Gome World

Creating A Memorable Opening Scene

If you are writing an adventure or mystery story you want to try to "grab" your readers in the opening chapter.  Even better if you can "grab" them in the opening paragraph, or even the opening sentence or two.  Here is how i started The Rusty Pelican.  You can decide if you think it "grabs" you:

The boy sitting at his desk was unaware that he was being watched.  but two angry eyes were fixed on him, burning like red hot coals in the damp night air.  The dark watcher was growing impatient.

When I talked to several hundred young readers in Bend, Oregon, about the story several of them commented that they found the first chapter exciting, but also confusing.  We are not told who "The Dark Watcher" is, or what he and the whining Dutchman are waiting for.  We do not know who the eccentric gentleman is who arrives and bounces out of the taxi to disappear into the house of the boy who is sitting by his bedroom window.  While the dark watcher and the Dutchman are waiting some strange events happen.  A dog walks past and lifts its leg to urinate on the car.  The dog's owner does twenty push-ups on the damp sidewalk before disappearing into his own house, next door to where the boy lives.  In three short pages the firsts chapter comes to an end and we are left confused... and I hope intrigued.  In a good mystery adventure story you don't want to be told everything all at once.  I want my readers to have to try to figure out what might be going on and to pick up clues along the way.  

 

One of my younger readers was troubled by the image of "The Dark Watcher" and drew a picture to try to imagine what he/she/it might be like.

Several other students were shocked and amused by the image of the dog urinating on the car.  I have received several pictures about that part of the story!

   

 

Some of the students have tried to draw the whole opening scene as a kind of wild collage of all the images that are going on.  The results are certainly memorable:

   

So if you are wanting to write a story that draws your readers in right away try to write a memorable opening chapter that "grabs" the attention of your readers right away and gets them hooked and eager to read on...

Stinky-The-Bog-Murtle

When a thirteen-year-old Finnley James Murray McDougall meets Wullie-The-Mahaar-Gome in his bedroom in Magnolia he should not have been as surprised as all that.  Five years earlier when Finn had been visiting his Great Uncle Hugh McDougall in Tobermory on the Island of Mull in Scotland he ran into another strange little creature that started spitting at him from the weeping willow tree at the edge of the bog at the foot of Uncle Hugh's garden.  It seems that Finn has a special ability to recognize lots of strange creatures that many other kids and almost all grown-ups can't see at all.  Stinky-The-Bog-Murtle is an unpleasant and mischievous creature that amuses herself by annoying humans.  She spits at Finn and tempts him into throwing his juggling balls at her so that Finn ends up losing all his juggling balls in the bog.  Here are some pictures of that scene of The Rusty Pelican drawn by some young readers at High Lakes Elementary School in Bend, Oregon.

   

 

When I first invented the character of Stinky-The-Bog-Murtle I didn't think that she would have a big part in my stories overall.  However, when I talked to several of the young readers in Bend, Oregon, it seems that they really like the idea of another creature that is rude and mischievous and cheeky, so I think I will bring Stinky back with a bigger and more complex role to play in a future adventure.  If you have suggestions for how Stinky could mess up Finn's life in a future story or just post your comment here.  If you want to draw me a picture of what you think Stinky looks like or of a new scene that features Stinky send it to me at: Gome World, P.O. Box 99327, Seattle, WA 98139-0327, USA.

Here is another great drawing of Stinky that I received recently from Gavin in Bend Oregon:

Finnley James Murray McDougall

When I talked to several classes of Middle School students last week in Bend, Oregon several of them asked me if the character of Finn is based on anyone I know.  Is he like I was when I was a kid or is he like one of my own kids when they were that age?  The answer is that Finnley is made up from lots of different children that I have known in my life, and maybe a little bit like I was when I was growing up in the remote and quiet countryside of southwest Scotland.  Finn is the quintessential "nice wee boy!"  He is not all that brave.  He is not all that good at school.  He has a hard time concentrating on his schoolwork but he has a great imagination and is a good-natured and loyal friend.  He is bored with homework assignments about Mesopotamia.  He day dreams in his boring Latin class.  He tries to avoid the school bully, Alex Drivelson.  He tries to stay on his mom's good side.  More than anything Finn longs for adventure. 

Finn shares all of his hopes and dreams with his next door neighbor and best friend, Hadley Kobayashi.  They have set up a unique and very cool communication system.  Their bedroom windows are about thirty yards apart and at the same height.  they have a wire and pulley system so that they can attach notes to the wire inside plastic bags and then turn the pulley to move the notes over to the other person's window.  One of the students at High Lakes began to do a drawing of this system but I think she didn't have time to finish it.  The house on the right is like a ghost house!  If you want to draw me a better picture of what the pulley-note system between Finn and Hadley's houses is like I would love to see it.  If you send it to me at my PO box in Seattle I will scan it and post it on the blog.

Here is another picture of the note-pulley system:

 Finn gets more than he bargains for when his wild and eccentric Great Uncle Hugh McDougall arrives from Scotland and gives Finn a most unusual gift of a dirty, smelly, "very special Scottish paperweight."  When the paperweight comes to life to become Wullie-The-Mahaar-Gome Finn's life turns into the most adventurous roller-coaster of fun and disaster.  Here is a great drawing buy one of Ms. Storey's Talented and Gifted elementary students at High Lakes school in Bend, Oregon, showing Finn walking to school with his best friend Hadley and with Wullie perched on Finn's shoulder.   

I hope you will enjoy traveling all over the world with Finn and Hadley as they have lots of exciting adventures involving a lot of wicked humans (and a few nice ones) and an even bigger number of evil and wicked rock creatures (or gomes) who would like to use Finn for a very special and evil purpose.  Wullie-The-Mahaar-Gome and some of his best friends have to work really hard to keep Finn safe from harm.

High Desert Middle School ROCKS!

I am so grateful to the wonderful kids and staff at High Desert Middle School in Bend Oregon for letting me spend two incredible days talking to them about writing, hanging out, answering questions, and taking suggestions for things that I ought to consider for future stories.

 A very special thanks to Jo Ann Enyart-Grant, the Media Manager, for hosting me in the awesome library and media center.  The kids were all incredibly well behaved and asked really smart questions.  Several people liked the character of Stinky-The-Bog-Myrtle and were disappointed that she did not appear more in the story.  I will definitely bring her back in an extended role in a future story.  Many, many students thought that it was disgusting that Wullie smokes dried cow poop (or "cowdie" as he likes to call it) in his little pipe or that a dog urinates on the bad guys' car fender in the opening chapter of The Rusty Pelican!  There were several great comments about the story. Quite a few kids commented that the opening scene was dramatic and exciting but kind of confusing because it was hard to know who the Dark Watcher was or what he and the whining Dutchmen were doing looking up at Finn's bedroom on a dark night in Magnolia in Seattle.  We had a good discussion about why it is good in a mystery story to start with a lot of drama and puzzling clues but leave the reader not quite sure what is going on exactly.

 

Some of the students liked the odd names for the characters (like the mean, snooty "popular" girl being called Tiffany Kistlebutt, or Hadley's wacky mother being called Riversong).  Someone wondered why there aren't more "female gomes" and thought it would be fun if there was a crotchety old female gome in the story who had a crush on Wullie!  It is hard to believe anyone having a crush on a scruffy, rude, bad-tempered old grump who smokes cow dung and is impatient all the time but I will need to give that some thought for a future story...

Thank you so much for giving me new ideas for stories and for letting me share my books with you.  I am honored that some of you wanted me to sign your books.  See if you can see yourself here:

   

Thanks again to Principal Gary DeFrang, Vice Principal Marshall Jackson, psychologist Erich Brocker and the awesome teachers including John Burton, Johanna Myers and Jennifer Lashley.  You all made me feel very much at home and welcomed me into your incredible school.  I do hope that you will let me return to High Desert Middle School next year when I should have the next trilogy in the series published.  I would be honored to donate more books to your school library and to students interested in reading more of the adventures of Finnley, Hadley, Wullie, Big Sandy and other characters both familiar and new.  I have lots more adventures planned and will incorporate some of your suggestions into future stories.  Thank you for inspiring me to write more.

Wullie Comes to Life... at High Lakes Elementary in Bend, Oregon.

One of the most exciting things for any author is to see his or her creation come to life in the minds of the readers.  I have had Wullie-The-Mahaar-Gome in my imagination for over forty years!  I have written about him in seven books now and have many new adventures planned for him.  But it is when I see what my young readers think of him that he really comes to life for me.  Ms. Storey's Talented and Gifted third and fourth graders gave me several versions of how they see Wullie in his petrified form and in his "alive" form.  Here are a few of those:

   

     

There are also some great pictures of Wullie jumping off high shelves and bookcases onto piles of dirty laundry in Finn's bedroom.  Here are two of my favorites:  

One of the kids also did a great job of making a comic strip with lots of scenes from the book in one picture.  In this you can see Wullie in Finn's bedroom on a bookcase, on the window sill of his bedroom, being washed in the boys bathroom at the Magnolia Academy of Arts and Sciences and also sitting on Finn's shoulder as Finn and Hadley walk to school:  

One of my absolute favorite pictures from Ms. Storey's class is one that shows Wullie sitting outside Finn's bedroom window as he is described at the end of Chapter 5 on page 36 of The Rusty Pelican, smoking his smelly pipe of cowdie and looking out at the waters of Elliott Bay by the night sky.

  So as Wullie-The-Mahaar-Gome looked out over Elliott Bay from a high window ledge in Magnolia Finnley James Murray McDougall lay back on his pillow and fought back waves of sleepiness.  The tiny man was silhouetted by the moon, the smoke from his pipe curling up into the night sky.  This had been the strangest day in Finn's young life.  It was like a dream. He just hoped it wouldn't all be gone in the morning.

Yeah to Ms. Storey's class at High Lakes in Bend!

I can't tell you how impressed I was to meet the Talented and Gifted (TAG) kids in Ms. Storey's class at High Lakes Elementary School last Wednesday (Nov 12th, 2008). I didn't expect that kids as young as third grade would enjoy The Rusty Pelican.  I am honored that you did.  You asked very perceptive questions and gave me several suggestions for new characters and new stories.  The pictures that you drew were really imaginative and well drawn.  I can only put a few of them here but I will add others to some of the other weblog postings that I have since your art work makes great illustrations for other chapters of the story.  A lot of Ms. Storey's class were amused by the idea that a dog would lift its leg and urinate on the car bumper while the Dark Watcher and the Dutchmen were waiting outside Finn's bedroom window.   Check these out!

   

   

Many other students did great pictures of what Wullie looks like in his petrified form and his "alive" form.  I will show a few of them here and then put others into another blog posting about Wullie:

   

 

There were also some terrific action shots of Wullie diving off the tops of bookcases onto piles of dirty laundry on the floor of Finn's room (and there are always lots of those in Finn's room!).  There is also a great picture of Wullie bouncing on Hadley's bed and several great pictures of Stinky-The-Bog-Murtle.  Here are some of the best.  I will feature others in other postings so poke around on the blog to see if you can see your picture anywhere.

   

 

Thanks again to all of you for the terrific artwork.  Your pictures really bring the story to life.  I will post as many more of the pictures as I can in other parts of the blog.  If you read on in the story and feel inspired to send me more pictures then you can send them to my regular Post Office box in Seattle:  Gome World, P.O. Box 99327, Seattle, WA 98139-0327