Skip to main content

WinterVision and reactive characters

Captain’s Log, Stardate 01.16.05

I am enjoying a lazy Sunday with my dog in my office. Well, she’s sort of trapped in my office because I need to close the door to keep the heat from escaping. She doesn’t seem too upset, although if I went to the door she’d probably jump up with her butt wiggling.

Today is the last day for the northern California Christian teen retreat, Winter Vision. My fellow youth group leader, David Kawaye, is the speaker for the Junior High school division. Terrific honor. I’m positive he’s done a great job this weekend. He’s already spoken at church a few times and he’s always done a great job when teaching the kids at youth group meetings on Saturday nights.

There are also several cabin leaders who used to be part of our church youth group. I love how they volunteer to give up their weekend to serve this way. It makes me feel both proud and old to hear of my former youth group students being cabin leaders.

I’ve been watching Battlestar Galactica on the SciFi channel, the remake of the original. It’s a pretty good series: great actors, even the minor characters; terrific characterization--tons of character conflict, both internal and external; good writing so far. I saw the miniseries premiere when it aired last year, and I’ve seen the two-hour series premiere of two 1-hour episodes.

The only thing I don’t like about it--and this is a big thing--is that the director has been using that fast-moving camera action stuff reminiscent of NYPD Blue. Since I tend to get motion sickness easily, it makes me really ill to watch the show for more than an hour or so at a time, and even then I have to close my eyes at points. Problem is, it must not bother most people or they wouldn’t be using that type of camera action, so I might be stuck. I’ll probably continue watching it, but if the writing starts to deteriorate I might use that as an excuse to stop.

Meanwhile, I’ve been enjoying the new seasons of LOST and Alias. We have 24 recorded on our Tivo, but haven’t had time to watch it yet.

I read a Regency romance today with characters that had horrific pasts, but somehow the writing didn’t make me care about them very much. The heroine seemed to get over her family’s deaths and her own mental baggage--with the hero’s help, of course--a bit too easily. From a psych major’s point of view, it seems a bit too convenient that she healed from her emotional trauma by simply sharing about her past with the hero.

The hero seemed hung up on his own problems. His emotional angst was deep and black, but didn’t move me. I found myself skipping his internal monologues, which became redundant--returning to the same problems, no new insights to change his mind. His actions for the heroine only postponed what he had intended to do all along. He didn’t go through any decisions or struggles about his goal, no deviation from his set purpose until the very end when he’s presented with new information to make him realize he wasn’t in the wrong after all. That seems rather like a cop-out. He didn’t do anything to resolve his own issues; the resolution was handed to him to make him change his course.

I think I would have been more satisfied with the book if the characters had done more on their own initiatives for themselves. If the heroine had worked harder to heal herself rather than living in fear and being helped out of it by the hero. If the hero had questioned the rumors or sought the source of his ruined childhood, making inquiries himself rather than the heroine doing it without his knowledge. Both characters acted out of love for the other, but as a reader I would have cared more for them if they had been proactive about their own problems rather than only for others and not themselves.

I read about this recently in Maass’ “Writing the Breakout Novel”: readers enjoy characters who do what they wouldn’t or couldn’t, characters who are brave and courageous in their own ways. Scarlett O’Hara fights for Tara and Ashley, Samwise Gamgee remains fiercely loyal to Frodo despite Gollum’s lies. Whether fiery or quiet, these characters exhibit strength in their circumstances that raises them above the norm.

I wanted the characters in this Regency to decide to fight their own battles and master their own demons rather than others convincing them to do it, or doing it for them. They weren’t solely reactive to the story elements taking place around them, but it was close. That made me lukewarm about the characters themselves.

Writing: none today, it’s my day of rest. But I didn’t get much done yesterday, either, because my husband was home and we caught up on TV watching.

Diet: Oh, don’t go there. I feel as broad as a flawn (Ha! New word). But I’m going to try to eat more vegetables. Today I’m at 950 calories so far, and hopefully I won’t pig out tonight at dinner.




Categories:

Comments

upwords said…
Camy,

You're not missing so much with 24. It's okay. Better than last season, but still not as good as year one. Lost and Alias are both kicking serious booty. (Now if they could just stop showing so much booty in the process...I'd be ecstatic! LOL)

Keep kicking it on the diet/PT front. You're inspiring me. :)
upwords said…
Camy,

You're not missing so much with 24. It's okay. Better than last season, but still not as good as year one. Lost and Alias are both kicking serious booty. (Now if they could just stop showing so much booty in the process...I'd be ecstatic! LOL)

Keep kicking it on the diet/PT front. You're inspiring me. :)

Popular Posts

No Cold Bums toilet seat cover

Captain's Log, Stardate 08.22.2008 I actually wrote out my pattern! I was getting a lot of hits on my infamous toilet seat cover , and I wanted to make a new one with “improvements,” so I paid attention and wrote things down as I made the new one. This was originally based off the Potty Mouth toilet cover , but I altered it to fit over the seat instead of the lid. Yarn: any worsted weight yarn, about 120 yards (this is a really tight number, I used exactly 118 yards. My suggestion is to make sure you have about 130 yards.) I suggest using acrylic yarn because you’re going to be washing this often. Needle: I used US 8, but you can use whatever needle size is recommended by the yarn you’re using. Gauge: Not that important. Mine was 4 sts/1 inch in garter stitch. 6 buttons (I used some leftover shell buttons I had in my stash) tapestry needle Crochet hook (optional) Cover: Using a provisional cast on, cast on 12 stitches. Work in garter st until liner measures...

Toilet seat cover

Captain’s Log, Supplemental Update August 2008: I wrote up the pattern for this with "improvements"! Here's the link to my No Cold Bums toilet seat cover ! Okay, remember a few days ago I was complaining about the cold toilet seat in my bathroom? Well, I decided to knit a seat cover. Not a lid cover, but a seat cover. I went online and couldn’t find anything for the seat, just one pattern for the lid by Feminitz.com . However, I took her pattern for the inside edge of the lid cover and modified it to make a seat cover. Here it is! It’s really ugly stitch-wise because originally I made it too small and had to extend it a couple inches on each side. I figured I’d be the one staring at it, so who cared if the extension wasn’t perfectly invisible? I used acrylic yarn since, well, that’s what I had, and also because it’s easy to wash. I’ll probably have to wash this cover every week or so, but it’s easy to take off—I made ties which you can see near the back of the seat. And...

What Is a Brutus Cut? A Regency Hair Trend Inspired by Ancient Rome

Regency Haircuts and Disguises in Lady Wynwood’s Spies In this excerpt from Lady Wynwood’s Spies, Volume 8: Traitor , Phoebe prepares for a dangerous mission—one that requires her to disguise herself as a young man. The hairstyle she receives, called a Brutus cut, was actually quite fashionable during the Regency. Read on to find out more about this curious trend and why it suited her new identity so well. Excerpt from Lady Wynwood’s Spies, Volume 8: Traitor : By far, the absolute worst part of Uncle Sol’s plan was that Phoebe had to cut her hair. Of the four agents, Phoebe and Mr. Coulton-Jones would be the least likely to be recognized when they entered the Ramparts building—Mr. Coulton-Jones, because of his skill in altering his facial features and his posture, and Phoebe, because she could play a convincing young man, which no one would expect. A disreputable hat would hide her long hair to an extent, but it would not fool anyone who looked closely. Also, because she would lo...

Free Christian Romantic Suspense Novels by Camy Tang / Camille Elliot

Curious about what my writing is like? Here’s a list of all my free books and the free short stories, novellas, and novels that you can read here on my blog. I’ll update this post as I add more free reads. Christian Romantic Suspense: Necessary Proof (Sonoma series #4.1, novella) Click here to buy the FREE ebook on all retailers Alex Villa became a Christian in prison, and because of his efforts to help stop a gang producing meth in Sonoma, he has been set up for the death of a cop. Can computer expert Jane Lawton find the evidence that will prove his innocence before the gang eliminates them both? Fantasy short stories: Pixies in a Garden in Kyoto There were pixies in the garden. Since she was in Kyoto, she was certain they were not called pixies, but she didn't know what they would be called in Japanese, and they certainly looked like what she imagined pixies would look like. The King’s Daughter The trees in the King's garden were full of colored pixie lights. The...

Meet the Dashing Spy on the Cover of Lady Wynwood’s Spies, Volume 3

If you enjoy clean historical suspense with slow-burn romance and a touch of danger, you’ll love my Lady Wynwood’s Spies series! It’s a multi-volume Christian Regency serial following a group of unlikely aristocrats battling a dangerous conspiracy in 1811 London. Today, I wanted to give you a behind-the-scenes look at one of my favorite covers in the series— Volume 3: Aggressor. Who is that handsome gentleman? The model on the cover represents Mr. Michael Coulton-Jones, one of my main characters. This clever spy with a tortured past finally gets the cover spotlight in this volume, which is one of my favorite covers because the model is so handsome. 😄 I absolutely love this cover model! His name is Anatolii and here’s the original stock photo . It was really tough to try to decide which photo to use for the cover! It was a tossup between him and the main heroine, Miss Phoebe Sauber, for the cover for book 1, but I eventually went with Phoebe. Then in book 2, he was kind of...