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McAnally's (The Community Pub) => Author Craft => Topic started by: the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh on June 15, 2010, 03:42:34 PM
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I'm kicking this back and forth for a couple of projects at the moment. Both are set in (different) far future worlds, one about a thousand years from now, the other closer to two thousand. Both are settings in which a great deal of complicated history has happened in those timespans, and where the protagonists and the basic social assumptions are about as different from ours, as ours are from people in other cultures a thousand years ago.
I'm finding myself caught between a) the story moving at a reasonable pace, b) getting the necessary bits of information in, and c) having it actually be reasonably plausible for the characters to think about or explain any of this. (How many times, when getting into your car, do you turn to the other person with you and say "As you know, other person in hypothetical example, the internal combustion engine, powered by burning oil extracted from the ground, allows a carriage to move much faster than anything pulled by horses, and over the last century they have become a dominant form of transportation... ")
On the one hand, stopping for five thousand words of people explaining stuff to each other is not really workable for snappy pacing*; on the other, it's not going to help the book to go racing into a supposedly tense and exciting scene where the reader does not know what is going on, or why. Anyone got any thoughts on what balance there works for you, and examples you like ?
*It could in theory work for Neal Stephenson-type pacing, but much though I like his work I am not Neal Stephenson nor have I any desire to be.
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Explain the counterintuitive stuff.
Work your pacing magic for the rest.
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The novel Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan, never really stops to explain anything at all and it forced me to reason out much of what the technology is like from little hints. That's not to say that there are no explanations at all, but (if i am remembering my reading experience correctly) I was well into the novel before there was any kind of an explicit explanation about the tech, the rest is done through little clues. It was kind of fun to work it out that way. So I say use none the first time through, and then when you have someone read it, have them mark points where they are totally lost not knowing why x does y, or how z was made.
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Something Asimov did in the Foundation series was to start his major break points with excerpts from The Encyclopedia Galactica. Could you use a similar technique by outlining the new technology pieces used maybe?
You could describe the item through the individuals senses. "He heard the familiar whine of the laser cannon charging up as the beam of light increased in speed, moving from dipole to dipole." (probably not the correct way to explain charging a laser gun.)
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Heinlein both /sucked/ and /excelled/ at this issue with varying degrees.
If you want to explain why there are flying hover cars, perhaps the best way to do is a hobbyist conversation.
Like Jim mentions, you want to avoid the talking head problem. (Or, you can have one)
In your future worlds, are there AI Agents? What's the 'internet' like? What is the access to information like.
I loved the use of the Encyclopedia Galactica, in the Asimov books. it depends on what your narrative is like. If it's doable, having the character muse about how cool his jetcar is, without having him go into detail about why they replaced the horse and carriage. Let the reader make that leap from the information you gave him. Why does everyone have cortical implants and a wetware computer in their heads? Well, just show them interacting with the Agents, show how their daily life is effected by it.
A Captain of a Starship walks onto his new Command and his implants interface with the Ship's computer. Said ship already has his brain-signature on file, with command level access. He gets a list of his entire crew. As he walks onboard from his point of view everyone has a nametag floating over their head, with the option for him to expand with a thought so he can get some information, perhaps even bring up a full Service File on the individual in question, as well as create notes for himself. That explains the way the implants work so much better, than a long winded explanation that makes no sense for the character to make to himself, or the person next to him.
Two people watching TV are not going to talk about the history of tvs.
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Two people watching TV are not going to talk about the history of tvs.
You have yet to watch TV with me, I notice.
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You have yet to watch TV with me, I notice.
Fine, two NORMAL people.
Better?
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Another example of pacing balanced with brand spanking new world is Snow Crash. You could read the first 15 pages of that for an idea.
Although it doesn't do quite enough explaining in the beginning for people like my dad, but I was ok with it.
You could try putting in a glossary / reference section at the end and keep the pace high. Sort of like an extras section on a movie DVD.
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A Captain of a Starship walks onto his new Command and his implants interface with the Ship's computer. Said ship already has his brain-signature on file, with command level access. He gets a list of his entire crew. As he walks onboard from his point of view everyone has a nametag floating over their head, with the option for him to expand with a thought so he can get some information, perhaps even bring up a full Service File on the individual in question, as well as create notes for himself. That explains the way the implants work so much better, than a long winded explanation that makes no sense for the character to make to himself, or the person next to him.
This would be insanely awesome IRL. You'd never forget a person ever again.
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Explain the counterintuitive stuff. Work your pacing magic for the rest.
Well, yes, ideally. The problem is that "counterintuitive" is in the eye of the beholder.
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Well, yes, ideally. The problem is that "counterintuitive" is in the eye of the beholder.
It is in the eye of the beholder to an extent. It sounds like alpha readers are what you need for this project; you can have a variety of opinions on what clicks easily and what people are still struggling with after 2 or 3 chapters.
I think John Scalzi does a great job with balancing pacing and explaining things. Have you read Old Man's War? Granted it doesn't have a whole lot of new things, and he doesn't try to explain cold fusion or anything, but there are some points where he has to both inform the audience and keep their interest and does a good job. Particularly the chapter where he introduces 'brain pals' is a golden example of how to correctly do this.
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Something Asimov did in the Foundation series was to start his major break points with excerpts from The Encyclopedia Galactica. Could you use a similar technique by outlining the new technology pieces used maybe?
Not really; it's a pretty tight first-person POV. I am inclining myself more toward leaving the clues in text for the reader to work out, but, well, there are enough arguments about different interpretations of such things in the Dresden Files in the on-topic parts of the board to make it clear that it's hard to make that unambiguous, and the Dresdenverse has a lot more background stuff that readers will be familiar with - being set in Chicago and having cars and dogs and cats and so on - than the setting I am working on here. Besides, Harry knows that as a wizard he's unusual in the mundane world and spends a fair bit of time explaining things that he has in-text reason to assume non-wizards will need explained to them; that much is not necessarily the case for a character who is much more within the norm of their world.
You could describe the item through the individuals senses. "He heard the familiar whine of the laser cannon charging up as the beam of light increased in speed, moving from dipole to dipole." (probably not the correct way to explain charging a laser gun.)
The thing that one suggests to me is "gosh, we are in a really weird alternate-physics setting if the beam of light is speeding up... "
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Another example of pacing balanced with brand spanking new world is Snow Crash. You could read the first 15 pages of that for an idea.
Although it doesn't do quite enough explaining in the beginning for people like my dad, but I was ok with it.
I think Snow Crash kind of does assume that one already has some familiarity with the basic furniture of cyberpunky SF, though.
You could try putting in a glossary / reference section at the end and keep the pace high. Sort of like an extras section on a movie DVD.
That... feels like admitting defeat, though. I have always hated getting those in a novel, it feels like either not bothering or not succeeding at getting enough in the text to work.
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You know, there's always the technique of introducing a character that is just as foreign to the world of the story as the readers are. He can act as the readers' proxy, constantly asking how everything works. The other characters can either explain it to him or snarkily remark that "It's magic," depending on the tone you're going for.
Don't have to involve time-travel or anything. Maybe your low-tech character comes from a primitive planet or has liven in a vault all his life.
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The thing that one suggests to me is "gosh, we are in a really weird alternate-physics setting if the beam of light is speeding up... "
I already admitted that probably wasn't the best way to explain the principles of a laser. If you'd like to dwell on nit-picking instead of commenting on the actual advice I can simply stop offering it.
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Don't have to involve time-travel or anything. Maybe your low-tech character comes from a primitive planet or has liven in a vault all his life.
Or you could kind of work backwards.
Maybe your character could be a bit of a nerd about 'ancient' history.
So you'd write like:
I reflexively use the Driving Guide Attachment on my feet to start up my brand new XXT LasRocket and pull onto the busy Starway. This is the worst galaxy for Starway traffic, and everyone is just using it to get to the next moon's StarCoffee shop because they don't like the one on their own damn moon. I wish I lived in 2020, when there wouldn't be any such traffic! But then I'd be using wheels and pedals instead of the latest bioengineering technology to keep my hands and mind free to contemplate my predicament and facepalm at all the terrible "captains" whizzing about.
^^This is why /I/ don't write. But you get the idea. Nerdy historian main character could work as easily as a Nooby side character.
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I already admitted that probably wasn't the best way to explain the principles of a laser. If you'd like to dwell on nit-picking instead of commenting on the actual advice I can simply stop offering it.
I'm sorry, that was not intended as hostile; I was just thinking of the coolness inherent in demonstrating how one's world works by having a character offer an explanation which the reader is meant to recognise as completely wrong, and what that might tell the reader about the character,
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Well, yes, ideally. The problem is that "counterintuitive" is in the eye of the beholder.
And the beholder is the FPN, whose intuition is strictly bounded by your characterization.
For my own part, lumping things as post and prior to a great Crash/Cataclysm/MomentOfGreatRevelation helps. Only have the character explain tech and social conventions to that point. Multiple such events, of different significance to cultures within your world? Even better: you can have your FPOV attempt to synchronize them, just as Thucydides had to do for the various calendars of various Greek cities and tribes.
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I'm sorry, that was not intended as hostile; I was just thinking of the coolness inherent in demonstrating how one's world works by having a character offer an explanation which the reader is meant to recognise as completely wrong, and what that might tell the reader about the character,
Ah, okay. I couldn't hear the gears turning on the idea. I get it now.
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I reflexively use the Driving Guide Attachment on my feet to start up my brand new XXT LasRocket and pull onto the busy Starway. This is the worst galaxy for Starway traffic, and everyone is just using it to get to the next moon's StarCoffee shop because they don't like the one on their own damn moon. I wish I lived in 2020, when there wouldn't be any such traffic! But then I'd be using wheels and pedals instead of the latest bioengineering technology to keep my hands and mind free to contemplate my predicament and facepalm at all the terrible "captains" whizzing about.
The historian, the primitive from the vault, the person from another setting/culture/context (I think that's at least as old as Wells' When the Sleeper Wakes if you want to count strictly SF) and indeed the child/adolescent protagonist who is in a position in their life to be learning/being taught key bits of How the World Works are established ways of fidning reason to explain things to someone, yes.
I think I am a bit twitchy about this at least in part because it feels like that is something that has been done a thousand times before; every farmboy who grows up to save the world from the Dark Lord somewhere along the way gets taught about who the Dark Lord is and why we are fighting them in the first place. Not that that can't be done well, just that I'm not finding it appealing. Whereas really good complete-immersion-into-alien-world books where you pick it up as you go along seem to me to be few and far between, and when that is done right I both love and admire it; that's a direction to which I am much more drawn.
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And the beholder is the FPN, whose intuition is strictly bounded by your characterization.
To an extent. I mean, it seems pretty obvious to me that a lot of things that seem intutive to me personally are not intuitive to many other people, and writing a character to whom things are intutitive which leave non-me readers going "huh ? How the heck did she just conclude X from Y ?" is a failure mode that worries me.
For my own part, lumping things as post and prior to a great Crash/Cataclysm/MomentOfGreatRevelation helps. Only have the character explain tech and social conventions to that point. Multiple such events, of different significance to cultures within your world? Even better: you can have your FPOV attempt to synchronize them, just as Thucydides had to do for the various calendars of various Greek cities and tribes.
I am, at this point trying to sort out all the information I have for the relevant setting so that I'm not overloading it, and just focus on a couple of the cool bits for the first story. Series are marketable, right ?
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For my own part, lumping things as post and prior to a great Crash/Cataclysm/MomentOfGreatRevelation helps. Only have the character explain tech and social conventions to that point. Multiple such events, of different significance to cultures within your world? Even better: you can have your FPOV attempt to synchronize them, just as Thucydides had to do for the various calendars of various Greek cities and tribes.
I am, at this point trying to sort out all the information I have for the relevant setting so that I'm not overloading it, and just focus on a couple of the cool bits for the first story. Series are marketable, right ?
I am trying to simplify things for you here: your character need only explain things to that all-changing event.
"Since the Great War no one had seen a technomage"
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Series are marketable, right ?
If you go by how Jim states he got published...they're almost mandatory.
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Ok, I think this is a great question, and it is a problem that everyone in sci-fi or fantasy has to deal with to some extent. If you are in the far future or distant anywhere, you have that much more to explain. So don't.
Seriously. Look, you don't have to explain everything in great detail. Maybe there was a 'Great War' recently. Have a character mention his or her 'time in the Big One'. You don't have to go into details, but if you want to later, you can. The reader now knows that these people have somewhat recently dealt with a large-scale war, and all that entails.
Maybe you have some new technologies, say an Alcubierre-based gravity warping drive. Do you need to explain that in 2340 they were able to tap into quantum energy, which allowed both power and an alternate method for creating the gravity warping than dark matter? Nope. Explain that so-and-so drive was developed in <insert year>, warps space, and allows FTL speeds within relativity by moving the frame of reference. Minimal details. Tell what it does.
From a social standpoint, have them think whatever they think, based on their situation. Sometimes it is better to leave the question mark there. If Joe talks about something that seems unusual to us today, and the other characters appear to take it in stride, the reader will generally go "I wonder what that is all about" and give you space. You can then use a reflective scene to bring out more of the history.
On a side note, think about the movie 300. Those events occurred in 480B.C. A thousand years from now, do you think there will be entertainment centered around key battles from our time's world wars, for instance? You betcha. Use that sort of thing to draw compairsons. Just a thought.
That's just my thought.
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Ok, I think this is a great question, and it is a problem that everyone in sci-fi or fantasy has to deal with to some extent. If you are in the far future or distant anywhere, you have that much more to explain. So don't.
I know one does not have to explain everything, but there's only so much I can leave unexplained; the failure mode there is "A happens for unexplained reason, and then B follows on from A for reasons also unexplained, and then C comes on from that where a contemporary reader would most likely expect D to happen instead", and unless enough of the How Things Work basics are in there somewhere, it just looks like pulling plot from thin air rather than playing fair with the rules of that setting. I mean, a detective story where one met all the characters and then had the detective present the solution but never got the reasoning between the data and the solution would be at best gimmicky and at worst pointless.
Nope. Explain that so-and-so drive was developed in <insert year>, warps space, and allows FTL speeds within relativity by moving the frame of reference. Minimal details. Tell what it does.
There's also a general-feel question here. Yes, there is made-up future science in it, but I want a solidity to it, and too much just describing what it does can end up feeling like "the ship is driven by a combination of plot contrivance and invisible pink unicorns." (This is not _Star Wars_, in which one can substitute "the Plot" for "the Force" throughout.)
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It's going to depend on the social mores, the scientific ones.
For example:
If you're building a world where polyamory is the norm: Have the protagonist meet a monogamous couple and react how strange that is (although how he would know they were monogamous. a sticky point i guess.)
If there is no marriages, but a marriage contract between people with a time-limit, to be renewed every so and so. Perhaps one of the Protagonists friends can be talking about how his family pod fell apart because Maria would only renew her marriage contract if Alphonse was removed from it. But Terry and Bob would rather leave and form a new pod with Alphonse then do that.
If it's an issue of science.
Have something break, and the protagonist has to take it to a mechanic/engineer/hobbyist to get it repaired. Said hobbyist can 'chat' about the X-Luger Ionized engine. And how it's so much better than the coiled plasma engine and why, as he's repairing it.
If you're in a military setting, the Military LOVES history lessons. Have the protagonist flash back to a history lesson from a favorite Instructor.
It would help if we knew what A -> b ->C looked like, and why you're worried that people will feel like they're being hit by the Plot hammer.
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It would help if we knew what A -> b ->C looked like, and why you're worried that people will feel like they're being hit by the Plot hammer.
Hrrm. Talking about this and staying clear of forum policy on story ideas is not easy.
If you're interested, I'll PM you when I get around to cleaning out my PMs, which will probably be in about a week.
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Sure
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If you're building a world where polyamory is the norm: Have the protagonist meet a monogamous couple and react how strange that is (although how he would know they were monogamous. a sticky point i guess.)
That works fine for issues where there is the equivalent of monogamy around.
The harder bit is issues equivalent to, to stretch your metaphor, polyamory being so much the norm that nobody had ever heard of monogamy for centuries, and that they would never bump into anyone who practised it or have any reason to talk about it or even think about it consciously; the unexamined background assumptions that are different from ours.
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That works fine for issues where there is the equivalent of monogamy around.
The harder bit is issues equivalent to, to stretch your metaphor, polyamory being so much the norm that nobody had ever heard of monogamy for centuries, and that they would never bump into anyone who practised it or have any reason to talk about it or even think about it consciously; the unexamined background assumptions that are different from ours.
The way around those is to create social situations where people talk about their homelife.
A small group of friends getting together. "Hey Marvin, how's the home life?"
"Well, you know.. I'm missing Marie alot, she's up visiting Joanna from Venus. It sucks, cause John(or Jane) and I feel like the bed is empty with out her."
"I know what you mean, Nathan and Serephina went out of town about a month ago . Mark, Gavin and I had our hands full with all the kids."
Maybe go to a restaurant (if they exist) where they get a nice romantic table for 5..
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So, to sum up, you're not really looking for the tools by which to do it (the majority of the answers thus far), rather you are polling the level of indirect revelation that has worked for most people here?
The harder bit is issues equivalent to, to stretch your metaphor, polyamory being so much the norm that nobody had ever heard of monogamy for centuries, and that they would never bump into anyone who practised it or have any reason to talk about it or even think about it consciously; the unexamined background assumptions that are different from ours.
One level at which that has definitely worked for me in the past is what Silverberg does in At Winter's End.
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So, to sum up, you're not really looking for the tools by which to do it (the majority of the answers thus far), rather you are polling the level of indirect revelation that has worked for most people here?
Yes, though, tools showing up that I'd not already considered would be a good thing too.
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Yes, though, tools showing up that I'd not already considered would be a good thing too.
The only author I can think of that doesn't use a 'tool' is Neal S. And you already said you didn't want to try to write like him. And aside from that, he doesn't get the whole of his potential audience because a lot of would-be SciFi readers don't have the patience to learn a new vocabulary every time the pick up a book entirely from context clues.
Although... Have you read Lovelock? It's by Orson Scott Card & Kathryn Kidd. If you haven't read it, it's worth a read. I can't think of any tools that they used. There's no 'talking book', or 'newbie character' or 'nerdy historian'.
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The only author I can think of that doesn't use a 'tool' is Neal S. And you already said you didn't want to try to write like him.
He has a great gift for the interesting infodump - I mean, he can spend a few pages of Cryptonomicon on the best way to eat breakfast cereal and make it compelling. I am not under the impression that i can do infodumps anywhere near that well.
And aside from that, he doesn't get the whole of his potential audience because a lot of would-be SciFi readers don't have the patience to learn a new vocabulary every time the pick up a book entirely from context clues.
He's not writing SF for non-SF readers, definitely. I am not at all certain where I would think of myself as being on that issue.
Although... Have you read Lovelock? It's by Orson Scott Card & Kathryn Kidd. If you haven't read it, it's worth a read. I can't think of any tools that they used. There's no 'talking book', or 'newbie character' or 'nerdy historian'.
No, I've not; will keep an eye out for it.
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I know one does not have to explain everything, but there's only so much I can leave unexplained; the failure mode there is "A happens for unexplained reason, and then B follows on from A for reasons also unexplained, and then C comes on from that where a contemporary reader would most likely expect D to happen instead", and unless enough of the How Things Work basics are in there somewhere, it just looks like pulling plot from thin air rather than playing fair with the rules of that setting. I mean, a detective story where one met all the characters and then had the detective present the solution but never got the reasoning between the data and the solution would be at best gimmicky and at worst pointless.
This may not be your cup of tea, but have you considered some simple flow charting?
Taking A, B and C in your example, give each their own box in the flow chart (without any accompanying explanation) and then see what minimums you need to logically get from one to the other.
In this case the flow chart is really just a mechanism to try and isolate the event flow from the rest of the story stuff swirling around in your head, forcing them to stand on their own, logic-wise.
I may not have explained that very well ...
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Taking A, B and C in your example, give each their own box in the flow chart (without any accompanying explanation) and then see what minimums you need to logically get from one to the other.
In this case the flow chart is really just a mechanism to try and isolate the event flow from the rest of the story stuff swirling around in your head, forcing them to stand on their own, logic-wise.
I have done something like this. And thus far I still find myself thinking things like "now, from X's POV A leads perfectly logically to B because X did her PhD about this particular alien civilisation and knows a fair bit about how they think. But the reader won't. How can I get enough stuff about the aliens in to make this work ?"
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Maybe put some of her research paper titles into a convo at some point like.
"Wow, it's nice to meet you Dr. Spoopenstein, I really was impressed by your paper, "Blue aliens like Green tea."
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Interesting thread flow. The first two pages reminded me of trying to pin a live butterfly onto a display board with only two fingers of one hand..nigh impossible.
I have done something like this. And thus far I still find myself thinking things like "now, from X's POV A leads perfectly logically to B because X did her PhD about this particular alien civilisation and knows a fair bit about how they think. But the reader won't. How can I get enough stuff about the aliens in to make this work ?"
The obvious answer might be an encounter... right up front.
My pref is world building shown through dialog and action only, and any info dumps are limited to two paragraphs only. At that point it must be broken up with dialog or action again. Yep, YA convention. Purely my rules and that style will not fit your style.
All I can encourage you to do is to 'trust your readers' and let them participate in the world building. Their own imaginations will carry them a long way as you slowly release this fictional world on them. Choose your action scenes carefully so they reveal the most possible about the world organically and the same for the dialog.
You can tell my age here-- I see your style being more similar to a 'social-science' perspective of a Ringworld or Mote in God's Eye. I'd re-read those to see how they managed such technically complicated but highly successful sci fi books. Perhaps you can incorporate and apply some of their techniques into your own work.
The other major world builder is Dune, of course, but it takes an entirely different approach to presenting the world. Again highly different world that has been popular.
Softer yet would be Heinlein, Bradbury, and Norton, but I think you're aiming for something between the Niven/Pourelle and Herbert type style?
Keep us posted and best wishes!
edit...chose? sheez... can you tell client came in and pushed send? :-)
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Interesting thread flow. The first two pages reminded me of trying to pin a live butterfly onto a display board with only two fingers of one hand..nigh impossible.
That's pretty much how I've been feeling about this project for the last little bit, yes.
Still, if it were easy, it would have been done before.
The obvious answer might be an encounter... right up front.
I think there will be, and more than one; am now kicking over how much I can get away with POV character briefing other characters in advance, and how much of that I need so that the alien encounter actually makes sense.
All I can encourage you to do is to 'trust your readers' and let them participate in the world building. Their own imaginations will carry them a long way as you slowly release this fictional world on them. Chose your action scenes carefully so they reveal the most possible about the world organically and the same for the dialog.
Very much aiming to get the clues in in advance so they hold together, yes.
You can tell my age here-- I see your style being more similar to a 'social-science' perspective of a Ringworld or Mote in God's Eye. I'd re-read those to see how they managed such technically complicated but highly successful sci fi books. Perhaps you can incorporate and apply some of their techniques into your own work.
The other major world builder is Dune, of course, but it takes an entirely different approach to presenting the world. Again highly different world that has been popular.
Softer yet would be Heinlein, Bradbury, and Norton, but I think you're aiming for something between the Niven/Pourelle and Herbert type style?
Keep us posted and best wishes!
I have read pretty much all of the above. I would certainly say, informed by how some of those have worked; and also by more recent authors like Iain Banks and Ken MacLeod; am hoping that I have learned enough to get some of the same technical tricks in without coming too close to the acutal voice of authors I like and sounding like stealing from them.
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Have you considered using epigraphs? Maybe you could try mixing and matching famous historical quotes, imaginary song lyrics, wedding (or whatever they call polygamous mating) invitations, exerpts from childrens' journals, tech manuscripts featuring hypothetical improvements to existing technology, religious doctrine, etc.
You could even expand them from simple epigraphs to slightly longer interludes of mixed media. Thinking something along the lines of the interludes in Watchmen. Using a method like this might help immerse the readers and give them (hopefully) well-camoflouged info dumps that will lead them to infer certains things about the world you've created.
I dunno if that works for you at all, but I figured I'd toss it out there.
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... am hoping that I have learned enough to get some of the same technical tricks in without coming too close to the acutal voice of authors I like and sounding like stealing from them.
there is so much more to an author's voice than just techniques. Employing style and technical techniques and evolving them is the whole idea behind the craft. Other than that marvelous Already Dead that you got me into reading and ee cummings poetry style-- technique is worlds apart from author's voice for me. I'd never borrow Huston's style for example since it is so clearly unique and that author's.)
Playing devil's advocate however, what on earth is with this recent fascination with re-writing the classics into cult classics these days? I counted up only a few stuck around the aisles and checkout registers at my local Borders--Android Karenina, Little Woman-vamp version, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, the Jane Austin new fic modern books? That is just wrong, obnoxious, and a rip off IMO---I KNOW they are past copyright dates, but still... And I know Shakespeare's been redone over and over and over... but come on guys?
Okay I really can buy these since they are so well done from what I've been told...Jane Austin new fic modern books?
Since these aren't genre books
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there is so much more to an author's voice than just techniques. Employing style and technical techniques and evolving them is the whole idea behind the craft. Other than that marvelous Already Dead that you got me into reading
Oh goodie. Thank you; it's really heartening to have recommended something that someone liked.
and ee cummings poetry style-- technique is worlds apart from author's voice for me. I'd never borrow Huston's style for example since it is so clearly unique and that author's.)
I don't intentionally borrow either, but some styles I just find infectious, and will write a whole chapter and then realise on reread it's been pulled in the direction of Douglas Adams, or Jack Womack, or Livy, or Paarfi of Roundwood...
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Livy infectious, eh?
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I don't intentionally borrow either, but some styles I just find infectious, and will write a whole chapter and then realise on reread it's been pulled in the direction of Douglas Adams, or Jack Womack, or Livy, or Paarfi of Roundwood...
ah geez! With all your writing experience and you still feel your style varies. That sucks. I hoped that tendency faded w time.
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ah geez! With all your writing experience and you still feel your style varies. That sucks. I hoped that tendency faded w time.
Why would it not vary?
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ah geez! With all your writing experience and you still feel your style varies. That sucks. I hoped that tendency faded w time.
Well, sometimes variation of style is what I am aiming for; i have written a fair bit in deliberate Dumas pastiche, for example. (Which you know is cooking when your average sentence length for a chapter hits fifty words.)
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Well, sometimes variation of style is what I am aiming for; i have written a fair bit in deliberate Dumas pastiche, for example. (Which you know is cooking when your average sentence length for a chapter hits fifty words.)
Wait, you mean not everyone writes sentences that are fifty words long? I seem to do that on a regular basis, especially when I'm trying to explain something to someone, the words just keep coming and coming.
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Too much fiber in your sentences.
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Wait, you mean not everyone writes sentences that are fifty words long? I seem to do that on a regular basis, especially when I'm trying to explain something to someone, the words just keep coming and coming.
Sentence length is associated with education; the more education you have the longer your average sentence. That just means you're edumacted svb.
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"With all your writing experience and you still feel your style varies? That sucks. I hoped that tendency faded w time."
The thing is--although style is different from author's voice, ultimately the writer is seeking a style and theme that represents what is in the writer's soul, which is the writer's voice. Once you find the style and theme that best expresses that voice, I don't see it changing or being swayed to match others. In other words, once you've found your unique writer's voice, which is made up from style, theme, techniques, writer craft tools, it may age like a fine wine, but won't change that much. Maybe a more audible image rather than fine wine in needed. Think of your writing as the quest for the perfect bell that will resonate in the reader's mind. Most, perhaps for the vast majority, that bell is slightly off key and the work fails to reach its full potential. Thus the quest is to find that perfect pitch in our writer's voice that is at last--right. I am perfectly willing to listen to other viewpoints on this, but inside it rings true for me (to keep up the metaphor LOL).
Brett Anthony Johnston from Harvard says that in a life time an author may have only one true theme or voice. (Like God only gives you one voice or maybe more correct would be to say S/He gives you lots, but its up to you to find the absolutely right perfect voice from those S/He gave you.) Brett bases that on well discussed writing advice that stems from F Scott Fitzgerald, ie that a writer has one underlying voice that s/he is compelled to tell--the writer may change the presentation, but ultimately there is only one.
So my comments were to author's voice and its style, which with a mature author, I see as steady and reliable and once found it won't desert or be swayed.
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Brett Anthony Johnston from Harvard says that in a life time an author may have only one true theme or voice. (Like God only gives you one voice or maybe more correct would be to say S/He gives you lots, but its up to you to find the absolutely right perfect voice from those S/He gave you.) Brett bases that on well discussed writing advice that stems from F Scott Fitzgerald, ie that a writer has one underlying voice that s/he is compelled to tell--the writer may change the presentation, but ultimately there is only one.
I think I will beg to differ. I would, for example, consider Steven Brust a mature author - in that he has been publishing very good books for more than 25 years - during which he has had two ongoing, though related, long series in drastically different voices (plus a number of other books in voices different again). Either that or we are using "voice" to mean subtly different things, which is entirely possible. I find the notion that one only has one True Voice and any other voice one does less True a bit pessimistic, tbh. (The thought "But that would be like only eating one cuisine, or monogamy... " kind of expresses the scale of my immediate reaction, if I can say that without risking a touchy digression; there may well be peopl for whom it's the case, but it does not feel like I am one of them.)
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I am using a differentiation between character voice and author voice. A character's voice has to be different and unique and thus the style of a work will vary to be true to the character, but the underlying author's voice comes from one well of, okay for better term, spirituality in my mind. I've had an editor tell me that she can read the author's voice beneath the surface and can recognize the author's name as a result. I've blogged on editors and agents who are looking for something beneath the surface in the queries they receive, something elusive, something MORE that flows beneath the words on the page. I still think that it applies. We've all read something and gone, "Wow, look at that. The page is MORE than the words on it."
When this came up in Brett's workshop, I was shocked and frankly thought how young he was, but on retrospect, I believe that I have come around to his point of view on this matter.
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I am using a differentiation between character voice and author voice. A character's voice has to be different and unique and thus the style of a work will vary to be true to the character, but the underlying author's voice comes from one well of, okay for better term, spirituality in my mind. I've had an editor tell me that she can read the author's voice beneath the surface and can recognize the author's name as a result. I've blogged on editors and agents who are looking for something beneath the surface in the queries they receive, something elusive, something MORE that flows beneath the words on the page. I still think that it applies. We've all read something and gone, "Wow, look at that. The page is MORE than the words on it."
I think you are talking about something that I half-don't see and half-don't believe in (to my mind the words are all there is, and anything additional they invoke or evoke is purely because of being the right words) so I do not see anything I can really say to engage with this.
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Does the halves make a whole or is there considerable overlap between them? ;D
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I think the first thing to do is sit down and plan out this Civilzation -- its technology, history, and social order, which seems to be the main areas of question. Once it's solid, take look at the story and look when references can be dropped in. Most of the time, additions that add to the reader's understanding of the world can be droped in with a few words, or a sentence or two at most. Info dumps, I think, should only be used for main plot points ("Why is the world going to blow up, Doctor Brain?" "Because they vill be reversing the polarity of ze Neutron flow, and the de planet don't like zhat!")
Most of the BG can be dole out, building up the picture of this world and the people who live on it. And if done right, even the main plot point can be boiled down to a few sentacnes, IF most of the info has already been dealt out earlier in the book, as part of the BG. Say a major polical figure was going to be assasinate (Major plot point), have said politician on the news, or the main character listen to their speech, or discuss the politican between two or more characters, or best yet, use all three ways to give the reader a picture of this person. sprikle a fw referecnes about the character though the first book. So, by the time the Assasination attempt is revealed, there's no need to explain who Politician is or why their important.
Of course, most of my writing has been in an estabished universe that already has all those details hashed out, which leaves me to only worry about plot points and Characters. I don't have to explain what a Battlemech is, or go into great detail about the major interstellar states of the Inner Sphere. So, a lot depends on how much the background influnces the story. I have less freedom with an established universe than I would have with my own, fully created universe.
As I have said, pick your spots to show a little more of the setting, and make sure the background being dropped in is relavent to the scene and story -- mentioning a sport called Quiddich and explaining the rules when it has nothing to do with the main plot is a waste of paper and time. Of course, there's nothing wrong with having a character complain about last night's Quiddich, then have them described enough of the action so the reader knows it involves broomsticks and more than one ball, that's fine. It's color.
Hope that helps -- I'm off to bed!! ;)
Craig
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This is bugging me too, in a story I'm working on at the moment. It's not the technology -- they're lower tech than us, except for a few mysterious 'ancient artifacts' (that don't need explanation, as they're complete mysteries to the characters as well) -- it's the society. The politics and society of this far-future world are both very different from ours (or familiar historical examples) and important to the plot, so it's becoming an issue.