Avon Van Hassel's Blog, page 8

He Said, She Sat

Dialogue can be a tricky thing. The trend is against words like, ‘declared’ and ‘answered,’ but writing, ‘said’ too many times can be just as stifling and boring. So what do you do to inject some life into the scene? Action tags may be the answer.

Which sounds better?

‘Hello,’ Mark said.

‘Hi,’ Anne said.

‘I want to learn about how to make my writing pop,’ he said.

‘I can help you with that,’ she said.

or…

‘Hello,’ Mark said, clicking off his phone screen.

‘Hi.’ Anne waved and sat in the booth opposite.

‘I want to learn about how to make my writing pop.’ He leaned forward and fixed Anne with an attentive gaze.

‘I can help you with that.’ Anne smiled and pulled a book out of her bag.

The second one, right? Sure, it’s a lot more words, but if you’re not on the Word Count Diet, it’s well worth it. We learn more about the characters from their body language. Mark had clearly been waiting for Anne, probably because he thought she might have advice for him. Anne had clearly come to this meeting prepared to help.

It also adds another dimension to the scene. Rather than just ‘hearing’ the characters talk, we can ‘see’ their physical actions. Naturally, you wouldn’t put this much detail after every line of dialogue, that would get a bit dense and slow down the pace, but you get my meaning.

Sometimes you don’t even need a tag. Take my characters, Alois and Sulat. (You can get a feel for their personalities by getting my first chapter free, here). Alois is quite emotive with his words and actions, and he’s very physical and active. Sulat, is much tighter–she’s a woman of few words, and can be confused with a statue, on occasion. I often have long action tags following Alois’ dialogue (what he’s doing with his hands or his face), whereas Sulat often gets no tags at all.

For instance, in this scene they find themselves in a dragon’s lair:

‘Let me just have a quick look around.’ Alois wandered off around a corner and down an aisle made of gold piles and marble statues. Sulat picked up a pair of leather boots with intricate patterns cut into them and held the soles up to her own feet. ‘How often do you get to see inside a dragon’s lair. Come on.’ Alois dropped a hat on Sulat’s head with a dramatic flourish. It did suit her. ‘Isn’t this why you got into adventuring, to begin with?’

‘No.’

The trend right now is to avoid using any dialogue tag besides ‘said.’ Personally, it drives me crazy. I feel like a lot of these ‘rules’ are just fads, touted as rules to give people more reasons to be pedantic and condescending, like somehow a whole chunk of language (like adverbs) are only to be used by the inexperienced and sloppy writer. That’s rubbish, in my opinion. Words are meant to be used: it’s like telling a painter they can’t use the colour green, because only sloppy and inexperienced painters use green. You can get the same effect by using fewer colours and implying green.

As with anything else: if you’re going to do anything, do it well. Cutting out dialogue tags and adverbs are not going to make your writing better on its own.

Also, don’t use ‘said’ after a question. You don’t say a question, you ask a question. *hops down off soapbox*

I do agree, however, that many things can be implied in dialogue without explicitly saying it. If your line features an exclamation point, you don’t need to add, ‘he shouted’–that’s redundant (same goes for ‘asked,’ really. And ‘said.’ That’s why this gatekeeping is so stupid). I prefer action tags, or the complete absence of them, for this reason. They add so much more than the sum of their parts.

However, there are times when the tag is necessary. If there’s only one character speaking, or if it’s internal monologue, you don’t need one at all. If there are multiple people, especially of the same gender. You need to identify who is speaking, and he/she/they is not always enough. (Don’t get me started on dangling modifiers! That’s for another post). So then, if you have to use a tag, should it be a dialogue tag or an action tag?

I was going to make a flowchart for this, but it got too complicated, and really, it is very simple. I know that makes no sense, but stick with me a minute.

Firstly, is the character expressive? Don’t force your character to wave their arms around if they’re a staid and quiet type. That’s fine, it’s in character. (Though you could write, ‘They remained still, but for their moving lips.’)

Secondly, does it add to the scene? You can show that your character is prepared for a fight by writing, ‘she moved into a fighting stance,’ or you can have her say, ‘”I’m prepared to fight you,”‘ (if that phrasing is in character). She unlikely to say something like that from a casual nonchalant contrapposto. Though, if she would, that is definitely worth noting.

Things like this are a constant balance between what adds to the scene/character, and what just slows down the action. When the tension is high, only keep what is absolutely necessary to know. If something can be implied through dialogue, cut the tag, and stick with ‘said/asked.’

The exception is high-emotion slow scenes. These scenes can still have high tension, and the way you ramp that up is through action. Body language is subtle, so every detail counts.

Writing is a highly intuitive, highly subjective art. There’s hardly a rule without an exception, and the exceptions are almost always, ‘you know what’s best for your book.’ But my advice is ‘it doesn’t matter what you do, do it well.’

One Word: Growth

Last year, a big trend was the One Word Challenge, where we chose one word to define the coming year. I chose Focus because I had so much that I wanted to do, and my life was so chaotic that I felt I really needed to buckle down if I ever wanted to get off the ground.

Well, I focused for all I was worth and I accomplished a huge amount. I launched my website, I took a bazillion classes about starting and running a business, I joined three viral builders that gained me literal hundreds of followers on Facebook, I published two novels and a short story, I helped friend launch her business, I started a Patreon (and then promptly dropped it, lol! Baby steps!), and I even took a much needed trip to the UK to reconnect with friends and get my head straight.

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Having a one-word affirmation helped massively. So this year, I’m doing it again, and focusing on GROWTH.

I will grow as a writer by publishing at least three more novellas and another novel. Hopefully, it’ll be off to betas by May, though I’m still optimistic about late March.

I will grow as an entrepreneur. As a self-published author, everything is on my own shoulders. Planning, researching, writing, editing (I do have a wonderful and affordable editor, but I do the first few rounds myself), cover design, formatting, collaborating with other creators, promoting, and finally, marketing. Thankfully, as I publish digitally at the moment, I don’t have to deal with printing and shipping, but when I do, that’ll be my job, too. So I have to really work on how to market myself effectively, which will require an almost complete rewiring of my extreme introvert brain, lol, and possibly a complete overhaul of all of my marketing platforms. Pray for me.

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Are You Ready to Join the Adventure?

It’s been quite some time since my last blog post, and while I feel a little bad for setting my blog on the back burner, I’m heartened by knowing that the reason for my absence was due to a big event in my life.

I’M PUBLISHING MY FIRST TWO BOOKS THIS WEEK!!!

Regulars to my website should be aware of my About Me and Beanseller Saga pages where I go on about these two books, Magic Beans and Golden, that I’m publishing. I’ve been plugging that they’re available to pre-order and I’ve posted the dates, but now that we’re coming up on a single-digit countdown, it’s all starting to feel very real. These aren’t the first books I’ve written, but they’re the first I’ve ever published, and for that reason, I kind of see them as my firstborns. Twins, as it were.

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Why two books at once?

I’ve been doing A LOT of research on traditional publishing (meaning, getting picked up by a mainstream publisher, with agents and print copies in bookstores, and all the rest of it) versus self-publishing; hardcopy versus digital; Kindle Direct versus other methods such as Etsy; etc. During the course of this research, which took place over like two years, I came upon this theory: If you write a book and publish it, people may read it and may like it. But people read faster than you can write, so they’ll finish your book and move on to someone else. But if you write two books and publish them at the same time, someone may read your book, like it, check to see if there is another–there is!–they read and enjoy that one, and now they remember your name. The next time you publish, you already have some people lined up to care about it.

So to answer the question, ‘Why did it take you four years to write and publish Magic Beans?’ once and for all: It didn’t. It took me four years to research, write, edit, critique, edit, beta, edit, query, pitch, edit, and publish Magic Beans AND Golden. Which is about right, if you think about it. And in that time, I have also begun the four novellas that follow Golden, and the three next novels. So I have not been idle!

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So what are the books about?

Magic Beans, as I’ve said a million times, is a retelling of Jack and the Beanstalk from the perspective of the man who sold the magic beans. In my version, the beanseller is a man named Alois, a thief and veteran of the Ettin Wars. He and his partner, a woman named Sulat, also a thief, accidentally get mixed up in an attempt to overthrow the king, which sends them to all sorts of strange places, including the top of a magic cloud. They encounter a cast of colourful characters, like a girl with magic hair, thief-catchers, giants in hiding, the murderous Spider Queen, and, of course, young Jack.

Golden is the story of the magic golden harp. Who is she? Where did she come from? How did she end up on the magic cloud? What happened to her after Jack took her? If you love the glitz and glamour of the royal court, you’re going to want to read this one. It’s got a plot to steal the crown jewels with deeper political undercurrents, social manoeuvring, a messy princess, complicated romance, and, not one–but two–weddings!

As of today, they are both still available for pre-order, but come September 22, 2018, they will be officially available for purchase from Kindle Direct.

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Why am I only publishing on Kindle?

Partially, it’s because of the royalty rates (Amazon gives me 70%, far more than any other platform). Also, did you know that publishers are allowed to edit your manuscript without your knowledge or consent, up to and including the removal of whole chapters? Nightmare.  Thirdly, A lot of the cost of a paperback book at Barnes and Noble is a result of paying the publisher and the agent, the marketing department, the designers, editors, the actual paper and ink printing, and the shipment to the stores. Digital publishing eliminates the vast majority of that. Also, I make my own covers, so that saves you guys some money, as I don’t have to factor in designer fees. Fourth, digital books don’t contribute to deforestation. I am considering ordering a limited (like 25 copies) run of signed paperbacks, but that will be highly dependent on how well the digital books do). Lastly, convenience. I realise not everyone has a Kindle–in fact, I only recently bought myself one. But the app is free and is available for all devices, including Nook, which I think is a bit cheeky. But basically, as long as you have an e-reader app somewhere, you can read my book, and it won’t take up any space.

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On the 21, I will be hosting a launch party simultaneously on Facebook and in-person in Bakersfield, California. There will be games and prizes and all sorts, so you definitely don’t want to miss it!

I would also love to take this moment to give a shoutout to my fantastic illustrator, Ana King of Inkcell Illustration, and my good friend and freelance editor, Breanna Clark. I couldn’t have done it without either of them, and you should definitely check them out.

One more time before I go, follow the links, Magic Beans and Golden, to pre-order before September 22! Thanks so much for your support, and is you love it, be sure to leave a review!

 

 

 

The Reading Nook: The Hazel Wood, by Melissa Albert

We’re officially past the halfway mark of the ‘12 Meses, 12 Libros‘ challenge, and I’m pleased to say I’ve stayed more or less on schedule, which I honestly did not expect to be able to do.

Do yourselves a favour, and pick up a copy here.

This month’s theme was reading a book based on the cover, and I chose The Hazel Wood, by Melissa Albert, because look at this glorious bastard. I picked it up at Target on a whim, and boy, does it break the old adage. Good cover, good book.

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I’m going to start this review by saying that while I have enjoyed all of the books I’ve read on this challenge to varying degrees, this is far and away my favourite. Like 3 pages in, I could feel it changing me. Maybe not as a writer because voice is a very personal thing and I don’t think Melissa Albert and I see the world the same way, but, my god, I wish we did. She has an emotional insightful clarity about her descriptions that I just don’t. The way she describes some things, it feels like that’s the only way to describe them, and I know that I would never in a million years get that accurate and precise. I feel like the only way to describe the difference in style is that I would describe what a thing is (how it looks, sounds, smells), and she describes how it feels on an emotional, sense-memory level. I’m sure she could even describe the description better than I am.

But enough fangirling. Let’s jump into the discussion questions. *SPOILERS AHEAD* Proceed at your own risk.

Consider Alice’s narration. How would you describe Alice? What did you take away from Alice’s experiences? What do you feel Alice has gained by the end of the novel?

First off, I don’t usually like first person narrative. I find it a bit limiting. But there is so much going on inside Alice, so much visceral reaction and raw emotion and memory, that I think it was done really really well. I would describe Alice as hot-headed, obviously, but also driven, focused, curious, relatable despite her mood swings, clever and plucky, and introspective. So much of how she perceives the world is filtered through her memories and the books she read because she moved around too much to have friends. She sees herself kind of like a patchwork blanket, made of books and snapshots, removed from even her own life, at times. I can relate to that because my family also moved around a lot when I was young (though we moved for Dad’s work, not because bad luck followed us, lol), and I didn’t have a lot of friends when I was young, but I was an avid reader and even to this day, the books I read in those days formed who I am now. I refer you to the American Girl series and my obsession with historical fiction centred around feisty young girls.

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I took away so much from Alice’s experiences, which I will not mention here, but you may be able to guess by the end of this post :-p But I think the biggest thing she gained by the end was answers and some degree of closure.

What were some of the references you caught to classic children’s literature in the novel? Were any of your own favourites mentioned? How do you think these references influence the story?

Oh, so many. One that I thought was interesting was the appearance of Tam Lin, who I always thought was a man, but who showed up in this story as a woman. Which…changes the story drastically, lol, but artistic license is a thing, and when we’re dealing with oral tradition, folktales, and alternate universes, it’s easy to blame misunderstandings, mistranslations, and politics. We folklorists have all kinds of tricks for making the puzzle pieces fit

The Writing Desk: Plotting

No, not revenge. Well, maybe.

Plot, at its most basic principle, is the series of events that make up your story. You could have the most well-rounded and complicated characters, and the most detailed setting in the world. But without plot, it’s just not a story.

Structure

Plot is defined by its structure. I know that sounds cringey. Structure sounds like template, which makes sounds formulaic. However, there are literally countless plot structures out there, each different and wonderful in their own way. All you really need is a starting point, and ending point, and some rising and falling action in the middle. Where and how you have that is what makes up the structure.

What IS it anyway?

Have you ever listened to someone telling you about their day and you find yourself lost in the details of some bit of smalltalk that happened at lunch, or whether it was Wednesday or Tuesday, and whether Event A happened before or after Event B, and you just want to scream, ‘what does this have to do with anything???’

Basically, the reason we have structure at all is to keep us on track and to keep the details relevant to the story. Not everything that happens in a character’s day affects the outcome of the story, so those bits can be skipped over so that we can give greater importance to the big events that actually drive the plot. It also shapes the dialogue so that you only have to read what actually matters, rather than the characters deciding whose turn it is to do the dishes.

It also helps us decide where to put the events of the story at all. Should the MC meet the villain now, or should we wait until a more dramatic moment? Or should there be a brief moment of eye contact to foreshadow the dramatic meeting later?

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The Hero’s Journey–is it still relevant?

The Hero’s Journey is perhaps the plot structure we’re most familiar with, as it is one of the most popular. I remember doing book reports in Jr High with a wavy line drawn onto the worksheet, and my job was to identify the beginning, rising action, climax, and denouement as it related to the book I was reading.

This plotline was popularised by professor, Joseph Campbell. It’s a circular model, really, though it can be distilled down into that wavy line we all know, and involves a series of  recognisable character archetypes. In a lot of ways, the Hero’s Journey has fallen out of favour for being dull, predicable, sexist, and generally stale. But I believe it still has merit. Indeed, the hero’s journey was identified at all as the basic plotline of most epic stories of the classical world, and so I believe that it still holds that epic feeling, and is therefore still relevant, especially in the fantasy genre.

Non-traditional plot structures

Non-traditional plot structures are gaining popularity because they keep people from getting too comfortable, and keeping things fresh and interesting. I personally find them fun to play around with.

The Parallel is like Lord of the Rings, where it starts off in the same place, then splits and follows two or more plotlines concurrently.  The Rollercoaster has multiple rising and falling actions. The Episodic is a number of complete storylines within a larger framework. The Fate starts with the climax, then goes back to tell you how it all started.

Subplots

So all of that relates to major plotlines, which brings us to subplots, or side quests, as I like to call them. They’re things that the characters do in addition to the main plot, but which nevertheless influences the main plot. If the Harry Potter series is the hero’s journey plot structure centred around the Harry vs Lord Voldemort conflict, each individual book can be considered a subplot, with numerous other subplots within them.

Let’s look at my favourite of the series: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. At this point, the primary conflict, Harry vs Lord Voldemort is somewhat on the back burner, since Harry hasn’t encountered an aspect of Voldemort since Chamber of Secrets, and indeed the main antagonist of Prisoner of Azkaban is Sirius Black, and Voldemort isn’t involved at all. Here, the main plotline is the TriWizard Tournament, and follows a more or less Rollercoaster plotline, as Harry and his fellow competitors compete in different challenges. Beneath that plotline is Harry’s relationship with the new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Mad-Eye Moody; his relationship with his godfather, Sirius Black, and the news from the outside world that he receives; his strained friendship with Ron; and his research into the Death Eater trials. With the exception of his trouble with Ron (which sorts itself out, and really only exists to show other aspects of Ron’s character building), all of these plotlines come together at the end, with the full-bodied return of Lord Voldemort.

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If you’d like a handy book about how to structure plots, I highly recommend Story Structure Architect, by Victoria Lynn Schmidt. I use it with literally every story I write.

Also, don’t forget that my first two books, Magic Beans and Golden, are now available for pre-order exclusively on Kindle!

The Writing Desk: Character Creation

Characters: the drivers of the plot and the people we get attached to. You can’t have a story without them, so how do you actually create a good believable character from nothing?

I’m going to approach this particular post from a fiction novel-writing stance, though I have to admit that a lot of my process comes from my experience with Dungeons and Dragons. Not all of it, I’ve been writing my whole life and only playing D&D since I was 16, but a lot of my tricks have been improved by my roleplaying skills. Perhaps one day, I’ll do a whole thing Mycreants-style on adapting fiction techniques to roleplay and vice versa.

Good or Bad?

The first thing to get out of the way: when I talk about ‘good’ and ‘bad’ characters, I’m referring to the quality of the writing, not their ‘alignment’ or moral code. A villain can be good and a hero can be sooo bad. I won’t call anyone out by name because we’re all in this together, writing is hard, and readers have differing tastes, and this is according to my taste. So if you were hoping for a roast of badly written characters, you’re going to have to read between the lines or form your own opinions

The Reading Nook: The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho

As you’ll recall from my 6 previous Reading Nook posts, I’m doing the ’12 Meses, 12 Libros’ Challenge. This month’s topic was a book from a genre I’d never read before, I chose travel, and went with the #1 recommendation from people who have opinions: The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho.

I’ll admit up front, I uhh, well I wouldn’t call it a mistake, more that I failed to do my research. When I decided on ‘travel stories,’ I had in my mind non-fiction, or at least creative non-fiction accounts of real people. Semi-autobiographical or a memoir, something of that nature. I wouldn’t call The Alchemist disappointing, just not exactly what I meant. We’re not yet to the middle of the month, so maybe I’ll have time to fit in a book more along the lines of what I expected.

Probably not, though. In a way, I dodged a bullet. I’m not a huge fan of non-fiction as a method of storytelling, as I find most people’s real lives to be depressing and I’m the kind of escapist reader who likes and fun adventure. Misfortune for fictional characters builds tension, misfortune for real people is sad.

But that’s me. If you know of a travel memoir that’s more fun than ‘inspirational’ (‘inspirational’ means ‘bad stuffs happens, but they’re ok in the end’), I’d love to hear about it! It is summer, after all. Time for reading, travel, and adventure!

Anyway, regardless of the fact that The Alchemist is fiction, I did read it, and I did get a lot out of it. And I would call it a fairy tale in a way because there were fantastical events, larger than life characters, a sense of destiny, and a bit of a moral.

The Boy, his guides, and the woman he loves

First of all, I kind of dig that Coelho never names his protagonist. Because he retains a narrative distance, we get a sense of the boy as a character and connect with him emotionally; but, it’s almost impossible not to put yourself in his position, almost out of necessity. It’s like Coelho forces you to see yourself in him, if only to bridge the distance. The boy becomes the vessel by which the reader goes on the journey themself.

That isn’t to say that he doesn’t have agency; the boy grows a lot from the Spanish shepherd into the fully formed alchemist, and we see him have his dreams, doubt his mentors, struggle through his various obstacles, and ultimately prevails.

At times it does feel like he’s coasting, like things are just handed to him. But I have to say that it’s not distracting, in fact, it’s almost the point. This book is more a journey than an adventure. What I mean by that is that the obstacles aren’t the point. The question isn’t ‘how will he overcome this?’ but ‘what will he learn from this?’ The moments of highest tension aren’t when he’s robbed in Tangier, or when he’s kidnapped all those times, or even when he does eventually reach his goal. The high points are when he’s meditating and literally–I mean literally–talking to the desert, the wind, and the sun. The aha! moments are little proverbs here and there that resonate with those of us of a spiritual nature. Indeed, one phrase that is repeated over and over is when one knows what they want, the universe conspires to give it to them.

So it may seem a bit deus ex machina, but remember it’s about following your dream and your faith in the face of adversity, and not neing distracted by things you think are important. Journey, not an adventure.

I’m personally of the opinion that all of his guides are pretty much the same person. Call it the king or the alchemist or God/Allah/the hand that wrote it all, etc. Even the boy at one time noticed that all of his guides shared similarities. Also, I’m a fantasy writer; that sort of this is 100% believable to me.

But one thing I want to address: Fatima. I would argue that Fatima is, for having so little ‘screen time,’ I do think she is a strong character. She is proud of her heritage, she is proud generally, she is secure in herself, she is enlightened. I just think she’s really cool. I don’t want to go too deep into her character because she has such a small chunk that I’d basically have to transcribe it to anlyse it further. But she’s cool. In lots of ways, she’s meatier than a couple male characters.

Now, I’m all down for meditation, and shutting up for a minute so you can actually see what’s going on and getting out of your own way, etc. But when he’s literally talking to the desert/wind/sun and they’re talking back, it got a little weird for me. I know it’s a metaphor, but still. It’s a weird way to do it. Everything up til that was weird coincidence that the boy interpreted, but this scene was an actual dialogue. I think I would have preferred it done a little more subtly. But that’s me. Everyone’s a critic, right?

The Reading Nook: Pygmalion, by George Bernard Shaw

Continuing with my ’12 Meses 12 libros’ challenge, this month I read Pygmalion, by George Bernard Shaw. If that sounds familiar to you, you may recognise it by the name of the musical based on it–My Fair Lady. So, if you’re not a fan of musical theatre, skip this post, because there will be gifs.

This month’s theme for the ’12 Meses 12 Libros’ challenge was ‘a book you should have read in school, but didn’t.’ Well, it should come as no shock to you that I was a literature nerd in school. I read my English assignments in every other class while the teacher was lecturing (yeah, I was an ass), so there aren’t many books we were assigned that I didn’t actually read. And I’m not in the place in my life to read dystopian spec fic like 1984 or depressing reads like the Diary of Anne Frank.  I’m not saying they’re not worthwhile reads by any means, just that they don’t appeal to me for a challenge that’s supposed to be fun.

So, I did what any book nerd does in a bind–I asked Goodreads. Some darling of an overachiever listed Pygmalion. I was hesitant at first because it’s a play, not a novel, but Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar are on that list (and I swear to god, the next person who calls Hamlet a ‘book’ is getting the collected works of Shakespeare straight to the face. Just because it is bound doesn’t make it a book.)

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So here’s a little glimpse into the inner life of Baby Avon. My mother introduced us to musical theatre at a young age. I recall being obsessed with The Music Man, My Fair Lady, and Cats as far back as third grade. My sister read Pygmalion earlier this year and giggled all the way through, so when it came up on the list of things some awesome kid read in high school, I was thrilled. You may have noticed that I have something of an affinity for source material, so I knew what to expect. It’s funny, nerdy as all hell, has a strong female, and it’s short, which is something I value in my busy life.

Oh, and this version has Discussion Questions, which I love. So let’s dive in.

How would you update Pygmalion for the twenty-first century? How would the story or the characters have to be changed? Would it work if the genders were reversed–if the professor were a woman and the Cockney flower seller were a young man?

This is an interesting question, and I have a feeling it’s going to fester. But the immediate answer that comes to mind is that I think it would be a challenge. Alfred Doolittle, every bit the Cockney that Eliza is, has no trouble climbing the social ladder and being accepted into the middle class, despite how he speaks. Eliza must change a lot about herself in order to change how people respond to her. In a modern setting, the female professor (with or without Higgins’ personality) would be seen as a bitch and her pupil as long-suffering and beaten down.

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Perhaps it’s jaded, but I don’t think society has arrived at a place where we can accept a female (Henrietta?) Higgins with the same indulgent affection like we do for Henry. And I don’t think we can have a crying male (Elias?) Eliza begging to be treated kindly without it turning into him defending his manhood against an overbearing female, or else the audience will likely criticise him for being weak, effeminate, and unsympathetic.

Shaw’s refusal to have Eliza and Higgins fall in love has remained one of the most controversial aspects of Pygmalion. Should Higgins and Eliza fall in love? Could they? What is at stake in Shaw’s refusal–that is, what kind of messages would an Eliza/Higgins romance send to the audience. How does the Sequel affect your perception of the ending?

This is one of those topics that can turn into a multi-paragraph rant really easily because it is a soapbox issue for me.  Magic Beans has a romantic subplot (I KNOW! I’ve acknowledged that that series is outside my comfort zones in a lot of ways!), but I’m generally resistant to the notion that I book must have romance (to hold the women readers’ attention, of course), and that it must happen between the two leads, if they’re a man and a woman.

Couple of quick things:

No, you don’t. That should be enough. But since it isn’t, I’ll go on.
Just because a straight man and a straight woman know each other, it doesn’t mean they’ll fall in love, or even be attracted to each other. As proof, allow me to direct you to around 60% of my platonic relationships. Speaking from experience, here, folks. Yes, I’m capable of finding people attractive, and I have had a crush on a few of my friends, but not all of them, and not even necessarily the ones I’m closest to. Human attraction is a complex and complicated thing. Don’t cheapen it.
Also, there is a pretty solid argument for Henry being gay. I won’t outline it because it’s not super important because that’s not the point of the play, the point Shaw was trying to make, or even relevant. The point is, what do we have to pair everyone up?
Never give in to fan service. I repeat, NEVER GIVE IN TO FAN SERVICE. If your story is heading that way anyway, fine. But if you’re doing something because the shippers want it, you’ll destroy it. It will feel shoehorned in there, and the pay-off won’t be what you want because half the fans who wanted it will be pissed about how you did it, and the other half will be pissed that you did it at all. If the X Files can’t make it work, no one can.
Allowing Eliza to fall in love with Higgins is a slap in the face to her as a character. he is emotionally distant, abusive, intolerant, and smug; everything she isn’t. They like each other fine enough, but they are oil and water. To allow her to fall in love with him would be to strip her of her humanity, her complexity, her self-respect, and everything that makes her who she is. It would make her weak and insipid for absolutely no reason validated by the actual story.

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Become? Gee, I can’t imagine why Eliza wouldn’t want to hitch her wagon to THAT…

…Damn it. I tried to keep it short, guys. I really did.

Eliza’s father, Alfred, never misses an opportunity to shirk responsibility, or to make a profit for the least amount of effort. Yet he refuses to take twice the amount for Eliza when it’s offered, and Higgins, only half joking, calls him ‘the most original moralist’ in Britain. Do Doolittle’s criticisms of ‘middle-class morality’ have any validity? Or is he just an unusually eloquent and witty slacker?

It’s honestly a little of both. He does make some very decent roundabout points on the counter-intuitive aspects of wealth that people rarely think about. (I know, boo hoo).

My mum and I were talking about household servants the other day, as one does, and we touched briefly on a scene in Downton Abbey where Matthew Crowley objects to being dressed by his valet, and Mr Molesley  explains that while Matthew can very well get dressed on his own, Mr Molesley’s job is to do it for him. A house like Downton Abbey is not only a grand and comfortable house for the family, it is a source of employment for other people in the area, and that’s how jobs like the dozens of distinct positions came into being–as a way of giving finding jobs for people to do so that the rich people didn’t have to do them, but also so that other people could actually get jobs. Little cogs in the bit capitalist machine.

Alfred lived outside the machine, as a dustman. Not in the modern usage, meaning a garbage collector, but in that he gathered dust, a layabout. His name is a damn pun. By his own admission, he’d ‘touch people’ for a bob or two (ask for money outright, like he did with Henry), but now everyone’s touching him. And then there’s the business about the wedding…

Many audience members, critics, and even Higgins himself find Freddy Eynsford-Hill weak, shallow, even stupid. Why do you think Eliza marries him? And for that matter, what does Freddy see in Eliza? Is he bright enough to know what he’s getting into by marrying her?

First of all, Higgins thinks that of everyone but his mother. I think Eliza marries him for the reasons she said, because he loved her. He treated her properly. I think in her, he sees someone wholly original, someone refreshingly unpredictable, but also warm and affectionate, and probably, yes, smarter than he is. I think it would be a boon for his social climbing family as well, seeing how well she did at the garden party.  Indeed, Eliza is something of an accidental trendsetter, which appeals to Freddy’ sister, Clara.

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Shaw has often been accused of writing characters who are mere mouthpieces for his ideas rather than fully rounded theatrical characters with complex psychologies. Do you think this criticism is applicable to Pygmalion?

Haha, yes. It’s not even subtle.

That being said, there are some subtleties. Pickering is warm and kind, but often does get distracted by Henry’s cleverness. It’s arguable that Eliza is more mad at him after the garden party than she is at Higgins. She expected Higgins to be an ass, but Pickering might have given her some acknowledgement, and didn’t.

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For shame, Pickering…

Mrs Higgins is very concerned about her position in society, but pities what her son and Pickering are putting Eliza through and drops everything to help her when asked. Mrs Pearce likewise is concerned for Eliza’s wellbeing, despite her annoyance.

Alfred, obviously, is enormously complex, even for the two scenes he’s in. And Eliza herself isn’t just the common flower girl that Higgins thinks of her as. In fact, at numerous times in the play, he remarks that she has a better ear even than he does, an unconscious observation,  a throwaway comment to him, but it makes all the difference in the world to her, who thought she would come of nothing else. And man, she remembered in her big fight with him when she came to the idea of opening her own phonetics school. Zing!

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How are women portrayed in Pygmalion? Is this a feminist play? Why or why not? In his life as a political activist, Shaw was an outspoken supporter of women’s rights, but is he a feminist in Pygmalion? Is Eliza? What does ‘feminist’ mean, exactly, anyway?

Lol, are you asking me, questioner, because you don’t know?

Well, for the record, to be a feminist is to believe that women and men deserve equal rights and equal treatment.

And if you believe that we already have that, I direct you back to the notion of the genderswapped Pygmalion, and challenge you to keep your opinions unchanged. It only works because we were unequal then and remain so today. It should be about class and education and language, and not about gender; but it isn’t. It’s about the complex fabric of inequality in Britain at the time, but translates to modern America, as well.

I think the women are portrayed well in Pygmalion. For every adorably assholish thing that Henry says, Mrs Pearce, Mrs Higgins, or Eliza has a zinger ready for him. But they’re not bitches; they get along handsomely together, with Pickering, with the Eynsdord-Hills–it’s just him who sets them off (psst–maybe he’s the problem). They all make logical and measured arguments throughout the play, which he impulsively bats away and then pays for later. Mrs Eysford-Hill and Clara have a very believable mother-daughter relationship that I identify with quite easily.

I would say that it is a feminist play. There are a few moments that make your heart fairly break for Eliza and her situation, and as much as you want to like Henry because he is clever and funny, you do want to shake him and tell him to stop being such a dick all the time.

Oh, did I mention that it also drew on inspiration from Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella?

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Well, hello there, unexpected relevance to my own interests

Eliza has a strong character arc where she begins one way and ends a totally different way, finding out a lot about herself along the way. She starts off strong and independent, then in her endeavour to better herself, she is broken down and reshaped. She could be defeated and overrun by the abuse, but instead, finds her strength again and rises from the ashes even stronger, more independent, and indeed more empowered in just about every way because of the experience. She relies on her innate talents and dignity to get her through the hardship and makes important allies along the way. I think she’s tremendously inspiring.

In the end, Eliza herself decides not to teach what she learned from Higgins, but took up the original idea of opening her own flower shop, and thus she began as a flower girl, and ended a flower girl, and she lived happily ever after.

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(Side note, at the time of this posting, Ireland just voted to repeal the ban on abortion. I find it fitting that we end the discussion on feminism in Pygmalion, and George Bernard Shaw, a proud Irishman himself, on such an historic day for Ireland and women. Congratulations, Ireland! Éirinn go Brách!)

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So, that’s all for Pygmalion, friends. Next month’s theme is ‘a book from a genre you’ve never read.’ I chose The Alchemsist by Paulo Coelho. And I’ll be travelling in June, so travel books seemed appropriate.

What are you guys reading?

The Writing Desk: Worldbuilding 101

One of the most important aspects of storytelling is creating a vibrant world. In many ways, the setting is a silent character and a driver of plot. Even if your story is set in modern-day Chicago, not everyone who reads it will be in modern-day Chicago, walking the streets, so you need to be able to make them feel like they are.

This topic has the potential to be LONG (my background is in history, anthropology, archaeology, and sociology), so I’m going to be very broad and basic about it. I’m considering turning this into a full-blown class at some point, if there’s enough interest.

Essentially, there are two things that worldbuilding refers to, and both rely on each other to work: the physical environment and culture.

Environment

The environment refers to the actual land on which the story takes place. The dirt, the air, the vegetation, the animals, the mineral deposits, sometimes even the laws of physics–I’m not leaving out sci-fi, even if I am a fantasy and hist fic girl. Where does your character find food and water? Shelter? Is it too hot or cold, too high to breathe? Is there a high plateau where there used to be a watchtower?  Is there gold in them thar hills? When the sun hits that ridge just right, do the hills sing?

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Literally, though–do you have actual musical land formations?

If your character moves from this location to a different location, what new challenges do they face? How does an aquatic environment differ from a terrestrial one? Or an aerial one? Or an extraterrestrial one? Does your world follow the laws of space?

These are all things you need to consider. It feels like a lot of work–and it super is–but the more you know about your world, the more you can add to the narrative without it feeling shoehorned in, and the more your audience will feel immersed in it.

Example: Magic Beans is set in a fantastical version of 1790s England. There are oak forests rich in deer and squirrels, rivers and oceans, a sandstone island, apple trees, four seasons, and oxygen-rich air. There are also two-headed giants called ettins, one-headed giants who are totally different, dragons, fairies, merfolk, and even some humans with genuine magical ability (to name a few).

Culture

The way you react to your environment is determined by your culture. Culture refers to a collection of behaviours, products, and thought processes shared by a group. People from different groups can literally think differently. If there are two people shouting, one onlooker may see two people arguing, while a different onlooker will see two people having a spirited conversation. Obviously, individual experiences will also affect how someone behaves, but they will still behave within the structure of their culture because that is how they were raised. Culture literally defines the way everything about you because in your formative years, that was all you knew.

Some people will be lucky (or unlucky) enough to be exposed to a number of different cultures from a young age, and that will form a unique sort of cultural amalgamation within that person. Immigrant children or children of immigrants are good examples, because they have the culture they started in or their parents’ culture mixed with the new one they’re immersed in as they grow up.

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Here, have an awkward selfie of me in the back of a truck on my way to Hobbitenango–a restaurant/theme park that fuses Antigua, Guatemala, with the Shire. Talk about mixing cultures!

I, myself, know that first-hand. My mother’s family has been in California for ten generations, now. We’re of Spanish heritage and belong to a culture group called Californios, but we’re also American. My father, who is also of Spanish descent, moved to the States from Guatemala in college, and I try to go to Guatemala at least once a year to see my family down there. So I grew up a proud Californio-Guatemalan-American. I understand the culture in both places–what is similar, what is different, and I know where I fit in within the structure wherever I am. My Spanish is abysmal, but both sides of my family are so proud of their heritage that when I finally visited Spain for the first time last year, it was like walking into one of the family homes–I felt so comfortable and at ease, it was almost alarming! I didn’t even have any trouble with the language.

So, enough about me. What does your culture need to feel real?

Well, culture is more or less comprised of a few specific traits:

Social organisation can refer to government and the family. Who is recognised as authority, and why; who is recognised as kin, and why. How we divide up the people.
Language and communication is the way we interact with each other. It’s spoken language, written language, emojis, what have you; as well as how that information is transmitted, like tv, radio, letters, email, Facebook Messenger. How do they differ?
Values and beliefs are the standards of what are considered right and wrong, the blueprint of life. This includes standards of beauty, philosophy, and even religious beliefs. This is how people feel and think.
Behavioral patterns are the actions that people go through, from morning food production to whatever their work is to hygiene to rituals on the high holy days. Do your characters eat rice for breakfast? Do they work in an office? Do they braid their hair in elaborate patterns and coat it in shea butter and red clay? Do they dance under the full moon? Or not? Or something different. What are the simple and elaborate movements that separate this group of people from that group of people? This is what people do (not always the same thing as what they think and feel).
Material Culture is anything that is produced and is physical. Art, food, architecture, clothing, tools, modes of transportation, games and entertainment like playing cards or musical instruments. This is what future archaeologists are most likely to encounter, as this is what we leave behind and from where we get information about everything else.

It can also be turned around. Just as culture adapts to the landscape, it can also shape the landscape. People can import non-native species into an area, mine for minerals, reroute rivers, farm, etc. Agriculture itself is an effect of culture on the environment.

That’s a lot to consider, I know. But the more you know, the more there is for your readers to discover, and boy, do they ever love to explore.

So give it some thought.

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If you guys would be interested in a CLASS about worldbuilding, leave me a comment below, or on any of my social media pages (links below). I’d love to hear your thoughts.

The Reading Nook: Touch the Dark, by Karen Chance

Well, we’re humming right along, aren’t we? April is finished, and with it, my fourth book of the year, bang on schedule. Last month, I read Touch the Dark, by Karen Chance, as recommended by a friend, for the April theme of ‘a borrowed book.’ Here’s how it went:

So, as you’ll recall, I’m doing a ‘12 Months, 12 Books’ reading challenge.  My friend has been hammering me mercilessly to read the Karen Chance books, so last month, I buckled. I actually did finish before the end of April, but then a mysterious stomach bug kicked my butt and set my schedule back a few days.

Anyway, let’s dive in.

Meet Cassandra Palmer, an orphaned human clairvoyant who was raised from a young age by a vampire gangster named Tony. Due to a series of rebellions in her youth and quite a bit of open opposition as an adult, Tony now wants her dead, and is willing to go against the Vampire Senate, as well as his own master to do it. It is revealed that a war between pretty much every supernatural race you can imagine is set to erupt, and Cassie must decide who to align herself with: the human war mages who want her dead, or the vampires who she knows she can’t trust because they don’t see her as anything but a pawn, but who might have information about her father, who she suspects survived the car crash that left her in Tony’s care.

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Car crashes are a very tidy way to make a Chosen One

Cassie isn’t just any clairvoyant, she can see ghosts, which not even vampires can. She has a haunted necklace with a gambler cowboy, named Billy Joe, attached to it. He’s a great help as a scout, serving as a spy and friend, and he’s full of folksy charm and old-fashioned quips.

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When she meets the illegitimate son of the Louis XIV, Louis-Cesar, she discovers that time travel is also something she can do. Her talents multiply and strengthen at an alarming pace until her destiny finally reveals itself.

The major themes are the nature of belonging and trust: she’s torn between the mortal humans who she knows want to kill her, and the self-serving vampires who want to say her so that they can use her. She struggles with her own identity, piecing together the broken shards of her own history, while weighing the veracity of the information she’s receiving.

Now, I have to admit up front, I’m not a big fan of vampire stories, especially the more modern kind. If I have to muck about with the undead, I prefer them animalistic and primal.

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The Undead, as God intended

Although, I will admit to having my soft spots.

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I mean, who doesn’t, though?

Touch the Dark is decidedly the latter, with suave-as-hell vamps like Dracula’s brother, Mircea, Louis-Cesar de Bourbon, the painter Raphael, Cleopatra, Kit Marlowe, and such infamous names as Rasputin and Jack the Ripper. It is undeniably smooth.

While the subject matter isn’t to my taste, I can’t find anything to fault in Karen Chance’s style. It’s tight, crisp, with an intellectual honesty that doesn’t gloss or obscure the graphic bits. Her chapters are on the longish side for me because I have a short attention span and A MILLION BAZILLION things to do all at one time, but there are only 14 of them, so suck it up and stop bitching, Avon, my god. I also can’t fault her research and understanding of history, which is something I will fact-check down to the molecular level, as well as her treatment of historical figures. That’s one of the benchmark of historical fiction–you gotta have recognisable figures, and you have to get them right.

I also like her treatment of supernatural laws. She has a few details and tidbits about vamps and ghosts and satyrs and things that I haven’t seen done before in other works of supernatural fiction, so I tip my hat to her creativity.

All in all, though I wouldn’t have picked this book without a recommendation. I did enjoy it, and I can see myself reading more of her books in future.

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Next month is Pygmalion, by George Bernard Shaw. Growing up, I was a HUGE My Fair Lady nerd, and my sister says the book is almost verbatim. The theme this month is ‘Books you should have read in school, but didn’t’ and while Pygmalion wasn’t on the list of reading at my high school, someone on Goodreads says it was on theirs, so that’s good enough for me.