The Ending is SO Predictable…

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If there’s one phrase that grates my ears, it’s “The ending was so predictable…”

Actually, if you’ve ever taken a literary theory class in your life, it would be quite obvious that most endings are generally predictable.  The hero wins, the villain loses (or escapes to the sequel), roll end credits.

But why? Well, there are hundreds of books on the topic that explain it.  It’s best summed up by Tom Clancy here: “The difference between fiction and reality? Fiction has to make sense.”  In real life, most of the situations faced by the protagonist have a fail rate greater than that of scripted scenarios.  House would be sued for malpractice if he was a real doctor and most likely lose his license, Temperance Brennan would be twenty years older than the character is portrayed, Sam and Dean would stay dead, etc. and the shows would have to end due to realism.

For all their fussing and finnicking, people don’t want the ending to be “realistic” but optimistic.

Good example: The Prestige

Bad example: Little Black Book

How to Love Your Villain

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villain: (noun) 1. a wicked or malevolent person; 2. (in a novel, play, film, etc) the main evil character and antagonist to the hero

The biggest problem I see in villain descriptions is that the writer obviously hates their villain.  The villain is the bad guy/girl who throws obstacles (among other things) into the way of the hero/heroine and is an all around nasty piece of work.  However, the villain becomes a very flat or ineffective when the writer dislikes the villain.  Not spending enough time developing them often puts a hamper on the story, because the writer hasn’t taken the time to organize and utilize the character.

A good litmus test of how well a story is written circles back to how effective the protagonist is at resolving the major conflict.  Conflict is often (but not always) created by the antagonist, ergo the more creative and challenging the antagonist is, the more creative and challenged the protagonist is.

For example, in a case of bad writing that appears far too often in romances, the villainess hates the heroine for having the hero’s attention.  She appears randomly in the middle of the story, plots to harm the heroine in an insipid, color by numbers method, then her plan fails and she is quickly disposed of and the hero and heroine live happily ever after.  Did you feel cheated by that story?  Probably.  Did the hero and heroine become better characters?  Not really.  It was easier to make the villainess the scapegoat or deus ex machina than having the characters think critically.

So what sets great villains like Iago and Lord Voldemort apart from these kinds of stock characters?  They’re characters we love to hate because they’re so damn brilliant we can’t help liking them or being in awe of what they do.  The writers of these characters took the time to flesh them out, to give them whole personalities and complex motivations.

Harry Potter’s development throughout all seven books is juxtaposed by Lord Voldemort’s own development.  Each book contains a piece of Voldemort’s past and how he has gotten to the point where Harry must fight and defeat him.  Voldemort is part of Harry, they’re linked by that night Harry lived.  By the time Harry has to face him, the readers have a multi-dimensional view of this madman.  The readers are not just invested in Harry’s success, but Voldemort’s failure.  It makes Harry’s challenge greater, thus his story becomes more epic.

Guess what else?  The writer is the villain.  The writer is the person raining fire and brimstone on the protagonist.  The writer is the person who shakes the character out of bed that Monday morning and kills his goldfish in the afternoon when ninjas attack.  The failure of the villain to create conflict is the failure of the writer to create conflict.

So writers, before you start to wish bad things upon your villain, please take the time to get to know them, let the reader get to know them, then feel free to throw them off a cliff into the fiery hellhole.

On Slaughtering Virgins at the Altar of My Boredom

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Last week’s episode of Supernatural featured 22 year old virgins being collected for some sort of demon sacrifice.  The show took the time to poke fun at people at that age who still hadn’t lost it at this day and age.  Hey, sometimes life doesn’t work out quite the way as planned for some folks.  Or maybe it does.

Anyway, there are way too many virgins in modern romance novels.  I’m sick of browsing through that section and the amount of times the word ‘virgin’ tends to come up.  Virginal meek martyr complex for all the girls, playboy arrogant martyr complex for the guys.  It’s enough to make me gag.

Regency novels can get away with it because 1) it was hard for women to be by themselves without a chaperon, 2) not being a virgin could void a marriage contract, 2a) women had next to no rights at this time (they couldn’t own their own money or property), 2b) divorce was messier and more taboo back then, 2c) society was more family based and it would be dishonor on the family involved.

That’s not what’s going on today.  Women have equal rights to men, they’re independent and they’re not wrapped up in saving themselves for just one guy.  There are still people who don’t lose it until they’re married, but for a majority of the population that isn’t true.  So why are there so many virgins still running around in print?  Maybe it’s the ones who don’t get laid that write (kind of like how drinking to escape problems creates problems, thus more drinking)?  Nope, I’ve read some of the author bios and a majority of them are mothers and wives.  What gives?

Not to hate on virgins, but they are horrible at sex.  Sex scenes with virgins are awful because the manwhore they’ve decided to give it up to has to be gentle.  Virgins are also a pain in the ass because they don’t know what they want sexually yet miraculously know how to get every position right on the first try.  Also, for some reason virgins are extra fertile? Right…

Making the modern heroine a virgin is frustrating because it makes the character stupidly naive and non-assertive, a strategic disadvantage for the guy to take advantage of.  Why is it so wrong for women to have a sexual history and experience?  Women can be just as experienced and knowledgeable when it comes to what they want out of love and sex.  Well, only the publishers can answer that one.

Mary Wollstonecraft hated romance novels because she felt that it made women think that having someone taking care of them, and that was back in the 1700s.  It would be expecting too much that the virgin/whore complex could fade even after the sexual revolution.

And with that I leave another book recommendation, Miranda Neville’s The Dangerous Viscount, a Regency novel where the hero is the virgin and the heroine has to show him the ropes.  The other book is Twice Tempted by a Rogue by Tessa Dare, where the widow didn’t live chastely ever after when her husband died, wasn’t afraid to proposition the hero for sex sans relationship, and was a truly independent character.

The ABC’s of Naming

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Naming characters can be a pretty grueling process.  Or for some folks, the names jump out at them.  Either way, please for the love of God don’t use too many names that are too similar or all start with the same letter.  It makes reading more difficult for the reader because in print, the words start blurring together.

For example, in Lynsay Sands’ novel Bliss (which inspired this post), the hero is Hethe, Lord of Holden aka “The Hammer” (it really takes an effort not to hear Wrestlemania when I see that name). Our  heroine is Helen.  They are ordered by King Henry to marry to stop their quarreling.  Adding to the melee is Helen’s Aunt Nell, whom she is named after.  Looking at the names repeat over and over again gave me a headache, and while I liked the story I felt like I had to put in extra effort to keep the characters straight.

On paper, they look like the same person.  It’s hard to tell them apart because of the way people read:

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Indoor Voices Please

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One of the worst ways to start a story is by opening with characters screaming and yelling at each other in the dialog.

It’s grating to start a story in the middle of an argument, and it’s jarring to open in a war zone of words.  Imagine walking into building for the first time, and having someone shouting angrily.  You wouldn’t want to be there, would you?  Opening with a whining or screaming dialog is basically greeting the reader in the same way.

If there are exclamation points and capitalized words in the first paragraph, you’re doing something wrong.

The Wrong Kali

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I’m a quarter of the way through American Gods and Kali has made her appearance.  Out of all the deities in the Hindu pantheon, Western writers are most fixated on Kali.  She’s made appearances in Christopher Pike’s The Last Vampire series and on Supernatural that were far more prominent than any other god.  My family is Hindu, so I make mental notes of every time Western culture makes a reference to the religion.  (When you’re in a small minority, it’s nice to feel “acknowledged” by the majority.)

For every appearance Kali has made in Western entertainment, her portrayal is always wrong in some crucial way.  In The Last Vampire, the narrator thought Kali was evil, which was something no  Hindu would make an error on.  It’s like a Christian calling St. Paul an evil demon.  Kali does get demonized in a really bad way in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (of course that movie was all kinds of wrong about “Hinduism” to begin with).  In Supernatural, she’s made into this sort of stupid waify creature (but bear in mind all the gods were screwed in that episode) and considering the context of the episode, Durga would have been a much much better deity to go with.  Kali would also be a much more decisive and Gordon-like character.  In American Gods, it’s made to sound like she’s not worshiped anymore which I find hard to believe since Navaratri (which celebrates the nine major female deities) was just two weeks ago, there are temples and sects still devoted to her, and every so often someone mentions a blood sacrifice made in her name.  Plus she made the cover of the temple’s monthly newsletter…  So why would anyone say she’s forgotten?  She’s as popular as she ever was.  Perhaps it’s that Western culture thinks because it sees her so much that the West thinks Hindus have forgotten?

I’m not exactly sure why Westerners find Kali the most fascinating, but it’s probably because she’s the dark side of “goodness.”  The hard decisions, the cold and calculating dark actions we make to preserve goodness.  The goddess images are also graphic and bewildering.  She doesn’t come up very often in Hindu functions I’ve been to compared to Lakshmi, Saraswati or Durga, but no one ever skimps on her offerings when they come up.  She’s also not a common idol found in people’s houses either.  So for Hindus, it’s a little odd to see her come up so much in Western culture, more than Shiva, Ganesh or Durga.

The West chose Kali as the representative for Hindu culture, but then still doesn’t quite understand her or the role she plays.  She’s not forgotten or neglected, but rather an extreme that people don’t always want to face.   (Moral ambiguity is a never-ending source of fun for Hindu philosophy.)  Kali is an awesome goddess by all means, but I’m waiting for the day when Western culture will get right what her role is…

How You Know You’re Reading a Cliche Romance

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I’ve started noticing rather mundane patterns in  romances.  Overall, I like the quality of historical romance stories because they actually have decent plots, but after reading a couple I’ve noticed some things.  They follow the same plot line.

1) The cover is always way more salacious than the actual content of the story based on sexual content.

2) The heroine is usually some kind of redhead (auburn, strawberry blonde, orange flames).  The hero is tall, dark and handsome.

3) Her Prince Charming is an off-kilter high-ranking nobleman (frequently a duke, earl or viscount) who doesn’t like being a duke/earl/viscount and resents “society.”

4) Heroine is tomboyish, constantly getting into mischief and resents the role of being a lady.  Yet somehow she is fine with the role when she accepts to marry the hero.  She is also often an orphan or orphan-esque and acts childish for someone often over the age of twenty.

5) The heroine and her hero meet when he catches her at some type of criminal act or mischief.

6) Somehow hero and heroine don’t know each other, but they’re all over each other before exchanging names.

7) Hero and heroine get caught in a compromising situation due to trying to cover for heroine’s criminal activities, and to preserve her reputation the hero ends up telling people that they’re engaged.

8) Heroine gets into more mischief with something to do with political intrigue or property rights.

9) Hero moons over heroine and ways he will keep her safe and bed her, the conflicting notions make him crazy.  This results in several steamy make-out sessions and/or they just screw each other’s brains out.

10) Heroine tries to prove that she doesn’t need hero and does something stupid.

11) Hero steps in and saves the day, but we pretend the heroine did most of it on her own.

12) Epilogue explaining happily ever after.

Dancing at Midnight

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Princess of the Midnight Ball by Jessica Day George

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a huge sucker for fairytale/myth retellings.  Someone online mentioned wanting to read a good version of The Twelve Dancing Princesses a couple of months ago, and to my surprise I stumbled across one.

Jessica Day George’s novel Princess of the Midnight Ball has to be the best retelling of this story I’ve ever encountered.  Of course, it is from Bloomsbury so there’s little surprise about the quality of their fantasy books.  I am usually not easily impressed by books, and I hadn’t planned on reading it until I accidentally glanced at the first page and was hooked in.

The story follows Galen, a young man who returns from war to work at the palace gardens where the princesses mysteriously have their shoes worn away night after night.  The plot thickens when Galen finds himself enchanted by the eldest sister Rose and he becomes determined to discover their secret.  George uses all of the stereotypical fairytale cliches like the invisible cloak, the evil magician, damsels in distress and the like, but she also creates a very realistic and fantastic world for them to play in.  The novel does jump the borders between mundane and epic at different points.  I would have preferred a little more emotion from the characters and for them to be a little more fleshy, but otherwise, it was a definitely worthwhile read.

The pacing was well done.  So often I’ve read novels with the reveals being dragged out, but this story opens itself up.  Rose and Galen are sharp and tragically woven characters though bland at times.  The great problem of The Twelve Dancing Princesses is that there is a large balancing act with so many characters.  I know because as a teen I’d write far too many characters and a simple scene can get complicated when you have to count if you’ve left someone out of too many conversations.  Overall, I have to say I enjoyed the ride.

Kindle PC and other ways to ruin my story experience

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I know, it’s been almost a month since my last update.  Time flies when you forget about your blog.  Also the weather’s been great so I’ve gotten more sociable.

Anyway about a week or so ago, I broke and got Kindle for my laptop just so I could collect book freebies.  Don’t look at me like that, I go to the library for most of my book needs and I’m an author myself (shut up, I’ll finish a manuscript one of these days).  I was super-excited to see a book on my to-read list (it’s Melissa Marr’s novel Wicked Lovely) was up for grabs today.

As I scroll through the freebies, I can’t help but reading the reviews.  Except I’ve found that reviews don’t correlate to how much I like the book, and I miss the days when I’d just browse through the shelves and not worry about the book’s larger success.  I know it helps to screen books for poor content, but I’ve read quite a few books that had great reviews on Amazon that in real life I’d give only two or three stars to.

So far, I feel like I’ve got better instincts with books in reality.  I also get too caught up in reading reviews that in the end aren’t helpful with me choosing and enjoying a book.  I miss the days of just browsing then figuring out for myself if I liked it.  It also makes guilty pleasure books ten times harder to read because it’s completely in your face that most people think the book isn’t worth their time.  Also, if a friend were to browse through my Kindle application, trashy reads would remain there for pretty much forever for everyone to see and I’m old fashioned about privacy.  It’s kind of like eating an entire large carton of mint chocolate chip ice cream then leaving the container on your desk forever for everyone to see and comment on.

I guess I’m still old school when it comes to reading.  Digital stuff is good for long train rides, but I still prefer the library for the best free reads around.  Of course, my high school teacher once told me that I grew up with a good public library system (technically, I have cards with all three in the five boroughs), if we were in the ‘burbs or boonies, then the reading selection would look more like a drugstore’s.  My mom says Americans rush too much and have little time and respect to appreciate the things around them.  I think that’s being driven home by the growing number of people who don’t think reading is worth their time anymore because it gets in the way of “multi-tasking.”

Some days I feel too utilitarian for my own good.

Leave the wand, take the road less traveled…

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The Fairy Godmother by Mercedes Lackey

I stumbled across Mercedes Lackey’s The Fairy Godmother after drafting my own story about a fairy godmother (I’ve been on a side-character to main character kick lately, I’ve also got a story about a bartender in a band).  Curious to see how someone else had handled putting the fairy godmother as the main character rather than the deus ex machina, I picked it up (also to make sure I wasn’t trying to write a story that had already been written).  The reviews on Amazon were enticing too, especially since I can’t stay away from revisionist fairytales.  I’m not sure why, but I’ve come to find that Amazon reviews can be even less useful than the summary on the cover of the book.

The novel follows the trials and tribulations of Elena, a girl who was supposed to be a Cinderella archetype but the story goes awry in the hands of the Tradition, the deus ex machina of the story.  So Elena becomes a fairy godmother instead.  The ideas for a great story were waiting to be woven into a new kind of fairytale.  And every good fairytale needs a good knight in shining armor, this time played by the arrogant Alexander of Kohlstania.

There’s an old adage that goes ‘show, don’t tell.’  One of the 1 star reviewers pointed this out and I think that best sums up the whole failure of this novel.  The narrative constantly tells us what happens in a Reader’s Digest/Cliff Notes style and doesn’t display anything for the reader to figure out on her own.  There is no ‘aha!’ moment anywhere in the story.  Lackey explains how the magical world works, then has it working in favor of whatever Elena needs to do in a less than clever way.

Elena’s growth into the role of fairy godmother loses it’s edge and depth because it is told rather than shown.  The reader is told that she learns from the books in the library all she needs to know from fairy godmothers past.  It was hard to invest in such a two-dimensional character, she just cries about being unable to have sex and that is the extent of her emotional range.  Her relationships with the other characters aren’t developed, she doesn’t think much on the death of her father, the abuse of her stepmother and stepsisters, or Madame Bella; she’s just passive-aggressive in a scene where she’s not just taking up space in the room.  Alexander has a bit more depth because he has to “redeem” himself for being an ass and has some feelings for his younger brother who people think is queer because he’s not callous like his older brothers (spoiler alert: he’s just a flake who’s soft-hearted).

While there were interesting twists on the fairytale world they’re living in, it was more like the story was trying to turn every tale on its head for the sake of, rather than having a set point.  Also, in a post-Shrek (Shrek 2 and Shrek the Third) world, many of these twists become trite in their efforts.  Especially when too many get mentioned.  Instead of streamlining the story and focusing on Elena and Alexander, the narrative gets too caught up in discussing elements of the world they’re in and goes to lengthy explanations for side plots while failing to genuinely develop Elena or Alexander.  If there was anything remotely mysterious, you could count on someone popping in with a paragraph long explanation before the characters could even think about it.

The action scenes requisite for the fairytale genre were also deeply watered down.  Instead of combat, we get Elena slipping past the enemy with no trips or slips whatsoever.  The grand fight scene with the big bad Sorcerer is not shown until the final strike, so there was no pay off there either.  Once again, telling not showing ruined what could have been an impressive scene.

The epilogue was absolutely pointless as well.  It covered characters briefly mentioned (who were also awful rip-offs of Ever After characters) and it made it seem like everything wraps up nicely even though the narrative spent the whole time saying ‘but it doesn’t always end neatly,’ the entire novel is a contradiction of happy endings for every tale involved.

Overall the story had the potential for a wonderful revisionist tale, but instead became a huge ‘Reader’s Digest of the Five Kingdoms and Beyond.’   I was disappointed while reading it, even though I found it to be helpful in pushing my own story forward (not in a plagiarizing way, the plots are quite different much to my relief).  It serves as a good reminder that while background information is nice, it shouldn’t be the backbone of the story.  That’s the plot’s job and while it was clever and interesting from the few glimpses I got from it, it really needed to be developed fully rather than taking a backseat to explanations and anecdotes.  However, since many of the bad reviews cite that this isn’t up to Lackey’s standard (her mentor was Marion Zimmer Bradley), and I’ve heard good things about her other books, I’m willing to give her other books a shot before blacklisting her from my reading list.