TamLin (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
tamlin_kitsune) wrote2010-02-11 07:36 pm
tamlin_kitsune) wrote2010-02-11 07:36 pm
my twilight fear
first off - thank you so much to everyone that has been so informative in response to my avatar out of character question. It helped me hugely - and the fact that everyone gave reasons was a God-send. Thank you so, so much.
You see, I've got this fear with my writing. I've possibly always had it - but it's come into focus since the last Twilight book was published and it's regularly in the back of my mind when I write.
For clarification, I've never read the Twilight books so I can't say they're good or bad. I find myself indifferent to the story idea and seem to have an inbuilt prejudice against things that are flamingly popular anyway. That said, several of the communities I hang out in or visit do have Twilighters and the anticipation when the last book was coming out was... vast. Then the last book came out.
The wailing was able to be heard even in the non-Twilight forums.
Not having read the books I can only speak from what I heard but according to a vocal number of fans, the characters in the last book were out of character noticeably and the ending was disappointing - a let down when they'd had their hopes so high. Granted, there's no way any author can live up to every fan's desires and hopes (and with Twilight I'm sure the hopes were sky high). And granted, there are always going to be readers that think you're not writing your characters properly *cough*. But the amount of negative response to the last book seemed excessive to me to simply be a few fans who were disappointed their 'team' didn't end up with Bella. It seemed, to me, reading what I did, that the author had lost her thread and simply written a book because a book needed to be written. When original characters you've created aren't acting in-character anymore - that's a sure sign something went wrong.
As a writer, I take very seriously the trust my readers give me when they start one of my stories. I do this because I've been on the reader side of the fence often enough to know how it feels. As a reader you invest yourself both time-wise and emotionally in someone else's world and you hope - God, you hope - that it pays off in the end. Writing, I admit, I have to follow my story where it goes and there's not much choice for me on that path (hell, half the time I'm not even consulted!). That doesn't mean that, as I get close to the end I don't start obsessively checking for loose ends and gnawing away at whether the ending is going to be satisfactory or not. It was the major concern of mine when I wrote Tales Within Tales for instance. I needed so badly for that last chapter(s) to leave the readers with the sense of satisfaction and completion and healing that they'd invested all that energy of theirs into reaching. I asked two other author's I respect and trust to read those last chapters before I posted just to make sure it ended right. Not necessarily the way someone wanted it to end but in a way that was right and felt as right to the readers as it did to me. Granted, I may not have accomplished that for everyone (I've had at least one wistful notice that I didn't include a sex scene - lol) but it seems I managed for the majority. Commandment One of writing is: Thou shall NOT bore thy readers. Somewhere shortly after that should come 'thou shall not betray their trust'. Which isn't the same as running them through the emotional wringer - heck, what kind of author doesn't enjoy doing that? It's just that everything has to be worthwhile at the end.
Following closely behind that for me is that the characters have to be believable. What author doesn't worry about one of their main characters being an unnoticed Mary Sue? But I also worry, I think we all do, about keeping our characters consistent. Perhaps even more so when we're borrowing a character we love from a fandom. We can play with them and twist them through new hoops but we love the characters we love for a reason and that's the core of them that we try never to change. Sometimes, experimenting too far with how much I can twist them, I worry about losing them. My readers trust me to love and respect the characters as much as they do (and more than some writers *cough*ffnet*cough* seem to). so yeah, I worry when someone tells me I'm abusing Cloud and he's drastically out of character. I worry because I'm well aware that I could easily be so close to the situation that I can't actually see what's really going on anymore. I worry that I might have lost him and not even realize it. And so I need eyes other than mine from writers and readers that I know know what they're talking about to tell me 'yes, no, stop, go'. It means the world to me when those people come up along side me and bring in clarity with them.
on that note, I've started chapter 4 of avatar ;) Since I can't glomp everyone, that's going to be my 'thank you'. You guys were all just exactly what I needed.
I love the internet.
You see, I've got this fear with my writing. I've possibly always had it - but it's come into focus since the last Twilight book was published and it's regularly in the back of my mind when I write.
For clarification, I've never read the Twilight books so I can't say they're good or bad. I find myself indifferent to the story idea and seem to have an inbuilt prejudice against things that are flamingly popular anyway. That said, several of the communities I hang out in or visit do have Twilighters and the anticipation when the last book was coming out was... vast. Then the last book came out.
The wailing was able to be heard even in the non-Twilight forums.
Not having read the books I can only speak from what I heard but according to a vocal number of fans, the characters in the last book were out of character noticeably and the ending was disappointing - a let down when they'd had their hopes so high. Granted, there's no way any author can live up to every fan's desires and hopes (and with Twilight I'm sure the hopes were sky high). And granted, there are always going to be readers that think you're not writing your characters properly *cough*. But the amount of negative response to the last book seemed excessive to me to simply be a few fans who were disappointed their 'team' didn't end up with Bella. It seemed, to me, reading what I did, that the author had lost her thread and simply written a book because a book needed to be written. When original characters you've created aren't acting in-character anymore - that's a sure sign something went wrong.
As a writer, I take very seriously the trust my readers give me when they start one of my stories. I do this because I've been on the reader side of the fence often enough to know how it feels. As a reader you invest yourself both time-wise and emotionally in someone else's world and you hope - God, you hope - that it pays off in the end. Writing, I admit, I have to follow my story where it goes and there's not much choice for me on that path (hell, half the time I'm not even consulted!). That doesn't mean that, as I get close to the end I don't start obsessively checking for loose ends and gnawing away at whether the ending is going to be satisfactory or not. It was the major concern of mine when I wrote Tales Within Tales for instance. I needed so badly for that last chapter(s) to leave the readers with the sense of satisfaction and completion and healing that they'd invested all that energy of theirs into reaching. I asked two other author's I respect and trust to read those last chapters before I posted just to make sure it ended right. Not necessarily the way someone wanted it to end but in a way that was right and felt as right to the readers as it did to me. Granted, I may not have accomplished that for everyone (I've had at least one wistful notice that I didn't include a sex scene - lol) but it seems I managed for the majority. Commandment One of writing is: Thou shall NOT bore thy readers. Somewhere shortly after that should come 'thou shall not betray their trust'. Which isn't the same as running them through the emotional wringer - heck, what kind of author doesn't enjoy doing that? It's just that everything has to be worthwhile at the end.
Following closely behind that for me is that the characters have to be believable. What author doesn't worry about one of their main characters being an unnoticed Mary Sue? But I also worry, I think we all do, about keeping our characters consistent. Perhaps even more so when we're borrowing a character we love from a fandom. We can play with them and twist them through new hoops but we love the characters we love for a reason and that's the core of them that we try never to change. Sometimes, experimenting too far with how much I can twist them, I worry about losing them. My readers trust me to love and respect the characters as much as they do (and more than some writers *cough*ffnet*cough* seem to). so yeah, I worry when someone tells me I'm abusing Cloud and he's drastically out of character. I worry because I'm well aware that I could easily be so close to the situation that I can't actually see what's really going on anymore. I worry that I might have lost him and not even realize it. And so I need eyes other than mine from writers and readers that I know know what they're talking about to tell me 'yes, no, stop, go'. It means the world to me when those people come up along side me and bring in clarity with them.
on that note, I've started chapter 4 of avatar ;) Since I can't glomp everyone, that's going to be my 'thank you'. You guys were all just exactly what I needed.
I love the internet.