If you take out the Dungeons and the Dragons...

In my last post, I talked about the three words I fear as an author, but also about same-ness. This seems to be on everyone's minds a lot lately, as evidenced by this recent interview with Patrick Rothfuss (of The Name of the Wind fame). As fate seems eager to bash me over the head until I express my opinion, I also watched a Zero Punctuation review of Kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning, in which Yahtzee flayed fantasy in general for it's overuse of tropes.

The message is coming through loud and clear, guys:

"Stop copying Tolkien."

Unfortunately, as one might imagine, it's not so simple as that.

If you were to take out the magic, dragons, swords, damsels, goblins, orcs, elves, dwarves, vampires, werewolves, wizards, castles, faeries, weird languages (aka Ye Olde Tongue), farm-boy chosen-ones, pirates with hearts of gold, knights, what exactly are you left with? In short, if you gut what makes fantasy fantasy, then why write fantasy in the first place? If you take out the Dungeons and the Dragons, you're just left with &. Nobody wants that.

Everyone wants something different, but in making it different you run the risk of pulverizing what makes it familiar. You ignore that which makes it classifiable as "fantasy." Sometimes dragons and dwarves is, actually, what we want, and re-reading Lord of the Rings for the hundredth time isn't going to cut it. Oh, but Tolkien has covered all the bases when it comes to elves and orcs. Nothing can be done differently or better, added or subtracted, modified slightly to produce an also-good story?

Perhaps I'm making an extreme point, here. Let's say that instead of gutting dragons, you just change them to something else. Rather than majestic, fire-breathing lizards who fly and are commonly known for hoarding treasure and doling out sage-like advice to the occasional passerby, we envision a race of beasts called solocups who are majestic, fire-breathing lizards etc. While it has the potential to completely revamp popular culture (just think of the connotations of that Toby Keith ditty), all we've really done is used the Find-and-Replace feature in MS Word to change all instance of dragon to solocup.

Fine, you say. Don't make solocups be just dragons-with-a-different-name. Let's make them giant birds... but not call them rocs. Shit. Let's make them giant sea monsters... but not call them krakens. Fuckbeans. Let's make a race of humanoids who... have nothing to do with every other race of humanoids who've been created for Star Trek or some other well-known, many-raced universe.

Sure, I can write a story about a race of reptilian humanoids and call them solocups and say Jimbob is going on an adventure to find his place in the world. But, hey holy shit, it's been done before.

an Argonian from Skyrim

It's all been done before. And I don't just mean the neologisms. Fantasy is, by and large, based on mythology. The same mythology that folk tales and fairy tales are based on. It just so happens that, since Western writers are familiar with Western mythology, Western fantasy is full of dragons and elves and dwarves and wizards.

Not to criticize Rothfuss (as I really enjoyed The Name of the Wind both times I read it), but just because his story doesn't have elves and dwarves doesn't mean it breaks new ground. Wind is a story [about a story] in which a young boy, the smartest boy around, has his parents murdered by the biggest-baddest-most-villainest-motherfuckers around, then spends time as a beggar but with the help of some well-meaning cardboard characters finds his way to the Arcanum (which is a fancy name for a University of Magic). Wizards aren't wizards, they're Arcanists. Sympathy, a way to manipulate the bonds between natural forces, and the usage of Names are just fancy words to replace "magic." You get the point. Rothfuss himself, like the rest of us, doesn't fall too incredibly far from the tree. Even though he brilliantly wrote a fantastic story, he relies on renaming common concepts to avoid reinventing the wheel.

There's another side of the coin, however, in the Quest for Snowflakes (aka the Search for Uniqueness in a Derivative World, copyright forthcoming). As mentioned above, neologisms abound in fantasy. In this article, really a criticism of the Clarke Award shortlist, Christopher Priest points out that China fucking Mieville should be discounted because of them. According to Priest, "He also uses far too many neologisms or SF nonce-words, which drive home the fact that he is defined and limited by the expectations of a genre audience." (Special thanks to Only the Best SFF for their piece on Priest's article.)

I might be using a Flathead for a Phillips on this, but it sounds a lot to me like Priest expects us to write fantasy without making up our own terminology. He's just one guy, but I'm sure his opinion jives with what keeps more people from reading fantasy at all, e.g. having to learn an entire lexicon to understand who's doing what to whom and why. Your casual reader doesn't want to reference the bestiary to know what a solocup is every time one is mentioned, whereas most people (thanks to Hollywood and various authors) have a pretty firm grasp on what a dragon is.

Now, that's not to say I don't enjoy the occasional dragon-free fantasy, or seek out every farm-boy-turned-hero/chosen-one story I can get my hands on. There's a difference between beating a dead horse and cutting off a nice steak to roast on a spit. If a story full of familiar elements is done well, there's an interesting world full of compelling characters, the plot and conflict aren't copied and pasted straight out of the "here's what to do with fantasy" handbook (which I wish I'd written), and there's some excitement and entertainment to be found there, then it is a good story whether or not it has elves in it.

Maybe, just maybe, when people look for something to criticize, they land on the familiarity of fantasy rather than the quality of the story. Some people scoff at Terry Brooks because "he ripped off Tolkien," but I've never bought into that. Anyone who mentions the words elf, dwarf, or orc while describing them as lithe, gruff/beardy, and ruthless are in a very real sense "ripping off Tolkien." To deviate too far from familiarity runs the risk of the ridiculous, like writing sci-fi where spaceships are made of cheese instead of metal, or fantasy where people ride ligers instead of horses.

I don't mean to slight them, but I think if Rothfuss and others are sick of reading about dragons and dwarves then perhaps they should be a bit more selective in the genre(s) they choose to read. Prophecy, swords and sorcery, the eternal struggle between light and dark/good and evil/balance and chaos, mystical and majestic creatures... these things are at the very heart of fantasy for me, and I want them to stay that way. After all, if we weren't willing to play the game with the same pieces, chess wouldn't have survived as long as it has.

So, rather than trying to write something different, perhaps we should all be focusing on writing something worth reading in the first place. Your thoughts on this are welcome in the comments section below.


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Three Words I Fear (as an Author)

There isn't a whole lot that I'd admit to being afraid of. Bees and heights, definitely, but those are fairly common things for people to be afraid of. Being a writer, it should come as no surprise that there are certain words I fear. Three of them, in a certain sequence, to be exact.

And no, they're not, "You suck, asshole." Me being the way I am, I've gotten used to that. Laugh, damnit; that was a joke.

No, the words I fear seeing, particularly when I scrounge for reviews of Thomas Redpool on Goodreads, are:

"More like this!"

You might think this is some weird "fear of success" post, but let me assure you that it isn't. I don't fear success. I think a fear of success is unhealthy and borderline ridiculous (as is a fear of failure, especially considering that "failure" just means giving up). However, as I've written a few times before, I probably define success a bit differently than others. Whereas some people view authorship as some quick path to fame and fortune, the only thing I care about is that people read my books.

To be clear: I don't care whether you buy or like my books, so long as you read them. That is success to me, and I feel like that's a healthy position to take on this whole writing-books thing. You might disagree. You're welcome to disagree.

More to the point, I fear "more like this" not because I don't want to write more religious satire, not because I don't want to write more fantasy, but because I don't want to write more like this.

I want people who've read The Ninth Avatar to read Thomas Redpool and say, "Wow, that was different," and vise-versa. Not necessarily in the "wow, his writing has improved" sense, though I hope under their shock comes that acknowledgement of improvement (or at least effort to improve), but in the sense that I'm not churning out the same thing repeatedly--particularly in an effort to "capitalize on a franchise" or some such nonsense.

If and when I release Rise of the Carrion, I want readers to notice how different the book is from The Ninth Avatar in theme, style, message, technique, or really anything--despite being a prequel. Should I venture again into religious satire territory, I hope to make different jokes and points than I made in Thomas Redpool, not just copy the same attitude and verve and paste it into a new manuscript.

Publishers may quake at the thought of an author having such an attitude, but I don't think readers do. And there are exceptions to this, I suppose, if you're carrying on a hugely arcing storyline and want each book to "feel" like the last, as in the epics of Diana Gabaldon and George R.R. Martin. At this point, I don't envision myself embarking on anything so grande. Mostly because I don't plan ahead all that well.

My next fantasy, Scions of the Shade, has two main protagonists and one of them is female. It's my earnest hope that readers struggle to draw parallels between Laurel and Starka, the female lead from The Ninth Avatar, because they are nothing alike (despite both being constructs of my imagination). I don't want Tysane, the male lead in Scions, to be compared to DaVille except to point out how different they are.

I don't want to tread the same ground, tell the same story, or anything that would run the risk of boring you. I like you too much to bore you.

Now, this not to say I'd begrudge the appreciation or scorn the sentiment. The reason I don't want this, honestly, is because I like to think of myself as vastly and exceptionally creative. Therefore, to do something not just similar (genre-wise or universe-wise) but the same, or close enough, is tantamount to admitting I have nothing worthwhile to offer. "Here's what I did before, I hope you like it just as much the second time around." That's just not me.

Even when I make mistakes, I make them differently.

Maybe I'm grandstanding a little, assuming I'll even get anyone to enjoy my work so much that they'll eagerly request more. Maybe I'm being a little egotistical here. That's fine. I'm allowed. Don't hold back what you have to say on account of my fears but, if you give it a second thought, all you really need to say is one word: "More."

That'll keep me going.


Thanks for reading, and I hope you come back again soon.

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One down (moving forward in 2012)

Reflecting on my resolutions for this year, I can now say that I have done two of them. Thomas Redpool is published, and I tried my hand at vlogging. It's time to move on to the others, but not before I revel a little that I actually got something done that I put my mind toward.

Self-publishing a book, let me just say, is every kind of difficult there can possibly be. While not without its myriad benefits and rewards it is, at heart, a one-man-show when it comes to the "marketing" aspect. In many areas of my life I know I'm not the most patient of persons, but crossing my fingers and hoping for the best when my own efforts were involved has never been an easy thing to do. Fortunately, I have a natural inclination not to be a human obstacle, so I try not to be so in-your-face about

"Hey, buy my book! Why haven't you bought my book yet? You know I write books, right? You should buy it, it's really good!" 

This is a double-edged sword since, while I'm not being incredibly obnoxious, my "message" isn't exactly reaching many ears. I've complained about this before, so I'm not going to give it much more real estate than I already have; just let me bitch for a minute that getting people to read books isn't exactly the easiest thing in the world.

And, to be clear, it isn't that my family and friends aren't supportive. That's the furthest thing from the truth. But I'd have to have a lot more family and friends if they're going to be the only ones buying/reading my books, eh?

Video blogging, on the other hand, only has one major drawback--and it's the same drawback that text blogging has. Content, or lack thereof. A person can blog their virtual ass off so long as they have something pertinent and relevant to say and, if the not-so-sudden influx of crickets around here have not tipped you off, I really haven't had all that much to share. Besides, I'm curious to see or hear any kind of information on exactly how helpful it is to put yourself on YouTube as opposed to just blogging. Seems to be that there's still a major hurdle to get over in that you need to get attention, and I'm pretty sure it's rare for a talking head to go viral (unless they're wearing a really nifty hat, perhaps?).

I usually refrain from public complaint about my own problems. It doesn't accomplish anything, and tends to only lead to throwing temper tantrums that no one is paying attention to that either. Not a healthy or mature road to go down, and certainly not something you want to engage in if you want anyone to take you seriously (as an author or otherwise).

Things in publishing, as in most parts of life, move agonizingly slow. It takes a decent amount of time to write a quality manuscript, even longer to edit that into a publishable manuscript, and even longer to turn that into a real-life book... then comes the real waiting of seeing if anyone will buy it, read it, like it, review it, and so on. Any attempt to shortcut or bypass any of these things is asking for trouble, even if it's well-intended or flashy. Even if it achieves the result you want, it can leave an impression or stigma that you really don't want, and you need to make sure you're weighing consequences before you open your mouth [and insert both feet].

So that's what I have for today. One project published and for sale, the next nearly ready to be edited in earnest before it's queried out, then one more left to finish writing before the end of the year. Nothing but good stuff here, people.



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Thomas Redpool Goes To Hell

by Todd Newton

Giveaway ends May 04, 2012.
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Thomas Redpool Goes To Hell is now available!

You need a good laugh, right? Sure, between the economy and the Republican primary, there's humor missing from your life. And, hey, if not, then everybody could use more laughs. You have a very exciting opportunity here. Not just laughs, but guffaws and cackles can be yours for merely a nominal fee.

Thomas Redpool Goes To Hell is the story of one man's afterlife. As the title implies, he arrives in Hell and soon finds it quite unlike what he expected. Did I mention Thomas was a complete asshole who deserves to be there? A likable one, to be sure, but quite a bastard nonetheless. Not the kind of person you'd want in charge of a McDonalds--let alone Armageddon--but the kind of person who says and does what many of us are thinking.

Considering the Rapture Index has us hurtling toward Kirk Cameron's Left Behind wet dream, I'd say your time to read a book about Hell is running out. Get your copy today and get laughing.

www.BuyThomasRedpool.com

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