Genre Bending
Posted by mcummings
True confession: I’m working on a fantasy novel. I’m not sure why it feels weird to admit that – there’s nothing shameful in the endeavor, but it still gives me a funny feeling to say, and it shouldn’t. If we ignore the short stories, the first attempt I ever made at a novel was a fantasy novel. I called it the WindWeaver Saga, and there is much to it that would better be left forgotten. And yet while I try and outline my current project, I find elements that I had worked out for WW surfacing. Some are simply places (The Sea of Gath), others are objects (the Sceptered Sword). The problem I always had with that novel – and there were many, many attempted starts at it – was with the characters. Coming up with places and objects is relatively easy. But the people that make it a story always eluded me. Sure, I could come with some names, even a few motives, but nothing that ever gave them depth or purpose in moving forward.
But lately I’ve been giving this idea some thought, something I’m calling “genre bending.” Its not a new concept per se, although I don’t know if anyone else has labeled it already [*see parting comment*]. The concept behind genre bending is taking a mix of genres to tell your story. The traditional fantasy novel, for example, is the classic boy on quest. Sure, you can substitute boy with girl, or grizzled veteran, but the end result is Person A on quest against Evil B. And yes, generally speaking, it is a story of Good versus Evil. There is no grey in the mass market published fantasy realms. Generally. Back to my point. Maybe the point of that quest is to obtain the magic spoon, or ring, or sword, but the story is ultimately about Person A against Evil B with the magic prop as their aid. Reads almost like a messed up game of Clue (Frodo did it in Mordor with the One Ring). But lately, I’ve noticed a lot of Science Fiction that attempts to do this genre bending (as I refer to it), blending elements of other genres to make a new kind of story.
Yes, I realize it actually isn’t a new phenomenon per se. Maybe its just that there’s a critical mass of fiction out there now that makes it more evident. Richard Morgan comes to mind, with his sci-fi noir Takeshi Kovacs novels. Maybe its just my imagination, but hey, that’s what we need to try and tell a story. Either way, the thought that has been seeping into my mind is that there’s a whole world of stories available, just as soon as I flush the tripe generality away.
Enter the story I’m working on making an outline for (which, by the way, though a slower process than I would have thought, is definitely helping me give thought – and corrections – to the flow of my story). As I mentioned, its a fantasy, though I doubt it will reach the same volume of what’s currently on the market. Most fantasy novels are 500-1000 pages long; not too likely I’m going to tell a story that long (maybe I will, but I wouldn’t wager on it). A good deal of fantasy novels are multi volume epics these days, a fact the reader doesn’t usually mind; I’d like to tell this story in a single volume.
Of course, as I write that, I wonder how reasonable that last goal is. The worldbuilding I’m currently doing certainly has the capacity to be a multi-volume epic. All the elements are there – distant and mysterious empire, prophetic motivations, maybe even a spice of magic. But can I contain this story in one volume and not break my fingers in the process?
Enter the genre bending concept. I’d like to bring to the fore a story that feels fresh, that doesn’t rely on old truisms of the genre. Maybe I won’t succeed – it sure is easy to type this laudable goal at an ungodly hour of the morning (and why, oh why, couldn’t I just sleep this once?), and something all together different to actually stop talking and put words to screen, as it were. My goal for this week, or at least the next four days, is just to finish the first draft (and keep in my mind that it is just a draft, not carved in stone and set forth as Law) of this outline. The only “writing” I’m letting myself do right now is either in the outline, or in the notes section – no actual story writing permitted until I finish the outline.
That’s a rule that’s really hard to stick to, by the way. For someone who has always just shot out into the dark with pen and paper (or keyboard and screen) and started writing a story from the cuff with just a vague notion of what’s going on, and no clue as to where the story is headed, holding back the urge to write is rough. I didn’t have this rule when I started toying with the concepts for this book, but luckily reeled myself in after I’d shot out about 5K worth of words, realizing I needed a direction. The irony to my steadfast refusal to attempt to generating content right now is that some of that make it as you go text introduced a character I hadn’t anticipated, who in outlining has become one of the main characters. Can’t win for trying.
I hope to write on here by Friday that the outline is done and I’m ready to dive into filling out the text that makes sense of the structure. I completely expect that either I won’t make it, or that I will rush myself to meet this artificial deadline so I can get on with the fun part (writing), and that either way I will see myself on the fourth revision of the outline by the time next weekend is over.
OK, enough morning brain dumping for me. A quick Google as I wrap this post up reveals that A) although I came up with the phrase independently and all on my lonesome, it was already an established term and B) A, with the addition that this isn’t original at all. But since this post veered off the stated subject early on, no harm done 
Have a good morning/week kids,
Uncle Mike
So whacked
Posted by mcummings
Not the only YouTube gem of the day, but definitely one of the better done. Enjoy
Writing Toolkit – DIY?
Posted by mcummings
I know, I know, in the past I have extolled the virtues of yWriter –- it really is a great little app – but more and more I find myself thinking about dropping it and writing something myself. Maybe its the closet linux geek buried under all this flubber, but I keep thinking I might, just might, be able to produce something that works better for me.
Its not the little things. I can deal with the tab key not going where I expect it in a dialog. Its not the annoyance of what happens when you import text worked on elsewhere. Its not even the way the spell checker flags words using smart quotes – heck, I didn’t even cognizantly know what smart quotes were until yWriter started marking words misspelled that used them.
Its actually more fundamental than that. Its all about how my brain organizes and generates ideas and information versus how yWriter collects and exposes them. Its about the features that aren’t really applicable to the general public, but that I would find immensely useful (like a cross-project encyclopedia – a place where you could store every character you’ve ever created, every locale, spot, item, and special word, so that from any project you can catch that you have a tendency to name your minor villain accomplices Darian.
There’s no scratch pad – a sorely missing feature that I find ironic since the only editor I can think of that uses one is the vile emacs (and oh, there’s a pun in that sentence if you are into the linux stuff that would just make you roll your eyes and groan). There’s no outlining tool, which would be super nifty because if done right, it would seem to me, you could take your outline and generate chapter and scene descriptions (and vice versa) on the fly.
My ideal tool would let me easily port data from machine to machine; it would be OS independent; and perhaps most important, it would be *mine*.
Granted, in a lot of respects, this is just an excuse to procrastinate instead of writing. But the idea keeps nagging at me. A lot of the problems that Simon has with yWriter usage is inherent in the interactions of the scene editors (at least those reported in the google group) – me? I’d abandon trying to code my own custom widget and instead let the user point to an external editor that they like and focus on managing and correlating the data instead. Sure, there are some hurtles I’d need to figure out, like how to merge the produced scenes into a cohesive (and maybe even ordered) whole, but I bet I could do it.
Or I could just work on that novel outline instead of spending my commute unintentionally writing the opening chapter. Yeah. One of the two.
Hey tsunam
Posted by mcummings
If you’re out there, give me a ping.
Everyone else – nothing to see here.
Blog Thoughts
Posted by mcummings
So I was thinking to myself this morning, gee, wouldn’t it be cool if I could get a guest blogger on here? Someone that had some recognition and that wouldn’t mind lending a few minutes to spout off on a topic?
At which point it struck me that the biggest problem with that is that this blog has no direction or focus to make it worth it for someone to stop by and do a guest post. There are just as many posts on writing as on general life in the Cummings household, Gentoo (if you did enough, anyway), and a few other random tangents over the years. This almost suggests to my coffee induced mind that perhaps what’s needed is a new blog – but am I up to the task of maintaining two blogs when I can barely maintain this one?
Maybe.
Maybe, if I don’t treat it like a dumping ground for random videos and thoughts, but instead focus on it as a legitimate avenue to talk on a subject. Ye gads. That would mean organizing posts on subject, planning ahead, and having a deadline (new posts posted Sunday morning, for ex.). Is it worth that when there are so many other sites out there?
Something I’m pondering. Along with how to translate mental images of half visualized scenes into a coherent outline. You know. Minor stuff.