Excerpt: PAPER MOON

Okay, so Kerry / @uppington talked me into growing a pair and doing this. Those who know me know I’m a little sketchy about posting stuff from WIPs here, though I don’t really worry about the random one-off snippets I do for writing exercises. For me it’s a bit strange to post something from a draft that might change completely by the time I finish and edit it. But I haven’t posted in over a week and it’s either this or a long rant from editor-Adri (who spent this morning buried in the slush pile and is too cranky after the past week to say anything helpful) about knowing your genre, so…I guess I’ll be posting a chapter from the rough draft of PAPER MOON.

It’s dystopian, YA, fantasy – not swords-and-sorcery or urban fantasy, but just a darker world. To be blunt, it’s a gender-swap story that takes place in a totalitarian future regime with strong flavors of Paris under German occupation, and it explores gender perceptions by completely swapping male and female roles with the understanding that it’s not considered strange or abnormal in their society, nor a reflection on their sexuality, but simply part of daily life. To them the roles aren’t reversed; this isn’t cross-dressing, and there’s no fetishization of the reversal.

It’s something I’m really enjoying writing, because by placing men and women in opposing gender roles without trying to justify it based on preconceived notions of masculinity and femininity, I’m discovering a lot about common gender perceptions in society and my own thoughts about them. On LJ, it sparked a really interesting discussion about how certain characters are perceived, certain assumptions made because they don’t act the way they “should” for their gender. Might be a little heavy for YA, but the classification fits with the story progression I have outlined for my 16-year-old protagonist.

But I should probably stop talking about it and let it speak for itself. So…yep. Chapter.

Is this really what you want in a man?

Guilty not-so-secret confession: I love romance novels. I started reading them as a boy, when they were my only outlet to secretly explore certain things that confused the hell out of me. As an adult I have a little-indulged soft spot for romance, and adore a smart, engaging romance novel with a good mixture of conflict, wit, heart-warming moments, and of course the steamy pages that make romance novels what they are. In my later years I’ve grown a bit more discerning about what makes it onto my shelf of favorites, though; it’s not enough for the books to have lavish descriptions of period dress and a swarthy, broad-shouldered, swoon-worthy hero. I need characters I like, relationships I can understand, love scenes that don’t make me snortgiggle at the euphemisms (or if they do, it’s with that sort of charming self-awareness that many exhibit), and plots that won’t unravel with the simple question of, “Well, why didn’t you just tell him that like a normal person would, saving this entire intricate mess from happening?”

So lately I’ve been rereading some old favorites, as well as exploring a few new titles from the authors of said favorites. Some are modern, some are historical, some are the classic bodice-rippers, but in a large number of them I’m noticing a disturbing trend:

Controlling, domineering, irrational men with very few redeeming traits. They’re insensitive, bullheaded, temperamental, impossible to talk to with any level of honesty, misogynistic, arrogant to the point of self-delusion, sadistic, prone to using physical force to get their way, borderline (and often outright) cruel, difficult to reason with once they’ve made a conclusion, and generally in some position of authority over the heroine’s life and well-being – whether placed there by others, rank, an unfortunate and perilous situation, or themselves. These traits, while superficially infuriating to the heroine, in the end only serve to endear him to her as signs of what a man he is, a true man’s man, an uncompromising force of nature who will protect her and eventually give her many fat babies. And naturally his flaws are forgivable because he’s handsome as the devil and the most amazing lover on earth, and he knows it.

I get the lesson: love isn’t perfect, but it can pave the way for accepting a few character flaws in your mate. And I’m aware that all these traits can exist to some measure in real men, in a variety of concentrations and combinations. And I’m aware that many women (and men) have different tastes in what makes a man attractive. But seeing all these traits combined to such extremes that they make an unappealing caricature of a dominating man-child, I have to ask…

Is this really what women want in a fantasy man?

Dear technology: don’t be hatin’, yo.

Last night Hikaru got to deal with one of the fun perks of living with a writer: tolerating said writer’s late-night spaz-fits as he hops in and out of bed, running to the computer over and over again to jot down a few inspired lines of ‘genius’ only to retire to bed again.

And rinse and repeat for a few hours, each time with hasty apologies and promises that it’s the last time tonight.

Last night I finally hit that spark I needed for the beginning of Shadow’s Voice. I’ve been jotting down what I can here and there, but past history and experience with how I work have shown me that I need my introductory scene settled before I can make consistent progress on the story. It helps set the tone for what I’ll be writing later. I’ve been floundering on it, and while I had a basic idea of how I wanted it to start, what I’d come up with before was lackluster and missing a certain impact despite conveying what I’d intended.

So when the perfect opening line suddenly hit me last night, seeming to crack open my skull so a font of ideas and jumbled words could pour out, I couldn’t just go to sleep and let it wait until morning. By morning I’d have forgotten it, like a half-remembered dream where I know what happens but the electric clarity is gone (much like the original intro). Three or four times I ran out of bed to jot things down, add on to what I’d written before, and overall make sure I didn’t miss a thing. Even when I fell asleep my mind was still churning through things I wanted to add, but they were smaller things I felt safe saving until morning.

So this morning I dashed out of bed and, before even starting work, added a couple of pages of notes and dialogue outlines to what I’d started last night. Happy, energetic, I saved the work and moved on to start today’s client project.

Now lately my darling laptop, the apple of my eye, my main conduit to the outside world, my obedient little mechanical lapdog, has been misbehaving badly when I ask it to print certain things. By ‘misbehaving’ I mean ‘forcing me to hard reboot after all my programs hang, terminating processes helps nothing, and it won’t reboot through standard procedures.’ I’m thinking it may be time to backup my data and just do a wipe and clean install.

That won’t bring back what I lost this morning, though.

It crashed. It crashed, and it ate everything I’d done on Shadow’s Voice this morning, despite the fact that I know I saved as I wrote. In fact, I’m entirely neurotic about that. Every other sentence, Ctrl+S. Every day I even save new versions in case I delete stuff that I might want to reference later. What I wrote this morning should have been there when I rebooted, either in an auto-recover save or in my original file.

It wasn’t. And while I managed to mostly reconstruct what I’d written, I was still not happy.

~eyes his computer~ Why don’t you love me anymore? We cleaned out the giant ball of lint in your heat sink, I brushed out your keyboard, I got you a shiny new chill mat that keeps your processor nice and cool. Why you gotta hurt the ones who love you?

…okay, I’m done being a dork.

Don’t try this at home.

Problem is about halfway solved, and should be 99% gone by the end of the weekend.

Thanks to everyone who offered feedback and advice. You were immeasurably helpful.

Now back to packing. ~groans~ The movers will be here in four hours.

Green as can be.

Hikaru and I are looking into adopting an adult cat from the local no-kill shelter; the more cats they find homes for, the more room they have to take animals from the kill shelters so they won’t be euthanized. There are three that are just luring us like you wouldn’t believe, but we can only have one. We could probably handle four in-home cats, but it wouldn’t be fair to Chathra (who has an appointment to get shaved again Monday, poor thing). He’s skittish enough without dumping three adult cats on him. We’ll have to be careful about socializing him to one. The one to the right is Lora; we probably won’t adopt her, but I want to. I just want to take her home and feed her until the skinny little thing just about pops, then cuddle her to sleep.

There are days when I wish I wasn’t human, so I wouldn’t feel jealousy. I’m happy to see other writers succeeding, and I can only hold on to the hope that if I keep trying and keep improving, I’ll get there one day. I’ll have the same experience they’re having. At the same time, though, an ugly side of me is jealous. Well, no…not jealous. Jealousy would mean I don’t want them to have those wonderful experiences, and I do. I just want to have them, too. So maybe “envious” is a better word. I want to share that success with them, not take it away from them. I suppose jealousy and envy are natural things to feel, but frankly I don’t like being that petty and strive not to be.

I know, that may seem hypocritical after this post. It’s not, I promise. I’m still being hopeful and positive. My pink kittens are emitting a great deal of sunshine from their nether regions, enough to give me sunburn. It’s a long road, and without hope and determination I’ll never get where I want to be. Sometimes I’m just a little envious of those who are already there. I think my pink kittens may be napping during those spells.

One day. Just have to be patient, keep trying, and keep writing the best stories I can. (Well, that and remember professionalism, etc. Writing is a luxury; publishing is a business, and you’ll never get anywhere if you aren’t polite, professional, and attentive to the requirements of the various people you hope to work with. No matter if it’s your dream, it’s also a job and should be treated that way.)

We’re almost done moving, and perhaps when we’re settled down I’ll be able to get back on a daily writing routine. I peck out a little on Shadow’s Voice now and then, but I probably shouldn’t push much on that until I find out if Shadow’s Breath will even sell. No point writing a sequel unless the first book works out. There are two others ideas I’m percolating on, Frost and Vagrant; once I get some free time I’ll have to take a stab at both and see which one grabs me. I go through so many story ideas it’s ridiculous, but then they aren’t all viable. Sometimes I have to play with them a little to see if they’re really worth writing.

Bah. I have to go finish work, then finish packing. This post has been brought to you by the letter P and the word Procrastination.