Earlier this year, I joined a writing group comprise of a few of my neighbors. There's been a few projects that's reared itself in multiple iterations, but for various reasons, have been sidelined. All of these projects shared common themes and are inspired by some of the same people/events/memories.
This year, I'll be attempting one of these projects for NaNoWriMo. If you're interested in learning more, check out their website at www.nanowrimo.org. If you're interested in being my writing buddy, look me up! I'm julia0101.
I'm going to do all I can to give myself the best chances to accomplish NaNo this year. I'm taking a few days off of work as vacation days. Longer weekends means more time to stay up and write. I seem to get the most writing done in the super late evening and early morning hours. I'm giving myself rewards for hitting word count milestones. And I've signed up for yoga classes to give myself a scheduled mental break. One of the days when I'll be taking the classes is the morning of my vacation day - making sure I don't end up wasting the time.
The down side is always me not being able to spend a whole lot of time with friends while I do this. This year, it seems like my calendar cleared itself. Two of my closest friends are leaving for a trip to SE Asia. The hubby will be gone the first weekend of NaNo. If I don't have a decent word count after this weekend, I'll only have myself to blame. As usual, I fully expect to have plenty of time to work on the novel over Thanksgiving.
If you want to follow my progress, I'll be posting word counts on FB and Instagram (@jwmyles) and longer updates here. Cheer me on if you want to help. :)
Sunday, October 30, 2016
Tuesday, July 7, 2015
When the lines of fiction and fantasy are blurred
I had a hard time deciding where this post was going to reside - my personal, everyday life blog, or this one, that houses my experiences and insights on writing. It doesn't quite belong in one or the other, but it's relevant to both. It's an experience that struck a personal note, yet it deals with character development.
The Background:
I'm a player in a tabletop RPG group. For those who haven't heard of this before, we're basically a group of people going through a choose-your-own-adventure story where each person creates and then controls one character. The Game Master is responsible for bringing the setting and Non-player characters to life. (S)he is essentially the narrator of the story that is getting unveiled.
Our group is playing a Pathfinder game in the Inner Sea World setting. My experiences with Fantasy as a genre, and with D&D and Pathfinder specifically, is that the world settings tend to break from being historically influenced norm of gender roles and sexism. The Iconic characters - the hero characters the game developers created as examples - are super diverse. All ages, genders, and yes, even sexual orientations. You see females excelling in roles that would normally be filled by males - classes and roles defined by strength and martial skill. So in short, the game itself is inviting and inclusive
At the (game) table:
Now, players tend to draw inspiration from a myriad of other fantasy/sci fi works - be it a futuristic space westerns like Firefly, urban fantasy like the Dresden Files or the Anita Blake series, or classics like Lord of the Rings - when they create their characters.
For my character in this game, I drew on several characters I've seen in various fantasy and sci-fi. I created a character that was alluring and charming, who uses her upper class station, Elven exoticism, education, and beauty as weapons. And if those fail, her skill with enchantment magic will turn most most enemies her friend. Why engage in a sword fight when you can convince your opponent to merely lay down their weapons?
The character is working out the way I'd intended. She's a wizard, wielding magic with subtlety and grace, specializing in the kind of magic that makes people want to be her friend, friends who were more than willing to do a favor if she asks. She charmed a guard into giving her information; she charmed a pirate captain into giving the group passage on his ship to a place that was kinda on his way. She failed to magically charm a lord, but she managed to talk her way out of a sticky situation and turn it into an opportunity for a win-win.
Now, during the last few times when my character used magic to charm a person, she's also flirty. The DM questions how far I was willing to take the character ie. was she going to seduce a guy to get what she wants? The answer every time he'd asked was, "depends on how attractive the guy is." The character is open to sexual encounters, but she is selective. And she has means to dissuade pushy suitors. As it stands, the character hasn't done anything beyond flirting.
But the latest interaction from the group went like this:
Me: "I'm going to talk to some ship's captains, see if I can secure passage, possibly at a discount."
DM: "Are you going to charm him?"
Me: "Only if I really need to."
Player 1: "Man, she certainly gets around."
Player 2: "She's in heat again?! I thought elves' cycles were much longer since they live so long."
Player 3: [something quippy that I can't remember since I was getting mad.]
Me to player 1: "Wait a minute. Do you sleep with every stranger that you talk to? Why would you think I do?"
Player 1: (jokingly) "YES!" (laughs it off)
Somehow, we moved on from the topic, getting back to the game, but the experience was unsettling. Here were guys slut shaming (out of character) a character that have not initiated or accepted any kind of sexual relationship in the game. The only thing that is different about this character from my other characters is that she uses her beauty and charm as power in both a literal and metaphorical sense. She's exhibiting female power rather than pursuing a more acceptable, traditionally masculine form of power. In the other games, where my character becomes involved in a romantic relationships - (romance and love being an acceptable and chaste form of female sexual expression) - no one blinks an eye. (It's also possible that those players were way more mature.)
Now, one might be able to argue that the shaming, the derogatory comments, was aimed at my character, not at me. Here's the kicker. It's my character and I'm the driving force of my character's behavior, actions, and decisions. Slut shaming in general, is NOT ok, whether it's projected at a player and live person or a fictional character.
Now, is there a time when slut shaming serves a purpose? Yes. In Firefly, Malcom Reynolds slut shames Inara all the time, calling her a whore. However, in the setting, it is Inara that has the power. Her profession as a Companion is a legitimate one where she has power and control. They've established that Inara doing business with Mal and his crew if in their benefit as her station gives them legitimacy, a good cover for their less-than-lawful endeavors. When Mal slut shames Inara, the audience can see that his comments stem from a place of insecurity and jealousy coupled with a need to emotionally distance himself from her. Additionally, no one on his crew shares the same view. He's being jerk on purpose and everyone knows that his slut shaming comments are out of line. It serves a purpose in establishing how that setting is different than the world we know and it establishes context for their characters' relationship with each other.
Now, relating it to writing - there are few examples that I can remember of a "strong female character" or a powerful female protagonist that unshamefully uses her body and beauty as a powerful tool. More commonly, you see a "good strong female" character take on the mantles of power and leadership by being a warrior woman. The villainess is the one who is wicked; who shows her wickedness through her sensuality and sexuality. A seductress, a monster that exploits the weakness of men - their desire.
Some fantasy writers are overt. I believe in Wheel of Time, only women can wield magic without going insane. In Anne Bishop's Dark Jewels series, the setting is compelling because it's a Matriarchal society - queens wield the most powerful magic and ruled. But Bishop's setting in the series is intentionally subversive where darkness is good and light is considered evil, wicked, or weak. But in these series, power is literal.
So I'm posing this question to the rest of you - in your creative works, how much does gender play in pushing the story? How much does gender and sexuality influence power and the type of power in your setting?
The Background:
I'm a player in a tabletop RPG group. For those who haven't heard of this before, we're basically a group of people going through a choose-your-own-adventure story where each person creates and then controls one character. The Game Master is responsible for bringing the setting and Non-player characters to life. (S)he is essentially the narrator of the story that is getting unveiled.
Our group is playing a Pathfinder game in the Inner Sea World setting. My experiences with Fantasy as a genre, and with D&D and Pathfinder specifically, is that the world settings tend to break from being historically influenced norm of gender roles and sexism. The Iconic characters - the hero characters the game developers created as examples - are super diverse. All ages, genders, and yes, even sexual orientations. You see females excelling in roles that would normally be filled by males - classes and roles defined by strength and martial skill. So in short, the game itself is inviting and inclusive
At the (game) table:
Now, players tend to draw inspiration from a myriad of other fantasy/sci fi works - be it a futuristic space westerns like Firefly, urban fantasy like the Dresden Files or the Anita Blake series, or classics like Lord of the Rings - when they create their characters.
For my character in this game, I drew on several characters I've seen in various fantasy and sci-fi. I created a character that was alluring and charming, who uses her upper class station, Elven exoticism, education, and beauty as weapons. And if those fail, her skill with enchantment magic will turn most most enemies her friend. Why engage in a sword fight when you can convince your opponent to merely lay down their weapons?
The character is working out the way I'd intended. She's a wizard, wielding magic with subtlety and grace, specializing in the kind of magic that makes people want to be her friend, friends who were more than willing to do a favor if she asks. She charmed a guard into giving her information; she charmed a pirate captain into giving the group passage on his ship to a place that was kinda on his way. She failed to magically charm a lord, but she managed to talk her way out of a sticky situation and turn it into an opportunity for a win-win.
Now, during the last few times when my character used magic to charm a person, she's also flirty. The DM questions how far I was willing to take the character ie. was she going to seduce a guy to get what she wants? The answer every time he'd asked was, "depends on how attractive the guy is." The character is open to sexual encounters, but she is selective. And she has means to dissuade pushy suitors. As it stands, the character hasn't done anything beyond flirting.
But the latest interaction from the group went like this:
Me: "I'm going to talk to some ship's captains, see if I can secure passage, possibly at a discount."
DM: "Are you going to charm him?"
Me: "Only if I really need to."
Player 1: "Man, she certainly gets around."
Player 2: "She's in heat again?! I thought elves' cycles were much longer since they live so long."
Player 3: [something quippy that I can't remember since I was getting mad.]
Me to player 1: "Wait a minute. Do you sleep with every stranger that you talk to? Why would you think I do?"
Player 1: (jokingly) "YES!" (laughs it off)
Somehow, we moved on from the topic, getting back to the game, but the experience was unsettling. Here were guys slut shaming (out of character) a character that have not initiated or accepted any kind of sexual relationship in the game. The only thing that is different about this character from my other characters is that she uses her beauty and charm as power in both a literal and metaphorical sense. She's exhibiting female power rather than pursuing a more acceptable, traditionally masculine form of power. In the other games, where my character becomes involved in a romantic relationships - (romance and love being an acceptable and chaste form of female sexual expression) - no one blinks an eye. (It's also possible that those players were way more mature.)
Now, one might be able to argue that the shaming, the derogatory comments, was aimed at my character, not at me. Here's the kicker. It's my character and I'm the driving force of my character's behavior, actions, and decisions. Slut shaming in general, is NOT ok, whether it's projected at a player and live person or a fictional character.
Now, is there a time when slut shaming serves a purpose? Yes. In Firefly, Malcom Reynolds slut shames Inara all the time, calling her a whore. However, in the setting, it is Inara that has the power. Her profession as a Companion is a legitimate one where she has power and control. They've established that Inara doing business with Mal and his crew if in their benefit as her station gives them legitimacy, a good cover for their less-than-lawful endeavors. When Mal slut shames Inara, the audience can see that his comments stem from a place of insecurity and jealousy coupled with a need to emotionally distance himself from her. Additionally, no one on his crew shares the same view. He's being jerk on purpose and everyone knows that his slut shaming comments are out of line. It serves a purpose in establishing how that setting is different than the world we know and it establishes context for their characters' relationship with each other.
Now, relating it to writing - there are few examples that I can remember of a "strong female character" or a powerful female protagonist that unshamefully uses her body and beauty as a powerful tool. More commonly, you see a "good strong female" character take on the mantles of power and leadership by being a warrior woman. The villainess is the one who is wicked; who shows her wickedness through her sensuality and sexuality. A seductress, a monster that exploits the weakness of men - their desire.
Some fantasy writers are overt. I believe in Wheel of Time, only women can wield magic without going insane. In Anne Bishop's Dark Jewels series, the setting is compelling because it's a Matriarchal society - queens wield the most powerful magic and ruled. But Bishop's setting in the series is intentionally subversive where darkness is good and light is considered evil, wicked, or weak. But in these series, power is literal.
So I'm posing this question to the rest of you - in your creative works, how much does gender play in pushing the story? How much does gender and sexuality influence power and the type of power in your setting?
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