Category Archives: Storyline

There are some people who cringe at the idea of combining science fiction and romance. I suspect that these same people also don’t like Firefly so their opinions don’t really matter anyway. Personally I like a spoonful of romance in my steaming cup of science.

Science fiction is a genre that romance plays well with. Okay, I’ll be honest. If romance was a person they would be a double-jointed omnisexual gymnast. Romance can be easily adapted to satisfy everyone’s needs and plays well with every genre. But when it’s combined with science fiction it gives the story a lot of *ahem* unexplored territory in which to boldly go where Kirk has gone before.

(Bondage night with Lady Gaga?)

At its heart, science fiction is about exploring new possibilities. Sometimes it’s a new scientific theory, sometimes it’s a new planet, and sometimes you’re running from Shai-Hulud. Regardless of the territory it’s still all about exploration and all of the joy, fear, trepidation, and danger that goes with it. If you boil romance down to its very essence it’s about the same thing. Seriously. What’s more exciting and terrifying than exploring a space cave and nearly getting mauled by a Gorn? What can be more explosive than the Tothian minefield? Relationships!

(I’m pretty sure the odds of not starting an argument when you suggest that your partner stop and ask for directions is 3,720:1)

Yes, there are a lot of novels where the romance is merely a time slot on the holodeck or a green skinned Mary Sue. But it isn’t limited to that. In fact, it can be a lot more.

When done well, romance can compound a story’s major conflict (cue Ted and Robin salute). In Babylon 5 the romance between Capt. Sheridan and Ambassador Delenn made it a lot harder for them to take necessary risks during the Shadow war. It also made things very awkward when (Spoiler alert) it turned out that Sheridan’s wife wasn’t dead. On the other side of the spectrum, Marcus’ final sacrifice wouldn’t have brought a tear to many viewers eyes, including mine, if his love for Ivanova wasn’t unrequited. The fact that they hadn’t so much as kissed turned what would have been just a noble act into the most romantically tragic moment in the entire show.

Let’s not forget that The Empire Strikes Back wouldn’t be the same without Han and Leia’s love spat or heartbreaking farewell. (Odd that both were in very cold climates.) But that’s enough examples from TV and movies. Let’s turn to books!

Linnea Sinclair writes some of the best sci-fi romances I’ve read. In fact, her novel, Shades of Dark made me cry. Some of hers are exactly what you would expect a sci-fi romance to be. However, in Shades of Dark the protagonist couple’s relationship become strained to the point of breaking when one of them starts learning how to use their latent alien abilities. They realize, almost too late, that their ignorance and folly not only hurt their relationship but put their partner in very real danger. It’s this last twist that for me makes this romantic conflict real. I mean we probably all know someone or were with someone who became so obsessed with something that it almost destroyed, or did destroy, a happy relationship.

In The Postman by David Brin the protagonist falls in love with an idea more than an actual person. When he stumbles upon a quiet, and safe community the idea of staying and building a life there rather than taking on the mantle of responsibility of being a postman is incredibly appealing. In some ways it’s strange to think of an idea as being romantic. Think if it this way: when you’ve been up late working on a manuscript and have to get ready for work at the crack of dawn, the idea of calling in sick has a lot of appeal. This is the same thing except their desire for comfort and ease is so idealized that it takes on a romantic quality.

Dara Joy is an amazing romance writer whose stories sometimes has a sci-fi twist. She has a duology, High Energy and High Intensity, that’s set in the real world but uses science in an… interesting way. The main character’s love interest is a sexy physicist who decides to teach them the basics of physics through sex. I know. It sounds super cheesy but take my word for it. It’s hot! Besides, who wouldn’t want to go to that physics class?

Okay. I’ll admit that last one was a traditional romance. While it doesn’t use romantic elements in a creative was she does get bonus points for including science in a creative way. This partnership does work both ways after all.

Whether you use a little or a lot, use more romance or use more science, or use a romanticized idea is up to you. It’s also by no means a requirement that there be romance in every science-fiction story. Rather, it’s another tool that can perform more than one task. It’s entirely up to you whether or not to use it, as well as how you want to use it.

The Genius of Mistborn

July 20, 2016

Jace Killan

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While I was working with Brandon Sanders at Salt Lake Comic Con a couple years ago, a fan asked him what his favorite book was.

“Les Miserables,” he shot back without hesitation.

Mine too. I read the book in high school a couple times and a couple times since. Victor Hugo was a genius.

Now I had heard of Brandon Sanderson, but admittedly had never read any of his stories, but that comment drew me to his work.

I started with the Stormlight Archive then moved to the Reckoners series. And then, while going through Stormlight withdrawals I delved into Mistborn.

The story takes place in a fantasy world with a unique magic system. I like fantasy.

The curtains open on this fantasy stage to a criminal outfit running a con. Now, I like fantasy, but I love cons and heists. I’m hooked.

Soon this becomes less about conning the nobility and more about fueling revolution. I start to notice the intertwined reference to a significant piece of history—the French Revolution. I love history. And coincidently this event also surrounds the story in Les Miserables.

There’s more. Religious philosophy and political rhetoric mixed along with military stratagem. It’s a fascinating read. What Sanderson does so beautifully in Mistborn is to combine elements of seemingly different genres to tell an incredible story. Think Oceans Eleven mixed with A Tale of Two Cities and throw in some Robert Jordan. And it works perfectly.

art credit Marc Simonetti

I live in Arizona with my family, wife and five kids and a little dog. I write fiction, thrillers and soft sci-fi with a little short horror on the side. I’ve hold an MBA and work in finance for a biotechnology firm.

I volunteer with the Boy Scouts, play and write music, and enjoy everything outdoors. I’m also a novice photographer.

You can read some of my works by visiting my Wattpad page and learn more at www.jacekillan.com.

Two Cathedrals

May 23, 2016

fictorians

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A Guest Post by Frog Jones

We live in a golden age for television shows. Netflix has surrounded us by amazing, boundary-pushing videos, HBO is constantly upping its game, and the cable networks have had no choice but to follow suit. Even among this eruption of great television, and as devoted a fan as I am to basically all of it, I continue to hold that there is no greater hour of television made than “Two Cathedrals,” the season 2 finale of The West Wing.

And yet, I’ve never really broken down why.

First off, we have to place the episode in context. Sorkin did a great job of building to the moment for this one, and so the audience approaches “Two Cathedrals” already having some information. That’s handy, for a writer; laying the exposition elsewhere lets you spend a great deal of time bringing nothing but impact later on. For a similar effect, watch the first “Avengers” movie; almost no exposition was necessary, because that got taken care of in the initial, individual character films.

So, coming into “Two Cathedrals,” we know some things. We know that President Bartlet has been concealing his Multiple Sclerosis diagnosis from the public, and that the team is getting ready to break the news. We know that the question on everyone’s mind is whether or not he will announce his candidacy for re-election. And we know that his secretary, the much-loved Mrs. Landingham, was killed by a drunk driver the previous night.

The show opens with a number of discussions that make it clear the Democratic party wants Bartlet to step down, anoint a chosen successor. The president’s mind, though, is on Mrs. Landingham. We get flashbacks to his past, revealing his complicated relationship with her. On the show to date, Mrs. Landingham has constantly been the one person who at no point took any guff from the president, and now we see why. She’s not just his secretary; she was his self-appointed big sister—the one who became his family while his father abused him. And she recruits him to stand up to his father on behalf of the women on staff at the private school where he is a headmaster.

He is, initially, reluctant. But after Mrs. Landingham “gives him numbers,” he is forced with a choice: do the right thing, or do the easy thing. Mrs. Landingham makes that apparent, telling him that if he’s simply denying her request because he’s scared to do what he knows is right then, “gosh, Jed, I don’t even want to know you.” Young Jed sticks his hands in his pockets, turns away, and smiles. Mrs. Landingham tells him (and us) that this means he’s made his decision, and he is going to do it.

From a writer’s perspective, it’s the next scene that makes this episode great. Everything builds to it, and it is not repeat not the climax to the story. Jim Butcher has long advocated for a writing technique called the “big middle,” in which a massive event in the middle of the book is the focus of the first half of the book, and catapults the story forward. “Two Cathedrals” makes expert use of this technique, rising the audience to an epic showdown between President Bartlet…and God.

Standing in the National Cathedral, Bartlet asks the Secret Service to clear the building, leaving him alone in the massive House of God. Approaching the altar, Bartlet begins to list his grievances. A devout, educated Catholic, he addresses God in Latin. He blames God for the list of wrongs in his presidency, and asks God why the right things he has done have not been enough for him. His anger grows as he talks to his Maker without response, and as he loses control of himself he switches back to the schoolboy. His father and The Father become conflated, and he looses a tirade of cursing, entirely in Latin, at God, while standing before the altar of the National Cathedral. It is, in short, breathtaking.

And it ends by giving us the answer to the question everyone has been asking. “You get Hoynes,” Bartlet says as he throws down a cigarette on the floor of the cathedral, one last act of rebellion against his father and his Father.

The rest of the episode proceeds with the staff learning of Bartlet’s decision. Toby is presented with a “life boat,” a job offer lined up for him by Leo; he rejects it, then immediately begins to yell at Leo for even presuming he’d take it. Leo assure Toby that he never considered Toby would take the job; Toby inquires as to why he set it up.

“To show him that,” responds Leo. One character, only one, that believes Bartlet is going to change his mind. Toby’s eyes widen as he realizes what Leo is saying; that Leo knows Bartlet better than he knows himself.

And in doing so, Leo gives us the string of hope that’s keeping us going. Bartlet’s already made his decision, and made it in a big, climactic way, but Leo’s move opens that door just a crack. Just enough to keep the audience engaged, while continuing to despair. It’s perfect. It’s brilliant. And it sets up what happens next.

Throughout the episode, an unusual storm has been brewing. Also, the latch on the portico door to the Oval Office has been broken. These two events, having been hung on the wall earlier in the episode, culminate as the storm rips open the door and, on reflex, President Bartlet calls out for Mrs. Landingham.

Then his face falls as he realizes what he’s done. But only for a moment.

Because, at this moment, Mrs. Landingham walks through the door and chides him for yelling. Whether she is an instrument of God or simply a figment of Bartlet’s imagination is left to the audience, but she delivers God’s retort to the accusations Bartlet made back in the National Cathedral. The counter-arguments culminate in Bartlet “giving himself numbers,” a move designed to line up with the earlier conversation. If Bartlet is simply not running for re-election because it’s going to be too hard, then “well, gosh, Jed, I don’t even want to know you.”

After this the episode is all denouement. A musical sequence culminating in Bartlet standing before a press conference, being asked whether he is running, ends with him sticking his hands in his pockets, turning away, and smiling. We all know what that means.

The pacing of “Two Cathedrals” is breathtaking, and it is easily the best example I can point to of visual media completely nailing the “big middle” concept. The middle of any story is the hardest thing to right, the thing that bogs the story down into exposition and dragging characters from point A to point B. By executing a “Big Middle,” a mini-climax in the book, “Two Cathedrals” absolutely rockets its pacing forward, keeping its audience gripped. This trick of writing, in addition to some fabulous acting on the part of Sheen and everyone else, makes this episode quite possibly the best hour of television ever produced.

Frog Jones writes with his wife, Esther. After a ten-year vow to never show each other a word they had written, they eventually broke down and wrote a novel together. Together, they have published the Gift of Grace series from Sky Warrior Books, as well as short stories in anthologies such as How Beer Saved the World, First Contact Café, and Tales from an Alien Campfire, as well as many more. The Joneses live on the Puget Sound in the State of Washington with Oxeye, who is twenty-five pounds of pure bunny. Frog’s works can be found at http://www.jonestales.com, and he also appears on the Three Unwise Men podcast at http://3unwisemen.com.

Jackie Brown: Quentin Tarantino’s Masterpiece

May 19, 2016

Kevin Ikenberry

Character Conflict Craft & Skills Dialogue Ideas & Plotting Kevin Ikenberry Narrative Voice Plot Structure Reader Investment & Empathy Setting and Milieu Storyline Subtle Confict Suspension of Disbelief No Comments

Quentin Tarantino’s Subtle Masterpiece

We’ve all seen Quentin Tarantino’s movies and the episodes of television he has guest-directed (I’m partial to his epic episode of ER), and there are so many things we love or maybe hate about them. I have my favorites and my not-so favorites like everyone else. Yet, his almost unique approach to storytelling makes him one of the examples I use when I discuss movies that are even better than their screenplays read. Does he tend to have too-long periods of conversation? Sure. Is there a lot of gratuitous violence? Yes. But it hasn’t always been that way. Along the way, he mastered subtle story-telling.

My favorite of Tarantino’s movies is Jackie Brown. The movie is based on crime fiction master Elmore Leonard’s novel Rum Punch. With a stellar cast including Pam Grier, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Keaton, Robert Forster, Chris Tucker, Bridget Fonda, and Robert De Niro, this film is not a hyper-violent revenge saga (Kill Bill) or a riff on alternate history (Inglorious Basterds), this is a very subtle character study and as such it is a masterpiece.

Jackie Brown (Grier) is a middle-aged flight attendant who smuggles money from Mexico into the United States for arms dealer Ordell Robbie (Jackson). When she’s caught by Federal agents, they propose a deal for her to help them arrest Ordell in exchange for her freedom. Ordell bails out Jackie with the intention of eliminating her, but Jackie is thinking ahead and plots a way to steal $500,000 from Ordell with the help of her bail bondsman Max Cherry (Forster). Things seldom are so simple.

From the beginning of the movie, the characters are so subtly handled that it almost makes you wonder if you’re watching a Tarantino film. We immediately like and empathize with Jackie in a dead-end job because we see her hurrying through the airport and putting on a smile all the while. When she’s caught, we can see she was stuck in the middle of a bad situation because it helped financially. Ordell (a masterful performance by Jackson) is creepy, distrustful, and loathsome from the moment we meet him – and he gets worse throughout the film. But these audience reactions are genuine and not ham-fisted by any means. Just by watching the movie and letting the character’s depth play out visually, you pick these things up. Tarantino mastered “show, don’t tell” and he doesn’t need product placement, direct conversation, or tedious imagery to get the point across.

The heart of the movie is the relationship between Jackie and Max. We see two middle-aged people in dead-end jobs that they do not enjoy being drawn together. How Tarantino handles their relationship is simply beautiful. The gradual development of their unspoken feelings for each other reaches a crescendo when Max puts his life on the line for her. I won’t spoil the ending, but the first time I watched it I remember wishing like hell it had been different only to realize that it was perfectly crafted for the characters because of who they were and what we as the audience had learned about them throughout the film.

And one more example. Robert De Niro’s character is such a departure for the actor that you’re almost dumbfounded he’s playing that role. To me, this is brilliant casting because you’re waiting for De Niro to be De Niro, you know? And when it happens, it’s brutal and perfect. I’ll leave it at that and not spoil much more. Brilliant casting.

One final thought. I always write with music playing and I pay very close attention to movie soundtracks for what works and what does not. Music is important to mood and when done well it’s a subtle attention grabber. The soundtrack for this movie is simply amazing. Every song fits its scene perfectly.

Tarantino’s strength in bringing memorable characters to life with the subtle aspects of their personalities, likes, dislikes, and they way there simply “are” is something all of us should strive for in our writing. Beating the reader over the head with what you want them to know takes away from the level of care they should develop for your characters. Be subtle. Be brilliant.