Savvy Saturday – Worldbuilding at the Next Level

Reviews and Exemplars, Writing Tips

I’m at an academic conference this weekend, so this week’s blog post will be a bit different. In it, I want to share something amazing that I recently discovered about the writing of one of my favorite modern fantasy authors, Brandon Sanderson.

Brandon Sanderon’s key differentiation feature – his personal brand, as we would say in marketing – is that he is an amazing worldbuilder. Yes, he tells good stories with realistic characters. Yes, he is funny and clean in his writing. But what really sets him apart is the logical, consistent, intricate way in which everything in a world fits together and makes sense, even when a world is entirely Other than the world we see around us. Good worldbuilders tend to incorporate worldbuilding at three levels.

First, authors can create a world for a single set of characters, tell a story about that world with those characters, and move on. A good example is Eddings’ Belgariad and Mallorean. The world of these stories is rich and complex, and focuses on one set of characters and their story. When the authors want to move on, then, they create an entirely different world with entirely different characters.

Second, authors can create a world for multiple, related sets of characters. This option allows an author to reuse settings, cultures, refer to events that have already taken place, and draw readers back into a familiar world with fresh characters and situations. A good example is Tamora Pierce’s Protector of the Small series, which takes place a few years after the events of her Alanna series in the same magical kingdom of Tortall. The events of the Alanna books set in motion the events of the next series, and the protagonist of the second series occasionally interacts with the protagonist of the first, but the stories themselves are about different events and characters. Similarly, Brian Jacques’ Redwall series follows this model, with over ten books set in the same Redwall Abbey and Mossflower Woods, though with very few overlapping characters.

Third, authors can create a world for multiple, unrelated sets of characters. This option allows for a larger meta-story to evolve, as one series about one set of characters in one kingdom then gives way to a different series set on the other side of the world that might be influenced by the events of the first series, or may have only heard about the other kingdom as a distant rumor of a far-off place. Future books might bring individuals from the kingdoms together, or drive them to war, or they might remain wholly separate, but the world remains constant. Also in this category are series that take place in the same world but spaced hundreds of years apart, where the events of one series might be seen as legend or myth in another and (with this being a crucial distinguisher), the way in which the world works – its society, its geography, its magic, etc. – are different enough so that the reader does not feel that it is taking place in the same location.

But, I recently found out, Sanderson has embarked on a fourth mode of worldbuilding. He has actually created separate worlds, separate series, with separate characters, that are all in the same universe, and linked by characters who can travel between worlds. This idea takes the possibility for a meta-story to the next level. Now, instead of worrying at most about how the plot of one series might affect the next series set in that world, bounded by the same rules of society, magic, religion, and history, readers can cross these boundaries and imagine how the events of one epic fantasy series with one set of magical rules might somehow affect another epic fantasy series with a different set of magical rules. For instance, in one of Sanderson’s worlds, magic works through the ingesting of metals and a corresponding ability of the mage to perform a particular activity by “burning” the metal – for instance, soothing another person’s emotions. What happens if a person from this world goes to another world where magic emanates from large, powerful storms and manifests as light trapped in crystals, where anyone can use devices powered by this magic, and mages can create and move physical objects via magic, but certainly cannot manipulate emotions? You get characters who do things that aren’t quite explained in-world, characters who are thought odd or prescient by other characters, characters who have some kind of authorial license to do things and say things that readers who don’t know better will shrug at and say, “I guess the character was lucky.”

For readers who do know better, on the other hand, this type of writing is mind-blowing. What does Sanderson have planned? (He has confirmed that he does have a plan.) How will the series eventually link up with each other? How can characters travel to different worlds? What do they want? Besides being an amazing marketing strategy to encourage readers to buy and finish entire series from the author they might not have otherwise been interested in, it is an amazingly large writing and worldbuilding strategy. Not only does Sanderson have to plan out how any given series will go, he has to plan out how this series fits into his universe’s meta-story.

As a worldbuilding writer myself, I am in awe.

As a reader, I can hardly wait to see what happens next.

Savvy Saturday – Seasons’ Greetings

Writing Tips

It’s the first weekend of spring! The sun shines longer each day, the birds wake up weary adventurers with their oh-so-cheerful predawn calls, the earth smells of rain and growth (or snow and slush, depending on the variable weather), the sun’s warmth provides a much-needed counter to the chill breezes that still blow crisply through the land, and the kings of the many realms begin their preparations to defend themselves against the hordes of the enemy who will no doubt be moving very soon to wreak chaos on the innocent of the earth.

How does seasonality affect a fantasy story and the writing thereof? As hinted above, different seasons lend themselves to different types of possible large plot events, small plot events, and written description that give life to a narrative.

Large Plot Events

Certain seasons tend to either enable or discourage characters from certain types of actions. Wars tend to be fought in spring: armies suffer a loss of morale and men if they are forced to fight, march, and sleep in snowy (or just below-freezing) conditions for too long. If kings wait for too long to begin their marching and attacks, however, their enemies have more time to prepare their own strategies and catch our heroes off guard. Similarly, spring is the ideal time to begin any journey or project that will take a long time to complete. The last thing that a reasonable character wants to have happen is to be stuck in a strange place, tired, with one’s resources drained, as winter begins to howl through one’s bones.

Of course, some activities that might occur in a plot occur specifically because it is a certain season. These include, for instance, holidays such as the winter or midsummer solstice, seasons of activity such as planting time, harvest, hunting season, or the beginning of a school year, and weather-driven tasks such as road repair, preparations for monsoon season, or migrating (as a tribe or on one’s own) to a summer or winter location. Your story, then, will depend as much on the natural environment of your characters’ society as it will on your characters’ own personality and goals. A tribe of hunter-gatherers will be far more affected by the changing seasons than will a colony of settlers under space-domes on a terraformed moon. (At the same time, if your terraformed moon suffers from regular seasons of dust-storms or intense solar flares, it could cause significant plot difficulties for your characters.)

Small Plot Events

How do the seasons affect your characters’ moods, clothing, daily activities, goals, and expectations? A knight will probably do many similar activities throughout the year, but may find that his winter clothing either restricts his movements as he rides and fights with the bandits who ambush him, or he might alternatively find that his thick winter clothing protects him from their first unexpected attack, giving him time to react and engage them in combat. A girl looking for a way to pass the time in between classes might go on a walk in the spring or fall, and in doing so might pick flowers or gather fallen leaves, while in the winter she might sit by the fire and read, sew, or stare out the window, frustrated at how confined she feels during the long season of cold. Any of these activities could serve to advance a plot, but incorporating season-specific activities into a plot helps ground the reader in a time and place of the author’s choosing, making the world and characters in question seem more real.

Written Description

Finally, seasons give an author an opportunity to make their writing a full-sensory experience. Visual cues of the seasons are easy to incorporate into a scene – mentioning snow, bare trees, a pale sky, and seeing one’s breath in the air, for instance, are easy ways of cuing a reader to think of winter, while pale green shoots emerging from the ground, birds hopping in tree-branches, melting piles of snow, and flowering trees all tell readers that spring has arrived. Auditory cues similarly enhance the reality of a scene’s setting. Describing the lazy buzz of a mosquito in the summer, the rustling of dry leaves in an autumn wind, or the crunch of snow underfoot draws readers in to feel a scene more than they would if only visual elements were incorporated.

The other senses – taste, touch, and smell – are also useful for grounding readers in a world and a specific time of year. Snowflakes taste cold and clean on one’s tongue. Spring breezes are perfumed and pleasantly cool on the skin. Lips get chapped, skin cracks, and extremities tingle and eventually go numb when exposed to the cold. Summer thunderstorms bring warm rain that smells of electricity.

As you read stories, then, pay attention to the author’s use of seasons. Does the story happen during a specific time of year? Does the physical environment and weather matter to the plot? Do characters actually interact with the changing world around them? As you write your own stories, consider purposefully how you might use seasons to convey a more holistic, real setting to readers that will help them lose themselves in your world.

Savvy Saturday – Narratives and Numbers

Academics, Research, Writing Tips

As I continue to study at the Ph.D. level, I become ever increasingly struck by the power of story and narrative on the human psyche. Academics and scientists like to pretend that facts and numbers drive society forward. If we can find statistically significant results, they say, we can change the way the world views important issues! We can eliminate disease and poverty; we can make people happy, wealthy, and wise! Surely, they say, if people just knew the facts, they would change their behavior and the way they think.

Surely, novelists say to academics, surely you jest. There is a huge difference between knowing a fact and having that fact impact your life. There is a vast chasm between reading a scientific paper and actually believing that scientific paper if it says something that you don’t already agree with. Emotion, narrative, and the personal experience of real or fictional others, far more than cold, hard numbers, are what sway people’s opinions.

Here’s an example for you. Suppose you were interested in purchasing a new television. You might go to Consumer Reports, where teams of experts rate different televisions on a number of objective measures and tell you which is the “best” quality for the money. Let’s say that you pick the one you like, and then go to your best friend and ask her opinion of the matter. “Oh, don’t get that one!” she says. “My cousin got that brand of television last month, and he’s had nothing but problems with it!” What do you do? If you’re like most people, that one personal review from a friend – passing along information from someone you don’t even know – will carry as much or more weight than the scientific tests as conducted by experts in the Consumer Reports magazine, whose jobs depend on making accurate comparisons between products.

Why? People are relational beings. We value experience. We value story. Facts and science are useful tools, and can provide a much-needed check on incorrect thinking, but even well-trained scientists have to work hard to overcome their natural urge to believe concrete narrative at the expense of abstract science.

As storytellers, then, it is our privilege as well as our duty to remember that the stories we tell may have a greater likelihood of impacting people’s perceptions than do the cold, hard facts of reality. On the positive side, we can tell a story that illustrates truths about life in a way that argues for the worldview that we believe is real and right and will result in positive outcomes. (Of course, we must make sure not to be didactic – narrative has the power to persuade only when people are swept up in the seeming reality of said narrative.) We need fairy tales, as Neil Gaiman put it, not because they say that dragons are real, but because they teach us that dragons can be beaten.

Charles Dickens exposed the social ills of his day by writing the character of Oliver Twist, who readers pitied and empathized with to such an extent that they changed their opinions of the way England treated its orphans. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin was credited with influencing public opinion of the horrors of slavery in the Deep South to such an extent that individuals were willing to go to war to end it. Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game gives an example of a brilliant child who is able to think on an adult level, take command of military forces, and save the world when adults cannot – inspiring adults to change what they believe about the abilities of children, and children to believe that they don’t have to wait until they grow up to do something important and heroic. More recently, Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy gives us a concrete picture of the power of media to shape public perception, and the risks, rewards, and terrible costs of standing up to an oppressive regime. The fact that certain individuals in Thailand adopted the Hunger Games’ three-finger salute as a form of silent rebellion against their country’s oppressive regime (an action they were arrested for) just emphasizes the power of fiction, narrative, and personal example to shape our world.

Of course, like any power, the power of narrative comes with responsibility. When writers do sloppy research, or support a position that is harmful to our readers’ wellbeing, our work has the power to stick in people’s minds for years and actually keep them from changing unhealthful behaviors or beliefs. Works that glorify violence, fail to show the ramifications and natural consequences of illegal or rash behavior, or more subtly affirm stereotypes or beliefs that are untrue can have pernicious effects on the public consciousness.

For instance, the idea of “love at first sight” is a dangerous myth that psychologists, religious leaders, and academics have combated for generations. While individuals may be physically attracted to each other in an instant, enduring love is only built through work, self-sacrifice, purposeful choices, and a decision to continue to love when the other individual seems unlovable. But this true type of love isn’t what’s shown in our culture’s stories. Our fairy tales, YA books, and romance novels imagine an unrealistic narrative of two people meeting by chance, being swept off their feet, and living happily ever after. Though there is no way of quantifying the damage that this narrative causes to young men and women who are seeking examples of what it looks like to have healthy, happy relationships, it would be fair to say that the effect isn’t positive.

As storytellers, then, we need to both embrace and be cautious of the power of the words that we weave. We need to think critically about the issues that we deal with in our stories and the messages that we overtly or covertly share. We need to use our stories to accurately portray truths about the world we live in, to give faces to the facts and build our readers up rather than tear them down. We need to be thoughtful writers, and also thoughtful readers, doing the hard work of evaluating the stories we are exposed to and the facts in question rather than just accepting them. It is in this way that we truly can change the world, one heart, one mind, one narrative at a time.

Savvy Saturday: Language and Meaning

Research, Writing Tips

Have you ever considered how language itself influences the way we think? As a fantasy writer and sociologist, I am fascinated by how our perceptions of reality as a society are influenced by the words we use, and the way in which we use them. I came across several interesting articles this week that speak to various ways in which language has shaped the way we see our world – and that can give interesting ideas to writers who are looking for other worlds to create.

First, our language shapes the way in which we view color. While all languages distinguish between colors to a certain extent, there are many colors we have words for today that were not so distinguished in other times and lands. The color blue, for instance, was wholly unknown and unrecognized in many ancient cultures, including ancient Greece (http://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-blue-and-how-do-we-see-color-2015-2). Further, when we don’t have words to distinguish between colors, those differences are harder for our eyes to process. A different study found that in Russia, where the language has different words for light blue and dark blue (as opposed to English, where nearly every shade is just “blue”), Russian speakers found it easier to distinguish between colors that fell into different “official” shades than colors that fell within a given “official” shade, whereas English speakers found it equally difficult to tell all of the colors apart (http://www.pnas.org/content/104/19/7780.full).

As a writer, what would it look like if a culture didn’t distinguish between green and blue? What would it look like if a traveler from a land that did distinguish between more colors came to a land that did not? Little touches such as color use or non-use might help give your work a strange, other-worldly type of feel that would draw readers in with fascination.

Second, our language shapes the way in which we view direction. English speakers tend to use the self as the reference point for directions – we tell people to turn right, go straight, and turn around if they’ve gone too far. Other languages use absolute directions: north, south, east, and west. Interestingly, individuals who speak these languages have a much better sense of direction than English speakers do. They are always subtly aware of what direction they are facing, as they align themselves to an absolute grid rather than a relative one (http://nautil.us/blog/5-languages-that-could-change-the-way-you-see-the-world).

As a writer, think about what advantages and disadvantages seeing the world in absolute directions would bring to a society. Individuals from this society would probably make excellent tracking and hunting parties, as their direction sense would help them not get lost and communicate and work efficiently and effectively with their fellows. If a society like this grew more developed, it would be likely that all towns/cities would need to be laid out in the same simple directional grid to avoid confusion. Rules such as “drive on the right hand side of the road” are easier for us to apply in an English context, as they equally apply on roads pointed north/south, east/west, or that curve around rivers and mountains. Written instructions in that kind of language would need to include initial orienting directions; before one could be told which pedal in a car is the brake, for instance, one would need to be told that one should make sure one’s car is facing north. (The east pedal, then, is the gas, and the one immediately to the west of it is the brake.)

Third, our language shapes the way in which we see numbers. Some societies only distinguish between one, two, and many, and some don’t have a concept of zero. A society that groups numbers by tens has a different conception of space and time and mathematics than societies that group numbers by sixties, as did ancient Babylon. The groupings that we find to be natural lead us to break up the world into those groupings, and to try to use those groupings in our daily lives. What would it look like if a society’s mathematical system were based in root 2 or root 15? The first is binary, which is computer language. A system based on it might lead, for instance, to a strong cultural norm of either-or answers: one or zero, yes or no, on or off, right or wrong.

These are only a few examples of how language affects the way in which we see reality. Other more subtle ones include passive versus active voice (for instance, Spanish tends to grammatically deflect responsibility for negative actions – “el plato se me rompió=the dish broke itself to me” instead of “I broke the dish”), and formality of language based on whether one is addressing an older or younger person, someone of a different social class, or someone of the same or different gender.

Of course, as a writer, you aren’t constrained by the grammar choices of Earth’s languages. What types of grammatical rules and quirks might you insert into a culture that would subtly affect the way in which its speakers view the world?

Savvy Saturday: Writing Male and Female Characters

The Quest of the Unaligned, Writing Tips

I was asked recently how, as a female writer, I approach writing male characters. In several of my works, including The Quest of the Unaligned, the point-of-view character is male, meaning that I write as if I am inside that character’s head. How do I make sure that it sounds right?

I’ve actually thought about this issue quite a bit – I want my characters to be real and sympathetic to readers, to behave in a manner consistent with who they are and who they have been raised to be by their society. Identifying how men and women behave differently, then, is crucial for writing believable characters. However, the implementation of this is surprisingly easy, since people are far more similar than many of us realize. The trick is not to consider writing a “male character” or a “female character,” but to write a person. A person has goals, motivations, personality, strengths, weaknesses, things they desperately want, and things they desperately fear. Men and women may show these slightly differently, but at the core, we’re all still human beings. We yearn for acceptance, for respect, for safety, for adventure, for success, for love. I would probably say that 80-90% of the action, dialogue, and character development pertaining to a given character in a book could be gender-flipped and readers wouldn’t notice the difference.

It’s that extra 10-20% that adds gender roles and male/female biological differences in thought processes, etc., that makes writing characters of the opposite sex realistic. As a female writer, I have learned that for male characters, I cut out most of the introspection regarding emotions and relationships that I would include for female characters. I also have male characters try to focus more on what the problems are at hand and how to solve them, whereas my female characters may not move so quickly to strategizing and action in every circumstance. My male characters tend to want respect – to be noticed, thought well of, and to prove themselves. While my female characters tend to want these things as well, they also may value harmony, relationships, and being listened to and understood more than male characters would.

For instance, Alaric, my main character in The Quest of the Unaligned, is trained as a security chief to act to assess situations, protect the innocent, stop and detain criminals, and provide physical solutions (e.g. fighting) to problems. He sounds very male, but a female security chief of Tonzimmel would be trained in the same way. I could write the same situation – stopping a thug, for example – and the reactions and dialogue of the two security chiefs would likely be very similar. What might be different would be how the two security chiefs would react to a potentially dangerous situation. Alaric, for instance, refuses to believe Laeshana (his friend and guide) when she says that Dragon Canyon is inhabited by real dragons, and gives her an ultimatum: she can either accompany him into the canyon or not, but he isn’t going to be late for his appointment, and so he’s going to charge forward and trust to his skills to handle whatever dangers lurk in the canyon. If I were writing a female security chief in this situation, she would probably be more willing to listen to what Laeshana had to say, would probably consider whether being late was actually as bad as seriously harming a relationship with a friend, or at least would talk with Laeshana a lot more about why it was that she thought there were dragons in Dragon Canyon rather than simply turning away from the conversation and charging down the canyon full speed ahead.

Finally, I do make sure to have some male beta readers read my work. They are a crucial part of my writing improvement process. Just like I have fantasy-loving beta readers who can tell me if my magic is unclear or my monsters sound too much like something they read recently, and just like I have English-major beta readers who help me catch awkward wording or problems with story flow, I have male readers who note when my male characters are behaving in a way that strikes them as odd, unusual, or inconsistent with their expectations.

Mostly, however, I just try to write characters who are complex people, and let those people create their own stories.

Savvy Saturday – On Words and Thoughts

Writing Tips

When you want to discover what you think about an idea, what do you? Do you write an essay? Do you call up a friend? Do you sit in a chair and ponder? As a novelist, I found it interesting to discover recently that writing plays a very different role in my thought processes than it does in the thought processes of some of my other friends. Understanding the role of writing in the mind of a given author can be helpful for readers and other writers alike, as different writers will use their writing for different purposes, and knowing how one thinks about writing – and how writing shapes one’s thoughts – can help one know how to best approach a project.

Until recently, I was only truly familiar with one way of writing and processing – mine. When I have a vague idea, I might jot down some thoughts about it on paper, but this tends to raise more questions for me than it answers. To really understand something, and to feel qualified to incorporate it into my writing, I tend to have to go talk to another real live human being. Depending on what the topic is – a plot point, an idea of character development, a world that I’m building, or an issue of culture, religion, or morality – I have different friends that I talk with. But I find that I don’t want to commit the time and effort to really writing something until I understand how I feel about an issue, and I don’t really understand my own thoughts and feelings until I talk about it with another person.

In contrast, other writers process their ideas themselves by writing. If they want to know what they think about something, they write an essay on the topic. They may not be as comfortable with talking out loud – they are more eloquent, complete in their thoughts, or coherent on paper, they believe, and so they prefer to interact intellectually with others via the written word.

These two styles of thought processes may lead to very different types of writing. I have always been comfortable sharing my written work, as it tends to be a coherent whole that reflects thoughts that I have previously engaged with, absorbed, and assimilated before beginning a writing project. However, I do not write until I know what I’m going to say, which can lead me to not want to write until I have thoroughly discussed a topic with my friends, my family, and my dog (if no one else is available). Others, who write to find out what they think, may find their work to be more exploratory and personal in nature. It may change over time in tone, theme, and even message, as they write to find out what it is that they believe or think about a topic. Writers of this sort may find that they need to rewrite their work more times before it is acceptable in their opinion to send out for others’ feedback, or that some drafts or pieces of writing never get shared at all, as their purpose is for personal edification rather than for distribution.

Neither style of writing is better than another, but knowing what your style is can help you write more effectively and achieve your goals. If you are the first type of writer, here are a few tips for making progress on a story:

  • Identify writing buddies who you can have serious writing conversations with – who will help you analyze plot and character holes and give you advice on exactly what magical powers the three-crested owl should have.
  • Once you know what it is you want to say, outline your work carefully so that every point you make works together and builds on the story you already know you want to tell.
  • Start writing! At some point, you have gathered enough information and talked with enough people that you do know what you think and what the right decisions will be for your story, so go write them! Procrastinating at this point will only put off creating the story that only you can tell.

If you are the second type of writer, however, here are a few tips:

  • Identify good editors who are willing to invest in your manuscript and tell you which parts are inconsistent, need work, or just don’t make sense.
  • Don’t worry about not making sense in your first draft. Just write.
  • Once you have written your first draft, go back and rewrite! You probably know far more clearly now what it is that your story is trying to say than you did at the beginning, so go back and tell the story that you now know is trying to be told.

Whichever of these methods speaks to you more, go forth and pursue it with passion. Have fun with your writing, and the end result will be a story that you can be proud to share.

Savvy Saturday – Valentine’s Day

Writing Tips

Happy Valentine’s Day!

You know what I’d like to read more of? Valentine’s Day stories involving non-romantic love. Romantic love has gotten more than its fair share of stories – but love is far more than most Valentine’s Day tales make it out to be. In fact, ancient Greece (the birthplace of Western civilization!) had four different words for love, referring to four different emotions. Only one of these (eros) is what Valentine’s Day stories typically revolve around. In today’s post, I’d like to share some potential story prompts having to do with the three less explored types of love.

Storge – brotherly love, affection

love1

“Of course I love him. He’s my brother. Even if he does drive me crazy.”

Familial ties, whether between parents and children, siblings, cousins, or people who simply share being in the “family” of humankind, are the most natural of all the forms of love. It ignores reasons for being loveable, and simply loves because of who one is. When a soldier throws himself in front of a bomb to save his squad, when five people are trapped in a submarine and suddenly feel a kinship with each other that drives them to work together to get them all to safety, when a tribe goes to war because one of their members has been wronged, it is a form of storge.

Possible plots:

  • A brother and a sister superhero who haven’t spoken in years need to come together, work out their differences, and forgive each other before they can take on the new supervillain who is terrorizing the city.
  • To save her son’s life, a mother must make a perilous journey through the jungle to find a forbidden cure. Terrible things are spoken of the cure – they say it could unleash evil upon the world, kill the one who uses it, or even worse. But that doesn’t matter – without the cure her son will die, so into the jungle she must go.
  • Four students – a computer geek, a football player, a marching band trumpeter, and a poet – stumble across a portal that takes them back in time to ancient China. They have to work together to get back home, and in the process, become fast friends.

 

Philia – friendship love

love2

Bromances, groups of girlfriends, teammates, coworkers – lasting friendships built on shared interests or activities have at their heart a deep-rooted affection for the other person. Delighting in another person’s company, enjoying playing a sport with someone, being committed to a team and one’s teammates in order to accomplish a goal – all of these are examples of philia. Good friendships have staying power that is worth celebrating, and that staying power is love.

  • In the future, a special forces unit of six Terrans must face their largest challenge yet: to infiltrate the alien high command and steal the key to the global defense system that will allow Earth to fight back against its alien overlords.
  • The “problem kid” at the orphanage at Tonzimmel joins its freezeball team in a last-ditch effort to avoid getting expelled, but finds new life in the game and in the companionship of the other boys on the team.
  • Two teams of explorers races against each other through an alien jungle to find the famous Ice Crystal. The team that finds it first will go down in history, while the losers will be condemned to forced labor to pay off the huge costs of the expedition. Both teams have skilled members and a drive to win – but our heroes have a secret weapon: they know each other’s strengths and weaknesses and trust each other completely, while the other team is comprised of professional treasure-hunters who view this as just another job.

 

Agape – unconditional love

love3

Forgiveness, self-sacrifice, returning good for evil, wishing others well when they don’t deserve it – these are the actions of unconditional love, and the plots that stick with readers for years. Characters who act unselfishly, who give so that others can benefit, who refuse to take advantage even when they are justified in doing so, show us the truest reflection of the best kind of love. Unfortunately, while these stories are some of the most powerful when they occur in real life, they are also the hardest to believably create in fiction. Here are some ideas that might inspire you:

 

  • A young gang member with no family shoots a man in cold blood as part of his initiation, but gets caught by the police. Rather than press charges, the victim’s brother and his wife adopt the gang member as their own son.
  • A knight on his way home from war sees that a helpless village is being attacked by marauders. Though they aren’t officially under his protection, he charges off to face the armies single-handedly, sacrificing himself to ensure the villagers’ escape.
  • After converting to a religion against the wishes of her husband, a woman finds herself divorced, penniless, and without any job skills. Nonetheless, she prays for her husband every day for the next fifty years, even as she struggles to put food on the table, that he will find the truth and peace that she knows he needs.

 

So this Valentine’s Day, take time to appreciate your family, to enjoy your friends, to serve others, and to read and write stories about characters who do the same – because love is about far more than romance.

Savvy Saturday – Unique Selling Propositions

Academics, Writing Tips

Authors are good at many things: storytelling, character development, world-building, and so on. One thing that many authors are not good at, however, is marketing. Why should I buy your books, readers ask. Some authors respond by focusing on the plot of their specific latest novel. “You should read The Quest of the Unaligned,” I might say, “because it’s an exciting YA novel about a security chief from a technologically advanced city who has to go on a quest through a magical country – and it turns out that he’s their long-lost prince.” This is a good start, but this sort of statement doesn’t really answer the question of why your book is a better investment of money or time than are other books in your genre.

The answer to these questions can be found in marketing theory. Specifically, developing a “unique selling proposition” (USP) for each of your books can help you better communicate with potential readers about what needs your book fills, and who would benefit from purchasing it. A unique selling proposition is what it sounds like – a proposition, or reason, that you can use to sell your product, and it has to be unique compared to other products in the market. Now, by the time most companies have their product, they already know what their unique selling proposition is going to be. This is because the traditional way of doing marketing is to start by identifying a need for a given target market, then design and manufacture a product to meet that need. In contrast, most entrepreneurs (including authors!) tackle marketing the other way around. We start by creating a product – writing a book – that tells the story that we want to tell, then we try to figure out who else would like it and why.

The first step in developing a USP for a book is to identify what broad category your book falls in. What other books will it be compared to? For a product to succeed, it first has to have a minimum level of quality in all core areas that customers expect (e.g. no matter what brand of soda you buy, you expect it to be fizzy, you expect it to be sweet, and you expect the bottle to not fall apart in your hand). If a product lacks a minimum level of quality in one of these common elements, customers will refuse to buy the product, or will be sorely disappointed if they do buy. So what are the common elements in a book in your genre? What is it that every book has to have for it to pass the “yes, this is an acceptable part of this genre” test? Make a list! Some elements that come to mind for any book include proper formatting, a general lack of grammatical and typographical errors, a certain minimum word count, and, if a story, a beginning, middle, and end. Additional (and more interesting) components get added once you start talking about genres. Science fiction and fantasy novels, for instance, have to be set in a time and place that is not “the real world here and now.” If you promote a book as being a fantasy novel, for instance, but the only fantasy elements turn out to be a figment of the main character’s imagination, many readers will feel cheated.

Once you have made a list of all the elements that a book in your genre must have, put it to one side and forget about it. Readers don’t need to be told that a new soda is sweet and fizzy – they need to be told what’s different about it compared to all the other sodas out there. In your case, you need to make a new list: the features that your book has that are unique. This can include more tangible elements of your book, such as a plot, character, and setting, and less tangible benefits that readers might get from your book, such as enjoyment due to your sense of humor, scintillating arguments, or beautiful literary flow. The elements that you identify are what you can use to develop a unique selling proposition.

For instance, while academic books on economics exist by the dozens, only one (that I am aware of) attempts to discuss and teach real issues of economics by couching them in the context of vampires and zombies. In the context of fiction, think about the benefits that readers in your genre are looking for, then promise them that plus something else. That something else, based on the unique elements that you as a unique person have built into your book, will give readers a unique reason to buy. Why should they buy your fantasy novel instead of any other fantasy novel? Maybe because your fantasy novel is uniquely dark yet lyrical in tone, and based on Chinese mythology. Or maybe because it is one of the only novels that is set in ancient Rome and features a female superhero protagonist. Whatever the reason, the stronger and more unique your USP, the more likely your book will be to stand out, catch readers’ interest, and persuade them to give your story a try.

So what’s your book’s unique selling proposition? Leave a note in the comments below!

Savvy Saturday: A Typology of Magical Creatures

Writing Tips

What kinds of magical creatures should populate your fantasy world? Well, that’s a decision you’ll have to make for yourself, but there are three basic categories you can use. First, there are types of magical creatures that a reader is already familiar with (e.g. fire-breathing dragons, unicorns, etc). Second, there are types that the reader may be slightly familiar with but that an author has imbued with distinctive characteristics (e.g. the basilisk in Harry Potter). Third, there are types that have never been seen before (e.g. fire spiders in The Quest of the Unaligned, or chulls and axehounds in Brandon Sanderson’s Stormlight Archive). Each type comes with its own advantages and disadvantages for fantasy authors who want to use them.

 

Standard magical creatures

dragon1The major advantage of using types of creatures that readers already know about is that, well, readers already know about them. You can make a passing reference to a town being laid waste by a dragon, and readers fill in the gaps: a fire-breathing winged lizard, likely with an inordinate desire for gold and a heated temper, flew out of his cave in the mountains and burned down the village. Just like you don’t have to tell readers that kings outrank peasants, or that bread is a food, you don’t have to tell them that dragons are dangerous and likely only able to be bested by a hero (or your protagonist). If the point of your story is its characters and their interaction rather than its worldbuilding, if the creatures in question are not vital to the plot, or if your story is set in a version of our own world where legends are true (e.g. Harry Potter), then including standard magical characters in a plot can give your story a fun twist, without too much work on an author’s part.

The problem with using standard magical characters is that it can make a story feel derivative. There are only so many ways to slay a dragon, and they’ve all been written countless times. That doesn’t mean you can’t have a fresh take on dragon-slaying, but it does meant that you have to work harder to show readers why your story is different. Similarly, if you are focusing on building a magical world that is very different from Earth and its classic mythologies, it can be jarring to readers to have creatures show up that have no logical reason to be there. Finally, once you start importing magical creatures from a given culture, you are almost making an agreement with a reader to stay within given cultural guidelines for the rest of the story. Having leprechauns (Irish myth), sirens (Greek myth), and kitsune (Japanese myth) all running around in the same world, for instance, would seem strange, if not even wrong to reader sensibilities.

 

Adapted magical characters

dragon2In this category lie all creatures that are trope subversions, spin-offs, inspirations, or even just distant cousins of their more standard magical counterparts. These creatures all have the same name as commonly known magical critters (e.g. dragons), but they are different in either a minor or a major way from what readers expect. One great example in print is Patricia C. Wrede’s Dealing With Dragons series, in which readers learn that dragons are honorable creatures who enjoy cherries jubilee, choose their own king, and are in a constant struggle against a society of wizards whose staffs can absorb dragons’ magic. The advantage of using this category is that authors can surprise and intrigue readers who are looking for something “familiar yet different.”

The disadvantage of using adapted magical characters is that readers can get confused or even irritated if an author changes too many things that are traditionally part of that character’s makeup. Major physical characteristics are typically the last to be changed – a centaur, for instance, must be half-horse and half-man to be considered a centaur. Traditionally, they are seen as wise, mysterious prophets and/or astrologers. But in Gail Carson Levine’s Ella Enchanted, centaurs don’t even have human intelligence, much less exceptional wisdom. Instead, they are kept in zoos and are fed apples by human visitors. Are these “real” centaurs? Should the author have written them this way? As a more extreme example, suppose that an author writes about creatures called “goblins” who are small and ugly in appearance (a traditional goblin description), but live in trees, eat berries and nuts, spend their days playing music and dancing, and are kind and generous to all who can look past their external appearance. Are these actually goblins? If an author is writing about a race like this, it might actually do the reader a disservice to give the creature a name that will bring to mind a large number of attributes that will be inaccurate. Instead, this brings us to the third category…

 

Original magical characters

Now, to start off, we should note that simply calling an already established magical species by a different name does not make it an original character. If you have a fire-breathing lizard with scales hard as diamonds that loves gold and has a mean streak, please just call it a dragon, a wurm, a wyvern, or whatever your myth-based name of choice is. But don’t call it a Snarglax or a Death-Lizard just because you want to avoid having “dragons” in your book. Your readers will see through you in a second, and they won’t approve.

cerberusGood original magical characters might combine two (or more!) creatures that actually exist on Earth (e.g. flying horses/monkeys), give more or different powers to a creature that actually exists (e.g. horses with human-level intellect, vultures that spit lightning, or octopuses with mind control powers), make a creature abnormally large or small (e.g. Shelob the giant spider), make significant physical changes to a real creature (e.g. a two-headed dog or an alligator with a dorsal fin and six legs), combine some features previously mentioned, or actually just make a creature up. Even made-up creatures, however, are typically modeled after real-life physiology to a certain extent, if just to give readers enough mental cues to be able to picture the creature you’re describing. The good thing about this category of creatures is its uniqueness. An author can use original characters to add breadth, depth, and a sense of wonder to a story. They raise new possible puzzle solutions, plot twists, and reasons for characters to interact in different ways. They keep the reader guessing and enthralled in the world an author has created.

What’s the downside, then? First, it takes a lot of work for an author to create realistic original magical characters that make sense in a world. Second, it can be a lot of work for readers to interact with a world that incorporate original magical characters. The more new things readers have to carry around in their heads, the more likely they’ll be to get confused and forget some of them.

 

So what type of magical creature should you put in your world? Now that you know your options, it’s up to you!

Savvy Saturday: Author-Character Relationships

Writing Tips

Here’s an interesting question for you readers out there: to what extent does your image of what an author is like as a person come from what his or her characters are like as people? Here’s why I ask: we can all think of Hollywood and stage actors who are viewed as having certain personality traits (e.g. being smart, being funny, being heroic, being obnoxious) based on the roles they play – this is the reason that certain actors are such good endorsers of products, because viewers associate the actor with their larger-than-life character portrayals. (For instance, last year’s Superbowl commercial for Jaguar used this principle to suggest that their cars are driven by super-villains.) In contrast, I almost never hear people talk about how an author “must be” a certain way because he or she writes characters who are that way.

On one level, the conflation of actor/character makes more sense than a conflation of writer/character. After all, actors can only play one character at a time, whereas writers are responsible for all of them at once. But at the same time, the connection between writers and their characters is far more direct and real than that between actors and characters. Actors are hired to play roles written by someone else, for someone else’s story. The good ones make the role “their own,” but any portrayal is still a collaboration between the actor, the script-writer, and the director. Authors, on the other hand, are wholly responsible for the creation, development, and portrayal of every character they write. Many authors like to say that their characters “come to life” and then drag a plot off in whatever direction they choose – but still, characters only have power, life, and “free will” that the author gives them.

More than this, authors’ characters are a reflection of how the author views the world. They have to be. Every human being processes the world through his or her own unique set of experiences, beliefs, and expectations. People may view the world cynically or optimistically; they may read every compliment as purposeful flattery, or be completely blind to people who are manipulating them. One can watch any political debate, for instance, to see people with different beliefs reacting very differently to the same speech. And authors are people too. As much as we would like to be objective recorders and discussants of reality, our writing instead reflects the way we see the world – our deepest beliefs, our biases, and the way we think people truly are.

With these facts in mind, we could argue that characters an author writes should be in some way a true portrayal of what an author is like – and in fact, a truer portrayal of the author than roles are of Hollywood actors. Yet I rarely see this point being made by either readers or by fellow authors. “I am nothing like my characters,” authors like to assert. “They are independent creatures; they are my dreams and fears and chance meetings in the street. They are psychological constructs made flesh; they are no more ‘me’ than you are.” And yet at the same time, we admit that our characters are “our children.” We grow deeply attached to them; we know how they react to stress, how they talk to each other, what pushes their buttons. We sometimes know them better than we know ourselves. Perhaps we don’t want to admit that our characters reflect who we are, or perhaps we are blind to it.

In my own writing, I find that my characters are all a part of who I am, who I want to be, or who I don’t want to be. Though I have never written a fictional “author insertion character” (a supposedly fictional character who says what the author would say and acts how the author would act in any situation), I find that I do have a certain set of beliefs and actions that are more or less conceivable for any of my protagonists to choose. For instance, I have been told – and it was a surprise to me to realize this – that the characters in the works I have written thus far tend to value truth more highly than most. Even villains, a reader noticed, don’t purposefully lie as a matter of course, and a protagonist’s word is their bond, no matter who they are. I hadn’t noticed, but the reader was completely right.

I suppose that writing characters with similar habits or beliefs is a form of self-typecasting, just as some actors try to only play certain types of roles on stage or screen. But I would argue that writing type-casting gives more information about authors than it does to actors. Actors can choose a type of role to play, a type of role they are believable in and good at, and stick with it. There can be (though there does not have to be) a separation between who they are and who they play. In business speak, one could say that there is a distinction between their self and their brand, or professional image. But as authors, what makes us good writers is the fact that our selves are not separated from our books. “Write what you know,” the adage goes, because when you try to write something that you don’t like or that you don’t know, it falls flat. When, therefore, we find similarities across characters, or similarities across protagonists in different books an author writes, I would suggest that those are glimpses into the author’s self that he or she may not even recognize.

So that brings me back to my original question. To what extent do you create a mental image of what an author is like as a person based on his or her characters? To what extent do you think we should? As both an author and a critical reader, I’d love to hear your thoughts.