Apr 26 2009
Plot elements that cannot be added lightly
Here are several plot elements that will really affect the target audience and/or mood of your story. Please do not include these elements unless they are so important to the work that you’d feel comfortable mentioning them on the back-cover.
1. Please do not include rape or drug use unless you want to sell the work as very dark, gritty and/or dystopian. These elements are extremely mature and will have an enormous effect on the mood of the work as a whole.
2. Real-world religious elements, particularly sermonizing, tend to have a major impact on the target audience. Most readers are not interested in overtly religious stories and publishers want to make sure that the story is aimed at the right audience. So please be careful: if your story has real-world religious elements, it may be marketed and sold alongside religious fiction like the Left Behind series.
3. Stories with gay characters tend to feel like gay fiction. Please do not go down this road unless you’d like to sell your book as gay fiction. That will majorly affect who sees the book and immediately passes on it. For example, US bookstores will probably carry your title in the gay/lesbian shelf.
4. If you want to go on philosophical or political tangents, advertise that upfront. There are publishers and readers that will read either, but you need to target them carefully.
5. Readers tend to typecast superhero novels* as action stories for kids. If your superhero novel isn’t 100% action (like a romance, an action-comedy, a psychological thriller, etc), make that clear. Also, please try to be especially careful with age cues. If your story is aimed at readers 18-30, make sure that your backcover blurb is clearly aimed at older readers.
*This is generally less of a problem for superhero comic books. Anyone that has been in a comic book store knows that most comic books aren’t written for kids. However, if you’re writing a superhero comic book, it’s still very important to showcase your genre(s) as much as possible. The default genre for a comic book is action, so that’s what readers will assume unless you tell them otherwise.
6. Talking animals generally have little appeal to readers that are older than the Bugs Bunny crowd. There are exceptions, like Calvin and Hobbes and the Narnia books, but they are exceedingly rare. I would recommend being very careful if you are interested in writing a book about talking animals for older readers. Publishers and older readers are likely to get creepy vibes from such a book. (“Wait, is this one of those books?”) If you are even considering this, I would recommend coming up with some really good reasons why your story needs talking animals rather than humans. If you do not provide such a reason, the editor will fill in the blanks on his own. “He wants to use talking animals because he has psychological problems.” Needless to say, a rejection letter is rarely far behind.
What do you think? Would you like to suggest any others?
Interesting, number 6 to me is written in stone…I can’t stand talking animals. Most of the other points are controversial subjects that I have no problems with — as long as they are well-executed and relevant.
Drugs are one of those things that most people don’t have a grasp of. Sounds crazy that it’s common for some kids get high on a regular basis. That’s fact, not fiction.
Overall, if you are confident that you can pull of a controversial/taboo subject, go for it. Just make sure you have the balls to back yourself up if you don’t pull it off.
After all, a controversial subject = extra/free publicity.
I agree with your assessment. I think it’s fairly easy to find publishers that will work with extremely mature elements (rape and drug addiction), religious sermonizing, homosexuality, philosophical or political pieces, or superhero novels for adults. In fact, at least two of them (religious fiction and gay fiction) have established their own niche with a preset audience, specialized publishers, etc.
As for talking animals… unless you’re writing for kids, it’s probably not gonna happen. Publishers won’t take it, bookstores won’t carry it, and readers won’t buy it. It’s a trifecta of unreadability. Unless you have a really good reason, the project will probably seem rather creepy.
“Most of the other points are controversial subjects that I have no problems with — as long as they are well-executed and relevant… also, a controversial subject = extra/free publicity.” Hmm. I agree that relevance is critical. For example, political views would probably fit into a political thriller pretty smoothly but would have seemed grossly out of place in a book like Harry Potter. I wouldn’t recommend thinking of this in terms of publicity, though. That might lead you to try putting a controversial element somewhere it doesn’t belong.
This might just be a cultural difference, but I wouldn’t consider homosexuality a mature subject. I agree, it would be a lot harder to sell for young children but I have seen successful books aimed at readers as young as twelve dealing with homosexuality. One example would be the CHERUB books which has an important side character, Kyle, come out in the second book. This forms a side plot that spans about four books as James tries to deal with his homophobia and friendship with Kyle. An example in comics would be the Young Avengers, who have Wiccan and Hulkling as a homosexual couple from the start.
Basically, I wouldn’t rule out homosexuality as a theme for a novel or comic that was aimed at anyone over eleven or so, but definitely don’t include it for the sake of it. At least in the UK, I don’t believe it would be a deal breaker for many publishers as long as it was tasteful and not a derogatory line up of stereotypes, but I imagine there might be a bit more resistance in the USA. I don’t mean to offend anyone.
Hmm.
The only one I have a doubt about is the drug use. I see how normal drug use is mature and whatnot, but… I have a sideplot in one of my books that involves a sort of drug.
Basically, my telepathic/precognitive character is on her own for a while, and in order to pull her own weight and be able to do her job without a chance of screwing up or being too weak (she’s pretty strong, but she’s used to being on a team, and she’s a perfectionist), she gets ahold of a steroid-like drug. It makes her stronger, faster, but starts to give her precog visions that don’t end up happening. (So they amount to more like hallucinations that she thinks are going to happen.)
It’s not going to be a real drug, and it’s not going to be the whole shooting-up-in-an-alley scene, so will I be able to use it without it taking things to a mature level?
I think it all comes down to context and how you present it. There will always be those that love and those that hate.
Here’s a random example; I find Twilight more offensive than American Psycho. Heck, more offensive than anything by Chuck Palahniuk or Brett Easton Ellis. Those guys are known for their offensive, controversial and vulgar subjects and themes….and people love it. (I know I do)
A pet peeve of mine is when a novel/comic is adapted into a movie and they water it down so much it becomes ridiculous. Obviously a lot comes down to money and a widespread target audience, but hopefully one day they’ll learn to rely more on story instead of reputation. Comic book adaptions are notorious for this.
At one point, a Preacher TV show was planned. That would have been horribley watered down in order to get anywhere near a TV station. Thank god it fell through.
Yea very true Mr. Brit, hopefully John August can work some magic with the script. It’s a good time to do so, so I have high hopes that Preacher will be somewhat faithful to the comic…otherwise it will be an epic fail.
Thank god I’ve heard Kick-Ass is keeping its adult theme.
On a barely related note, imagine if they made a film of ‘The Boys’ with Simon Pegg as Wee Hughie. That would let me die happy
Mr. Brit I don’t know about the UK but in the USA most 12-17 year olds treat gayness as ‘funny’ and/or ’something to be avoided’, and I don’t think they would take gay fiction very seriously.
What I find funny about 12 – 17 year old dudes is the fact that a lot of them act gayer than actual gay guys. You see it all the time, a hug here, a turkey slap there, a slap on the ass from time to time and oh, who could forget the wrestling, wedgies and pulling down someones pants. All this when they’re not even drunk… but the rules remain the same, as long as both the guys are straight it’s considered funny and not gay at all. Then things get extremely weird and awkward when you find out that someone is actually gay. I’ve had 3 friends who “came out” in my last year of high school.
What people need to learn is gayness isn’t that big of a deal. If you tell a guy that 2 chicks are making out you’ll get cheers, but if you say that 2 dudes are making out all you’ll get is ewwwwww.
I’m so over racism, discrimination, religion, etc in the real world.
My worst reading experience ever was in a writing class where every student had to write 3 stories of 25-50 pages. For his first story, one author did 40 pages about a Gary Stu whose only two life experiences were 1) being gay and 2) being persecuted for being gay. The second story was even worse. It was another 40 pages of that, but with a female protagonist.
When our workshop discussed those pieces, our comments were fairly humorous.
REVIEWER 1: I feel like this was really similar to your last story. In particular, I noticed that the climax of both stories was trying to take a gay boyfriend or girlfriend to prom.
REVIEWER 2: Maybe you should try mixing things up a bit more.
AUTHOR: Nah, this is totally different. It’s a lesbian prom story.
B. MAC: I swear on my life, if you try another 40 pages of this, my final story will be 50 pages about C. Mack, a political scientist that gets the girls and saves the world by pondering about postmodern Hobbesian counterinflationary policy.
(“Oh, C. Mack! Your data models are positively orgasmic!” “Yeah, babe. My hotness is statistically significant.”)
I agree soundly with 2. Hearing a character spout verses every other balloon or sentence is irritating. Noone should expect YA readers to pick up a book/comic-book like that. That’s one thing I’m working to avoid in my stories.
Hmmm…Does an animal shapeshifter count as a talking animal (since Jazz can still be understood by humans in her animal form).
- Wings
I think you’re completely fine on the creepiness level, Wings. It might seem a bit cheesy, though– for example, Sky High had a funny joke about how hard it is to have a dignified conversation with a guinea pig. But it’s worked before… Sabrina the Teenage Witch had a hilarious talking cat, for example.
Then I will do it. It’s kind of important for Jazz’s animal form to talk simply because it keeps Ian from finding out who she is. Therefore, he hasn’t got a clue who the talking boa constrictor/black fox/hawk is (which helps him learn not to judge people based on appearance. Look how Heather turned out).
- Wings
About number three… Hero, a novel by Perry Moore, is sold right beside Twilight at every bookstore I go to. Yes, they’re both teen series but they’re completely different. We all know Twilight is an overly cliched series that has grasped boyless girls who have to now find their Edward. Hero is about a boy with superpowers. He can heal people. He’s also gay and living in a homophobic town. Yes, it’s a highly cliched novel but my point is, not all gay fiction is sold by gay (homosexual, not “uncool” or-in this case- overly cliched) fiction.
Hero– and probably The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay– are probably treated differently than most books about gay characters because they are bestsellers. However, the overwhelming majority of books about gay protagonists get relegated to a part of the store that doesn’t see very much traffic.
I think it’s really too bad that (almost) all stories that have gay characters seem to be clichéd coming out stories. I hadn’t thought about the marketability of stories with gay characters being a factor in that before. It’s interesting. Do you think that it’s because stories with gay characters all tend to get shoved into the gay fiction section that there are hardly any stories with gay characters that are about other things that being gay?
The experience in your class sounds awful! Yet hilarious. I hate prom persecution stories.
“Do you think that it’s because stories with gay characters all tend to get shoved into the gay fiction section that there are hardly any stories with gay characters that are about other things than being gay?”
I think the single most important reason is that the typical American reader tends to equate gay characters with “gay story” with “I don’t want to read this*.” Let’s say you were interested in doing a detective story about a detective that happened to be gay. I think it’d be a hard sell because the gayness would scare away a lot more detective readers than it would attract.
In general, I think it would be very difficult to write a story about gay characters that isn’t about their gayness; if the story weren’t about gayness, then the publisher would push you to axe the gay characters. “Let’s not broach a hard-to-market topic unless we have to, okay?”
*To some extent, I suspect that many secular readers have a similar reaction to religious fiction like the Left Behind series.
Tricia in my story binges, and a subplot is that Hardy’s trying to get her stop, but later on in the series, she suffers a heavy blow, and temporarily leaves them for a while, and when they find her, they find out that she has become bulimic. Do you think that’s okay, or should I axe it? I really like the idea, but is it too controversial?
Hmm. What’s the connection between Tricia’s bulimia and the rest of the plot?
Something big happens in book 5, and she leaves Hardy and Riley for a while, and in book 6, when Belinda’s deliberating her morality, she comes across a passed out Tricia, and she helps her, and informs Riley and Hardy, who grudgingly accept she isn’t all bad, and she decides on her morality as well.
Or should I axe it?
“I think it would be very difficult to write a story about gay characters that isn’t about their gayness”.
Unless of course, you pull a JK Rowling and only mention outside of the books that the character is gay, or make them ambiguously gay, or a combination.
Character 1: “So, how are things with Adrian?”
Character 2: “We’re moving in together. My parents don’t completely approve, but they’re supportive.”
Character 1: “That’s good. Just to think, you hated eachother in primary school, and now you’re a couple.”
Character 2: “Yeah, Adrian used to love getting me into trouble.”
Then, on the website, post:
“By the way, Adrian is a guy.”
Oops, I forgot to add that Character 2 is also a guy. But you get my meaning.
Yogi, I recommend focusing on the things that are most relevant to book 1 first. Book five is probably at least a decade away. The good news is that, after you’ve gotten published, you can ask your editor what he thinks.
“Book five is probably at least a decade away”.
I think it would be nice to publish a book every year or so, whether as part of a series or seperate work. I have over twenty five ideas now, and only a couple are series-worthy. If I were to publish one a year from now, I’d be set for ideas until I’m in my forties. Unfortunately not all my ideas will likely make the cut, and there’s no way I’d be able to work that fast. Plus they’re plotted for different mediums, like books or manga, so that would affect releases.
I don’t know, RW. In your case, I would have assumed that Adrian is a gay male because Adrian isn’t really much of a girl’s name, is it? For example, Think Baby Names lists it as just a guy’s name.
However, let’s say for the sake of argument that you renamed Adrian as something that didn’t even lean towards one gender, like Avery or Jessie. I think that would still be problematic because it might feel like the book treats gay men as interchangeable with straight women. My best guess is that most gays would object to that. If, as I suspect, gays and bisexuals make up most of the audience for gay fiction, then irking them with a gay character would probably be unwise.
Also, the people that want gay fiction would probably expect that the author have the courage of his convictions to actually specify that the character in question is a gay male rather than leave it ambiguous. Also, if the relationship in question matters at all the to the story, I don’t think you could keep it ambiguous for long. If it doesn’t matter at all to the story, I don’t think that it would interest gay fiction readers very much. They can read gay fiction that is definitely about gay characters. Likewise, straight readers can read fiction that is definitely about straight characters. I think that an in-the-middle approach leaves you with a half-hearted appeal to both straight and gay readers.
I used to know three girls called Adrian. Haha, they all had different nicknames. Likewise, I know/knew three Camerons, two Jordans, five Michaels, four Daniels, and three Lukes. Hence Lucky, Dan, Mickey, Cam, Ronnie etc
But what about the beginning? :S
I’ve been working on my novel about wolves for quite a while, and I really hope to get it published. I guess the only reason it’s about talking wolves is because I’m fascinated by them. . . Should I just ditch the idea and try something else, or are there any ways of making the idea of talking animals less creepy and more likely to sell?
Personally, I think that going with something else will probably be easier to publish and sell. (For example, you could replace a pack of wolves with a human tribe). However, if you’re really committed to the wolf concept…
You can avoid most of the potential creepiness by eliminating any hint of romance. (Talking animals in romantic situations will probably make an editor think it’s about furries).
I would recommend coming up with a more compelling reason that this book needs talking wolves than authorial fascination. I think that the costs will be high, so your explanation should make it clear that the benefits are high.
Here are some of the costs that a publisher will probably consider:
–Historically, teens have not been very receptive to these sorts of stories. Series like Redwall, Poppy, Swordbird, etc. have not performed notably well among teenagers. Series with talking animals that have performed well among teenagers– like Calvin & Hobbes and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles– tend to be comical and/or off-the-wall.
–The characters will probably be less relatable. It’s very rare for books to use nonhumans as main characters (let alone all the main characters).
–Using wolves rather than humans would make it much harder to use some plot angles. For example, romance. Anything remotely sexual. Varied combat. Etc.
Hmm. . . I think I might as well not have it published, then. I’m already committed to finishing it, because my friends have read some of what I’ve written so far and will be disappointed if I don’t. There is another story I’ve been working on in case this didn’t work out, so I think I’ll just work on that for now. Thanks for the advice.
Awww … I loved Redwall. So cute! And the TV series or whatever drew the mice and all the other animals just as I’d pictured them and true to the style as they were portrayed on some of the covers.
Does it need to be in the future? Do they need to talk? You could tell the story, by all accounts within the real world as it stood just a few decades ago without many alterations.
You wouldn’t be able to have dialogue as such, but wolves and many canids are capable of extensive non-language based communication. You could carry the core names and titles for the organizations, but simply use the real world to tell it. It’s been a while since I studied wolf habits extensively, but I recall a history of Gray Wolf packs adopting unrelated and formally unknown members as pack members without much issue.
Don’t tell a story about furry four legged people, tell a story about wolves being wolves in the real world, but with a fictional twist to keep it engaging, entertaining and captivating.
The alpha wolf and the beta wolf at the head of the pack, the demonic ones as you called them, could be affected by a non-contagious disease, perhaps a fictitious one, or a prion-borne genetic ailment caused by in-breeding. You’d have to research it very thoroughly but you’d need to do that as it is planned now.
A great example of what I’m talking about would be Raptor Red by a brilliant paleontologist named Robert Bakker, and it’s really a fantastic book.
Of course, this is just a suggestion.
That’s a really interesting idea, LM, but maybe a story where the main characters can’t talk is a bit too experimental for a first-time author. (Fortunately, it’s probably not as hard as writing a book about how to get published as a first-time author).
That is an interesting idea, but as I’m not very experienced, it would be a bit too experimental, as B.Mac said. I’ll definitely keep it in mind, though. Thank you.