Sci-Fi Heroes for a changing world...

'Hope everybody had a great fourth!  I spent the evening as I do most every 4th - Standing on the Cambridge Esplanade looking up at expanding globes of green, gold, purple and red stars exploding in the sky amid cascading showers of gold and floating fire lanterns.  We Americans love huge displays.  In film as well as patriotic tradition.

As a science fiction writer, I'm gratified to see sci-fi making a cinematic comeback, and in a a tasteful and artistic way.  Two sci-fi films I recently enjoyed very much were "AfterEarth" and "Man of Steel."  Both were huge special effects projects, with all the subtlety and restraint of a fireworks display.  But, they still found room for human feeling and genuine character development.  Proof the genre is coming of age.

"AfterEarth" is a visually dazzling space opera whose premise sounds an ecological cautionary note:  The human race is forced to colonize a distant solar system after pollution and climate change render Earth uninhabitable.  (Feeling the blazing heat of the summer sun this month, I feel that reality fast approaching.)  Against that backdrop, the story is one of father/son conflict and bonding.  The two main characters are played by sci-fi film veteran Will Smith and his real-life son.  The story is familiar enough.  Dad's an old army man and his son's heart just isn't in following in the old man's footsteps.  But, he wants and needs to prove himself (to himself as well as to his father.)  When the boy washes out of military training, the strained relationship between father and son comes to a head.  An interstellar father/son outing dad is hoping will bring him and his boy closer together takes a dramatically surprising turn when their starship crash-lands on, of all places, Earth.  Earth has been uninhabited for a thousand years and has reverted into a prehistoric wilderness, infested with ferocious mutant animals.  Father and son are (conveniently) the only survivors of the crash.  Dad is badly wounded and immobile.  His son must survive on his own in a savage wilderness and retrieve a radio device to summon help and save the day.  Somewhat cliched yes, but a classic coming-of-age tale and a baptism of fire that makes for an effective adventure.

 Computer-generated big jungle cats and giant birds make for a powerful man/nature story.  The boy's struggle to survive, served not always by a willingness to kill, but sometimes by a compassionate respect for nature is reminiscent of another visually spectacular fantasy film "Life of Pi."  The ultimate threat in "AfterEarth", the boy's primal fear made flesh, comes in the form of an immense and deadly alien predator which hunts by scent, rather than sight.  Here, the story gets points for originality by inventing its own lingo and mythology (as all good science fiction must, to establish its unique brand).  The military elite of a beleaguered future humanity is able to face these alien monsters through a martial arts fighting technique known as "ghosting."  The alien monster's sense of smell zeroes in on the smell of human fear.  So, the human warrior who faces the monster, George-on-dragon style must be able to suppress his fear.  To the alien, the human is like a ghost;  present, but without scent, and therefore undetectable.  As in any classic dragon slayer myth, the monster embodies our darkest inner demons.  The real struggle is internal, since the hero must conquer his own fear in order to win.  A timeless tale, "AfterEarth's" weakness is in its predictability.  It's strength is in its human emotion and classic hero mythology.  Beautiful and modern as the special effects in a film like this may be, the human factor is still the most important.  Science fiction has come a long way from its early, soulless beginnings in the pulp fiction of yore.

And speaking of yore... An iconic, all-American comic book hero, Superman, is brought to life again in  a movie which was, without doubt, the most spectacular and visually beautiful special effects display I've ever seen.  The cost was nothing short of obscene, but worth every penny.  That said, the story, again is definitely a human one.  Alien in its premise, but very human at its core.  Again, a tale of fathers and sons.  The familiar tale of Krypton's last son sent to Earth by his idealistic (and perhaps somewhat arrogant) father as the final legacy of his dying planet is reminiscent of the long-running TV series "Smallville," the coming-of-age Superboy fable which centered on the theme of destiny; choosing to be who you wish to be, not what society expects you to be.  The rarest of achievements.  The one who can manage it is the one who will restore hope to a world desperately in need of it.

In this version, Krypton is painted as a Brave New World society in which everyone's destiny is decided at birth through genetic engineering.  (A vision graphically represented by the sight of babies growing like fruit on a tree in immense fluid tanks.)  Jorell and Lara commit the ultimate blasphemy by having a child the old fashioned way, leaving his future in doubt.  Their son Kal is the ultimate messiah of hope because of his own unpredictability.  His future is what he makes of it. His antichrist-like adversary General Zod is the exact antithesis of that.  Zod is a soldier because he is genetically programmed to be.  His mission to destroy the human race so he can turn Earth into the new Krypton is what he must do; it is his duty.  When he is robbed of that, his existence loses all meaning, and he has nothing left but hate.  As always, the backdrop of sci-fi must create its own world, but the characters still must be developed to move against that backdrop, as they would against any other.  Clark Kent is innocent and vulnerable.  He wants to know who he is, and he wants to help people.  His adoptive human father prohibits both, wanting only to keep his foster son's secret, fearing the world will never accept him if they knew.  The world's capacity for hope is tested by the appearance of this new potential savior.   A Kansas farm boy who suddenly finds the weight of the world on his shoulders.  Clark/Kal/Superman's moral code is simple and pure.  Through his uncompromising love of life and respect for his fellow man, he sometimes succeeds in turning enemies into friends.  But, there are other times when life presents him with irredeemable evil and choices that force him to kill as the lesser of two evils.  The effect is excruciating for him, as all growth must be.  His innocence is lost, but his ideal survives.

Superman has become a classic American fable.  Keeping it fresh and alive in the re-telling is the challenge.  The underlying theme is hope.  Hope for new beginnings.  Science fiction has taken a nose-dive in the post-9/11 years because hope had for a long time been replaced with fear.  The apparent resurgence of the genre may be a sign that, as in "AfterEarth," we're learning to overcome our primal fears and start over.  And, as in "Man of Steel," we're learning to hope again and forge ahead into a new future, no longer slaves of the past.

And, isn't that what the American dream is supposed to be about?  Happy Independence Day.

Tom Olbert ( Mocha Memoirs Press publications:  Along Came a Spider, Hellshift, Black Goddess)
http://tomolbert.blogspot.com

The Watershed

If you are a writer, you’ve heard the phrase "show don't tell" until you are sick of it. People who claim to teach writing drum this into their students’ heads as the number one tenet. Editors criticizing rough drafts red pencil it above passages written with sweat and blood. But it is hard to quantify exactly what that three word phrase actually means.

Honestly, I doubt I can make it much clearer than anyone else, because it is something that suddenly makes sense to you when you see it – like the scene at the water pump in THE MIRACLE WORKER, when suddenly Annie Sullivan’s patient hand gestures in her palm “click” for Helen Keller, and the world unlocks for her. “Show, don’t tell” is that kind of epiphany. It may come in smaller stages, but in the end, it is as life-changing.

Here is a practical illustration. In my first published novel, THE BLOOD THAT BINDS, Stefan was crippled as a child by a dog. The scene was presented to the reader in the form of a flashback thought sequence by Roland, the other character present at the time. This is “telling” the audience what happened. Now, of course, without taking the action of the novel back in time so that the scene occurs chronologically, I can’t completely “show” the scene, but in the rewritten version of the book, THE LUCKLESS PRINCE, Roland has a conversation with someone about the incident, making it much more immediate and integral to the action – “showing” it much more clearly. (And, as a bonus, revealing more character details through the give and take of a conversation.)

Even more to the point is another example from later in the book. In the original version, Mendana thinks about the supplies she may need to replenish. The reader is told which herbs are low and so forth by virtue of an omnipotent look into her mind. Now, she is talking to another character as she looks through the baskets. He is offering suggestions, and taking down her requests on his tablet. The scene has now gotten a life; it shows what happens instead of telling about it.

And the thing about this is, it took someone who was not a writer, but a reader, to look at the scene and say “but wouldn’t it be better if…?” My husband became my Annie Sullivan by teaching me that italicized thoughts are rather boring and break you out of the story, but—in his words—“forcing” the world around the characters to provide the information you want the reader to know makes that world a lot stronger and deeper. 

Not only does removing the italics help keep the reader in the story (the change in font always catches the reader’s eye and breaks the flow somewhat) but it gives the writer a chance to expand their world. For example, in the scene mentioned above with Mendana, the second character in the scene originally didn’t show up for the first time until later. Now, his character is more developed, and the reader will care more about what happens to him further along. He becomes less “the messenger” of the original – created because someone needed to send a letter – and becomes a living being with other interests and talents.

Another example of “show, don’t tell” is the result of my new writing partner, who read through my original rewrite and commented about many aspects of the world-building that were never mentioned through both a professional “book doctor” revision and full—and thorough—edit before the book was published the first time. (I am convinced that part of this was because my editors were all women, and saw the book from a different perspective—having beta readers of both sexes is a much better strategy.) In trying to answer his questions, several characters have been added to the story. The history of the kingdom that the reader needs to know isn’t handed out in a block of narration, but delivered as a lesson in politics.

Flashbacks, thoughts, blocks of exposition…all of these are ways a writer uses to “tell” their audience something. Sometimes, they cannot be avoided. Sometimes, they really are the best delivery method for the information the reader must know, but far more often than you would think, they can be rewritten into dialog or interactive scenes that “show” the author’s intent. This is the most important lesson an author can ever learn—but it is the hardest for anyone to teach them. If you can break through that mental darkness like the blind Helen to understand the symbols in your palm, you will not be able to type fast enough to show the world your watershed stories.

I am still learning how to show my worlds, but it gets easier every time you practice. :)

[An earlier version of this post appeared somewhere in 2009, but I can't for the life of me remember where.]

Delicious Mistakes

One of the things I find difficult about writing is making progress.  I know that sounds strange because I’ve finished projects.  One of my favorites is an MMP publication entitled The Snow Maiden.

However, I make progress in fits and starts.  I tend to go back to correct the mistakes I make as I’m writing instead of writing forward and worrying about mistakes later. 

Several people in my writing group have expressed the same concern: slow progress because of writing while editing. As assistant organizer of a local writer’s group, I discourage this practice, but I admit to engaging in it, too.

I attribute it to detesting seeing my mistakes in print. It’s like a white glove to the face. I’m afraid to answer the challenge. Afraid to fail. So I edit while I write. And make slow progress.

I’ve recently discovered being in my kitchen helps my writing. So I am once again baking.

The result of my efforts was two dozen vanilla buttermilk cupcakes with Tuaca icing.  (If you’re not familiar with Tuaca, find out about its deliciousness here.)

When baking, I’m fearless. I don’t worry about mistakes in the kitchen for three reasons:

-       I can fix the mistake

-       If I can’t, it’s probably delicious anyway

-       A mistake doesn’t mean I’m not a good cook (baker)

  

So when I’m spooning batter into the cupcake liners and see some of the ingredients didn’t fully combine, I scoop it into the pan anyway. (The brown sugar and butter didn’t fully mix with the flour and baking powder.)

And so began my experiment. In two of the cupcake liners, I spooned dark swirls of brown sugar mixed with a lighter whipped honey-colored batter.  Beautifully marbled in the cups.

They imploded.

Or exploded, I wasn’t looking in to the oven at the time. But I did hear a noise.

Once I looked, I had to make a decision: take out the entire pan to remove the not so-perfect cakes at the risk of hindering the baking of the ones I knew were right.

I’ve been baking since I was “knee-high to a duck”. (Yes, I’m a Southerner.) So I knew not to remove the pans. Let the ones that are not-so-perfect finish their time in the oven and deal with the unsuccessful ones later.

The cupcakes finished baking and I took them out of the oven to cool and they were gorgeous frosted. I took them to a friend’s for dinner.

As for the exploded cakes, I scraped off the caramelly sugar-butter crust on the edge of the pan and removed them, too. Fluffy, sugar-crusted, buttery, melty goodness.  They were the first ones to disappear.

So don’t fear your mistakes. Don’t edit your writing as you go or you might sacrifice losing your vision for the whole work.  Or get stuck in an endless editing loop.

Fix it later.

Or don’t.

It might be delicious.

Eden Royce A/K/A The Dark Geisha loves a good ghost story, a good mystery, and a good romance.  Preferably a combination of the three.  Check out her other ramblings at darkgeisha.wordpress.com

When you're smiling....

I love to laugh. I actually love to laugh a lot and if someone can make me laugh they are my instant bestie. When there is a character that makes me laugh, I'm instantly in love. Lately, I've been in a dark place when it comes to writing. All angsty, kill a few characters, deep thoughts kind of writing. Now, I have a macabre sense of humor and can also find funny things in what some find extremely morbid but I haven't even tapped into that lately.

So it was with great surprise that while planning out a story, one little line from a character popped into my head. This was going to be a disposable character that I hadn't taken the time to develop. I was going to use him as a place setter to help flesh out something between the hero and heroine. He was lacking completely in physical description, but then he whispered that line as I was jotting down notes, and he became the sexiest thing I'd ever seen. It was a magical transformation and because of his wit I decided he needed to have a story all his own.

I'm sure some will see this as just transference of my subconscious utilizing a character of my imagination to express latent humor I needed to ground myself emotionally...um that got really clinical. Anyhoo, the point is, it may seem odd that a character I made up could make me desire him more, but tis true and I'm very grateful for him. I'm sure when I finish writing this cheeky bugger you'll be grateful too.

Janet

Seven Questions with Wynelda Ann Deaver!

It's the fourteenth, so it must be time for Seven Questions with Selah Janel! This month, we're talking to author Wynelda Ann Deaver!

SJ: As a writer, what is your absolute favorite part? What's the part that makes you want to hide under a bed and scream? 

WAD: My absolute favorite part is when my eyes go out of focus, the computer, tv, everything disappears and I’m in the story. It’s like living your own movie, and nothing else is quite like it, except perhaps the way children play and are in the action.  Hide under a bed and scream? That would definitely be revision and marketing. Revision because I just want to scream when I do it, marketing only because I don’t know how (that homework is superhard, mom!)

SJ: Is there a character you've written that definitely comes from you and is a part of you? Who? 

WAD: There are two. The first character I wrote, Alex, was who I was and who I wished I was at the time (20 odd years ago). Completely bad-ass, rides dragons, sword fights with the boys, loyal to the end and interested in justice. She was also the heroine I was working with when my mom died, so a lot of the grief, and the hitting and screaming… that came right from me. Other than her, the character I’m currently writing is based loosely on some of my experiences (she had some of the same, but I threw in a few Greek Gods, a magic garden, and well… you get the idea.) So her past is similar to mine, but what’s happening to her now? Not so much LOL.

SJ: Have you ever written any plot point or scene that makes you blush for any reason at all? 

WAD:Any and all love scenes make me blush to write. Always have, probably always will. Since my primary genre is fantasy, I can get away with a lot of fade to black.

SJ: If you had to have a cage fight with a character you've written, who would you choose? If you got to kiss them better at the end, would your choice change? 

WAD: Someone I wanted to hurt, or who I wanted to hurt badly? That would be the Blue Mage (aka Asshat) from Dragon’s Champion. I can’t stand people who feed on the pain of others. Kissing of the boo-boos? Definitely Ares, the hero of my current work in progress.

SJ: What is your biggest pet peeve with yourself as a writer?

WAD: I don’t write enough. I feel as if I should be writing reams and reams every day. Instead, I wake up, get my son ready for the bus, go to work, come home, spend time with the boy, and then possibly write. I’m getting better at it, making sure that I get words down in the story every day. It’s slow, but you know what? I’m not a single college student living with my parents anymore either.

SJ:  What's the author that you hope to live up to someday? Who's your inspiration? 

WAD: There are too many to count! Frances Hodgson Burnett is one of the reasons I wanted to start writing, along with Madeline L’Engle. Their stories transported me. Now, of the writers I currently read, hmm… I love Lynn Flewelling, Mercedes Lackey, Carol Berg… All of who write wildly different tales, set in  fantasy worlds.   

SJ:  Why MMP? What's your favorite part about working with them?

WAD: Let me tell you a story. I wrote a novella in college, and I was offered a contract on it about 5 years later. Well, technically I never even received the contract. The editing “help” I was getting was vague at best, and downright lazy in parts. I grew so frustrated I pulled the novella (which I knew needed work, but I needed help with it). A friend and fellow writer recommended I submit Dragon’s Champion to MMP, and I am so glad I did. Not only has everyone been professional (from getting the contracts, to cover art, to editing)… they’ve also been incredibly kind (helping out, answering a newbie’s endless questions).

Bright, funny Constance sets off to rescue herself when she first sets foot on the Dragon’s Path. Along the way, she’ll encounter a merry band of brigands, a shop full of dresses (and temptation) and a Golden Dragon. Constance will find out that by taking that first step… she just might find her destiny.

http://mochamemoirspress.com/dragons-champion/

Tune in next time, where I respond to Wynelda's writing prompt challenge!