Theme-Plot-Character-Worldbuilding Integration Part 6 - Fallacy, Misnomer and the Contradiction by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Theme-Plot-Character-Worldbuilding Integration

Part 6

Fallacy, Misnomer and the Contradiction

by

Jacqueline Lichtenberg 

Previous posts in this series:
Part 1 -
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/04/theme-plot-character-worldbuilding.html
Part 2 -
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/04/theme-plot-character-worldbuilding_14.html

Part 3 - index to Monthly Aspectarian Reviews
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/04/theme-plot-character-worldbuilding_21.html

Part 4 - Sidewalk Superintendent
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/05/theme-plot-character-worldbuilding.html

Part 5 Murderer In The Mikdash
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/05/theme-plot-character-worldbuilding-part.html

These 4-skills posts are advanced material.  But that doesn't mean you can't start reading them first.

December 1, 2015, we started discussing ways to depict Wisdom, an abstraction, and we have to tackle the issue of how to depict a Wise Character.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/12/depiction-part-13-depicting-wisdom-by.html

That post has a link at the top to the index post for the depiction series.

A "Wise Character" -- a Yoda or a Gandalf, (note not usually a Point Of View Character) a teacher of ancient wisdom or a role model to emulate -- is a feature of most novels that live from generation to generation.

Often the character, or his/her name, will become part of a quote bandied about by future generations who have no idea where that quote came from.

Creating a character to ignite the thirst for wisdom in the other characters, perhaps even in the reader, is easy.  Getting the character you have created down in a text based story is very hard.

What seems like Wisdom to one human, seems like Folly to another.

Brain researchers may have nailed the reason for the Wisdom/Folly flip/flop in point of view.  They have found why one single person can see, hold, articulate, and advocate two incompatible points of view at the same time.

The capacity to believe six impossible things before breakfast is rooted in the linguistic faculty of the brain.  It's just science.

Philosophers have known and used this (as have poets and artists) for thousands of years.  Suddenly, it's a scientific discovery!

http://www.businessinsider.com/how-language-changes-views-of-the-world-2015-8

--------Quote From that article-----------
Just as regular exercise gives your body some biological benefits, mentally controlling two or more languages gives your brain cognitive benefits. This mental flexibility pays big dividends especially later in life: The typical signs of cognitive ageing occur later in bilinguals – and the onset of age-related degenerative disorders such as dementia or Alzheimer’s are delayed in bilinguals by up to five years.

Read more: https://theconversation.com/how-the-language-you-speak-changes-your-view-of-the-world-40721

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

The article goes on to point out the different ways German-only speakers and English-only speakers describe a short-video.  Then it describes how a bilingual German-English speaker describes that same video, first when the observer is thinking in German, and then when that same observer is thinking in English.  The article concludes:

----------QUOTE---------------
People self-report that they feel like a different person when using their different languages and that expressing certain emotions carries different emotional resonance depending on the language they are using.

When judging risk, bilinguals also tend to make more rational economic decisions in a second language. In contrast to one’s first language, it tends to lack the deep-seated, misleading affective biases that unduly influence how risks and benefits are perceived. So the language you speak in really can affect the way you think.

Read more: https://theconversation.com/how-the-language-you-speak-changes-your-view-of-the-world-40721#ixzz3hxuczPys
-----------END QUOTE---------------


This article and the science behind it are vital to any writer of Science Fiction Romance who wants to depict a relationship between a human and an alien blossoming into love.

In this science article you find the origin of the fallacy, the misnomer, and the contradiction, all rolled into a brain function.

And once again (and again and again) this classic visual image is worth a thousand words on the subject of language.  Consider it while reading the article on German-English speakers describing a video.

The gist of it is that when thinking in German, the description of the video includes the goal of the depicted action, but when thinking in English ONLY THE ACTION BY ITSELF is considered relevant to a description of the video.

That's just one difference between two cognate languages, and a small one at that.

But the research shows what the brain is doing when parsing a moving image using different language frameworks.

It's a good article because it brings to the surface a principle that Romance novels working to convey not only the bonding love between Soul Mates but also the novel-generating, super-heated conflict that drives the plot.

In a great Romance, there has to be an obvious affinity between the individuals forming a couple, but also an even more obvious reason why "it will never work."  And then a not-at-all-obvious pathway to how to get it to work, and not only to work but to lead to the stable, renewable, and eternal Happily Ever After Ending, our prized HEA.

At least half the general public believes firmly that life can not ever deliver an HEA.

It may be that in "real" life, we are not integrating our life's Theme with the Plot of our life, with our Character, and with the world we have been thrust into willy-nilly.

Humans in such a disintegrated psychological condition can't believe that their real life has an HEA -- a sweet-spot that can be attained by hard work and the right life-partner.

If that's true of humans today, does that have to be true of your Aliens?

Or what if your human character could firmly envision the HEA she wanted, but your Alien character was speaking a different language and knew for a fact that there is no such thing as an HEA?

If you have studied anthropology, you know that there really is such a thing as women's language and men's language.  It's not just a joke.  It's a very real thing.  Nobody knows the reason for that (yet), but there are a lot of theories.

Some say it's culture that divides the genders and forces them to learn different ways of speaking.  Some say it's biology that shapes their language.

Study of how humans (and Bonobos and Dolphins etc) use language is absolutely essential for any writer, but especially a writer of Paranormal Romance, or any Romance story built around the odd or different bit of science.

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33731444

That story is about Bonobos using squeaks for language.

The more we learn, the more we see that animals and humans are built on the same platform, and just have different apps installed.

Who's to say Bonobos don't have Wisdom?

As a writer, spinning a yarn about love, you need to figure out what you think Wisdom is.

Romance stories are about how just plain right life feels when you finally encounter that singular individual who lights up your world, reveals the best part of yourself to yourself, and responds to you by revealing their own best part

We experience love through another Character, see through their eyes, learn their language, and flip-flop between our own language and theirs.

The HEA comes into possibility when you meet that special someone who, when you tell them how you feel, they understand what you said.

Whether the HEA exists in your world -- or not -- depends entirely on language.

Just as with the German-English experiment, the language inside your head reveals one world, and the languages you have learned reveals other worlds.

That idea -- that language shapes perception -- is a THEME element.

The idea that perception creates Wisdom is a THEME element.

What exactly Wisdom might be is a THEME element.

What exactly a Wise Character might say is a CHARACTER element (discussed also under DIALOGUE).

What exactly a Wise Character might do (or resist or refrain from doing) is a PLOT element.

The problems that such a Wise Character might encounter that would trigger such a speech and action (Theme-Plot-Dialogue Integration) are the WORLDBUILDING elements.

You can see from this German-English experiment that the Character, the Wisdom-Theme, and the Plot are absolutely integral to the WORLD element.

How you, as the writer, present the world you have built depends on Point-of-View (PoV) -- from which Character's eyes is the reader "seeing" the world you have built, and the "languages" your world features.

The research is regarding established, living languages, shared by many.  Narrowing like that is essential to Science, but not necessarily to Art.

An artist or writer can think of it all another way.  The language you invented before your parents taught you to say mama and dada, before your brain developed synapses to connect cause and effect (you drop your bottle; it falls DOWN every time!) so you could build an image of the world you had been born into, is your Native Language.  All the rest are added.

Each language you add lets you perceive the world around you with different emphasis, different value-systems, different ideas of what is real and what is not-real.

Each THEME you use as the foundation of a romance novel bespeaks one such set of values, and excludes others.

That's embedded in the fundamental definition of Art: Art is the Selective Recreation of Reality.

The operative word is "Selective."

You must select the perception embedded in the "language" of your Characters.  What is real to them will be real to your reader, no matter how alien to your reader the idea might be, if you teach your reader the language that Character is thinking within.

Most writers do this subconsciously, intuitively.  You have this fully realized world and its Characters in your imagination, and it really is good!  The difference between what you imagine and what your reader imagines can be narrowed by craft skills, but never eliminated.

The point of Art is not to argue, but to illustrate and experience.

A romance story can evoke the language of love so powerfully that a reader sees the real world differently -- at least for a while.

The suspension of disbelief can dissolve the mental barriers that prevents us from seeing the whole story of something like that German-English experiment video.  The HEA can be seen by the reader as the Goal of all the busy action in the romance.

Romance and Science are both all about Language.

Bonobos may have sex, love, even bonding -- but not Romance which is rooted in the hypothetical and extrapolates into a possible future that wasn't possible "before."

And so far as we know, Bonobos don't have Science.

When you dissect and examine the anatomy of a Romance scientifically, you get science fiction romance.

Let's explore an example - a novel to write.

THEME: Home For The Holidays

PLOT: Gretchen Wilder brings her boyfriend Mark Underwood home to meet her somewhat religious parents.  Unknown to them, she's 7 months pregnant with a child that is not Mark's and he knows that.  Can their Love Conquer All without an abortion?

CHARACTER: Gretchen has lived the life of an apostate, and firmly believes a woman has a right to make her own reproductive health decisions.  Mark, raised by Atheists, thinks he has fully internalized that value - it's her decision - but he's worked as a Medical Technician and knows it's a baby human.  He's now plowing through medical school, and can't afford a child disrupting everything.  Gretchen has just been laid off when a company went bankrupt.

WORLDBUILDING: 2016 USA. Gretchen's parents are staunch Catholics (but used birth control and see no reason women can't be ordained priests).  Gretchen's siblings run the gamut from atheist to devout, and a few cousins and in-laws may be Hindu, Jewish, Confucian, maybe Native American, even Muslim?, a nice variety.

Everyone is gathering at the Parent's house to cook, clean, decorate, and party because the father has survived his first heart attack.  They are doing all the work for the parents as a present.  They run the gamut of the political spectrum, and at least half of them feel the recent election turned out all wrong.

INTEGRATION: the writer's job is to DEPICT all these clashing points of view in such a way that the reader's emotions resonate to each one.

Get the reader believing in and agreeing with each in turn, feeling the urgency of the decision that must be made soon (to have the child, put it up for adoption?, go for an abortion, get married, not get married, in the Catholic Church?)

You have a wide variety of Characters, each of whom may speak different languages, parse situations in different ways.  Some may arrive late, others leave early in a huff.  Some are staying in the house, others in a hotel.  They all have smartphones.

Perhaps one present the children are giving the parents is a wireless speaker system throughout the house for TV, Radio, Netflix, podcasts, intercom, so there's the ongoing tech issues across generations.

There's the HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS theme manifesting in LANGUAGE - computer language, app language, Apple vs Android, etc.  What language you speak shapes your perceptions -- "home" is a perception and has its own language, the language of Nostalgia.

CONFLICT: all these tense undercurrents and roaring disputes are taking place in a household where an Elder has just had a heart attack -- medical advice is for calm, warm-friendly family interaction.  (Ever gone home for the Holidays?  You know the odds!)

Your job is to depict a Character thinking in one language, then thinking in another language, and seeing "both sides" of the problem in different ways.

This multi-language Character should be your Wise Character.

Usually, the Wise Character is not leaping into every conversation with opinions, ideas and solutions to everyone else's problems.  But Wisdom sharpens the ability to detect lies.

One signature behavior of the Wise is that they don't say much, especially not when others are yelling.  Thus the Wise Character is your source of the zinger one-liners that will be remembered.

So you take your reader on a roller coaster ride from one end of the spectrum to the other and back again with regard to the problems posed in our society today regarding abortion.

For example, some of the family may be Progressives, proud of that label and absolutely convinced that the Progressive agenda coincides with the very best values of Catholicism.  In other words, you can't be a good Catholic unless you are a Progressive.

Progressives are dedicated to kindness to animals, gentle treatment of the Earth's resources and human environment, healthcare for all, raising the minimum wage so the least among workers can live decently, and can argue persuasively that every ethical point in the Catechism is found in the Progressive Agenda.

A woman's freedom to choose is a natural and necessary extension of the highest Values ever promulgated among humans.

That's an absolute that is beyond question.  Therefore anyone who questions it must be against everything good that humanity has ever known.

That thinking is built into the English language -- just like the focus on ACTION to the exclusion of DESTINATION as illustrated by the article on German vs English.

English is an amalgam of many historic languages, very largely derived from Ancient Greek and Ancient Latin.  Modern American English has many structures and borrowings from other languages brought to the U.S.A. by immigrants.

One perception feature of English is the reliance on either/or paradigms, the zero-sum-game, or in sports the Winner vs Loser.

In English, "There Can Be Only One" (from the TV Series HIGHLANDER) is easily believed.  All the action in that Series was predicated on the assumption that you couldn't change that Rule.

The T.V. Series BEAUTY AND THE BEAST -- not the current one, but the 1987 one with Linda Hamilton and Ronald Perlman ...

http://www.amazon.com/An-Impossible-Silence/dp/B0126NA4V8/

...also used a premise that declared the couple could never be together.  That premise was not challenged.

Your current readers have been conditioned for generations not to question premises.

So when, in our example romance story, the devout Catholic parents get wind of the possibility that their pregnant daught does not plan to marry the boyfriend she's just brought home, and is wondering if she should have an abortion so that they can get married -- oy veh!

The parents in this scenario have also been conditioned not to question the premises of their very existence, their life and practice of their religion.

Gretchen knows their attitude.  She expects support from her siblings.  She assumes she has Mark's support, no matter how she decides.

Your job as a writer is to depict Gretchen gaining an understanding of her Parents' attitude that is deeper than the Parents' understanding of their own attitude.  You may need to add the local Catholic Priest character -- who might be a young replacement of the Parents decades long confidant, a young man who is not the Wise Character yet.

Your Wise Character in the family has to be able to teach the language of Souls, Eternity, Mysticism, and the non-falsifiable hypothesis of a Creator and how that hypothesis can lead to the conclusion that abortion is a very dicey choice.

For example, the Wise Character might be a High School History teacher bemoaning Common Core to anyone who will listen when he's been tippling a bit -- or maybe he's just pretending to tipple so people won't think he's pontificating.  He might refer the customs of the Ancient Greeks and Romans of "exposing" unwanted babies on "the wall" (of the city).  Some such babies were "rescued" or "adopted" for good or nefarious purposes, but their fates were never known to the parents.  In any event, the Progressives are actually Regressives in freedom from reproduction.

 He might take a dig at the Progressives by noting that the advocacy for "the woman's right to control her reproductive health" gave government another increment of control over reproduction (via who pays for the medical procedure).  Government control of the individual is tyranny - regressive.  Being fair, he'd point out that before tyranny of Kings and Oligarchs or Theocrats, there was Anarchy, a kind of freedom from government some today advocate.  In an Anarchy, you can murder people if you can get away with it.  Revenge rules.

Control of reproduction, he would pontificate as a historian, is the central ingredient in "domestication" -- breeding animals for a particular trait - which he can see government doing to today's women by skewing their values.

You can just imagine how well that would go down in this mixed family (don't forget to include at least one Gay -- maybe someone willing to adopt this baby).  The prescribed calm-happy-reunion for the Holidays honoring the parents and celebrating the father's survival would be out the window in two seconds flat.

At that point, even the most Wise of Wise Characters might be incensed enough to keep on talking.  (silence is the signature of Wisdom, remember?)

So he/she might note that, given the way psychologists have developed the mathematics of controlling the behavior of large masses of people (PR) to get them to buy a particular product (or vote for a particular person), perhaps large numbers of women were being swayed toward a particular opinion with regard to unwanted pregnancies and what to do about them.

In other words, Gretchen's opinion and decision might not actually be her own -- not a choice her Soul is making, but imposed by distant dictators trying to gain control of humanity. (of course, maybe Aliens -- at least one of the family or in-laws should instantly be thinking Aliens trying to control humanity.)

Someone would surely whisper in her ear that her parents' God was that sort of control freak, so she shouldn't listen but make her own decision.  That whisperer would couch the suggestion in the Language of Religion -- putting another perspective on the scene, just as the German-English Video experiment did.

Learning the language of Religion as a "second language" as the article on German vs. English discusses, the family will be able to discuss alternatives in a risk-assessment framework different from their usual thinking.

It's the 'second language' aspect that makes alternatives possible that were not possible with only one language to think in.

Spirituality has its own jargon which is so obtuse that it has to be regarded as a "language" by the artist if not the scientist.

As the German speakers always noted the goal of the action in the video, the Spirituality speaker will note the goal that is utterly invisible to those who do not have that language.

Do not confuse Spirituality (the awareness of a non-physical component to the human being) with Religion which defines one or another causative force and a specified creation-paradigm through which one must view reality.

Each Religion has its own "language" too.  Imagine if this Mark Character was raised Muslim. Imagine him at Midnight Mass with the family he ever so much wants to join.  Suppose he fears rejection over the decision Gretchen is making.

In the novel outline of Gretchen & Mark, you have dramatic potential all the way up to and including pure Soap Opera -- another heart attack, a near-miscarriage, the old family Priest having been a boy-molester, or Mark raised Muslim and converted to Catholicism being murdered during Midnight Mass by his righteous father.

There is plenty of material from which to spin a plot to go with the story of "must decide if abortion is an option."

Pick point of view characters according to whose story you want to tell, and imagine how this multiplex modern family might work through this issue while interacting with the Holidays.

The glue that holds plot and story together with Character and the world they live in is THEME.

That's why I write so much about THEME as a craft element.  It is the hardest of all to master because it requires being "multi-lingual" or polyglot.  The writer must be able to see why this Character can not see what that Character sees, then explain that reason to the reader in show-don't-tell.

The best way to show-don't-tell is to build the theme into the world, then turn the Characters loose to live in that world.

Here are posts on Fallacy and Misnomer:

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/05/index-to-theme-plot-integration.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/09/theme-worldbuilding-integraton-part-2.html

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

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Fish Out Of Water

I'm not talking about the Australian "Climbing Perch", the mangrove rivulus, or the mud skipper. 

I'm talking about creative people who are being forced--indirectly-- by "the sharing economy" to perform unnatural acts... like performing.

If you can access it, read Authors Guild president Roxana Robinson's piece "Should Writers Be Performers?" in which she memorably retorts, "Going to a local restaurant and asking them to find 10 people who are willing to pay $150 to watch you eat is a really different thing. It's hard enough for a new writer to ask a local bookstore to stock her book."

My favorite musician-blogger is David C Lowery, for his music-business-related blogging. His blog has long talked about the upending of the music business, where touring once was a promotional activity to spur vinyl sales, and now is the bread winner; while pittance-paying digital plays are the promotion.

Last week, he compared free streaming to the cut-out bin.... and struck a chord with me.

http://thetrichordist.com/2015/12/07/free-streaming-is-the-modern-cut-out-bin-you-deserve-better/

The cut out bin is the musical equivalent of the Remainder Bin. Amazon and the DOJ (which appears to me to be Amazon's enforcer) have convinced many writers to publish their new works directly into the ebook equivalent of the bricks and mortar bookstore remainder bin. That is totally backwards. New works should not be priced like overstock that cannot be sold into a saturated market.

I'm afraid that ebook subscription models are very much like streaming. IMHO, the purpose of copyright is/should be to protect quality in that which is created.However, there is some (more) positive news from Europe:

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-15-6261_en.htm

"Overall, the Commission wants to make sure that Europeans can access a wide legal offer of content, while ensuring that authors and other rights holders are better protected and fairly remunerated." 

(They will) "....work on a European framework to "follow-the-money" and cut the financial flows to businesses which make money out of piracy. This will involve all relevant partners (rights holders, advertising and payment service providers, consumers associations, etc.)"

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

Notice For European Visitors

Thank you for visiting, European visitors!

We are required to make sure that our European visitors are aware that European Union laws require us (the authors) to give European Union visitors information about cookies used on our blog. (Not by the authors. We have no control over the cookies. We don't even know what the cookies are! They are Google's cookies). In many cases, these laws also require us to obtain consent. 

If you follow this blog, we assume that you consent.

Google tells us that, as a courtesy, the good Google folks have added a notice on our blog to explain Google's use of certain Blogger and Google cookies, including use of Google Analytics and AdSense cookies.

Google tells us that we are responsible for confirming this notice actually works for our blog, (but we have no idea how to go about confirming whether or not this notice actually works, short of asking European visitors to leave a comment telling us!) and that it displays (but we don't know how to do that, unless European visitors kindly leave a comment to that effect). If we employ other cookies, for example by adding third party features, this notice may not work for us.  I don't think we do, but I'm not omniscient.

What I do to avoid being tracked by Google is to go into my Safari Preferences every day, and I delete every cookie that I don't want.

My real blog follows, but this blog will repeat from time to time.

Best wishes,

Rowena Cherry

Unlikable Protagonists

On the panel at ChessieCon about attracting female readers (as I mentioned last week), the topic of unlikable protagonists came up. One panelist remarked that the statement "Your heroine is unlikable" is a too-frequent basis for rejection. She complained that male viewpoint characters are allowed to be "unlikable," while female characters aren't.

I replied that I don't enjoy reading about unlikable protagonists of either gender, at least not in full-length novels. I can tolerate such a character in a short story but don't want to live with him or her for an entire book. Yet I admit to making some exceptions. I'm a big fan of Jonathan Kellerman's Alex Delaware mysteries, but I dislike the snarky tone of Dr. Delaware's cynical observations on the Southern California milieu. The character has enough appealing traits otherwise, though, to override that drawback. I found Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake very unpleasant, prickly and constantly picking fights with people whether justified or not. I stuck with the books because of the world-building and ingenious plotting; I gave up on the series only when it turned into one menage sex scene after another. (Yes, I sometimes write erotic romance myself, but I didn't find most of Anita's lovers interesting and didn't like seeing a horror / urban fantasy series baited-and-switched into erotica.)

In short, a protagonist who's unlikable in some respects can be tolerable if he or she has enough interesting qualities to rivet a reader's attention in spite of the negative traits and, especially, if the character's positive traits override the negative ones enough to make the reader sympathize with and root for him or her. Although I enjoyed many of Sara Paretsky's V. I. Warshawski mysteries, I eventually abandoned the series because I just didn't like V. I. very much. The absorbing plots and the sympathy the author generated for the heroine couldn't compensate for what I saw as her unpleasant personality. One of my favorite "cozy" mystery authors, Susan Conant, whose dog mysteries I've read over and over with delight, started another series on which I gave up after the first book; to me, the heroine came across as an irresponsible ditz.

On the subject of editors not allowing female characters to be "unlikable," two prominent counter-examples of "unlikable" heroines of bestselling fiction come to mind: Scarlett O'Hara in GONE WITH THE WIND is not only a not-very-nice person, she's selfish and amoral. She's such a vivid, passionate character, however, that the reader can't help but sympathize with her, and the fact that much of her manipulative behavior is motivated by the preservation of her beloved home and the survival of her family makes us root for her. Lt. Eve Dallas in J. D. Robb's "In Death" series of futuristic police procedurals is abrasive, foul-mouthed, and antisocial. Yet her fierce devotion to justice and her deep love for her husband and a few close friends make her a thoroughly good person at heart, whom we can sympathize with and cheer for.

From a writer's perspective, an author may intend for a character to be sympathetic and likable, then learn to her surprise that readers don't perceive the character that way. I once had a story with a preteen protagonist rejected because the editor saw her as a whiny brat, when I sincerely meant for the reader to empathize with her and view her grievances as entirely valid. How unpleasant does a character have to become before you can't accept him or her as a protagonist? Are there particular "trigger" traits that make you dislike a character at first glance? What kinds of positive qualities are required to override an initial negative impression and make you embrace a character despite his or her flaws?

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Guest Post by Jean Johnson on her Science Fiction Romance The Terrans

Guest Post
by
Jean Johnson
First Salik War:
The Terrans

I discussed some of Jean Johnson's science fiction and SFR in previous posts and will rave more about her work in the future.  But now you should listen to what she says was behind the science concepts she has used.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/11/reviews-20-by-jacqueline-lichtenberg.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/09/reviews-18-by-jacqueline-lichtenberg.html
-------------GUEST POST BY JEAN JOHNSON-----------

Science and Romance in Fiction

http://www.JeanJohnson.net

Greetings, Dear Readers!

Does everyone have their safety goggles and lab coats?  Excellent.  Today’s session is on blending science and romance into fiction, and why entangling the two is actually a pretty good idea.

Now, there have been plenty of debates on where the dividing line is between things like paranormal/fantasy romance versus urban fantasy.  The conclusion which myself, Kat Richardson, Shannon Butcher and Jim Butcher all came to during Norwescon 34 (April 21-24, 2011) was that the focus of the story is what determines whether it’s paranormal romance set in a fantastical contemporary setting, or urban fantasy with romantic elements.  But we’re going to talk about how you can blend science and romance, not just fantasy and romance.

Fantasy romance has been around since the first fairy tales with hints of romance in them started circulating.  Whether it’s the brave lad wooing the princess or the plucky lass winning the prince, we understand those tropes and are familiar with them.  Science fiction, however, has been (rather wrongfully) considered more of a “boy’s thing” and so a lot of romance writers don’t try to blend it because they don’t feel their readers would be interested in it.

Or if they do, they may not be heavily into reading science fiction, and thus don’t understand it for its own merit; they’re looking for a fancy but quick backdrop in which to place the setting, somewhere new and exotic.  Or there are those science fiction writers who don’t read romance, but try to wedge some romance into their stories without really paying attention to how romances actually work, both as a genre and as an actual “how do romances actually work in real life?” kind of thing.

Thankfully, there are those of us who read both romance and science fiction.  A lot.  I grew up cutting my literary teeth on Johanna Lindsay and Alan Dean Foster.  I’ve read Dara Joy and Andre Norton.  I’ve cuddled up with Catherine Coulter and Anne McCaffrey.  In fact, I figured I could write in my three favorite categories as a reader, science fiction, fantasy, and romance, because Alan Dean Foster has had a successful career writing science fiction, fantasy, and books based on movies. My life goal is to write as many stories or more as the 150 which Andre Norton got published over the span of her own career.

So when I set out to write, I knew that I’d be hopping from genre to genre.  I knew that I wanted to write science into my science fiction, too.  I also learned fairly quickly that I suck at contemporary romance; I just have to put in some sort of fantastical element, or it’s just not a story I want to write.  Other people have other experiences, but hey, plenty of room for plenty of different sorts of stories, right?  Right.

My latest release, THE TERRANS, which is the first novel in the First Salik War trilogy, is predominantly a science fiction First Contact novel.  The startlement, surprise, irritation, humor, aggravation, bewilderment, and wonder of trying to figure out how to deal with an alien culture, an alien lifeform, is a fun plot to map out and follow.  There is lots of room for political intrigue, social gaffes, cultural misunderstandings, and potential conflicts all over the place.

(For those of you interested, THE TERRANS can be found at at http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-terrans-jean-johnson/1120853148?ean=9780425276914
and
  http://www.amazon.com/Terrans-First-Salik-War/dp/0425276910/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1438550621&sr=1-1&keywords=the+terrans

as well as through Black Bond Books up in Vancouver, BC, Canada, et cetera.

At the same time that I figured out I wanted to write a First Contact story, I knew I had to find a way to draw the readers in and get them not only interested in reading the plot, but involved in the struggles of the characters.  Politics is kinda boring for a lot of people, so why should anyone care?  Well, in this particular universe, I developed a logical way for psychic powers to exist (“Aliens!”), and developed the science-y stuff on how it all works, because I like my science fiction to have an attempt at science in it.  (Remember, it doesn’t have to be right if it’s just a theory; once the theory is out there, then experiments can be devised to test the theory to see if it holds water or not.)

Once I had that established, it occurred to me that if psychic abilities are the manipulation of energy and matter by the mind—itself a source of energy and matter—then it could be quite possible that two minds could become quantum entangled.  If you don’t know anything about quantum entanglement, it basically means that if you “entangle” two molecules into having a matching “spin” to them, you can separate them over great distances and they will still have the same interrelated spin.  You can try to change and measure one waaaay over here and know that the one waaaay over there has the corresponding measurement because they’re entangled.

So why not minds?  On the surface, telepathy would seem to be a great way to overcome obstacles in communication, right?  Alas, I believe Douglas Adams was far more accurate about the end results when he said, “Meanwhile, the poor Babel Fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation.”  Or to put it into more mundane terms, gentlemen know that the best verbal answer to “Do these jeans make my butt look fat?” is always, always, “No, dear,” or  “You look perfect to me in whatever you wear,” regardless of what they may actually think.

Mercedes Lackey, in a line from her Vanyel books in her wonderful Valdemar series, once remarked that “lifebonding” (her version of entangling two souls or two minds) is actually more awkward than awesome, because you constantly have to juggle the needs of both people; you have to work harder at getting along than any other pairing because you’re stuck with each other.

So thinking about all these things, I bwahaha’d a bit and wondered if I could get my heroine, Jacaranda Mackenzie, and her counterpart from the other faction, Li’eth, stuck in a quantum entanglement of their minds.  In my series, this is called a Gestalt (geh-sh-TALL-t), which is a lovely German word which boils down to “the end result is bigger than the sum of its parts”, or basically, 2+2=5 and not just =4, for sufficiently strongly enough reactive values of 2.

Now, there are several alien species in the universe of the First Salik War.  In fact, readers familiar with my military science fiction series Theirs Not To Reason Why (the first in the series, A SOLDIER’S DUTY, is found at  http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/soldiers-duty-jean-johnson/1102164487?ean=9780441020638
and at
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/soldiers-duty-jean-johnson/1102164487?ean=9780441020638 )will have already met the Salik species because that story struggles with the problems of the Second Salik War.  But there were also two branches of humanity, the Terrans and the V’Dan, and I thought it would be more fun, and more plausible, to entangle the brains of two Humans.

That meant having to come up with the distinct and unique culture of the V’Dan, who—according to the history I drew up for that universe—have been cut off from Terrans for almost ten thousand years.  We don’t really get into the V’Dan culture in the series Theirs Not to Reason Why because it’s entirely from a Terran perspective.  It’s also had roughly two hundred years of contact with Terrans by that point, and like any situation where two cultures start interacting, they’ll have had an impact on each other, for better or for worse.

In the First Salik War series, however, I knew I could show these two Human empires being as alien and separate as they could get and still be a story about two branches of the same species interacting and clashing.  Throw in the other aliens and their reactions and interactions to the new players who “are not like the V’Dan we’re used to dealing with,” and you have a delightful recipe for lots and oodles and scads of expectations falling short, cultural misunderstandings, assumptions being made, and the whole making an “ass” out of “u” and “me,” so on and so forth.  Lots of fun, lots of room for a writer to work.

So I took this idea of a telepathic Gestalt, and poked and prodded at it from all angles.  Since I’ve been working on this series on and off for a couple of decades, I was able to iron out a lot of wrinkles, trim and tailor it this way and that, and I think have come up with a pretty good story.  We have Jacaranda MacKenzie, whose telepathy has been so strong, she’s never considered settling down with anyone.  This has made her an excellent civil servant as well as a former soldier, so on and so forth.

She is of mixed ethnicity, though she identifies strongest with her Hawai’ian heritage, and she is earnestly interested in finding solutions that will benefit the most number of people, not just a select few.  (Yes, authors will find a way to sneak our opinions into a story in the hopes it will inspire future generations.  Sometimes those opinions might even be good ones, but only time will tell.)  She is lucky to live in an era where skin-based prejudice no longer exists, where corruption in politics is rooted out ruthlessly, and your representative is actually trustworthy.  Do they still have problems in the Terran United Planets?  Oh my, yes…but they’re willing to acknowledge and work on them.

Then there’s Li’eth, a prince of his people, destined to serve in the military for a while because that’s one of the things extra children do when they’re not the primary heir.  He comes from a culture where physical maturity is displayed by jungen, which is a set of colorful markings which appear on the skin, the irises of the eye, and even the color of one’s hair can be changed.  This has led his entire culture into the “obvious correlation” of thinking that if you don’t have these marks, you must still be pre-pubescent, and thus still immature.  Add in the fact that his people treat psychic abilities as a mystical religious experience, whereas the Terrans treat it as a palpable science, and you have yet more awkwardness awaiting the pair.

I also decided that neither of them could be in their early twenties, let alone teenagers.  We don’t give political power to anyone under 25, and we certainly don’t hand over control of a First Contact situation to a teenager.  I didn’t even want to put them in their late twenties.  People need time to gain experience in life and in work, to figure out how to get things done, to be entrusted with a great deal of clout, if not actual power.  So mid-30s seemed about right.

So, we’ve got quantum entangled brains, check.  We have culture clashes over perceptions of maturity, check.  We have people who do understand politics and governance interacting in First Contact situations, check.  Wait…entangled brains.  They’re sharing thoughts.  Not like constantly, but very easily all the same.  So…how would these two react to that?  Should I put in some romance, or not?

Going back to that Mercedes Lackey quote, it occurred to me that if they could communicate in packets of thought with mental images and underlying subtext flavorings, it could be useful for communication, but it would also require constant mental adjustments to get along with each other.  Since neither one wants their respective governments to go to war with the other—most civilized cultures don’t—that means they would have to get to know each other, get familiar and friendly with each other, and…

Hm…are they both heterosexual?  (I rolled some dice, the dice said, “Yep!”)  Do they find each other attractive?  (Rolled more dice, again “Yep!” came up.  I can’t help it; I grew up playing D&D and other RPGs, and thus use a random number generator to help make up my mind when I’m ambivalent.  I like to think of it as injecting random potential for fun.)  Well, since they were both single, both forced to work together, both find each other attractive…oh, wait.  Li’eth is from a culture where if you don’t have the right sort of marks coloring your body, you’re, um…well, you have curves and stuff, and you’re thirty-five years old, but…society says you’re a child.  Ahah!  Another source for culture clash!

Plus there’s that whole thing about “exerting undue influence” that crops up whenever two people on opposing sides of a debate or a treaty or whatever start dating each other on top of everything else.  So how would a career representative and an imperial prince balance everything?  The needs of their people?  Their own brains becoming psychically entangled to the point where they suffer when they’re separated?  Their interest in each other?  The ethical and moral quandries of “sleeping with the as-yet-not-firmly-stablished-ally” if not “sleeping with the enemy”…?

Well, the focus of the story, as I said, is more science fiction than romance.  But you can put romance into science fiction.  You can put science fiction into romance.  The plot can be X and Y and even Z…but how the characters deal with all of that, how they change and grow and struggle, that is what makes the plot into a story that grips you and pulls you in.  Because you want to know how they deal with all of that.  Because it allows you to journey with them as they try to manage love life and career and complications.

As a reader, you become all the more invested in their struggles.  You become a sympathizer for their failures.  You become a cheerleader for their triumphs.  You become, Dear Readers—if just for a little while—entangled in the spinning of their lives.

Enjoy!
~Jean

If you have any questions, you can always contact me via:
My website, http://www.JeanJohnson.net
Twitter: @JeanJAuthor
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Fans-of-Author-Jean-Johnson/180367135307085
Tumblr:  http://jeanjauthor.tumblr.com/

…And I also have a Patreon which gives sneak advanced peeks at book covers, chapter and scene selectsion, so on and so forth:  http://www.patreon.com/JeanJAuthor

Copyright Infringers Rejoice And Beware

Google Allegedly Pays The Legal Costs Of Certain Alleged Copyright Infringers

On Vox Indie, Ellen Seidler (a copyright owner who has been ripped off multiple times) ponders why it is that Google will pay the legal costs of alleged uploaders of copyright infringing material to YouTube, but will not pay the legal costs of copyright owners who are forced to sue alleged uploaders of allegedly copyright infringing material.

Why are copyright owners "forced" to sue?  If a copyright owner sends a takedown notice, and if the alleged uploader posts a counter-notice to the original DMCA takedown notice (regardless of whether or not the counter-notice is bogus), then Google will republish the allegedly infringing material with no further recourse for the copyright owner other than to sue.

http://voxindie.org/youtube-covers-legal-costs-for-some-users/

Takeaway? The DMCA does a poor job of protecting copyright owners because there is no takedown-and-stay-down, and there is little downside for pirates if they file untruthful counter-notices.

When Insurance Policies May Not Cover Internet Service Providers For User-Generated Alleged Copyright Infringement.

Quoting an opinion piece... "Why is [an insurance company] denying coverage?  Because [the insurance company] quite correctly says it won’t insure [a Communication Company] for its intentional refusal to comply with the DMCA for largely the same reason that the DMCA has a repeat infringer requirement in the first place.  If you try to do it right and screw up, you can get insurance or you might be entitled to the safe harbor (and you can probably more easily get insurance if you promise to comply with the safe harbor).  You cannot insure your way out of doing something that is purposely bad behavior."....  Unquote.

Learn the names of the insurance company and the Communication Company by reading the full op ed here:

http://thetrichordist.com/2015/11/26/did-cox-communications-just-do-the-dirty-to-shareholders/

And just for good measure...

Digital Defamation Explored  (by Reed Smith LLP - Brian J. Willett and Justin H. Werner)

http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=341b6c7a-95f7-4abb-a848-0295d9fcea7b&utm_source=Lexology+Daily+Newsfeed&utm_medium=HTML+email&utm_campaign=Lexology+subscriber+daily+feed&utm_content=Lexology+Daily+Newsfeed+2015-11-26&utm_term=

A hyperlink to an allegedly defamatory blog or tweet or website without quoting the allegedly defamatory content is considered a "reference" and not publication of the allegedly defamatory allegations.

That's over-use of "alleged" and derivations of "alleged", but I am following a bunch of lawyers. One can never go wrong, as a commentator, if one lards ones prose with "allegeds" and "IMHOs".


Have a safe week, bloggers and copyright owners!
Rowena Cherry

ChessieCon

We had an excellent Thanksgiving weekend at this year's ChessieCon (held just north of Baltimore in a hotel that used to be a Holiday Inn and is now a Radisson). It's small, friendly, and highly book-oriented, with many sessions directed specifically at writers. The main musical guest, Heather Dale, sang some traditional ballads plus her own original songs. She has recently completed an Arthurian musical play starring the women in the legends, from which she performed several songs. I was delighted with her voice (clear and mellow, and I could understand every word!) and her vivacious performing style. It would be great if she'd become a regular member of the program. I also heard filk by Roberta Rogow, mainly on scientific topics, e.g. the latest discoveries about Pluto ("It's a Strange World After All"). And some former members of the disbanded folk and filk group Clam Chowder, for many years the highlight of the con, got together for an hour of singing old favorites—quite a thrill. Seanan McGuire, author of the October Daye urban fantasy series, was the author guest of honor.

I participated in three sessions: In the Broad Universe Rapid Fire Reading (about seven minutes allotted to each author in the group), I read from my quasi-Lovecraftian paranormal romance novel SEALING THE DARK PORTAL.

I was on a panel about attracting female readers that generated stimulating, sometimes heated discussion. We agreed that female readers are, fundamentally, READERS first; however, we also agreed on some valid generalizations, e.g., that women look for solid character relationships in their fiction, not simply "action" with nothing behind it. The YA author on the panel mentioned her experience that young readers of either gender enjoy a good story regardless of whether the protagonist is a girl or a boy. Not surprisingly, most of the hour focused on the portrayal of female characters in SF and fantasy. Much was said about the sub-par representation of women in movies and TV, which tend to lag behind print fiction in that respect. Gratuitous underwear and shower scenes came in for particular disdain. One panelist remarked that in any medium, it's not that submissive women, domestic women, or female characters who use their sexuality for manipulation shouldn't exist, since they do exist in real life, but they should be complex characters integral to the story, not lazy stereotypes. The familiar demand for "strong heroines" was called into question, although we didn't get into precisely defining the term. When the moderator asked us to name well-crafted female characters, of course we went blank. I mentioned the first who came to mind, Claire in Diana Gabaldon's OUTLANDER series and, outside the genre, Harriet in the Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries. I thought of Paks, the soldier-turned-paladin of Elizabeth Moon's trilogy, but the right moment to cite her slipped by. We discussed the premise that male characters are allowed to be "unlikable" while female characters aren't, and I completely forgot an obvious counter-example—Eve Dallas in J. D. Robb's futuristic mysteries, who is abrasive and foul-mouthed yet a fascinating and sympathetic heroine.

My husband, Les (Leslie Roy Carter, primary author of our four-book Wild Sorceress high fantasy series), and I appeared on a panel about collaboration, along with one other male-female writing team. We had a productive discussion, among ourselves and with the audience, about methods of co-authorship and writing methods in general. Since the moderator worked as a developmental editor, a different type of "collaboration," we benefited from varied angles on the topic.

On his own, Les took part in a session on military SF versus the real-life military. We heard lots of interesting "sea stories" about the panelists' experience in military service over the course of discussion about right and wrong ways to portray a military background in fiction. They never got around to citing and discussing as many specific examples of movies and books as I'd hoped for, although there were some, especially in audience comments.

Other sessions: The panel on complex villains and anti-heroes veered into nonfictional territory and wandered in that wilderness for over half the hour before being dragged back on topic, mainly by audience questions. The moderator began by asking how cardboard villains in a context of stark "good against evil" affect people's attitudes in real life. The panelists waxed eloquent on that subject, sometimes getting overtly political, and for a while the subject of fictional villains threatened to get lost altogether. They never did get around to one subtopic implied by the panel description, how a writer can create believable villains. I attended half of an enjoyable discussion on Terry Pratchett, beginning with the question of how we first encountered his work. A fascinating panel on "ethical non-monogamy in fiction" was very informative, although again spending almost as much time on real-life examples as on fictional ones. In that case, though, balance between the two was maintained.

The one thing I miss is the costume contest. There's a fair amount of hall costuming, and a "time travelers' social" on Friday night attracts people who dress up, but the formal Masquerade was canceled for lack of participation several years ago. With all the steampunk participation in the con in recent years, it seems the time to reinstate the Friday night contest has come. If it returned, the con would be almost perfect. Well, aside from the need for a time-turner to avoid missing all the alluring events scheduled opposite other alluring events. In my opinion, a time-turner should be automatically included in the registration fee at every convention.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Depiction Part 13 - Depicting Wisdom by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Depiction

Part 13
Depicting Wisdom
by
 Jacqueline Lichtenberg

The previous parts of this series are found here:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/04/index-to-depiction-series-by-jacqueline.html

Wisdom is an intangible.  So how do you Show Don't Tell?

The PR (Public Relations ) science that creates ads for perfume, and even food -- both of which are tangible -- is really selling the experience of smelling or tasting, which is intangible.  So you learn depict Wisdom by studying TV Commercials, even web-ads.

Intangible aspects of human experience are rooted in the tangible.

You can look at this two ways:
A) that which is tangible creates the intangible
B) that which is intangible is the "Foundation" or creative channel which causes the tangible to manifest.

OK, you can sprain your brain on that one.

So lets look at some of the fundamental components of the general subject of wisdom as a means of generating one-liners that people will enshrine in those little digital samplers you see all over the place, with a tag crediting your Character with saying it just exactly so!

1) What is Wisdom?
2) Where Does Wisdom come from?
3) How do readers identify the Wisdom level of a Character?
4) Does Wisdom have anything to do with Truth?
5) Who was the wisest human in human history?
6) Does a real-world historical character's wisdom shape your reader's world?
7) If you see historical bits of wisdom creating the standards of wisdom in the current world, should you include some Historical Character in your Worldbuilding for your current characters to quote? If you should include such a quote, how do you include it?
8) Does your target audience respect Wisdom or despise it?
9) Is Wisdom sexist?
10) What historical real world females are quoted today as having achieved Wisdom?
11) Are there more Wise Men than there are Wise Women in your reader's real world acquaintance?
12) If your readers are largely female, do they need a Wise Character to look up to and emulate -- to strive to become?  Does that character have to be female, too?
13) Does the Romance Genre typically use the first encounter and process of internalizing a point of Wisdom as the plot-driver? 14) Are men sexually attracted to young women who utter Ancient Wisdom couched in Modern Vernacular?
15) Does the application of a point of Wisdom to real life create success in Love Stories, Romance novels, real life business, child rearing, rejoining a career track after childbirth?

Perhaps, for our purposes, the most important question would be how do you find a bit of Ancient Wisdom and re-cast it into modern vernacular applicable to a sizzling hot Alien Romance story?

Is the Wisdom component part of the story or the plot?  Or does it only belong in the Theme?

Is the "Theme Stated" Beat in Save The Cat! actually the quotable one-liner that encapsulates an Ancient Wisdom into modern vernacular?

   Those are just a few of the most obvious questions to ponder when creating the Wisdom factor in your fictional work.

There are a lot of ways to use these concepts in Fiction, and I'm sure that with self-publishing successes turning up, we will find and define many more ways to Depict Wisdom.

Via the biggest, broadest Markets, we have good illustrations of the methodology in Yoda of Star Wars and Gandalf of Lord of the Rings.  Both are male.

When Wise women are depicted, the writers aiming for the big markets usually grab for some caricature of the Witch.  In the days of Radio Drama, Black Women were given the wisdom lines, keeping the family on track ethically and morally.  But they were usually Grandmothers.

The world has changed drastically -- and the rate of change seems to be speeding up as people communicate electronically.

So we have plenty of examples of Wisdom in science fiction and fantasy genres.  But Wisdom as a salient component of Romance seems to have gone missing.  Young women, nubile females, with a yen for a Soul Mate are not depicted as "attractive" because of their deep Wisdom and ability to articulate the oldest truths.

We won't get through that whole list of questions in one post, but we can get started by pondering what exactly is meant by Wisdom, what it is objectively, what the modern world thinks it is...

 

...and perhaps what you can do to express your Theme in a Wisdom Quotable.

From a writer's standpoint, Wisdom is a component of Character -- and so part of this discussion relates to Depicting Characters, and also to formulating Character, creating a Character who belongs in your Story, is a product of his/her World that you have built and thus depicts that world, and does things to change that world.

Always ask yourself if you want to write fiction that can change the world, or if you want this particular story to simply state the problem in the world today.  Or do you want to write a story that, as Gene Roddenberry always taught, simply asks a question.  If you are asking a question, how do you pose that question in Show-Don't-Tell terms?  And how does this question manifest as the Theme that glues your plot to your story.

Here's an index to advanced, two-technique synthesis on Character.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/07/index-to-theme-character-integration.html

Here's the series on Dialogue - it has more than 4 posts:

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/10/dialogue-parts-1-4-listed.html

Here's the most elementary entry on Dialogue:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/10/dialogue-as-tool.html

Dialogue is one of the most efficient ways of depicting Character, and those one-line zingers that get quoted forever are generally types of wisdom quotes.

 

If you enjoy the exercise in pondering the abstracts of which comes first, the Wisdom or its manifestation, you should read the posts on this blog about Tarot -- or grab the Kindle compilations to nibble at in odd moments when you're looking for a plot-twist or solution to a conflict.

You can find the Tarot posts on Pentacles (tangible) or Swords (not-so-tangible) elements here:

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2010/03/pausing-for-you-to-catch-up-with-me_23.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2010/03/pausing-for-you-to-catch-up-with-me.html

Each of those lists has links to 10 posts on each Suit of the Tarot.

Here is the Kindle version of all twenty of those posts, plus 20 more on the Suits of Wands and Cups.
http://www.amazon.com/Not-So-Minor-Arcana-Books-ebook/dp/B010E4WAOU/

My approach to Tarot is simple. It is no use whatsoever for "foretelling" the future.  But it is a potent tool for creating riveting Plots, especially Romance plots that explore scientific truth.

You've seen the "quotes" that I've strewn through this post so far.

As a writer, have you noticed the ones that impact you most strongly have the fewest words, writ largest?

For example, what is the most terse, transparent, and easy to comprehend definition of Wisdom you have ever encountered?

King Solomon, the son of King David, was known far and wide for his Wisdom, so at the end of his life he wrote down the principles he used that were regarded as Wise.  These principles are all derived from what is derived from (many generations) the Torah, the 5 books of Moses, but distilled into the vernacular of King Solomon's day and age.

King Solomon defined the beginning of wisdom as the beginning of Knowledge rooted in the fear of God.  I could argue against that definition in many thousands of words because I disagree.





Those who have read my extensive discourses in this blog on the spiritual dimension of the Soul Mate, of Love Conquers All, realize that I see the real world as fabricated out of Love.

 

In my personal view, LOVE of God is the beginning of Wisdom.

But King Solomon's father, David, was the man who ran for his life saved only by the Hand of God, fought more fiercely and bravely than King Arthur, and handed a United Kingdom to his son, Solomon.

So naturally King Solomon would see in David's fear of God the source of his wisdom, obedience and thus success.




In the Book of Proverbs, King Solomon wrote at the very beginning, right after his definition,

 

This historic figure whose Proverbs reverberate throughout our whole culture -- right alongside, interwoven with, often indistinguishable from the Helenistic roots of our civilization (Aristotelian Logic) -- implores us to pay close attention to our Parents.

King Solomon didn't make that up.


Here's a hint of his main Source.

 

Note the 5th Commandment is the link between the Commandments that depict the Relationship between humans and the Creator -- and those that depict the Relationship between humans and humans.

The link-concept between the two sets of Commandments is Creation.  The Creator created humans, and then fathers and mothers create more humans.

Another source of Wisdom encapsulated in this graphic is what you learn when you read across (pairing #1 with #6 -- #5 with #10) -- so that you ponder how it is that Honoring your parents (not necessarily loving or approving of or even respecting your parents, but rather just Honoring) is related to the process of not "coveting."

In other words, Honoring your origins prevents you from hating others who have things you wish you had but don't.  Hate, envy, resentment, and the impetus King Solomon cites as the sign of a lack of Wisdom that causes us to chase after bait like a bird getting caught in a net, come from not knowing or understanding or revering your origins.

Ever noticed how fans of an Superhero bore right down to "The Origin Tale?"  How much money and brain-power have been spent trying to discover "the origin of life?"  Or think about the relentless pursuit of the Big Bang origin of the universe.  We know, deep down, that knowing our origin is vastly important, and the beginning of happiness.  We just have to KNOW our ORIGIN.

And that's what King Solomon pegs as the beginning of Knowledge -- fear of God, an awareness of the Originator of our origin.  We just have to find out.

How exactly Characters in a Romance story might find out something about their Origin ("I was adopted. I don't know who my mother was.") is the substance of a Theme -- a huge theme that could support a long series of long books that could live forever. Consider Oedipus Rex.

So maybe King Solomon got his "Wisdom" which we preserve in the book of Proverbs from his Father's biography and fear or obedience to God.  David's main life-theme was Praising God (even when handed the dirty end of the stick).  He praised God even from the depths of his worst suffering (which was epic!)

Remember, King Solomon's father, King David, had one of those trick memories, and annually would recite the entire Torah (all 5 books) before the people.

The Torah itself is actually a SONG -- it's written to be sung, not spoken.  King David is renowned for his musical talent, and is the author of most of the Book of Psalms -- the songs sung in the Temple daily by the Levites.

So when King Solomon explains that the beginning of his Wisdom lies with his father and mother, he is telling us (today) how to acquire that magnitude of Wisdom which caused him to be revered.

The whole book of Proverbs consists of nothing but quotables -- often more quoted than the one-line zingers our motion picture industry prizes.  Solomon's pithy distillations are very short conclusions about very knotty subjects.

These Proverbs are potent, concentrated conclusions on these topics, not lengthy lectures, info-graphics or How To lessons.  Nothing Made Simple.

So through the ages, many great writers have written extensive commentary on each and every one of the entries in King Solomon's list of Wisdoms.

Here's an example of one of the most quoted Rabbis annotations to Proverbs:
http://www.judaism.com/malbim-on-mishley/dp/BEBBE/

Here is a quick biography of the Malbim (a nickname -- all the great Rabbis whose commentaries are quoted have nicknames -- the custom was not invented JUST for Twitter!)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malbim

It isn't "simplicity" to use fewer words.

The concepts behind the words are deep and abstract, the subject intangible.

The few words are the tip of the iceburg of the main thought.  It's up to the reader to unravel and delve deeper into the subject when they come to a point in life where they are questioning in that area.

The Proverb is a brief, terse, one-liner, so that it will be remembered and quoted until it becomes a cliche.  "A stitch in time saves nine."

Then one day, something happens -- you walk your Character into a Situation -- and the Proverb comes to mind.

If you write it well, the reader will think of the cliche-Proverb before your Character does and will be rooting for your Character to remember that principle.  The Character then has to morph the Proverb into a form that applies to that Character's problem.

That's why I mentioned The Malbim -- a much quoted commentator.  The commentators "update" the encapsulated Wisdom from Proverbs, giving it the context of their time.

When you read the comments from the 1800's in Europe (the Malbim's venue) you notice they may as well be about some Alien Species among the Stars.

That is why they are salient to a writer's arsenal. They give you an alien perspective, and for a writer of science fiction romance stories that alien perspective is a priceless treasure trove of Ideas.

Know the original Book of Proverbs, read the commentary, see how the commentator of the 1800's translated the Ancient World into his era, grasp the technique used, then transpose that original wisdom into something applicable to your interstellar civilization.

Even readers who have never read the Torah, the Bible, or flat disbelieve in God, will recognize these principles even after you have morphed them into the cultures of non-humans.  That sense of recognition of the alien provides the necessary verisimilitude so the reader can walk a parsec in your Hero's moccasins.

Each of these bits of Wisdom encapsulated by King Solomon are Life Lessons you will find pegged in every culture throughout time, maybe spun in different ways, maybe inside-out in Values, but lessons considered Wisdom.

Learning some bit of wisdom is your Main Character's job in life.

In a series of long novels, the entire series sums up to ONE such Life Lesson, while each of the novels depicts some stage on the way to that big insight.  King Solomon's Proverbs are each the theme of a long Series, while the Commentators give you the intermediate steps for the individual books.

If you quote one of the Proverbs or the Commentator's wisdom, be sure to get the attribution correct.  That's important for all kinds of mystical reasons.

Oh, and be aware that with these internet sampler patches, the quote attributions need cross-checking.  Many are not correct.  Some people just put a name on there to make you respect the saying.  There are websites where you can plaster any words you type onto one of these samplers, and attribute the words to anyone.

But accuracy of attribution is not why I've included the images I found on Pinterest and by Googling.
In fact, the ones improperly attributed or mis-quoted, are your most valuable resource as a writer of romance stories.

These quotes represent popular wisdom -- some of which may have a kernal of truth behind it -- but for you, the point of pondering these quotes is to discern how they depict our current cultural realities.

Some substantial fraction of your readers will believe these things.

If you adopt one of these as a Theme, your Plot must argue against the quote (as well as for it), or its interpretation and application by your typical reader.

You also have to pay attention to how you choose vocabulary.

Sometimes you want an obscure word to rivet attention and make people look things up.  Sometimes you want to teach the meaning of an obscure (or made-up) word via show-don't-tell, and sometimes you want to be clear, plain, unequivocal and accessible by using the most common vernacular.

So, to sum up -- "What is Wisdom?"  Our oldest texts defining Wisdom may be Chinese, but the most relevant to the U.S.A. today's culture is either Aristotle or King Solomon.

Your original contribution may be quoted for centuries to come if you can distill Aristotle vs Solomon into Interstellar Civilization.

King Solomon says "fear of God" is the foundation of Knowledge.

Then he describes how fools take "bait" like a bird flying right into a net just to peck at some seed.

 


King Solomon wrote -- "O Simpletons" -- yes, the great, revered example of the Wisest of all Men was not "Politically Correct."

Now, who will be the revered Wisest Of All Women and will she be Politically Correct?

Remember, Wisdom is intangible.  Show Don't Tell means make it tangible.

Give it a symbol (remember the Seal of Solomon and the Shield of David?).

Give that symbol to a Character and make it emotionally meaningful to that Character (a lone surviving photo of Parents, an old, crumbling book of poems or sheet music, a piece of religious-themed jewelry, a Sword with an engraved blade?), challenge the Character to internalize that Wisdom.

Start your story at the beginning.  As King Solomon did, start with the tendency to be lured by bait despite the discipline of the Father and the teaching of the Mother.  Start with your exceptionally smart Character being a "Simpleton" as King Solomon termed the gullible.  Start with a Love of Folly and teach your Character the Wisdom of Solomon.  If you get stuck, read the Malbim's commentary.

There is a more handy source than these printed books, though.  On iTunes,
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-ous-nach-yomi/id267721005?mt=2

Nach Yomi goes through the books of the Bible after the Torah, discussing the commentaries.  Just listen to the podcast for 20 minutes and you'll be brim full of story and plot.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

"Likes" For Nothing

Does being apparently popular translate into sales? Who really knows? Since around Y2K there seems to have been a frenzy all over the internet of enterprises of all sizes trying bribe fun-loving individuals to "like" them, or "follow" them, or "friend" them, or "pin" them, or .... whatever term any given social site uses for the conspicuous attraction of attention.

One popular method has been the contest, which often ends up looking suspiciously like a lottery or sweepstakes. Sweepstakes are not legal in every state, and there are certain rules to be followed, certain phrases that must be included in every contest's rules in order to keep the promotion on the safe side of the law.

Such phrases should include "void where prohibited", "no purchase necessary", "full rules available at...", moreover, there should be alternate (write in) methods of entering, there should be a clearly stated start and end time and date for the promotion, the means of selecting the winner should be set forth. Ideally, there ought to be some skill involved to avoid the winner being chosen at random, but if the contest promoter satisfies two out of three criteria, he/she is probably fine.

Also, the contest promoter should be careful not to require "a consideration" (payment or a review or a "like" or some other valuable activity by the entrant.)

Here's a good guide: http://www.dca.ca.gov/publications/legal_guides/u-3.shtml
Here's another: http://contests.about.com/od/sweepstakes101/p/whatarecontests.htm

Here's a Thompson Coburn LLP law blog devoted to the topic:
http://www.thompsoncoburn.com/news-and-information/sweepstakes-law-blog.aspx

The law may be changing, per the latter, for the FCC, but there is also the FTC.  The following quote caught my attention.

the FTC brought an action against [a famous shoe company] for a sweepstakes promotion asking people to pin pictures of [the famous shoe company's] shoes, as well as destinations to which they would like to travel. People who pinned pictures received an entry into a sweepstakes. The FTC took the position that the mere act of pinning constituted an endorsement, and a sweepstakes entry was a "material connection that had to be disclosed." In other words, [the famous shoe company] needed to make sure that consumers disclosed that they were pinning pictures, because they were hoping to win a prize.

Find the entire article on Lexology.com
http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=9d4702c7-34f9-48d8-ac14-eec463f40d6f&utm_source=Lexology+Daily+Newsfeed&utm_medium=HTML+email&utm_campaign=Lexology+subscriber+daily+feed&utm_content=Lexology+Daily+Newsfeed+2015-11-26&utm_term=

All the best,

Rowena Cherry

Personality Types... More Fun Than A Horoscope?

There are many ways to build a character, and one might be to do a 16 Personalities test on behalf of your nascent alien romance hero or heroine.

Try this one:  http://www.16personalities.com/intp-personality

You will have fun, and at the bottom of the page, you may see whether or not your own protagonist has a lot in common with a Game of Thrones or The Matrix or LOTR or Hunger Games character. You'll also find enough predictions to suggest a life story.

For myself, I used to be an INTJ, but now I am an INTP... or perhaps I lie online. That is always a possibility.

What are you?

All the best,
Rowena Cherry

Happy Turkey Day

Happy Thanksgiving to all our American readers! As usual, I'll be attending ChessieCon (formerly the Darkover con) this weekend. I'll report on it next week.

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday and, if you're leaving home, smooth travel and safe weather conditions.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt