Category: World in the Satin Bag

Book Plug: Chosen Sister by Ardyth DeBruyn

I recently discovered that one of the members of a small writing groups I’m a part of has had her first novel published! It’s called Chosen Sister by Ardyth DeBruyn and can be found either through her personal page or at the publisher’s page. Here is the novel blurb: When the Gold Wizard comes looking for the Child Warrior in Reina’s village, it’s no surprise he’s only looking at the boys. However, when the wizard magically selects her younger brother as the warrior prophesied to defeat the Red Wizard, Reina has mixed feelings—jealousy and concern. Austyn is only six.Allowed to accompany her brother, Reina soon finds they’re in deeper trouble than she thought. The Gold Wizard’s fake beard is ripped off by attacking harpies, revealing he’s only seventeen, not to mention his magical demonstrations tend to go awry. Unfortunately, with the Red Wizard’s harpies and snakewolves on their trail, finding a new (and better) wizard mentor is hardly an option. If anyone’s going to find a way to track down the elusive Sword of Chivalry for Austyn and get him into the Red Wizard’s castle to fulfill whatever the obscure prophecy insists must be done, it’s got to be Reina. If you’re interested in a debut novelist’s YA fantasy novel, then check out Chosen Sister by Ardyth DeBruyn! And expect to hear more about this in the near future!

Fantasy Clichés: The Good, the Bad, and the Published (Part Two)

In the last part of this, I talked about whether or not clichés are bad. Now it’s to the discussion of whether or not fantasy clichés have any influence on publishing, in my opinion. My short answer is: well, yes, but… The “but” is the important part. While it is assumed by some that publishers are on the lookout for the next original fantasy novel, the reality is that they’re just looking for well written novels. That’s it. Sometimes they get it right, and sometimes they don’t. Publishers don’t care if you think that your novel is the most original thing since Tolkien. They’ve heard the same ego trip before and, at this point, it’s a bit stale. It doesn’t matter how original you think your novel is, because it’s not. Unique, sure, but not original. And that’s the important part. The best fantasy novels, as I mentioned before, aren’t ones that are claimed to be original by the author (who is almost always wrong and is almost always writing obviously clichéd fantasy trash); the best fantasy novels are ones written by authors who take clichés and make them their own. Publishers, again, are not concerned with whether or not your fantasy novel is cliché, because it already is by default. What they are concerned about is whether or not your novel is interesting, well-written, and worthy of the paper it may potentially be printed on. If a publisher doesn’t think it can sell your work, then it’s not going to take it. Period (with rare exception to those small presses that are less interested in sales and more interested in purely unique stories; such places have a tendency to focus their attention on matters of style and the nature of the content than on anything else). Having said all that, there really is little to be concerned about in regards to clichés. The only time one should be concerned is if their work is a direct ripoff of something already told, or if the clichés are made exceedingly obvious by poor execution. What this means is that you probably shouldn’t retell Tolkien’s LOTR series and you probably should avoid having Tolkien elves who live forever and act like Spock. Of course, you can still get published with these sorts of things, but I suspect that has more to do with a well-crafted plot than anything else. There is, of course, a problem with all this. We all have different opinions on what constitutes good execution. A lot of novels that are quite obviously cliché have been published, and quite a few have been rather successful. What does this say about the publishing world? I don’t know, to be honest. Those novels sell, so perhaps what it is saying is that publishers are simply following the money. As long as we buy the books, they’ll keep making them. So while many fantasy purists and junkies may find the clichéd forms of fantasy to be trash, but such folks aren’t necessarily the largest demographic for fantasy. They’re the folks who read the stuff that sells well, but not always well enough to get onto the bestsellers list. Perhaps the question to ask about all this is whether or not fantasy clichés are a good thing in the publishing world. What do you think? Are the more cliché forms of fantasy literature necessarily lesser forms (in the same way that media tie-ins)?

RIP: Philip Jose Farmer

Apparently Mr. Farmer, one of the grand masters of science fiction, has passed away at the ripe old age of 91.  He published more than 75 novels and had fans all over the world. He will be missed, surely.

Show Review: Dollhouse (Ep. 2)

The second episode of Dollhouse was released last Friday and I have a few thoughts. Firstly, I’m not giving up on the show just yet, but there are certainly some serious things working against it. Whedon is a brilliant storyteller, there’s no doubt about that, but Dollhouse is suffering from something I’d like to call “sitcom-ism.” The story is developing slowly, at best, and the episodes thus far feel disconnected from one another when, for a show of this type, they should be following a noticeable plot-arc. The first episode was a throw-away, one which Whedon and the producers could toss out there to establish the central idea and let us know what is going on. The problem, however, is that the first episode shouldn’t have been a throw-away. Whatever the FOX folks did to the first episode may have irreparably damaged the Dollhouse franchise. The second episode probably should have been the first, because what it did was bring in an interesting story that, quite frankly, should have been a part of the whole idea in the first place. What happens when a company that imprints memories gets a glitch in the system and one of it’s “products” goes haywire? Well, the answer to that is more interesting than the questions posed in the first episode; and that is the problem. Dollhouse, essentially, is suffering from a problem of disconnection, where the episodes have connections that seem forced rather than fluid. Story lines that should be highlighted are given undeserved lesser treatment; the second episode pretty much established the first as a pointless waste of space. Yeah, we got to meet Echo and a couple of important characters, but now the story is conflicted by the disconnection between the Echo story and everything else. Whedon tried to bring them together, but thus far it isn’t working. I want the Alpha story (the rogue doll) to become more important, but as of right now, it isn’t. It’s there to add back story and conflict that isn’t conflict at all. Perhaps I’m being harsh about Dollhouse, but I feel somewhat cheated at this point by Whedon. Firefly was brilliant: it never failed to highlight the important parts, or the most interesting parts. But Dollhouse isn’t Firefly. It is missing something that Firefly had: charm and cohesiveness. I’m not ready to give up on it yet, though. I’m hoping that the third episode will resolve some of the problems I see. I know sometimes it can take a while for a good show to come into its own. Perhaps that is what is happening here. To be honest, I think that Dollhouse could have benefited from a two-hour opener, much like Firefly seemed to benefit when seen on DVD. Generally I hate those two-hour deals, but I think it’s possible it would work here. What thoughts do you have on this? What do you think about Dollhouse?

How Not To Sell Your Fiction

Since I haven’t a clue how to actually sell fiction–considering that I haven’t done so myself–I can at least talk about the reasons why you won’t sell your work–assuming, of course, that selling your work is your intention.How do you go about not selling your work? Well, these are some pretty good reasons: You Don’t SubmitPretty obvious, right? If you don’t submit, you won’t be published, unless by some freak accident some random editor sees some of your writing and comes to you. But we’re talking some seriously absurd odds here–worse than anything NASA can come up with. You Can’t Take CriticismI’ve mentioned this before primarily because it’s something I think is enormously important for any writer to be able to do. If you can’t take criticism, you can’t improve your craft. People who criticize your work aren’t doing it to be mean (well, some of them might be, but good people aren’t). The best way to improve is to pay attention to what others say about your work. What do they perceive to be weaknesses and strengths? You don’t have to agree with all of it, but you wouldn’t have let them read it if you didn’t care about their opinions, right? You Don’t Follow GuidelinesEditors don’t put submission guidelines on their websites simply to torture new writers with the “complicated” nature of formatting, etc. No, editors put them up to make their lives easier. You’re not the one reading hundreds or thousands of submissions for every publication. It’s bad enough for the short story market and it’s even worse for the novel market. Follow them. The last thing you want ruining your chances is your inability to double-space. You Don’t WriteDuh. Do I even need to explain this one? You Make Death Threats or Other Career-Sabotaging ThingsRemember the whole Kevin W. Reardon/Cole A. Adams thing? If you don’t want to sell your work, I recommend sending death threats to editors. Guaranteed results. Just like with Mr. Reardon, who has, at this point, been put into every editor’s book of folks to banish to the depths of writing obscurity–since I’m sure he won’t be obscure in the realm of authorial conduct. You DieDon’t. It’s generally a good idea to live. Otherwise someone else has to sell your work.  It doesn’t count if someone else sells your work, because you’re dead, and dead people don’t generally care if they achieve fame post-mortem. You Let Evil Wombats Store Your WorkThere’s a reason why they’re called evil wombats: they take unsuspecting writers’ work, print it, delete it, and then shred it into tiny pieces right in front of you. I don’t know why, that’s just the way it is.  They’re evil…and wombats.  That’s a double whammy right there. And there you have it. What do you think? Got any suggestions? Leave a comment!  And as always, feel free to digg it, stumble it, or submit it to your favorite social bookmarking site.  Anywho!