Why Being a Geek Isn't Enough

Where am I up to with the whole heroine's internal conflict thing? Well, since getting the big thumbs down on the mother angle of her conflict, I've had more feedback. Now, initially my heroine was ashamed and insecure about being a geek. But this is not 'good conflict' because being a geek should not be a reason to be a ashamed or embarassed. There has to be something deeper that makes her feel insecure, not just because she likes electronics and gothic metal. And there is something deeper I've decided. What makes her feel insecure? The fact that she's different and has never felt like she fitted in.

So, how do I make her different without falling into the Parent Trap? I can't make her feeling different because her mother always told her she was. Neither can I make it dependent on her taste in music or because she likes computers. It has to come from something inside herself. I had a good think about my heroine and the way I've written her, and thought that probably she'd feel different because she was very, very bright. Perhaps her family is very normal and don't know how to deal with a high IQ child? Perhaps when she was in high school, she was put in accelerated learning classes, made to feel different from the rest of her peers at a time when all a kid really wants is to be the same. And then I thought, well how about at one stage of her life she found a group where she did fit in but ended up being cast out of it? How would she feel? What's say that at university, a place where she thought she belonged, she maybe showed up someone by mistake, and as a result was excluded from the group. This would make her very unsure of herself. She'd always be worried she's going to make another mistake, break some social rule she didn't know about, which may mean a loss of the feeling of belonging. So maybe this is why she doesn't like social situations, the reason she's very insecure, worried about saying the wrong thing. And this will be the reason why her black moment will be so terrible for her: she will say the wrong thing and it will result in her losing the hero, and thereby losing the one person in the world who she thought understood her, the world she built with him where she thought she belonged. Evil eh? Didn't I say I liked torturing my characters?? :-) Her resolution will be her finding the confidence to risk saying the wrong thing again in order to win the hero back.

Phew. Sorry, went on a tad there. I hope that wasn't too boring! It's just that I thought going through the process of deciding on strong internal conflict could be useful. Ideally you would do this before beginning writing your manuscript - or at least you'd have the bones of it there to begin with.

Anyway, I don't know if this will work. I let Anna know the angle I was going to take and I haven't heard back so I'm assuming this is a 'go for it' sign. I hope!! She has given me a deadline which is in a month's time. Eurrgh! I feel sick!!

Conflict - The Parent Trap

I have had more feedback from Anna at M&B re my conflict for my heroine. One word: argh!!!

Want to know why? Alrighty, no, having parents dictate a characters actions is not acceptable. A bad relationship with a parent should add to the conflict, not define it. And add is the key word here. In other words, the reasons a character behaves the way they do must be for their own reasons alone and not be explained by another person's ill treatment of them.

So what does this mean for my poor heroine? Well, her mother's ill treatment of her cannot be the reason she is the way she is. Whether this happens in the real world or not is beside the point - this is what they are looking for in a character and so this is what I must provide.

Do I have a solution? Oh yes, indeed. In fact I had a brainwave about this last night. My heroine at the time the story opens is feeling lonely. Why is that (why question again)? Because she feels no one understands her. Why? Because she's different and she feels she's never fitted in. Aha! I sense a conflict coming on... And indeed, Anna suggested the feeling of not fitting in, in her feedback to me. So that's what I'm changing. My heroine now has always felt like an outsider. She's completely different to everyone in her family, is fearfully intelligent and this has always set her apart. Her conflict is that she yearns to belong. How is this a conflict? Well, the hero makes her feel she does belong in the little world she creates with him. Until his conflict blows this world apart.

Complicated huh? Anna told me the aim is to create a believable character and not just invent reasons for already existing behaviour. Can you see why it's hard to do this with an already written mansucript?? Luckily my heroine's behaviour is to do with confidence issues so fitting this conflict into the ms shouldn't be too difficult. I just have to fight the urge to over-complicate it. And also I have to find a resolution for her. Which is the thing that's getting to me now. Does her resolution involve her finally accepting her differences? They are what makes her special after all. Or does she decide that she has let her differences define her and hasn't noticed the parts of her that do make her belong?

Conflict Again or Keeping Your Poker Hand Secret

Wow, this is great guys! I'm loving your questions and comments. Doing these posts focuses me too 'cause I'm still learning along with the rest of you.

Right, so, I read my ms last night and thought about my poor old heroine. Interestingly, and luckily for me, I found I had the bones of a great conflict for her already in there, but I just didn't develop it enough. Must have got distracted and in the end, couldn't see the wood from the trees! So what's her conflict? Well, it has to be strong. It has to be the kind of conflict that would affect your whole life. I guess internal conflict is the emotional baggage we all drag along with us and everbody's got it. My heroine's baggage is a mother who wanted a pretty little girl but got a tall, skinny geek with a stammer. H's mother pick pick picks at her, telling her to smarten up, pretty up, how being interested in unfeminine things will mean she'll be lonely all her life, how she'll never be as sucessful as her brother. How she'll never measure up. So now my H has a reason to be ashamed of her geekiness - ashamed because her secret fear is that perhaps her mother is right and she will never find someone who will want her for who she is, that she will never measure up. Naturally this fear will be realised because that's what you have to do to get the emotion pumping, and she will be forced to either get brave or give in to her fear. And that, my friends, is internal conflict. I still have to run this by Anna at M&B (want to get it right) but I think it's pretty strong.

So you've got your conflict sorted. Great. Now, how much do you give away in that vital first chapter? I would say it's a bit like playing poker. You've got a great hand but you don't want to give it away all at once because you have to save something for later. I mean, you want the reader to keep reading, right? So you hint. Like a trail of breadcrumbs (sorry, mixing my analogies here), you give the reader a little bit to intrigue, for them to keep reading a bit more. A hint could be along the lines of: "He was never going to end up like his parents." or "If only her relationship with her mother was better." So now you've got your reader thinking, 'so what's the deal with his parents? She's got a bad relationship with her mother? Why?'
Does that help? I mean, it's by no means a hard and fast rule. I've got a wip where the internal conflict is right out there in the second chapter and the rest of the ms is how the h/h resolve it.

Again, the crucial part of this is the strength of the internal conflict. It has to be life changing in order for the h/h to make the decision that they can't be together. I mean, if it's just because her job is important to her, that's not strong enough. But what if her dying mother's last wish was for her to follow her dream of being a plastic surgeon? And then what if the hero pops up and tells her she has to make a choice between him and the vow she'd swore to her dying mother? Can she live with having the hero and breaking her vow to her mother, or will she lose her one chance at love because of the promise she made to a dead woman? That's what I mean by strong internal conflict. It's not dependent on the heroine's job, but on her own desire for two goals that cannot be reconciled.

Okay, now I've got my heroine's conflict sorted (hoping!), I'd better go write it! Anything else you want to ask or discuss, please go right ahead and post. I'm liking discussing this too.

More on Conflict

Okay, we were talking about internal conflict. Thought I'd discuss this a bit more because I got my revisions today! Yes!!! These are revisions for another story that is currently under consideration at Mills and Boon. I am hugely relieved to say that they like the story but there is one major problem with it that I have to address. And I thought I'd use it as an example as the major problem is to do with - yep, you guessed it - conflict!

So, lots of people liked the analogy of putting your characters in a room, shutting the door, and asking yourself if there was any reason why these two couldn't be together right then and there. It's a good one eh? But how, if they can get together right then and there, do you provide reasons for them not to? A good place to start is asking the 'why' questions.

Which brings me to my problem. The central issue with my story is that the heroine's conflict needs to be stronger. When I wrote this story, I fell into the same trap as I fell into with Kate: I based my heroine on a social group rather than as a fully-rounded individual. She's a geek. She's shy, introverted, into computers. Cool, I thought. Lots of room for conflict there. But sadly I did not consider the most important question. Why is she a geek? Any yes, she does need a reason other than because she just really likes computers!

Okay, so I stick her in a room with my hero and ask myself why they can't be together. He doesn't want to because he's afraid of love. Why? Because his parents' relationship was a bad one. Why? Because his father loved his mother but she didn't love him back and their marriage went to hell in a handcart. My hero now considers love ruined his childhood (see what it did to his parents?) and he's not having a bar of it. Right, now this conflict came across as strong. Great.
But let's compare with my heroine. She can't get together with the hero because she's a geek and is ashamed of it. Why is she a geek? Why is she ashamed? Um.... See? As was suggested to me, turn it on its head - perhaps it's her insecurities that made her a geek rather than the fact that being a geek has made her insecure? Better. So, why is she insecure? Why is she so shy? What is it in her life that has her running from the hero? Why does she think she isn't good enough for him? It has to be a very good reason for her to run away from the love of her life.

So, are you getting the hang of it? See Lucy King's blog for more on the why questions and how you can get a handle on that wretched internal conflict problem. As for me? Well, I need to go away now and figure out the answers to the above questions myself!

Editorial Comments on Chasing Kate

Hello lovely blog readers. Thanks again for your great comments re my synopsis! Maybe I'm not as lousy at writing them as I thought... :-) Right, prepare for a long post...

You've probably seen the editorial comment go up on I Heart Presents. I want to say Anna wrote an extremely flattering and lovely piece - I don't know if it's fully deserved but I'm extremely grateful to her for her faith in me. It does seem to be true what they say - the editorial staff at Mills and Boon are great!

Right, so the editorial comment. She says that I leaned quite heavily on stereotypes and she's absolutely right. This was part of the whole 'lack of of internal conflict' thing. Now, poor old Kate seems to exist in a vacuum. There aren't any reasons given for her to act in the way that she did. Why does she feel so passionately about her beliefs? My only excuse is that 'she's a hippy. That's what she does'. Stereotype? Uh huh. Anna told me I needed to provide reasons for her to act the way she does otherwise she doesn't come across as a fully rounded character. She said that at every step you have to keep asking yourself why your characters do the things they do. What made Kate lie in the dirt? Why did she go with Alex to his office? Why did he threaten her? 'Just because' isn't a good enough reason! Providing reasons means providing backstory and you'll notice that there wasn't any backstory in that first chapter. Now, I'm no expert, but I've been told a number of times that because these are short romances, you have to get all the information out there quickly. And do it without info-dumping. Who said writing Mills and Boon was easy again??

Now, what else did they say? Kate's appearance was an issue. She's got a nosering (thank God I didn't give her a tattoo!) which may be a turn-off for some readers. Readers have to identify with the heroine so you can't go for extremes. They also thought the whole protest scene was a 'gimmick' and over shadowed the rest of the story. Does that make sense? Their conflict stemmed from the setup and not from their internal conflict. A no no.

And the humour. Yes, I'm a dialogue girl. I love writing it. I can hear my characters talk in my head like it's a movie. I am extremely flattered that some people found the dialogue funny because humour is just one of those things that's hard to do. But (you knew there was a but didn't you?) I got kind of carried away with it in this chapter. They told me that the humour was great but it couldn't be there just for the sake of it. The dialogue should drive the romance forward and if it doesn't, you should cut it.

Do you see now why they didn't want it? I did revise and give Kate some backstory, toned down the protest scene (should have not put it in at all in retrospect but I liked it!) and gave them a bit more in the way of internal conflict. But I didn't go far enough. The archetypes were still there. Again, stick your characters in a room, with no external plot or sub characters or anything else, and what is it that keeps them apart? If there isn't anything, then there is no internal conflict and therefore no story.

However, all is not lost for Kate and Alex. I am going to write their story. It will be a new story though and hopefully with lots of internal conflict and absolutely no archetypes!

Okay, I'd better stop now. Does this help people? Feel free to ask me any questions about it. Again, I'm not an expert (hello! Still unpublished!) but I hope that by passing on comment like this, it helps others get an insight into their own work.

My Synopsis

Firstly, another big thank you to all who posted here yesterday and said such lovely things! I've been feeling a bit down over the past few weeks, waiting for the wretched revisions, and having such nice comments made me feel much better. Thanks guys.

Anyway, I see my synopsis is up. Argh. Now, I hate these things. I don't know any writer who likes them (don't put your hand up, Lorraine!). It didn't help that it was only supposed to be two pages double spaced and that Chasing Kate had been rewritten six times and I still hadn't worked out what was going to happen! Anyway, luckily I had a baby plot in there - the ultimate in internal conflict (yes, apparently it is) - so that was a relief. And I chucked an argument with an ex in there just for good measure. But they were just desperate attempts to cover up the fact that I didn't have a handle on the conflict and it showed. If your conflict isn't convincing to you, it won't be convincing to other people - at least that's what I've come to realise.

Right, I think they'll put up the editorial comment tomorrow so I'll wait till that goes up before I post anything else. People had some great questions about conflict so I'd like to talk about that, and stereotypes as well. They also gave me some good comments about alpha males in MH - slippery beasts to get a handle on (no double entendres intended!). I had half thought to post up my revised chapter here, just so you can see how I revised it with their recommendations and to see how it compares with the first draft. Would that be useful? Maybe not. Although they liked the revisions, they still didn't want the story! :-)

Oh and if you have any questions about the synopsis, do ask. I'm not an expert by any stretch though, and they didn't give me feedback on the synopsis specifically.

My Chapter is Up

On www.iheartpresents.com. Argh!! To all of you who posted about it, thanks so much for your great comments. It's great to know you all liked it - and even if you didn't, thanks for posting that you did. :-)

Unfortunately Kate and Alex did not get their happy ever after because M&B decided in the end that the story wasn't strong enough - mainly because their conflict was pretty much based on what they did rather than who they were. The conflict was external rather than internal. I was asked to do some revisions on it, which I did (retro-fitting a manuscript with decent internal conflict is NOT recommended!) and they liked the revisions but said that the beginning kind of overshadowed the rest of the story. Luckily I had a partial of another story already with them and they liked that one better. Yay!

Anyway, feel free to ask any more questions about Chasing Kate and why they didn't want it. I found the editorial comment they did on it hugely helpful and don't mind passing any of that kind of stuff on.

Top Ten Things to do While Waiting

1. Twiddle thumbs and whistle tunelessly while surfing around aimlessly on the interweb.

2. Check email for the 50 millionth time.

3. Post pointless comments on other people's blogs.

4. Finally get to your WIP then waste time trying to think of titles for it. So far - being crap at titles - I have gone for the joke option (you never get to choose your own titles anyway). Option 1: It Started With a Panic Attack. Option 2: The Venture Capitalist's Backpacker Mistress.

5. Critique other people's manuscripts. This is the perfect time, people. If you have a Modern Heat burning a hole in your PC and need a crit partner, I am currently not doing anything. ;-)

6. Eat more chocolate and have another coffee.

7. Wonder if you should go for a walk and then decide not to 'cause it's too hot. Summer in Auckland is far too hot for anything strenuous.

8. Check to make sure Hell hasn't frozen over. No. Good.

9. Wonder if you should post a poll on your blog - Revisions first or chapter up on I Hearts first?

10. Plan the next blog post, determining not to mention revisions again because you're in danger of becoming a revisions-bore.

11. Return to number 1. Yes, the numbers do go up to 11 (for those who have seen Spinal Tap).

Gemini, Feb 14th

My stars for Valentine's Day:

"Change is but a hair's breadth away. It is so close you can't even invest in frustration now. True patience is to be waiting as if your lover is about to call from overseas. Encourage the party in your heart."

Okay, I'm not one for horoscopes but it did seem to tie in so nicely with my current mood that I had just to write it down! And to have a horoscope like that on Valentine's Day... Anyway, am encouraging my heart to party hard. :-)

As to the rest of the day, Valentine's has seemingly passed my hubby by. Okay, so he's on call (he's a doc) and distracted but still... No 'happy Valentine's love'. No flowers (not so bad since the price of flowers is extreme). No chocolates (probably a good thing). Not even a silver tea stand (thanks Lucy). Oh well, the up side is that I did get an email from Amy at I Heart Presents telling me that my chapter will be up next week. Eeek! I'm hoping it's been so long that everyone will have forgotten about it...

Writer's Block

It's official, I seem to have lost my mojo. Have spent the past two weeks staring at my screen, writing a paragraph then deleting it, writing another paragraph then deleting it, rinse, repeat. I guess it's better to actually write something than nothing at all but when you actually have nothing to show for it? Usually when I'm stuck on a scene I can't get past, I jump ahead and write the next scene on but I can't seem to do even that.

Anyway, this lack of doing anything is making me even grumpier than I am normally, which does make the family want to jettison my study into deep space with me inside it (hey, I wouldn't mind. At least I wouldn't have any distractions!).

So, what does everyone else do when they can't seem to write? More chocolate? More martinis? More chocolate martinis??

More Wittering While Waiting

Still waiting for revisions. You'd think after six months of being on the 'getting published' train I would be used to waiting. But no. I'm either going to have to get myself a set of worry beads to fiddle with, drink way more martinis, or have a personality transplant. I'm thinking the martini option sounds like a lot more fun, especially when they're of the chocolate variety...

At least my husband's birthday helped pass the time. We had dinner at White which is in the Hilton (see photo) Hotel in Auckland. Beautiful. We sat outside, overlooking the harbour, watching all the lights come on as the sun went down... And I realised that this was where I'd set some of the manuscript currently being considered in London! There is a scene where the heroine storms out of a party and goes and sits in the lobby. I was imagining some vast hotel lobby with lots of seating but in reality there is not much of a lobby and nowhere for the heroine to sit! Argh. Oh well, I guess it wouldn't be the first time someone's written about somewhere they've never been, only to find they're wrong when they actually see the place in real life. In fact, I'm writing one right now that is set in London (I have actually been there, though over 10 years ago). The characters go for a walk down the Embankment and on Google Earth, it doesn't look very far. Just my luck that what I think is a thirty minute walk would actually take three hours! :-)
So, has anyone done this kind of thing before? Written about a place only to find you've imagined it completely wrong?

Missing Something Vital

I was thinking about my current wip last night (instead of sleeping. Bad Jackie!) and realised, abruptly, that I had forgotten a vital part of the conflict: the why.

What do I mean? Well, my heroine is a very driven lawyer and my hero is a very driven mountain climber. So far so good. But I haven't explained why she likes law and why he likes climbing mountains. Problem? Oh yes! Their conflict revolves around neither of them wanting to give up their dreams (or what they think are their dreams) for a relationship, so having an explanation about why their dreams are so important to them would probably be a good start right? Argh! It's quite a basic thing but I forgot totally about it. In my defence it is a manuscript that I am rewriting, using all the feedback from M&B that I've been given so far. Retro-fitting so to speak.

Anyway, now I have had this breakthrough, I'm hoping the rewriting will get easier. At least that's the plan. The only other worry I have is that it's turning out to be quite angsty. Remember how soon is soon? Well, how much angst is too much angst?

Concerning Impatience

Yes, I am impatient. I always have and always will be. Not to mention sensitive to criticism and very up and down emotion-wise (I'm a Gemini so that figures). So really, all things considered, I am very ill suited to writing as a career choice. At the moment I am surfing aimlessly around the net, reading writers blogs and generally living on the eHarlequin boards, all trying to immerse myself in writing. Note that I am not actually writing.

Actually, that's a big fat lie. I did write something yesterday so I am gradually getting back into the zone. But I'm still finding it difficult to concentrate because I am waiting. Waiting for my revisions!
Which brings me back to my impatience. Anna at M&B (who must be cursing the day I entered that contest because not only did she have my chapter to give feedback on, but also the partial that was waiting in the slush pile that I'd submitted before the contest!) told me that she would be in touch 'soon'. Argh! Makes me feel like a kid again, when your parents told you that you could have something to eat 'soon'. Or you could watch TV 'soon'. How soon is soon?

Anyway, this gradual inching closer is playing merry hell with my poor nerves. Like the stages of grief, there seems to be the stages of subbing: Excitement (when you hear they like it), horror (when you get the first lot of revisions), despair (when you can't do them), denial (when you know your writing is crap), nausea (when, sick of the sight of it, you finally send the ms back to the editors), relief (when it's gone - lasts maybe an hour), doubt (yes, you're now certain your writing is crap), impatience (when you haven't heard for two days - this gradually becomes more intense as the wait lengthens), and back to excitement (if the news, when it comes, is good) and/or horror/despair (if the news is bad). And then, the whole thing loops around again.

Fun eh? I think I was never so happy with writing as when I was writing for my own pleasure. Ah well, I'm still glad I started this whole thing. A year ago I was just sending off my entry to the Instant Seduction Contest - the very first time I ever subbed anything...

Modern Heat Circa 1979

I found an old M&B in my bookshelves a couple of days ago. Old being 1979. It's even signed by the author, with an inscription that says "to Danny's friend Charles". I don't know if Danny's friend Charles would ever read this (do guys read M&B? Especially in 1979?) but hey, signed by the author is still signed by the author.

Anyway, I decided to have a read just to see how times have changed and actually it held up pretty well, apart from all the sherry drinking and phones you actually have to dial. However, though I was pleased to see that the heroine did have a job as a chef (pretty good considering chef jobs for women are rare even today), I was somewhat annoyed when the hero demanded that the heroine give up her job because he 'doesn't require a working wife' (it's a marriage of convenience). Now, this may not be unusual for Presents these days - the guys are fairly arrogant like that - but heroine's response was 'okay, I'll give up my job, no problem'. Her job that she's been working hard in. Sure. No problem. Now, I don't know about you, but I'm thinking today's heroine would be just a little bit upset about that. But in 1979, apparently not.
As to the characters, the heroine is quite fiesty but of the doe-eyed, little girl type, which the hero takes advantage of - lots of spanking threats. The hero is very, very arrogant and not a little chauvanistic. An example: "Carmela, for all that she is a women, is also a highly qualified accountant". For all that she is a woman. Huh? Or how about this one: "I do not fight with women, and unless severely provoked, I rarely strike one." Note the rarely. Obviously they liked them a bit violent back in 1979.
Anyway, for all the spankings and ruthless crushings of soft lips, the bedroom door remains firmly closed, which I suppose is kind of expected.

So, did I enjoy it? No, not really. I like my heroines to be women rather than girls and definitely, though I love an arrogant hero, they have to be sympathetic at least some of the time. I think though, these things were indicative of the time it was written. The author is still writing for M&B today - must get one of her most recent ones and do a comparison. Would they be different? I'm thinking so.

Which brings me to today's question: what do you like in your hero or heroine? I'm thinking that striking women only rarely wouldn't be a quality you'd want in your hero - or your heroine! :-)

Chocolate Fish

I have been eating far too many chocolate fish lately (AnNZ thing. See Wikipedia). Obsessively some might say. I think it's because I'm not writing. I've had a non-writing week which always makes me very grumpy and always inclined to eat chocolate.
I've got two WIPs that I'm currently working on at the moment and I did open them up and have a look. I even wrote a couple of lines. But it just didn't work. I suppose everyone has these down-times where nothing seems to come to together right.

It doesn't help that it's school holidays here and I'm providing entertainment for my seven year old. She's pretty self-sufficient usually but will come in to bother me with requests for food, observations about random phenomena, and the occasional whine for a play date because Mum's boring. When I'm writing, these interruptions are incredibly distracting. I can't tune them out and keep going. So I just don't bother writing when she's around. I wonder if this inability to concentrate with distractions is a symptom of age? Or motherhood? In my twenties, I used to be able to write away happily, stereo going loudly, interruptions aplenty and just be able to tune them all out. Not so now.

Anyone else need complete silence to write or could you write in the middle of a rock concert?