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This post is not about my wordcount.
Jan. 26th, 2011 01:19 pmGot a full page handwritten yesterday -- don't know the exact wordcount yet but I know it was over 250. NOW ON TO OTHER SUBJECTS.
There are a few subjects that recur in almost everything I write, time and again. Tropes -- and you can thank me for not linking to TVTropes there, although maybe I should for my examples. My stories have:
-Witty banter, regardless of whether it's appropriate. For this I blame Spider-Man and Joss Whedon.
-Characters with troubled relationships with their fathers. All The Best Cowboys, etc. etc. ... but mostly just an inescapable bit of "Write what you know."
-Names and naming as an important factor in the construction of identity. Have I discussed the tangled history of my name on this journal? Again, sort of an unavoidable preoccupation for me.
-Elements of horror. Almost always, anyway. It just seems to be what I do best, expecially in conjunction with witty banter. I used to say I wrote fantasy. Now I say I write dark fantasy.
-Antiheroic sharp-tongued aristocratic blond boys who dabble in magic-use. Seriously, brain, that's an awfully specific hang-up. What the Hell? My role-playing career is likewise full of these guys. And they're not the same character, recurring -- I think anyone who's read Running In Her Veins and Hellion Prince would back me up when I say that Casimir and Damarhis are FAR from the same person -- they just share this particular set of adjectives.
-Characters who use subtlety, not force, to win. Which is relatively universal, but still. Nobody in my stories wins because they're the best at physical violence. Trickster-heroes are way more interesting than warrior-heroes. Odysseus over Achilles, every time.
And there are probably a lot more, too. Has anyone noticed any obvious ones I missed? And what are your own writerly pre-occupations and fascinations?
There are a few subjects that recur in almost everything I write, time and again. Tropes -- and you can thank me for not linking to TVTropes there, although maybe I should for my examples. My stories have:
-Witty banter, regardless of whether it's appropriate. For this I blame Spider-Man and Joss Whedon.
-Characters with troubled relationships with their fathers. All The Best Cowboys, etc. etc. ... but mostly just an inescapable bit of "Write what you know."
-Names and naming as an important factor in the construction of identity. Have I discussed the tangled history of my name on this journal? Again, sort of an unavoidable preoccupation for me.
-Elements of horror. Almost always, anyway. It just seems to be what I do best, expecially in conjunction with witty banter. I used to say I wrote fantasy. Now I say I write dark fantasy.
-Antiheroic sharp-tongued aristocratic blond boys who dabble in magic-use. Seriously, brain, that's an awfully specific hang-up. What the Hell? My role-playing career is likewise full of these guys. And they're not the same character, recurring -- I think anyone who's read Running In Her Veins and Hellion Prince would back me up when I say that Casimir and Damarhis are FAR from the same person -- they just share this particular set of adjectives.
-Characters who use subtlety, not force, to win. Which is relatively universal, but still. Nobody in my stories wins because they're the best at physical violence. Trickster-heroes are way more interesting than warrior-heroes. Odysseus over Achilles, every time.
And there are probably a lot more, too. Has anyone noticed any obvious ones I missed? And what are your own writerly pre-occupations and fascinations?
