The Ur Challenge (Mixing and Matching Genre and Author)

Back when the kindle was young, and reading off of portable computers was the new hot trend, Stephen King wrote a short story titled Ur. This short story was about a college professor who, out of spite at his ex, finally broke down and ordered a kindle of his own. However, while all kindles at the time were white, this one was pink. Not only that, but when he bought books to add to it, they were never actually charged to his card.

Without giving too many spoilers, he soon realizes there is something unique about this kindle... namely that it can access books written in other dimensions! These other Urs, as they're called, give us some strange insight into what people may be reading in the world next door. A notable example of which is the idea of a Hemmingway that wrote pot boiler crime novels... it's still definitely his work and style, but something so utterly unexpected that it makes you scratch your head wondering what that would be like.

For writers out there, I'm referring to this as the Ur Challenge, and I got the idea from Oxford Royale.

Let's get strange with this!

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Lastly, make sure you check out my Vocal archive for several hundred other articles about geek ephemera, weird history, writing, and more!

What Styles and Genres Would You Mix and Match?

Folks who are fans of my work know that I am a fan of mixing and blending as much nonsense into the pot as I possibly can. Whether it's an old testament angel navigating the power games of ancient Babylonian gods in downtown L.A., or writing about a team of dishonorably discharged mercenaries taking on the horrors of Lovecraft's mythos, I like to mix and match my nonsense.

You can find those stories in The Rejects and SNAFU: An Anthology of Military Horror, for those who are curious.

While mixing and matching genres and conventions can be fun, the Ur Challenge takes things a step further. Because it's one thing to imitate the particular style and tradition of a known writer, but it's quite another to take that style, and then attempt to write a completely different genre than that author would ever have tackled.

It's kind of like Post-Modern Jukebox, but for books!

So if you need a bit of inspiration to really get your fingers tuned up for something, ask yourself how you would tackle this prompt. Would you try to write a bodice-ripping romance in the style of H.P. Lovecraft? A post-apocalyptic tale of survival if it were told by Arthur Conan Doyle? A gritty private detective story with all the purple prose of Robert Howard? They sky is the limit, but the very concept can really get your mind moving, so I thought I'd share it this week!

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Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Not All Writing Advice is Going To Apply To You, And Your Work

There's a metaphor I've used several times since I started this blog most of a decade ago, which is comparing the writing process to going to the gym. However, while this comparison works on multiple levels, I feel that one aspect I haven't touched on is, quite simply, there's no such thing as universal exercise advice. Something that works perfectly for one person isn't going to work at all for someone else; it all depends on who you are, where you're starting, what your end goals are, and a thousand other factors.

So please, keep all of this in mind whenever you start looking for things to improve your writing regimen.

Not all exercises are for every regimen, after all.

Before we get into it this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron!

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Different Sports, Different Bodies, Different Goals

For those who need a visualization.

Too often, people just assume that every kind of writing is the same sport. Not only that, but they assume that writers are all the same kind of athlete, and that what works for one person will just as easily work for another. If you've ever tried to write something, though, you'll quickly learn that is definitely not the case.

For example, some authors are long-distance runners. Their prose is a journey, and they focus on steady progress toward that eventual goal. Other authors are sprinters, and they focus on pieces that are economy of motion; all killer, no filler, as it were. Some authors are power lifters, focusing on heavy worldbuilding, and others are cage fighters, focusing on heavy-hitting action or deep emotional impact. And as you can see from the sample above, taken from Bored Panda, all of these sports and areas of focus require different kinds of peak physiques, different kinds of training, and different areas of focus.

It's useful to think of writing advice in this context. Because just like how there's some general advice for exercising that can be used by everyone, there's also some general writing advice that will work for all authors. But the more specific the advice gets, the higher the chance there is that it's not going to work for you and your style or project.

And just like how dieting advice meant for long-distance runners is going to be the opposite of what power lifters need, and how a regimen for a fencer isn't going to be great for a wrestler, there's a lot of advice out there (including the advice on this very blog) that isn't going to work for you.

The most important thing to remember is that you know yourself and your style better than anyone on the Internet. So while I generally recommend trying various methods, and listening to the different approaches other writers use, you're the final arbiter of what's good for you and your style. Just remember that when you open your ears to other folks' approaches and suggestions, and remember that they don't know you personally, so they can't tailor their advice/recommendations to you specifically.

It seems obvious, but I felt it needed to be said.

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Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

"Weird Fantasy" A Genre Title We Need More Of

Have you ever had that moment when you realized there isn't a term for an idea or a concept that you're working with? Even if the story you're writing, or the world you're creating, seems simple and straightforward in your mind, you realize the language to easily describe it to other people seems to be lacking? Sometimes if you talk around the idea for a while you'll meet someone who knows the proper label to apply to it... but sometimes that label doesn't seem to exist. So you start digging, trying stuff out, and seeing what best fits.

And that is why I now have the term "weird fantasy" rolling around in my lexicon.

And that's where we get into my Sundara: Dawn of a New Age setting

Before we get into it this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron!

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What is "Weird Fantasy"?

For folks who haven't been following my RPG work, for the past year and some odd change I've been putting out guides and splats for my Sundara: Dawn of a New Age setting for both Pathfinder and Dungeons and Dragons 5E. I recently put together an Ask Me Anything video to field the questions folks have been giving me on it over at the Azukail Games YouTube channel (which you should totally subscribe to if you haven't yet, by the by), and one of the questions I tried to answer was, "What is Sundara?"

That was how I came to use the term "weird fantasy" to describe the world I'm making, and the game that takes place in it.

What is weird fiction, though? Glad you asked!

For folks who didn't watch the video (though you should, if for no other reason than it was a bastard and a half to put together while I was in exile at a hotel), the idea stretches back to the weird fiction that was popular before and during the pulp era. The term was coined to describe stories that took the tropes and ideas from classic ghost stories and gothic horror, but then put them into stories where those things didn't seem to belong, or where they hadn't been before.

And that's more or less what I'm trying to do with Sundara, except with fantasy.

Sundra, as a setting, has all the elements one would expect from a high fantasy RPG. With elves and orcs, sorcerers and clerics, and so on and so forth, it has all the elements one might expect from any Pathfinder or DND setting. However, much like a new menu item from Taco Bell, they're placed in a different order than other offerings... and there are certain things you might expect to be present that I've decided to get rid of.

For example, Sundara has no nations or countries as we think of them. Towns are the most common center of governance, with cities and city states being the largest group that one typically finds. There is no absolute good or absolute evil, which leaves morality up to the players, and it destroys the idea that certain creatures are inherently wicked. There's no such thing as a universal racial language (elven, dwarven, orc, etc.), and communication tends to vary by region and dialect. The gods come in an infinite variety and scope, and it's very possible that churches and congregations actually have very little idea what their gods want from them. Different religious factions may war with one another, as well, not even aware they worship the same god.

The list goes on and on. In short, however, Sundara has enough of the ear marks and elements of a standard high fantasy RPG that players will be able to get stuck in, but there are also enough important differences that it feels new and unique, either eliminating certain staples of the genre, or standing tropes on their heads so that players can't just assume all their preconceptions are valid in this setting.

Is there a better name for Sundara, and what I'm trying to do with it? Possibly. But I thought I'd share this label in the hopes that others were trying to do something similar, and who were likewise struggling for an easy label to slap onto their project so they could make a quick elevator pitch to their audience, could try this one on for size.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Make Sure Your Story Hook Doesn't Give Readers Whiplash

One of the oldest pieces of writing advice out there (and one that I've given myself on this very platform) is to make sure you open your story with something to hook your audience. You want them to be immediately interested and invested, struck by what hits them on the first page. Put another way, if this is not the most interesting part of your character's life (or at least the beginning of that interesting part) then why are we starting here instead of somewhere else?

However, it's all too easy for us to be dishonest with our story opener. To slap down something we think will generate a lot of engagement and interest, but which really isn't reflective of the narrative going forward. And there are few things you can do that are more guaranteed to piss off your audience than that.

Just gonna take this down a bit...

Before we get started, remember to sign up for my weekly newsletter if you want to stay on top of all my latest releases. If you want to help me keep the wheels turning and the lights on, consider becoming a Patreon patron. And lastly, to follow all my followables check out my Linktree!

Now then, let's get to it!

Don't Open a Vegan Meal With a Steak

Let's say you had a delicious vegan meal prepared. The courses were filled with unique spices and styles, making use of breads, fruits, spreads, nuts, and more. But you wanted to start the meal with something special... something that really draws your audience's attention. So you open with a medium-rare steak, prepared right at the table, the scent and sizzle of the red meat filling the room.

That sounds absurd, right? Because sure, there may be some people who are down for both of those things, but if someone is a vegan then the intro is going to turn them off before they get to the rest of the meal. And if someone is there for more tasty meat, chances are good they're going to be disappointed by what comes after the steak. So why the hell would you do that?

It's not a great look, is what I'm getting at.

Sadly, this same logic is something that a lot of writers will do to hook their readers, who will then feel they were lured in under false pretenses.

An example of from Writer's Digest is a story that opened with a pulse-pounding, adrenaline-pumping car chase. It was engaging as hell, no doubt, but it also created certain expectations within the reader. Which became a problem after the introductory hook, because this story was a romance about a woman falling in love with a doctor, and there wouldn't be any further action scenes going forward.

A hook is definitely important, but it also needs to be consistent with your narrative. You don't want to have a high-fantasy opener that turns out to just be a dream, and this is actually a book about a girl trying to get along in a new high school if that sword-swinging dream sequence has nothing to do with the rest of the narrative. You don't want a high-octane shoot out in a club to lead into a quiet, meditative story about a man going into the woods to find himself. These are teasers that don't match the tone, genre, and expectations of the rest of the story you're trying to tell.

Could someone make those examples work? Sure, you could. But to make them work you'd need to work them into the narrative in a meaningful, organic way. You'd have to cover the seams, and make the whole story feel like it was all of a piece, rather than like you took two different books and stitched them together because the intro you had wasn't engaging enough.

First Impressions Are Important

Think of engaging your reader like a job interview. What impression do you want your story to give, and will it follow through on that impression? Because if someone is looking for a hard-hitting detective story and a novel shows up with a gritty murder investigation, but then once it's been hired devolves into a messy relationship drama with no investigation going on, readers are going to feel they were lied to during the interview. And those who were looking for a messy relationship drama likely passed on the book because it came to the interview smoking an unfiltered cigarette and wearing a rumpled trench coat with a 5 o'clock shadow on its face.

Be consistent, and don't give flash you can't back up.

With that said, I wanted to give an example of an introduction that I felt moved smoothly into the following book. Because "Profanity Heralds Discovery" is the introductory fiction for Silkgift, the City of Sails. And I think it sets the tone of the place nicely, while giving readers an introduction into what they should expect going forward.

Currently trying to get the Azukail Games YouTube channel monetized, so if you'd like to help me in that endeavor, give the video a like and a share, and subscribe to the channel!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Look Beneath A Story's Surface When Taking Lessons From Other Writers

Every writer out there has studied the works of those who came before, especially when it comes to the books that personally inspired their work. A lot of us could probably hold lectures on the things that really stood out and affected us, whether it was the tragic elements of Frankenstein, the unique interpersonal dynamics of Avatar: The Last Airbender, or the tone and gothic atmosphere of the 1980s/1990s Batman comics.

With that said, a lot of us can enjoy and be affected by stories without really popping open the hood and getting at what makes them work (or what made them work in their time). This can often lead to writers learning the wrong lessons when analyzing these works, which is why it's a good idea to dig a little deeper to be sure that you're putting the right tools in your toolbox going forward.

Oh... oh there's a LOT going on in here...

Before we get started, remember to sign up for my weekly newsletter if you want to stay on top of all my latest releases. If you want to help me keep the wheels turning and the lights on, consider becoming a Patreon patron. And lastly, to follow all my followables check out my Linktree!

Now then, let's get to it!

Knock-Offs and Genuine Articles

A long time ago I wrote an entry titled Your Fantasy Novel Probably Sucks, and Professor Awesome's University Explains Why. The short version of that post is that a lot of people who want to write fantasy novels grew up influenced by Tolkien. While not a bad thing in and of itself, they often wanted to follow the blueprint he'd laid down with an epic trilogy of books, big world building ideas, etc. The issues was that these stories often lacked characters to act as audience focus; characters who have the same heart as Samwise, the same mystery as Aragorn, or the determination of Frodo.

Put another way, a lot of folks end up copying the style, the sound, and the aesthetics of arguably the most famous trilogy in fantasy at this point, but their vehicle lacks an engine. And without that drive, the story just sort of sits there, doing nothing, and going nowhere.

Hmmm... why isn't it moving?

We can see this in all sorts of creative endeavors, and from all kinds of creators. Another good example is Zack Synder's adaptation of Watchman, as it could be argued that his personal politics and opinions caused him to utterly miss the point of what the original creator Alan Moore was laying down. Snyder got the aesthetics of the story, and he understood the basic reversal (treating superheroes as part of the real world, and the implications thereof), but he utterly missed the commentary Moore was making on that power fantasy of superheroes that made it such an effective deconstruction of the genre. So we see characters like Rorschach portrayed as heroes, rather than as the monsters they were intended to be. We also see the glorification of the superhero, instead of how it is (arguably) something that wears one down, and rarely solves any problems. And so on, and so forth.

From romance novels to zombie stories, killer clowns to Viking-esque fantasy epics, the classics become classics for a reason. And if we want to tap into these tales and understand what makes them tick then we need to look beneath the surface to get to the heart of the matter.

Look Beyond Aesthetics

A lot of the time when authors miss a message it's because they were focused on the outward structure of the story, missing what was going on deeper inside of it. As a result, when they apply their own creative touch it feels like they perfectly recreated the wrapper around a Reese's peanut butter cup, but they completely neglected the delicious treat inside of it.

It looks right, it smells right... taste? Why bother with that?

Stories that stick with us affected us for a reason, even if we aren't always sure what it was at the time. And it's true that sometimes a story will hit us harder because of factors that aren't of the author's doing (it reminded you of someone you cared about who gave you the book as a gift, it was the first "grown up" story you read, etc.). The stories that we keep coming back to, though, and the ones that really stand the test of time, tend to have messages inside them. They have characters who are interesting and compelling, and they deal with themes that spark our imaginations.

Magic systems, sci-fi gadgetry, fantasy species, mood and storytelling flair are all nice things to have, but these things are often the icing on the cake. And while you can construct a cake-like replica made out of just icing, it isn't going to satisfy the audience the way a genuine cake would. So keep that in mind when you start drawing inspiration from authors who came before you, and asking what elements of their stories you're trying to add to your own repertoire going forward.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Readers Love Comfort Zones ("I Want Something New That's Just Like Something Old")

I didn't realize until I was an adult that there's a significant portion of the reading public out there who will read the same books over and over again. This is not a habit I have, and while I will listen to a book more than once (if I like the voice actor), the reason for that was always because I needed something to fill the silence while I was cleaning, drawing, driving, or performing some other task. Devoting myself entirely to a text that stopped me from doing anything else while I was consuming it felt very strange to me if I already knew the story and where it was going, and what the ending was. Even today if I pick up a book I've forgotten about, I'll stop reading it as soon as I remember what the ending is, and how our protagonists get to it.

While re-reading favorite books is a fairly complex behavior, psychologically, as Men's Health points out, it's at least partially connected to comfort. It takes far more energy to consume new media rather than to simply put an old favorite movie or song on and follow the familiar beats, for example. It's also the sort of desire that leads to the consumption of fan fiction when someone runs out of the initial content from the original source.

So, with all that in mind, I think it's important for all of us writers to admit something. We're far more likely to succeed if we can give our readers a new story that feels like a story they already enjoy.

It tastes the same, but has a unique kick to it!

Before we get started, remember to sign up for my weekly newsletter if you want to stay on top of all my latest releases. If you want to help me keep the wheels turning and the lights on, consider becoming a Patreon patron. And lastly, to follow all my followables check out my Linktree!

Now then, let's get to it!

More of The Same, But Different!

If I had to pick a concern that a lot of writers and authors alike seem to have, it's worrying that their work is going to be too much like something that's already on the market. Someone writing a high fantasy trilogy may find that being compared to Tolkien puts a huge amount of pressure on their shoulders. Others may worry that their novel about a team of teenage superhumans is going to just be X-Men with a different color scheme. And I've seen some writers tie themselves in knots trying to find some way to avoid their stories about vampires being compared to everything from Dracula to The Strain.

So today I wanted to remind everyone out there of something very important; most readers aren't looking for some totally fresh, unique take. They're looking for something they already know, and already like, but presented in a way that might feel new to their palate.

Put a different way, there's always going to be those people who are looking to explore food in all its forms. A lot of people are going to want to try something new every now and again. But you're never going to go wrong with promising your audience a classic taste that they already know they like, even if your version of the burrito, cheeseburger, or pizza promises to have a zest that will make it their new favorite iteration of this staple.

Speaking of the same menu item prepared a hundred different ways...

As Alice Liddell points out, the entire romance genre (one of the most lucrative genres out there) is based on providing the same experience to readers in different ways. The ending is already something of a foregone conclusion, it's just the journey to get there. Anyone that's a fan of Warhammer 40,000 has seen how Games Workshop cannibalizes sci-fi and fantasy properties alike, ensuring that whether you want big stompy robots, heroic soldiers fighting alien wars, space wizards, or tech knights, they have covered every, possible base to appeal to an audience who loves everything from Alien and Terminator to Judge Dredd and Mechwarrior. There are dozens of Conan lookalikes slaying monsters and laying maidens in their pages, and probably hundreds of books that present new mysteries and adventures around Lovecraft's terrifying mythos.

It is a lot harder to sell a reader on something outside their experience or comfort zone than it is to get them to try a story that looks like something they already know and like. I say this both as someone who has sold books at cons and shows, as someone who's surveyed a lot of fellow authors, and as someone who's checked the buying habits of readers out there according to marketing data.

So, for all my fellow creators who are wringing their hands because they're worried people aren't going to like their book because it's too similar to this-or-that property in aesthetic, style, story beats, etc., just stop. As long as you've told a good story that's interesting to read, people are going to want it. Period.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!