Plot Monkeys

I can’t exactly remember when I met Kathleen O’Reilly, though I’m pretty sure the connection was made through Julie Kenner, who is a mutual friend and fellow Blaze/Temptation writer. What I can tell you is that Kathleen is one of the nicest, funniest, most talented writers I know and I’m so thrilled to have her here in the jungle, talking about a topic near and dear to my heart. I love wordsmithing! And there are some lines in here that are just priceless…read carefully, jungle friends. Welcome, Kathleen!

Wordsmithery
By Kathleen O’Reilly

I have a love-affair with words, especially the wild and kinky ones. I like words that surprise me, that whisper in my ear, that crook a finger and say, “follow me…” My favorite authors are the clever ones that know how to use words, how to misuse them for best effect, and how to make me sigh with envy.

As a writer, words are the only tools we have. We must build a world with mere words, we must beget a whole pedigree of humans with our words, we must intrigue the reader using nothing more than the smallest of building blocks — words.

Yet words can be arranged and rearranged to great affectation, or affection, depending on which cunning-linguistical coterie you prefer. There are the classic stylists like Nabakov:

“I pushed her softness back into the room and went in after her. I ripped her shirt off. I unzipped the rest of her. I tore off her sandals. Wildly, I pursued the shadow of her infidelity; but the scent I traveled upon was so slight as to be practically undistinguishable from a madman’s fancy.”

There are the great bawds, like Shakespeare, who had ever so many word-tricks up his sleeve. “Oh, when she had written it (a letter), and was reading it over, she found ‘Benedick’ and ‘Beatrice’between the sheets.” Even the simplistic, “I am stuffed,” can assume a more insatiable meaning, if you mind wanders in those directions, as mine is wont to do.

The list of wordsmiths go on: Dickens, Twain, C. S. Lewis, Douglas Adams, Dorothy Parker, and oh, my, I’m being obtuse, how could I forget the great Dr. Seuss?

One of my favorite form of word-play is taking the expected and twisting it into the novel. We all expect: “Her skin was pale and silken, shimmering in the moonlight.” We do not expect, “Her skin was pearls dipped in moonlight,” or, if this is a paranormal, and the hero is a were-hog: “Her pale skin was pearls before swine.”

Cliches are especially rife for the mistaking. “Looking in the mirror, she examined her butt, and forty acres and a mole sadly stared back at her.” I could go on, ad infinitum, eternally, to infinity and beyond, but I only have a limited number of words handy.

When you choose the words to preen your scene, there are mean words that will lash at you, wrenching you out of your comfort zone, squeezing your mind until it explodes, charging and pummeling, pummeling and charging, thrusting and driving until you cry out for relief.

And if angry-words are not your cuppa, there are pretty words that sing out on the muted page, honeyed words that slowly fall from the writer’s imagination, dripping with a soothing rhythm, floating just beyond the tried and true, leaving the reader breathless, poised with anticipation, awaiting that next….small…set of letters.

I love words, all of them, the good, the bad, and the ugly. I have the Describer’s Dictionary, Descriptive Word Finder, Zounds!, Swearing, the Synonym Finder, Roget’s Thesaurus, sexicon, and the Dictionary of Allusions at my fingertips because my brain can be lazy without the proper stimulus (usually Red Bull). I am a mere lexiconologist in training, but my current favorite sexy, lexiconologist is Stephen Colbert. On that note, I’ll leave you with this:

Julie here again: In case you haven’t noticed, Kathleen has a new Blaze out this month…if you click the cover of Nightcap, you’ll go to Amazon where you can buy your very own copy! Her books consistently get awesome reviews from some of the toughest review sites. And I think she rocks…so go out and buy a copy for yourself, if you haven’t already!