No Leads to Yes: Examples for Writers

I saw the Billy Crystal special on cable TV about 700 Sundays where he talks about his youth and how he wanted to be a NY Yankee or a comedian, or a very funny baseball player. I thought about my early ambitions and realized that we come to ourselves through a long series of ‘Nope, not that,’ or even ‘Been there, done that.’

I only wanted to be a writer -- a Great American Novelist. More specifically, I wanted to be F. Scott Fitzgerald. I didn’t want to be Zelda, the wife of a famous writer. The lifestyle was not my focus, but the stories.

I liked how Fitzgerald used anglo words and sneered at the French language that his buddy Hemingway only side-stepped.  I liked that Fitzgerald exposed the pretension of the new money classes and didn’t require a happy ending for a love story.

Later I discovered Lillian Hellman and wanted to be her, except she was so uncomfortable in her skin (when young). She told the stories from the point of view of the women, even though they were victims of the plot rather than driving the plot. Margaret Atwood does something similar, displaying the women as powerless in a stilted marriage or without funds or smarts to make a difference.

But why not a story where the female lead character drives the action?

You will suggest Sylvia Plath, I’m certain. Nope, not that.

There’s Carson McCullers, of course. Southern Gothic was her genre, and I was influenced by The Heart is a Lonely Hunter that I read at an early age. McCullers was sorta chewed up by the NYC writer’s lifestyle, though, as was Harper Lee (To Kill a Mockingbird).

These stories are presented as confessions, a slice of life, illustrations of the era. Plots were outgrowths of situation following that axiom to write what you know.

“Today you are You, that is truer than true.

There is no one alive who is Youer than You.”

– Dr. Seuess

But my life was boring – well-raised, bookish, affluent, Midwestern (not from the South where they seem to suffer more deeply). So … Nope, not that.

I liked action adventure stories like The Perils of Pauline or Love is a Many-Splendored Thing. I wanted the woman to drive a real plot. Why was that so much to ask?

So I read more stories by women in the fantasy genre like Louise Erdrich who brings in mythical elements from Native Americans, and Juliet Marillier’s series about a Daughter of the Forest. The girl protagonist was typically young and imbued with unusual powers of seeing. Other genre writers sent 14-year-old girls into battle in full armor and wielding a 24-inch battle sword. This impossible heroine makes the same choices a guy would make, except she’s gender female (often a cross-dresser like Arya in Game of Thrones). Nope, not that.

I read Robin Hobb’s many series (series-es) that start with The Assassin’s Apprentice. Hobb certainly has the chops for the fantasy genre with immediacy and surprise. (Dragon warming stations: still too funny!) I wondered why the primary character was not a girl. The female characters (in the early series) were relegated to stilted roles of a candle-maker and a misunderstood queen who wielded minimal powers through example and patience. The many lady-aunties accomplished small victories behind the scenes while presenting a benign presence at court. Nope, not that.

Is the same true for you, dear writer who is reading this blog? Do you come to goals for what you want to accomplish by what you know you don’t want to reinforce? Here are some of my standards I impose for my own stories:

·      Girl protagonist (past age 18) who drives the story

·      The protagonist isn’t isolated – knows her mother and sisters and cousins and opponents

·      Real problems that real women have to solve (without pretending to be a boy)

·      Believable obstacles such as no voice in public and no funds to achieve goals

·      A plot that has a crescendo at the end, not slice of life

·      Each character grows during the story arch (even the men)

This last goal is a pet peeve of mine that I call the Lee Remick syndrome. She played opposite Jack Lemmon in The Days of Wine and Roses. They were both drunks and he went through all the stages including getting clean but backsliding. She kicked him out so she could raise their daughter in a stable life, but he visited during his many ups-and-downs. Each time she opened the door, Remick looked the same, not a line on her face. She may have worn the same wig for the whole movie that spanned a couple of decades. Nope, not that.

Killing off the Bad Guy: Robin Hobb Series Finale

by Stella Atrium 5/1/13
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I’m an unabashed fan of Robin Hobb and force copies her books on my friends so we can discuss the characters and inventive plot twists later.  Dragon warming stations! What a hoot!

I’ve read each series as they were published, and cried when the grey wolf died, and when the Fool and Fitz were separated in the fourth connected trilogy. I knew that Hobb had a talent for wrapping up story lines to a satisfying ending that signaled the reader that this character’s arch was finished now, as she did when Fitz settled in with his childhood sweetheart after his soul was made whole by the Fool’s most recent adventure with magic (trying not to give away the climax).

Her stories have influenced readers and other writers who use (or skim) plot ideas that were made whole in Hobb’s fertile imagination.  GRR Martin allows certain characters, designated wogs, to ride-along on the spirits of animals, for example, even though he keeps that feature in the background of his series Game of Thrones.

Martin seems a bit trapped with Daenerys’ dragons, still infants in Book VI, because communication beyond hand signals will seem to imitate Hobb’s work. I wonder how he will resolve that conundrum.

When Blood of Dragons was made available in April 2013, I had mixed emotions. I didn’t want the long-enjoyed world that leads to exploration of the fabled city of Kelsingra to end, so I actually put off the reading of  to savor the anticipation.

The first three books of this storyline presented stunted dragons and their malformed keepers who were young people just exploring girl-boy friendships.  I liked that Hobb included hard choices for the girls, and provided the girl characters with the presence of mind, prompted by queen dragons, to manage events. Too many writers for sci-fi or fantasy neglect the hunger of girl fans to engage with characters like them.

Robin Hobb has more well-drawn characters than she needs to finish the series, and only nods to Althea and Brashen (and their liveship Paragon) who readers have followed in earlier stories. She holds certain developments for the young keepers to the very end, and even brings old-world dragons Tintaglia and Icefyre back into the mix.

The richness of the stories almost invites new episodes in older storylines like the dime novels that use characters from an old Star Trek series.  Except Hobb’s endless invention for new twists would be missing from these.

If I can add one sour note…  When the bad guys are removed, mostly by dragon anger or indifference, the story sorta falls flat. Many stories are bad guy driven, of course, like any Spiderman is memorable more for who played the villain than for who played Spidey. And Hobb’s villains are often without redeeming features.  But the power of the dragons is so overwhelming that the deaths seem puny, and the humans who kowtowed to the bad guys seem parochial in their fear.  Here’s a clear warning for Martin when Daenerys’ dragons are grown, hey?


The sci-fi reader should schedule reading Hobb’s books in order from the beginning (Assassin’s Apprentice) since certain secrets about the Skill and jitzin and flame jewels are revealed in this latest episode.  I hope there are more in the works! I envy the reader her many hours of solitary enjoyment ahead.

Louise Erdrich: About the Unreliable Narrator
by Stella Atrium 2/16/13
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Louise Erdrich has written a series of novels about a Native American extended family trapped in poverty and fear on the reservation and in Minneapolis (called Apple Town due to the vowel sounds). In The Antelope Wife, revolving narrators bead together  events apparently to bind patterns over generations – fates of twins, lost babies, lustful wives. Since the level of diction of each narrator is identical with lazy grammar, interjected native words, and self-centered vision, the use of he-she-they gets confusing for relations among the cousins.

My reading of The Antelope Wife was different from other reviewers who took the first narrator in chapter one as the center. I found the central character to be Cally who struggles to find meaning in the advice, myths, strange gestures, broken dreams of her parents-stepfather-cousin-grandmas-ancestors. The details Erdrich presents of their disassociated lives are unsparing and often funny. For example, Cally wonders about the choices of a cousin who pre-salts her food since salting before tasting is an indication of general dissatisfaction with life.

Cally moves to Minneapolis and works in the family bakery, asking each client if she has seen the twin grandmothers who are Namers and have a reputation among the tribes. The grandmothers visit much later for Christmas while listing all their digestive complaints. Cally’s main frustration is with a distant mother who seems tortured by a lustful past and troubled by judging ancestors. After her botched second wedding, this Calico Wife cooks for hungry ghosts so the ancestors and a lost daughter will feel full and leave.

There’s no stream of current events from TV or even military service to anchor the reader, and no structured reasoning for any character gained from books or technical training. The stepfather tries to duplicate a cake made by an outsider without recipe or reference to books. Each character tries to divine meaning from the ignorant acts of others – willfully ignorant as though the Native Americans refuse to learn from the larger culture for fear of losing spiritual contact with the prairie.

Throughout the reading, I was often reminded of the Mexican novel Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel that has a central love story, a fear of vengeful ancestors, and an ironic take on the fates of family members. Recipes were said to hold the spirits of ancestors, and service to family was an organizing theme.

But Erdrich offers short vignettes, often from the POV of non-family members, even a dog, as part of her beading, constructing a unique and gritty backstory tied to the land. The effect is like a child’s watercolor as viewed through a window streaked with rain. Although the colors were once strong, the current outlines are blurred and runny, made void of the sought-after deeper meaning.

Since this story was in the cache for the Worlds Without End 2013 Women of Genre Reading Challenge, I wondered again at the loose categories for genre writing. The unreliable narrators and the Native American stories about troubling spirits don’t constitute a genre subcategory. I would rather shelf this novel and all of Louise Erdrich in literature, although Like Water for Chocolate is often shelved with Ethnic Studies.

Luck in the Shadows by Lynn Flewelling
by Stella Atrium 2/12/13
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I love castle stories. What could be better than a 350-page fantasy novel that starts with three companions on horseback carrying swords and Radly bows crossing a frigid field to escape the bad guy or to rescue the princess?

I celebrate that there’s no end to these horse-and-castle stories, and I investigate whatever’s new. Some novels like A Quest for Heroes by Morgan Rice are calibrated for a juvenile audience and the heroine is too young for insights I would seek. Some stories follow the new trend of heaps of gore and lists of knightly heraldry like The Wilding by CS Freidman.  For some stories I don’t buy the second book in the series because not enough surprises held my attention during the first outing, like Blood of the Falcon by Court Ellyn.


I picked up Luck in the Shadows because I had enjoyed all three Bone Doll’s Twin stories, and especially the gender-bending twist.  The witch who lived in the forest and the young magician who she trained were diverting enough for use of magic.  Though the three stories lagged in places, a whimsical holy man arrived like a breath of fresh air to resolve some plot difficulties.  A 15-year-old girl in full armor and long sword at the head of an army to save the empire was a bit of a stretch, but at least she was a girl, and she had female relatives who had roles in the plot (more than decorative).

But…  I would call Flewelling’s Luck in the Shadows a lighter version of The Golden Fool by Robin Hobb.  Over the past two decades, Hobb wrote four series (series-es) around the enduring friendship between a fool with a mysterious background and an apprentice to a wizard.  There are same-sex undertones, but each becomes the beloved to the other through their many adventures.


Flewelling’s Book I of her Nightrunner series presents a watcher with a longer life than many, a wizard who commands spells for shape-shifting and message bubbles, and an orphan (why is it always an orphan?) who is a quick learner (why is he always more gifted at picking up dark skills?). Without a girl/boy love story to carry the reader through the MANY discussions of the heroics of former queens, and more discussions of the dead wizards who helped the dead queens, getting to the end was a struggle.

I don’t care about those old queens.  I have no context for those old queens. More living female characters who have roles in the plot -- other than decorative -- please.


Flewelling presents a bad guy (why do they always have no redeeming value?) who pursues our watcher and apprentice, but she drops this story line in the middle of the book in favor of describing the needed lessons in swordplay for the apprentice (why are long descriptions of training with swords required for fantasy writers?).

The struggle in the final act means the watcher and apprentice fight on the side of the current royal family for whom only three scenes were spared, and vanquish a long-simmering blood feud for which only two scenes were constructed.

Again, the reader doesn’t feel invested in solving the problem at hand, especially since the resolution was a matter of home invasion and a fire contained in a single room. A comparison to Hobb’s white queen in Fool’s Fate comes to mind, wherein the queen lost her captain, her familiar, her ice castle, and her hands before her suffering ended.

The bad guys in Flewelling’s story had not shown their faces again by the end of Book I, but the homoerotic undertones were coming to light. If there were more surprises, fewer long-winded stories about dead queens, less description, more jeopardy, more hetero romance – then I could overlook the disjointed plot.  I doubt that I pick up Book II.

Remnant Population: A Look at First-Person Narration

Posted on January 14, 2013 by Stella Atrium

 
Elizabeth Moon is a controversial writer both for her writings and for her stance on social issues.  She’s a favorite of the feminists in science fiction crowd and broke ground for women writers competing for awards in a genre that was claimed for many decades as men-only. Because of her notoriety, many female writers received a fairer hearing from agents, publishers, readers, and award groups. Kudos!

Characters in the works of Elizabeth Moon are often women past the age of romance and child-bearing who struggle to find voice in a repressive family or community – one of my favorite themes. I will mention specific plot points in this review, so **spoiler alert**.

Remnant Population is narrated by a solitary 80-year-old woman named Ofelia who secretly stayed behind when the failing colony was evacuated offworld. She resisted decisions made for her by her son, by the corporation that owned the colony, and (implicitly) by her long-dead husband.  When a rescue team arrives years later, she must find her voice to resist deportation, but also to negotiate the relative rights to technological advances for the indigenous and intelligent creatures.


Ofelia reminds me of Grandma in Edward Albee’s An American Dream who has no voice within family. She is constantly shipping out boxes, and eventually follows her shipments to escape a repressive domestic fight.

This archetype follows the idea of the “affirmative no”, meaning that to realize her complete self, she must say no to loved ones. This concept was articulated in Martin Esslin’s Theatre of the Absurd where he discusses the plays by Albee along with Brecht, Beckett and even Sam Shepard.

Ofelia achieves her “affirmative no” when she hides to avoid the shuttle flight. She enjoys the solitude of the abandoned village even though she worries about her age and failing health.  The pacing is good. The number and difficulty of obstacles Ofelia overcomes is engaging for the reader (similar to Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood).

Additionally, Elizabeth Moon deftly handles a classic problem of how to report plot events that are beyond the sightline of the first-person narrator. Ofelia hears the struggle over an abandoned “weathersat” when a colony ship 200 kilometers distant has to abort the landing mission because the indigenes mount a successful attack. Ofelia is sorry for the offworlders who she identifies with, and is afraid of the indigenes who she eventually befriends. The reader quickly sees that later in the story Ofelia will serve as an ombudsman between these groups.

Herein lies the problem. How does the writer present the worldview of the indigenes? How does the writer present the group dynamics of the rescue team before they step off the shuttle? A solitary narrator can only assess what is in her sightline and from her POV.

Moon resolves this writerly problem by inserting scenes from the group-think of the indigenes using a specific vocabulary, and scenes from the POV of one member of the rescue crew named Kira. These scenes are not separate sections, but presented as the next paragraphs within a chapter. But then, I read the story on Kindle where standards for section breaks are still evolving.

I found the group-think scenes charming and valuable for increasing the nuance of later encounters with the indigenes. I found the POV scenes for Kira wholly unnecessary. The crew was stereotypical for arrogant scientists, and their gestures after landing told the story of tensions in the group.  In fact, Moon includes a well-written scene between Ofelia and the “enforcers” of the crew who are not included in the expedient exposition of Kira’s POV scenes.

For overall balance, though, if the Kira POV scenes were deleted, what justification remains for the occasional group-think scenes from the indigenes? Both or neither may have been the final (editor/publisher) decision.

Aspiring writers who struggle with the temptation to pause the first-person narration and present an alternative POV within the story can take a lesson from how Moon resolved that need in Remnant Population.

Reading in 2013

by Stella Atrium 1/3/13
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My resolution for 2013 centers on more structured reading, maybe with a group, and posting reviews where the group discusses results. Goodreads is a great place to start, but the smaller challenges are fun too. Here's two that I embrace in January: