Category Archives: Craft & Skills

There’s Room for Both: Risk-Taking Young Women and Risk-Assessing Young Women in Young Adult Literature

Generally, I think authors write young, female characters very well. I know what you’re thinking. But Kristin, this month is all about how authors get things wrong! You’re supposed to point out instances where a writer wrote a young woman incorrectly!

Instead of throwing some other poor soul under the bus, I’ll use my own writing as an example.

Recently, I received feedback from an older, knowledgable man about my young, female protagonist. He said that she didn’t take enough risks and needed to be more impulsive, and even make some mistakes. That piece of advice has stuck with me for months, and I recently figured out why: because it’s a misconception of what makes a female protagonist compelling.

Initially, the advice seemed fair enough. Action needs to happen in order to make a story happen. The protagonist has to (although it doesn’t always have to be the protagonist) make a move and get the plot rolling. Sometimes, that protagonist is hasty and makes a decision that comes back to bite him/her in the ass. Sometimes, the protagonist needs to take a risk. And in Young Adult Literature, we are accustomed to seeing a young, impulsive protagonist head out on a collision course like a bull in a china shop.

The rub comes when I think about traditional young male protagonists. They take risks, they act impulsively. They sometimes even make stupid decisions that are also hilarious to get the story moving along. And as a trope, that absolutely works.

I don’t mind if a young, female character is also written in this way. Weren’t we all young once and made a slew of terrible decisions? Yes. Yes we were. However, because I was a young female once, I think that female characters can be just as successfully compelling being risk-assessors instead of risk-takers.

Let’s unpack this.

The research in the article states that 83% of young women aged 16-19 in the United States have kept a journal. That, to me, is huge. I hypothesize that’s why we see so much first-person past tense in YA lit (read more about that here), and I’m digging deeper into that to also examine what kind of female characters readers can identify with.That means most women that buy books have journaled at one point in their lifetime.

Journalling is unique in that the writer will write specifically to her own experiences, but there are usually a wide range of similarities in the process of journaling. People use journals to recount the day or week, write down memories, note things of importance, and/or to work through feelings or ideas. When a person recounts their day or works through emotions or ideas, they are assessing certain actions, situations, or feelings that occurred.

Generally, we enjoy reading about protagonists we find interesting and/or can relate to. So when I received the feedback that my protagonist should take more risks, almost to the point of recklessness, it didn’t jive with me. I kept thinking that not all young women impulsively act — lots of us evaluate things first. Sometimes, we don’t even act, we take it all in, assess the situation, then make the best choice available to us. And while it can be empowering to read about a young woman taking risks and yes, even making mistakes, it can be equally empowering to read about a young protagonist that is strong in risk-assessment, and then makes her decision. And that’s what I realized: I had written a character that weighed her options, then made the best decision she could at the time, even if that didn’t turn out so well for her after all.

I absolutely do think we can empower young women to take risks, as it’s stated so beautifully in this article. But it’s also important to show a young female that many people can identify with: one who is thoughtful, weighs her options, assesses them as many young women do in their journals, and then make a decision. A young female character can be just as compelling by making smart, thoughtful decisions, and the real twist can come when the outcomes do not turn out as she expected them to, and how she deals with the fallout.

There are many young women who are impulsive and would like to read a protagonist that is as well. But there are just as many young women who are thoughtful, think of the options, and then choose. Indeed, having your protagonist make a hasty, reckless decision can no doubt move the plot. But can you still move the plot along and still make your protagonist’s virtues shine? Yes. Absolutely. And there’s room for both kinds of female protagonists, and even more so, all kinds of female protagonists.

The “Coconut Effect” and Reader Immersion

June 2, 2016

E. Godhand

Authorial Trust Doing Good in the World Emily Godhand Suspension of Disbelief 1 Comment

“An eagle-eyed viewer might be able to see the wires. A pedant might be able to see the wires. But I think if you’re looking at the wires you’re ignoring the story. If you go to a puppet show you can see the wires. But it’s about the puppets, it’s not about the string. If you go to a Punch and Judy show and you’re only watching the wires, you’re a freak.”

— Dean Learner, Garth Marenghis Darkplace

…but I mean, there are times when research and accuracy aren’t the most important thing for reader immersion. The “Coconut Effect”, named after the horse-hooves sound the characters make in Monty Python and the Holy Grail by banging two coconut halves together, describes a phenomenon where readers have come to expect something so much, however unrealistic it may be, that not having it would break immersion.

Because there’s reality, and then there’s what the reader knows and understands of reality. Readers look for familiarity in common, repeated tropes that make up their repertoire from media they have consumed in the past, as opposed to actual science or facts. They come to expect these repeated in future media as its own language for the purpose of telling a story, all the while understanding that they are suspending disbelief in accuracy for the purpose of Plot or Rule of Cool. (Godspeed if you follow that link to TV Tropes.)

So maybe cars don’t actually explode into pyrotechnics when you shoot the gas tank (but it looks cool). Maybe radiation isn’t always glowing a sickly green (but it’s an easy way to show invisible radiation on a visual medium). Maybe it’s not so easy to get past security measures (thankfully so).

But readers come to expect these. We don’t actually ever anticipate a reader needing to blow up a gas tank with a well-placed rifle round or break past security. And that’s not touching the legal or ethical ramifications of essentially teaching someone how to carry out these acts.

It is important for you, the writer, to know the truth though, and insert it into your story as necessary. If your plot is based on something being true when it is not, the reader immersion may be so broken that the rest of the plot doesn’t make sense.

…There are exceptions for ad hoc cultural understandings based on the scientific data available at the time.

mobydick — “…spouting fish with a horizontal tail…”

There are many ways to subvert this trope, and whether or not it’s appropriate to do so might depend on your story. Did your character learn some false information from watching too many movies or TV shows? For example, you might have a character who thinks they can blow up a gas tank with a rifle round, and when that doesn’t work out, what is their Plan B? Plot twist!

Are the characters arguing over whether or not they can actually “suck the venom out” of a snakebite? (The record, no, you can’t. Also it’s gross and unhygienic and you just introduced a lot of bacteria to a wound.)

Does your characters inaccurate knowledge lead them into trouble when everyone else calls them out on it?

One place where it might be important to subvert or lamp-shade the trope the reader expects (regardless of how common it may be), is when perpetuating the myth might actively harm people and the cultural understanding of the people affected by the trope.

For example, writing stereotypical characters may perpetuate some of the prejudice and stigma real, live people face.

The “Crazed Lunatic” may be a recognizable trope, but without a nuanced exploration that subverts it, it can lead to further cultural misunderstandings of mental illness and discourage people from seeking help they may desperately need.

Writing any stereotype about a sex, gender identity, religion, race, or sexual/romantic orientation may reinforce negative opinions the culture may have in regards to those people. It can deny them humanity and the ability for their character to be perceived as a fully nuanced, complicated person.

So sometimes it’s not so important to have perfectly researched, detailed accuracy. But it is important to consider how sharing this information might affect the people reading it, their enjoyment of your story, and how making this common knowledge might help or hinder the population reading it.

Welcome to June! (Misconceptions in Fiction)

June 1, 2016

E. Godhand

Craft & Skills Emily Godhand Reader Investment & Empathy Suspension of Disbelief The Writing Life Writing Tools No Comments

Hey Folks!

This June I’d like to showcase some great posts about misconceptions often seen in stories. Research can be hard, so we’ve done the grunt work for you!

Good research in writing is absolutely essential to me because even though I write about immortals and dead elder gods and paranormal entities, I like realism in my stories, dammit.

These are abnormal things happening in a normal world and the little, but accurate, details accentuate that contrast between what is real and what isn’t. If the world doesn’t seem real because the demographics, geography, tools, or physics are off, it can take a reader out of the story. Immersion can be important to pacing, so anything that takes your reader out of the story will ruin the “…Just one more chapter” effect you’re going for.

People, even mistakenly, take information from books. It’s how we learn about the world when we can’t or haven’t yet experienced it ourselves. Even in fantasies, even in anything fiction, if the reader can find something similar to their world, they’ll apply it subconsciously as learned information.

They trust you did your research as the author. Misinformation from the media we consume is spread and impacts people’s’ lives because we don’t remember where we learn information, just what was said. Even if it’s wrong.

If you write about a character being chased by a black bear and they escape by climbing a tree, you think that person isn’t going to try to climb a tree to escape a black bear? What other information did they have? They trusted you.

But if you have the character learn, “Oh wait! Black bears will totally climb the tree after you!”, then very likely that person will NOT climb the tree. And hopefully survive anyway.

…Why yes I did get chased by a black bear once, why do you ask?

So please enjoy this month’s collection of misinformation to avoid as necessary in your writing, and perhaps some suggestions on how to do it better.

The Rewards of Glaciality (Which I Realize Is Not a Word)

May 27, 2016

Evan Braun

Character Evan Braun Ideas & Plotting Movies Our Favorite Fiction Reader Investment & Empathy Setting and Milieu No Comments

Sense8 Last summer, I got psyched up about Netflix’s new series, Sense8. I had no idea what it was about—I hadn’t even seen a trailer—but it had J. Michael Straczynki and the Wachowskis at the helm, and that was enough for me to give it a shot. I stayed up until 2:00 a.m., waiting for the show to appear in my Netflix queue. I was strangely drawn to the fact that the cast was mostly composed of people I hadn’t heard of before. After all, when I see Matt Damon onscreen playing a character, I have trouble seeing the character; I see Matt Damon onscreen playing a character. Know what I mean?

Anyway, I watched it all very quickly. Finished it in two and a half days. And then I read the reviews, and to my surprise realized that as a profound admirer of the show I seemed to be in a minority, at least as far as critics were concerned. And usually I’m on the same page as the critical consensus.

Sense8 is so many things to me. It’s beautiful beyond description, mostly. It’s atmospheric. It’s sensual. It’s sexy (I’m looking at you, Episode 6). It’s worldly, global. It’s cosmopolitan. It’s mysterious and coy. It’s haunting. It’s diverse. It’s profoundly moving.

It’s slow.

Glacially

Which is awesome! I mean, one of my favourite movies of all time is Meet Joe Black, so obviously I’m not averse to taking my sweet time getting to the point (and even then, perhaps being a bit vague about the point). Sometimes I don’t want something explained; I just want to dig in and experience every aspect and nuance of it.

As the years go by, I value plot less and less. When I read books, I skim right over the battles, the big action scenes. In movies, I drift off to sleep when everyone else’s pulse starts to pound. The setup, and the aftermath—that’s my jam. The long travelogue of meandering from Point A to Point B? The average person may throw their popcorn across the room and stalk out of the theater in frustration; I eat that shit up.

These weren’t always my preferences. So yeah, I admit that this is a surprising trend in my life.

At the heart of Sense8, you have a really powerful and beautiful idea—eight people, waking up slowly, suffering from confusion and long-dawning realization, discovering that they’re connected, that they’re sharing each other’s memories and emotions and experiences. They are strangers and they are intensely familiar.

This series, or at least the first season, is dedicated to exploring the underlying confusion of these eight characters as their very separate and independent lives begin to merge in surprising ways. They come from every corner of the globe, have different passions, different sexualities and gender identities (did I mention this show is diverse?), and they all bring unique skills to the table. And they don’t know what the hell is going on. They’re very slow—realistically slow—to put the pieces together.

And damn if that isn’t a beautiful thing to behold.

It’s a massively complex idea, on a character level. And there are eight main characters to be explored, and just as many interesting side characters. The best novelist would have trouble executing this, never mind a TV series. And if Sense8 wasn’t on Netflix, which is about a hundred times more patient than its broadcast cousins, it wouldn’t exist at all past the pilot.

As you make your way through the show, you realize that the show is not particularly interesting in explaining things. Well, it does explain things occasionally, but it’s never in a hurry to do so. The show knows that as long as it’s turning the spotlight on the characters and their relationships and interactions, and their inner struggles and emotions, it’s on solid ground.

But if you need plot bleeding from your every pore, Sense8 may not be for you. It’s character first. Character, character, character, and more character. So much character that you almost can’t stand it.

In a world of brainless action flicks, it’s pretty refreshing.

P.S. I also adore The Leftovers. Which is, now that I think of, Sense8’s spiritual sibling. It evokes very similar reactions in me, critics, and the overall TV-viewing audience.

Evan Braun is an author and editor who has been writing books for more than ten years. He is the author of The Watchers Chronicle, a completed trilogy. In addition to writing science fiction, he is the managing editor of The Niverville Citizen. He lives in Niverville, Manitoba.