Two Sides to Motivation

No, this is not a post on how to get yourself to meet your NaNoWriMo word count goals.  This isn't about "get your cursor moving" motivation at all.

This is about motivation within the story--motivating the characters as well as the plot.  First, a little background on what prompted this post.

I was reading (and generally enjoying) a pair of books from a particular series.  The first red flag came when a side character was killed and I felt nothing.  Maybe it happened too fast, maybe it was a failure to develop an emotional connection earlier ... or maybe it was because it "just kinda happened."  Moving on, the MC executed an impressive string of "just doing things" for no clear reason other than to conveniently get herself in trouble.  That's when I really started thinking about it and the failings of motivation.

Anyone who's tried to write a query letter has probably explored character motivation related to central conflict.  What does the MC want and what stands in his/her way?  My exploration has taken me from that macro level to the micro level of individual scenes and character actions or decisions.  I've concluded that there are two types of motivation.  I'm sure someone out there has more technical names for them, but this is how it's worked out in my mind.

Front-End Motivation
This is what triggers a character's actions.  Why does she do this?  Why does he react that way?  It stems from preceding events as well as the character's personality and values.  The trick here is to make sure our characters act and react in realistic and consistent ways, keeping them imperfect yet still believably human.  If a character's going to make an obviously poor choice, the reader should be able to buy into the reason.  Show the doubts or the willful rebellion, whatever it is that drives the decision.

Back-End Motivation
This is why an event/decision/development is worth including in the story.  A few random details for flavor are fine, but anything more substantial should have a reason for happening.  It may be the resolution of an earlier mini-conflict or the catalyst for something to happen later.  In essence, it's what keeps individual scenes connected.

Both types are necessary, and different scenes will have a different balance of front- and back-end.  I imagine few could be described as 50/50, but 5/95 (or 95/5) should be likewise rare.  What happens when the balance is weighted too far to one side--or worse, when one side of the motivation is missing?

Back-End with No Front:
This dilemma inspires the "Well, that's convenient" reaction in readers and seems to be at the root of my instigating experience--the MC who "just does stuff."  As authors, we know what we want to happen, so sometimes we force our characters to jump through hoops, just for the sake of making something work in the plot.

Front-End with No Back:
Scenes with this problem may come across as feeling random, tangential, or even indulgent.  I suspect it occurs more when a writer is trying to pad the word count, or perhaps when the plot isn't yet fully formed.  The characters do things that make sense given their personalities and prior events, but it doesn't really go anywhere.  I'd say it's nothing to be too afraid of in a first draft if you're a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pantser rather than a planner, but definitely something to watch out for in editing.

Neither Front Nor Back:
Sound the alarm and get thee a reality check, pronto!  Characters are reacting inconsistently and randomly, and the story is going nowhere.  At its most extreme, this isn't a story--it's words spewed onto a page.  Might be okay for a free-write to play with dialogue or characterization, but once you're in story mode, these things need to be reined in ... at least to a degree.


So, let your characters be human (even if they aren't human, SF/F writers).  People rarely do anything truly random.  At the same time, be judicious in choosing which human moments to include in your story, and be mindful of why you've chosen them.


  

Why Writers Should Be Masochists

Want to be a writer?  Prepare for pain.  The pain of sleep-deprivation, the pain of rejection, the pain of carpal tunnel syndrome, the pain of a good face-keyboard smack when things just aren't working ... all of this and more is likely in your future.

That's not entirely why I think a touch of masochism is a prerequisite, though.  Those things all come with the package, and we have to find ways to deal with them--like power naps and ergonomic office furniture.  The masochism comes in with the pain we (should) intentionally seek: the sting of constructive criticism.

Personally, I love getting feedback specifying certain aspects that aren't working for the reader, but that sting still pricks me now and then.  Still, I'd rather endure that minor pain than get a inbox-full of, "This is amazing and should be published right now!"  While the latter is nice for the ego, it doesn't actually help me improve, and even if I got a publishing contract tomorrow, I would always have room to grow.

A parallel:  In my day-job, an administrator observes my class a couple of times a year for evaluation.  I've yet to have an administrator with a math teaching background, so the fact I can teach calculus already impresses them.  More often than not, the feedback is something like, "You're doing great--keep it up!"  Once in a while they remark on a small item they can tell was more because they were in the room than anything else.  (My fingerspelling skill takes a nosedive when other adults are in the room ... definitely gotta work on that.)

I know I'm a good math teacher, but I also know I'm not perfect.  I can identify certain areas for improvement on my own, but for others, I could really use an outside observer to tell me if something works or not, or if I'm doing things I'm not aware of.

Same thing with writing.  If a reader isn't feeling my MC's emotion in a certain scene, I need to know.  If a particular section is boring, I need to know.  When those are areas I've worked on and think are great, finding out they might not work that well can hurt.  The biggest hurt is when someone clearly doesn't understand my intention.  Those are the moments I doubt myself, wondering if I have any idea what I'm doing, assuming my own failings led the reader to misconstrue the concept.  But I will still seek out those opinions, weigh them against each other and against my own instincts, and try to incorporate what I learn into making my writing better.

Turning it around, then, writers should not be sadists.  When we're offering critique, it's important to be honest--as noted above, glossing things over won't help anyone--but not intentionally cruel or derogatory.  Telling someone, "This sucks--you're never going to make it," is no more helpful than gushing why-isn't-this-published-yet praise.

Most importantly, we have to make sure we aren't such masochists that we lock ourselves into the editing/revising phase for eternity.  At some point, you have to decide that it's good enough to get out there and submit ... and ready yourself for those darts of rejection.

  

Learning from Fiction

There are lots of ways we learn through the written word.  Textbooks are the most obvious, though not always very effective in and of themselves.  Nonfiction books can be a great way to learn about almost anything you can imagine--cultures, history, technology, or just the lives of interesting people.

We can learn through novels as well.  Hard-working authors who do their research can infuse factual tidbits seamlessly into the plot, and we can learn through a character's choices and their evolution through the story.

It recently occurred to me that there's a key difference between the nonfiction and fiction approaches to learning, though.  Nonfiction generally sets out to teach--that's the whole point, to be informative.  In fiction done right--in my opinion--it's up to the reader to learn, and what they take from the story can vary.  The parallels they draw will depend on their own worldview and experiences, and that's what makes it so fun--that feeling of finding your own meaning.

What happens, however, when someone sets out to write a novel with the nonfiction writer's intention of teaching in mind?  Does it still work?  I'm not sure.  I haven't tried it myself.  Do you get a "moral of the story" or after-school special feel as a result?  If so, that could be a problem.  I can't speak for all teenagers, but my students are master cynics.  If they sense a story's been contrived to teach them something, brace for imminent eye-rolling.

Does it come down to ensuring Story trumps Message?  Is it more a matter of not talking down to your audience?  Or are those two related?  Something to think about as I dig through the latest YA works to find books to recommend to those charming cynics.

 

A Touch of Good News

A few good things that have happened lately:

• I made the "Literary Agent Showcase" round on WEbook's PageToFame contest.  (See, here's proof!)
• While we're talking about PageToFame, "Assumptions" made it out of the Shorts round.  (Still waiting to see what that means.)
• "Significantly Other" was published by Crossed Genres.  (Not bad for my first "serious" attempt at at a short story.)
• I survived IEP Intensive.  (Not related to writing, other than being the reason I couldn't do much writing for the past month.)

Otherwise, I'm still in the agent hunt, still working on Book #3, and jotting down some pre-writing notes for a brand-spanking-new idea.

I'm also counting the weeks until Thanksgiving break.  For the record, it's at five.

 

YA Work and the Big Bad

One of the basic elements of storytelling is conflict.  Most sources list between four and six main conflict types.

• Man vs. Self--the identity crisis
• Man vs. Man--"duke it out" (physically or otherwise)
• Man vs. Society--the rebellion
• Man vs. God/Fate--big-time underdog
• Man vs. Nature--the disaster scenario
• Man vs. Technology--"Good morning, Dave."

As I look at young adult novels (particularly the sci-fi/fantasy variety I'm so fond of), Man vs. Man is certainly common, as it seems to be across the spectrum of genres.  Harry Potter has Voldemort.  The Mortal Instruments has Valentine.  Twilight has an assortment of "non-vegetarian" vampires.  (What's with everything starting with V?)  Even The Hunger Games, which is more Man vs. Society, personifies society as a whole in a single antagonist, President Snow.

In general, there almost always seems to be a "bad guy."  That probably explains some feedback I got recently, suggesting I introduce a more significant antagonist sooner.  I'm still pondering it.

Does the YA formula require the presence of a Big Bad?  I conceived my story as a combination of Man (or in my case, Girl) vs. Self and vs. Society.  There are a couple of antagonists, but their role (in the first book, at least) is secondary to the main character's struggle with herself and the society she doesn't quite fit into.  Is this type of struggle enough?  I don't know yet.

I like to think that for teens in particular, Character vs. Self is something they can connect with.  After all, they're at that stage where we start to decide who we are--what we want to hold onto from our childhoods and how we want to expand into new things.

It seems to work for the teens I've had test-driving the story so far.  None of them have complained about the balance of internal and external conflict.  Perhaps that's all the answer I need.  Or then again, maybe I should be working to incorporate more external factors without losing the internal struggle.

Anyone have some good examples of YA books (particularly sci-fi or fantasy) with conflict that's less about fighting the embodiment of evil?  I'm sure I've read some, but I'm drawing blanks.  It would be interesting to look at how authors have successfully handled such a thing.

Playing with Covers: Part Two

Because I don't have enough to do (?), I started playing around with Photoshop on Thursday night.  Here's the result:

ETA: Went ahead and made a matching one for Echoes, too.

These just might be my favorites so far.  See the previous versions (fronts only) here.

I still haven't decided to self-publish, but it doesn't hurt to be prepared, right?

That Aristotle Guy

Oops, kind of a long stretch since the last post.  At first, there wasn't much to say.  Then there was, but it was more of the same (four fulls and a partial out at one point = more waiting).  Finally, it was getting back to the day job, where almost everyone on campus had to relocate due to renovations.

The inspiration for today's post comes from the day job, in fact.  We had a professional development day yesterday, most of which wouldn't interest any of you.  During a presentation on critical thinking skills, though, came a moment of epiphany ... and it wasn't while my colleagues and I were trying to build a tower out of marshmallows and toothpicks.

Our presenter includes some quotations on a few of her slides, and one particularly caught my attention:

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

-Aristotle

In addition to the implications for educating my little rabblerousers, it struck me as a nice summation of my philosophy on accepting critique.  You have to be able to entertain a thought, even unpleasant ones, without (necessarily) accepting it.  Once you entertain it, you can make that decision whether it has merit you should act on or not.

This is especially applicable to me recently, as three of my four fulls came back with rejections.  One was a form rejection, so there's nothing for me to take from it.  Another was a detailed message that felt like the agent just didn't get it--we all view things through our own lens, and hers seems to be polarized at a right angle to mine.  The third was a brief but personal message that raised an interesting question.

It's that last one that has me thinking the most.  Perhaps I'll expound on it in another post.  My book doesn't follow a certain part of the YA sci-fi/fantasy formula.  I know that, and in many ways it was my whole point.  So I'm trying to entertain the thought planted by that agent without accepting it, at the same time looking for what I can take from it.

Meanwhile, I'm forging ahead--working on Book Three, receiving good news on another front (see if you can spot it in my Twitter feed, post forthcoming), and wondering if I'm ever going to hear back from Agent #1.

Oh, and keeping up with the day job.


  

Audience ID

Know your audience.  Sounds simple enough.  It occurs to me that there are two types of audiences, though—the general audience that's likely to enjoy the book, and the narrower audience that's likely to think the book is the best ever.

At its broadest, my general audience is teenagers.  Throw in adults who like smart YA work, too, and there you go.  To get a little more specific, I think my novel appeals especially to girls who like math or science, and/or have a bit of tomboy in them.

While at Best Buy with my sister yesterday, I found a succinct description of the sub-population who would most enjoy my work:

Girls who bought StarCraft II

That's why we were there—for my sister to buy the brand-new game.  The cashier (female) asked if my sister was buying it for herself.  When we confirmed she was, the cashier said, "Finally! Another girl that plays!"

Those girls (or the ones that play their brother's/boyfriend's copy) are exactly the ones I wrote the story for.  It turns out other groups of people enjoy it, too, which thrills me.  But they're the ones I was aiming for.  That's my Audience ID, the quirk that puts them on just the right wavelength.

What's your Audience ID?  Something that on the surface may seem to have nothing to do with who they are as a "reader" but describes who they are in under five words.  Kind of tricky until you run into the right cashier.

While Waiting: Part 2

A few months ago, I posted a list of things to do while waiting on an agent.  Agent #1 still has the full, and now two more agents have it as well.  (My latest attempt at a query letter actually has legs!)  So, more waiting.  Here's what I have gotten/am getting done, and it's nice to see some of these are progressions from the first list.

• Finished Book 2 in the series and Book 3 is well underway.
• Wrote two "real" short stories that I'm working on submitting.
• Packed up my classroom to be relocated this fall when they renovate half our building.
• Helped my dad with yard work, woodworking projects, and whatever else he needed a slave for.
• Got elevated to Round 3 in WEbook's PageToFame system.
• Worked with my sister to design two covers, seen here (just for fun, and in case I end up self-pubbing).
• Hung out with my awesomely awesome friend for a weekend (rare treat since she now lives 2000 miles away).
• Read a lot of books (Darkest Powers trilogy, Mortal Instruments trilogy, first two books in The Hunger Games trilogy ... is Mockingjay out yet?)

A lot of that looks like work.  Here are some additions for the To Do list:

• Figure out how and when to get together with the inimitable T.L Tyson (in my country, hers, or another one altogether ... doesn't matter)
• Possibly find time to visit my cousin in Mississippi (though the humidity might scare me off)
• Plan a trip to Rochester, NY to visit the friend mentioned above, plus anyone else I knew back in grad school that's still there.

Hmm, all of that involves travel and interacting with humans outside of cyberspace.  That might be a clue.

Anyone else have fun ways of keeping your mind off the waiting game?

Playing with Covers

My siblings are graphically gifted, so when I needed a cover image for Authonomy, I turned to my sister.  After I finished the sequel, she decided to go a different direction for Fingerprints to mesh better with her take on Echoes.  We still have some thoughts about tweaking things.  Enjoy.

Original Fingerprints Cover

New Fingerprints Cover

Echoes Cover