Tuesday and Wednesday were both 2000+ word days, and though today is moving much slower (there was writing-related business to do this morning, which also involved a trip to town to the post office),\u00a0 Book V seems to be over its “You ignored me–I’ll ignore you” snit.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I’ve written out almost all of one of early-Tuesday-morning’s plot-bombs, and have the other still to do (notes made at the time, of course.)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I think it’s not quite as “big” in terms of wordage, but that doesn’t matter.\u00a0 It’s an important chunk of plot, to be sure.<\/p>\n
Sam Barnett-Cormack asked about themes in the books, and how and when I knew what they were.\u00a0\u00a0 I don’t think about “theme” when I start a book (or series of books), but about characters.\u00a0\u00a0 The characters have their own problems,\u00a0 one or more of which starts to vibrate (buzzing in my head)\u00a0 and announce itself as something more than a character problem.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This vibration (it really is that sensation) may come early in the process of that book, or later, or not until I read the book a year after its publication.\u00a0 Sometimes when I think I know what it is,\u00a0 it’s a minor issue, and the BIG issue announces itself later.\u00a0\u00a0 I was a dud at finding “the hidden meaning” or “the theme”\u00a0 in school, too…the teacher always had one thing in mind, and I was always seeing something else.<\/p>\n
Writing to a theme feels more like writing political essays than fiction, and for me, being aware of the theme interferes with Story–with letting the characters lead the way through their problems, their issues.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Nonfiction writing, essay writing,\u00a0 can benefit from a firm thematic structure, and I know where I’m going (nearly always) but fiction is discovery writing.\u00a0\u00a0 Follow the footprints and the crushed leaves and the thread caught on the bark of a tree, to find out what this character is up to (they get enough ahead of me sometimes that I am, in fact, stuck with hunting for hints of where a character’s gone.)<\/p>\n
But just as I have my cranky but very effective Plot Daemon laboring in the engine room of the story-ship,\u00a0 I seem to have a Theme Daemon as well (the Plot Daemon’s cousin Reilly, maybe?) who takes care of theme for me.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 So I’m free to follow the characters, sometimes living in their heads, sometimes trailing behind,\u00a0 and whatever I think the book is “about” doesn’t matter because the characters and the Plot and Theme Daemons\u00a0 collude to produce something better than I can think of at the start.<\/p>\n
It’s sort of like my internal organs–a kidney, say, or a pancreas, or bone marrow.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 They’re doing important things in there, but they don’t need, or want, my constant intrusive attention.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 So “theme” gets woven or knitted up or whatever metaphor works, as the story goes along–and we might not even agree on what it is.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Because readers come to any work with a mind full of previous books, previous experience in life, previous teaching on how to identify a book’s theme…so the reader may think the book’s theme is one thing and the writer may think it’s another.\u00a0 And another reader may think a third idea is the right one.<\/p>\n
Before I started Oath of Fealty formally, I thought of it as Kieri’s story…and in fact, all the volumes have been in folders\u00a0 labeled Kieri-n (n from I to V)\u00a0 before they got their real titles.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But once I started writing,\u00a0 I realized that it wasn’t just Kieri’s story.\u00a0\u00a0 It was a bigger story, a story of change and the reaction to change–of consquences to a a good thing, some of which would not be good.\u00a0\u00a0 Is “consequences” the theme?\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Is “change and the challenge of change” the theme?\u00a0\u00a0 I have no idea.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I know it’s about (among other things) disruptive change that forces people–adults in midlife as well as young people–to cope with that change, and how they react to the requirement.\u00a0\u00a0 But I don’t know that that’s all<\/em> it’s about.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In fact, I’m fairly sure that’s not<\/em> all it’s about.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I won’t know, until I finish the last book,\u00a0 because every notion that comes up connects with other notions and I never know how far that will propagate.<\/p>\n Consider the Serrano-Suiza books, the Familias Regnant group of seven.\u00a0 I started out to write a rollicking space opera involving horses and spaceships–and also to play with the notion I had that how people approach problems depends in part on their age–that 20-somethings, 40-somethings, and over 60-somethings will deal with the same problem differently because they have different toolkits, different experience.\u00a0 That provided enough complexity to start with.<\/p>\n But then…what about longevity treatments?\u00a0 Hmmm.\u00a0\u00a0 How would a long lifespan affect a culture?\u00a0\u00a0 Who would take the treatments first, and why?\u00a0 Who would refuse, and why?\u00a0\u00a0 Which of my characters would be eager to live longer, and what plans did they have for that?\u00a0\u00a0 Etc.<\/p>\n Soon I had developed a whole range of thoughts (based on living through the characters) that predicted the kinds of conflicts due specifically to longevity treatments (as well as all the usual sources of conflict.)\u00a0\u00a0 So the head of the Compassionate Hand sees it as his duty to call for the assassination of the Familias head of state, to prevent what he foresees as endless war with an entity that will continue to expand with exploding population and its inhuman desire for immortality.\u00a0 (As one instance.)<\/p>\n There are rejuvenants who continue to accumulate wealth with their very extended lifespans–and people who can’t succeed in their careers if they can’t afford rejuvenation, because they age “too fast.”\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Increasing concentration of wealth, along with increasing paranoia of the multiple rejuvenants as they fear accidental (or intended) death more when death is no longer inevitable.\u00a0\u00a0 Wealth and long life span makes people “prudent” in this world, too, but prudence isn’t the only virtue.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 What about the military–it’s nice to have someone with long experience, but what if that means they define “prudent” in a way that means timid (think of\u00a0 some of the older US Civil War generals early in that war, or some of the older admirals in the Royal Navy in WWI.)\u00a0 Increasing frustration of those whose elders may never die off (so when DO you inherit the company?)\u00a0 and those who will never be able to afford rejuvenation.<\/p>\n Vatta’s War<\/em> also has generational complexity, but ignores longevity concerns for several other complicating topics:\u00a0 the benefits and costs of monopoly,\u00a0 intrafamilial relations with siblings, cousins, etc.,\u00a0 and the psychology of killing, trust and betrayal across a broad field of opportunities.<\/p>\n So with the current Paladin’s Legacy<\/em> group, I’m still in progress and have no firm, final answer.\u00a0\u00a0 And remind people that the way I write is the way I write.\u00a0 Other writers do it very differently.\u00a0 There are only two rules to writing:\u00a0 Shut up and write (or it never gets written) and Don’t bore the reader (or it never gets read.)<\/p>\n