Myth-illogical?

Ever read a paranormal story that left you scratching your head because you’ve been left been left with so many questions. It’s not an uncommon problem, but one that can be easily handled. The author just needs to plant their mythology.

Mythology, whether it is the accepted form or of the author’s creation, must in some way, shape or form, be delivered to the reader. There are a few things it should include.
Who – who is the paranormal and how did they become that way.
What – Are they night loving vampires or baying at the full moon werewolves – this relates to the rules of the paranormal. All paranormal characters should have rules and at least one weakness, otherwise they are lawless, too super superheroes.
Where – the mythology is always attached to the world in which the paranormal is living.
When – Are they new to this or not. Where are they at in their development of powers and in respect to the powers-that-be.
Why – Why pulls it all together. Almost always, it relates to why the character is in the story. Are they an unfortunate soul who just got their freak on with a vamp and wound up undead? Has the character been charged with a duty, such as protecting the counterpart? I’ve always found it easiest to attach the paranormal’s GMC to the plot.

None of these points need to be over explained, but it does need to show up in the story. If it doesn’t, then how does the reader understand the basics of your paranormal character?

Have a great week and until next time, cheers and happy writing,

T.J.
www.tethysjkillian.com
Now available, Torrid Teasers #57 from Whiskey Creek Press Torrid
Coming soon, Master and Commander’s Prey from Eirelander Publishing

With Love, from Ms. Blush

Hello to you all wonderful, beautiful people!

Sense and sensibility... No, not the Jane Austen version, though as writers we do need sense tempered by a good deal of sensibility.

We're almost at the mid-point of April and we're still on the road path of logic.

So how does sense and sensibility play in? Sense, well, logical - you need a good deal of sense to be able to convey logic. Sensibility? Well, every writer is unique, and the person at the heart of this writer brings to the fore his/her characteristics, inherently, their sensibilities.

Catch us this week as we bring you further takes on logic from the perspective of sense and sensibility.

T.J. on Tuesday will tell us more about the myth of the paranormals, how logic plays in there and why your mythology should inherently be driven by logic.

Aasiyah/Nolwynn expands on the same subject, delving into logic and the 'myths' in the historical and also the contemporary genres.

This April, we're delving deep into the recesses of the true writing craft.

This April, we're on the quest:

Searching for the logic that actually makes sense...

The best of us for the best of you, that's our promise as we deliver the full flush of romance.

From now till later, enjoy!

With love, from Ms. Blush

Get to the point

What writer hasn't dreaded 'the pitch'?

What writer hasn't obsessed over the need to have a succint description of their story in a nutshell to present to a potential editor?

Say you meet your dream editor in an elevator and he/she tells you, What's your plot? You start to go, my story is about this girl who gets divorced and then she comes back home and realises life has changed and then she decides she must put up with it and-- Ding!!

The elevator door opens and out glides your editor. Unless you got stuck between floors for at least an hour would you have been able to lay out all your story is about.

That's too true, you think? Actually yes. And unfortunately for the editors, and to a great measure the writers too, we miss a lot of good stories this way, because the writer wasn't able to grab our attention.

I've been there before, even if it wasn't in an elevator. As Lady T.J. already pointed out, I've known the barb of, And your point would be? What's your plot, girl?

What many of us do not realise is that editors know their job, or at least, a good editor should know his/her job. This implies that a brief description in the appropriate language/words will convey more than a drawn-out monologue will ever convey in this circle.

Take the story I just started outlining up above. A divorcee comes back home and realises society views her in a new light. Amidst all this chaos, she meets the man she had loved and given up on in the past, because she hadn't had it in her to pursue this 'impossible' relation in her youth.

That pitch would take at least 2 minutes to convey, and that is way more than the average elevator trip, unless you're on a ride to the top floor of the Empire State Building.

Now, I meet an editor and I go - the plot is about Maturation in the setup of Man V/s Society/Nature/Man with underlying hints of Forbidden Love.

This might not make sense to you. How the heck did that explain your plot or the uniqueness of your story?

Believe me, to an editor, you just exposed the very uniqueness of your plot, because you related it to the basic framework that is predominant in the publishing world. This tickles the editor, because this description tells him/her what you have done and he/she can relate it immediately to what's already been done.

Take a moment to study the basic plots and the master plots. Like Lady T.J. already said, they are going to be your road map, and through this road map, however silly/overstretched/far-fetched your story, laying it down within the framework of the basic and master plots will mean you never lose the way and what you write will ultimately make sense.

I give you another analogy, that of the medical world. You bring someone to ER and the paramedic says to the resident- this man was brought in with shortness of breath, near paralysis on the right side, excessive sweating, erratic heartbeat, difficulty to articualte resulting in slurring speech. By this time, the pateint may already be dead. Why do you think the paramedic goes, man of fifty, possibility of a massive stroke to have occureed within the past hour? The resident knows what a stroke entails, and he knows what to do with this description.

Same goes for your editor. Be brief, succint, and know your jargon - in other words, know your plots. Your words will only speak louder and your writing path for a story will only be clearer.

Any question, feel free to holler!

Aasiyah Qamar - Cultural Romantic Fiction, With a Twist
Coming out October 2 - Light My World - Eirelander Publishing
Nolwynn Ardennes - the Promise of Fulfilment
Coming out in early 2010 - Storms in a Shot Glass - Eirelander Publishing

Aasiyah Qamar/Nolwynn Ardennes - Romance the world over
www.aasiyah-nolwynn.webs.com

Holy cannelloni, Batman, it's a plot.

Last week, Lady Aasiyah and I went over two methods for creating a story. One was basic formula and the other was p...p...plotting. Notice, I stutter when I say that word. Not because I have any problem with plotting, but more because as most writers who have met me know, I expect them to know what their plot is.

Many of them start into this rambling explanation of the story. Then they get the good old wallop from me – what is your plot? Tell me, in one sentence, what's the plot. I normally get asked – you mean my tagline?

No, what is your plot.

P...P...Plot?

As an editor, I find a plotless story a big disappointment. I also understand that most authors have never been taught that a strong plot can rescue a story.

There are seven basic plots.

1.Man vs. Man
2.Man vs. Nature
3.Man vs. Situation
4.Man vs. Himself
5.Man vs. Destiny
6.Man vs. God
7.Man vs. Machine

There are twenty Master Plots.

01. Quest
02. Adventure
03. Pursuit
04. Rescue
05. Escape
06. Revenge
07. The Riddle
08. Rivalry
09. Underdog
10. Temptation
11. Metamorphosis
12. Transformation
13. Maturation
14. Love
15. Forbidden Love
16. Sacrifice
17. Discovery
18. Wretched Existence
19. Ascension
20. Descension
It's easiest to explain a plot as it is the path your story follows. If the plot makes no sense, then the story won't make sense either. If you take your building blocks or your plot points and follow the map of a specific plot, you aren't likely to lose the logic of the story.

An example is -

You are writing a Quest. Tolkien is the King of the Quest, and his formula is followed in at least a basic form to this day.
One character (the martyr) starts the quest. He/she is given a mission which involves him starting at one place and fulfilling a mission in another. Quests are rarely one character stories. He'll start with partners who are as invested in fulfilling his mission or meet them along the way.

From place to place, the martyr grows. The readers sympathize with him because he's always placed in incredible situations. Remember, he must mature, as will the ensemble in some way, as the story progresses.

He goes through the quest until he reaches his destination – end of story.

Makes sense, right?

The biggest thing to realize when you have a story that comes across as nonsensical is to know your plot. Tailor your road map to follow it in a logical progression.

Do you think the plot is that important? Or is it just a waste of mental energy to think on this? If someone gave you the opportunity to learn more about plots, would you be interested or shrug?

Can't wait to hear your answers.

Until next week, cheers and happy writing,

T.J.

www.tethysjkillian.com
Now Available - Torrid Teasers #57 from Whiskey Creek Press Torrid
Coming Soon - Master and Commander's Prey from Eirelander Publishing

With Love, from Ms. Blush

Hello to you all wonderful, beautiful people!

As April slowly rolls by, we're still dealing our hand in the game of Logic!

No, we're not playing poker, though it sometimes feels like it when you're a writer and you are submitting, submitting, and submitting but not getting any nibble back.

The reason may be - you don't know your plot.

Plot is an important part of logic, and this is what we'll be focusing on this week.

Catch T.J. on Tuesday as she tells us what the plots are. Aasiyah/Nolwynn will extrapolate more with her own brand of rambling on Thursday.

This April, we're delving deep into the recesses of the true writing craft.

This April, we're on the quest:

Searching for the logic that actually makes sense...

The best of us for the best of you, that's our promise as we deliver the full flush of romance.

From now till later, enjoy!

With love, from Ms. Blush

Take me to an HEA

Hey everyone!

Ready for a boring lesson that'll have you sleepy by the time you get to the third paragraph? Great, so let's get it rolling.

Following on T,J.'s post about the building block method, I'm gonna expand on another building method (which is often rightfully called plotting) that enables you to get a logic thread in your story and allows you to carry logic from the start to the finish line.

Now, I am what is called a compulsive and completely anal plotter, so this might make sense to plotters out there. Pansters, I'll try to be clear by using examples.

I usually follow the route gone by almost all romances. Start, middle, black moment, end.

Basically what does it mean? It's like a train with the wagons coming one behind the other.

Start - obvious - intro of character, plot, leading us into the story (don't worry, I'll have examples further down!)
Middle - where things and issues are being dealt with, in a romance, it's attraction, falling in love, confessing the love.
Black moment - well, where it all goes wrong and you dunno how a happy ending can come about now.
End - resolution of all issues and everything that brought about the black moment.

Let's take this one step further. I usually work with external and internal conflict in the start-middle part of a story, and the black moment usually stems from a mix of the two and what they brought to the story. The end/resolution goes back to internal conflict and what was the root of the black moment, easing it all to bring an HEA.

External conflict refers to whatever conflict in the plot that is external to the characters, that is out of their hands if you want. These are environmental factors, fate, that sort of thing. External conflict bring your characters together and gets the plot moving.

Internal conflict refers to what is inside your characters. Their mindset, prejudices, ideas, convictions, beliefs. Whatever is inherent to them that may hinder the progression to HEA. Internal conflict is usually the lead-in to the black moment. It then takes resolving these internal conflict issues to have the H/h together again for your HEA.

Allright, I've confused everyone now, so let me try to use an example. Or two. I'll pick the movie How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days and the book Pride and Prejudice. I suppose everyone is familiar with those.

Let's break those down in the external-internal-black moment-end format.

How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days, for short I'll write 'movie', ok?
The title says it all. You have heroine Kate Hudson and hero Matthew McConnaughey (for short, we'll use McYummy). She writes How-to articles for a women's mag, and must show how to lose a guy in 10 days. Writing this will mean she can move up the editorial ladder and write about more serious stuff than shoes and scarves.
He is fighting for an advert campaign, and has two absolute cold, heartless, biatches as rivals.

These two are your H/h, you need to bring them together, fall in love, throw in a wrench to break them up, and then make them end up together again. How do you do this?

You bring them together through external conflict. How did they do it? The 2 biatchy rivals come to the mag, where the editor tells them Kate is doing this article. She has to pick a guinea pig. Now, the rivals need to have McYummy out of the picture, so they bait him - a bet wins the contract: he'll have to date the girl of their choice and have her fall in love with him within 10 days. They want him to lose, so they sent him to Kate, who has been told she must 'lose' McYummy in 10 days.
Neither Kate nor McYummy had a hand in there, yet they're brought together and have to stick to it now (external to them). Both have different motives, But motives are part of characterization (prolly another post to come soon).

Now, middle of the movie. Kate has done all she could think of to lose McYummy (acting on the external conflict), but the guy is stickier than Power Glue. He always comes back. Then he takes her home to his parents' place, where Kate learns she's the first girl he's brought home (external conflcit is easing into internal conflict - the parameters are merging). Now, she knows she's 'playing' him, she needs her article, but the woman in her, not the reporter, is falling in love with him. She is deceiving him - that's the internal conflict! McYummy too has issues. He's falling for her, but it's all about a bet, and he has to win the contract, not the girl exactly. That's his internal conflict.

Both reason the other need not know and won't know once the article and the bet is over. Can you already hear 'bad move'?

Fast forward - he's won his bet and won the contract as Kate confesses she loves him to his boss and rivals. She's written her article and can now write 'serious' stuff. But then Kate learns it was all a bet, and when McYummy knows he's lost her, her boss tells him how she's done this fab job on a poor guinea pig for 10 days.

You know all hope is lost here! That's the black moment.

Yet, by the end credits, the 2 are together in an HEA. Turns out they worked out their issues and each explained where they were coming from. A bit simplistic, but it shows you how you get to the end,

Now, Pride and Prejudice. Less details here, but almost same plot progression.

Darcy and Lizzie meet at the ball - Lizzie's sister Jane is invited to Bingley's estate, she falls sick and Lizzie goes to see her, ending up spending the night - Darcy has time to kill and is thus in the area with his best friend - external conflict.

Middle of the book - Lizzie learns Darcy discouraged Bingley from proposing Jane. Her prejudice plays in then (internal conflict). Darcy thinks the girls are hunting for rich husbands (internal conflict). Enters the scene at Lady Catherine de Burgh's place - issue about Lizzie's advanced age, how Darcy is 'promised' to the lady's sickly daughter, and how the Bennets are so further down the class hierarchy, how could they even pretend they could land Darcy and Bingley?
Big fight then between Darcy and Lizzie - the black moment. They almost confess their love, it's palpable in the air, but both know they've crossed a line they shouldn't have crossed in the argument.

Resolution - when Lizzie's sister Lydia runs away with Wickham, Darcy is the one who restores the Bennet family's honour. Lizzie has to revise her judgement, and Darcy does too when he realises Jane loves Bingley and he shouldn't have told his best friend to stay away from her because she was a gold digger. Darcy proposes, Bingley proposes too, and Mrs Bennet ends up with 3 of her 5 daughters married off in the space of a few weeks.

See how the progression plays in all of them? It starts with a simple premise. You expand on it, thinking of the circumstances of the story, and you find your external conflict. Next, you bring your characters in the spotlight - internal conflict takes center stage. Then you get sadistic and break them up, only to play matchmaker again and being an HEA.

Clear as mud, right?

Any questions, just holler!

Aasiyah Qamar - Cultural romantic fiction, with a twist
With stories set amidst the rainbow nation of Mauritius, a multicultural island in the Southern Indian Ocean, author Aasiyah Qamar brings you tales of today's young women battling life on all fronts and finding love where they least expect it. Indo-Mauritian culture wants to stifle them in traditions, customs and antiquated morals while the world is opening its arms of modernity and globalisation. Where do these women belong? And more importantly, with whom? Find out more about her first release, The Other Side, here.

Logical Action and Reactions

April is the month, we are focusing on logic. What can I say? I am one of the most illogical people you will ever meet. I have to be told when my characters actions, then their reactions don’t make sense.

Why is this you ask? Personally, I think it has to do with the wiring in my brain because I think what I write makes sense. Now, the question is can I undo this system? My answer is anything can be relearned, but it takes longer than if you had started with a clean slate.

I have learned (in most cases) to ask myself would I do this? If I would, then I ask what my reaction would be. Here is a simple example: Tommy knocked Jane into the muddy puddle. Jane started crying lifting her dirty wet skirt out of the mud. Now, this is Tommy’s action and Jane’s reaction.

To go a little farther if in my story Jane was a tomboy her reaction above would not fit the character. A tomboy would not cry she would be fighting mad. She might even attack Tommy and rub mud all over him.

Another scenario: Tommy pushes Jane onto the mucky ground, and Bobby sees him do it and rushes to her aid. Jane, the tomboy half-blinded by mud and water rises screaming, her fists swinging at Bobby. Here again this is logical for a tomboy because we know she can’t see the person coming to her aid.

Learning the logical aspects of writing is not any easier than the other elements we have to study. It’s all hard and takes time.

Thanks for joining me today.

Sandy