Characters

In regards to character descriptions

Posted by Aibird on July 9, 2017
Posted in: Characters, Feminism, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

A question asked in the Legendfire Writing Critique Forum I help moderate focused on clothing aspects of character descriptions. My reply on the thread expanded that to the wider viewpoint of how clothing and the overall outward presentation of a character can differ based on culture and ethnicity and/or race and influence how the character is perceived and treated. I thought I’d post this discussion here as well. (Caveat: I live in America, so this mostly discusses readers within America or Europe.)

There is a lot of diversity in outward appearance (including clothing, make-up, tattoos, and other outward presentations). How people choose to present themselves outwardly is based on their personality, their upbringing, their culture and/or religion, and their racial or ethnicity identity. When writing a protagonist who interacts with folks from varied cultures and ethnicities, the descriptions of outward appearance and/or how the protagonist reacts to other people’s outward appearances is a huge indicator of how biased or accepting the protagonist is toward that person or the person’s particular culture or religion.

As a caveat, I personally love the details for such things because it broadens the world-building, diversifies the characters, and makes them distinct. Without these details, characters tend to feel generic, like a blank slate, and the attempts at diversity falls short. These generic “let the reader imagine the character!” types of approaches fails to show the diversity with outward appearance and how this may affect the person’s movement (or freely or oppressed) within various cultures. Outward appearance also gives insight into the mental likes and dislikes, socioeconomic status, cultural norms, and even the person’s thought patterns and actions.

For example, the socioeconomic status of a person often differs in clothing — a rich business man can afford expense suits and may hold himself with a confidence that makes him stand out in the crowd. So, when writing about one, having a few details about the expensive suit and posture in context to others is more than enough to make it clear this dude is rich. On the other end, a poor person cannot afford such a suit, so they may have an outfit that is put together to look as nice as possible, but none of different components of the outfit are the same brand and some parts may be older and more worn. The poor person may not feel as confident and their posture or other gestures may give that away — that description reveals they are poorer than the businessman and gives insight into their internal sense of self.

This is just me being generic with social class alone. Think of all the other identities a person has outside of their socioeconomic class: gender identity, sexual orientation, ethnicity, religion, cultural heritage — all of these affect what people wear and how they present themselves and how they navigate society within the character’s plot and character arc.

Also, there is the problem that if you don’t describe an individual who isn’t a white person, then readers will default to imagining a white person. It’s a fairly well documented phenomenon.

Here’s a few links where folks discuss this frustration and provides evidence for this:

Neil Gaiman in particular brings up a great point. He described in Anasazi Boys a dinner characters had that was what Black people in the Caribbean would have eaten, and he did indeed describe race — as these were folks whose ethnicity was from the Caribbean. But he still got angry emails from folks angry that he got his research wrong and white southern folks actually eat this other food. The problem? These readers had imagined the characters as white and ignored their ethnicity entirely, and thus what the characters ate differed from what they imagined white people would eat in that same situation.

Yes, even if the writer did their research, folks still have a tendency to white-wash the characters despite details in the text proving otherwise. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ever describe such details. We can’t change this socialized aspect of society unless we make it more prevalent in our fiction. The more these descriptors make diversified people distinct, the more we challenge the white as default notion, the more likely we can alter how folks are socialized to see characters in literature.

In all honesty, if there are diverse characters in your stories, and you don’t describe a few details in a sentence or two to make the who they are clear — then often folks default to what is socialized as the default setting for humanity: white and white people traditions (traditions dependent on region). Sure, this is often unconscious judgement calls on the part of readers, but without slipping in these details in a seamless fashion, this unconscious bias never gets challenged, and a part of the story is lost.

Details about a character isn’t just outward appearance or personality clues either.

Culture is made up of lots of different elements that hugely influence folks lives: food, dialects, ways of greeting others, what behaviors are allowed to be seen in public without arising ire and retaliation (often called ‘norms’), rules of friendship (as in how intimate friendships can be without being considered a romantic relationship), specific restrictions on the gender or racial roles in a society, and other cultural/religious norms that influence how we act, often without our realizing it.

A lot of these cultural and/or religious norms/roles are socialized into us from a very young age, and we may not be fully aware of the bias these norms may create. It can take a lot of self-reflection and growth to undo these biases. As much as it affects all of us, it will definitely affect the character and how the character navigates through situations and various societies.

Common opposition to character descriptions is that too much description of a character’s outward appearance or cultural/religious heritage bogs down the story, and this is also simply not true. This isn’t an either/or conundrum. There are some books that do overdescribe, but there are other books that do it seamlessly, where the reader takes in the description and visualizes that character and doesn’t recognize it as “character description.”

It is essential for writers to understand that there are ways to slip in description seamlessly without it burdening down the story. Without these seamless descriptions of characters (as I have described above), the characters can run the danger of feeling barebones or just a placeholder. The world may not feel as vivid or as intimate. It can be a difficult balance when it comes to character descriptions, but it is possible to learn and practice this technique in a writer’s toolkit.

To see examples of how description of characters is woven seamlessly into stories, I highly, highly suggest reading anything by:

  • Nnedi Okorafor,
  • Neil Gaiman,
  • Julie Czerneda,
  • N.K. Jemisim,
  • Tamora Pierce,
  • Frank Herbert
  • Gabriel García Márquez
  • J.R.R. Tolkien
  • Nalo Hopkinsin

This is just to get you started as there are plenty more great writers out there that do seamless descriptions of characters. The one on the above list are writers who write either science fiction and/or fantasy. I suggested them because their use of character descriptions — outward and inward — are seamless and paints the character, scene movement, and character’s place in the world vividly.

Read with the eyes of a writer and take in how other writers handle these issues. See how it can be applied to your own writing, and be willing to read beyond your comfort zone and comfort your own possible biases. I provided a list of authors from a wide variety of backgrounds on purpose to assist in this process. And to be honest, this is something I do often when I read, because it is through this process I can learn more techniques for my writer’s toolkit and better hone my own unique style.

What are other writer’s thoughts?

Characterization: The Template

Posted by Aibird on October 5, 2016
Posted in: Characters, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

I have a fairly robust character template that I keep regularly updated as I progress through my novels. Character aren’t static, and they do change over time, so I have a section in my template that covers character growth.

I try to dig deeply into the psyche of my characters as well as their past and what influences them throughout the story. This helps me get inside their heads, so I can write believable, interesting, and dynamic characters.  My goal is to go through the sections of this template in further detail in a different post, but for now, I’ll leave this template up for folks to peruse.

Here are two versions of the template for those that are interested in character design:

Character Design Template as a Word Document

Character Design Template

A Primer on Writing Trans Characters

Posted by Aibird on June 13, 2016
Posted in: Books, Characters, World Building, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , . 2 Comments

Introduction

A question I’m commonly asked is: how does one write a trans character? I also get asked this question in regards to writing gay, lesbian, or bisexual characters, and/or how to write a person of color. There is a lot of overlap in these questions since a person can have a variety of skin colors, and that same person can also be trans or cisgender as well as gay, lesbian, bi, asexual, or straight; therefore, some of the articles I will link offer excellent advice on writing people of different skin tones and ethnicity as well as different genders and sexualities.

In this primer, I will focus primarily on gender identity. I will provide some common definitions, how to worldbuild with trans characters in mind, things to keep in mind when designing a trans character, and steps you can follow when writing trans characters’ stories. I will also have a list of resources at the end of this article for further reading.

How to use the guide

Think about the setting of your story and the characters you wish to create. For writers whose settings are real locations in current or historical time periods of Earth, you may not need to go through the worldbuild section. Instead, you can research how gender is perceived and how people are treated within your chosen location and time period, then go straight to the Designing Your Character section. For example, if your setting is 1800s Ireland, then do some research to see what it was like for men and women in that time period, then go straight to the Designing Your Character section of this primer. If you are writing an alternate Earth history, then you may find the content of the worldbuild section helpful. If you are creating your own science fiction or fantasy universe, I highly recommend going through the entire primer and not skipping any section in order to assist you in deepening your understanding of your world and characters.

Important Things to Keep in Mind

Trans people are a diverse group, so I will cover a few of the most common gender identities. Trans women were assigned male at birth but are women. Trans men were assigned female at birth but are men. There are also non-binary people, who could be assigned either male or female at birth and may use various identifiers such as genderqueer, neutrois, agender, and others. Although some intersex people are trans, not all trans people are intersex. You can view the transgender language primer link I provided in the definitions section to read more about the various terms and identities.

The gender identity of a trans person is real, and it is important to respect their pronouns, to use their chosen name, and to not out them without their permission. When talking about transgender people before they transition, it is important to  use their current pronouns unless specified otherwise by that individual; do not use the sex assigned at birth pronouns.  Also, avoid the use of their “deadname,” which is the name they were given at birth but is not their chosen name. Even if discussing their life before transition, it is still better to not use their deadname unless they give permission. When writing the character’s story, seriously consider whether it is even necessary to provide the dead name ever. In most cases, it will not be relevant to the plot.

Why is this important? Because trans people exist, and representation really does matter. In this essay by a transgender woman, she discusses the power of representation and the tragic tropes people often use when writing transgender characters. Negative portrayals that show us as comedic relief or as a villain only serve to perpetuate the stereotype that we are not serious (or real) or that we are dangerous, which can also cause tremendous harm — trans people, due to discrimination and rejection of who they are by today’s society and sometimes their family and friends, already have high suicide rates and rates of being murdered for who they are. Negative portrayals can aggravate those rates by perpetuating harmful myths, which can lead to increased harassment, lack of acceptance, and other harmful behaviors perpetuated against trans people.

Tragic portrayals done respectfully can be important in showing how society treats trans people today and gather sympathy for trans people. However, in our current culture (in America where I live), most of the stories I see of trans folks are tragic portrayals. Having an overabundance of tragic portrayals is exhausting to a trans person, who already faces discrimination and injustice and makes it hard to hold out hope for positive change in society’s treatment of us. At this point, I am desperate to read anything but a tragic and/or negative portrayal, so that I can enjoy seeing a trans person flourish and thrive rather than wither and die.

Positive portrayals provide hope for the future and shows people that trans people can do awesome things too, where trans people are shown as human beings just like everyone else and that we are just as worthy of rights and respect as a cisgender person. It’s important to think about how we portray characters, especially if you wish to write a trans character respectfully. We often underestimate the influence literature, video games, movies, TV shows, and other media can have on our perceptions of others and ourselves.

This isn’t to say you can’t have trans people as villains, comedic relief, or have them experience great tragedy and/or death. But if that is the only portrayal of trans people you have in your stories, then there is a problem. Trans people can be heroes as well — diversity in representation such as providing balanced portrayals is also important. Let trans people be heroes, and let them experience interesting story lines that aren’t only about their gender identity. Think about all the diverse portrayals of straight, cisgender people, then consider how, with some alterations here and there, you could give a trans person similar diverse roles in stories.

Diversity can help to deepen your worlds and stories. Diversity can also provide you with more opportunities for conflict, character growth, and societal change, which can give you even more ideas for future stories. Writing diverse characters and diverse story arcs also challenges us to learn more about people not like us; this can increase our ability to emphasize with others, helps us reconcile diverse worldviews, become more accepting of other people, and pushes us to challenge any biases we have that may be holding us back as writers and as people. Writing diverse characters can be a fun and interesting journey, but it will require you to do some research, but then as writers, we should all be used to research by now!

In order to start our journey, it is important to understand the terms we will be using. I have provided a short list of terms, but I included a resource for a more comprehensive list of terms that you may encounter as you research and explore the transgender community.

Definitions of Terms

Gender identity means a person’s internal sense of what their gender is. Some describe it as their brain’s gender. The person’s gender identity may or may not align with the sex assigned at birth.

Sexual orientation denotes who a person is attracted to. Gender identity and sexual orientation are not the same thing. A trans person can be any sexuality.

Sex assigned at birth means that at birth the doctor looked at the baby’s genitalia and labeled them as either male or female (rarely if ever is any other test used to determine sex). (Note: if the genitalia is ambiguous due to various Intersex conditions, the doctor may do surgery without permission to force the baby into either male or female. This is a common practice in America.)

Cisgender means people whose gender aligns with the sex assigned at birth, i.e., they are not trans.

Transgender means people whose gender does not align with the sex assigned at birth. This is often shortened to simply trans. A transgender person can be a woman, man, neither, or an third gender altogether. Trans people may or may not experience gender dysphoria, and they may or may not decide to physically and socially transition. Again, there is a lot of diversity within the trans community.

Non-binary denotes a person who does not identify within the male/female binary. Non-binary people fall under the transgender umbrella, although not all may identify with the term trans. See the Transgender Language Primer for definitions of various non-binary identities.

Gender Expression denotes the external appearance of one’s gender identity, usually expressed through behavior, clothing, haircut or voice. A person’s gender expression may or may not conform to society’s gender norms.

Transition denotes the process a person may undergo in order to align their body and/or their gender expression with their gender identity. Physical transition may or may not involve hormone therapy, various surgeries, and voice training. Social transition involves changing how a person expresses their gender and may or may not include changing their behavior, clothing, haircut, or voice.

Gender Norms denotes society’s rules, expectations, and roles that define for each gender a set of behaviors, gender expressions, characteristics, and roles. Norms often include how society enforces these roles, expectations, and rules.

Gender Roles denotes society’s expectations for each gender in regards to the familial, workplace, and social positions within society as well as the characteristics and traits society associates with each gender.

Socialization is a sociological term that refers “to the lifelong process of inheriting and disseminating norms, customs, values and ideologies, providing an individual with the skills and habits necessary for participating within their own society.” (Definition from wikipedia).

For a comprehensive list of terms and definitions, please see this lovely list: Transgender Language Primer

Worldbuilding

I have an extensive list of resources and articles I have written regarding worldbuilding. You can view that here.  In this section, I will explore how gender can influence society (such as the culture of your country and/or planet). When you engage in worldbuilding and/or designing your characters, many different influences from society, language, and history can increase the complexity of your character’s journey, of how characters interact with each other, and of your plot lines. I have provided some questions for writers to consider:

  • How many genders does your society and/or country have? Some cultures on Earth have up to five genders. In fact, biology is showing more and more that even humanity is not as simplistic as having just two sexes. Think of gender as your identity that is within your brain. Your sex is related to your biological make-up such as secondary sex characteristics or chromosomes; however, studies show that using sex to determine gender is not always reliable. Also, there is some evidence that one person could technically have cells with very different chromosomes. The point here is to show that even gender can be incredibly diverse.
  • Is gender neutral pronouns common in your society? What types of pronouns does your society’s language have?
    • As a side note: In American society, gender neutral pronouns are rare, but people are slowing changing the language over time by using gender neutral pronouns within written and spoken works/discussion.  There are many languages in the world where there is multiple gender neutral pronouns or the language may not have any gendered pronouns at all. (Finnish is an example of a language that doesn’t have gendered pronouns (or nouns) like what we see in English.) Remember language also affects how people perceive others, and languages are not static. If a language doesn’t have gender neutral pronouns, this can change if enough people use gender-neutral pronouns, which is how languages evolve — folks changing how words are used over time.
  • How does your society treat each gender? Is one considered “better” or “stronger” or “more intelligent” or “more simplistic” than the other? How is gender perceived and experienced within your culture? What are the gender  roles? This leads into my next question about gender norms (rules or expectations enforced by society).
  • Has the treatment of each gender changed over time? Was some genders treated differently in the past? How did that change over time?
  • What rules and/or expectations does your society enforce for various genders? This can manifest in various ways (this list is just to get you started):
    • What types of employment are accessible to what genders?
    • In what ways are people of each gender typically presented in the media/entertainment, educational, and/or political discussions?
    • How do people view the body (as in are there specific body parts that society labels is for one gender only?)
    • How people view sex (as in how is consent taught? Is specific sex acts considered belonging to one gender only? Is one gender presented as more dominant in sex than the other genders?)
    • What clothing is taboo (or allowed) for each gender?
    • What types of physical or psychological characteristics are associated with each gender?
    • How are people of certain genders treated in public?
    • What actions a person of a specific is allowed to do in public and what is considered taboo?
    • Is one gender considered better than another gender and how this power differential is enforced?
    • If people transgress the gender norms, how does society punish them (if society punishes them at all)?
      • (For example, in America, if a man (cisgender or trans) acts too feminine, other guys may beat him up, insult him, abuse him, and/or demote him until he acts the way society states a “man” should act. In some extreme cases, the man could be killed. Or if a woman (cisgender or trans) acts too manly in America, she can be dehumanized, abused, raped, verbally harassed, insulted, and/or demoted until she acts the way society states a “woman” should act. Again, in extreme cases, the woman could be killed. Also, note that this enforcement is even more harsh for trans people in America, especially if they do not “pass” as a cisgender person. Many trans people, especially non-passing and non-binary people, are often seen as “transgressing” the gender norms, and so they experience harassment, abuse, destruction of their property, loss of jobs or denied jobs, loss of or denied housing, loss of rights, unable to access public services, etc. In some cases, they may be driven to suicide or are murdered.)

When you think about gender norms and their enforcement, think about socialization. This can be a complex topic, so reading sociological theory on socialization may be useful. How we are socialized by society today may not be how people in the past were socialized, as socialization of norms is changeable over time. Think of it this way. You know how we are socialized to think pink is feminine and blue is masculine? At the end of the 1800s and early 1900s, blue was actually considered feminine. Things like this can change depending on time period and culture.

For example, in American culture, guys are supposed to be tough and show little emotion, and masculinity is associated with power, sexual prowess, and violence. Femininity in America is often associated with being overly emotional, not smart enough, weak, or bossy. However, in some societies on Earth, the masculine person is expected to show more emotion than the feminine person and their gender roles are polar opposite of how gender roles are perceived in America.  These socialized perceptions and gender norms have an impact on how people are perceived and treated. And all of what I’ve discussed thus far? That’s all learned behaviors and perceptions. I bring this up because I want writers to think outside the box. To avoid having these biases and/or socialized perceptions color your world-building.

The Sociological Images page does a good job of breaking down how a society enforces and perpetuates its norms. Also see their “for instructors page” as it has a lot of good resources for learning more about sociology and societal norms.

Designing Your Characters

Now that you understand the backdrop of your world in regards to gender, think about your character and how they inhabit that space. By understanding the environment, space, history, and personality of your character, you can develop intriguing story lines that move beyond stereotypes. Although there is a time and place for stories about the act of transitioning, there’s also much to be said about giving your trans character different types of story-arcs. You don’t have to make their entire plot line about them being trans or about their transition. Remember, trans people are very diverse, exist in all sorts of professions, and there’s more to them than just their gender identity. Their gender identity is only one facet of who they are. Also, recognize that a trans person can be any sexuality — gender identity and a person’s sexuality are not the same thing, so a trans person can be straight, bisexual, gay, lesbian, asexual, or pansexual.

The following questions can help you better understand your character and the space around them, so when you write, you can include little details that add depth to their story-arcs and their interactions with other characters and societal systems.

  • How does the character navigate their society? (Is there roadblocks that prevent them from accessing certain opportunities or areas of society? Are their laws that prohibit their movement or restrict their rights? Do they have laws that guarantee their rights? Is society accepting of them or not? How do they react to these things? What is their opinion on the state of society?)
  • How does the character get through a day? (As in how to people respond to the character’s existence? Is it positive, negative, and/or neutral? Do they feel safe going about their day?)
  • Does the character encounter discrimination? How do they deal with discrimination? (Is there legal recourse for them? Programs or resources to help them access healthcare, employment, education, basic needs requirements, etc…)
  • What sort of movements exist that challenge the society’s gender norms? Or is your society accepting enough that there is no need for such movements? Is your character connected with such movements and what do they think of them?
  • How does your character experience gender? Do they have dysphoria? Will they transition physically or socially? Or are there roadblocks that prevent their transition? How do they react to society’s view of people like them?
  • What does your character like to do? Hobbies? Work?
  • What is your character’s spirituality or belief system? How does that influence their behaviors and thoughts?
  • What is your character’s worldview — how do they perceive their place in society? What do they feel about some of society’s laws or expectations? What sort of political theory to they adhere to?
  • Where did your character grow up and what was their childhood like? How does events from their childhood influence them today? What lessons did they learn during their childhood in regards to life, society, and their view of  themselves?
  • What is their family like? How many siblings do they have? What are their parents like? Does their family accept their gender identity?
  • What is your character’s sexuality? Have they dated anyone in the past, and if so, why did the relationship end? Are they interested in dating anyone? Are they in a relationship?
  • If in a relationship, did your character marry the person or not? Why? Do they have kids?  What are their kids like? Do they have any pets?
  • Who are your character’s friends? Why did they choose those friends? How did they meet? How deep are the friendships?
  • Is there anyone your character really dislikes? Why do they dislike them?
  • What was their education like? What did they study? Why did they decide to study that particular subject(s)?
  • What type of employment does the character have? Why did they choose to apply for that job? Or were they forced into that job due to societal norms or family pressure?
  • What is a typical day in the life of your character? (Think of a day before the big events of your story changes their life forever.)

For a longer list of character questions, see this thread on Legendfire Writing Forums.

Do not be afraid to use gender-neutral pronouns if there are characters who are of a third or fourth gender (or no gender). You can even meld the gender neutral pronouns into the society of your character’s world by making it a commonplace and/or important to the culture. When integrated into the setting (world) and characters, gender neutral pronouns will seem essential and not jarring to readers. For example, in science fiction, writers will use a variety of techniques to denote people (or aliens) of genders outside of the male/female binary:

  • Writers may use actual gender neutral pronouns such as ve/vir/vis (Alastair Reynolds has a character who uses these pronouns in one of his novels).
  • Or they may use a pronoun native to the language of the character (common with stories that have aliens in it like the Xenogenesis trilogy, where the aliens denote their third gender as just ooloi, or in Julie Czerneda’s works where it is a word native to the alien language).
  • Another approach involves writers using humanity’s tendency to stereotype and denote things by human’s norms. In this case, humans may decide to use only one pronoun for the entire alien species.  (The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin does this, where the human observer denotes all of the people on Winter as “he.” Ann Leckie does this in Ancillary Justice, where humans denote everyone within the alien species as “she.”) As a caveat: this particular approach may be useful for aliens and human stories, but I find this approach to be limiting and somewhat troublesome when used for non-binary characters (human or not).

 

Writing the story

Writing the story can often seem daunting, especially to people who are uncertain if they can portray trans characters well. I’ll tackle the steps to take in a bit, but first let’s discuss ways of writing the story your characters inhabit.

Once you have designed your characters, be willing to place them in diverse roles within your stories. You can make them the hero, the antagonist, an important side character, or peripheral characters that influence the plot in minor ways. It only takes a sentence or two to establish that they are trans. This can be done through a conversation the characters have, how other people interact or react to your character (such as microaggressions), the character’s inner thoughts about society and what they experience, or through well-worded descriptive details. The best way to explore how to do this is by reading books that feature trans people. Or think about how trans people may discuss being trans to other people — sometimes it comes up naturally in conversation. I will include a list of books to try at the end of this primer for you to explore how others have written trans characters.

For an example, I will use myself. A few days ago, some friends were sharing experiences of harassment (namely cat-callers). As a trans person who was assigned female at birth, I have experiences with this from when I was not yet out and was still perceived as a woman by nearly everyone. Since I was with friends, I joined the conversation by saying, “I get that. Before I came out or even considered transition, I experienced that too. I remember this one time…” Another example was when I was with friends on a hot day. I made the comment: “Ugh, I hate that feeling of sweat inside the binder. I’m totally going to take a nice shower when I get home.” My friends then shared their own discomfort with the heat, we laughed about it, and the topic changed to something else. In both these instances, my sharing of my trans part of my identity was brief and not the focus, but in both instances I felt comfortable and safe enough to share my experience.

By reading and listening to trans people’s stories and experiences, you can compile all sorts of ways to slip in details that the character is trans, where it may or may not be crucial to the plot but it is another interesting detail that develops the character further.

Here is a wonderful example of a writer doing a good job in creating a trans character. In Dragon Age Inquistion, there is a character who is trans, and the main indicator is some dialogue where the character mentions that they bind. Here is a blog post of how the writers and developers of Dragon Age Inquistion researched the subject and implemented the character in a respectful way: Building a Character: Cremisius “Krem” Aclassi. This article also shows the steps involved in writing a trans character well:

  1. Research and lots of it. Best way to do this is to listen to the stories of trans people. Read about their lives and read stories by them. Read up on definitions and concepts pertaining to trans people and the issues they face.
  2. Look for roles trans people can have in your stories — try for diverse roles in a variety of professions, and try to avoid making their story-arc just about the fact they are trans. Trans people are just as interesting and complex as cisgender people. Trans people can be any profession, any sexuality, any ethnicity or race, any socioeconomic position. Diversify!
  3. After you write your story, look for beta readers who are trans, and ask for their critiques. Listen to their constructive feedback on how to improve, and don’t feel defeated or sad if their reaction is less than stellar. Learn from your mistakes, fix any errors, and keep doing your best to diversify your characters. The best way to write diverse characters is by trying, learning from the experience, and trying again when you mess up.
  4. Understand that no matter how hard you try, some folks will love what you write and other people may not. As long as you do your best to write trans characters respectfully, that’s what’s important.

Remember, you don’t have to be a trans person in order to include trans characters! Writing trans characters may seem hard at first, but I challenge you to try anyway. Realize that trans people are just like you, and by writing about them, you can not only better understand trans people but also grow as a person and a writer. If you have any questions or want to see certain sections covered in further detail, feel free to drop me a note, and I’ll see what I can do.

Resources:

Legendfire Writing Forum Thread discussing how to write trans characters.

The Gender Book is a good 101 primer about trans people and issues they face. I highly recommend starting here.

Tips on writing trans characters (article published at Strange Horizons).

An article published on SFWA that provides tips on writing characters of different races and/or ethnicities. A lot of the advice is applicable to trans characters as well.

An article published on Walrus called Rise of the Gender Novel. It discusses how trans people are portrayed in literature.

Kat Blaque’s Advice on How to Write Transgender Characters (a YouTube video):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3fbvOX8Zh4 (I highly recommend this resource. Kat Blaque is a trans woman, who does a wonderful job offering tips on writing trans characters well.)

Lists of books with a trans protagonist:

Writing Process: An Update

Posted by Aibird on June 5, 2016
Posted in: Characters, Elivera, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , . 1 Comment

Update on The Dragios Twins Trilogy

Book 1: The Lost Ones

A few weeks ago, my editor returned my book to me with some excellent edits and suggestions. She noted areas where I needed more precise and descriptive words, areas where believability was an issue, characters who weren’t as strongly painted as other characters, suggestions on how to reword convoluted sentences, and other mistakes that I had missed. Objective eyes really can help polish a book, because a lot of these issues I hadn’t noticed. Although I had spent many weeks scouring it for mistakes, being that entangled with the novel, my brain tended to fix things for me as I read through the pages. Sometimes an objective pair of eyes can ferret out easy to miss problems because their brain isn’t automatically fixing it for them; for the editor, this book is new to them, the material fresh, so they don’t have the history of the story’s evolution like I do, and are able to see problems as they are. I highly recommend all writers find a professional editor to review their work. It really does help.

What’s the next stage? Researching legitimate agents, writing query letters, and submitting queries. I have a few potential agents picked out, but now I have to research their submission process and make sure I abide by it. I also need to try to write my queries  so that I sell myself and yet also sound succinct and professional. This is a hard balance, and it’s been stressing me out. This is the part of the writing process I hate the most.

Book 2: The Experiments (or The Found ones)

I have started the second book in this trilogy and am near the quarter point of 25,000 words. The first book is more of a mystery in which the characters try to understand what is happening to them and why by seeking out clues. In the second book, the characters understand what is happening and are now fighting to save each other from dangerous situations. They know what they need to do, but doing the actions are proving difficult. So the second book has a lot more action and fighting scenes.

The theme of the second book is tied up in the theme of the first book: empathy, seeking truth, and conflict resolution.

Analysis of my Character’s Journeys

I tried hard to avoid any spoilers in the following analysis.

Kia

Kia’s journey starts with her in a healthy place in life. She has conquered cancer, emotionally fairly healthy, and has regained some of her strength. She strongly believes in equality and civil rights, and fights against xenophobic attitudes within her classmates behavior, especially if they direct it at Kate. She’s a fighter to the core but also loyal to those she loves. In the second book, these qualities are put to the test to a high degree.

In The Lost Ones, Kia is kidnapped and placed in a terrifying new world that she doesn’t understand – the only similarity between her new world and her old is pain. She understands pain very well due to her cancer and due to fighting against discrimination. By the end of the first book, Kia and Kate come to understand who Kia’s captors are, but their motives are still obscured by a language barrier. In the second book, Kia struggles with anger and a growing hatred of her captors and their actions. She starts to distrust anyone who looks like her captors, and in doing so, she starts to judge everyone within that species as bad — discounting the good ones that are actually her allies. Her distrust and growing hatred of her captors puts her in danger of becoming the xenophobic person she had fought so hard against at the start of The Lost Ones.

The climax of the second book depends on Kia mitigating her anger into less destructive avenues and quelling her hatred of her captors in order to find common ground with potential allies who seek to end her captivity. As Kia toes this line between constructive avenues for her anger and destructive, Kate serves as her foil; she holds Kia accountable, and for Kia, who ends up in a leadership role during the events of the second book, she needs to be held accountable and needs the emotional support, so that she can make decisions and act in a way that drives toward justice and resolution rather than destruction and revenge. All good leaders need someone to hold them accountable.

Kia’s question becomes: how does one seek justice without perpetuating a cycle of violence?

Kate

Kate’s journey in The Lost Ones centers on her anxiety disorder and how she mitigates its effects on her life. She has lived most of her life in the shadows of other people, quite content to support them so that she could escape notice. She doesn’t like to be the center of attention and struggles to speak up about her needs due to her anxiety. In the first book, Kate must learn how to speak up and fight for those she loves, and she starts to discern when speaking up is necessary and when to use her tendency toward silence during stressful situations to her advantage.

In the second book, her newly developed skills are put to the test as she and her cousin must fight their way to Kia. Kate, who prefers to avoid conflict at all costs, must learn how to defend those she loves and most importantly how to diffuse intense conflict by speaking and fighting back. This is extremely difficult for Kate due to her anxiety disorder and also due to her struggle with PTSD, as the events of the first book will have a tremendous effect on her mental health. Throughout the second book, Kate struggles to articulate her needs to those she trusts and allow their help when she needs the support.

Kate’s main motivation is finding and freeing Kia, the person she loves most in the world, but as the events of the second book progress, Kate’s motivation starts to change. She still seeks to free Kia from captivity, but at the same time, she wants to help Kia heal from the trauma they’ve both endured. Her empathy toward Kia’s struggle and toward the struggle of Kia’s fellow captives pushes Kate to try to find ways to help others discover their inner strength to survive and heal from the trauma they’ve endured. Kate wants a peaceful resolution to the conflicts they face.

Kate’s question becomes: how does one seek resolution and healing in and after traumatic situations?

Jillsa

Jill’s journey differs from both of Kate and Kia. She enters the tale in the latter half of The Lost Ones. As Kate’s cousin, Jill has lived most of her life in Norway, hasn’t experienced that much discrimination due to her unusual looks, and she’s fairly well adjusted. She has a terrible sense of humor, but is very loyal to those she loves. Unlike Kate and Kia, Jill has no desire at all for romantic relationships, and enjoys long arduous hikes and creating things with her hands. She doesn’t have a lot of interest in outside affairs, so when Kate tumbles into Jill’s life, Jill is thrust into a world of intrigue, adventure, and dangerous conflict. At first Jill resists it, but Jill has a strong urge to keep those she cares about safe, so when she begins to hear Kate’s mind-song, Jill finds herself empathizing with Kate’s struggles. This pushes her to assist Kate in finding the truth of what happened to Kia and ways to save Kia from her captivity.

At first, Jill’s main motivation is keeping her cousin safe. She could care less about the affairs of Kia’s captors or the fate of Earth, but by the end of the second book, when she confronts the horrors of the captors’ experiments, Jill must make a choice — she could turn and walk away, go back to her home in Norway, and continue to avoid recognizing the larger problems, but doing so would mean turning her back on Kate and Kia entirely. And even then, she might not escape the impact Kia’s captors have on Earth and Elivera.

Jill, by the end of the second book, has developed empathy for the captives’ plight and for Kate’s fervent desire to seek a peaceful resolution to the conflicts between all the factions involved. Jill understands why Kate wants to avoid loss of life as much as possible, but Jill also understands that sometimes loss of life is unavoidable when people are fighting for their freedom. As much as Jill wants to go back to the life she lead before the events of the first book, Jill slowly comes to understand that if this larger conflict is not addressed her life and many others could be severely harmed.

Jill’s question becomes: how does one balance one’s needs against the needs of the many?

Book 3: Liberation (placeholder title)

At first I wasn’t sure I’d need a third book for this series, but the further I move into the second book, the more I realize how necessary a third book is. The third book will focus on conflict resolution, seeking common ground (empathy for others), and the characters trying to avoid an all-out war between Earth and the scientist factions (Kia’s captors) on Elivera. I have 12,320 words for the third book thus far, and these scenes exist only within notebooks currently. I have yet to transfer them into my Scrivener project. Originally, I wrote these scenes for the second book, but then realized that including them would draw out the ending of the second book too much. So the scenes were shifted to the beginning of the third book.

The events of the Dragios Twins Trilogy takes place a good 900 or so years before most of my planned Elivera novels. This Trilogy is the origin story of my Elivera world. This series has been years in the making, and I’m determined to get it right. Kate, Kia, and Jill’s story has a huge impact on humanity’s presence on Elivera and their relations with their homeworld, Earth, so I best get back to writing it!

 

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Posted by Aibird on May 18, 2016
Posted in: Author, Characters, Feminism, movies, Reviews. Tagged: , , , , . 4 Comments

I loved Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It’s everything I always wanted from Star Wars, where they had complex, nuanced women protagonists and people of color. This diversity made the film’s great acting, dialogue, and story even more engrossing. It also hearkened back to some of the best moments of the original trilogy of IV, V, and VI. So this review will also include my examination of the characters and how I interpreted their journey.

What really struck me about The Force Awakens is that although it feels very much like Star Wars, it has a different approach than the other two trilogies. This Star Wars was about the connections between people, and it was emotion heavy. There are a lot of shots that focus on the eyes of people, where we see their reaction to the events before they act. You get to know their personalities, and you can see the struggles they have as they learn and grow. The prequels was mostly just dialogue — not even good dialogue — and the characters felt like cardboard stock to me. The original Luke, Leia, and Han movies were action-based, where you had glimpses into who these characters were, but the movies were so focused on them getting to places, them doing things. Which is fun in its own right, but sometimes it’s also fun to dig a little deeper. (This is why I like the Empire Strikes Back more than four and six. We had a more intimate experience with the characters.)

Star Wars: The Force Awakens uses about the same amount of dialogue as IV, V, or VI, but what stood out to me, is how well they utilized gestures, expressions, emotions, and specific actions to provide a vivid and intimate experience into who these characters are and why they do what they do. I love this approach, and I love how well they used these details to paint a character-focused and emotionally-laden story. I can’t wait to see where these characters go from here.

Below is my examination of some of the characters, but be warned, there be spoilers.

 

 

Rey

When we first see Rey, she is a scavenger in a hostile environment. Highly skilled in traversing the sand dunes, in fighting, and knowledge of ships, she makes her living finding useful salvage. She’s hardy, determined, and confident in her abilities. Her spark of confidence is not diminished by her circumstances because she knows what her limitations are as those limitations were tested again and again in the hostile desert world of Jakku. Her will to survive is strong, mostly because of her undying hope that her family will honor their promise to return.

When adventures comes her way, her quick thinking and confidence serves her well, but it also causes her to make glaring mistakes.  She learns quickly, but then she has to as a survivor and scavenger. That’s all she knows to do — learn quickly if she’s able to do it, because life is survival. So once she realizes she is force sensitive, the first thing she does is try to learn how to wield it, so she can escape, because life taught her to never rely on people to be there for her.  This is why Finn’s presence in her life changes her for the better. He teaches her that people can be reliable, they can care, and they will try to be there for her in their own ways. He complements her in that regard.

What caught my breath about Rey’s journey is her resilience. What makes her so resilient? She has a tolerance for discomfort due to her extreme survival skills, learned on Jakku. She must survive in a harsh desert with little water, where her only source of food is reliant on how well she scavenges parts in dangerous locales and how well she mitigates conflict from those seeking to steal the parts from her. No wonder she built up a tolerance for discomfort. Her emotional intelligence developed because she had to read others body language and intentions in order to avoid fights, find safe escape routes, determine who could be an ally or foe — so it’s not surprising to me that she adapts well to changing circumstances, no wonder how mind-blowing they seem to others.

Brene Brown explains what tolerance for discomfort  means:

Brene Brown, the resident expert on vulnerability and resilience, said in an interview with Tech Insider: “What I’m talking about is an acceptance that our drive, this insatiable appetite for comfort and happiness, does not reconcile with who we are as people. Sometimes we have to do tough things and feel our way through tough situations, and we have to feel tough emotions.”

Rey understands her emotions and the tough situations she’s had to survive. She dealt with her emotions and got through the situation, so she could survive another day. This resiliency keeps her going, despite all evidence that she’s been abandoned on this harsh world. Even so, her one of her greatest faults is her obstinate attitude and her reluctance to accept help from others. She’s so used to being alone, unable to rely on anyone, that when Finn and Han Solo and Chewie appear to aid her on her journey, she struggles to allow them to assist. Her stubborn confidence in her abilities nearly gets Finn, Han, and Chewie killed when she accidentally unleashes the Rancors rather than sealing off the pirates in Han’s ship. She makes mistakes that put her and sometimes those around her in extreme danger, but she learns from them and accepts responsibility for her actions.

Her second biggest fault is holding onto the myth that her family will return for her, as if the tighter she holds this myth the more likely it will happen. But this causes her to reject Han’s offer of co-pilot, despite the fact part of her really wanted it.  They myth of her family’s return and the fear of the lightsaber’s power causes her to reject Maz’s words and the lightsaber. She runs from her friends and returns to what she knows best — being alone, because she cannot accept that her hope for her family was in vain or that her destiny could be tied to something other than Jakku. There in the forest she is overwhelmed by Kylo Ren’s attacks, and she fails to escape the encounter.

We all wish to feel wanted and loved, to have a family that is loyal to us, and Rey wanted that more than anything. Except she never found it on Jakku and never will. It’s when she finally lets go of Jakku that she’s able to realize she found a new family — one in Chewie, Finn, Han, and Leia.

Rey throughout the movie learns from her mistakes, learns new abilities, and most of all never stops growing. Because that’s one thing she can do extremely well — learn and learn fast, because in the game of survival, that’s the only way you will live to see another day. Rey has trained hard, has learned to quickly adapt, and has done her research, and even in her darkest moments, these skills she’s honed her whole life helps her overcome her mistakes, rally from defeat, learn new skills to overcome a stronger foe, and grow as a person. She was extremely well-written for a character with a backstory that made sense in relation to the skills she had.

Finn

Finn’s story follows a similar path to Rey’s but approaches growth in a slightly different manner, where his growth lies in becoming more confident in who he is.  He was stolen from his parents as a child, given a number, and raised to fight for the New Order. His first job was sanitation, but he worked hard and finally had the chance to go on his first raid with Kylo Ren himself. But what does this teach Finn? He was taught to fight, but when put in a situation where the orders involve killing innocent families, Finn can’t stomach it. But what else does he have? He has empathy for others and a big heart, which simply cannot survive in the New Order. His faith in who he is is shaken, and he struggles to understand his place in the world.

What Finn learns in the first ten or so minutes of the movie is that the one thing he was brought up and trained to do, no longer fits. Who is he really? He knows he’s not the killing machine the New Order wants, because he cares too much and his empathy for others puts him in danger if he stays with the New Order.

Poe’s capture provides him with a chance to escape and start over. Saving Poe’s life was brave, possibly stupid, and terrifying for Finn, but he understood that this decision meant there could be no return. He either throws his lot with Rey, Poe, and the others, or seek death. The New Order terrifies him because of his past, and his desire to run from its tyranny makes sense. But the truth is, even when given the chance to leave for the outer rim, he can’t because he cares too much for his newly found friends.

Finn’s heart is his driving motivation and makes him who he is. He’s not the best fighter in the world, nor is his survival skills all that great, but he never had to survive in hostile conditions like Rey, so he never had to perfect these skills. He has a different skill set from Rey, and although he grew up around other stormtroopers in training, Finn remarks on how alone he was. Both of them were alone, but in very different ways. Both had to be resilient in the face of uncomfortable circumstances, and both had to learn to accept help from others. Both realize that they don’t have to do it all alone, and there are others out there like them who will stand by their side.

A lot of people may wish to be like Rey — the survivor who can quickly learn and adapt. A Lara Croft of sorts really, but there’s only a certain amount of people who adapt well and learn quickly. They’re the people that the average schmo would love to hate if they weren’t so dang nice. Most folks are more like Finn — more mundane, more average, and more likely to fail than succeed. Both types of people exist in our world and both have their roles in the great journey of life. Learning how to work together and support one another can be difficult, but as Rey and Finn teach us, it’s not only possible but an imperative for survival. We don’t have to do it all alone.

 

Let’s Write! Constructing and Developing Ideas

Posted by Aibird on February 5, 2015
Posted in: Characters, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

In a writer’s life, there are times where ideas seem plentiful, like the molecules in a river, and other times, ideas seem scarce like water in a desert. No matter how plentiful or scarce your ideas are, the hardest aspect to them is constructing those ideas into workable stories. In the following writer’s exercise from Now Write! Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror (pg. 49, original exercise devised by Brittany Winner), the challenge is to take these ideas and channel them into a workable story.

  1. First set your timer to two minutes. Next, pick a genre and create an eight word summary of your scene. Once you have this summary, start your timer.
  2. Think about the summary and your genre. What image comes to mind? Take that first image and construct it in detail.
  3. Consider the following questions: What does your character(s) look like and what are they wearing?
    Where is your character(s)?
    What is going on around them?
    What actions does your character(s) take? Why do they take those actions?
  4. Write this down in as much detail as you can.

Genre: Science Fiction

8-word Summary: A daily jog transforms into life-threatening situation.

Begin Timer.

Full-figured lady with dark curly hair and brown eyes. She is jogging in a park full of trees and an occasional bench along the path. There is birds singing in the tree branches, and the trees are oak and cedar. A person clothed in black shirt and pants grabs her arm. Startled, she grabs her mace spray and fires it in his face. He clutches his eyes as she kicks him in the groin. A second assailant shoots her. And she falls to the ground, blood coating the front of her bright blue shirt.

End Timer.

So that was all I had time to write in two minutes. I spent at least half that time thinking about what the life-threatening situation could be and decided on an attack. This is what I call a story nugget. It’s a short scene but evocative and leaves me with a lot of unanswered questions such as:

  • Who are the assailants and why did they attack her?
  • What is the motivation of the assailants?
  • Will she live or will she be kidnapped?
  • Who is she? Is she someone important or just an unlucky jogger? If she is not someone important to the community or a specific group and is not wealthy, then why would they target her?
  • How does she escape?

These are all questions I need to answer if I were to sit down and develop this story nugget into a full-fledged story. Since this is a science fiction genre, some of the answers to these questions could draw upon science fictional ideas.

For example, perhaps she is a scientist who likes to go for daily jogs in the park after a day in the laboratory. Her research could be focused on nanotechnology, specifically building tiny robots that perform surgery without having to cut open the body directly. She is attacked because the assailants are part of a fringe group, who find her research to be a danger to society. They hoped to kill her and then raid her facility later that night. Their plan included dumping her dead body in the lab as a symbol of their movement.

Now this story nugget is slowly starting to grow into a possible short story. However, the last question still hasn’t been answered. How does she escape? Should I introduce a new character, such as another jogger, who happens upon the scene and calls for help? This could introduce a third aspect to the story, one in which bystander intervention could spell the difference between life and death.

If I go this route, then I may need to either use two points of view — the first jogger and second jogger — or have her see the second jogger stop at the sight of her and the assailants and then turn and run. The sounds of sirens will then sound within a few minutes as she struggles to negotiate with her attackers to avoid death. The sirens could cause them to run off for fear of getting caught, leaving her to bleed to death. The bystander may return with police and an ambulance team, and she could be saved by her own technology. Thus the assailants inadvertently hurt their cause as the press will see the attack as another example of how important her work is, and the fringe group will lose more credibility.

Now that this story nugget has been fleshed out, I can sit down and write the story. However, one thing to note: even with all this planning and outlining, it is rare for me to follow these ideas exactly. Once I am inside the story idea and writing it down fully, the characters often surprise me. Sometimes they introduce new ideas and scenarios that I never would have contemplated during the outline process. Due to this, my stories tend toward a more organic form of growth, where the characters influence the final result immensely and the plot can evolve into new territory in interesting and fascinating ways. It’s why my outlines often lay forgotten during the writing process, especially after character input has altered the story in a way that improves upon my original ideas. Keep this in mind as you work on your story nuggets. Let your characters guide you as you get to know them better, and you may discover interesting ideas and subplots that could beef up your story further.

When you write this first draft, try to include all the possible ideas and scenes that may transpire during the course of the story. You don’t want to limit yourself in the first draft, for some of these side tangents may prove more interesting than your original idea. In the editing and pruning process, you can cut out any unnecessary scenes that don’t move the story forward and really start to polish the piece. Until then, channel your imagination and let it flow freely and abundantly. The above exercise can help jump-start that process, but don’t let it confine you either.

Let us go Write! — Horror Edition

Posted by Aibird on September 14, 2014
Posted in: Aliens, Characters, World Building, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , . 3 Comments

I write speculative fiction, where most of my focus is on science fiction with a dabble of horror. However, my roots were in fantasy, partly because when I first started writing in middle school I simply did not have the scientific foundation to write science fiction well, but that didn’t stop me. I tossed aliens into my stories, clones, and mind controlling gadgetry, all of which lived alongside feats that would only work if magic existed. I had dragons and demons and monsters. This need to understand science better to more effectively write science fiction played a large role in me earning the physics degree I have today.

Now I look back at those tales and recognize them for what they were: my practice sessions and my imagination garden. There I planted the seeds of my future fiction, and over the years I cultivated my imagination garden, helping it become more refined and less chaotic. I learned how to write a story arc. How to craft a consistent and coherent plot, and most of all, I learned how to build a science fiction world. This new series, that I’m starting with this post, will focus on various aspects of speculative fiction and will offer myself and my readers a challenge for their writing. It’ll help me plant more seeds in my imagination garden and hopefully expand my capabilities as a writer.

I’m still not perfect at writing speculative fiction, but no one ever is. We simply keep trying and keep writing the best we can. It’s always good to push our boundaries to the limits because the challenges are what helps us to grow the most. This is why I’ve tried to start learning how to write horror. So this first post in my “Let us go write!” series will focus on the horror story.

In the Now Write! Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror edited by Laurie Lamson, several articles discuss horror directly. Glenn Benest, a horror screenwriter and producer, writes:

Unlike other works of fiction or film, the protagonist in this genre does not need to go through a character arc.

He goes on to explain how horror’s main focus is not necessarily on the protagonist character.

… we must realize that the real star in the horror genre is not the hero but the source of the horror itself. Whether it’s a haunted hotel in The Shining or the great white shark in Jaws, the crucial thing that makes a horror project really work is that which scares us.

This isn’t to say strong characters shouldn’t exist in horror pieces, but it is important to take notice that the focus isn’t really on the characters. They are the vehicle that brings the reader to the confrontation with the terrible evil; this means that there is something even more important that the protagonist character when it comes to writing good horror fiction. Another point the essayist makes is that often the audience for horror pays money to be scared silly, and so expect to be scared silly. It’s not the nuances of the characters that impress them, but more how well they are scared and how much of a lasting impact that has on them. Understanding this aspect of the horror audience can aid a writer in getting their story sold.

When I think back on my own experiences with horror, I notice that the pieces that stood out to me the most were indeed dependent upon the source of the horror. I don’t remember the characters as much, nor was their character arcs that important. What made the piece good was the source of the fear. For example, in the Alien Franchise, the aliens had a very lasting impact on my psyche. Yes, Ripley has become an iconic character, but examine her storyline. She is shown from the beginning of the film to be a strong-willed and courageous woman. This doesn’t change at all during the course of the movies. She remains strong and courageous, but what changes is that she confronts the terrifying aliens and finds a way to survive. Her confrontation is what made the imprint in my mind, and has made those movies some of my ultimate favorites in the genre. It’s that confrontation that made the movie, not necessarily her story arc (or lack thereof).

So when I write horror, I need to be cognizant of this factor. The horror that is confronted is the focus of the piece, and the characters are there to help force the confrontation. I need to bring out that confrontation, really examine ways to showcase the horror and the scare factor, but to do so in creative ways. I can’t use just one method of scaring a person, but instead, I need to utilize a whole tool belt of scare methods. If I use just one method, I risk losing the element of surprise and the piece becoming lackluster and boring. Surprise can play a large role in pulling off horror well. One way to utilize different methods is to cross-cut scenes with another line of action to build the suspense. Or the writer can utilize a fake-scare, where it seems like something terrifying will happen, but it turns out to be mundane, and then start the real terror directly afterward. Another way to add variety and keep the reader on their toes is to build the suspense slowly by adding creepier and creepier situations, and then add an unexpected scare. Alien was excellent in this regard, as the creepiness of the discovery started slow, and then the alien bursting from the guy’s chest was an unexpected terror.

If a writer is having trouble finding scenarios that could be scary, examine what scares you. What causes you to jump in fear at night? What sort of dream causes you to wake up in a cold sweat or with a stifled scream? Ask friends and family about what truly scares them, and compile a list of ideas. Then try honing that list and creating ways of writing them effectively.

The essayist also points out that humor, especially in longer pieces, is a very useful tool to have in the horror tool be;t as well.

Humor always plays well in the horror genre because it gives the audience a chance to laugh and dispel tension, before you ratchet up the suspense and horror even more. When you scare us, it makes every fiber in our being taut with tension — so occasionally we need a reprieve, and humor is how that reprieve is achieved.

So it’s not enough to just learn how to utilize various scare methods. I also need to become more fluent in the use of humor done well. That will, of course, take practice, but then that’s all part of the job of writing. Now, my readers, let us go write!

Feel free to share your thoughts on horror in the comments below, or even excerpts of your own horror pieces. How else can we improve our horror fiction, and what methods (and combinations of methods) do you find most useful?