In which I talk about writing plans.

[ilthit]

This is rather long and I apologize for that in advance. But it's a community for talking about writing, isn't it? So there. 

After 15 years of writing, I'd say I'm definitely a writer, even if all I've published is one minor article in a local newspaper, a few reviews in a super-indie publication and tons of fanfic online. I've never really taken my writing seriously enough to try to make money off it, but I'm going for it at last this year for National Novel Writing Month. 

I know - NaNoWriMo is usually for bad writing, but it's a good excuse to really work hard every day and get a first draft done from start to finish. I have a lot of research and planning to do first, even though all I'm going to attempt is a romance novel. I figured it's got to have a better chance of being published, considering the huge percentage of the book market romance novels dominate, and from what I've seen Harlequin doesn't exactly mind "beginner" errors. 

I got a hold of some romance novels for researching the genre, though before I got them I had already got excited and begun to plot - a plot that I now see I can' t possibly use... Believe it or not, I had never before read a bona fide category romance novel. My first one was Linda Lee Guhrke, and I found it so-and-so, but having since read two others I now see that in its genre it was quite brilliant. There are very clear rules and there seems to be a formula for plot points that I intend to calculate by pagecount next. I want to do the genre justice. It's actually interesting to write such specific genre fiction, as the challenge is to make it original and still make it fit. 

I face several challenges in writing this:

- I will want to improve on the clichés, and that's a difficult balance to keep - I don't want to sound like I'm mocking the clichés the reader is likely to love. 
- I really hate the way the heroes are written. I don't find them attractive at all. I don't know how I'll be able to write one of these silly characters and still like him. 
- The man will have to be stronger and more capable than the woman, and that needs to be one of his appeals. This offends my feminist sensibilities somewhat. 
- I will have a lot of doing trying to stop myself from subverting the clichés (my first urge is to write this about a middle-aged overweight couple who are so mundane it hurts, and show the beauty of their love while they munch on industrial cookies on their tacky 80s pattern sofa).  

Pretty much the only thing I'm sure I can ace are the sex scenes, and even there I think I'll need to hold myself back a little. There's also the problem that I'm not at all used to writing novel-length fiction; I tend to peter out long before 10,000 words. The longest I've written so far was 45,000 words. 

All this makes me think I should just write the novel I want to write; it's got more of a chance to be actually finished, but pretty much zero chance of being sold, despite probably being a better book. 

What do you think I should attempt? Mundane romance (this is the idea that fires me up) or something I can actually sell? 

Comments

[ilthit]

Huh - I heard that one of the good things about her was that she liked sex? Now I'm just confused. Oh well, I don't have to read them at all, of course.

[anthimeria]

The series changes drastically from the early books--in the later books there's a lot of sex. Even a few of the earlier books with sex in are okay. The series changed from a plot-heavy urban fantasy crime drama with an anti-sex heroine to a sex-heavy urban fantasy with monster-related political drama, and Anita's ideas about sex change radically. In some ways it's a very interesting progression for her character. There is a large increase in the page count devoted to sex in the later books.

If you're looking for a mix of sex and paranormal crime drama, try "Blue Moon"--it's the seventh or eighth book in the series, about where the serious sexual issues start (for Anita, anyway. The other characters are an entirely different story).

I do suggest you check them out, at least--they are good, I just didn't initially suggest them because the main character doesn't have sex for the first half-dozen or more books.

[ilthit]

So which of the Anita Blake books are good - the first or the later ones? I realize quality is not directly related to the amount of sex.

And is it really anti-sex, as in suggesting sex is bad, or she just doesn't have it?

I should probably read some of them just to know what it's all about.

Just ordered The Wizard of Earthsea (I read it once ages ago and found it dull, but Le Guin is so well-loved I decided to give it another go) and My Soul To Keep (because I heard good things about Tananarive Due). In the meanwhile I'm cheating on Artemis Fowl with Studying the Novel, though I really should be doing research... What about you?

[anthimeria]

The Anita Blake books--I prefer the early books, which are heavy crime drama. Re: the book's attitude toward sex--Anita Doesn't Like It, but pretty much all the other characters are sex-positive (. . . but sex is complicated), so even though we're deeply in Anita's head, the books' attitude toward sex is positive overall. Anita, as a character, is anti-sex in the early books.

Sorry, I should have made that clearer initially.

I'm in the middle of Highway to Hell, the third "Maggie Quinn: Girl vs Evil" book, a GREAT young adult urban fantasy series. I also just finished Peeps, by Scott Westerfeld, and I'm researching my current worldbuilding project (I write speculative fiction), so I have a stack of books about Victorian fashion and dirigibles checked out of the library.

Le Guin is awesome, though my favorite of her stuff tends to be her nonfiction. I've read a few books of her essays that I love.

How's Artemis Fowl? I never quite got around to that one.

[ilthit]

Artemis Fowl is... It has all the right elements, as in stuff I usually like, but somehow I'm not that drawn into the story, hence the cheating. I've already read five other books since starting it, which should tell you something! I have now delegated it to bath reading, with Studying the Novel as my commute (main) reading.

"Girl vs. Evil" is a fantastic title. :D