rita Moir would set a picture of her dog, Connor, and a small, stylized metal sculpture of a buffalo on the desk or table where she was working.  Like icons, these artifacts enabled her to engage more poignantly with the heart of the story she was telling.  Following her example, on the wall above my desk I have a large photograph of an artist’s rendition of Lucy, the famous 3.4 million year old hominid, Australopithecus Afarensis, discovered in 1974, whose image is central to the novel I am currently resuscitating (I’m at 26,697 words, last count, and still going strong!).

Yes, like more than a few writers of my acquaintance, I, too, have a novel in need of resuscitation.  I wrote 50,000 words, and threw them away.  I wrote another 30,000 words, then like Luanne Armstrong, I moved.  I packed all the detritus of the novel in a box and loaded the box into the Budget Rent-a-Truck.  In my new residence I unpacked said box of detritus and placed it on a shelf.  A prominent shelf, certainly, but a shelf nonetheless.  Then I wrote short stories, and dreamed of finishing the novel.  I wrote a novella, I designed a website, I went off to my day job, periodically attempting to resuscitate arrested humans. 

While I slugged it out to resuscitate Part 1 of my novel, I didn’t read a single work of fiction, I avoided television and movies, I didn’t answer the phone, I didn’t listen to music. I did go to work, however, and I did enjoy my lovely partner’s conversation and company, I did walk the dogs. But I didn’t join that new committee, I didn’t finish painting the bathroom, I didn’t mow the lawn.  I kept my butt in that chair.

As a paramedic, I know how much sweat and muscle goes into a resuscitation attempt.  Ribs get broken, there's often vomit; your shoulders ache from doing compressions or your hands get sore from bagging and suctioning the patient.  But every once in a blue moon you bring life back. 

I’ve learned what to look for.  The very breath of the story, that initial, tiny spark of life that originally set my heart leaping with the desire to write this story down.  You know it, too, that spark—a scene, a turn of phrase, a feeling, a character, an image—which shocked that story out of nothingness and right smack into your own heart and brain and soul, so that you became, even if briefly, a person possessed.  Recapture that spark.  Then add the muscle of reading and research and plain old-fashioned hard thinking, and the sweat of running around after your characters as they hurl themselves in and out of trouble, and the discipline of getting your butt in that chair day after day.  It's hard work, but it’s exhilarating! 

Remember, though, that despite Herculean effort, sometimes stories—and people—die.  No matter how down-and-dirty you get, no matter how long you slug it out, no matter how bloody hard you try, your story simply flatlines.  And just as paramedics are advised in debriefing after a losing a patient on a difficult call, I advise writers:  don’t hit the bottle, don’t kick the dog, don’t lock yourself in your garret and think dark thoughts.  Instead pick up the phone and talk to another writer about what happened, eat right, exercise, let yourself grieve, then go back to work.  People die, and paramedics get back out on the street.  Stories die, and writers put butt back in chair and they start a new project.

None of this means, however, that you can’t always hope for resurrection.  In the film, Jesus of Montreal, the protagonist’s “resurrection” takes the form of organs transplanted into needy recipients who are thus given new life because he gave up his body for their use.  A character from a long-dead short story appears in your new novel, or that whole story line set in Prince George in the ’80s rises up from the corpse of your unfinished first novel to find new life in your latest short story.  Saul, an 89-year-old character from a plotless short story I just couldn’t seem finish, rose up to become a central character in my novella.

Successful story resuscitation is possible.  The Bone House is living proof!  But it’s damn hard work.  Prepare relentlessly.  Stay engaged:  build your project bible, meditate on your icons, turn off your TV.  Then get your butt in that chair.

However, as in all matters of health, both physiological and writerly, prevention is the key.  Don’t drive fast and pass on curves, don’t feed the bears, don’t eat French fries for breakfast everyday, and you won’t have to rely on me and my ilk for cardio-pulmonary resuscitation.  And, as Luanne Armstrong suggests, in order to prevent the need for story resuscitation, nothing should get in the way of working on the story, and she means nothing—don't move residences, don't go to work, don't even eat if you don't have to—undoubtedly with her tongue only partly in her cheek.

The End