An Idiot's Review of The Diary of Modern Cinderella

As you guys know, I typically review fantasy books. However I decided to go with a change of pace and read a slice of life YA called The Diary of Modern Cinderella. I'm sure more than half of you are rolling your eyes at the mere title and saying: "Are you serious, another Cinderella teen drama story? Don't you have a few more brain cells than that, Luka?"

To be fair it's called an idiot's review, what did you expect? In all seriousness this story, written by Ms. Sekina Mayu, has very little to do with the actual overall plot to Cinderella aside from the fact that our main heroine, Risa, get's a stepmother and stepsister after her mother passes away. However her new mother, Riko, is actually kind to her from the get go and her new sister, Chiyu, becomes her bestest friend. Riko doesn't try to replace Risa's original mother, and Risa herself is only angsty after the initial news of her father dating someone else. However her life is tipped over when her father, a superintendent in the police force, get's sent away to Nagasaki on a case and all hell breaks loose as Riko begins to abuse both of her daughters.

I honestly loved reading everything from Risa's point of view. For her everything is usually cut into quick logic thoughts, nothing too complex or over the top. It really felt like I was reading from the mind of a young teenage girl who's confused by her step-mother's strange behavior, and struggling to keep it all a secret. With that said, I would have loved a deeper analysis on how it affected her and more scenes depicting the abuse. Risa ,in general, is a typical girl thrust in an atypical situation, there's no real defining characteristics about her.

Now comes a large problem I had with this novel. A lot of it felt rushed, with little time to actually sit down and let us absorb what was happening, or a real chance to meet the characters. Risa had an advantage since she's the eyes we see everything happening from, but everyone else is foggy and almost one dimensional. Understandably this is a light novel, meaning that you have to read the accompanying novels to get a better idea, but it would still be nice to see how Risa truly viewed them.

All in all this was an interesting take on the Cinderella trope, and is enjoyable as long as you're not going into it expecting a constant barrage of angst and drama.

If you wanna buy the book it can be found here.

I'm gonna go work on the next blog post. I'm so behind....

Fear and All It Pertains

Fear is what makes us human. It separates us from machines, guides many of our decisions, and dictates when we're gonna go to bed at night. Because let's face it;  if you watch a good horror movie at midnight, chances are you're not gonna go to bed before dawn. Anyway I digress, the point of this post is exploring the fears that your characters have. And I don't mean the typical ones like 'loosing a loved one' because unless you're a demented sociopath everyone has this. No, I mean something like a fear of the dark or a fear of spiders. I also want to take a look at how characters should/could react to their fears.

I always find it amazing that a ton of characters just don't have basic fears. All their fears have to be this noble bullcrap that makes them seem like a good person, as if it will help us like the characters more. Well you know what, the entire emotion of fear is a completely selfish thing! When you're truly afraid of something you rarely compromise with the people who need you to get something done. You're gonna do everything and anything in your power to avoid making contact/looking at/interacting with whatever it is you fear. So even though the pretty red-headed gypsy girl may be drowning in a pond full of filth, if your hero is a total germaphobe, he's probably gonna keep going on his merry way or not give his 100%  if he helps her.

Now that sounds terrible doesn't it? That poor guy I just created sounds like a total bastard but Joe, that'll be his name for now, could have other traits that balance his mysophobia. He could be a very giving person that would give the shirt off his back to save a sickly orphan that'll die anyway, he could clean the local poorhouse twice a week, all things that would generally make him seem like a good person. Balancing out traits is super important, and is slowly becoming this thing I say in a crazy tone whenever I read books. If you don't balance out his mysophobia with something like...a strong work ethic, then he's going to topple over into a character that will be seen as completely miserable. However if this is your goal then good for you, in fact you should just ignore a good chunk of this post and go do something else. Go bake a pumpkin pie, clean your refrigerator, or read and comment on another one of my other blog posts...Please?

Anyway, my obnoxious suggestion aside, this entire time you're probably wondering why Joe just doesn't get over his fears. After all, there's gonna be something in his life that he needs to deal with that also involves his phobia. And that's true, because life really doesn't care about our comforts and wants. However, people are ridiculously stubborn and selfish. Going outside your comfort zone is a hard thing to do, and takes a toll on a person mentally and sometimes physically. So even if Joe wanted to save our red-headed gypsy, it'd make his stomach twist in knots, his mind go back and forth on his moral responsibilities, and make him sweat freaking him out even more. Thinking back on all this, I wouldn't want to deal with my fears either. Three cheers for cowards!

I'm gonna go bake an apple pie now...

An Idiot's Thoughts on a Fantasy Writer's Education

So as a writer you probably already know you've got to read. And I don't mean just one novel every few months, no you've got to read at least one a month. And that's just the minimum! The reason being, so that you can get plenty of information on your craft. After all, it's important to know what's been done and how others have done it. However, I think that's almost skimping on the entire fantasy idea bucket. Maybe just books were needed thirty years ago, but in the 21st century there's plenty of other mediums you can glean from to help your inspiration and fantasy learning experience.

1. Video Games- I know video games aren't for everyone, and some people still consider them childish, but in this day and age a good story is a big factor in selling a video game. There are literally hundreds of good video games out there that have interesting stories, characters, and magic systems that you probably haven't explored. I've spoken about one multiple times on this blog called Bayonetta, a story about a witch that has amnesia and has to piece her memories back together. All the while fighting angels and working with demons, and looking absolutely fabulous doing it. Another I'd recommend is Bloodborne, a gothic, steampunk, horror fantasy. If that wasn't enough to get your attention, then maybe I should tell you that the entire story revolves around a hunter fighting Eldritch Abominations. Oh, and did I mention the fact that you have no idea if it's all a dream or not?

2. Anime/Manga- The Japanese medium that CNN has called porn. As someone who actually watches/reads the stuff, I can tell you that it isn't porn. Well, there is porn but there's also cartoon porn in America too. Anyway, since this comes from Japan not only are you getting some new fantasy ideas, but you're also getting it from a completely different outlook. Since most adults aren't particularly happy to watch cartoons, I understand if you cast away these suggestions completely. But just watch Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood first. It has an extremely intense story about a pair of brothers who try to bring back their dead mother via alchemy...Just for one of the brothers to become a black monster and has to be put inside a suit of armor to stay together. And that's just the beginning, the rest of the journey is just as amazing. Take a look at it before you dismiss it for being a Japanese cartoon.

Now manga is a comic version of anime, but one I would certainly recommend is Ancient Magus' Bride.  The story revolves around fifteen year old Chise who's sold into slavery thanks to being able to see fae. Instead of being bought by a stereotypical cruel man who learns to love her, she's bought by the very inhuman Elias Ainsworth. A powerful mage with a goat skull instead of a human head. The magic system for this story is the star of the show, but the character development is nothing to laugh at either.

3. Comics- I actually know very little about American comics, so I can't personally give you recommendations, but I wouldn't count these out either. Just like all the other mediums discussed, comic books can help you find a plethora of interesting stories, characters, and magic systems for you to explore. Plus, just so you know, Neil Gaiman wrote one. That has to be worth mentioning.

4. Movies- This one is a bit trickier. Most fantasy movies are based on books, but if you're lucky enough to find a movie based on someone's imagination, then study it. A ton of movies love giving lazy exposition, you'll be able to find something interesting to get your juices flowing.

5. TV Shows- For some reason the TV channels have all decided that fantasy is the genre they'll be making shows for. One of those shows happens to be Once Upon a Time, a show taking all the Disneyfied classic fairytales and throwing them on their head. It uses the typical savior trope, but it does it tastefully, though I wouldn't recommend anything after season 2. There's also this show called Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I never got around to watching it, but heard it was pretty good.

So those are all the mediums you can glean from. I recommend spreading your time out involved in all of these, but since you're a novel writer make sure you spend more time writing. It just makes sense.

Now I'm gonna go watch Bleach...

Taking a Look at Injuries

I feel like most fantasy writers have never gotten hurt in their lives. You can't convince me that if you break a toe that you can sit there and run away from a band of rabid elves two hours later. Or if someone gets choked for a good few seconds, they're not gonna have issues breathing for a little bit. Nope, instead the warriors can go on fighting as if they were in the prime of their lives, injured or not. And I'm sure a few of you are thinking: "Luka, clearly they used magic to heal themselves."

If that was the case then it should have been mentioned! No, all of these characters are just super human/elf/orc/dust bunnies and when they get injured it never actually counts. That, dear friends, is called lazy writing, and missed opportunities, but mostly lazy writing. You should never just forget something that happens to your characters, because most times those things will show up later on. This is especially true with injuries. If your character snaps his dominant wrist, there's no way he's gonna pick up his sword and slash at the ravenous dog that's trying to eat his kitty. If he put that much weight on his wrist then it would damage it even more, maybe even making it completely useless after awhile.

These are things you have to put into consideration when you decide to injure your characters. How will it effect the story later on? Now if the guy who snapped his wrist wasn't able to save his kitty, maybe it'll give him some character development. Maybe he'll realize you shouldn't take a tiny cat with him on his adventures. Or maybe you could introduce a completely different character who fights off the dog with magic, giving our adventurer a new companion.

Another thing you've gotta think about when you beat on your characters, is how long it takes to heal. Being a person who breaks their toes about twice a year on the vacuum cleaner, I can tell you it takes about a month for me to put my full weight on the other foot. But just because I can walk on it doesn't mean anything, more than likely it takes a week or more to actually be completely healed. So if it takes a month for a toe to get in shape, how much longer do you think it'll be for a freaking rib, or an arm, or leg? Of course healing times gets skewed when magic is involved, but if you have no intention of saying "Charmy the hobbit got a healing potion from Happy the wizard cat." Then I'm just gonna shake my head and assume that your character became god at some point.

You know, a lot of the injuries in fantasy comes from epic battles. And most of the epic battles happen in muddy, nasty, and absolutely dirty places. So if you're planning to have some guy stabbed in the abdomen, his wound needs to get cleaned. I mean, that should be a higher priority than saving blonde princess #33,333,758,558. Because if that thing isn't disinfected with something, then he's likely to get an infection and die. And don't even pull that 'rips a piece of his shirt to wipe the blood away'. That shirt is probably just as disgusting as the rest of him, especially if it was splattered with other people's blood, mud, and sweat.

God, this post makes me want to check into a freaking hospital. But I assume you all get the point of this blog post. Pay some attention to your characters, pay attention to the time in your story, and for insert some deity here's sake don't go for romanticism over realism. Unless that princess happens to have healing kisses, you're gonna bleed out from that wound.

Now I'm gonna go make breakfast....

My First Story Overhaul

Oh Lord, how time has flown. My poor WIP has made it to its second draft today. And while I wanna just get on the dancefloor, I'm actually banned from it in sixty countries, it's so freaking weird. I've never managed to get to the point where I can't recognize the draft. I've aborted some of my characters, others have changed gender, all of them have had their goals tweaked, and I managed to birth a couple of new babies that'll no doubt get killed off later on. And that's just the characters, the world that I have created has also changed to suit my needs. While I once talked about several different cities, it's all boiled down to just one massive one that has several layers to it. I even went so far as to change the season this story starts in forget winter, we're going for spring now, baby!

And while it's all super exciting, it also plants a few seeds of doubt into my tiny brain. 'What if the theme is harder to understand?' 'What if my plot doesn't make sense anymore?' 'What if I just decide to eat cake instead of ice cream?'. While I do have issues with the last one, it's not nearly as important as the other issues presented. Unlike that first draft when you were full of bright smiles, happiness, and pixie-piss, the second draft feels like the dark version of all that. Now I'm full of frowns, sadness, and...What's a negative version of pixie-piss? Demon-piss?

Who knows.

And while all this is going on I know that something very important is happening, something that will no doubt change me into a better person...I'm challenging myself. It's so freaking easy to sit down and make up a magical world, a theme, and a few characters; but it's much harder to sit down and believe that every bit of it is complete and utter crap. That you have to get in there with your scalpel, drill, and old rusty axe, and get rid of what's just not working. It's sitting there and saying 'I'm not always right, sometimes I'm wrong, time to fix my mistakes'.

I-I think I'm gonna cry.

Anyway. this was a pretty sappy post. But I like to think I'm growing in my writing life, as well as my dwindling teenage life.

Now I'm gonna rot my brain by playing Mario Kart 64.

A Sad Truth

So the other day I was reading an article that demanded that every single book needs to have one LGBT person. Doesn't matter the type or gender, they just need to be a reoccurring character with some good character development. You know, I'm the type that's all for diversity. I believe you should try to represent more for the masses, it's unfair to have an all snowy white American/British/Canadian cast all the freaking time. However, I also don't believe we should absolutely freaking placate to other people just because.

This world doesn't cater to you, so I don't have to either.

Wait...

Doesn't that just defeat the whole purpose of my opening paragraph? Yes and no. While I do believe in diversity, I don't think that you should have 'token characters'. When I was a kid, my mom would watch TV with me and would sigh and say 'token character' whenever a person of color would show up on certain programs. This was the late nineties and early two thousands, so it happened a lot less than when the bulk of my audience was growing up, but that character still stood out like a sore thumb. If the writers of the show really cared about diversity then they would add more characters of ethnicity not just one. You don't have to add diversity because that's the hippest thing, you don't have to cater to other people, just yourself and maybe your moral compass.

In my own WIP I have a mass of heterosexual characters, and the only one on the other side of the court is an asexual character, Yup, not even gay or transgender, they just don't care about sex. Did I add them in because the asexuals have been screaming for proper representation? No. He, yes it's a guy, just doesn't like sex; there's no need for some deep or hidden meaning in it. I also have two Japanese characters, a white woman, a black teenager, and a white guy. Did I choose these characters to be this way just so the minorities in question can have representation?

NO.

Seriously, when you begin to write things just because you don't want to offend people, that's when you know your stuff is going down the crapper. If anything your writing should offend people! It should make them think long and hard as they write angry tweets on your Twitter. It should worm through their brains to the point that the whole meaning of your story is twisted in their eyes and they found an entirely different, albeit ridiculous, message of your book. You're a writer and you shouldn't have to cater to anyone, that's why there's genre and even age and sexuality shelves. If they want something specific then google search it like everyone else. But if they just want a good book that just so happens to have gays, an Indian protagonist, and even a sociopath, then so be it.

I'm gonna go play Uncharted now....

Tsunderes/Bitchy Love Interests

My most viewed blog entry is about female perverts....Okay, let's talk about bitches then. Bitches and tsunderes.

Actually, I highly doubt the majority of my base knows what a tsundere is...So, basically a tsundere is a Japanese term using the word tsun tsun, kinda meaning cold, and dere, kinda meaning sweet. Basically it's one of those bitchy characters that'll argue with you for three fourths of the book, then by the end they're kissing some poor bastard. Now just because I use female derogatory terms don't think a tsundere is just for females, there's plenty of males. In fact the most famous male tsundere has to be Mr. Darcy from that one book you all know of. He's not bitchy per se, but he's very much so a guy that has a cold persona that rubs people wrong more often than not.

Now I'm not sure why people like having these as main love interests, and god forbid both characters act this way, but I decided to help people write them. Mostly because I actually have experience...acting this way in real relationships. Don't look at me like that and just finish reading the blog article!

1. Have a reason your characters even act this way: For whatever reason people think having tsunderes/bitchy people as love interests creates amazing drama. And this is true, it does create drama, but it's too easy to do. A character has to have reasons for why they do things, in a way they're puppets, but they need to believable to your audience. If your character acts like a saint to everyone else, but suddenly is cruel to the poor guy that likes her, then that's out of character. She needs a reason to act that way! Maybe she's rich so she sees everyone below her, and people above her social class or inside it she acts 'stiff' since she wants to be on their good side. That would make a lot more sense than some usually sweet girl suddenly wanting to cut off some poor guy's head for liking her.

2. Don't have them switch from 'cold' to 'sweet' erratically: I hate it when a couple sits there and will have a snuggle moment, but a few scenes later the tsundere/bitch person will freak out around the love interest. It just doesn't work that way, not even with PMS. The only way to remedy this is to have proper character development. Have them go through trials that has the bitchy person rely and value the love interest, and have moments when the love interests realizes that it's hard for the bitchy person to open up about their feelings. Speaking of which...

3. Don't have an overwhelming amount of angst: Do us all a favor and tattoo this to your face, so every single time you look into a reflective surface you remember this rule. It's standard for any type of writing, romance or not. If you need to, tattoo it to your refrigerator and cellphone as well, just get this rule in your brain.

4. Don't have the tsundere/bitchy character suddenly decide to love the love interest: Love at first sight does not exist, sorry to burst your bubble. On the same note love after hours and even years of arguing doesn't exist either. If you want your couple to argue, fine more power to you, but don't have them plan a wedding at the end of the book. If I don't see any kind of affection, not lust, then I'm not going to believe it. Affection stems from something, either an action or some words, and then it branches on to connect to other things in a person's head. It's also a mass of chemicals and a false sense of security, but who am I to get in the way of romance?

5. Don't have bitchy as the main character trait: As a person who is a bit hard on their lovers, I know that it seems to be all consuming, but you have to realize that we're not really this way all the time. It's mostly around love interests or people that are generally seen as annoying, yet they hold some sort of affection for; not necessarily romantic affection. So if your character is around their best friend that they found soothing, they'd probably act completely different. Basically what I'm trying to say is look at the character interaction as well as the character traits.

So that's it. I'm gonna go watch Sgt. Frog....