Ownership of Ideas

Volume 31, Issue 1 of the JOURNAL OF THE FANTASTIC IN THE ARTS includes an article by Dennis Wilson Wise on the literary development of EPVIDS (evil, possessed, vampire, demonic swords). He begins with the trope's modern origins in the works of J. R. R. Tolkien and Poul Anderson, who borrowed motifs from Finnish and Norse legends, which in turn share common roots. Wise then analyzes the uses of sentient, demonic swords by Michael Moorcock and other more recent sword-and-sorcery authors. The article fascinatingly highlights how the different writers incorporated the same archetypal concept into their fictional worlds in their own individual ways.

Editor John Campbell is said to have sometimes proposed the same plot or theme to several different contributors at once. Each writer would come up with a unique story, unlike any of the others. There are no completely "original" fiction ideas. Robert Heinlein claimed that only three basic plots exist. Space for creative "originality" lies in the execution of the idea.

I know of at least two anthologies based on filk songs that illustrate this principle. The fantasy anthology LAMMAS NIGHT, edited by Josepha Sherman, comprises a variety of stories based on Mercedes Lackey's song of that title. The volume begins with the lyrics of the song, followed by Lackey's own conversion of the poem into a prose narrative. The rest of the stories develop the premise in many different directions. CARMEN MIRANDA'S GHOST IS HAUNTING SPACE STATION THREE, edited by Don Sakers, plays a similar game with a Leslie Fish song. Long ago, I read an anthology weaving variations on the plot of "The Highwayman," the classic poem by Alfred Noyes (unfortunately, I don't remember the book's title).

Vivian Vande Velde's single-author collection THE RUMPELSTILTSKIN PROBLEM explores six different angles on the traditional fairy tale, offering explanations for the details that don't seem to make sense. (For example, if the little man can spin straw into gold, why would he care about getting the heroine's ring and necklace as rewards?) And other authors have created their own versions of Rumpelstiltskin, such as Naomi Novik in SPINNING SILVER. Among countless re-imaginings of "Beauty and the Beast," Robin McKinley wrote two, and Mercedes Lackey has published three.

These works demonstrate a truth Lackey repeats over and over on Quora, in answer to questions from naive aspiring authors: "You cannot copyright an idea."

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

The Rule of Six

RWR, the official magazine of Romance Writers of America, has a regular article series called "Your Writing Coach," by Shirley Jump. In the April 2021 issue (alas, planned as the final print issue, with the publication switching to digital-only) Jump explains the "rule of six," a term originally derived from the advertising business. Since RWR articles aren't available to non-members, I want to summarize this thought-provoking concept here. According to research on human memory, the most items we can easily remember at one time equal five. Therefore, in the realm of consumer goods, when we think of popular brands of commonly used items, four or five spring to mind immediately. It's harder to think of a sixth or higher-numbered item in a category. The purpose of advertising is to implant certain products in the audience's "top of mind" awareness, so that if we're looking to buy a new refrigerator (for example) the client's appliance brand will pop up in the customer's consciousness first.

Jump connects this principle with the craft of writing by applying it to brainstorming story elements such as characters, plots, and motivations. The themes, tropes, and scenarios we think of first will be those we've encountered over and over in our recreational reading and viewing. To come up with something fresh, we have to push ourselves beyond "top of mind" responses. The article urges writers to consciously attempt to think of at least six answers to each brainstorming question. When we reach the point where it's hard to dig up an idea that's not a variation on one of the others, we're getting somewhere. The author says if those fifth and sixth ideas flow too easily, we aren't doing it right. As she puts it, "you really have to reach deep into your imagination to come up with something truly unique." Now, I read that comment with reservations, since I doubt any "truly unique" plot twists, character types, or motivations exist. Just browse TVTropes.org with your "unique" concept as a search term, and you'll probably discover it isn't "something that hasn't been done before." In my opinion, Jump is more on target when she recommends trying for "a really cool spin."

So, to invent a fresh answer to the "what's next" question in plotting, you'd list the ideas that come to you most readily and dig deeper for those fourth, fifth, and sixth possibilities. Jump demonstrates with a scenario of a sexy guy driving a minivan. What's he doing there? She moves from the obvious (dropping off children at school, his own or a relative's) to the progressively unusual (e.g., "he stole the minivan to go after his kidnapped best friend"). She suggests exploring six external and six internal goals, motivations, and conflicts for each major character. Done thoroughly, this exercise in itself should generate a wealth of plot ideas. She mentions flipping gender roles as one way to freshen up a familiar scenario or character type. Long ago, I read a Western romance with a twist on the often-seen plot premise of freeing a criminal from prison to perform a task or participate in a vital mission. The title was something like "The Virgin and the Outlaw." The virgin was a bachelor needing help on his ranch; the outlaw was a woman from out of town incarcerated in the local jail.

Suppose I want to conceive of an entertaining, conflict-generating "cute meet" for my hero and heroine? Their children or pets get them together. (Been done a million times.) They clash as strangers, maybe literally bumping into each other on foot or in cars, or arguing in a store or other neutral venue, then walk into a business or political meeting or a job interview to run into each other again. (Been done in a multitude of variations.) One of them hits the other with a car. (I included versions of that in one of my vampire romances and in a shapeshifter novel, and I've seen similar incidents in other paranormal romances.) A volunteer in an animal shelter encounters a werewolf mistaken for a dog. (Not my idea but the premise of a novella I once read, and I wish I'd thought of it first.)

If you search the phrase "meet cute" on TV Tropes, you'll find several dozens of these kinds of scenarios. And, as TV Tropes reminds us, tropes are not bad. "Tropes are just tools. Writers understand tropes and use them to control audience expectations either by using them straight or by subverting them, to convey things to the audience quickly without saying them." Because "human beings are natural pattern seekers," the existence of tropes is inevitable. To return to the RWR article about the rule of six, the trick is to put your own "cool spin" on the familiar patterns by refusing to settle for the first plot twist, goal, motivation, or character type generated by the "top of mind" phenomenon. While the outcome probably won't be "something that hasn't been done before," it will display your unique touch as an individual creator.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Visualizing Characters

Any Superman fans here? I mostly enjoyed the first two episodes of the new series SUPERMAN AND LOIS on the CW network, although for me neither this program nor the older series SMALLVILLE measures up to LOIS AND CLARK. My husband complained about my griping over Lana Lang's black hair (same objection I had to that character on SMALLVILLE). Everybody knows Lana is a redhead, just as everybody knows Lex Luthor is bald (eventually ending up bald even if he doesn't start that way). Her hair is one of the iconic traits of her character in the comics. It wouldn't have been hard to have the actress wear a wig—flame-red, auburn, strawberry blonde, any shade within that general category. A visual image of a fictional character so jarringly different from expectations interferes with my immersion in the story.

Many actors have portrayed Count Dracula, the classic character I'm most familiar with, probably lots more than I've gotten around to watching. Christopher Lee and John Carradine come closest to my image of Dracula, although even Lee never performed him in a script fully faithful to the novel. Among the myriad attempts at adapting the original, the Dan Curtis TV movie starring Jack Palance makes a pretty decent try, but Palance in the title role made it hard for me to suspend disbelief. In my opinion, he's the least suitable Dracula I've ever seen.

For fans of Dorothy Sayers' mysteries, the adaptations broadcast on public TV under the umbrella title MURDER MOST ENGLISH dramatize the novels with a high degree of fidelity. Ian Carmichael, however, doesn't quite fit the image of Lord Peter Wimsey as described in the books. Still, he comes close enough not to undermine my suspension of disbelief. As far as Sherlock Holmes is concerned, for me Jeremy Brett was perfect (until he began to gain a little weight in the later seasons, but he can hardly be blamed for that). And from my perspective, Anthony Hopkins IS Dr. Hannibal Lecter, probably because I'd seen clips from the movie (although not the entire film) before reading the book.

How much does the appearance of an actor who plays a character from a novel or comic series matter to you? Does it make a difference whether or not print illustrations (as in comics or on book covers) exist to provide a template? If you view the movie before reading the original text, do you visualize the character as looking like the actor?

For writers, this topic bears on how much visual detail to provide in describing characters. Some novelists touch very lightly on physical appearance. The only characters in DRACULA described thoroughly enough to draw portraits of them are Dr. Van Helsing and the Count himself. Robert Heinlein sometimes delineates characters in detail, but not always. Although the clothing and body paint of Eunice in I WILL FEAR NO EVIL are often described, we get very little hint of how she herself looks except the "telling" rather than "showing" remark that she's very beautiful. According to Heinlein, she's meant to be Black, but the actual text of the novel says nothing to indicate that fact (nothing to contradict it, either, though). As a reader, I want to know what fictional characters look like, preferably early in the story. It's jarring to imagine a character one way and later receive information that invalidates the image I've formed. It also bugs me to visualize a fictional person as a particular gender and then find out well into the story that I've been mistaken, unless the author has a sound narrative reason for the ambiguity. As a writer, I know it can be difficult to work in descriptions of characters—particularly a viewpoint character—with grace and subtlety rather than producing a "wanted poster" list of traits. It's especially hard to manage this task with a first-person narrator, of course. If she gazes at herself in the mirror and says things like, "I brushed my luxuriant blonde hair," she'll come across as insufferably self-absorbed. That's probably a major reason why I use third-person limited rather than first-person narrative in my fiction.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Tackling Revisions

Since I'm currently revising a paranormal romance novella under consideration by one of my publishers (addressing changes the editor requested), naturally I've been thinking lately about the process of revision. Professional advice about revision and rewriting varies widely; writers can find many different approaches and suggested procedures. There's an often quoted precept to the effect that, "Writing is rewriting." One of Robert Heinlein well-known rules for writers, however, states, "Never rewrite except to editorial order." He seems to mean that it's better to devote time and energy to a new project than to undertake a massive rewrite of an old one. (I assume he doesn't include as "rewriting" the unavoidable polishing on the sentence level.) At the other extreme, I've read advice from a bestselling fantasy novelist that assumes a fledgling writer should expect to produce multiple, extensively overhauled drafts before allowing a work to see the light of day. That expectation risks the author's turning into one of those aspiring writers who spend years on a single novel in a quest for perfection and never get around to submitting it, much less starting any other work.

Among many resources about revision available online, here's one example, very lucid and detailed:

8 Awesome Steps to Revising Your Novel

Some of the advice strikes me as well worth following, such as setting the book aside before one starts to edit (although not everybody has the luxury of "stepping back" for the month or more this article suggests) and then doing a preliminary read-through to list problems that stand out. Overall, the questions suggested for interrogating the work are definitely useful, too. Some of the recommendations, though, seem mainly directed at "pantsers." When the article explains how to evaluate such elements as plot complexity and consistency or character arcs and motivations, I instantly react with, "Why didn't you take care of all that in the outlining phase?" To me, "pantsing" would feel like an exhaustingly time-wasting method of producing a book, although I realize many writers can't work any other way. Stephen King and Diana Gabaldon, to name only two bestselling examples, demonstrate what amazing creations sometimes result from that approach.

Some writing-advice articles explicitly recommend a separate read-through for each element of editing (e.g., plot, character arcs, grammar and style, spelling, etc.). If I tried to do it that way, I would get sick of the story long before completing the process, as well as getting so familiar with it that I would probably cease to see errors. Also, the not uncommon advice not to bother with minor corrections during the first editing pass, because you may scrap or entirely rewrite that scene anyway, doesn't apply to me, for two reasons: I've already planned the story or novel scene by scene in the outline, so if a particular section didn't fit, I would have noticed before writing a full draft of it. Second and really primary, I'm constitutionally unable to read a chunk of prose without noticing and correcting errors as I go. No doubt that's a side effect of having worked as a proofreader for over twenty years.

Anyway, all writers, after seeking out and absorbing the advice most relevant and helpful for their own temperaments and stages of growth, develop their own individual revision processes.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

The Value of Friendship

Here's a guest post in LOCUS by Mike Chen, discussing the undervaluation of friendship in contemporary culture, particularly in fiction:

Like a Friend

He praises friendship as "one of the cornerstones of our lives," especially in the past year of unprecedented isolation, and mourns the frequent neglect of its importance. As he puts it, in stories friendship is "often presented as a lower-tier relationship, something given to a secondary character to help the main character achieve their goal of family connections or romance." He deplores this attitude and offers examples of a few strong friendships in popular media, expressing the wish that such fictional relationships were more common. He also celebrates friendship as a relationship of choice, different in that way from familial bonds and the swept-away emotions of erotic love. The concept of friendship and its portrayal in storytelling "should show the power of choice over the given defaults of blood family, the power of steadiness over the intensity of romance, the power of consistency over flings that come and go."

This essay reminds me of the friendship chapter in C. S. Lewis's THE FOUR LOVES. Lewis would agree with that remark about choice. He begins by stating that any discussion of friendship in modern times must start with a "rehabilitation," because nowadays most people don't think of it as a love equal to affection or eros (romantic attraction), or even a love at all. For Lewis, friendship (as opposed to affection, such as parent-child or other family ties or any attachment that simply grows out of long, comfortable association) arises from mutual interests and deeply shared values. Sometimes it's situational, as between classmates who grow close by bonding over schoolwork, sports, or hobbies, and sometimes it lasts a lifetime regardless of outward circumstances. Lewis had a lifelong friend of that type in a boyhood neighbor with whom he maintained ties until death severed them.

Chen's article discusses whether men and women can be true friends without romance. Lewis takes the rather traditional view that, unless one or both of the friends is/are otherwise committed, male-female friendship is likely to develop into eros. His own life took that direction after he united with one of his best friends, Joy Davidman Gresham, in a civil marriage-in-name-only to allow her and her sons to remain in England legally. He later fell deeply and passionately in love with her. "Friends to lovers" is a favorite trope in contemporary romance novels, understandably, since a solid friendship makes a firm foundation for a lasting union.

In my life, friendship has tended to be situational. I've had church friends, writing friends, convention-attending friends, and, when I worked at a day job, office friends, and during my husband's military career, Navy friends. For the most part, I didn't keep up with the latter two types (aside from occasional Christmas cards) after the respective situations changed. If challenged by Mike Chen, I would have to admit that in my own fiction—mostly paranormal romance in recent years—friends usually play the role of secondary characters there to act as confidants for the protagonists (as Chen mentions in his essay). As for books and other media, on THE X-FILES Mulder and Scully remained loyal friends for many years, but eventually they became lovers; how much that shift was driven by pressure from fans, I don't know. One of the most memorable friendships in popular culture, of course, is the trio of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. Similar non-romantic friendships developed on STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION. Currently, we can find friendship separate from romance in ensemble-cast TV shows such as NCIS, where the core investigative team displays strong bonds among its members. As for novels, in the Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon, Jamie and Claire have a devoted friend in Lord John Grey, who was originally hopelessly in love with Jamie but now accepts the platonic friendship with no indication that he regards it as second-best.

So celebrations of friendship are not quite so rare in modern storytelling as Chen pessimistically suggests.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Stubborn Skepticism Versus Indiscriminate Gullibility

Working on a paranormal romance novella, I'm presently dealing with a recurrent problem in fiction of the fantastic: How long should a character keep rejecting the possibility of the supernatural before admitting it exists? How do you find a balance between jumping to the conclusion that every anomaly proves the existence of a vampire or ghost and clinging to adamant disbelief in the face of overwhelming evidence? Most people who discovered a century-old photograph that looked uncannily like a present-day acquaintance wouldn't think he must be a vampire, after all. They'd say, "Wow, what an amazing family resemblance." On the other hand, if they saw their friend turn into a bat or a cloud of mist, it would be only sensible to entertain the vampire hypothesis.

In DRACULA, Dr. Seward at first quite logically rejects Van Helsing's pronouncement that Lucy has risen from the dead as a vampire. After all, Seward is a man of science, running a "lunatic asylum" according to the most up-to-date precepts and practices. Of course he's aghast that his revered teacher, with advanced degrees in multiple fields, would embrace outmoded superstitions. Even when they find Lucy's coffin empty, Seward falls back on the obvious explanation of grave robbers. Only when he witnesses the undead Lucy walking in the cemetery does he open his mind to the horrible truth. After that, though, he drops his objections; he doesn't try to insist she's a hoax or hallucination.

Right now I'm reading THE HOLLOW PLACES, by T. Kingfisher, an outstanding horror novel featuring an alternate universe. It offers a skillful treatment of the characters' shift from skepticism to belief. When the narrator finds a hole in a wall of her eccentric uncle's combination home and novelty museum, she assumes a visitor must have damaged the drywall and left without mentioning the mishap. Upon starting work on a patch, she and her friend Simon discover a large open area behind the wall. Naturally, they first believe they've stumbled into extra space that was walled off for some reason. As they explore, they see that it's much larger than the dimensions of the building should allow. Even then, they don't think they've fallen through an interdimensional portal. They discuss ideas such as a tunnel constructed by illegal alcohol dealers during Prohibition and try to rationalize the fact that they don't seem to have gone up or down a level as they should have. When they open a door onto a fog-shrouded river dotted by numerous small islands, though, they realize they've entered an alternate world, an "anti-Narnia," as the narrator says. Despite Simon's joking remarks about being poisoned by black mold, they don't seriously waste time on the possibility that they're hallucinating.

My work in progress features a ghost child who performs poltergeist-like tricks. At first, the protagonist does her best to attribute the odd events in her house to the cat, her seven-year-old son, or even herself in absent-minded lapses. Further along, she contemplates whether she might be sleepwalking and moving things around or whether she dreamed the strange singing she thought she heard. The sight of the little girl vanishing before her eyes forces the heroine to accept the supernatural as real. I consider it plausible that an otherwise normal, stable person would believe in a ghost rather than assume she's suddenly gone crazy with no provocation. The latter happens in vintage horror movies, not ordinary life. For the same reason, her highly skeptical boyfriend converts to the ghost hypothesis when he, too, witnesses the child disappearing into thin air.

Where should the creation of a character in fantastic fiction draw the line between the extremes of hardheaded materialism and softheaded gullibility? The former can make a character very annoying, but the latter can lose the reader's sympathy, too. The main reason I never cared for the SCOOBY-DOO cartoon series when our kids used to watch it was that, no matter how many times the gang exposed a haunted house as a hoax, when they investigated the next "ghost" Shaggy always believed in it as uncritically as ever.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Shadow of the Beast

My first published novel, SHADOW OF THE BEAST, a werewolf urban fantasy with romantic elements, is back in print after a few years of dormancy, being recently re-released by Writers Exchange E-Publishing:

Shadow of the Beast

This wasn't the first novel I completed. That was the true book of my heart, vampire romantic urban fantasy DARK CHANGELING, first published not long after SHADOW OF THE BEAST and currently available in an e-book duology called TWILIGHT'S CHANGELINGS:

Twilight's Changelings

And as a Kindle e-book here:

Amazon Page

SHADOW OF THE BEAST was originally published by a small horror press that produced numerous attractive trade paperbacks for several years before closing down. My novel was later picked up by Amber Quill Press, which had a fairly long run before it, too, went out of business. I was lucky to find Writers Exchange, which sells its products in both electronic and trade paperback formats, to adopt most of my Amber Quill books. (It's somewhat disheartening to contemplate how many of my works have been "orphaned" by the disappearances of publishers over the years. Fortunately, we now have self-publishing as an alternative in case switching to a new publisher doesn't work out.)

I lightly revised SHADOW OF THE BEAST before the Amber Quill edition was published. The text of this latest version hasn't changed from that one; only the cover is different. The story follows the template of one of my favorite tropes, the Ugly Duckling. The heroine discovers she isn't what she always believed herself to be, and traits that first seem like flaws turn out to be gifts. I've retold that basic story multiple times over the years. My first professionally published work of fiction, "Her Own Blood" in FREE AMAZONS OF DARKOVER, fits that pattern, as does DARK CHANGELING.

Because SHADOW OF THE BEAST retains the text from the previous edition, it features technology that has become obsolete. Since only one scene is affected (where the characters use a VHS camcorder and tape player), the editor decided it wouldn't be a problem and didn't need a disclaimer at the beginning. As far as the plot goes, SHADOW OF THE BEAST has some undeniable flaws. The editing for Amber Quill corrected some of the original version's problems but didn't amount to a major rewrite. The "because line" is weak in places; back then, I didn't realize I was sometimes making characters do things for my convenience as author, rather than from solidly established motives. I've learned better since then, I hope!

What's your philosophy on rewriting older books for re-release or leaving them alone?"

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Accessible Writing

The April 2020 issue of RWR (magazine of the Romance Writers of America) contains an article titled "The Literary Craft of Accessibility," by Rebecca Hunter. She begins by analyzing the difference between literary fiction and genre fiction, for which she focuses on level of accessibility: "Literary fiction expects the reader to come to the book, while genre fiction books come to the reader." To put it simply, literary fiction expects the reader to work harder. It would be easy to conclude that denser novels are therefore of higher quality than less "difficult" works, a "false—and harmful—hierarchy" the author warns against. I readily agree that a "literary" novel may be difficult and dense for the sheer sake of difficulty, putting unnecessary roadblocks in the reader's path from the mistaken notion that lucid prose and a clear narrative thread equate to "dumbing down." And a genre novel can include deep themes that make a reader think and challenge her established assumptions.

Hunter undercuts her cautionary reference to false hierarchies, in my opinion, by contrasting "lyrical" and "thoughtful" with "fast-paced" and "light," the latter suggesting a "more accessible style." A genre novel can be accessible, yet sedately paced and deeply emotional. Some factors she lists as contributing to degree of accessibility include length of sentences, breadth of vocabulary, balance among action, atmosphere, and ideas, moral clarity or ambiguity, how clearly the characters and plot fulfill "expectations set in the beginning of the story," and "use of cliches, idioms, and other familiarities." I have reservations about some items on the list. For example, I don't think a novel has to lean heavily toward "action" to be accessible. Many romance novels don't, nor do many vintage favorites in other genres. GONE WITH THE WIND is one perennial bestseller that has many more reflective and emotional scenes than action scenes in the popular sense of the word. I find the mention of "cliches" off-putting; while familiar tropes, handled well, can be welcome, an outright "cliche" is another matter. Another feature, "amount of emotional complexity spelled out for readers," sounds as if excessive telling over showing is being recommended. Every writer must balance all these elements in her own way, of course, and Hunter does address the shortcomings of cliches and "telling." She points out that "frankly, there are lots of readers who like this familiarity and clarity." So an author needs to know her target audience well. "Each reader's preferences are different. . . .there are readers for all accessibility levels." Hunter also discusses theme, which she defines as "an open-ended question our story asks" and briefly covers the possibility of increasing a work's complexity by adding additional thematic layers.

Personally, I enjoy a book with a varied, challenging vocabulary and complex characters and emotions. What make me impatient are works that appear to be confusing for the sake of confusion, such as failing to clearly distinguish characters from each other or coming to a conclusion that leaves the reader with literally no way to be sure what happened—by which I mean, not an ambiguous ending deliberately designed to allow multiple interpretations, but one in which it's impossible to puzzle out the plain sense of what transpires on the page. As Marion Zimmer Bradley used to say in her submission guidelines, "If I can't figure out what happened, I assume my readers won't care." Levels of acceptable "accessibility," of course, vary over the decades and centuries according to the fashions of the times. Long descriptive and expository passages, common in nineteenth-century novels, would get disapproved by most editors nowadays, no matter how well written. Something similar to the opening paragraphs of Dickens' A TALE OF TWO CITIES ("It was the best of times; it was the worst of times. . . ."), although accessible in the sense of easily understandable, probably wouldn't be accepted by most contemporary publishers. It also used to be common for authors to include untranslated passages in foreign languages, especially in nonfiction but sometimes even in fiction. Most nonfiction writers up through the early twentieth century assumed all educated readers understood Latin and Greek. Dorothy Sayers inserted a long letter in French into her Lord Peter Wimsey mystery CLOUDS OF WITNESS; the publisher insisted on having a translation added. On the other hand, to cite a contemporary example, in Barbara Hambly's Benjamin January mysteries, set in Louisiana of the 1830s, January's erudite friend Hannibal often includes Greek and Latin quotations in his speech. They add flavor to the story's atmosphere, but understanding them is rarely necessary for following the story; when it is, Hambly clues us in as needed. Readers who'd be put off by this kind of linguistic play simply don't form part of her target audience, but then, such people probably aren't fans of historical mysteries in general, which require openness to navigating an unfamiliar time and place.

Hunter's article also doesn't discuss accessibility in relation to genre conventions. For instance, Regency romance authors probably assume their target audience has some familiarity with the period, if only from reading lots of prior novels in that setting. Science fiction, in particular, expects a certain level of background knowledge from its readers. We should know about hyperdrive and other forms of FTL travel, if only enough to suspend disbelief and move on with the story. Some SF stories expect more acquaintance with the genre than others. Any viewer with a willing imagination can follow the original STAR TREK, designed to appeal to a mass audience. Near the other end of the accessibility spectrum, the new posthumous Heinlein novel, THE PURSUIT OF THE PANKERA (the previously unpublished original version of his 1980 NUMBER OF THE BEAST), envisions a reader with a considerable fannish background. The ideal reader knows or at least has some acquaintance with Edgar Rice Burroughs' Barsoom books and E. E. Smith's Lensman series. That reader also has a high tolerance for dialogue about the intricacies of alternate universes and the heroes' device for transiting among them, on which the text goes into considerable detail at some points. Optimally, that fan will also have read Heinlein's own previous work, at least his best-known books. This novel is not the way to introduce a new reader to Heinlein, much less to SF in general.

It seems to me that "accessibility" forms a subset of the larger topic of reader expectations. So the question of how accessible our work is (or needs to be) comes back to knowing the expectations of the target audience.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Science in SF, Continued

The second part of Kelly Lagor's LOCUS article on "Putting the 'Science' in Science Fiction" is here:

Putting the Science in SF

As in the previous essay, she quotes opinions from various authors and editors, including Elizabeth Bear, Sarah Pinsker, Lee Harris (editor at Tor.com), and Sheila Williams (editor of ASIMOV'S), among others. Some bits of advice on the "delicate tightrope walk" of "getting the level of detail just right so as to not be so technical you alienate your readers, while avoiding being needlessly inaccurate":

An SF author should keep up her "baseline knowledge of popular science" (in Elizabeth Bear's phrase) at a level sufficient to make her aware of what's going on in the scientific world and where she needs to seek out deeper research into any particular topic or sub-field. Academic journals and popular science books and articles each provide useful resources, which should be consumed in the proper balance. Other comments logically point out that the amount and kind of research needed will depend on how much the author already knows about the field. The level of scientific detail required to make a story plausible also depends on the subgenre. Readers of different types of SF have different expectations; as Lee Harris observes, "we’re much less critical of the science in the latest superhero epic than we would be in a hard science fiction story." Another observation states that "with great familiarity can come great reluctance"—a writer might hesitate to delve into the technical details because he or she finds it hard to resist including excessive exposition that might turn off the reader. Some other suggestions: Don't hesitate to consult experts firsthand. The kind and degree of technical specificity varies depending on the viewpoint character—what would he or she notice and care about? And getting the depth and scope of detail correct ultimately grows out of knowing how much the reader needs to understand to enjoy the story. "Sometimes, when it comes to details, less is more."

By the way, Lagor's phrase "needlessly inaccurate" seems to imply the existence of conditions under which inaccuracy is needed, a position I'd find hard to agree with. Whether the density of detail is heavy or light, surely whatever IS on the page should be accurate, within the limits of how technical the particular text gets. Even in fantasy, I find a story more interesting and entertaining if the writer gives the impression of accuracy in mundane matters such as architecture, food, travel times, etc., as well as basing the biology of imaginary creatures (for example) on a plausible analogy with real ones. The more incredible the central premise a reader has to accept, the more plausible the supporting details ought to be.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Worlds with Depth

The Fall/Winter issue of MYTHLORE includes an article by Katherine Sas on creating the "impression of depth" in a work of fiction (specifically, in this case, in the backstory of the Marauders in the Harry Potter series), a term coined by Tolkien in his classic essay "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics." One of my favorite themes in fiction is the overshadowing of the present by the deep past. That's one reason I find Stephen King's IT enthralling, a feature that the new movie tries to present a bit better than the old miniseries, but still not adequately. So I'm glad to have an official name for this theme. Sas herself paraphrases this effect as "a sense of antiquity and historical reality."

The essence of the "impression of depth" consists of a feeling that the author "knows more than he [or she] is telling." Tolkien refers to the creation of "an illusion of surveying a past...that itself had depth and reached backward into a dark antiquity." He mentions the crafting of this effect in BEOWULF by "allusions to old tales." In his own work, Tolkien uses invented languages, frame narratives, references to ancient tales and lost texts, and "hypertextual layering" (i.e., metafictional features that draw attention to the text as an artifact). Such techniques produce the illusion of a world that has existed for a vast expanse of time before the present action and contains places, peoples, and events glimpsed at the edges of the main story.

Within a more limited physical setting, King's IT creates an illusion of deep time by the gradual revelation of how the monster originally introduced as merely a supernatural killer clown has haunted Derry since the town's founding—revealed by Mike's research into the generational cycle of the entity's periodic return and hibernation—and, eons before human settlement, came through interstellar space from an alien dimension. Likewise, the TV series SUPERNATURAL begins on a small-scale, personal level and expands to encompass an entire cosmology. At the beginning of the series, all we know about the background of Sam and Dean Winchester is that their father is a "Hunter" (of demons and other monsters) and that their mother died in a horrific supernatural attack when Sam was a baby. The brothers themselves know little more. We, and they, soon learn that their father made a deal with a demon. Eventually it's revealed that Sam and Dean were destined from infancy, not to save the world, but to serve as "vessels" for divine and diabolical entities. As they strive to assert their free will against this destiny, they uncover secrets of their family's past and the worldwide organization of Hunters (along with its research auxiliary branch, the Men of Letters), they clash (and sometimes ally) with demons, angels, pagan deities, and Death incarnate, and, incidentally, they do save the world and visit Hell and Purgatory several times. They learn the real nature and purposes of Heaven, Hell, and God Himself. The hypertextual (metafictional) aspect of the series is highlighted in episodes such as a visit to an alternate universe where the brothers are characters in a TV show and their discovery that a comic-book artist who turns out to be a prophet (as they believe until he's revealed as the very incarnation of God) has published a series that chronicles their adventures.

Tolkien's colleague and close friend C. S. Lewis reflects on the literary impression of depth in two articles reprinted in his collection SELECTED LITERARY ESSAYS, "Psycho-Analysis and Literary Criticism" and "The Anthropological Approach." In both pieces, he concludes that the ideas of hidden, half-forgotten, multi-layered dimensions in place or time and disguised remnants preserved from the ancient past are alluring in themselves. We're fascinated by the suggestion of "the far-borne echo, the last surviving trace, the tantalizing glimpse, the veiled presence, of something else. And the something else is always located in a remote region, 'dim-discovered,' hard of access." We're thrilled to enter "a world where everything may, and most things do, have a deeper meaning and a longer history" than expected. Many readers (although admittedly not all) enjoy the idea "that they have surprised a long-kept secret, that there are depths below the surface." Tolkien's exposition of this effect, as well as the creation of it by him and other authors who use similar strategies, offers valuable hints to writers who want to produce that kind of impression.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Sequels, Prequels, and Reading Order

Should the audience for a sequel be able to understand it completely without having read the previous book(s)? The EPIC e-book contest allowed judges to subtract points if a novel required familiarity with a prior book to be fully understood. I thought that criterion was unfair; in many fiction series, a story arc continues from one volume to the next, so that each installment legitimately depends on the previous ones. The Harry Potter series and Stephen King's Dark Tower saga are obvious examples. And some trilogies or series are actually single stories divided into multiple volumes, such as the Lord of the Rings. I recently read the final volume in Theodora Goss's delightful "Athena Club" trilogy, starring the daughters (born or created) of the classic 19th-century mad scientists. A reader might be able to understand and enjoy the second novel, EUROPEAN TRAVEL FOR THE MONSTROUS GENTLEWOMAN, without having read the first, although a lot of nuance would be lost. The third, THE SINISTER MYSTERY OF THE MESMERIZING GIRL, however, depends too heavily on the others to stand alone.

On the other hand, with most mystery series the reading order doesn't matter so much. Although the detective's character may develop from book to book, so that taking the volumes in order enriches appreciation of them, it's not necessary. Dorothy Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey stories fall into this category, mostly, except for the ones involving Harriet Vane. Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple novels, on the other hand, can be read in any order with no loss of appreciation.

C. S. Lewis fans disagree on the proper order in which to read the Narnia books. Lewis didn't commit himself on that point. He agreed with a child reader who preferred the internal chronological order, but the context suggest he was just being polite. At first sight, chronological order within the universe looks logical. Most fans, however, seem to support publication order. They reasonably point out that many details in THE MAGICIAN'S NEPHEW don't have their full impact if one hasn't read THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE WARDROBE first. Although LION... takes place later in the timeline, it was published first, when Lewis had no idea of writing further books in that setting. Marion Zimmer Bradley encouraged new readers to approach Darkover in publication order rather than internal chronological order, because doing it the second way meant they would encounter the earlier-published novels (which she considered inferior to the later-published ones) before books written when her craft had matured.

When my husband (Les Carter) and I started plotting LEGACY OF MAGIC, the previous-generation prequel to our Wild Sorceress trilogy, I planned it so that it could be read either before or after the trilogy. Someone who picks it up first will find that it works as a stand-alone fantasy romance. For someone already familiar with the trilogy, LEGACY OF MAGIC answers some questions about the background of the characters in the other three novels and contains "Easter eggs" that will be meaningful to those readers. For people new to that world, I painstakingly tried to avoid including spoilers in LEGACY OF MAGIC that would reveal secrets meant to come as a surprise in WILD SORCERESS and its two sequels.

I'm currently working on a sequel to my recent light paranormal romance novella, YOKAI MAGIC. It might more accurately be called a spin-off, though, because the hero and heroine of YOKAI MAGIC appear only as minor characters in the new story. Prior acquaintance with them isn't necessary for understanding or enjoyment of the sequel/spin-off. Most of Mary Jo Putney's Regency-era romances work this way. Recurring characters (protagonists from previous novels) pop up from book to book, but nobody needs to read the earlier novels to enjoy the newer ones. Recognizing the established characters, however, enhances the pleasure. That's how I've structured my Vanishing Breed vampire universe. Aside from CHILD OF TWILIGHT, the immediate sequel to DARK CHANGELING (the first one published), the novels, novellas, and short stories can stand alone, with almost any one of them serving as a viable entry to the series. Similarly, readers can enter Bradley's Darkover or Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar at almost any point, as long as they read the individual books in the various sub-series in the proper order. For marketing purposes, that would be the ideal way to arrange a series. But most series with long-term story arcs building steadily from one book to the next just don't work like that.

And then there's the question of how much background information to include in a sequel. How much effort do you make to accommodate a new reader who might pick up a book in a series out of order? Or do you assume (as is more often than not the case) that a person reading a sequel is familiar with the earlier book(s)?

How do you handle sequels, prequels, the risk of spoilers, and the chance that readers might feel lost if they start in the middle?

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Bait-and-Switch Book Beginnings

Stephen King's latest novel (which I consider one of his best recent works), THE INSTITUTE, starts with a long section from the viewpoint of a secondary character (who doesn't reenter the story until close to the end). It then switches to the protagonist, a 12-year-old boy with a slight degree of psi power who gets kidnapped by the titular Institute. Both characters are deeply engaging, and their separate stories end up skillfully meshed. It's Stephen King, so it works! Nevertheless, spending that much space at the beginning of a novel on a secondary character before even introducing the protagonist is definitely not what most readers expect.

What I think of as "bait-and-switch" narrative is common enough, in a modest way, with suspense and horror fiction. Such novels often start with a brief introduction of a character whose main purpose is to get killed. (A regular reviewer of the SUPERNATURAL TV series used to call this type of victim "doomed teaser guy.") Even in those novels, however, I feel sort of cheated if the author allots too much wordage (more than a few paragraphs or at most a couple of pages) to a doomed character. The writer has fooled us into mistaking this short-lived person for the protagonist, luring us into an emotional investment in her or him, after which we have to start all over getting engaged with a new character.

The sense of being "baited and switched" can pose a difficulty with prologues. If the prologue focuses on a character other than the protagonist of the main text, we may feel as if the author has started the book twice. We get all excited about the prologue's main character and may feel let down when he or she disappears or fades into the background in favor of a different focal character for the story as a whole.

Some readers may feel "baited and switched" by the entire opening volume of George R. R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series. While I wouldn't say I felt cheated, I was certainly shocked by that first exposure to his "anyone can die" authorial strategy, when the man I assumed to be the protagonist of the entire series didn't survive to the end of the first book.

Assuming this kind of shift at the beginning of a book is sometimes justified, how can an author pull it off so the reader won't feel tricked? Or lose interest when the focus switches to a different viewpoint character after the opening scenes have lured us into caring about the character first introduced? It's a little different, although still potentially tricky, when a narrative repeatedly switches perspectives throughout, presenting scenes through the eyes of two or more equally important viewpoint characters, as Martin's series does. In reading such a text, I sometimes have trouble getting back up to speed, emotionally, after each switch.

This let-down feeling doesn't have to result from a change in viewpoint characters. Long ago, I read a book intriguingly set in an alternate present where supernatural creatures exist openly, and social and economic structures are accordingly different from those in our primary world. The protagonist is a private detective who works with supernatural-related cases. (At that time, this worldbuilding concept was new and uncommon, not a familiar trope as it is nowadays.) In the first chapter, the protagonist deals with a vampire in a very funny scene. "Oh, goody, a cool vampire novel," I thought. Alas, nary another vampire in the entire book, although it wasn't a bad story on its own terms. Granted, this kind of problem isn't necessarily the author's fault. Other readers less vampire-focused than I might not assume from the first chapter that the point was to launch a vampire plot rather than (as it actually was) to introduce the protagonist's profession. Still, in my own case, I approached the rest of the story with a negative bias as soon as I realized my initial assumption had been mistaken.

Then there was the bait-and-switch of a successful chick-lit novel called MUST LOVE DOGS, whose inciting incident has a friend persuading the protagonist to place a personal ad in a dating venue. The friend gets her to include "Must love dogs" as a way of attracting nice guys, although the heroine doesn't have a dog and knows almost nothing about the species. Between the title and the inciting incident, I was expecting a romance with, you know, lots of dog content. Nope. The story soon leaves that premise behind. Maybe I would have felt less cheated by the plot if the inciting incident hadn't been combined with the title and a dog-centered cover (neither of which might have been the author's fault, admittedly, especially the cover illustration).

Do you feel "baited and switched" by these kinds of abrupt turns in a novel? And, as an author, how do you handle them if you have reason to write them?

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Writer Emergency Pack

One of my Christmas presents was a clever little item called the Writer Emergency Pack. It's a deck of cards with prompts to help a stuck fiction writer get unstuck. The pack includes brief instructions for a group storytelling game using the cards, but it seems mainly intended for individuals. It comprises two numbered sets of cards. The first presents a one-sentence suggestion with an illustrative sketch, while the corresponding number in the second half of the deck elaborates with further details. Although I haven't actively used this product yet, I find reading the prompts fun in itself.

The story sparks aren't random ideas such as "Throw your heroine off a cliff," which was sort of what I expected. (That would have been fun, too, though.) They're more serious and of more general application. Some examples: What if your story were changed to a different genre? Talk it out. (What would the protagonist and antagonist say if they had an honest discussion?) Stop talking. (How would the characters handle not being able to communicate verbally? This hint reminds me of the BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER episode when the whole town was magically silenced.) Kill the hero. (If the hero died at this point, what would happen next? Who would carry on?) Imposter. (Some character is not what he or she seems.) An apparent blessing turns out to be a curse. Take away your hero's allies and other support. Bring on the zombies (which could mean any type of mindless horde). The explanatory note cards briefly explore the ramifications of the proposed twists.

If I did apply the cards to a writing project, as a devoted outliner I would probably find it more helpful in the planning phase than the first draft.

The deck is sold on this Amazon page:

Writer Emergency Pack

By the way, my first new e-book in quite a while (as opposed to re-releases) has just been published by the Wild Rose Press. "Yokai Magic" is a light paranormal romance novella featuring an enchanted Japanese scroll and a cat spirit:

Yokai Magic

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Updating Older Books

When a book published years or decades ago and set in the "present" gets reprinted in a new edition, should the technology and cultural references in the text be updated so that the story will still feel as if it's set in the present?

My vampire romance CRIMSON DREAMS has just been re-released by my new publisher:

Crimson Dreams

At the editor's request, I revised scenes that included computers (and inserted mention of cell phones into places where they'd be expected) to avoid having readers distracted by outdated references. The story was contemporary when first published, and there was no reason it shouldn't feel contemporary now.

Diane Duane's Young Wizards series has been around for decades, beginning with SO YOU WANT TO BE A WIZARD (1983). She has self-published new editions of the earlier novels in the series, collectively labeled Millennium Editions, explicitly set in the twenty-first century, with the technology updated. She believed that the obsolete references in the original editions were confusing to the contemporary YA audience because their time period isn't far enough in the past to feel like historical fiction, just enough to feel outdated. Also, the revisions eliminate the anomaly of having the characters age only a few years over a much longer real-time span:

Diane Duane's Ebooks Direct

Some authors tacitly modernize their worlds while the characters age slowly or not at all. The BLONDIE and BEETLE BAILEY comic strips, for instance. The creator of FOR BETTER OR WORSE took an interestingly different approach when she concluded the comic series a few years ago. She started over again from the beginning, reprinting the original strips with additions and revisions.

There are some works in my Vanishing Universe vampire series that I wouldn't update if I were re-publishing them, because I had a good reason for the original dating—specifically DARK CHANGELING, its immediate sequel (CHILD OF TWILIGHT), and a couple of novellas dependent on them. DARK CHANGELING had to be set in 1979 because the then forty-year-old, half-vampire protagonist had to be born in 1939 to make his backstory plausible. My quasi-Lovecraftian novel FROM THE DARK PLACES, due to be re-released by Writers Exchange E-Publishing eventually, presents a special problem. It's set in the 1970s, and its next-generation sequel (currently a work-in-progress) focuses on a twenty-one-year-old heroine who was born at the end of the previous book. How can I set the sequel in the present (to avoid confusing readers with an unnecessary 1990s setting) and have a heroine who's twenty-one when she should be middle-aged? I plan to revise FROM THE DARK PLACES to remove blatantly specific 1970s references but have it set in a sort of "indefinite past."

Do you think it's necessary or desirable to update re-released older novels with settings that were contemporary-present when first published? Does the answer vary on a case-by-case basis for you? Authors of historical or far-future fiction have it easy in the respect. (Writers of near-future SF have a slightly different problem; their settings soon become overtaken by events and transformed into alternate history. Think of Orwell's 1984.)

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Writing and Storytelling

Kameron Hurley's column in the current LOCUS discusses the difference between stringing together a succession of events and actually telling a story:

Story Isn't Just "Stuff Happens"

The principles she highlights apply not only to books but to films, comics, games, all sorts of media. She asks, "Why do we teach people how to write instead of how to tell stories?" Do we think storytelling comes naturally? On the contrary, doing it well is a skill that must be learned. In mundane conversation, we've all suffered through rambling anecdotes riddled with backtracking, digressions, and gaps. Hurley reminds us "there are always two stories that make up a good piece of fiction. There is the external story, the thing we would call ‘plot.’ These are the explosions and sex scenes and betrayals. Then there is the internal emotional story, the ‘so what?’" Like Tolkien, she maintains that stories are far from merely devices for escape (although Tolkien also argued in favor of the right kind of escape). "We seek out stories because they help us make sense of the world and societies we live in today, which is the real reason we grasp for them most during dark times. We seek out stories to learn how to be better humans."

Hurley urges us to remember that "readers are far more interested in exploring what it means to be human than how gram­matically correct our sentences are. Pretty writing does not equal explosive story." Her argument reminds me of Marion Zimmer Bradley's famous caveat, "Editors do not buy stories because they are well written." They publish stories that offer the kind of Satisfying Reading Experience their particular audience wants. Here's the classic essay in which Bradley explains why editors DO buy stories (or reject them):

Why Did My Story Get Rejected?

Bradley, of course, is quick to add that nobody OBJECTS to good writing. Good storytelling, however, has priority. I do have reservations about taking this advice too much to heart, though. Aspiring authors shouldn't skim over the part about "good writing" and assume style, grammar, syntax, word choice, etc., don't matter.

To draw an analogy, I'm not at all musical. While I enjoy lots of music, I listen to songs mainly for the lyrics. Where the tune is concerned, I react to it on the basis of whether it seems to me to fit the words. On any more technical points, I'm at the "I don't understand it, but I know what I like" level. I might have a vague perception that a certain tune sounds "folky." A real musician could point out exactly what features of its mode, tempo, chords, or whatever make that tune sound like a folk song. Similarly, most non-writers probably couldn't explain in technical terms why a piece of writing doesn't "work." They might say vaguely, "it's boring" or "it's confusing." A professional writer or editor can analyze the story with remarks such as, "There's too much exposition" or "We aren't given a reason to care about the protagonist" or "The point of view jumps around too much" or "Many sentences contain dangling participles." Likewise, a reader not familiar with all the rules of grammar, usage, and spelling may not be able to pick out the specific errors in a work, but if there are too many of them, it will probably still feel "wrong" to that reader.

Fortunately, it's possible to learn at least the basics of "good writing," what Bradley summarizes as how to write "a literate English sentence." Techniques of pacing, plotting, point of view, etc., can also be taught. Storytelling, however, is to some extent a gift, which may or may not appear in tandem with a talent for "good writing." For instance, nobody would describe Edgar Rice Burroughs as a master of literary style. Yet Tarzan of the Apes and John Carter of Barsoom are immortal.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Guest Post by Karen Wiesner

Here's a guest blog by Karen Wiesner, whose writing manual FIRST DRAFT IN 30 DAYS has been a tremendous help to me (Margaret Carter). It begins with a description of her latest novel, followed by Karen's discussion of the writing of the book and the development of the series:

CROOKED HOUSE {Book 3: Bloodmoon Cove Spirits Series} by Karen Wiesner

Don’t close your eyes…

Nestled on Lake Superior in northern Wisconsin is a small, secluded town called Bloodmoon Cove with volatile weather, suspicious folk…and newly awakened ghosts.

Some doors, once opened, can never be closed again…

Orphan and widow Corinne Zellman is stunned when she receives several urgent letters from a lawyer, telling her she’s the only surviving heir of Edward Buchanan, a relative of her recently deceased husband. Though Corinne ignores the first few summons, too grieved to consider them anything but cruel hoaxes, she takes notice when yet another arrives, this time with a family ring identical to the one her husband wore and lost just before he was killed. Stuck in a dead end job and curious about the family the love of her life seldom spoke of, she reluctantly pulls up stakes and heads to Bloodmoon Cove, where the persistent elderly gentleman lives. There, with her best friend Ruby, she finds Crooked House, the family "estate". Crooked House certainly lives up to its disturbing name, as does Edward Buchanan, who is old and pale and disappears so frequently she can almost believe he's nothing more than a ghost. It isn't long before Corinne begins to suspect that her new family member had ulterior motives for insisting she come live with him. But to believe that is to believe that Rafe Yager, a hardened soldier, is entirely correct when he says Crooked House is dangerous. The longer she stays, the less chance she'll ever leave again.

Ghost hunter Rafe is one of the last descendants of the Mino-Miskwi Native American tribe whose elders disappeared during a ritual at their sacred place at the top of Bloodmoon Mountain. Rafe has come home based on a terrifying vision of wide-eyed, wholesome dreamer Cori losing her soul to an evil she doesn't recognize. Crooked House is falling and its sinister legacy demands recompense for her husband's death--something that was no accident, as she supposed. Can Rafe save Cori from a sacrifice she never meant to make when she unknowingly came to love a monster?

978-1-925191-83-7 (electronic) from Writers Exchange E-Publishing

Crooked House

978-1-329-84940-2 (trade paperback) from

Lulu.com (30% discount)

Trade paperback from Lulu.com (only $4.95!)

Download from Amazon:

Crooked House

Paperback from Amazon:

Crooked House

Paperback from BN.com:

Crooked House

While writing up the proposal for BOUND SPIRITS, Book 1 of my Bloodmoon Cove Spirits Series, I had an idea about writing a series of ghost stories. I love scary, terrifying ghost stories as well as fun or playful ghost ones, but I also like the idea of exploring well beyond the boundaries of what a typical ghost story is. I intend to delve into the depths of supernatural elements with haunted places, cursed objects, portals to other worlds and/or time periods, and even unfathomable creatures from those other realms that have crossed into ours on Bloodmoon Mountain. This is what readers can expect all through this series.

I wasn't sure how to go about developing BOUND SPIRITS as a series until I realized another book of mine (which is a mild ghost story), THE BLOODMOON CURSE, was lagging with its at-that-time current publisher. I knew the town mentioned in that story, Bloodmoon Cove, would be the perfect setting for the series. Long story short, I got the rights back to THE BLOODMOON CURSE after BOUND SPIRITS was in the pipeline and was published by Writers Exchange. THE BLOODMOON CURSE became the second book in my Bloodmoon Cove Spirits Series, but I had to revise it slightly to make it fit this new series angle. From there, book ideas for this series have abounded in my imagination. Currently, I have nine books planned along with a collection of six shorts. You can find out more about them (including a sequel to THE BLOODMOON CURSE, coming early next year and titled RETURN TO BLOODMOON MANOR) here: Bloodmoon Cove

The basis of CROOKED HOUSE was formed when I had a dream long ago with a modern Gothic feel. In the dream, the heroine was visiting some obscure relative of her brand-new husband. When I woke up, I wrote everything down that I could remember on the off-chance that I might someday use it as a basis for a story. While I didn't use the idea verbatim, I was able to utilize parts of that dream for CROOKED HOUSE, the third title in my Bloodmoon Cove Spirits Series, which is newly available.

CROOKED HOUSE has a lot of the classic elements of a ghost story--vengeful ghost, haunted house, tough-guy hero and vulnerable heroine--with some unique twists and turns in the form of a cursed ring, a white-witch best friend who literally has no idea what she's doing, a ramshackle house in Bloodmoon Cove serving as a portal into the spirit world, along with a reluctant ghost-hunter that's one of the last descendants of the Mino-Miskwi Native American tribe whose elders disappeared during a ritual at their sacred place at the top of Bloodmoon Mountain a hundred years ago. That ritual ripped a hole in the mountain and let loose a flood of spirits that haunt Erie County. The heroine Corinne has come to Bloodmoon Cove with her best friend after being bequeathed her recently deceased husband's family estate, Crooked House. Cori hasn't yet realized the witchcraft that was weaved into the fabric of her life and she's only begun to wake up from the trance she's been in when she meets Rafe. In helping Cori break the curse on her stemming from the ring, Rafe may save himself as well.

Rafe and Cori's story starts in CROOKED HOUSE, but I wasn't ready to let go of them when I was finished with this tale, nor of an intriguing plot thread that actually started earlier in the series about a lawyer that caters to the dead with unfinished legal business. Rafe and Cori will make a generous appearance in Book 4, as all the other main and even some of the secondary characters from Books 1 and 2 will, but also in their own brand-new story, ELDRITCH JUSTICE, Book 9 of the series (release date TBA).

One of the things I love the most as I'm developing this series is that the characters from previous books make solid (i.e. not simply "glimpses" from one book to the next) appearances in later books. Considering how small the town is and how involved they are in each other's lives, it makes sense that the developing characters would be seen all through subsequent stories. I can hardly wait to write each one of these books and expand the world I'm creating with them. I hope readers will also be just as excited in seeing more from this series that's already getting five star reviews and has won numerous awards.

Author Bio:

Creating realistic, unforgettable characters one story at a time…

Karen Wiesner is an accomplished author with 116 titles published in the past 18 years, which have been nominated for/won 134 awards, and has 40 more releases contracted for spanning many genres and formats. Karen’s books cover such genres as women’s fiction, romance, mystery/police procedural/cozy, suspense, paranormal, futuristic, fantasy, Gothic, inspirational, thriller, horror, chick-lit, and action/adventure. She also writes children’s books, poetry, and writing reference titles such as her bestseller, First Draft in 30 Days and From First Draft to Finished Novel {A Writer’s Guide to Cohesive Story Building} (out of print; reissue available now in paperback and electronic formats under the title Cohesive Story Building). Her third offering from Writer’s Digest Books was Writing the Fiction Series: The Complete Guide for Novels and Novellas, available now. Look for Writing Three-Dimensional Fiction: How to Craft Lifelike Plots, Characters, and Scenes Using Multilayered Storytelling from WDB, release date June 23, 2017 and available now for pre-order from Amazon.com: Amazon.com. Visit Karen's website at Karen Wiesner. Check out Karen's author page at Facebook, where you can like, friend and follow her: Facebook. If you would like to receive Karen’s free e-mail newsletter, Karen’s Quill, and become eligible to win her monthly book giveaways, send a blank e-mail to KarensQuill-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

Research-Plot Integration in Historical Romance Part 2

Last week:
http://www.aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/01/research-plot-integration-in-historical.html
we looked at a trilogy of historical romance stories about Rashi's Daughters.

I'm discussing how Maggie Anton's trilogy of historical romance novels with paranormal, supernatural, and spiritual elements blended in, fails because of a failure of orchestration of advanced writing techniques, namely the technique of integrating techniques.

Anton's trilogy does not fail because of a failure of either research technique or plotting technique by itself, though her plotting technique is not one that I respond to or use.  But the two techniques applied separately produce an "oil and water" layered effect rather than an emulsion or a new chemical compound with unique properties (i.e. a Romance Novel).

I hope you have had time to consider these novels.  Here's a link to them on amazon:

Maggie Anton

I don't know Maggie Anton personally, and have no idea what went on with the writing of these novels other than what it says in the books.

Here is a reader response on Anton's first novel from Amazon to consider indicating that the author's imaginary Jewish Culture of the Middle Ages stood out from, made an oil slick on top of, and obliterated all the rest of the romance novel stories in the books:

---------QUOTE-----------
3.0 out of 5 stars Good in general but Jewish life lacks authenticity, May 10, 2009
By
D. L. Lederman "leahiniowa" (Iowa USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME) 
This review is from: Rashi's Daughters, Book 1: Joheved (Paperback)
I am an Orthodox Jew who happens to deeply enjoy history and well-written historic fiction. I have strongly mixed feelings about this book. I am deeply impressed with the research that went into this book as well as Anton's ability to compile an enjoyable story from her research.

Unfortunately, it is clear that Anton does not know enough about living the type of authentically observant life that Rashi and his family enjoyed to write about these people without over-laying them with a 21st century mentality.

Those of us who follow the traditions given down from parent to child over the generations know that Rashi's daughters did not wear tefillin and learn Talmud because they were rebels. On the contrary, they were very holy women who followed the law to the letter. Judaism is, at its authentic pure level, NOT a sexist religion.

Further, those of us who live the observant lifestyle are aware at a bone-deep level the benefits of abstaining from prohibited activities. E.g., the prohibition against mature, unmarried men and women touching at all (not to mention "making out" or "snogging" or what have you), along with the observance of the laws of married life, create an intense, passionate bond between husband and wife. No intelligent woman (or man) who has lived this lifestyle and learned significant amounts of Torah (the term Torah is often used to include the Talmud, Mishnah, Midrashim, etc. - basically all of the accumulated studies) would be foolish enough to put themselves in a position such as the female characters in this book found themselves with their "beaux."

To clarify what one of the other reviewers stated, yes, Jewish women at that time were mostly illiterate - especially as regards to Judaic studies. But so were most of the Jewish men. Only the special few - those with outstanding mental abilities or those with the finances to pay for an education - were able to learn enough to read and/or write Hebrew. And learning more than that was even harder to accomplish.

On the other hand, Anton's portrayal of Rashi's mother as an active, educated intelligent woman who ran her own business is strikingly accurate. Plus, I enjoyed learning about the lifestyle and history of Jews living during the time of Rashi.

I really would have preferred to give the book 3 1/2 stars or even 3.75 stars, because I do think it is very well-written and interesting. Unfortunately, books which do not portray Torah true Judaism accurately tend to do more harm than good. From the other reviews I have read, this already seems to be the case.

------------END QUOTE----------

And here is a reader response posted on Amazon on one of my novels, House of Zeor, which indicates that applying the integration technique I'm discussing causes readers to be able to absorb the imaginary culture of imaginary characters even when it differs starkly from anything familiar:

------QUOTE------------
5.0 out of 5 stars Only the beginning . . . of a great series, November 4, 2011
By J. A. Davis "firedrake54" (Ontario, CA)
This review is from: House of Zeor (Sime~Gen, Book 1) (Kindle Edition)
I can't tell you when I first read "House of Zeor", but it was back when I was thin and my hair wasn't. I found it amazing, when, last month, after not reading it for perhaps 20 years, I picked it up and was immediately transported back into a fondly (and well) remembered world. This book is one of the most complex, painfully realistic and memorable psycho-sociological thrillers I've ever read, and the foundation for an entire universe of stories, the complexity and beauty of which would definitely win awards at Arentsi (and you'll have to read it to find out what that means).

Ms. Lichtenberg, her eventual co-author for later books, Jean Lorrah, and the entire community of Sime-Gen worldbuilders have imagined characters, societies and situations that embed themselves on your brain and don't let go. I suppose it's indicative of something that I remembered many of the terms used in House of Zeor for decades -- mostly Sime-specific curse words, I confess, but they're used in context so clearly you have no problem knowing exactly what they mean.

I've been reading science fiction for nearly 50 years (yes, really). I can count the number of authors and series that have stuck with me this well easily on two hands, and I've read a LOT of SF in those years. The Sime-Gen books make you want to KNOW these people, and make you CARE about what happens to them . . . and their society, which comes painfully to the brink of collapse and ultimate calamity.

I've heard them called "vampire-analog" stories, "chick books" and more, but at base, what they are is good stories, well told, about characters you can get into.

READ THEM!
-----------END QUOTE-------------



House of Zeor illustrates how readers respond to a "new chemical compound" and how that response differs from the response to "oil and water."

There are also comments on Anton's novels from non-Jews and from Jews who know less about Judaism than most readers of this blog know about Simes.

In the comments on Anton's novels, notice how the Medieval Jewish culture - the truly "alien" culture - of a small town in France leaps out and dominates the reader commentary.

Most of the reader comments on Sime~Gen focus on trying to explain the background to prospective readers because that background is the compelling force that shapes the characters.  Readers feel you won't understand why the characters do what they do without that background, but it's the characters and their effect on their civilization that the reader wants to tell you about.

That's what I feel the effect the Rashi's Daughters trilogy ought to have because all the characters were shaped by Torah and Talmud study an even smaller minority interest in those days than now, and much less accessible then than now.

But the comments on amazon are not explaining points of Talmud that you need to understand the character motivation, or what the reader learned from the novel that they applied to life with some success.

On the SimeGen Group on facebook, fans are always talking about whether they "identify" with Sime or Gen.  Non-Jewish readers of this trilogy are not saying that for the time it took to read Anton's books they knew what it felt like to be a Jew in Medieval France.  They got a glimpse of life in Medieval France, they didn't live there for a time.

Fans of Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover novels often relate how they "grew up on Darkover."

Note how Robert A. Heinlein's fans talk about how his novels inspired them to learn math and science.  Or Isaac Asimov's fans.  Fans of Star Trek talk about how Roddenberry's creation led them into career tracks.

The comments on Rashi's Daughters are not relating how  people are dashing off to learn the real Torah and Talmud after becoming enchanted with her fantasy version of Torah and Talmud.  How many are reporting they enrolled their kids in Yeshiva?  But science fiction fans who grew up on Heinlein have kids on track to become famous astronomers, N.A.S.A. engineers, etc.

Keep in mind, it's my opinion that Anton wrote these novels as a polemic in modern feminism touting feminism to young Jewish women, hoping they would become feminists not Torah scholars.  Oil and water.  Some readers react to the oil and some to the water.

There are technical, writer-craft, reasons for that contrast in response between Heinlein/Roddenberry and Anton.

It is not a difference in the basic material or the story.  No place or time could be more alien to the modern reader than a Jewish Quarter in a small French town during the Crusades and the fall of Rome -- Darkover was easier to relate to.

Anton's historical Jews are alien to the modern Jew, and the dangers of Medieval France are just the same as in any Historical Romance with knights in shining armor, damsels in distress, and arranged marriages.

It is a difference in the application of writing craft techniques.  It's not that Science is more interesting than Torah.  It's simply a difference in how the "researched" (or factual) material is used to generate the fictional structure.

Being a professional writer means being able to get the reader-response you aim to get by using the tool that triggers that response.

Maggie Anton has probably gotten the reader response she was aiming for -- but not the response I would have aimed for had I decided to write about Rashi's Daughters.

And I'm only guessing, but I think she may not have known that the material about the Medieval Talmud Academies she had become enchanted with could be incorporated into a historical romance novel using the exact techniques perfected by science fiction writers decades ago.

The "technique" I'm referring to here is the "integration" of two (and sometimes more) of the basic techniques I've discussed on this blog in previous posts.  The integration tool that's most useful is "theme"  which we've discussed at length.

Anton has a theme.  I suspect it might best be stated as "Feminism is not new."

To illustrate that theme, she's created an alternate universe fantasy history.  Since she failed to use the Science Fiction techniques I'm discussing (she may know them and just didn't use them) her readers are calling her down for inaccurate or bad history -- possibly because her readers haven't read a lot of alternate-history fantasy such as Katherine Kurtz pioneered.

Her readers are miffed at the historical errors because Anton didn't lull them into a "suspension of disbelief" by telegraphing that she knows the "real" history that the reader already knows, but will now play a fun game re-arranging that history to tell a story that will pose interesting questions.

She could have created Rashi as a cross between Spock and Sherlock Holmes that would have rocked this nation.  She didn't.  Rashi himself hardly gets a word in edgewise, and when he does, it isn't the word "Logical" which would have been the author's wink at the reader soliciting the suspension of disbelief.  

The readers who don't know enough to spot her historical errors believe her version of history and like it, maybe prefer it.  Other readers are distressed by ignorant readers being taught inaccuracies, with never a clue that this is actually fantasy.

And then there are the real nuggets of historical fact Anton has uncovered which contradict what people in the modern world think they know about Rashi's time and lifestyle!

The knowledgeable reader rejects those nuggets along with the warped facts, not being able to distinguish one from the other -- all for the lack of writing techniques, most especially Research-Plot integration.

All that could have been avoided by treating the hard facts, the warped-facts, and the imaginary facts with a science fiction writer's techniques.  Poul Anderson comes to mind.  Vernor Vinge.

The readers who are calling her down for her historical inaccuracies have completely missed enjoying the Romance stories in this trilogy because their attention was distracted from the foreground story to the background setting.

Please note that the number of reviews Amazon has posted on Anton's novels far exceeds those on my novels.  There are a lot of technical (internet world related) reasons for that (Amazon has erased lots of reviews posted on my titles as they upgraded their computers).

But there is also the fact that Anton's work hits a far more popular topic than I have ever tackled, and was very well published to its exact audience at precisely the time Amazon was growing fastest.

One would conclude I have no business dissecting her product, but should rather be emulating it.

But I have read Marion Zimmer Bradley's SF/Fantasy novels, especially the hottest Alien Romance novel I've ever read, her Planet Wreckers.  I have read the Lensman Series (oh, did I have a crush on Kimball Kinnison and a case of envy for his red headed Soul Mate).  I have read C. J. Cherryh's Foreigner and Chanur series.  I have read  Ursula LeGuinn's Left Hand of Darkness.  I have read all of Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's St. Germain novels, and a lot of her historical horror novels.  I've read a lot of historical novels (a certain Scotland based historical time travel series pops to mind.)  I used to be a Western Romance fan!  I have read dozens of Vampire Romance novels with varying "rules" for the Vampire species.  And I've read all of Robert A. Heinlein, and dozens of others who blend real science, imaginary science, and a special "take" on human personality seamlessly into their plots.

I somehow don't "hear" an echo of that kind of reading exposure behind the reviews of Maggie Anton's novels by those who liked them.

If you don't know what can be done with the Research-Plot integration technique, you won't miss it at all, and you'll think Anton's novels are really fine novels.

If you read the novels that are there, it's true that they are good.  But I'm a writer.  I read the novel that could have been there and compare it to the novel that is there -- if they're not the same, I try to figure out what to change to make them the same.

In this case it's the Integration techniques that are missing.

As I said above, the plotting technique choice didn't work as well as other choices might have.

Anton's books aren't actually "novels" in the structural and technical sense.  They are strings of anecdotes lightly glued together.  That's what produces many reader comments about "couldn't put it down."  The reader will race through the anecdotes with the feeling that the beginning of the story is imminent, and then find themselves at the last page of the volume thinking they've read a novel.   They didn't.  They read a book, yes, but not a novel. 

Perhaps I just have higher standards in Romance Novels than the readers who loved this trilogy because I found the structural and technique omissions glaring and jarring.

None of the writers I admire who have written novels  blending facts you can get out of an encyclopedia with imaginary characters, real historical characters, and a specific idea of how the world's affairs have been managed, are being managed, and might become managed, would ever have failed to make this integration of plot and research smooth and in-detectible.

As far as I can tell just from reading, Anton made no attempt to blend research and plot, nevermind  create a smooth emulsion.

I learned how to do that integration by hatching an ambition to write like those writers I listed above.  I dissected their work to find out how they did it, then applied that technique to what I had to say, and according to the responses I've been getting on the SIMEGEN Group on Facebook, I succeeded.

Most of you who have read this far must be very frustrated because I'm not laying out exactly how to do this Integration yet.  I'm going to try to explain it, but I am pretty sure many busy readers of this column need time to read at least one of the Anton novels and possibly to explore Sime~Gen.

Meanwhile here is an example from Rashi's Daughters Book III, Rachel -- of a bit of Anton's research which sits like "oil" on top of the emotional waters of her story.  And don't yell.  Last week I did promise you a spoiler and a connection to House of Zeor, and here it is.
---------QUOTE FROM BOOK III RACHEL p353 of the Trade paperback --The main character is talking to a trading partner who deals in dye and wool.-------------

..."But why are some black?"

"The abbess at Notre-Dame-aux-Nonnains was inquiring after fabric so I asked Simon to prepare some for her," Rachel explained.  Nuns took a vow of poverty, but the local abbess came from a noble family and refused to wear anything but the highest quality fabrics.

Simon turned to Pesach.  "True black is one of the most difficult shades to obtain.  Each dyer has his secret formula; mine involves lamp soot."  He motioned the pair back indoors, where he slowly unrolled a small bolt of brilliant purple.

Rachel gasped.  "This is exquisite."  She couldn't resist stroking the material.  "I thought Eliezer couldn't find any Tyrian purple, or did you mix scarlet and indigo?" 

Simon allowed Pesach to answer.  "I found some, although Eliezer judged it too expensive.  But the other dye merchants in Toledo said Tyrian purple was particularly scarce this year, so I gambled and bought some on credit."

-----------END QUOTE-------
 
Now there are some obscure facts about the beginnings of the dye industry that few people know, and it's inherently interesting.  It is related to the world of this novel because Rachel is in business with another of her sisters who raises sheep for wool and had to import rams from England to get the kind of wool that can take the expensive dyes of the time.  I know this stuff is true from other sources.

This snatch of dialogue advances the plot element of the side-business of cloth merchanting the lead character is in.  It's not wholly extraneous, and it reveals a lot about the trade-world around this little village.  Worse, all the characters in the scene already know all this and have no business talking as if they don't.  Maybe the scarcity and trade details might be discussed in dialogue - but there's really no dramatic reason for this dialogue. 

If you examine the scene this dialogue is in, and compare it to the discussions we've had here about scene structure and dialogue, you'll see that the scene isn't actually a "scene" -- there's no conflict driving the scene, no rising action, no emotional change, and no climax to the scene, leading to a hook onto the next scene.  The author may believe that all these elements are in the scene, because she tags the end of the scene with a worded thought about her husband who is neglecting the cloth business for his studies in astronomy.

See my blog post of DECEMBER 27, 2011 - Dialogue Part 2 - On And Off The Nose

Anton's Rachel character's husband (the son-in-law of Rashi) is, in this fantasy, involved in the studies in Spain where astronomers may have figured out that the Earth revolves around the Sun centuries before Galileo -- and very possibly those Moorish inspired Spanish Jews may be the source of Galileo's inspiration, or he might have originated the idea on his own.  You can see why I love this trilogy!

There's no reason for this scene, though, except to showcase some of the research the writer did.  You could cut this exchange about dyes and you wouldn't lose anything except that "window" into the "world" of Medieval France.  It's decoration.  It's nice.  But it's not essential.  It says to me that the writer just couldn't bear to leave out all that hard work she did, so she couched it in dialogue and used Rachel's business venture as an excuse to include it.  If I were the editor, I'd have cut it with a big red X through it.  (my editors did that to me a lot; I learned)

To me, personally, though, this  bit of dialogue is the best thing in the whole trilogy! 

This obscure bit about black dye being difficult, proprietary secret, and very easy to spot against the kinds of colors cloth had been able to hold in those days was, I thought, common knowledge for at least 10 years before I wrote House of Zeor and invented "Farris Black" as a special color.  I learned it so long before writing House of Zeor that I have no memory of learning it, I just know it. 

Jean Lorrah, who joined me writing Sime~Gen after Unto Zeor, Forever was written, did not know this historical fact about black cloth dye and I had forgotten how I knew it and couldn't prove it when she challenged me.

My fictional House of Zeor is famous in the textile business, in the crude bathtub chemistry of dye manufacture and wool dying.  They do all kinds of small-batch chemistry that's related to textiles, agrochemistry, and medicinals.  Nowhere in any of the 12 volumes in this Universe is there any dialogue even vaguely resembling this snatch I've quoted for you. 

When the Zeor Householding members are faced with the problem of identifying a particular genetic line of people who are medically vulnerable, Zeor does that by clothing them in this very special black -- it's used on edging, fringes, belts, emblems, medical case file flags and chevron stripes, and on entire clothing ensembles at different points in the several thousand years of Zeor's history. 

It's always referred to as Farris Black -- not just any black.  This is a special color, a shade that leaps right out at you.  You can't miss it.  Over the centuries of the Sime~Gen saga, it becomes the custom and eventually a rule with the force of law that ONLY those of the Farris genetic strain may wear this color.  Nobody else would want to -- it could be a life or death issue if you were treated medically as if you were Farris.  Later, when it's not so special, special shapes and items become the label. 

Nowhere in the Sime~Gen novels do two characters who already know all about the dye business discuss the sources or applications of dyes. 

So there's the Sime~Gen/Rashi connection I promised you last week.  Farris Black. 

Eventually here, we'll probably talk about the second published Sime~Gen Novel (a novel I modeled on the typical "Doctor Novel") Unto Zeor, Forever, (my first award winner) and the medical profession research I did for that one -- and what Robert A. Heinlein said about it after he read it.  Of all the novels I've written, that was the only one I deliberately did research for with the specific intent of crafting that particular novel from the research. 

All other research I've used in my novels has been like that Farris Black example, something I've known so long I don't know where I learned it.  Many times, though, I have had to go look up details that I wanted to include to fact-check before including.  In some instances, I've used astronomical calculators and programs that help predict the orbit of a world around another sun.  But Unto Zeor, Forever is a specifically researched-to-write novel.  I hope you won't find any evidence of research in that novel, though. 

So you might want to read Unto Zeor, Forever first and compare it to Rashi's Daughters. 

Rashi's Daughters also has a whole lot of medical research into medieval and Jewish Medieval medicine and especially midwifery larded into the text.  Some of that medical research is well integrated, and some is not.  Many times whole birthing incidents are incorporated simply to illustrate the midwifery techniques.  The birth of a child who will become a significant influence on the course of history makes it seem that the birthing scene advances the plot -- but often that Integration technique just isn't there. 

Perhaps you want to find pair of Historical Romance novels to compare.  You want to find a novel that has obviously been researched for decades, that the writer is so very proud of their research and the publisher is selling it on the authenticity of the research.  And then find one which has even more information in it but you can't tell it's been researched at all -- you can only see that some of the things in it are real facts, and some things obviously made up just for fun.

Your personal library may already have two really good examples to work on.

Once you've tried to figure out what one writer did that the other writer did not do (and which you'd rather emulate) -- then move on to the next Part in this blog series "Research-Plot Integration in Historical Romance."

By the way, I learned this method of deconstruction, dissection, and distillation of techniques to discover and apply writing techniques to my own work from a correspondence course on writing from The Famous Writer School (which I do not recommend at all!).

I've seen how Blake Snyder applied this dissection method to create his SAVE THE CAT! film genres -- and I don't think he got it from the Famous Writer's School.

You don't need a teacher to learn this.  But you do need a pair of books you didn't write, one of which represents the kind of book you want to write.  Find and study two such novels, and come back next week for more thoughts on how to learn and apply Research-Plot Integration to your own work.

Live Long and Prosper,
Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com