Silk & Shadows

Currently working on: Unpacking
Mood: Sandy

My parents were in town this weekend and the weather was that gorgeous secret of the Pacific Northwest: the sunny week in October. See, right before the rains close in, nature gives us one more week of glorious blue skies and balmy temps. A cruel taunt? A promise? Whichever.

So we headed up to the Olympic Peninsula for a bit of walking, then back down Hwy 101 to the Oregon Coast.

While we walked, I thought about the new story I’m working on, and it seems to me, that our hiking and my story have a lot in common.

1. The stuff

When I start a new idea, I am excited and overwhelmed by all the stuff I might stuff in the story. Secondary love triangle! BB guns! String theory!

Much like my car has five doors for stuffing, I figure my story has many, many openings to be filled. But as you can see, Monster Girl is concerned about where she will fit. So it goes with my story; I have to ask myself — fun though it might be — whether I really need a talking, one-armed octopus.

2. First steps

I love the beginnings of hikes and the beginning chapters of a story. Both are so filled with promise. I feel strong and confident, with plenty of chocolate in my backpack.

The way ahead doesn’t necessarily look easy. There are barriers to be surmounted, but the adventure calls.

3. Lost

This part is less fun, but it seems to be true of hikes and stories, at least for me. Okay, I’m not EXACTLY lost, but there comes the moment where I definitely want to sit down, where the way seems a little more hazy and bleak than just a few steps or chapters ago.

This is where hikers and writers are made, I think. To quit? To continue? Walking out into the waves isn’t really an option (not on a Pacific Northwest beach, at least, not without a dry suit!) but I could parallel the shore on a new path.

Or build a boat of driftwood and dreams.

4. The view

I must continue — somehow — because I know — somewhere — I will come to the point where I can SEE the point. THIS is why I am here.

5. Panting fun

I’ve said before, I love love love The End. Whether writing or hiking, coming to the end (in mostly one piece with relatively few debilitating blisters) is a great feeling of satisfaction. But the satisfaction does seem relative to the exertion. Some of our best hikes (and by best, I mean make the best stories, of course) have been the worst technical hikes. Too long, too wet, too ridiculous, waaaay too much panting. But in The End, totally worth the reliving.

Especially if there’s a little chocolate left.

Do you find a certain pleasure in some kinds of hard work? Got any favorite hikes I should try someday?

After two and a half years of blogging here at Silk and Shadows, it’s unfortunately time for me to say goodbye. I’m still writing fiction and still blogging over at my own website, but life is forcing me to scale back a bit.

Celebrating romance novels and dark, delicious heroes with you has been a lot of fun. I’ve truly enjoyed the opportunity to meet the avid readers and writers who visit the blog. I’ve met some wonderful people—including the wonderful authors who’ve blogged with me, Sharon Ashwood, Kim Lenox, and Jessa Slade—and I’ll miss you all.

As I head out the door, I’ll leave you with some parting thoughts about surprises…

Do you believe a good story is as much about what you don’t say as what you do?

Voltaire did: The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out.
Alfred Hitchcock did: Drama is life with the dull bits cut out.

I do, too. However, this was a piece of craft I didn’t fully understand when I first started writing.

My initial attempts at story starts were rampant with backstory. I believed it was necessary to explain the hero or heroine’s past or to allow the reader to ‘catch up’ on some of the events that recently happened. People suggested that I take the backstory out but I still didn’t understand that not only was it okay to do so, it made the story better.

Two reasons:

1. Pacing. This reasoning I got first. It made sense to me that by giving all this information I was slowing the story down.

2. Drama. It took longer for me to realize that by dumping information on the reader at the first opportunity, I was taking the fun out of reading.

When we meet new people or start a new job or take a trip to somewhere we’ve never been before, a large part of the excitement is related to discovery. We don’t know everything about a new person when we first meet them — in fact, we usually only get a very superficial glance. The fun in meeting someone new is learning about them, bit by bit. Yes, we form first impressions, and those are often lasting, but they’re based on tidbits of information, on subtle clues, not on a detailed accounting of the person’s life story. Why should reading about a fictional character be any different?

Now, to be fair, in fiction our goal is to have the reader identify with the protagonist, so it’s important to give more insight into that character than any other. But choose your moments. Give the reader tidbits of information at the moment when it makes the most impact. Keep secrets. Real people do, so it won’t surprise the reader that your hero/heroine does, too. Well, the information might surprise them , but not the keeping of a secret.

What sort of info do you hold on to?

Well, motivations is a good place to start. We usually don’t get to know what’s motivating people. There’s often a surface reason — a quest for riches, for example — but the underlying motivation — I need to prove to my dad that I’m not a worthless piece of crap — is something we often don’t discover until we’ve gotten to know someone extremely well.

Backstory (all that stuff you wanted to tell upfront) is another place to look for what to hold back. The hero got a letter that set him off on this journey? Why not hold back the details of the letter until them finding out will incite a crisis? The heroine has three sisters? Why not hold that information back until you have a moment of intimacy between the hero and her that gives her a chance to tell him what those sisters mean to her?

If you’re holding back key pieces of info, dropping clues is vital. Readers get a little peeved if in a moment of crisis the heroine suddenly displays her black belt Karate skills when there’s been no indication she possessed them up to now. For important elements you’re going to use later, drop one or two clues along the way so the reader isn’t scratching their head going ‘huh?’. We’d much rather have reader going ‘I knew it!’ or ‘Now I see the connection!’

To use a popular TV show example: Remember the first season of Grey’s Anatomy? Yeah, I know I’m asking a lot. From the very beginning (in fact, from the first scene of the first episode), Derek Shepherd is a mystery. Several episodes before the finale, Meredith Grey, who’s dating him, gets a little frustrated about how little she knows about him. The episode ends with a romantic moment of sharing, and Meredith is satisfied that she’s finally learned the truth about him. Then, in the last minutes of the last episode of the season they produce Shepherd’s wife. Not ex-wife. Wife. Viewers are delighted with the shocker, but prepared because it’s been made clear that Shepherd has secrets.

Wouldn’t it have been dull to know he had a wife all along … even if the viewers knew, but Meredith didn’t? I think so. I love surprises.

How much time do you spend selecting the names of your characters? Do they pop into your head and stick? Or do you pour through baby name books looking for the one that calls to you? Or do you pick the names (or variations on the names) of your favorite public figures?

Ever since I was in grade school and sat next to a fellow by the name of Barry Perry (who was never called just Barry), I’ve been fascinated by names.

I think long and hard on the names of my characters … testing first and last together for rhythm, verifying authenticity with the locale and time period, and ensuring the name reflects the personality of the character. If, during the course of writing a book, a character’s personality evolves into something I didn’t foresee when I started, I’ll change that character’s name.

I confess, though, the most common reason for me to change names partway through a book is realizing that I have too many that begin with the same letter.

I use a couple of resources to name my characters: a standard baby name book and a book called Names through the Ages by Teresa Norman. The Norman book breaks names into Irish, Scottish, Welsh, English, French, and American origins, and assigns time periods to their usage. Very helpful for a historical writer. I also use another great book, the Character Naming Sourcebook by Sherrilyn Kenyon. This book goes further on the origin side of things, breaking names into 45 countries/places of origin, and also has articles on character naming.

If you don’t have the funds for a book at this moment, you can have a look at a few online sites:

Behind The Name First Names – provides meanings for various first names
Behind the Name Surnames – provides meanings for a selection of last names
Social Security Administration – gives lists of popular names by year

Or if you need more help, check out some of the character name generators:

Behind the Name
Ficticity
The Script Vault

Here’s hoping you have as much fun naming your characters as I do.

One of the truly wonderful things about the internet is the volume of information available to anyone who surfs. Gone are the days when you had to trudge down to the library for everything. If you’re a fiction writer, you can benefit from the wisdom of others with a simple click of your mouse. You’ll still need to visit the library occasionally, but you can learn a lot about your craft just sitting in your computer chair.

There are many, many resources out there. Preditors & Editors, itself a fabulous resource, lists a few of them.

Here are five that you may or may not have stumbled upon in your internet travels:

1. Forward Motion for Writers – Holly Lisle has an article on almost every topic imaginable, and since she’s a published author herself, she knows her stuff.

2. Resources for Romance Writers – Charlotte Dillon put this site together for romance writers, but many of the resources are helpful for anyone making their way in the publishing world.

3. Write it Sideways – Susannah Windsor Freeman posts several articles each month on a variety of writing topics. As a former teacher, she provides information in an easy-to-absorb and interesting way.

4. StoryFix – Larry Brooks has published books on how to write and publish, plus his site made the top ten list of blogs for writers composed by Write to Done. Hint: if you click on the icon for his award, you’ll see the entire top ten list.

5. Nathan Bransford’s Writer Forums – Nathan Bransford was an agent with Curtis Brown until he left the publishing field for a job at CNET. But he’s a writer himself, and he started these forums when he was an agent, so there’s a wealth of great info here.

Happy exploring!

When you have a busy life, filled with work, family matters, and chores, it can be hard to find the time to write. This is especially true for those just starting their trek through the jungle of the publishing world. Why? Because at that stage no one believes in the dream except you.

Family and friends tend to see writing as a hobby, as easily put aside as their plans to scrapbook the family vacation to Disney World. And in the face of children who ask for snacks while doing their homework, husbands who want you to watch the latest episode of Law & Order, and friends who beg you to join them on a shopping excursion, it’s challenging to see it any differently.

But writers write. Preferably every day. They make sacrifices (like turning off the TV) all the time. If you’re serious about being a writer, then you need to carve out the hours necessary to craft a story.

One of the easiest sacrifices a writer can make is sleep. That’s because the only person who’ll complain when you trade an hour of sleep for an hour of writing is you. Try getting up an hour earlier than normal (if you’re a morning person) or going to bed an hour later (if you’re a night owl).

Another easy sacrifice is lunch hour (or lunch half hour). Brown bag your lunch, take it to a quiet spot where your co-workers won’t be tempted to interrupt, and go for it.

If you’re a work-at-home mom, perhaps the twenty minutes it takes the washing machine to clean a load of laundry would be a good place to start. No guilt if the laundry is getting done, right?

Some writers I know hop down to the local coffee shop to write—because they don’t have family demands there. Others manage to write while attending Little League games, skating lessons, and doctor’s appointments. If you carry a small notepad and a pen everywhere you go, you can ‘bring your office’ with you.

Start with a small goal—even if it’s only a paragraph per day—and work yourself up to longer writing stints.

The good news is there’s no defined amount of writing required to get that story written. The more you write, the faster the story will be finished, but a page a day for 365 days will give you a whole novel. If you only write a ½ page per day, it’ll take you two years to get that novel written, but it will still get written—if you keep going.

Good luck and good writing!

Currently working on: Unpacking
Mood: Contemplative

Today is Memorial Day here. Originally intended as a day of remembrance for those who died in the nation’s service, the three-day weekend also gets used for general remembrances of all departed loved ones as well as for an excuse to barbecue various departed farmyard animals. This year, I used the weekend to attend a cousin’s wedding which was cause for many memories as well.

Memory is an interesting thing. Memory is how we attach meaning and relevance and value to moments no longer in our immediate timespace, and yet memory is a highly unreliable standard, influenced by attention, emotion, presupposition and more.

Memory is even more problematic in the hands of a storyteller.

Lots of stories were told this weekend around the wedding. People sharing stories about the bride and groom, sharing stories about what they’ve been up to since the last wedding/funeral, sharing stories about how they met their own life partners. Silly stories, sweet stories, sad stories.

I wonder how many of them were true. Or “truthy.” Or not true but True with a capital T.

As a semi-professional storyteller, I respect the judicious molding of memory into story. XY often bemoans this vocational hazard of mine.

He says, “That’s not how it happened.” (Or so he remembers.)

I say, “But it’s funnier that way.”

Funnier or sweeter or sadder, depending.

It seems odd to me that poppies are associated with Memorial Day since opium is made from poppies and one of the side effects of opium use is memory loss. But maybe the other side effect (at least according to the Romanticists of the later 18th century) of opium — insight — is ultimately more important than mere memory.

For the storyteller, memory and truth work in service to the story. I noticed this technique in many of the stories told this weekend. I could see the technique best when I’d been part of the original event and got to hear the “story-ized” version told to others.

1. Tell it simple.

Life is complicated. (Nothing like wedding planning to prove that.) The story version of life is simpler. Look for unnecessary complications, redundancies and tangents, and eliminate them. In your stories, I mean. Although I might also try this in real life.

2. Tell it “more.”

Make if funnier or sadder or crazier or whatever-ier. Find the “truth” that the story is telling and bring out the threads that lead there.

3. Tell it again.

While it’s painfully inevitable that some people tell the same story to death, I also see that the best stories get honed to a thing of beauty by regular retelling. I think this correlates to the craft of writing on a couple different levels, whether it’s choosing a familiar and well-loved thematic trope during the brainstorming stage or revising for best effect in later drafts.

Next time you’re at a family event hearing the same old same old or eavesdropping at a coffee shop to strangers, listen to the stories being told around you. What makes them interesting? What makes your attention wander? How can you apply those to your storytelling?

Are you a plotter looking for guidance on how to deliver maximum punch? I’ve got some suggestions for where you might want to look for answers:

1. 3 Act Structure – A plotting method that originated in the theater and is commonly used in movies. It breaks the action into three distinct sections, each with their own turning points, high points and low points. Here’s a link to Alexandra Solokoff’s blog where she discusses the 3 Act structure. Her blog has lots of great tips on plotting.

2. Hero’s Journey – American scholar Joseph Campbell outlined the stages of the Hero’s Journey back in 1949. Chris Vogler later wrote a book based on Campbell’s work called The Writer’s Journey and, with its clear explanations and more modern examples, it has become an iconic writer’s tool.

3. W Plot Method – This method is commonly used in novels and movies. It involves plotting toward a series of high and low points, which occur when the hero meets barriers to his or her goal. The reason it’s called the W plot is because the points go from high to low, low to high, and repeats…creating a W shape.

4. Snowflake Method – This method is not for the faint of heart. It requires a lot of prep work that may not mesh with your creative brain. On the other hand, some people swear by it. The guy who developed it is a former software engineer, so you can comfortable that it’s a very logical and organized way to create a book.

5. A Mix of Methods — Some writers blend plotting methods to create their own way of working. Some write down a few turning points, then write organically from there. Others blend the W plot with the hero’s journey, or the hero’s journey with the 3 Act structure. Anything is acceptable as long as it gets you to the finish line. Here’s a nice explanation of the W plot blended with the Hero’s Journey.

The good news is you can use any of these methods, or none of them, and still end up with a great novel. We all work differently. But sometimes creativity benefits from a bit of structure, so if you’re tempted, give one of these methods a try.

This article first appeared in the Romance Writers of NZ (RWNZ) monthly magazine Heart 2 Heart.  I wrote it after the newsletter editor there asked if I had an article on character creation and I realized that, gasp!, I didn’t. Now I do. I’m also teaching a class on Creating Creepy Characters for Savvy Authors this week and this post adds to that content.

* *                  *

Which comes first, plot or character? Like the chicken-egg question, it’s basically irrelevant. For successful poultry — and story — creation you need both. For me, though, plot comes more readily. “What happens” bubbles up in my brain before “who it happens to.” Since character doesn’t come first for me, I have a process to create the people to live (live through!) my story.

Warning #1: Long post
Warning #2: Pantsers/organic writers, back away slowly. This technique may give you contact dermatitis.

1. What sort of person will suffer the most from this particular storyline?

Okay, that sounds a little mean, but conflict is the heart of commercial genre fiction, so the characters are going to have to suffer to earn their happy ending. Story conflict is amplified by building personalities who will struggle most vigorously against (and ultimately for) the lesson they have to learn. Thoughtful character creation is especially important in romance because not only are the characters fighting their way through the plot, the hero and heroine will fight against and for each other.

For me, thinking about the theme helps me find my characters. In my Marked Souls urban fantasy romances with alpha male warriors possessed by repentant demons, the series theme is the shifting balance between good and evil, but each book in the series explores that question from a slightly different angle. For example, in the latest story, VOWED IN SHADOWS, the book theme is about weaknesses of the flesh. Naturally, the heroine is a stripper with a boa (not the feathered kind; the reptilian). Nim’s body is a sensual weapon she uses against an uncaring world…and it is also her weakness because she still carries the scars of childhood sexual abuse. So who would suffer most from such a conflicted heroine? A married man who hasn’t had sex in eighty years! Unlike the heroine, the widower hero holds femininity sacred. I’m being a bit wry by saying ‘holds’ since a maiming in an earlier story left Jonah with only one hand; his weakness of the flesh is quite literal.

I find that it helps to list the characteristics of the hero and heroine side by side to make sure the conflict between them and the plot is inherent in their personalities. I also make sure the seeds of their need for each other is nestled in that conflict by answering the question “What does he/she learn from her/him because of the story?”

2. What made the character this way?

When I first started writing, I took a character-building class where they handed out a twelve-page dossier to fill out. Eye color, okay, but favorite ice cream? Really? It paralyzed me because it seemed so arbitrary. (People with processes tend to dislike arbitrary.) If dreaming up a character to that level of minutia works for you, of course, carry on. I find that knowing the character’s likes and dislikes NOW is less important to me¾and to the story¾than the roots of their discontent. Working backstory into the actual pages is tricky, but knowing the character’s history can help flesh out the present without seeming so random. Not all of it (please, not all of it!) will show up in your story, but hints of those experiences will tint the character at every level.

The rule of backstory creation is: Go deeper. For example, Jonah is an ex-missionary. Of course he is, since Nim is a stripper! I wanted that source of conflict between them from the beginning. But I also wanted to give a reason for their eventual relationship. So I went deeper. Sure, he’s a missionary, but why? He was a religious man (another level of conflict with his demonic possession) and his wife was a minister’s daughter (the exact opposite of his heroine) but what more? Go deeper. Ah, he was a missionary, in part, for the adventure. But why? Going deeper, I find out that as a child he read a penny dreadful with bare-breasted native girls! That spirit of adventure along with a touch of male ogling gave him the history to bond with his heroine. Eventually

3. How will the character get from the beginning to the happy ending?

Once the basic characteristics and backstory are nailed down, I track the character’s growth through the plot. As a plotter, it’s easy for me to let the battle scenes run amok without making sure the characters get something out of it besides bruises. But since our genre is about conflict AND change, I want to make sure the characters are embedded in the experiences on the page.

Time to make another list. I start with Point A: where the character begins the story, which is usually some version of 1. despairing, 2. lost, 3. oblivious, 4. willfully blind, or 5. happily puttering and about to be catapulted into the gleeful hell that is the plot. I end with Point Last, where the character finally “gets it,” whatever it is for the particular story. Since stories where the characters come to unmotivated insights and unsustainable epiphanies are unsatisfying and unbelievable, I chart the clear steps between Point A and Last.

For example, Nim goes from the kind of girl who metaphorically wields a gallon of gasoline and a match to being a powerful positive light against the darkness. A few of the steps between include: selfishly taking on a demon to improve her chances of winning the stripper all-stars; facing monsters in real life and in herself and learning she finally has the power to fight them; finding tentative friendship with other women in the demon-possessed league; admiring the hero for his dedication to fighting evil; believing his love for her means her scars don’t make her damaged goods; valuing the goodness in the world.

Here is where plot and character and romantic relationship intertwine on the page. The forward progression of the plot drives changes in the character, and the character’s changes drive the plot forward, and the hero and heroine push each other. I find that I usually have to move pieces around a few times — can’t have the hero injured in the battle here because that would force the heroine to acknowledge her feelings and she can’t do that yet, etc. Personally, I think that character rules plot because I find you can more easily massage the plot to echo the character’s growth; fudging the character’s growth to fit the plot can feel forced and unrealistic (always funny when you are talking about fiction).

I have other, smaller tools for refining characters¾motto, behavioral quirk, personal imagery dictionary, etc. — but these three steps give me a sturdy launch for a story. You can also write most of a synopsis with these pieces. Pantsers, if you made it this far, you see there’s still a lot of room for on-the-fly characterization, like favorite ice cream. I also use these character notes during revisions to make sure I told the story I wanted to tell.

Although I consider myself a very analytical writer (shocking, I know) in the end, I do believe a character comes alive through some indescribable jolt of magic. But I think it’s a lot like Frankenstein’s monster; Frankenstein had to do a lot of work first — grave robbing, sewing, decanting mysterious bubbling liquids — before the lightning brought his creature to life.

Happy mad scientisting!

After watching the new Marvel movie, Thor, over the weekend—along with thousands of other folks—I expect a surge of interest in Norse mythology. Mythology makes a great basis for storytelling, and it worked for Tolkien and Rowling, so I say embrace it.

There are two ways use mythology in your stories:

- Stay faithful to the legends and be very careful about the details you include, treating your story like a fictionalized historical.

- Play with the mythology—even blend it with other mythologies—to create your own twist on the old stories.

Fantasy authors have been doing both successfully for years. Tolkien and Rowling both played with mythology, creating a unique world that is wonderfully identifiable to their stories. Many have copied them.

Is there a right approach? Not really.

But the reason many authors tweak mythological tales to suit their own needs is that the old tales are restrictive. You can’t stray off the beaten path without a fan of the old tales pointing out your error. If you create your own variation of the old tales, there are no beaten paths. Everything is fresh, new, and malleable.

You don’t need to stick to Norse mythology. Almost every region of the world has its own set of tales, from Hindu to Celtic, from Egyptian to North American Indian. There are plenty of stories from which to draw. I’ve used both Egyptian and Japanese mythology in my Soul Gatherer series so far.

One of best investments a paranormal/urban fantasy author can make is the purchase of a thick tome of mythology. Or several. I haunt the discount shelves at my local bookstore and regularly find texts on Greek myths, the Celtic druids, and Ancient Egypt—to name a few. And I’ve found all of them helpful at one time or another.

Anyone have a favorite mythology reference?