Isn’t this pretty close to what people ITT were trying to tell you when you were completely hung up with the beginning? (Or whatever it was that had you hung up.)
Have you storyboarded the arc of your journey? Do you keep a rough outline in your head of points you want to hit? Or are you just winging it and going chronologically?
I was so hung up in the beginning. I have no idea what I was thinking. I was convinced I needed to summarize what was going to happen in the Baja section in 3 paragraphs - like a news article. For some reason I was just entrenched in that and there was no talking me out of it.
The writing coach was like “This is a story, you start with the first step down the road. Don’t summarize what’s going to happen in the story before it happens.” DUH!
Sorry if you guys were saying the same thing and it didn’t stick. I was wrapped up in a pretzel back then, as you can see from the tone of my thread title.
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The whole story is here:
I did keep a blog during the trip, for the express idea of writing a book later.
At least once I saw what it takes to actually promote and maintain a popular blog from my friend who has one, and unlike her, realized I had no hook whatsoever. “White dude drives Pan-Am in car” isn’t really that grabby. But a thoroughly-researched Bill Bryson-style book about the trip is imo.
So at that point I determined the blog was for a few friends and family (I did have some fans from FB, 2p2, CP and the FJ Cruiser forums) and mostly for material for the book later. I’m super glad I did it because the blog and pics job my memory and remind me how I was feeling at the time and whatever weird shit my inner monologue was cranking out.
I’m writing it chronologically. But my writing coach keeps pushing me to lead with the Nicaragua adventure where I got trapped for a week and had to talk my way through a bunch of roadblocks and protesters armed with homemade rocket launchers. It’s definitely the climax of the book. But I dunno about moving it to the front. Feels a little cheesy to me.
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I don’t think this shit is easy at all. It’s something like half hard work, half science, and half art.
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It really is. I also did standup comedy in my 20s and my jokes were generally long windy inner-monologue type stuff. So this kind of writing is very similar at least for that part.
The part I struggle most with is the expository writing about historical (pre/post-Columbian) and scientific stuff (plants, animals, geology, etc.). I’ve never really done that and it comes out super grindy and clunky. I feel like a fraud unless I’ve read like 20 books on every subject, which isn’t really feasible. So I try to read 2-3 books at least to get some different perspectives. And THEN you have to pick out the really interesting stuff and spin it in a new angle - like Bryson does. It’s tough.
Is this book gonna have pics of those PCH chicks?
You know I found out those chicks were in high school right? I could have been arrested for trying to get pics of them.
The crazy part is I found out through some guy on Poker Stars. I noticed he was from Redondo Beach. We started talking. He told me he taught at RB high. I was starting to suspect those girls were in HS, so I asked him about them. He said yep. I know exactly who you’re talking about. Glad I never actually got pics.
Then when you have a best seller a bunch of assholes will pick apart any little slight inaccuracy. So you have that to look forward to!
Yeah, at least I have the blog to back up my stories. It also limits me from making anything up lol. I’m still trying to figure out how to work in the Olmecs when I never went to any of their sites. I was hoping to go sometime around now, but that’s not happening. I’d mention that it’s on a subsequent trip. But my cover has a gigantic Olmec head - it’s so cool-looking!
I regret that I never got to visit an Olmec site. As they are truly fascinating people… (Assuming they are people?) Yada yada yada.
La Venta isn’t a whole lot to see I guess since they made their pyramids out of earth. But the giant heads are amazing.
Monte Alban has a bunch of Olmec stuff, the Zapotecs and Olmecs had a lot of contact - maybe I’ll use that to work it in.
In media res is a valid literary technique. You could start the story of Nicaragua and end with you looking down the barrel of a homemade rocket launcher, thinking “How the fuck did I end up here?” Cue the flashback to the start of your journey and work your way chronologically to how you got to Nicaragua. Then, tell the story of why you are still alive.
You’d then have a filter for editing everything down to book length. Is it relevant to how you ended up in Nicaragua or how you got out? (Did you make any mistakes in Nicaragua due to assuming it would be more like Mexico? Did you learn any lessons that helped you?) If not, consider tossing it. You can always write a second book, maybe inspired by your future search for the Olmecs, and cram some of your cut material into that story.
Books like this work best with over-arching themes that tie a lot of the stories together. If you’ve figured out what those themes are, it helps focus your writing on what matters. If you haven’t, it helps to just pound out enough material until you can look back and retroactively impose something on your stories.
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Yeah that’s how Wild started - with her accidentally launching her boot off the side of the mountain. As a reader it felt cheesy. But maybe I’m not the typical reader.
At this point I’m looking at 300k words lol. I’m at 80k words and still in central Mexico. I have absolutely no idea how I could filter down to 80k words. I’m thinking 3 books at this point. But I just need to write everything and then evaluate.
Potential over-arching themes so far:
- learning more than the half-day we spent on all new world pre-Columbian history in in high school (the main one)
- meeting or seeing indigenous people from these cultures still living in the present day
- me getting over anxiety every time I get to a new place
- me being an introvert but still somehow meeting people
- my Spanish getting better over time and that helping me in the climax moment
- me making stupid parking/driving mistakes
- my concern that I’m always perceived as a sex tourist when I’m on my own
- random thoughts about travel (not sure if that’s a theme)
- places getting successively scarier (Mexico->Guatemala->El Salvador->Honduras) - but then supposedly safe Nicaragua being where all the shit goes down
A running joke is should I do this potentially risky thing or not, and my non-existent future grandkids demanding that I not deprive them of this most favorite story (if things go horribly wrong).
There might be some more. I’m trying to keep those in my mind but also let them come out naturally.
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If you wanted to read someone else’s book about travel to a place where you’e never been, which of those narrative arcs would you most want to read about?
#1, #2 and the last one
The stuff about me is tough because I really have no idea if it’s interesting to others or not. But I absolutely love most of the Bill Bryson stuff where he talks about himself. So it’s possible to pull off.
If I had to guess i’d say the stupid parking and driving mistakes would be a hit. I loved the stuff in Wild about her giant backpack and how ridiculously overstuffed it was. But then again Jbrochu didn’t like that part much. So it comes down to personal taste.
Traveler anxiety in a brand new place (and not in some sequestered resort) and getting over it could be a common theme that resonates with people. I haven’t even hit my first real border crossing yet. Those are anxious places. But then again most people don’t drive over those kinds of borders so that might not resonate.
My plan is to run it by a bunch of people when it’s closer to a final draft and ask them to be brutally honest about what worked and what didn’t. When looking to cut down I have sections, but I also have whole running themes I could just yank if they don’t work.
For now I see it as just throwing everything I can think of against the wall. Don’t leave anything out, go back later and figure out what actually works.
I also realized thanks to you that I need a hardcore fact-checking round as well.
If you view the danger in Nicaragua as the climax, then the last thread is definitely the one pulling everything together. There’s something to be said for the juxtaposition of humorous stuff about you, presumably culture clash comedy, with whatever real danger you experienced.
I’d probably try to get through at least Guatemala before I start looking back at what can be cut, but I’d also think about skipping over some of the expository sections and leaving a rough sketch of how you can get in and out of those spots. It sounds like there are a lot of parts where you still have to research to feel comfortable writing about them.
I plan to write the whole thing before looking for cuts. I can’t imagine doing it any other way.
I already have to go back and do the Aztecs and maybe the Olmecs depending on when I link to them.
I just did Mitla and basically paraphrased this cool story (I ordered the book this site quotes from) about how the Zapotecs told the Spanish there was a 100 mile tunnel to the underworld under one of the buildings. Someone went to explore it and got all freaked out, so they supposedly sealed it up forever (possibly by building a church on top of it). This is my goal, to find one cool story like this not found in a dry history textbook, or at least present it in a more “this is incredible” way, like Bryson does.
And now I want to tell the whole Emperor Maximillian story, which is back-fill. So yeah the goal is to keep plowing forward, but write the back-fill expository stuff when I feel ready. As long as I keep cranking out 5k words/week I’ll get there eventually.
The Maya are by far the most ruins I went to, so I really want to give them the most writing - which is going to take a ton of research. I think they’re the most interesting too. There’s still like 6M indigenous Maya - a majority of them still living fairly traditionally. That’s a big untold story for most Westerners imo. Stumbling across a radio station speaking in Mayan was a big eye-opener for me.
I’d like to at least hit one great (usually tragic) story of post-columbian history in each other country. At least with those everyone pretty much knows what happened and you don’t have to filter through a bunch of competing theories.
The way I think of it, if this was a Bryson book - I’d hope to get some quintessential highlight of each country’s pre and post columbian history that illuminates their life before Cortez and current state of affairs. Or something like that. I’m kinda drunk now. The idea is you’re obviously never going to cover everything in a country’s history. But find some tidbit which is a good story and illustrative of the overall historical picture. Or just a good story.
For Mexico it’s more like 3 or 4 cool stories, since it’s so vast and has such a crazy history.
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That was me! Many thanks, and here’s the article:
That will be the first chapter.
The long story short is that literally right after I went there, back in Port-au-Prince the night before I went home, I met some people who were into boating in Haiti who told me there used to be these artificial islands made of various forms of garbage that fishermen live on. So I found them, went to them, using public transport this time rather than hiring a boat, and actually camped on a couple of them. Parts of it were fun and cool, but part of it was quite bad–like a waking nightmare.
Since it’s a book, I’m taking ample fucking time to rant about how awful the situation regarding Haiti is–a condemnation of human society. Haiti as the society of righteousness and justice. America as the society of genocide and oppression. They’re perfect foils; it’s almost poetic. Also dread and existential despair, and lots of other things I don’t have the skill as a writer to express. I sure as shit hope I find a good editor.
re: your last post, I totally get the feeling of border crossings. I love them–they’re so exhilarating. The act of crossing a border on foot is like a middle finger to the idea of the state, and yet paradoxically in doing so you’re walking from the jaws of one state into the jaws of another. BUT as a writer you have to think audience. You could exoticize the experience if you think readers are going to be alienated by it; OR if readers are seasoned travelers they might be like “okay, why so freaking dramatic here?” Appealing to both is tricky.
Similar situation for me: I describe the expat social scene in Port-au-Prince kind of as one would describe the different groups in a high school cafeteria (think like a movie cliche). But my sister read it and was like, um, none of this rings a bell to me. So I need to rethink the writing from the perspective of someone who isn’t familiar with places like that, or P-au-P specifically.
Mexico is tricky. It’s my favorite country in the world to travel in–you and I could probably talk for ages about it. But it doesn’t capture the gringo imagination for some reason. I rant and rave to people about how Monterrey should be a world class outdoors destination, and they go “wait isn’t that in California?” Mexico is a fucking amazing place, unfathomable in its layers and complexity and depth, but conveying it to people is such a challenge. They feel like they already know Mexico because they’ve been eating enchiladas since they were kids and went to the beach there. It’s agony trying to get people to understand.
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That article should be in the New Yorker, or Outside, or Vice, or something. Have you shopped it around aggressively?
Knowing almost nothing about Haiti except the usual “most fucked country in the western hemisphere” stuff, I’m actually surprised they have an ex-pat scene. So you might start from that angle - here’s tons of stuff Haiti has that the typical gringo (or whatever Haitians call gringos) would never expect.
The only other thing I know is my roommate in SF in the late 90s went to Haiti a lot on humanitarian missions. She said they didn’t even have internet cafes yet (which maybe was wrong I dunno). So I’ve always assumed Haiti is dead last to get stuff like that.
I think scenes of human dignity in Haiti would resonate with me. Of normal people just living their lives and trying to do the best they could.
I’m always embarrassed to admit this given I grew up going to schools in the KC school district that were often majority black kids and even spent time with friends in all-black neighborhoods, which seemed fine to me except that I was the only white person. But it literally took seeing Boyz in the Hood in high school for it to dawn on me that even in these crime-ridden hot blocks in Compton, which are usually depicted in movies as just free-for-all animalistic hell holes, there are still normal people just trying to live their lives - fathers trying to raise their sons, high school kids worried about their SATs, etc.
Should I have already grasped this? Absolutely. But for some reason it took that movie to drive it home through my thick skull. Maybe because before that it was movies like New Jack City and a ton of others which only focus on the crime. You just see the barred windows with a light on behind them. You never see the normal people inside.
So anyway what I’m saying is don’t overestimate your audience. Assume they’re completely ignorant like I was. No one has a fucking clue about Haiti in the US. Just start with stories that illustrate the abc basics - here’s what going to the store is like in Haiti. Here’s what school is like. Here are the dining options for normal Haitians. Here’s their sporting diversions. Here’s what it takes to become a doctor in Haiti. Etc. Anything that shows some % of life really isn’t that different from the rest of the world could be a theme.
I’d be more fascinated to read about what life is really like in Haiti than almost any other country. You of all people on this site I’m sure know that phenomenon where you go to a place and have most of your preconceptions about it shattered. Walk the reader through that as it happens to you. Also walk through the preconceptions that turned out to be true.
And of course the trip to that island is the real killer story that makes it a book.
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