Different is good

All this week I'm blogging about writing differently. By that I don't mean your writing is different but that your setting, locale, and/or characters are different.

Just recently I had a conversation about The Inn of the Sixth Happiness and Curt Jurgens. (OK, I admit I mixed him up with Yul Brenner who is way sexier.) Jurgens plays a half-Chinese half-Dutch Chinese officer with whom Ingrid Bergman, as tenacious Gladys Aylward, falls in love. Hollywood historical inaccuracies aside, let's look at the different-ness of it all.

*Half-Chinese is a lot different than the normal half-American Indian normally portrayed in romances. Is it too much? Or have we, as a romance-reading people, come to accept that? We accept interracial couples, so why not this?

*China before and during the Japanese invasion of the Second Sino-Japanese War. War is always a great setting, let's face it. Not so different except for (again) the locale. How many of you know about the Second Sino-Japanese War? Or the first for that matter?

*Missionary? Other than it isn't what I write, or what I'd ever write, but putting that aside, all I see that type of book being is inspirational. Not bad if you're into that but not my cup of tea.

Whatt does all this mean? Not 100% sure, but it's all to the good. Different is better. Or at least different.

This week's Friday guest is Robyn Bachar. She'll talk about the thrill of publication & the stress of marketing. Blood, Smoke and Mirrors available from Amazon, B&N, and Samhain Publishing.

Monday Musings

What are you working on? How are you handling these winter blues? Taking it out on your characters, I hope! All that frustration of dark winter nights, cold walks to work, and chilly mornings. Kill that annoying character, snuggle up your hero, kick out your heroine...oh, wait, have your hero and heroine snuggle next to a roaring fire.

I read about this new alarm clock (might not be that new but I just read about it) that lights up gradually to simulate a rising sun. Supposed to help you wake up easier, more naturally, and get a better start to your day. I'm not sure how waking up at 6AM is a prelude to any kind of decent day, but whatever it takes to help me out of bed and get moving, right?

Characterization

I had problems (ongoing) with my hero and realized in all the past stories I've written, either he hero or heroine give me trouble. Never both in the same story, and never just the guy or the girl.

For instance, in my dark Regency story, I had Grayson, the hero, nailed almost instantly. My heroine, Juliette, on the other hand, gave me problems like a teenage daughter on her first date.

In this 1920s story, I had to go back and examine both hero and heroine's motivations number of words, and in doing so realized I needed to change the beginning...almost completely. But let's not go into that. My problem isn't my heroine, Emma, but my hero, Jared.

Anyway else have this problem? Not knowing who their character is no matter how many times you beg him/her to talk to you? Or how many times you bang your head against the wall/keyboard?

Help!

And don't forget my Title Contest!

Monday Musings: Swoon-Worthy Hero

Swoon worthy heroes!

Brace yourselves: Shameless plug coming up!

Noble and brave men, relentlessly loyal women, scalawags and blockade runners all combine to highlight one of the most difficult times in our country's history. All the stories are good, but Ross and Roman deliver scalawags that will make readers swoon. Civil War buffs will love the well-written, well-researched stories in this must-have collection. ~Romantic Times Book Reviews.

That review was for Northern Belles and Southern Roses anthology from The Wild Rose Press.

So what constitutes a swoon worthy hero? I'm sure you have lots of opinions, for every woman there's a man who makes her swoon. Might not be the same as me (*cough Colin Firth cough*) but there's someone out there who has the that makes your knees week.

He's got to be handsome but that has more to do with your imagination running away with you or picturing Brad Pitt's better looking alternate universe evil twin. He also has to have confidence, or the appearance of confidence even if he's not an alpha hero.

Heroes can go through their own character growth which involve deep seeded conflicts or insecurities but they always have to have an area they are truly confident in. Otherwise, they become the wimpy secondary character.

However, confidence can also be a tricky slope, one that can easily turn into arrogance. Now, that doesn't mean that an arrogant hero is a bad thing, it just mean you have to know your hero. Plan him out before you start writing (let's not talk about inconsistency!) and make sure he compliments the heroine no matter what you write about either of them.

Plot his growth to compliment and coincide with the heroine's, make sure whatever it is he learns/does/is/wants doesn't make a romance between them seem unlikely. There's nothing worse than a reader wondering why the heroine fell in love with the hero.

But how to make him swoon worthy? I have no idea. I can tell you how I wrote Jack in In the Shadows...he loved Marion enough to join forces with her. He didn't regulate her to the background or belittle her mission, and in the end, he saved both their lives.

What about you? What's your swoon-worthy hero?

characteristics part 2

The heroine and fashion. I'm a big believer in making the character work for the character herself, and if she's unfashionable, then she is. You can get away with it better in a contemporary, or even in much of the 20th Century than you can previously.

In the upper class there were 2 kinds of women. Fashionable and those too poor to afford fashion. If her family could afford it, she wore the best. Maybe not if she were gardening, but every other time, yes. Whether or not she had any idea what was and wasn't 'in', the dressmaker did, and that was enough. And if she couldn't afford it, then she still wanted to look her best, just as women do today.

Forgetting for a moment those poor relations populating romance, the woman had to look her best. Society was extremely catty, and fashion was what counted among the rich. It affected a woman's place, her marriageable chances, and her social circle. Now, if she wanted to wear last year's style, she could - not at any balls but around the house, assuming she wasn't entertaining there.

She wasn't going to leave without everything in place, and she certainly wasn't going to embarrass herself or her family by making a fashion faux pas.

Fashion vs need - part 1

This is my new soapbox - real characterization. Real personalities, problems, and issues. It has nothing to do with conflict, that's separate from what I'm talking about though sometimes these things are the conflict in a character-driven story.

I try to give my characters real problems, everyday human issues. Allergies, migraines, poor eyesight, bad tempers, snobbishness, etc., etc., etc.

Personally, I don't know anyone who is nothing but altruistic, doesn't ever talk badly about anyone, never needs a tissue, some Tylenol, or eyeglasses for something (ok, I do know some people like that but apparently my circle of friends and family are mostly blind), and has no problems other than they're too nice.

In reading, I've noticed that very few heroines have these issues, and it bothers me. Or if they do, they wear eyeglasses but have no fashion sense. They have allergies or headaches, but never complain. I have both and let me tell you, there are times you can't help but complain. It's human nature.

Those characters don't seem real.

Why is it that the woman needs to be the nice, kind, attentive one, but the man can be arrogant, snobby, and dismissive? Why can't she be the one who knows, the one with the friends, the fashion sense, the attitude?