Recent content by Hallen

Don't do it unless it's really necessary for the character. Also, don't do accents, or if you do, do it very little so the reader gets the idea. A little grammar and a few phrases are usually enough to get the idea across, don-chya-know. Archaic language in what context? Is this an...

Yes, there are cliche romance plots. But, like most cliche, it's generally because they happen all the time. I think back to the dusty dark ages when I was in high school and I think they all happened. Love "triangles" (usually a girl who couldn't pick between two suitors), love at first sight...

Yep. Bear in mind that a novel is a melding of both character and plot. Literary novels have a tendency to be heavily character driven. The changes in the character drive the plot and the resolution of your novel. This is also true of romance. Speculative fiction, Fantasy, is generally (just...

I would typically use them in the context where the character actually said them. "Ugh, it really stinks in here," said Sheila as she wrinkled her nose. Verses, if the character did not use the sound as part of a comment. "Rooooaaarr. I'm going to kill you!" I would prefer something like...

The typical mentor is not only a character, but a literary device. It gives the author a way to provide info dumps without them seeming that way. Then, you have to make the mentor flawed, or unavailable, or something, so that the lessons are never quite fully imparted on our hero. This is so...

Most people have a fear of the "other". That fear is instinctually based in our genes because often the other was an enemy, or as a minimum, a competitor for scarce resources. It's natural to mistrust the other. (This doesn't meant that we can't rationally overcome this. It's also where...

It's fun to play with these types of ideas. Coming up with those things is one of the cool things about writing sci-fi / fantasy, isn't it? Pretty much everything is a variation of three different concepts. Really fast travel in real space. Warping space/time in order to allow traveling short...

I would concur. It is your book so write it the way you want. At the worst, when you are done, you'll know a heck of a lot more about it than you do now. And that's an important thing for a writer. I would add that it's the most challenging perspective to do well. I think a lot of people...

I think we all should strive to be fresh and engaging. I have no disagreement with that concept at all. It is challenging. And, in order to do so, yeah, you may want to stretch the bounds of your genre beyond what people would normally expect.

I would think that it depends on what you are promising. Are you saying that there will be swords and elves and dragons and sorcery in all fantasy novels? I did say that it was for marketing purposes. That is a way of categorizing, or labeling, a story for easier display and organizing. It...

If your story gets picked up by a publisher, they will help finding an artist to do the work. Almost nobody does their own maps. If you need a map, draw it. Don't spend time trying to make it cool. Make it functional to assist you in writing the story. The difficult part is having it make...

It depends on your story. If it's a secondary world story, then you probably need to do more. If it's an adaptation of our world, then you can do a bit less. In either case, you need enough to frame the story and to not cause roadblocks when writing. For example, if you are describing the layout...

A villain needs to be relatable. At some level, the reader should understand the motives. The character must behave constantly within their own goals. In order to do this, your villain should probably have some depth. A villain who is all evil, all the time is not only boring, it's lazy...

Genre is just a label. It's a label used to categorize, usually in very general terms, what your story is from a marketing standpoint. "Urban Fantasy" didn't exist when I was first reading fantasy. Neither did Steam Punk. Those labels came into being once enough authors had success with stories...

There's lots of interesting thoughts in the thread. I wouldn't really disagree with any of it. I do have my own thought on the subject of complexity. Plot is the mechanical structure you hang your story on. Just like the frame of a house -- there are a million ways to decorate making it a home...