R.M. Archer's Blog, page 53

Book Review: Falling Kingdoms by Morgan Rhodes

This book looked pretty cool when I got it. I mean, it’s high fantasy. I had yet to read a high fantasy that I was particularly disappointed by. Plus, it’s a high fantasy with political intrigue and three countries going to war. Now where have I heard that before… I thought it could be a good research book for The Dark War Trilogy, considering the idea was somewhat the same, and I might glean some insight from it.

Skip forward to me, sitting in the dentist’s office waiting room, beginning to read the book, skimming over paragraphs of irrelevant backstory and info-dumping. (It actually inspired me to write a whole post on how to avoid info-dumping.)  However, up to this point the characters have potential, and if you’ve been around for a little while you’ll know that characters are what I look at most in any story. If I don’t like the characters, your book is sunk. But for now they didn’t look too bad.

But once you get 37% through the book, the shallow romances are dominating and detracting from the plot. Shallow romances are something I absolutely despise in books and the one thing I can’t escape in pretty much any book I read. But at least in most of them they’re executed well and start to be less shallow. These just stayed shallow and underdeveloped. One jumped from level one (the other person’s hot but we won’t admit we have a crush on them) to level eight (oh my gosh I’m so “in love” with him! Let’s get Daddy to make him a knight so that I can marry him because I’m a spoiled brat who always gets my way and we “love” each other so much) after what felt like maybe a week of really knowing each other. (There was probably an additional week of them knowing each other, but they weren’t even in the same part of the country for that.) (This book also inspired me to write a whole post on the importance of good romances in literature.)

And that’s just one of the romances. The other was much better executed, but morally wrong (a guy in love with his sister, even though you know they’re not actually blood-related), and after a point you just say “Why did you do that and how are you such an idiot.” Well basically none of the characters in this book seem to have brains, so I guess that answers that question.

The worldbuilding was also shallow. Not unbearably so, simply enough to be underwhelming. (I actually described the whole book to my orthodontist as “underwhelming.”)

By the end of the book none of the characters had developed much in depth or arc, and there was only one that I would have not wanted to die (and he could do a LOT better than the ditzy princess he was pining after). The rest I was all apathetic toward and didn’t care whether they lived or died. Neither the protagonists nor the antagonists were compelling, and the one character I liked was a side character who didn’t get enough attention even when he was the only character with his country’s protagonist.

All of the character’s voices (aside from that of the one character I liked, at times) sounded the same, to the extent that it was sometimes difficult to figure out who was talking in a one-on-one conversation with well-spaced tags. The kings, in particular, were hard to tell apart and felt like copies of each other. Out of them, only the chief was remotely unique, and even he not in dialogue.

All that said, Rhodes did well developing her courts (something I stink at). She has lords who actually have bearing on the kingdom, confidantes and companions for her royal figures, maids and servants who have roles instead of being faceless, guards who do things, etc. (Although I can’t say the guard was very good if the princess was able to give him the slip so repeatedly.)

And despite everything, there was something that kept me interested and let me enjoy the book just a little bit. I wish I could identify what it was. Maybe it was the plot (I doubt it, since it seemed pretty flat, but it was the one thing I didn’t expressly dislike), maybe it was just the hope that the characters would get better, the relationships would develop into something enjoyable, the world would be fleshed out more… I don’t know. Whatever the something was, it allowed me to give this book two stars instead of one.

Overall, I’m wishing my dad hadn’t spent ten dollars on this book.

Character Interview: Lucienne Crain

Lucienne is a good friend of both Nissa and Detren, and one of the main side characters of The Shadow Raven. She’s also one of my personal favorites in the trilogy. She’s able to keep a level head even when Detren and Nissa are both declining, and help them through it, and I suppose she’s sort of a wise mentor character. I hope you enjoy her interview. :)

Lucienne: *comes in and sits, legs crossed*

Interviewer: Hello, Miss Crain.

Lucienne: *nods a bit* Hello.

Interviewer: How are you today?

Lucienne: *shrugs* Fair enough.

Interviewer: Let’s start with an easy question. How old are you?

Lucienne: Twenty-six.

Interviewer: Do you have any siblings?

Lucienne: *shakes head*

Interviewer: What is your job?

Lucienne: I’m captain of the infantry in Roenor’s army. I’m also on the royal council.

Interviewer: How did you get that job so young?

Lucienne: I proved myself in the academy.

Interviewer: It must have been difficult to outdo everyone else there.

Lucienne: It was, but I was rather fueled by rage and the need to do something worthwhile at the time.

Interviewer: Why is that?

Lucienne: It’s a long story that I’d rather not go into just now.

Interviewer: Of course. *glances at his script* Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

Lucienne: Introvert.

Interviewer: What is your favorite food?

Lucienne: Plum pie.

Interviewer: Favorite color?

Lucienne: Purple. Which is rather problematic, considering I’m not royalty.

Interviewer: Why is that?

Lucienne: Only royalty is allowed to wear purple – because the dye is rare – except on Linhalla, which I don’t celebrate.

Interviewer: What is Linhalla?

Lucienne: It’s the Lankadian celebration of the rulers of their gods, Kaysar and Rane. Since I’m an Abban, I don’t celebrate it.

Interviewer: *nods* Interesting. What is your favorite book?

Lucienne: Rebel Cause. It’s widely popular in Roenor, and you may have heard of Soldiers of the East?

Interviewer: *nods* Several times, in fact.

Lucienne: The two take place in the same universe. The whole series is incredibly well-known.

Interviewer: I’ll have to read those sometime. I’ve heard of them at least three times now. What genre are they?

Lucienne: Fantasy. They take place in a desert, where magic is real and unfettered. They’re quite fascinating. The author is Mandorian, so I think he drew from the idea of magic that existed there before the Faerie War. It’s a long story that I won’t get into, but it’s fun to read about. *smiles*

Interviewer: I’ll definitely have to look into that. Thank you. Um… *looks at his script again* What is your favorite animal?

Lucienne: I like all of them, really, but probably cats if I had to pick.

Interviewer: What are your hobbies, aside from reading?

Lucienne: Singing, playing piano, horseback riding, playing chess, and perusing the Anador Museum.

Interviewer: A fan of history, I gather.

Lucienne: *nods* All history. Roenor’s, Mandoria’s, Kaloris’… Even Adrelia’s, to some extent.

Interviewer: Adrelia isn’t one I hear talked about often, though I know it exists. Why is that?

Lucienne: Adrelia is much smaller than the others, for one thing. For another thing, it mostly keeps to itself. The Adrelian’s try to stay away from us aside from trade, and they refuse to make any sort of progress technologically. They hold fast to their traditions.

Interviewer: Interesting. I suppose they’re likely rather boring to study, then.

Lucienne: Beyond a point, yes. But it’s interesting to see how those traditions developed and that sort of thing.

Interviewer: *looks at the script* All right, we’re nearing the end. Which of the following is most important to you: Kindness, intelligence, or bravery?

Lucienne: Bravery. Without it, the other two are fairly useless.

Interviewer: And honesty or selflessness?

Lucienne: Honesty. It lends itself to selflessness.

Interviewer: Last question: What is something you can’t leave home without?

Lucienne: A gold bracelet that King Alleyn gave me. We developed something of a brother-sister relationship when I came to the castle, and I always think of him when I see it. *smiles faintly, pain in her eyes*

Interviewer: I’m sorry for your loss.

Lucienne: *nods a bit*

Interviewer: *takes a breath* That was the last question. Thank you for your time.

Lucienne: *nods, rising, and shakes the interviewer’s hand* You’re welcome. I enjoyed it. *smiles a bit before leaving*

Why the Literary World Needs Better Romances (And How to Write Them)

Romance is a large feature in the majority of books (at least above middle-grade level). It’s nearly impossible to find a book without at least one romance in it, and almost as hard to find a book with a good romance in it. The romances found in most books today are shallow, based almost entirely on physical attraction, and often have little basis in a prior platonic relationship. This is not a good kind of relationship to be praising and providing examples of. Real relationships require much more than physical attraction to survive, and relationships based only on physical attraction are not love, no matter what the media may say. We need to write more books with real, deep relationships – particularly in the YA category, where the readers are those who are most pressured to be in relationships and most likely to take their cues from the media – so that there is something in literature that provides a good, healthy example of what a romantic relationship should look like.

I will be the first to admit that I don’t always do the most amazing job of writing good romances. We’re steeped in a culture that prizes beauty and physical displays of affection over character and selflessness. When we’re reading books that have these bad romances in them, it’s easy to write our own relationships more shallow than we might intend because it’s what we see displayed, giving more evidence that something needs to be done about the romances in literature. It’s hard to push against the current and not be swept away.

So what does a good relationship look like? They say write what you know, and I’ll tell you now that I don’t know a lot about relationships firsthand. I’ve never been in a romantic relationship, so my knowledge here comes from my own experience with crushes and what I’ve seen demonstrated by my parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, etc. in their relationships. Proceed or ignore the rest of this post as you will, having that information.

Physical Attraction Does Not Mean Love

Physical attraction, so lauded as “true love” in mainstream media today, has nothing to do with love. If you find a person attractive, you may want to be with them, but that doesn’t mean you should be with them. Often they’re physically attractive but they don’t share your religious beliefs, they don’t like you back (woe of woes!), they’re just plain jerks, or there’s something else that just doesn’t make you a good match. And even if you do match in personality, values, etc., that still doesn’t mean you’re automatically “in love.” What the mainstream media calls love, the Greek word Eros, is just a feeling, an emotion, a surface-level thing. Love, the Greek word Agape, is an action. Love is something you choose. A romantic relationship likely will begin with some sort of physical attraction, yes, but real love is something that has to be worked at.

Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth;  bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. – 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

Patience, kindness, humility, politeness… These things don’t just happen. They’re worked at. They’re disciplined. Love is something you do, not something that happens to you. It’s active, not passive. And sometimes it’s a huge pain in the neck. Sometimes that person you’re loving is the most stubborn human being on the planet and will not hear what you’re saying. It takes a massive amount of self-control to be patient and kind in those situations, and we’re not perfect. We’re not going to be able to be patient and kind all the time like we should. We’re fallen humans. Which is why it takes work and love is an action. If we were perfect, true love would be a piece of cake.

Know the difference between love and attraction and glorify relationships accordingly. Yes, it’s okay for your characters to not understand the difference, but make sure that you’re not glorifying the shallow relationship and indicating to your readers that that’s right and good. Glorify the true loves, the relationships that are worked at and maintained through the hard times.

Physical Attraction Isn’t Even Always the First Step

Physical attraction is often the first thing that makes us want somebody for a romantic partner, but it’s not always the first thing we notice. Sometimes we don’t even think someone is particularly beautiful or handsome until we’ve known them for a while and suddenly realize, “Wow, how did I not notice how beautiful you are until now?” Because the people that we enjoy being around and think are wonderful in other ways gradually begin to seem more physically beautiful as well. It’s weird how that works. So while some people may seem physically attractive right off the bat, it’s quite possible for your character to be drawn to a good friend, and that relationship is likely the better one.

Start With Friendship

A romantic relationship needs a good foundation, and the best foundation for that is friendship. A serious romantic partner needs to be someone the character can trust and feel safe with, not just someone they like to look at and kiss. If the character doesn’t trust their significant other, the relationship isn’t realistically going to last. Friends trust each other, and melding that with the above point that those we like as people become more physically attractive to us means that your character will quite likely want to begin a romantic relationship with a friend.

If your character is particularly wise and sees someone they find physically attractive, or gets to know from a distance and grows to find attractive, they’re likely to want to become friends with that person so that a potential romantic relationship can be based on friendship and trust. And even if it doesn’t turn into something romantic, they’ve still gained a good friend.

The Importance to Writers of Writing Good Relationships

I talked at the beginning of this post about how it benefits readers for us writers to be writing good romances, but what about how it benefits us? Personally, it’s hard for me to write a book without a single romantic relationship. Part of this is because I’m something of a hopeless romantic when it comes to characters, but a lot of it is simply because of the culture we live in and the fact that romances are so praised and promoted. It’s easy, having read so many novels that show examples of bad romances – or at least not optimal romances – to fall into writing less-than-stellar romances myself. It’s easy to not think about it and simply see that two characters have chemistry and begin “shipping” them. Goodness knows how many times I’ve done this.

But this is dangerous to our minds. It’s reinforcing even more the idea of these shallow romances, these romances that aren’t selfless and aren’t sacrificial like Agape. It affects not only what we’re putting into our stories, but also how we act in real life.

As I’ve started taking certain crushes more seriously, actually considering whether or not the guys I’m attracted to would be suitable for me to marry, I’ve realized that I don’t know how to love properly. I have trouble being okay with the fact that my friends sometimes don’t have time for me. I have trouble not obsessing over the guys I like and thinking about hanging out with them. You might think that because it’s not anything specifically romantic most of the time it’s harmless, but it’s not; I’m still thinking only about myself and how being with them would make me happy.  I don’t think about their happiness, I think about mine, and that’s not what Agape is. That’s what Eros is, or possibly Ludus (playful love). There is nothing of Agape – true, selfless love – in that.

As I read and watch movies I find one of the first things I think about is which characters are going to end up together. I start “shipping” them right off the bat, and I’m disappointed when the characters I think fit perfectly don’t get together. I’m frustrated when the girl picks this guy over that guy.

I even find myself, on rare occasions, “shipping” real people and having to force myself not to. It’s bad enough when it’s the first thing I think about with fictional characters, but with real people? It’s a terrible habit, and it’s hard to break when you’re reading, watching, and writing lukewarm romances.

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy–meditate on these things – Philippians 4:8

When we write these things, we’re meditating on them. We’re reinforcing them in our minds. We’re dwelling on them for as long as it takes to write the book, and then into the many levels of editing. This can take years. Is what you’re writing something you want to be reminding yourself of and reinforcing for years? Is it portrayed in such a way that you’ll be inclined to think it good and right or is it portrayed in such a way that the character is obviously in the wrong, if you do have a lukewarm romance?

A member of one of the writing groups I’m part of, in response to a post about what we take in affecting us and who we are – be it books, movies, conversations, music – said,

That which we ingest we may remember or forget, but that which we put forth is forever a part of us.

This is definitely something we need to keep in mind as authors. We need to be mindful, for the sake of our readers and the sake of ourselves, to put forth what is edifying.

Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. – Ephesians 2:29

To reiterate, I do not mean to say that you should never have a lukewarm or even harmful romance in your book, we should all simply be aware of how we’re portraying them and what we’re promoting.

I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments. (Even more than usual.) Do you agree with my assessment, or do you think looser definitions of “good romance” are acceptable? Do you think I missed any points? Is writing good romance something you struggle with, like me, or is it something you find easy?

Farewell to February

February’s Failed Goals

Let’s get the bad out of the way up front. I intended this month to publish both This Is His Story and The Mirror-Hunter Chronicles. Obviously neither happened, one of which wasn’t really my fault, and I’m sorry. I still intend to publish The Mirror-Hunter Chronicles, but I have to, um, finish them first. I’m working on story 4/6, but it’s going a little bit slowly. After #3 I didn’t have a whole lot of concrete ideas, so now it’s a lot more making it up as I go, which is fun but a little slower. (I’ve definitely fallen out of my place in the pantser camp that I so adamantly remained in until last year.)

In smaller goals, I also failed to finish reading The Hobbit (I have about twelve and a half chapters left) and finish The Last Assassin. Why is finishing my novel considered a “smaller goal,” you ask? Because while I didn’t finish it, I got it to a point where I couldn’t continue without writing the other two books to the same point and started working on The Shadow Raven to work toward finishing.

February’s Writing

As mentioned above, I got to a stopping point in TLA and started working on TSR some more. That was on the 10th, and after that… I didn’t get a whole lot done. When I was planning and beginning my writing, TSR was my favorite, but now that I’ve gotten a good ways in and Nissa’s following her arc and all that I’m finding that it’s a lot harder to write than I imagined it would be. Actually, I’ve had this issue since I really worked on it in November. At this point I need to figure out what my antagonist is doing, outline some more, and figure out what these people like to do in their spare time.

With TLA it was easy for me to just write, developing as I went, and everything was developed and outlined sufficiently from the get-go. I did the exact same amount of development for TSR, but it needs more and I’m having to stop and figure stuff out again. It’s interesting to me how the writing process can change so much from one book to another, even within a series like this.

Lately I’ve been working on worldbuilding for my old story universe overhaul, my sci-fi/dystopian country Concordia, and my desert fantasy area Kersir as a means of procrastinating on TSR, which is fun and a bit daunting, lol. Worldbuilding is a lot of work. It’s totally worth it, but it takes a lot of time and effort.

But of course early this month I did publish my first book, my Short Story Collection Vol. 1. It contains four of my short stories: Lost Girl (along with an extended ending), Escape Room, The Paladins (a prequel to The King’s Paladin), and Silence. Lost Girl and The Paladins are both fantasy, while Escape Room and Silence are more sci-fi. The collection is available in paperback for $8.99 and I hope to make it available on Kindle soon, as well.

Overall I’ve written about 34.5k this month.

February’s Reading

I actually read stuff last month! It’s really good to be reading again. I finished The Forbidden Library by Django Wexler and Masters & Slayers by Bryan Davis; read As You Wish by Cary Elwes, The Girl Who Could See by Kara Swanson, and Colors of Fear by Hannah Heath; and I began reading Falling Kingdoms by Morgan Rhodes (which inspired my post on info-dumping). Overall my reading last month was really good, and I’m looking forward to staying in the habit, lol.

 

What have you been up to in the past month? Have you read any good books? Gotten any writing done?

How To Avoid the Dreaded Infodump

I was going to post a worldbuilding resource roundup today, but that was going to take too long and I was inspired to write this post last night, so here’s this instead. (The worlbuilding resource roundup will be coming later, I promise.)

Everyone hates info-dumping, right? We don’t want to know all of the characters’ motives right from the get-go, and we don’t want to read a paragraph as soon as a character’s introduced about who their parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles are and how they all died. That just doesn’t make an interesting read. But how do you avoid doing this to your readers?

Ask the question: Is this necessary?

Does how the main character’s parents and grandparents died have bearing on the current plot? If the answer is yes, you’ll probably want to keep it in the wings to be placed in at a convenient time; we still don’t want to read it as soon as the character’s introduced, sorry.

If the answer is no, it’s just some cool backstory that you wanted to share, keep it to yourself. If you absolutely can’t help yourself and have to share it with the reader, make it a prequel short story or put a family tree in the back of the book. Don’t interrupt the reader’s flow with information that’s useless to the book in the story itself.

Weave it in

Be creative. You’re a writer, it’s your job to be creative, so come up with a new way to portray information instead of just giving us a thick paragraph of information on the world and characters. That king is cruel and heartless and hates his son? Don’t tell us that, show him yelling at his son when the son’s done nothing wrong, or show him oppressing the peasants. Action is way more interesting than exposition, and it makes a much larger impact on the reader if they see the king being cruel than if you just tell them he’s cruel. We readers are smart and we like forming our own opinions of things.

Worldbuilding is a little tougher. For one thing, you’ve developed this whole intricate world and all its inner workings and you want to show it off! See point one and resist the urge. If you absolutely have to share it, put it on a blog or something and let the readers who are interested look it up themselves, maybe mention in the back of the book that it’s available there and leave those readers who just want to read the story without the marsh of worldbuilding.

What worldbuilding is necessary should be shown as it’s needed, the same as all other information, or woven in unobtrusively so that instead of a blaring sign in the reader’s face it’s a delightful little treat that they can latch onto. Colors of Fear* by Hannah Heath does this beautifully with the memory scars of the elves. Little details woven in carefully, mentioned fairly quickly and in context, will make your world seem ten times deeper, I can almost guarantee it.

*review link

I’m realizing that while I gave a fairly concrete example with character, I’ve failed to do so with worldbuilding. Let’s fix that. As an example… My country Parenna. I’m going to start with the subtle things and see if I effectively convey them before revealing the big obvious thing. A character from somewhere other than Parenna might say:

As I look around I feel under-dressed; my linen tunic and leather pants pale in comparison to the silk and jewels that adorn the Parennans bartering in the marketplace. Even those in simpler clothes are still studded with glittering earrings and rings that catch and reflect the sunlight, throwing rainbows across the entire square.

Later, if they’re traveling to the castle as an ambassador of some sort, they might continue:

As I walk my gaze falls from the paintings on the wall to study the floor beneath my feet. The marble is inset with diamonds of various colors, polished to be even with the slabs around them.

My gaze rises again when a giant set of doors opens in front of me and I step into the throne room. King Julen wears more rings than anyone else I’ve seen – which is saying something – and his crown is overcrowded with diamonds and rubies.

Parenna happens to be nicknamed The Jewel Kingdom, for numerous reasons, which gives it away even if the above description hasn’t. Parenna values jewels pretty much above all else. If you were to read the story I’m planning that’s set there, you’d also quickly realize that those born into the royal family (or other super prestigious families) all have jewel-related names: Julen, Onyx, Diamond, Beryl, Carnelian, Cordier, and Sphene, to name those I have so far. Fortunately this only applies to the royal family (and a few prestigious exceptions), because otherwise I’d have issues.

Normally I wouldn’t write that much description at once (that’s probably mostly due to the fact that one of my greatest writing issues is balancing description), but that gives you the idea. You don’t have to state things with a blaring neon sign; you can do it just as effectively with well-written description and references to things within context. (Which is not to say that mine was or wasn’t well-written, but just in general.)

Give information where it’s needed

Remember how I mentioned at the beginning of this post not to tell character motivations? That’s no fun, then there’s no mystery. Hidden motivations are a big key to intrigue. While your main character’s motivations are probably transparent to the reader, your villain’s probably don’t want to be, and even side characters’ motivations should probably be revealed in pieces. And just because the main character’s motivations are clear to the reader, there’s no reason to make it entirely transparent to the other characters in the novel. Hidden motivations are great for conflict.

So how do you give information as it’s needed? A few things to keep in mind as a good start would be:

A) Don’t give us a character’s life story as soon as they’re introduced. We’ll figure it out as we read if you’ve done it right (which starts with cutting the life-story-in-the-introductory-paragraph piece).

B) Don’t describe every single aspect of a place as soon as the character enters it. Mention a few key, meaningful details (ideally that will come into play later, but if they’re just memorable and unobtrusive they’re still good), describe the basic atmosphere, but don’t describe the room down to every mote of dust.

C) Don’t give the reader every character’s motivation on a silver platter. Make them ambiguous; make us figure them out. Why is that side character so cold and distant? Because his brother hated him. Don’t tell us this things up front, let us figure it out. Plant clues, like the chess piece he always carries around that’s his only gift from his brother, or have a character go to him for relationship advice and get something along the lines of “Love only hurts.” Show his envy and bitterness when he sees siblings together, as he curls his lip and avoids them. Whatever. Just show instead of telling, and let us figure some stuff out.

Hopefully this gives you some ideas of ways to avoid the dreaded info-dump, and I wish you happy writing. What books have you read that were awful in the info-dumping department, or conveyed information wonderfully?

Character Interview: Thorian Sedona

Thorian is a character from The Shadow Raven, a member of the Roenoran council and a friend of Nissa‘s and Detren‘s. He’s also kind of a flirt and may or may not have something of a shady backstory.

Thorian: *comes in and shakes the interviewer’s hand* Hello.

Interviewer: *shakes Thorian’s hand and releases it* Hello. How are you?

Thorian: *sits down* I’m doing well. How are you?

Interviewer: I’m all right. Shall we begin?

Thorian: *nods*

Interviewer: What is your name?

Thorian: Thorian Cassel Sedona.

Interviewer: And how old are you?

Thorian: I’m twenty-four.

Interviewer: Do you have any siblings?

Thorian: An older brother, Vesnar.

Interviewer: Do you have a job?

Thorian: I’m the cavalry captain of Roenor, and thus part of the council.

Interviewer: Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

Thorian: That depends on my mood.

Interviewer: What is your favorite food?

Thorian: Chocolate cake.

Interviewer: Favorite color?

Thorian: Navy blue.

Interviewer: Do you have a favorite book?

Thorian: The Eilram Brigade.

Interviewer: What is your favorite animal?

Thorian: Real or fictional?

Interviewer: Either.

Thorian: The Aree from The Eilram Brigade. I would love to see one in person.

Interviewer: What are those like?

Thorian: They’re huge – sort of like the dragons, but even bigger – with scales and wings and claws and teeth that could more than easily kill you. They’re terrifying things, to be honest, but they’d be incredibly interesting to see.

Interviewer: They sound awful, but fascinating. What are some of your hobbies, aside from reading?

Thorian: That’s about it. I go horseback riding for fun sometimes, and I’ll sing if I have to, but other than reading and playing chess I don’t do much.

Interviewer: Chess seems to be a popular game in Roenor. Where did it originate?

Thorian: Mandoria came up with it, actually. One of their historians invented it, using the political turmoil they were facing as inspiration. It became quite a stress reliever for them, and it’s still incredibly popular. Roenor adopted it after Mandoria’s war was over, and Kaloris shortly after that, but it’s never been as popular in Kaloris, and Adrelia never adopted it at all.

Interviewer: Interesting. What war was that?

Thorian: The Faerie War. Apparently the humans in Mandoria thought the faeries were encroaching on their territory and decided to shove them back into their swampland. The faeries haven’t been seen since, only their history in the Mandorian Paladins.

Interviewer: Interesting. And the current Paladin is Coraline Seralen, correct?

Thorian: It was Eliot Dashire, last I heard. But they rarely keep even their own people up to date on the Paladins, since they’re supposed to be secret until it’s clear they won’t be needed for a while, so it’s likely someone else now.

Interviewer: You seem to know a lot about Mandoria. Does that come of being on the Roenoran council?

Thorian: No, I just have an interest in outside histories, Mandoria’s in particular. It’s fascinating to read, and I enjoy theorizing about what might happen if the faeries come back.

Interviewer: You think they’re still in that swamp?

Thorian: No, they created a new home for themselves, an alternate dimension where they could expand freely. You start to wonder why they didn’t just do that in the first place.

Interviewer: *nods* We’re getting to the end now… Which of these is most important to you: Kindness, intelligence, or bravery?

Thorian: Bravery.

Interviewer: And honesty or selflessnes?

Thorian: Honesty.

Interviewer: Last question: What’s one thing you can’t leave home without?

Thorian: My black knight chess piece. It’s something of a good luck charm to me. It was a gift from my brother – the only one I ever got – so I like to keep it with me.

Interviewer: *nods* Thank you for your time.

Thorian: *returns the nod and rises, shaking the interviewer’s hand* You’re welcome. Thank you for the interview. *smiles and leaves*

Roleplaying and Character Development

First, an explanation of roleplaying

Roleplaying, in short, is when usually when you and another author (or other authors) put your characters together in a situation and see what happens and how the characters react and interact. There are two main ways that roleplaying is done. One is more like you’re writing a story together; it’s written like a story and you simply take turns writing out scenes from your character’s POV (in third person, so it doesn’t get confusing). The other way, which I personally prefer because it’s looser, is to write it more like the character interviews I do here on the blog, where things are written in a more conversational style with the character indicated by their name before an action or piece of dialogue and actions within asterisks.

To show these more clearly, a line from Roleplay Type A would look like this:

Bren walked up to Orian, punching him in the nose. “How dare you! My parents did nothing wrong! You darn faeries are the problem, with all your stuffy rules and intolerance of anyone else. You’re in no position to demean me or my family.”

While Roleplay Type B would look like this:

Bren: *walks up to Orian and punches him in the nose* How dare you! My parents did nothing wrong! You darn faeries are the problem, with all your stuffy rules and intolerance of anyone else. You’re in no position to demean me or my family.

And usually Type B has more dialogue and less description, while Type A has roughly the same balance as a novel. Like I said, I prefer Type B because it’s looser and there’s not usually an ongoing story that you’re going to mess up if you don’t have time to RP a lot or have to go in the middle of a scene, you can simply make your character vanish and you’re good to go. Given that this is the style I’m more accustomed to, this is the one I’ll be using in this post.

How roleplaying helps character development.

I used to roleplay more than I do now, as several of the members of my NaNoWriMo writing group can tell you. I’ve pegged it as a time-suck (which, to some extent, it is) and decided that “real writing” is more important. But given the fact that A) it’s more useful than you might think and B) I procrastinate like heck on my writing anyway, I should probably get back into it at least for briefer spans of time, because it’s great for character development. How is that?

When you roleplay, you’re throwing your characters into a (usually fairly random) scenario, sometimes in a type of setting they’ve never even seen before, much less interacted with. For instance, throwing a high fantasy character into a modern-day mall. Culture shock much? Since there are so few limitations, you can see how your characters interact in various places and learn about their character through that. Plus, they may find that they love cream soda or jellybean burritos.

In addition to a new setting, your roleplay characters interact with a myriad of new characters, which is always interesting. Some of them decide they want to kill each other, some fall in love, some become good friends… It’s really interesting to see the interplay between the characters, and it gives you a lot of insight into your own characters when you find out that, “Oh, that one character who doesn’t show a like or dislike of anyone is a lot looser when she’s only with a pet,” or “Oh, that character can actually flirt. (Who knew?)” Plus, sometimes your characters become looser with other roleplay characters than they are with you, and then you find out how tragic their backstory really is, or that they’re actually a huge softie under all that calculating logic, or that they like to tinker with watches.

Roleplaying just overall brings out a lot of character that would otherwise be hidden, and you can learn a lot of fun stuff about your characters. So see if you can find a friend to RP with and have fun letting your characters surprise you. :) (P.S. It’s even more fun if you can RP with characters you aren’t familiar with, because then you learn about those characters at the same time, and you’re less likely to let your knowledge of them decide how your characters react.)

Character Interview: Solem Anders

Solem Anders is the main character of my short story collection The Mirror-Hunter Chronicles, which I describe as Disney meets A Series of Unfortunate Events, which I plan to publish a week from today. (But so far my plans haven’t gone according to plan, so we’ll see.) The first story can be read here. I hope you enjoy his interview. :)

 

Solem: *comes in and sits down*

Interviewer: Good morning. How are you today?

Solem: I could be better, but such is often the case.

Interviewer: I suppose that’s true. What is your name?

Solem: Solem Maran Anders.

Interviewer: How old are you?

Solem: I’m thirty-two.

Interviewer: Do you have any siblings?

Solem: No. Just a cousin. I was once close to him like a brother, but I haven’t seen him in twelve years.

Interviewer: What happened to him?

Solem: He moved away. He needed an escape from Ambrel.

Interviewer: Why is that?

Solem: Because a magic mirror is quite unhealthy to live around for a long time. I would never recommend it. Nasty things, magic mirrors.

Interviewer: You’ve done research, then?

Solem: You could say that. Two years of in-depth study, along with having one in my basement for another ten… You could call that research, I suppose. At present, however, I’m hunting one down to ensure that it doesn’t do any more damage than it already has.

Interviewer: Is that your job, then, at present?

Solem: I was a part-time merchant, but after the mirror was stolen I had to give that up entirely. I may come back to it once this whole mess is over and the mirror has been destroyed. *winces at that last word*

Interviewer: What is your favorite book?

Solem: Anything without a magic mirror.

Interviewer: Favorite animal?

Solem: Griffins. They’re quite useful when it comes to expedient travel.

Interviewer: Do you have any time for hobbies?

Solem: Not at this point.

Interviewer: Which is most important to you: Kindness, intelligence, or bravery?

Solem: Intelligence. If you don’t have that you may find yourself stealing a magic mirror that could very well kill you.

Interviewer: And honesty or selflessness?

Solem: Selflessness. Although neither is particularly appealing. Sometimes you have to be dishonest to take care of someone, so clearly not honesty, but selflessness is far too taxing. I’d be content to complete this one mirror-hunting task and then return home and lock myself away from the world for all time, never having to deal with another human being again.

Interviewer: What’s something you can’t leave the house without?

Solem: A small axe. Self-defense is important, plus I might be needed to cut down a giant beanstalk again or shatter a mirror into a million pieces.

Interviewer: That was the last question. Thank you for your time.

Solem: *nods and leaves*

A Quick Blog Update

So there are a few new things happening lately. Obviously I changed my blog theme a week ago, and I’ve been working since at updating all of my post images to match that new theme (I’m getting close to finished with that). I really like the new theme, I think it fits a lot better and looks a lot nicer, and apparently it’s bringing in a lot of new traffic from Pinterest. Thank you Pinterest and everyone who’s reading my blog.

In other blog-related news, I’m sorry I haven’t been able to put up short stories the past two weeks. Because I’m so consistently having trouble with Short Story Sundays, and short stories in general, I’ve decided to cancel those – unless on a certain week I really want to do a short story – and replace them with Story Snippet Sundays (sorry, I had to keep the alliteration) and share excerpts from my novel. Thoughts on that change? Do you like the excerpt idea or would you rather I just let it go altogether?

In book-related news… I’m published! As of Thursday, my Short Story Collection Vol. 1 became available on Amazon in paperback for $8.99. It will be available for Kindle in the near future (I don’t have a set date yet), but for now it’s only available in paperback. Stay tuned and I’ll let you know when it’s available for Kindle, too. Buy in paperback here.

How to Write Families & Siblings

When writing families and siblings, there’s a certain dynamic to the relationships. It’s teasing, mean, loving, protective… it’s about a million things all wrapped up at once. Those of you with siblings will know what I mean. Keep in mind that the tips below might not fit quite all the families that populate your stories, so use your judgement, but they’ll fit the vast majority.

They Fight

Yes, family members fight. All the time. Some of them fight more often than others, which tends to be proportionate to how much they’re around each other. How well personalities mesh or don’t has as much affect in families as it does in other relationships.

I fight with my mom more than my dad (waaaay more), and I fight with my closest younger sister more than any of my other siblings. With my mom it’s because we don’t get each other. We have serious issues seeing from the other person’s point of view or even just listening to each other in an argument. My dad is something of a translator when we get into spats. Think about who in your fictional family fights more, why, and who steps in to help.

Another thing to keep in mind is that arguments often repeat themselves. By this I mean both that the argument itself is often repeated on numerous occasions, and also that people arguing tend to repeat themselves, sometimes in subtly different ways, either to twist the meaning of their words or to try to be more clearly understood by the opposite party. But it’ll likely be more pertinent to your story to think about what the recurring arguments are among family members and why they haven’t been resolved yet.

They Work It Out

There’s always some resolution to an argument. They may end up storming out to cool down first, but then they come back, it’s put to rest (at least for a bit; it may be one of those recurring arguments), and all is good again. Particularly if an argument is merely a misunderstanding, it’s easy to forgive once the kinks have been sorted out.

Now, there are some arguments (particularly if they’re recurring) that may be harder to resolve than others. One person may not want to budge on their argument, and may have to be pushed to forgive or apologize. Think about which fights would be easier or harder to resolve and who would be more or less stubborn in the situations. Also think about how they might resolve it. Would they simply stop talking and let that be the end of it? Would they hug the other person to sort of prove that they’re forgiven?

If a Non-Family Member Tries to Pick on a Sibling, They’re There in a Heartbeat

Siblings. We pick on each other, we tease, sometimes we’re even kind of mean. But if another person picks on our sibling? We’re there in an instant ready to defend them to our last breath. We are the only ones allowed to pick on our siblings. Aside from maybe really close friends who are like siblings, because they’re just special.

We had a friend a while back who would constantly pick on my little sister (she comments as Siberia on here). Now, Siberia and I rarely get along (unless it’s the middle of the night and we’re supposed to be asleep but instead we’re chatting up a storm), but when said friend would pick on her and was mean to her, I would fight for her and sometimes even make sure she or both of us left so it didn’t happen any more.

Siblings are weird.

Families are Often Dysfunctional

No matter how perfect a family may seem from the outside, if you go and live with them for a week I guarantee you’ll see issues. No family is perfect. Some of us are downright dysfunctional and feel like we’re always a mess and aren’t doing anything right. But a dysfunctional family is not necessarily a broken family or a bad family. We love each other, even when it doesn’t seem like it. We all have our faults and flaws, and we all know exactly how to push each other’s buttons, but we get through all the fights, all the disagreements, all the mess. Because we’re a family. Don’t forget to give a family flaws and errors. Unless they’ve been doing this for a really long time, they haven’t figured everything out. Maybe they haven’t figured out anywhere close to everything. But don’t let that alone make them worthless.

Family Doesn’t Have to Be Blood

I’ve been talking about and using examples from my blood family up to this point, but a family doesn’t have to be blood, and sometimes blood isn’t family. Using Catessa from The Last Assassin as a prime example, her family for the majority of her life was a ragtag bunch of assassins. She was orphaned as a baby, and finally at age six the leader of the Cron Hatal assassins’ guild took her in and added her to his family there. Now, some of the members really were related – there were brothers who were the leader’s nephews, and the other girl had a son – but they weren’t family for their blood relations, they were family for the way they took care of each other and were always there for each other and saw all the faults and flaws and still loved each other. Catessa’s birth family never became family to her, even after she found them. She finally became friends with her half-brother, but she was never as close to him as to the assassins. Her birth family may have been related to her by blood, but they never became her family. Her family was always that hobbled-together group of assassins.

“Ohana means family, and family means no one gets left behind.” I feel like that’s a pretty good motto for this post. What do you think? Is there anything I missed? Who’s your favorite fictional family? Let me know down in the comments.