Thursday, July 4, 2013

Chekhov's Gun

From: The Outlet

"I rarely incorporate guns into my fiction. To me, the (sudden) presence of a gun shifts the trajectory of a story much too easily. No matter how a character has been established during the preceding pages, a gun suddenly—and more importantly, unfairly—gives ultimate power to that character. When given a gun, either 1) a lackluster character becomes the fulcrum of a scene (or story) or 2) a well-developed character gets robbed of all the reader investment by artificially becoming the fulcrum of a scene (or story)[1]. Either way, a gun generally says to the reader 'I’m a lazy author, and I don’t respect your time, reader.'”
— Caleb J. Ross, calabjross.com
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"If you are running out of sneaky hiding places for guns, this might be a viable option… Hide one in a book. There are a couple of rules of thumb I can think of when it comes to choosing a book:
1. Do not choose a childrens book for obvious reasons
2. Do not use a bible... thats just poor taste even if you are not religious
3. Do not use a good book... one that someone will want to take off the shelf to look at
4. Do not use a book that someone will want to borrow
5. Do not use a book you think you might ever want to read, or re-read"
EVERYDAY NO DAYS OFF
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