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Things Bad Movies Taught Me About Writing

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : March 17, 2015
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Category: Things X Taught Me About Writing

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Pictured: Tom Cruise, the most miscast book character since That Chick from Divergent.

Pictured: Tom Cruise, the most miscast book character since That Chick from Divergent.

(Author’s Note: This is actually a rare re-post of a blog I wrote back in 2013 shortly after sitting through the exhausting, disappointing Jack Reacher. It is two years old, but since I also just sat through the absolutely abysmal Chappie, I felt it necessary and relevant to post this blog. Please enjoy.)

So I just watched Jack Reacher last night because my parents claimed it was alright.

It was not.

And that is an understatement.

However, it’s not like this is the first time I’ve seen a hair-tearingly stupid movie. I have also subjected myself to A Good Day to Die Hard and RIPD this year. Yes, yes, I should have known better, but when you’re wrong, you’re dead wrong. Still, every horrible experience I’ve had sitting in a theater has taught me something.

Respect your audience’s time. Specifically, I am referring to pacing a story. Jack Reacher had abysmal pacing. For instance, the first five or six minutes of the film has absolutely no dialogue. I have seen movies where this is effective and sets the mood. In this particular film, it felt pretentious and exhausting. It didn’t enhance the evil nature of the bad guy and it didn’t make the character we were introduced to seem intelligent or quirky. It was just boring and unnecessary. Pacing means that the events of your story glide into each other, whether it’s a romantic scene followed by a violent scene, a violent scene followed by a humorous exchange, an action scene followed by a quiet denouement, or any combination of different sequences. If at any point during your movie, a non-idiotic audience member checks his/her watch, something is deeply wrong. This is not to say that everything should be fast and hectic—that was one of the main pitfalls Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole—but you have to spend time on things that matter and omit things that aren’t relevant to them.

Write good characters and we can pretty much sit through anything. Think about ten of your favorite films off the top of your head. How many of them have premises that are absurd if explained out loud? I know plenty of mine do. However, if you write enjoyable or relatable characters, your audience won’t care that the plot is silly. Perfect example: Clive Owen’s hysterical action flick Shoot ‘Em Up. About 99% of what happened in that movie was physically impossible and utterly ridiculous. Why did I love it? Commitment, man. Clive Owen nailed every single one-liner with his perfect deadpan expression and I adored his character—carrot chewing, cynicism, and all. What’s the reverse of this effect? A great plot with horrible characters. We’ve all seen it before. Hell, I can rattle off examples with ease: My Super Ex-Girlfriend, Push, Jumper, The Last Stand, and RIPD. In my personal opinion, those movies had plots that sounded interesting that were executed horribly. Some of them failed for several reasons, but the common element is unlikable characters. Jack Reacher had this problem as well. There were exactly two types of characters: morons and douchebags. Some were a combination of both. Terrible writing will strangle a great concept in its crib and you’ll be left there weeping. Many writers advise to build a novel, script, or short story from the character outward. I agree completely. We have to like the guy or gal we’re riding piggyback with or nothing will pan out.

Commit. I have an entire laundry list of awful movies that I love with full awareness that they are awful. I am able to freely admit this because 90% of the bad films I enjoy committed to their premise or their characters. For instance, my number one guiltiest pleasure of all time is Hudson Hawk. No, no, don’t close your browser yet! Let me explain. I love Hudson Hawk, if only because everyone—and I mean, everyone—in that silly mess of a film committed to that incomprehensible, ludicrous script of theirs. They just nailed it. No one half-assed any of their scenes and so the movie turned into the beautiful butterfly of horribleness as a result. To me, nothing is worse than being mediocre or half-hearted. I’ve read plenty of books in time and the ones that frustrate me the most are the ones that don’t commit to an idea.

I try not to name examples, but the main offender on my list is ‘City of Bones’. Great concept, great conflict, great world building, but one truly half-assed main character. I just couldn’t get into it even though I liked Jace and Simon and the other Shadow Hunters just fine. Clary was a loaf of Wal-Mart brand bread to me—bland, dry, and forgettable. This is not to say the books are bad. Not in the least. I actually think the writing is quite good and I recommend them with no remorse, but that series is something I can never get into because I feel like the author didn’t commit to making Clary a distinct protagonist. I believe this is possibly the most important part of the writing process—setting the main character apart from her supporting cast and from characters outside of the novel itself. I am the first person to slam the ‘Twilight’ novels, but at least Bella Swan was her own person. True, she was a perfectly repugnant person, but she was still an individual and no one can really replicate her. (Though E.L. James tried her damnedest.)

Weak villains will kill your story. Not physically weak villains, mind you. Villains who aren’t threatening are also something that makes me want to kick puppies. Jack Reacher was definitely guilty of this. Mr. Potato Head—sorry, Jai Courtney—was kind of intimidating if only for being a cold-blooded sniper, but his “boss” was the least scary villain I’ve seen in ages. Oh, gee, he has one blind eye and no fingers! Bring me my brown pants! Building up a good villain is one of the most important parts to a story because otherwise, your protagonist—no matter how charming and funny and cool—will have no dragon to slay. Winning an unwinnable war is what makes someone a hero, whether that war is literal or not. Creating a slimy, obsequious villain is essential to draw a line in the sand and make the stakes as real as they can ever get. Want an example of what happens when you don’t do that? The Happening. ‘Nuff said.

Kyoko

Cover Reveal: The Holy Dark

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : January 29, 2015
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Category: Author Events

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You’ve been patient and now it’s finally here.

Cover design by Gunjan Kumar and Chris Cold.

Cover design by Gunjan Kumar and Chris Cold.

Sarcastic demon-slayer extraordinaire Jordan Amador has been locked in a year-long struggle to hunt down the thirty silver coins paid to Judas Iscariot. The mere touch of these coins is enough to kill any angel.

Jordan’s demonic opposition grows more desperate with each coin found, so they call on the ultimate reinforcement: Moloch, the Archdemon of War. Moloch puts out a contract on Jordan as well as her estranged husband, the Archangel Michael. Now Jordan and Michael will have to find a way to work together to survive against impossible odds and stop Moloch’s plan, or else he’ll wage a war that will wipe out the human race.

The Holy Dark will hit shelves April 24, 2015. You can get in paperback right now, pre-order it on the Kindle, add it to your Goodreads To Be Read shelf, like my Facebook page, or sign up with the mailing list to find out more about the series. While you wait, there are two excerpts available to read. Please spread the word!

Kyoko

Things Justified Taught Me About Writing

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : January 19, 2015
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Category: Things X Taught Me About Writing

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fx-s-justified-renewed-for-fourth-season

If you’re not watching Justified, you need to reevaluate your life goals. It is by far one of the best, most consistently good shows on television, and after six awesome seasons (including the one starting this week), it’s finally saying goodbye. For that reason, I’m pouring one out to my long-legged, drawling, whip-smart, deathly sarcastic, eternally troubled badass modern cowboy, Marshal Raylan Givens.

First, a brief introduction: Justified tells the tale of Raylan (Timothy Olyphant), a Kentucky-born U.S. marshal who is a living, breathing modern cowboy. He was chasing down criminals in Florida before he faced off with a crime boss in a crowded restaurant. The crime boss pulled his gun and Raylan shot him in full view of the public, prompting a huge investigation that got him into so much trouble he was reassigned to his hometown. Harlan County, the area where his new jurisdiction covers, is absolutely teeming with all kinds of criminals from prostitution rings to drug dealers. Raylan is put under the supervision of Art Mullen (Nick Searchy), and works alongside fellow Marshals Rachel Brooks (Erica Tazel) and Tim Gutterson (Jacob Pitt), whom he has friction with at first but they soon get along.

Meanwhile, things start to get heated when Boyd Crowder (Walt Goggins) blows up a church and makes trouble for his former brother’s wife, Ava Crowder (Joelle Carter) when he finds out she killed him with a shotgun in his own home. Raylan and Boyd grew up together as teenagers, so Raylan is assigned to get him under control, kill him, or bring him in. Raylan’s life also gets even more tangled up as he crosses paths with his former wife Winona (Natalie Zea), a court stenographer, who remarried but they both still show signs of being attracted to each other.

Sound juicy enough for ya? Well, let’s dive in. Spoilers ahead, as always.

Sharp dialogue can be the most effective way to get your work noticed. Justified has a lot of unique things going for it, but what I’ve always considered to be this show’s most valuable asset is the dialogue. The stuff that comes out of these characters’ mouths is nothing short of genius. When Raylan, Art, Rachel, and Tim get in a room together, you don’t need violent criminals to have a good time. These four engage in the most intensely awesome snarkfests you will see in your natural born life. The relationships they’ve built over the years make for some of the best scenes you have the privilege of watching, especially Art and Raylan, who are equally exasperated with each other but still see the value of one another. If you need the highlights, check out the Crowning Moment of Funny page on Tvtropes.

It’s more than just humor, though. Justified has made a name for itself by carving out beautifully intricate characters through words alone. Boyd Crowder would be just like any other drug dealing crime boss if it weren’t for that legendary silver tongue and trademark drawl. He’s constantly cool under pressure and unlike 80% of the criminal underbelly of Harlan county, he uses his brain to get out of scrapes more than he uses a gun.

Similarly, Raylan’s biggest asset is that he just flat out pays attention and listens to the things around him. That is why he’s such an unbelievable marshal who nearly always gets his man. He knows how to manipulate bad guys and how to either talk them down or trick them into giving him the info he needs.

This is tricky for writers. Every author, and aspiring author, has strengths and weaknesses. Some of us are awesome at dialogue. Others are awesome at descriptions, diction, spinning whimsical plots, or creating imaginative worlds. Stick to what you’re good at, but also remember that great dialogue from your characters can set them apart, whether it’s humorous or poignant or terrifying or heartwarming. It also adds extra layers to their personality if they have a particular speech pattern or a quirk, like how in my series Belial insists on calling Jordan “my pet” just to work her nerve, and gives these grand overblown Hannibal Lecter-esque speeches just because he likes the sound of his own voice. Make the words coming out of their mouths matter and make them work for you, not against you.

 

Know the durability of your villains. One of the things that I’ve always loved about Justified is that they always pick a season-long villain to antagonize the marshals. This is a brilliant tactic because it allows us to get the full scope of someone without allowing them to drag along forever like Percy from Nikita or Abbadon from Supernatural. We get to see what kind of threat the villains present, why they need to be stopped, what their strengths and weaknesses are, and what their hubris is if they have one (which they typically do because they are human.)

My personal favorite villain thus far has been Mags Bennett (Margo Martindale) because for me, she’s the most layered and three-dimensional villain of the show. Mags actually had good sides to her, even though we find out she’s incredibly ruthless and scary. Hell, Mags was so amazing the role won Martindale an Emmy, and for good reason. She was expertly used and executed, and by far the best female character in the show’s entire run.

Conversely, Justified is a bit guilty of overusing their villains too. Dickie Bennett (Jeremy Davies), Mags’ wretched son, is still alive and kicking when he wore out his welcome by the end of season two. He’s a despicable coward, but yet he’s somehow managed to hold on to his life despite Raylan having every single reason to wipe that slime off the face of the earth. Thankfully, though, Dickie was downgraded to a minor character in the recent seasons, so while his presence still induces headaches, it’s tolerable.

Managing your villains properly is a hard trick to master as an author. You can’t look at it on a case-by-case basis. You have to unfurl your villain like a scroll and consider both the short and long term effects of their presence in the narrative. If you make their presence too short, then readers question why they were there in the first place. If you make their presence too long, then readers can get fatigued with them. I can freely admit one of the biggest struggles in writing the upcoming Black Parade novel The Holy Dark is that I had a villain who just wouldn’t fall into the category of major or minor character. It took me forever to figure it out because there were so many possibilities. It’s important to remember that nothing bogs a story down faster than a boring impervious villain who lasts longer than they should. You have to know when to fold ‘em.

 

Make your characters earn their keep. Alright, I’m going to get a little salty for this lesson—I f*@king hate Ava Crowder. I won’t launch into my 3,000 word essay about why, but if you’re curious enough, watch the following video (skip ahead to 12:35). I’m sure people would debate with me why she’s supposedly a good character, but the number one reason I can’t stand Ava is because she isn’t an independent character who pulls her own weight. Almost everything in this show just conveniently gets Ava out of a fix rather than her getting herself out of her own problems.

For instance, her introduction is killing Boyd’s brother with a shotgun after years of abuse. Look, fine, I understand that because domestic violence is pretty much the worst, but he was an unarmed man sitting at a dinner table eating and she shot him. In damn near any other case, Ava’s ass would have gone to jail, but no, she doesn’t. She gets off scot-free, which irritated me when I began the show, but I let it slide with the hope that she would give me a definitive reason why she was taking up time on my TV screen. She then enters a borderline creepy relationship with Boyd, which again annoyed me but whatever she clearly had bad taste in men to begin with, but what tears it is that Ava is basically just coasting off of Boyd’s reputation. She’s his lackey, except she gets to sleep with him and pretend that she’s his lieutenant. They keep up this disgustingly long pretense of being in love and wanting to buy a home and get married until finally the season four finale has Ava being apprehended in possession of a dead body and she’s sent to jail. Finally, Ava will prove she’s worth a damn, right?

lana-kane nope

Ava gets in jail and immediately gets help from Boyd, even though it later backfires. Then she gets mad that he can’t find a way to help her, so she breaks up with him and starts to learn the pecking order in the prison. It turns out they have a drug ring inside the prison and the guards are in on it in exchange for sex. The girls play along, but Ava—who is such a hypocrite because she ran a whorehouse herself before getting in jail—is too good to trade sex for status and rebuffs a guard. She tries to make a deal with the local nurse to get the product in and out of the jailhouse, but the guard she rejected frames her for attacking him. She is later saved by someone Boyd hired to watch over her. Then, Ava decides to take out the head of the drug ring so she can be the queen bee and it turns out it’s some elderly woman. And they get in a fight. And the elderly woman kicks Ava’s ass for a while before she finally stabs her to death. The woman’s followers suspect Ava and she’s all but tied her own noose because half the prison now wants her dead.

And then the entire season-long subplot is rendered pointless because Raylan gets her out of jail so she can tattle on Boyd to finally send him up the river. That’s right. After an entire season of her skating by on pure dumb luck, she is Deus Ex Machina’d out of trouble. Yep.

There is little worse than making someone a main character and then letting them constantly get away with everything with few relevant consequences. People are flawed, yes, but bailing a character out over and over again is the quickest way to make your readers dislike them. Not everyone needs to be a badass, but they all need to earn their keep and solve as many problems as they create. This is part of what authors mean when they say “kill your darlings.” It refers to more than getting rid of pieces of your work that you like but isn’t relevant to the overall story. It means push your characters off that pedestal they are on and force them to be worth your readers’ time. You can’t babysit them. Make them matter.

Don’t forget to just plain have fun. I am about to introduce the most brilliant moment ever put to television thanks to Justified. If you take nothing else away from this blog post, then you must do me the one favor of indulging me while I set up the best scene in the entire series, and in any series if you ask me.

In our fifth season, we’re introduced to Dewey Crowe’s family—a bunch of horrible, ignorant, slimy, back-stabbing guttersnipes who come up from Florida after they find out Dewey has come into some money thanks to suing the marshal service (long story.) They pressure and bully Dewey into sharing the wealth, and in doing so, cross Raylan and the marshals’ paths as they try to get a foothold on the crime syndicate in Harlan county. The Crowes are led by Darryl Crowe (Michael Rappaport), and consist of his sister Wendy (Alicia Witt) and his unbelievably stupid brother Danny (A.J Buckley).

Danny has been an incredible thorn in the side of everyone he meets for just being stupid as a bucket of shrimp, a coward, and a bully all in one. He bullies Wendy’s son, Kendal, in front of one of their dangerous allies Jean Baptiste (Edi Gathegi), who challenges him to either leave the kid alone or face off with him. Danny shoots him in the back and then threatens to kill Kendal if he tells anyone, and then tries to kill Kendal after he accidentally lets Danny’s beloved pit bull run off and get hit by a car.

At the end of the season, Raylan finally tracks Danny down to try and get him to lead him to Darryl. Danny decides to have a showdown with sharpshooter Raylan by setting up the 21-foot rule, a legend where a person with a knife is good enough to take someone with a gun within 21 steps of each other.

The result is the most glorious thing ever created ever. Please enjoy.

Reportedly, this scene was so amazing that Timothy Olyphant himself simply could not stop laughing in between takes because it is by far the most satisfying villain death ever made. When this happened live, my mother and I both jumped straight up off the couch and gave it a standing ovation for over a minute. You just have to have fun when opportunities like this present themselves. Justified went for it and they knocked it straight out of the park. True, you do need a bit more context to fully appreciate why the aforementioned scene is perfection, but nothing beats just having fun in your work.

No matter what the genre, it’s important to have fun with your writing. You have to love it. You have to put yourself inside it and make your readers turn those pages, the way that Justified is so good it practically demands me to watch it. Be audacious. Be bold. Do risky things or edgy things and make the pay off so great that people are excited to share it with each other. Even if you’re not Stephen King, you have the ability to gain readership by making your work an experience they cannot get elsewhere.

I’m super nervous about how Justified will end—after all, this is FX we’re talking about and they don’t pull their punches—but I’m so glad for the ride. It truly has been a show that no one can touch. It has its own voice and style and I will miss it sorely after it’s gone. If you’re curious, tune in Tuesdays at 10 o’clock pm EST. See you, cowboy.

New Year’s Resolutions 2015

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : January 5, 2015
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Category: Inspiration

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2014-12-26-2015-graphic-610x330

For the record, I almost never make New Year’s Resolutions. I think it’s a bit of a tired practice and pretty much are only done by people who don’t intend to see them through in the first place. However, I was delighted to see that I actually managed to reach the goals I set for myself last year, which were the following:

  1. Make a name for myself as a self published author.
  2. Get my cat Tyger back from my brother’s place (he was staying there after I had to move again.) He’s adorable and evil, just look at him:

    Pictured: the demon of famine and pestilence.

    Pictured: the demon of famine and pestilence.

  3. Read more than five novels.
  4. Finish the last novel in the Black Parade series.

So I feel kind of confident about making some new goals for 2015 (and praying to God or Satan or Cthulhu that I catch a frickin’ break in the employment department finally) so here they are:

  1. Reread and write reviews for The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher
  2. Finish writing and publish my upcoming YA high fantasy novel
  3. Publish The Holy Dark as well as a box set for The Black Parade series
  4. Sell 500 paid copies of my books
  5. Try to get to 500 Facebook likes
  6. Read at least ten novels

See? Sounds kind of doable. Nothing unreasonable up there. Fingers crossed for me, my darlings!

Happy New Year to you all! I hope things are going well for you so far and I look forward to spending even more time with you in 2015. Stay tuned for upcoming release dates for The Holy Dark. Don’t forget you can still read excerpts for the book at the end of She Who Fights Monsters or on my blog.

Year in Review: 2014

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : December 31, 2014
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Category: Inspiration

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2014-graphic

Whew. It’s been some year, hasn’t it?

My friends and I had our annual end-of-the-year chat last night via Skype and one of them asked me how I felt about 2014 as a whole. I told him 2014 seems to be a year of extremes. It seems as if every good thing that’s happened has been counteracted by something horrible. I met my favorite author, Jim Butcher, but I had to quit my day job. I got a new car, but I also got a car payment. I’ve sold a lot of books, but I’m still unemployed. I bought some awesome new outfits, but I also gained a few pounds so now I’ve started the grueling process of exercising. It’s been a give-and-take from day one this year.

I think the most important thing about 2014 is the amount of knowledge I’ve now crammed into my head in just twelve months’ time. The things I know about writing, editing, marketing, and publishing would have served me extremely well this time last year, but there’s nothing to be done about it now.

I estimate I had only sold about 45-50 copies of The Black Parade in December of 2013 and now we’ve got 7,500 copies circulating on readers’ shelves. This year, I was able to launch The Deadly Seven, my short story collection, as well as the sequel to my first novel, She Who Fights Monsters. BookTrackr estimates I’ve got 5,600 copies of The Deadly Seven and She Who Fights Monsters out there. I also was lucky enough to be included in the Paranormal 13 box set with 13 other insanely talented authors. The set is free across all platforms, and last time I checked, we were well over 100,000 sales, so there are also a lot of people who will (hopefully) eventually see my work as they read through the set.

I consider my greatest accomplishment of the year to be simply getting my name out there. Yes, I am still a small fry, but I’ve actually met a handful of successful authors and I’ve gotten a couple of fans, which is incredibly humbling.  Last year, I was pretty much lying in a puddle of my own pity depressed about not selling, and now I understand that there is more to selling novels than throwing your work out there and expecting to be recognized. Readers have too many choices out. It doesn’t mean that my books are masterpieces or total garbage. It just means they haven’t found me yet. 2014 has proven that there is indeed a market for my particular type of storytelling, and nothing is more encouraging than knowing someone hears my voice and likes it.

I think it’s important for young upcoming authors to know that they aren’t alone and that the percentage of authors who are instant successes is far smaller than you think. Sadly, the mass media perpetuates the myth that there are millions of them and you’re a big fat loser for not selling, but that’s not true. There are some who hit the jackpot, but most authors take years to generate a following and start actually making money. It’s discouraging to know, but it doesn’t mean it’s impossible if it just takes a long time.

I would say the lesson I’ve learned for 2014 is that you can only go up from rock bottom. My life still isn’t where I’d like it to be, especially since I just turned 26 (aka the age where you’re supposed to have your shit together, according to society), but this year has proven that I can meet my goals if I just keep my eyes fixed on the horizon and keep swimming. Dry land’s out there somewhere. There’s nothing left to do but sink or swim.

I hope 2014 has been good to you, dear readers. We’ve suffered some serious losses, but the important thing is we dust ourselves off and keep going. May 2015 be a better year to us all.

Happy New Year from yours truly,

Kyoko

On Love Triangles

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : December 23, 2014
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Category: Book & Movie Reviews

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Left: Jennifer Lawrence Right: Liam Hemsworth Below: Josh Hutcherson

Left: Jennifer Lawrence
Right: Liam Hemsworth
Below: Josh Hutcherson

Hey, guys! Do you like my new glass house? Isn’t it beautiful? Well, gonna start throwing stones now, so remember to duck.

Yes, I know, it is hypocritical for me to write a blog post discussing love triangles, especially when it’s focused on one of the most successful book-to-movie franchises in history. That being said, Mockingjay Part 1 gave me a subject I want to discuss anyhow. Spoiler alert for The Hunger Games novels. Sorry.

My sister-in-law and I went to see Mockingjay last night and we came to the scene in what remains of District 12 where Katniss and Gale are in her victor’s mansion and Gale recalls when she kissed him after he was recovering from being whipped. Katniss kisses him, and Gale bitterly remarks that he knew she’d do that because she only pays attention to him when he’s in pain. My sister tapped me on the arm and made a face, pointing at Gale, and I knew why. We later discussed how she felt about Gale’s bitterness at being rejected by Katniss, and I agreed, but I told her I did feel a little bad for him—not because he was rejected because that’s a part of life, but because Gale is an example of a character who is too closely tied to a love triangle and that’s why that scene made him so unlikable.

I feel as if Gale—and this is strictly based on the film adaptation of him—is propped up by the love triangle and doesn’t stand on his own as a character without it. That’s a problem in the writing. His whole existence is wrapped up in Katniss, whether it’s her actions in District 12, her actions in the Games, or her actions after the second revolution happens. I told my sister I kind of wanted Gale to understand that Katniss wasn’t in love with him at the end of the first novel and then just become her ally for the remaining two books because he isn’t given the right amount of attention thanks to the love triangle. He’s not a bad guy, after all, but the reason Gale’s confession about the kiss was so teeth-clenchingly bad is because it’s such small potatoes in the grand scheme of the rest of the film.

I kind of wanted Katniss to turn to him and say, “Dude, we’re in a WAR. They are bombing innocent people into oblivion. I’m the sole symbol of this war and I don’t have time to tend to your wounded male ego. I don’t have time to fall in love, okay? Suck it up.” That sounds harsh, but seriously, having a second romantic subplot in the middle of a war torn saga is unnecessary.

I really think a better source of conflict for Gale and Katniss would have been the propaganda and her position as the Mockingjay. For instance, what if Gale’s recollection of District 12’s bombing became more popular than Katniss’ other appearances? What if they were considering him for their new symbol, which meant Katniss’ leverage to get Peeta back would be defunct? That could have been a better way for them to be at odds instead of Gale being a sourpuss that Katniss is in love with Peeta. As it stands, he just sounds like one of those whiny boys who post on Facebook about getting ‘Friendzoned’ all the time when it shouldn’t matter. Sure, one sided romance is a bitch, but if someone truly loves you as a friend, you should be respectful of their feelings and simply love them anyway. If it’s too painful to do that, then be an adult and tell them that you can’t continue the friendship because of your feelings and bid them adieu. Don’t mope and whine about it because all you’re going to do is make your friend feel like crap for something they have no control over.

Mockingjay’s love triangle is something I feel isn’t a natural part of the narrative. I think that Collins needed an easy way to create tension between characters, and she chose this one. I think Gale could have come across a lot better if he wasn’t in love with Katniss. After all, he’s a strong, handsome, dedicated human being and we don’t get any of his backstory in the movies, and only a little bit of backstory in the books. He is very underdeveloped and so everything kind of slides into the negative category by the time we get to Mockingjay. He shouldn’t be pouting and throwing tantrums because she’s not in love with him. He should be supporting her after all the horrible things she’s seen and done. He should have been the one to race to her bedroom when she had nightmares, but he wasn’t.

I also think this love triangle might have been easier to digest if we knew with absolute clarity how Katniss felt about him, or why she cared for him. It’s not the same as her relationship with Peeta, which was forged in the kiln of the Hunger Games. Katniss is an extremely solitary person and she appears to like Gale because he’s easy company. If we saw more about his actions, his ideals, and how she relates to them, then maybe it would have made more sense for there to be a triangle. After all, Gale was actually right. Katniss didn’t have any romantic feelings for him, and only kissed him out of comfort because she didn’t know what else to do. There is a such thing as platonic love, after all, and I think that’s what Katniss has for Gale. Granted, kissing him on the lips was pretty misleading, but hey, she’s a teenager, she didn’t know any better.

For me, the love triangle in this series falls short because it is so damn obvious that Katniss is going to end up with Peeta that there was no point to drag it out across all three books, and subsequently, the films. It’s not a triangle when it’s just unrequited from one guy while the other two are wrapped up in their own little love bubble. It clogs up an already complicated story with needless bickering and stressing over something that in the grand scheme of things will not affect the ending. Katniss has far too many issues to worry about settling down with someone, especially when they could all be blown to steaming bits by the Capitol at any time. I feel sympathetic towards Gale just because I’ve had crushes on guys who didn’t reciprocate before, but I didn’t wander around behind them like a puppy begging for attention just to suit my own needs. Friendship should mean more than that to him and that’s why his character starts to deteriorate in the final novel and film.

Love triangles in general, however, can work if you write them with enough weight behind the characters. I think it’s crucial that the two love interests vying for a girl or guy’s attention can stand up on their own and just happen to be in love with him/her instead of all their actions being directly tied to the main character. For instance, The Dresden Files didn’t have the typical love triangle situation between Harry, Susan, and Murphy. When Harry started noticing he might have feelings for Murphy, Susan wasn’t around. When Susan came back, Harry was focused on her and didn’t waffle back and forth between the two. Murphy respected his boundaries and didn’t bring up the shift in their friendship. It was balanced. Both of these women had their own separate lives to lead, and we hardly even saw both of them in the same book. It worked because we didn’t dislike Harry for being indecisive because it was never portrayed that way. He loves Susan for a particular set of reasons, and he loves Murphy for a particular set of reasons, and they don’t intersect. That works well for the series since the stakes are always so high and Harry doesn’t have time to worry about his heart when he’s trying to keep some monster for ripping it out of his chest.

For example, in my own series, I sort of made a list of pros and cons for Michael and Belial as Jordan’s main love interests. Michael is who she is in love with, but Belial is that dangerous little voice in the back of her head reminding her she could just be selfish instead of having to work at her relationship. Belial has a lot to offer Jordan if she went in that direction. She’d be sacrificing her marriage and her friendship with the angels if she chose him, but he would give her a life that she couldn’t experience otherwise. Additionally, Michael and Belial’s entire lives don’t hinge on Jordan’s every action, and that’s because I think it’s important they have their own agency. The boys also have a complicated past with each other that’s going to come up in The Holy Dark, and that’s something I think is lacking in Mockingjay between Gale and Peeta. I’d have to reread the novel, but I don’t remember them interacting with each other very much, and it does damage to the love triangle if the only interactions between the competitors is them fighting over the main character.

Love triangles are complicated and overused. That’s fact. However, it doesn’t mean they are impossible to pull off, nor does it mean authors should stop writing them. I do think YA leans too heavily on them, but when done correctly, it can be an enticing addition to a narrative that helps you learn more about the three people involved and forces the protagonist to make a hard choice. I think that’s the reason why they exist and why they’re so prominent in fiction. Like anything else, it just needs to be used in moderation.

…think fast! *throws stone*

P.S. While I’ve got you here, She Who Fights Monsters will be free this Thursday on Christmas. Spread the word or grab yourself a copy!

9 Things No One Tells You About Being Over 25

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : November 24, 2014
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Category: Uncategorized

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Search your feelings. You know it to be true.

Search your feelings. You know it to be true.

Supposedly, with age comes wisdom. Here’s some wisdom I’ve learned after being 25 for almost a year. Your mileage may vary.

1. Being constantly tired and/or sleepy. How many hours a night do you sleep? The average is 6-8, and some poor students or overnight workers get 4 or less, but no matter how many hours you’re under or how many naps you take to compensate, you’re always tired. You’re tired at work, you’re tired at home, you’re tired at parties, you’re tired at dates, and for no apparent reason. Tired is no longer a state of your health. It just becomes part of your personality as a twenty-something.

2. You can’t eat the same food you did as a teenager. Granted, you still want to and you still do against your better judgment, but usually one of two things happen: (1) your body no longer digests it properly and you end up with a stomachache, heartburn, or gas (2) it doesn’t taste the same and you no longer like it. For instance, I used to eat Ramen noodles with little salad shrimp in them after school if there weren’t leftovers. I ate one bite of shrimp Ramen earlier this year and threw the entire lot in the garbage while contemplating removing my tongue. Your body chemistry pretty much stops making sense and all kinds of things switch on you without warning.

3. You become horrifically impatient. Doesn’t matter what you’re doing, with whom, or why, but it can’t happen fast enough. Old lady driver? You want to run her off the road, cackling all the way. Post office worker? Jump across the counter and punch in the buttons yourself to make them go faster. Fast food drive thru? You could kill the chicken, pluck it, gut it, and cook it faster than these clowns. Everything feels like it’s happening in Zack Snyder slow-mo and you feel like going off on a Jim Carrey ‘Liar Liar’ rant every time someone does something in more time than you feel it requires.

4. The thought of turning thirty makes you have panic attacks. No matter how many years you have between now and then, you’re convinced you will die alone surrounded by cats in your bed and no one will find your body for days and you will have the emptiest funeral ever. No matter what you’ve done, it isn’t enough. You have to accomplish so much more with your life in only a few short years and it feels like you will never get there. Whether it’s having kids, getting promoted, traveling the world, or any of the other thousands of things you want to do before kicking the bucket, you feel that if you don’t get them done, you will have dishonored your entire family. Dishonor on you, dishonor on your cow, the whole nine yards.

5. The harder you try to save money, the faster it evaporates out of your wallet. You have bills. Some bills you have every month and every year, others just congeal out of nowhere and steal precious pennies every single day. Blow a tire? That’s $200 minimum, unless you buy a used replacement. Forget to pay a bill on time? Extra $35 late fee. Renew your website’s hosting? That’s $50. Oil change? Anywhere from $18-30. You’re hemorrhaging money and the harder you try to save by staying indoors and eating leftovers, the faster it seems to leak out.

6. Strangers’ children turn you into a crotchedy 60-year old. Not the cute fat-faced babies in strollers who smile at you or the friendly toddlers that say the darndest things. It’s the bratty ones who wail and scream that they want candy in the supermarket, or kick the back of your seat in a movie theater, or snap at their way-too-docile-and-understanding mothers in a snotty voice. At the mere sight of these cretins, you want to whip off your belt like Grandad from The Boondocks and teach them a lesson they will never forget. You get the urge to put the fear of God in bad children when you were previously more patient or sympathetic to them.

7. The holidays no longer excite you. Granted, you’re happy to see your extended family and stuff pounds of delicious food into your face and exchange goodies, but it’s nowhere near the same as when you were a kid or a teenager. Christmas is nice, but no one gets up at the crack of dawn to race over to a tree. You sort of just slouch out of your rooms, make breakfast, and get there when you get there. This is probably a lot more varied because everyone has their holiday traditions, but since your priorities have changed over the years and you can usually afford to buy yourself whatever you want thanks to your job, there isn’t much reason to wake up super early for opening presents unless you have children of your own or if your household has little ones staying overnight.

8. Dating is a chore. Male or female, tall or short, dating is working your last nerve. On the female side of things, you notice your competition way more in your mid-twenties. You get irritated walking around shopping or running errands when you see someone looking exceptionally hot, regardless of if they’re with their boyfriend or girlfriend because they’re still willing to put in the effort and you look plain by comparison. Makeup, getting your hair and nails done, waxing and shaving, finding the right clothes to wear in case you do get asked out are a monotonous, expensive pain-in-the-ass. Half the time you don’t want to be bothered with a date just because there is so much involved in trying to meet a nice person and hook him/her.

As for the male side of things, it’s hard to meet girls who aren’t already taken or who don’t have flashing signs on their foreheads that say ‘This is so not going to work in the long run.’ Your newfound impatience makes it way harder to sift out the good from the bad, all the while the multiple first date costs can rack up in just weeks.

After all, there’s a reason almost 50% of Americans are single these days.

9. If you didn’t already, you now cuss like a sailor. Regardless of if you grew up with bad language in your household, for some reason, everything that doesn’t involve small children or a professional situation at work requires the F-word. You’re not sure how you got to that point, either, but something about being over 25 means you curse often and with relish to every foul word that exits your lips. Bizarrely, half the time you’re not even angry, you just do it out of pure habit. It’s not a bad thing as long as you’re still an intelligent, decent human being, but it is kind of weird that it seemed to come from out of nowhere.

What do you think, my dear twenty-somethings? Anything on this list ring a bell, or am I way off base?

The Paranormal 13 Box Set

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : October 17, 2014
0

Category: Author Events, Book & Movie Reviews

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Ain’t she a beaut?

So you like The Black Parade. Would you like to read other books in the paranormal genre?

FOR FREE?

Of course you do.

Then boogie on over here and pick up a free copy of The Paranormal 13: tales of werewolves, vampires, ghosts, demons, mermaids, Norse gods, and much more! It’s a collaboration of 13 authors and 14 novels for your reading pleasure. Here are the novel titles and authors:

Darkangel by Christine Pope
Twin Souls by K.A. Poe
The Girl by Lola St Vil
Rest for the Wicked by Cate Dean
Drowning Mermaids by Nadia Scrieva
Wolves by C. Gockel
The Witch Hunter by Nicole R Taylor
Beyond the Fortuneteller’s Tent by Kristy Tate
Nolander by Becca Mills
The Medium by C.J. Archer
Dream Student by J.J. DiBendetto
Deception by Stacy Claflin
The Black Parade by Kyoko M
The Thought Readers by Dima Zales

Just in time for Halloween, too! Don’t forget to also add the box set on Goodreads and give it a review when you’re done with them all.

And while we’re discussing Halloween, check out my review of Guillermo del Toro’s new animated film, The Book of Life. It was fantastic, and what’s more, it’s fantastically diverse. 99% of the cast is people of color. You can’t beat that.

In honor of the macabre holiday, check back here on Monday for the Most Hateable Movie Villains in the last 20 years. It’ll be tons of fun.

Kyo out.

The Holy Dark Excerpt

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : October 13, 2014
6

Category: Author Events, Uncategorized

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The_Holy_Dark_3_final_Front

Are you excited for the final installment to the Black Parade series? You should be! If not, here’s another sneak peek of what’s to come.

Read The Holy Dark Chapter 1.

CHAPTER TWO

JORDAN

Hospitals gave me the creeps. All of them, no exceptions. Part of the reason was an inherent childhood fear thanks to the psychiatric hospital that had abducted my mother when I was five years old. The other part was thanks to two archdemons who kidnapped me and tried to kill me two years ago inside a hospital. Still, I ignored the tiny voice inside me that screamed for me to get the hell out and continued my way through the hallway of the Outpatient medical center. Every time a doctor passed by, I flinched and tried not to look at their bright white lab coats. It was ridiculous. I had killed bloodthirsty monsters from another plane of existence and saved the world twice yet a stupid piece of clothing made me want to run and hide.

I reached the room in less than a minute; mostly because I had been walking so fast to the average person it looked like running. My hand froze on the doorknob. I stood there, breathing heavily, remembering the last thing Lauren said to me a year ago. She’d hung up on me, her voice icy as she told me goodbye. Was she still angry? How badly was she hurt? What could I even do about it? What was I doing here, truly?

I took a deep breath. You’re just checking on her, Amador. Man up and do it.

I opened the door. The room was freezing cold. I had to resist the urge to button up my duster to shut out the chill. There were a couple of other patients dozing in their beds. I walked past them, searching for her. She was in the last bed to my right.  My chest constricted as I saw her for the first time in almost a year.

Lauren was a couple inches taller than me with straight black hair that used to make me envious. Mine had to be treated to get that perfect glossy look that fell around the shoulders, but hers was natural. She was Korean, buxom, obnoxious, and hilarious. Her nails were painted blue this time instead of pink or purple. She’d been in the hospital for several hours so they’d cleaned her up a bit, meaning she had no makeup on. She looked years younger than her age of twenty-seven.

Her right arm was in a cast and a sling, resting against her stomach. There was a bruise on her cheek as well. They said she got mugged. I hoped they caught the bastard. Hell, I hoped I caught the bastard so I could teach him some manners.

Lauren opened her eyes, sending a sharp jolt of fear and surprise through my gut. I’d hoped she wouldn’t wake up just yet. Her gaze wandered around for a few seconds, probably a result of the painkillers, before settling on me.

I offered her a weak smile. “Hey, Lauren.”

Her voice came out hoarse. “Jordan?”

“Yeah. I, uh, hopped on the first thing smoking to get here. It was shitty, by the way. The carry on alone put me back eighty bucks. Don’t ever fly with—”

“Get out.”

I managed to cap my nervous verbal diarrhea, staring at her. “What did you say?”

She raised her voice, glaring a hole through my head. “Get. Out.”

I stepped forward, imploring her. “Lauren, I know you’re mad, but please, just let me explain—”

“I’m not going to tell you again. Get out!” she shouted, scaring the guy in the bed across from us awake. I had never heard her sound like that, not to me, only to her scumbag ex-husband. Guilt gnawed through my insides. I had been right. She was still angry, and understandably so.

“Okay. I’ll go. I just…wanted to check on you,” I mumbled, turning away from the fury in those brown eyes. I shuffled out of the room and collapsed in a chair in the hallway. I squeezed my eyes shut and buried the pain inside me as deep as I could. I felt ashamed of myself. I wanted to go back home and crawl under the covers and hide. But that wasn’t going to happen. It didn’t matter if she had disowned me. I still had to make it up to her, somehow. Too bad if it ripped a new scar in my hide. I had plenty as it was.

Time dripped off the clock. I stayed where I was, mentally constructing a speech that would hopefully get me back into her good graces. Sometime during this process, a nurse tapped me on the shoulder.

I glanced up to see a pretty black woman, mid-thirties. “She’s asking for you.”

“Huh?”

“Ms. Yi. She wants to see you.”

I checked my watch. Holy hell. I’d been here four hours and didn’t realize it. I nodded too many times and stood up, wobbling on account of my legs falling asleep. I opened the door and made my way back to her bed, expecting the worst.

“Um, you called for me?”

Lauren stared me down for at least a minute. I tried my hardest not to fidget. At last, she spoke and her tone was still disapproving.

“Why are you here?”

“I had to make sure you were alright.”

“Oh, so now you care?”

I shut my eyes for a second. “Yes. I do.”

“What do you want me to say? Are you expecting me to forgive you?”

“No, not really. You’re pretty stubborn. Besides, if I were in your ridiculously high Prada heels, I’d be mad too.”

The ghost of a smirk touched her lips. I almost felt better. I wasn’t much of a friend, but I could make jokes until the end of the world. Which, come to think of it, might one day be my fault.

“Well, I didn’t call you in here to forgive you,” she said, sitting up a bit against her pillows. “I called you in here to ask you a question.”

“What?”

“Why did a man claiming to be a demon follow me home and break my arm?”

TO BE CONTINUED…

Want to be the first to see the rest of Chapter 2? Sign up for the mailing list and get the next chapter right in your Inbox. You can also add it to your Goodreads To Be Read shelf.

Stay tuned for more announcements coming soon! In case you missed it, the official plot reveal is here.

 

Why Bother? The Two Deadliest Words to a Self-Published Author

Posted by :letitia.carelock@gmail.com On : October 9, 2014
1

Category: Inspiration

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You said it, Daria.

You said it, Daria.

Y’know what sucks? Being unemployed and your books not selling at the same time.

It’s not just the lack of money, either. I’ve been unemployed before back when my second retail job went under thanks to rent issues in 2012. The funny thing is, the first month is kind of a like a honeymoon period. You wake up when you want to, do what you want to, don’t do what you don’t want to, and feel this general sense of relaxation since you don’t have a set schedule as you don’t have to go to work anymore. You sleep pretty well and you have the free time to do practically anything.

Then it wears off.

Then the stress starts.

Okay, so it’s not like you thought getting hired for your dream job was going to be easy. It’s going to take time. You throw yourself into your writing while you’re praying to God (and sacrificing a goat just in case Satan’s listening) someone hires you. After all, your sales have been pretty consistent for the past few months and you’re slowly building readers, right?

Kevin Spacey WRONG

Out of the blue, September hits you with the biggest sales flat-line since you started self-publishing. I’m talking you don’t even make it into double digit sales per week. You close out your September sales with less money than you made in literally four hours at your previous day job. And October is looking to be the exact same way.

No big deal. Deep breath. You can totally handle it. It’s not like you became an author to get rich. It’s probably easier and more lucrative to sell crack than be a self-published author, after all. You’re in this because you love writing and you love stories and you want to share the reading/writing experience with your fellow man. That’s easy enough. It’s what the Internet is for—connecting people together across vast distances.

Except you kind of suck at it.

Twitter? Not that many followers. You get maybe a handful of replies per week. Maybe you should redirect your energy.

Tumblr? Oh, don’t talk about your book. No one cares unless it’s a natural recommendation from a book nerd. Just write occasional fanfics and reblog handsome celebrities and social justice speeches. Anything else and you get unfollowed en masse.

Facebook? Only a tenth of the people who liked your page see your posts, and even less than that like your posts? Right. Uh, keep trying. Maybe it’ll get better.

Then you’re lying in bed for a while, watching television because it’s a fantastic distraction from the horrible current state of your life, your manuscript untouched for days, and then a quiet little voice whispers in your ear the scariest words to any self-published author:

“Why bother?”

“What?” you sputter back indignantly.

“Why bother?” the voice continues. “What’s the point of putting yourself through this misery? You’ve been writing your whole life with nothing to show for it but a couple fans and a pocketful of change. You can’t make friends. You can’t get through to readers. You can’t even make enough money to get your own place by yourself. Just give up. You gave it your best shot. You’d make twice the money if you just settled for a job like your old day job. You’re never going to be the female Richard Castle. You’re never going to be a bestselling author of any sort. Better to figure that out now than before you use up all your savings and die in a gutter somewhere.”

“That’s pretty melodramatic,” you scoff.

“But it’s not far from the truth. Aren’t you tired of this? Aren’t you tired of being a nobody? Of putting yourself out there and almost never getting anything out of it?”

“I have gotten stuff out of it!” you argue. “I’ve met people! Not a lot of them, but enough. And I’ve met some really cool people who think my work is great.”

“Yes, and I’m sure you can pay your student loan bills with reviews,” the voice muses.

You hesitate. This a-hole has a point. Maybe you’re just being stubborn, chasing this dream of yours. Maybe it’s time you grew up and did what thousands of people do every day—shelve the dream in order to make a living. After all, you can’t get what you want. Who reads your work is beyond your control. You can’t hold a gun to your readers’ heads and order them to buy your books. You can’t threaten Bookbub into accepting your book. You can’t convince bloggers to review and spread word of your book on your own. Maybe it is time to throw in the towel. Maybe you were wrong. Maybe your work isn’t that good. Maybe it never will be. You have too many bills to pay. Time to get real.

But then you think about Stephen King’s On Writing. You think about how that man spent the better part of thirty years trying to get his feet beneath him, facing hundreds of rejections day in and day out. Sure, you’re nowhere near as good, but he’s fantastic and even he had to wade through the long stretch of no one knowing who he was or caring about the work he poured his sweat, blood, and liquor into.

“No one cared who I was until I put on the mask,” Bane said in The Dark Knight Rises. The fictional villain had a point. Nobody cares who you are. They won’t care until you’ve made it to the Big Time. Right now, it feels like you’ll never make it, but you’ll definitely never make if you give up. Maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll never be anything more than an underground author with a tiny fanbase of less than 100 people.

But guess what?

There is one goal you’re still meeting. You’re sharing your story with others, even if it’s not as many of them as you’d like. People are reading your work. People have made the choice to sit down one afternoon with your characters when they could be reading Stephen King or James Patterson or Suzanne Collins or J.K. Rowling. They said yes to you when they said no to so many others. For better or worse, they stuck with you, even if they end up disliking the book, even if they don’t want to move on through your series.

And that is why you still bother.

“Screw you!” you say cheerfully to the voice. “Maybe I’ll always struggle and not be where I want to be, but at least I met my original goal and not even you can take that away from me.”

The voice grumbles and shuffles off to that dark place in the back of your head, kicking over trash cans along the way. You turn off the television—well, after that Castle marathon on TNT ends—and crack your knuckles and open your Word document and get back to work.

You are a poor self-published vagrant and you’ve got work to do.

So keep doing it, against all odds, even those your own doubts and fears present.