Tension!

I started to read two novels the other day. One is a murder mystery, the other a somewhat self-conscious and pretentious story of a group women going on a road trip and finding their purposes. I am halfway through with the former and probably won't finish the latter, as it was too contrived for my taste.

One is written in third-person, the other in first-person. One drew me in from the beginning with the originality of the premise and the voice of the protagonist, while, the other put me off with its overwrought narrative and banality of the protagonist's voice. One thing both of these novels have in common, however, is the tense in which they were written: the present tense.

This seems to be a big thing these days. I almost never used to run into a novel written in the present tense, and now it seems as though every third book has this construction. "Amelia looks in the mirror one last time before opening the door, and straightens her lapels, though they are level and neat.'I am stalling,' she mutters to herself, and, taking her nerve firmly in hand, she grasps the polished brass handle and flings the door open. " "I walk slowly around the car, examining the path the water is making in the sand at my feet. The rain falls faster now, the drops crackling on the hood of my raincoat, and so I don't hear the footsteps approaching."

I do not like the present tense; it feels awkward and unnatural for me to both read and to write. I don't know why, because it is a perfectly valid tense to use, but it feels more like reportage than storytelling to me (I know, they're both a kind of storytelling), but the present tense lends the narrative a kind of arrogance. To my ear, anyway. To some writers, it must feel quite natural, but I don't think I could maintain it for long, and would soon fall back into the comfortable pace of past tense.

This seems a little odd, even to me, because of course, life rolls along in the present tense. I could write a paragraph about the last 10 minutes, thus:

I put on the kettle to boil, wincing at the screech of the aluminum over the stove grates, and wait for the water to heat while the computer slowly wakes up. It is an elderly computer, and like some elderly people, it drops off to sleep at unpredictable moments and is hard to rouse once it has slipped into a doze. I look outside at the iron-gray sky, heavy with the unusual October snow that is due to start falling this evening. My cell phone chimes; it is a text from a friend in Marin County, telling me how it is 79 degrees there, and he is hard at work on a roofing job. The kettle begins to sing just as the computer decides it is awake enough to let me log onto my neglected blog, so instead of opening the "new post" page, I get up and pour the tea. Hot water gurgles over the tea bag, and the fragrance of Constant Comment rises on the steam.

I can write like that, but it feels awkward to me. I think it might be because it is NOT all happening in the present; as soon as it has happened, it is in the past, so it is more natural to say, "the kettle began to sing just as the computer woke up...I got up and poured my tea."

I guess the intent is to carry the reader along with the action, to make it more immediate, to lend the sense that the story is still happening, that the characters really don't know what will happen, and perhaps even the author is along for the ride as well. Perhaps that enhances the sense of urgency and mystery. I can see how it can be perceived that way, but for me it diminishes the suspension of disbelief, and makes the narrative read more like stage directions than a relaxed flow of storytelling.

Cheryl flicks the ash from her cigarette and sighs. Tomas is now fifteen minutes late. "I'll give him another ten minutes," she thinks, when his rattling pickup truck pulls up and he hurries across the grass to the bench where she is waiting. "I'm sorry," he says, "but Jerome had me run an errand and it took longer than I thought it would-" Cheryl shakes her head and waves the cigarette. "Forget it," she says.

Cheryl flicked the ash from her cigarette and sighed. Tomas was now fifteen minutes later. "I'll give him anther ten minutes," she thought, when his rattling pickup truck pulled up and he hurried across the grass to the bench where she was waiting. "I'm sorry," he said, "but Jerome had me run an errand and it took longer than I thought it would-" Cheryl shook her head and waved the cigarette. "Forget it," she said.

They say the same thing, of course; the same characters and action and mood. There's something about the present-tense version, though, that just feels uncomfortable to me. Even as I was writing it, I slipped into my accustomed past tense, and upon reading it over, found "flicked" instead of "flicks" and "said" instead of "says."

CHERYL

(waiting on park bench. flicks ash from cigarette. Looks at watch.)
I'll give him another ten minutes, but-

A RUSTY PICKUP TRUCK RATTLES TO A HALT AT THE CURB.
TOMAS
(jumps out of truck and hurries across the grass to where Cheryl waits on the bench. Breathless.)
I'm sorry, but Jerome had me run an errand and it took longer than I thought-

CHERYL
(shakes head, waves cigarette dismissively)
Forget it.

I'm sure the format is all wrong, but the present tense scene above reads very much like the screenplay sample. It just doesn't feel right to me.

I Am a Writer

I have not infrequently asked myself why I write. I have not ever made a penny off it, yet have spent hours writing, thinking about writing, agonizing over writing. I have a shelf groaning under the weight of binders full of manuscripts, and file drawers full of writing - from a single paragraph jotted on a scrap of paper to multiple revised copies of novels. I have stories that I keep only to show myself, to remind myself of how far I have come; these papers, I hope, are never seen by anyone else. Not that I have written anything grotesque - it's just bad writing.

None of this answers my question - why do I write? To be honest, I do not know. I just know that I have to write, because that's what I do. I am a writer.

What do I write? Fiction - novels. My muse feeds me stories that take hundreds of pages to tell; no short stories for me. I am within an inch of finishing a novel which at its simplest level is a mere ghost story, but which a friend of mine has called a "bildungsroman". I didn't set out to write literature, but it seems that I have.

There are two intertwined novels that deal with the supernatural and the eternal nature of love. I have written 3 low-tech fantasies (and have embryonic ideas for 2 more), devoid of dragons, orcs, mages, elves, dwarves and other stock fantasy characters. This series has people, some of whom are gifted with a talent of sorcery; the magic is understated but essential. These stories deal more with human nature than super-nature.

There is one story I am having trouble writing, because it is so grim and dark. It is a ghost story, but two of the main characters are two very evil and disturbed little girls. I will write the story, but find that I can never work on it for long because it is so dark.

I also write non-fiction essays about life in Vermont - the change of seasons, food, gardening, family - the day-to-day things, special occasions, silent icy winter nights, spring evenings chiming with peepers, muggy summer days, sharp autumn winds. These observations of the world around me work their way into everything I write.

-----

I think I'm a pretty good writer. I do. I'm not tooting my own horn. Anyone with a basic education and halfway-decent grasp of fundamental writing mechanics can put words on paper, but not everyone is critical of their own writing, and I am very critical. I believe that a love of language is essential to making a good writer - a curiosity and appreciation of the subtleties and vagaries of the language they use. As I am a monolingual American, then I must make do with English.

It's not a bad language with which to make do. I love this language. I love its history and evolution, and the way it adapts, and absorbs words. I also respect the language; I don't use vulgarity, but do not object to witty earthiness. I'm not a hidebound language purist, but you will never find me using "parent" as a verb, "impact" as a verb except in reference to wisdom teeth, or "normalcy" in any sense. These usages are ugly to my ear. God help me, I read a corporate memo the other day that used "vehicle" as a verb. I stopped reading when I got there, and didn't finish the memo.

Why do I write? I used to say I write because I am too shy to act. I have stories in me that want to be told. I write because I have to. I don't know if I have anything of any importance to say. I don't know if anyone will ever see what I write, if it will inspire anyone, if I will be remembered for the words I string together. I am sure there are writers with this in mind, but I know there are many like me for whom the impulse to write is undeniable, like an involuntary reflex. Writers are born, not made.