Really?

Well, from here on out, come and catch me and fellow Carina Press authors over at ‘Here Be Magic’ to get our take on writing, life and all things random.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been working on completing my new project, which is currently at 63000 of 70000 words. Overall, I’m really pleased with it, but there’s still a long way to go before it’s ready for submission.

What else…what else…with the launch of In Darkenss Bound, it looks like I’ll be doing a blog tour towards the end of August to early September. I’ll be blogging with such awesome ladies as Carrie Lofty, Cindy Spencer Pape and We Write Romance. Subjects TBA (I’ve got my homework cut out for me!)

I also wanted to take this opportunity to launch the cover and synopsis for In Darkness Bound. Woo!

Data Collection by Dalhousie, Dr. Donna E.

Patient 77
Reclassified to staff status. Useful, malleable.

Confined in a sterile research facility and treated like a lab rat, Chris is alone and terrified. His special powers are his only escape, allowing him to psychically connect with other patients.

Alone in his cell for longer than he can remember, Vance is hungry. When newcomer Chris makes a mental connection, Vance is intrigued and soon wants more than just conversation.

Chris and Vance seek comfort with each other, and with Simon, the only staff member who’s shown them a hint of compassion. Their relationships develop during stolen moments between bouts of pain and fear, and they turn their thoughts to escape. But as Dr. Dalhousie’s madness spirals and her experiments intensify, more than cell walls threaten to keep them apart…

And then there’s — OH MY GOD THERE’S SO MUCH PURPLE!!! This site may need a bit of an overhaul.

I also wanted to officially announce that I’ve signed my contract with Carina Press to publish my new book. The title is currently being debated over, but the release date is set for September 13, 2010. Hang tight for excerpts and other goodies coming your way!!

It used to be really easy. I’d always pick paranormal/fantasy over any other genre. I was fairly singular in my younger years, in retrospect (and I primarily blame Patricia C. Wrede and her YA book Dealing With Dragons for my fanaticism). I wasn’t really interested in contemporary, and especially not drama. I didn’t get the point: bad things happen every day, and it’s easier to do battle with a dragon then your inner demons.

As I’ve gotten older, though, I’ve started appreciating contemporary more and more. I think one of the books that really won me over was The Kite Runner. I know… it’s been on every single booklist ever, but I read it several years after the initial release (right around when sexy Khalid Abdalla played Amir in the movie, but I’m not admitting to anything). It grabbed me and held me, and gave me a new appreciation for books outside my comfort zone. Don’t get me wrong, nine times out of ten I’ll probably still grab a paranormal/fantasy novel before anything else, but it’s that one time that’s driving me towards removing the paranormal elements from my current project and make it something a bit different.

There have been some writers who very successfully cross genres. I mean, I’m certainly not saying that I’m anywhere close to Nora Roberts in terms of raw talent and success, but she’s managed to have a bestselling series in the mystery aisle while maintaining her role as a traditional romance author as well. I really admire that, because she’s found a way to balance two genres without compromising her integrity. She publishes under another pen name, sure, but it’s still really incredible.

Then again, there are some authors who aren’t so successful in bridging the genre gap. (Yeah, see what I did there). I’m not sure which category I’ll fall into. I certainly don’t want to wake up one morning to read a review telling me I should have stayed in my comfort zone.

(Of course, all of this is based around the fact that I’m kinda hoping to be successful in general, and with only one book out to my name, I’m not so sure if that’s something I should consider to be inevitable).

I know I’ll end up doing it, because I can’t have a challenge put right in front of me and back down. I think that a part of me needs to write this, because I have to know if my writing skills (such as they are) can break outside the box that I’ve put them in. I know that I’ll always circle back to paranormal and fantasy, because the genre is a passion and I love playing in it. But there’s something to be learned from breaking outside your comfort zone and attacking a new challenge. Let’s see what I can take away from it.

Now, onto the actual blog post for this week:

“…And wuv…. tru wuv….”

Will fowow you foweva…”

(Is my soapbox all good and centered? No? A little to the left? Okay, thanks…)

Okay, I get true love. I really do. I’m a hardcore romantic. I married my high school sweetheart and I’m moreso in love with him today as I was the first time I said “I love you.” I believe that in a well-written book or movie, two people can fall in love in 350 pages or 120 minutes (whichever comes first). I think that love is eternal and undying. What I have a problem with, is shows/books/movies in which there is one couple (Couple X) who are obviously wrong for each other, break up and then spend the remaining four seasons-slash-scenes-slash-pages justifying why they actually SHOULD be together instead of looking for someone else who could make them legitimately happy.

(The examples that follow will mostly be based in television, and while I could go on a rant about Twilight, I think my feelings on that particular can of worms are best saved for another day).

Let’s take Battlestar Galactica: I hated Starbuck and Apollo as a couple (my simpering girl-crush on Michael Truccio nonwithstanding). I was hugely relieved when they had a one-off and then decided never to speak to each other again. When they started pining over each other despite both having particularly loving partners and decent relationships, I had a problem with it! It’s like the producers of these shows decide that Couple X must end up together, but no good couple can just last. There needs to be dramatic tension and break ups and harrowing ordeals until, finally, the series finale comes along and they get together for good.

Another example is more recent: Penny and Leonard from Big Bang Theory. I love this show. It’s clever and I dig it. I really liked it when Leonard was dating the character played by Sarah Rue. I thought it was terrific that he and Penny weren’t going to hook up, and I was glad to see he was with a quality character who wasn’t just acting like a space filler until he and Penny got together. (Imagine my chagrin and disappointment when this actually proved to be the case). And now that they’ve broken up, I imagine that we have another whole season of pining to look forward to until they get back together again.

Little Women is a favorite of mine that subverts this trend. The whole thing seems to be one big build up to Jo ending up with Teddy and then BAM! He marries her sister and she ends up with Friedrich. And it’s awesome. Fritz was so much better for her than Teddy would have ever been in a million years and Louise May Alcott got that (even if she did introduce him simply to appease whining fangirls). If more writers could just cue into the fact that the introduction of a new character is worth the work it takes to create them, instead of relying on the failsafe character they’ve already spent time developing, then I wouldn’t find myself red in the face with rage.

Something I really appreciate about How I Met Your Mother is how this is handled with Robin and Ted. I can deal with them dancing around each other for a few seasons and Ted being convinced that Robin’s the one for him because she’s not. She ends up being “Aunt Robin” and the quest to find that special someone continues. I love it. I wish more writers would adopt this as a rule instead of an exception.

It’s sort of like drinking too much coffee as a kid. A character gets so wholly reliant on another person and can’t escape them. It stunts their growth. It closes them off to the rest of the world. Harry doesn’t end up with Draco because Ginny is the Chekov’s Gun from the first book that he’s obviously always meant to be with.

Sexual tension is a brilliant plot device, but the people involved don’t always have to end up together. I think that Castle and Beckett work better a partners/writer-and-muse than they would as a couple, and there are some people that should just stay friends. There should also be character growth. If Couple X break up, and they go their separate directions, they don’t always have to come back to each other eight years later and realize that they’re perfect for each other. In eight years, isn’t there anyone else in the world you’ve met that is better for you than your girlfriend from high school? (*coughcoughHarryPottercoughcough*).

Anyway, this post seems very rantish, but it’s something that’s been on my mind.

So, I’ve been watching the Tudors. In Canada, we don’t get the original Showtime airings, so I have to wait until CBC deems to release season four in December. In the meantime, I’ve been re-watching the first three seasons and marvelling over the complete babe that is Natalie Dormer and wishing that I had even a fraction of Sarah Bolger’s amazing talent. The entire series is incredible, but as a writer, I find it dangerous to watch period pieces. Not only do my characters suddenly have a complete and comprehensive grasp of the King’s English, but I suddenly have the desire to soak the scenery with dresses, formal language, lavish setting (setting being something I struggle with, but that’s probably better saved for later) and an inordinate amount of “gazing.”

It’s not just the Tudors that’s my problem, either. Watching Lord of the Rings makes me want to go back to writing high fantasy (which I haven’t done in years), True Blood (my newest obsession) is trying to pull me into vampire fiction and anything even remotely related to Gerard Butler makes me want to throw in a Scottish protagonist/beefcake. I think that I allow myself to be overly influenced by the media around me. Reading, watching TV, seeing a movie, all of these things impact the stuff I’m working on. And it’s a dangerous thing! If I’m trying to write something light and comical, it doesn’t really work when I’m suddenly going off on a tangent about so-and-so’s dark and gritty past. I mean it. I’m not clever enough to be subtle in these sorts of situations, so it’s rather like trying to fit the square peg into the round hold with a sledgehammer to the tune of “I’ll make it fit.”

This isn’t a new challenge for me. When I was younger and even more easily influenced, I used to watch Shakespeare adaptations and then speak in iambic pentameter for an hour afterwards. This, I’m sorry to say, is not an exaggeration or entertaining lie. It’s part of what drove me into the English program at the University. I don’t even think that there’s a reasonable condition I can blame this on. I don’t have ADHD (to the best of my knowledge) or anything similar, so I think that I might just be weird.

Then again, weird is cool, right? Some of the most interesting people I know are weird. My weird just tends to manifest itself in different ways, such as describing a lavish dress down to the tiniest detail while struggling to write a fight scene. (Let me tell you, you haven’t truly done a ludicrous fight scene until you’ve had one in which a character is in a full-length gown).

It’s not always a bad thing, however. My newest piece, which has just been resubmitted for consideration to Carina Press, was heavily influenced by a certain romantic poet. I’m not going to ruin it, just in case its accepted and readers get to be pleasantly surprised, but the piece itself was rounded and developed by relying heavily on one poem in particular. Some of the imagery, themes and language were incorporated for my benefit, and I think it adds a lot to the manuscript. Not only that, but I really got a kick out of dusting off the old English degree to analyze the poem and pick out thoughts and ideas that really went well. It was actually a lot of fun, and something I would like to do again in the future. Maybe not the near future, but eventually.

Being influenced by the media around you isn’t a curse for writers, unless it gets completely out of control. I remember reading a book that read like a Starsky and Hutch fanfic. I mean, I dig on S&H, but I remembered thinking that if I wanted to read fanfic, there were plenty of free sites online. The trick is finding balance. Instead of allowing what you’re reading/watching to dictate your next project, figure out what makes you love it and key into it, then use that to drive the success of your writing. I’m not sure if I love the Tudors for its dazzling costumes or brilliant writing, or just the feelings that it invokes when I watch it. “Wow. This is pushing boundaries. How can I do that?”

But someday, I will find a niche for my Scottish beefcake.

My friends, I give you the magic of the Playlist. Pick an emotion, I have a list of songs that help me invoke them every time, and keep the momentum going as I tackle some of those harder scenes. That heartbreak will probably start off with A Fine Frenzy’s “Almost Lover,” come around to Damien Rice’s “9 Crimes” and continue to pull on the heartstrings with Maria Mena’s “If You’ll Stay In My Past.” Between these three staples—three of the saddest songs I’ve ever heard—I actually might start weeping. It’s not that I haven’t felt heartbreak in my life, but in order to really get into the space that I need to make it real and convincing, I rely on the medium of music to help me get there.

Music is a very primal, real thing for me. I find that my writing is effected by what I’m listening to, and sometimes indirectly. I could be writing a scene that’s joyous and filled with new hope and wonderment, but if anything by Rammstein comes on, the characters are screaming obscenities at each other within three minutes and fifty-four seconds. I’m aware enough of myself to be very careful when picking out the track lists during my writing time, but you never know when something might slip in. (I would talk about the tragic effects of writing a romance scene while “Dragula” by Rob Zombie is playing in the background, but that’s a story for another post).

What is it about music that has the power to change our moods or invoke strong feelings and emotions? Another tool I use for writing is the CD player in my car. Depending on the project I’m working on, I’ll have the same thing playing in my car as on my computer, trying to keep momentum on considering a character’s overarching motivation and personal habits. Some of my CDs serve as soundtracks for my projects, or even the lives of my characters. One such character has been fully conceived, developed and rounded during the musical stylings of Adam Lambert. Needless to say, he’s fabulous.

Music is a brilliant tool. Like music, writers aim to invoke emotion and make it real. The lyrics, tone or rhythm of a specific musical piece can do in less than five minutes what some of us strain to achieve in a 55 000 word novel. If I’m having a bad day, and I need some serious cheering up, Owl City’s “Fireflies” becomes the raison d’etre. It can always cheer me up. Everything about that song appeals to my happy nerve, and it hits it with precision every time.

And, because it needs to be said, every time I bake, I listen to the Sweeny Todd soundtrack. It’s not really related to writing, but I get a kick out of listening to “The Worst Pies In London” while baking.

One of the characters I’m current working with has a severe phobia, and the antagonist has discovered it. Thus I have had her casually throwing it about as threats to inspire his complicity. He’s also constantly wracked by guilt by the death of his brother and has conflicting emotions about two different men. To top it all off, the entire plot of the book begins with him being kidnapped. I’d say that he’s having a pretty bad time of things.

There are certain characters we create that we love to torture. It can’t be because we’re all sadists by nature. I mean, I am, but I’m confident that I’m in the minority. There’s something more to it than that. Something compels us to want to tear someone down and make them suffer the worst that the world has to offer. And I think that it’s because it is such a relief when things finally begin looking up. Yes, my character will be poked and prodded by his worst nightmares, he’ll agonize over his brother’s death and he’ll worry about whether he’s making the right choices. But when that light finally appears at the end of the tunnel, the Hallelujah chorus will sound and choirs of hawt, hawt angels will arrive to make everything a sunny paradise of rainbows and unicorns.

I think it’s the collective sigh of relief and contentment that means the most when you’re writing (or reading, for that matter). You empathize with your characters, and when they suffer, you do too. That’s what makes it so much better when they turn around. After despair, joy becomes more joyful and everything is a little brighter after a long time spent in the dark places of the world. I think that’s why we decide to pick one character and pour all the world’s problems into them. Because it just feels so much better afterwards, when things get better.

Either that or we’re all evil adherents to the wonderful concept of schandenfreude. But let’s save that speculation for another post.

For the past three days, I’ve been staring at the glaring white screen of a new Word document. Pondering. I have the plot loosely outlined in my head. The work is done on the characters and where I want them to go and how I want them to develop. I have backstory and a few cool scenes mapped out in my head. What I don’t have is a catchy opening line.

And let me tell you, reading doesn’t help. You get so caught up in how great the opening line of your favourite books are that you feel even more pressure to perform. How can I possibly compete with Dickens’ “It was the best of times it was the worst of times…”? You can’t. Even modern classics are hard to stand up to. Take Rosenburg: ‘The idea of using porn films to encourage the dairy cows to breed had been a poor one.’ How does a person possibly live up to that???

I think Tolkien had it right. He started with the first line and went from there. I remember one of my English professors telling me about it. Apparently, Tolkien was marking papers, when he was suddenly struck by the desire to jot something down. “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” One single, innocuous line started the Great Transformation of fantasy literature. Not to, you know, put any additional pressure on anyone… (This is where I begin banging my head against the wall).

At this point, I recognize that my blogs usually have a moment of emotional clarity, where I turn the desperate moanings and kvetching into something vaguely positive to reassure myself and readers. In this case, however, I find myself still stumped. I also encourage anyone in the same situation not to Google ‘memorable first lines,’ as First Line Anxiety only gets worse.

Maybe I’ll just break tradition and start in the middle, instead. (There’s a very catchy Latin phrase for that, but I’ll blog about Latinisms at another time).

I’ll leave off with just one more first line. The first line of my perpetually favourite book, and one that pretty much everyone knows: “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of good fortune must be in want of a wife.” (Which isn’t really related to anything, but while we’re on the subject of first lines, I needed to toss in a shameless Jane Austen plug).

“But, Clinton, I like the idea so much! I mean, the laser-wielding bear cavalry? That’s golden!”

“Maybe for another writer in another genre, but it’s into Recycling for you!”

Let’s get one thing straight: I write romance. True, it’s something I stumbled into quite by accident, but it’s the genre that I’ve adopted as my own, and I love it dearly. There’s something sinfully satisfying about characters realizing their deep, abiding love for each other and finding a happy ending. And one of the best things about the genre is that it’s changing. There’s very little in the way of ripped bodices any more (except in the purely ironic sense) and as a whole, writers have fortunately begun to stray away from “no means take me I’m yours.” Instead of man and woman, there’s man and man, woman and woman, man and woman and man, man and alien, woman and werewolf… it’s diversifying beyond what I’m sure could have ever been imagined by the pioneers of the genre.

But regardless, there are still a few limitations. Aforementioned laser-wielding bear cavalry, for example. A concept I personally find to be wonderfully rich with pure awesome, but not something that could probably be incorporated into a romance novel without a lengthy pause and confused “what?” from the readers. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not denying readers any credit. While there might be some stigma against romance novels in general, the readers are for the most part very intelligent and down-to-earth human beings. It’s just that there are some things that the genre would struggle with. I can’t particularly imagine cyborgs with lightsabers riding flying sharks either. It’s because it’s absurd, and it is very, very, very difficult to find a balance between absurdist elements and conveying the depth of emotion between two people who are struggling to express their love. I bow in deepest respect to anyone who can strike that balance between absurdity and emotion without being pandering or condescending to the audience (which I think is the biggest fear). And let’s face it: a man and woman expressing their love when explosions are happening in the background sounds a bit too 1970s sci-fi to fit in.

But then again, maybe we should look at removing all those preconceived notions from the wonderful world of fiction. Instead of breaking bookstores into “romance” versus “fiction” versus “sci fi,” maybe we look at just putting everything under the heading “a good story” and incorporate the elements that we find entertaining and rewarding. I know that I’d be stoked to find a story that incorporates even one absurdist element and still manages to make me teary by the end. And I can’t be the only one out there. One of the rewarding parts about being involved in the romance genre is watching it grow outside of the box planter in which it started. And as more branches develop, there’s a good chance that we’ll start to see ‘absurdist romance’ settled in beside ‘paranormal romance,’ ‘mystery romance,’ and ‘historical romance.’ But I think that pioneer will have to be a lot more talented than me. Because as much as I find the idea of laser-wielding bear cavalries and cyborgs with lightsabers riding flying sharks, I cannot think of a single way I could incorporate them into a story without cracking up and wondering about my caffeine intake. Which is already substantial.

I think I’ve gotten off-topic. Somewhere, there was a point in all this, though I can’t imagine what it was. Maybe I was coming to some deep inner revelation about the growing romance genre and how privileged I feel to be a part of it. And if that wasn’t my point, let’s just go with it.