A Bridge Too Far: Taboos in Fiction

 

       

 

Thanks to all the wonderful readers for their enthusiastic reception of SHADOW WIZARD! Just because it's so squee-worthy, here's a fabulous Reddit Gush about the book. Made me very happy!

This week at the SFF Seven, we're asking about limits. How far is too far in your writing? Is there anything you find taboo?

I think these are two different questions. I mean, they're literally two different questions, but I think the consideration of what is "too far" for me vs. what I find taboo are not the same at all. 

George R.R. Martin once told me about one of his favorite writing exercises to assign when he teaches workshops. He'd ask the students to write about the worst thing they ever did. Some, he said, were clearly fictionalizing. And others couldn't seem to come up with anything that terrible - which he figured for another sort of denial. But the point of the exercise was to demonstrate that all people - and thus all characters - can do really awful things. I mulled this over, and the conversation has clearly stuck with me, and I'm pretty clear that I do have places I won't go in my writing.

Some of the reactions to SHADOW WIZARD that I've seen remark on how awful some of the high houses in the Convocation are. In fact, some readers tap out on the world altogether, because it is so dark. I want to show in my work what absolute power does to people - it's a recurring theme for me - so perhaps I'm not so different from GRRM in that perspective. I have shown sexual abuse to the point of rape on the page, so that's clearly not too far for me. I won't show the death of a child or an animal-friend, however. That's just because it's too much sorrow for me. 

As far as taboos, however... I have a workshop I sometimes teach on writing sexual tension, and I delve heavily into taboos, especially as they apply to sex. In short, taboos exist in society for good reasons - they are instilled in us as children to protect our health (no dessert before dinner) and safety (don't touch the hot stove) and later they come from our larger communities to protect us all (murder is wrong). Because taboos are so deeply ingrained in us, breaking them releases a huge amount of emotional and spiritual energy. It's freeing to break taboos - which is why breaking sexual taboos (which often don't exist for very good reasons) can be so healthy.

The great thing about fiction is you can break all the taboos you want to! It's exhilarating for the writer and the reader. There's a reason we love kick-ass characters who kill with glee and ease. That releases the same energy in us as breaking the murder taboo, but without social or personal consequences. So... is there anything taboo for me in fiction? 

Probably not. 

Go-To Taboo or Just Lazy Storytelling?

 What are the limits? How far is too far in my writing? Is there anything I find taboo?

Yanno, it depends on the subgenre. When I write high fantasy, there are no taboos. Anything can be interwoven into the story as long as it's part of the development of characters or plot. However, depravity in its many heinous facets for the sake of pandering to the prurient interest is lazy and trite. We really should strive to be better storytellers when we express the loss of personal agency, the stripping of power, the crumbling of independence, and the hollowness of defeat. Similarly, villainy needs more depth than dick-sticking.

When writing UF and Fantasy Romance, there are paths I won't tread. Primarily because these genres are about empowerment and building strong relationships--personal, familial, and community. Thus, the readers don't want to suffer through scenes of sexual violence. They're tired of misogyny. They want consent. Mutual respect. Healthy relationships. Flawed protagonists who aren't Too Dumb To Live nor Too Testosterone-Laden to Think. The age of the Alphahole faded with dial-up, so did the Helpless Heroine. It's not that certain topics or tropes are taboo, it's that the readers' expectations evolved. They expect our storytelling to evolve too. 

How Far is Too Far?

This week's topic at the SFF Seven is how far is too far in your writing? Is there anything you find taboo?

First of all, let me say that this is a pretty complex topic if you sit down and really think about what taboo means across different cultures and how it can be used in fiction as a means to examine our own societal 'norms,' boundaries, and structures. When placed in the hands of a skilled and careful writer, taboo can be explored and provide an entirely different view of something we might otherwise never think about or understand.

Taboo by definition is: proscribed by society as improper or unacceptable.

The list for taboo subject matter could go on for ages, because everyone is different in what they find improper or unacceptable. For me, there are definitely lines that I don't think I will ever cross, like rape and incest. I can't make myself watch Game of Thrones, and those are some of the reasons why. For me as a viewer, it's just not something I want to see. I will also never watch Dahmer, no matter what anyone says, because that's too real for me. However, show me The Walking Dead with people getting eaten by zombies, and I'm just fine *shrugs.* 

One of the most recent taboo things I read was a scene in Empire of the Vampire by Jay Kristoff, a book I will finish if it kills me. There's a newly emerging vampire-type situation for a character and his menstruating girlfriend. Menstruation isn't as taboo in the US as it is in some other countries, but it's still often viewed as an unclean part of a woman's life, especially in sexual situations. In Kristoff's hands, this scene read like poetry, you guys.

Salt and iron. Autumn and rust. Flooding over my tongue and answering every question I’d never known how to ask. Because the answer was the same. Always the same. Blood. Blood.

Kristoff, Jay. Empire of the Vampire (p. 37). St. Martin's Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

And then, then God help me, I sank my teeth into her, her back arching, her every muscle taut as she threw back her head and pulled me closer, trying not to scream. And I knew the color of want then. And its color was red.

Kristoff, Jay. Empire of the Vampire (pp. 37-38). St. Martin's Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

I think writing is about pushing limits. It's about exploring darknesses along with the light. It's about discussing what lives in the shadows and what we as a society force into the shadows. It's also about tearing down social constructs that don't fit us as individuals and illuminating hate that just so happens to wear the clothes of taboo. Sorry, but religion doesn't get to decide what's right and wrong for all. 

I could talk for days on this topic haha, but I won't. Instead, I'll leave you with an article by Vylar Kaftan that explains the importance of writing the taboo far better than I ever could.

Here's an excerpt:

Taboos fascinate many writers and artists because we are rebels at heart. We’re drawn to the forbidden, the denied, the unacceptable. In order to show the world in all its beauty and grossness, we portray both the sacred and the profane, sometimes in the same sentence (holy shit, it’s true!). Many speculative fiction readers also find taboos fascinating, because they show what is different or excluded in humanity. A good percent of science fiction fans already feel quirky or weird compared to the ordinary world; it’s hardly surprising that stories about taboos often appeal to these readers. In this article, I’ll discuss briefly the nature of taboos and why speculative fiction is uniquely well-suited to handle these topics.

What's the last taboo topic you read about?

~ Charissa

I Need to Erase a Few Images, Thanks

 This week we're supposed to talk about an iconic scene from a book or movie or show that galvanized us and influenced our writing. I'm going to make it easy. It's the fight scene from The Princess Bride. Okay wait. Maybe the Iocaine Powder scene. Okay. Maybe the whole movie. (It really is the fight scene - the fight choreography and the quick quips and one-upsmanship.)

Then I'm going to leave it there to relay the images etched into my brain after Hurricane Ian came ashore yesterday. The family and I are fine. We were incredibly lucky. Ian came over us as a weak Cat 3 and we never got hit with the eye wall where the strongest winds were.  Still, we're shaken. The torrential rain and the wind we had (top gust clocked at 97mph nearby) was more than enough to cast fear into all of us. The worst part was watching the news streams of the monster storm destroying places I know and love - long ago, we declared the key lime pie at RC Otters on Captiva Island the best we'd found in Florida. The Ding Darling Wildlife Reserve on Sanibel Island was unmatched for wildlife spotting hikes. Yesterday, I watched those islands vanish beneath 18' of the Gulf of Mexico in real time. Yesterday, in real time, I watched while water swept into Fort Myers up to the roof line of single story homes. The friend who lives there and I checked in with one another just as Ian was approaching. She and her elderly mother hadn't been able to leave the area. They were at 11' of elevation. Storm surge was 18'. I haven't been able to raise her.

The worst part (for me) is that storm shutters turn homes into dark, blind boxes. It's as if you've taken shelter inside a ready-made tomb. You know weather is going to hell in a hand basket, but you can't see anything. If you can't see anything, you can't begin reacting until it's already far too late. Maybe that would always have been true - that even if you did see something bad coming (storm surge, for example) you aren't likely to be fast enough or have the option to change the situation. This may be one of those 'tell me you're a boater without telling me you're a boater' cases - I'm trained by boating to live with the illusion that if I see a bad situation developing I can mitigate it if I think and act quickly enough. I'm not sure storm surge has gotten a copy of that memo.

I'm privileged.

I slept in a dry bed last night in a house where the power never went out. Entirely. The worst privation we suffered was losing internet and cable TV. That felt bad enough because we couldn't go on keeping tabs on the storm and the people out there in it. But this morning, I could go outside. It was still windy. The rain had stopped. My climbing roses had beaten themselves to shreds. All the leaves are gone. The canes are shreds. A neighbor lost a tree. My oak tree is leaning and will have to be removed. The plants at the front of the house are all laid down to the south. The plants on the south side of the house are all laid down pointing due west. Part of our downspouts ended up in a neighbor's yard. My feral cat (who I desperately tried to catch before the hurricane came ashore) showed up for breakfast this morning. There are bright spots.

Because there was so little damage, I left to salvage what remains of the vacation that Ian nearly preempted. As we drove north out of the swath of Ian's destruction, vast caravans of rescue equipment and supplies passed us, heading south into the heart of the devastation. My chest hurts. I want to help, too, and have no skills to do so. I want to find my friend. And I have no skills to do so. And I'm afraid of what I'd find. It's a very mixed up place to be: Aware that but for the grace of the gods there go I, because if Ian had drifted a few miles north . . .; sad for all that's been lost, guilty for going on vacation, and relieved that my extended family in the area are all safe. There's no good or easy way to make the early part of this week okay. It won't be okay for a very long time. For some people, it will never be okay again.

Three of the four of us in the  house had never been in a hurricane before and the one who had admitted that his previous experience had left him with an offhand attitude about what hurricanes were. Until now. For context, Hurricane Charlie - the last hurricane to take the same path ashore. It hit in 2004. The entirety of Hurricane Charlie fit inside the eye of Hurricane Ian. 

 

Stu Ostro, a senior meteorologist at The Weather Channel produced this image. He published it to Twitter during that time that everyone was holding their collective breaths about whether or not this Godzilla parked off shore would ever move. Check out the original.

The Same...Yet Different Scenes

Writing inspiration comes from many places—as many as there are people in the world! But does an author have an iconic recurring-scene that inspires their writing?

I had to give this topic some thought. Even though I only have one book (audiobook) out in the world I have a number of complete manuscripts and to add to that, some are science fiction and some are fantasy. Each book was inspired by a different emotion, character, or scene. And they all, save for two of the fantasy ones, take place in different worlds. 

Despite all the differences, they do all share an iconic scene. Inconceivable, you may say. But these pivotal scenes are all rooted in my author purpose, that moral-of-the-story theme that’s at the heart of every tale I weave. 

So, my iconic scene and my author theme are aligned: it’s the moment you face an incredible terror and instead of looking to the side or reaching out for help, you face it head-on and discover the true depth of your own strength.

In The Mars Strain that happens when Jules realizes she knows how to defeat the strain and that, as much as she depends on her team, she knows the key and won’t stop, no matter how much she looses, until she has it. Yes, a little ambiguous, but I can’t spell it out too detailed in case you haven’t listened yet! 

Do you have an iconic scene that keeps showing up? Is it tied to your author theme? 

Jeffe and her Iconic Scene

SHADOW WIZARD releases tomorrow!! Preorder price of $4.99 will be good into tomorrow, then it goes up. (Along with my grocery bill, alas!) The audiobook is being recorded now and should be available in about 2 weeks.

       

 

This week at the SFF Seven, we're asking: Do you have an iconic scene that inspires your writing?

 

I think most of my stories arise from certain pivotal images. For most every book I've written, I can almost certainly identify what the core image was. It's more than visual, however, and feels more like a snippet of a moment: a character in a situation. For a long time I have had an iconic scene. I started drawing it when  was a little girl and it's found its way into any number of stories over the years. I've never quite felt like I fully wrote the story of it, though it's haunted me less recently, so maybe I've come close enough for it to leave me alone.

 

The scene:

 

A woman stands on a cliff overlooking the ocean. Waves rise in whitecaps, dashing themselves against the rocks below. A wind off the water blows back her hair and gown. She's waiting...  Perhaps for an enemy to arrive on her shores? That's my usual feeling. Sometimes a large wolfhound is with her. Sometimes I think she's a sorceress, other times a queen.

 

If you've read a lot of my books, you'll probably recognize ways that this scene appears in various forms. I might've finally worked it out of my system with the Forgotten Empires trilogy, although it still didn't feel precisely like that iconic scene. Maybe I'll wend my way back to it someday!

 

For the time-being, however, I've been in the marshes and woodlands with the denizens of the Renegades of Magic world. SHADOW WIZARD takes us to a new high house (if you're familiar with the Bonds of Magic trilogy), and increasingly wild adventures. In this book, this snippet of a scene is one of my favorites:

 

She flung herself against him, embracing him with fierce tenacity, face buried against his neck, her chin digging rather sharply against his collarbone. For a slender, barely-there wraith, Seliah possessed a surprising amount of tensile strength. And she smelled of water in the moonlight, her tough, tense, thin little body vibrating with spiky silver magic, her breasts surprisingly—and distractingly—soft and full pressed against his chest. He couldn’t help a tiny fantasy of how it would feel to be buried inside that intensity, to have that passionate body surging against his, embracing and engulfing.

It's never going to happen, he told himself firmly.

Are you sure? part of him whispered back slyly.

Yes. Ruthlessly banishing the image, he refused to touch her any more than he already had. Holding his hands out, even more awkward than ever, he kind of waved them around as he waited for the hug to end.

It didn’t. Instead she held on, a buzzing bundle of intoxicating magic and tempting woman. Jadren tried patting her back, thinking maybe that would satisfy her enough to encourage her to go away, but she only purred, snuggling closer, like a cat who’d found the one cat-hater in the room and had no greater goal in life than encamping on his lap forever.

       

New Fantasy Romance Release: CITY OF RUIN by Charissa Weaks

 🎉📚💖🎉We're celebrating Sunday blogger Charissa's newest book baby today! It's the second in her Witch Walker fantasy romance series. Grab a copy today and get lost in a tale of swords, sizzle, and sorcery! 🎉📚💖🎉

CITY OF RUIN
Witch Walker, Book 2

The night the Prince of the East razed her village, Raina Bloodgood’s life changed forever. Forced into someone else’s war—and into the arms of the Witch Collector, Alexus Thibault—Raina discovered that everything she believed was wrong, and that she was capable of far more than anyone imagined.

Now, the Prince of the East has taken the Frost King as a pawn in his war against the Summerlands, causing Alexus’s life to hang in the balance. To thwart the prince’s endgame and prevent the Tiressian empire from returning to an age of gods, Raina, Alexus, and a band of Northlanders race against the sands of time to reach a mystical desert land where merciless assassins lurk around every corner.

In the midst of tragedy, Raina and Alexus fight to stay together and alive, all while a nefarious presence follows them straight to the jeweled gates of the Summerland queen’s citadel—the City of Ruin. With much to fear, it’s the terror of a past she shouldn't remember that Raina cannot cast from her dreams.

A past that's determined to find her. One way or another.

BUY IT NOW: Amazon | BN 

Buy Book 1: The Witch Collector 

Iconic Scenes and A New Book Release

 

Happy Sunday, all! 

I've been buried under writerly tasks getting City of Ruin out in the world. It releases this Tuesday, though, 9/27! I kind of can't believe I'm going to have two book babies in the world in the course of less than a year. As a slow writer, I'm utterly amazed by that! Like... who even am I? ;)

Today's topic for the SFF Seven is: Do you have an iconic scene that inspires your writing? 

I can tell you of one main scene (from books and film) that affected me as a writer. 

At the Prancing Pony from The Lord of the Rings, we meet Strider, aka Aragorn.

“a strange-looking weather-beaten man, sitting in the shadows near the wall… He had a tall tankard in front of him, and was smoking a long-stemmed pipe curiously carved. His legs were stretched out before him, showing high boots of supple leather that fitted him well, but had seen much wear and were now caked with mud. A travel-stained cloak of heavy dark-green was drawn close about him, and in spite of the heat of the room he wore a hood that overshadowed his face.”

I can't say that this impacted scenes that I write, save for the importance of character introduction and how it can either be memorable or not. But it did impact how I write heroes and how I introduce characters. This moment, for me, was perfect. I saw him, I was curious about him, and I was intrigued. Then I was in love for the rest of my freaking life, but we won't talk about that haha.

But! If you like Aragorn mixed with a little Geralt of Rivia, you might like Alexus Thibault from my book, The Witch Collector. Again, book two, City of Ruin, is out Tuesday, and I'm so excited! Signed copies are available in my Etsy store, and it's in ebook and print everywhere online too.  

I hope you all have a good week! I'm going to watch the new Rings of Power this week and CHILL!

~ Charissa