Lancelot the Laptop Progress Report: No news doesn’t seem to be good news. Has Yousef the Apple Genius Abandoned us? Methinks that if it’s not something they’ve figured out by now, it’s probably terminal.
In other news, Sailor Boy has gone to California to go skiing with some people who shall remain nameless, because, well, that’s part of their deal. He’s also taken a copy of my ARC. So, um, party at my house, Max? I’ll get my hands on Carnivale.
I’m currently juding two RWA writing contests, and, as usual, after the first half dozen entries or so, you start to notice a pattern in the problems. Last week, agent Kristin Nelson blogged about an overuse of the “portal plot” in YA fantasy. I haven’t noticed that, but I have noticed a ridiculous amount of something that the SFF folks call smeerps:
A cheap technique for false exoticism, in which common elements of the real world are re-named for a fantastic milieu without any real alteration in their basic nature or behavior. “Smeerps” are especially common in fantasy worlds, where people often ride exotic steeds that look and act just like horses. (Attributed to James Blish.)
Seriously, folks. You aren’t gaining any points with the reader if every evening your characters sit down to a meal, at a table, with forks, knives, and spoons (or even chopsticks!), eat stew, drink wine, speak recognizable English in every other facet of their existence, and happen to call their meal sizxcletexch. Just call it dinner and be done with it.
Had to vent. Now, do not take this to mean that I’m not a fan of writers inventing their own lexicon. On the contrary, I’m all for it. I just finished a very interesting novel called FEED that woulnd’t work if the narrator wasn’t using his own made-up words for everything. But that’s the difference. The made-up words were completely organic, and he used them all the time. (Because he didn’t know the real ones, but whatever). If you live in a fantasy world where things are different, then sure, you’re going to call things by a different name. But those things have to actually be different. Like, say this fantasy world you’ve made up has a very strong religion, and every night, before you eat, you have to pray for two hours to a god called Sizxcle. Then maybe you would call your dinner Sizxcletexch, because it means “after the praying to Sizxcle.” Who knows? You can get away with just about anything if you motivate it properly. But… just calling it sizxcletexch becaue you think it sounds cool, even though it’s just dinner… is rather bizarre.
And, while we’re at it, name your characters something pronounceable. Harry Potter is perfectly normal. Frodo Baggins isn’t hard to figure out. If Tolkien and Rowling can pull it off, then why must you stick us with Frhcle’thxsough v’Ardnghrtow’firns el Gh’ritlb’nikmosidj?
February 22nd, 2006 at 10:34 am
I have to agree with you on the character names. If it’s a fantasy or an odd time/location then a strange name *can* be good. But I’ve started to get tired of strange names often created by throwing in random and unnecessary y’s as if it was Gaelic. In fact, I’ve actually put down books (usually contemps) because the heroine has such a strange name.
More on topic… I did have a question for y’all. I’m judging my first contest and they encourage comments (which I’m assuming are similar to critiques?) Is there special etiquette to judging contest entries? Perhaps a website or article with advice? I have two days of business presentations this week with nothing else to do than judge these entries so I have loads of time to spend on them but don’t want to overstep my bounds. Is it ok for me to give a full critique – mark up the manuscript? What are y’all’s thoughts on this?
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February 22nd, 2006 at 10:47 am
I feel for Lancelot, given that Valentine the Vaio may be headed for the shop too, because it has suddenly decided that it doesn’t like my home’s wireless network. >.<
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February 22nd, 2006 at 10:49 am
It depends on the contest. Most really encourage critiques. THe Golden Heart contest doesn’t accept them at all.
In the contests I ran for my chapters, I was really into critiques being included. I wanted judges to get very in depth about the reasons for scoring the way they did, what parts they liked, what parts they didn’t, etc.
One thing, though — be careful how you word stuff. If you are correcting grammar, make sure your corrections are correct. I will forever mock the contest judge who told me that one’s interest is “peaked” and not “piqued.” ::rolls eyes:: And my friend Julie, who has like a billion books out, still mocks the judge who told her before she was published that she got her historical research from television commercials, when she’d actually spent hours in a univeristy library. My suggestion? If an element of the plot reads like a load of bullshit, I would say something to the effect of “while it might be entirely accurate that your regency heroine took a jet to New Brunswick, it gave me pause as a reader and took me out of the story. Is there a way to stick in some clarification on this point, since not many readers are aware this sort of transportationw as available in the 19th century…”
It’s all in how you word it.
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February 22nd, 2006 at 10:54 am
Carrie–My advice would be to keep it simple. The entrant will not get an opportunity to ask you what you meant by anything, so whatever notations you make have to be very, very clear. Don’t line edit. Do mention what doesn’t work for you and why. Do mention what works for you. A smiley face or “LOL” goes a long way on a contest entry.
Diana–I have given up on books like what you describe. If you’re going to give me a new world with a new vocabulary then deliver on the promise. My SIL (who wrote several books and then never really tried to do anything with them) wrote a paranormal where the “dragons” looked just like cats. I could never understand that. In her case she wasn’t even making a new word for them. :sigh:
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February 22nd, 2006 at 11:02 am
Someone seriously told Julie that she got her research from television commercials? That is just ridiculous! I can’t believe any judge would ever be so rude (and wrong – well, wrong I can understand a bit better). If I were Julie I’d probably send that judge a copy of every book I published (I can hold a good grudge). That just boggles the mind!
My take on critiques is that it’s just one girl’s opinion (in my case). I can say what I like, what I like less, what pulled me out of the story, what flowed well and got me excited to keep reading. But – especially with only 25 pages and no synopsis to go on – it’s hard to make really sweeping opinions. Plus, I can’t spell worth a shirt and am not the best grammar queen so I have to really watch myself there – just point out that it looks odd and perhaps should be double checked.
Thanks for the thoughts (and for letting me know just how awful some judges can really be!)
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February 22nd, 2006 at 11:04 am
Oh Diana, that’s so funny. And actually, things like that are exactly why I gave up on high fantasy years ago. With a few notable exceptions.
But I’ve never heard of a smeerp.
Oh, by the way, I’m getting an error message every time I come to your blog. Is anyone else having similar problems?
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February 22nd, 2006 at 11:12 am
What kind of error message? Like, you can’t read it, or the sidebar isn’t showing up right or what? Because I think that my new countdown javascript might be misbehaving a bit…
Rachel, you should check out the Turkey City link (the one hypered on “smeerp”). It’s hilarious!
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February 22nd, 2006 at 11:18 am
LOL on the character name.
cindy
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February 22nd, 2006 at 11:22 am
I do line-edit contest entries if they really need it, if only to clarify what I’m trying to tell the entrant. Also, I really appreciated line editing *that didn’t mess with my voice* when I was entering a lot of contests. It’s so much easier to “see” a problem than just to be told about it – IMO, anyway.
Cindy
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February 22nd, 2006 at 11:25 am
Love “smeerp!”
Yes, I’m getting the error (“page not loading correctly”) from work and home — there’s something wrong with the ability to scroll down.
Finally, on contest judging…all good advice here. The advice I was given when I started judging was:
1. Don’t re-write the story YOU would write it. Judge it as it is.
2. Offer constructive, never critical, feedback.
3. Always find something to compliment them on (“Nice font!”) and provide an LOL or two if something makes you laugh.
4. Always preface things with, “in my opinion” or “from my experience” or end with “this is just my take” or “only a suggestion” or something to offer them another possible way of looking at the passage without seeming like you’re the be-all and end-all authority. *eg*
5. Thank them for entering the contest and wish them good luck no matter how bad you think the plotting, writing, etc. is.
6. Never tell them they shouldn’t do fill-in-the-blank because “it will never sell” or “no editor is buying that.” No one knows what will sell or what editors are buying other than editors.
7. Have fun and remember, there’s someone on the other end who paid good money for comments…give them as much time and consideration as you can.
Hope that helps!
Marley = )
…who doesn’t want to be at work today. *EG*
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February 22nd, 2006 at 11:25 am
Gina, one of my CPs has written this fabulous, fabulous fantasy novel (if you follow RWA writing contests, you’ve probably seen mention of “Tairen Soul” in the winners’ circles) where she has creatures that are both dragonlike and catlike and called –wait for it — “tairen.” Actually, I kid her that these things are a mix of dragons, panthers, werewolves, and stegosauruses. (Is that how you spell stegosaurus?)
Gena’s book had “dragons” in them that weren’t like normal dragons, but they were meant to be the creatures from which dragon myths emerged, so it made sense to me that they were called that. It’s like how Christine Feehans Carpathians aren’t actually vampires, but are the beings from which the vampire myth emerged. Do those cats of your SIL’s… breathe fire? Anything?
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February 22nd, 2006 at 12:02 pm
Turns out my boy (TattooBoy? RowerBoy? I must find a code name for him…) is going to Bolivia for a couple weeks, so party we must! Name the night…
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February 22nd, 2006 at 1:47 pm
Yup, calling a rabbit a smeerp is one of the things listed in The Turkey Lexicon. Other entries include having two people from the same race, culture, religion and town named Bob and Katloctoctanzal and the insidious infodump (I can name some very famous ‘in’ authors of fantasy (who have movie deals) who are very guilty of this. I’m talking the first 200 pages of infodump).
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February 22nd, 2006 at 2:08 pm
Well, there are always exceptions… and never any accounting for taste.
I maintain that if you’re going to give a character a weird name — any weird name — for their culture, that there should be a mighty good reason for it. Like in SPEAKER FOR THE DEAD when they name the piggie Human. That’s a very unusual name for a piggie.
Say everyone in the alien culture is named Katloctoctanzal-type names, and then you’ve got a Bob, maybe it’s because when Bob’s mom was pregnant, she was helped out by a convenient visiting astronaut, Major Bob.
I don’t have a problem with made up names in fantasies at all, I just don’t know why they need to be names no one can pronounce. Frodo and Arwen and Elrond and Saruman and Gandaulf are all made up, but they look like they could be real names in another world. You can read them aloud. You can figure out what they are supposed to sound like. Names like the one I posted in my blog… who has a name like that, really? How do you say it out loud? How mystified do you want your reader to be? Their mind-tongue will be twisted every time their eyes hit that name…
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February 22nd, 2006 at 2:46 pm
I know I’m speaking up a lot today, but Diana’s question of “how mystified do you want your reader to be” really hit home. I’m doing a critique on right now where in the first three pages I don’t know where the book is taking place, who’s POV it is, if the narrator is male or female, and what’s generally going on. And not in a good way. I know that some writers really want to grab the reader in the first few pages – want that element of mystery – but this just went waaay too far. I think sometimes that as writers we forget that we don’t want to make our readers too mystified or too lost or else they’ll just give up. It’s important to give theme some way to anchor themselves in the beginning. The question, I guess, is just how far to push it.
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February 22nd, 2006 at 3:05 pm
I’m happy to report that the published author who made that snide comment to me (and who signed her name, no less) is no longer publishing and her backlist seems to have fallen completely away. Not that karma has anything to do with it–but keep that in mind when you’re writing on your entries. Oh, and never sign your name. (Anyone who is old enough to remember…Corinthian leather is a very real thing and would have been used in the home of a Spanish nobleman in 1891…not necessarily just in his car, as this author seemed to believe, thanks to Ricardo Montalban.)
One more contest suggestion–if you want to make a note of something but you don’t want the entrant to think you deducted points, write NPD (No Points Deducted) above the comment. Make sure they understand what it means. I do this all the time on things that don’t require point deductions, but that are bothersome or worrisome and require the entrant’s attention.
This was a good reminder. I’m leading contest judge training next week for my chapter and it’s always good to review.
Diana, totally on you with the unpronouncable names. And Carroe, same with your comment about writers trying to be too mysterious. If the reader doesn’t know what the hell is going on, you’ve lost them. Keep your mysteries for the important stuff!
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February 22nd, 2006 at 4:15 pm
Ok, apparently I can’t spell my own name right and I also can’t seem to stop posting on this topic (nice diversion from work).
As a first time judge I found it very interesting just how much improper formatting stood out to me. I don’t think the contest cares and it’s not something that I would ever deduct points for (unless it was truly egregious) but I did notice it. And I have to admit that it makes me think – why was the formatting off? Does the author not know proper format? Is she trying to save paper? Were the rules not clear enough? Too many other things going on in life (which is what I find generally makes me miss the details).
It’s not that I find anything wrong with improper formatting, per se, but I feel like I understand just a little bit more what agents/editors are saying when they talk about formatting.
Any other thoughts on this?
And thanks so much for all the contest judging advice – I knew y’all would have great suggestions!
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February 22nd, 2006 at 5:17 pm
Hey Diana,
Just wanted to let you know I’m having the same error message/scoll not working thing but only when I’m in IE. In Netscape, it’s fine. And – I think it started when you changed the countdown graphic for SSG. At least, that’s when I started to noticed it.
My word verification is Wunmlzb. Think I’ll use that as the name for my next hero. ;o)
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February 22nd, 2006 at 5:23 pm
Kristen stole my joke! I was so going to make a word verification joke!!!!
I think you’re right about the reasoning, Kristen, but it works fine for me in IE. However, my coworker said it wasn’t working for her. I’ll take the javascript out and see what happens though.
Carrie, I knew you were “carroe” — I wondered if you were making a joke. LOL. As for formatting, nothing “little” ever bothered me. I don’t get uptight when the margins aren’t right or they put a different number of spaces after a period or use a different font. What kind of formatting issues are we talking about, here? Single spacing? tiny font?
However, I am VERY taken aback when they double space between paragraphs, the way one might on a blog… I used to write “this doesn’t look like a book” until I saw a copy of the novel SPEAK, and it does the same thing. I’m having a hard time reading it, because it doesn’t look like a “book” to me. I feel like I should be reading it onscreen.
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February 22nd, 2006 at 6:58 pm
I think you should have a videoblog section. Then we could watch you try to read that character name aloud
FYI – your countdown is showing up fine on Firefox but it’s kind of distracting as it flashes every second.
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February 22nd, 2006 at 9:54 pm
I just wanted to pop back in and thank everyone for the contest judging advice. I’ve never entered any, nor have I ever been a judge. But I hope to do both soon.
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February 22nd, 2006 at 9:59 pm
Diana – it really was basic unimportant formatting things that I noticed. Like not spacing down on the first page and using a really fancy font for each chapter heading. The funny thing is, I totally remember using a fancy font on my first ms because I wanted it to be so special (I did use the regular font when I submitted though). That’s the thing – it’s not that the formatting differences are against the rules or are that big of a deal. But, they do stand out because they deviate from standard formatting. And, like I said, it just made me wonder what made the author make those choices (not judging at all making those choices, just curious). It’s the same thing that makes me wonder what couples are talking about when I see them bent over a table at lunch, or what the woman on the elevator was thinking when she bought her bright green purse. I think as writers we see things that are a little different and we instinctively wonder what it was about the character that made those choices – that way we can strengthen our own fictional characters and pepper then with real life.
Whew- that glass or two of wine went to my head! LOL. Wish me luck as I endure 3 days of dread law firm “retreat” that will at least give me plenty of time to indulge in contest judging… nothing like a rainy beach in Feb!
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February 23rd, 2006 at 9:51 am
No one mentioned apostrophes and capitalization.
I always enjoyed fantasy, but I will not be able to get past the first page if every name is Ix’ta and Dran’by and they speak the Word and sit at the Table and control Fuga or whatever they call their magic. It changes the cadence in my head when I’m reading and makes me grumpy.
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February 23rd, 2006 at 4:45 pm
I remember during the previous wave of futuristic or fantasy romances, back during the early 1990s, that the smeerp disease ran rampant. In those days, the books were essentially historical romances with the settings and relevant details changed (the stagecoach became a spaceship, etc.), and authors were really bad about coming up with exotic-sounding words for everyday things to remind us that we were in The Future! or On a Different World!
So we had things like “monats” for months, “daylas” for days, “notas” for nights, etc. I’d been a science fiction and fantasy reader longer than I’d been a romance reader, and I just couldn’t read those books. I think that was a big reason why that market soon tanked. The audience that was most interested in that kind of book couldn’t stomach them. Fortunately, when it started to come back, it was being written by people who were truly writing paranormal romances instead of trying to alter their historical romances.
I think it was Orson Scott Card who said something to the effect that you have to assume the entire book is being translated into modern English so you can read it, so all terms that can be translated into English should be. You should only use the foreign word if there’s no direct translation to English that would still convey the meaning in a way that makes the story work or if the thing in question is so significantly different from the nearest English equivalent that it makes a difference to the story.
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February 20th, 2007 at 8:31 am
Well, I’m not getting any errors. Though it’s really thrown me for a loop that everyone’s left these comments on Feb 22/23 of last year
And I totally love Kristen’s word verification joke! HA!
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February 20th, 2007 at 8:35 am
Um… ignore my last comment. *sigh* I’m so confused. LJ picked up this entry on your feed and posted it to my friends list. No idea why. So I thought it was a new entry and got confused as to why everyone’s comments read 2006.
Just going to go hide now…
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