Fear is the Mind Killer: or, Don't Worry, this is not a post about the "Dune" Saga

Since today is the day before Halloween, I wanted to talk about fear.

Fears vary so much from person to person. My husband is afraid of spiders, while I'd rather catch and release them into the yard. Riding my scooter makes me fearless, yet fear of failure can make me an emotional train wreck.

The one thing that we all have in common is that our fears will make us do things we might not normally do. Fear is a universal motivator, although what it motivates us to do is as variable as our fears. Concern for ourselves and others will motivate us to act, or even to overcome another fear. As writers, fear is an important tool to convince our characters to do what we want them to do. Of course, the flip side to that, is that these fears must be established early on as a quirk or flaw of the characters. Ah, the joys of characterization!

But the most interesting part about fear is how humanity seems to crave a good scare every once in a while. Scary stories told around the fire pit didn't originate with the Boyscouts of America, they are as old as fire pits themselves. Americans go in droves to scary movies, especially this time of year, wanting to get their blood pumping and endorphins flowing.

I love a good haunted house, but none will ever be as frightening to me as the first one I ever went to-- first grade at my school overseas. I was six, a little gypsy, ironically enough, and I'd never been so frightened in all my young life. Not even when I fell off my trike when I was four and got glass in my knee. I wasn't scared then, because my big strong daddy picked me up and took me to the hospital. But without Mom or Dad to cling to in the haunted house, I'd never felt so vulnerable, even in a familiar place where I knew I was safe. I had nightmares for months of rubbery bats dropping out of the ceiling on me, and tripping over bones trying to get out of the dark. I still draw on that chest constricting fear for my writing, even though my rational adult brain knows that my first haunted house was probably not very scary at all. But the memory freaks me out far more than going to the House of Shock or the Mortuary as an adult.

Scary movies still give me nightmares, which is why I prefer campy horror of the Evil Dead and Cabin Fever persuasion. Only movies, though. I have no problem with reading horror. Something about the vivid imagery of the movies supplants itself indelibly in my subconscious and flashes behind my eyes when I'm trying to sleep. That's why you'll see me at Zombieland before Saw 87 gaziilion.

What scares you? How do you use fear to motivate your characters? And do you remember the first time you went to a haunted house? Does it still chill your blood and keep you up at night?

Or is it just me?

Wannabe Scribe Book Giveaway!

Great contest opportunity from Shannon Messenger at Ramblings of a Wannabe Scribe that ends midnight on Friday, her time.

Up for grabs are:

NERDS signed by Michael Buckley

Dreamdark: Blackbringer signed by Laini Taylor

Fancy Nancy and the Posh Puppy signed by Robin Preiss Glasser

And you get to choose which prize you want. Sorry, U.S. entrants, only!

My current followers (meaning everyone who followed before today, October 26th) will automatically get five (5) entries in the contest when they comment. New followers will get three (3) entries when they comment. And if you don't want to follow, you can still enter and get one (1) entry.

But wait--there's more! (Heh. I've always wanted to say that.)

Extra Entry Options

+10 for writing an actual post on your blog about this contest. It doesn't have to be long, but I will be checking it to make sure it's there and it qualifies.

+3 for linking this contest on your sidebar

+3 for tweeting a link to the contest (please be sure give me your twitter name so I can track it down)

+2 for telling me why you want the book you are choosing in your comment

+1 for telling me I'm wonderful :) (What can I say? I feed off compliments.)

Just like last time, all entries will be written on equal sized pieces of paper, scrambled up, and then I will draw one winner at random. You have until midnight on Friday, October 30th to enter and I'll announce the winner Saturday, October 31st (weird how that worked out, huh?) And unfortunately I can only pay to ship within the US.

Good luck to all who enter!

30 Days of Write: Pre-November Planning and the Allure of the New Notebook

I've been doing a lot of thinking recently about how NaNo can benefit me if I treat it as a serious writing exercise. As I've said before, my goals are to ignore my inner editor-- as in, don't get it right, get it written-- and to focus on my perceived weaknesses in craft and characterization. It seems as though a lot of people who participate in NaNo are changing their writing habits, whether out of desire or necessity.

A strange phenomenon is the planning that occurs in the time leading up to November, before any of the actual novel can be put down. Ordinarily, I'd love this time, plotting and writing character bios and researching. But since I'm also scrambling to finish up my WiP-- don't get it right, get it written!!-- I have very little time to devote to pre-November planning. Another reason I'm glad I chose a project that already has an established story/plot arc I'll be more or less following.

But does this expectation in October turn pantsers into plotters? How many self-proclaimed "fly by the seat of my pants" writers give in to creating plot arcs or storylines, or-- Heaven forbid-- even the dreaded outline before they're allowed to type that first sentence? There's nothing I'd love more than to snuggle into a chair tonight with a notebook and some cocoa and flesh out my characters for NaNo. Instead, I'm going to be forcing myself to finish my WiP's first draft. The end is in sight for Mara's story. Which is good, because we need some space. So you can understand the allure of Hans and Greta and a new notebook right now.

In my world, there's nothing more promising than a blank notebook. I have a bit of an addiction to adorable notebooks about 5 by 7. When I first started writing, I was afraid to write in anything other than an old, half-used Mead from my grad school days, 8.5 by 11. I didn't trust myself to break in a new notebook. As if what I wrote wouldn't be worth the paper it was inked on. It actually took quite a while for me to believe in myself enough to know my ideas were worthy.

It's a little thing, but now a get a distinct thrill of expectation when I start a new notebook. A new notebook means a new story, new characters to love and torture and dream about... well, you get the picture. Nothing promotes creativity for me, and helps me get the characters and the story straight in my head like writing it all out longhand. There's no way I can sit and stare at a blank screen and wait for the story to come drizzling out one line at a time, so I applaud those who can. Instead, the smaller the notebook, the easier I find it is to face those blank pages, to fill them with worlds of words and exciting detailed character backstory.

So if any of you pantsers feel the need to get your story started before November gets going, don't forget about the allure of the new notebook. ;)

WIP Wednesday : There and Back Again

Some of my favorite stories end where they begin, and my WiP is no different. Wait a second, maybe it is...

If you study the tropes of literature and television, you may hear that there are only three plots. Or seven. Or thirty-six-- it's all very confusing, really, but worth the time to study. One of Christopher Booker's supposed seven basic plots is the "Voyage and Return" story. Obviously, this encompasses stories like The Hobbit, Robinson Crusoe, Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, in which the main character leaves home, has an adventure, and comes back home.

Mara's story, however, gives the Voyage and Return a different spin. Yes, she leaves home and has a great adventure, but though she does get a little homesick, she finds a new life and a new home. Before she can start that new life, however, she must take care of some unfinished business at home, which is where she is when the story ends.

What I like about studying tropes is how you can use them to give an old story new life. Everything old can be new again when an author knows what has come before and how s/he can change a trope to suit their story. What I like about this method is that it provides the reader with a story that starts out familiar and comfortable, but in the end winds up surprising them by diverging from the story the are expecting to read. Of course, there's a danger in diverging too much, but a skillful writer can make it work with solid, likable characters, a uniquely lyrical narrative style, or a fast-paced plot.

If anyone still hasn't decided on a project for National Novel Writing Month, take a look at t.v. tropes (see the "television" link above). You may waste hours looking at this site, so don't say I didn't warn you. But knowing what has come before is a great way to decide what you'd like to write next. As my daddy always says, those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it.

Which is why we'll be seeing Lord of the Rings rip-offs for another seventy years. ;)

That Which We Call a WiP by Any Other Word, Still Smells as Sweet...

Morning, y'all! I had an amazingly productive unplugged week, but it's great to be back. I've got my yet-again-untitled-work-in-progress completely plotted and I think I've only got another 5-7k words left to go, so the timing is perfect to finish before NaNo.

Sadly, as you may have surmised, I'm back to hating my title. Frustrating to be so close to the end, yet still not see my finished work as a whole. It's like finishing a jigsaw puzzle only to discover that the picture you've completed has vanished from sight.

I'm holding out the hope that as I think more critically about my revisions, a title will make itself apparent. Not something I really want hanging over my head during NaNo, though, so I've been looking for inspiration in old French ballads and poems. I heard that Margaret Mitchell got the title for Gone With the Wind from a poem, so I thought I'd try that route. Of course, the translations lose something of the passion of the originals, so it hasn't been very forthcoming.

Hans and Greta have been in my thoughts this past week, as well. I even talked about it with my husband, who asked me why I decided to go with the traditional Wilhelm Grimm story when I could take it in any direction: A modernization in Eastern Europe where the step-mother sells them into the sex trade, or some rural American setting where the witch is really a cannibalistic serial killer. (Seriously, these were his ideas, not mine)

The easy answer was that the time frame-- one month-- would be too short to research like I'd want to (the rituals of serial killers and cannibals, or the truth about the sex trade). Hence, the appeal of a Grimm's fairy tale. I've read every version of Wilhelm Grimm's rendition, which is enough research for me to plow through a first draft in 30 days. I'm writing it as if the Grimms heard the story from an elderly Hans and Greta. And I was actually born in Hessen, the story's region of origin.

There are a lot of reasons-- including my love for the story-- that I chose to write an extended version of the Grimm fairy tale, but I realized that the long answer is similar to what Davin Malasarn wrote in a recent Literary Lab post:

"I'm hoping, through this experiment on non-experimentation, to pick up some good story-telling habits. I'm also hoping to direct my creativity into other areas of the storytelling process. By fixing certain elements, like structure, my creative energy will flow into other avenues, like scene building and character traits, that will force me to think in a different way."

Like Davin, I'm hoping that this exercise will help me direct my creativity into characterization and motivation, instead of plot twists. That it will help me devote more time to craft and style and whatever I tend to sacrifice while I'm writing for the sake of the story. Hansel and Gretel is pretty much all about the characters anyway. Motivation is the key, as I've said before.

As we read the children's story, we don't question why the father decides to give up his children. We don't question Hansel's devotion to his sister, or the witch's desire for fresh meat. In an extended narrative, defining the motivations of the characters is necessary to make the reader believe the story is real.

So there's the long answer. I'm not using NaNo as an excuse to crank out another mediocre novel like all the others I've written. It's an exercise to improve my writing skills, to stretch the writing muscles I hardly use.

Why will you NaNo? For practice? To let a WiP sit for a while? Or just for fun?

While I'm Gone, Don't Feed the Demons!

I've been driven to finish my wip as if I'm being chased by the procrastination demons. I've been working so hard, I even thought it might have a proper title. When I googled said title, I discovered it had been used by an author for a 2006 coming of age novel. But I figure for now it makes a good working title and looks snazzy topping a query letter. I'll reveal my new working title at the end of this post, but first--

I've got to unplug for a week. I've been making such good progress on Mara's story that I need to give it the attention it deserves, especially if I'm going to sign up for NaNo. I haven't even allowed myself to think about my dark, delicious NaNo fairy tale while I'm still working on my WiP, that's how serious I am about finishing this first draft.

But if, while I'm gone, anyone wants to leave questions for me in the comments of this post, I'll answer them to the best of my abilities. Anything from "What's your favorite ice cream?" to "How many places have you visited?" (Answers are, respectively, lychee sorbet, and not as many as I want to. ;) ) It's been a while since my last personal post, anyway, and there are just so many wonderful things to discover about yours truly. *bats eyelashes*

To tide you over until then, I leave you with an exceedingly rough query for my almost finished, as yet working titled WiP (constructive criticism welcome!):

Query: Strings Attached, a 65,000 word YA paranormal

When the boy she refused to marry goes missing, a selfish young Gypsy girl discovers that the gift she's always denied might be the key to finding him.

Mara has always known she’s different. She can see muló, the spirits of the dead still chained to this earth. Some are helpful, like Kira, the old wise-woman, and some, like the Tinker, have much baser desires. Far from being a normal Romani girl, Mara is still surprised to realize she wants more from life than to marry Alex and become a wife and mother. Spurned, Alex leaves for Paris. Following the death of her father, Mara decides to go find him.

Mara's quest to find Alex leads her to a Parisian cabaret where nothing is as it seems-- particularly not the backer's handsome son, Guy. And using her unique gift only seems to get her into trouble. After Alex's body is found in the Seine, Mara knows she has only until winter's end to discover what happened to him before her family moves on to a new campsite. The longer she stays at the cabaret, however, the less she wants to go home. When she discovers Alex's murderer might be someone at the cabaret, Mara needs to use all her wits to keep from being the killer's next victim.

Have a great week, everyone!

Believing is Seeing; Making the Magic Work

Went to see Where the Wild Things Are this weekend and I enjoyed every second. From the very beginning I was drawn into Max's world, and stayed firmly put until the final credits rolled. Which inspired today's blog post.

I know, as a rational human being, that the Wild Things ARE NOT REAL. They are puppets with computer generated facial features. Yet I enjoyed myself more when I pretended they were real, living, breathing, eating, fighting, filthy, wild things. Why is that? Perhaps it's easier for me to lose myself in a fantasy world than some people, but there are certainly times when it's easier than others. It took all the elements of this movie mixed with the emotions it made me feel to suck me into the story. Which leads me to the question:

How do I do this in my own work?

What combination of craft and emotion do I need in my book to catch readers up completely in the web I've woven for them? How do I make them believe, and thus, SEE my vision?

There's a lot to be said about what a story needs to be successful-- all successful novels rely heavily on craft and style, plot and pacing. But how do these qualities come together and make... MAGIC?

I've decided to make a list of what my strengths and weaknesses are, so that I know what I've got to make magic with. From previous critiques I know that I do a good job setting the scene. That's something to work with, for what would the Wild Things be without their wild island? But I've also been told I need to work harder to reveal what's going on in the main character's head. Okay, I can work on that. I've also been told that my style can read a bit dated. Hmmm, I can work with that, too, especially since one of my strong points is making a historical setting believable.

I won't bore you with the rest, because behind the scenes, making magic is very tiresome. It takes a lot of getting it wrong first to get it right, and a lot of hard work to make something so difficult and time-consuming look so easy. I will tell you that knowing I'm armed with the proper components for my magic making takes a lot of stress out of writing.

Of course, there's one component that's more necessary to the magic than all the rest combined.

Every book needs to have the sort of magic spark that makes a reader want to suspend their disbelief-- a book must make them FEEL. Whether they sympathize with your main character's disadvantaged upbringing, or your antagonist's inexplicable love for his sick sister, the reader must feel something. And this, I think, I really where the magic starts. Where the reader really begins to get lost in the story, to call the author cruel for inflicting such hellish torments on the people they've grown to care for.

Your plot full of angels and demons and apocalyptic mayhem will simply roll off the reader like water off a duck's back until a character that provokes an emotional response comes into the story. Then it becomes as real in their head as it is in the author's.

Which is why we read books in the first place, is it not? To be taken away on a journey of words to a place where the problems of imaginary people become more real than our own?



To conclude, there's no reason why we all can't be masters of making readers feel. Haven't we all experienced pain, loss, wrath? Hope, fear, and envy? What writer (or reader, for that matter) hasn't experienced all the emotions life has to offer? Good writers learn how to harness the energy of these emotions, how to draw upon them to add reality to the novel they are crafting. This is something I'm slowly learning to do because as a writer, I instinctively feel what my characters are feeling. However, unless this emotion is properly transferred to the page, the reader will never truly know what they are supposed to be feeling.

The magic happens when the reader doesn't sense the author's hand forcing them to feel an emotion.

That's when they stop simply seeing your story, and they start believing it.

That's what I hope to be able to do with my current novel.

Make the magic real.