Many Thanks

Thanks to all participants of the August 2013 GoodReads giveaway for SufferStone. We had 633 entrees for 18 paperback books.

Watch this space for a new giveaway in October!

Also see:
HeartStone: Book II of the Dolvia Saga
StrikeStone: Book III -- released in July 2013
SignalStone: Book IV -- due out in January 2014
SeaStone: Book V -- under construction

What's with All the Violence for Girl-Heroes in Fantasy Stories?

by Stella Atrium
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So I was thinking about how female fantasy writers connect the girl-hero with violence. I was seeking a quote to start this blog entry, but I came up short.

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent – Isaac Asimov

Violence is the last resort of the ignorant – L. Ron Hubbard

Both are a mis-reading of a post-war Roosevelt speech. I guess everybody borrows.


I like that we have chosen to empower women by giving the girl-hero choices and weapons and treasure and magic and the ability to talk to horses. These are exciting additions to her personal power, and I wish the stories had existed when I was young. (My comfort was A Wrinkle in Time where one of the travelers was a girl.)

I recently read a couple trilogies in fantasy where the girl-hero wields a sword, leads an army, and grown men twice her age follow her.  In history,  there was a queen named Matilda (we need a biopic here!!) who put Henry Plantagenet on the throne of England. But Matilda was a grown woman who took advantage in a fractured system where the heir apparent was weak, and the King of France had died leaving Eleanor (Henry’s wife) with a larger kingdom.  Matilda’s victories on the battlefield were few.

Other queens featured in history ride at the head of armies as inspiration (a young Catherine the Great, for example), but none of them were commoners. Rather, the queen had resources a man usually claims such as treasure and blood rights to squander on a bid for the throne. Mostly these examples from history acted through diplomacy and deceit when the monarchy was weak.

So where is the precedent for all the violence for girl-heroes in fantasy stories?

What girl kills without remorse?  What 14-year-old kills a man who outweighs her by 80 pounds? So sometimes the girl-hero has more magic than the opponent’s magic. Sometimes she was trained in the use of poison to level the contest.

But there’s still the kill stroke – the coup de gras.

Why are we turning girl-heroes, who are written to serve as liberating role models for our younger generation, into killing machines?  When did this trend start?

So the three possibilities for female roles in fantasy are still warrior, sweetheart/victim, or harlot – right? We have no better/different roles for women? Really? I can think of a few, but they depend on adding additional characters to the story; a pantheon of aunts, school mates, teachers, cousins, young sisters and BFFs. Listed are a few examples of character types:

Jealous sister like in the movie The Bodyguard

Buddies like in Thelma and Louise

Friend who turns on you like in Bridesmaids

Long suffering steadfast friend like in Bridesmaids (hence the popularity)

Narcissistic nemesis like in You Again

Overbearing boss like in Working Girl

Friends bonded to improve conditions like in Nine to Five

Friends bonded by community like in Steel Magnolias

Mentoring from an expert like in Bones on TV – Why do we never see this structure in fantasy stories? The girl-hero is always mentored by an older man who admits, much later, to sexual interest.  In real life, older women teach younger women. It seems that when a woman reaches age 40, she suddenly goes mute and the girls she mentored erase her name from history.

And another thing – I’m warmed up to it now!! A woman as the bad guy gets the short shrift. The male characters who serve as bad guys in fantasy stories are often deftly drawn with a back story for how they started down a dark road.  But the female bad guys are usually stuck in the “Mirror, mirror, on the wall” musky old motif.  What happened in her background that twisted her sense of doing good?

A bad guy who serves to drive the story thinks he is doing what’s best for the future, and he offers every justification for why he is right.  A female bad guy never gets that speechifying moment to justify her choices before somebody throws a bucket of water on her.

Come on, ladies…  We can do better than this.

Study Fantasy Series by Maria Snyder: A Review

Stella Atrium
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Ideas for story elements are like grapes.  We can devour them off the vine for the sweet pop in the mouth and feel pleasure.  Of course, we need to consume several to feel satisfied.  We can allow ideas to grow wrinkly and discolored and devour them later as raisins that provide pleasure and also are longer lasting – in storage and in nourishment.  We can allow story ideas to ferment tangent to other ingredients and age in a dark cool place, and use them up later as wine when they provide long lasting pleasure and also maybe a giggle or two.

I’m in favor of the wine.

I have been reading the Study Series by Maria Snyder and have enjoyed following the antics of Yelena Lliana Zaltana.  I didn’t think I would ever make this next statement, but there’s too much magic in the stories. 

Everybody has magic, even the leader of the district that killed all the magicians. The two seemingly untalented characters, who only study plants for derivatives and distill perfume, are parents to the most powerful apprentices.  How is that possible since it was established that magic follows the bloodlines?  Also these parents are introduced in a domestic environment, but later are referred to as king and queen of the clan that only has clan leaders, not royalty.

The stories are bad guy driven, but the bad guys are wholly craven and unrelenting.  The good guys are wholly loyal and hiding a secret heart of love.  Oh-hum.

My real complaint, though, is that the writer got tired of her story and her otherworld. The third story is weighed with exposition explaining past events, and the plot line jumps from one fire to another – literally. Action scenes are related after the fact, and some secrets are held but only until the next chapter. Preventing death at the hands of the bad guys is all-consuming – almost a substitute for character development. There’s no breath for festival days or growth with age or mentoring sisters.

And everybody has magic, even the horses – like a cloying dessert (with raisins) that makes you reach for a cool glass of water.

I enjoy these books and sat up late at night reading them, the true test for the fantasy genre.  I regret the writer lost patience, rushed through intriguing scene set-ups, and used and dropped characters.  What happened to Fisk and his street urchin army? How did he know clan legacy taught in the schools? Was he a latent magician too?

What happened to Captain Star? Will she appear in the next installment as a confidant to Valek? I wanted wine and I got raisins.

Didn’t Make It Past Page Four:  Poor Writerly Choices for 99¢ eBooks

by Stella Atrium
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I try to read books recommended by friends on GoodReads, although I’m continuously disappointed with eBooks for 99¢. Since I didn’t spend my lunch money on the book, it’s easier to set down the Kindle Fire and never return to that cover image on the bookshelf.

My genre is fantasy, and I’m forgiving for grammar when the magic or otherworld elements provide surprise; like Robin Hobb and dragon warming stations – too funny! But sometimes I don’t make it to the surprise, or even past page four. 

The reading has to go easy.  This is for fun, right?

1) Who is they, or he?  When I find myself tracking back through a dense description to identify who is speaking or acting, my patience evaporates.  There’s nothing wrong with repeating the character names.  If three characters are in dialogue, use their names!

2) Pronoun agreement counts.  “The soldiers reached for their swords” is correct.  “The hero wondered if their home was still intact” is incorrect.  This error signals that your text did not benefit from a round of proofreading. 

3) Leads in opening scene named Mark, Luke and John.  Name one Tres and another one Jessup.  Additionally, a smoldering look is NOT adequate character description.

4) Too many foreign names. Conversely, don’t hit the reader with the clan loyalties in the first chapter, like a pie in the face.  Dole out the structure of the society in layers like expensive truffles for nibbling.

5) Missing single point of view. The first chapter should be an action scene; readers expect that. Relate this scene from a single point of view, with a single emotive response – like fear or jealousy or expectation.  The other characters can display emotion in chapter two.

6) Physically impossible action. If the jetpack ignites underwater, I accept that.  If the jetpack propels the hero to the surface ahead of his bubble stream, I worry about getting the bends.

7) Clichés, and more clichés.  If you borrow from other writers twice before page four, you just lost me.  Think up your own magic tricks.

8) Sentence Variety.  “The hero entered the bright and warm room, carrying his heavy and dirty sword, looking for the funny and pretty heroine.”  I have a left and right brain headache now.  

9) Preteen with skills beyond her age.  Can a 14-year-old wield an 18-inch sword? Can she ride a horse into battle in full armor and win? 

10) Talking dragons, teenage vampires.  Embrace the next trend, not the previous trend that’s about to burn out (one hopes).

These are red flags that make the reader wonder about investing time in the next chapters of your story.  Respect the reader and don’t expect her to plow through these poor choices, even for 99¢. 

Writers are Readers

--By Stella Atrium
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Joni Mitchell claimed once that she didn't listen to music of her peers (or competitors) because she didn't want the melodies or rhymes to impact her style.  Music is in the air, and composers can imitate without realizing the source.

I knew a singer-songwriter who performed twice a month at a small club.  One week he sounded like Steve Goodman, and the next time he sounded like Kris Kristofferson, and later his voice had the quality of Fred Holstein.  I saw him perform again about a year later, and the young songwriter had found a method of phrasing that suited him, really and amalgam of all his heroes.

By emulating those who came before, he met audience expectations and began to step out on his own. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, they say.

Writers are always experimenting, and a turn of phrase borrowed from another writer shows that he reads, at least. Except fantasy writers borrow magic from other stories, and borrow powers for vampires from other stories; even slang in urban fantasy is often borrowed from other writers.

I had a writer friend who refused to read the Harry Potter series because she didn't want her own work to appear derivative.  This concern is real — I can tell after devouring a fantasy series from a single author if she read Shakespeare or not.

The word skulking is from Hamlet, for example.  The young prince and his buddies skulked around the rampart until the king's ghost appeared.

We learn to address the world by using models of success and following lessons learned by elders shared as cautionary tales. We feel engaged with the group when we identify with players or singers or actors. Rick Perry wants to be the Tim Tebow of the debates.

We know we have succeeded when the boss enters a meeting wearing your same tie. 

Ray Bradbury claimed he wrote well when he fed his soul with good reading. His imagination was alive and ready for making new characters and new dialogue. Perhaps the operative word here is GOOD reading.  It's not enough to read; what we read counts for quality writing, just like museum art or music that isn't rap.

We write what we know. The first science fiction stories grew from the experiences of engineers who were veterans of WWII and had seen the horrors people can do. Remember GI Joe comic books? Remember Slaughterhouse Five by Vonnegut?

So it's fine to capture words and situations from reading and re-purpose and remediate (my word of the day, he, he). It's also fine to research and dig deeper to find your truth spoken in your voice that you delineated by comparison to all those other voices, like a soloist in a choir.

Just don't write any more vampire stories, 'kay?

Nim's Island & The Tempest

9/23/2011 by Stella Atrium
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Nim's Island as a Remix of Shakespeare's The Tempest : a comparison to show the dominance of archetypes

I have written elsewhere that story archetypes are a straight jacket where especially women characters are relegated to a limited number of roles.  Some formulas for action adventure stories are so rigid we can see them work across genres.  The example offered in that earlier discussion was the similar plotlines for the first Muppet Movie and The Outlaw Josey Wales.  (see explanation below)

Another example of how old stories are reworked for fresh audiences can be found in Nims' Island, especially the 2008 movie based on the novel by Wendy Orr. I assert this story (perhaps unconsciously) is a re-working of The Tempest by Shakespeare, which is itself a reworking of archetypes from fairy tales. The similarities are striking.

(see response from Wendy Orr below)

In Shakespeare's final play, Prospero is an old sorcerer exiled with his daughter Miranda to a Mediterranean island where he frees Ariel (a water spirit) and enslaves Caliban (a lost tribesmen).  Prospero protects Miranda from the truth about his past by keeping her isolated, and he does NOT train her as a sorceress. 

Even when the story is handled by a female director (Julie Jaymor in 2010) where Prospero becomes Prospera (played by Helen Mirren), Miranda is NOT trained in sorcery. Prospera spends considerably more time guiding Ariel into new dimensions than she spends with her daughter's education.  The archetypal princess must be kept unschooled and without work in order to keep her sexually innocent.  But... we speak to gender bias extensively in other discussions. 

On Nim's Island in the South Pacific biologist Jack Rusoe (played by Gerald Butler) leaves his young daughter alone while he goes on a two-day excursion to find glow-in-the-dark plankton. They have a pact to keep the island a secret and both fear the return of a ship called the Buccaneer that carries the taint of knowledge of the world. 

Novelist Wendy Orr invests Nim with curiosity and problem-solving skills beyond her maturity, and allows Nim to manage saving the new turtles, connecting the internet, and blogging with a pulp fiction writer in San Francisco named Alex Rover (played with little humor by Jodie Foster).

Nim Ruscoe (Abigail Breslin from Little Miss Sunshine) spends the time alone with favorite pets that include a dancing sea lion named Selkie that does the heavy lifting for rescuing stranded sojourners in shark infested waters, and a pelican named Galileo that flies back-and-forth between the island and Jack Rusoe who has got himself lost in a sinking sailboat. Jack works magic by using the tools at hand to make a raft and limp home.

We can easily see how Selkie serves as Caliban, and Galileo is Ariel from The Tempest. Galileo is the hero of the story, in fact. He piles fish in the boat for Jack to eat. He snatches Jack's tool belt away from Nim on the island so Jack can rig a sail before Galileo guides Jack home.

Now the good part. 

In The Tempest, Prince Ferdinand is separated from the other sailors who have "undergone a sea change" and wash up on the island.  Ferdinand "exchanges eyes" with Miranda and, by way of Prospero's magic, becomes her slave like Caliban is Prospero's slave.

Of course, Alex Rover and Nim Rusoe cannot provide sexual tension similar to the plotline in The Tempest, because the audience knows from the get-go that Alex Rover is for Jack Rusco.  The fictional character featured in all of Rover's novels is played by Gerald Butler, just in case the viewer could miss the archetypal assumption. This imaginary friend is, in fact, her slave.

In the absence of Nim's father, then, Alex Rover provides advice about keeping a wound clean and commits to leaving her own comfort zone in San Francisco to tolerate the many travel venues, including a sinking rowboat, to undergo a sea change (leaving behind her agoraphobia and dependence on an imaginary friend) and get washed up on the island. 

In fact, Alex Rover spends a few hours on The Buccaneer with the troublesome captain and the events director (similar to the separate story line of Stephano and Trinculo) before she is separated from the other sailors and arrives alone and without technical support to begin to solve real world problems alongside Nim. 

Alex Rover and Jack Rusco don't meet until the final scene of the movie because, in these archetypal fairy tales, all tension flows away when the mating couple touch (read: Sleepless in Seattle). In The Tempest, the final act is about reconciliation and wedding preparations.  Although the speeches are very fine and often quoted, the story unravels into a simple masque.

Even Peter Greenway's engaging version titled Prospero's Books with the aging Sir John Gielgud spent two-thirds of the movie time with images of a less-than-traditional wedding feast while a peeing cherub sang in a painful octave. 

So an additional scene of fragmented storyline is inserted in Nim's Island when the Buccaneer arrives while Nim is alone. The captain and events director bring tourists ashore who treat the pristine beach as a backdrop for a Hawaiian luau.  The tourists obligingly run for the lifeboats when Nim catapults lizards and geckos into their midst from the safety of the treeline. 

Inside this action scene one tourist, a boy about Nim's age named Edmund (Maddison Joyce), sees her and enters the jungle to confront her about what she's doing to his parents and the other "pirates".

In this well-written scene, Nim claims that Edmund and all real people aren't what she had imagined from the stories she read. These would be the stories written by Alex Rover who studiously avoided contact with real people while writing in San Francisco. Nim and Edmund seem to argue, but are really engaged in discovery, even touching each other's face for assurance the other is real. 

Critics complained that Nim's Island provides too many "plastic" events such as Nim riding the back of the sea lion through the island surf. But I feel the level of improbable events is on par with the original work by Shakespeare, and the farcical elements also mirror the precursor story.

The real change here, or growth in our use of archetypes, is that Nim has intelligence, curiosity, warmth, problem-solving skills, and a community of helpers who allow her to make decisions in committee. 

Kudos to Wendy Orr!

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Kermit as Josey Wales

In the first Muppet Movie, Kermit is pushed from his equilibrium in the swamp by bad guys who want him to serve as spokesperson for selling froglegs.  Kermit goes on adventure and accumulates several sidekicks including a love interest in Miss Piggy, all the time relentlessly pursued by these same bad guys. Kermit and friends find a new place to settle, but first must negotiate with the tribes who already populate Hollywood.  Before Kermit can win the love interest, he must confront the ultimate bad guy and vanquish him. 

Watch The Outlaw Josey Wales and see if you can find the exact same sequence of events.