The Rise of the Heroine (ConCarolinas 2012 Writing Panel Notes)

Writing strong female characters can be a challenge, and that was reflected in the lively discussion that took place at this panel. Maybe it’s because Western society, while theoretically equal, is rife with double standards and mixed messages and no, being a girl still isn’t the same as being a boy. The diverse range of women’s issues out there means that these days, the female characters we write don’t go read without eliciting opinion. Here’s the topics and questions that came up at this panel.

NB: Three heroines (Anita Blake, Bella Swan, and Katniss Everdeen) drew a lot of discussion in this panel, and there were no clear-cut answers. Since each of those characters could be the topic of hours of discussion on their own, I’m going to focus on the other points that arose.

The Rise of the Heroine

Authors: Faith Hunter, Misty Massey, William Hatfield, Eliza Gayle, Diana Bastine

(Moderator: Betty Cross)

Question: How many kinds of heroines are there?

Answer: How many kinds of women are there? As many types of heroines as there are women.

Examples of Heroine Types
- Woman warrior
- The Moral Teacher
- The heroine in spite of herself, who carries on in the face of a shocking encounter
- Someone who’s a heroine who rises to the occasion and does what needs to be done (e.g. Luna Lovegood)
- A raging granny (e.g. the woman who survived losing her family to yellow fever, the potato famine, lost her business in the Chicago fire, and then organized the coal miners)
- The reluctant heroine: the one who fights because she has to. The reluctant heroine is one who doesn’t have every resource available, she just has to use what’s at hand to save the world. (e.g. Rosa Parks – she never intended to be the beginning of a movement, but she got sick of the way things were and rose to the occasion)
- The stealth heroine – rises to the occasion as needed, not just contributing, but guiding (without taking over).
- This list is not exhaustive.

The Message
 - Every character sends a message to readers, from Bella Swan to Katniss Everdeen.
- When bodice-rippers were okay, we were teaching that it’s okay to be abused as long as the man falls in love with you.
- Are we raising a generation of women where they think being stalked is sexy? Eg. Edward, Angel, Spike
- Regardless of the message you send, it’s important to be aware of what you’re trying to say.

Common Issues
 - Women are central to a lot of relationship entanglements.
- Avoid making your heroine super, she has to do things wrong, make mistakes.
- Make sure to tone down the hero. If the male romantic lead is too strong, people will think he’s stronger than she is, so it can help to make the heroine look even stronger.
- Also, tone down the heroine so that they’re not super-woman.
- Avoid making your heroine super. She has to do things wrong, make mistakes.

Question: One common character criticism is, “She’s not strong, she’s a bitch.” How do you avoid this criticism? Not every strong woman has to be a bitch. But if you give them flaws they’re suddenly weak. How do you walk that fine line? 
 - Keep the character human. E.g. To increase likeability, find and show weaknesses in the character that demonstrate that she’s human and has a heart.
- This really is a fine line. The heroine can’t be too hard. She can’t be too bitchy or too weak. A good editor can really help.

Examples of great strong heroines
Books:
- The Heinlein Juvies had strong, smart heroines
- Eve Dallas (JD Robb)
- Stephanie Plum (Janet Evanovich)
- Cyllan from Louise Cooper’s Time Master trilogy (Intiate, Outcast, Master)
- Cat Murphy from Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden series 
Television:
- Once Upon a Time (Fantasy): the premise is that they’ve taken fairytale characters and made them function in the real world – and it’s the women rule the game. All the women have different personalities/stakes.
- Babylon 5 (Sci-Fi): Delenn, who transforms herself to help forge peace between the Minbari and humanity

Rewards

Hey everyone. Long time, no see. How's it going?

I've been busy. These past few months, my brain's been focused mostly on finishing revisions to my existing manuscript, and on writing a challenging new urban fantasy piece with an entirely different character. Challenging and complicated and a slightly different genre than I usually work within, but also wonderful and exciting for reasons I don't feel ready to share quite yet.

As my dear departed grandmother was fond of saying, Anyway. Now to the topic at hand. See that chocolate peanut butter heart? The one filled with delicious Reese goodness? Well, I bought that last February. And I told myself that I would reward myself with its delectable yumminess when I finished revisions.

But as I have told others, this manuscript has become another learning piece. I get that we should never stop improving our craft, or assume we know all there is to know, but I still feel like I've come to understand a lot about the craft with this one. I've written and re-written it and passed it through the best beta readers I know. I feel like I've grown even more as a writer. This past year, I've had to take breaks from it, face harsh truths, and force myself to improve even when I thought I was "done". Now I feel ready to indulge in that chocolate heart. Because, as I've told others, I would like to turn the learning piece into a piece I sell, and I finally feel ready to try again.

So. What have I learned?

1. My character's voice is my voice, and trying to force a different voice on her was helping neither of us.

2. The hardest feedback to take is usually the most accurate.

3. Having beta-readers who come from a wide range of backgrounds—published, unpublished, academic, peer, and even those who just like to read—is a real blessing.

4. Online feedback can be wonderful (especially with agreed-upon standards, like track changes), but hands down, nothing beats having an in-person critique partner that you can have a thoughtful discussion with over tea.

5. If you pitch to an agent and get asked to send a partial, they are generally okay with waiting a little bit for you to send the best piece you can instead of sending a rushed submission right away.

Oh, and that Reese’s peanut butter heart? There's some debate in my household as to whether or not it's still good. Chances are, it is. But I have new goals now that tell me that I don't need a slab of chocolate to reward myself.

Tune in Monday, when I take on the most challenging set of notes I've dealt with yet!

Bringing Life to your Characters (ConCarolinas 2012 Writing Panel Notes)

Slow-clap time. Yup, more way-belated notes from ConCarolinas 2012. And yaaay, I'm going to ConCarolinas 2013! I honestly wasn't sure if I could ... but hey. Nothing like being in a car that was rear-ended and finally getting an insurance settlement for it, six months later. Yeah. Sigh. Okay, I got off easy. But I still haven't made it back to sword class ...

So. I've been busy revising-following-agent-requests-at-SIWC, beta-reading (for one must give in order to also receive), and suffering through the latest nasty plague going around. But I survived, just in time for the holidays. At the start of the month, well before I came down with that awful cold, I made new discoveries on how to ensure a smooth tiger butter. I'll be sharing those fun facts shortly. Promise. No, really, I mean it ...

But first, enjoy these notes.

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Bringing Life to Your Characters
Edmund Schubert, James Maxey, Faith Hunter, Terry W. Erwin II,  A.J. Hartley, Teresa Frohock, John G. Hartness
Moderator: David B. Coe
Bringing life to living characters who are alive, creating believable characters

DBC: What is your biggest challenge?
TF: Keeping the focus on the main character, the protagonist
JM: The character has to be constantly learning from their experiences. A lot of that goes into the foundation of any character you create. What was their childhood like? What shaped them as they grew into an adult? What shaped them? Healthy well-adjusted people are not his typical character. His typical character are broken, not necessarily great people.
JH: Information hoarding – not telling the reader what the main charaacters’ dirty little secrets are, except bit by bit (1 or 2 a book). Little pieces here and there, backstory in dribs and drabs.
FH: Outlines her books – the conflict thoroughly. Every *thing*. Just doesn’t know exactly how the characters are going to react to things.
AJ: Middlegrade/YA vs adult; When dealing with younger chars, they don’t have as much backstory, haven’t had time to accumulate baggage; the biggest thing was that there’s such little difference otherwise. RL Stein: “Most things that scare kids are the same that scare adults. People are afraid of the dark, the unknown, things with lots of legs, etc.” Shift in mindset was to stop worrying about it. Easier to just think of them as people he could write. With Macbeth, someone else’s character, he takes his experience in theatre, sees it in theatres and treats it accordingly. Even though these chars are familiar, in some ways they’re blank slates. Took them as his protagonists. Made his characters people.

DBC: What do you look for in a character?
ES: (What does he look for in character)? There are so many things that don’t work. What does work: What makes him want to spend time with a char is  one entertaining and surprising at the same time. Not theatrical, but interesting to be around. By getting to see all the different sides of them. Tries to make the protags dirty as possible while keeping them likable, antagonists who are doing horrible things for the best reasons possible.  Compressing compelling chars into a short story? It’s challenging. So much harder to write great short story. Short stories have to be laser-like in focus. One or two key details to tell the reader what he needs to know. Katniss in The Hunger Games – you get the sense she’s trying to take care of her sister and mother, but she loves her sister so she lets the awful cat stay. Efficient, effective opening In the first 5 pages, worth studying.

DBC: Are there elements to writing comedic vs. serious characters?
JH: What really helps define a character: choice of dialogue. Also background in theatre. Reading dialogue, being able to dial in your dialogue really does help. You set the tone for a char. Has to catch himself when writing the straight guy. Being serious is a challenge. Also steals from the classic tropes of comedy.

DBC (to JM): Did you have a different approach in your superhero books vs. your Dragon Forge books?
JM: Uses a lot of tropes in action. Protagonist has the burden of changing, but the comic relief are tropes. In his action novels he has the character type he’d call the badass. He doesn’t need all of them to have a lot of internal conflict. But can’t wirte a book with just these tpes of chars. Needs someone who’s weak. Someone who’s changes. Also, we want to know what a character’s intentions are. What they want to accomplish.

TF: You don’t always want to insert 21st century attitudes into historical characters.  As much as we’d like to think that we’d do better, she wants them to act and react realistically. She needs to be conscious of their thought processes. “Your story is your character’s emotional growth  Your plot is how you get him there. And all the things that happen to the character will enhance the story and promote that emotional growth.”

DBC: What about point of view?

TE: What’s the best way to tell the story to the reader? Which POV works best? E.g. 1st person – can be useful, can be tricky. The reader learns as the character learns. Still some mystery about that character.

FH: Beast and Jane – first person point of view. Must include all parts of them. The multiple personalities. Editor made sure 2 first person voices are different.  POV is whoever body they’re in. The most important POV is whichever body they’re in.

AJ: ACT OF WILL – First person. DARWEN ARKWRIGHT AND THE PEREGRINE PACT: Third person. In case of Will, when you tell a story in first person the story becomes about the character. Everything’s mediated by the character. Every sense, every impression. Middle grade third person, very limited to just Darwen, you see nothing the character isn’t present for. This is a standard for middle grade right now. Close enough to him that we’re never really outside of his conscious.

DBC: Audience question: Sherlock's not a sympathetic character, but that’s why Watson’s there. What have you done with your non-sympathetic characters?

DBC: Yes, the main character in the Winds of the Forelands wasn’t sympathetic, but his supporting cast was. Hard not just because he was mean, spoiled, and obnoxious, but because these other chars affected him and he grew.

FH: Jane Yellowrock isn’t likeable herself, but she has those around her to love, which makes her easier to like

ES: Even if we don’t like a character, we can respect him.

AJ: Will is not likeable, but he’s charming.

Audience Question: What about characters with Otherness?

JH: You can’t relate to the other, unless you find a way to write the other so they’re something you understand.

JM: Dragons and Vampires can explain themselves, if they can talk, but if your story is about the difficulty of communicating with an alien/other mind,that itself can be a major part of the story.

AJ: Even if it’s just people from a different period, you lose the reader.
DBC: The inscrutability brings terror. But if you want them to have emotions.

Audience Question: Can you write any good heroes anymore, outside of YA, just the good guy who’s a good guy?

AJ: Yes if he’s also crap at a lot of stuff.

TE: Make him relateable. Who tries to do the right thing but doesn’t always succeed. Just keep them human. Not perfect.

ES: Whatever you do, your char must have some flaws, things to overcome. An internal struggle as well as an external struggle.

JH: You can play a paladin, just make him a paladin with a dexterity of 4.

Audience chime-in: Put the character in situations where he can't uphold his moral code.

JH: Torture your characters – half the fun of being a writer (torturing your readers the other half)

DBC (on villains): The degree of which you can make sympathetic villains, and the blending of flawed and good for both characters, is also important. Not just evil for evil’s sake. Every character is the hero of their own story. Even the villains.

Worldbuilding: Maps

Hi everyone! Good news: I finished NaNo early this year. It energized me with a new story that has been aching to be told for years, an urban fantasy that is very different from the YA high fantasy I typically write. So I stuck it in a drawer until I can come back to it with fresh eyes unclouded by the quantity-over-quality madness that cheerfully defines NaNoWriMo. I'll be back later this week with more notes, finally, but yesterday a conversation on worldbuilding at Magical Words led to the discussion of maps, so I thought I'd talk about that first.

I love drawing maps. It's about all I can draw (hence why I consider myself very fortunate to have artist friends who can do better than I when it comes to character sketches). But I love it.

Passions can wax and wane, but I believe this one will always stay with me. Aside from knowing not to put a searing desert beside a frozen tundra (okay, and being able to describe geological features through the eyes of my characters), this has to be the biggest and best use of my Geography degree.

I've been focused so much on revising and writing lately, especially as I prepare Sign of the Star for submission to agents, but it was nice to remind myself of this. I'll be re-drawing the map of Nem soon to fit all of the changes made to the story since it was first created. I can't wait to get started again.

Map drawn for the land of the webcomic The Dementia of Magic by Nicholas Killewald.

Map drawn for a now-defunct roleplaying game, Lycoria, at Speculative Vision.

Original map of the part of the world where Sign of the Star takes place. I'll be revising this soon.

Map of Takara, a world that hope to one day come back to, but not for some time, because I want to do its stories justice when I do.

Sketch-map for a friend for an abandoned project of his. I like drawing contour lines, can you tell?

So, yeah. Maps are fun. *grins* Back with those previously-promised notes later this week!

Pacing: Keeping the Action Going (SIWC 2012 Notes)

 Aaaand we're back with the first set of notes from SIWC 2012.

Which was awesome, by the way. I took a different approach this time around; rather than just attending panels, I remembered why I was really there, and so I took some more time to focus on pitching. What I said last post still holds true: I need to focus on sending my manuscript out. So I don't have *as* many notes to share this time around, and I'm okay with that.

The first set comes from a request I received from another attendee of the panel, who had to duck out to pitch his own novel. Could I send him my notes? I had to clean up these notes before sending them, so I thought it would be a great kick in the pants to get me to post them, too.

This class actually took place on the Sunday, the last day of the conference, but I love the subject matter. I found it very useful. Pacing is one of those things I know intuitively, but can't put into words very easily. And the tips here are great for doing what Donald Maass recommends, "Increase tension!"

* * *   Pacing: Keeping the Action Going  Boyd Morrison

A great rollercoaster ride is as much about the buildup of suspension as it is about the thrills. You want to know what’s going to happen next to the characters.

Suspense can be used in *any* type of fiction.

First rule: There are no rules.
-   Writing is subjective. You may hate the book I love, you may love a book I can’t stand, and that’s okay.
-   Everybody has a different writing style and method.
-   But when you’re doing something that many others caution against doing, be sure you know why, and make sure it’s for the right reasons. (And make sure you do it well!)
-   Take all pronoucncements you hear in a writing seminar with a grain of salt (e.g. “You must never outline” vs. “You must always outline”. Think about them critically and decide whether the guidance works for you. Will that criticism make the story better, or is something important to the story you’re telling?

Storytelling
-    Think about how you tell a story verbally to someone you know – imagine the reader yawning, rolling their eyes, looking art their watch. Anything that would make you do these things, leave it out.
-    Elmore Leonard: “try to eave out the parts that readers tend to skip”
-    Exclamation points not necessary unless a character is shouting. Esp not in narrative. The words should convey the excitement of the action.
-    Everything in the book should advance the plot. By knowing where you are (describing settings), who the characters are (show how characters react and the reader will get what kind of person they are), and by conjuring mystery about what will happen next.  

What does “Fast Paced” mean?
-    It’s about rhythm and momentum. Building momentum as the story goes.
-    A thriller should be like a roller coaster: Build-up of suspense going up the first the first hill. The release and exhilaration fot ehfall. In a novel, the biggest hill should be the end of the ride.
-    Give breathing room after an action scene. Allow the reader to build up adrenaline stores for the next action scene. Without the quiet scenes between the action scenes, it will be too much. Pull back and catch up – how does the action change the characters, change the plot, what do you need to know for the next action scene? Eg. in the video game Halo – the music gets fast-paced until the last bad guy is killed, then the music slows down. When he writes, he listens to movie soundtracks for this very reason. (Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Inception)
-    Vary the sentence structure of writing depending on the type of scene. Shorter sentences and paragraphs speed up the pace. Your eye flows down the page very quickly. You have the sense that you don’t have time for long sentences. They're trying to not get killed! They don’t have time to look at the pretty scenery. Long descriptions will seem inappropriate in a gun fight.

In media res
-    In media res: In the middle of things.
-    Start the story already in progress. Begin by presenting a scenario that invites questions from the reader.
-    Start from character. A sentence that doesn’t orient you to character doesn’t drive the reader.
-    Don’t begin with backstory, character descript, weather, or scene setting. Start with evoking a question.
-    Dreams of waking up in bed are cliché. If you have them wake up, it has to be in a very weird situation. Unless it’s unique, it will be rejected. And dreams? You’re cheating the reader by giving them a sense that something didn’t really happen.
-    Explain things later. Keep questions in readers mind.
-    A prologue is fine as long as it directly affects the story that follows. Sometimes if the rest of the book answers what happened in the prologue, then it can work. But if it doesn’t relate to the rest of the bk, then it shouldn’t be there.
-    Kurt Vonnegut: “Start as close to the end as possible.” The latest you can start the story and still make it work.

Suspense
-    Setting the rules. The reader should understand what’s at stake, who the players are, and what the consequences of the action will be. Suspense results from the reader understanding and caring about what happens to the characters. What are the consequences of the character not succeeding? Explain the rules to the reader. And give your readers a reason to care about the character. “To make them immediately sympathetic, make them kind to a puppy or kitten” You also want the reader to feel relief when the villain is defeated.
-    Alfred Hitchcock’s theory of suspense: Surprise is when a bomb blows up in a restaurant; suspense is knowing the ticking bomb is under the table when the character sits down for dinner. Surpise is shocking and the aftermath is tragic, but suspense does so much more.
-    Seed your resolutions from the beginning. If your character offs the villain with a drill, don’t introduce it in the paragraph before. Find a place in the book with enough distance so that the reader forgets about it, but still thinks it’s clever when it’s ultimatey used. If you show a gun on the mantle in the first act, you gotta use it by the third act.

Coincidence
-    Coincidence can kick off a story; believability is the key.
-    Don’t use coincidence ot make things better for the protagonist. It’s a cheat, and readers will call you on it. Too convenient. Eg. rain when the house is on fire. If the gunman’s shot goes awry because the sun got in his eyes, it can’t be because the clouds suddenly parted; but it *is* okay if the protagonist used a hidden mirror to shine the sun in his eyes. But the mirror has to be there for a believable reason, too. You have to put a lot of thought into making the plots work. Not just because it’s convenient.
-    Coincidence can make things worse for the protagonist – just don’t overuse it. Don’t have floods, tornadoes, Acts of God, and bad luck making things worse for the hero. Have the villain make things worse.

Cliffhangers
-    Have them at the end of every chapter; it's a page-turning factor.
-    Avoid direct foreshadowing. “Lttle did he know, but he had less than five minutes to live”. Be subtle. Don’t clobber the reader over the head with things. Use only info the character would know.
-    Pose a new question to the reader. Doesn’t have to be life or deah; should pertain to plot or character, pref both. A new discovery.
-    Don’t save a character’s life at the end of a chapter. Unless it unveils a new mystery or plot problem. And don’t save the life in the first sentence of the next chapter. We know readers will skip forward. Even better, switch to a different scene, something totally different.
-    Try to end chapters on a strong note, particularly the last sentence or even last word. Especially viscerals.

Enter late, leave early
-    The “Law and Order” technique
-    Void showing mundane activities: opening doors, driving directions, etc. Just enough to make the reader understand what’s happening. Unless it’s germane to the plot. If it’s important.
-    Skip traveling scenes. Have characters teleport to the next place. Unless exposition or curuicial events happen during the travel.
-    Skip all the stuff we know happens: Sleeping, eating, bathroom breaks, and any other normal routine. Unless it’s important, leave it out! If it’s not routine, include it, but only if it relates to the plot.
-    Flash forward to the next part of the story that’s important. Summarize anything pertinent that happens in between. But don't have whole chapters about it.

Research
-    Only include 10% of the research you do.
-    Don’t info-dump. Dole it out a little at a time.
-    Don’t have a character explaining something another character should already know. E.g. “As you know, Dr. Tindale, the liver produces enzymes critical to…” – Include a character who’s new to the situation or isn’t a subject matter expert. Explaining jargon doesn’t work unless that new character’s there, to make it as simple as possible to understand.
-    Long exposition and paragraphs slow stories to a crawl. Limit those, and try to put as much of that in dialogue as you can.
-    Leaning things is fun for readers, but balance it with story.

Dialogue
-    White space makes for a fast read. When people talk about a page turner, they mean that literally, because there’s a lot of dialogue and it
-    Use dialogue tags sparingly. But don’t confuse the reader about who is talking. Try to crate the characters such that you could tell who’s speaking just by their style, grammar, and syntax
-    Avoid spelling out a drawl or patois – usually it’s confusing or distractiogn. Can be conveyed by word choices. Eg “Alabama Accent”. And a Southern person uses colloquialisms.
-    Avoid dialogue tags other than “Said” and LEAVE OUT ADVERBS modifying “said”. You can use other words sometimes, especially when it’s odd – e.g. “I’m going to kill you,” she whispered.
-    Avoid monologue-ing. Can put conflict and interjections into that. Long blocks of dialogue are daunting to a reader. Short sentences work. Unless the villain has an agenda for the monologue.

Stakes
-    Give the protagionist a high personal stake in the outcome. James Bond saving the country is okay, but in Casino Royale, he has a stake in the girl – and isn't just doing this because it’s his job. The best thillers have that personal reason, sometimes internal (eg a sense of justice because the hero’s family was killed and he doesn’t want other families killed; a characters being depending on how he solves a case)
-    Life or death stakes are reliably gripping. But the reader has to care about the people who live or die. Without them feeling that stake, they don’t care. We can’t imagine ourselves as a hundred thousand people dying in a nearthquake, but
-    The stakes should get progressively higher as the novel develops. Gets worse as the story goes on, more personal. Two steps forward, one step back. Apply frustration and conflict. They’re not fun inreal life, but they’re essential in storytelling. You don’t want to make it easy for your protagonist!

Obstacles
-    Make it unlikely for your protagonist to survive or whin. Overwhelimg odds against achieving goasl. The protagonist’s flaw simede progress.
-    Make your villain better than your protagonist in some ways. But give your villain flaws, some wof which he may not even not think are flaws. They may see them as advantages, even. (e.g. superconfidence – the theory they’ll awyas be right, something your protagonist can take advantage of to succeed.) Why are the henchmen willing to throw away their lives?
-    Don’t make the obstacles occur by random chance. (e.g. a tornado randomly wiping out evidence).
-    Use obstacles to raise the stakes. One flows from another.

The Ticking Clock
-    Add  a ticking clock, then shorten it.
-    Countdowns can be extremely tense.
-    Remind the reader of the timeline on a regular basis. But don’t hammer it down the reader's throat; work it in naturally.
-    Orient the reader in time. Can be difficult in international thrillers with characters in multiple time zones. Try to make it natural. If one scene is happening in Vanouver and another in London, there’s a 9 hr time difference. Don’t make the reader waste time doing calculations.
-    Keep track of the time.
-    Make sure there’s enough time for the events and action. Can all the things happen in that time period? Have beta-readers double check.

Action Scenes
-    Don’t pause in the middle of the action. If someone’s shooting at you, you don’t think back to your childhood. You’re trying to figure out how not to die.
-    Details, however, can seem more pronounced or intense. Memories of intense or traumatic events can be triggered by odors, so don’t forget the sense of smell, in addition to sight, sound, feel (texture of ground?), even taste (the bile at the back of your throat or the gunpowder residue landing on your tongue). Not just sight and sound.
-    Make the action plausible. Make sure someone can’t keep shooting because they’re out of bullets. Factor in number of bullets and time to reload. Can build that into the suspense of the scene.
-    Describe the setting beforehand so that the reader doesn’t get lost. So that it doesn’t need to be described during the action scene. Lay out in detail so it can be referenced when needed. Otherwise
-    GET THE GUN INFO RIGHT. Readers hate it when you get it wrong. But does your character know about the gun? It’s more plausible if they don’t know, and you don’t describe it directly.
-    Sometimes shock is fine.

Flashbacks and Dreams
-    Use flashbacks with caution.
-    Like prologues, they should be directly linked to the sotry.
-    Keep them short.
-    If you use dreams to foreshadow, don’t be heavy-handed with theme. Also, DON’T start a novel with a dream; it deceives the reader, who won’t trust you after that (Inception is a good example of an exception done well)

Switching POV
-    When writing in third-person multi POV, change POV from chapter to chapter
-    Works especially well when thera re two related but separate plot threads going simultaneously.
-    BUT don’t switch within a scene – called “”Head-hopping” and can be confusing to a reader. Takes reader out of story.
-    Try to limit POVs to only three or four main characters. You can add in minor characters’ POV, but do it sparingly.

The Payoff
-    Don’t rush it. This is what readers have spent 400 pages waiting to see.
-    No deus ex machina – the protagonist cannot be rescued, the protagonist has to use resourcefulness, skill, stamina, or willpower to defeart the enemy. That’s satisfying to the reader.
-    Make the villain get an appropriate comeuppance. Make sure they know they didn’t succeed before they die.
-    Answer all the big questions and resolve all the plot threads.
-    Leave the reader wanting more.

Donald Maass uses lots of thriller novels for examples in Writing the Breakout Novel; Writers Digest has a lot of books, too; How to Write a Damned Good Thriller.

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More notes to follow; in the meantime, you know what month this is, folks. NaNoWriMo! 'Scuze me while I go write 50K. ^__^

The Case of the Mystery iPod

This is just a quick note to say that yes, I am well aware that I haven't updated my blog in weeks.  Mostly, this is because I have been revising like mad because hey, SIWC 2012 starts on Thursday. (Okay, and I paused for a breather, and I have another WIP that I'veplotted in earnest in preparation for NaNoWriMo. But mostly the revising thing.) To be perfectly honest, as someone not much published yet, I think my focus needs to be on my work, and this blog is fun, but it can wait right now. There's a novel to be polished.

I still have ConCarolinas 2012 notes.

This is going to be the running joke, isn't it?

Regardless, I still think the notes are worth sharing. One of the nice things about my belatedness is that it often brings back fond memories of SIWC and ConCarolinas long after the fact.

So I'll be back soon with notes from both ConCarolinas and SIWC, but no promises as to when.

In the meantime: here's an interesting writing prompt for you.

See that beat-up iPod in the photo? The college where I work had a garage sale on Wednesday. Some of the things sold include items turned into Security but not claimed after a year. I scored that for five bucks. People were dubious about whether it would work, especially since the top panel (not pictured) is missing. But I took it home, plugged it into an i-charger (yay ubiquity) and sure enough, it works just fine

Sure, I could wipe it and use it as a spare, but I don't need a spare, not right now. But here's the thing: it still had all of the former owner's music loaded onto it.

What is that music? What does it tell me about the original owner?

This sort of thing definitely gets my creative juices flowing. Tell me, what do you think? Who was this guy or girl? What sort of playlist was it? What if the person I assume it is by profiling the playlist is nothing like I think?

Have fun, kids. See you on the other side of SIWC 2012.

In the meantime, it should be noted, however belatedly, that Charlie Holmberg was kind enough to interview me for the "Someday Stars" feature of her blog at the end of August. Want to know what I'm up to? There you go. The only update to that is these revisions I'm working on, when in the interview I state that SotS is complete. I am so grateful for my beta-readers, who it must be noted are *awesome*.

I Believe in Magic (ConCarolinas 2012 Writing Panel Notes)

So about those ConCarolinas notes.

Ever experience a dramatic event that throws you off your game? Well, this is what happened to me. Look at the picture above. See that shiny glob of gold splotched onto the RAM? I knew my laptop had an overheating problem. I just hadn't realied how bad it was until it imploded. I joked with friends that my computer had a meltdown, and I thought it was hyperbole. Then my friend Drekian was over at my place for a write-in and killed time waiting for the others to arrive. So he took apart the dead laptop for fun. Turns out, it actually melted down.

Anyway, everything's good again. The universe was nice to me; the night it stopped working, I found an amazing deal at Best Buy to replace the poor pile of sludge. All is well again. I've let it interrupt my blogging rhythm. But now, I'm ready to get back to work!

So without further adieu, here's more notes; and what could be more fitting after all that technology stuff than for us to talk about magic?

* * *

I Believe in Magic

Betty Cross, Faith Hunter, Kalayna Price, Rachel A. Aaron 

Moderator: Stuart Jaffe

There’s a wide-spectrum of what you can do with magic. From Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn saga (magic is created by ingesting certain bits of metal for certain effects) to [missed example] (“Magic is anything we say”).

Tell us about your magical systems.
-     BC: Falls closer to Brandon Sanderson. Finds amature writers make magical powers unlimited, with lots of Deus ex machina. Superman has to have Kryptonite.
-    FH: Has written two magical systems. Rogue Mage – learning how to use raw energy with the abilities each mage is born with. It’s a gift they have to learn themselves, like a  child teaching themselves to walk. The limits: if you don’t learn it and you overuse it, you explode. Jane Yellowrock – she’s a Skinwalker, which is learned. Jane has the skill but was only taught a bit before losing her teacher. Her new work involves a pre-set system ahead of time. Some people come up with their magical systems first. She does a lot of figuring out how her magic works as she goes.
-    KP: Two different magic systems – Does worldubilding and character-creating at the same time, because the society will determine how the magic is used. Haven: Magic is underground. Grave Witch: everyone knows about magic.
-    RA: Creates magical systems for fun. Her spirit world – everything has a spirit, have to work with those spirits
-    SJ: Difference between external and internal magic. In his world, most of the knowledge is lost. Characters are discovering their powers with the reader.

How much do you find you have to reveal about the magic system?
-    RA: Plots an info map of who knows what. Plotting how much to reveal, misunderstandings about magic, stopping to think about how you reveal the information, means you can do amazing things with tension, who knows what.
-    KP: Establishing what the magic is very quickly is very important, but establishing the full parameters goes through the book. But make rules and *stick* with them. Unless you have a very sound plot reason that changes things, that is plausible.
-    FH: No rules for Rogue Mage, until she made the roleplaying game. Has had to make rules for that. Has learned to create systems and write stories based on that. Likes the revelatory process of discovering the magic as she goes. Plots out a lot of her books, big outlines, so discovering the magic is fun, but then she sticks by the rules.
-    BC: Big on having limits on her magic. Characters explain magic by reference to other magic.

Do you create a bible, a document to make sure you stick to your rules?
-   RA: Stays true to the spirit of the law rather than the letter of the law. Based on a fundamental understanding of the system.
-    FH & KP: create bibles.
-    SJ: Only one rule: if it works, it works.
-    KP: Readers will only suspend disbelief so far
-    RA: If you break a rule, you have to have a good reason.

Creating magic based on myths and folklore:
-    KP: Has twisted bits of folklore based on what her books need
-    SJ: Example: Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Mists of Avalon – blends myth and magic
-    FH: Skinwalker – lots of research into pre-Christian, NA tribal version of skinwalkers.
-    RA: Important to remember, you’re not chained to the folklore. It’s your book.

What about weird stuff for the sake of weird stuff?
-    There is an audience (e.g. China Meiville)
-    SJ: We’re coming out of the 80s and 90s with big thick trilogies, medieval fantasy was really selling, that seemed to be canon. That’s no longer the case.

And what about stepping on the toes, borrowing/stealing other magical systems?
-    BC: It’s okay. Writers do it all the time.
-    FH: With enough twists that a creative mind can put into their own work, don’t worry. Make changes. You can give a plot line or magical system to ten different writers and they’ll go ten different ways.
-    SJ: Everyone’s coming up with new takes. Look at how many different takes there are on vampires.

Can you draw from real magical systems?
 -    Sure, those are great sources for inspirations. E.g. Voodoo, paganism, high magic,
-    KP: If you’re going to use beliefs currently in practice, be respectful.
-    BC: Can be very subtle about it. E.g has system based on Kabbalah

Can you combine sex and magic?
-    FH: No limits for the genre. Fantasy as a genre can become erotica very easily. Depends on what you want to write. Kushiel is very mainstream. But other books can be powerful, terrifying, and off-putting. LKH does it well, even though she’s changed. Do it well, you can stay mainstream; don’t do it well and you can fall into a different group. Sex must forward the plot, not just be titillation.  Otherwise it’s erotica.

Other things to keep in mind: 
-    KP: You can explain less if you can assume the reader is well-versed in a similar magic system.
-    Good to have the good guys screw up. Magic can be a source of humour, be funny.
-    Remember to think of the consequences. You MUST build consequences into your magical system. The magic shapes the story. So the consequences are an integral part. That’s an integral part of the conflict.
-    Any magical system can be used for good. Even necromancy. Any magic can be used any way you want, it just depends on how you build your system.

The Next Step (ConCarolinas 2012 Writing Panel Notes)

 

Here's a look at what we should be doing once we've finished writing a novel.

* * *

The Next Step

Authors: John G. Harness, Misty Massey, Terry W. Ervin II, Edmund Schubert, Gray Rinehart 

Moderator: David B. Coe

So you’ve finished your book … what now?
- This is assuming that you’ve already sent it to beta-readers and edited it.
- Having a good beta group geared towards publishing really really helps.

As the author, what should we be doing?
- TE: Get the novel best you can, research markets, check guidelines to see if it’ll be a good fit; write other stuff while waiting on response. You can always read the guidelines of the publisher but also read what they’re publishing. Know what you’re going for. Check the bookshelves in the library and the bookstores.
- MM: Start the 2nd book right away because if you sit and wait and stare at your e-mail, you’re just wasting time. These books don’t write themselves. Keep moving, keep writing. Novels. Short stories. Work on *something*. Momentum is hard to regain once you let it die.

- JH: Took the self-publishing route after trial and error. When he finished his first novel, he tried the “submit to agents” route, then realized he had no idea how to craft a query letter or who to submit to. Spent a year submitting poetry and lit fiction to small presses. Learned the process. Didn’t make much money. Self-published first, and then started learning by fire the self-publishing route. Went through self-publishing process on a much smaller scale, then realized he couldn’t categorize his first novel. So he hired an editor, formatted and reformatted the book for print and e-publishing. Was not an immediate success. Now he has a publisher for his books.

For the editors in the panel, did their experience change anything?

- GR: No, because he started as an author. Started making all the mistakes generally made on the writer’s side. Didn’t have experience to draw some. Didn’t have beta-readers; that was a big mistake. Did Orson Scott Card’s boot camp. Started writing short stories when he was really young. Gave up for a little while, and came back to it later. DON’T give it up, or you’ll have to re-learn. Wrote a few more short stories then went to the novel.
- ES: Also was a writer first; also did Orson Scott Card’s boot camp. Realized he had so much to do. His beta group was great but everyone was interested but not experienced. He wrote novels before transitioning to short stories. Turned to short stories to learn his craft. Then went back to the novel feeling more competent.

Should we be writing shorrt fiction first?
- JH: Wrote a lot of articles for the poker industry. Didn’t write short fiction until he started self-pubbing novels and needed something to fill in the holes between self-pubbing his novels. Quick turnaround time. Quit his day job.
- MM: Writing a short story is easy. Started writing short stories. Also, instant gratification from short stories. Novels take a bit longer. FH encouraged her to write novel-length.
- TE: Short stories are great, but writing fantasy/sci-fi shorts is a challenge because you also have world-building, too.
- ES: It is possible to write a novel full of short stories – a cluster of standalone short stories that has an overarching arc or links, but would take more time and effort to write this than to write a novel.
- DBC: Still, this isn’t something he’d recommend to beginners.

About queries:

- ES: Query-writing is a science. Getting a rejection doesn’t mean that your book sucks, it means that your query letter sucks.

About agents:

- Most authors agreed that it was important to find an agent first, but only one had an agent at the time of this panel.

- Publishing is a hurry-up-and-wait game.

- One author went though a small publisher.

- One author: Had an agent who sold the author's first book. Signed with that agent because the agent had the connections in New York. You need someone enthusiastic who’ll believe in your work. But then as time went on, the author realized the agent wasn’t doing much to help, and didn’t even look at the second book before passing it onto the publisher. The author currently looking for a new agent.

About editors:

- DBC: Editors can be friends. The average writer will go through several editor relationships. An agent author relationship is a marriage. Ending it is like a divorce. The relationship is complex; there should be rapport. There should be support. They should be there for you.

How long does it take to publish a book?
- JH: finishes a novel-length Jan 1, hired a good freelance editor. Sent it off. Gets it back from editors and proofreaders by the end of February. Meanwhile has consulted with cover artists. By March 1 is ready to sell/upload. Meanwhile sold the contracts to re-release older works to small pub last August, and the books should be ready to go this August.
- DBC: Handed in Thieftaker on time Feb 1, 2010, will be published July 3rd, 2012. And it didn’t need that much rewriting. Tor is notoriously slow. Editor is glacially slow in the context of Tor editors.
- GR: The process of creating cover art, releasing arcs for review, is 6 months to a year. Publishing schedule is 18 months to 2 yrs. Lots of BAEN authors are very prolific. As far as what you can expect, if you submit a novel today, you’ll get a response in nine months. Don’t expect exclusivity. Appreciates being notified if the novel has been picked up elsewhere. If he likes the start of the book and sets it aside, it’ll take much more time for him to look at. Then if he really likes it he’ll submit it to his boss (chief editor), and then that will take more time.
- ES: Remember, there are a lot of little steps in the process. You want the publisher sending out review copies. The reviewers want the books 3-4 times prior to being published, too, and you want it reviewed, because good reviews drive sales.
- DBC: Got blurbs by sending out manuscript to authors, which adds a few more months (but this is also very important)
- TE: Smaller press means smaller pub schedule. Depends on blurbs, reviews, etc.
- JH: There are many of self-published authors who sell tons of copies.

Social media before submitting?
- DBC: Social media is a great way to market a book that is already most of the way through the publishing process. But it takes up more time that you should spend revising a novel, and you should focus your energy on writing.

Kidnapping Your Muse (ConCarolinas 2012 Writing Panel Notes)

Back again, finally. Sorry for the delay, folks. Canada Day fell on a Sunday, so our statutory holiday was Monday ... and, well, not much sleep was had that night. Let alone posting. My rhythm, it was interrupted.

This next panel, "Kidnapping Your Muse", was technically called "Part One", but I never did make it to Part Two (which featured different authors). But this was pretty good. It was about writer's block (if you so choose to acknowlege it), overcoming simply being stuck, and how to keep the inspiration flowing.The responses were very insightful into process!

Again we had a round-table sort of discussion going, so here's what I transcribed.

* * *

Authors: David B. Coe, Crymsyn Hart, Misty Massey, Allen Wold, Faith Hunter 

Moderator: A.J. Hartley

AW – Does writers workshops, teaches

MM – Fantasy writer, Mad Kestrel, pirate magic adventure, on the Magical Words team, MW book

FH – Jane Yellowrock series, on the Magical Words team

DBC – Now also writing as D.B. Jackson – Thieftaker, on the Magical Words team

CH – Paranormal erotic e-romance

What to do when the book we’re writing doesn’t want to be written – inspiration, and more specifically, what to do when it dries up

What do you think about Writer's Block?
 

AW – gets blocked when his story takes a left hand turn and goes off in the wrong direction, that can be discouraging – when he lets a character down, when he pushes them down a wrong path or make a wrong decision rather than what they want to do – that’s why he’s often stopped writing. So he has to go back and find that place and where he’s supposed to go and then he can continue with the story.

MM – hates the term writer’s block. Two types – 1. The temporary, where she’s stuck at the computer and the words aren’t flowing – gets up and moves, walks around her house; dances; that; 2. Emotional issues in her real life that stand in the way of her being creative – she calls friends and seeks solace, or turns to something completely different from what she’s working on, for forward motion.

FH – Instead of not allowing a character enough freedom, she gives the character too much freedom and they do something stupid. Has to back off, put the words elsewhere, and make the character do what she promised to do in the outline. Also, can’t write when house is dirty; has to houseclean to get work done

DBC – Doesn’t believe writer’s block exists – that term presupposes writing is easy, is supposed to flow, everything should go smoothly from beginning to end – Writing is hard. There are fits and starts and stumbles. That’s writing. This is a hard process. Block is just the wrong word for it.

FH – It’s a creative process.

CH – When creative process stops or dayjob gets in the way, characters are screaming in the air to write them, there’s a spot she gets to that she has to write

AJ – Writing time is circumscribed. Very specific deadlines. Has to produce x words consistently in places to get it done. He’s not blocked, but he’s bored sometimes by sitting in the same place, etc. Has to get re-excited about the book again. Something about the term writer’s block  - it’s a legitimizing excuse for not working.

AW - It’s about not being able to move forward for some reason. There are several different varieties of reasons – You must be able to identify it and then you’ll get unstuck.

Outlining?

FH – does not deviate from outline. If she leaves outline, it gives her trouble. (She only outlines plot points, not how the character feels or reacts).

MM  - Used to be a pantser, let narrative carry her along – tried outlining and is now completely committed. If she’s not sure where to go, she looks at outline. She’ll occasionally deviate if it turns out in the narrative that it’s not a really good idea – She outlines the events, not the reactions.

AW – every book is different. Has written with and without outlines. "Outline" is like “block”; it means different things to different people. The more detailed, the less he can write.

AJ – Outline not written in stone – tells story as he imagines it at the start – discovers things about characters as he goes along – it’s a balance. He may not need the outline in the end, but it gives him faith that there is a story to be told that he can get to the end of. Occasionally he glances down to make sure it still working.

CH – Is a pantser. She just keeps going. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, and she writes something different.

DBC – Writing a 15 pg outline would be death. Each chapter gets 2 sentences. This is his creative process. It's like a bottle of soda – every time he opens it to talk about it, to outline it , it goes flat. He is sparing in what he does in prepping because that release of energy is his creative process. He re-outlines as he goes along if he needs to.

AJ – Does write a 15 page outline – very loose, and he writes from character perspective so that it reads like  a short story with lots of emotional colour with lots of specifics that are missing. He knows what has to happen in the next 70 pgs, but doesn’t know how it’s going to happen.

Outlines with novels vs. short sotries?

DBC, AW: don’t outline their short stories. The outline is the objective the character is trying to accomplish, whether he gets it or not. DBJ has no idea what’s going to happen, how it’s going to end. Writes with faith, treats it like an adventure. The characters tell him. Misty: outlines short stories. On paper.

AJ: However much outline he does, there will always be a point where he has to create a document, “What the hell is this book about”. What the core of the story is about. What the narrative arc is. This is after writing the story, though.

CH – Doesn’t outline anything, writes the outline in her head and not on paper.

Does the quality change whether you struggle in real life or don’t?

CH – Where your mind is is a big thing.

AJ – They tend to go together.. A miserable day in real life or writing is a miserable day. They're not separate. Writer's block is a sign that he’s lost faith in a story.

When you have a bad day, do you find refuge in your writing to turn your day around?

FH – Sometimes.

AW – If he has a bad day, he can’t write. Except when he gets a very very very nasty rejection.

MM – Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

FH – Writes well when upset if she can find a way to channel that energy.

What's one thing you do when you’re stuck that works for you?

FH: (You mean, other than drinking?)

DBC: Opens a separate file, talks about where the story needs to go. Also goes back and reads what he has so far (even if it’s the whole book), and takes notes.

AJ: Sometimes the act of re-reading gives you faith that it works.

CH: Steps away from the book.

AW: Goes back and sees where he made the mistake. If you can’t get much done, it’s time to stop and go back. 

MM: Moves – dances (exercises). Easiest way to jumpstart her brain. Stops reading what she is writing and looks at something else.

FH – Outlines in a web outline, starting with the main point in the centre, to try to pinpoint what's not working.

AJ – Walks, any time he runs into a part where he’s bored, struggling , or stuck. Doesn’t run. Energizes his body but keeps his brain free. Imagines conversations – the act often helps get the issue figured out.

MM – Does her best dancing when she stops talking to herself. It’s about disengaging the brain. Can think about writing because her body is doing stuff.

DBC – Can’t walk away. When faced with that thing that isn’t working, he pounds away at it until he figures it out.

AW – Ideas come clear to him when he first wakes up, because all of the critical aspects of thinking are eliminated.

AJ – Wrote a problem on a piece of paper and stuck it under his pillow before bed. It worked. Because he was aware of it.

Do you ever have moments of doubt even after completion of the novel?

  

DBC – Every novel at 60%, he has a serious crisis of faith. Everything sucks. Then he gets over it.

AJ – Neil Gaiman's 3 things : “Produce good work, on time, and be nice and easy to work with. If you have two of those, you can get away with the third.”

MM – Yes, we doubt. The night before her book came out, she thought of better ending.

AW – There’s always another book, another story to tell.

 

Can you read fiction when you’re writing fiction?

AW – No.

MM – Yes, reads all the time. Tries to save it for bedtime, like a treat for having written. Everybody’s different, though.

AJ – Yes, but things that are different from what he’s writing

DBC: Didn’t used read what he is writing, because he was afraid of similar voices creeping into his head. But at this point he does and he’s glad, and it took him awhile to be comforatable enough with his own writing.

CH: Doesn’t read romance because that’s what she writes.

If you’ve built your world for your novels, do you therefore stop reading in that genre to avoid lifiting ideas?

AJ – Yes, so he doesn’t subconsciously.