How Do You Know If You've Written A Classic - Part 7 - How Do You Know These Two Are Soul Mates

How Do You Know If You've Written A Classic

Part 7

 How Do You Know These Two Are Soul Mates? 

Previous Parts in this series are indexed here:

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2020/03/index-to-how-do-you-know-if-youve.html

Opposites attract, but do they always make a good team?

It is Ancient Wisdom that you shouldn't marry someone expecting them to "change" -- or expecting you can "change him."

But people do change, and the velocity of change can be ferocious during early life development (which is why we avoid marrying too young), and oddly enough, during the elder years (with the Second Time Around story).

It is said that if you're not a Democrat or Socialist when you're in your twenties, you have no heart, but if you're not a Republican or Capitalist when you're in your fifties, you have no brains.

Ferocious attention has been devoted to proving or disproving this notion that maturity dictates an individual's view of how society should govern itself.

In 1962 John Crittenden published a paper based on research funded by an award of a Law and Behavioral Science Fellowship at the University of Chicago Law School.

https://academic.oup.com/poq/article-abstract/26/4/648/1868747

The way party affiliation, or political views, tend to correlate with age has been a focus ever since.

Recent studies have shown that today people don't change their politics when they move to a state dominated by the other party, and people do not shift from progressive to conservative (or any other pair of polar opposites) of opinion as they age.

Science fiction writers ask: "Well, maybe they did shift, but they don't now. Why? What changed?"

Maybe there has been that kind of change in human nature, or maybe not.

Writing Science Fiction Romance will bring you to wrestle with the adage that human nature never changes.  Science Fiction is about science impacting human cultures.

See Part 18 of the Targeting a Readership series - Targeting a Culture
https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2020/03/targeting-readership-part-18-targeting.html

Cultures change -- but the basic nature of the humans who form the culture doesn't change much. What does happen, over 280 year spans or multiples of that) is a shift in emphasis in a human generation.  What people all born in the same 20 year span think or feel is most important, most critical, most consequential.  Or in other words, what bothers them the most.

For that reason, we tend to make marriage matches with people of about the same age, and from the same culture (if not country).

Within the parameters of politics and generation, a person can find their match much more readily.  Many matches work just fine for all the decades of life to be lived, but a good match can be torn apart if one of the couple finds an actual Soul Mate.

Often, a couple merely matched will break up when one of them becomes so deeply infatuated (at a later age, it's really hard to admit to a teenager syndrome of infatuation) with another person, and believe they have found a Soul Mate.

A writer exploring the making and breaking of a marriage, in any setting and time, has to convince the current readership of the Soul Mate status.

It is possible for Soul Mates to stray because of an infatuation - what happens then? Does the marriage break then reform?

How does a person who is caught deep into an infatuation discover that the object of infatuation is not the Soul Mate they seem to be?

What is the diagnostic test for Soul Mating?

What will the reader accept as proof?

Today, families are riven apart by politics and arguments about how ethical, moral, or intelligent those who support one view (or the other) are.  The view espoused over the family dinner table can label a person so "deplorable" they will never be welcome in this house again.

So the problem, even if the hosting couple are genuine Soul Mates, becomes how do you change your in-laws' minds about an issue of right/wrong ways of thinking, of solving ethical dilemmas?

Such a dramatic scene, played out in show-don't-tell, in symbolism and dialogue, and storming out of the room, and returning in a different mood, and maybe pulling down reference books to prove a point, may become our next towering Classic that lasts forever.

To convince your reader that two Characters are true Soul Mates, show them handling such a delicate, strife-ridden family scene.

That scene would be the middle of a Happily Ever After novel, an epic fail of family bonds.

Say, for example, this family dinner were the celebration of a young couple's engagement where they are discussing Setting The Date.

The first half of the novel has to reveal the reasons why each of the family members holds the view of right/wrong that they do -- the view of justice, and the correct way to proceed with the wedding plans.  If the family is large enough, you can bet any date chosen will exclude someone.

It has to be soon because so-and-so is thinking of entering Hospice.

It has to be later because so-and-so has a scholarship for a year in school in (some exotic place that will give them major credential in job hunting - say Tokyo?).

It has to be here because most of us live here.

It has to be there because so-and-so can't travel.

It has to be somewhere else cheaper, or where the weather is nice that time of year.

Or if someone is running for public Office, there will be political reasons for place, date, and timing, possibly even religion or lack thereof could figure.

Watching this family define and solve the problem will telegraph to the reader which couples are actual Soul Mates -- and which are likely to break up next.

The first half of the novel reveals how each faction in the family arrives (by reason, by emotion, by unthinking commitments) at their stances on the matter.

The Soul Mate parent-couple in the family will show-don't-tell the solution, and lead all the factions toward each other.

This could take several chapters -- as groups break away and reform in the kitchen, the back porch, the front yard, even the garage to show off a new car, or one being fixed.

The Soul Mates won't impose their solution on the engaged couple, but rather bring up the basic principles they have always taught their children for social and family problem solving.

If the reader agrees with those principles, the reader will likely believe the elder couple are Soul Mates -- and by association, that the married-children of that couple are likewise Soul Mates.

For contrast, at least one couple should be merely a good match with a solid working relationship.

The second half of the book is all about the engaged couple trying to make the family chosen date-time-place actually work for them.  How they go about making the adjustments will reveal to the reader whether this young couple are Soul Mates.

Soul Mates fight each other harder and hotter than any other sort of partner.  But the fire exploding through their arguments heals rather than wounds.

Soul Mates argue - but they don't fight.  And they argue all the time over everything.  Vociferously.  Adamantly defending their positions.  Stubbornly returning to that position. All until they suddenly discover the error in their argument - then they change their mind and immediately admit that out loud.

A Soul Mate might not behave that way with anyone else, might fight all the time with others, concede or crow victory, and just be obnoxious about it.  But that behavior would change when in the presence of the Soul Mate.

The second half of the novel would include the engaged couple arguing shown in high contrast to another couple in the wedding party who fight each other over the same issue (e.g. which restaurant should the dinner be at).

The couple that fights, and simply can't be guided into arguing, ends up in divorce court just before the Soul Mates' wedding, while the couples that argue show up at all rehearsals and do their jobs smoothly.

What is the difference between an argument and a fight?

An argument is about what is right.

A fight is about who is right.

When it's about who is right, it is all about power, dominance, and avoiding confronting emotions.

When it is about what is right, it is all about the mutually shared, urgent, burning desire to choose right over wrong.

That is how Soul Mates are distinguished from other couples, and, whether they are conscious of it or not, readers can see the difference.

Sorting out right from wrong is hard, and humans rarely agree on how to apply those principles to solve real world problems (like choosing a restaurant).

The symbolic difference between fighting and arguing is simply whether the pair doing the shouting are articulating their reasons for their stances, then delineating why the other person's reasons don't apply to this case, or how that reason is based on a fallacy.

Soul Mates argue, destroying each others' reasons for holding a position, until they both agree -- often they evolve to agree on something neither knew before, or would have adopted as a position.

When Soul Mates argue to a conclusion, they are each thankful to the other for imparting new information or correcting an error.  Learning from a Soul Mate is a great joy, not an ignominious defeat that leads to subjugation.

A mismatched couple will fight, and if one of them always wins, the marriage will likely break up unless one of them prefers being subjugated.

Marriages based on a good match generally go through many fights, many arguments, ending with a basic score of 50/50, keeping the balance so neither is subjugated.

To convince readers your Soul Mates are genuine, you need contrasting couples, contrasting families, and contrasting Singles, divorcees, widows, etc.  We need to see them all fighting, arguing, and settling the matter to see the stark difference in methodologies.

The future Science Fiction Romance Classics will lay out this pattern around at least one Human/Alien couple.

The Classic that defines the field will (maybe already has) illustrate the nature of Soul Mates by how they go about solving problems using an Alien methodology.

My candidate for CLASSIC SCIENCE FICTION ROMANCE is the Alien Series by Gini Koch -- #16 came out in February 2018

https://www.amazon.com/Aliens-Abroad-Alien-Novels-Book-ebook/dp/B06XJYL8LY/

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Theme-Symbolism Integration Part 6 - Expository Lump Dissolver

Theme-Symbolism Integration Part 6 - Expository Lump Dissolver 

by

Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Previous parts in the Theme-Symbolism Integration Series are indexed at:
https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2018/02/index-to-theme-symbolism-integration.html
Symbolism is saying without saying.

Symbols are the essence of Show Don't Tell.  It is how the writer conveys both information and emotion -- giving both a single context.

Symbolism often uses the visual cortex, but all the senses can be used.

Perhaps the biggest contributor to symbolism is culture, heritage, and tradition.  Any object can become a "symbol" when used over generations in a particular way.

Wedding Bells, the Family Bible, a Gravestone, a monument or flag, an old soldier's uniform, a candle.  Anything can have layers and layers of history-emotion-meaning imbued into it.

Alien Romance writers, like all science fiction writers developing non-human peoples, have to bring readers to understand the symbols of Aliens.

Symbols are fabricated by writers (or chosen from their real world story-setting history books) to explain the THEME without using words.  Symbols are the alphabet of emotions, the "right brain" functions, and all the traditions of the Character's forefathers.

For questions, the answers to which are succinct Themes you can use, see:

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2018/02/theme-worldbuilding-integration-part-18.html

You build your world, your fictional setting, from theme - from what you want to say.

So all sorts of questions having to do with "worldbuilding" are connected to the business of inventing symbols and explaining what they mean.

Theme and Symbol, when fully integrated (made into one single thing, indivisible), speak to the reader's subconscious and trigger floods of emotion, perhaps mystifying and intense, and make the reader memorize your byline.

But what does a fictional culture need a symbol for?  Human cultures all have invented symbols, but do all Aliens do that?  Or do they do it, but in a different way?

Creating the symbols meaningful to your Aliens is essential to bringing the reader to understand these Aliens -- and why a human's soul mate might lurk among these strangers.

Soul Mates respond to symbols in emotional ways which, if translated to music, would form a chord.  There is emotional harmony between the two Characters.  Multiple symbols can form an entire symphony -- a life together, a happily ever after.

Take for example, the problem of Depicting
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/04/index-to-depiction-series-by-jacqueline.html
an Alien-Human Romance that starts out with repulsion between the two main characters.  Maybe they are on opposite sides of a war, or one does something the other considers immoral or degenerate.

But the plot calls for them to end up together -- in an HEA - a Happily Ever After life spanning the stars.  Or maybe spanning Galaxies, or Time Itself.

See the Guest Post by Julie E. Czerneda
https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2018/02/guest-post-by-julie-e-czerneda.html  where I rave (once again) about her long and complex Inter-Dimensional-Romance -- a whole universe driven and brought to a satisfying point of HEA by a simple and beautiful Love.

Julie's two characters start out strangers, with distrust and maybe condescension between them.  It is awkward, mysterious, strange -- not a friction-less love at first sight.  But they literally save the universe.  It just takes a while.

How can you make an HEA plot work when it starts with two people entirely, relentlessly, hopelessly at odds?

What in our everyday reality of human life would readers be familiar with that depicts this transformation?

When new writers, (who have seen this phenomenon draw two people into lifelong marriage,) try to depict what they have seen in reality, they end up narrating "backstory" -- all the things that happened before anything happened, before the story started but which make the story happen.

When related to a reader in that order (backwards) and using only narrative, a little dialogue, even peppered with a bit of description, the result is boring, and few readers will get beyond Chapter Two.

When you are certain the reader must understand these things BEFORE reading the story -- you produce what is known as the Expository Lump.

Such lumps "tell without showing."

That's not a "story" -- it is a lecture.

When your readers must know something before the impact of something else will score an emotional high for the reader, you probably have hold of a series, as Julie E. Czerneda discovered, and very possibly you have hold of the series by the wrong end.  Julie got a grip on her epic by the right end, and the entire odd universe she invented unfolded and cradled her Characters perfectly.

The way writers tell themselves stories is the opposite way (mirror image) of the way readers read themselves stories.

The writer has to learn to take what is imagined and turn it around, inside out and upside down - even backwards - to find a viewpoint angle in time-space-character which has artistic composition enough to draw a reader into the story.

In photography, or web page layout, they have made a science of "focusing" the viewer's eye, the attention, using "composition."  Story structure works the same way.  Symbols are the images that must be laid out in a composition to focus the emotional intelligence of the reader on the substance of the theme -- without telling the reader what the theme is.

So how do you compact all that information the reader must know before they know anything at all?

How do you plant the seed of Romance in the reader's mind where they don't see it growing until it blossoms?

One of the most popular plots is the Hate At First Sight which turns to Eternal Love -- but how can you Symbolize True Love amidst hatred and revulsion?
It takes space.  Decades ago, the entire Romance field consisted of 50,000 word novels -- little skinny things you could read on an airplane and toss in the trash when you deplane.

Then Science Fiction lovers spun off the Adult Fantasy field -- with big, fat, lovely, complex Relationship Driven Fantasy novels.

Then Big Fat novels exploded into the general Romance field (Historicals led the way, I think).

Now, most Romance Novels take a few evenings to read.

Why is that?

What is it about the Romance field that requires all those words to tell the story?

Is it the sex scenes -- just padded in between actual plot developments?

Partly, yes, but I think the main reason is that, like Action-Adventure, the Romance field has begun to explore the vast, untapped depths of human psychology.

The thing about early science fiction novels that attracted such scorn (up until Star Trek) was simply that, like early Comics, the characters underwent huge psychological turn-arounds, complete change of essential Character, (epiphany moments), after a single Plot Event.

Epiphany does not work that way in real life.

We have a MOMENT -- when we "see the light" -- and feel "changed forever."  And then we REVERT to old habits.

Only gradually, over years, does the Epiphany take hold and draw us into a more mature self-image and thus view of the world, and a new way of functioning.

Later - decades later - we look back and see it was that one, single, moment when "everything changed."  And most of us realize that it was indeed that moment, but then much-much-much more gradual assimilation of the meaning of that moment, and then implementing it in life.

Change can be abrupt -- such as the sudden loss of a loved one in a car crash - or it can be gradual -- such as the loss of a loved one to recurrent Cancer.

But the loss of what was, (job, home, family, -- think of all those who have lost their houses and jobs to hurricanes and wild fires in 2017 -- ) leads to the acquisition of what will be.

It isn't about THINGS.  It is about self-image.

Acquire a new self-image, and the things (symbols) in your life (Character) automatically change.  Abrupt change is painful.  Slow change just draws the pain out and out and out.  But slow change (maybe taking 4-10 years of hard living) leads to permanent change -- a true Ever After situation can be crafted step by step.  (e.g. get a new college degree, or job credential, better job, move to another country, found a business).

Along the path of change, THINGS acquire the status of SYMBOLS.

In a Romance, a couple will have one of those "transported" moments and designate the music they danced to that night as "Our Song."  Or the place it happened as "Our Place."  Or the clothing they were wearing as "Our Lucky Outfit."  Or perhaps the make of car (that saved them from injury in a crash) as "Our Lucky Car" and always buy that brand of car.

People create symbols -- love and hate all generate symbolism.

The most potent symbols are generated at moments of Change.

An example is the flag of a country.  The American Flag was created at the moment of breakaway into independence as a nation and symbolizes the independence of individuals -- a self-image of the pioneering spirit shared in the 13 Colonies, strong individuals bound by their beliefs.

If Aliens come to Earth to (save us from whatever) do something -- say the Aliens are being chased by worse Aliens (Gini Koch did that in her Aliens Series - big fat books driven entirely by Romance).  Earth decides these refugees are "The Good Guys" and we take them in, then turn and fight their pursuers -- and create a NEW FLAG to represent that Earth Alliance.

That new flag becomes a symbol of human-alien unity.

Uniting two civilizations under one symbol takes a long series of very big fat Romance novels.

And yes, starting such a series by narrating the history of the galaxy that led to the first arriving refugees and their war with their pursuers being so catastrophically lost, would just bore readers to tears.  Well, actually, readers would just toss the book after the first 3 pages.

But if you start crafting the opening with a human meeting an Alien Refugee (think of the film STARMAN), distrust, strangeness, -- and then instead of just falling into an alliance based on sympathy, -- you set them at odds over a symbolic issue, you have the springboard into a long series.

If you start with your Star-Crossed Lovers at odds, you have to convince the modern Romance reader that the evolution of your Characters' Relationship is possible.

How exactly can a human come to love a person (human or alien) that they find revolting, disgusting, horrifying, or threatening in some way.

The writer must study human psychology -- both actual university course textbooks on psychology, and modern self-help pop psychology with a special focus on the differences between them.

Then the writer must SHOW DON'T TELL that difference between what is actually known about human psychology and what the reader thinks is known, what is popularized.

Find the difference between actual science and pop-science that you want to reveal or argue about -- define it in one sentence.

Then make that difference the core driver of the Initial Reaction of the two Characters who will hold each other in such low regard, maybe contempt.

It could be that one will hold the other in Contempt and the other will regard the one who holds the Contempt as Willfully Ignorant Bastard.

Or they could each see the other in the same very unattractive light.

Find the reason behind each Character's view of the other.

Now, design the epiphany each encounters that changes their view.

Create the symbol they will later consider "Our Song/Place/Garmet"

Derive that Symbol from the difference between real-science psychology and pop-science psychology.

In other words, concretize an abstract concept.

Make sure that concrete object (symbol) is present in your opening scene and ending scene.

It should also be on the exact middle page -- and at that mid-point, you reveal the true meaning to them.

If it is a 14 book series -- book 7's middle page is that Epiphany magically attached to the Symbol.

A single symbol may come in a variety of shapes.

Note how in our discussion of Why Do We Cry At Weddings -- we mention a wide variety of symbols of weddings.  Certain things symbolize weddings -- others don't.  There is a mystical relationship between a physical object and what it can (or can't) symbolize.

Symbolism (for humans, and one supposes for Aliens) is not random.  Not just anything can become a symbol of whatever.  You don't get to invent the entire mechaniism of human psychology freehand, and just put in what seems "cool" to you, for the heck of it.

Creating Symbols is almost an exact science.  But it is still more than half artform.

A lot of a writer's time, and workday, is spent contemplating symbols and symbolism.  A picture is worth a thousand words.  Symbols, used well, move the plot, explain the backstory, break up expository lumps, transform narrative into description, and even create settings.

For example, as a writing exercise, set a love scene at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. -- right there at the foot of the seated statue.

Now pick that scene up, and set it on the walkway of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Examine what you have to change.

Setting = Symbolism.

So, humans think in symbols and humans feel in symbols.  Things, objects, heritage, -- all in free association with abstract ideas.

The reader starts with the described symbol, and then feels the idea.

The writer starts with the feeling of the idea, and then creates the symbol.

Writing is backwards from reading.

When you've got that one nailed, and can think backwards -- every novel you read will become something very different than a novel.

Learning to think backwards changes your life.  It takes getting through an epiphany to transform yourself from a reader into a writer.  (or vice-versa; some people are born writers).

So study the psychology of the epiphany, and learn to pilot your readers through a Character's epiphany from being utterly blind to their own "self" to having a good view of how their inner mind works.  Real people do this constantly, all the time through life.  Characters, only once.

That's right.  Story is just about defined by the high-point of a Character's Life.  Story is the MOMENT when a Character's life changes, and their self-image changes, and their behavior changes, and thus the results of their actions change.

CHANGE is the essence of Conflict which is the essence of story.

Conflict produces change in Characters.

The biggest, single, and most common Conflict all of us are familiar with is Romance itself.

Romance happens when we set aside our self-image and embrace Another Person.

So to pilot your readers through the transformative moment of Romance, you need to select a Conflict that will cause your Character to CHANGE -- from "this" type of person to "that" type of person.

You could write a self-help non-fiction book about what forces a person encounters in life that cause them to change -- and probably sell more copies than any Romance novel.  But if you want to write a novel, leave the narrative and lecture on the shelf in your mind, and focus on the Conflict that Causes your Characters to Change Each Other.

If they will end up at an HEA, in love forever, then start with them having an innate antipathy.  Explain that antipathy with symbols, and narrate it with conflict (he did this; therefore she did that).

Here is one key to dissolving the expository lump.

As the plot progresses, the story progresses.  Each has a Beginning, a Middle, and an End.

Start your love story with the two Characters averse to one another.

Make a Middle where the aversion abates to neutrality.

End when you transform that neutrality to love. 

Make the readers believe the theme of Love Conquers All by Showing Without Telling a basic principle of psychology.

Here's an example.

You see in others what you love or dislike about yourself - you see yourself in others - but "Love" of a certain HEA type happens when you meet a person whose aura or presence brings out the BEST IN YOU - and though the worst still exists, the BEST comes to dominate your life-expression.

Then you love your "self" (flaws and all) and are able to love this Other (flaws and all). It is a psychological vertical learning curve leading to the kind of maturity that can establish and manage an HEA life.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Worldbuilding From Reality - Part 5 Realistic Happily Ever After by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Worldbuilding From Reality
Part 5
Realistic Happily Ever After
by
Jacqueline Lichtenberg 

The previous parts to Worldbuilding From Reality are here:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/03/worldbuilding-from-reality-part-4.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/07/worldbuilding-from-reality-part-3.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/02/worldbuilding-from-reality-part-2.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2010/03/worldbuilding-from-reality.html

Reality is a tricky thing to define. Take any pair of humans and they will disagree on the "reality" of at least one broad topic of life.

Marry those two people to each other and they'll fight cats-n-dogs over that one issue, no matter how much fun they have making up afterwards.

Yet, ultimately, "reality" (whatever it is) is the substance from which fiction is woven.

A fiction writer must study "reality" as closely as any non-fiction writer, more closely than most journalists today.

A fiction writer doesn't need to "know the truth" to set her imagination free, and in fact "truth" probably won't help the WIP get finished.

But if you are a Romance Writer, you need to know what your readers feel is true.

Here is an article about the beliefs of successful people -- if you are writing for successful people, you should incorporate these beliefs into your Characters.  Note #1 on this list is READ.

http://www.businessinsider.com/beliefs-of-rich-people-2016-7

And here is the Source.

http://richhabits.net/rich-habits-study-background-on-methodology/

Knowing what your readers feel is true (as contrasted with what they think is true) is also vital for a science fiction romance novel writer.

What we feel is true does not always line up with what we think is true.

Men differ from women in the area of thinking about emotions.

Nailing that elusive difference on that one topic lets a writer depict a Character as male or female in a way that the reader will recognize without the Character being just another thin cardboard cutout cliche.  But it has to be "off the nose" -- see Save The Cat! If you articulate and delineate that difference, it won't seem "realistic" to many readers.

So today we have 3 separate topics to blend into one seamless artistic whole called a "world" we have "built" -- Realistic - Happiness - Ever-After.

That's a Love Triangle: the Practical Guy - the Idealistic Woman - the Visionary Guy.

One thing Romance genre readers have in common is a subliminal, sometimes elusive, feeling that there really exists a Happily Ever After lifestyle and state of being.

Readers feel that truth even if they have never, personally, observed a couple living a Happily Ever After life.

Why is it that we believe in the Happily Ever After, not as just fantasy but as reality, without ever seeing it with our own eyes?  Believing it is real and then failing to achieve the ideal state is a source of much larger than life, dramatic, angst Romance novels focus on.  "Get a different man, and everything will be fine!"  Is that true?  How could it not be true?

I've collected a few answers to that question that could be used as Story Springboards.

Here's Part 4 of Story Springboards:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/11/story-springboards-part-3-art-of.html

And here's an index to a few:

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/11/index-post-to-art-and-craft-of-story.html

Remember, most often the Story Idea precedes the building of the world in which the story is a plausible (maybe inevitable) Event.

Not all writers (or not every project of any given writer) begin with Story or Character, but it is vastly common among the most prolific Romance writers.  Romance is about the Characters and how they Relate to each other.  Well, for that matter, so is "War" -- and that is another reason science fiction and romance genres are such a natural fit.

My collection of answers to the question of why WE believe in the HEA (while so many others just don't) includes examinations of fictional Worlds and their structures, the nature of Reality, the nature of Happiness, and perhaps most important the concept of "ever after."

We've been working on how to create a Romance between a Human and an Alien that is plausible to readers who disbelieve the HEA for some while.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/09/theme-worldbuilding-integration-part-16.html

Previous parts of Theme-Worldbuilding Integration are indexed here:

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/04/index-to-theme-worldbuilding.html

We have discussed, under Theme-Symbolism Integration, why it is that we cry at weddings.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/08/theme-symbolism-integration-part-3-why.html

That entry has links to the two previous parts of that series on symbolism.

So we've been assembling the tools to discuss the vast schism in our real world between those who expect "life" to have a Happily Ever After and those who know for a fact that there is no such thing as an HEA.

Now we have to survey our everyday real world and the prevailing beliefs guiding thinking and the prevailing thinking shaping beliefs.

Remember the theory that in every Man there is a Hidden Woman, and in every Woman there is a Hidden Man.  In other words, both polarities are available to every human (might not be true of Aliens).

And remember the occult theory that Gender is a property of Soul -- Souls come in masculine and feminine, and as the Soul descends into the body in stages (from conception, through 12 or 13 years or so of growth) the Soul shapes the body.  These two theories of "what" a human is generate a vast number of themes and their attending conflicts, all pre-packaged to become perfect Romance Novels.

If the human social schisms were cleanly divided along gender lines, all women would be on one side of the HEA battle and all men on the other.  Since that is not the way it is, what is actually going on?

Why do some people believe that what they've never observed nevertheless exists, and some people believe that if they can't observe it, it does not exist.  Worse, that if they can't see it, then it is impossible.

We see humans divide themselves on every issue right along that idea of what is real and what is not  -- religion vs science, HEA vs HFN, Freedom of Speech vs Don't Offend Me, Freedom to Bear Arms vs. You Must Be Prevented From Attacking Me Because Of Course You Would If Armed.

How many have observed Science discarding settled scientific theories, yet believe the latest is the last, firm and absolutely true truth?  How many have observed Religions splitting, reforming, founding new branches?  How many have been the target of a madman/woman with a gun?   You may see it on YouTube or TV but how do you know its "real?"

YouTube videos that go viral are often professionally shot and edited, a secret that few know.  Also few know the secret that "demonstrators" who show up with signs and rotten tomatoes to "protest" something actually are recruited and paid for the job.

We do not live in a what-you-see-is-what-you-get world.

Just look at the Political Candidates who hire image consultants and speech writers, makeup artists, (Botox is making a fortune) and even a specialist to go buy clothing and get it altered to fit, to be worn only once.  The package presented for voters to choose does not resemble what's inside the package. You can't see what's inside the package, but you are supposed to "believe" it is what you want or prefer.  You are supposed to believe that the packaging is Reality because it is "realistic."

Note how Belief In The UnObserved appears as the rationalization for an attitude on both sides of the schism, the side that believes what can not be proven and the side that flatly refuses to believe anything is real if they have not observed it.  Any given individual human (not Alien) can be on different sides of this schism on different issues and not feel any lack of intellectual integrity.

One very important schism of the 21st Century is over whether what can't be observed is real.

For example Global Warming.  There are those who accept the numbers as observations and "settled science" and thus the phenomenon as Real (because science is never wrong), and those to whom numbers are way too easily concocted out of imagination, forged, or misinterpreted and so are not proof of Reality.

This is the schism that divides us on the issue of belief and knowledge.

One depiction of Reality attributes Knowledge to the Masculine and Belief to the Feminine.  So the schism besetting our National and International politics is the old Battle of the Sexes issue of "what is reality?"

"My feelings are Real!" vs "I know what I'm talking about!"

Do modern men today believe in the HEA as a real goal in life?

It's obvious from the burgeoning Romance field that a huge fraction of women do, and a lot of men as well.

So why doesn't everyone know (not believe but know) that "life" well lived leads to a long stretch of Happily Ever After years -- despite the size of the challenges before you during youth (18-30 are the peak years of peak challenge usually).  After 30, people tend to confront challenges (Conflict of a novel) using previously acquired and tested skills.  Everything that has happened, happens again, only this time you have the where-with-all to deal.

Humans on one side of the schism view the real world from the angle of, "If I just had X, Y, Z, then X, Y and Z would make me happy."  XYZ can be house, car, job, or it might be wife, kids, great vacations, or $7,000 suits, diamond cuff links and the respect I'm due.  Or alternatively, maybe "If I just had enough money, I'd be happy."  They "know" because they've seen people who have those "things" who are quite clearly "happy."

Humans on the other side of the schism view the real world from the angle of, "Wow, look at this amazing world full of glorious surprises and magnificent people! Life is such fantastic fun!"

In other words, some people deem Happiness to be a product of what happens to them, or their situation, or possessions. Other people deem Happiness to be a product of what they do in life, or give in life, or observe in life.

Both see Happiness as real, but identify the emotion's origin differently.

Many human cultures have enshrined this wisdom in various aphorisms.  Even those who seek "things" and "wealth" expecting it to "make" them happy know with their minds that things don't make happiness.  What they don't know is that Happiness Makes Things.

Happiness is a force, a simmering and muted Joy, that comes from deep down inside a human being and emanates outwards into their environment, creating and shaping that environment.  Things don't "happen to them."  Rather, "they happen to things."

We all know the Great Novels depicting the contented, glowing satisfaction that can envelope a household ostensibly impoverished of "things" where a good marriage creates fine children who go on to do great things in the world.

That is the President Abraham Lincoln legend -- log cabin, learning to read and study law by firelight, becoming President, freeing the slaves, being assassinated.

We have had Presidential Candidates galore bragging about their poverty-stricken origins and meteoric rise.

Poverty as a badge of honor -- or poverty as an excuse never to contribute to the world.

Same schism we've been talking about - the poor, living in poor neighborhoods see nobody who has succeeded to become not-poor.  Half of them know for a fact that's because there is no way to succeed (because if there were a way, they would see it), and the other half believe there must be a way, and if there is not then they'll create one.  Some of those found drug cartels, others become tech company CEO's or Senators.  Half can't be stopped because they believe, and the other half can't be started because they know.

It is amazing how many do succeed.  Most of us know how dispiriting grinding poverty is.

http://www.nature.com/news/poverty-linked-to-epigenetic-changes-and-mental-illness-1.19972

We've all read tons of novels about the poor little rich boy - the wastrel and ne'er do well, son of a Duke who gambles away the family fortune.  It's classic for a reason - it is real, it happened, it still happens.

So starting out with the presence or absence of wealth does not correlate with productivity and stability in life.

When we talk about the "Happily Ever After" we are referring to a Steady State -- a stable condition that does not change despite events.  It's not an absence of Events that characterizes the HEA years, but the inability of Events to change the state of "Happiness."

Think about that.  The HEA is about a Happiness that is not caused BY Events, and does not prevent Events (adverse and otherwise) from occurring.  The Happiness comes from within and is stable because it is not caused by "stuff" that is possessed, status, social standing, or reputation.

The HEA is a steady state.

In Chemistry, this is called Buffering - a buffered solution contains a reserve of chemicals that will absorb any acid tossed into the solution and convert the acid to a neutral, and other chemicals that will absorb any base tossed into the solution and convert that to a neutral.  The Buffered Solution will be measured at the same pH regardless of what is tossed into it.  It APPEARS stable.  You can measure it.  You can identify the numbers precisely.  You can see for a fact that it is stable.  It isn't. Its reserves get used up neutralizing whatever is tossed into it, so eventually its pH will change.

Life is like that.  Stability is only apparent.

Viewed from outside, a stable situation may seem unchanging even though it is really Buffered.

The HEA is like that buffered solution.  With enough stress, change is required.  But because of the Happiness being sourced within, not without, the emotional resources to make those changes are available.

So a person who has little or nothing, a person going through an impoverished stage of life (college student, student-loan years) (or living a whole life in that stage, never making it to college) may look at people who have a stable-seeming suburban life/job/kids/pets/mortgage/cars/ lifestyle and deem that the lifestyle makes them Happy because it is so stable (while the impoverished always have good reasons to feel threatened).

The people who have all those "things" and don't feel Happy may seek to acquire more things because they know people who have more and seem (from the outside) happier. Since they can see that it is so, they therefore know that it is so.  Just get more and be happy.


People who have reached a Happily Ever After plateau in life may take such pleasure in their "things" that they deem their happiness caused by the things.

You can construct Aliens who have this same schism -- or perhaps see their world and lives from a different angle.

Even humans have another way of looking at the world, but it involves a different concept of what a human being is, what the world is, and how humans and the world fit together into such a seamless whole that we can't figure out what happiness is, where it comes from, or how to acquire our fair share.

This would be termed the Spiritual view of the world, the view of the world where a Human is an ape-body hosting a Divine Spark of a Soul not just a collection of neurons subject to epigenetic modification by Events.

Thus Romance Genre is built upon the concept of the Soul Mate.

Because science fiction romance is "romance" genre, the worlds we use are built on the concept that romance is the primary precondition to marriage -- "I love you" and "Will you marry me" are generally at or near the END of the typical Romance novel.

So if the concept of the Soul (which nobody can see or measure, so we can only believe in it) seems un-realistic to a particular reader, the concept of the Soul Mate will be nonsense, and the entire foundation of the Happily Ever After crumbles to a painful Happily For Now.  The next incoming Event will knock the couple off their Happiness pinnacle and plunge them into more angst and agony.

But science fiction and fantasy readers, especially Paranormal Fantasy readers, are accustomed to believing six impossible things before breakfast.

If you can induce suspension of disbelief in your readers, you can draw them into a world you have built where Souls do exist, and Soul Mates do find each other and live happily ever after, not in the absence of adverse Events but despite that adversity, perhaps even relishing adversity.

It is tricky to write like that because you, the writer, must know what beliefs your reader holds dear and how to get that reader to suspend disbelief.

Try this approach.

Suppose your target reader is convinced there exists no such thing as a Happily Ever After because no couple he/she has ever known seems to live that way.

Perhaps you can sell that reader on the hypothesis that the HEA state of Life can be created, perhaps magically or perhaps by Computer Dating Service, Time Travel, Dimension Travel, or some other device.

You then have to explain to this reader why he/she can't observe any real people living in the HEA state right now.

One answer is well known in an old traditional religion, and it is privacy.

Here is a 30 minute video of an explanation of Jewish marriage ceremony customs that explains how essential to Happily Ever After is the establishment of 3 Private Spaces -- the woman's personal private space, the man's personal private space, and the Couple's very well defended personal private space.

http://www.chabad.org/multimedia/media_cdo/aid/3343913/jewish/Secrets-of-the-Chupah.htm

This video explains the way that personal, individual sovereignty is the bedrock necessity for the forming of stable community (where, in this case, community is the married couple).  Remember "stable" is the Characteristic most identified with the HEA.

10 minutes into the video, the lecturer uses the term soul mate.

25 minutes into the video he discusses the 3-rings I'm using as a model below.

It is a much better constructed essay than any I've ever written. It sticks to the point, where I never do.

It is a 30 minute video, but worth every minute if you are irked by how hard it is to get readers to accept the HEA as plausible.

The solution to that problem is in that video -- but the fellow speaking probably has no idea what he's said.  Here is some of how I think it can be used in a Romance novel aimed at HEA-skeptics.

The individual, personal separateness maintained during all the years of marriage is here explained not as inimical to togetherness, but as the essential component of togetherness and to unconditional love.

Unconditional love (watch the video for the explanation of it in Marriage) generates "happiness."

Happiness is the outward flowing force that shapes the couple's world.  No incoming Event can alter the state of "happiness." because happiness does not originate without, does not come in from outside, but emanates from inside.

He's talking about forming a dwelling for the Love that Conquers All.

The description of the symbols of this ceremony can be used to explain to the disbeliever in the HEA that Happiness is not dependent on finding exactly the right person to marry, or on hammering the new spouse into the desired image, but on making the person you marry your Soul's Mate.

The Soul Mate condition is a creation, the result of a mutual and arduous effort on the parts of two people, who create that condition by respecting each other's personal privacy.

Not just any random pair can make a marriage, so a great deal of high precision discrimination is necessary to find a solid match.  But humans being humans, nobody's perfect, and parts match while other parts clash.  The point of the arranged marriage is not lack-of-clashing-parts, but rather stability of the Couple and their home, to raise children well.  Stability is the point, and it rests on privacy.

The secret sauce, the ingredient that forges all human Relationships, is Privacy.

What goes on between these walls stays between these walls.  When you come inside these walls, you leave your work outside with your muddy boots.  (see House of Zeor)

Personal sovereignty and personal privacy is being eroded in modern life, and concurrently we can see the deterioration of families, of marriages.  Is there a cause-effect relationship between those observations? You can build a number of Worlds around answers to that question, each to house stories with vastly divergent themes.  Study our current Reality, rip your stories from recent Headlines.

For example, one famous incident, way back at the end of June 2016, illustrates how Public Necessity now obliterates personal privacy and personal sovereignty.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/lawsuit-disabled-woman-injured-security-airport-40283511

---------quote------------

The lawsuit says an alarm went off as she and her mother were going through a security checkpoint operated by the Memphis International Airport Police Department and the Transportation Safety Administration. Hannah Cohen became disoriented by the alarm and the security workers' attempts to search her, the lawsuit says.

"The security personnel failed to recognize that she was confused because of her obvious disability and was unable to cooperate with the search," Cohen's lawyers, Kelly Pearson and William Hardwick, wrote in the lawsuit.

Her mother, Shirley Cohen, said she tried to tell TSA agents about her daughter's disability, but she was kept away by police.

"She's trying to get away from them but in the next instant, one of them had her down on the ground and hit her head on the floor. There was blood everywhere," Shirley Cohen told WREG-TV.

The lawsuit alleges the security personnel assaulted Hannah Cohen at the checkpoint, "causing her physical and emotional injury as well as emotional injury" to her mother.

Hannah Cohen was arrested, but the charges were later dropped. ...
--------end quote-------

Why would a TSA Agent make such an error?  Of course, later in the TSA's official (lawyer written) defense, lots more comes to light.

But we're not after facts, here.  We are ripping a Headline to use for story material.

We have a society where a complete stranger can forcibly (legally) lay hands on a person without any indication that the person is guilty of a crime, in fact where indications are that she is innocent of crime (though possibly a dupe of a suicide bomber).

The theoretical concept behind TSA "screening" (search all the innocent in case there's one maybe guilty among them) is Guilty Until Proven Innocent.  In fact, Law Enforcement has moved over the last few decades from removing criminals from circulation to preventing criminals from doing crimes, therefore leaving them in circulation.

Theory was always that it's better to let some criminals get away with crimes than to inconvenience an innocent person.

The innocent miscreant who did something by accident won't do it again.  The criminal will definitely do it again, and more boldly and carelessly, and therefore be caught and removed from circulation.  Law Enforcement need not worry about missing a guilty person, but only about inconveniencing the innocent.

Society can afford to take the damage from the few that get away.  This idea is based on the feeling of solid families firmly living the HEA, experiencing many adverse Events that do not alter their Happiness.

With the disintegration of the nuclear family, the perception dominating society is completely reversed.  We get happiness from things and status, and lose it by losing things and status -- a single criminal action can destroy our country, our American Dream of the HEA.

The theory that Law Enforcement can let a few criminals get away rather than inconvenience the innocent is completely reversed now.

Now Law Enforcement only worries about missing one, not about disrupting the lives of the innocent.  Just imagine how your Alien visitor sees that.

Think about Innocent Until Proven Guilty in terms of "believe what you can not see vs. know only what you can see."

You can believe a Guilty person is Innocent, and can know Guilt only by proof you can see.  Today, Law Enforcement now knows you are Guilty even if they can't see any proof, so they have the right to search you, despite your right to be not-searched.  The rights of the individual count for nothing before the fears (imaginary or not) of the Group. We can't afford to experience even one Adverse Event because it will destroy Happiness.  We must be safe from Events that might happen.

The right of the Group, society, people, the crowd, to be sure there are no bombs on you completely sets aside your right to be not-searched.  This is true of NSA email scanning, and even CDC disease monitoring, or Obamacare mandated screening for diseases you don't have.  You must test everyone to find the few problem people.  Guilty until proven innocent.  Not only that, but the burden of proving your innocence is on you, not the accuser.

The old legal theory of "Innocent Until Proven Guilty" comes from the Ancient Greeks where logic established that it is not possible to prove a negative.

You can prove that something does exist, but you can not prove that it does not exist.

Hence the problem with proving Souls exist.

Here is another item on the Ancient Greeks and Happiness:

http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/a-better-kind-of-happiness
Nobody has figured a way to prove that souls exist, and since you can prove a positive, surely if Souls exist then we can prove it.

Because we have not proven Souls (and thus Soul Mates) do exist, probably about half of humanity is convinced that Souls do not exist.  The rest believe Souls exist without seeing them, or believe they do see them in the eyes of others.

The thesis is that you can not prove a negative, and mere lack of proof of the positive is not indicative of the negative being true.  Therefore, in a court of law, the accused does not have to prove innocence, but the prosecution must prove guilt.  At a TSA checkpoint, however, you must prove your innocence.

The schism that divides humanity between those who believe in what they can not see, and those who know only what they can see, is not always a 50/50 divide as it is today.  So you can create Aliens who have say, 10% Believers who understand humans in terms of Souls (therefore as possible mates) and 90% who know humans have no Souls because they can see from our behavior how soulless we are.

In other words, perhaps 10% of that Alien population would understand Innocent Until Proven Guilty.  They would view this TSA incident with genuine horror just as most of us do.  The woman was brain damaged, not soulless.

BTW the TSA's immediate rebuttal was that the burden of proper behavior rested with the brain impaired woman who should have called ahead to find out what the screening protocols were.  It so happened, in this one incident, the brain impaired woman (who had just had a cancerous tumor removed from her brain) was traveling with her mother (whose protestations were ignored by TSA).

But the impaired woman was 19 years old, and thus dealt with by TSA as an autonomous adult.

What has this to do with a Realistic Happily Ever After?

This incident illustrates what "realistic" means to those readers who don't believe in Souls because they are not proven to exist.  The woman's innocence was not proven, therefore her innocence did not exist.

We all are focused on preventing explosions and shootings in crowds.

We want to be certain we can go where we choose and not be murdered.  How can we not fear Terrorists?  They're very good at making people afraid, very professional at it because they get paid to instill fear in us.  These days even phoning in a bomb threat can divert a plane or cause it to gain a military escort.  So you can see, they have succeeded.  Why?  That tactic would never have worked on the USA of a hundred years ago - maybe 150 years ago.  What has changed?

The numbers clearly show an increased divorce rate, single parents, adults who were raised by single parents.

Of course, the misery of being unable to get a divorce and the even greater misery of unwanted children, has to be figured into the worldbuilding for an Alien Romance.  By targeting and solving those two problems (which admittedly desperately needed solving if we are to call ourselves human), may (or may not) have done collateral damage in unexpected ways.  What if your Aliens have evolved in such a way that solving those social problems does not destabilize their HEA?

So now we have the social problem of voters wanting to force their politicians to make them feel safe. Remember, this is an exercise in ripping story material from headlines.

Realistically, because some humans hide in crowds of humans then murder a bunch of the humans in the crowd (what if some in the crowd were visiting Aliens?), therefore we must search each and every member of that crowd to find the potential miscreants, and we'll know them by the weapons they carry.

Anyone carrying a weapon, or even just a pocket knife, is obviously a miscreant bent on murder of strangers.  So to find that one murderous person, every single person in the crowd (maybe attending a political rally or a concert) must be thoroughly searched.

Who should do the searching?  Law Enforcement -- i.e. government, crafted by politicians who have been elected on their promises to make everyone feel safe.

We discussed government and its power structures here:

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/10/alien-sexuality-part-3-corporate-greed_25.html

Government used to be tasked with securing our perimeter so we can function freely within it.

But since government has been unable to secure the Nation's borders from the current pop-up threats, we have now tasked government with the job of invading our privacy to keep us safe from having our privacy invaded.  Try explaining that to your visiting Alien diplomats while a TSA agent violates the being's sexual private parts.

What has this to do with marriage?

Did you take the time to watch that video?  It is full of story springboards.

Here is the URL again:

http://www.chabad.org/multimedia/media_cdo/aid/3343913/jewish/Secrets-of-the-Chupah.htm

Now back to the video.  Here is a man.  Here is a woman.  They each acknowledge each other's personal space, personal sovereignty, individual foibles.  Together, in cooperation, they CREATE a third space, the Couple.  This new composite has its own space, its privacy, (and foibles).

This marriage between distinctively imperfect people will be solid, stable, "ever after" and at the same time, as a product of that stability, it will radiate Happiness, a force which shapes the surrounding reality.

Happiness does not come from "things" -- but rather "things" come from Happiness.

Happiness is the upwelling, out-flowing force that enriches the world.  It is a creative force, the Divine Love that is Unconditional and manifests as spikes of Joy exploding from a sea of Happiness filling a vessel fabricated from contentment.

This entire Rube Goldberg device called Marriage rests on one thing and one thing only -- privacy.

Marriage rests on three separate and special zones of PRIVACY.

Listen to that video.

The implications of this are stupendous.

The whole concept of the Happily Ever After ending as a "Realistic" goal of real people depends entirely on the establishment and maintaining of Privacy.

Examine how the place that privacy has in our world has changed over the last say, 100-150 years.

Think about what changes in privacy practices (and all the computer hacking related items) has in determining the course of life in today's world if this ancient practice of establishing a zone of privacy is soundly rooted in human nature.

Human Nature might be understood as the privacy zone of the Soul, the privacy zone of the Body, and the privacy zone of the Couple, Soul-Body=Human.

Think about how all this might be viewed by Aliens.

The incident with the brain damaged young woman is a great illustration of how primal bodily privacy is.

It is easy to imagine ( imagine, without basis in the facts of the actual incident) that a person in a brain fog of confusion simply reacts on a primal level to hands intruding into her PRIVATE SPACE, her bodily privacy, reacts as if being attacked by a rapist, and reacts by trying to get away (despite debilities).

Imagine what that intrusion would feel like.

Imagine how you would feel bewildered, in pain and bleeding from falling to the hard floor, then being separated and alone (she was arrested, but we're only imagining the arrest involved separating her; as a 19 year old, she would plausibly have been separated, but this is a story, and that is reality) -- so in our fiction she's alone with strangers in a strange place and has no idea why.

Remember all the posts where we've discussed "ripped from the headlines" -- this news item about the TSA incident is a headline and we are now ripping out the facts, ignoring the truth so we can tell our own story.

Now, imagine because of this news report on her trouble, she gets invited into some experimental stem cell treatment for her brain damage, her brain issues just miraculously clear up, and she fully understands this world and remembers what happened.

If you're doing an Alien Romance, of course the stem cell treatment is donated to Earth by the visiting Aliens, and because of publicity of the incident, she is chosen as the first experimental subject.  And she probably falls for the Alien who shepherds her through the treatment process.

But now she understands what was done to her by the TSA agent, and knows it was done in a perfectly legal way by humans who were convinced they were righteous, doing Good in the name of Good, keeping the public safe, and incidentally getting paid for it.

From the safety of a marriage to an Alien, what does she do?  If she has an HEA with the Alien, does she risk losing it?  If she's miserable, does she see an action that could make her happy?

The problem is half of humanity (that schism that has a mirror image among the Aliens) does not believe in the HEA because HEA only occurs when surrounded by those 7 circles of PRIVACY.

From the outside, you can not observe an HEA in progress.

HEA can not happen where it can be observed.  It can exist only in PRIVATE.

The HEA grows into existence within the privacy of marriage, but the kind of marriage within which the complete sovereignty of the individuals is observed.

As the video defined it, marriage is about Trust - the trust that privacy will not be breached.

The TSA, FBI, CIA and other alphabet agencies have been legally empowered to breach that privacy -- maybe because voters don't think privacy is important.

Small wonder that half of humanity doesn't believe in the HEA - you can't see it because it ceases to exist when you look.  Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle applied to the Soul?

Now, Human society is composed of the nuclear family.  Families amalgamate into tribes composed of related families.  Tribes amalgamate into larger groupings, counties, states, and Nations.

National Federal government rests on the privacy of marriage -- hence a spouse can not be forced to testify against a spouse, or an individual against self.  The whole house of cards comes tumbling down without that pure and absolute Trust that Privacy is honored.

But lets look at the larger social structures (remember we're writing Alien Romance).

Humans marry each other, creating the nuclear unit.

The Units likewise "marry" each other, in that same 3-way-circle structure described in the video.

First individual privacy is guaranteed, then two of the units create a new zone of privacy around them.  The Tribe exists within a circle of privacy created by trust in each other.

The Tribes then "marry" each other -- same process, two private individuals create a third private space, perhaps a County containing them both.  Counties marry each other to form States.  States marry each other to form The United States.  Eurozone seems to be a failed marriage - maybe because privacy has been violated.

Marriage is a business contract just like cities making counties and counties making states - all under constitutions with officers and bylaws.  A single couple's marriage is a contract, a business contract with value exchanged.  The same process creates States and Nations.

That is the theoretical basis of State's Rights -- each state is a zone of PRIVACY which exists because of Trust that privacy won't be violated, and because of that Trust the State or Nation produces Happiness which has the side-effect of producing riches.

In other words, the idea behind State's rights (history books aside) can be summed up by that video explaining Marriage as a process of establishing privacy within a bond of trust.

That's why our money says In God We Trust.

Without that trust in our privacy, without a personal perimeter into which government does not go, there is no family, and thus no Nation.

With that trust in our privacy being respected (even or especially by the TSA) we generate happiness that flows into the environment and creates the love that conquers all.

Unconditional love requires privacy to conquer all.  Consider, the IRS is also a hated monster -- its mission is to invade our privacy and even the private space of a marriage (filing jointly - your spouse cheats; you can go to jail).  We likely would not hate or distrust government if it didn't invade our privacy.

There is a huge difference between privacy and secrecy.  You could make a case for the idea that they are not even related.

Criminals keep their activities secret. Normal people guard their privacy.

It's not that simple, of course, humans being human, but entire thematic structures can be built from the nuances of these two concepts, private and secret.

Just look at Hillary Clinton's FBI investigation results.  Intent made the difference since she accidentally didn't keep her private email secret enough to conform with the law.  But it is not a felony to commit a felony by accident (or we'd all be in prison).  She wanted her privacy and saw no reason the law could interfere with her legitimate need for privacy.

Secrecy vs Privacy is a huge theme source for romance.  (Do watch that video.)

Here is more on thematic structures and love.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/01/falling-in-love.html

And here are two in the Believing In Happily Ever After series:

Standardization vs Customization:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2011/10/believing-in-happily-ever-after-part-3.html

and

Nesting Huge Themes Inside Each Other:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2011/10/believing-in-happily-ever-after-part-4.html

There are now 7 parts to Believing In The Happily Ever After.

The Index post goes up on this blog Tuesday, November 8, 2016
The link will be
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/11/index-to-believing-in-happily-ever-after.html
Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Reviews 17 by Jacqueline Lichtenberg Alien Separation by Gini Koch

Reviews 17
by
Jacqueline Lichtenberg
Alien Separation
by
Gini Koch

Today we're going to look at a genuine Science Fiction Romance with what seems to be Fantasy elements -- that turn out to be alien-advanced-science.  This series is popularizing mixed genre. 

Alien Series Book 11 from DAW Science Fiction, ALIEN SEPARATION by Gini Koch. (534 pages of small print)




Last week and the week before, we looked at Why We Do We Cry At Weddings. 

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/08/theme-symbolism-integration-part-2-why.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/08/theme-symbolism-integration-part-3-why.html

While I was writing those two posts on why we cry at weddings, I was itching to cite Gini Koch's series because it is a case in point. 

In 2011, the 3rd in Gini Koch's Alien Series was all about The Wedding after two of the hottest Alien Romance novels you will ever read, and was aptly titled Alien In The Family.  I loved the Wedding Dress on the cover.



Here is Gini in 2011, Gini in the foreground and me in the background, at the con where we first met in person.  Photo curtesy of Marsheila Rockwell. 

Gini Koch and Jacquelne Lichtenberg

Only up to Book 3 in this series, and I already admired what Gini was doing with a story that was complex and thus difficult to tell.

Yet, she turned this galaxy-spanning tapestry into a follow-your-nose page-turner plot using elegantly simple techniques but orchestrating them into a symphony. 

These novels illustrate how a text-only writer can use the techniques developed by camera-directors for big screen cinema to create close-up reader engagement.

The tight use of Point Of View enhances the emotional impact because all the things that happen, and all the consequences of actions taken by Kitty-Kat (the main POV character - a human woman with morphing genetics) are felt sharply by the reader.

As I've noted previously, the novel writer's medium is not "words" but "emotion."  These 11 novels are crafted of the emotional spectrum that a modern, well educated, intelligent woman would experience when hit by the inexplicable, the bewildering, and the confounding.

Kitty-Kat's theme song is, "But What Is Really Going On?" 

Think about that theme -- This Is What I See, But What Is Really Going On? 

That is the seminal question of our everyday lives right now. 

Last week, we looked at several scientific reports detailing the 7 Primal Emotions or Primary Emotions as in Primary Colors.  And we looked at one list that reduced that 7 emotions to 4.  None of these lists pinpointed LOVE.  Then we contrasted those scientific lists with a different list that started with LOVE and used love as the driving force behind all the other 6 primary emotions. 


In other words, we did a Kitty-Kat exercise of "What is really going on here?"

We look at the world as it is painted in the News, at the "excuses" employers use for hiring/firing/promoting/transferring workers, at the kinds of cars everyone in your current traffic jam are driving, at what your neighbor's house just sold for, at what your doctor just billed your insurance for, at the endless lists of declared Presidential Candidates, and we think, "Wait a minute!  What's really going on here?"

So we all relate to Kitty-Kat's double-takes and we wish we could penetrate the blurry flog surrounding us the way she solves galactic riddles.

The close following of Kitty's Point of View gives us the perspective on our own problems, and makes each of these novels a treasure of a Good Read. 

The real delight in the series as a whole, a long series of long novels, is how the Romance starts with Love At First Sight, continues through harrowing adventures and desperate combat to the Wedding, and then after the Wedding the Romance continues to get more intense, the "tall, dark stranger in Armani suits," more mysterious and more dear.

As noted in Why We Cry At Weddings, the typical Romance ends before the Wedding Planner is hired.  Gini Koch has crafted a MARRIAGE which is a continuous, ongoing, cliff-hanger Romance (complete with amazing sex scenes).

Kitty-Kat, a human woman from a human family, marries an Alien -- native to Earth, yes, but of off-world ancestry.  The off-world in-laws take a real-time interest in the Wedding, and their political situation on their planet continues to change Kitty-Kat's life, right on through the birth of her first child, and the boomerang genetic effect gestation of that child has on her body. 

Here in Book 11, ALIEN SEPARATION, for the second time, Kitty-Kat and her alien husband are targets of assassins.  That's another theme that runs through Kitty's new life -- she has a very happy marriage still shrouded in Romance, but there's always someone (several someones, usually, and never who you'd expect) trying to kill her, her husband, her daughter, or others who matter to her.

Sometimes, what seems to be an attack actually turns out to be help-in-disguise, or perhaps a cry-for-help.  It gets complicated because there are pure-energy-beings, beings who are native to the inside of worm-holes, hybrid-beings of various types, clones, and mechanical beings.  And you can't quite tell which are "just" animals. 

ALIEN SEPARATION starts out with Kitty, her husband, her daughter, and an ensemble cast of her friends and allies being swept up and transported in a "beam" to an Alice-In-Wonderland-Fantasy world complete with talking animals (or are they animals?).  They land separated from each other, scrambling to survive as they hunt for each other. 

Again, as in the first novel, TOUCHED BY AN ALIEN, the environment and events give the reader the definite impression that this is a Fantasy Series -- when all of a sudden, what is "really going on" begins to re-arrange your assessment of the difference between science and magic. 

If you want to write Alien Romance that reads like Science Fiction to science fiction fans, like Fantasy to fantasy fans, like a Videogame to videogamers, and at the same time, like Romance to romance fans, then make this series your textbook.

Here are some previous posts I've done mentioning or featuring the Alien Series by Gini Koch.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2010/04/turning-action-into-romance.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/09/theme-worldbuilding-integration-part-3.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/05/theme-plot-integration-part-9-use-of-co.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/05/theme-plot-integration-part-10-use-of.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/11/reviews-2-by-jacqueline-lichtenberg.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/05/reviews-7-by-jacqueline-lichtenberg.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/06/information-feed-tricks-and-tips-for.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/08/reviews-9-sex-politics-and-heroism.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/10/dialogue-part-9-depicting-culture-with.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/03/reviews-12-heroic-point-of-view-in-mass.html

In most of those mentions of Gini Koch, I have noted that absolutely everything about her Alien Series makes it a Must Read, whether you are studying how to blend genres or just looking for a good read.

But every time, I have noted that some readers may find the text wordy in spots, which makes the pacing un-even in an annoying way.  Most readers have a "fast-skim" mode and just skip over of fly through sections where there are too many words used to tell a brief part of the story.

When you write a novel, you have to just let the words flow -- and there will always be too many words here and there.  Second draft sees about 10% cut, and third draft -- or the editor's blue pencil over the manuscript -- soaks another 10% out.  If those cuts are well done, the result is easier to read, and more fun to read, and re-read.

When you have a long story to write and a tight deadline, very often there's no time to do those careful cuts.  To know what to cut, you have to let the manuscript sit for a few months, then re-read it and cut as you go.  If you do not have the time to let it sit, then wordy-structures will get into print.

There is one other way to prevent wordy-structures from making it into print -- don't write them to begin with.  Make a habit of crafting your sentences tightly -- of constructing dialogue without loops and repetitions, without one character recounting to another what the reader already knows (except where a character is lying to another character and you want the reader to know that.)

I don't know how she did it, but Gini Koch achieved a huge reduction in wordy-constructions and looping dialogue with this novel.  The published version would not benefit from another 20% cut. 

Every page is filled with purposeful, plot-advancing, story-enhancing words and nothing else.

It's not terse writing, yet, but it is very different from the previous 10 novels. 

For that reason alone, I recommend that you read these 11 novels in order.  This series is not like Sime~Gen, where you can read in any order.  This is an ongoing saga, a story that unfolds in chronological order, and all about the same characters you get to know in depth.

December 2015 has book 12 scheduled for publication -- ALIEN IN CHIEF. 

Go to Gini Koch's Amazon Page and on the upper left, click the button to FOLLOW her.  Amazon will email you when the next book comes out. 

I love that FOLLOW button!  I follow a lot of series this way.

All in all, Gini Koch's Alien Series is a classic in the making.  It breaks new ground, gives a new perspective, and heralds the shifts in modern publishing and audience taste. 

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com