Tracy St. John's Blog, page 204

WIP Wednesday - Clans of Kalquor 7: Alien Refuge

Outlining has begun on the seventh(!!!) installment of the Clans of Kalquor series.  Good heavens, did I say the seventh?  Wow.  I never in a million years thought I’d see so many books come from that first one, Alien Embrace.  My thought was there might be ONE sequel to the first book if it did okay in sales.  And yet, the stories keep coming, along with a spinoff series (or two.  Or three.   Stay tuned.).
Anyway, we’re going with a character near and dear to my heart.  Iris is the mother of 6-year old Thomas, who is a high-functioning autistic child.  They live on the Earther farming colony Haven within the Kalquorian Empire, overseen by the Kalquorians.  Earthers are pretty much allowed to do their thing, so long as no one gets hurt.  It’s a benevolent occupation by their old enemy, but we humans don’t like ANY occupation, do we?  So there are issues.
Plus there’s that little complication with Kalquor’s slowly growing rebellion.  Anywhere you find Earthers and Kalquorians in the same place with the potential for interbreeding, there are problems from both races who don't want that to happen.  On Haven, the two sides are coming together for one purpose:  to stop the mixing of the races.
I know, I know.  You want to meet the clan that figures prominently in this little tale, the men that our heroine will come to know.  They’ll have to be pretty amazing guys considering there’s a beautiful  little Earther boy with special needs attached ... and Iris’ supposedly dead, abusive husband who shows up to make things more complicated.
They’re still in development, so I don’t have a clear handle on the men yet.  However, I do have a general feel for them.  First you have Dramok Ospar, the governor of Haven.  Tough, sometimes a little overbearing from what I’ve seen so far, but his heart is definitely in the right place.  He has to do a balancing act that entails keeping the Earthers safe as they get their feet under them, without stepping on any toes.
Nobek Jol is head of Haven security and Ospar’s main bodyguard.  He does step on toes, especially when a child and his mother’s welfare are involved.  He might be a bit overprotective, but he’s a Nobek.  What did you expect?
Imdiko Rivek is a temple priest, devoted to the principles of the Book of Life.  He is also a badass martial arts expert.  Yep, an Imdiko that will hand you your butt if he has to.  It’s Rivek I know least about at this point, but I look forward to getting to know him.
So I’m at the very beginning of the process, with no idea when Alien Refuge will be done.  Maybe April or May?  As always, I will keep you informed.

Tutorial Tuesday - Details, Details

Making your story come to life is a matter of zooming in for close-ups of the little things.  Minute details can go a long way to spicing up a setting or making a character stand out.  The smallest elements loom large when it comes to making your book memorable.

Setting
When it comes to the room a scene takes place in, what makes it stand out?  Say your characters are enjoying a spontaneous romp in a suburban middle-class living room.   What do you furnish it with to paint a picture for your readers?
Think about the furniture that decorates your space.  A tan couch and blue recliner do little to tell us about the tastes of their owners.  Are we looking at grand antiques?  Lovingly restored shabby chic pieces?  Sleek-lined contemporary?  And don’t forget accessories like dead plants, framed circus posters, cheap tourist knick-knacks; pieces that stand out and give us information.
Look at this passage from Alien Conquest in which the chapel’s main focal point differentiates it from what you might think of when you visualize a church:
            Cassidy entered the chapel.  Her grandfather sat on the bench closest to the altar, his bald head gleaming in the soft colors of the stained light glass and altar candles.  She hurried forward.            She knelt before the altar and the mammoth symbol of her religion that hovered behind it.  “The emblem of great religious perversion” one illicit book in her collection claimed.  “The North American bloc’s final insult to the world it has consumed.”            At the center of the icon was a six-pointed star representing the former Jewish faith.  Radiating from it were four bars, the cross of Christianity.  Topping the brushed gold figure was a crescent moon with a five-pointed star perched on its lower tip for Islam.
Characters
It’s not enough that your character has curly blond hair, stands about five and a half feet tall, and wears jeans.  You need details that make this person stand out, especially if it’s a minor character that resembles two or three other characters.  I can’t tell you how many books I’ve read in which a character pops in and out of the story, but I can’t remember who they are.  You need something memorable that will jog the reader’s memory.  Raw bitten nails, chipped black nail polish, a birthmark, scars, a nose hooked like a bald eagle’s beak ... something.
Also take a look at the clothing for a specific style, jewelry, and cologne.  Maybe the character carries a ballpoint pen that leaks ink all over him.  And what does he carry in his pockets?  Change, his dead girlfriend’s picture, ribbed condoms?  
How does your character move?  A shambling limp is distinctive as is someone with ramrod straight posture who takes great strides.   Maybe he shuffles along hunched over as if the weight of the world has been placed upon his shoulders.  
Another useful detail can be nervous habits.  Does the lady in the corner play with her rings or twirl her hair around a finger?  All it takes is one little element to stand out in the reader’s mind to make them take notice of a character.
Take a look at this description of Naya, the heroine from the WIP The Font.  See if this description from the hero’s point of view gives you a mental picture of her, one you will remember throughout the story:
            Taken piece by piece, she was not a beauty.  Her pale blond hair, reaching to her waist, was too flyaway and untamed.  Her eyes, as green as the ubiquitous pine needles of Georgia, were too large, too round to balance her tiny chin.  Her nose was long and straight, and her lips, while well-formed, were thin slashes of pink.  Her body was so willowy as to make her appear taller than she actually was, especially in the sweeping gown she wore tonight, its green skirt that matched her eyes reaching the marble floor.  There was an aloof restraint in her demeanor that suggested she was above the pettiness of the world around her, but gazing at her for only a few seconds told the observer this regal bearing was but a mask she wore.  Beneath it, there was a nervous fluttering of fingers, a jerkiness of the darting eyes that took in everything, and a tension in her stance that spoke of a willingness to take flight.  She was at her heart a wild thing, as untamed as the floating froth of hair that moved with its own life around her torso.            In parts, Naya was not even pretty.  But put together, she was striking, a pale will o’ the wisp that pleased the eye even as it confounded it.  That such a dainty ethereal being gave Heriolf his power over all other vampires made her even more compelling.

Backgrounds
When the action takes place in the great outdoors, think distinctive.  Think about it:  the Great Smoky Mountains look quite different from the Rockies.  The pink sand seashore and blue waters of Eleuthera in the Bahamas is little like the blond beaches and green ocean off North Carolina’s Emerald Isle.
What is the weather doing during this scene?  What sounds and sights are going on?  On a playground there might be a child at the top of the slide too frightened to come down without coaxing.  When I think of Atlantic City in New Jersey I’m reminded of the panhandlers on the boardwalk, especially the one who played a kazoo for money.  Here in southeast Georgia, there’s always a turkey buzzard flying overhead looking for roadkill and porpoises' round silvery backs rolling through the shrimp boats’ wakes. 
I wanted a background that reflected the stiff, unnatural lives of the nuns in Alien Conquest, so I when I created their colony/convent, I went with the vision of manufactured geometric shapes to create a landscape on the moon of Europa:
            Degorsk peered around the depressing compound, wondering why anyone would choose to live in such surroundings.  Suspended lights kept the compound from succumbing to the total darkness of this side of Europa.  They emitted little illumination, but for sensitive Kalquorian eyes, it was more than enough to see by.            Besides the low rectangular building with the pointed spire shooting towards the star-strewn sky, two rows of squat box-shelters each sat in the center of a square of trimmed green grass.  Straight walkways led from building to building, with a main thoroughfare between the double strings of structures.  Like most Kalquorians, Degorsk preferred the natural state of vegetation growing wild, even on terraformed colonies.  This collection of squares, rectangles and straight lines appeared aberrant to his eyes.  He felt if he spent too long looking at it, he’d go crazy.

The Detail that is More than Window Dressing
 While you’re looking for a key detail to set apart a scene, keep in mind that there are certain objects that cannot be used simply to dress up your background.  Weapons such as guns, knives, swords, and the like are never mere elements to give a vibe.  I can’t remember who uttered this memorable quote, but it’s a guide I live by:  “If there’s a gun in the room, at some point in the story it had better go off.”  
Think about in the movie Alienswhen Ripley shows off how she can operate the exoskeleton loader to the hardened Marines.  Later, she uses it to battle the big mama alien.   In the Star Trek:  The Next Generation series, if Worf was handling a batliff at the beginning of the show, you knew he’d be doing battle with it by the end.  
Remember in Alien Rule when Jessica’s clan is touring her around their home and they come to Bevau’s private room?
            “This is my room,” Bevau announced, the door to yet another chamber opening.  Jessica stepped in, marveling at the array of weaponry displayed on the walls.  Everything from crude stone knives to the latest technology of crowd-control guns had its place.  It was a personal armory fit to make any battalion commander jealous.
That's right, a room full of weapons.  Something was coming off those walls to threaten someone at some point:
Pwaldur pulled a long, wicked blade from his belt, and Clajak recognized it from Bevau’s collection, one he himself had given to his Nobek as a clanning present.  The vicious curved knife was serrated in such a way that it would slide easily into a victim and shred the flesh to ribbons on the way back out.  
Weapons don’t show unless they’re going to blow (or shoot or stab).  That’s the rule.
Otherwise, the sky is the limit.  Enjoy bringing out those little aspects to create the right mood or characterization to your story.  It can make all the difference between an okay story and a memorable one.

Six Sentence Sunday - Netherworld: Drop Dead Sexy

Whoa.  My mind reeled as I contemplated the idea of enjoying both men at once.  Okay, maybe I was easy after all.  I’d never considered doing such a thing before … but then I’d never been faced with two gorgeous examples of the opposite sex willing to share before either.  Were there consequences to such actions?  What’s the worst that could happen to a girl who’s already dead?  
Available at Amazon, Amazon UK, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and Smashwords

Something Special Begins October 1

The surprise I’ve been planning for blog readers is only nine days away.  I’m still saving the particulars for that day, but in the meantime, you can meet some new Kalquorians who will be a part of it: I’ve let you have a peek at Dramok Dusa before.  He’s a young man, off his homeworld for the first time as he joins in a rescue mission.
Dusa’s Nobek Esak.  He too is part of the rescue effort.  They have not as yet clanned an Imdiko.
Commander Dramok Nang is in charge of the main site where the Kalquorians are based out of as they go about their important mission.
There’s your little taste of things to come.  Stay tuned!

First Four Friday - Alien Salvation (Clans of Kalquor 4)

Chapter 11
            The rain ended by sunrise, and Lindsey was happy to be on a beach again, away from the fetid smell of the Everglades.  She was a beach bunny through and through.  She wondered if the shores of Kalquor were as nice as Earth’s.            Strong arms embraced her from behind, and Lindsey smiled up at Bacoj.
Available at Amazon, Amazon UK, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and Smashwords

Alien Redemption's Cover Art

Beautiful!!!  Erin at edh graphics outdid herself in my opinion.  She also re-vamped Alien Interludes' cover, which I am currently uploading to the sites where it's for sale.  That will take a few days to kick in.  We have a theme going!  Here's the new look:

WIP Wednesday - Next Month’s Surprise

To Whom It May Concern:
My name is Shalia Elizabeth Monroe, and this is my confession as to my part in bringing about Armageddon.  Two months after the nuclear explosives detonated beneath our major cities, civilization here on Earth has collapsed.  I anticipate I will soon join the millions, perhaps billions, of the dead.  For anyone who is not aware of the truth of what happened, I want to set the record straight.  I am uniquely qualified to do so as I am one of the many people responsible for the loss of life, and perhaps, the loss of Earth itself.
We are done.  Earth is dead.  And I helped put us in this position.  With everything that’s happening now, I will probably be just another body on the pile before long.  You might think it’s just what I deserve.  You’d be right.
All I can say at this point is I am so very sorry.  I really, truly am.  It’s not much, certainly not enough to make up for what I allowed to happen.  Even if I had said something and they’d shut me up before it got to anyone’s ears, at least I could have claimed I tried.  But I didn’t.  To my eternal shame, I didn’t even try.

Beginning October 1

Tutorial Tuesday - Writing in the Men’s Room

Writing from the point of view of the opposite sex can be a bit worrisome.  After all, we know men and women don’t think alike … why else all the real-world relationship drama?  Or all those womens magazine articles that breathlessly ask, What is He Really Thinking About?
Yes, if you’re a woman trying to write from the male perspective or vice versa, you might find yourself floundering a bit.  How do we write the opposite sex’s viewpoint convincingly?  That’s what we’re looking at today.

Yeah, We Are From Different Planets
It may sound a little too simplistic, but do yourself a favor and pick up the bestseller Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus.   My husband and I read this book together, and we were stunned to discover how differently men and women really do think.  There were horrified looks exchanged too many times to count, and exclamations of “That’s what you hear when I say that?”
It’s an eye opener to be sure.  In general, men and women actually see and hear completely different things from each other.  One thing that shocked my husband is how women ‘keep count’.  Because it’s the big things that stand out in a man’s mind, such as fixing a leak in the roof, they’re stunned when their girlfriend/wife sobs in utter despair, “You never do anything around here to help me!”  That’s because we women tend to count everything equally:  laundry, dishes, cooking, vacuuming, dusting, mopping, taking out garbage … along with fixing that leak.  Meanwhile the man is thinking along the lines of, “Okay, I did the big job – fixing the roof.  I’ll take out the garbage, and that makes us even.”
Amazing, isn’t it?
Like any other part of your writing you’re not entirely comfortable with your extent of knowledge of, you should research the opposite sex.  If you’re a woman who wants to write from a man’s perspective, read men’s magazines.   Say your hero is someone who likes to hunt.  You’ll benefit greatly from reading that kind of literature, not only for hunting information in the articles, but from the tone of male authors who write them. 

Men are Specific, Women are General
Something else to keep in mind when writing from the other gender’s perspective:  men speak in specific terms whereas women tend to talk in generalities.
We women like to say words like never, everything, always, everybody.  For example:  “Everyone at work hates me.  I never get any respect from anyone!”
That’s a pretty broad statement, and a man will take it literally that his lady is working in a veritable lion’s den of enemies.  What his beloved actually meant was something along the lines of, “I had a bad day at the office.  I had a disagreement with a couple of co-workers who dismissed my suggestions on a project I’ve worked hard on.  I felt as if I wasn’t being heard and my opinions weren’t important to those who mattered.”
Contrast that with what a man would say should he have faced the same issue:  “I don’t know what’s up with Charlie and Tony.  They ignored the new ideas I proposed on the Whitehall project today.”
See how specific he is on this?  That’s the way men talk.  Which brings up the next point:

Women are Descriptive, Men are to the Point
Men tend to not be very descriptive when they’re speaking.  It’s almost as if they’re talking in bullet points (from the female perspective).  Women, on the other hand, want to paint you a picture.
Take a recent situation that occurred when my husband and I were watching a race.  There was a horrific crash, one in which a driver died.  If you’d asked us to separately describe what we say, it would have sounded something like this:
Me:  What’s so crazy about this is that less than one second before the crash, the TV was showing the view from the driver’s camera, the one who died.  Then the crash started happening with a few cars up ahead.  You could see all the smoke.  They switched to the other camera, which is a blessing considering what happened.  And there was all this smoke and cars hitting each other at high speed, a bunch of flames, then I saw one car fly into the air, and then a second car went flying.  And I was thinking, somebody’s going to die.  I couldn’t tell who was who.  I saw that Danica Patrick just missed being in the middle of it all.  Some of the cars were demolished and on fire.  They were showing the wreckage from all the onboard cameras of the different race cars as they drove past, then we saw an ambulance on the track.  Later we heard who died, and I was like, “Aw man, we were looking from his perspective LESS THAN ONE SECOND before his life was over.”  That was creepy.  And so sad.
Him:  Well, there was a bunch of smoke, then you could see cars hitting each other.  A couple of the cars went airborne.  It was a mess. 
Women embellish.  Men don’t do frills.  When it comes to man-speak, as Joe Friday would say, “Just the facts, ma’am.”

Mr. Fix It
We women vent.  We talk about what’s driving us crazy, what’s not working in our lives, who said something we didn’t like, so on and so forth.  Women tend to share.  A lot.  And all we’re looking for is for someone to listen, nod at the appropriate times, pat us on the shoulder, and say, “Gee, that’s awful.”
But that’s not what men hear when we’re using them for a sounding board or a sympathetic ear.  What men hear from this is, “I’m not happy about something.  Fix it.”   It’s a call to arms, and the man is looking for a way to charge in and save the day. 
Then we women get peeved that the men are tossing unwanted suggestions and advice at us as to how to handle the issue.  We weren’t looking for those men to solve the problem for us; we knew how we were going to handle it all along.  We just wanted them to listen. 
Men don’t understand this a lot of the time, because men don’t tend to talk just for the sake of getting stuff off their chests.  They talk to deliver information, request information, or solve problems.  If a man is telling you he’s got a problem with his mother or co-worker, nine times out of ten he’s asking for your insight and advice.  Not so with women.  We often talk simply to feel close to someone else.

Show Vs. Tell
Men rely on their actions more than words.  Some men don’t feel the necessity of saying things like, “I love you.  You’re important to me.”  Why?  Because they feel they are showing you this by going out and working two jobs to keep food on the table and a roof over your head.  Or by slaying a dragon.  Or by searching the countryside for weeks on end with a glass slipper on hand that fits only you.  Men perform actions to show how much you mean to them.  Seriously, when was the last time you heard one guy say to another, “You’re a great friend, and I treasure your company”?  No, he just buys the next round of beers, comfortable that says it all.
Women tell.  “I love you.  You mean the world to me.  I don’t know what I’d do without you.”  It’s easy for us to emote through our words.  We tend to be more intuitive, more emotive.  We’re encouraged as a gender to talk things out, whereas many males are told as children, “Big boys don’t cry.  Suck it up.”  The trouble with making men shut off overt displays of one emotion is that the rest tend to get shut down too.

Take a Good Close Look
Yes, we’ve been around the opposite sex all of our lives.  But when have you truly observed them?
Take the approach of a social psychologist and watch those of the other gender with an unbiased, critical eye.  Don’t take apart what they’re doing yet (he’s left dirty clothes on the floor again because he’s a slob, she’s changed outfits for the third time trying to get ready for the party because women can never make up their minds).  Just observe.
After you’ve had a look at how the opposite sex acts differently and had time to think it over, then assign analysis to the act.  Does the man leave dirty clothes on the floor despite continuous nagging not to because he’s a ‘typical man slob’ or because he’s acting out against being treated like a child?  Is the woman changing outfits a ridiculous amount of times because she’s the ‘typical woman who can’t make up her mind’ or because she knows her ex and the bitch he dumped her for is going to be at the party and she can’t be seen as anything less than stunning?  People are not simple male/female stereotypes.  They have reasons for what they do.
The biggest question to ask yourself when writing from the opposite gender’s point of view is, what does he/she want most?  And how is that different from what a member of the other sex would want?  Is there a difference based on gender?  Let’s consider a man and a woman in competition for the same promotion.  Do they have the same reasons for wanting to move ahead in their careers?  If not, do you feel their reasons have anything to do with their gender?   Are they hardwired by virtue of their sex to strive for completely different reasons? 

Get a Professional Opinion
The easiest way to know you’ve written your opposite sex’s point of view right is to have a member of that gender read it.  I’ve written from male points of view in the Clans of Kalquor series, and my proofreader for these is a man.  It’s a relief to know I won’t emasculate my aliens, because I have someone keeping an eye on things who knows intimately how men think and act.
Draw on all the sources you can find to keep opposite sex characters believable.  It’s worth the extra work because the different viewpoint will enhance your story and create marvelous tension between your hero and heroine.

Six Sentence Sunday - Alien Slave (Clans of Kalquor 5)

Gelan drew her to a stop.  “This.  You like being restrained?”Dani wanted to crawl into a shadowed corner.  She pretended nonchalance, but knew she wasn’t convincing in the least.  “Yeah, well it can be fun.”
Available at Amazon, Amazon UK, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and Smashwords

Let Me Beat This Dead Horse Some More

They are everywhere.  Articles and blogs debating the Fifty Shades of Grey phenomenon.  And so many start with the same sentence or a variation of it:  ‘I am so tired of articles and blogs about Fifty Shades!  Why won’t it go away?’  And then they proceed to write about it.
Ah, irony.
I have very few opinions about the insanely successful trilogy that has supposedly launched the ‘mommy porn’ era.  For one thing, I haven’t read it.  I’m a sci-fi and horror junkie, and I have little interest in contemporary erotica, even if it does include BDSM.  I’m not a fan of our real world, even the fictionalized versions of it.  (I am allowed to see contemporary fiction as the real world, aren’t I?  Great, now I’ve confused myself.)
Anyway.
Another issue is the price of these books.  I’m cheap.  I’m not spending ten bucks on an ebook that I question I’ll even like.  I won’t spend that much on an ebook from an author I adore.  It makes my butt cheeks clench.
I do pay a lot of attention to what everyone is saying.  After all, these books have brought BDSM into everyday conversation and sparked a boom in the genre’s sales.  I’ve heard the Fifty Shades books are badly written.  That they’re utterly hot.  That they’re pure porn.  That they do not represent the kink community in any way that is remotely accurate.  That BDSM is abusive.
It’s that last bit that gets my attention.  The allegation comes from, among others, authors who may or may not write erotica.  They can’t refrain from weighing in on why Fifty Shades doesn’t deserve the success it has.  I sense much jealousy out there.  Because jealousy is unseemly, it seems that making the ‘abuse’ argument is a valid reason to them to jump all over these books and their author.
Now, I can’t comment on whether or not the relationship depicted in this trilogy is abusive since I haven’t read it.  But to slam the BDSM community as a whole with such a label makes me shake my head.  People who live outside the kink world really have no business saying such things, particularly if you are going to write entire articles about it.  Seems to me you should be doing your research before going on a rant over something you don’t know the first thing about.
First of all, not all kink means whips and physical discipline.  Some people within the community never indulge in such things.  It can be mental domination.  It can be bondage.  It can be a dressing up and playing out a scene.  Seriously.  BDSM does not automatically equal bruises.
Secondly, and I’ve talked about this before, the submissive is the person in ultimate control of the play.  Check out my earlier blog Control Freaks to re-visit this discussion.  The Dom or Master gets to be the power figure because the sub gives him/her permission to be that.  It’s like the joke, “I’m the man of the house because my wife says so.”
Third, in a healthy BDSM encounter, the Dominant is always checking on the sub, especially if physical chastisement is taking place.  Even if the sub has not used their safeword to stop play, the Dom makes sure everything is okay.  There are some subs out there who will not safeword out as a matter of pride, even if they need to.  Responsible Doms know this and take steps accordingly.  And that goes for emotional as well as physical issues.  Just because spanking or whipping might not be involved doesn’t mean a sub can’t be damaged.  Most Dominants take their role very seriously in keeping their subs safe.
Fourth, and this is the biggie, BDSM play involves much more trust and care than the typical vanilla relationship.  After all, the sub is putting their wellbeing in the Master/Mistress’ hands.  Does a victim of abuse trust her abuser?  Absolutely not.  Yet trust is a major factor in kink play.
Does physical and mental abuse take place in BDSM?  Sure, the same way it takes place in vanilla relationships.  Abuse has nothing to do with the kink life anymore than it does with the couple who only have sex on Friday nights with the lights off and in the missionary position.  To assume just because it carries the label BDSM that it is automatically abusive to a woman is pure ignorance. 
I know abuse, physical and emotional, from firsthand experience.  What I do and have done to me in the privacy of my bedroom is not abuse.  It is fun and loving and safe.  I have complete trust and confidence in my partner, not fear.
So you don’t get the kink lifestyle.  Fine.  I don’t get your vanilla lifestyle.  Sex without the intensity and excitement I get from indulging in BDSM is boring to me.  That’s just the way I’m made.  I’ll tell you what:  I’ll respect yours if you’ll respect mine.