Illustration Friday: Wise

This is the first time I've participated in Illustration Friday in AGES. This week's topic is Wise.
When I saw the topic I immediately thought of the faeries from my novel. This is a sketch of a character called "the Master," who resembles the devil, which is not an accident. Really though, the character is more bitter and desperate than truly evil. In spite of everything, I've gotten to quite like him as I've written the novel, or at least feel sorry for him.

200!

I just reached page 200 in my novel! I think I'm finally getting close to being finished. Right now I'm working on the climactic scene, which is more because I'm skipping around than because I'm actually that near the end. I expect the finished book will be about 250, maybe a little longer. There are a few scenes I'm putting off writing, either because they're difficult for me (the beginning is giving me fits) or because they're such a big deal I'm still intimidated by them. As I close in on them it will get easier, at least that's how it's been working so far.

Writing a novel is a new experience. I chose to do a novel for my MFA thesis because I was afraid that if I didn't write one now I'd never write one. This particular story has been forming in my head for about seven years. I was feeling depressed, chatting with my friend Adam and trying to explain the kind of isolation I was experiencing. Finally I told him, "it's like being a changeling," and from there the story exploded.

It's pretty much unrecognizable now from the comic book concept I came up with as an undergrad. Gale is the main character of this book, part 1 of 4, and she didn't even exist in the initial conception. When I did invent her, I intended her to be a "bad guy" a nemesis for my main character, but instead she's turned into a full and tragic character, in some ways even more engaging than my initial protagonist, Breeze. Breeze will take over in book two.

One of the most alarming things about novel writing is how unpredictable it is. I'm used to short stories, 14-17 pages long, where I usually know everything that happens before I write it. With this novel, Lost Child of Summer, I had a vague outline in my head, but while the start and finished stayed at roughly the same spot, the middle wiggled around like the body of a snake. I know it sounds cliche, but it's almost magic to see how the characters take on a life of their own and the story twists in unexpected ways. It makes me feel a little powerless to realize that I'm not actually in control of my own story. With about a fifth of the book to go, I'm still not entirely certain about what's going to happen in certain parts. How weird.

Anyway, getting closer. Wish me luck. Here are some sketches I did way back when I first came up with the story. They don't really fit any more. Click on the images for a large version.

Page 1: "In more superstitious times it was believed that a spirit might come and steal an unguarded child." "The child would be replaced with the spirit's own unnatural babe. Candels, bells and other charms were often used to protect against this." "But sometimes the charms failed..." "And a human baby was lost." "And sometimes..." "No one noticed."Page 2: "Naptime age 1 1/2" "2nd birthday party" "Zoo visit age 3 1/2" "Family Camping Trip, age 5" "Basketball game 1st grade"Page 3: "Sheesh Mom, don't you have any normal pictures of me when I was little?" "Well... those are normal. For you." "Right."

Muggle Musings (kinda sad, I know)

I was re-reading the Harry Potter series the other day, I think thats third time or so I've read the final book (I've read the others more obviously). Whenever you reread something you tend to notice things that you missed the first (and second) time around, and I'm certainly picking up on mistakes that I managed to miss in the first place.

That's not to say I didn't find lapses in logic in my first reading, but most of the big ones, the obvious ones, were explained away. Snape's character for example always seemed a bit flat to me; in spite of the fact that I never believed he was a "bad guy" he was a little too conveniently and consistently nasty. The more times I read it though, particularly the final book, the more whole a character he seems.

He's not perfect mind you, there are still huge gaps, and I still feel like there was some scrabbling going on in the final book to explain how he could possibly be a good guy. I can accept that he hates Harry on site, the fact that he looks so much like his father is explanation enough for that, but why is he such a jerk towards everyone else? Aside from rivalries, he actually seems to get along well with Minerva McGonagall and the other professors, which would seem unlikely if he were so obviously wretched to everyone not in his own house. I think he starts to redeem himself in book five, when he seems to be more pretending to be cruel, but there's a big gap between "I see no difference" comment when Hermione's teeth grew all over the place and his suggestion that Crabb (or was it Goyle?) not choke Neville to death in order to avoid tedious paperwork. I've gotta wonder if in book four Rowling was really sure what she was going to do with Snape, because it seems like he could have been just as mean in less obvious ways, without giving away his uncertain status in Harry's eyes.

Fantasy and Spreadsheets

Yeah, who knew I could put those things together in a title? So I've spent the last two hours plugging ages of faeries for my novel into a spreadsheet to see how things break down. It's been shockingly helpful.

There are a couple of tricks with my faeries that make figuring out character age difficult. The first trick is that the faeries age at about human speed during childhood, then at around age 11 when they begin puberty their aging slows dramatically. At around age 13 they "change" getting their wings, horns, lengthened fangs and become sexually mature (sort of... about as sexually mature as you would expect a girl who just got her period to be: aka able to reproduce but not necessarily recommended).

The other trick is that this group of faeries lost a war about 18 years back. When they lost, the victorious faeries slaughtered all the elders (faeries over age 70) and all the faeries of reproductive age (13-63). When the leader of the tribe begged, they left some children alive, but killed all the children that were descendants of the remaining faeries (there's a practical social reason for this which I may explain later). So what had previously been a healthy population of faeries (ok I know that sounds ridiculous, but bear with me) was left at 25-30 older faeries and five children aged from under a year to eleven years. It took five years before the oldest of these (a female) was able to reproduce. The next oldest female (in terms of reproduction the adult males are still viable, so male children are irrelevant) was only five years old at the time of the war, which means she would not be able to reproduce for approximately eight years.

This all sounds a bit cold, and it is, but by playing with these numbers I've discovered some interesting things about the society I'm creating. For one thing, I've got all sorts of extra reasons for the frustration and bitterness I've already put in there. That's nice to know. The main thing I've realized though is that for the female children left after the war, life would have been hell once they reached reproductive age. The oldest child for example, had five children in the course of thirteen years, all by very old men (faeries). The oldest of these children was taken from her, the next oldest lived, the next was mutilated, the next was stillborn and the last lived. At the time the book takes place, she's pregnant again. Possibly even more devastating than her status as a broodmare is the fact that she would have been forced into sex pretty continually as soon as she matured until it was evident that she was pregnant and then again once the babies were born. This is not only because of the brutal nature of the characters in question but the practical concerns of rebuilding a population that was growing from 300 or so pre-war, and shrunk to 25 immediately after.

She's not a particularly important character but knowing this makes her more important to me. It gives me a better understanding of my creatures and my story. I also now realize that whatever desperate measures this group of faeries take, they are probably doomed in the long run since they have only three blood lines to start from. Suddenly, just by putting something as simple as ages into a spreadsheet, I know all sorts of things about the society I created that I never would have imagined on my own. Now that's weird science.

*Pregnant image is an altered image from a photo I found on flickr. Linked.