Distractions

I’m being pulled apart.

A part-time job needs working. Five classes require preparation. Family and babysitting take time. Illness of friends calls me away. Church activities eat energy.

But I want to write. I want to tell stories. But I have no emotional capacity or time to do so. My passion has become so depleted it may as well be gone.

Distractions have led me away from my purpose, from what is important. My life needs to be refocused and the clutter removed. Balance must be restored. I need to learn to say no.

I don’t know completely how to do all this. Some commitments must be fulfilled. And people are important and I can’t simply withdraw from life. But I can do one simple thing, and that can lead to another and another. So maybe the passion will soon grow again.

For even baby steps can be steps in the right direction.

ACFW 2009

Each year I head to conference, thinking that I’ll find a rhythm or pattern to settle into. Each year I return home wondering how the conference could be so different than last year. That was especially true this year.

Last year was a year of promise. I came home with many wonderful notes, multiple requests for my newest manuscript with openings for potential future submissions, unexpected pieces of encouragement for my writing, and a thrilling Genesis win.

But this year—I could practically hear the doors slam shut and the locks engage, especially the moment the words sci-fi and fantasy left my mouth. By the time I left conference, I would introduce my writing by saying, “I write the impossible genre.” I returned home without a single request.

Nonetheless, there were bright moments in the conference.

1. The class by Donald Maass. That single class made every penny I paid for the conference worth-while. Many of techniques I had applied instinctively, which was an encouragement, and I learned more exercises to strengthen my writing.

2. My roommates Paula and Stacy. Though both first-timers to the ACFW conference, they handled everything like pros. They were both a gift from God amidst some rather disappointing happenings.

3. Wins by my friend Sharon Hinck! Her novels, Symphony of Secrets and Restorer’s Journey, each placed first in their respective Book of the Year categories. To be a witness to that was thrilling.

Other things happened too. Good thing, and hard things too. Some moments are personal. Others have left confusion in their wake and I’m still trying to sort through everything.

But this I know: God is good. Even in the midst of disappointment His gifts are numerous.

The Vanishing Sculptor

Title: The Vanishing Sculptor

Author: Donita K. Paul

Genre: Tween (10-13) Fantasy

Excerpt from “A View from a Tree,” Chapter 1 of The Vanishing Sculptor:

Sir Beccaroon cocked his head, ruffled his neck feathers, and stretched, allowing his crimson wings to spread. The branch beneath him sank and rose again, responding to his weight. Moist, hot air penetrated his finery, and he held his wings away from his brilliant blue sides.

“Too hot for company,” he muttered, rocking back and forth from one scaly four-toed foot to the other on a limb of a sacktrass tree. The leaves shimmered as the motion rippled along the branch. “Where is that girl?”

His yellow head swiveled almost completely around. He peered with one eye down the overgrown path and then scoped out every inch within his range of vision, twisting his neck slowly.

A young girl sets out to recover three statutes, whose sale imperiled her father and her world.

The Craft: The writing of The Vanishing Sculptor is very similar to that of Mr. Paul’s DragonKeeper Chronicles. Colorful and entertaining, new characters and old enact a variety of adventures and misadventures.

This plot is a bit more cohesive than some of the past books, with each tension building on the last one into a riveting yet comical climax. Despite this, the ending felt…incomplete. Perhaps it’s because the point-of-view characters, Tipper and Beccaroon, seemed only minimally involved in bring change and being changed? But I’m not sure.

Nonetheless, The Vanishing Sculptor remains a delightful tale.

The Content: The Vanishing Sculptor is clean, where most of the action and violence are more comical than truly threatening. The magical elements remain the same as earlier books. The story turns a little preachy toward the end, almost like “this is the moral of the story” feel. But overall, the themes are worked in fairly well.

One thing that confused me was a shift in the allegory with a paladin—or at least in my perception of one. I originally equated Paladin from the original series with a Christ-figure. Here, however, it is more like an Old Testament prophet/judge, like Samuel. Neither is wrong, but it does require—or it did for me—a slight shift in thinking.

Summary: A light-hearted adventure with a colorful cast of characters and Christian themes always makes for a great read.

Rating: Craft—4, Content—4, Overall—3.8 out of 5 stars

Check out the reviews of the original DragonKeeper Chronicles, or buy any of them from Words of Whimsy.

The Return of Donita K. Paul

Where does the time go? Here we are, ready to do another blog tour, and my brain is still in Denver, trying to sort through all the stuff at ACFW (American Christian Fiction Writers) conference. Oh well. I'll have to get something posted about that soon.

But in the meantime, this month's Christian Sci-fi and Fantasy Tour is featuring Donita K. Paul (who just won the mentor of the year award at ACFW) and her latest release, The Vanishing Sculptor, a fun prequel to her popular DragonKeeper Chronicles. Check out what others are saying, and then stop back later for my reveiw of the book.

Brandon Barr, Jim Black, Justin Boyer, Rachel Briard
Karri Compton, Amy Cruson, CSFF Blog Tour, Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson, Jeff Draper, April Erwin, Karina Fabian
Linda Gilmore, Todd Michael Greene, Katie Hart, Ryan Heart
Becky Jesse, Cris Jesse, Jason Joyner, Julie, Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher, Dawn King, Rebecca LuElla Miller, Mirtika
Eve Nielsen (posting later in the week)
Nissa, John W. Otte, Lyn Perry, Crista Richey
Cheryl Russell, James Somers, Speculative Faith, Rachel Starr Thomson
Robert Treskillard, Steve Trower, Fred Warren, Dona Watson
Phyllis Wheeler, Elizabeth Williams, KM Wilsher

Fusion Fire

Title: Fusion Fire

Series: Firebird Trilogy #2
(Reviews here for book one and book three)

Author: Kathy Tyers

Genre: Adult Sci-fi

Excerpt from “Night Attack,” Chapter 1 of Fusion Fire:

Even rain on wet leaves can sound ominous after midnight.

Firebird stopped walking and listened intently. The dark hours were slipping away, but she’d awakened with both calves bound up in excruciating muscle cramps. Pausing on her third lap around a long, windowless training room, she felt positive she’d heard something—someone—out in the pass-way.

She would’ve known if that were Brennen.

Barefoot, she crept across the cushioned mat. Once a storage area, this room bristled with weapons, simulators, and exercise equipment. A home-security master board glimmered behind the flight simulator. She bent toward it.

One of her unborn sons kicked her ribs in protest.
Firebird straightened and pushed red-brown hair back from her face. She’d hoped to command a star cruiser someday . . . she never hoped to resemble one. Now, six and a half months pregnant with twins, she suspected she did.

She snugged the belt of her flimsy nightrobe. On the security board, an image of their two-story hillside home gleamed in pale yellow holo. Each entry and window shone red, fully covered by sensors and dispatch circuits. Brennen had invested his Federate severance pay in a lovely, defensible location near Thyrica’s primary military base, then installed the best available home sec system. In ten years of intelligence work, he’d made enemies.

The board showed no sign of intrusion.

A night attack forces Firebird to flee her new refuge and her husband Brennen to track down renegade telepaths on their home planet.

The Craft: As is often the case in a trilogy, the second installment in the Firebird Trilogy, Fusion Fire, is not quite as well constructed. The cadence of the plot is somewhat off and some of the flashbacks feel clunky, disruptive, and hard to follow.

Yet Fusion Fire carries all the strengths of the previous book, Firebird, and the quality of the craft started at such a high level, these problems fade into minor irritants, probably barely noticeable to most.

So I was and remain in awe of this writing.

The Content: There may be flickers of problems in craft, but the content of Fusion Fire suffers no such set backs. Ms. Tyers continues to plumb the depths, offering many insights into spiritual life before Christ’s incarnation as well as more practical issues still faced today, such as the importance of blood atonement and the depth of evil in the human heart.

In other content issues, there is some violence, but only a couple times does it turn even remotely graphic, and each time is necessary (such as in the animal sacrifice scene). There are also a couple suggestions of the sexual—Firebird and Brennen are a married couple—but the suggestion is done so well, you probably won’t notice unless you know what you’re looking for or are married yourself.

Summary: While there are a couple minor flaws in craft, Fusion Fire is superbly written, with delightful heroes, treacherous villains, and a fast-paced plot. To top that off, the content depth has much to offer, much to chew on, and everything is portrayed such as to make the story accessible to even the youngest teen. Highly recommended!

Rating: Craft—5, Content—5, Overall—4.7 out of 5 stars

A Servant’s Job

By the time you read this post, I will be nearly to Denver, if not already there, preparing to attend the ACFW (American Christian Fiction Writers) conference.

My stomach’s butterflies will be fine-tuning their routine—I have no doubt about that—and a battle between nerves and anticipation will be waging. (Not that anyone else will be able to tell the difference; the external symptoms are about the same.) After all, who knows? Maybe this year, this conference will see those open doors I long for.

Because, quite simply, I hate waiting, and I’ve been waiting for eight years. That may not seem like much to some, and in the eternal scheme, it is inconsequential. I know all this. However, at my young age, it still feels like a long time—I’ve spent nearly a third of my life working toward and waiting for God’s timing in my writing.

Yet what if this is still not the time? What if God tells me “not yet” once again? For that always is a distinct possibility. I myself am a WIP—a work-in-progress—and God works on a timetable that rarely matches mine.

The answer is I wait, as much as I might dislike that. To force something before God wishes it almost always leads to disastrous consequences, and I hate to think I settled for the second-rate because I was too impatient to wait for God’s best.

But waiting seems like such a waste of time, when time is already in short supply. Yet is it really “a waste of time” like I tend to think? For I am God’s servant, and what is a servant’s job?

His job—my job—is to wait upon the Master.

A Crash Course on Craft for Non-writers

Most people who read novels and watch movies on a consistent basis instinctively know when a story works. They just may not be able to explain why it works.

So during the next few weeks I’m going to provide a crash course on writing craft—some of the basic principles that writers learn (many of which I’m still learning myself) and ones I look for in story. It will not be exhaustive, and what I’ll provide are only principles; many masters of the craft have learned not only how to use them, but also when to break them.

But by knowing a few basics of craft, even if you have no desire to write, you’ll be surprised how much more you appreciate a well-told story.

A Squirrel Hunt

There's a hunt going on for an albino squirrel, who has been set loose in the blog, wrecking all kinds of havoc, I hear. If you can track him down, there will be a prize. Go to http://www.teresaslack.blogspot.com/ for participating bloggers and other information.

The squirrel looks something like this:

Firebird

Title: Firebird

Series: Firebird Trilogy #1
(Reviews here for books two and three)

Author: Kathy Tyers

Genre: Adult Sci-fi

Excerpt from “Prologue” of Firebird:

Lady Firebird Angelo was trespassing.

Shadowed by her friend Lord Corey Bowman, she squeezed and twisted through a narrow, upright opening between two dusty stone walls. She’d paced off twenty meters in silence. Her eyes had almost adjusted to faint gray light from ahead and behind. Growing up in this palace, she’d explored it thoroughly and cautiously during her childhood. She hadn’t tiptoed between these particular walls since she found the gap, four years ago, when she was fifteen. If she remembered right, then in ten meters more—

Something rattled behind her. She froze. If anyone caught her and Corey this deep in the governmental wing, they could be done for. Powers help us! she prayed silently.

Slowly, she turned around. Corey crouched three meters away. He pointed at a loose stone and cringed a silent apology.

Time hung suspended, like a laser satellite passing overhead. They waited motionless, hardly even breathing.

Evidently, the Powers weren’t feeling vengeful—if those supernatural guides even existed, which Firebird had started to doubt. The soft voices behind the curved inner wall kept droning on, incomprehensible from this point in the hidden passage.

Firebird crept on.

The rough partition on her left enclosed an elliptical chamber. Inside, the highest council in the Netaian planetary systems held its conferences.
An heiress, destined to die, fails on a suicide mission, only to be captured by a most unexpected enemy.

The Craft: Firebird was my introduction to contemporary Christian science-fiction and fantasy. Recommended to me at one of my first writing conferences, I immediately fell in love with the story and characters, devouring the whole trilogy in days.

But I’ve learned a thing or two about stories and writing since then. Stories that were so much fun—well, sometimes they have glaring problems, unseen by me at that time.

So it was with no small amount of trepidation that I returned to the series this summer. Was the trilogy really as good as I remember?

It turns out that no, it isn’t. It’s even better than I remember.

What pure delight. The story, even though I knew the gist of the plot, immediately recaptured my attention and I fell in love all over again with Lady Firebird and General Cadwell.

The plot is intricate with plenty of twists. The characters are complex and vivid with personality. The science-fiction world is drawn in great detail without explanations or descriptions becoming overbearing. The storytelling is simply well-balanced.

Of course it doesn’t help that I’m a sucker for an underdog, and spunky Lady Firebird ranks as one of my favorites.

The Content: The content of Firebird doesn’t disappoint either. The themes and spiritual threads—pride, grace, spiritual blindness, hope, gift of life, God’s majesty, the list could go on and on—are tightly woven into the plot. Yet they are never preach or dominating. They are simply part of the story; without them, the novel would unravel.

There is some violence and killing, but it done cleanly, with no graphic images to burn into the mind.

Summary: Firebird remains the best example I’ve found to date of bringing together a fast-paced, well-told story with a spiritual depth that will provide much to chew on. Though now out-of-print, I highly recommend every sci-fi/fantasy reader to do what they can to read a copy, both teens and adults. It is also an excellent example to study for writers wishing to write a great story with spiritual depth.

Rating: Craft—5, Content—5, Overall—4.9 out of 5 stars.

On My Reading Shelf

The Firebird Trilogy by Kathy Tyers
The Bones of Makaidos by Bryan Davis
Worlds Unseen by Rachel Starr Thomson
Merciless by Robin Parrish
Outriders by Kathryn Mackel
Sir Kendrick and the Castle of Bel Lione by Chuck Black
The Vanishing Sculptor by Donita K. Paul
The Cooper Kids Series by Frank Peretti
Writing the Breakout Novel by Donald Maass
Time Lottery by Nancy Moser

That should keep me reading for a while yet, right?

The Potency of Craft

Last Friday, I made a comment in my book review of Icefire that the content was made more concerning by how well the story was told. It was a comment I realized later might be puzzling to some.

While I’ve been focusing on how to analyze the content of a story in these Monday posts, craft also plays a critical role. I haven’t focused there, however, as most people instinctively know whether a story is well-done or not, generally speaking, even if they can’t explain what they know.

So why is craft important?

Craft is what lends the power to the story’s content. The better the craft, the longer the story will linger in the mind and the deeper it will burrow into the heart. Thus the content will have a greater impact on the receiver.

When the content is good, this is wonderful. We want principles like redemption, loyalty, forgiveness, and God’s grace to stick. But when the content promotes harmful ideology—that’s when trouble comes.

For if the story is poorly done, it will be quickly forgotten, giving the bad content less opportunity to influence. But with better writing, the content will have more opportunities to impact and change us. So when I see poor content with great craft, content problems that would be of minor concern in lesser stories become major issues because of the power lent to it by the craft.

So if you remember nothing else about craft, understand this: The better the craft, the more potent the content.

Icefire

Title: Icefire

Series: Dragons #2
(Book One's review here.)

Author: Chris D’Lacey

Genre: Tween (10-14) Magical Realism

Excerpt from “The Wishing Dragon,” of Icefire:

“David, if your face grows any longer your chin will be scraping the soles of your shoes.” Elizabeth Pennykettle hung up her apron and half scowled, half smiled at her student tenant. “What’s the matter?”

“Give you one guess,” the tenant muttered cheerlessly. He walked into the kitchen, his mouth turned down in a curve of disappointment. In his hand, he was flapping a letter. As he approached the kitchen table he pushed the letter under the snout of a dragon, which was sitting by a jar of raspberry jelly. “Here, torch that.”

The little clay dragon remained unmoved.

On the far side of the table Mrs. Pennykettle’s daughter, Lucy, remarked, “You mustn’t say that to the dragons. They’re not allowed to burn things, are they, Mom?”

“No,” said Mrs. Pennykettle, glancing at the letters. “I take it that’s another rejection?”

David nodded. “Complete with coffee stain. This makes fourteen now. And they all say the same. Dear Mr. Rain. Thanks, but no thanks. No one wants to hear about Snigger the squirrel.”
A college student, eager to win a research trip to the Artic, seeks answers about dragons, polar bears, and an ancient fire tear.

The Craft: The craft of Icefire picks up where The Fire Within left off. While still simple and easy to read in style, this novel increases tension and introduces a complex but intriguing plot that will carry into books three and four. Sometimes this results in minor confusion with point-of-view, but overall it works well.

Meanwhile, the characters continue to be the highlight of the writing. Funny but complex with just enough surprises to keep you on your toes, they provide a sense of whimsy while adding to the story’s momentum.

The Content: Icefire has many content issues that caused me to pause with concern:

--There is some mild language (like geez) sprinkled throughout the book.

--The hero speaks of moving in with his girlfriend without concern or reproof from other characters, although it never comes to fruition. (Yes, he is non-Christian, so we can't expect otherwise, but remember, this book is targeted toward pre-teens.)

--The hero spends dubious time with second girl while girlfriend is away. At least the hero struggles here with matters of conscience.

--The environmental issues continue to gain strength.

--Very human characters wield magical powers.

--The lines between good and bad, especially in areas of magic, have become blurred.

But perhaps the thing that concerns me the most is the predominating American Indian-type mythology. While these elements are clearly named (no sneaking in the backdoor) and my sense is that they are employed for furthering the environmental themes, things like animal spirits, talismans, other planes of existence, and a Mother Earth goddess (including offering prayers to her) should nothing be trifled with.

Summary: While Icefire offers a delightful and engaging tale, it is also riddled with content concerns, made all more concerning by how well the story is told. Therefore, I recommend avoiding, as a whole, Icefire and its subsequent books, in which these content problems appear to become even more predominate.

Also as a result, I will not be reviewing any further books in this series.

Rating: Craft—5, Content—1, Overall—1.7 out of 5 stars

Storytelling

A story awaits its telling.

Some parts are clear in the mind, vivid and colorful in the details. Other parts are obscured by shadows, with only vague shapes moving through even vaguer actions. And many parts are black-hole voids that hold infinite possibilities—both for advancement and utter destruction.

Danger pluses. It thrills. It terrifies. And the journey is so long and fraught with unknowns. And what is known—it provides no comfort.

Who dares to go forward? Everything gained could be lost, and other paths—easier, safer paths—exist.

Yet the journey must be taken. The story must be told. If I don’t do it, who will?