Writing a hunting story

Stories, questions, lies about the one that got away....

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looseplucker
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Writing a hunting story

#1 Post by looseplucker » Mon Oct 31, 2011 11:26 am

Gday. For those that don’t know me I am John. For the last couple of years I have been sub-editing to help out Ant and the boys with what I believe to be one of the best hunting magazines I have ever seen (Bowhunter Australia, now called Southpacific Bowhunter). Due to work commitments I have had to step back a bit, so am posting this here in order to help out any aspiring writers and impart some of the things that I picked up along the way.

1. Plan your story.

This sounds easier than it is. But where are you going to begin? What parts are you going to put in or leave out? A heck of a lot can happen on a hunting trip: even an afternoon walk can fill 3000 words. Planning is helped by working out a structure.

2. Work out the structure.
By this I mean dealing with the main items in your yarn. For example, you need an introduction. This can be anything from the alarm going off, the snoring from the tent 20 yards down the hill or even starting at the end of the hunt and then working from there.

3. Body of the story
After the introduction you should have a few points to bring out as regards to what you did. Common ones that work very well are:

(a) Who you are with?
(b) Are you a guest of someone else or are you the organiser?
(c) Have you hunted there before, and if so what were your experiences, what did you learn;
(d) A description of the terrain (but not such as to give away your secret spot);
(e) Your gear – what it is, how you happened to choose it – whether you are taking it out for a blooding, or is it ‘old faithful’.
(f) Becoming aware of the animal you are hunting – a description of the stalk and things that made it hard or easier – wind shifts, light, undergrowth;
(g) Taking the shot.
(h)Whether you hit or missed – this can be anything from seeing a good solid hit and then waiting for your quarry to expire, following a blood trail or the much quicker “b*gger!”
(i)War stories and other lies back at camp.

Note, the above are not exhaustive and are in no particular order, but you will find if you write to a planned structure you will not burn up too many words, you will avoid writer’s block and get a more even flow.

4. Matters of style
(a) Long sentences make for heavy going for a reader. That is the case when working with type across an A4 page. It is harder when dealing with columns. So when you do your draft follow the simple rule that if the sentence goes for more than two lines, it is too long. A lot of spell and grammar checkers tell us if we are too long by saying “fragmented”. Rework your sentence a bit and keep it to two lines. Do not forget colons ( : ) and semi-colons ( ; ).

(b)Apostrophes. A lot is being argued about in relation to the use of the ‘flying tadpole’. Not to put too fine a point on it the schools have not done a good job in how to use it properly. Most usage in the shops is wrong too. Essentially this little chap is used to:

• show ownership or ‘the possessive”. For example: “John’s arrows fly like North Korean missiles”.
• join two words together, usually to describe something: “It is a good day for hunting”, said Kev can become “It’s a good day for hunting”. “How is Fred going?” becomes “How’s Fred going?” Finally “You would be Mick?” becomes “You’d be Mick?”

Most of the incorrect usage of the apostrophe that I rework relates to its use (note no apostrophe in “its”) to pluralise things – i.e. to describe more than one item of the same thing.

The common use here, which you see in record shops and department stores, is “CD’s” and “DVD’s”. Now what is happening there is a rule that crept in from the USA. That rule was that you CAN use an apostrophe to pluralise but only if the meaning would be lost if you did not use an apostrophe. To my mind CDs and DVDs is pretty clear. No need to hang a tadpole up there.

The following is pretty typical: “the billy’s ran down hill” or “The pig’s moved off slowly”. There is (or There's) no need for an apostrophe in either example. First, the plural to describe more than one billy doing something is “billies”. Second, pigs is just, well, pigs, unless you are in an argument about the contents of a hamburger with the lot and you say “pig’s ar$e they don’t have pineapple”.

A good tip is to ask yourself whether you are talking about one critter and something about that critter:

“The billy’s left horn was damaged, which made him unsuitable as a trophy. I saw another mob of goats further off and there were a few billies that were better”.

Enough already. More here about apostrophes for those that give a stuff:

http://velorum.ballarat.edu.au/~iwright/apostrophes/

(c) Technical Jargon. Whatever floats your boat I suppose but bear in mind that your story will get bogged down if you load up your sentences with the make and model of everything. “I drew back and aimed” does the job. Most of us are not paid for product placement but if you want to describe your kit, do it at the front end or the back end.

(d) Repetition in a paragraph. Simple stuff: read the paragraph back and if you’ve made the point, don’t make it again.

(e)Assumed knowledge. Not everyone is as knowledgeable as you. So if hunting exotic beasties overseas you might want to put in brackets after using the common name for the animal what it is (i.e. ‘ type of deer’ – if the species is not obvious from the name).

(f) CAPITALISATION. No strong views here, but whatever you do, be consistent. There is no need to use capitals for billy, boar, doe, stag, buck etc. Capitalisation is appropriate if the animal is named after a person: Thompson’s gazelle, for example.

(g)General style. Just remember that ‘breathless prose’ is not everyone’s cup of tea. One of the best things to do is read widely and see what sort of style might work best for you. For mine if you can write it as if you were spinning the yarn by the campfire then you have it nailed. A few things to avoid:

•“Hunting porn”. This is loosely described as anything that appears you get jollies out of gratuitously killing stuff and seeing blood (remember that once published it is out there for everyone to read);
• Describing you doing anything illegal. ‘Nuff said;
• Anything else that could fairly and objectively (not what the opponents of bowhunting might feel, but one’s peers) be seen as showing bowhunting in a bad light;
• Overreliance on spellcheck. Spellchecker is a good offsider but a poor boss. I remember being very puzzled when Ant sent me a few articles that described some deer as “menial”. I initially had a crazy thought that they were employed in really poor paying jobs. I went on Google and found it a few times on a bunch of sites. I am pretty new to deer hunting so am not up on the jargon. Eventually, after swapping emails it appeared that the word we were after was “menil”. The lesson there is read back over your copy and if the computer does not recognise a word like “menil” just add it to your dictionary: Spellcheckers offer you that option;
• Getting a block. If blocked just go out and have a walk. Turn the words around in your head and then go back inside and write it down – even on a blank document and then paste it in; and finally
• Becoming disheartened. Have fun. Writing is challenging but ultimately it can be very rewarding. There is a very good feeling to be had in seeing your words in a magazine and knowing “I wrote that”.

I have the above done up in a word document so if you want a copy drop me a PM with your email.

Cheers

John
Last edited by looseplucker on Tue Nov 01, 2011 12:16 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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TomMcDonald
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Re: Writing a hunting story

#2 Post by TomMcDonald » Mon Oct 31, 2011 11:44 am

Onya John.
this should go towards presenting 'us' in a better light :)
Tom

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Re: Writing a hunting story

#3 Post by Stickbow Hunter » Mon Oct 31, 2011 11:57 am

Good little article there John. :biggrin:
looseplucker wrote:• Anything else that could fairly and objectively (not what the opponents of bowhunting might feel, but one’s peers) be seen as showing bowhunting in a bad light;
I think this is one of the most important points in the whole article and one of the biggest problems I see with hunting mags and web site stories today!!!

Sadly, IMO, the problem is that a lot of Bowhunters willingly accept unethical behaviour as being normal because such things are written about so much now days. Instead of Bowhunters voicing their concerns about such behaviour they stay silent for fear of being howled down by their peers - very sad and annoying indeed. :roll: :x

Jeff

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Re: Writing a hunting story

#4 Post by looseplucker » Mon Oct 31, 2011 12:38 pm

Thanks Jeff and Tom - although the thing is what is "fairly and objectively". For mine you cannot go past the ethics stuff posted here.

In terms of the opposition to hunting, certainly avoiding the blood, guts and gore would be the best thing, but the opponents will find something wrong with even the most well crafted piece.

What I have always tried to do when working on this magazine (and I subbed large chunks from issue #2 when it was under the former name) is to do what I could to dispel the stereotypes. I believe that Ant and the rest of his team were onto that as well.

Anyhow it was good fun working on the thing - must have subbied about 40 articles at about 1.5hrs average per one. Great way to learn stuff too!

Not that it helped with the rabbits on the W/E. Two shots for two misses - and the arras did nothing particularly North Korean.
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Re: Writing a hunting story

#5 Post by rodlonq » Mon Oct 31, 2011 4:07 pm

Good stuff John, thanks for your thoughtful post.

Cheers......... Rod

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Re: Writing a hunting story

#6 Post by Stickbow Hunter » Mon Oct 31, 2011 5:10 pm

looseplucker wrote:Not that it helped with the rabbits on the W/E. Two shots for two misses - and the arras did nothing particularly North Korean.
Yeah, but wasn't it still so much fun chasing those little blighters. :lol:

Jeff

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Re: Writing a hunting story

#7 Post by hazard » Mon Oct 31, 2011 5:58 pm

Great post John :biggrin:
A good spell check does help if you are as $hit house as me :roll:
loosplucker wrote:. First, the plural to describe more than one billy doing something is “billies”. Second, pigs is just, well, pigs, unless you are in an argument about the contents of a hamburger with the lot and you say “pig’s ar$e they don’t have pineapple”.
I dont believe I got Billb's opinion on the matter at the time :mrgreen:
looseplucker wrote:For mine if you can write it as if you were spinning the yarn by the campfire then you have it nailed.:
Around that particular campfire I must say after that carton you knocked back I didn't see you fuss about too much about punctuation. :shock: :razz:

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