Masquerades

No, not those mysterious balls that you wear a mask to, that'd be too easy to pick at, I'm talking about the masquerade life. That life where dwarves, vampire, and faires can pretend to be humans or humans just don't know they exist. With urban fantasy being super popular, this trope has simply become so obnoxious and in your face it's ridiculous. Every time you read an urban fantasy, it's likely that no one knows that the fae exist. Those that do know are insane or are forced to keep it a secret for...reasons.

So that's what today's article is gonna be about. Writing masquerades and having them make sense, not an excuse for your character to be all special and whatever.

1. Decide who can know about the masquerade.

Too many times I've read an urban fantasy, and some random teen finds out that fae exist. Then there's that old wrinkly guy down the street, that new ager who runs the yoga place, and maybe your nutty Grammy. Now there's no issue with more than one person knowing about the masquerade, but at least make that whole thing interesting! Don't have the people who know about the masquerade be the most obvious people alive. If they're always smoking a joint and saying that we have to be 'one with the earth' I'm always certain that guy knows that fae exist, and that joint is just some fairy herbs that stop his cancer. Have people you'd never expect to know about the fantasy world, maybe the president of a band fan-club, that guy who owns the insecticide company, or even the ice cream man. Having teachers, old folks, and family knowing about the masquerade is just boring and stereotypical. Stop it!

2. Have a good reason for the masquerade.

I roll my eyes when I see the reason for the masquerade is that humans wouldn't understand. Seriously? Humans take better care of their pets than their children, I think that we've come to an age where we'd understand and accept quite a bit. There's always going to be cultural differences, power struggles, and outright hatred between others. So having those reasons as your sole excuse is not only over-used, but so obvious it's stupid. In the RPG game The Changeling: The Lost it's pretty obvious why there's a masquerade. The 'True Fae' are terrible beings that are more than happy to exploit your very soul for their own pleasure. It's for the humans safety that there's a masquerade, not the fantasy creatures.

3. Have the cop not be an idiot.

Every time I read an urban fantasy where the cop is the protagonist, I hold my breath and hope that the cop isn't an idiot. Now when I say idiot I don't mean smart, for some reason they're always witty and sarcastic to a fault, no I mean they deny. They deny the fact that a tiny person stole their wedding ring, that a bird spoke to them, that a dragon ate them then reincarnated them into a plant. A human only has so much disbelief that they can have, there's no way that these cops can just deny everything so obvious. One of my favorite cops in fantasy is Officer Morgan from the urban fantasy book Dolls. He just never denied what happened to him, he accepted it and tried to get deeper to the truth of the matter. Why can't we have more cops like that?

4. When something obvious happens, have people question it.

The whole town is set on fire by a dragon and the dragon slayer kills him in a jet fighter. That's great and all, but if the whole town saw it how are they covering it up? I just facepalm when no one questions the obvious stuff. If they use a glamour spell, fine. But when your character just kicks the werewolf body to the side and walks through the trail of dead bodies, why are the town folk not questioning this? Having there be constant worry about outsiders finding out about the fantasy world, is why the masquerade is so compelling. At every turn your character should question if dead beat Joe , the room mate, knows about his new found fairy wings. Or have the angsty teenage girl worry that her adopted mom knows about her ability to breathe fire. Let people wonder, it's just gonna add plenty of drama and complexity to the plot.

5. If it's a masquerade, don't let everyone know it.

I hate it when that one guy thinks he loves this one girl, but she get's upset that he's always dissaperaing. The reader knows it's his job to hunt vampires, but she doesn't know that. And the poor sap, being who he is, will tell that girl all about vampires and his job. When they break up two days later, for a stupid reason I'm sure, she's gonna tell someone else just to make him sound crazy...Now I know this type of thing doesn't always happen, but in urban fantasy it always feels like everyone in town knows about the masquerade. Maybe because the plot calls for people who know to interact with the character, but make it just one or two people in one city, not half of them.

7. Have a large variety of fantasy creatures.

Vampires, werewolves, Disney faries, and ghosts seem to be the only creatures of the masquerade. What happened to all of the other creatures in fantasy? Dullahans, kitsune, harpies, gorgons? Just because they look strange or are rarely written about doesn't mean they're off limits! The harder it is to hide, the more interesting they are to the story. I also just wanna read a story with a gorgon as the protagonist, that'd be so cool.

And here we are, a huge list on helping you write a masquerade novel. While some of these points may not apply to your novel in particular, I hope it at least helps you identify a good urban fantasy novel from a bad one. Or just entertained you. Whatever.

I'm gonna go read The Finisher now...

Because Not All Royalty are Selfish Pricks

I really love history. It's not only my favorite school subject, but it's also a hobby of mine that I'm more than happy to blather on about for hours.That's why I love looking at history for my writing projects, whether they're historical fantasy or not. History has a wonderful habit of not only teaching us about mistakes idiots in the past have made, but also shocking us about the nice things. And one very nice thing to know about past monarchs is...

Not all of them were selfish pricks.

Oh look, the article title!

In all seriousness, I've read a boat load of books where royalty are either selfish pricks that enslave their people, murder babies, and eat young lambs. Or they so good and loving that they've cured diseases, let the orphans live in the guest bedrooms, and even raise the dead with their tears. Whenever I read these types of monarchs I just roll my eyes and continue onto the next page, hoping that at least the hero is more realistic...Unless the monarch is the hero, to which I can only hope that the plot is half decent.

If you look in history the monarchs of time past have always been interesting. Some really did have good intentions for their people, but were also firm on their rules and did what they wanted to do regardless, just like Queen Elizabeth of England; often called the Virgin Queen.

Then there are rulers who were religious. They were so religious that they would often kill and destroy any who didn't agree with their religion. I could point out at least one monarch from every single country that has ever existed, but let's stick to one that's rather well known. Have you ever heard of  a tiny event called The Spanish Inquisition? Well what if I told you that Queen Isabella of Spain, that lovely queen that said yes to Christopher Columbus, had started it? Bet you didn't expect that.

In another category of rulers are those who want nothing to do with their country. They'll go as far as to leave their country and pillage and conquer. Not because they actually want to pillage and conquer, but more because they just hate their country that much. That reward would go to King Richard the Lion Heart. A guy who was technically French and hated England so much he tried to sell it...And failed.

Next you have rulers who are ridiculous in their debauchery. I'm not saying 'sleep with the chamber maids and get drunk all the time' type of debauchery. No, I mean going out into the streets and raping people in the middle of crowds, sleeping with their mothers, and spending enough money to bankrupt an entire nation.That award would go to Nero.

There you go, a kinda large list of ideas that could help you write a monarch. Now these are just examples and you can add to the list or meld two types together, but hopefully this will give you more variety when tying to create a monarch.

Welp, I'm gonna go make dinner now.

Dark Romance

So last night I was up until two in the morning watching Phantom of the Opera with my mom. And while I could go on and on about how much I loved Gerad Butler, how Joel Schumacher loved Titanic, or how much my mom and I both love the main theme, I'm gonna talk about dark romance in fantasy novels.

Now, for those of you living under a rock or another country, It was a tragic tale of a man that, at the end of the day, was in love with a singer and would try to get her in anyway necessary. He killed, plotted, sabotaged, and even threatened Christine herself if she were to refuse him. Of course everything turned out right in the end, for Christine not the Phantom, and we get our happily ever after.

Now in most books dealing with dark romance, especially YA, the way people go about it is to make the heroine a lamb of light. She's never smoked, never drank, never saw a man without his shirt on, and thought that blood was really strawberry pop/juice. And you know what? I'm not even sure why people even go down this road. Never in my entire life have I met someone so innocent, and if the world you're trying to paint is a dystopian land of violence and cruelty, the chances of your heroine being that way is next to nill. The only way I'd expect her to be that innocent is if she got amnesia....And I'll talk about that on a later date.

Now, if the heroine isn't some squeaky clean angel from squeaky clean angel land, then the heroine probably has a strong sense of justice. She'll help the little old lady cross the road, hate stealing, and hate those who kill...Unless it's killing the bad guys who hurt others, then it's fine.

Or it's our dark, brooding, trigger happy love interest.

For whatever reason, boring and dull love interest has to be ready to kill without a moment's thought. He probably makes sassy remarks, if he isn't the silent brooding type, and smokes and drinks like no ones business. That really doesn't sound like a dark romance, more like a romance with some kind of pirate anti-hero or something.

No, the way to write a dark romance is actually rather simple. The answer will probably shock you, make you stare at the screen with a raised eyebrow, or just click out all together. Are you ready? Well the answer is...

Making the love dangerous.

What? That simple? Something about the love interest has to be dangerous. Sure he can kill all the time, but that really doesn't make him dangerous depending on the world. In Phantom Eric/Phantom was dangerous because he was strangely obsessed with Christine and would do anything to get her. Even when she made the decision to reject him, he decided that she didn't know what was good for herself and held control over her life. The creepy part was that he was able to get from one side of the opera house to the other so quick you'd thought he used magic. All together that makes is dangerous, almost an allure to have someone care so much about you, but at the same time scary enough you stay a good foot away.

At least normal people. Obviously your heroine isn't 'normal' if she get's with the guy at the end.

Now I just want to note that dark romance always has to have boundaries. If the girl truly loves this guy, don't be the moron who allows the guy to constantly smack her around, kick her unborn child, and choke her. That isn't romance, that's abuse. But you all should be smart enough to figure out where the boundaries lay...

I hope.

Alright, I'm gonna go do some Phantom of the Opera karaoke.

An Idiot's Review of Dolls

So after taking exams, crying in a corner, and getting ready to move out of my lovely parents' house, I'm reviewing this short story written by one Simon Ericson. As usual I don't post spoilers about the story, so you shouldn't either in my tiny and very inactive comment section.

So our story starts...Without a prologue. It jumps straight to the point and introduces us to the main character Officer Morgan. Unlike a lot of stories that just up and throws their characters into the occult world, our officer has been there before and he's even made friends within it. He calls these people the 'Craftsmen' and they make different things like eyeballs and strange potion stuff that, from the way it's described, reminds me of a magical lava lamp. These people are the ones who help him learn of our plot word, and coincidentally enough the title,'Dolls'. Dolls were coming. These dolls are apparently coming and with them coming the criminals are leaving, either under their own power or being butchered like pigs.

However not all is lost, but then again isn't criminals leaving a good thing, because Morgan has found his prime suspect. A dashing young man named Arthur who was about as fake as they came and didn't do a good job of concealing the fact that he was suspicious. After a debate that went in circles he finally leaves and our plot launches into action when Morgan get's a strange phone call and remembers what happened only a few minutes before hand.

Now the plot for this book is pretty standard for an urban fantasy cop escapade. The cop is warned/accidentally finds strange happening, they go about trying to stop the strange happenings, the day may or may not be saved. And while this is true for this story, it's interesting in the fact that the whole time Morgan doesn't deny that anything happened. He doesn't deny that little doll girls tried to kill him, that they are commanded by older men, and that they are not the least bit human.

Which reminds me of the magic system. If you've like Rozen Maiden, Chuckie, or something along those lines, then you'll like this book. The dolls aren't human and instead are spirits that are put into dolls made from various ingredients and are constructed by Dollmakers. According to Arthur it's not an exact science and there's much shadow over the entire operation. However what's explained so far, such as the doll's heart having to be something with a constant tempo, is rather interesting and I hope it gets explained further in the next books.

So those are all the good points, so what's the bad? I didn't like the way that some of the actions were explained. 'As surly a tone as he could manage'. The writing should tell us that he is trying to be all sour. Also there's some things that really didn't need much explanation, it was just snippets of life that gives Morgan more character, but what was put there could have been more doll musings or something. Aside from that it was an all round good book with good characters, an interesting magic system, and the beginning of a pretty good series.

So yeah, I'm gonna go play some Spiderman 2 now....

If you wanna get Dolls, for free might I add, just go here.

Teenagers, the Original Idiots

I know it's almost been a month, I know I'm due for a book review, and I know I have a video that needs to be uploaded. But there's this very strange thing....I have a life. A very boring if not monotonous life, but a life none the less.

And in this life I'm a teenager.

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Is that the title I see? Okay, enough with the stupid jokes. This month's...week's....something's post is about teenagers in fantasy. With YA being a big hit and teens being the subject of all kinds of adult coming of age stories, I guess it's about time to address the original idiots of the world. However you'd never know that if you were unlucky enough to read a terrible fantasy story. Most times these teens know EXACTLY what they need to do in life, all the steps it'd take to do it, and all the finesse and skill that would take normal people who has one foot and half their left arm in the grave they're so old. Now some people could chalk this up to protagonist rights or chosen one privileges, but I like to call it for what it really is.

Terrible writing.

I'm a teen and I think I can speak for all of us when I say we don't have it all together. Heck, just two days ago I was freaking out about buying and filling out a money order for the first time. That sounds easy to most people, and it is, but I'd never done it before and people were actually counting on me to get it done. It was a responsibility and something new to learn, two things that never blend well with teens. So why is it that all the teens in fantasy have no REAL issues with saving the world aside from the usual teenage, or what you adults must think is teenage, angst?

So since I can't find whatever the teen protagonists of books are drinking, I'll just help you adult writers remember what it was like to be an original idiot, and help you teen writers get your head's out of your butts.

When writing teen characters don't forget that we're young and haven't actually experienced life to the fullest. Now that doesn't mean characterizing us as terribly naive, there's no such thing as a mentally pure teenager no matter how often you see it in movies or books, or making us angsty childish pricks. Have a balance of someone who knows when to take up responsibility, but doesn't know all the ropes yet. And please for the love of all that's holy don't have us complain all the time!

Believe it or not teens don't complain to every living or non-living thing about their lives. Do we do it when you adults are around?

 Yeah.

Why?

Attention! If we complain enough we hope you'll tell us to stop washing dishes and you'll do it yourself! At least that's why I do it, that may not be why the brat down the road does it. Even for characters that aren't teens,  far too often it get's boring to read about how Esmerelda the Valiant lost her puppy, Gir, to the evil knight of Hamminess. It not only get's old, but you begin to wonder if Esmerelda had no life outside that idiot dog of her's.

For you urban fantasy writers out there let me tell you a secret. Not every single teen alive either wants to be outside of the social conga line, or think they have to follow whatever the conga line is doing. Most of us are a healthy balance of both. I'm not into social media all that much, just Twitter because I want to follow some really awesome authors and anime studios, and I don't enjoy watching reality TV. However I LOVE finger nail polish and will squeal when I see something super cute in the store or even on someone else. So don't think your character is 'good' because they aren't popular, because a lot of the unpopular kids can be just as jerky as the popular school barbie.

So to sum it all up let me put it to you this way. If it will help you relate more think of them like interns at your super important adult jobs. They know when to help out, but they may over or under do it, or they complain and want to take a break to get a coffee. Sometimes they say the wrong thing, sometimes they have the wrong impressions on things, and sometimes they're just real idiots.

Now I'm gonna go take a nap....

An Idiot's Thoughts on Necromancy

So yesterday I got my issue of GameInformer. For those of you who either live in another country or under a rock, GameInformer is a gaming magazine. It gives updates on the latest video games coming out, some awesome posters, and interviews with developers. Well this month they had a pretty cool spread on a Dungeons and Dragons RPG game. I guess with all the hype with high fantasy games they were bound to make one eventually. However I was kinda shocked, pleasantly so, when I read that the token necromancer would be a good guy with good intentions...

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Yeah, either I don't read as much fantasy as I'd like to think I have, or they are doing something pretty unique. Nearly every fantasy book that's existed whether it's high fantasy, grim dark, or even urban, it's been written that necromancers are pure evil. Heck, even in my own book the necromancer is pretty corrupt. It's just strange to think that someone who does such dark and unholy magic, bringing up dead corpses is pretty dark no matter how you spin it, has good intentions. Unless of course he starts out with good intentions and it just slides down from there.

Anyway, this whole ordeal has had me thinking about necromancy and how its users are portrayed in fantasy. All of them have been evil, some more than others, and those who use it are normally outcasts of society. But does it really have to be that way? In plenty of Victorian era stories there's that one con-artist that claims to use necromancy to bring up the souls of the deceased so their loved ones can speak to them. Of course this guy is always evil and wants the money, but what if this was used by actual necromancers? Their sole purpose in  life is to give people closure if they weren't able to before or when that person died?

Also why does necromancy always revolve around corpses? Why can't it be broken down to different tiers of magic? You're able to summon souls, skeletons, or just point blank zombies? I think the default of having necromancers as just these evil people who summon zombies has been around so long that people have just accepted it as a rule, however with grim-dark fantasy being so popular I think it's about time to exploit it on a different level. If we can have a bunch of raping mercenaries as heroes, albeit they're mostly anti-heroes, why not a necromancer with kinda good intentions?

Anyway, I'm gonna go look over my necromancer now....

An Idiot's review of The Immortals Part 1: Shadows and Starstone

Hey guys! I know I've been off the grid lately, but that's because I was reading a high fantasy called The Immortals: Shadows and Starstone. This was written and published by Cheryl Mackey, and is a quick little novella that is pretty fast paced and set in the magical land of Ein-Aral. As usual with my reviews don't expect spoilers, and please don't leave them in the comment section.

Our story starts with those prologues I hate so much. It's short, thank goodness, and provides some background on how this story even got rolling.

Our story proper starts out with a girl on a horse riding into a village in a desert. Yup, you heard me a desert. Not some medieval plain village, forest village, or river side village. A tiny desert village that apparently makes its livelihood mining. And, get this, this village is made up of humans, not dwarves. Already this novel is making a good impression on me with those simple details! Anyway, we learn that the strange girl isn't just a normal person but an Immortal. A person who was supposed to die but the gods, The Four, make them into their special warriors who can wield magic and live forever.
Anyway, it turns out that our hero, Emaranthe, had called some of her friends and they're all supposed to fight the demons who are on their way to brutally destroy the tiny village.

Since we're on the topic of warrior companions, let me introduce them to you. First off there's Jaeger, an Earthlander who wields a massive ax and shield. He's brother's with Ivo, another Earthlander, who wields a massive sword and shield. The two remind me of the barbarian races often found in most high fantasy books. They're super macho, strong, and have a sibling bond that can't be defeated by anything. They didn't stand out too well for me, perhaps they will be in the next novella, but I found them pretty bland.

Next would be arguably the main character, Emaranthe. She's a blonde who's a seemingly nice person who wields a shepherd's staff and fire magicks. She felt like the leader a lot of the time and was the most knowledgeable about myths and stuff like that. In all honesty I found her to be really refreshing since most female MCs these days are sarcastic and rude, even in high fantasy. When the villagers question Emaranthe instead of telling them to piss off, she explains to them why she's there and her back story.

Finally we have Jadeth who has to be my favorite character. Now most people would find elves annoying, I did a piece on elves and stuff like that so you know my feelings on them, but with Jadeth I found her so entertaining. Unlike most elves in high fantasy she wasn't haughty, arrogant, solemn, or even a blonde. Jadeth is a redhead who's often unsure of herself, friendly, and wields a battle hammer. Yes, you read that right, she wields an awesome battle hammer that kills people and helps her heal people. She's just that awesome. Of course there's other things about her, like how her ears are able to move according to how she feels and what she's trying to hear, which I found pretty cool and unique.

All together the four heroes did help me enjoy the novella, however the one main villain we see in the book was not defined enough for me to enjoy them. It was a necromancer who works for the demons, but we see her for merely a chapter. From the way she sounds she reminds me of a voodoo queen you'd see at a madi gras. Whether or not that's a good thing is up to you to determine.

The plot itself for this book was linear and reminded me of a level in Final Fantasy. Cut down all the skeletons and zombies so you could make it to the big boss. Along the way we get some back story, which was typical for the genre, talk about the magical starstones, and plenty of awesome elemental powers.

Speaking of which I have a ton to say about this magic system. While it is seemingly elemental based there's a lot more to it. If an immortal should be heavily wounded they have to go to an alter of sorts and pray to The Four. The gods will then heal the immortal or just give them a new body in general, however this process could cause the immortal's soul to be wounded beyond repair. This idea is pretty unique and I love it quite a bit and can't wait for another novel to expound upon it.

In the next novel I also hope to see more of this world. There's a mention of multiple suns as well as elves, humans like Earthlanders, and winged beings called Windwalkers.(To be completely honest I wish they were called Skywalkers just so I can make a Star Wars reference.) There's plenty of other casually mentioned things that I wished appeared in the novella, but I couldn't expect to see it in a fifty page book.

So what's the drawbacks to this book? Well, I saw a lot of grammar mistakes. I also didn't like the prologue, but I hate that for all novels and this wasn't going to be the exception. The constant mention of how the characters looked got annoying after awhile, especially the eye color. Oh yeah, and there's also info dumping that will happen in the middle of a conversation.

Aside from all this I thoroughly enjoyed the novella!

If you wanna purchase it you can do so here.

Welp, I'm off to go eat some German chocolate cake....