Kings Are Easier

I mean for storytelling purposes. I don't actually have any data about the promiscuity of royalty.

Anyway.

I wrote a list while working on my political post of why politics are structured the way they are in a lot of “traditional epic fantasy”.

1. Kings are easier.

Now, I know that this is very simplistic, but I think there is some merit to it. From a storytelling perspective it is a whole lot easier to deal with one dude in charge instead of a governing body of some sort. Kings are easier to make and topple, and there is a larger chance of extremes when your whole system of government relies upon the whims of one person with all the power. Big governments are unwieldy and need to be populated by a large cast of characters with their own motivations and needs. It is just easier to deal with one person.

2. Secret royalty is fun.

How many times have we seen the trope where some clueless farmboy finds out that he is, if not the “Chosen One”, at least a prince in disguise? It is a trope because it gets used so often and part of the reason it is is because it's fun. It's always fun to have a character turn out to be more than what they appear to be and royalty in disguise is a pretty tried and true method for doing that. It is also easier with a king to have a bastard born and raised in secret and if it's one of the king's by-blows it tends to have more weight than if it were just a random senator or member of a council. Which brings me to thought number three.

3. Kings are more epic than senators.

I have a lot of respect for the legislative branch in terms of its role in government. However, there's just something more “epic” about a king. Traditional fantasy in the vein of Lord of the Rings or A Song of Ice and Fire is of a huge scale and royalty fits in with that.

4. “Epic Fantasy” is usually medieval.

This one is more purely pragmatic. It is pretty common that epic fantasy takes place in a medieval world of some sort. It lends itself well to sword and sorcery and that is a big part of the genre. It is also a world that is highly romanticized in our culture and one that is so vastly different from our own that it is fun to imagine. Granted, it ends up being heavily idealized in fantasy as well (unless you're a writer like G.R.R. Martin), but that's ok when it's done well. It gives writers a chance to write about castles, knights on their chargers, and sword fights, and then bring in fanciful things like dragons and magic. Anyway, the point is that medieval history conjures up images of kings and queens, not senators and congressmen. If you think of a medieval court, chances are you are imagining a king or queen and assorted princes and princesses. Castles and kings go together like Dean Winchester and pie.

Anyway, I'm not trying to say anything big and certainly nothing I am saying is “new”, I just wanted to put a few thoughts down as to why politics in fantasy are usually structured as they are and these were the things that I came up with. Feel free to weigh in in the comments and let me know anything I missed. Or argue with me, that's always fun too. :)

Until next time, Dear Reader, take care!

Fornicating Badgers: How I Came To Re-Write Book the First Time

Hello again, friends!

This is the first part of my politics post-sorry it has taken me so long! In this post I will be mostly addressing my experience incorporating politics into the EBR, while in the next one I will share some general thoughts about politics in fantasy. So, if this sounds interesting to you...welcome aboard!

Before we get started I feel like I should probably 'fess up to something. Politics used to bore me to tears in both real life and literature. When I started reading fantasy I wanted quests, magic, and action. I'd skip over scenes that talked about political intrigue and strategy to find out what characters were doing. The first drafts of DragonTouched really reflected this attitude. I've said before that they were an amalgamation of what I love about fantasy and that's pretty accurate. They were fantasy's grab-bag, or perhaps more accurately, fantasy's junk drawer.

However, the one thing that I was not at all interested in including was politics. I wanted to focus on a main character (Wren) and her supporting cast of awesome (but not-as-awesome-as-the-central-Sue) characters. Kings and such were there for plot convenience. They were there to spawn “Secret Princes Raised As Farmboys” or to be fought against because they were Evil, or to knight the Sue for being such a “speshul snowflake”. Governments were there so I could have interesting names and cool cities to describe, not to actually do anything.

One day, after patiently listening to more babbling about all the super-cool things that Wren was going to do, Amelia asked me a really practical, cogent question about the governing bodies within the EBR (sorry, Amelia, I don't remember what it was but it came from you so I know it was practical and cogent). I was stumped. I had pretty much thought as far as “kings and queens are cool and get to wear crowns and stuff”. Amelia was very kind about my startling lack of knowledge about my own world and politely suggested that maybe I should think about some of these things.

I think I really got started addressing those issues one day when I was working on drawing maps of the EBR. It had taken me six or seven tries to actually get a map that I liked (and one that was geographically possible, for the most part), and I had gone and drawn two or three of them for different purposes. One was to sketch out borders, one was to hang on the wall so that I could easily reference it at all times, and one was to mark out the ranges of all my monsters so that I wouldn't have something really random like a fihuri popping up in Windajiona.

As I was working on the monster one map I started wondering how the presence of say, crop-eating unicorns would effect commerce in that part of the world, which led to larger questions about trade in general. I started drawing roads and trade routes and making lists of what the principal exports of each duchy would be. This, in turn, led to a lot of thoughts about politics. Why was the EBR structured the way that it was? Why duchies instead of kingdoms? What was the purpose of the titular “Overlord”? Were the Realms a peaceful place?

This was not a can of worms that I had opened. This was a Pandora's Box of relentlessly fornicating badgers: ornery, obnoxious, and determined to reproduce. Each question spawned more questions and, what was “worse” was that each question exposed the existing holes in the current story structure. Soon, book came to resemble a colander it was so full of holes. The only thing left was Wren, and that was because she was too big a sue to fit through any of them.

It was then that I knew what I had to do; scrap it and start all over. It was a harrowing decision because that was when the story was at its most WFSIMSS¹ stage. However, a really cool thing had started to happen as I asked myself all these questions. I found myself getting more and more interested in my world for its own sake and less for how it was my escape. Those of you who started reading my blog at the beginning know that the EBR started off as escapist writing for me in an effort to “deal with” my depression. I'm not ashamed of how it started, but I'm really glad that it took the turn that it did. It is a much more interesting story now and a lot of that is because I started looking at the political environments of the EBR and trying to treat them as “realistically” as I could.

All that being said about my own work, I do have some thoughts as to why politics are often structured the way they are in “traditional epic fantasy”. Please join me next time for what should be the last political post. :)

1Wish Fulfillment Self-Insert Mary Sue Story

Grieving

Today is a really rough day for me. I found out from my mother that the last of my childhood pets, a beagle named Ethan, and a cat named Memphis, passed away. Ethan a few weeks ago from old age, and Memphis after a valiant fight with cancer.

I know a lot of you will wonder at my grief here because they are "just" animals but...for me they never were. Pets always had a special place in my family. They were "furry people" and they knew it. I was very lucky in pets growing up. We never had fewer than one dog and after I was about five, never fewer than two cats. I just want to talk about the animals that I've loved and lost for a little bit, if that's ok. I want them to know that they are loved and remembered.

Baxter and Sweetpea were the dogs who were there when I was born who used to sleep under my crib and follow me around the house. Baxter was a hound-dog mix who was way too smart for his own good. Sweetpea was a terrier-mix who was black and white as a baby, and a dignified steel-gray and black at the end of her very long life. My parents saved her life and I know she never forgot it.

We found the cats Cally and Cinnamon in a garbage dump in a small town in tidewater Virginia. Cally came and got into my lap when we first met, clearly "adopting" me. We caught Cinny a week later. Cally was the smartest animal I have ever known and my constant companion growing up. Cinny grew into the embodiment of quiet sweetness who never met a patch of sunlit floor she didn't like.

Our dog Jake was a beautiful black, white, and brown mix who liked to stand up and "dance" with me, Grizwald (named for the national lampoons family because he was so goofy) was a lab-mix who proved that there was no such thing as a bad dog, some just need more training than others. Rosie was dubbed the "Wonder Beagle" for all that she survived in her long life and Toby, the little beagle, was so shy and sweet and wanted so badly to please us to show us how grateful he was to be adopted. He was taken from us suddenly and way before his time. The first book I ever wrote was about Rosie, Toby, Cally, and Cinny trying to solve the mystery of the werewolf in the woods behind our house.

And Ethan, the last in a long, proud line of dogs...my family brought him home when I was in the seventh grade. I'd stayed home to study for an exam and when they got home there was this young, incredibly lively beagle with them. He was the first dog I ever had who ripped apart some of my books and man if he wasn't proud of himself for showing that mean old book who was boss. He liked to sing with you if you sang in front of him and for some reason only he knew, he loved broccoli and red onions. He snored so loudly you could hear him three floors up and years after moving out of my parents house I would still find his hair on things. Whenever I came home from college he was always the first member of the family to come and say "welcome home". He'd sprint across the driveway and careen into my legs so hard he would almost knock me over, then he'd about kill himself trying to crawl up my body so he could lick my face.

Memphis was a kitten when we brought him home after Cally died, a little black and white bundle of fur who hid behind the washing machine. He liked to sit in my lap when I crossed my legs and was very fond of munching on the big wolf spiders that lived around our house. He was so goofy and sweet and his presence was the only thing that saved Cinny from completely disappearing into herself after Cally died. He had spunk and was so friendly that you'd think he was a small, cat-shaped dog.

Ethan, Memphis, I'm so sorry I wasn't home when you left us. Memphy, it kills me to know you were so sick. You were such a young boy and I know you must have been scared and in pain. I know that mom and dad did everything that they could for you and I know that you were grateful for it. Thank you for taking care of Cinny and for being the joyful, silly boy that you were. I know that you're now with the other members of our furry family and that you're free of pain. Ethan, my beagle, I'm so sorry that I never saw you again after I left the last time. I hope that you know that I thought about you every day. There's a picture of you and Cally on the little fridge next to my desk. You're both lying out on the deck in the sun. You look so content and happy. I hope that you know that I love you. That though there were circumstances that kept me from home I never abandoned you. I knew you were safe at home, I always asked after you, and I always talked about you with love and pride. I have faith that even though I was gone you knew that I loved you and Ethan, I know you would have run (just a little more slowly) to greet me even after all this time. I'm so sorry I didn't make it home in time to see you. I'm so sorry.

My furry family, you guys were never just pets. You were my best friends and partners in crime growing up. You were protectors and loyal friends. You taught me so much about love, and loyalty, and gratitude, and just plain being able to enjoy bright sun and good company. Your snores, and purrs, and beagling are the sounds of my childhood and home. While I am not sure of where I might go after my own death, I know that there are Summerlands for you. A place where you are all young and whole and together. You deserve it. I know that for me, no afterlife could be truly heavenly without you in it.

Ethan, Memphis, go and play with everyone. Memphis, I know that Cinny will be so happy to see you. Ethan...Good boy.

Rest in peace.

About My Uncharacteristic Optimism

I just wanted to throw one last thing out there after my last post. I know that I sounded incredibly idealistic, especially in the last paragraph. But you know what? I am ok with it. I have read so much cynicism in the past week that it pushed me out of my comfortable nest of pessimism to take up the idealistic stance for once. Seriously, I was just so sick of reading why everything sucks and how meaningless this election was and I'm sorry, but what kind of message is that? If there was ever a time for us to be forward-looking and idealistic...it's now. What is wrong with a little hope, as long as it doesn't mean burying our heads in the sand about the very real nature of the problems we face? So that was me being hopeful. I know it's weird, but let's roll with it. :)

Dear Body,

I know that the past few weeks we haven't been at our best. I'm still not sure what happened down in the nether-regions. Either IUD needed to have a nap, or Lady-Parts got sick of its presence and decided that the best course of action was to absorb it like an alien from a John Carpenter movie. Either way, there's been a lot of pain for the past few weeks. Yesterday I shocked you by actually taking one of my Norcos when ovaries decided to remind me that they were still pissed off by all the upheaval. It wasn't a good afternoon for us, was it? Stumbling around the house drunkenly and not even for a fun reason. I know you were grateful for strategic application of heating pad and I appreciate you working with the Norco to help me stop feeling like wolverines (not the hot kind) were gnawing on my squishy bits. I admire your spirit.

Also, Brain, I know that we've been experiencing a lot of pain, but is it really necessary to assure me that it is for the WORST POSSIBLE REASONS? You can't help that we didn't know what was wrong and I know that you dealt with it the best you could. You amped up my OCD so that I could convince myself for small periods of time that if I flicked the lights on and off the right number of times, or washed my hands enough, everything would be ok. However, I don't appreciate that after I found out about surgery you worked overtime to come up with every horrible thing that could happen during the procedure and stacked them ten-deep into both my waking and sleeping moments. Since then you have allowed Depression to get his lying, manipulative hands on you to convince us that we are worthless and fail at everything. Body is broken because I am broken, right? No, Brain, that's enough. The pain was real and for a real reason. You have the picture the nice surgeon drew you to prove it. It is natural that you were scared by all the new pain, so let it go. You have to start resting. You have to start letting Body sleep at night. Surgery is done, Husband is no longer traveling, Election is over, and books will get written (especially if you get rest so you aren't useless (no offense) during the day).

Furthermore, body has informed me that there are now seasonal intruders on board. Throat is swollen and pissed off about it. Head is hurting. Nose is jammed full of goo. Overall temperature has started to rise. In other words, we are getting sick. Brain, it is time for you to calm down, slow your roll, and let Body rest. I do not want to have to take you out with Nyquil, but so help me, I'll do it. You know me, I hate ultimatums, but it's time for the line in the sand. Body has been doing the best that it can, it is time for you to do your part and let it rest so that the invaders don't win.

Also, I don't have time to be sick. So work it out, all of you. Play nicely or I will Nyquil you. So there. 

Love, 

Sentience

Please don't eat me: My thoughts post-election

Good morning, friends. This is the first of two posts about an issue that has been pretty front-and-center in the US as of late. Any guesses as to what I want to write about?

I'll give you a hint-it involves a lot of shouting, name-calling, and a repeated sentiment that the world will end if the other guy (who our sources tell us was Satan's roommate back in college) wins.

Yes, I am talking about politics.

Now, before you zone out on me with a piteous groan of: “Oh gods, not you too!” let me temper this by saying that only this first post is going to deal with US politics and the election. I am passionate about the events of last night and do have some thoughts I want to get out. However, the other political post will be more fun as I about politics in fantasy. It just made sense to do these posts back-to-back, especially after last night.

Does that sound do-able? Then let's jump in.

I was thinking this morning about exactly what I wanted to say here or, quite honestly, if I even wanted to say anything at all about politics. I was raised not to talk about politics, money, or religion and I think there's a lot to be said for that. I tend to believe that those things are a person's own business. This is further complicated by the fact that this blog is an interesting convergence of personal and professional space for me. Currently this is my only “author website”, but at the same time I have shared some deeply personal things here. Thinking about what I have already shared about my depression, self-harm, suicide attempt, and my lady-bits, well, politics seems a bit tame after all that.

So, in the interest of transparency: I voted for Obama. I spent a lot of time before the election reading things and watching things, in other words, doing what I always do when in doubt: research. I know I am not alone in that I wasn't blown away by President Obama's first term. However, I am hopeful now that he has won a second one. I think that this is the best thing that could have happened. Is he perfect? Absolutely not. However, I don't think that a big presidential transition would have been good for us right now. I think that if Governor Romney had won we would have seen a repeat of President Obama's first term. I think he would have faced a lot of obstruction from the democratic party (sorry guys, but we're all human here) and we just would have been mired in mud-slinging, recrimination, and stagnation. I am hopeful that both President Obama and Governor Romney make good on their assertions that we need to work together, because they are absolutely right. Nothing is served by us bickering at this point.

I will also freely admit that my gender came into play when it came time to cast my vote. I couldn't vote for a president whose party seemed to treat my vagina as a pre-existing condition. I was genuinely creeped out by some of the rhetoric coming from the right this election season. “Legitimate rape”? Really? To channel my MMORPG gaming self: GTFO of my body. I am the only person qualified to make choices about it. I believe every woman should have that right. If you are pro-life, good on you. If you are pro-choice, good on you. The power to decide the fate of your body should rest with you. While I do like smaller government, I don't want it to be so small that it can comfortably nestle in my uterus.

Furthermore, I firmly believe that my gender shouldn't determine how much I get paid, nor should it be used to rob me of control of my body. I am grateful to President Obama for standing up for women like me, my sister, my mom, my girlfriends, and any daughters I may ever have. It saddens me that it was even an issue, but I am so proud to be an American woman today. We have been fighting hard and the results of this election show that it is not for nothing. This gives me hope.

Speaking of things that give me hope...it seems like we are moving away from a victim-blaming mentality and towards a sense that we are in this together. I know that President Obama's “You didn't build that” has been twisted to imply that people who succeed deserve no credit for it. However, that is not the core message there. The message is that we are a nation. We are the United States of America. We fail and succeed together. We are not islands of success or failure. It is a fallacy to assume that the disenfranchised portion of our country is that way by choice. I am not saying that we have no responsibility. I am not saying that we don't make our own beds. Personal accountability is important to me, but I can't in good conscience vote for anyone who is willing to write off a portion of the country on the assumption that “well it's their own fault”.

Let me make it personal for a moment. What if all of this fuckery with my IUD had happened before Husband and I had gotten married? I was uninsured for awhile. What if I not only had to have surgery, but it had gone badly and I'd needed to stay in the hospital for awhile? That would have put us in a really precarious position financially. It wouldn't have been because we were irresponsible, it just would have been really, really awful luck. I am beyond grateful that that didn't happen but the point is it could have.

I want to know that there's someone in the White House who wouldn't want to punish me for that ill-luck. I would want someone who has the faith that if I accept help it is not because I am looking for a handout or that I am lazy, but simply that I needed help. I want a leader who trusts that I am doing the best I can and that I will repay the help given to me as soon as I am able.

I am not in favor of a giant government, ok? But I do think that our government has to remember that it is first and foremost “of the people, by the people, for the people”. Government programs are not about helping lazy people stay lazy. Are there lazy people who take advantage? Yes. But they aren't about keeping people complacent, they are about being willing to give our fellow men and women a hand when they need it.

Look at this way: imagine you are rock climbing with a group of strangers. Suddenly, the safety equipment fails and all of you are find yourselves without anything keeping you from plummeting to your deaths. Now, you were one of the first up the rock face and your brand-new climbing shoes are giving you more traction, so you use your position to get up and over, reaching safety. Do you look over the edge and watch dispassionately as the people struggle, clucking your tongue and berating them for not having superior equipment too? Do you watch them sweat and start to slip and shout down: “you're not trying hard enough! I got up here so you have no excuse?”

Hell no. You help pull them to safety. You extend a rope, a hand, a branch, anything to make sure that your fellow man does not perish. And, if you'll permit the conceit, chances are the people you pulling aren't just dangling there and letting you do all the work. They are scrabbling for a toe-hold that they only would have been able to reach with your help.

Unfortunately, some people will never try the climb, and that means that they will stay as they are. However, they need to have the option. They need to have the opportunity. And they need to have access to help to get them off the ground and something to catch them when they loose their footing. Summiting the mountain shouldn't only be possible for people who had access to all the best equipment and training right from the start. It should be possible for the people who started out with nothing but a little chalk on their fingers and the drive to go for it.

That is how our government should be. It should let us do the work and climb our own mountains, but man, if our equipment fails and we are in danger of plunging...it's good to know that there's someone there to catch us and let us regain our footing. Then it is on us to pay it forward.

So, yes. Obviously there are a lot of issues in play here that I haven't talked about that I will leave discussion of to better political minds than mine. I think that we need to recognize that for the most part, Donkey or Pachyderm, we want the same thing. We want a strong, vibrant, stable country. We have been disagreeing a lot on how to get there, but it is time to set that aside. Let's remember that as big as we are, we are ultimately just a community. We need to take care of each other and work together to move forward. Set aside your party colors, or even better, combine them. Our flag bears both red and blue, after all. It's time for us to do the same and unite under those colors to get shit done. It's time to stop being Republicans or Democrats, Red or Blue, Donkeys or Elephants. We are Americans. We are stars and stripes forever. We are eagles. So, let's do this. Let's fly together.

IUD Apparently Needed A Nap

Ahoy-hoy friends!

So, I survived! I'm sorry that it's taken me over a week to actually post anything but last week was, as you can imagine, a little crazy. Somehow we managed to still celebrate my birthday and get me both into and out of the hospital in one piece. :)

My friends and husband are incredible; I truly couldn't ask for a more supportive, loving group of people in my life. Especially with Husband out of town, my friends have been very sweet and have looked after me better than I deserve. Thank y'all so much. I am so lucky to know you.

As you probably remember from my last post, my lady-parts have been a giant pain in the cervix for the past few weeks. Well, when I went in for surgery on Friday we were finally able to ascertain what had happened. My IUD, which we knew had slipped low, had actually managed to lie down on my cervix and then proceeded to nestle in and embed there. I guess it needed to have a nap?

Anyway, with the aid of a little camera my doctor was able to get a grip on the thing and pull it out. I woke up in a lot of pain, though I'm grateful to be able to say that the pain has been completely manageable this week...as long as I don't move around too much. Those of you who know me know that the whole not moving around/taking things easy isn't really in my MO, but I am trying to take care of myself. Husband being gone has actually made taking it easy a little bit easier because I am deeply aware that if I push too hard and hurt myself I am on my own to deal with it unless I want to bother one of my friends. They have already been so sweet and supportive and they have tons of stuff going on in their own lives, so I hate to impose on anyway.

So yes, the whole point of this was to let you, Dear Reader, know what has been going on. I plan to start actually posting interesting (are they interesting? I really hope so) things again next week. I have just needed some time to take care of myself and recover a little bit. Couple that with how uncomfortable it is for me to actually sit at my desk at the moment and things are a little slow.

Gah! And that makes me so antsy! I am antsy to get back to work! :) And that's a good sign. How...twitchy I am to return to work tells me that I am doing the right job.

See you all soon!