Not ready yet

I haven’t written anything here in quite a while because I’ve been frantically editing and working on a submission package for an urban fantasy novel I finished and wanted to submit this month. Yesterday as I was working on the synopsis–the last thing I had to do before submitting–I looked through the novel to be sure I’d covered all the salient points. And I found a scene that had a huge logic fault. It was a scene I liked, but for some reason I’d overlooked the fact that it simply didn’t work as written.

So–back to the drawing board. I’ll not only have to rewrite that scene but others before and after it. I won’t be submitting this month. I am too optimistic about the prospects for this novel to send it off with sloppy editing and with a scene that doesn’t make sense. I’m not under a deadline, and I want this novel to work on all levels.

I’ve seen too many authors rush to submit work that isn’t ready, get rejections, and finally self publish because they are too impatient to be published to want to do that one more edit that would make the novel acceptable–or, in some cases, two or three more edits.

I’m certainly not saying that any time an author gets rejected it’s because the novel isn’t ready. We all have to accept rejections that can come for many reasons other than the quality of the work submitted. We’ve all read of best sellers that were rejected by publisher after publisher until finally one editor was willing to take a chance on the manuscript. Writers need a lot of patience. We can’t get discouraged and give up because of rejections. But at the same time, we have to be able to look at our work objectively and make sure it represents our best effort.

I won’t send my manuscript out until I honestly feel that it is the best I am capable of. I don’t have to compare it with other people’s work. I just have to know that I have done my own personal best. And I hope that that personal best will get better with each novel I write. That’s my goal.

Isn’t the Information Age Grand?

I just got off the phone with my bank. It’s not a local bank, and I’d called just to get envelopes in which to send deposits. That’s all I needed, just envelopes, which they gladly send to their customers. They are postage paid and have the bank’s name and address imprinted on them. They contain no personal information about me. My name does not appear on them, nor does my account number, my return address, or anything else.

A pleasant young man came on the line, greeted me, and asked me how I was doing. I told him. Then he asked me what he could do for me. I said I needed envelopes in which to mail deposits. Fine, no problem, he assured me. And what is your account number? I gave him the account number. And what is your name? I told him. Thank you, he said, and what is your date of birth? I asked why he needed that information just to send envelopes. We have to have your account information to get your address, he said. But I can tell you my address, I told him. No, we have to do it this way. It’s the way the system is set up.Oh, okay, I said, yielding. I gave him my birth date. And what is your mother’s maiden name, he asked. I told him. And the last four digits of your social security number? All this just for envelopes??? But I gave him the information, all of which he seemed to need just to bring up my account to get the address I could have given him to start out with.

And then he asked, And would you please verify your address for me?

I was laughing so hard I could hardly get it out, but I did, and he proudly informed me that he could now send the envelopes and how many would I like. We settled on a number, he told me the envelopes would arrive in 7 to 10 business days and wished me a good day.

I know we live in the information age, but isn’t this carrying it just a bit too far?

What’s the Theme?

Literary critics often talk about the theme of a work of fiction. When I get an idea for a novel and start writing, I don’t do so with any particular theme in mind. I just want to tell a story. I come up with some characters, know that I’ll add others as the story progresses, choose my protagonist and what point of view I’ll use for the story. I write a couple of chapters, stop, take a close look at where the story is going, and work on developing the main characters–their back stories, their problems, their goals, motivations, family life, friends, enemies, personal habits, likes and dislikes, all that sort of thing that goes into producing well-rounded characters. When I feel I have enough information, I go back to writing. I still haven’t given thought to a theme.

So do I ever come up with a theme, and if so, when?

Not while I’m writing the first draft. Sometimes not until I’ve written a second and possibly a third draft. It isn’t until the novel is pretty much in its final form that I can step back, look at it as objectively as possible (as objectively as an author can look at her own work), and discover the theme. I don’t ever plan a story around a theme. For me the theme has to arise naturally from the plot and characters.

In my new science fiction novel, Shadow of a Demon, the theme is “dealing with inner demons,” using demons in the metaphorical sense, of course.  This is how I described it in the submission package which got the novel accepted by Double-Dragon Publishing: “Inner demons haunt them all: China Terrano must face and overcome her incestuous love
for her half-brother, Paolo. Paolo Terrano has to accept the rejection of his foster mother  and the blame she puts on him for the tragedies her family has suffered.  K.T. (Koyne Tamille) Malloran must resolve the conflict between her religious calling as a novice in the Daughters of Mercy, her growing love for Paolo, and her feeling of responsibility for India Terrano’s fate at the hands of the Interplanetary Patrol. But it is India who must cope with the worst inner demon, for her demon is all too real.” I go on to explain that the “demon” is actually a symbiont, an alien being accidentally brought by her father from another planet and transferred to her at her father’s death.

The point is that just as these characters all have inner “demons” that haunt them, so do most of us, and, like India, we must learn either to cope with them and draw strength from them or to exorcise them. This is a lesson that a reader can take away from the book, but the book is not didactic. I didn’t set out writing it to teach a lesson. It is meant to tell a story that entertains, and I hope it will do that whether or not the reader “gets” the theme. Because, ultimately, that’s how the book will be judged–by whether or not it tells a good story. The theme lends depth to the story, but it doesn’t determine its success or failure.

Language Matters

I started out writing academic papers and articles, so when I turned from that type of writing to fiction, my sentences tended to be stilted and wordy, and I still have problems along that line from time to time. That’s why I turn to readers to review my work and sound the alarm when I’m using words or sentences that are too convoluted and use vocabulary that doesn’t fit the situation or the character.

I’m a real purist when it comes to grammar. I was raised to use correct grammar, have a thorough grounding in sentence structure and know how to parse sentences to be certain I’m using grammar correctly. As a kid I loved to diagram sentences! (Are kids even taught that any more?)

All that said, when I write, I have to consider the level of diction that my character would use. If I’m writing in the point of view of a character who uses casual speech and is careless about grammar, I need to reflect that in the character’s dialog and also to some extent in the narrative of the scene that is seen through that character’s eyes. And it’s the narrative part that gets tricky. I don’t want to “dumb down” the narrative, but neither can I use exalted language and phraseology that just would not fit the character. It’s a bit of tightrope walking, because over-simplification can turn off a reader, but so can the use of a lot of obscure words and overly poetic language in situations where that type of writing just doesn’t fit.

I hope this is something I’ve gotten better at as I write more. I know that my first novels had problems in this area. It helps me to read the work of other writers and see how they handle the vocabulary and phrasing in similar types of situations and characters as I’m using in my work.

Language usage is very different in a novel currently under production in which my protagonist is a well-educated young noblewoman in the mid 1700s and the story, written in first person, is told through her journal entries,  from the language in a novel I’m currently working on, also written in first person, in which the protagonist is a modern young woman with only a high school education and a flip, somewhat jaded attitude. The two novels require entirely different writing styles and different levels of vocabulary. Challenging but fun. Then there’s also the matter of language difference according to whether the point-of-view character is male or female.

I’d be intersted in hearing about how some of you handle language issues, and how you adapt language to character, time, place, ethnicity, and other variables. What problems have you encountered? Is this anything that presents a difficulty, or are you able to change styles easily when needed?

Let’s learn from each other!

Magical Thinking

When I talk to people at book signings and readings, I often am asked why I write fantasy and whether I believe in the occult and in magic. To me those are two very different questions, but to the questioners they are often related.

I write fantasy because I enjoy stretching my mind and using my (admittedly wild) imagination. I also hope to stimulate the imaginations of my readers. I find writing fantasy a wonderful creative activity and I hope my books may inspire creativity in their readers.

As for whether I believe in magic and in the occult, the answer is that I’m very much a skeptic. Occult has many definitions, so I cannot say flatly, I do not believe in any aspect of the occult. But I do not believe in the sort of magic I write about, nor do I write to promote witchcraft and sorcery (as I’ve been accused of doing). I reject all forms of magical thinking.

Unfortunately, magical thinking is all too prevalent in these times. And often it’s especially prevalent among those who would accuse fantasy authors of promoting witchcraft and magic. Just a few days ago I was treated to an example of it when someone referred to the recent tsunami and nuclear contamination in Japan as being God’s punishment on the Japanese people, evidence that they must be very wicked. This, too me, is a particularly dangerous and insulting type of magical thinking. Another example occured on an NPR program in which young people from a town struck by a deadly and destructive tornado were interviewed as to their reactions to the devastation. Some who were touched by it–homes damaged or destroyed–felt guilty, believing it to be God’s judgment on them and on their families. Others who escaped any damage, whose houses were not in the tornado’s path, wondered why they had escaped because they did not feel that they were better than those who suffered damage. And there’s Texas Governor Rick Perry, now a presidential candidate, who refuses to believe the scientific evidence of climate change and global warming, but believes that the drought afflicting Texas can be healed by prayer and repentance.

The forces of nature are impersonal forces that do not choose their victims on the basis of morality or lack thereof.  People can and do affect nature and bring about change, but this is not magical. Our interference with natural processes and our greed too often put the desire to gain wealth at any cost over the wellbeing of our earth and its peoples. I firmly believe that until we put aside the magical thinking that we have a God-given right to exploit all the natural resources of our planet and we cannot exhaust those resources because God has provided them for our use, we will not take the steps necessary to protect our planet and all its lives–and then it may well be too late.

Writing fantasy and science fiction can be a way of subtly getting the message across that our resources are finite and that the practice of “magic” always exacts a price. And not all stories have happy endings.

Titles Matter

I’ve been thinking about how I come up with titles for my books. Sometimes the title comes to me even before I start writing. At other times I struggle to find the right title and never do feel satisfied. And sometimes the title I come up with and like turns out to be one nobody else likes.

Titles can’t be copyrighted. You can use a title that has been used by someone else. I think most authors try not to do that, but we don’t always know what has been used and what hasn’t. We can check via Google and Amazon and feel fairly safe if nothing comes up in either place. But sometimes a title that I’ve checked does come up but on an obscure work published many years ago that is not even remotely like the book I’ve written. That has just happened to me. I have a manuscript recently accepted for publication that I called Twice Blessed, Thrice Cursed. The publisher doesn’t like that title and has asked me to come up with a different one. The one I came up with is The Weight of a Crown. I found that there is a book listed on Amazon with the title The Weight of the Crown. It’s an older book, not the same type as mine at all.  The Weight of a Crown does fairly well express what my book is about, and the publisher likes it, so I’ll probably go with it. It’s a fantasy novel set in a fictitious eastern European country in the mid-1700s. The protagonist is a young noblewoman who falls in love with a prince and winds up marrying a prince, but not the one she’s in love with (and who loves her). I thought my original title best alerted the reader that this might not be a story with a happy ending. It is, in fact, a tragedy. The Weight of a Crown may hint at this but not so blatantly. Preferences, anyone?

My YA novel A School for Sorcery has the title I originally gave it, but my publisher had wanted me to change the title. I came up with a couple of other options, and the publisher decided that A School for Sorcery was better than those alternatives and let me keep it. And the book has done very well. The prequel to it, A Perilous Power, I originally titled For His Friends, which I was asked to change and did, felicitously so. For His Friends is a blah title, and A Perilous Power really expresses much better what the book is about.

On the other hand, I was not asked to change the title of the sequel to School, When the Beast Ravens. I should have been. I liked the title but I now realize that it probably was a big mistake, because people do not understand the use of  “ravens” in that context and may have been put off by that. If I ever get a chance to republish the book, I’ll change the title to When the Beast Hungers. I think that would be much more effective.

Titles do matter. You can’t really judge a book by its title any more than you can judge it by its cover, but in fact people do buy books on the basis of title and cover, and so how to title a book is a matter requiring careful thought.

BALANCING THE EQUATION

Okay, I’ve written about the crazy way I plot novels. But there is another side to the process. I have to have a framework in which to place the wild ideas and inspired bits. To work, the equation that includes dreams, impressions, and sudden inspirations has to be balanced with research, world building, and character development.

I have a good-sized library in my own home, with lots of reference works, but now I do most of my research online. As an example, for the YA fantasy novel I’m currently writing, I had to research cobras–their habits, diet, characteristics, and how dangerous they are. I save quite a volume of material in a file that I can refer to while I’m writing. Of course I don’t use it all, but I have it available to pull up when needed.

When I’m working in a fantasy world or on an alien planet, I need to do a lot of world building. I make maps. I work out a system of magic in the case of a fantasy world. For science fiction I look up and work out characteristics of the world determined by the planet’s size, distance from its sun, land masses, oceans, etc. Does it have a moon? Several moons? How does it/do they affect the planet? climate. weather systems. And so on.

For my Arucadi series I have a detailed file on the world and the country. (Someone asked why the world has only one continent. I never said it did. It doesn’t. There are other continents and there are island chains. But Arucadi is, like Australia, a nation that occupies an entire continent and, while it has trade via ship with other lands, it is large enough to be fairly self-sufficient and peaceful.) I had to work out a political system, economics, religion, political divisions: provinces, regions, etc. What is the economy based on? What are the major sources of revenue? What is the monetary system? Educational system? culture? (art, literature, music, etc.) Again, I don’t put all that into one novel or into the series. But I need to have it ready to call on as needed.

And character development. Once I know who the characters are, I want to know all I can about the principal characters. What their background is, what problems they have, what strengths and weaknesses, who their friends are; their enemies. What their home and family life is like. What their level of education is. What their likes and dislikes are. What kind of clothes do they wear? How do they wear their hair? What foods do they eat? And much more. Most importantly, why do they matter?

So this is the other side of the equation. A lot of preparation, a lot of research, a lot of logical thinking that go into constructing the framework for those crazy ideas. If the equation isn’t balanced, the novel won’t work.