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Archive for the ‘Science fiction and fantasy’ Category

Taos Toolbox: What to Expect

Posted in Science fiction and fantasy, Uncategorized, Writing, tagged , , , , on November 30, 2010| 11 Comments »

I’ve had many people ask me about Taos Toolbox, the speculative fiction writer’s workshop I attended this past summer of 2010.  Here’s the scoop on what my experience was like.  Please note, however, that every year will inevitably be different, both in terms of participants, lectures, and details.

Taos Toolbox is a two-week residential workshop in the high mountains above Taos.  It is run by Walter Jon Williams, who teaches with one other writer (for my year, this was Nancy Kress, who will also be teaching in 2011).  During this time, each attendee has the chance to have two pieces critiqued.

My Taos Toolbox classmates

Pros of Taos Toolbox:

1. The shorter time (2 weeks) is easier to fit into life without massive restructuring.

2. Participants can work on either short stories OR novels.  Both lengths are addressed in lecture.  In my year, I’d say about two-thirds of the attendees presented the first section of a novel plus a synopsis for at least one of their two pieces.  However, I opted to turn in two different short stories and also received valuable feedback.  So there’s flexibility here.

3. Walter Jon Williams and Nancy Kress are both experienced writers AND teachers.  Not everyone who can write can teach, but these two certainly can.  I learned a great deal about many aspects of craft and business during my two weeks.

4. Because the two teachers are teaching together and present for each other’s lectures, that means you get two different views on many subjects.  Walter and Nancy are perfect for this because they don’t have the same writing process at all.

5. The location is gorgeous and secluded.  You really do feel like you’ve gotten away from it all.  But there was (in my year, at least) still internet and cell service, so you’re not completely cut off.

6. As with other workshops, by the end of the two weeks the group had really bonded and I now have many new wonderful writer friends.  We’re still regularly in touch both one-on-one via email and social media, and through our email list.  I see Danielle every few weeks for coffee.  We’re planning other writing and critiquing events and hang out at conventions.  We even read each other’s blogs (hi guys!)

Potential Downsides:

1. Yes, it’s a wee bit expensive.  But do remember that your fee covers the instruction and critiques from two top pros, most of your meals (except for a few dinners), and your lodging.  Personally, I felt like it was worth every penny.

2. The altitude can be a killer, so be warned.  In retrospect, I wish I had come a day earlier and slept in Albuquerque for a night to help my body adjust.

3. It’s intense and involves a lot of critiquing.  A lot. Happily I learned a lot from all the critiques, whether on my own or other people’s work.  However, if you are not comfortable receiving criticism, this might not be the workshop for you.

Format and Logistics:

Every weekday, we’d gather at 10am and usually meet until around 3 or 3:30pm, with a lunch break somewhere in the middle.  During this time, we’d listen to two lectures, one from each teacher, and go through that day’s critiques, Milford style.  Each student had a two-minute time limit on critique-giving, although Walter and Nancy could speak for as long as necessary.  We were also assigned various writing exercises.

Afterwards we’d have free time to write or critique.  Many people took advantage of the free time to go down to Taos for sundries or take hikes in the surrounding mountains.  There was also much hanging out, playing music (Rich brought his guitar), soaking in the hot tub, and movie watching.  (Walter does a plot breakdown of The Maltese Falcon that shouldn’t be missed.)  We were provided with three meals a day during the week, and everyone had their own room.

I will add that I was unsure if I was qualified enough to attend the workshop, being unpublished and never having attended other workshops in the past.  Obviously it worked out well for me, and I’d encourage you to apply if you’re interested and let Walter and Nancy decide if you’re at a level that could benefit from the instruction.

Topics of Instruction:

  • Cleaning up prose
  • Story and structure
  • Writing in scenes
  • Plotting (WJW and NK have fairly different approaches to this.)
  • Literary elements and rhetorical devices
  • Plotting elements and maintaining suspense
  • Narrative modes
  • Analysis of specific works
  • Opening Scenes
  • Writing description
  • Characterization
  • World building
  • Business and contracts
  • Commercial fiction, genre, and issues specifically relating to spec fic

I would say that overall, the greatest focus was on plot and structure (and related topics).

What I Learned:

Do I think my writing improved due to my Taos experience?  Yes, indeed.  One of my critique group members back at home even commented on the difference.  My understanding of the various elements of writing fiction has been deepened in a variety of big and subtle ways.  For example, when I arrived at Taos, I was relying on intuition and my experiences as a reader to work with plot.  It feels like I was fumbling around in the dark compared with how I think about plot now.  My awareness of some of my most pressing issues has been heightened, and I now have tools to deal with these weaknesses and to gradually improve my skills.  I’ve also become more comfortable experimenting with my writing, which I think will ultimately speed up my learning process.  Combine all of these writing lessons with the fabulous friends I made, and I think of my time at Taos as a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Final Note:

If you apply to Taos Toolbox before the end of the year, Walter is offering a discount on the cost of the workshop.  So if you’re interested, consider applying early.  Walter and Nancy are accepting applications for 2011 starting on December 1.

More questions about Taos Toolbox?  Please feel free to email me or ask away in the comments.

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Wasted Talent? I don’t think so.

Posted in Science fiction and fantasy, Writing, tagged , , , , , on November 4, 2010| 15 Comments »

I was flipping through the November issue of Locus a few days ago, ensconced on my couch and trying to get over an unpleasant cold, when I came across Gardener Dozois’s review of “Dream of the Arrow,” a mainstream story by Jay Lake that was in Subterranean’s Summer 2010 Issue.  Mr. Dozois says this story is:

…a story good enough to suggest that Lake’s talents may be wasted working in the genre, as he has the literary chops to make it as a significant mainstream author instead.”

Since I’ve become more educated in the field, I have grown accustomed to the speculative genre being dismissed and marginalized.  I had no idea of any such stigma before my decision to pursue writing seriously, in spite of spending nearly twenty years making a beeline to the science fiction section of any library or bookstore I happened to enter, but I’m certainly not arguing that it doesn’t exist.  Usually when I encounter such sentiments, I blink, shrug, and move on.

But I was actually shocked when I read the above quotation in Locus.  For those of you who aren’t deeply involved in the science fiction and fantasy community, Locus is the trade magazine of the field, and Mr. Dozois is a highly respected writer, editor, and anthologist in the field.  He’s won twenty Hugo awards for his work in professional editing, which should give you some idea of his stature.  And yet, even so, his comment seems to imply that genre writing is in some way not as inherently worthwhile as mainstream (aka literary) writing.

Let’s unpack this quote a little further, shall we?  If it were merely a question of suggesting that Lake might consider a career as a mainstream author due to his particular talent for it, I wouldn’t have paused.  I have no doubt Lake has the abilities to become a literary author if that’s what he wants to do (whether or not he would achieve critical acclaim for it is another question, but not one connected to his abilities as a writer).  There is also no discussion of the possible merits of Lake’s speculative novels being shelved in the general fiction shelves as have books by such crossover successes as Susanna Clarke, Isabel Allende, and Kazuo Ishiguro.

What we get instead is the idea that Lake is wasting his talents working in science fiction and fantasy, and with this idea, I must respectfully disagree.  As a reader, I want variety in my speculative fiction, and I want to read speculative books written by authors with literary chops.  I balk at the implication (perhaps unintended) that writers only work in the science fiction field because they don’t have the ability to do otherwise.  The last thing our field needs is internal ghettoization; we get enough flak from the outside.

I’m proud to be a science fiction and fantasy writer, and I don’t write in those genres because I think it’s easier.  For me personally, writing in the speculative genres is more difficult (world building, I’m looking at you).  I don’t feel the need to apologize for the kinds of stories, worlds, and structures I find interesting and compelling.

Now Lake, of course, can do whatever he wants.  An author makes the decision on what genre to write within based on any of a number of factors (financial gain, critical acclaim, artistic inspiration or satisfaction, etc.)  If Lake wishes to make the leap over into mainstream fiction, I would certainly support that decision (and really, it’s none of my business).  But if he spends his entire career writing in the speculative genres, I believe his creative contribution will be just as valuable.

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Not a Con Report, or Advice for the Convention Newbie

Posted in Science fiction and fantasy, Writing, tagged , , , , on November 2, 2010| 6 Comments »

Two years ago, I had no idea that science fiction and fantasy conventions existed.  I only had a vague sense of the beast known as “fandom” and I didn’t know what anyone was saying about any of the books I was or wasn’t reading.  When I imagined a writer’s life, it pretty much consisted of me in front of my computer screen typing.  And in fact, that is exactly what I did with my first novel.  I sat in front of my screen and typed.  I didn’t talk about it much, considering how all-consuming a project it was.

It wasn’t until after I completed my rough draft that I began to learn about the social side of writing.  I learned that I was supposed to attend these events called “conventions”.  And given that I had decided to throw all in on the writing dream this time around, I dutifully bought a plane ticket and headed out.  I had no idea what to expect.

A year and a half after that first convention (Wiscon 2009, for those keeping track), I pretty much do know what to expect.  And having just returned from World Fantasy and having the convention scene firmly in mind, I’m going to share what I’ve learned.

Go to panels. People will tell you they never go to panels because they’re too busy hanging out with friends in the bar.  Don’t feel bad about this.  Go to the panels that you find interesting.  You’ll probably find less of the panels interesting later on, since you’ll have already attended many of them, so take advantage of them now.  Someday you will know enough people that you too can spend the entire con at the bar.  The fact that you don’t magically know that many people after one day (or a couple of cons) doesn’t reflect negatively on you.

Corollary: when you do start spending all of your time hanging out at the bar, enjoy it to the fullest.  Sit at the bar with glee, before it too becomes old hat.

Find your people. At every convention and conference I’ve attended, I end up spending the most time with a few people who I think are the most awesome people ever.  They might be people you knew ahead of time, although they often aren’t (they’re often the people the people you knew ahead of time introduce you to, though).

Corollary: Try not to smother your people.  That’s why you’ll ideally need more than one.  This is another good reason to attend panels and readings, giving them space, and then you can catch up with them later.

Don’t be afraid to talk to people. I know, I know, if you are an introvert, this is the most painful thing ever.  But everyone else is also there to meet people, so most of them will be nice to you.  This is yet another good reason to attend the panels and readings, because then you’ll have an automatic topic for conversation if this sort of thing is hard for you.  Sometimes the best opportunities for talking come at in-between times: in the meeting room right after the panel ends, or when you’re waiting in line outside a reading that’s about to start, or when people are randomly hanging out in the halls.

Corollary: This doesn’t mean you’re allowed to be a stalking crazy-fan person.  The established authors, editors, and agents are there to work and see their colleagues whom they only get to see a few times a year.  You can talk to them, sure, but don’t be alarmed or surprised if they can’t talk for long.

Go to parties. No con experience is complete without shoving yourself into a hot, stinky party room, forever popular for the free booze and high skill level involved to actually hear a word anyone else is saying.  However, unless you absolutely cannot avoid it, don’t go alone.  This is a time to start out with your people (which is why you craftily gave them space earlier in the day while you were busy — you got it — attending panels).  Hopefully your people will introduce you to more people, or you can be especially bold and introduce yourself to more people.  This is, after all, the main purpose of parties (I know some people who would argue with me on this point, but I’m sticking to my guns).

Corollary:  Keep your expectations low: you are, after all, in a crowded noisy place where many of the people you are trying to talk to are sleep-deprived and intoxicated.    Or their feet hurt.  (This would be me.  If you’re ever talking to me at a con party, it’s almost a sure thing that my feet are killing me.)

Remember people. I wish I could tell you that you could count on others to remember you too, but the truth is, sometimes they won’t.  The onus falls on you to maintain the connection.  Most people being confronted with a smiling person saying “Oh, it’s so great to see you again!” will in fact pretend to remember you, thereby renewing the connection.  If you can help them out further by tactfully reminding them of where you’ve met before or referencing a previous conversation, all the better.  Business card exchanges can be helpful, but only if you’ve actually had a real conversation with the person.  Otherwise, they’ll just throw your card away.  Remembering names long enough to later add the person onto your social network of choice is also good (or remembering who introduced you, so you can look at their list of contacts to jog your memory).

Corollary:  People remember better when they’ve received multiple impressions of the same thing (or in this case, person).  Repeated short interactions over the course of a convention weekend can assist others in remembering you.  Also, after you attend a few conventions, you will begin to look familiar to the other regulars and they will think you’ve met even if you haven’t.  Then you can pretend to remember them instead of the other way around.

Every con is different. You’ll be in a different stage of your career, different people will be there, maybe this time you’ll know a ton more people because you just attended Clarion or joined an online workshop or whatever.  Or maybe everyone will want to talk to you because you just won a Nebula.  The trick is to be prepared to go with whatever opportunities might present themselves while remaining outwardly calm and gracious.

And there you have it, all the con-going wisdom I have gleaned in the last year and a half.  Questions?  Snark?  Completely different con experiences?   Comment and let me know.

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Silver Linings: Writing What You Know

Posted in Arts, Science fiction and fantasy, Writing, tagged , , on September 30, 2010| 3 Comments »

A fringe benefit of being a writer (or other artist, since this certainly applied to my songwriting and singing) is that everything that happens in your life can be recycled into your work later on.  And by everything, I mean the bad stuff.  I recycle the good stuff too, of course, but while that good stuff was happening, I probably wasn’t thinking, “Oh, this is character building and I can use it in a novel someday, which will make it worthwhile in end.”  I was probably just enjoying my happy moment.

No, it’s the repurposing of the bad stuff that is the real benefit.  I find it oddly comforting that when life throws something unpleasant my way, it might come in handy later for some character or plotline.  Of course, we’ve all heard the phrase “stranger than fiction”; one has to be careful not to stay too true to the actual facts for fear it will sound unbelievable (or be offensive to the involved parties) — I’ve personally had a story slip into the implausible from mirroring reality too closely, from which I learned that writing in too autobiographical a fashion can be a mistake.  But the feelings, those are a rich mine to draw upon, as are the general categories of experience.

Write what you know is the kind of writing advice that is misleadingly simple.  If writers literally only wrote what they knew, there would be precious few fantasy novels and no science fiction novels whatsoever.  Instead there would be a lot of boring novels in which nothing much happens and a lot of time is spent sleeping and doing chores and working in tiny increments towards the exciting goal.  I’ve never known anybody who was murdered, for example – does that mean I can’t write a murder mystery?  Plus, even when I do write what I know, sometimes I can’t remember all the details, at which point I’m still back to relying on Google to fill in the gaps.

But I think write what you know hides a deeper truth.   Maybe we should say instead: write what you feel.  Write what you believe in.  Write what matters to you.  Look deep inside and see what all that life stuff, good and bad, has left you with, and write about that.  Don’t shy away from the stuff that’s dark or scary or sad, because some of that will give your work the lasting resonance you’re looking for.  But don’t feel you have to look away from your streak of idealism or optimism, either.  It’s all material.

So I write a lot about death and mortality and family relationships.  At some point I’ll add in a dash of chronic pain and difficulty walking.  I also write about romantic relationships – usually in which something goes crashingly wrong (the story’s got to have a secondary conflict, after all), but once in awhile in which it goes wonderfully right … at least for awhile.  If I didn’t feel these things myself at some point in my life, I wouldn’t be half as convincing when writing about them.

And the stories that it kills me the most to write are the ones without happy endings.  Because fundamentally, I believe in the happy ending the most.  Or at least the silver lining ending.  Just as in life, in my narratives, I’m always searching for that silver lining that will make even the bad stuff worthwhile.

Ask yourself: what material has your life given to you?

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Fantasy Sidekicks: Results!

Posted in Polls, Science fiction and fantasy, tagged , , on August 6, 2010| 2 Comments »

The voting period for your favorite fantasy sidekick is over, and the winner is:

WILLOW from Buffy the Vampire Slayer!

Wicca Genius

Runner-up is Ingoya Montoya, from The Princess Bride.

Channelling through his father's sword

And because he’s cute, even though he only got one vote, I’m also gonna show you Pantalaimon:

I deliberately didn’t tell you who I voted for so I wouldn’t accidentally skew the vote.  However, being a huge Buffy fan, I did in fact vote for Willow, although it was a tough call for me between her, Inigo, and Hermione.  Willow is a tricky one because she had all those problems in season six that make her less than ideal as a sidekick, but when she’s at the top of her game, she’s kick ass enough that she almost crosses the line from sidekick to independent superhero in her own right.  For the win, she’s a character I wouldn’t mind being friends with, and honestly, workplace dynamics are important if you’re going to save the world every day.

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Fantasy sidekicks have their say

Posted in Polls, Science fiction and fantasy, tagged on July 30, 2010| 6 Comments »

I couldn’t let the science fiction sidekicks have all the fun.  Discerning readers may note certain biases on the part of the poll-taker. 🙂

Let the voting begin!  The poll will remain open for one week.

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SF Sidekicks: Results!

Posted in Polls, Science fiction and fantasy, tagged , , , on July 16, 2010| 3 Comments »

The poll is closed, and the winner is….

ZOE from Firefly!

And no, I’m sure that has absolutely nothing to do with this blogger’s stated preference for Zoe, but rather reflects the amazing taste of my readership.

Runner up: Spock

Which one do you like better, the old or new?  I think Leonard Nimoy is too classic to resist.

And, finally, neither Chewbacca nor his Spaceballs counterpart Barf got any votes.  Given that my private prediction was that Chewbacca would win (well, either Chewbacca or Spock), I feel just a little bit silly.  But here’s a photo anyway, mostly because I’ll take any excuse to post something Star Wars-related.

And that’s your bit of Friday silliness before the much-needed weekend.  Next week, I’m planning a series of posts on creativity, so stop on by!

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Getting Men

Posted in Science fiction and fantasy, Writing, tagged , , , on July 14, 2010| 25 Comments »

Mark Charan Newton recently wrote a blog post entitled “Getting Women”.  His provocative title caused me to click through and read what he had to say.  He talks about having awareness while writing female characters in fantasy, and how he improved at avoiding stereotypes and portraying more realistic female characters in his latest novel.  Having not read this novel, however, I am left without concrete examples of *how* he succeeded.  Hence my own post with a similarly eye-catching title.

I’m going to talk about a recent example from my writing life.  For one of my latest stories, I chose to write it in a first person male POV.  This is, in fact, the first time I’ve attempted such a thing in my writing.  I adore first person, but up until now, I have always chosen a female voice.  Part of this was because I felt more confident that I could get a female voice correct, and part of it, I’ll admit, was my desire to read more stories in the adult science fiction/fantasy genre told from the POV of a woman.  Write what you want to read, and all that.  (Interesting side note: At Taos Toolbox this year, we had six women students and eight male students.  For our first week submissions, we had ten mainly male POV stories/chapters and four female POVs.  All four female POVs were written by female students.  Food for thought, that.)

But for this particular story, I really wanted a male POV, and it had to be in first person.  I was somewhat apprehensive about giving it a try.  I decided, in order to avoid complete creative blockage, to not obsess too much about the “maleness” on my first draft.  I would do as I usually do and try to inhabit my character’s mind (similar to Method acting), but beyond that, I’d fix any voice problems in a later draft and rely on my writing group to catch the things I couldn’t catch myself.

My writing group critiqued the story last Friday, and I was surprised at how few issues of male vs. female voice they brought up.  There were a few, notably a mention of a “champagne pink silk dress” (apparently, men aren’t aware of the color champagne pink.  Who knew?)  But overall, only a few changes of that nature needed to be made.  So apparently my technique of trying to get into the head of my specific character, as opposed to thinking “what would a man say” every five words, worked out mostly okay this time.

Of course, I think what Mark might have been talking about in his blog post is the prevalence of female stereotypes in fantasy.  Fantasy readers get to see several cardboard classes of female character: bad-ass in leather, damsel in distress, someone’s wife/mother/daughter/sister who only exists to be angelic and pure or bad and slutty, or be rescued or to show our hero isn’t completely socially maladjusted.  The list goes on and on.

Here’s my question: can you think of any stereotyped male character types in fantasy that you find equally boring and/or offensive?  Comment below and let me know!

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Science fiction sidekicks going head to head!

Posted in Polls, Science fiction and fantasy, tagged , , , , on July 9, 2010| 9 Comments »

For my own amusement, feel free to explain why you chose who you chose or suggest a write-in candidate.

This poll will be open for voting for one week, so go ahead and weigh in!

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