We're a group of YA authors published by small presses, and we're getting the word out about our books, talking about writing, the world of kid lit, and anything else that pops into our pretty heads.
Writers often say that they use ‘What If’ to trigger a story. It can be used over several genres, starting with children’s books. What if animals could talk? What if a snowman came alive? What if the Vikings had continued settling North America? What if the dinosaurs hadn’t died out? The possibilities are limited only by a writer’s imagination. The triggers for the 'what if' can be in news stories, science papers, or even events that happen in everyday life.
I’ve done it myself. What if an alien decides to attend college on Earth? What if a wizard ended up in a garage sale? (that one went in a different direction than I had planned) What if a meteor shower hid something else? (Hmm, I tend to use that one a lot).
Science fiction tends to rely on a number of ‘what if’s as basic. What if faster than light travel existed? (And FTL communication is possible). What if psi powers do exist? (That ‘what if’ started off in science fiction when I first started reading it, but now it seems to have migrated into fantasy.) What if there are other lifeforms in the universe?
Not only is ‘what if’ a good way to start the idea behind a story, it’s also a good way to continue or add threats or twists. Lois McMaster Bujold, for example, has her "worst-possible-thing guideline" (Sidelines: Talks and Essays, 2013) - i.e., "what is the worst possible thing I could do to this character?" For some YA and children's stories, this could be rephrased as "what is the most embarrassing thing I could do to this character?"
What are some 'What if?' triggers that you have used as a writer or enjoyed as a reader?
This month I’m posting my review for The Secret of My-Myst by Mike DiCerto (another YAAYNHO blogger). This is the second book in the Rupert Starbright series which I love because it’s all about the magic of imagination, which is such an empowering message to young readers. And the cover is totally cool. I hope you will join me in introducing this fun new series to all the kids you know and love.
The Secret of My-Myst The Adventures of Rupert Starbright (Volume 2) By Mike DiCerto Zumaya Publications April 2012 240 pages
The Secret of My-Myst is Book 2 in the Adventures of Rupert Starbright series. And Mike DiCerto does not disappoint. We jump back into the thick of it with our hero, Rupert and his companion Dream Weaver. The evil Murkus still enslaves the children of Far-Myst while his darkness spreads across the land. He is more terrifying and powerful than ever before as a flame-throwing, winged Dragon Lord. Rupert is still trying to make his way home to Graysland. On a quick trip to the outhouse, Rupert crosses paths with Quix and Xerks, Murkus’s boy soldiers. They lure him into the Wildness with the promise of finding the treatmentia bush to cure his grandmother’s coffus. After all, the only reason he even came to this bizarre-o-land was to help his grandmother, who happens to be a very wise woman. But now he’s stuck here.
As much as I would like to go on and on about this captivating tale, you really must enter the mysterious land of My-Myst with Rupert and meet the shape-shifting Truseens for yourself. Be prepared to lose all contact with the outside world while immersed in this mesmerizing adventure. Once again imagination plays a major role – which I love. Amazing things are learned about the Weaver kids. And the path to victory does not necessarily mean destroying the enemy.
The Adventures of Rupert Starbright is a top-notch, original fantasy series. For all the questions The Door to Far-Myst (Book 1) asked, The Secret of My-Myst answers – then asks some more. Along his journey this time, Rupert discovers a connection between Graysland and the strange lands of Far-Myst and My-Myst. See if you can figure it out. I’m pretty sure the answer will come in Book 3. I confess, I’m hooked on Rupert Starbright.
In the last few years authors have had to take up more and more of the marketing duties which were once handled by publishers. One of the ways to do this are by the use of Book Trailers.
Book Trailers are meant to be no longer than a couple of minutes and pack enough punch to get you guys interested enough to bite and take a closer look at the book. (A lot like the hook I talked about a month or more ago.)
I've procrastinated making mine but am slowly catching up. (Trolling for appropriate pictures make my eyes hurt! Looking for fodder is harder than making the darn thing!) For this latest video I started using a piece of software called Anime Studio. I think it really pumped up the quality of what I can make by a lot!
Watch the video and then I'll go through the steps I took to get it to the finished product. (Hopefully it won't be too lame and you won't cry to get your 1 minute and 13 seconds back.) :P
It's always best if you have some kind of plan before you ever start. Basically what you hope to say/show and the order.
There are several picture sites where for a fee you can download royalty free pictures (a few even have video clips) to use in the book trailer. There is one I know of that allows you to use them for free, but you have to make sure to give the photographer credit. Always need to make sure you're not infringing on someone's copyright. This includes the music and photos.
Another option too is Deviant Art. If you find something nice there, you can email the artist and see if they'd allow you to use it in the video, giving them credit at the end. Some will and some won't.
For all these though, be prepared for your eyes to want to fall out of your head after hours and hours of scrolling through stuff! But if you end up with the perfect picture/drawing, it is well worth it. (Just give yourself time to recuperate! lol.)
Of course using photos you took does make things even better! Those are yours to use as you see fit. :P You never know what you may have hiding in an album somewhere. And with camera phone, nowadays, taking pictures is even easier. Just make sure the photo quality is high enough for what you have in mind.
I use two pieces of free software to put the video together. 1) Movie Maker, which comes standard with all computers using windows. 2) Audacity, which is a free down loadable audio recording and editing software (you will need a microphone or headset to use this to best effect).
The great thing about Audacity is that once you find your background music, you can open it up in the software then record your voice to add to the track. Even better, (make sure to save as the project) it keeps the soundtrack and the voice track separate so you can add silences in your voice parts to manipulate when they occur. This becomes very important when you're putting all pieces together in Movie Maker.
Like I said before, this year I also bought Anime Studio. The great thing about this piece of software is that you can add 'bones' to pictures to make them move. Even the Text can be manipulated. So you can make the book trailer less static. And it's even kind of fun! (You will export your project as an .avi to add to Movie Maker)
So, you have pictures, video bits, the music. Now all you need to do is put them together. Movie Maker will help you do that. Movie Maker allows you to import all the bits and then you can arrange them in any order you like, adding transition effects, scrolling text, and end titles.
The beauty here is that as you add each thing, you can preview it, and also see what time it falls on the video. This allows you to go back to Audacity and tweak your spoken parts so the timing is perfect.
Hopefully at the end you will have something to be proud of that you can share. And while it may have taken a lot of time to create, it won't be going anywhere and you can use it for years to come at your website, promo CDs, and whatever else you can think of. Make sure to upload it to Youtube. You can get code there to embed it at your webpage, or blog. Even better join Blazing Trailers where you can join a ton of authors and display your trailer with theirs.
Years ago a friend lent me a book and told me I just had to read it. What was funny at the time was how he also told me the first three books were great, but the ones after weren't worth it. Didn't sound like something I wanted to get into, but since he went to the trouble to bring me one of them, I figured I’d give it a shot. Within the first few pages I hit something that just about made me think there was no point in reading the rest of it, regardless of the good prose and likeable characters. It was a bad case of where Character Motivation/Smarts and the Author's Plot COLLIDED. (This is not just a book issue. It’s a lot more prevalent on TV.)
In this particular book, a man who lives in a non-magical land and is very well versed about nature, comes across a plant he’s never seen before. He cuts the plant, and it hits him with a thorn in retaliation. When the hero tries to remove the thorn, the latter embeds itself deeper into his hand. The hero has no knife, so does what he can, but the darn thorn acts in unnatural ways and evades his attempts to remove it by totally disappearing into his flesh. He mucks with it for another moment but can’t get rid of it, and then for all intents and purposes, shrugs his shoulder and goes on his way as if this thing that’s invaded his body is of no consequence.
Now, hold the phone!
Anyone who had a thorn in their hand and saw it dig itself deeper like some stubborn animal would be screaming bloody murder and trying to get themselves to the nearest doctor to get the sucker out. (I know I would!) Yet this man forgets all about the invader, except for noticing occasionally how the hand turns red and hurts (like that wouldn't be sending panic signals to anyone else), and goes on his way getting into the meat of the adventure and so on. In my opinion, there was a definite clash in what the writer wanted to set up as a later problem, and what the character would have really done about the problem when it happened. Personally, I would have fallen for the state of things as written if the guy had a least panicked a little, did try to go home to get help, even if on the way he got distracted for a short while by other events going on around him. So this clash between the author and his character could have been averted or minimized for the reader and made that much more believable. As a writer, you’ll often try to stick to a mental road map of where the story needs to go. And that’s not a bad idea. But it’s also important to absolutely stay true to the motivations and characteristics of the characters you’re portraying or you will be doing the whole novel/story and your readers a huge disservice.
Listen to what the characters tell you, even if it's not part of the map! Would they really go into that dark room alone especially when they hear the growling noises coming from inside? Probably not. Yet there are ways to have it happen where despite their common sense, they’d still go in there.
If you just have to have something happen in the story, but it clashes with your character's motivation/personality find a way to shift the situation so they will do what you want anyway. If you can’t find a way, it wasn’t mean to be – so ditch it. Don't force it! Here's an example: An old saying is that Tonto (The Lone Ranger's Sidekick) never goes into town. "Tonto no go to town." For him, going to town is a stupid thing to do because he knows that due to his race and the prejudices of some of the people there, he will not be welcomed and bad things are likely to happen. But in order for your plot to progress in the story you’re writing, you absolutely must have him in town because it’s the only way he’ll meet the beauty from Boston and fall in love.
So what do you do? You can't just suddenly have Tonto say he wants to go to town. That's totally against his usual motivation/personality. But if he absolutely needs to be in town, be smart, burn some brain cells and then arrange matters in a believable way that while still being true to his personality and choices, Tonto still goes into town.
Making this happen for Tonto is easy.
If the Lone Ranger went to town and hadn’t been heard from in too long and Tonto knew his friend was going into a possibly dangerous situation to begin with, Tonto would eventually go to town to look for his friend and make sure he was alright.
If Tonto received a message that the Lone Ranger was in trouble and needed him, this would also drive him to go to town--his need to be there for his friend would overrule his hesitation about going to a place where there could be unpleasantness or even danger for him.
Both options above keep Tonto true to his character yet it still gets him to where you need him to be to progress the story you want to tell. Know your characters’ personalities and motivations and remain faithful to them. Don't let the planned plot put you in a Character vs. Writer's Plot Clash. The more believable and reasonable you can make the choices your characters make due to the factors you've thrown at them, the more fun and believable the story will be.
As I tell people, I've been writing since the dark ages. Those were the times of typewriters and carbon paper for copies. I've often been asked where I get my ideas. It's all in the imagination. As a child, I drove my parents, grandparents and just about everyone crazy with a question. "What if." My mind would take a simple situation like, and remember I was a child during WWII. What if the Germans come? My mind didn't stop there but I created a dozen different scenarios. My friends loved these little stories and I'm afraid we took them to heart, learning Morse Code and planting traps in the woods.
"What if? I think this is a writer's jumping off point for writing their stories. What if X happens instead of T. Incidents read in the newspaper, seen on TV, events around the house are turned into stories by asking "What if?"
During the writing of my YA fantasies, this is often the case. "What if Jewe;s enabled a person to do magical things. Thus the Jewels of Earda trilogy was born. The first two books went easily and then I came to the last book and a question popped into my head. "What is the secret of the Jewels? What if they aren't what they were thought to be during the first two books. I was off and running.
The question "What if" also figures in the Henge Betrayed series. What if someone could control the elements as water, fire, earth and air. I was off and running.
Asking yourself "What if?" can add twists and turns to your stories that even you as the writer don't even suspect will happen. Triggering the imagination. Isn't that what fiction writing is all about?
