Characters---Dungeons and Dragons Style

I've now moved on to the Dragonlance phase of my research, and one of the more interesting things about Dragonlance is that it was originally conceived as a D&D adventure and only later turned into a series of novels. It's not something I ever would have picked up on without knowing it ahead of time (kind of like the bible stories in C.S. Lewis), but knowing that you can definitely see the influence.

So that got me thinking about the D&D character creation process, and how it actually works fairly well as a template for creating fictive characters in general. I've never actually played D&D, but I have played a lot of videogames based on its system, and I once read part of a rulebook. So my description of the D&D process may not be completely accurate, but that doesn't make it any less useful for creating characters in fiction.

That disclaimer aside, here we go:

In D&D, you begin the character creation process by choosing a number of different attributes about your character. What race they are, what age they are, where they come from, what their job is, how strong they are, how smart they are, how fast they are, etc.

That gives you a basic sketch of your character. You know a few of the external things about them, which can help you figure out some of the internal things as well.

You then go on to pick some cool skills and talents for them---what makes this character special, what makes them different from the others around them, what makes your big dumb warrior different than your friend's---is he really good with two-handed swords? Does he fight with two weapons at once? Is he a sword and shield type? Does have a good eye for traps? Can he pick locks? Can he use a bow? Does he swim well? The list goes on and on...and on and on, but you get the idea.

So now you know what your character can do. In terms of the game, he's pretty much done at this point, at least until he starts leveling up (I think ;-p). But in terms of being a character, you're just starting. Now that you know all the cool stuff he can do, you get to go back and figure out why he can do it, which eventually leads you into who he is as a person. Why did he choose to fight with two-handed swords instead of a sword and shield? Why can't he swim---is he afraid of water? Did he have a traumatic childhood experience in a river? Why did he choose to be a warrior---or did someone else choose for him?

You get the idea. I don't imagine that that many people struggle with creating characters---it's a big part of what makes writing fun, but taking this approach can help you flesh out characters you've already created, and it doesn't just work for fantasy. Let's take the crime genre (which I've been working with a lot this summer). You can do the same thing. What kind of cop is this person? Why? What are their specialties? Are they big? Small? Smart? Dumb? Addicted to donuts? Coffee? Can they swim? Why? etc. etc. etc.

Just an interesting thing that occurred to me as I was seeing some of the D&D emerge in Dragonlance today. I may try to play a game or two when I get back to college in the fall---just so I can really go through the process of creating the characters, the storylines, etc. I'm a big proponent of the theory that learning different ways of creating and telling stories can only help you as a writer...even if those ways are a little outside the normal writing curriculum. ;-p

Fonts

Not much to say tonight, it's late and I'm pretty tired---I've had a lot to do at work this week, which is great, but leaves me pretty wiped out at night.

But I did notice something today as I was wading through hordes of contest entries, and I thought it was worth sharing.

I have an uncontrollable negative reaction to certain fonts. I think they're Courier and Arial, but I can't be completely sure. They're just harder to read for me, and I think they look somewhat unprofessional, probably because they're a far cry from the fonts used in bound and printed books.

The point here isn't that they're bad fonts, but that font choice can actually matter. As much as I can make an effort to recognize and ignore my gut reaction, it's still there---it's a distraction from the writing, and it's harder work for me to read and evaluate. And as I've said before, that's never a good thing when with every submission I'm looking for a reason to reject it (it may sound harsh, but there are enough submissions in which I can't find a reason that it makes a good M.O.).

So if an agent or publisher has guidelines up about which font to submit in, follow them, even if you personally hate their chosen font. You can always switch back to the one you love again after you've signed a contract. ;-p

Query Letter, Redux:

Some of you may remember a previous post of mine in which I discussed how work on my query letter was going swimmingly.

You'll be pleased to know that I've pretty much scrapped that query letter entirely, based on one solid principle imparted to me from one of my bosses at work, and my ever-growing experience reading the query letters of others (have I mentioned yet how working in publishing is the best thing an author could ever do for himself?).

Said principle is a sales principle, and it goes a little something like this: "Once they say yes, stop talking."

The corollary to this principle is as follows, "The only other thing they can say is no, and that's not what you want."

Now, this applies to query letters in the following ways:

1.) Keep it short. They will be sold on your writing, not your pitch. The only purpose it serves is to get them to turn the page, and hopefully make them a little excited about what they'll find.

2.) Don't try to summarize your whole novel, or even the main plot arc, in your letter. All it really needs is the hook. That'll be enough to pique their interest, and from there on it's all about what you've written.

3.) You're at a distinct advantage if their guidelines ask for sample chapters with the query letter, because they can just turn the page and start reading, rather than having to respond to you and ask for more. You can use this to your advantage, especially if you're new or bad at writing query letters, by targeting places that ask for sample chapters.

That's all I can think of for now, but I'll leave you with this other piece of interesting information: books are published in increments of 16 pages (including back-ads, etc.) because of how they're printed. Crazy, huh?

Writing Fantasy

So Moonrat over at Editorial Ass is having a month of guest blogs where people write about their favorite books and why they impacted them so much. I was allegedly on the slate for June 19th, but seeing as my post still isn't up yet, I may drop her an e-mail this week and see what happened. ;-p

Regardless, today's guest blog really struck a chord with me, and I'd suggest you all go check it out. It's from a woman who writes "speculative fiction"--a fancy word for sci-fi and fantasy, and in it she discusses briefly what she thinks makes the genre so great.

Suffice to say, I feel the same way. In the face of intense criticism, some overt and some more insidious, of my chosen genre from most of my professors and classmates, I have maintained that fantasy is important because it can change people's lives.

My evidence for this, had, until today, been based entirely on my own life, and the way I created my identity by cobbling together bits of pieces of the heroes I most admired and identified with as a kid. The writer on Moonrat's blog today hinted that she did something similar.

So hooray! I'm right, and everyone else is wrong, and maybe, just maybe, my writing will help a struggling kid someday. That's something worth working for.

Things Learned From Videogames: Balance Pt. 2

Yesterday we established that books need to be balanced, much like videogames. A book that is too hard risks losing readers, as does a book that is too easy. You want to hit a sweet spot right in the middle---complex enough to get people thinking, but not so dense that they can't get at what you're saying.

How to do that, of course, is one of the keys to writing well, and there are many different approaches. One that I've learned from videogames is to introduce concepts one at a time, give people time to get used to them, and then move on to introduce a new one.

In videogames this tends to work with skills or moves--different tricks you use to beat the computer (and later, in some games, other players). As you level up you unlock new abilities that each have their own learning curve. In a perfectly balanced game, you get a new ability just as you start to get tired of the last one, so you're always adjusting your strategy, always thinking on your feet, and always excited about the cool new thing you've just discovered.

You can do this in books with themes, characters, ideas, plot threads---you name it. The trick is to neither let the book stagnate nor flood it with too many different concepts too quickly. A smooth movement from idea to idea, character to character, subplot to subplot, is, in my opinion, ideal.

But I'd love to hear from others on this one. Tell me about your favorite books, and how they dealt with this. Did the central themes, characters, and plots of the book unroll one at a time, or were they tossed out all at once?