Gendered Characterisation

This is a fantastic article from TV Tropes on the different media expectations, tropes, and reasoning behind certain gender norms on television and in other forms of media. There's no real way for me to summarise all the brilliant details here but I do encourage you to take a look. It'll help you understand why your characters don't seem feminine or masculine enough for your readership and what the perspectives behind the issues are.

DIAGNOSTIC: To Glory We Steer by Alexander Kent

Well, those who have been following me for awhile would know by now that I do love a nautical novel. The mixture of daring, history, and well-drawn characters that typify this group of books never ceases to satisfy and Alexander Kent is a prime example of this.

Alexander Kent is an interesting author because he certainly writes his novels with a mixture of brutality and compassion that makes it more similar to World War novels than other Napoleanic War novels. People die. They die gruesomely. They die slowly. They die glad they didn't go to the surgeon. They die under the surgeon's knife. They die when we expect that they might just be important enough to life. And they die suddenly. And Kent manages to make this really work for him. He never cuts down a character before we've gained enough satisfaction from the arc, but he certainly doesn't let them linger just because they were important beforehand.

What this means is that the reader can never pooh-pooh his threats. Each battlefield holds risk. Each threat holds a promise of pain to come. There are no guarantees. I was just lucky this time that my favourite characters (Allday, Ferguson, and, of course, Captain Richard Bolitho) all survived. Since they're being dragged along into the next book, I'll be sitting with bated breath, flicking pages, hope they make it through again this time.

And that's the beauty of it. If he didn't let the canonballs fall where they may, if he didn't let people drop like flies then his beautifully described scenes of utter devastation would become mere scenery. The Jeopardy (anticipated pain or loss) would cease to be effective. Now this doesn't mean that other genres need to treat all characters as expendable to be effective but in this sort of War Story, it certainly helps to build the stakes.

Hmm, what novel shoul I pull apart next? Or what technique should I examine?

DIAGNOSTIC: Dragon Age 2 (videogame)'s alluring character Fenris

Well, I haven't done a writer brain exercise in awhile - haven't found good fodder - but I've finally come up with one. Alluring Characters. What makes them. What we like about them. What we can learn from examples in the various forms of media that surround us. I will be looking at characters that resonate with a lot of people, often in the form of fanfiction, fan art, and fangirling, and which I have personally connected with. Feel free to offer suggestions, however, and I'll try to read the book / watch the movie and do an analysis of what makes that person tick and why I think they tapped into the general psyche of viewers / readers / players today.

I'm going to begin with a videogame, largely because I found myself, for the first time in a long time, ensnared by the characters. In this case, I got a major crush on Fenris (this never happens to me, I swear) and started fixating on the in-character scenes involving him. Now, for those who don't play videogames, yes, I understand it's silly to crush on a set of polygons, but it's really not different than crushing on any other fictional character. Many people have done it. Okay, excuses aside, here we are:

Fenris.
He's a runaway slave / experiment of a Magocratic Empire that makes a point of enslaving his kind (elves). So, why does he work?

* Sense of Humor: He has a very dry wit and is seemingly straightforward even while poking fun at things, allowing him to both have a sense of humor and still maintain that brooding demeanor. The sultry voice of the voice actor doesn't hurt, either.

* The Dark Past: He's given complexity through an interesting past that makes his conversations more intriguing. Most people have relatively boring histories. His is one that makes you sit up and take notice. He championed to be the candidate for an experiment that would have this magical compound tattooed into his skin so that he could purchase his family's freedom (adds sympathy). The agony of the experiment wiped out all of his previous memories and left him an enslaved husk that obeyed his Master without question and without thought of freedom (adds sympathy for the bad things he has done in his Master's name / adds complexity and contrast with his current defiant nature). He didn't choose to escape his Master. His Master was forced to leave him behind due to a riot. Fenris was then adopted by free-willed Forrest Warriors for a few months of peace before his Master came back and ordered him to kill them. He obeyed - then, realizing what he had done, fled his Master (adds sympathy / horror by showing how much control his Master had over him but reveals that his conscience was able to break that hold ... but only when it was too late, thus justifying all the broodiness).

* Appearance: He actually looks quite young and sweet with big green eyes, a lean body, mid-length hair (looks boyish without being feminine) and an expressive face. He maintains the brooding appearance by attempting to seem intense and focused, but when the facade cracks, you can really see it. His appearance is also contrasted with spiky black armor (setting up complexity through a clash of nature and worn demeanor imagery). Such an appearance can be drawn in words, though it's obviously easier when you can literally show your viewers.

* Balanced Brooding: Yeah, brooding is in this year so this counts as a positive. Normally it irritates me but he manages to balance it with his dry wit and his lack of respect for pity. He is trapped in the past but he doesn't revel in it. While he doesn't emotionally move on (well, he does but at a glaciar pace), he tries to verbally move on as quickly as possible and that prevents angsting. What complains he does make feel justified and due to his interesting past, even the complaints themselves hold interest.

* Moral Complexity: In many ways he's an anti-hero with the possibility of redemption. He's fairly callous toward Mages, thinking them all scum, and prefers his new country's practice of what are essentially concentration camps for Mages. Since a bad or weak-willed Mage leads to cruelty / possession by demons / temptation toward blood magic, it's easier to sympathise with him. In that way, he actually feeds in to one of the underlying themes of the game: Is free will worth more than the safety of others?

* Danger Level: Only cool in fantasy for most people but the idea of being the exception to someone who is dangerous is often quite appealing. You can play a Mage and still be his friend and even his boy/girlfriend (depending on the gender you pick). The novel equivalent would be if the Main Character was a Mage and thus the exception to his values.

Does anyone have anything to add? Did I write it in a way that conveyed meaningful points that may be useful to you? Did you play Dragon Age 2?

DIAGNOSTIC: Blood Relatives - Ed McBain

So, here's another time where we sit down an analyse just what made a particular book work for me. Well, Ed McBain is an interesting author because he does so many things that should be wrong and that we've all been told not to do and somehow does it in a way that is not only forgivable but actually add to the character of the novels. He writes procedural crime fiction, generally from the Point of View (POV) of the detectives who work out of the 87th precinct (he has other series of novels but Blood Relatives is an 87th precinct novel so that's where we'll focus).

So what does he do wrong/right?

He breaks the POV rules: He writes with multiple POVs (generally only one per scene, though) though sometimes he drifts into an omniscient POV with a distinct author voice. Somehow, it works for him. I think part of the charm is that the omniscient POV is really interesting. I mean, really interesting. He'll use it to describe people and places in a way that is generally humorous in a sometimes dark / sometimes light way and it just really adds to the setting. The characters are rich and full creatures and he'll frame the entire scene through some of the omniscient drift.

Like this:

The average garbage can on any city street got battered and bruised within the space of a week because these men loved their work so much. (Some people insisted these men also loved the smell of garbage, but that was pure conjecture).

This is part of a few paragraphs that introduce a few garbage men, their conversation, and their daily rounds. The garbage men have a very small part to play in this novel. In truth, their entire job is, well, their job. They move trash from the kerb to a garbage dump and, in so doing, allow another minor character to find the diary. The omniscient tone keeps the scene lively and interesting and makes it seem somewhat important. It also satisfies the voyeur in me as it describes things more interestingly than the obvious options for the POVs.

Part of how it works for him is because of its structure. He a) doesn't head hop; b) generally only does it much with the minor POVs or criminals; and c) tends to do it at the start of the scene and then start narrowing it down to a particular character's viewpoint.

List-like Descriptions: This works because the POV characters are generally cops and therefore actually think in a more orderly fashion, because he varies the sentence length / structure, and because he generally slips in unexpected information. For example, he might slip in a bit of evidence that stands out more because of the orderly description:

The man was wearing a dark suit and a white shirt, no tie. His hair was brown. There appeared to be bloodstains on the front of his white shirt.

Or because they give some interesting and additional information that tells you a lot about the person:

The fifth man who approached Kling's desk had black wavy hair and blue eyes. He was wearing a navy-blue jacket over a pale-blue sports suit. His trousers were a dark blue too, but they did not quite match the jacket. Jacket and trousers alike were crumpled, and there was a beard stubble on the man's face.

Where a less interesting author might write:

He had black wavy hair and blue eyes. He wore a navy-blue jacket over a pale-blue suit. His clothes were crumpled.

See the difference?

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Well, hope you found that interesting. There's much more that Ed McBain does right but I'll leave it until I analyse another one of his books (which I will do). Does anyone have any suggestions for another book I should analyse?

DIAGNOSTIC: Hell's Fire - Chris Simms Book Analysis

Just so you know, this isn't a traditional book review. This won't discuss the good and bad aspects of the book and then weigh them both up for an assigned score. This is more an analysis of what Chris Simms did right and a few details about techniques that might assist us to pull off what he accomplished. I will do negative review / analysis in future when I next read a bad book but I won't be naming names.

So, without further ado, Hell's Fire by Chris Simms. First of all, the title. I love all things demonic or demon-inspired so the red inked Hell's Fire really caught my eye. When I realised it was a crime novel, my thoughts immediately turned to arson even before I read the blurb which mentioned the torching of churches and links to satanism. It also has a sub-title 'There will be no forgiveness' which actually conjured up a few themes and can be taken several ways that are all relevant to the book. The first theme conjured up in my mind was 'vengeance for crimes both real or perceived' and its a theme held dear in a few of the character's hearts. Another theme it suggests now that I've read the book are thematic questions such as: 'What would it do to a person to know their crimes, or the crimes of a loved one, will never be forgiven?' 'Is there such a thing as an unforgivable crime?' and 'Sometimes, it is better to forgive'. Without giving too much away, forgiveness is as much a driving theme as the more obvious vengeance plot with attempts to reconcile family members over past arguments and a man struggling to deal with the idea of an unforgiving God.

The novel also explores a contentious issue in society today about freedom of religion. This adds richness to the story because the author ensures that this issue is explored by a number of characters in different ways and they each have their own perspective on the matter. A rift in a family between a staunch Catholic and her burgeoning Wiccan daughter. The protagonist's issues with religion in general - whether its pagans, satanism, or organised religion - and how sometimes religious beliefs can lead to murder (or the establishment of refuges for the homeless) all weave together to challenge preconceptions without the author ever intruding by saying that any one of these religions is outright wrong. There are examples of people doing immoral things in the name of religion, whether its due to their fanaticism or simply a calloud desire to exploit the spiritual needs of others, but it's very much a sense of individuals doing this. It's not about any one religion being *evil*. It's about people. That helps keep it from getting preachy.

I also like the specificity in descriptions. This book oozes authenticity because he always nails the little details about arson investigation. I couldn't say whether it's true or false, whether his research is wrong or right, but it feels right because he's confident enough to be unambiguous in his descriptions. I really like that.

There are other good things about it, but I think I'll leave it there. Until we meet again, bloggers and bloggettes....

DIAGNOSTIC: Why I Love The Procedural Crime Genre

This may come as a surprise to some of you, since I read fantasy novels and am even writing a few, but I have a lot of love for the crime genre. Ed McBain of the 87th Precinct series is my favourite author and I read his novels over and over without feeling bored - even though a lot of them are quite short.

So what is it about the style of writing in the Crime Genre that makes it awesome?

Sparkling dialogue: Perhaps it's because of how important dialogue is so important in revealing clues, but generally, the dialogue in crime novels are often very individualised to the speaker. The sense of rhythm differs, the slang differs, the sense of perspective differs, and the core of the characters differs which means you can get some very interesting twists and turns in the dialogue that hold the reader's attention. There are often several minor characters that have a few pages of dialogue to explain certain situations and these minor characters are often as well-drawn as the primary protagonists. This means that I pay a lot more attention when they're speaking because by anaylsing the words a) I sate my voyeuristic need to understand where other people are coming from, and b) you never quite know what will happen next.

Quirky characters: I find this especially in procedural crime novels, perhaps to provide contrast against the rather sensible detectives, but it's also true of other sub-genres as well. The characters are often quirky in new and amusing ways. Personally, I think this is because really good procedural crime novelists do a lot of research and listen to a lot of anecdotes. They notice the strange reactions people have sometimes and they port some of that into their books. It's harder in speculative fiction because the only 'anecdotes' you have for people's behavior in other worlds is other people's works and importing them only makes your work more derivative. The exception to this are fantasy and science fiction novels set in the modern world with a few twists. Perhaps it would help if speculative fiction authors spent more time asking people about random anecdotes about other people and then seeing if those reactions could work in lands dramatically different from our own.

Precision in description: Perhaps again related to the copious amount of research a crime novelist has to do but they often are very precise with their details. They use the correct titles of rooms, the right names for equipment, and at every step try to pack the most information into the fewest words. This may be more of a personal preference as I'm sure a lot of readers enjoy the more leisurely and diffuse descriptions that can often be found in other genres but I certainly enjoy a certain crispness to my descriptions.

What do you like about the crime genre?

Disclaimer: Writers in other genres have achieved all of the above and more. These are simply positive points that I have more often found in the crime genre.

DIAGNOSTIC: Examining Robin Hobb's 'Rain Wild Chronicles'

First, I'll tell you what this isn't. It's not a review of the book. I liked it. Don't get me wrong. I had to return it to the library half-read as someone else had booked it but I went and got it back in the end. Still, I don't really think you need yet another actual review of a book. I think what you want to know is about how a story does something really right or really wrong. In this instance, I want to talk about something Robin Hobb did really well (and generally does well - check out the Liveship Traders and Rain Wild Chronicles to see examples).

The Rain Wild Chronicles is an interesting exercise in writing a drama set in a fantasy setting without recourse to battles and frequent set-piece events. There's a group of very well-drawn individuals on a barge setting out to guide a group of disabled dragons to the legendary city of Kelsingra. There's a few set-piece events, such as gallators (poisonous alligators) and floods, but really they're just there to provide additional conflict to the group. Robin Hobb certainly doesn't rely on that sort of external conflict to keep the novel going. Instead, it's that internal and interpersonal conflict which can be enflamed by the odd external set-piece event that really drives the novel.

How does she do it?

Well-developed personalities ensure that certain clashes will be inevitable. Robin Hobb does her best to drive such characters together to ensure the clashes happen. Characters who can't get along are kept in close proximity by the claustrophobic environments of the barge and small boats and this environmental constraint heats things up. She's not timid about their reactions, either. Even if the reaction is unpleasant. Even if it's unkind and cruel and shows the bad side of a character, she will hold to it if it is something the character is likely to do. Part of the chronicle's charm is simply watching how the various characters tangle and untangle themselves. Its a character study and a sociological study rolled into one and the unpredictability of it all is what keeps reader interest. Who will react to that? How will they react to that? Where is this going? The actual destination, Kelsingra, falls into the background as a legendary McGuffin while the humans and dragons' personalities take center stage.

How do you do it?

It seems like she puts a lot of thought into the various ways a character might react, in order to find the reaction that rings true the most (and provides for an additional layer of conflict or resolution of conflict). Now, whether you're an outliner or a guess-writer (I'm the latter), odds are that you've found it difficult to create character reactions that really zing. I mean, normally the first reaction we grasp if the expected one and that can fall a little flat when the characters' quirks could take the reaction in a whole new and interesting way. I think I've said it somewhere on this blog before: When your character encounters something important, brainstorm a list of possible reactions and pick one of the least expected yet in character option that works for you. Just by brainstorming, you'll open your mind to unlimited possibilities.

Another technique is to create a web of personalities. Put a name in the middle of a page and then draw radiating spikes. At the end of each spike, put each other character. Then write along the spike the feelings one character has for the other. Or you could create a mind map of conflict, using multiple radiating spikes to really explore the various conflicts surrounding a character.

A third technique is to list each character's name and brainstorm a list of secrets, pet peeves, goals, and motivations. Just see what the list says and then prune a few of the options or take a look at what you've written to see if you could make it a little more complex. For example, if one character's goal is to be respected, then they'll probably get along more with someone who gives them compliments than someone who points out all their failings. However, what if it was the other way around? What if the character needs to know they're respected, and so appreciates someone who is so forthright and grudging with compliments that each compliment must be earned. Someone who compliments them often might be thought insincere - even if the complimenter is telling the truth. i.e. "Of course my father says I'm a good guy, he's a push over. My grandfather, on the other hand, always tells it like it is.... He's the one worth talking to."

Hope that's helpful!

Before you leave, do any of you have any additional ideas, tricks and methods to deepen the character interplay so that even their simple reactions to each other are enough to keep us interested?