What Video Games Taught Me About Flashbacks

When I was a teenager, I was a nerd.  I'm talking computer programming, networking, comic book reading, video game playing uber nerd.  Not a lot has changed over the years--I'm still a nerd at heart--but I don't have time to geek out the way I used to.  At seventeen, I poured hours into games like Zelda, Final Fantasy, Star Ocean, and a hundred others I can't even remember anymore.  Flash forward ten years and the most video game action I see in a month is when my son begs me to jump Robin over to the high platform in Lego Batman.  So once in a while I like to grab a new game at the store and veg out.

Friday was just such a night.  My husband was out of town, my kids were in bed, my house was clean (ish.)  Best of all, I'd read a great review on a game and had finally talked myself into buying it.  Like most things though, reviews are subjective.  As soon as the game play began, I was smack dab in the middle of a cut scene that I can only describe as a prologue.  Worse, the character dialogue went something like this:

"Well, as you know Geralt, the people will kill you if you don't tell me what I want to know."



I'm paraphrasing there.  I think there were some colorful threats about beatings and ripping out my character's guts.  You get the idea, though.  Of course my character didn't want to die, so he began to spill the story of what happened...in a flashback.

The first real game play for this game doesn't even happen in present day.  You know what's more annoying than reading a flashback at the beginning of a story?  Playing one.  Every item I pick up is essentially useless.  All the herbs and potions and swords I come across won't do me an ounce of good when I jump back into the present day (six years later.)

The whole thing was more confusing this way, too.  There are all these characters I don't know.  There are whole conversations that mean nothing to me.  I almost feel like I've been intentionally left out of the loop and that annoys me to no end.

Someone once told me that flashbacks are a clever way to show important events that will have an impact on things occurring in the present day.  I say clever my foot.  It's nothing more than the game developers (or author) scrambling to dump info on the player (or reader) because they are either too lazy to develop the plot in its own time, or they simply don't know how.  Excuse me Polish Studios, but you've got two disks worth of playable content and you're telling me you couldn't structure the plot a little better?  Shame on you.

If you're going to employ a flashback in your writing (or video game) here's a few tips to keep in mind:

Don't put a flashback in the very beginning of your story.  It should never be the first, or second, or probably even third scene.  Flashbacks are weak from the onset because they have already occurred and therefore cannot create a realistic tension.  Frame stories work, yes, but only as a novelty.  It's nice once in a while, but not as an everyday thing.  I certainly don't want to play this setup very often. (I'm talking to you, Dragon Age II!)

It's also a matter of getting acclimated to the story at hand.  Let your reader get a sense of what's going on, what this world has to offer, and who your characters are.  Then, when the time is right, feed them some of the important information that led up to the present day.

If the memory or flashback is essential and there's just no way to get around it, make it as brief as possible.  Sometimes this can be accomplished with internal dialogue, or in a conversation with another character, while other times you need a full-blown chapter devoted to the event that occurred.  Use your best judgment, but remember, the more time you spend in the past, the less connection your reader feels.

Lastly (and this is just my personal opinion,) keep it relevant.  Maybe the flashback in this game really is critical at this point in the game (I doubt it.)  For the sake of argument, I'll go ahead and give the developers that.  If that's the case, then you'd think the flashback would start at the most important moment.  Not so.  It opened with a slightly graphic sexual encounter with a chick I don't even know yet.  (I've got a whole separate rant for game ratings that I won't get into right now.)  I realize I'm not exactly the target audience for this game, but in terms of story, I fail to see how this scene was relevant.  If I'm going to suffer through a flashback, I want it to be pertinent information only.

Flashbacks can be great literary devices, if done correctly.  There are plenty of books, movies, and even the odd game or two that do the technique justice.  There are a lot more, however that give the flashback a bad name.  Don't fall into that category.  Make sure your flashbacks are not your opening scene, keep them brief and on topic, and don't confuse your reader by throwing a dozen new characters in them (unless you want your reader to be confused.)

And if you ever find yourself on the development team of a video game, don't make your first level a prologue with a flashback full of items the player can't keep.  That's just mean.

Query Letters and What To Do With Them

Query letter, query letter, query letter.....

No, I'm not summoning a demon when I say those words together, but it kind of feels like I am, doesn't it? 

I started sending out query letters this week. 

Eventually, this is going to turn out to be a highly motivating blog post. But first...

Admit it. It's scary!

I keep trying to tell myself that it's no different than finding a job in today's pressure-riddled economy. But actually, it's more like working for three years and then trying to find someone willing to pay you for it. In the era of self-publishing, why would anyone want to subject themselves to this torture?

Because it seems like it would be fun to make it the old-fashioned way, and it's still the best way if you hope to see your name on the spine of a shiny new book, or if you dream of making your living as an author. Times, they are a-changin', but an agent can still be a valuable resource.

On to the highly motivating part:

Creating a Query Letter 

Most query letters contain:

A professional, courteous greeting

An introductory paragraph with title, word count, genre and a hook

A short synopsis

An optional biographical paragraph--(if relevant!)

Your name and contact information

It's exactly that simple, and exactly that complicated. Nathan Bransford's mad-lib post is a good to have on hand for those moments when Query Panic begins to overwhelm you. 

But it's much harder to explain the nuances involved in making your novel's voice apparent while staying in third person; in being interesting while still remaining professional. Other people, far more skilled than I, with much better credentials, have done a fantastic job explaining the precision necessary to get an agent's attention--in a positive way. Trisha was one of them, and you can read her post here. 

Some links to my favorite real life query letters from successful authors:

The Demon's Lexicon 

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet 

Jacob Wonderbar and the Cosmic Space Kapow 

Anything from queryshark:  Be careful though. This blog has been known to suck all the energy out of my body, leaving me staring at the screen with arms too limp to reach the computer mouse and legs too flaccid to run away.

I've Got A Query Letter. Where Do I Send It?

You've survived query writing 101. Every word in your query letter shines. 

Next you've got to find an agent who represents your type of book. I recommend agentquery.  On the left hand side of their home page, about half way down there is a box that will help you narrow the field of agents to find ones that represent the type of book you have written. For example, where it says "keyword" I typed in fantasy and romance. Where it has a scroll down bar for fiction, I picked "Young Adult". When I clicked "search" it came up with 102 entries. I could tell by looking that many were not a great fit for me, but some of them were.

Make sure any agent you send a letter to is legitimate. Often you can tell by their website, but if something seems off, trust your gut. You can also check preditors and editors, which is a website devoted to making sure that agents and editors are the real deal.

Most agents prefer e-mail over snail mail these days, but you've got to do some research by finding their website and clicking both the "About Us" link AND the "Submission Guidelines" link. Make sure your query letter is formatted the way they prefer. Most agents only want a query letter, but some want 5 or 10 pages of your novel printed in the body of the e-mail. Very rarely do agents ever accept attachments. Do your research. They look at zillions of query letters every day, and a poorly formatted letter is as good a reason as any to reject you. They want to work with people who know how to follow directions. (I say this with a sad little grin on my face, because I already know I messed up one of the query letters I was really excited about. #Come back! Come back--I didn't really mean to sent you yet!)

Which brings us to another Nathan Bransford classic (although this is a guest poster, not Nathan himself): The 5 Stages of Query Grief: 

I'd rather just skip this part. But I've got a secret that helps me get through it. Do you want to know what it is?

The Flowchart Doesn't Stop Here

In the old days, if you couldn't find an agent, you were pretty sunk. There are great places that don't work with agents, but if you couldn't get your foot in the door there, you were sunk with an anchor tied around your ankle. But these days, I'm feeling the joy of knowing that if this doesn't work out, there is always self-publishing. In the over-saturated world of publishing, many awesome books are not getting discovered. Sheena has a great post about self-publishing here. And Susan's awesome post about it is here. (And you Vampire Diaries fans who want to self-publish--look here.)

So I've got a deadline. Some amazing agent will discover me this summer. If not...I'm moving on.

On Art and Science

A few weeks ago, in those odd unplanned theme weeks we occasionally have, we went back and forth on thought and magic and art. I joked to Melanie that even my subconscious is a scientist. She laughed and advised me to make it work. And I do make it work – when I can remember to stop worrying and actually write.

Jokes about subconscious aside, I actually have a very disorganized brain. For a short time, I’m happiest letting my thoughts wander in no particular direction. But that (as is typical of my personality type) leads to chaos and disorganization, and feelings of dissatisfaction.

Contrary to my disorganized mind, my brain produces results most effectively in lists and numbers. For example, I’m a better baker than a cook. Baking is all about precise measurements, the perfect ratio of flour and salt and water. A triumph in baking to me always seems a triumph in measurements, in proportions. Not in talent, like those cooks (my stepfather, my brother, Lawyer Friend), who can throw together any random set of ingredients and make magic. If I try cooking without a recipe, I can’t hold the process and the flavors together in my mind, and the dish falls apart.

But even when my structure is imposed, and the rules are in place, there is room for so much more. Take bread baking. The measurements are very precise, because otherwise the dough will rise too little or too much. And yet, some things are not exact, like the way the dough changes in your hands during kneading. There is art between the measurements, and the bread is better for it. As is writing, and any truly innovative scientific project.

Art made possible through science: Hubble Telescope Image of the Orion Nebula. Courtesy of NASA.

Perhaps I have to prepare my over-thinking scientific brain that we’re still safely surrounded by numbers and facts. There is an organizational pattern there to avoid too much distraction. And then, once those rules are in place, creativity really flows, without anxiety, and without limits. I can take the step back and feel the story change in my hands, until it feels light, until it reaches a place beyond numbers.

It’s more easily said than done, and all too easy to lose sight of. That’s where the scientific brain lets me down, and why I have to occasionally write blog posts to remind myself of why the method works. But that feeling of pure, effective creativity is what I aspire to in writing--even more than getting published.

How do you find your magic – by imposing rules and structure, despite them, or ignoring them altogether?

Happy 4th of July!

 

And for those of you not of the American persuasion, I hope you have a very nice July 4th, which is as good a day on the calendar as any other to enjoy yourselves.

Why the Movie Tangled is the Perfect Romance

Beauty and the Beast has always been my favorite Disney princess movie.  I’ve always loved that fairy tale, maybe it is because the princess rescues the prince instead of the other way around, or maybe it is because it’s about seeing past the outer appearances to find the beauty within.  Either way, something in that fairy tale speaks to me. 

But when I saw Disney’s Tangled, I was surprised by how much I loved it.  I’ve never liked the story of Rapunzel, but Tangled almost took the number one spot away from Beauty and the Beast.  Maybe it did or at least tie.   I have a hard time giving up Beauty and the Beast because I love that story.  But I do think that Tangled has a better romance.   In fact, to me the romance in Tangled was perfect.

Before I get into why, I want to give a brief caveat.   When I write these posts, I’m kind of doing them for myself.  I’m trying to sort out what I think makes a great character or romance or book.  I do hope that you will find them useful and maybe spark some ideas that will help you figure out what works for you, but I believe we all need to read lots of books and watch TV and movies for the purpose of figuring out what works best for each of us.  Your opinion of a perfect romance may differ, and I love it if you would share your ideal romance in the comments. 

One more thing, Melanie has already done a great five part series on adding a romantic subplot.  Her suggestions are spot on and pure gold.  So if you haven’t read it and have a romance of any kind in your story, you need to read this series.  I’ll make it simple for you, go here, then here, then here, then here, and finally here.  Well worth the read, I promise.  :)

So in order to show you why I think Tangled is such a great romance, I’m going to go step by step through the movie to illustrate how the movie shows us Rapunzel and Flynn Rider (Eugene) falling in love.  There will be massive spoilers.  You have been warned.

1.  Mutual attraction.  When Rapunzel first knocks Flynn out, she examines him to see if he has any fangs, and there is this moment when she brushes the hair away from his eyes.  And I’m pretty sure there is more than just curiosity there.  Flynn’s attraction to Rapunzel is more obvious.  When she steps out of the shadows, he’s definitely checking her out and gives her a cheesy pick up line that is hilarious.

When the two characters first meet they should feel some sort of attraction to each other.  I know people get annoyed when the characters in books all seem to be gorgeous, but it ruins the romance a little if the two characters don’t find each other at least a little attractive. 

Of course there is a big exception to this rule, like Beauty and the Beast.  If the whole point of the story is to see past the physical appearance and find the true beauty within, then obviously there shouldn’t be an immediate physical attraction, but there still can be sort of spark.

2.  They both have their own goals.  Rapunzel wants to see the floating lanterns, and Flynn wants his satchel back.  Both of them have goals outside of each other, and this makes the story far more interesting. 

I don’t like either the girl or the guy giving up everything for someone they just met (Romeo and Juliet is not romantic at all).  When once the two meet, their only goal is getting together.  I prefer two people with their own agendas who just happen to fall in love along the way.

3.  Their goals are at odds with each other.  Rapunzel needs Flynn to take her to see the lights, but he’s not exactly willing especially since he’s a wanted criminal with a price on his head (I love how Flynn keeps trying to convince Rapunzel to go home at first).  Flynn wants his satchel, but Rapunzel has hidden it from him and will only give it back once they return from seeing the lanterns.  They both are standing in the way of each other’s goals, which gives some nice conflict.

Conflict is always good.  I’ve seen a lot of complaints about the hate turns to love trope (like we see in Pride and Prejudice).  But there needs to be some sort of conflict between the two love birds because it is boring to read about people getting along famously.  Giving two people who would otherwise get along opposing goals is a great way to add some much needed conflict.

4.   They have a good reason to stick together.  If it wasn’t for Rapunzel holding Flynn’s satchel hostage, he would’ve ditched her (yeah, he’s not exactly a boy scout).  If Rapunzel didn’t need Flynn to be her guide, she would’ve just let him go once she realized he wasn’t after her hair.  They need a reason to stick together especially when the times get rough.

If the two people in the romance aren’t instantly in love with each other (I’m not a fan of instant love), they need a reason to stick together.  This is especially important if they risk their lives for each other.  There has to be a logical reason for one of them not to bail when things get tough, and it can’t be love, not in the beginning.

5.   They come together to fight a bigger problem.  Rapunzel and Flynn’s flight through the tunnel and subsequent fight with all the people (and the horse) who want to catch Flynn is where they first start working together.  And they work very well together, each taking turns helping the other out.

It is important to see the couple work together and not just against each other.  Strong bonds form when people learn how to count on each other and trust each other.  If the couple is only at odds with each other, I’m not going to buy it when they are suddenly in love.

6.  They open up to each other.  When Rapunzel and Flynn believe they are about to die in the tunnel, they both share their deepest, darkest secret (Flynn’s real name and Rapunzel’s magic hair).  They open up to each other, which makes their growing relationship stronger.

The two future lovers need to share something with each other on a personal level.  They need to be vulnerable with each other to show the growing trust developing. 

7.  They have fun together.  I love the city montage in Rapunzel where we see Rapunzel and Flynn exploring the city and having a great time with each other. 

If the two people never laugh together or have any happy moments, if they only make each other miserable with all the angst, I’m not going to sold that these two really belong together.  I need to have some sort of indication that they can be happy with each other.

8.  They take a chance on each other.  I like how until the lantern scene, Rapunzel and Flynn feel a little tentative around each other.  But when they are together in the boat with the lanterns floating around them, they decide to take that chance on each other.  After that point, only external sources keep them apart (Mother Gothel and the two thugs).

An important step in the developing romance is that scene when the two characters decide to go for it.  There needs to be that declaration of love.  This could of course come at the end, and actually Tangled does have another, stronger love declaration scene later.  Where they have that moment before Flynn dies, "You were my new dream."  

9.   They are willing to sacrifice everything for each other.  At the end, Flynn tries to save Rapunzel from Mother Gothel, but gets stabbed.  Rapunzel is willing to stay with Mother Gothel for the rest of her life and let Mother Gothel use her magic hair if Mother Gothel lets her save Flynn with her magic hair.  But Flynn chooses to die instead of letting Rapunzel be imprisoned forever and cuts Rapunzel’s hair, so that it can no longer heal anyone.  They both are willing to give up everything for the other person.

And this to me is what really catapults Tangled from a great romance to amazing.  I’m a sucker for sacrifice.  To me true love is that willingness to sacrifice anything for the ones you love when they really need it. 

Of course in order for this to work, the reader needs to really believe that these two crazy kids truly love each other, otherwise the whole thing comes off as melodramatic.  Oh, and killing yourself because your lover has died (like in Romeo and Juliet) is not a sacrifice.  That is stupidity not romance.

10.   They live happily ever after, and damn it, they deserve it (Yeah, Rapunzel finds another way to save Flynn, and I loved it).

Not every romance has to have all of these moments (not every story should end in a willingness to sacrifice everything for each other, plenty of great romances don’t), but to me when they are all present and done right, the romance is perfect.

So what makes a romance in a story perfect for you?

~MaryAnn

Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts

I'm gonna teach you a little bit of math.

Stop laughing, Jana.

Sometimes, one plus one doesn't equal two. Sometimes, one plus one equals... eleven.

The idea is brilliant.
The book...meh.

Before 2009, there were books about Zombies, and books retelling Pride and Prejudice, but Seth Grahame-Smith combined them and...eleven.

Before Charlene Harris started writing, there were books about waitresses in the south, and books about vampires. She combined them in Dead Until Dark and...eleven.

 Grahame-Smith did it again with Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter and...eleven.

The math is simple. You take something you know, something familiar to people, or something easily researched (and public domain), and then you add something unexpected.

This is a good example from YouTube. Someone brilliant combined Party Rock with the Cantina music from Star Wars and...eleven. It's thirty-three seconds of beautiful.

What I failed, yet tried, to say last week, is how people are looking for connections to people who are the same as them. People who like both Zombies, and Pride and Prejudice. People who like Star Wars, and LMFAO. People like me.

 And it works.  People buy or click, because they feel connected. Plus it meshed two markets. People who like Pride and Prejudice but who wouldn't touch a zombie book, might buy P&P&Z. One market plus One market equals...published?

Applying It to Find the Next Great Story Idea

Okay, so step away from your story ideas for a second, and ask yourself, what are you an expert at? What aspect of our world do you know well enough to not need to do any research? Do you know well what it's like to be in the PTA? Do you really know how to do laundry?

For me, I know what it's like to work as an usher in a Theatre. And no Spell Check, I won't change the spelling. That's how we Haleians spelled Theatre. I know those details, so I can get it right.

Now, all you need to do is take your known world, and add something speculative.

Take your PTA world and add Zombies. Imagine the fight scene in the middle of the Bake Sale... eleven. Imagine monsters in the laundry basket, or a new laundry machine that becomes sentient and seeks for companionship...eleven.

I can use the Back of the Theatre world I know so well, and add... robots...ghosts...vampires...magic. All of the above. The story ideas write themselves.

If only the books did.

If you can't figure out yet what you're an expert of, think of something you love that's easy to research, or now in public domain. Add speculative, and...published?

Happy writing, people!
~Sheena

Coming Home

I wish I had happy anicdotes from my trip to write about today.  Don't get me wrong, camping was great, and I loved Minneapolis, and cheese curds are AMAZING!  But if you've been watching the news, you might be able to understand the grey cloud that hung over our trip this past week.


The problem was, I hadn't been watching the news.  Or checking Facebook.  Or staying in touch with my family back in Colorado.  I didn't get great reception in southern Kentucky (last week I had to jump on the wifi at a laundromat to post my blog.)  So when I finally spoke with my sister last Tuesday, I was shocked to say the least when the following words came out of her mouth:

"They're issuing a pre-evacuation notice for southern Douglas County.  The fires in Colorado Springs are out of control."
I was sitting in the car and thankfully my husband was driving.  My mind went blank, trying to figure out where in the county I lived.  I tried to listen to what she was saying, but I couldn't process the information.  My first thought was, "We're going to lose everything."  It was a heart-stopping moment, but it passed quickly.  I had everything I needed sitting in the car with me.  My family was safe, my parents and sister were out of the path of the fire, I had clothes and food and enough money to keep me going for a while if the worst happened.  I was okay.  As a matter of fact, I remember thinking there wasn't a single thing in my house that I couldn't live without, and relief flooded in.

I made several phone calls to friends that live in my area.  Was the fire getting close?  Was our town a part of the evacuation notice?  Was I going to have a place to come home to?  No one thought the fires were close yet, and most of them had hopes that it would be under control before our neighborhood was in real danger.  It made me feel a little better, but I couldn't stop worrying.

That night I hopped on my aunt's computer and my heart broke.  I'm talking 'turned to ice and shattered into a million pieces' broke.  I couldn't believe the pictures.  I knew when I left home there were fires to the north.  I'd offered my home to some friends whose house was in the evacuation zone.  But I had no idea that practically our entire state was burning.  I spent half of the next day crying.


By Thursday I thought I was over the worst of it.  We were staying in a hotel in Northfield, Minnesota.  That morning, my family and I went down for breakfast, but a tv in the corner was showing the devistation in Colorado Springs.  It was worse, watching a live report, than the still photos had been.  One woman sobbed as the camraman filmed her.  "My mountain, my mountain," she cried as the camera panned to the fire eating away the hillside.  I knew her pain.  It's my mountain, too.  I think everyone that lives along the front range feels that way.  It's a kind of collective ownership.  We've all invested some level of pride in them and it is physically painful to see them destroyed.

For me, it was an assault on some of my favorite memories.   When my husband and I were first married, we lived in an apartment just a few blocks away from the heart of the fires.  Our first son was born in the hospital down there.  Six months ago, I was a penstroke away from signing a lease for a house smack dab in the middle of the chaos.  It makes me physically sick to see a place I called home go up in smoke.  It was worse when I realized how many people were standing by watching their homes, their businesses, their jobs and pets and photos turning to ashes.  By Thursday afternoon, I decided to come home.

It took us seventeen hours of driving to get back.  I stopped for gas, food and restrooms.  For two hours, I slept in my car on the side of the road in Iowa.  When I reached the Colorado border, I didn't need a sign to tell me I'd crossed state lines.  We could smell the smoke and the sky was a hazy red off in the distance.  When I made it home, it was just as my friends had said: the fires were bad, but they hadn't reached us.  I said what was probably my thousandth prayer for the lives and homes of people living in the path of the fire before dragging myself out of the car.

Needless to say, fireworks have been cancelled state-wide, and the fires still rage all the way through New Mexico up into Canada.  There is still a lot to be done.  For our part, my family has decided to abandon the second half of our vacation.  We're putting some of that money towards the relief efforts.  If you would like more information about sending a donation, click here.  If you are in Colorado and want to volunteer your time or use of your truck, click here.  And if you pray, add the victims of this disaster to your prayers tonight.  As of this posting, the containment has barely scratched the 50 percent mark.  Let's get those firefighters home and start the rebuild.