Month: August 2017

Front Page, Musings

Weekly Musing: What I Like About You

DH Hanni

Readers have favorite types of characters. They could be characters opposite our own personalities allowing us to live vicariously through them. They could be like ourselves, but do and say things we wish we could do and go on adventures we dream of. Favorite types of characters can be found in genre fiction as each genre has tropes readers expect. Other times favorite authors have their own character tropes readers love.

As a reader, I gravitate toward strong female characters. They don’t have to be physically strong; I’d prefer if they weren’t because I don’t lift, bro. Rather females who are smart, resourceful, and flawed. Humor is also a plus, but it depends upon the appropriateness of the story. I also prefer them to not fit into societal expectations, who stand out, and either are equal to men or fight to be an equal.

In some ways, my favorite female characters are like me; usually the intelligence, humor, and being deeply flawed. Overall, though, they differ greatly from me. They are bold and brave where I feel weak. Adventurous whereas I’m a homebody. Speak up where I’m too scared. Or if they are a villain, they tap into my dark side.

There is also a certain type of male character I enjoy. Like the women, I prefer the men to be smart, funny (without being childish), flawed, but also kind without being boring. Likewise, it’s great when they buck expectations, be it society’s or the reader’s. I appreciate it when a male isn’t just a warrior or a brute and I certainly don’t understand the “bad boy” trope. A level of vulnerability is great as well though I don’t see that as often as I’d like to.

Having favorite types of characters is true for authors as well. As a writer, I try to write characters I myself enjoy. Sometimes upon first glance they fit a standard trope, but through the story I try to reveal they don’t fit. Other times from the start I make it clear this person isn’t like everyone else and this difference is one of the struggles they will deal with.

For some reason, I frequently feel more comfortable writing male characters. Perhaps it’s because I like it when men are portrayed differently and want readers, especially female readers, to see men in a different light.

I struggle writing females. Since I’ve always felt as if I don’t fit in with my own gender, I worry my women won’t connect with female readers. It’s a contradictory philosophy, especially when compared to my philosophy of writing male characters. But a lifetime of blank stares and mouths agape expressing views and opinions counter to what many females feel and think has had an impact on my writing. That being said, I am working on when I do write women, to keep in mind there are plenty of examples of “different” women who connect with readers.

While we all have our favorite character tropes, it’s import for both readers and writers to explore outside your comfort zone. Within those characters something special can be discovered. You can also safely tap into other parts of yourself you are afraid of. Similarly, it’s a great way to delve into diversity on multiple levels.

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Front Page, Musings

Weekly Musing: Something New

DH Hanni

You never know when or where inspiration will strike. Sometimes it comes from an observation, a news story, from a book currently being read. Sometimes there’s no explanation for it. We can either follow this and fall into a rabbit hole of creation or we can ignore it.

Not looking for a new novel idea, I have plenty, I was nevertheless inspired by a recent post on the Dirty, Sexy History blog. Despite the name of the blog, not all of it’s posts are dirty or sexy. Their focus is to bring up unique tidbits of history normally never mentioned in books. The post which has inspired a novel I have started working on is about a period in Victorian England where floriography, or the “language” of flowers, was quite popular working alongside Dating to ancient Greek and Roman times, flowers and plants have stood as symbols of love, friendship, dislike, and a rainbow of emotions.

Intrigued, it got me thinking and soon inspiration for a novel came about. I’ll not go into too many details because I don’t like discussing whatever I’m working on. In my opinion, whatever I’m working on could be for myself, could be for a themed anthology, or it could be a novel I may or may not want to pursue getting published. What I will say about my new project is I’m exploring the idea of communicating emotion through flowers. In doing research it became apparent people would create arrangements expressing complex emotions. It’s a very Victorian thing to do. In an age defined by repression of emotion, floriography was a way to creatively let your thoughts and feelings out.

I began thinking about how could I use this to create a story? Unlike so many of my other stories, this is a project where the characters are of my own construction. Beyond a vague concept of the main character, I’m allowing the research to drive the development as well as the setting and plot.

Since this isn’t my first foray into historical fiction, I’m using lessons learned on previous projects. For example, there is such a thing as too much research and it’s easy to get sucked into a research black hole. When I start worrying about nitpicky details then I need to back off. I also set myself a time limit on research. After a month, whatever I had is what I was going to use to develop the characters and the story.

Or so I thought. Admittedly there are knowledge gaps and research, particularly in historical fiction, is never truly done. However, instead of stopping in the middle of writing to go back to research, I’m using the weekends, a time I normally do not write, to work on it. My hope is this will prevent me from overthinking and only stick to relevant information. I’m also hoping it will keep me focused on this being a piece of fiction and not a research paper.

Something different for me is I started writing without a finished outline. I’m a writer who is a hybrid; not a pantser, but I do struggle to have a complete plan before writing. Even with a full outline it changes enormously as the characters and new ideas take over. But for my sanity on the weekends I’m working to flesh out and rework the road map.

I’m excited for this project and hope it will be different from anything I’ve written before. The uniqueness of the subject matter as well as a unique main character is energizing me. I don’t know how long this rough draft will take and I’m not setting a concrete deadline.  So, while I’m nervous, this new approach I’m hoping will work for me.

Front Page, Musings

Weekly Musing: Something Different

DH Hanni

This week I thought I’d talked about a movie I recently watched and what caught my attention as a writer. This won’t be a movie review, there are plenty of site for that, rather I’ll be examining the narrative structure, dialogue, and character development of Dunkirk.

First, let’s examine the narrative structure of the movie. While it doesn’t break any ground in structure, I still found it intriguing. Christopher Nolan, who in addition to directing the film also wrote and produced it, utilizes a non-linear approach. He uses flashbacks at appropriate times to develop certain characters but to also show the chain of events which took a dicey situation into a disaster. Nolan makes it easy to keep track of the back and forth which to me is tricky. There are books I’ve read which have done this back and forth is such a sloppy way I couldn’t keep track of where I was in the timeline.

Using a non-linear approach to storytelling is tricky no matter what the medium is. Perhaps it’s easy for a visual medium, perhaps it’s easier for the written word. I truly don’t know. There are some people who simply cannot follow anything straight forward. That’s fine. All our brains are wired differently. The film makes it easy because from the start the audience is given a notation of 1 week or 1 day letting us know what is going on. Nothing more is needed to explain what Nolan is doing.

Next, I’ll examine the dialogue or the rather shockingly lack of dialogue in Dunkirk. Normally, I am someone who loves dialogue and believes it is the best way to show character. But with this movie, I find myself appreciating its sparseness. It simply does not need it except where appropriate. According to the Wikipedia entry for the movie the dialogue for the movie is only 76 pages. A page of dialogue for a script equals 1 minute of spoken dialogue. This gives the impression the movie is only 76 minutes long movie, but it is 1 hour and 45 minutes long.

Nolan’s philosophy toward the movie was to focus solely on the event itself. No need for big speeches from military men or Churchill. No need to show the enemy. In fact, the only interaction the movie deals with the enemy are pieces of paper which floated down upon the French and English soldiers printed by the Germans showing them how they were surrounded on the beach in the opening few minutes. That’s all that is needed; not discussions between characters as to what it means. In a traditional war movie we would get nothing but grandiose speeches by military men and politicians and explanations for just how difficult each decision was.

The lack of dialogue creates an intimate sense each character is operating on instinct. For example, dialogue would have ruined a scene in which two characters pick up the gurney of a wounded soldier left behind on the beach after a German bombing. They realize he is still alive and know their best and only chance to leave is to pick him up and hustle him to the medical boat, the only boat authorized to leave. Through their actions the audience gets what they’re doing. They know what they’re doing. To have them talk about it would quite frankly come across as 1) info dumping purely for the audience’s sake, and 2) make them sound stupid. The reality of it is I doubt many of the people sat around discussing themselves or the war. It simply wasn’t what was on their mind. What mattered was surviving long enough to get off that damn beach and go home.

The most dialogue comes between the interaction of a captain of a small civilian boat enlisted by the navy, his son, his son’s friend, and a stray army officer they pick up along the way. This is effective because it focuses the attention on heroes we aren’t used to seeing on screen. The audience later finds out why so many civilian vessels were enlisted to help near 400,000 men get off a beach.

Finally, I’d like to examine Nolan’s approach to characters. I am someone who lacks stories to be character-driven rather than plot-driven. Characters are how I make, or don’t make, an emotional connection to the overall story. However, Dunkirk is truly plot-driven. That’s not to say it doesn’t have characters the audience doesn’t care about. With a large ensemble cast, a mixture of well-known actors such as such as Kenneth Branagh and Tom Hardy, Nolan instead focuses primarily on young, unknown actors and their story.

From the start Dunkirk is intentionally vague with information about the characters, their backgrounds, and honestly, even their names. No matter what medium, the audience gets information early on about why we should or shouldn’t like a character. We usually get bits of relevant backstory so that the audience clearly understands the stakes for each character. In war movies, the characters are taken one step further in that we also get to know the military men and politicians behind the decisions.

In Dunkirk, we do not get this nor is it really needed. Enough is given so we feel how harrowing each of their stories is. Though it is a historical movie, and it’s easy enough to look up how it ends, I teared up and empathized with the characters. From the army officer pleading with a civilian boat captain to not go to Dunkirk to the young men beaten by the Germans to the air force pilots circling the beach to bring down enemy planes, I had an emotional connection to them.

As a writer, watching a movie like Dunkirk shows how effective storytelling can be when it breaks a few rules. Granted, I think the primary reason why it works is because of top notch acting so the sparse dialogue, non-linear storytelling, and lack of character development works. Though I know there are books which employ one or all of these traits, I think it’s more difficult. The movie certainly challenged me to re-examine my thoughts on plot-driven stories. I don’t know if it has inspired to me to try my hand at a non-traditional story structure; I think that is something very few have a talent for. But like reading outside one’s genre, it’s important to examine how other mediums tell a story.