After what came before…

For today, a couple of unrelated thoughts based on my previous post.  If you need to, you can go back and read it. I’ll wait – the Internet is patient.

My first thought is that comic book format creates interesting challenges to pacing.  At the request of the person I am writing for, I’m trying to avoid too many words per panel.  I’m also trying to avoid too many panels per page.  Otherwise, you know, they get really small and cramped.

Unfortunately, the original plan also included not having too many pages of story as well.  And the way I’m working now, it takes five pages to move the story an inch.  I suppose economy of storytelling is an issue in any media.  Brevity, wit.  It’s a fun, but occasionally frustrating challenge.

My other thought was about the classification and demystification of magic that I ranted about in my previous post.  Particularly as it pertains to my work-not-so-much-in-progress, The Illusionist’s House. 

I’m thinking the solution may be to go ahead and let the people in the story try to classify magic.  Maybe even let them think they’ve succeeded.  And then have them be wrong.  Let them learn that some things defy pigeonholes.

The limits of what can be known is becoming a theme for the story anyway.

Post Mutant Magic Syndrome

First, as I write this it’s the last day of 2010.  So Happy New Year to all my readers.  Second, this may turn into a rant. Hey, I’m sure I’m the first blogger that’s ever happened to.

The weeks surrounding the holidays have thrown me a little off track, so I haven’t really been keeping up on either my blogging or my writing.  As a result, The Illusionist's House has hit something of a stall.  I have also taken on another writing project, a (theoretically) short web-comic script for a sister-in-law.

Looking back on my work-in-progress, I see it suffers from a modern condition that I have chosen to call, for want of some other equally stupid name, Post Mutant Magic Syndrome.

Long-time readers will probably have gotten the impression that I like superheroes.  They would be right.  One of the interesting traits of the genre is that superpowers are frequently (though not always) well defined.  Readers like the heroes with clearly defined limits – it cuts down on the Deus ex Machina endings you get if a hero can pull any power out of his hat. 

Marvel Comic’s mutants are a good example – the usually only have one or two very specific powers.  This one has wings, that one can walk through walls.

Now the fantasy genre relies heavily on magic and magic, as a general rule, defies easy definition and classification.  Only not so much, any more. 

I’ve been reading a collection of werewolf short stories but current popular urban fantasy authors.  As is the modern trend in dark fantasy, there is more than one thing out there going bump in the night.  In a world of demons and vampires, a werewolf can actually be the good guy.  And who doesn’t like to see werewolves and vampires at war?

This leads to more definition for the supernatural element. I’m okay with different stories defining the monsters differently – these werewolves turn into wolves, those turn into wolfmen.  I’m a big fan of doing what serves the story.  But some of these worlds are becoming so populated with magical beings that rigid scientific principles of taxonomy are starting to apply.  I recently read a story by an author I really like where the hero (a vampire-hunting werewolf) paused to explain the difference between the powers of witches and wizards.

It’s starting to take some of the magic out of things.  I mean, these stories still work for me on the level in which I enjoy superheroes, but the trade-off is a level of mystery.

Which brings us back to my current work in progress, which hinges on defining the limits on illusion magic as distinct from several other forms.  I’m writing what I’m ranting against and I’m not sure how I feel about that.

Originality Blues

Pop quiz: I thinking of a school. It's a special school, a training center for young people with special gifts that set them apart from the mundane world. What school am I thinking of? You have ten seconds. Go.

Now for the scoring. Did you say Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry? Professor Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters? Camp Half Blood? Redhurst Academy? The Isle of Roke? The Invisible College? Something else entirely? Doesn't matter. Give yourself two points. Did you know that the phrase "Devil take the hindmost" comes from an old folktale about a school for magicians?

The reason I ask the question, I mean aside from the chance to show off my geek lore, is to demonstrate that there is no one answer. It has been argued that there are no new ideas, no new plots, no new stories. I'm not sure I agree.

But I am fairly certain that it doesn't matter. How you present an idea, how you tell a story -- these things can make all the difference. Does it matter if your special people are magic, mutant, psychic or bionic? Of course it does! But what really matters is how well you tell their stories. Whether you make us care about them and the challenges they face.

So don't worry too much about whether your core idea is shiny and new. Worry instead about what you can do with it. Where it can take you. And the funny thing is, this is true even if you do have a truly new idea. An idea by itself is not a story. You still have to do the work.

That Magical Feeling

I have observed, on more than one occasion, that the comic book sorcerer Dr. Strange conducts his fights in pretty much the same manner as the starship Enterprise.

Since the good Doctor can fly, fights for both typically occur in three dimensions, moving through a spatial environment. Both Dr. Strange and the Enterprise raise their shields, which are often depicted as taking hits and losing integrity throughout the conflict. Both the mage and the ship start with their basic energy blasts and then escalate to more powerful bolts. Against especially difficult opponents, new and unusual tactics are brought out near the end of the fight.

This post is not about Clarke's Third Law or its inverse. My point is this: For all that I enjoy a good Dr. Strange story, magic should not feel something that happens on Star Trek. So how does an author make magic feel more magical?

Even when accomplishing ends that can be achieved with science or super-powers, magic can use methods that startle, amaze, and confound. There are a number of ways to disarm a gunman in a story, but how often is the gun transformed to moths? Even better, being a weapon, the gun could change into steel moths with sharp wings that cut anyone they brush against until, when they are exposed to true moonlight, the metal flakes off and they become ordinary lunar moths and flitter away.

Magic can be subtle. A series of happy circumstances that might not have been magical at all, except for that crazy person claiming to have made it happen by lighting a single red candle at midnight. Magic is also often depicted has having a price, a cost to the user in terms of temptation, corruption, or risk to the immortal soul.

And magic can harken back to myths, fairy tales, legends, and stories. We have a great treasure trove of folklore giving us magic rings, dragons, and swords of power. Stories of shape-changers, tricksters, and unquiet spirits. Magic has its own recognizable toolbox, as surely as science comes with robots, computers, and starships. Sure, you want to be careful of being too cliché, but the archetypes do exist. When was the last time the Enterprise summoned a demon?

And for those of you poor souls who, unlike me, have no interest in writing stories with magic, consider this: The lesson still applies. Want to write romance? What feels right for romance? What are its elements, its clichés, its strengths? Want to write crime fiction? Same questions. Because your film noir shouldn't feel like a superhero story.

Unless, of course, that's what you really wanted all along.