Blog | Classes, Writing Techniques | By: nick

Rafting the Salmon River

I had the pleasure of rafting on the Middle Fork of the Salmon River this summer. Working on the story now. Here’s a preview:

It’s a rock dodge. I point the red 9-foot kayak toward Orelano Rapid on the Middle Fork of the Salmon River in Idaho. The rapid is rated a III (on a scale of I – VI, from easy to hazardous), putting it at the limit of my abilities as a kayaker. Earlier rapids have boosted my confidence, but I hope they haven’t lulled me into a false sense of security.

I enter the rapid on the right, weaving past one rock and then another, relishing the feeling of dashing through the boiling cauldron. A boulder looms ahead. I glide past it, but overcompensate, turning my kayak to the side. The current smashes it against a large boulder, high-centering it on the top. I dig on the paddle, trying to free it.

As I try to shove off, the current catches the underside of the kayak, flipping me into the drink. The water is cold, fast, and powerful. I clutch the boat and pin the paddle between my knees. The river surges past me, threatening to knock me over. I remember the guide’s advice about staying calm, facing down river and releasing the boat if necessary, but I keep fighting and drag it over to the bank. Taking a moment to catch my breath, I assess the situation…

For more, check back in when I know where I’ll publish it.

There’s still room in the fall writing class, Revising Your Life. For more, take a look at my website.

Literature is nothing but carpentry.

Ultimately, literature is nothing but carpentry. With both you are working with reality, a material just as hard as wood.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez

There are only two or three human stories.

Isn’t it queer: there are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before; like the larks in this country, that have been singing the same five notes for thousands of years.

Willa Cather

Don’t try to figure out what other people want to hear from you.

Don’t try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It’s the one and only thing you have to offer.

Barbara Kingsolver

Pleasure in a good novel…

The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.

Jane Austen

…with luck and if you stated it purely enough, always.

I was trying to write then and I found the greatest difficulty was to put down what really happened in action; what the actual things were which produced the emotion that you experienced…the real thing, the sequence of motion and fact which made the emotion and which would be as valid in a year or ten years or, with luck and if you stated it purely enough, always.

Ernest Hemingway

The difference between the right word and the almost right word…

The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.

Mark Twain

For some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth.

For some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you. Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us what community and friendship mean; they show us how to live and die.

Anne Lamott

It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world.

It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That's where the mischief starts. That's where everything starts unravelling.

V.S. Naipaul

Just follow your hero.

First, find out what your hero wants, then just follow him!

Ray Bradbury

The forms of things unknown and the the poet’s pen…

And as imagination bodies forth The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing A local habitation and a name.

William Shakespeare (from A Midsummer Night’s Dream)

One false word, one extra word…

One false word, one extra word, and somebody's thinking about how they have to buy paper towels at the store.

Patricia Marx

Writing a novel is a terrible experience.

Writing a novel is a terrible experience, during which the hair often falls out and the teeth decay. I'm always irritated by people who imply that writing fiction is an escape from reality. It is a plunge into reality and it's very shocking to the system.

Flannery O’Connor

Get it down. Take chances.

Get it down. Take chances. It may be bad, but it’s the only way you can do anything really good.

William Faulkner