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Posted on 08/07/2007 7:52:15 AM PDT by HairOfTheDog
Welcome to The Hobbit Hole!
Sing hey! for the bath at close of day
That washes the weary mud away!
A loon is he that will not sing:
O! Water Hot is anoble thing!
O! Sweet is the sound of falling rain.
and the brook that leaps from hill to plain;
but better than rain or rippling streams
is Water Hot that smokes and steams.
O! Water cold we may pour at need
down a thirsty throat and be glad indeed;
but better is Beer, if drink we lack,
and Water Hot poured down the back.
O! Water is fair that leaps on high
in a fountain white beneath the sky;
but never did fountain sound so sweet
as splashing Hot Water with my feet!
Outline a little! Don’t be wedded to the outline but it’s great for organizing, seeing where your holes are, and finding a place to start. My outlining showed me a seriously weak spot in my story, which I am fixing by introducing another bad guy. I also need more good guys but am not sure yet where to get them.
Point is. Bible isn't fiction. Bible is real-world reflections of faith and grace, ntm Word of God. The Bible's purpose is the suspension of a different kind of disbelief than a work of fiction. I go to the Bible to nurture faith, I go to fiction to escape reality and unwind. I don't care for uber baddies in fiction unless they get their comeuppance in the end or are cannibals. I don't like cannibals under any circumstances.
I guess my biggest problem with thread dementor types is they (for whatever reason) cannot draw a distinction between reading as entertainment and reading as worship. There is a difference, but it's wasted effort to try to explain it to them.
I dunno, but its not a topic I want to get entangled in today. It's Friday!!! And there's no baseball on tonite!
My point was just that all of those characters were flawed people who sinned and were redeemed. Their sins and failings became part or were always part of the Plan. To pretend that only perfect flawless people can be worth knowing or reading about is to deny the power of redemption. And at the core, all stories are about redemption. Just different sorts from different views. Because that’s the only story worth telling, really.
So yes, a baddy who stays a baddy, or rejoices in his evil, or whose evil is portrayed as a good thing, that’s bad. A bad person who is redeemed but whose past bad actions still have consequences, that’s a powerful story.
Yes but I really like the mechanics I’ve got. I can always throw in helper-characters who help up to a point then say “you do the rest”. Or just add more siblings.
If they die, will there be a sequel?
Yup, and even in a story where the ‘goodys’ stay goody they still might make mistakes and have to correct them. Again a sort of redemption. Some books with flawless, mistakeless heros are interesting but most are just lame.
Well if they don’t die until the sequel then it darn well better be a death worth the wait.
My example is L. Ron Hubberd’s Invasion Earth series. Some interesting stuff in the premies and all but I HATEd the main guy (he was a bad guy)and could tell by a glance at the back covers that I would have to put up with this guy getting his way in some way shape or form for 10 very thick books. No thanks, end of story. If I am reading just to see someone get killed it better not take 10 books.
There’s only one book with a flawless, mistakeless character that’s worth reading, and that one’s about Redemption, too.
Please stand as we sing. If you came in buses, they’ll wait.
:-)
Wait, what post were you replying to?
and thus began the separating of the sheep and the goats...
The thing I hate in literature and books is extreme post-modernism - there is a cynicism and an dry soullessness in post-modern types that I just cant connect with when I read them. If the challenge is to make me drop my belief in something Greater than myself or lose hope, then I agree with you. But if the challenge is to help me see an incarnation of something Greater than myself, then I welcome reading about whatever struggles the character is going through.
Hmmm, seems like the pit of goats would be a deadlier than a pit of sheep but I still vote for the piranha tank.
I’m really struggling with a lot of good/bad/weak kinds of issues with regards to several of my characters, starting with the gal who ends up kilt. If she isn’t sort of bad, she wouldn’t be mixed up with the murderer, but if she’s all bad, why did her husband fall for her, unless he’s a knucklehead and/or weak, neither of which are appealing?
I’m leaning toward her having known murderer in a past life, which changes my planning considerably, but may make everything a bit more logical.
which is why I keep going back to books written before WWI, it seems... or books that write of a time period before WWI.
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