Love, Lust & Liaisons: What makes a romance tick?

Forever and ever ago I came across this article, which really got me thinking about how I categorize Cynosure – there’s big romance in it, but I’d always categorized it as a Historical Fantasy. Truth is, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it’s both. The romance drives decisions that influence the fantasy (the historical being more setting than legitimate plot) plot, while the fantasy influences the characters in how they respond to the romance parts. Both plots resolve at the same point in our outline. To avoid confusion, I’ll keep it as a Historical Fantasy – but to me it’ll always be a Historical Fantasy (Romance).

But I kept thinking about how a romance functions in a story. I’ve always liked writing stories where there’s already a little meat to the romantic plot. Where the characters know one another, so there’s a history to toy with while they move forward; but I’ve also had problems with that. Cynosure went through a (three page, haa) draft where Rosaline and Max weren’t involved at all at the beginning of the story – interestingly enough, there was almost no tension there, contrary to the crazy amounts of romantic tension between the characters when they’d already kissed.

LTWF’s Susan Dennard wrote a post (a lil more recently than the other blog post I linked) on THE KISS as a turning point in a novel. We all know why; THE KISS is a catalyst for a release of all the emotions we’ve been hearing in-POV up to that point. I really enjoyed it – a lot because of my aforementioned insecurities about having started a YA book where the main love interests were already in a relationship (albeit a secret one). While I was reading it – and under the umbrella of the first post I linked – I realized something really important: THE KISS doesn’t have to be THE KISS. THE KISS is a turning point tailored to your story, to your character. There can be a metaphorical moment to stand in for THE KISS. It just has to be a release point. Tension has to build towards it, like any climactic moment.

Because romance, like any other part of a story, is built from conflict. We’ve all read the archetypal romances: the Romeo and Juliet romance, the Pride and Prejudice romance, and the Fairytale romance. Respectively, conflict is built as such:

1. Romeo and Juliet Romance – Two characters are in love but external forces keep them apart, requiring emotional and/or physical sacrifice to bring them together (potentially eternally)  in the end. “I’ll Do Anything For You”
2. Pride and Prejudice Romance – Two characters are thrown together in a misunderstanding, and must sacrifice personal opinion/belief/personality traits in order to be together. “I’ll Be Anything For You”
3. Fairytale Romance – One character is in a situation that they are unable to navigate, and conflict stems from the other character rectifying that situation. “I’ll Always Save You”

They’re effective in different ways, though the second one is the one I find to be cropping up in YA the most – which makes sense. Teenagers are learning how to read people, and how to read themselves. They make stupid mistakes, and being insecure, that creates a lot of tension (as I’m – though not for much longer – nineteen myself, I speak from potentially recent experience : P). And, because it’s automatically internal conflict, that makes character development a key factor in the story automatically. I think the hardest part about it is making it interesting: I’m of the mind that in P&P, neither Darcy nor Lizzy actually hated the other. They misunderstood one another, and were placed in embarrassing situations that hurt their pride, and then reacted in a way that caused the other one to feel their pride hurt more until they reached their THE KISS; aka. THE LETTER. They’re responsible for the unease between them. And responsibility is key, because later, when they cop to that responsibility, that’s when there’s both resolution and growth.

The Fairytale, in the meanwhile, is more effective with spins. Right now I personally think that the reconciliation of the “messed up” boy/girl is probably the best example of a modern-day fairytale. Just take the prince saving the princess who’s asleep in the tower and switch it to the significant other doing whatever they can to snap the boy/girl out of their depression/anger/etc. And, of course, they don’t have to have happy endings; the Little Mermaid didn’t get saved by her prince, and YA teens can drown just as easily. I think it’s brilliant. Conflict stems from being unable to act, so it forces the character to grow by trying out different ways of being in search of salvation, whether the POV is the significant other or the boy/girl.

For Cyno, though, the most crucial plot is the Romeo and Juliet. Which I realized only recently. Rosaline and Max are attracted to one another when the story begins; they love one another in their own ways, but aren’t in love. Their love story is about how they fall in love, and fight for that love, and the resolution comes when they achieve it. Just because they’re in a relationship already doesn’t mean they have nowhere to grow (silly Kae!). It means that they’re growing in a slightly different direction than the Pride and Prejudice plot focused romance market. Their THE KISS won’t be a kiss. It’ll be something else, some other wonderful physical manifestation of everything we put them through (getcher head outta that gutter).

So what do I think makes a romance tick? Conflict and sacrifice (physical, emotional or personal). Building tension to a resolution. Using metaphor effectively to represent catalysts for that tension and resolution. You know. All those things we always read about, but takes so very, very long to sink in.

What makes your romance tick? Or the romances you like best! Any particular sacrifices or archetypal plot?

Kae is Bad

Bad, bad indeed. This is when I stopped posting on my last, blog, too. But this time I will not fail to return. Next Post: May 1st! More of a promise to myself than anyone else.

Also,  my co-author Mila Haines and I will be starting a blog that’ll be updated three or four times a week on Gilded Age Manhattan/YA in the Gilded Age/Our WIP Cynosure, which is a YA Historical Fantasy that takes place – you guessed it – in Gilded Age Manhattan. And it’s always more of a draw to post blogs when you owe it to another person – I know, I have terrible blog integrity.

Hope you’re all having a great exam season/April/Spring is here!

Til then.

Blender Post

AAAAH! So much to read!

And not just for school. Though there’s a lot to read there (ALWAYS ). I went to Indigo yesterday, and my YA-to-read list overwhelmed me. I didn’t have any spare money to spend, fortunately, so I’m not any more broke than I was – but my heart is throbbing from the lack of purchases. Instead I’ll just forge through those school books! Funnily enough, ‘Orlando’ is the Woolf book it’s taking me the most amount of time to get through – and it’s not even stream of consciousness. Bah.

On the writing side, we’ve been making SO much progress with Cynosure the past couple of days. We really cemented out the endings (to Cynosure AND its sequel, Avarice), or at least the concrete direction we’re taking with them, and we’re solidifying motivations/etc of all of our main characters. I’d lost my feeling for Rosaline for a little bit there, but with all this character building I’m getting her back and it feels wonderful. I’m even going to write her later on this week. I’ve been scared to since I lost my handle on her, in case I just continued to mess her personality up. OOC is sad-making. ) : (Yes, Westerfeld reference)

Also, I literally just got this off twitter (via a retweet by Margaret Atwood). A new Gatsby movie! I love Gatsby, it was my independent study topic for grade 12 English, and it holds a special place in my heart. I’ve always been a little scared to watch the old movie due to reviews, so a Leonardi DiCaprio/Toby Maguire movie sounds lovelyyy. I’ll definitely be watching it.

On that topic, I’m excited – I’m going to see ‘I Am Number Four’ this week. And no, I’m not particularly excited for the movie. I haven’t read the book, and the story behind it makes me not too terribly interested IN reading the book. I’m excited for the boy. I’ve been following Alex Pettyfer since he was a fifteen-year-old model and looked like this:

 

Yum. AND while we’re on the topic of goodlooking men, I went to the symphony with some of my writer friends (EEE Tchaikovsky’s Manfred Symphony) and saw a boy (man) who looked like Jake Gyllenhaal’s slightly thinner brother. It was extremely distracting. He was three rows behind me, and yes, I peeked back a lot.

Also, for the record, I’m addicted to this song. Addicted. The music video is way too darn cute! They’re a couple of girls from Toronto, right here in my town, and one of them was/is apparently on Degrassi? Huh. Cool.

Kae out.

To Networking: I [heart] You

Unknown Credit

It’s Valentine’s Day.

My Valentine is usually Jackie Chan, whose movies I traditionally watch on this, the day of aware singles and smooching couples. But this year I thought, alongside the wondrous martial arts master, I’d honour something that  I’ve developed a lot of love for since the start of the school year: Networking.

Organic networking, of course. I’d always been skeptical of twitter, and I’ve never really been as into facebook (or before that myspace, and all the ones before it) as other kids in my generation. Or texting. It all seems sooo…disconnected, for being so connected. But then this year something magical has happened.

I was actually able to help create, and become a part of, a functional writer’s group. And we owe it all to social networking sites, or at least the internet in general.

I met June Hur last year in my first year Literature class, and we started meeting once a week to talk about writerly things and maybe potentially forming a group. It wasn’t until this year that it was actually set into motion – but now we have eight members! (And a very interesting process to get those members.)

June’s friend Maybelle posted a link to her fictionpress on June’s page. Which I stalked. And was thoroughly impressed with. So I asked to be introduced to her. Come first semester, the group numbered at three. Then I found out that a girl – Madeleine – who I used to write with online a MILLENIA ago had come to UT. So I invited her, and we met for the first time in ‘REAL LIFE’.

When we’d first met, June introduced me to Let the Words Flow, a blog that she was contributing to at the time. I realized that Biljana, another contributor on the blog, went to our school – and suggested to June that she invite her. So then we were five.

June invited a few other friends, which brought us to seven – and then, for our latest addition, we have our most interesting story. Alex used to read the fictionpress story of another LtWF contributor, and was following them on twitter, through which she found June, and then went to June’s facebook page, found out they had a friend in common, and was introduced to her. June then invited her to our group, bringing us our eighth and final (for now) member.

A magical thing, networking.

So thank you, social networking sites and the internet in general, for giving me the best Tuesdays I could have, and for bringing me into the company of people who are just as interested and passionate about writing as I am. Because story writing is my real Valentine, and authors flourish in the company of other authors.

[ WrUT (Writers @ University of Toronto) is an as-of-yet unofficial club at UT filled to the brim with writerly enthusiasts. If you go to the school and would be interested in joining - and continuing the story of online connections - send me an email @ saturdayperson@hotmail.com ]

Happy Holidays

Just a quick little blog post in here to celebrate, thoroughly selfishly, the end of my exam season: HURRAH!

The last few weeks have been a little hellish, so being able to recline back on my bed or the couch in the common room and saying “hark, I have no homework” is thrilling.

I’m looking more and more forward to working on cynosure every evening. <3

Anyone else have an early start on the holidays? : D

(Have I mentioned that I love University and it’s more or less monthlong holiday break? LOVE.)

And for the season:

To me, The Nutcracker means Christmas. : ) I’m crossing my fingers that I might be heading towards the ballet this Christmas season – I haven’t seen it on stage since I was very, very small.

Time Shakers, World Makers: The Author as a Hero

There isn’t a day that goes by where the art of story building doesn’t make me gushy and happy inside.

But you can’t blame me: it’s my world. I study English. I study Paradigms and Archetypes. I study Semiotics & Communications. Every time I sit down to write an essay, it’s about narrative functions; every time I do homework, I open a book. Then, in my spare time, I write. And I write. And I write. And then I do a little reading. A little singing. And then I go back and I write some more.

But there are a lot of days where, despite it being my world, I feel like writing is doing nothing. I’ve never finished a whole project. I don’t have anything that’s polished enough to show anyone who could give me a thorough analysis of where I am in my craft. And that’s terrifying; you can say “I’m a Writer” as much as you want to, but the fact is, that only gets you so far. Because what you WANT to be is an author, and as far as I’m concerned that only happens when you see your name splashed across the cover of a book.

It’s easy to be scared. Easy to resist the urge to be creative. But that’s what makes writing so phenomenal – what makes the writers I know some of the strongest people in my life. Because this is the career of pulling something from nothing. Of taking abstract thoughts from everywhere and pressing them into a new story, a new meaning, a new feeling that other people can relate to. It’s breaking down semantic barriers and using a world, with limits you set, to convey some story of importance. So as easy as it is to be scared, and as tempting as it is to be reluctant, I think it’s also easy to be excited. To be driven. To be brave.

These are our thoughts, our dreams, the hours of our days, ground into pages until they fit perfectly. Until there’s that perfect meaning, ready to be presented to other people. A connection, quick and clean, where you have some control of the middle man.

Narrative intoxicates our every day life, our every day communications; we narrate our own relationships, our own selves, and have little control of it because to us it simply is. But with novels, with books, with stories, you set something down. It’s out there, in the world, rather than inside yourself. And that’s beautiful.

So remember: writing is not doing nothing, whether you have a whole novel or a broken outline. Writing is something. Something FROM nothing. A way to be heard the way you want to be.

And that bravery to be heard, that makes you, the author, a hero. Your own hero.

And not many people can say that.

As Nanowrimo comes to a close, this is my ode to you, whether you’ve won or lost (I’ve ‘lost’, at around 30k, but there’ll be a blog post sometime soon about THAT little adventure). If you wrote, you made; and that is something.

[ My apologies for the gush factor. <3 ]

Do you like your hero/ine?

This is something that’s been bothering me lately. While writing London Fog, I’m coming again and again upon the fact that I don’t like my main characters – yet. I like who they’re going to be at the end of the novel, but I hate the naive, simple personalities they have at the beginning. Probably because, to a degree, they’re cliches, and cliches coming out of my fingers tend to make me mad (read: crazy, not angry).

On the other hand, disliking my main characters gives me a chance to develop them in ways I wouldn’t have considered if I was too involved with them. For example, in the project I’m just finishing outlining, I’m so attached to the main characters that I wanted to create an alternate timeline to the (not completely happy) ending that’s been set up for them (haa). The ending I have is great – but loving my characters means that I don’t want to put them through pain, and not putting them through pain means a less effective novel. Ah, the sacrifices!

In London Fog, I don’t care about putting my characters through pain. So they’re gunna grow a heckofalot more. Lucky them. (evil smile)

Not liking characters, though, can also limit them. If you don’t like a character, it’s probably because they aren’t fully developed. They don’t have that empathetic connection that comes from being a recognizable person. And if a character isn’t fully developed, and also isn’t able to be so completely unfilfilled that any reader can step into that character’s perspective (you all know what I’m talking about), they’re really, really boring to read about. So it’s a disease, too, if the reason for not liking a character isn’t discovered!

So I just thought I’d throw it out there. Do you like your main characters? Or, really, even your secondary characters? Why? Why not? What effect does that have on the manuscript, or on the sort of things you put them through? Do you think it helps or hinders your project? Can you write a character that you don’t personally like, but that the reader likes? What makes or breaks a character that you like?

It’s the Most Wonderful Time

No, don’t worry, I’m not talking about the holidays. Yet. : )

It IS, however, almost November. And with November, for writers, comes Nanowrimo – for those of you who aren’t familiar, National Novel Writing Month. And I. Am. STOKED!

While I may be going against the official nano rules by cowriting this novel with another person, I think the fact that we’re aiming for seventy-five thousand words might make up for it. This is a story that’s one of my favourite concepts – a period urban fantasy romance. Yes, I know, it’s very inter-genre. But I promise, it works.

The story’s called Cynosure, and I’ve worked with it for the past year. Last week, I finished an outline for the second half of the novel – now we’re just figuring out what has to happen to set those events up! A little outlining, a couple new secondary characters, a bit of plotting for the first couple of chapters, and we’re off! I’ll be posting tidbits of the (horridly unedited) first draft on my blog as we go. Probably one section a week. : )

Nanowrimo is a great experience for any writer who’s having a hard time getting into their funk. An excuse to put writing first, right smack dab between midterms and finals (for university students)? Sounds like a good plan to me! And you don’t have to go into it – at least, I certainly don’t think so – intending to do the whole fifty thousand word novel. Last year, I went into it just to make some progress on a concept I’d been fiddling with for FOREVER, and while that concept is now back on the shelf, Nanoing it gave me the first draft of a HORRIBLE first few chapters (twenty-five thousand words of them, actually) from which to realize what needed work. (And a LOT of things need work.)

This year, I intend to come out with something a little more functional. With time comes growth, yes? Yes!

If you’re participating in Nanowrimo, look me up, feel free to add – my username is LePipette. Just click here. : )

Making the Choice

One of the hardest things about ‘growing up’ (a la big kid now) is making decisions. Knowing that for once in your life, you can’t blame your parents, or your friends, or your pets (ha!) for what happens to you – which you do, constantly, though not necessarily maliciously. For me, one of the hardest choices I’ve had to make is deciding what to do. You know. In life.

I have always been a person of many hobbies. When I like something, I take it on, I work at it, and I do my best to become – and usually, I like to think (being human, and therefore mildly inclined to favour myself while ALSO being completely unsure of myself), accomplish becoming – adequately skilled at it. I sing, I’m a web designer, I’m a writer, I’m a graphic designer, I’m a photographer. I get good grades, I’ve made intricate costumes, and I have so many ideas for other things that I want to start – clubs, groups, online magazines – that I can hardly contain my excitement to DO things. And I love that I’ve done all of this – I love that, generally, almost everything has been self-taught. It’s made me independent, and given me confidence to take on new challenges. All of these interests, all of these loves, have helped make me who I am. They kept me interested in developing myself, and gave me goals – the teenager’s most hated word – to accomplish. It’s been wonderful.

But frankly, it’s too much. I’ve been doing too much – I want too much. Two years ago when I was supposed to apply for University, I almost decided not to just for the reason that I couldn’t decide what would make me happiest. Did I want to go into web/graphic design? A more classic form of art? Creative Writing? Photography? Music school, Musical Theatre school? Did I want to wait a year, and make up a portfolio – or audition – for this potential school? And could I take, being the kid with the weak immune system and a tendency to go after individual projects, having a career that would be so straining on my body, or would include working with other people every single day? Did I, in the purest sense, have what it took?

I didn’t send out my applications until February 2009. Only a couple of weeks before the deadlines at schools that kept their applying dates wiiide open. And somehow, I got lucky; I wound up at a school I love, and in progams – some of which I didn’t even know the meaning of the titles of before I went to UT – I adore. I’m doing something solid, or I feel like it, and that’s good.

But I still hadn’t chosen, hadn’t really made it definitive what I was going to concentrate on. Last year, I was unsettled; I didn’t participate in anything, didn’t join anything, and pretty much kept up with schoolwork here and there and on the side watched a lot of computer television. I was bored, more bored than I’d ever been in High School – something I didn’t even think was possible – and that had to stop. HAS to stop. When you want something, so much, you have to concentrate on it. You have to be willing to focus on it. To give everything you’ve got, and not take no for an answer. My way of avoiding that was having so many things that were half-accomplished that I could feel comfortable in knowing I was doing ‘something’. But I want to do SOMETHING – yes! In CAPITALS. Because it’s IMPORTANT.

And that starts with a CHOICE.

So let it be heard, from near and far, from mountains to valleys, from east to west, yaddayadda, that I choose writing. Narrative. Story-telling. That’s where I’m going to sit. That’s where I’m going to be. And the rest will just be the excess, the fun. But the writing will be me. What I’ll do. So here it goes.

Starting now, I try.

Starting now, I do.

A Lil Inspire-ation: Continuing to Conceptualizing?

In my last blog post I mentioned having a bad bout of chronic Conceptitis – and as a writer, this disease is a double edged blade. On one hand, I’m never short of inspiration; I have about a dozen potential stories locked away in my head and on journal pages, waiting to be written. But on the other, I’m constantly bouncing between ideas, between worlds, and between characters – this makes actually getting a project down and finished almost impossible, as I’m forever writing first chapters. Not good at all!

However, being a self-proclaimed optimist, I still like to think of it as a blessing. One of the worst things that can happen to a writer is being required to write another book, and managing to crank out a stinker under the pressure of the publisher  - I don’t like to see it in my favourite authors, and I’m terrified of it happening to me.

Because as hair-pulling-out irritating, as high-pitched-screaming frustrating, as laptop-smashing angry as Conceptitis can make us, being immune to developing further concepts is worse. Much worse. Because regardless of how many millions of dollars your first projects make you (or regardless of how many not millions of dollars they make you), you still aren’t a writer if you aren’t writing. You’re a published author. But not a writer.

But how do you do it? How do you create something out of nothing? I was talking to my friend about this the other day – she’s a fantastic budding writer, has a firm grasp on character building (with a strange ability to create characters so loveable that you’re always excited for the next word), and is my absolute FAVOURITE person to bounce ideas off of. When I’m developing plots, she knows when I’ve gone too far, she knows when I need to develop a little more, and, thankfully, she’s always willing to put up with my crazy perfectionism of sorting the concept into near-structural-completion. And yet, somehow, she doesn’t feel like she knows how to create her own concept. With all of that grounding in creating fictional worlds, conceptualizing is still intimidating.

So I thought, hm, how do I do it? What gives me the disease? What makes me love it? (And love it I do.)

And I wrote it out, just for fun.

STEP 1 ) FIND THE FEEL

The very first thing I do when i start developing a new concept is that I find something to inspire me – sometimes it’s a painting or image, sometimes it’s an object, sometimes it’s an event in time. When you look at, or read about, or think about that inspirational pin point, there’s a certain sort of feeling attached to it – that’s what makes it inspirational in the first place. And I try to capture that feeling. Get a hold on it. Know it. And once I have a good idea of what kind of emotional or mental interpretation of that inspiration I’m trying to create, then I move on to step 2.

STEP 2 ) FEED THE BEAST

Once I’ve got a grasp on the basics of what I’m intending – what I want to come out of the idea – I move on to populating the thought with actualities. If it’s a fantasy concept (as a great many of my concepts are), I begin to come up with names of places, do a little digging for their histories. Basically, you create a setting in which everything else can develop – nothing nitpicky, no details. For London Fog, it was working out the basic situations of all my characters, since it’s a character-based plot. For Close Your Eyes, it was creating connections between all the different countries, and knowing the political and magical structure of the world. Building the basics.

STEP 3 ) WIND THE WEB

Now that I’ve got a world (or the bare bones of a world), and a specific feel which that world coincides with, I’m ready to start developing some sort of story. Choose the basics – is it a character driven or plot driven? Character driven limits what you can do in this stage – which is, basically, jumping out of the conceptualizing process and into the character building process, since the plot consists purely of character relationships ebbing and flowing. For plot driven, though, it’s time to consider what kind of plot I’m interested in; personal change, quest, conspiracy theory, etc. Whatever fits best with the feel and world.

STEP 4 ) FILL THE BLANKS

This is where it all starts falling into place – and also where my approach probably won’t work for everyone. This is where I take a step back from the concept, look at it seriously, and figure out what it needs to work. What needs to be tweaked, what kind of character archetypes will be required to fill it out, and, should it require it, I do some serious worldbuilding. Then I fill out these: WHO WHAT WHEN WHERE WHY HOW. You’ll find that the last two are killer. You can apply them however you want to – I do it until I’ve reworked the story, setting and characters until they mesh perfectly with that initial feeling I had. Can’t say much more than that; this is abstract. It’s writing what you want to write. Which is, of course, the most important part.

STEP 5) START WRITING

I outline everything. I write a general plot, for the situation as a whole. I write a particular plot, that involves the characters. I write character summaries, character relationships. I make maps, I write summaries for settings. I create anything and everything I need to, know that any and all of it will be completely different by the time I’m halfway through the story. Because creating a concept is creating a basis, and in order to write something successful I need to have a feel for a story that I love – and everything that’s involved in that feel. And that’s where chapter one can start!

- – -

And that’s about it. Am I completely crazy? Maybe. But it’s a formula that keeps me happy, keeps me writing, and keeps me – always, ALWAYS keeps me – a little farther away from finishing my current projects. But I don’t mind. It’s the creation part I love.

I am, of course, thoroughly interested in hearing how other people conceptualize – since I’ve probably got the most dramatic plan for it out of every writer I know.