The one-track heart

I have noticed something.

I can't focus on more than one thing at the same time. No, I'm not talking about sex.
What I mean is I can't give all my energy into more than one project at a time. I can't care about more than one thing. I have a one-track heart. You know, not the organ that delivers blood to your body, the part of your mind that is full of passion and worries and obsessions (it's not my fault if our forefathers thought that was located in our ribcage rather than our skull).

This is my explanation for not doing any writing recently. My job was all-consuming. It was the thing I thought about before going to bed, had nightmares about and seemed to be the main subject of conversation I had with pretty much anybody. Now that I am not going to work every day and instead am doing a research proposal, that seems to be the thing on my mind all the time (and which I talk about all the time - sorry, Mark!). I've had more free time in the last few weeks than since the summer holidays. And yet I haven't been able to think about writing, because all my energy and brain-space has been devoted to my research proposal.

The problem is that if you want to write something, it's probably best to do a little bit every day (did you know this also applies to research theses? What do you mean I'm getting sidetracked?). But, especially in fantasy, you need to immerse yourself in the world your have created. It means my one-track heart needs to stay focussed on the writing - and that's only possible if there's nothing else in my life I care deeply about. You know. Like my career.

What happens is that I won't write for ages. Then, like now, there'll be some freed up space in my head, and my writing waves frantically in the background so I take a closer look. But by the time I've re-read what I'd written, remember what the heck my dates mean and why I'd decided the make those changes last time, the free afternoon has evaporated and I haven't written a word.

I don't know how other people do it. HOW DO YOU DO IT, PEOPLE? I mean people who have a day job that they care about - hey it's easy to find time to write when you're bored out of your mind. I know. I've been there. But how do you juggle up your head space to make room for writing?

I'd like to know.

Have courage and be kind

Something a little bit different today. Although this blog is about writing, it is also more generally about storytelling.
(Besides, this is my blog so I can talk about whatever the heck I want.)

So today I am going to talk about a story. A very old story. The story of Cinderella.

Or rather, Kenneth Brannagh's live action version. Having read mixed reviews, I went to see the movie with my mum last night with no other expectation than it would look pretty. (And it did - oh that blue twirling dress!)

What I wasn't expecting was such a strong moral message. 
On her death bed, Ella's mother asks her daughter to promise to have courage and be kind, two rules by which Ella strives to live, even when life deals her a pretty bad hand.
Have courage and be kind. I was surprised - and impressed. Kindness and courage are rarely associated.

Now I'm going to go a little bit personal on you.
When I was growing up, I was a bit of a goody-two-shoes, and my older sisters, dutifully doing their jobs as older sisters, teased me for it. They called me Cinderella (mostly when they got into trouble because I was crying or I'd told on them). It became an insult. Being a Cinderella was being whiny goody goody who couldn't stand up for herself.

And that's often how people view kindness. Now I'm not claiming to be as good as Cinderella, and when mice eat from my kitchen they leave droppings everywhere. But being generally nice, and usually shy, I can still appear to be a bit of a pushover. A Cinderella.

There is, in some people, a simplisitic view of what being kind or being brave is.

Some people think that being 'nice' is being a smiling warm person and having good manners, saying nice things and flattering, and avoiding conflict.
But being kind is something else entirely. 

Being kind is caring, especially about those who are more unfortunate than you are or those society deems unworthy - like Cinderella, sharing the little she has with the mice.
It's thinking of others, and sometimes putting their needs before your own - like Cinderella giving milk to the poor old lady, having lost everything herself . It's about giving, of yourself, your time, and whatever you have. It's about forgiving, like Cinderella forgives her stepmother (I won't carry on giving examples from the movie, but you get the gist). It's giving people a chance, and giving them a second chance. A chance to be kind, too.

In the same way, brashness and confidence are often mistaken for bravery. Some people think the brave ones are those who speak louder than everyone else. They think of courage and see men with swords, charging into battles.

But in the wise words of the Starks:

'Can a man still be brave if he's afraid?'
'That is the only time a man can be brave.'

Bravery is about not giving up and keeping going, even when things are tough and don't look like they're going to get any better. It's doing what you're afraid to do and daring to show the world who you truly are. It's standing up for what is right and saying no to wicked deals, even if it will cost you everything. All those fascets of bravery, Cinderella demonstrates in the movie. I wrote a post a while ago about strong female characters. To me, Kenneth Brannagh's Cinderella is strong. She's strong from within.

Now this isn't a lesson life teaches us often. I know that to appear sassy wins more hearts in the real life than being a Cinderella, and I know having a big mouth gets people's votes. I also know that 'nice guys finish last' and people don't get ahead in life but putting others first. There aren't any fairy godmothers in the real world to give good people a happy ending.
But what a sad lesson that is. And what a sad world it would be if these were the rules we lived by.

So you might scoff at Cinderella, at the twirling dresses, at love at first sight and graceful dances. You may think Cinderella's wet eyes and candid manner are twee and you may think the storyline too simplistic (I loved it all). Or you might think there was no need for a live action version of an animated classic, or even for anything straying so far from the original fairy tale.

But I, for one, am grateful that there are still people out there telling stories that teach us the importance of having courage and being kind.

'I've got a feeling we're going to need them more than usual before long.'

(Bonus points if you can tell me what book this is from. Hint: the quote doesn't refer to kindness and bravery, but to laughs.)

To write or be published

A while back I wrote a post about ratings on goodreads, my bottom line basically being that different people have different tastes. Someone’s trash is somebody else’s treasure (or if you’re like me, you love your trash).

More insightful, perhaps, is this quote James posted in the comments:

"It’s not the job of the artist to give the audience what the audience wants. If the audience knew what they needed, then they wouldn’t be the audience. They would be the artists. It is the job of artists to give the audience what they need." –Alan Moore


And it’s got me thinking.

A lot of advice to writers I read is about getting published (see my toolkit to know what I mean). From what I understand, publishers are very timorous. They buy what they know will sell. So if I want to be published, I need to write what sells. And I understand that. I don’t think studying the market is a cynical way of writing. After all, why should anybody take a financial risk on my behalf? How can I expect to be read if I don’t write something people want to read? Good writing takes into account the audience and how the reader will be gripped – even my nine-year-olds learn this. Fine. Don’t write shite and expect others to read it.

But I don’t think it’s that simple.  I recently read this interview with a literary author whose book, Even the Dogs, I had just read – the book is depressing and certainly literary, but also very clever, in a way I will never be able to write. The part of the interview that struck me was this:

"When I started writing Even the Dogs I decided to ignore any concerns about readers who might not buy into what I was trying to do: to write the book as I wanted to write it, and wait to see what happened."

Of course, as a literary writer he is allowed, even expected, to be experimental. The kind of writing he admires is ‘barely readable’ (his own words). I am writing genre fiction, as mass market as it gets: YA. Not quite comparable. Yet I do think there is something true there.

Yes, I would love to be published. And I have studied pace and points of view and all of those good tips and techniques to make my writing better. As good as I can possibly make it.

But I spend my weekends and holidays writing because I love it. I love Lacie and Rowan and Meuriaden and Faerie more than publishing. And if getting published meant that the changes I was required to make corrupted the core of my book and its message – and it might well be that my current plot/ characters/ story are unmarketable at present without massive changes – then I’d rather carry on as I am now: an amateur holiday-time writer.
I'm not saying there is always a dichotomy (unlike my title suggests), and still hope for a bright future for my book. But if it doesn't turn out like that, at least I have written the book I wanted to write. If I find out it’s not publishable, well… tough.

In the meantime, I’ll carry on trying to make it as close as possible to what I want it to be.

The good thing about Goodreads

I like Goodreads. It's great to find indie books that no one else knows about (I found The Last Falcon through it and thoroughly enjoyed it). They hold competitions where you can win books (although I've yet to win any). It has a large forum with lots of different groups you can join to discuss books and writing. You can get in touch with authors and, if you're an author, you can have a platform to reach readers.

But mostly it has reviews.

I don't know if anybody has done any statistics on Goodreads ratings but I would guess the average would be around 3.8. And also I disagree with a lot of them. Example:

A Great and Terrible Beauty (loved): 3.78

Evernight (hated): 3.66

The difference is small.

Doing a quick search, these are the average ratings for bestselling YA books:
The Hunger Games: 4.4
Harry Potter (1): 4.38
Twilight: 3.56
The Maze Runner: 4.02
Gone: 3.87
Inkheart: 3.83
Uglies: 3.87

These are the average ratings for some indie books:
The Last Falcon (read in one day): 3.67
Switch! The Lost Kingdom of Karibou (gave up): 4.46
Switched: 3.89 (this was a self-published book that became a bestseller and was picked up for traditional publication)
Arrow of the mist (haven't read yet): 4.22
Altors (haven't read yet): 4.25

And not an indie, but not so well known: The Night Circus: 4 - this was very pretty but I hated the plot and the characters.

Another example of differences depending on the version is Stargirl, a book I absolutely loved when I was a teenager: the one book version is rated at 3.76 for book 1 and 3.78 for book 2, but the boxset is rated at 4.05.

Other famous sci-fi/ fantasy books I've read:
Transition (Ian M. Banks): 3.82
The Assassin's Apprentice (Robin Hobb): 4.1 or 4.27 (depending on the version)
The colour of magic: 3.94 or 4.15 (depending on the version)
The Lies of Locke Lamora: 4.27


Now of course, the averages for the famous books are from over 10,000 ratings (sometimes considerably more), whereas for lesser known books it can be from a dozen or up to a few hundreds, so it's not a fair comparison. Also the readership is different: the rater for Ian Banks is not going to be the same person as the rater for Harry Potter - well, unless they're like me.

My point is that the difference in ratings between great books and average books is small, and sometimes null. Books that frustrated me are loved by some, and books I love are hated by others.

What gives me hope is this: people have different tastes. 

Not to say that I won't accept feedback - I always (over)think about it. But it helps me get over the fact that not everyone will like my story. Not everyone will like my character and my world.

And that's ok. I only hope that some will.

Now there's loads of other things involved in rating books, so if there's anything you've noticed, please leave a comment. Let's get a discussion going!

Saturday morning thoughts

~*~ Warning: this post includes discussions of plot and characters ~*~

I have been reading a Wattpad online book on writing and it made me reflect on a couple of things about my book, namely high concept and strong characters. So I thought I'd share those thoughts.

High concept:

The pitch of a book (or a movie) is a sentence that summarizes what it’s about. Also known as the elevator pitch, i.e. ‘you bump into an editor in the elevator and you have one minute before they get off - what do you say?’, famous examples include:

"Bambi in Africa meets Hamlet” (The Lion King)

“Teenagers fight to the death in an arena” (The Hunger Games)

If a story can be sold purely on the pitch alone, it is a High Concept. It is highly marketable. The Hunger Games is one.

Other examples (from storymerchant) include:

“Erin Brockovich": An unemployed single mother becomes a legal assistant and almost single-handedly brings down a California power company accused of polluting a city's water supply.

"American Pie": Four teenage boys make a pact to lose their virginity by prom night.

So what would my pitch be and is it High Concept?

Well, the plot itself is quite complicated to explain. Whenever I'm asked what my book about I feel like asking, 'How long do you have?' - needless to say I haven't nailed the elevator pitch yet. The closest I’ve come to summarizing my story in a few words is my tagline ‘How far would you go for what you believe in?’ Thinking about it today, the only thing I could think of is ‘Good fairies do bad things’, but although it describes the concept, it really doesn’t tell you what the story is about. So I think I definitely fail on the high concept front.

But then again, what is the point? To make a story marketable. Marketable to publishers? I’m not going down that route. Marketable to the public? Well, I think word of mouth is more what I’m going for. After all, very few high concepts sell something to me. I read Harry Potter well into the hype (and in spite of it) because they were casting a role and advertised it in my school. I read the Hunger Games because I liked the movie, after it was recommended to me by a friend. If anything else, the high concept of the Hunger Games turned me off. 

My conclusion is that high concepts are overrated. The value of a story, I think, is in its execution.

To quote:

‘Story ideas, treatments and screenplays can all have High Concept premises. But only High Concept projects can be sold from a pitch because they are pitch driven. Non-High Concept projects can't be sold from a pitch because they are execution driven. They have to be read to be appreciated and their appeal isn't obvious by merely running a logline past someone. This is the reason why films like "Pulp Fiction," "Star Wars" and "Sideways" could never be sold from a pitch.’

Not to say that my book is the next Star Wars, but I do think that its value is in the world, the characters and the ideas in it. And I think that is true even of High Concept books and movies. 

'Bambi in Africa meets Hamlet' really doesn't do this movie justice.

Strong characters:

You might remember my rant about strong female characters. However, the description the author of the wattpad book makes of strong characters is purely from a narrative perspective: they are characters who make choices (even bad ones), who act, and therefore move the story on.

So I analysed my own story from that angle. Stus and Rowan definitely are strong characters: they makes choices, and these choices have consequences that drive the story forward. Not so for Lacie, but I’ll come back to her in a second.

One comment The Boyfriend made while editing my book was that things for Stus happen too quickly. Because of the timeline, and the places where the different stories intertwine, I have no choice but to have those events happen to Stus when they do (or it would be confusing for the reader). After that, Stus is a lot more passive as he loses control of the situation. So his story peaks quite early on.

Lacie’s story, on the other hand, is the opposite. For most of the story she is passive. I know - I'm selling my character really well! So she doesn't act like a strong character, but I think her story is interesting because she eventually takes on a strong role. By the end of the story, when both Rowan and Stus have become powerless she is the one making the choices and making things happen. She becomes strong, when she wasn’t to start with. To me, over and above the plot resolution, that’s what makes the climax interesting.

I suppose that is why I need my three POV (point of view) characters: they take turns leading the story. Now I can see how that’s a little unorthodox (to say it nicely), but it’s not done for the sake of being original. It’s part of the story and how I need to tell it.

Relay race, anyone?

Whether or not it’s effective… well that’s a good question. But you'll let me know, right?

Hear the geeky fangirl scream

Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!!!!

Hear that sound?

Yep, it’s my geeky fangirl scream. What’s yours?

Yesterday there was a Q&A with BOTH George R R Martin and Robin Hobb. If you’ve missed it, then you can start communal prayers with me that someone will put it on YouTube, because there’s some gems in there that I’d really like to watch again.

Needless to say it was amazing. Not just because they are fantastic authors and I love their books, but also because even though they are incredibly successful they’ve remained humble and human and relatable and lovely and amazing people...

They covered a lot of ground so I won’t bore you by recapping it all, but they made some points that I really wanted to share. It was the kind of comments that made me go, ‘Me too!’, and when you say ‘Me too!’ to something George R R Martin has said, it makes you glow inside a little bit.

‘Me too’ number 1: What makes a good book?

I can’t quite remember how the subject came up, but George (Yes, I’m going on first name terms with them, it’s shorter that way!) was talking about what makes a reader be hooked to a book. He was explaining that sometimes he’s reading a book that the critical part of his mind thinks is not very well written, yet he carries on reading and reading. Then sometimes he reads a book that the critical part of his mind thinks is wonderfully written and the critics acclaimed, yet he puts it down and never touches it again.

Now I completely agree, which is why I read the Twilight series (and enjoyed them! Yes, it’s out there now!). I think even twihards will agree they’re not literary, but it’s bit like chocolate: it’s not nourishing, but you love it! I’ve been reading a lot of books recently, in my attempt to cut down on the number of books on my bookshelves, and so I’ve come across a lot more of the latter kind.

I read them and I think, ‘Wow, I could never string sentences so cleverly,’ or ‘Wow, the way that idea was put across was intelligent.’ But it takes me weeks to get through 150 pages. You see? They’re clever books. They’re interesting at an intellectual level. But they’re not very engaging.

Now of course the best kind of books, in my opinion, does both. And of course it’s largely a matter of personal opinion. I’m a huge Harry Potter fan, and that’s because they struck a chord with me, as well as being unputdownable. I wouldn’t go as far as saying they are literary, but they stayed with me long after I’d read them. They were more than just entertaining.

What I found interesting was that, not only is it highly subjective, but both George and the editor who was leading the interviews said they can’t tell what makes a book so addictive. Now he’s doing it right for sure, even if he doesn’t know how, but that’s not going to help me. Still, it’s kind of reassuring to know that even the big guys don’t know. Kind of scary, too…

‘Me too’ number 2: Catching butterflies

A beautiful analogy from Robin: writing is like catching butterflies. The ideas are lovely floating around, but then you have to try and chase them and pin them down.

As George put it, when you write you have an idea, and as long as it’s in your head it’s perfect and beautiful, but once you put them on paper, they become this ugly mess that was nothing like what you had in mind. The butterflies end up all squashed and then you cry on your manuscript.

It was the reason it took him so long to finish any story when he was younger (cue: ‘Me too!’). A new idea would appear, and being unwritten, was much more beautiful than what he was currently working on.

As Robin said, writing is hard, which is why she prefers re-writing than first drafts, as there is something to work with (cue: ‘Me too!’). And again, it’s both reassuring and scary to learn that it’s hard for them too.

‘Me too’ number 3: Doubts

I won’t go into a lot of detail about this one, it's fairly simple: famous writers doubt too.

Robin explained that she doubts the most once she has pressed the ‘send’ button. She had thought she was finished, then she thinks back to her work and worries. ‘Did I change that paragraph I wanted to change? I don’t think I did.’

And George saying that there had been times when he had thought his writing career was over. And talking of rejection slips. Fat chance of that now, George!

So the conclusion? Hey, famous writers are human beings too!

They also talked about killing characters, which is always fun. New tip for predicting who’s going to die next in A Song of Ice and Fire: if they’re the only point of view character in a particular place, they’re unlikely to die.

But enough talking. Time to go and chase some butterflies.

Women's Day

Today is the International Women’s Day. As far as I understand it celebrates the rights of women, so I thought it was a good occasion to write about something that has been on my mind a lot when I’ve been reading books and book reviews recently: the portrayal of women in books.

Obviously what follows is only my humble opinion. But you might know that I defend my opinions quite fiercely.

Now we’re going to play a game of guess who. I’m going to describe a character and you have to guess who it is.

My character is fiercely independent. My character is very good with a bow and knows how to trap animals and forage for food. My character can fight and wield a knife and climb trees. My character is emotionally confused and pretends to be in love only to survive.

Hands up if you think I am describing a guy.

Otherwise, you might have recognised Katniss Everdeen from the Hunger Games. That’s what started this whole debate for me.

I have to admit, I love the Hunger Games, I love Katniss Everdeen and she kicks ass. But I started getting annoyed at all the admiration for ‘such a strong female character’ and reviews like, ‘finally a strong female character’.

Yes, Katniss Everdeen is a strong character. There are many ways in which the story wouldn’t work if she had been a guy. But based on her personality and actions, you’d think she is male. Now some may argue that the fact we can’t tell is a good thing, bonus point for gender studies and all that. That’s not what bothers me.

What really irks me is that people only say female characters are strong when they are like men.

Where are all the articles praising Hermione, Molly Weasley, Cersei Lannister and Malta Vestrit?

Because there are many strong female characters in literature (and here my references are Fantasy, but I’m sure there are plenty of other examples). And they don’t have to be like men in order to be strong.

Hermione is the brain behind the trio (that’s Harry, Ron and Hermione) and a driving force behind their adventures. She gets things moving, has initiative, and she’s brave. She’s determined and stands up for what she believes in. She’s strong. But she’s definitely a girl, who worries about her hair and understands Harry’s girlfriend problems better than the two boys.

This is a difficult exercise, a sensitive topic and I’m trying very hard not to fall into clichés about what girls are meant to be like. You can argue all you want about whether or not men and women are different, but the fact is that the ‘women’ group is itself diverse. It annoys me that one way of being strong is being glorified, as if all the other more ‘female’ ways were weakness. If a character likes shopping and wears lipstick and wants to be pretty they are shallow, if a character doesn’t know how to fight physically then they are a damsel in distress, if a character is kind they are a Mary Sue.

JK Rowling made a superb comment about Molly Weasley being a stay-at-home mum and yet a strong character:

“I always saw Molly as a very good witch but someone whose light is necessarily hidden under a bushel, because she is in the kitchen a lot and she has had to raise, among others, George which is like, enough... I wanted Molly to have her moment and to show that because a woman had dedicated herself to her family does not mean that she doesn't have a lot of other talents.”

Another author who portrays female characters very well is Robin Hobb. Her books are wonderful because of the diversity in its characters, including the women. Take the Liveship Traders trilogy: there’s Althea Vestrit, who disguises herself as a man, but also Ronica, the matriarch who takes care of the family fortune and lands, and Malta, the spoiled brat whose hidden bravery we only find out later.

They’re all different. They’re all strong. And they’re all undeniably female. Can’t we celebrate them too?

Not that this is a purely female issue. When we will start celebrating Peeta Mellark for being compassionate instead of labelling him as weak (even though the guy can lift hundred pound bags of flour)? Why is it bad for a man to have women traits, but laudable for a woman to have men traits?

Fitz and the Fool - Art by A6A7

In Robin Hobb’s books, you have the Fool, whose gender we never really know, Fitz, who’s your typical strong man, and moody and frail Wintrow. Even her male characters are diverse.

Now a quick Google search has told me that I’m not alone in thinking that this whole 'strong female character' idea is backwards.

But these are important questions for me because, as I develop my characters, I have to think about the kind of people they are. Are they stereotypical? Do they encourage clichés about men and women? Do they appear strong?

My main character seems weak. She’s shy, scared of her own shadow and not particularly good at anything. She’s definitely not physically strong, she’s not particularly smart and she can’t fight. She doesn’t go looking for adventures. She doubts every decision she makes and cries easily.

But she has immense power of resilience and love. She’ll stand up for what she believes is right even though she’s scared shitless. To me, she’s strong. And she doesn’t need to know how to wield a sword to be so.