Writing the Magic Moment

The first time the Magic Moment became clear to me wasn't a book: it was an opera. Les Miserables, in the original Sydney production, which was very closely based on the original London production. Since a Magic Moment is a lot easier to describe by example than definition (it tends to be one of those "you know it when you see it" things), allow me to describe it as it occurred.

This was quite early in the Sydney season, so most of the audience were seeing it for the first time. For those who aren't familiar with Les Miserables, one of the pivotal sequences is the barricades battle: Parisian students throw furniture and whatever else comes to hand into the street to create a defensive barricade of sorts. Their mini-revolution is a dismal failure: the students are killed almost to the last man (and woman). After his friend Marius is shot, the iconic leader Enjolras takes the red flag and climbs to the top of the barricade, where he waves the flag in defiance until he is shot multiple times and falls forward, over the barricade and out of sight of the audience. It's important to note that Enjolras is wearing a scarlet and gold waistcoat over a white shirt - he's one of the few splashes of color in the musical.

One of the key staging devices used in Les Miserables is a rotating section of stage. Soon after the Enjolras falls, the stage rotates, slowly and majestically. Here is the Magic Moment. The dead are scattered in front of the barricade and draped over it. Enjolras is in the center, head down, facing the audience, with his arms splayed out rather like an inverse crucifixion. The bright waistcoat and white shirt against the backdrop of his red flag pulls your eyes to him: he is absolutely the focus of attention. The audience gasped. In that one moment, the waste and pointlessness of the whole attempt at revolution came into brilliant clarity, with fiery, charismatic Enjolras as the symbol and centerpiece of the devastation.

That is my first memory of a Magic Moment, where something immensely moving and profound hits with the force of a sledgehammer and nothing is ever quite the same again.

There aren't many of them, and I've certainly never been able to write one deliberately. I think I may have managed one in Impaler, but I'm not sure. Even Pratchett only has one or two. The moment in Thud! when the terrible tragedy of Koom Valley becomes clear. The secret of the Grandfathers in Nation. They're that rare - and that precious. They also only ever have the full impact once: the first time you hit them.

Here's my attempt at a definition: a scene or image in a narrative work (i.e. opera, musical, book, play) where a number of plot and character threads connect to illustrate a deeper sense of meaning than expected.

Pretty lame, yes? But when one hits you, you know all about it. It's personal, too - because what goes into that illustration of deeper meaning is also all your experience up to that moment (which is why they only ever hit once - after that you know it's coming and the power of the moment is lost).

Here's some of the things I've identified in creating a Magic Moment:

- foreshadowing in buckets, but subtle. In Thud!, for instance, there are hints all along that Koom Valley is a lot more than we know, but Pratchett sets up an expectation that the truth will still be something more or less expected.
- strong interaction between character and plot. I've never seen a Magic Moment where the characters weren't central to the plot as it unfolded. The Koom Valley revelation in Thud! would not be the same without Vimes being present and being who and what he is.
- one or more characters is fundamentally transformed by the event. Again, in Thud!, Vimes is transformed into... well, himself. He sheds the various layers of social expectation, and in that moment is more quintessentially Vimes than we have ever seen him - and he understands and accepts that this is who he is.

I suspect there are more requirements - for a Magic Moment in a book to work, a single word that doesn't quite ring true will kill it. But when it does work... well. In all the examples I've given, I was left shaken, deeply moved, and with the books I couldn't hold them properly. My hands shook too much.

What are some of the Magic Moments you've found?

Trilogies, where would fantasy readers be without them?

I've been thinking about trilogies recently, since I'm in the throes (and I don't mean that lightly) of cleaning up my latest trilogy, The Outcast Chronicles, to send to my publishers. What started out as something that should only have taken me 6 months has grown until I've written another 400 pages of manuscript and I'm only halfway through cleaning up book two.

Don't get me wrong, I love writing. I love spending time in my book with my characters, but I feel like I'm undergoing the labours of Hercules. Will it never end? The books just keep growing. I want to be where Dave is in yesterday's post with a completed book, or in my case, trilogy.

It all started out innocently enough when I thought I needed to end book one in a different spot so that book two had a better beginning. This meant I had to enlarge on narrative thread to create a stronger subplot to give the first book a better resolution. Then, when I started cleaning up book two, the changes I'd made on book one necessitated a rewrite and tweaking of scenes in book two's opening. Every change you make has a roll on effect. And I'm sure book three is going to require a major rewrite. The characters have taken on a life of their own.

I have to keep a flow chart for the time line, another one for birthdays, feast days and special events. I have to remember who is related to who and how. I have to remember sayings and rites. The hardest part is remembering who knows what at each given moment in the story's time line.

I'm sure you have the same problems. I had a look around to see what advice was out there for writers of fantasy trilogies.

Here Jonathan Stroud talks about writing his Bartimaeus trilogy. (It took him 4 years and 3 drafts of each book). Here Holly Lisle talks about plotting trilogies. And here is an article by Vicki Hinz on how to approach a publisher with the proposal for the trilogy. While agent Kristin on Pub Rants has a different view. And here at Bookends Literary Agency, Jessica has her opinion.

Here is a transcript of a panel at the latest world con by fantasy writers on writing trilogies. (Trudi Canavan, Glenda Larke, Russel Kirkpatrick and Fiona McIntosh were on the panel). It is amazing the difference in time that writers take to complete books. The average is about a year. Fiona McIntosh says she can write a book in 16 weeks and I know Karen Miller can produce 3 fantasy books a year. (I don't know how they do it).

And here Juliet McKenna sums up trilogies, their history and why they exist in the publishing world. And I'm going to be very post modern and reference myself, Over at the ROR blog I ask, Does it have to be a Trilogy?

Which brings us back to trilogies. Readers love them because they get to visit old friends and take a holiday in a familiar world. Writers love them because they invest so much time and effort in building the world, it would be a shame not to explore it further. And publishers love them because the trilogy has a ready-made market of readers and the publisher can slot it into their publishing schedule.

How do you feel about trilogies?

Emotional Resonance

Emotional resonance seems a very subjective term to me. Like so many of the phrases you might see on a rejection slip. "Your characters lack emotional resonance". But what does it mean?

Resonance. Well the Free Dictionary gives a few definitions, I guess the most relevant might be: Richness or significance, especially in evoking an association or strong emotion.

If I am guessing correctly - and honestly I don't even know if the people who use this term really define it, even for themselves - emotional resonance is about evoking within the reader the emotions you are trying to portray in the work. If a character is said to lack emotional resonance, then my understanding is something along the lines that this character does not evoke an emotion in the reader.

Now I am pretty sure that this term is also used when people object to a character, and also when the reader does not buy the reactions that a character might have - you might say when the suspension of disbelief is broken. This seems to be a different issue, but it gets lumped into the same basket.

Of course, beyond the definition and what exactly people are trying to say is the reason for the lack of emotional resonance. The characterisation may just be poorly thought out or executed, or perhaps there is a lack of consistency that is jarring. Perhaps the emotional reactions of the character do not gel in some situations, and this breaks the reader-writer connection.

Even though all of this could be true, I think more often than not the reason is that the reader (or editor is they happen to be one), just don't like that character. They don't 'get' them. The things that particular character experience and strive for, their emotional reactions, do not echo with any level of personal experience in the reader. If that is the case, then no amount of crafting will make that reader like the work - no matter how good the characterisation or how relevant it is to the story.

I don't know. Help me out. What do people mean by 'emotional resonance'?

How Much is Enough?

Re-reading some old favourites lately, I have been struck by the differences in the degree of description. One of the books was so spare that little more than a single line was offered to describe new characters on introduction, and then only a repeat of this key image when they appeared at other times (yes the exact same one, over and over). Balance is everything - but I like a little more than this.


I guess 'less is more' is often a good rule to follow. The problem is things like that can be very hard to judge. This particular author had removed a lot of the casual description and attribution you might find between dialogue. That's fine from the PoV of the author, but what seems alive and accented to the peculiar viewpoint and personality of the character within the author's mind can read very flat indeed to an objective reader. In this case I found that the scenes dominated with dialogue offered me very little. I could not tell from the dialogue whether the character was being sharp, dim, sarcastic, excited or whatever - and there was not enough else to propel the story.


I know that very clever writers can manage to convey all this personality through the dialogue itself in the absence of all but the most minimal attribution.


For myself, I am very tolerant of description. I like to get atmosphere. I like to get a direct line to what the character is feeling. What starts to gripe me is long backstory infills on the geopolitical setting, or scenes that seem to have no point - except the fact that I am supposed to be in so in love with the character I really want to see them walk through the docks for two pages.

So what are your thoughts? How much description is enough? And how do you tell? Is it even possible, or do we all need a savvy test reader?

Prologues, do you skip them?

I've sent book three back to the publisher with the edits done and I'm rolling up my sleeves to get back into my new WIP (work-in-progress). Because you know, you can never really stop writing. It just sucks you in and before you know it, you're writing another book.


Right now I'm struggling with a difficult decision. I've started the new series with a prologue. I've never done this before, always just jumped right into the story. But this book seemed to need the prologue to set up the story. I'm 240 pages into it now and I'm beginning to think it was a mistake.

I'm one of those impatient people who always skip prologues. I just want to get into the meat of the story.

According to Lital Talmor you have to ask yourself these three questions:

• Do you really need a prologue?
• What does your prologue do?
• And finally, Does it get the job done right?

Read the rest of her article here. I think my prologue does set up the story. Vickie Britton says 'a prologue (or epilogue) can help explain a complicated story'. Read the rest of her article here. And my story certainly is complicated.

But what if the reader is just going to skip the prologue?

Maeve Maddox says, 'beware the back story disguised as prologue'. And she comes up with three reasons to ditch your prologue. See the full article here.

Meanwhile, Carolyn Jewel thinks 'a prologue should be a last resort, used only when there's absolutely no other effective way to convey the information. Note, I did not say easier way, I said effective way. Writing is hard work.' (She wasn't kidding about the hard work). See the rest of her article here.

So it all comes back to me again. My prologue does reveal information which is back story, but it helps make the opening chapters easier to understand. I'm veering towards taking it out and seeing if my test readers think I need one. I'll be taking it to a ROR writing retreat in September.

Funnily enough, I don't mind an epilogue. I like dropping back in on characters to have a cup of tea and catch up, especially if nice things have been happening for them.

What about you? Do you skip prologues? Do prefer epilogues to prologues?

The Great Gender Divide

First let me confess I am a romantic at heart. Hence the reference to what I think of as Georgette Heyer's romances. (Yes, I know these were from Jane Austen movies. I prefer Heyer to Austen because of Heyer's sense of humour).

I'm not a feminist as such more a people-ist.

There is no denying, men and women are different. When my eldest daughter was born I dressed her in blue overalls and gave her cars and trucks to play with. When she turned two, she would wearing nothing but hot pink. Her brother was born with boy-behaviour firmly encoded in his brain. After that I gave up fighting gender preferences.

All this is leading up to how different male and female brains are and how we, as writers, dare to write from the Point of View of the other gender.

Louanne Brizdendine has done a post on Love, sex and the male brain over here. She talks about the male tendency to become territorial:-

'The "defend your turf" area -- dorsal premammillary nucleus -- is larger in the male brain and contains special circuits to detect territorial challenges by other males. And his amygdala, the alarm system for threats, fear and danger is also larger in men. These brain differences make men more alert than women to potential turf threats.'

That comes as no surprise. She also talks about testosterone and what it does to the male brain. She says:-

'if testosterone were beer, a 9-year-old boy would be getting the equivalent of a cup a day. But a 15-year-old would be getting the equivalent of nearly two gallons a day. This fuels their sexual engines and makes it impossible for them to stop thinking about female body parts and sex.'

And then there's this bit that made me smile.

'When his mate becomes pregnant, she'll emit pheromones that will waft into his nostrils, stimulating his brain to make more of a hormone called prolactin. Her pheromones will also cause his testosterone production to drop by 30 percent. These hormonal changes make him more likely to help with the baby. They also change his perceptual circuitry, increasing his ability to hear a baby cry, something many men can't do very well before their wives are pregnant.'

So, if men and women think so differently, how do we dare to write from the other gender's perspective? Well, if there was a Ven diagram men and women would overlap far more than they were diverge.

Can you think of male writers who write females really well and, conversely, can you think of female writers who do really good males?

Confessions of a Volunteer

My name is Rowena and I have Chronic Volunteeritis.

It all started over ten years ago, when I first went back to writing. It was innocent enough at first. I just joined a writing organisation.

Soon I was a chronic 'joiner' with several writing organisations to go to on the weekend. When things needed to be organised and I put my hand up. This progressed to chronic volunteering. Before long, I found myself on the management committee of state and national arts bodies.

I joined BrisRom - a romance writing group. Very supportive, very practical.

I joined the Queensland Writers Centre -- lots of useful workshops.

I joined Romance Writers of Australia. What a great bunch of women. Supportive and serious about writing, but able to have fun.

With Marianne de Pierres, I founded the VISION writing group, for writers of SF, fantasy and horror. There wasn't a genre specific group in Brisbane. At VISION we set exercises, and critiqued work. The group is still going strong 13 years later.

Before I knew it, I was on the Romance Writers of Australia national committee, where I set up a national Romance Award that is still going.

I served for 3 years on the management committee of the Queensland Writers Centre.

I did one year on the management committee of the Brisbane Writers Festival.

I did 4 years as Vice President of Fantastic Queensland. This grew out of VISION and they were a great bunch of people to work with. There I organised a national mentoring writing workshop, where aspiring writers were mentored by published authors, while they did rewrites on their books. As an organisation we set up Clarion South, based on the US Clarions and we ran the national SF convention in 2006.

I was a judge for the Aurealis Awards (Australia's Spec Fic Awards) for 3 years, then ended up the Assistant Director for another two.

Marianne and I established the ROR writing group which has been going nearly 10 years. We started this because we wanted to push ourselves and our writing craft. So we gathered together a small group of fearless writers who agreed to lay bare their babies (works in progress) for examination. And we, in turn, promised to read the rest of the group's manuscripts before we got together once every year or so. It is a bit like a guild, I guess. We support each other as we sail the rocky seas of publishing.

And now I'm back on the management committee of RWA, where I'm in the middle of organising a national mentoring workshop, the 5DI.

I don't regret the time I've spent 'passing it forward' to other writers.

From other writers, I learnt about the craft of writing and critiquing.

I learnt how to run a critique group so that we concentrated on writing and supported each other.

And I met lots of wonderful people. We helped each other through the ups and downs of publishing, which is a crazy industry.

If I could go back now to that dewy eyed aspiring writer that I was, and give them advice I would. (Disclaimer, this advice is meant for me 13 years ago. It may not be useful to you now).

I'd say, get a good agent who keeps an eye on the publishing industry and is ready to move with the times.

I'd say, diversify. Don't stick with one publisher, or one genre.

But more than anything, I'd say, believe in yourself. But don't invest your identity in your writing. Be a whole person.

What writing organisations or people have helped you along the way. And, if you could go back and give yourself advice, what would it be?

Godzilla Attacks Sydney!

Recent reports of a massive dust storm in Australia -- with an 800km storm front and sweeping across thousands of kilometers -- fail to advise that the irradiated dust has drawn an attack on Sydney by the feared Godzilla! The image on the left was sent to our office only moments before the brave soul was incinerated by radioactive flame.

Mothra has been spotted on satellite images, and is moving swiftly toward Brisbane. Scientists fear it is being drawn to the Sunshine State by the scent of radioactive mangoes. The east coast of Australia remains on high alert. . .

OK, well maybe it wasn't quite that bad, but the recent dust storm that blanketed the east coast of Australia (and is heading toward New Zealand) was certainly epic in its proportions (it really was that big). It was the biggest dust storm in 70 years, and dumped more than 75,000 tonnes of dust on Brisbane in one hour. More than one observer reported 'It was like the end of the world' or 'It was like being in a science fiction movie'. The sunset was awesome, the sky as red as Martian dust (Australian desert sands have a high content of iron oxide).

When you see something like that -- really experience it -- it truly is amazing. It got me thinking about settings in books. If only we could channel that experience directly, make the reader feel that same creepy wonder, that otherworldlyness combined with the wake-up-and-look bite of something that is absolutely real.

It also made me realise that we owe it to ourselves as writers, and our readers, to get out there and really experience everything this world has to offer. There are some truly strange and wonderful things out there. It took that massive dust storm to remind myself of that.

So what things have you experienced that have made your head spin? That lifted you out of your own reality? And what writers have inspired similar feelings in you with their sense of setting?

By the way, if you want to see some great images of that dust storm, check out this link: http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/gallery/0,23816,5060705-17382,00.html

The Secret Life of Writers

As you can see from Dave's last post, writers are being asked to do more to promote their books. And, if you are anything like me, you're finding it is all a bit overwhelming. By the time you've twittered, written your prerequisite blogs, answered all the emails on your different email lists, attended conventions and writers festivals, supported friends at their book launches, helped out the writing community by judging competitions for free and kept on top of your private life, there's not a lot of time left for writing.

So today, I thought I'd write about the Secret Life of Writers, the time we spend inside our heads, that magical creative time.

We writers need quiet time. When you saw us pottering around in the garden or doing the ironing, we weren't really there. We were off on a space station battling aliens, down a dark alley dicing with vampires or galloping across a misty moor looking for dragon eggs as we sorted out plot problems. We need that quiet, reflective time to mull over the intricacies of character, plot and world building so that the gems can percolate up to the surface.

We need input. Writers tend to be solitary people, much happier observing life and the crazy things people do, then standing in the lime light. Everything from the evening news, to something overheard on the train, can trigger a 'what if' moment. I catch a lot of trains and, for some reason, people talk to me. You would be amazed the things people have told me, heartrending stories of loss, stories about the triumph of the human spirit. I find people fascinating, maybe because my 'inner writer' is always trying to understand what makes us tick.

And we need time to write. Because it takes time to wrestle a story out of the ether. Sometimes we need to write the first three chapters before we realise we've started the book in the wrong place. Sometimes we have to drag the story out kicking and screaming. And then there are the days when it flows so fast we can't type quickly enough.

I was sitting in the hallway at the gym today, waiting for yoga to start and one of the gym instructors asked if I was OK. I was. I was miles away, on the Shallow Sea, with one of my characters, trying to solve a plot glitch.

If it was easy to be creative everyone would be an inventor, writer, artist or musician. Here's some tips on how to tap into your inner creativity from New Scientist.

When do you do your best creative thinking? Late a night when it is quiet? First thing in the morning before the family gets up? Or can you day dream in the midst of chaos?

Brand Names and World Building

I write book length fantasy and near future SF in short story length, so I build worlds. It will sound nerdy but I love it. I love reading about history and sociology. The study of linguistics for instance and how language can not only define your place in the world, but how you see the world fascinates me.

Because I write science fiction and fantasy, I don't write much that is set in our contemporary world. But recently I've been reading books from the incredibly popular Dark Urban Fantasy genre (DUF). These have been fun and easy to read, with good pacing and likable characters.

Coming fresh to the DUF genre, one of the things I noticed was the use of brand names in the narrative. In theory it is like writing in short hand. The author doesn't need to explain what the car/watch looks like, they just give the brand. This brand name will tell the reader the character's social status and wealth or lack of it.

As long as the reader knows the brands. I don't.

I found some of the books so heavy on brand name usage that it was like reading an SF book, where the author introduces a lot of invented nouns. At least in an SF book the author will plant clues in the narrative to explain the meaning of the invented nouns. With brand names the author assumes you know all the associations.

Brand names in contemporary narratives. What do you think of this?

Art Versus Music

Are you a visual writer or are you inspired by music?

So many writers I know blog about how they write particular manuscripts while listening to certain bands or albums. I do enjoy music, but I’m a visual person. I’m inspired by things I see, places I’ve been and either photographs or artwork. While I’m researching for a book I collect photos from newspapers or on-line and file them. These visual revolve around in my mind, and become imbued with the emotions and characters of the book.

Currently, I’m writing my Shallow Sea book, which is set in a tropical paradise so I have several computer desktops of tropical islands that I rotate to keep me in the right mood for writing balmy summer settings. (This helps as I’m sitting here wrapped in a blanket with gloves on while I type). When I work on the King Rolen’s Kin series, I use desktops of Russian winters, glimpses of sun streaming through icicles, that sort of thing. The artwork by Alexia Sinclair at the top of this post reminds me of my T’En series, beautiful, dark and sensual.

I tend to get very involved with what I’m writing. I spent a day on a series of scenes on a ship during a bad storm and by the end of the day, I was feeling sea sick. Doh!

Are you a visual writer or do you listen to music?

Artwork by Alexia Sinclair alexiasinclair.com/home.html
Posted by Rowena Cory Daniells

Love Scenes

I should explains that Tim Tams are Australian chocolate biscuits that have to be eaten to be believed.

I saw a line in a book that went something like this -- 'She thought it was about as likely as an orgasm on a one night stand!'

This was an urban fantasy, with a strong female protagonist, who obviously knew what she liked. Romances are comfortable exploring emotions.

We write books, ranging from fantasy, adventure, SF and through to mystery. But somewhere sometime, someone is going to fall in love. How comfortable are you writing love scenes?

How far do you go? Do you close the door after the first kiss? Are you uncomfortable going into detail?

I was on a festival panel when someone asked me what was the most moving love scene I had ever seen/read. It made me realise that the scene was from a movie set in 1890. She was a widow, he was a married man, with a cold wife. He didn't want to fall in love with her. There was a scene where they were in a carriage. He lifted her hand, peeled back her glove and touched his lips to the pulse of her wrist. It was powerful because of what wasn't said, or done.

What love scenes have you read/seen that moved you?

First Draft VS Rewriting

R&D Studio artwork. Just for fun.

I find rewriting fun. First draft is hard work. It's scary because I set off with an idea and a couple of characters ... and that's it. The story grows.

One of the lists I'm on has been debating the differences between being a Pantser and Plotter.

Plotters plan the whole book beforehand and can write chapter ten before they do chapter four. I can't imagine writing like that. I'm a Pantser (Seat of the Pants writer). I find out what's going on as the characters do. It makes writing the book exciting but hard work, because I'm constantly interrupted by my family, so I have to keep characters, world and narrative threads fresh in my mind over months.

By the time I get around to the rewriting, I can relax and thread through the character layers and subtleties that I look for when I read books. Without a deadline, the temptation is to keep rewriting for ever.

Having worked on some very long multi book narratives now, the only way I can keep it all straight in my head is to create a scene by scene breakdown in a separate document. Then, if I want to insert a character clue in a particular scene, I can find that scene without having to scroll through the document looking for it. I create maps, lists of terms and their meanings, character descriptions (did minor character X have a broken nose?) and I keep spare deleted scenes in a file. Obsessive Compulsive?

I think to be a creative person in any field you have to be a little bit obsessive. In the nicest possible way.