June writing excuses episodes.

I suppose this should be May, but here is what I got from episode 10.22 of Writing Excuses.

Be careful with blending the real and the surreal. Caution is necessary because someone is guaranteed to call you out on it, though it may be accurate up until the fake point.

Walking the periphery could be a chance to see two sides of the fence and be honest to the people of your book.

Research and goals relationship
- reality could change the story and should if it's necessary.

The character of the magic.
-the can be a character.
-introducing be twists on magic could indicate magic is deeper and can enhance a story.
-what are the cultural aspects of the magic?
-having characters from different cultures interact with each other about magic could reignite the wonder.

Even in the final book in a series one must keep the tone the same and not change it in order to wrap up the series. It's gotta keep itself honest.

Anyone else care to share or discuss?

 

There are other shows earlier on that mention the different approaches to world building. I think they compared Sanderson, who is a fairly broad world builder, to Rothfuss who is fairly comprehensive. They mention that neither is better than another but that the Sandersonian (yes I made that up, no I won't not unmake it up) method allows for greater output than the Rothfussian (same as before) method. I think there is some truth to that. I mean compare Rothfuss's output to Sanderson's. Name of the Wind was published in 2007. (Wikipedia). Since then he's published one other book and nine other works. In that same time period Sanderson has published 17 books (including both his Cosmere Works and his YA/Children's books) and 15 other works. (Wikipedia) That totals 32 works. 32! In books Sanderson is 17 more prolific. And is 1.5 times more productive in short works. I think that indicates the short and "necessary" world building approach allows for more productivity.

I fall into the Sanderson camp. Sitting down and world building bores me too death. I hate it. I'd rather create characters and stories and do some back filling. Although, I do make exceptions for interesting ideas like my legal magic system, my Harry Potter thought experiment, and a couple of others ideas. However, after I use these world seeds I generally jump into character creation and create a story. Once there I can do some minimal world building that fits within the story and one degree of background information--meaning things that are not in the story but have direct effect on it. Sometimes I do two degrees--which is world building that may or may not be mentioned and has an indirect effect on the story--but this is rare. I never, at least anymore, do three degrees--things that may or may not ben mentioned that have almost no effect save to fill the world. If there is a mentioned third degree world building element it is a name and that is all I know about it. That makes fantasy writing more fun for me. This approach makes more sense to me.

Of course there are many different approaches, but I do enjoy the deep builders like Rothfuss, Tolkien, and others. In any event, I think with their approach they are also trying to help people avoid world builder's disease, which they have mentioned several times. But that is a topic for another forum and another day.

 

I don't think it's a false dichotomy at all. Pratchett took 30 some odd years to write those 41 books. And even still he is an outlier. Rothfuss, Martin, and Tolkien are three deep world builders. How many books have they written? Not a whole lot when you think about it. If Sanderson continues at his current pace he'll write around 60 or so books within 30 years. That, to me, is just insane. I think there is correlation to world building in this manner and amount of books one writes. This correlation is further strengthened when we consider that time is finite and if it's taken up by world building (or forum posts ) we're not writing a story.

Nevertheless I think the characterization they give of themselves is not as stark as it seems. I've been to a couple Sanderson functions. A lot of people ask world building questions and he has answered every single one of them, except one. They asked about some super extraneous detail, and it really was extraneous, to which he said that he never developed that. I think that characterization comes as a kind of frustration vent. Fantasy fans are fairly...nerdy and can be really detail oriented. They often focus on details and can get so fixated on the details that they have burning questions about really strange questions. So much so that they often get in arguments with the author about various points in a story. (See e.g. Rowling v. Fan. This is just one example, but this happens in more passive aggressive ways on fan sites and forums. I think when people ask questions like who was the general in battle x, which battle was mentioned only in passing by a character, I get their reaction.

 

I suppose we will have to agree to disagree on this one Mytho. In any event a new episode was posted today and here is what I got from it.

Tell me how to show

• Using the right proper words
o Emotion of the person describing the thing colors the way they are describing something

o Showing and telling needs to be a balance
o Showing can get in the way of the action
o Showing properly creates tension

o The length of a sentence can create a tone (short choppy sentences indicate a tone of action)

o Suddenly has the effect of delaying that which is sudden

o A character should focus on what you are introducing in the new paragraph

o When sitting down to write know who you are writing for so that you can tailor your prose accordingly

o You can use the POV characters descriptions to show their history and their culture, and standing within that culture

 

I have to agree with the showing notion that many modern writers do it a bit too much. However, I think showing a lot of motion at the beginning can be very, very helpful to a reader later. Especially with the character you are describing (Szeth). His actions, motivations, and magic are a bit mind bending, but having a lot of action first, even if it is a bit boggy, can pay dividends later when he and another person with similar powers get in a fight in book 2. That way the action is crisp, clean, and dang sexy.


****Also if you are behind in the month feel free to discuss whatever you want. Since the month is focuses on a single topic, more or less, anything is fair game at any time. Just make sure you let us know where it's coming from.*****