thoughtfulA few of my preferences:
* Mermaids! I love mermaids. I've been thrilled by everyone enjoying the glimpse of the Undersea in One Salt Sea, because wow did those chapters feel self-indulgent. I could have written a whole book just explaining how the social structure of the Undersea functions. Someday, if I get a good enough excuse, maybe I will.
* Evil twins. Yeah, I know, it's a Patty Duke cliche, and I don't care. I love me some evil twin action. Blame my early exposure to All My Children and move on.
* Mathematicians and scientists in leading rolls. I think math is sexy. Science is basically my favorite thing that isn't the Great Pumpkin or my cats. It's pretty rare to find a book of mine that doesn't have at least one of these character types represented. (Ironically, Feed didn't need a scientist because I was the scientist, with all that delicious virology kicking around.)
* Alternate universes and timelines. Yes, I love breaking continuity and seeing what happens when it's put together in a new shape. Enough so that sometimes people have to hold me down and take the hammer away, since otherwise, I'll just keep smashing things. My one regret about prose as a primary medium is that it's hard to pull off alt-universes in most prose settings.
* The malleability of death. Look, I grew up on X-Men comics, soap operas, and horror movies. I enjoy playing with the elasticity of mortality, and finding ways around things that seem permanent. You can't cheat, but watching your dead girlfriend's robot replacement come to terms with the fact that she's really a brain in a jar delights me.
...there are more, but you get the idea.
One of the interesting things about knowing and being at peace with my narrative kinks is that I get much, much pickier about how they're used. You can't just raise the dead and expect me to be happy; I want it to make sense within the rules of your universe, hang together internally, and be fair to the character you've just brought back. If you're going to have a lead scientist, they'd better be a scientist, and not a magical knows-everything widget that can somehow apply every field of science KNOWN TO MAN to whatever situation they happen to be in (Winnifred Burkle, I'm sorry, but I'm looking at you).
If you're going to do an alternate universe, I expect you to think it all the way through. Yes, all the way through. One of my favorite shows rebooted their continuity two seasons ago, and while they made the usual assortment of flashy surface changes, they didn't consider all the ramifications of those changes. The fact that at least two of the characters involved didn't tear down heaven and earth looking for a way back to the original timeline was incredibly disappointing to me. (Shawn says this is because I over think these things. I point you, again, to my list of narrative kinks. These are the things I am programmed to over think!) Basically, I want stories that will give me what I want, but really commit to giving it, not tap-dance around going all the way.
Also, often, narrative kinks are a lot like salt or bacon: a little can go a long way. I adored Marvel's House of M alt-universe, but I would have been annoyed if it had replaced the main Marvel Universe completely (even though it was an awesome setting, and I want them to do more with it). I'm enjoying the current season of Fringe, with its re-imagined continuity...and at the same time, I find myself restlessly demanding the original timeline back, because I invested a lot of time and emotional attachment in those characters, those relationships, and every delighted "oh, it went like that over here" is followed by a "...wait, does that mean that this other thing didn't happen?" So sometimes, getting what you think you want out of a story isn't ideal.
And this is why I have proofreaders and editors who don't share my narrative kinks. They may encourage me to put more foxes, or talking animals in silly hats, into the narrative, but they'll help me avoid the story turning into a stew of "things Seanan wants to play with."
What are your narrative kinks? How do you feel about their use, and how do you react when they get overused? What narrative toys would you rather never came off the shelf again? Enlighten me!
October 21 2011, 04:19:28 UTC 5 years ago Edited: October 21 2011, 04:32:08 UTC
Then again, my lovely admiral and I were friends for years before we even thought about dating, were hanging out constantly for six months before we admitted we were dating, and took nearly two more years to actually get married, it's kind of a personal thing for me.
As much as I like the slow burn, however, it pisses me off when the writers start making the characters stupid to avoid breaking formula. To quote Stana Katic, "Just grab her and kiss her and go make babies already!"
Stargate did this to the stupidith degree, and the X-files pushed it about two seasons too long, and then sort of imploded under the weight of Chris Carter's ego and David Duchovny's departure right around the time they stopped being stupid about the relationship. People cite S & MK as an example of "they got together and it killed the show", but that's just bull. What killed the show was not them getting together (they were in a relationship and adorable for the entire third season) but the fact that right around the time they did the wedding episode, Kate Jackson was diagnosed with freakin' breast cancer and couldn't film anywhere near as much as she had been, so they rewrote her to essentially a supporting role, rather than the center she had been. THAT killed the show.
Babylon V did it right (along with so many other things) with John and Delenn.
I'm okay with it taking 3, 4 even 5 years for a couple to finally make the leap. It's just when it gets to, oh, 7 or 10 years and they're still dingling around with it that you just want to slap someone and say, "Dude, relationships can be every bit as interesting as unresolved sexual tension!"
Then again, the best fanfic comes out of shows with great characters and flawed storylines. When good writers get motivated to fix things... can that be a narrative kink all itself? Because when I think about my long stories, the ones where I get going and then churn out 250,000 words in a couple months, it's because the show left something hanging that shouldn't have been left, and I feel absolutely compelled to write what should have happened next were the show not bound to its storytelling formula for television.
October 26 2011, 14:24:31 UTC 5 years ago