Immersive reading: My worlds and the world of Georgette Heyer

From as far back as I can remember, I have always been an avid reader. When I was in junior high school (I missed going to middle school by a few years) we moved into a house where I finally had not only my own bedroom but my own walk-in closet. I loved it partly because I could put a chair in the closet and sit there and read without interruption. Once, I was immersed in a book when my sister opened the closet door, intending to borrow a sweater. She stared at me open mouthed. When she told me what she wanted, I handed her the sweater and asked her to please close the door.

 

Surprisingly, considering that every book I have published to date is set either in a fantasy world, an alternate earth, or the far future, I love reading historical fiction, especially historical romance. I love being transported to the past, because in many ways, it's another world, with different customs, different speech patterns, and sometimes very different problems.

But unlike the far future, our past is a world we know something about. The best historical fiction is well researched. With the right amount of detail, historical fiction can make you feel that you're experiencing life in the past. To achieve this, characters shouldn't use modern idioms; and if they act in a way that we consider normal but wouldn't be tolerated in their actual time period, it needs to be clear they're not typical. One of the best writers I've ever encountered for immersing the reader into the past is Georgette Heyer. From the early 1920s to the late 1970s she wrote over 50 books-- mysteries, historical fiction and Regency romances. I have read pretty much every one.

I like some of her books more than others, of course, but in every book Heyer does a decent job of immersing the reader in that world. The ones I like best are those set in the "alien" world of Regency-era England, the second decade or so of the 19th century.

Society in that place and time was incredibly stratified. Not only wealth but social standing divided people into classes that did not mix socially. Women's lives were strictly circumscribed as to what was proper behavior. And men who aspired to call themselves gentlemen had an equally strict code, even if it was far less limiting of their activities. This gives Heyer's stories a setting that transports the reader from the everyday to the exotic.

I, too, want to transport my readers to a more exotic place and time. But unlike Heyer, I don't want to be limited to a specific place, or a specific set of rules of behavior that had actually existed as a setting for my stories.  Side note: I enjoy Heyer's stories more when they include purely fictional characters. I find the ones where she includes historical figures and actual events, like the Duke of Wellington at Waterloo to be less entertaining.

Back to my writing: In order to give myself total control, I create my own worlds, my own customs, sometimes my own species. But at the same time, in rereading Heyer's books and then rereading my own (which I do sometimes), I can see what a debt my stories owe to hers. 

In emulation of Heyer, I try to achieve that sense of immersion in a character's life, that makes the reader feel as if they were actually in that place and time. Like her: I give the major characters a family history and often have family members as characters; I stress familial and friendly relationships as well as romantic ones; I have my characters go through their daily activities, and in some cases, encounter humorous situations (as when a human man is invited for a family holiday on an alien world and discovers he'll be sharing a bed with the daughter of the house; Heyer's books may not have aliens, but they certainly have humor!); I describe clothes and customs with enough detail to give the reader a sense of what it's like to live in that place and time. And finally, I try not to have my heroes always be the same guy in a different hair cut.

In fact, I like to think that if Georgette Heyer had chosen to write her romances in a science fictional setting, we might well have attracted the same readers! And if you have never read anything by Georgette Heyer, you might want to check out her books. They're set in the past, but they are also timeless.

Killing off characters is a balancing act

Something that came up in my writer's group once  was the question all fiction writers face: when and if should you kill off a character.  Death is a part of life.  And really, if there is no risk in a situation, there is not much tension either.  Unless you're writing a romance where the two (or more than two, in some subgenres) main characters need a happy-ever-after (or at least a happy for now) ending, any character should be fair game to get killed off, right?

Maybe not.  When you write a story, you're asking the reader to invest their time and a certain level of emotional involvement in that story, and that means making them care what happens to the characters.  Killing a character for a good reason is one thing, but killing them off just to show that you're willing to do it can leave your reader feeling betrayed, almost like they've invested time in a relationship and then found out it could never have worked out. I had a friend who is also a fan tell me that when she came to the part of THE SIXTH DISCIPLINE where a major character dies, she closed her Kindle and put it down like it was on fire.

So what constitutes a good reason to axe a character?  I heard a writer at the Pikes Peak Writer's Conference (and I wish I could remember her name!) articulate the best rule I have ever heard:  you kill off a character to change the motivation of another character.  That works for me.  But I would also say that, if possible, it should not be as simple as their death making the protagonist mad for revenge or anything like that.  Certainly you don't want a female character to get horribly slaughtered just to motivate the male hero to a blood rage (a.k.a., "Women in refrigerators syndrome"). I always thought killing off the First Lady in the movie Independence Day was really just a milder variant of shoving her body into a refrigerator. She wasn't seen as necessary to the story (she didn't fly a jet or otherwise act heroically) and her death, conveniently staged in her husband's presence, motivated him even further to kill those nasty aliens. When I killed off the character that my friend complained about, I answered that he or she was in the way of the plot.

The revenge angle is not totally bad, but I think it works better when one character's sudden, abrupt absence actually changes the other character's circumstances.  Maybe now they have to support themselves, or rule their country, or face their fears, or go on a quest, or even just finally grow up.

Of course, in spec fic, an added complication is that magic/advanced technology may make it possible to bring the dead back to life, and I don't mean as zombies or anything like that.  I mean that spec fic writers have to be careful they don't make death meaningless.  That happened on STAR TREK TOS a little bit and TNG even more so.  The damn transporter got too powerful!  If a machine can basically copy a person's molecules and later spew out a copy on demand, no character ever needed to stay dead. 

So, have you ever read a book and gotten really angry at the author for killing a character?  Or have you seen an instances of too-powerful-transporter syndrome?  Alternatively, have you ever ready a story and thought (as was said at my writer's group once), "Really, the author should have just killed off x?"

Character names: Why is he just Willoughby?

Characters' names can have meaning in stories. I try to maintain a pattern to naming characters, when I think it's important to the story. In my fantasy romance Bag of Tricks, I imagined an eastern European setting, so I named the male main character Zarek, a name found most often in Poland and Hungary. But because the female lead was a woman who had wandered far from her home, I gave her the French name Aveline (even though in my fantasy world, her country of origin was north of where Zarek came from. I mean, it is a fantasy). 

In the far future, on the other hand, I can see names merging and race and ethnicities blending.  In my science fiction romance Worlds Apart, some of the population of the colony world Celadon are Greek-speaking refugees, who didn't want to be assimilated, and so they lived separately on their new world, keeping their language while forming a new culture. Those characters all have Greek names, naturally, but in some cases I used names from Greek mythology, and the hero is actually named after the most famous sculptor of the classical age, Praxiteles. On a friend's advice, I gave him the nickname Prax so it was easier for readers who didn't have an art history teacher who drilled the name Praxiteles into their heads, as I did. 

In the same book, among the strangers who come to Caledon from more cosmopolitan worlds are a man named Hari Ijiomah (a South Asian first name and an African last name) and Rishi Trahn, another South Asian first name, but with a twist because it's a man's name and Rishi is a woman, the heroine, in fact. Trahn is South East Asian, so that gave me even more variety. And for a real mix there is a also a secondary character named Ingrid Nakamura. 

Sometimes. especially if I work on a book long enough, the characters' names become fixed in my mind. The Nameless World duology was written as one very long book and later split into two books. It took me so long to write and polish the book(s), that the characters' names became a part of them that I couldn't contemplate changing, even after a beta reader suggested that having two principal male characters' names both starting with D (Darius and Daniel) was not a good idea.  Too late! Darius and Daniel they stayed.  

I got to thinking about the importance of book character names because in the pandemic-induced isolation, I have been re-reading a lot, including some Jane Austen books. Let me add, if you're inclined to do this, I would not bother with Mansfield Park. I could not believe how prosy and long-winded it is! Pride and Prejudice holds up well, as does Sense and Sensibility, which brings me to my point. In 19th century Britain, there was more formality about names. Only good friends called each other by their first names. Indeed, in Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth Bennet's parents called each other Mr. Bennet and Mrs. Bennet, at least in front of others. Darcy and Bingley are sometimes Mr. Darcy and Mr. Bingley and sometimes just Darcy and Bingley, especially in conversation. But in Sense and Sensibility, Marianne's love interest is almost always called just Willoughby. There are about a dozen or fewer instances of "Mr. Willoughby" being used but he is mentioned hundreds of times in the books as just plain "Willoughby." Even Marianne calls him Willoughby, not John. I wondered if, having named him John Willoughby, Jane Austen was in some way trying to signal the reader that just-plain-Willoughby was less of a gentleman than her other important characters? He certainly acts badly in getting Marianne to love him, all while knowing he won't ever marry a woman with no money.  I have no way of knowing if Austen did it on purpose, but I did notice the Willoughby difference. 

So, do other writers obsess about characters' names? Do non-writers? Just me? Oh, well. 

 

 

Musings on my muse: The care and feeding of my inner control freak

If you met me, you would probably think I'm perfectly normal.  But inside, I do have a quirk that makes me a tad different from most folks: on one level, I'm a control freak. This might surprise a lot of people who see me as reasonably laid back (except when I'm worried about my kids, and then I freak out).  

But I'm a different person when I write books. It's not just being a writer that makes me different. Technology has made it much easier to write and to publish, which has revealed that gazillions of folks have that ambition. Some of them write hoping to make money, some write hoping for recognition or fame, and some write because they enjoy it. I write because I want people to read what I have written. Let me stress that—what I have written. What appeals to me writing stories is that by writing them as science fiction or fantasy, I control not only the characters but the setting. I can create my own worlds, each with its own appearance, environment, inhabitants, and cultures. And I can populate those worlds with whatever characters I think would make for an interesting story.  

In the Wakanreo trilogy (Alien Bonds, Alien Vows, and Alien Skies), I created a world where  an alien people mate because of biological reaction that cannot be controlled. I wanted to create a society in which sex was completely divorced from morality, and where nudity was not linked to a desire to provoke a sexual reaction. I also foresaw greater equality between the sexes and among socioeconomic groups; because there was no such thing as marriage, either arranged or from affection, and divorce did not exist, class structures were too difficult to enforce. Also, since pairing off was purely pheromone-driven, looks didn't matter. Add to this the question of love; just because you paired off with someone doesn't mean you have to love him or her.

In Tribes, I wanted my readers to inhabit a world where there was one overriding loyalty, at least in a legal sense. Belonging to a tribe was a a life-long and immutable thing. One's tribe provided security, a safety net against disaster, and also determined what was legal for an individual. On the other hand, if someone had no tribe, his life was doomed to slavery, drudgery, and degradation. Interjecting a slave into such a setting provided a way to see how the other characters behave toward him.

But setting a story on another world or in the future isn't the only way to control all the facets of my story. In Hidden Magic, I gave some characters magical abilities, but plunked them down in a society that feared and suppressed magic. I made them brother and sister, and then, because I enjoy a romance, I had each of them find someone they loved.  

I don't only read science fiction and fantasy. I enjoy mysteries, historical fiction and historical romance, and even sometimes young adult novels. But I don't think I would ever write in those genres because I would be stuck with the rules imposed by reality. 

Technology and the writing process

This post on Tor's website about J.R.R. Tolkien and how he developed Éowyn of Rohan as a character made me think about how technology has changed the process of writing a novel.

For most of the twentieth century, writers wrote in long hand and then paid someone to type the work, or they typed it themselves. The resulting manuscript could only be changed (in any but the tiniest of ways) by rewriting or retyping it. You could mark it up and add notes in the margin, but eventually, if you wanted to make changes, you had to write or type it all out again. If, like Tolkien, you kept every version you typed (or possibly hand wrote), then you, in effect, created a sort of fossil record of how the book evolved.

I really wonder if any writers do that now. With word processing, you can constantly revise the same file over and over. Unless you make a point to copy your files in a different location or to a different name, you won't have the earlier versions. Personally, I only copy a file in that way if I want to revise a story it in a way I'm not sure about.

It used to be that I would have backup copies on floppy disks, but even that has gone the way of the dodo as I now rely on Dropbox for backup. Every now and then I might email a manuscript to someone, which creates a saved version in a sense, but there's no pattern to when I do that.

Actually, when I first started to write, decades ago, I typed a short novel on a typewriter. I think I have the pages somewhere, but I have no idea where they are. Probably just as well.

Besides the biggest impact of technology on writing and writers isn't the loss of a book's fossil record, but rather the sheer number of people who are writing. You no longer need to be so obsessed by the need to get a story down "on paper" that you're willing to churn out reams and reams of typescript pages. All you need is a computer and some spare time. Not a totally insignificant barrier but nowhere near as high as it was in 1973.

So, technology has opened the floodgates. It remains to be seen what the impact of the deluge will be.

My books are like my babies

I was the third of four children, and when my mom got stressed and wanted to yell at one of us, she would often yell all our names instead of just the one who was about to do something bad or dangerous. Sometimes she even threw in the dog's name.

I thought of this the other day when I recalled writing a specific situation, and then I couldn't remember which of my books had that scene in it. All my titles repeated in my head, one after the other, and it came to me that in some ways, they are my children.

If you think about it, a story idea formed in my head and was made fertile by something in my life, either personal experience, or something I had read, or even just my imagination. The idea developed and took form, much like a fetus, until it had a life of its own. I could send it out into the world without me. But unlike people, books don't always have the same gestation period. Some might take nine months, but some might take nine years. 

About 25 years ago, I started writing seriously. Before that, I had dabbled in writing. I had started a book, which I later called Child of the Sand (still not published) but I hadn't finished it. Then somehow the beginning scene for The Sixth Discipline popped into my head. A man with a bow and arrow was walking through a forest. He had a premonition of danger and then he was shot (not fatally) and kidnapped. That was it, to start with. I sat down and started writing (I have never been an outliner; I am a classic pantser) and six week later I had a first draft. In actual fact, that first draft became two books, since it was too long for one. The working title had been Haven but that became the series name for the two-book series, The Sixth Discipline and No Safe Haven. It was the fastest I ever wrote a first draft.

But in the way of things, both books sat there and germinated a while. I always wrote whatever floated to the top of my brain, to take advantage of the energy that a story has when it's newly formed. I had a day job, a helpful husband and two wonderful kids, but I always made time to write in the evenings. I eventually joined a writers' critique group, and I took a writing class, both of which I found helpful. But in writing, I have found nothing more helpful than the actual doing of it. Getting feedback is 100% essential, but it's not how you start. You start by doing it.

And if you're lucky, you give birth to one or more stories. 

Writing technology into stories

As someone who was born smack in the middle of the 20th century, I know first hand that the pace of change has accelerated. When I compare my childhood with my children's I see huge differences:

When I was a kid:

• Only a few moms worked outside the home; not everyone had washing machines and not many had dishwashers.
• Rural areas still had party telephone lines; when the phone rang, they had to listen for the pattern of the rings to see if it was for them or for someone else who shared that line.
• Not everyone owned a television set, and most who did had a black and white set.
• Dogs ran loose, for the most part. If there were leash laws, they didn't apply in suburban residential neighborhoods.
• If you had kids and could afford it, you owned a set of encyclopedias, because that's where you looked things up.

When my kids were small:

• Very few moms were stay-at-home mothers; everyone had washing machines and dishwashers. 
• Everyone had a phone and after about 2000, many had cell phones; my daughter had one at about age 10.. After the Columbine shooting, I wanted to be able to call her any time. 
• People owned multiple TVs, some of them huge, and all of them with color screens.
• Only people with really well trained dogs ever let them run loose. 
• If you could afford it, you had internet access, either dial-up or DSL. Encyclopedia salesman were out of business. 

Actually, my kids are about six years apart in age, and even that made a difference in when technology influenced their lives. My son was a teenager before he got a cell phone. 

Putting the detection in detective fiction

I was thinking about this recently because I read a fair amount of  older novels, very often mystery novels. Publishers (or in some cases authors) are willing to price older titles very reasonably in ebook form, so I often pick them up even if I don't know the author. I can't always tell when the book was published because usually the date shown in the meta data is the date of the ebook only, so I look for clues as to when the story is set. If there are no references to dates or to world events, it can be difficult to tell if a story is set in 1910 or 1930 or even 1940. After WWII, some differences appear-- cars, and telephones become more common. But from about 1970 to 1990, it can be difficult to pin down the time frame. 

The one thing that makes it clear a book is set in the last 20 or so years is the presence of cell phones. in fact, if it's only a cell phone, with a physical keyboard and no web browsing ability, it's usually set in the 1990s.  

Tomorrow's technology today

As someone who writes science fiction, I pay attention to how people use technology.  I can tell you the cell phone has had a huge impact on fiction. Nowadays, if a writer wants to strand a character in the middle of nowhere or lock them in a haunted house or otherwise make them inaccessible, he has to account for the character's cell phone.

And of course, in stories set in the far future, the trick nowadays is to guess how the future will work. Which can be damned hard when it seems like the future is happening every day. When we look at the communicators in StarTrek TOS, we might wonder why Mr Spock needs a communicator and a tri-corder. If our "phones" can do so much, why can't theirs? 

But of course, another factor is, what do people want technology to do? Do they really want a device sitting on the kitchen counter than can hear and possibly see everything that goes on?  Will they trade convenience for privacy? 

I guess the future will tell.

Story-telling versus writing

I consider myself primarily a storyteller. I've chosen the written word as a way to tell my stories. Or perhaps I mean the written word chose me, as I never envisioned another method.

But there are plenty of other ways of telling a story.

Some people use songs. I have a tin ear myself, so that was never an option. Some people use dance. Hawaiian hula dances always tells a story, as do classic ballets like Swan Lake or Sleeping Beauty. Musical theater combines songs, dances, and spoken words, as in the traditional The Music Man and more recently in the edgy new Broadway hit Hamilton.

Interestingly, the modern era has produced some excellent story telling in television commercials. One of my all time favorites is this Tullamore Dew whiskey commercial; it packs a huge amount of story telling into a small amount of time, and pulls off a surprise ending, too.  In spite of my tin ear, I love the song in it.

A Toronto artist found a unique, visual way to tell a story. He makes dioramas out of vintage ring boxes, in an effort to make the viewer feel transported to another world. Each of his creations is a complete scene, and each viewer can interpret it in his or her own way.

Dance, music, songs, movies, TV. commercials, visual art, books, they're all good. What works for you?

Blog Hop: Why (and how) I write

This is my entry in the writer's "blog hop," also known as a blog tour. I was invited in by my friend and fellow writer Rosemary Claire Smith, whose own blog hop post is here. Rosemary writes science fiction and fantasy stories, drawing on her highly diverse background which ranges from the study of archaeology to the practice of law. Her subjects cover dinosaurs, time travel, folklore, mythology, aliens, and genetic engineering.

Here goes!

What am I working on?

My current work-in-progress is a science fiction romance called Worlds Apart. It's something of a duck-billed platypus of a story. It's set in the far future, and has tropes from romance, space opera, and duck-out-of-water stories. Because it's set in the far future, the title is quite literal; the two protagonists are from different planets. His people have a unique language, different manners, different values, and a way of life that seems primitive to her. To him, her world seems crowded, noisy, and full of rude people.

The tension in the story comes from a secret he keeps from her, and a mistake she makes that puts him in an impossible position.

How does my work differ from others of its genre?

Considering I love to read and write science fiction, I really don't focus that much on technology, in the sense of worrying about how things work. Except at a very basic level, I don't know how my car works, But what I know is, if you own a car and can afford to maintain it, you can go pretty much anywhere you want in this continent.  Likewise, in my stories, it's the effect of the technology that interests me. Even more than that, I focus on the culture and societies that my characters inhabit.  As for the romance in my current story, I created a character who is very much a product of his culture, but once he finds himself in a different setting, he has to learn to adapt without changing the core of who he is.

One of the writers I most enjoy reading is Georgette Heyer, because I always felt transported to another time and place when I read one of her books. In a way, I feel that I'm writing historical fiction/romance that hasn't happened yet.

Why do I write what I do?

Well, the stories come into my head, so it would seem wasteful not to write them down. I guess at a basic level, I write what I like to read. In addition, speculative fiction offers unlimited scope in terms of creating an interesting setting. A spec fic writer isn't limited to what's happened already or what's possible.  If I want to create a world where men and women have separated into different tribes, I can (I have!).  If I want to create a matriarchy, I can! And frankly, I love the thrill of reading a finished story. There's just nothing quite like it--except maybe getting fan email from someone who was as immersed into my story as I was.

How does my writing process work?

See above, where stories come into my head. That's how it starts. I get a scene in my mind of a person in a specific situation. The more vivid the scene is, the more I have to think about that person, and what he or she is doing and why. Once I get the gist of that straight, I think through some ideas of what the story might be about.

I might make a few notes, and I try to keep background files as I write-- lists of characters names with their relationships and physical descriptions, places (sometimes even maps and floor plans), and (very importantly) a time line.  Once I start writing, the story could easily change direction. Sometimes when I read what I have written, I get a whole new idea.

After I have a first draft, I submit it to my writers' group for critique.  They provide invaluable feedback on the characters, the setting, my writing, and the story overall. I always make some changes after I get this level of feedback, but sometimes it's more drastic change than others.

Who's up next?

Passing the baton, the next leap in this hop goes to these folks who will be posting on or about May 5, 2014. I will add a link to their posts once they do, but meanwhile you can check them out.

Ian Thomas Healy is a prolific spec fic writer whose work can range from sentient alien farts, competitive forklift racing, a religion-powered rabbit-themed superhero, cyberpunk mercenaries, cowboy elves, and an unlikely combination of vampires with minor league hockey. (in the same story!). He is also the creator of the Writing Better Action Through Cinematic Techniques workshop, which helps writers to improve their action scenes.

Aimee Condayan is a mainstream writer who is at the "looking for an agent" phase. Her knowledge and skills are wide ranging, from the DC punk rock scene to technical writing. In addition to working on a novel, she writes comedy scripts, essays, open letters, hate lists and whatever else inspires her.  Her entry is here.

A. R. Williams developed a love for reading at a very young age and in the fourth grade, when an assignment for students to write their own works of fiction was given, it occurred to him that he could craft his own SF and Fantasy tales. His work has appeared in Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, Three Crow Press, and Every Day Fiction. A.R. received an honorable mention in the fourth quarter of the Writers of the Future Contest in 2010.

Writing by the rules

I have belonged to a writer's group for well over a decade. Sometimes called critique groups, writer's groups are one of the most powerful tools a writer can have— if he belongs to a group that works for him. The wrong group is worse than no group, but the right group is a treasure.

Our group has minimal rules. We let writers submit short stories or novels, and the novels can be submitted in chunks as they are written, or as an entire manuscript after they are complete (although those require at least two months reading time). We don't require a specific number of words from every writer, and although we are all speculative fiction fans, we will look at mainstream work or stories in other genres. Critiques are presented at a more-or-less monthly meeting where we go around the room, but unlike some workshops, we don't impose a strict “absolutely no comments or questions while the critiquer is speaking” rule. The writer and other critiquers can speak up if they feel so moved.

The membership has fluctuated between six and twelve members over the years with people dropping out when they get too busy and sometimes dropping back in as their circumstances change. There are a few members who have been in the group even longer than I have. I have stayed in the group because I find it valuable, and sometimes I find myself harking back to other people's comments on mine and other member's stories, some of which we have solidified into “X's rule.”

The Kathy Rule
If possible, don't give minor characters a name. Referring to them by name signals the reader that they have some importance, that they are worth keeping track of. If characters aren't actually important, try to avoid naming them.

The Sharon Rule
In writing spec fic, avoid figurative verbs that could be taken literally in some circumstances. That is, don't say the hero flew across the room, or the heroine vanished from the doorway, unless those characters are literally doing what the verb says. This is especially true in the first few chapters where the reader is figuring out the rules of the world the writer has created.

The Tom Rule
The protagonist must protag! That is, he or she needs to be an active player in his or her own destiny. Circumstances might force an unpleasant choice on him or her, but the protagonist needs to be the one making the choice.

The Carmen Rule
Avoid flashbacks, when possible. This is partly personal preference, but I do generally prefer a linear story line, so long as this allows the story to start at a good place.

Of course, like any good rule, any of these can be broken by a good writer!

Catching up

Is it really July already? How did that happen? I am deep into the revisions stage of Saronna's Gift. When I give a manuscript to my writing group, I always have to weigh their comments against my own sense of what the story is about and what tone I am going for. As you can tell by looking at almost any book's Amazon reviews, people have varied taste. What one person finds edgy, someone else will see as too dark. What one reader admires in a character will sometimes make other readers dislike him intensely. This is why Baskin-Robbins makes 31 flavors!

The group has been in existence for about 20 years, although the membership has varied during that time. One “new” member just rejoined the group because she retired and finally has time to write again. Another is new-new, as he had only attended a few meetings.  The folks who have been in the group for years do have some predictability in their critiques of stories submitted. One guy always wants more physical description of the characters. One woman always loves the character everyone else hates. And one bloodthirsty guy always wants the writer to kill off one or more characters.

When I review the comments my fellow writers have made, I look for two things. First is consensus. Is there something everyone hated or thought didn't work?  Because if so, that is something I need to change. The second thing is harder to pin down. Does a suggestion resonate with me, with what I want the story to be? Because it's my story, and no matter how interesting an idea sounds, of it doesn't make the book into the story I want to tell, then it's a suggestion I won't use.

At least not with this book. But I save everything. A writer is really a kind of idea vampire. He or she feeds off chance observations, friends' life struggles, newspaper items, and anything else that comes his way. It's what we do!

Writing to make a connection

When people ask me why I write, I say it's because I was born a storyteller. I have a tin ear and two left feet, so music and dance were out as a way to tell stories. I can draw a little, but not enough to do what I would want to do. Telling stories in person is fun, but finding an audience is hard to do. That leaves writing. Putting a story down on (real or virtual) paper gives me the best opportunity to reach people. I want to make a connection; I want to tell a story and make people care about how it ends; I want to create characters and make them come alive in other people's heads.

Self-publishing is a fantastic breakthrough because in the past, unless an editor thought your story was marketable, it went nowhere. Notice I didn't say “good,” I said “marketable.”  Editors are in the business of buying books from authors that they think readers will buy from them. RandomHouse didn't buy Fifty Shades of Gray from E.L. James because they thought it was great literature; they bought it because they knew people would buy it. Thousands of people were already buying it from online sellers because the author had self-published it. An editor might think a book is beautifully written, but if he doesn't think anyone will buy it, he won't buy it either.

Self-publishing has been around a long time, but in the print world, it costs a lot of money to do. In addition, a self-published print book had no good path to get into bookstores.  There were a few authors who started that way, but not many. eBooks were a game changer not only because they were cheaper to produce, but because because their distribution is online, and not controlled by companies that deal only with publishers.

One nice benefit of technology is that online sites like Goodreads and online retailers like Amazon allow readers to post their thoughts on the books they have read. Admittedly, not all reviews are positive, but still, enough are that I can get a good buzz of connectivity, and know that I suceeeded.  I'll take that deal!

Writing in a series: why I created my own universe

I got a wonderful email the other day, from a reader who was requesting the free story I offer via this blog. It was the kind of email authors dream about because she said she had read The Sixth Discipline (which she got free in iBooks, but it's also free almost everywhere) and loved it enough to buy the sequel No Safe Haven, and loved it enough to buy all my other books in the iBooks store. On top of that, when I checked, she had left a review on iBooks! Talk about your ideal readers!

When I sent her the story, I suggested she read Tribes first, because it's most like the Haven books in overall tone, and I warned her that Shades of Empire is noticeably darker and more explicit than my other books. But when I was writing the email, it occurred to me that in some ways, the fact that she loved the Haven books so much could make it difficult for her to enjoy the other books.

Readers love books in a series. Once they find a character they like, they want to stick with him or her. When a local book club read my fantasy novella Where Magic Rules, one of the questions the readers asked me was did I have any books in a series.

Authors, on the other hand, often find it difficult keep finding new things to say about a character. The Haven “series” is only two books long, and I didn't know it would be two when I started it. As it turned out, I had too much story in my head for it to fit into one book. Fortunately, there was an eight-year gap in the story, which made a logical place to end the first book; I just had to be sure there was enough resolution of all but the one significant plot point that continues in the second book.

But in a sense, most of my books are in a series. All of my far future science fiction stories take place in a universe in which people from earth colonized other worlds in a way that left them cut off from our earth. The societies and cultures they created varied, depending on why they left their own world. I call them "sleeper worlds," partly because the colonists traveled in suspended animation. In the Haven books, there were three distinct groups on the colony world of Haven: one looking for new resources, one wanting isolation to experience harmony with nature, and one hoping for a total lack of government. In Tribes, the world was a prison colony, and its culture and government evolved from prison gangs. The colony world in The Nostalgia Gambit is an exception in that it's not a sleeper world.

I named my universe the ThreeCon universe, for the Third Confederation of Planets, the organization I created to oversee commerce and other interaction between the worlds. Although there are no characters shared between stories (except for the Haven books), the universe has a consistent, shared history. There are events mentioned in one that carry over into other stories, too.

My next book, most likely titled Saronna's Gift will be a romance, but it's also set in the ThreeCon universe, and the sleeper world the story takes place on was founded as religious colony by a charismatic but despotic leader who believed in an Old Testament-style patriarchy. After a few centuries of isolation, the world is a pretty awful place, in a lot of ways. The story starts when a young woman's father takes her to a city to sell her. I'm hoping the book will appeal to both romance readers and science fiction readers.

Really, my kind of series is the kind authors like: low overhead for the writer in creating the overall history, and a new set of characters each time. I don't know how much benefit that is to readers. If you have an opinion, let me know in the comments.