When J.R.R. Tolkien wrote The Lord of the Rings, he never intended for it to become a trilogy. His masterpiece was meant to be one epic idea, bound into one volume. As we all know, this did not happen, thanks mainly to his publishers. It was decided that The Lord of the Rings was too long as one book, and it should be split into three parts for “economical” reasons. (Being forced to split a novel may very well an author’s worst nightmare.) Fortunately for Tolkien, his book broke seamlessly into three well-known volumes. Those sneaky, intervening publishers unknowingly paved the way for what would become the modern day fantasy trilogy. The Lord of the Rings has since become one of the most influential works in 20th-century literature.
But what about writing with the intention of creating a trilogy? Before I answer that question, perhaps I should take a step back and try to explain why the trilogy format is so commonly used.
It all begins with the number three. What is it about this digit that so fascinates us? Why is it so widely used in all walks of life? And why does it work so well in the world of books, movies, plays, etc.? (Three questions!) Numbers have always been significant (no pun intended), but that little backwards “E” seems to have made a big impact on us throughout history. There are countless examples of its influence. It’s everywhere: Morning, noon, night. Beginning, middle, end. Three acts to a play. “On the count of three!” The Third Reich. (Not all threes are good.) The Triforce of Power in Nintendo’s The Legend of Zelda. Aeschylus’s The Oresteia. And one of the most significant uses of the number three is the Holy Trinity: Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. These examples no doubt lend to our interest in trilogies, but there is something about the three-book set which is appealing to so many readers.
In essence, a trilogy is little more than one idea stretched into three books. However trilogies have evolved since The Lord of the Rings. Most authors who pen a three-part novel aim to do so. These same authors, Stef and myself included, are careful to write a trilogy which is not only one idea over the course of three novels, but also three separate ideas which fit into the whole.
There are three (seriously) pitfalls to avoid in writing a trilogy. One is when the first book ends on a cliffhanger. Two is when the second book has no beginning or end, and it serves as a dull “interlude” between the 1st and 3rd books. Three is when the third book is nothing more than rising and falling action. This scheme might appeal to some readers, but for those who prefer closure between books, it can be frustrating and disappointing. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings suffered from these pitfalls, but his ideas and characters were able to carry the books to success. And like I stated, he never intended his books to be split.
So Stef and I have nearly completed our Black Earth trilogy, and what we discovered is that writing a trilogy is pretty damn difficult! After writing the Raven’s Heart duology, conveying one thought over three novels while trying to make them stand apart has been a real challenge. But, it is a challenge we welcome. We have both struggled and enjoyed the development of our characters and ideas from book to book. And if nothing else, writing a trilogy has helped us to appreciate the craft even more. It has forced us to focus on what is truly important to the novel and the overall theme. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about that.
-Matt
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Friday, July 24, 2009
The Bitter-Sweet Relationship with a Red Pen
There are those who enjoy it and those who detest it, but it is a must for every writer. Friend or foe, we all must wield the red pen sooner or later. We hope editing improves the manuscript, and we would like to think that eventually it makes us better writers.
By no means am I a professional editor. I remember a few things from high school English, but admittedly my major in college was studio art---as right-brained as you can get in terms of occupational fields. Between Matt and me, I have been delegated the responsibility of editing the technical side of our writing. “Daunting” is a word I know well.
Why is it such a great undertaking? The process itself is, theoretically, endless. You can continue to edit your work even after it is bound and on the bookstore shelves. Oh yes, you can have versions! Drive readers mad by updating and improving your novel every so many years. But really, I think that is self-induced torture. I’m all about walking away from a quality piece of work---never mind that you want to rename chapter two and tweak the spelling of a minor character’s name. Just walk away!
I say this now, knowing that when the Black Earth trilogy is finished, we are heading back to the pages of Raven’s Heart for another revision. This is it, folks! The REAL novels. I’m very much NOT looking forward to reading near a thousand pages that I have edited at least ten times before. And they’re OUR novels! Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy reading what we’ve written, but this is not pleasure reading that I’ll be undertaking. It’s grueling, it’s tedious: it’s editing. Again.
So why, you ask, are we insane enough to edit what has been bound and published? Reason #1: Money. We will pursue a publisher who will allow us to set a cheaper cover price. Reason #2: Quality. We want the books to be the best they can; we’re expecting total satisfaction this time. Reason #3: There isn’t another reason, aside from insanity.
But back to the red pen. It will journey with me through the pages again, and I have no doubt it will look like murder. Blobs of red ink as horrific as spilt blood, marring every page I touch. I’m determined that it should not be so. There’s no need for a massacre. Not when we’ve hacked and slashed lines and paragraphs to trim it down to a 500-page first book.
If you’re getting the idea that I’m unleashing my anxiety over my red pen relationship, you have earned the right to console me. I will walk the hall of grammatical correctness with all the writers who have gone before me, and I will be silent and obedient to all rules of punctuation and spelling. In the end, it will be worth it, and that’s not just a case of self-convincing. There’s no lesson to learn here for any aspiring writers. Just know that you’re not alone when you wrestle with that scarlet-blooded stick of discretion wedged between your fingers. Good luck!
-Stefanie
By no means am I a professional editor. I remember a few things from high school English, but admittedly my major in college was studio art---as right-brained as you can get in terms of occupational fields. Between Matt and me, I have been delegated the responsibility of editing the technical side of our writing. “Daunting” is a word I know well.
Why is it such a great undertaking? The process itself is, theoretically, endless. You can continue to edit your work even after it is bound and on the bookstore shelves. Oh yes, you can have versions! Drive readers mad by updating and improving your novel every so many years. But really, I think that is self-induced torture. I’m all about walking away from a quality piece of work---never mind that you want to rename chapter two and tweak the spelling of a minor character’s name. Just walk away!
I say this now, knowing that when the Black Earth trilogy is finished, we are heading back to the pages of Raven’s Heart for another revision. This is it, folks! The REAL novels. I’m very much NOT looking forward to reading near a thousand pages that I have edited at least ten times before. And they’re OUR novels! Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy reading what we’ve written, but this is not pleasure reading that I’ll be undertaking. It’s grueling, it’s tedious: it’s editing. Again.
So why, you ask, are we insane enough to edit what has been bound and published? Reason #1: Money. We will pursue a publisher who will allow us to set a cheaper cover price. Reason #2: Quality. We want the books to be the best they can; we’re expecting total satisfaction this time. Reason #3: There isn’t another reason, aside from insanity.
But back to the red pen. It will journey with me through the pages again, and I have no doubt it will look like murder. Blobs of red ink as horrific as spilt blood, marring every page I touch. I’m determined that it should not be so. There’s no need for a massacre. Not when we’ve hacked and slashed lines and paragraphs to trim it down to a 500-page first book.
If you’re getting the idea that I’m unleashing my anxiety over my red pen relationship, you have earned the right to console me. I will walk the hall of grammatical correctness with all the writers who have gone before me, and I will be silent and obedient to all rules of punctuation and spelling. In the end, it will be worth it, and that’s not just a case of self-convincing. There’s no lesson to learn here for any aspiring writers. Just know that you’re not alone when you wrestle with that scarlet-blooded stick of discretion wedged between your fingers. Good luck!
-Stefanie
Thursday, July 2, 2009
The Power in a Name
I know I’ve touched briefly on the subject of names before, but there is an opportunity with this topic to delve into a deeper significance. I’m talking specifically about character names here, as with Matt’s and my protagonists, we ponder long and hard about the names we choose or create.
The significance of a name is nothing new. Look back to your favorite fairy tales, and you’ll find it’s a recurring theme that a being’s name invokes power. Rumplestiltskin is a great example, where the queen must guess his name in order to keep her child. Roughly translated, “Rumplestiltskin” is a German goblin that rattles the posts (stilts) in a house’s foundation. In other tales of folklore and myth, to know the name of a demon, spirit, or creature is to have the power to banish it or command it.
Modern authors have also employed the value in a name. In The Neverending Story, Bastion must name the Childlike Empress in order to save the world of Fantastica. Josepha Sherman’s The Horse of Flame has a wind-spirit that is imprisoned by the name given it: Sv’istat. The spirit is only freed when the letters of its name are erased one by one in a spell. The Last Unicorn, Peter S. Beagle’s classic, the unicorn is given a name when she becomes human. This is significant because she is the only unicorn to ever taste mortality, to ever have a name.
Names define us, and we use them to define everything around us. The scientific names of plants and animals are descriptive of a particular species. Our first, middle, and last names speak to our heritage, our culture. Look in any baby name book, and you’ll see that the origin of every name has a special meaning. “Stephanie” is Greek for “crown.”
Matt and I have pored over baby name books to find just the right name for our characters. The meaning of the name must be significant, and the overall feeling of the word must match the character’s personality. We try to match names and their origins to particular cultures in our books. For instance, we try to name all our Markanturians from Old English. (Ok, Arcturus is an exception, but he is exceptional among his own kind).
Our latest struggle has been dealing with a nameless character. He is a struggle to work with because he is known by so many names, yet none are his own. He never chooses a name to define himself, and that is an important detail we maintain. He is a wanderer, and he does not seem to belong anywhere. His identity is a mystery, because it changes from book to book, from place to place he visits. He is different in the eyes of every character who interacts with him, and his assortment of names reflects this.
We have yet another character, who among his people—the Ilangiel—was born Eraekryst. As he integrates himself amongst Humans, he is given the name Erik. But the name he chooses for himself is Sparrow of the Weeping Mountain (you’d have to know his past to understand that one!). For as confusing as it is to have characters with multiple appellations, it’s also a symbolic necessity. Some of our characters choose their names as a rite of passage in reaching adulthood. Others must earn their name, and still others are born with one.
For me, assigning a name to a character is one of the most difficult tasks I encounter. I think I’ve come up with the perfect one…until Matt says it aloud and falls off the couch laughing. I swallow my pride and try again. It’s not a gift of mine, finding that perfect name, but I will always see it as the most important point in character creation.
-Stefanie
The significance of a name is nothing new. Look back to your favorite fairy tales, and you’ll find it’s a recurring theme that a being’s name invokes power. Rumplestiltskin is a great example, where the queen must guess his name in order to keep her child. Roughly translated, “Rumplestiltskin” is a German goblin that rattles the posts (stilts) in a house’s foundation. In other tales of folklore and myth, to know the name of a demon, spirit, or creature is to have the power to banish it or command it.
Modern authors have also employed the value in a name. In The Neverending Story, Bastion must name the Childlike Empress in order to save the world of Fantastica. Josepha Sherman’s The Horse of Flame has a wind-spirit that is imprisoned by the name given it: Sv’istat. The spirit is only freed when the letters of its name are erased one by one in a spell. The Last Unicorn, Peter S. Beagle’s classic, the unicorn is given a name when she becomes human. This is significant because she is the only unicorn to ever taste mortality, to ever have a name.
Names define us, and we use them to define everything around us. The scientific names of plants and animals are descriptive of a particular species. Our first, middle, and last names speak to our heritage, our culture. Look in any baby name book, and you’ll see that the origin of every name has a special meaning. “Stephanie” is Greek for “crown.”
Matt and I have pored over baby name books to find just the right name for our characters. The meaning of the name must be significant, and the overall feeling of the word must match the character’s personality. We try to match names and their origins to particular cultures in our books. For instance, we try to name all our Markanturians from Old English. (Ok, Arcturus is an exception, but he is exceptional among his own kind).
Our latest struggle has been dealing with a nameless character. He is a struggle to work with because he is known by so many names, yet none are his own. He never chooses a name to define himself, and that is an important detail we maintain. He is a wanderer, and he does not seem to belong anywhere. His identity is a mystery, because it changes from book to book, from place to place he visits. He is different in the eyes of every character who interacts with him, and his assortment of names reflects this.
We have yet another character, who among his people—the Ilangiel—was born Eraekryst. As he integrates himself amongst Humans, he is given the name Erik. But the name he chooses for himself is Sparrow of the Weeping Mountain (you’d have to know his past to understand that one!). For as confusing as it is to have characters with multiple appellations, it’s also a symbolic necessity. Some of our characters choose their names as a rite of passage in reaching adulthood. Others must earn their name, and still others are born with one.
For me, assigning a name to a character is one of the most difficult tasks I encounter. I think I’ve come up with the perfect one…until Matt says it aloud and falls off the couch laughing. I swallow my pride and try again. It’s not a gift of mine, finding that perfect name, but I will always see it as the most important point in character creation.
-Stefanie
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