Writing Cross Genre: Putney, Klasky, Knight and Agent Kristin

I had the pleasure, along with Nebula award winner Catherine Asaro, to co-host an internet radio show on CROSS GENRE FICTION last week. Guests were:

Mary Jo Putney, Mindy Klasky, Angela Knight,

and literary agent Kristin Nelson:

http://lilliancauldwell.podbean.com/2009/01/06/crazy-tuesday/

It's a two hour show. A long time to sit and listen so here's a tip: it's in approximately 20-23 minute segments with guest appearances as follows:

Putney

Klasky

Nelson

Knight

You can use the player's slider to advance to the segment you want to listen to, or download it to your own player.

Lots of terrific information on writing to genre expectations, crafting multi-genre books and some valuable insights from Agent Kristin on what NY is looking for...and why.

Enjoy! ~Linnea

HOPE’S FOLLY, Book 3 in the Gabriel’s Ghost universe, coming Feb. 2009 from RITA award-winning author, Linnea Sinclair, and Bantam Books: http://www.linneasinclair.com/

“If we can’t do the impossible, then we need to at least be able to do the unexpected.” —Admiral Philip Guthrie

Human Evolution and why we love the "Bad Boy"

What do British racecar driver Damien Hill, Virgin magnate Sir Richard Branson, Sir Francis Drake, Sir Richard Burton (translator of the Kama Sutra), the first homo erectus out of Africa, and my alien romance hero Prince Djetthro-Jason have in common?

They are (or were) all thrill seekers, high level risk takers, extreme sportsmen, and no doubt were considered a menace to society by one or two of their more sedate contemporaries.

Margaret's Thursday blog changed my mind about what I'd say in my first blog of 2009. I've been in the UK for a month, exposing myself to BBC TV and also to "DAVE", and one of the very fascinating documentaries I saw was by a TOP GEAR frontman (who is a bit of a daredevil badass himself).

It was about fear and fearlessness. It was also about human evolution.

Some people don't feel fear the way most of us do. Some feel it more. Some a lot less.

Now, I wouldn't want to go on one of those extreme Disneyworld rides. I'm like the Top Gear guy's mother, who patently didn't enjoy some monster ride. It took a trip down a bobsled ride (where his head could have been ripped off by an unforgiving wall of ice at any moment) to scare the Top Gear guy.

Apparently, people who choose to do dangerous things for fun or for profit are genetically a bit different. It takes a lot to excite them. They aren't happy with normal, sociable thrills. They are the sort who will pick fights to make life a little more interesting.

I'm not sure they are covered in the Beatitudes. There's no "blessed are the troublemakers and the mavericks..." as far as I recall.

In peacetime, they are a bit of a nuisance. They tend not to be team players. They go off on dangerous adventures, get themselves into trouble and have to be rescued by the Coastguard.

However, their continued --persistent-- existence, and their inability to be like the rest of us, is a hint that mankind has not lost its capacity to evolve. The gene that brought "us" out of the sea, out of the trees, out of caves, out of Africa, across frozen land bridges and across vast oceans on papyrus rafts (if Thor Heyerdahl was correct) and on open longships and on galleons, and into space is still with us.

We will evolve in space. A visit to the Johnson Space Center tells us that. Our heads will get bigger, and the rest of our bones will lose mass. We'll suffer kidney stones until we adapt. Perhaps we'll evolve bigger plumbing. Something happens to spines, too, but I cannot recall if they elongate... I rather think they do, because I remember thinking that tricky surgery to correct stenosis of the spine could be done in a space station.

Which brings me to the great mystery of Romance literature: why we love "bad boy" heroes.

Possibly, we like to dream of the vampires, the werewolves, the mutants and cyborgs, the pirates, the rakes, the highwaymen, the bikers, the hit men, secret agents and licensed killers because something deep within us ( us ladies) is ready to be turned on by dangerous guys like this when our world changes, and breeding selectively with them becomes necessary for the survival of the species.

And now for something completely irrelevant....

While I was away, I was thrilled to discover that Knight's Fork won the amazonclicks.com Authors' Choice Book of the Month award. Thank you to all the authors who voted for Knight's Fork. Thanks also to all the readers who voted. I understand that for a while, it looked like Knight's Fork might take both awards!




http://www.amazonclicks.com/Allwinners.html

The Future of Human Evolution

The January SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, a special issue on Darwin and evolution, contains an article called “What Will Become of Homo Sapiens?” It addresses the widespread belief that the physical evolution of our species has stopped. I admit I’ve tended to assume that’s the case, at least for the foreseeable future. Thanks to technology, many of the physical differences that would have affected individuals’ survival under primitive conditions have become irrelevant. People who once would have died in infancy grow up to reproduce. And someday gene therapy will enable most couples to have children without worrying about genetic defects they might otherwise pass on to descendants.

This article undercuts the assumption that Homo sapiens has reached a stable plateau in evolution. It mentions changes that have occurred in the time since modern human beings arrived on the scene (a mere instant in terms of geological eons)—for instance, the development of racial differences; varying disease resistance among ethnic groups; the capacity for some population groups to digest milk after childhood. (It’s easy for Americans of European descent to forget that “lactose intolerance” is the norm, not the exception.)

Will a new human species ever arise? The article points out that speciation depends mainly on isolation of some kind. Separated groups tend to drift apart genetically, so that if they eventually reunite, they find they have become too dissimilar to interbreed. Globalization has made us members of a single worldwide breeding population. Special circumstances might produce the isolation necessary to spawn new types of humanity, though, such as colonies on distant worlds unable to communicate easily with Earth or a global disaster that breaks up the survivors into small, widely separated groups.

And then there’s genetic engineering. If biological science develops the ability to design preferred traits into human embryos, parents with access to this technology will inevitably use it. A division might arise between the classes who can afford custom-designed offspring and those who can’t. Would the differences become wide enough to engender separate species, though? The article also poses the possibility of symbiosis with machines, leading to the development of a new kind of human race sufficiently different from us to be thought of as a distinct species.

I’m more intrigued by genetic engineering, however, which of course reminds me of the Sime-Gen universe. Although we’re never told how the change occurred, it seems likely that artificial tampering with genes was involved. The development over a mere thousand or so years of a whole new energy-producing system, not to mention visible features such as tentacles, is radically more extreme than developing immunity to a particular disease; it seems to require artificial intervention. Remember the short-lived TV series PREY? It had an exciting premise of a new human species living secretly among us. In execution I found it disappointing. For one thing, the new species didn’t literally prey on us in any way (wouldn’t it have been cool if they’d been energy vampires?), and their hostility toward us didn’t have any rational motive that I recall. I don’t think closely related species of birds or mammals kill each other on sight; unless they’re competing directly for the same resources, they’re more likely to ignore each other. More important, the cause of the new species’ evolution was ridiculously attributed to global warming since the late nineteenth century. That’s far too short a time for a separate species to evolve, and the planet has experienced much greater temperature variations since the advent of Homo sapiens, with no species differentiation as a result. Now, wouldn’t a TV series based on the Sime-Gen books be not only more logical but more fruitful of intriguing plotlines? Well, we can dream.

Margaret L. Carter (www.margaretlcarter.com)

The Cycles and the Seasons

Margaret Carter raised an interesting point in her New Year's post.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/01/happy-new-year.html

All of Earth's cultures have noticed we have a "year" -- a solar year, or cycle, and picked a point of the circle for a "beginning" of the year -- and made that a celebration of some sort. Fiction worldbuilders writing for an Earth audience have to take this kind of celebration into account when creating alien cultures - and romances across that cultural gap.

Also this year the standards authorities have brought to our attention that the Earth's rotation is slowing, and this year the master timekeeping standard atomic clock was adjusted another second.

We've only been able to measure accurately for a little while, so presumably the slowing has been going on since Earth began rotating.

Still, the Day is part of the Year cycle. The slowing, the lengthening of the Day and year, indicates a kind of non-permanence about our situation on Earth and around this star. Time is elastic. What changes can begin -- and end. The slowing of the Earth's rotation puts a whole 'nother spin on things.

In the Torah, the Creator of the Universe assigns the proclamation of the New Moon, and the New Year to the human venue. We are responsible for choosing the marking and celebrating of TIME itself -- and as Margaret pointed out, all our cultures create and innovate on how to do this. But NONE of these cultures have chosen "wrong" -- they're all "right" -- all at least OK. Because it's the human prerogative to divide and mark the cycles of Time.

From the human perspective, we all know "time" is "relative." The 20 minute wait in the dentist's office is much longer than the 20 minutes spent watching your favorite movie, or bedding your lover.

If Time were to be absolutely regular and objective, the Creator could have just assigned the cycles and markers to suit Himself. But now, only NOW, we discover that Earth's spin is not precisely repeating. No two years are alike. And it's up to us to call the end and beginning of cycles.

More than that, we now understand how our Sun fits into a spinning Galaxy that's moving through space.

In truth, no two successive years (days or months or any other cycle) are THE SAME. There actually is no "repetition" -- yet we are given the responsibility to mark the anniversaries of a death of a close relative, and other Events that are featured in our personal and collective History. All our cultures and religions have a year's calendar of Holidays commemorating such Events.

Yet the Earth is never -- ever -- in the same place twice. Even in the billions of years it takes a Galaxy to rotate completely, the Galaxy has moved through space and the suns do not come back to the same "place" in space-time.

I used the galaxy's rotation and move through space in setting up the backstory of two novels (now available on fictionwise.com as e-books as well as used on Amazon) - Molt Brother and City of a Million Legends.

Each moment of life is unique. Imagine that.

Margaret brought up one of my favorite novels by Robert A. Heinlein, Time For The Stars, where twins are used to communicate telepathically from Earth to FTL ships.

That reminded me suddenly of a wonderful little book -- HOW TO BUILD A TIME MACHINE by Paul Davies, from Penguin Books paperback 2001 -- reprinted through 2003.

I don't know if this book is still available. It might be woefully out of date with respect to the newest discoveries in astrophysics. But that wouldn't matter to worldbuilders writing fiction.

HOW TO BUILD A TIME MACHINE is popular physics which explains clearly in layman's terms how it is that there can never be any such thing as simultaneity at interstellar distances.

Gravity distorts space-time in such a way that the galactic civilizations we write about really can't exist or function as we describe them -- as analogues of Earth at the time of sailing ships.

My mind is still absolutely dizzy about this concept. Even Robert E. Forward (an astrophysicist) in order to write a good novel had to kind of cheat his way around this concept.

And then a couple years ago I took a course which I've mentioned many times in blogs and my review column ( http://www.simegen.com/reviews/rereadablebooks/2007/ ) and which led to a series of 6 review columns which I called the Soul Time Hypothesis. Those 6 review columns presenting this concept of the relationship between the Soul and Time became the basis of a course I gave in the Spring of 2008.

The mind-boggler is that the soul enters manifest reality through the dimension of Time.

Physicists obsess on measuring Time because it's a factor in almost all the key equations that describe the physical universe. So possibly they'll keep on studying and finally discover that the non-simultaneity concept has to be changed to something more amenable to SF writing. After all, physics said FTL travel is impossible, but we write about it. And physics said matter-transmission is impossible, but it's been done in the Lab (albeit on sub-microscopic particles). So maybe there's hope for writers.

Maybe, by writing such imaginings, getting others to imagine the universe CAN have simultaneous effects on events across galaxies. Maybe we can actually change the way the universe works? If Time is so plastic -- maybe other things are likewise responsive to human imagination? That was the theory behind Marion Zimmer Bradley's MISTS OF AVALON - a wonderful novel of Arthurian Legend's women.

Or alternatively, the power of the human imagination to change the functioning of the physical universe could become the reason that galactic aliens want to destroy Earth and all humans? What a threat - our novels alter THEIR reality! What a Helen of Troy lovestory!

Actually, I approached that idea sidewise in my novel DREAMSPY. But I fudged the physics with a little magic. Anyone know another novel that plays with that concept?

I don't really know how to "worldbuild" myself a universe strictly based on the non-simultaneity concept that includes the Soul-Time Hypothesis and that would work for a novel's background. Yet more than likely a blending of those two ideas would depict our objective reality (if there is such a thing) much better than any novelist has yet managed.

Well, then maybe the key for writers is to create some Aliens who do understand the universe in that blended way - non-Simultaneity plus Soul-Time, and just proceed from there?

Oh, wait -- actually, I think Edward E. ("Doc") Smith did that with the Lensman Series and his Arisians vs. Boskone war that stretched over millenia. I read all those books when I was in grammar school and High School, and they made a deep impression on me. They're still available in a recent reprint.

I haven't seen anything even remotely similar lately. If you have, please drop a note about them on the comments here. But don't forget that the Lensman Series had the first really HOT romance in the space-travel SF field. I've always wished I had auburn hair.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/
http://www.slantedconcept.com

WINDOWS TO THE SOUL

One of the interesting things about studying the craft of writing is that you realize 1) there is no one right and perfect way to write and 2) concepts you think you know can be overhauled and freshened with a mere turn of a page and a new phrase.

One of those phrases, for me, is Window Character.

Next weekend my local RWA chapter is hosting an all-day workshop with Todd Stone of Novelist’s Boot Camp fame. Stone’s workshop is great not only because he’s an ex-Airborne officer who teaches in a kilt. But because of his merger of military tactics and discipline with the often wiggly and elusive craft of writing.

Window Character is one of his terms, his concepts.

It’s not something I didn’t know about. Secondary or tertiary character is probably an equally as apt description. If you go by archetypes, this would be the “Friend,” the confidant. The character who can function as the sounding board for the main character.

Stone’s twist on this is not only to make the character the sounding board but to make the character a window to the past.

This nicely addresses the problem of info dumps and backstory. I’ll get to why in a moment.

Stone writes: “A window characters…provides multiple opportunities to give the reader glimpses into your protagonist’s true nature.” The key thing is that your window character knew your main character BEFORE the story began. And knew him very well. (And yes, the antagonist can also have a window character.)

Stone says: The window character is a subordinate who
1) Shares the protagonist’s experiences
2) Has a relationship based on friendship not romance
3) Has conflicting personality points with the main character
4) Has the same agenda or understands the main character’s agenda
5) Must let the main character have the foreground

Yes, the window character is a secondary character and we all feel we know all there is to know about secondary characters. But what makes the window character special or slightly different are the points above. Most succinctly, the window character has been on the main character’s journey for a while. Or knew her “when…” This is an almost guaranteed solution to the icky problem of backstory.

Backstory are all those things that happened to the main character BEFORE the novel actually starts. Backstory likely shaped the main character into who he is at the story’s start and very often provides the motivation and explanation for his actions. But backstory is boring, it’s mostly unnecessary and if amateur writers have one consistent failing, it’s the flailing around in backstory in the book.

“Fiction is forward moving,” says writing guru Jack Bickham.

“People pay more money for prize fights than reminiscences,” advises writing guru Dwight Swain.

Those are two reasons why backstory is so deadly and why a window character is the perfect solution. The writer doesn’t need several paragraphs explaining the disastrous ending of the protagonist’s previous marriage, which is backstory. The writer needs a window character to see, hear and feel the experience as the main character and the window character interact with each other (with reader as voyeur):

“How are your holidays so far, Theo?” Liza was still squatting next to
him.

“Fine,” he lied. “Yours?”

“Kids are up to their eyes in toys they don’t need, as usual. And they can’t even get to the ones under the tree until Christmas.” She nudged him with her elbow and grinned. “My husband’s cousin Bonnie is in town. She’s a couple years younger than you, thirty-four or thirty-five, single. Real cute. Like you.” She winked. “You’re clocking out for vacation, right?”

He nodded reluctantly. He’d wondered why she asked about his schedule when he ran into her at the courthouse yesterday. Now he had a feeling he knew.

“Why don’t you come by the house tomorrow night, say hi to Mark and the kids, meet Bonnie?”

He rose. She stood with him. Liza Walters was, as his aunt Tootie liked to say, good people. But ever since he’d divorced Camille last year, Liza had joined the ranks of friends and coworkers trying to make sure Theo Petrakos didn’t spend his nights alone.

“Thanks. I mean that. But I’ve got some things to do.”

“How about next week, then?

I’m sure you’ll like her. You could come with us to the New Year’s concert and fireworks at Pass Pointe Beach.” She raised her chin toward Zeke. “You too, Zeke. Unless Suzanne has other plans?”

“New Year’s Eve is always at her sister’s house.” Zeke splayed his hands outward in a gesture of helplessness. “Suzy doesn’t give me a choice.”

Liza briefly laid her hand on Theo’s arm. “Think about it. You need to have some fun. Forget about the bitch.”

He smiled grimly. Forgetting about the bitch wasn’t the problem. Trusting another woman was. “I’ll let you know, but I’m probably scheduled on call out.”

“That Bonnie sounds real nice,” Zeke intoned innocently as Liza went back to photographing a splintered bookcase. “Thirty-five’s not too young for you. I mean, you’re not even fifty.”

Theo shot a narrow-eyed glance at the shorter man. “Forty-three. And don’t you start on me too.”

Zeke grinned affably. “So what are your plans for tomorrow night, old man?”

“I’m restringing my guitar.”

“Alone?”

Theo only glared at him.

Zeke shook his head. “Still singing The Down Home Divorced Guy Blues? Man, you gotta change your tune.”

“I like my life just the way it is.”

“When’s the last time you got laid?”

“If you focus that fine investigative mind of yours on our dead friend’s problems, not mine, we just might get out of here by midnight.”

“That long ago, eh?”

“I’m going to go see what I can find in the bedroom,” he said, ignoring Zeke’s leering grin at his choice of destination. “You take the kitchen.”

Zeke’s good-natured snort of laughter sounded behind him as he left.

(from The Down Home Zombie Blues by Linnea Sinclair, Bantam Dell 2007)


Both Liza and Zeke function as window characters in my CSI:Miami meets Men In Black science fiction romance novel. Theo—the main character—is a homicide detective. Zeke is his long-time partner. Liza is a forensics technician. Rather than penning…

Theo Petrakos is a forty-three year old detective who went through a divorce that has left him emotionally scarred and leery of relationships…

I let you in to Theo’s life and let his friends—my window characters—show you what’s going on with him. Did I know I was creating a window character when I created Zeke? (Who, more than Liza, continues to function that way throughout the book.) Nope. I’m a pantser, pretty much an instinctual, organic writer. The character just felt right.

Now I know why.

The other important function of the window character is to act as a sounding board for the main character’s ideas…and to throw monkey wrenches into them. This is a wonderful source of conflict because it’s not from the expected source: the antagonist. It’s from the main character’s friend. Who not only makes the main character rethink his plans but makes him doubt himself as well.

“And what do you think,” Theo asked quietly as his friend voiced the one downside he’d overlooked and now feared, “the news media will do to Jorie?”

Zeke’s mouth opened, then closed quickly.

“A freak show, Ezequiel. It’d be a fucking freak show.” Everyone would want a piece of Guardian Commander Jorie Mikkalah. The National Enquirer. The Jerry Springer show. And worse. Bile rose in Theo’s throat. How could he have been so stupid as not to realize what would happen? All this time he’d seen the Guardians’ reluctance to reveal their presence as a selfish act. And he’d ignored what Jorie told them the Guardians learned from experience: nil-tech worlds routinely acted illogically—sometimes even violently—when faced with someone from another galaxy.

“I’m not putting her through that.”

“The Feds will never let that happen. They’ll put her under lock and key.”

Another scenario he’d come up with and feared. “I’m not letting that happen, either.”

“Theophilus. I don’t think you have a choice.”

“Like hell I don’t.” Theo spun away from him and resumed pacing.

“What are you going to do, risk hundreds of people’s lives because you don’t want a bunch of scientists in some basement room of the Pentagon asking Jorie questions? I think she can handle that. She’s probably been trained to handle that.”

Theo could see the tight, pained expression on Jorie’s face as she told him about her captivity with the Tresh. He could feel her shivering against him. He could see her fingers trace the rough scar on her shoulder.

He could see her getting into a dark government sedan with darkened windows, knowing he’d never see her again.

His breath shuddered out. This was the only scenario he’d agree to. And that, too, had flaws. “I’ll give them the zombie, the weapons.” They had both Guardian and Tresh now. “I’m not giving them Jorie.”

“You can’t hide her in your spare room the rest of her life. She has no Social Security number, no ID. She can’t even get a job.” Zeke raised his arms in an exasperated motion. “Talk about illegal alien!”

“I’ll get her an ID. A whole identity.”

Zeke stared at him. “Be serious.”

“I am.”

“You know what that costs, a good fake identity?”

“I can take equity out of my house to pay for it.”

Zeke barked out a harsh laugh. “Brilliant, Einstein. Traceable funds. There goes your career.”

“I’m not going to write a fucking personal check.” Theo glared at him. “I’m not that stupid.”

“Then listen to yourself, damn it! You’re talking felony jail time. Your life down the shitter. You do know what they do to cops in the Graybar Hotel, don’t you?”

“You’re assuming I’d get caught.”

“No, she’d get caught, suddenly surfacing in all the databases.” Zeke ticked the items off on his fingers. “She’d have to get a job, buy a car, rent an apartment—”

“Not if she’s living with me, she won’t.”

“Living with—what’re you going to do, Theophilus? Marry her?”

Theo raised his chin and met Zeke’s question with a hard stare. This was one of the decisions he’d made driving through the bright Florida sunshine in the middle of Christmas Day with Jorie by his side. And a dead zombie behind them. “Yes.”

“You’re—Ay, Jesucristo.” Zeke dropped his head in his hands, then lifted his face slightly and peered up at Theo. “You got a thing for women with fake identities?”

The not-so-veiled reference to his disastrous marriage hit him like a sucker punch. Theo looked away, keeping his temper in check. But he couldn’t keep the anger out of his voice when he turned back. “I’m sorely tempted to kick the shit out of you for saying that.”

Zeke straightened slowly, eyes wide then narrowing. “You want to take it outside, Theo? We can take it outside.”

In the above snippet from The Down Home Zombie Blues, Theo’s partner and best friend is punching holes in everything Theo wants to do, in the very things Theo believes are the only answers to the problem. It even escalates to the point where the two friends threaten to come to blows.

This isn’t the usual conflict from the opposition. It’s the more deadly conflict from within. It strips the safety net away from the main character. It leaves him totally alone—which is exactly where he needs to be in the last quarter of a fiction novel.

The window character—who knows the main character better than anyone—is the perfect person for the job of conflict. Their shared history—their backstory—becomes a workable ingredient in increasing the conflict rather than info slathered on, stopping the flow of action.

So here I am, seven books in with Bantam, and I’ve learned something. Yes, it was something I was already doing—I wrote Zombie long before I read Stone’s book. But now I know why I did it, I know why it works, I know what it can do and because I know all that, I can do it better in future books.

Writing is often an innate process but that doesn’t mean we don’t need to understand the craft of creation. Actually, because it’s so innate and often elusive, it’s vitally important we understand the craft of creation: why did that work? And more importantly, how can I do it again?

That is, if you want to sell your next book.

Thanks, General Stone. ::Linnea salutes::

~Linnea

Linnea Sinclair
RITA award winning Science Fiction Romance
Bantam 2007-2008: Games of Command, The Down Home Zombie Blues, Shades of Dark
2009: Hope's Folly
http://www.linneasinclair.com/

Happy New Year

I have a certain resistance to the idea of celebrating New Year’s Eve in a big way (but, hey, any excuse to eat a festive meal and drink champagne is good) or make New Year’s resolutions, because the date is such an arbitrary, culture-centered convention. January 1 isn’t even the winter solstice or anything logical like that. (In the church calendar it’s commemorated as Holy Name Day, in honor of Jesus’ circumcision and therefore set eight days after Christmas, which at least makes liturgical sense even if not much attention is paid to it in some churches.) The Chinese New Year can fall in either January or February. The Jewish New Year usually occurs in September. The ancient Romans started their year in March, which is why September is named after the Latin word for seven instead of nine (and so on with October, November, and December).

Will interstellar ships reckon time by “stardates” as on STAR TREK, or will the crew and passengers cling to the familiar Earth calendar? The latter practice could cause some awkwardness, as in Robert Heinlein’s classic “twin paradox” novel TIME FOR THE STARS. In that book, it’s discovered that telepathy is not constrained by physical laws such as the speed of light and can thus be used for instantaneous communication between Earth and starships. Because telepathy occurs most often between twins, the communication team on the starship in the novel is composed almost entirely of twins. Because of relativistic time dilation, the narrator is taken aback to find a difference of several months between the day his brother on Earth celebrates their birthday and the day when it’s celebrated aboard the ship. The only way to avoid that kind of problem would be to invent a hyperdrive system that makes almost instantaneous travel possible and eliminates temporal discrepancies. Out among the stars, when the year begins depends very much on one’s point of view.

Come to think of it, though, New Year’s Day is less arbitrary than Mother’s Day and Kwanzaa, celebrated by millions even though invented by single individuals (the latter within living memory). So, what the heck, Happy New Year!

Astrology Just For Writers Part 5 - High Drama

Pluto and Vampires -- continued from Part 4

Last time we started to look at Pluto as the ruling planet of Vampires (friendly and unfriendly varieties).

Pluto is the best source material for villains and villainous schemes because Pluto is about Power, the use and abuse of Power, the way Power corrupts absolutely, and how power controls the world from the "underground" -- from the unseen parts of society.

Pluto is the symbolism you need in a novel that skirts the edges of the definitions of "privacy" and "confidentiality" and "secrecy." Pluto has a lot to do with espionage. When is it morally right to keep a secret? (see what I mean about vampires?)

But it has even more to do with the learning curve of the long-lived entities such as countries or Immortals.

Pluto transits last a long time. See the relevance to Vampires? Reincarnation love affairs? Yes, Pluto is said to occupy the spot in your natal chart that your Sun occupied in your previous life, and Pluto rules the natural 8th House so it is about death and rebirth.

Pluto has an elliptical orbit (another reason they decided it's not a planet but a "capture" from some other solar system. Ah, Alien Romance!)

For the last decades of the 20th Century Pluto was moving pretty fast (relative to its usual), but now Pluto has begun to move more slowly as it rounds its elliptical path.

In Astrology the principle is that the slower the transit, the more profound and lasting the change -- the more prominent the change in the history books.

All planets bring change on transit, but maybe the character of the change is different -- and many Astrologers argue that all the planets signify the same thing, change, just the speed differs and thus the magnitude of the change. Pluto's magnitude is the biggest, though it's such a tiny body and now, once again, the outermost of our solar system (that we know of).

Pluto is now, and once again, the slowest moving planet (from Earth's perspective).

Pluto takes 248 years to go all the way around the Sun. So every 248 years, Pluto gets back to the spot it was when you were born.

See what I mean about Vampires being ruled by Pluto?

Since Methuselah, nobody "alive" ever experiences a Pluto Return. Astrology spends a lot of effort studying the periods when a given planet returns to its place in the natal chart. These periods punctuate our lives if you can read the symbolism. Just as a comma can change the meaning of a sentence, a Venus Return during a long Neptune transit can change the meaning of your life.

We learn Astrology from "lore" not theory, and the theory of astrology is created from the lore.

We study people, real people, who experience this or that transit against the background of a Natal Chart that has this or that characteristic, during this or that time of their life, and keep lots of notes. Then the experiences of lots of people are compiled into general principles. The notes on which these conclusions are based have been kept for literally thousands of years.
That's how "rulerships" are "assigned."

Pluto is new to our lexicon of planetary experiences, and thus people are still guessing what it is really about. Mars was assigned long ago (Roman Times) to rule Scorpio and recently Pluto was added as ruler of Scorpio because many of Pluto's characteristics are just bigger, deeper, longer wavelength attributes of Mars.

That means that war is Pluto related, while Mars is battle related. Mars is marital strife, but Pluto is divorce -- see what I mean?

With a Mars transit you may get into a yelling match with the clerk at the supermarket; with Pluto transiting that sensitive spot in your natal chart, you might be mugged as you exit the store with cash clutched in your hand. Or car-jacked. Mars produces gossip. Pluto produces headlines.

Read up on Saturn Returns in Grant Lewi's ASTROLOGY FOR THE MILLIONS to see why the return of Pluto to the place at birth has to be significant in a Vampire's existence. (Saturn rules Capricorn) Grant Lewi wrote before Pluto was discovered, but the "return" principle is the same for all the planets. Consequences of actions taken during the cycle materialize, new starts are possible, and new troubles begin to descend.

As a Saturn Return is a time when consequences and responsibilities rule ordinary people, a Pluto-Return has to be a totally shattering Event for a vampire or other immortal.

The attack that murdered the Chabad Rabbi in Mumbai -
See my blog entry:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/12/mumbai-chabad-terrorism-love.html

- came when he was 29 years old, midst of or just after his Saturn Return (Saturn's cycle is 28-29 years). That ghastly ending was not his fault but was a possible consequence of taking the post in Mumbai (which is ordinarily a very peaceful city). (and I found out his wife was 5 months pregnant).

We're looking at serious, major, HIGH DRAMA, larger than life events here, the stuff of novels not real life.

Astrologically, there had to be many other confluences to complete the symbolism of such a prominent death by violence (astrology can't predict death because it's not a very important event in the life of a soul), but that illustrates the power of the "return." Those attackers were not the Rabbi's personal enemies. That attack was a skirmish in a war that's been going on for centuries, maybe longer and had more to do with international affairs than individual lives.

EXAMPLE: There's a branch of Astrology called "Mundane Astrology" and it deals with the Natal Charts and transits of whole nations and the world in general.

A lot that's been happening in the world since Pluto touched 0 Degrees of Capricorn can be understood in terms of Pluto symbolism, and when you grasp the Pluto symbolism you'll be able to create "larger than life" villains that people can read and accept as real.

So this discussion is about understanding the symbolism, not the fate of a particular country.

There's always argument about exactly when a country is "born" -- and the USA has several accepted natal charts that astrologers study. I found that in one of the most famous charts, (July 4, 1776, 2:13 AM, Philadelphia PA) the USA's 8th House Cusp is at 0:38 of Capricorn).

House cusps move very quickly with the tick of the clock, and there are many schools of astrology that calculate where the 8th House cusp is via different mathematics!

We're not talking about "facts" here but principles writers can use to craft stories. I want to use what you already know to let you see a pattern from an artist's point of view.

2008 was the year of the financial meltdown, starting with MORTGAGES (borrowing other people's money - 8th House; Pluto). Banks get the money they loan from depositors (government loans notwithstanding). Banks are an 8th House phenomenon.

248 years ago was 1760 - the USA hasn't had a Pluto return yet! By this natal chart, our Pluto is at 27 degrees of Capricorn, in our 9th House which is foreign affairs, foreign travel, foreign thinking, and justice, courts. Jupiter rules Sagittarius the Natural 9th House, Honesty.

If this natal chart holds, this phase of Pluto induced change should be over for us by September 2009, but Pluto then moves on to oppose our Natal Venus, Jupiter and then Sun. Pluto finishes our 8th House and enters the 9th in Nov 2019. By then the character of the USA will be wholly changed.

Watch how Pluto affects long-lived organisms such as countries, and you will begin to see how it signifies the kind of life events a vampire would face. Periodically. Routinely. Ho-hum, yawn, I'm bored with existence. Who could be bored the first time you ever face a "change everything" Event -- a lose everything or win everything Event? But the 20th or 1,000th time?

Recently, the Thailand government was toppled by airport sit-ins that trapped thousands of tourists. The Greek government is being challenged after a police shooting at a rock throwing incident. The Mumbai terrorist attack has aroused India's wealthy class to challenge the current Indian government, but not the form of government. Africa is a mess. There's unrest in every country.

The terrorist philosophical manifesto is about gaining power (Pluto) over other people's (8th House) public sexual conduct (physical sexuality; i.e. body exposure; 8th House). Their target to achieve this is the USA Economy -- an "economy" is "other people's money" and that's 8th House. Hide the women - that's 8th House, Pluto is hidden.

Political Revolution is (often, not always) a Pluto driven event.

Being toppled from "power" can be a Pluto type event from the point of view of the one toppled, but the same kind of thing can be signified by a transit of Saturn.

Pluto will topple by revealing the hidden, by sex scandal, by embezzlement, or sometimes by someone else wanting the power for themselves, by assassination.

Saturn often topples by failure, by running out of steam, by enemies succeeding, by losing the election, by a failure of discipline or authority, by getting your comeuppance, your just deserts. With Saturn, it's obviously your own fault; with Pluto it seems to be external to your self if you don't live several 248 year cycles.

You see what I mean by "drama" - Pluto is very High Drama indeed.

Pluto events are about the whole world more than any given individual, thus they lend themselves to drama where the Hero's own personal, private sex-life or love-life (or both) actually creates or topples Empires.

Pluto driven lives and events are the very substance of movies even more than of novels. Robert Ludlum move over!

Noel Tyl (as I discussed in my post Astrology Just For Writers Part 1)

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/07/astrology-just-for-writers.html

shows how Pluto is one part of a pattern that shows up routinely in the natal charts of the extremely prominent -- thus Pluto is connected to both fame and infamy.

A Pluto driven life has these gigantic, larger than life, ups and downs -- from which the individual usually comes back. Pluto supplies both the crisis and the strength to survive it. Pluto works perfectly as the plot driver of Blake Snyder's genre "Dude With A Problem."

Pluto driven love can range from the sickest, most violent obsession (stalking, kidnap, etc) all the way to the longest lasting, most eternal, and most animal-passion driven bonding of hunger and need.

So astrologers face a quandary trying to analyze a Vampire's existence. Is his (or her) natal chart the moment they were born as a human? Or the moment they first drew breath as a vampire?

Does a vampire who has been immured for a few centuries, going dormant until dug up, get a new natal chart when they "waken" again? Is that like reincarnation?

Does memory have anything to do with how you respond to transits? Does a person who has a total memory wipe have a new natal chart when they start recording events again?

Look at this article if it's still up:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7777385.stm

It's about about the finding of what may be a human brain, more than 2,000 years old, shrunken and barely identifiable.

So it occurs to me to wonder what if that were the brain of a vampire?

And then it occurs to me to wonder how a fossilized (really infused with stone) vampire body might respond to being "brought to light" (that's what Pluto does, exhumes, brings to light, turns up, discovers, exposes).

There's this fossilized body in a museum -- a vampire, of course -- and the vampire's Pluto return takes hold. What happens next?

The possibilities for the use of Pluto in stories is endless. Do you see that? Have I explained Pluto well enough for you to use it, see it in novels you're reading, in headlines and current events, and maybe use it in your own stories?

Do you see how artists work in color schemes, in palettes, and writers work in symbol groups that go together the same way as colors do -- harmonies, groups.

If you're writing a Pluto driven plot, everything in the novel (from the color of the drapes to the ages of the characters) has to partake of that SYMBOLISM GROUP which signifies Pluto, 8th House. If you choose from the palette of the planet driving the plot events, readers will believe everything in the novel (at least while reading) without objection because the novel's reality will resemble their own actual reality.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.slantedconcept.com

CHANGE OF HEART: the quandary of the comeuppance

Today’s blog picks up from last week’s blog, which was based on the movie, Serenity. (A great flick and one I heartily recommend if you’ve not seen it…and if you’ve not seen it you might not want to read further as again, this will contain spoilers.)

Last week I whined about the (what I felt) untimely death of the character, Wash. While I could see where it had emotional impact, it failed, for me, to engender character growth. So it left me feeling…confused. More than usual, that is.

Here I’m going to whine about the second part of my thoughts on Serenity—the apparent capitulation, the change of heart of “The Operative” who was the foremost antagonist in the movie. This was a man who rather gleefully admitted he killed children. This was a man who clearly had no problem killing anyone. He showed no remorse; if anything I had the feeling he saw himself as some kind of avenging angel of death. He advised those he was in the process of killing that they were dying bravely and for good reason. But he wasn’t apologetic. No, not that. He was a man doing a job he loved.

So when, at the end, Mal lets him live (bit of a surprise, that, but not fully unexpected), he evidently (off-camera) returns the favor and gets the baddies off Mal’s tail. There’s a scene where he comes to tell Mal good-bye and even though Mal threatens to kill him at that point (tagged with the ubiquitous “if I ever see you again”), clearly, this man is not the man who was the antagonist for most of the film.

What happened?

I haven’t a clue in a bucket ::ka-ching to Paula L.::

Most likely—as has been posited—there was supposed to be another film or movie for TV and he’d have a recurring role. That’s what the ending felt like but since that hasn’t happened (though I live in hope), the movie’s end left me feeling…strange (more strange than usual).

The character went out of character. He went from a heartless and somewhat haughty killing machine to—okay, not Mister Nice Guy. But he’d obviously found a stash of happy meds somewhere. He was removed as a threat, even to the point of turning on his former employer.

All because of Mal and the Reavers. I just didn’t quite buy it.

I’m not saying baddies can’t become goodies. They can. Susan Grant did that marvelously in her How To Lose An Extraterrestrial in 10 days in which Reef, the assassin from her Your Planet or Mine? is recast as a hero. She does this through one of the finest and most gripping first chapters. It worked, beautifully and flawlessly, for me.

I took a less bad baddie in the form of Admiral Philip Guthrie who straddled the fence between friend and foe in my Gabriel’s Ghost, fully came into friend category (though not without a touch of tension) in Shades of Dark and finally into his hero duds in my upcoming Hope’s Folly.

So understand I have no particular issue with an antagonist having a change of heart.

As long as you show me how and why that happens, and Whedon in Serenity didn’t do that.

I would have been far more satisfied with the movie if Wash had lived and The Operative had died. That, from a plot and characterization point of view, would have made more sense. As it was, it was the second WTF? moment for me in the movie.

Again, maybe scenes were cut. Last I knew, Mal left the guy secured to a railing in Mr. Universe’s lower chamber, with the tape of the “truth” about the world, Miranda, running on the big screen (without commercials, too!). Okay, gripping stuff. But based on the character to that point, it didn’t seem sufficient motivation for the guy to turn on his employers. He was no newbie. He was a seasoned assassin and had seen—and done—worse than that before. That much was shown in the flick.

Now, maybe what we didn’t see was The Operative’s teammates coming to rescue him and mocking him for his predicament. Maybe this threw him over the edge. Maybe the Alliance shunned him. And so he reacted. But we didn’t see that. We don’t know that. We don’t even get a hint of that.

It certainly does make the movie end “happier” though and maybe that’s my problem with it. I have this thing against forced happiness in endings. Yes, I write to an HEA (though some readers of Shades of Dark may quibble with that). But an HEA doesn’t mean Everything Is Now Perfect. Therein I think is the problem with some readers who want Perfect at book’s end, rather than logical to plot and character.

At Shade’s end (S P O I L E R), Sully is wounded, pretty seriously (so is Philip). The final scene is in ship’s sick bay and Sully is still wounded…but Chaz loves him anyway. Now, a few readers have asked me, “Couldn’t you have just fully cured him then and there and then had Chaz say she loved him?” The fact that Sully was still injured at book’s end took Perfect away from them. (It’s almost as if the fact—the main issue of the love between Sully and Chaz is ignored. Which confuzzles me. Loving someone who’s in perfect form is easy. Loving someone who’s injured takes a special, deeper kind of love. Doesn’t it?)

Anyway, the answer to “couldn’t I just cure him” right there is no. And the answer is no because it would have felt as wrong to me as Serenity’s ending.

Sully made some huge mistakes in Shades. The Operative did some really nasty shit in Serenity. Characters’ actions must engender reactions. That’s a basic law of the craft of fiction. It’s often illustrated by the old “if you show a gun in scene one, you damned well better fire it in scene two…” analogy. A character’s action in chapter one directly impact the actions in chapter two. You can’t have a character doing all sorts of nasty shit for six chapters and then in chapter seven—for no salient reason—suddenly he’s a veritable good neighbor. Everyone’s friend. All forgotten. There are consequences in fiction. In real life we’re not always aware of the consequences but in fiction—if the piece is to work—they are unavoidable.

Or else you risk writing Mary Sues or Marty Sams or whatever you want to call them.

“The reader needs someone to pass judgment on.” Writing guru Jack Bickham said that and that’s another reason why the laws of karma apply in fiction, right up front. And why things getting too pretty, too fast, violates credibility. Readers might not like the fact that Sully was so seriously injured at book’s end. But if I’d lightened up on him in the final chapters of the book, I would have been Mary Sue-ing out on the basic principles. And the reader would be denied the right to see the passing of judgment.

There’s nothing to pass judgment on if all is prettied up and forgiven. The punishment must match the crime. Sully had become a tad too big for his intergalactic britches. He needed to be taken down several notches. He needed to realize he’d likely lost Chaz. And Chaz needed to be there for him at book’s end because her story, also, had to make logical fictional sense.

Her journey is different from his.

The Operative definitely had a comeuppance coming.

He didn’t get it.

And I’ve not a clue in a bucket as to why. Do you?

~Linnea

SHADES OF DARK, the sequel to Gabriel’s Ghost, July 2008 from RITA award-winning author, Linnea Sinclair, and Bantam Books: http://www.linneasinclair.com/

Something cascaded lightly through me—a gentling, a suffused glow. If love could be morphed into a physical element, this would be it. It was strength and yet it was vulnerability. It was all-encompassing and yet it was freedom. It was a wall of protection. It was wings of trust and faith.

It was Gabriel Ross Sullivan, answering the questions I couldn’t ask. Not that everything would be okay, but that everything in his power would be done, and we’d face whatever outcomes there were together.

Merry Christmas

Recently I reread (again) parts of a fascinating book called THE BATTLE FOR CHRISTMAS, by Stephen Nissenbaum. It explores the shift from the REAL old-fashioned Christmas celebration to what WE think of as a "traditional" Christmas, the family-centered holiday invented in the nineteenth century. What the New England Puritans, like their English counterparts under Cromwell, objected to when they tried to abolish Christmas had little in common with our "traditions." To us, the medieval Christmas would have looked like a combination of Mardi Gras (masquerading, revelry, and inversion of the normal social order), Halloween (begging from door to door), Thanksgiving (overeating and over-drinking—well, a lot of us still do that at Christmas), and New Year's Eve (more drinking and revelry, noisemaking to drive away the dark; nineteenth-century American Southerners still heralded Christmas by firing off guns). All these elements combined at the winter solstice festivities because, in the northern hemisphere, December was the one time in the agricultural year when abundant fresh food (especially meat, because animals couldn't be slaughtered until the weather turned cold, and then the meat had to be either eaten quickly or preserved by salting) and leisure from heavy labor coincided. For modern people who complain about the holiday season starting too early and going on too long, this trend isn't a new invention; in some parts of Europe the Christmas-centered revelry extended from late November to Candlemas (early February). Complaints about the pagan roots of Christmas and its being celebrated in a secular rather than religious manner go back quite a few centuries, too. 'Tis the season to reread Terry Pratchett's HOGFATHER, which includes an abundance of incisive reflections on both the commercial and the ancient seasonal-cycle dimensions of the Yuletide festivities.

I'd like to post a couple of Madeleine L'Engle's moving Nativity poems, but quoting them in full would be copyright infringement. I think it's permissible, though, to quote part of one, "The Risk of Birth, Christmas 1973." It begins, "This is no time for a child to be born" and ends:

"The inn is full on the planet earth,
And by a comet the sky is torn—
Yet Love still takes the risk of birth."

Happy midwinter holidays to all!

Margaret L. Carter (www.margaretlcarter.com)

Astrology Just For Writers Pt 4 - High Drama

SORRY - THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO AUTO-POST ITSELF TUESDAY 12/23/08

This post is about Vampire Romance, or Romance with aliens or Immortal characters whose lifespans reach back into History, and ahead to long after their mortal lover is gone.

You'll see a connection to UFO's below, too. And to Linnea's discussion of the creation of a dynamic antagonist for a novel which I discussed last week.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/12/double-duty-putting-face-on-conflict-in.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/12/villain-defined.html

The problem is that Villains have to be "larger than life" -- Heros can start small, as ordinary dudes (as Blake Snyder calls us in SAVE THE CAT GOES TO THE MOVIES!), but via the Hero's Journey the ordinary dude must become the Hero, overcoming internal obstacles as well as external. Villains on the other hand are the hero of their own story, but in most literary genres the villain has to start out larger than life and get ripped assunder.

That is a writing problem Gene Roddenberry ran into with Star Trek, when they went to make the first movie. "It isn't big enough" they kept telling him about his premise. He'd spent a lifetime writing for the small screen and wasn't thinking BIG. Eventually he hit on villains Big Enough to fill a large screen.

There is a way to do that, methodically, and precisely. There are any number of fields of psychology, sociology, anthropology, diachronic linguistics, -- there's a huge world of knowledge to explore that will give a writer a method for generating Larger Than Life problems, people, and plights.

But here we're going to discuss how Pluto may be the ruling planet of Vampires (both the friendly kind and the villianous kind). As you get a feel for how Pluto keys events and personalities to be just like you and me, but LARGER THAN LIFE, you'll see how becoming aware of Pluto operating in Headline News can help you create villains who are larger than life.

So, I'm assuming Pluto "Rules" Vampires and other Immortals.

Pluto was recently demoted from the status of "planet" -- and people have been talking about calling it a "Plutoid." It doesn't matter what astronomy settles on -- astrology is not very closely related to astronomy. (Though I could make a strong case that they're identical if I had to.)

Here I've set myself an impossible task, to explain to people who think "Astrology" is the predictions you see in newspapers, just what use the Pluto symbolism is in fiction writing and reading.

I want to explain this well enough that a writer or reader who doesn't know anything about real astrology can recognize Pluto symbolism when writing or reading fiction.

So I'm going to try to use what you already know to show you something that may have escaped your notice but which will explain a lot you've been curious or frustrated about.

Like most of the planets, Pluto symbolizes change. But each planet seems to specialize in a different kind of change. The House where a planet is in your natal chart, and the House that the planet rules, will focus the axis of change for you in your personal life. That potential for change will be confronted as that particular planet circles the heavens, and you may either accept or reject the change thus signified.

As I currently perceive the world, each planet seems to key off a particular type of change. So let's examine how Pluto functions as it "transits" or circles the heavens.

Pluto changes are the sort you look back on and say "before this" and "after this" - they are dividing lines, or a period of life when events pounded you as Pluto transited a sensitive House in your Natal Chart -- or you pounded on the world and either bloodied yourself or made it yield.

Pluto is that deep well of strength you tap in pure survival mode, but it also puts your survival at risk.

FOR EXAMPLE, a Pluto transit might signify the death of a parent (not the kind of loss of a parent which changes nothing in your life, but the sort that pounds you into a new shape). Saturn also can symbolize loss and bereavement, but brings more responsibility than pure power as Pluto does.

FOR EXAMPLE, under a Pluto and Saturn bereavement, you become the executor of the estate - a task for which you are wholly unprepared, a task which really is way beyond you. You end up staying up all night, phone calling all day, staring bleary-eyed at legal forms, bank forms, and real estate sales. And from somewhere deep, deep inside comes the physical strength, the mental strength to obsess over tiny print, the ability to learn arcane fields like investing or antique car collecting. Whatever you must do (Saturn is must) you CAN (Pluto is can).

FOR ANOTHER EXAMPLE: another person and a similar Pluto transit might signify the onset of a major, life-threatening disease or disorder, but years before that, the person dropped out of High School and can barely read the ingredients on a soup can, nevermind figure out what's on WebMD. Yet, Pluto provides the mental strength (temporarily) to learn, judge, evaluate, obsess on (Obsession is a Pluto manifestation) all this medical stuff and make an informed choice of treatment or physician. And thus conquer the medical problem and survive (or not; Pluto does bring death sometimes.)

You begin to see why I think Pluto rules Vampires?

Pluto is the ruler of Scorpio, the Natural 8th House.

The 8th House is all about the resources of other people -- inheritance and legacies, Trust Funds, leaning on the expertise of others, using another's body for sexual pleasure, being held in thrall (obsession) by a lover. Pluto and the 8th House are about POWER, the power others have over you, and the power you have over others. Insofar as sex is about power, it fits the symbolism. Pluto is also about blackmail, secrets and the revealing of secrets.

The relationship between a blackmailer and the victim is Pluto ruled.

The "battle of the sexes" goes in the category of Pluto transactions. When conducted with back-biting, undermining, and character assassination, Pluto conflicts can be all about gaining power over the other. Passive-aggressive tricks can go in this category although they also have elements of Neptune. Co-dependency can have strong Pluto elements.

Remember, everyone always has all the planets and signs somewhere. Every situation has them all, even if only waiting in the wings to make an appearance. But each event sequence usually has a power source, a driver, a planet that exemplifies the symbolism underneath the event. We're looking now at Pluto, the 8th House, and Scorpio in Alien Romance.

The 8th House and sexuality also illuminate another element in Romance, that physical sex is about the relationship between your resources and that of the Other. Every graphic sex scene is about how one moves and the other feels, and one feels and the other moves, and a feeling that prompts a movement. A well written sex scene is about how the two communicate about power, life, getting what you want, giving what the other wants. Dominant position says something. All that is Pluto symbolism. Neptune is imagining it; Pluto is doing it.

The 8th House is the tango, moving and responding to the movements of others. It works in sexuality, but the pattern repeats when it's about money, sharing a bathroom, or shopping chores.

Pluto was discovered about the time Uranium was discovered which ties the symbolism together. The potential in Pluto is the same as in the atomic explosion. Pluto is explosive, but the deep, powerful explosion that erupts from way down beneath the surface, the energy contained in the atom -- or in the smallest indivisible unit of the psyche.

Pluto is about the HIDDEN. (the affairs of "others" are not yours; thus they are hidden)
Pluto is about the secrets that are kept from you -- and that you keep. But not just ordinary secrets like a surprise party -- these are the secrets we call CONSPIRACY. Thus the government coverup of Aliens From Outer Space, i.e. UFO's, is a Pluto ruled issue and process.

Pluto rules embezzlement.

That's much in the news with the "exposure" (Pluto exposes secrets) of a confidence racket on Wall Street, a Ponzi scheme.

The following is from a Yahoo Reuters News item
http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/081212/business_us_financial.html?.v=9
Retail sales, fraud case worsen auto bailout flop
Friday December 12, 11:27 am ET
By Daniel Trotta and Mike Peacock

"Bernard Madoff, a quiet force on Wall Street for decades, was arrested and charged on Thursday. The former chairman of the Nasdaq Stock Market also ran a hedge fund that U.S. prosecutors said racked up $50 billion of fraudulent losses."

Note that: "Quiet Force" -- that's Pluto to a T. (I've seen discussion that his Fund was not technically a "Hedge Fund" though.)

This quiet person who kept out of the headlines, kept his business very private, used his impeccable record of privacy to take charge of other people's resources, is experiencing the effects of PLUTO here. (I don't know the man's natal chart - I'm just looking at the dramatic events, and the type of events from his point of view and I see Pluto written all over it.) He was managing other people's money (8th House) and has been explosively revealed to the public, and had his dirty secrets exposed -- and all that is so very Pluto.

Recently, we also had the incident of the Governor of Illinois's phone calls having been recorded by the authorities (secret wiretap - very Pluto) resulting in charges being brought that he was trying to sell Barak Obama's Senate seat for personal gain. Both the type of transaction (clandestine or ultra-private understandings and agreements about deployment public resources in your custody, 8th House resources) and the revealing of that confidential business, reek of Pluto.

For the last couple of years, transiting Pluto has been going across 0 Degrees of Capricorn, and it has another year or so to go. Pluto started on 0 Deg Capricorn at the end of January 2008, and made station retrograde at 1 degree of Capricorn at the beginning of April -- that is all last winter Pluto was pouring change energy into 0 Deg Capricorn and coming to the opposition to the USA Venus.

Any Natal chart with 0 Deg of Capricorn sensitized will very likely (not always) be responding now to Pluto's powerful, subconscious, subterranean urge to CHANGE.

Pluto went direct in early September at 28 Deg Sagittarius, and re-entered 0 Deg Capricorn the end of November (it was close enough to call it 0 Deg on Election Day). It'll finish 0 Degrees again the 4th week in Dec. 2008, then it goes on to 3 Degrees of Capricorn, and back again to make station in the middle of the 0th Degree of Capricorn in September 2009.

Thus for 2009, Pluto will be activating the USA Natal Venus, and we should see wealth, jobs, health care, and relationships under Pluto's hammer of change.

I'll give you a week to digest all that, and then we'll take more about Vampires and Pluto and Change.

Astrology Just For Writers Part 5 - High Drama Pluto and Vampires


Pluto transits take a long time. (See the relevance to Vampires? Reincarnation love affairs? Yes, Pluto is said to occupy the spot in your natal chart that your Sun occupied in your previous life.)

Pluto has an elliptical orbit (another reason they decided it's not a planet but a "capture" from some other solar system. Ah, Alien Romance!)

For the last decades of the 20th Century Pluto was moving pretty fast (relative to its usual), but now Pluto has begun to move more slowly as it rounds its elliptical path.

In Astrology the principle is that the slower the transit, the more profound and lasting the change -- the more prominent the change in the history books.

All planets bring change on transit, it's just the character that's different -- and many Astrologers argue that all the planets signify the same thing, change, just the speed differs and thus the magnitude of the change. Pluto's magnitude is the biggest, though it's such a tiny body.

Pluto is now, and once again, the slowest moving planet (from Earth's perspective). 248 years to go all the way around the Sun. So every 248 years, Pluto gets back to the spot it was when you were born.

See what I mean about Vampires being ruled by Pluto?

Since Methuselah, nobody "alive" ever experiences a Pluto Return.

We learn Astrology from "lore" not theory, and the theory is created from the lore. We study people, real people, who experience this or that transit against the background of a Natal Chart that has this or that characteristic, during this or that time of their life, and keep lots of notes. Then the experiences of lots of people are compiled into general principles. That's how "rulerships" are "assigned."

Pluto is new to our lexicon of planetary experiences, and thus people are still guessing what it is really about. Mars co-rules Scorpio with Pluto - and many of Pluto's characteristics are just bigger, deeper, longer wavelength attributes of Mars.

That means that war is Pluto related, while Mars is battle related. Mars is marital strife, but Pluto is divorce -- see what I mean?

Read up on Saturn Returns in Grant Lewi's ASTROLOGY FOR THE MILLIONS to see why the return of Pluto to the place at birth has to be significant in a Vampire's existence. (Saturn rules Capricorn)

A Pluto-Return has to be a totally shattering Event for a vampire or other immortal.

EXAMPLE: There's a branch of Astrology called "Mundane Astrology" and it deals with the Natal Charts and transits of whole nations and the world in general.

A lot that's been happening in the world since Pluto touched 0 Degrees of Capricorn can be understood in terms of Pluto symbolism.

There's always argument about exactly when a country is "born" -- and the USA has several accepted natal charts that astrologers study. I found that in one of the most famous charts, (July 4, 1776, 2:13 AM, Philadelphia PA) the USA's 8th House Cusp is at 0:38 of Capricorn).

2008 has been the year of the financial meltdown, starting with MORTGAGES (borrowing other people's money). Banks get the money they loan from depositors (government loans notwithstanding). Banks are an 8th House phenomenon.

248 years ago was 1760 - the USA hasn't had a Pluto return yet! By this chart, our Pluto is at 27 degrees of Capricorn, in our 9th House which is foreign affairs, foreign travel, foreign thinking, and justice, courts. Jupiter rules Sagittarius the Natural 9th House.

If this chart holds, this phase of Pluto induced change should be over for us by September 2009, but Pluto then moves on to oppose our Natal Venus, Jupiter and then Sun. Pluto finishes our 8th House and enters the 9th in Nov 2019. By then the character of the USA will be wholly changed.

Watch how Pluto affects long-lived organisms such as countries, and you will begin to see how it signifies the kind of life events a vampire would face. Periodically. Routinely. Ho-hum, yawn, I'm bored with existence. Who could be bored the first time you ever face a "change everything" Event -- a lose everything or win everything Event? But the 20th or 1,000th time?

Recently, the Thailand government was toppled by airport sit-ins that trapped thousands of tourists. The Greek government is being challenged after a police shooting at a rock throwing incident. The Mumbai terrorist attack has aroused India's wealthy class to challenge the current Indian government, but not the form of government.

Political Revolution is (often, not always) a Pluto driven event.

Being toppled from "power" can be a Pluto type event from the point of view of the one toppled, but the same kind of thing can be signified by a transit of Saturn.

Pluto will topple by revealing the hidden, by sex scandal, by embezzlement, or sometimes by someone else wanting the power for themselves, by assassination. Saturn often topples by failure, by running out of steam, by enemies succeeding, by losing the election, by a failure of discipline or authority, by getting your comeuppance, your just deserts. With Saturn, it's obviously your own fault; with Pluto it seems to be external to your self.

(I'm just leaving Neptune out of this. Astrology is nothing if not complicated.)

You see what I mean by "drama" - Pluto is very High Drama indeed.

Pluto driven lives and events are the very substance of movies even more than of novels. Robert Ludlum move over!

Noel Tyl (as I discussed in my post Astrology Just For Writers Part 1)

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/07/astrology-just-for-writers.html

shows how Pluto is one part of a pattern that shows up routinely in the natal charts of the extremely prominent -- thus Pluto is connected to both fame and infamy.

A Pluto driven life has these gigantic, larger than life, ups and downs -- from which the individual usually comes back. Pluto supplies both the crisis and the strength to survive it.

Pluto driven love can range from the sickest, most violent obsession (stalking, kidnap, etc) all the way to the longest lasting, most eternal, and most animal-passion driven bonding of hunger and need.

So astrologers face a quandary trying to analyze a Vampire's existence. Is his (or her) natal chart the moment they were born as a human? Or the moment they first drew breath as a vampire?

Does a vampire who has been immured for a few centuries, going dormant until dug up, get a new natal chart when they "waken" again?

Does memory have anything to do with how you respond to transits? Does a person who has a total memory wipe have a new natal chart when they start recording events again?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7777385.stm

Is an item about the finding of what may be a human brain, more than 2,000 years old, shrunken and barely identifiable.

So it occurs to me to wonder what if that were the brain of a vampire?

And then it occurs to me to wonder how a fossilized (really infused with stone) vampire body might respond to being "brought to light" (that's what Pluto does, exhumes, brings to light, turns up, discovers, exposes).

There's this fossilized body in a museum -- a vampire, of course -- and the vampire's Pluto return takes hold. What happens next?

Jacqueline Lichtenberg

http://www.slantedconcept.com

OFF WITH THEIR HEADS: villains, conflict and killing off characters

A couple of disclaimers.

First, this blog will contain SPOILERS for Gabriel’s Ghost, Shades of Dark and the movie, Serenity.

Second, I know I’m not remotely in the category of Joss Whedon. The man is brilliant. Beyond brilliant. Don’t take my questions and/or criticisms of his work as anything more than the ramblings of an author looking to make sense of the craft of fictional entertainment.

That being said, you by now may have surmised I watched the movie, Serenity, recently, and am somewhat perplexed over the death of Wash’s character. I watched the movie, not just because I thoroughly enjoyed Firefly, and not just because Whedon provides one helluva good romp with his stuff, but because I wanted to learn. One of the downsides of being an author—and YA author Stacey Kade (watch for her debut with Hyperion in 2010--right now she's still SFR author Stacey Klemstein) and I were chatting about this—is that reading for pleasure seems to happen less and less. It’s hard to read—or watch—something in your genre and not analyze characterization, plot, conflict and the like. So I found myself last weekend watching Serenity with one eye and breaking it down with the other: oh, bit of a plot twist, there. Oh, some layered on characterization here. Oh, major plot conflict coming up. Oh, here’s the regroup and revise scene…

Then, sitting in the cockpit of Serenity, just having crash-landed on the world of Miranda, Wash gets lanced. Skewered.

And I go, WTF?

Yes, obviously, it was an emotional moment. And writing is about emotional moments. “It’s the author’s job to manipulate the emotions of the reader,” said writing guru Dwight Swain. And I subscribe to that. But it’s also said that fiction must be more logical than real life.

And Wash’s death wasn’t plot-logical. It was emotional, no doubt. It wrenched the reader. But it wasn’t logical to the plot and didn’t create or improve on the growth of a major character.

Emotion for emotion’s sake is not enough in fiction. When it’s done like that, it becomes a cheap shot. Or what writing guru Jack Bickham refers to as “dropping an alligator through the transom.”

Book’s death, on the other hand, was plot logical. It impacted heavily on Mal and that was shown clearly. Mal was the one to find Book, was the one to hold him as he died. Prior scenes showed their friendship and their backstory conflict. Book’s death was a clear catalyst to Mal.

Wash’s wasn’t. For one thing, Wash and Mal had no backstory conflict and though they were clearly friends, it was a calm friendship for the most part. There wasn’t a Wash-Mal issue as there was a Book-Mal issue. Wash was a minor character who served a great role and was also the husband of Zoe, another minor character.

The two major characters, to me, in Serenity, were Mal and River. Writing gurus always ask: Whose story is it? And that’s a huge question that must be answered as you craft your fiction piece. If you don’t know whose story you’re telling, your piece will wander all over the galaxy, lost, in search of coherent and cohesive plot and conflict.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg details much of this on her Sime~Gen site:
http://www.simegen.com/school/workshop/WORKchoosingProtag.html

The main POV character is the one who ACTS FIRST -- the person attempting to impose their agenda on the course of events -- to get things to come out in their own favor. The VILLAIN or ANTAGONIST is the one who is acted-upon and objects.

River, through help from her brother, Simon, acts to escape the psychic detention facility that’s held her and tortured her. They end up—and much of this is backstory—on Mal’s ship, Serenity. But it’s Mal who acts—when the Alliance assassin confronts him, demanding River’s surrender—to tell the Alliance to take a hike and it’s Mal who acts to thwart the Alliance. Zoe, Jayne, Wash, Simon and the rest are all minor characters. The two main POV characters—and most of the movie’s scenes are with one or the other as key—are Mal and River.

Given that, Wash’s death is useless. Simon’s death would have made more sense. River is a main POV character. Simon is her beloved brother. His death would have forced her into “character growth.” Wash’s death doesn’t force with Mal or River into character growth (any more than had already occurred.)

So to me, Wash’s death was a cheap shot, basic stage door faux-trauma simply for the shock value. As a movie-goer, I thought it was an exciting, emotional scene. As an author, I thought it was sloppy.

Now, Stacey, much more a Whedon-ite than I am, had a bit of a different take on the matter:

“Wash...I probably wouldn't have killed him off, no. But here's the thing, it does, in a sick and twisted way, which is Joss's way, make sense for him to be the one to die. He is the MOST innocent out of all of those involved. And Mal...well, I think it all relates back to the Battle of Serenity in the war between the Alliance and the Brown Coats. Mal believed in the war, thought he was fighting on the side of good. He was in charge of a platoon. He and Zoe fought and continued to fight even after the battle was essentially over. Not only did they lose, but he and Zoe were the only ones who walked away. All the others reporting to him died. After that, Mal withdrew. He gave up his white hat, ceased to see himself as a good guy. He wanted nothing to do with helping others or getting involved in any cause. He looked out only for himself and what benefited him. He got involved in helping others only when forced by circumstances and the fact that he couldn't completely tamp down his do-gooder (for lack of a better term) conscience. He did not want the responsibility of all those lives on his "boat." In fact, Mal would have preferred, I think, to die rather than to be responsible for their deaths (see ep "out of gas").

So, in this situation, here we are again, Mal leading innocents into hopeless battle. He's taking on that white hat again, and his hands are bloodied by the deaths of those who follow him. And he's not going to quit this time.He has to confront his fear that he's going to cause the death of all these people and lose AGAIN. He's being forced to be the hero and he's going to go through with it, even if it kills him.”

I can see Stacey’s point but notice how much it relies on backstory—television episodes of Firefly, that the movie-goer may not have seen. The author can’t assume they’ve seen them. So to build a huge emotional twist like Wash’s death based on backstory unavailable to the viewer at the moment strikes me as… less than good. The movie should be able to stand on its own as a cohesive unit.

Now, it may be there were earlier scenes between Wash and Mal that were cut. That happens all the time and that’s a failing of any media—books included—that have time or word count restrictions. You have X amount of pages to do something or X amount of minutes to do something.

But to me, then, if you cut the prequel, the rationale for a major character’s death, then cut the death scene. Or rewrite it. Wash could simply have been seriously injured, his injuries providing conflict to the fleeing crew (Drag him along or leave him behind? Slow us down? Save his life?) and Mal. I would have bought into that fully. It might have even created more conflict and tension.

Wash’s death to me was quick, final and senseless.

I know. People die for senseless reasons all the time in real life. But read what I wrote above: fiction must be more logical than real life.

(BTW, Jacqueline has an excellent critique of an episode of Star Trek: Voyager in a similar vein. I couldn’t find it on the Sime~Gen website but I’m sure it’s there and perhaps she’ll post a link.)

So how does this fit in with my books?

Two characters. One I killed off, one I didn’t.

Del in Shades of Dark. Ren in Gabriel’s Ghost.

I really hated killing off Del because he was a hugely fun character. But Sully, a main character, had to have growth, had to experience sacrifice, had to be motivated to reach deeper inside himself. The two main motivations for Sully in Shades of Dark were Del and Chaz. I took both away from him near the end of the book. Chaz, of course, he regained. Del had to die. But Del had to die not only for Sully’s growth and lesson but to partially redeem Del as a character and yes, to be true to the character of Del as I built him. He wasn’t as much an evil character as a selfish one. But his selfishness was, to a great extent, cultural. As was his penchant for sacrifice and, in the end, sacrifice he does. He dies so Sully can live. Which, based on Del’s upbringing, mindset and culture, was exactly the way things should be.

I took pains to prequel—lightly so but I did it—that this was a possible outcome all through the book. Del’s line of “…and I shall walk again with kings…” and his adherence to Stolorth traditions set up completely the book’s end. Rash’mh han enqerma. A sacrifice in exchange for an unspeakable wrong. This was one of Del’s guiding principles—and yes, villains can have principles—and it was the logic behind his death.

So was Sully’s challenge to Del:

“You’ve told me many times I still need training. That a rogue Kyi like me is capable of utter destruction if I’m not careful. Then heed your own warning. Don’t force me to find out just what I’m capable of. Because when the dust settles, I will be the one left standing. And you know that.”

The character I initially killed off then rewrote and didn’t was Ren in Gabriel’s Ghost. Again, I was looking for a catalyst for change for the main character, Sully. But at the point I would have done it—and I’m grateful to the crit partners who pointed this out none too gently—it would have been more for emotional manipulation that character growth. It would have, in essence, been a cheap shot. The timing and placement were wrong and going back and rereading the old pages, I could see where Linnea the author had run out of ideas so, hey, let’s kill someone.

I ended up not doing so because Ren, alive, forced much more character growth on Sully then Ren’s death ever could have.

It’s a very easy trap to fall into when writing: let’s just throw on a bunch of actions that engender scary and unhappy emotions, and keep the reader reading. But eventually that’s exactly what the story will feel like: things just thrown on. More is not always better. In fact in fiction, more often produces crap. Conflict must come with a why, not just an ouch.

Maybe next week I’ll touch on why the capitulation of the Alliance assassin at the end of Serenity also set my writerly teeth on edge.

Unless you all want to open that dialogue here too…

(and I still think Joss Whedon is a freakin’ genius, and if I could produce stuff even half as good as he does, I’d be a happy camper…)

~Linnea

SHADES OF DARK, the sequel to Gabriel’s Ghost, July 2008 from RITA award-winning author, Linnea Sinclair, and Bantam Books: http://www.linneasinclair.com/

I watched Sully’s eyes snap to black, his lips, thin. His hand clasping mine tightened. Shock gave way to anger, which gave way to something more primal, more male. It tasted of jealousy, possessiveness, dominance.

And all I had said was, “Hello, Sully. I just met Del.”

I poured the encounter into his mind almost as fast as he retrieved it. I held nothing back, not Del’s seductive handsomeness nor the power that fairly seethed beneath his surface, nor the ease with which he rendered me helpless, folding the Grizni back around my wrist.

Questions of Immortality

I've been reading a YA novel called SUCKS TO BE ME, subtitled "The All-True Confessions of Mina Hamilton, Teenage Vampire (Maybe)." Mina's parents are both vampires, the traditional formerly-human, transformed type. (Vampires can't breed; they had her before their change.) The Vampire Council has recently learned of Mina's existence. Because ordinary human beings aren't supposed to know about vampires, Mina is faced with the decision of whether to become a vampire. Her parents and uncle (who's also a vampire; he transformed her father) take it for granted that she probably will accept the change. In preparation, she has to attend classes, which of course she has to keep secret from her friends in high school. It's an amusing book with lots of debunking of myths that, in Mina's world, aren't true. For one thing, the vampire lifestyle isn't nearly so glamorous as the popular media imagine. (Her father is an accountant, for Heaven's sake.)

I've read other books in which the protagonist is given that choice, but no others that approach the topic quite the way this novel does. As for my own vampires, they're members of another species. Most fictional vampires don't get a choice; they're either born that way, transformed against their will, or faced with vampirism as an alternative to certain death. But suppose a free choice existed. Which brings up the question: If you were offered the opportunity to become a vampire, would you accept? Assuming vampires aren't intrinsically cursed and evil, the core question here, of course, is whether you'd want to become immortal. The down side of an indefinitely extended lifespan includes growing apart from all the people you know and eventually being cast adrift in time, possibly afraid to make friends because, from the vantage point of centuries, they'll die too soon. On the other hand, ordinary mortals keep and love pets even though cats and dogs live much shorter lives than we do. Does that mean an immortal would relate to other people the way most of us relate to pets, though, not as equals?

Corporeal immortality has never appealed to me. For me, the fascination of watching history unfold over centuries wouldn't make up for the isolation. Fast healing and immunity to disease and age, though, that's another matter. Those benefits would be tempting. Other considerations depend on what version of vampire lore you accept. Inability to go out during the day would be a major disadvantage; however, that restriction doesn't apply to all folklore vampires or any of the classic nineteenth-century fictional vampires. If the only problem were a slight weakness or sensitivity to sunlight, I could live with that. I'm something of a night person, anyway. Most versions of the mythos agree that vampires can't eat solid food. I'd miss that part of ordinary life very much (and I love garlic). Reputed benefits include superhuman strength and speed, the ability to mesmerize people into obeying your will (a power that could also be regarded as a dangerous temptation), and irresistible sexual allure. Transformation into animals would be cool, if that's part of your accepted vampire lore. A crucial problem could involve obtaining blood without hurting people. Many vampires in fiction can manage on animal blood or bottled discards from blood banks, but would those sources of nourishment be completely satisfying? If blood-drinking has a sexual component, finding a compatible lover could solve the problem, but then the vampire would have to face eventual loss of his or her human lover, even if the lover changes rather than dying; transformation is sometimes assumed to make an erotic relationship impossible, as in Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's Saint-Germain series.

I'm thinking of these issues partly because I'm scheduled to chair a panel on vampires and other immortals at the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts in March. "Highlander" immortals face many of the same issues vampires do, though without the dietary limitations and other vulnerabilities. Peter Pan lives forever at the cost of never growing up (which the author presents, at first, as a boon, but by the end of the book we see hints to the contrary). Some fictional vampires are portrayed as psychologically frozen in time, unable to grow past what they were in life or transcend the limitations of the era in which they were born. Claudia, Anne Rice's child vampire, who can't even cut her hair without having it grow back by the next night, illustrates this premise in an especially chilling way. That kind of immortality, in my opinion, would be a curse rather than a blessing.