Fail Gloriously

I watched the Susan Boyle You Tube again today, and was just as moved as I was the first time I watched it. It also put me in mind of this quote from Lois McMaster Bujold, a paraphrasing from something one of her characters says in one of the Chalion novels.

God is not interested in perfect souls, but glorious ones.


This resonates with me in a big way, reinforced by the nearly unanimous reaction to Susan’s performance. Each of us is created to be able to do big things. Many of us are removed from the running, by circumstance, accidents, or the grim reality of unhappy lives, but for those of us who are left, for those of us who still have that possibility within us, we owe it to everyone who’s lost their chance to at least try.

Not for the prestige or for a five minute You Tube clip, but for the sheer experience of fully flexing our muscles, for dreaming and reaching big, at least once, to have faith in ourselves and our dreams.

The thing is, to have attempted something great, even if it fails, changes our internal landscapes in a way that nothing else can, so that even if we fail, we gain. Not only that, but by merely attempting, we give others the courage to try.

One of the reasons this is rolling around in my head these days is that I have this sneaking suspicion that I am going to have a Major Fail on this project I’m working on. If it doesn’t work, it will be the SPLAT! heard around the world (or at least throughout the halls of my publisher.)

But there are also some really big things I want to say about love and death and duty and honor, so big, I can’t even articulate them, except through this story. The chances I will fail are good, but there is a chance--a tiny chance--that I might not. That I will in fact, be able to say what I feel driven to say. I’ll never know if I don’t try. Epic fail, possibly, but it will be a glorious failing, not a small one.

Give yourself the gift of a few minutes this weekend and allow yourself to dream BIG, not about the affect (winning an award, reaching a list) but what you would attempt to accomplish…

Chronological Order is Way Overrated

Well, I’ve been stumbling along on the wip, at first eeking out 500-700 words per day for the last few days, which I was not happy with. Part of the problem is this constant reweaving and smoothing thing I’m doing, trying to graft two old drafts together, as well as add new stuff to make it work. I sometimes wonder if it would easier to just toss everything out and start fresh. Except I just can’t toss out 65,000 words. The mere idea of it makes me break out in a cold sweat. Especially since there is quite a lot of it that I’m very happy with.

So instead I’ve been stumbling along, trying to weave everything together and making only small inroads into new page territory.

Until Sunday, when I woke up and gave myself permission to jump ahead two acts to a scene I wasn’t even sure would be in the book—it certainly wasn’t on my outline--but it was calling to me. Vividly.

And Bam! 3,000 words came tumbling out, just like that. And it’s an absolutely pivotal, critical scene. There’s no way it couldn’t be in the book. I just didn’t know that until I wrote the darn thing.

Which reminded me of two important lessons.

1) It’s perfectly okay to write out of order. I know that, I preach that, and yet, I also forget that. ::le sigh::

2) I often outline or jot down upcoming scene ideas just so I can be moving in a forward direction/momentum. And the thing is, I can only write these new scenes because I’ve spent so much time reimmersing myself in the story. There’s no way I could have started out there. BUT, I am always happy to cheerfully disregard that when my muse leads me down a (seemingly) random garden path. Always follow your muse, or at least, that’s been my experience. I can honestly say I’ve never regretted it.

So now what I’m doing is jumping forward and writing a new scene from later in the book each morning, then turning to the grafting/revising part. Seems to be working well. But for how long? That’s always the question. What works today, may not work tomorrow.

My Current Obssession

Because the truth is, I become obsessed with my projects and I need to absorb them through all of my senses. Since I am very visual, I often create a collage of images that helps put me in the world of the story. Here is the collage for the one I'm working on now:


Yes, it's fairly ironic that there are so many old men in there when it is a YA, but what can I say? Most of the men of political power in Medieval France were old. Or at the very least well-seasoned. Some of the images are thematic, the masks for example, and obviously many of the images evoke the decadence of a royal court rather than feature the correct historical costume, but it works to get me in the story when I need a jump start, a touchstone, if you will.

Revealing Character

So as a follow up to my post about reading Orson Scott Card's book, I thought I'd talk a little bit about revealing character versus having a character growth arc.

I think, especially for childrens books, characters aren’t going to always have a huge growth arc because in childhood we’re always growing to new awareness, new life lessons, mastering new skills. In general, kids are more malleable, their growth more ongoing and continuous until they reach their adulthood. Then, dramatic or profound occurrences or situations are usually required to propel us adults toward change and growth.

In fact, I've heard it said that a book should be about a person's most profound and dramatic life experience. And I would argue that kids have so many, each coming rapidly on top of the other, that that doesn't necessarily apply to kid's fiction.

Which is why I was so struck by Card’s reminder that some characters are revealed rather than grow. But how do we resolve that with today’s reader (and agents and editors!) who tend to look for a growth arc of some sort? How can one satisfy that readers longing for an internal journey and yet remain true to our character's core if they don’t change significantly over the course of the book?

I think having the character come to terms with who they are, which is a form of personal growth, can also make for a satisfying growth arc. In order for a character to do that, they have to recognize who they are, they have to strip away all the pretenses—the persona they cloak themselves in—and meet themselves face to face. They sort of have to see themselves, warts (emotional scars) and all, and come to terms with that. So if they aren’t going to change, consider having them learn to accept who they are or their role in their family or school or whatever.

But that needs to be developed over the course of the entire book. We have to feel we know more about the character at the end of the book than we did at the beginning. Which makes sense since it is the crucible of hard choices that the character goes through that enables him to finally reach a higher level of understanding.

One really effective tool can be to peel back the layers of a character, like an onion, to reveal his innermost nature to the reader. By doing that in stages, it gives a sense of internal movement and forward momentum as the reader comes to learn more and more of the character.

If you think about it, there are things about all of us that we wish the world didn’t see, but is often plain to most people who know us well.

Then there are the things that only our best friend or close family members know or understand about us.

And finally, there are those parts of us that are so painful, we can hardly stand to admit them to ourselves. For some, facing these painful truths will cause the entire world to shift. For others, it will shift only a little bit, but in a vital way that helps us continue on.

So for Theo, in Book I, she was lonely, anyone could see that. (First Layer) And on some level she worried it was because she was doing something wrong, that she was lacking in some fundamental skill needed in order to form friendships. (Second Layer) But the thing she was terrified of acknowledging, was that she was so flawed, that something was so wrong with her that even her parents couldn’t muster up the emotional connection necessary to love their child. In fact, that’s part of what propels her to such huge risks, trying to earn their love. (Third Layer)

Of course, in the end, this is proved wrong and Theo learns her parents do value her more than she realized.

So while Theo didn’t change, her understanding of the world and her place in it and her value to others did.

And I think, to address another point that was brought up in the comments, it can be smart to mention in a synopsis or summary that the character is wrestling with trying to come to terms with a particular emotional issue so that it will be clear that there are two layers to the story.

And thus endeth today’s lesson….

iSuck Redux

So Sunday was a miserable day, one of those days when I slammed smack into the wall of my own limitations and realized I was never going to be able to write this d@mn story. Majorly stuck in iSuck.

And then I awoke Monday morning to find I was riding another white hot writing streak that hasn't let go since. Odd, no?

Of course, I'm grateful! But puzzled a bit, too, and wonder if this is part of the process. I think it must be, hitting the bitter bottom, realizing that we suck, but we are so stubborn and obsessed and insane that we don't care and keep going anyway, even if only fueled by sheer determination. Eh, the mysteries of the writing life.

So the good news is I now have 55,000 words of a good solid draft--probably a 2nd or 3rd draft quality at this point. I also have another 25,000 words written. Unfortunately, I'm guessing only about half of those words are useable. The bad news? It's looking like this sucker could swell up to around the 120,000 word mark. I'm hoping not, but it's hard to tell at this point. I know that's borderline unacceptably long, so I'm guessing I'll have lots of choices to make when I go back in to trim it. ::sigh::

But that is why I haven't posted anything meaty in the last day or two. I am working on a post for tomorrow, though, about methods of revealing character and how to do so in a way that makes if feel as if there is a growth arc involved.

Tools, Not Rules

So this Orson Scott Card book is really working for me.

So one of the things I’ve had pounded into my head throughout my writing apprenticeship (and that I have in turn pounded into other people’s heads) is that stories are about character growth and conflict. Which can be true…

Except when it’s not

One of the things that Card explains better that I’ve seen before is the different types of stories. Sure there are character driven stories, but also event stories, idea stories, and milieu stories. And after years of focusing on one kind of story, it was helpful to be reminded of this. In fact, one of the things I’ve argued with some of my writing instructors (with varying degrees of success) is that the need for direct conflict in every scene pertains only to a certain type of story, that not all stories need that specific sort of tension to create a narrative drive.

Which I think goes a long way to explaining why some stories leave some readers cold while others rave about them, they’re not our type of stories.

In the same vein, just because stories with character growth speak to me more vividly than other stories doesn’t mean it’s the only type of story out there. (Although, Card does make the point that a greater level of characterization is currently the fashion now, just as “Dear Reader” was the fashion in the late 19th century, and that is true.)

This was yet another thing I needed to hear right now, especially as I ruminate on additional Theo books.

The truth is that Theodosia doesn’t have giant growth arcs in each book, but quieter, smaller episodes of personal growth. Card put it really well; he said, in some stories characters are revealed, rather than grow. Another aha! moment. Theo isn’t hugely unsatisfied with her life or needing to move out of the emotional place she was in, she just needs to understand it better and her role in it. With each adventure she faces she learns more about herself, but she doesn’t undergo some monumental change. I do challenge each book to go deeper than the one before or to shade different elements of her development; in Book II for example, she had to stand fast to who she was in spite of the formidable influence of her grandmother and a bevy of governesses. And in Book III, we see her “tribe” of fellow odd ducks beginning to coalesce around her.

Part of the reason for this less steep growth is that she started out strong to begin with. Nathaniel Fludd on the other hand, does have quite a lot of growing to do. His emotional scars are greater, partly because his life experience has been more extreme, and partly because he had a more tender nature to begin with. So the Beastolgoist books are very much about him growing into a different, healthier, more emotionally secure and balanced individual.

It occurs to me that I really need to have Tools, not rules, tattooed on my forehead!

Managing A Cast of Thousands

So here I sit, struggling with my overwhelming cast of thousands. When I drew perilously close to tearing out my hair, I pulled a writing book by Orson Scott Card off my shelf today, CHARACTERS & VIEWPOINT. I only have it because someone gave it to me instead of the used book store and I’m a pack rat where books are concerned. However, in true gotta-love-it fashion, I found exactly the information I needed to help me through this.

The thing Card said that was exceptionally powerful for me was that characterization is a tool, not a virtue.

Wow, did I need to hear that. When one’s novel is populated by hundreds of people, not every one of them can stand out, nor should they. It would be exhausting to have them all be memorable. It is perfectly acceptable to have some characters in one’s novel simply be part of the backdrop, the bodies that populate the room for realism’s sake while the true drama unfolds among a select handful of your characters. For those walk-ons and stand-ins, its okay, necessary even, to use quick broad strokes, perhaps even, dare I say it—stereotypes—since their actions have no bearing on the plot.

Because their actions have no bearing on the plot. Gah! Of course!

This is a prime example of me not being able to see the forest for the trees. It’s a matter of selecting the right tool for the right job, and complex characterization isn’t always the right tool. In pursuing some abstract concept of "good writing," I got so wrapped up in wanting every character to be meaningful, that I lost sight of the simple fact that it isn’t necessary. Or even desirable. Brilliant characterization for every single human being in a novel would be exhausting and would not even serve the story.

I love it when I get permission to do exactly what I needed to do . . .