Stories like Fine Beer and Cheese: The Importance of Texture (Part 3)

The following is part 3 of 3 from Robert Garbacz.

[Author’s Note: This the final entry in my three-part series on the importance of a rich and multivaried “texture” in which different parts of the story resist each other, making for a far more engaging piece.  In parts 1 (HERE) and 2 (HERE), I discussed Greg Mitchell’s genre-fiction “Flowers for Shelly” and Michael Snyder’s more literary “Normal People.” In this section, I turn to the issue of how--and why--readers might want to take the risk of making complicated, textured fiction.]

Okay, so now what?  Sure that’s how I choose stories, but what good can it do for those of you who actually want to write stories with texture?  Well, I’m not yet an expert writer, but I think I’ve found two simple principles:

1) Let ideas wait for a while, and don’t be afraid to mix them up. For me, an interesting idea will stick in my head for months, if not for years.  My story in the first Diner started when I was listening to way too many 1920’s-1940’s adventure radio dramas.  Somehow, a phrase came to me, “the cozy firelit tavern in the middle of the Abyss.” But it was several months before I started my story, in which I had plenty of time to fill my tavern with dead authors, throw in a generous portion of film noir flavorings, add a single-mindedly Quixotic Preacher, and a protagonist who goes along with him without really buying his program wholesale.  And then, of course, there was the proofreading, where I looked for any odd, interesting spices I could throw in.  But each stage required time, and a willingness to try to stick things together that common sense would keep apart.

2) Don’t be afraid to contradict yourself. In throwing a variety of flavors into the mix, you’re probably going to end up with a story that is true to the parts of life that don’t allow for easy solutions.  Sometimes that will feel uncomfortable, or strange, and you’ll feel the temptation to make everything neat and clean and right.  And maybe you should--for certain publishers and certain audiences.  But the best--and most memorable--tales are the ones that don’t shy away from their endings, even if the end the story leads to only emphasizes the difference between how the world should be and how the world is.

I’ll close with one more example, from a piece of genre-fiction that wasn’t published in the Diner because it was written some ten thousand years too early and was too long.  It is also, through a twist of fate, now considered literary fiction.  The story is the Iliad and the scene is the climactic meeting between the (essentially fatherless) Greek warrior Achilles and the Trojan king Priam (whose son, Hector, was brutally killed by Achilles in a cycle of vengeance).  In a shocking moment of grace, Achilles not only gives Hector’s body back for burial, but he feels a strange sympathy for the father of his dead enemy.  They eventually eat together, remembering another story which beautifully mixes horrific tragedy and simple joy.  As Achilles puts it in Lombardo’s translation,

Even Niobe remembered to eat Although her twelve children were dead in her house, Six daughters and six sturdy sons.  [...] Nine days they lay in their gore, with no one To bury them, because Zeus had turned The people to stone.  On the tenth day The gods buried them.  But Niobe remembered She had to eat, exhausted from weeping. [...] Well, so should we, old sir, Remember to eat.  You can mourn your son later When you bring him to Troy.  You owe him many tears.

(lines 651-3, 659-63, 669-71)

This act of compassion is not the end of the story.  As the poem’s original audience well knew, Priam’s son would soon kill Achilles and Achilles’s allies will soon kill every man in Troy.  The result--texture.  It isn’t just a straightforward revenge-tale, or a saccharine tale of friendship among enemies.  It is something more.

Homer, or whoever wrote the Iliad, chose to interrupt his tale of rage and death with a story of acceptance and commonality (or, conversely, to surround his story of acceptance and commonality with a larger story of rage and cyclical violence.)  That sort of incomplete, soulful, and very-human texture is a goal well worth seeking.

***

Robert Garbacz, when in his natural habitat, can frequently be seen arguing theology, politics, and art over ale with often excessive volume, haranguing his friends repeatedly with obscure but fascinating facts about Medieval literature, or staring cloyingly into the eyes of his beloved wife Hannah. Unfortunately, his natural habitat is Oxford in the period from 1930-1950. This is a bit awkward for someone born in Tulsa in 1983, but he is studying towards his Doctoral at the University of Texas in Austin and feels this is a firm step in the proper direction. His short story, “The Salvation of Sancho,” appeared in the previous Diner anthology, inducting him into this peculiar world of horror, bloodshed, and merciless ravagement of grammatical missteps.

Stories like Fine Beer and Cheese: The Importance of Texture (Part 2)

The following is part 2 of 3 from Robert Garbacz.

[Author’s Note: This is the second in my three-part blog series on the importance of a rich and multivaried “texture” in which different parts of the story resist each other, making for a far more engaging piece.  In part 1 (HERE), I discussed Greg Mitchell’s “Flowers for Shelly,” a piece that combined zombie mayhem, humor, violence, multiple characters, and a sweet-hearted love story in order to get itself on the “must publish” list.  Here, I discuss a piece from Relief that is similarly textured, though in a more literary manner.  Next week, I will conclude on a practical note, showing tips for writers and examining the payoff for taking risks.]

The sort of texture I talked about last week isn’t just for zombie romantic comedies, or even genre fiction.  Another story that blew me away was Michael Snyder’s three-page tale of grief and madness inRelief 3.1.  Read it yourself if you haven’t, as soon as possible.  Once you have, here’s the last paragraph in full:

“I walk now.  I talk a lot too.  Out loud.  Mostly to myself, sometimes to God.  All the good smells are gone.  There are no more kind eyes either, no more Tonys or groggy nurses.  I do have my photographs though.  And Hailey’s blanket.  I bartered away Maria’s bathrobe for a pair of Pumas that don’t fit.  When I get desperate, the priest will feed me or give me a coat.  He tells me to keep talking to God, to say it out loud if I have to, no matter how the normal people look at me or move to the other side of the road.  He says my decrease is Jesus’s increase, which sounds like total crap to me.  Still, I continue to testify about the things I have seen and heard and smelled and done.”

This doesn’t look like a zombie romantic comedy, because it isn’t.  What it does look like (and is) is a combination of different sorts of expectations, meeting in unique ways to provide a textured perspective that is true to life.

One would expect certain narratives, particularly in an explicitly Christian magazine: grief slowly giving way to acceptance, an increased understanding and reliance on God.  Those stories are there, like the love story element of “Flowers for Shelly.” The narrator is talking to God more, with the guidance of a priest.  He’s also moving on--maybe--with his final willingness to get rid of Maria’s bathrobe.

But there’s other flavors, as well.  In addition to the comforting taste of acceptance, there’s a strong flavoring of bitterness and continued, self-destructive mourning.  He may have given up Maria’s bathrobe, but he keeps Hailey’s blanket and the photographs.  And while the narrator may be talking to God, he’s still profoundly suspicious of the preacher’s words, which often “sound like total crap to me.” And then there’s the sheer mundanity of life; he gives up the bathrobe not in some glamorous ceremony but in a trade for shoes which didn’t fit.

Again, it is the multiplicity of voices--even if they’re all within one person’s mind--that makes the story memorable, and in this case heart-breaking.  And the conclusion doesn’t get rid of the complexity of flavors; it leaves them, in a melange of tastes that remain on the palate.  Like a fine (and highly alcoholic) Trappist ale, the story leaves the reader a bit disoriented and uncertain, but with a delicious aftertaste to contemplate.

***

Robert Garbacz, when in his natural habitat, can frequently be seen arguing theology, politics, and art over ale with often excessive volume, haranguing his friends repeatedly with obscure but fascinating facts about Medieval literature, or staring cloyingly into the eyes of his beloved wife Hannah. Unfortunately, his natural habitat is Oxford in the period from 1930-1950. This is a bit awkward for someone born in Tulsa in 1983, but he is studying towards his Doctoral at the University of Texas in Austin and feels this is a firm step in the proper direction. His short story, "The Salvation of Sancho," appeared in the previous Diner anthology, inducting him into this peculiar world of horror, bloodshed, and merciless ravagement of grammatical missteps.

Stories like Fine Beer and Cheese: The Importance of Texture (Part 1)

The following is part 1 of 3 from Robert Garbacz.

[Author’s Note: This is part one of a three-part series discussing the importance of a rich texture in fiction.  Here, I discuss the way Greg Mitchell used contrasting genres and perspectives to earn “Flowers for Shelly” a place in the second Diner. Next week, I will take a more literary turn with Michael Snyder’s “Normal People” from Relief 3.1. I will conclude on a practical note, with hints for how to create a sense of texture and a promise of the rewards of taking risks.]

One of the greatest little pleasures of living in Austin is to visit Whole Foods, sampling the cheeses, wines and beer that are available for free.  There is something almost magical about the blend of flavors in a good cheese or ale; a sea of competing tastes, textures and sensations that changes as it trickles across the tongue.  A good beer might start with a soft, fruity taste and then kick in later with a bitter aftertaste.  A good cheese will often be uneven, with a delicious, organic texture as it slides across the tongue.

I hate processed “American cheese” and “light beer.”  Sure, they’re smooth, easy to eat, and they’re focused on their goal.  But they lack the complexity and texture of the good stuff.  In comparison, they’re crap.

The same thing is true of short stories.  Reading through a slush pile, nothing will make me sit up and take note about a story than a sense that it has a really good, complicated texture; that it goes in multiple directions at once, instead of trotting straight at its target.  And while nothing will guarantee acceptance, a story with the rich, variegated texture of a Trappist ale or Irish cheese will make me perk up, and at the least make me want the story to be good enough for acceptance.

But enough about foods, before I get hungry.  Let’s look at our first story, and the way it uses contrasting thoughts and “flavors”  to make something better than the sum of its parts.  (Minor spoilers, it should be noted, are a given.)

“Flowers for Shelly,” from the second Diner, started with the solid, earthy basis of a good character drama.  The narrator is obviously in love with his wife, and wants nothing more than to stay in bed with her all day.  His responsible wife wants him to get up and go to work.  The scene is cute, a bit saccharine, but already somewhat textured thanks to the narrator’s self-deprecating wit.  The wit is understated, but at least engaging:

“Work sucks.  It’s 9:30 a.m. and I want to go home, lie in bed, and wait for Shelly to return with less pressures.  And, preferably, less clothes.”

So far, it’s more textured than processed cheese, but not much.  Maybe Kraft mild cheddar, with a slight kick of humor and marital tension.

Then the narrator’s friend and co-worker gets slaughtered by zombie-police and the story takes on a different tone:

“Suddenly, I feel a cold sensation around my ankle and see a bloody hand reaching out from underneath the car.  Pulling.  Yanking.  Moans rise up like phantoms from the depths of hell and I look into the still teary eyes of Kevin as he lures me in.  At first, I think he’s somehow survived, but then it hits me.  He’s dead, too.”

All of a sudden, this story is beginning to feel more like the sort of solid, hand-crafted cheese that is worth shipping over oceans.  What are the dead doing coming to life?  How will our hero survive?  And what the hell does this have to do with his decision to give flowers to his wife Shelly?  It’s interesting, uneven, and because I have such dissonant tones I don’t know what’s going to happen next.  I like it.

Nor is the combination of two genres all that Greg Mitchell does in his story.  In addition to the gruesome descriptions of zombie mayhem, we have the narrator’s often incoherent thoughts, his gun-nut friends’ insane euphoria at the fact that they’re actually shooting zombies, a thoroughgoing sense of humor, and a mad quest to give pretty flowers to the beautiful Shelly.  I’m not much into zombie stories, but Mitchell’s ability to pile on a hundred different flavors and cram them into a small space made this a fun romp through death and mayhem that I won’t soon forget.

The moral: even with straight-forward, zombie killing genre fiction, odd combinations and unexpected, off-kilter happenings are key.

***

Robert Garbacz, when in his natural habitat, can frequently be seen arguing theology, politics, and art over ale with often excessive volume, haranguing his friends repeatedly with obscure but fascinating facts about Medieval literature, or staring cloyingly into the eyes of his beloved wife Hannah. Unfortunately, his natural habitat is Oxford in the period from 1930-1950. This is a bit awkward for someone born in Tulsa in 1983, but he is studying towards his Doctoral at the University of Texas in Austin and feels this is a firm step in the proper direction. His short story, "The Salvation of Sancho," appeared in the previous Diner anthology, inducting him into this peculiar world of horror, bloodshed, and merciless ravagement of grammatical missteps.