Perils of the Writer: Letting Fandom Set Your Sails

So, yesterday I had a nice long chat with one of my beta-readers about A Parliament of Bodies.  Yes, she gets to read it a year before the rest of you, but what she reads is an imperfect draft.  And we talked a bit about what happens in the book versus what her expectations as a fan were, and how either fulfilling or subverting those expectations result in reader satisfaction.

Because sometimes there is an urge to ignore what the story needs to give the fans "what they want".  And, I'm against doing that for two reasons.  One, I'm kind of a believer in that old Joss Whedon quote about not giving them what they want, but what they need.  This quote is sometimes treated with derision, in that people complain, "Oh, [Bad Plot Point] is what we 'needed'?"  I can understand that to a degree, especially when plots make characters suffer, characters the readers care about.  They don't want to see them suffer, because they want Good Things for the characters.

But my job is, as J. Michael Straczynski so eloquently put it once, to chase them up a tree and throw rocks at them.

The second reason I'm against changing with the winds of fandom desires is simple.  When it comes to Maradaine (or any other world of mine) and the characters within that world, no one is going to be more of a fan than me.  I love this setting, these people, and their story so much, and I hope that love comes through in what I'm writing.  It hurts me when bad things happen to them, but I also know... that's the path they're all on.

So what does that mean?

It means that I'm that #1 Fan, so I'm the one who gets to tie myself to a bed and break my own legs if I don't do right by the story.

So now I need to get back to work.  There's a certain fanboy who insists that I clean up this manuscript.  See you in the word mines.

It's Your Book, But You Need To Write It My Way

When fans tell you how to write your book, do you listen?

~shifty eyes~  

~leans forward~

~whispers~

What fans?

Just kidding. Sort of. Mebbe. There is no greater compliment than fans who really connect with your work. Some of those fans will shout their passion from every review page, book party table, and fan-Con hallway (gods bless 'em; most authors really need that visibility boost). Similarly, everybody has an opinion. So when those opinions about your work collide with a passion for the characters, world, and plot there might be a few "suggestions" made.

Don't kill that character. 

Ship these two characters. 

Get that character some religion. 

Not that religion.

Speaking practically, in a series where books are still being written, the author is most likely writing two or three books ahead of what's just hitting the shelves. A lot of those "suggestions" are too late.  Similarly, the series may only have been contracted for X number of books or the series was sold as a trilogy so there are certain plot points, milestones, character developments that have to occur at a specific in the timeline in order to satisfactorily end the series. Again, the suggestions are too late.

Now, what if, what if it's not too late? What if--because the author is a super-slow writer publishing on their own damn schedule like moi--there's time for fans to voice an opinion and have it be heard? Well, the kind of feedback that might sway me is if a minor character turns out to be a fan-favorite; that character might end up with more page time. Not so much as to take away from the story, but sure, why not give a nod to the fan base? Plot suggestions? No, sorry. My world, my crazy. Who lives and who dies? Sometimes those developments surprise even me. Who's going to get laid, when, and how explicitly will it be depicted?

Dudes. 

Duuuudes. 

Come on. 

Nookie will happen if and when it's meant to during the characters' developments. Whether it happens on page or off depends on a lot of things. It's not a radio show; the characters aren't taking requests.

Yep. Nope.

I've had this discussion in public plenty of times I see no reason not to have it here.

When people ask if I consider my fan base when I'm writing, the answer is no.

Please don't take that the wrong way if you are part of that fan base. It doesn't mean I don't like you and appreciate you. It means that I can't consider the desires of the readers when I am writing a story.

If I do, I might pull punches, and that weakens the tale.

Listen, I kill a LOT of characters off. I'm in  the final book of a series that involves a war with the gods. Trust me, a lot of people are about to die. I don't want to stop what I'm doing, what has been planned, and try to second-guess anyone. And, yes, that has blown up on me a time or two, when a novel hasn't the way a few people liked. That affected some Amazon reviews, but I'll stick to my plans.

It's not about the reviews. it's about telling my tale.

I can't do it any other way. If I'm nit having a good time, I firmly believe the readers will not have a good time.

The closest I've come to an exception was when I asked readers which character they wanted to see next on the cover for CITY OF WONDERS. I was rather pleasantly surprised when the vast majority asked to see Swech, one of the female leads who just happens to have the highest body count of anyone in the SEVEN FORGES series.

I'm all about commercial success, please don't get me wrong, but before I worry abut that part of the equation, I worry about telling a good tale. That means two things to me: 1) I'm not going t take your idea and write it for you so we can split the profits 50/50 (No really, that offer happens. A LOT) and 2) I'm writing the book I want to read. Hopefully I find others who feel the same way.

Who's Looking Over Your Shoulder as You Write? Appeasing the Fandom

One of my faithful desk companions - Isabel has little interest in the stories themselves, but she disapproves of my reaching for the mouse. Good incentive for me to keep typing with no backtracking!

Not as visible - and not as likely to claw me for reaching for the mouse - is everyone else virtually on my desk as I write. By this I mean my readers. And not just any readers - but those passionately invested in the stories, worlds and characters. You know who you are! These are the power readers, the ones who take time to give me personal feedback on how much they love what I write.

And they have opinions. Sometimes strong ones. Again, you know who you are. :-)

That's our topic this week: Responding to the fandom – where do you draw the line? (e.g., not killing a character after all)

It's an interesting question for me because I've noted several authors in recent years who I've felt have caved to reader pressure on various levels. That might be a bit sideways of this topic, so let me respond directly to the question before I dive into that.

Would I not kill a character because my readers urged me not to? Absolutely. Okay, probably I wouldn't. The only exception would be if I believed that death to be necessary to the story in a way that resulted in greater richness. I wouldn't do it to make a point or to create emotional angst. I like stories that make me feel enriched and optimistic, so I like to leave my readers with that feeling, too. I have killed characters - because people die, and sometimes a character's death is needed to allow another to move forward - and I would even kill a loved character because the story demands it.

For example, in MAGIC RISES, the sixth Kate Daniels books (don't read this paragraph if you aren't caught up and don't want to be spoilered) Ilona Andrews made the choice to kill Aunt Bea, a hugely popular character. I tell you - and you know if you love the series, too - I cried and cried. BUT, her death was important. The stakes were very high and it made no sense if no one was killed in that situation. Also, her death meant a change in the political structure and allowed two other characters to step into leadership positions. I'm sure the writing team of Ilona and Gordon Andrews got a LOT of upset feedback from their passionate fandom about not killing that character. They mention in interviews that they argued between themselves about it.

They made a hard decision and stood by it.

At the same time, other authors have made the choice to kill characters - even first person point-of-view protagonists - in order to make a point. George RR Martin famously kills off characters, sometimes almost arbitrarily, to demonstrate how capricious such things can be, and how tenuous our grip on life.

I'm not into that so much.

Where I do draw my own line is bending to political pressure. There's a great deal of discussion online about what's appropriate in real life - such as consent and healthy relationships - and also trope exhaustion. I've seen authors change their stories to accommodate this kind of feedback. One wrote a beta hero who gave way to the heroine in all things because her readers were "tired of alpha holes." (That's a cross between alpha and asshole, for those not in the know.) You know what? That book was dead boring, at least to me. I know some readers loved it, which is cool, but I thought it was far from her strongest work - and I fell off reading that series due to lack of interest.

Another author has gotten tons of feedback on a couple who are both highly emotional, sometimes violent people. She's really toned down their interactions over the years - and I wonder how much is due to the sometimes strongly chastising posts written about some of those scenes. The thing is, I read the most recent book - found it dead boring - then went back to an earlier one and devoured it for all the excitement and turmoil. I'm missing that element now.

Passionate voices are loud voices - and strong opinions have great conviction behind them. It's important to discuss issues like consent and healthy relationships. But it's worth noting that conflict is what makes STORIES interesting and exciting. I think authors bend to social pressure at the risk of bleeding the energy from their books.

In real life, we'd never find it useful for someone to die. As authors of our worlds, it's a choice we make. Sometimes with relish.

Because relish is what adds the flavor!

The Best of Both Worlds For Me

This week’s topic is about doing worldbuilding for the pleasure of doing it, as I understand the guidelines.

I write in two very different worlds – ancient Egypt and the far future. (I also have one fantasy romance out, The Captive Shifter, but as yet I haven’t written enough there to really discuss today. Although yes, I have massive worldbuilding in my head.)

Ancient Egypt is a very well established world, with oodles of research out there to revel in and draw from, and gorgeous artifacts galore, some of which I’ve seen with my own eyes and marveled at. I have multiple book shelves full of tomes about ancient Egypt – everything from translated love poems to scholarly treatises on one tomb by itself -  and I love doing the research. There are so many more stories and story possibilities than I could use in a lifetime.

 I picked my era, which is around 1550 BCE, when the Egyptians drove out the Hyksos and embarked upon an age of expansion and stability in the New Kingdom. I invented my pharaoh to allow myself more latitude in the stories I could tell, although he’s based on several real rulers of the time.  My added element is the fact that I have the Egyptian gods and goddesses involved in daily life the way the Egyptian believed and hoped they were. My readers have told me that I make them feel as if they were in ancient Egypt, despite the fact I have this paranormal or fantasy element going on, and I also commit certain deliberate anachronisms to make my books work better and sound plausible to the modern reader who may not be immersed in all the research about the time. (Not writing actual historical where every detail is expected to be 100% accurate.)  I have a page devoted to this on my webpage in fact. As an example, Egyptian deben wasn’t actual money per se, no coins but more of a concept of relative value, but my characters deal in actual money.

I really enjoy trying to fill in the blanks left for us by the elaborate tomb paintings and the artifacts, to figure out and portray what daily life might have been like for a lady in Pharaoh’s court or living on a country estate. How was it to take a ride in a war chariot and go so much faster than you’d ever moved in your entire life? What did a priestess of the Crocodile God do all day, running her temple?

In short, I have a heck of a wonderful time dwelling in ancient Egypt on my terms, telling my story and then returning to my own modern life.

Pretty much any topic I have questions on, I can find at least a few kernels of useful information in the research materials or online and then let my imagination soar.

Now the science fiction romances are a different story and there I created my interstellar society, the Sectors, from scratch.

Except not really, because my chosen author theory is that we as humans are going to remain pretty much the same, whether in the past or thousands of years into the future. I really resonated with the well-worn, lived in, used spaceship type of universe depicted in the “Aliens’ movies and the early “Star Wars.” I also loved Andre Norton’s science fiction and the structural set up she had going on. 

My Sectors are kind of similar to all of these influences, although I’ve added elements of my own including various alien civilizations both friend and foe. The longer I write Sectors novels, the more I add to the world building. I do have some secrets that only I know, which may or may not ever be revealed in a novel, but which give me the high level context to write the stories.

So I have fun in either universe I’m inhabiting – Egypt of the Pharaohs or the far future in the big galaxy. Currently I have my next Sectors novel at the developmental editor and I’m about midway through writing the first draft of my next Gods of Egypt novel. I'm living the best of both worlds!

Fandom: the Gateway Drug to World Building

The picture has nothing to do with the subject today. It's just the season for butterflies in the zinnias and I was lucky enough to be out there with a camera when this one flitted in to have a snack.

World building, huh? Well. I have a theory.

Fandom is the gateway drug to world building (and often to writing . . .)

Pretend for me that I'm not the only one so invested in a fandom or twelve that I tell myself stories inside the world of whatever story/movie/book/game du jour that I love. I mean, you have a thing you love. Maybe it's Dr. Who, or Anime,  or Star Wars, or Sponge Bob. I don't know and I don't judge. Much. But after you've binge-watched all you can binge-watch, what happens?

If, like me, you go into immediate withdrawal, you probably start daydreaming yourself onto the bridge of the starship Enterprise. Or into some tiny New England sea-side town mysteriously afflicted by madness and rumors of something terrible lurking beneath the surface of the waves. If you do that, you're world building. If you've ever shipped a non-canon partnering in that thing you love, you're world building. Sure. Both are on a small scale and in someone's pre-built world. But you are and you know what they say. The first taste is free.

It's a slippery slope. First you're playing through mental movies of you starring in that thing that gives you life, the next, you're resentful of the restrictions that come with working inside someone else's constraints. I mean it's a stupid rule that Sponge Bob can't fly, right? So you shift worlds - you create a new construct, one that's all your own, one that won't hold back your imagination. The world you create may be based off of something that already exists - whether book, game, TV show or movie, but you'll have tweaked it to suit you. And that's it. You're hooked on world building. You're spending your time debating the finer points of whether magic that requires blood makes the mages of your world vampires and if it doesn't, where exactly IS the line between blood mage and vampire? (Do they ever cooperate? Share blood recipes, maybe?)

World building is a game, one that begins with 'what if?' and ends in narrative structure, conflict and some kind of resolution. You mix and match and create something wholly new. Like a mad scientist. Oh. Oh. Do you suppose this makes one of us here the Walter White of fiction?

How Much Worldbuilding Is Too Much?

As much as I talk about Worldbuilding, when it comes to the actual writing of books, I don't put too much on the surface.  Sometimes it's out of fear of boring my potential audiences.*  Sometimes it's out of presumption that the things I know about the world are just so screamingly obvious that I don't have to actually explain them. 

But a lot of the time, it's because the worldbuilding details aren't necessarily relevant to the story at hand.  That's the challenge, is making those details come out as organic and natural.  Even if it isn't boring.  Heck, I could easily drop into any one of the Maradaine-set books a few thousand words on, say, the 7th Century disintegration of the Druth Kingdom, or the Mad Kings of the Cedidore Line in the 8th Century, or the coup against Queen Mara, complete with a stirring account of her fruitless last stand in her own throne room.***

But what would those have to do with the story at hand?

Not a whole lot.

What my underlying philosophy has been with translating worldbuilding into actual writing boils down to the Iceberg Principle: 90% is unseen under the surface.  One of the reasons I love using food as a worldbuilding reference point is it provides all sorts of under-the-surface information subconsciously.  If someone is eating sheep-kidney pie with parsnips and turnips it conjures a completely different cultural image than quails stuffed with dates and walnuts, or roasted goat and sweet potatoes, or mango chutney pour over broiled fish and brown rice.  Each of those dishes gave you a very distinct idea of the kind of person eating it, and what kind of culture they came from, yes?

Small, telling details.  That's the key. 

____
*- Who hasn't been reading something by a, shall we say, less meticulously edited author, and reach a point where we go, "Oh, infodump" and just scan until something actually starts happening again.**
**- I can think of one example where an author/series lost me completely, in that an entire chapter was a huge infodump on the history of genetic enhancements-- which didn't play into the plot of the book at all-- and all that happened in the chapter is a tertiary character walked across a spaceport terminal.
***- Come to think of it, any of those might make fun short stories or novelettes.  File that in the back of the brain.

Worldbuilding Indulgences: Quantity Varies by Subgenre

What worldbuilding do I do that isn't necessarily about the story itself but is a personal indulgence? It depends on the subgenre I'm writing.

There is so much worldbuilding necessary in second-world fantasy--the kind of story that doesn't take place in a recognizable period on Earth--that everything I include has to be relevant to the story; otherwise, the worldbuilding dominates the plot and character development...or I end up with a 300k tome. The first round of cuts I do in my second-world fantasies are the TMI details of the world. Does the reader really need to know where the water is sourced? Purified? Only if there's a plot-relevant problem with the water--scarcity, poisoned, monsters--or if an important character is employed in that industry. Infrastructure usually takes the first hit in the cuts, because I absolutely write that info in the draft. The administrative necessities of running a nation/tribe/horde? Again, it gets cut if it's not plot-relevant. A little bit of mundane is necessary, but too much can bog down the pacing and distract from the story rather enhance it. Weeds. I know them too well. Alas, getting lost in them is part of my process of immersing myself in the world I'm creating. Gods bless editing.

In contrast, for my upcoming Urban Fantasy series (releasing Jan 30th!), the worldbuilding there is all about pointing out the uncommon amid the common. That is where I allow myself the luxuries of sneaking details that--if they were missing--wouldn't impact the plot. Silly things like how dust is applied to shelves or why guys are wearing flip-flops in the dead of winter. I indulge my love of creating fantastical explanations for the one-offs in our everyday lives. I try not to be heavyhanded with them, but they do make me snicker.

In the end, worldbuilding indulgences are a lot like pepper on pasta. Flavor enhancements.